Date: Fri, 3 Oct 2003 15:55:04 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: [cascaders-internal] Frere Jacques So there I was, going about my daily business (aside: I waited for THIRTY WHOLE MINUTES in the same ENTIRELY FEATURELESS CORRIDOR waiting for my DoS. By the time he came out to see me, I was standing in the stairwell hallucinating that I was in The Sweeney or something---fingers held in gun shape, the works.) when who should happen by but our very own Cascaded Learning Scheme Organiser, whom, you may recall, I have previously stated I know nothing whatever about. "Hello, Paul," said he, and continued to know everything about me, including who my DoS was, my course, what I was doing this year, and the potential administrative problems therewith. I was half expecting him to give me a slide show, take me on a helicopter tour of George Square, and then ask me why I'd resigned. The only contact I have ever previously had with Mr Fleuriot is that I attended a couple of his lectures over two years ago. Either at that time I said something particularly witty and erudite that I've now forgotten, or once again I've become the kind of student who gets discussed in the staffroom. Anyway, returning to the point. What there was of it. Here it comes now. See if you can spot it. We briefly discussed Cascade. (That was it.) "Oh, that's you," said he. Refreshing that he didn't know quite everything. He did, however, seem fully genned up on everything else I've told the Department thus far. (See? They care about us. It takes a lot of motivation to fight the bureaucracy in this place.) He is fully appraised that his job is to help with selection, ensure that we are working within the bounds of any teaching regulations that may apply, and---woo hoo!---to secure us a budget. The budget thing was his suggestion, not mine. I played it down a little, but it's nice to know it's there if we need it. It's also nice to know that at least we can get the meece. I told him I'd email him. I thought it pertinent to email you first. Work looks to be quiet tonight, so I shall see about doing some more of this draft proposal I've been supposed to have been working on. Ooh. Consider Revising. Long strings of prepositional phrases can be confusing. That's it, for now. pajh ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh I don't want to be Elfstar any more! I want to be Debbie! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Thu, 9 Oct 2003 03:08:07 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: [cascaders-internal] Crunch time Right chaps, The time has come, the Walrus said, to talk of many things. And that time is to be some time this week. Most of the things we, the Cascade Working Group, need to decide have already been thrashed out on this very mailing list. All that remains is to determine once and for all a plan of action and then take it to the Department. This shall be done---in a pub, as is our wont---one evening this week. Suggest either Friday or Sunday, at 11.10 pm (this being the earliest I can get there from work) in the Peartree. If the Peartree hapens to be closed we can meet outside and go elsewhere. I don't anticipate this meeting taking long, as most of the preliminary work has been done. However I think it's important that we meet in person so we can all agree on things at the same time. Once this is done, I, or a delegation of us, can go to the Department and get the wheels set properly in motion. Email me at your earliest convenience with your preferences for Friday or Sunday night. A majority potential attendance shall decide, or in the envent of a tie, I shall flip a coin (or finally insist that Jehane learns how to do it by picking a bit and XORing them). You've finished reading my email now. What are you waiting for? Email me. Now, dammit, now. PS: I had dinner tonight with Michael "Robin of Sherwood" Praed. pajh ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh I don't want to be Elfstar any more! I want to be Debbie! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Thu, 09 Oct 2003 10:02:10 +0100 From: Nicholas Wolverson Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Crunch time > Email me at your earliest convenience with your preferences for Friday or > Sunday night. A majority potential attendance shall decide, or in the > envent of a tie, I shall flip a coin (or finally insist that Jehane learns > how to do it by picking a bit and XORing them). Can do either, prefer Friday. _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Thu, 9 Oct 2003 10:04:59 +0100 From: Nicholas Wolverson Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Crunch time > > >Email me Damn damn damn. You'd have think I'd have worked this out by now. -- Nicholas Wolverson _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Thu, 9 Oct 2003 15:57:53 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: [cascaders-internal] Crunch time, reprise The votes have been cast. The consensus opinion is... *rustles silver envelope* Friday. (Sorry, Michael.) I finish work at 11, and I shall get to the Peartree as soon as humanly possible[0] after that. See y'all tomorrow. pajh [0] Possibly not quite that soon. I could theoretically fire myself from a railgun or similar. But I shall be swift. