Event

Constraint Programming research group at the CP2024 conference

The 30th International Conference on Principles and Practice of Constraint Programming (CP2024) was held in Girona, Catalonia during the first week of September. The CP conference series are the main event for researchers in constraint programming to get together, share latest developments and for networking. 

Our School contributed to the conference in large numbers this year. 

  • Ian Gent was the invited speaker on the conference’s first day, with his talk entitled “Solving Patience and Solitaire Games with Good Old Fashioned AI” (abstract) (video recording).  
  • Christopher Stone was invited to the discussion panel ‘Have Chatbots Reached the Holy Grail?’ at the same workshop and presented the paper: Ian Miguel, András Z. Salamon, Christopher Stone, Automating Reformulation of Essence Specifications via Graph Rewriting (paper) 
  • Özgür Akgün was the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion chair of the conference and presented the DEI initiatives to all the attendees (video recording).
  • We presented several papers at ModRef 2024, the 23rd workshop on Constraint Modelling and Reformulation: 
  • Csobán Balogh, Ruth Hoffmann and Joan Espasa, Towards Understanding Differences Between Modelling Pipelines: a Modelers Perspective (paper) (slides) 
  • Joan Espasa Arxer, Ian Gent, Ian Miguel, Peter Nightingale, András Z. Salamon and Mateu Villaret, Cross-Paradigm Modelling: A Case Study of Puzznic (paper) 
  • Carla Davesa Sureda, Joan Espasa Arxer, Ian Miguel and Mateu Villaret Auselle, Towards High-Level Modelling in Automated Planning (paper)
  • Nguyen Dang, Ian Gent, Peter Nightingale, Felix Ulrich-Oltean and Jack Waller, Constraint Models for Relaxed Klondike Variants (paper) (slides)
    • Jack Waller (who is an undergraduate student at St Andrews!) presented this work.
  • Alessio Pellegrino, Özgür Akgün, Nguyen Dang, Zeynep Kiziltan and Ian Miguel, Automatic Feature Learning for Essence: a Case Study on Car Sequencing (paper) (slides) 
    • Alessio Pellegrino (who is a visiting student from University of Bologna) presented this work.
  • Orhan Yigit Yazicilar, Özgür Akgün and Ian Miguel, Automated Nogood-Filtered Fine-Grained Streamlining: A Case Study on Covering Arrays (paper) 
  • Our PhD students Orhan Yigit Yazicilar, Erdem Kus, Carla Devesa Sureda, and Joseph Loughney attended the doctoral program. As part of the doctoral program they presented their work by giving a talk and presenting a poster. In addition, they were assigned a mentor during the conference. 
  • Visiting research student (from University of Bologna) Alessio Pellegrino gave his first talk at the ModRef 2024 workshop. 
  • PhD student Erdem Kus presented the following paper in the technical track of the main conference: 
  • Erdem Kuş, Özgür Akgün, Nguyen Dang, and Ian Miguel, Frugal Algorithm Selection (slides) (video recording)

Finally, here is a group photo of the St Andrews group, standing at the front steps of the beautiful conference venue in Girona. 

Week 1 Social Events

The following social events are being held in the School this week in the Jack Cole coffee area:-

  • Monday 16 September – 17:00 – 18:00 – MSc and MSci welcome reception (TODAY)
  • Wednesday 18 September – 16:00 – 17:00 – Honours (Junior & Senior) welcome reception
  • Friday 20 September – 17:00 – 18:00 – Sub-honours (students on first and second years of CS programmes) social event

Drinks 🍷 and snacks 🍰 available at all events, so please come along and join us!

STACS Welcome BBQ 🍔

If you are a new Undergraduate or Postgraduate Taught student to the School of Computer Science, you are invited to the STACS Welcome BBQ outside the Jack Cole Coffee Area on Friday 13th September 5.30pm-7.30pm.

The usual BBQ favourites will be available from the grill and refreshments will be provided. We look forward to seeing you there!

WICS Coffee Break is back!

Women in Computer Science is back and are excited to invite you to the first coffee break of the academic year. This is a perfect opportunity for incoming students and returning students to meet each other and academic staff in the School.

Event Details:

  • Date: Wednesday 11th September
  • Time: 14:00-15:00
  • Where: Jack Cole Coffee Area

Chat, coffee and snacks available!

Orientation 2024

We look forward to welcoming all our students to the School for the new academic year.

Details of the events for staff and students scheduled for the week commencing 9th September are in the Computer Science Orientation Programme.

More information on the University Orientation and Induction Events provides students with an overview of the University, and important dates to mark in your calendar.

GAP Days Summer 2024 @ St Andrews

The School of Computer Science hosted this years Summer GAP Days between 26th August and 30th August.

GAP Days are workshops where developers and users with programming experience are invited to influence the future development of [GAP] by initiating and contributing to discussions and coding sprints.

These GAP Days have been special as we celebrated 10 years of the [Digraphs] package as well as 10 years of [GAP Days] (to the week!).

We had a great selection of speakers and attendees from varied backgrounds, which cumulated in the release of the re-vamped GAP webpage, and over 30 new versions of packages!