May 2024 Newsletter

8 May 2024 15:00

The University of Sheffield Research Software Engineering Community Newsletter May 2024

Welcome to the May 2024 newsletter for the research software community at The University of Sheffield, featuring news, opportunities, events and training for you.

Events

Upcoming events in Sheffield

  • HPC-SIG meeting in Sheffield
    • 2024-06-18. The organising committee is looking for contribution to the High Performance Computing Special interest group meeting. They are looking for a wide variety of topics. Have look here if you are interested in research computing!
  • Best Practices in AI Afternoon
    • 2024-07-05 July @ 12:00-17:00. The RSE team at the university of Sheffield, in collaboration with the CMI, are holding and afternoon “Best practices in AI” seminar. The even will be held in Workroom 2, 38 Mappin, University of Sheffield. S1 4DT. We are looking for talks, walkthrough and demos on best practices research, design development and deployment of AI systems or, alternatively, how AI can be used to contribute to these best practices. Registration and call for speakers can be found here
  • Second workshop on Multimodal AI
    • 2024-06-25. Multimodal AI, which integrates various data modalities such as text, image, sound, and others, is swiftly revolutionising our interaction with technology and data. MultimodalAI’24 brings together researchers and practitioners from AI, data science, and various scientific and application domains to discuss problems and challenges, share experiences and solutions, explore collaborations and future directions, and build networks and a vibrant community on multimodal AI. More information can be found here
  • OpenFest2024
    • Week commencing 2024-09-09 Sheffields popular OpenFest2024 symposium returns for its third year with in-person events at University of Sheffield (2024-09-10) and Sheffield Hallam University (2024-09-12) and an online symposium (2024-09-11). There will be workshops, presentations, panel discussions and more. Further details and a call for presentations will follow. In the meantime if you’ve suggestions please get in touch with Open Research Manager Dr Jenni Adams.

Upcoming external events

Open Research

Articles, Blogs, Papers & Podcasts

Articles & Blogs

Podcasts

  • Code for Thought: Make computing GREENER by Loïc Lannelongue.
    • This podcast discuss the carbon footprint of algorithms and compouting jobs. It comes from the Green Algorithm project which received the HDR UK Susannah Boddie Award for Impact of the Year in March 2024.

Training

  • Git & GitHub through GitKraken - from Zero to Hero!
  • Performance Profiling and Optimisation (Python)
    • This course delves into the tools and methodologies used to analyse and enhance the performance of Python programs. You will learn how to profile, analyse and optimise Python code effectively to create high-performance applications.
    • 2024-05-30 09:00-16:00 Hicks G43a
    • 2024-06-20 09:00-16:00 Hicks G43a
    • 2024-07-11 09:00-16:00 Hicks G43a
    • Book through myDevelopment

For more forthcoming RSE training events, keep an eye on our Training page and join our mailing list to hear about new events.

Jobs

  • Check for advertised RSE and RSE-adjacent roles at the RSE society’s vacancies board
  • Sheffield IT services is recruiting a Research Platform Engineer. Deadline to apply 2024-05-15. More information here

Community

Digital Research Practice Support Community

The DRPS community is a group for people that support researchers in carrying out research in the digital age. Meetings are held monthly, with discussions around events, training and opportunities related to the field.

You can join the google group here to stay informed.

The next meeting is scheduled for 2pm on Wednesday 22nd May 2024.

LunchBytes

LunchBytes are short talks from the research community on research software, data, and infrastructure.

LunchBytes needs YOU

LunchBytes are organised by and for the research software community at The University of Sheffield. If you’d like to curate a session on a topic or present something, get in touch by emailing lunchbytes-organisers-group@sheffield.ac.uk or suggest topics on the jamboard.

Support

RSE support via the Centre for Machine Intelligence (CMI-RSE)

Sheffield’s Centre for Machine Intelligence (CMI) is funding 1 FTE of research engineering time, enabling RSE to provide AI/ML services without cost recovery. The CMI-RSE team primarily supports members of the University community by enabling, designing, implementing and refining AI streams in research projects.

If you have a project in mind that would benefit from CMI-RSE involvement, please have a look at the FAQ and complete the application form to register your interest and begin the conversation.

Code Clinics

Why not come to a Code Clinic? We’re keen to help you.

Code Clinics are fortnightly supported sessions run by the RSE team and IT Services’ Research IT team. They are open to anyone at TUoS writing code for research to get help with programming problems and general advice on best practices.

At each session, members of the RSE and/or Research IT teams will be available to review code, advise, troubleshoot, and suggest ways to improve your computational workflows.

Research IT HPC Drop In

HPC Drop-In sessions are providing assistance with HPC related user issues such as challenges in scaling an application from desktop to supercomputer. We are considering extending the number of our sessions to two or three weekly. These interactive sessions could provide a better interface with our users than our non-interactive ticketing system. These sessions are advertised on the HPC mailing list.

Research IT Consultations

Alongside the HPC Drop-In sessions, Research IT are also running one to one consultations to solve in depth user specific problems. These consultations can be booked via our webpage. If you are interested please visit the following link: https://students.sheffield.ac.uk/it-services/research.

Sheffield RSE Team

The Sheffield RSE Team aims to collaborate with you to help improve your research software. They can provide dedicated staff to ensure that you can deliver excellent research software engineering on your research projects.

Research IT

Research IT directly supports research, both academic and commercial. We provide large scale HPC systems, advice on everything from statistics to ML to data pipelines and training for both students and staff.

Working with academics, our staff are embedded within research groups on both long and short term engagements.

Contact Us

For queries relating to collaborating with the RSE team on projects: rse@sheffield.ac.uk

Information and access to JADE II and Bede.

Join our mailing list so as to be notified when we advertise talks and workshops by subscribing to this Google Group.

Queries regarding free research computing support/guidance should be raised via our Code clinic or directed to the University IT helpdesk.