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh I don't want to be Elfstar any more! I want to be Debbie! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Thu, 9 Oct 2003 16:13:33 +0100 (BST) From: Thomas Figg Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Crunch time, reprise > The votes have been cast. The consensus opinion is... *rustles silver > envelope* Friday. (Sorry, Michael.) > > I finish work at 11, and I shall get to the Peartree as soon as humanly > possible[0] after that. See y'all tomorrow. I shall try and turn up... don't count on it. _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Mon, 13 Oct 2003 14:45:00 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting Have arranged meeting with Mike Fourman, 3.30 pm this Wednesday (provisional). Haven't had chance to speak to Jacques yet, but I'm emailing him straight after this. Let me know if you want to come along. The agenda will be as discussed at the preliminary premeething meeting on Friday. pajh ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh I don't want to be Elfstar any more! I want to be Debbie! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Mon, 13 Oct 2003 14:53:06 +0100 (BST) From: Alex Panayotopoulos Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting On Mon, 13 Oct 2003 pajh@ed.ac.uk wrote: > Have arranged meeting with Mike Fourman, 3.30 pm this Wednesday > (provisional). Haven't had chance to speak to Jacques yet, but I'm > emailing him straight after this. > > Let me know if you want to come along. The agenda will be as discussed > at the preliminary premeething meeting on Friday. Can't make 3.30, as I have a PMR lecture till 4. Have a badger stand in for me. -- <<>> Defender of Mushrooms, mushrooms _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Mon, 13 Oct 2003 15:25:32 +0100 (BST) From: Mark A Miles Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting On Mon, 13 Oct 2003, Alex Panayotopoulos wrote: > > Let me know if you want to come along. The agenda will be as discussed > > at the preliminary premeething meeting on Friday. > > Can't make 3.30, as I have a PMR lecture till 4. Have a badger stand in > for me. Er. Um, this Friday? I am on night-shift, but will try and come if someone tells me where it is *AND* where I can park. Also, Paul can you make this go to my virgin.net address as well. Ta. -Mark _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Mon, 13 Oct 2003 15:43:16 +0100 From: Kate Ho Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting [ The following text is in the "ISO-8859-15" character set. ] [ Your display is set for the "iso-8859-1" character set. ] [ Some special characters may be displayed incorrectly. ] > Let me know if you want to come along. The agenda will be as discussed at > the preliminary premeething meeting on Friday. I forgot to ask, what was the result of the meeting on friday? Incidentally, I am back up in bonny Scotland on wednesday (have to escape from scary management people). Depending on how much time I have, coffee anyone? Kate _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Mon, 13 Oct 2003 18:17:04 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting On Mon, 13 Oct 2003, Mark A Miles wrote: > > > Let me know if you want to come along. The agenda will be as discussed > > > at the preliminary premeething meeting on Friday. > > Er. Um, this Friday? No, Mark, last Friday. The one I told you about. For those who could not attend and were interested, the agenda consisted of formalising the agenda for the meeting on Wednesday (/this/ Wednesday). Then we shot things and drank beer. > I am on night-shift, but will try and come if someone tells me where it > is *AND* where I can park. I really need to get myself a car so I can have an excuse not to go anywhere. pajh ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh I don't want to be Elfstar any more! I want to be Debbie! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Mon, 13 Oct 2003 18:44:37 +0100 From: michael eng Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting On Monday, Oct 13, 2003, at 18:17 Europe/London, pajh@ed.ac.uk wrote: > > For those who could not attend and were interested, the agenda > consisted > of formalising the agenda for the meeting on Wednesday (/this/ > Wednesday). > For those of us who couldn't make it to the pre-meeting meeting, it would be helpful if you could provide a précis of said agenda, in order that we know what fate awaits. Michael _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Mon, 13 Oct 2003 20:51:15 +0100 From: Mark A Miles Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting On Monday, October 13, 2003, at 06:17 pm, pajh@ed.ac.uk wrote: >> I am on night-shift, but will try and come if