Wednesday, November 20, 9:15 - 10:30 am

Gregory D. Abowd, College of Computing, Georgia Tech

Title: Programming Environments...literally
Ubicomp's Grand Challenge for Software Engineering

Abstract: In 1995, the College of Computing at Georgia Tech initiated a research effort aimed at building the kinds of interactive environments that embody Mark Weiser's vision of ubiquitous computing (ubicomp). While it is fun to contemplate what the future might bring, it is necessary to go beyond our dreams and push toward the development, evaluation and continued evolution of applications of these future technologies. In this talk, we will present some of the visions of the future created at Georgia Tech. These are presented as "living laboratories" and cover domains such as the classroom, office, home and our bodies. In order to advance the state of research in this important area, I will argue that there is a significant software engineering challenge to be met. Put succinctly, we need to provide the ability literally to program physical environments more easily. Advances in software engineering have greatly simplified the development of interactive services on desktop machines. I will discuss how we might begin to view the generalized input, output and interactive properties of physical environments in an effort to make it just as easy in the future to build interactive services off the desktop.

Bio: Gregory D. Abowd is an Associate Professor in the College of Computing and GVU Center at the Georgia Institute of Technology. His research interests include software engineering for interactive systems, with particular focus on mobile and ubiquitous computing applications. He leads a research group in the College of Computing focussed on the development of prototype future computing environments which emphasize mobile and ubiquitous computing technology for everyday uses. The general themes he investigates include automated capture environments, context-aware computing, and natural interaction. He has focussed his applications work in the domains of university education (the Classroom 2000 and eClass projects), the office (CyberDesk) and home (the Aware Home). Dr. Abowd has affiliations with several campus research groups, including the Graphics, Visualization and Usability (GVU) Center and the Broadband Institute. He currently serves as Director for the Aware Home Research Initiative.

Dr. Abowd received a BS in Mathematics from the University of Notre Dame in 1986 and the degrees of M.Sc. (1987) and D.Phil. (1991) in Computation from the University of Oxford, where he attended as a Rhodes Scholar. Before coming to Georgia Tech in 1994, Dr. Abowd held post-doctoral positions with the Human-Computer Interaction group at the University of York in England and with the Software Engineering Institute and Computer Science Department at Carnegie Mellon University. He is a member of the IEEE Computer Society and the ACM.

Thursday, November 21, 9:15 - 10:30 am

Gerard J. Holzmann, Bell Laboratories, 2002 ACM SIGSOFT Outstanding Research Award Winner

Title: The Logic of Bugs

Abstract: Real-life bugs are successful because of their unfailing ability to adapt. In particular this applies to their ability to adapt to strategies that are meant to eradicate them as a species. Software bugs have some of these same traits. We will discuss these traits, and consider what we can do about them.

Bio: Gerard J. Holzmann received his PhD in from the University of Technology in Delft, The Netherlands, in 1979. He joined the Computing Sciences Research Center of Bell Labs in 1980, where he is currently Director of Computing Principles Research. At Bell Labs Dr. Holzmann has worked on computer graphics (leading to the digital darkroom tools PICO and POPI in 1984), on text processing, theorem proving, requirements analysis, software testing, and protocol verification. In 1989 he wrote the model checker SPIN, as part of a book on protocol design. SPIN has been freely distributed since 1990 and has become one of the most widely used verification systems worldwide, with thousands of users in both academia and in industry. Dr. Holzmann has taught courses at the University of Southern California, Delft University, Princeton University, and Columbia University. He has written three books and holds seven patents in computer graphics and software verification.

Friday, November 22, 9:00 - 10:15 am

Gary McGraw, Ph.D., Chief Technology Officer, Cigital

Title: Building Secure Software - Why the standard approach to security doesn't work, and what Software Engineering can do about it

Abstract: Computer security takes on more importance as commerce becomes e-commerce and business embraces the Net. However, little progress has been made in the security field, especially when vendor technology is considered. Popular press coverage of computer security orbits around basic technology issues such as what firewalls are, when to use the DES encryption algorithm, which anti-virus product is best, or how the latest email-based attack works. The problem is, many security practitioners don't know what the problem is. It's the software! Internet-enabled software applications, especially custom applications, present the most common security risk encountered today, and are the target of choice for real hackers. This talk is all about software security risk and how to manage it. The trick is to begin early, know your threats (including language-based flaws and pitfalls), design for security, and subject your design to thorough objective risk analyses and testing. This talk covers material that software practitioners, including architects and languages researchers, can use to avoid security problems and produce more secure Internet-based code.

Bio: Gary McGraw, Ph.D. is the Chief Technology Officer at Cigital <www.cigital.com>. Dr. McGraw is a noted authority on software security and has co-authored four popular books: Java Security: Hostile Applets, Holes, & Antidotes (Wiley, 1996) and Securing Java: Getting down to business with mobile code (Wiley, 1999) with Prof. Ed Felten of Princeton; Software Fault Injection: Inoculating Programs Against Errors (Wiley, 1998) with Cigital co-founder and Chief Scientist Dr. Jeffrey Voas; and Building Secure Software (Addison-Wesley, 2001) with John Viega. Dr. McGraw regularly contributes to popular trade publications and is often quoted in national press articles.

Working with Professional Services and Cigital Labs, Dr. McGraw sets Software Risk Management technology strategy and oversees the Cigital technology transfer process. His aim is to bridge the gap between cutting-edge science and real-world applicability, and to transfer advanced technologies for use in the field. In addition to consulting with major commercial e-commerce vendors, including Visa, Mastercard and the Federal Reserve, he founded Cigital’s Software Security Group and chairs the Cigital Corporate Technology Council.

Dr. McGraw began his career as a Research Scientist, and he continues to pursue research in software security. He has written over fifty peer-reviewed technical publications, and serves as principal investigator on grants from Air Force Research Labs, DARPA, National Science Foundation, and NIST's Advanced Technology Program. He holds a dual Ph.D. in Cognitive Science and Computer Science from Indiana University and a BA in Philosophy from UVa.

Dr. McGraw is a member of the Technical Advisory Boards of Counterpane, Cenzic, Aereous, and Tovaris. He also serves as an Advisor to the UC Davis Department of Computer Science. He recently chaired the National Infosec Research Council’s Malicious Code Infosec Science and Technology Study Group.