someone tells me where >> it >> is *AND* where I can park. > > I really need to get myself a car so I can have an excuse not to go > anywhere. Seriously *where* can I park? It's not as if I'm a student anymore, so I can't use the Appleton thingy... -me _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Mon, 13 Oct 2003 20:51:45 +0100 From: Mark A Miles Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting On Monday, October 13, 2003, at 06:44 pm, michael eng wrote: > For those of us who couldn't make it to the pre-meeting meeting, it > would be helpful if you could provide a précis of said agenda, in > order that we know what fate awaits. Yes, that would be good. So, this "meeting meeting" is on Wednesday, this Wednesday? -me _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 12:35:27 +0100 From: Mark A Miles Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk, a.panayotopoulos@sms.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting On Tuesday, October 14, 2003, at 10:48 am, Alex Panayotopoulos wrote: > On Mon, 13 Oct 2003, Mark A Miles wrote: > >> Seriously *where* can I park? It's not as if I'm a student anymore, >> so I >> can't use the Appleton thingy... > > How about the big Crichton St.[0] carpark *in front* of Appleton? > > 8^) > > -- > <<>> > Defender of Spudkind > > [0] Crighton St? Kryten St? > _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 12:36:00 +0100 From: Mark A Miles Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk, a.panayotopoulos@sms.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting On Tuesday, October 14, 2003, at 10:48 am, Alex Panayotopoulos wrote: >> Seriously *where* can I park? It's not as if I'm a student anymore, >> so I >> can't use the Appleton thingy... > > How about the big Crichton St.[0] carpark *in front* of Appleton? I thought that was Uni parking. -Mark _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 12:45:29 +0100 From: Kate Ho Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting No Mark, anyone can park there - if you can stand the over-priced fees ... ------------------- Kate Ho MSc Technology Management, Manchester School of Management, UMIST I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by -Douglas Adams ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mark A Miles" To: ; Sent: Tuesday, October 14, 2003 12:36 PM Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting > > On Tuesday, October 14, 2003, at 10:48 am, Alex Panayotopoulos wrote: > > >> Seriously *where* can I park? It's not as if I'm a student anymore, > >> so I > >> can't use the Appleton thingy... > > > > How about the big Crichton St.[0] carpark *in front* of Appleton? > > I thought that was Uni parking. > > -Mark > > _______________________________________________ > cascaders-internal mailing list > cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk > http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal > _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 12:57:46 +0100 From: Mark A Miles Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting On Tuesday, October 14, 2003, at 12:45 pm, Kate Ho wrote: > No Mark, anyone can park there - if you can stand the over-priced fees > ... How much, do you know? -me _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 18:54:25 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: [cascaders-internal] Moose extinction The mooses. The fucking mooses. Meece. Whatever. Turns out that Ty discontinued the Chocolate Moose line in 1998. After some trawling through their website (which is pink, just to let you know) I have ascertained that they have a rolling schedule of various beanie babies which are `born' and `retired' some time later. A moment's silence please for Chocolate, the moose, who left this world for a better one (that of being a rare collectable) 31st December, 1998. Ty are currently running a `Zeus the moose' who looks similar but not nearly as good (but maybe I'm biased). My main concern is that this rolling schedule does not bode well for the future; in a few years we will probably have to change beanies.[0] GIYF: Chocolate moose http://images.google.co.uk/images?q=chocolate-moose+beanie Zeus moose http://www.ty.com/3_detail?id=2206 [1] It appears that Ty do not make a badger beanie. Fuckers. Anyhoo, I can get a dozen of the Zeus type for just under forty quid. It would seem that this would be a half-decent start, unless anyone has any better ideas. pajh [0] As I recall, this was originally the plan for the first incarnation of Cascade; Helen Pain tells me that they intended to have a different animal each year. [1] You would not believe how long I spent trying to find a copy of this picture that did not include the little poem. I did this to protect you. I hate IE.[2] [2] If that wasn't bad enough, you might want to take a look at ../3_detail?id=2401. Ty gets patriotic. Yeugh. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh I don't want to be Elfstar any more! I want to be Debbie! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 19:13:07 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Big meeting On Mon, 13 Oct 2003, michael eng wrote: > For those of us who couldn't make it to the pre-meeting meeting, it > would be helpful if you could provide a précis of said agenda, in order > that we know what fate awaits. ph33r teh attachment. Hope this makes everything clear. pajh ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh I don't want to be Elfstar any more! I want to be Debbie! [ Part 2, "" Text/PLAIN (Name: "meeting.txt") 24 lines. ] [ Unable to print this part. ] Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 19:33:46 +0100 (BST) From: michael eng Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: [cascaders-internal] But I sleep better, yes I do, when I am cuddled next to you! * pajh@ed.ac.uk-san ga 2003-10-14 no 18:54 (+0100) ni kakimashita [ snip verbose discussion of beanie babies ] > Anyhoo, I can get a dozen of the Zeus type for just under forty quid. Honestly, Paul, don't you have anything better to do than look at beanie babies on the Web? Can't we just go to a toyshop and get a job lot of something suitable (and cheaper)? Or, failing that, I hear you can get them on ebay ... if you have the time and/or inclination (but you'll never live this down). Michael -- _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 20:16:11 +0100 From: Martin Ling Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Moose extinction On Tue, Oct 14, 2003 at 06:54:25PM +0100, Paul Hamilton wrote: > > The mooses. The fucking mooses. Meece. Whatever. Googling for 'plush' and 'moose' turns up a seemingly endless array of options. Perhaps we should stock up on the Zeus model for now and make it a rite of passage for would-be Cascaders to find or produce their own meece in future, should a standard issue type not be available... Martin -- http://the.earth.li/~martin/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 21:00:27 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] But I sleep better, yes I do, when I am cuddled next to you! On Tue, 14 Oct 2003, michael eng wrote: > Honestly, Paul, don't you have anything better to do than look at beanie > babies on the Web? I'm at work. I work in a hotel. It's not August. Any questions? I admit that it was my intention to have a standardised moose type, to be homogeneously applied across all cascaders (I'm sure Kate would approve of this idea). However I appreciate that this is perhaps not entirely necessary. Nonetheless, the meece, being the Cascade Badge Of Office (TM), should at least have some sort of general Look & Feel (TM) to them. And buying wholesale from a supplier is cheaper than buying individually from a toyshop or eBay. > But I sleep better, yes I do, when I am cuddled next to you! I shall set fire to the next person mentioning this to me. Furthermore, I see no reason how it can possibly be my fault that a company that makes plush toys segments its marketing towards the younger end of the market. Furthermore, I can see how sleeping with a large antlered ungulate is probably more comfortable than... pajh ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh I don't want to be Elfstar any more! I want to be Debbie! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 21:33:10 +0100 (BST) From: michael eng Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] But I sleep better, yes I do, when I am cuddled next to you! * pajh@ed.ac.uk-san ga 2003-10-14 no 21:00 (+0100) ni kakimashita [...] > Furthermore, I see no reason how it can possibly be my fault that a > company that makes plush toys segments its marketing towards the younger > end of the market. Hey, nobody said it was your fault. > Furthermore, I can see how sleeping with a large antlered ungulate is > probably more comfortable than... reasons of personal decency and incoherence brought on by sleep > deprivation> Thank you for exercising due restraint. Perhaps you might wish to invest in a large antlered ungulate for yourself, it might help with the sleep deprivation. (I would ask that those purchased for Cascade are kept strictly for professional use only, in the interest of hygiene.) Michael -- _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 21:49:44 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] But I sleep better, yes I do, when I am cuddled next to you! On Tue, 14 Oct 2003, michael eng wrote: > Thank you for exercising due restraint. Perhaps you might wish to invest > in a large antlered ungulate for yourself, it might help with the sleep > deprivation. I think a twelve-bore shotgun might be the best type of help with the sleep deprivation. Where I point it I shall leave to your imaginations. > (I would ask that those purchased for Cascade are kept > strictly for professional use only, in the interest of hygiene.) I have Muttley for that. hrf, hrf, hrf. pajh ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh I don't want to be Elfstar any more! I want to be Debbie! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 23:27:48 +0100 From: Kate Ho Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] But I sleep better, yes I do, when I am cuddled next to you! [ The following text is in the "ISO-8859-15" character set. ] [ Your display is set for the "iso-8859-1" character set. ] [ Some special characters may be displayed incorrectly. ] > Honestly, Paul, don't you have anything better to do than look at beanie > babies on the Web? /me puts a saucer of milk in the corner Incidentally, can the powers that be change my subscription from this email address to K.Ho-2@postgrad.umist.ac.uk - I could change it myself, but that's why I'm doing a management course ... _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 23:43:55 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] But I sleep better, yes I do, when I am cuddled next to you! On Tue, 14 Oct 2003, Kate Ho wrote: > /me puts a saucer of milk in the corner mr0wr. > K.Ho-2@postgrad.umist.ac.uk ^ There are two of you? Oh Goddess. > - I could change it myself, but that's why I'm doing a management > course... No you couldn't. And why? Because only I have the list admin password. I alone! Muwahahahahah, etc. pajh ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh I don't want to be Elfstar any more! I want to be Debbie! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 18:37:12 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: [cascaders-internal] Sitrep As you are aware, a meeting took place on Wednesday between a delegation of the Cascade Working Group and the Division of Informatics. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY (for Kate) We rule. MINUTES OF MEETING Wednesday, 3.30 pm Attending: Prof M Fourman, HoD, Division of Informatics Jacques Fleuriot, Something (maybe), Division of Informatics Paul A J Hamilton, Supreme Overlord of All Flesh and Cascade Co-ordinator Martin J Ling, El Presidente, CompSoc and Noble Cascader STUFF THAT HAPPENED [0] We stated that the Cascade system was ready to be piloted with a core group of ten-ish members, initially contactable via moose and email. We discussed a number of options for future expansion e.g. the RT system. MF came up with a couple of dozen suggestions for future directions for cascaders, including summer project work, undergraduate recruitment, drop-in centres etc. etc. To be discussed at some stage in the extreme future. Mail me if you want details. We got a GBP 500 budget. Regulations and restrictions upon us were discussed. There aren't any. MF stated re. plagiarism guidelines that we should all be sensible enough to know how to approach matters.[1] Re. interaction of role with demonstrators, the Working Group proposal to simply not touch practical code was presented and approved. An Initial Cascade Document was to be drafted for presentation to JF within one (1) week. This to include a description of the Cascade system and initial guidelines for cascaders, subject to revision after a suitable piloting period. Publicity of the Cascade system in lectures and via departmental email to be arranged following presentation of the Document. JF designated our Divisional Cascade Igor, to run around and fetch us things as necessary. TARDIS arranged to be moved to another room in JCMB. Murmurings from MF about how CompSoc may one day take over running thereof. Links forged between the Division and CompSoc wrt cooperation on talks, events etc. Did I mention the GBP 500 budget? MEETING CLOSED 4.30 pm. Cascade Working Group delegation adjourned to the pub. I am in the process of drafting this blasted Document, to be submitted to this list for approval before I email Jacques. I have also ordered a dozen meece. I also need to see if the old Cascade posters are available anywhere on what remains of the DAI servers. Alternatively, if anyone wants to draft some ALL-NEW! colour Cascade posters, go wild. Did I mention that we got a budget? pajh [0] Kate, I'm presuming there's a more appropriate, managerial term for this in common usage. [1] See? It really is that simple. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh I don't want to be Elfstar any more! I want to be Debbie! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 18:46:59 +0100 From: Martin Ling Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Sitrep On Fri, Oct 17, 2003 at 06:37:12PM +0100, Paul Hamilton wrote: > > I am in the process of drafting this blasted Document, to be submitted to > this list for approval before I email Jacques. I have also ordered a dozen > meece. I was hoping to help out with this, so if you'd like a hand give me a ring and I'll meet you in the pub later (free from 9:30). Martin -- http://the.earth.li/~martin/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 19:00:27 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Sitrep On Fri, 17 Oct 2003, Martin Ling wrote: > I was hoping to help out with this, so if you'd like a hand give me a > ring and I'll meet you in the pub later (free from 9:30). At work until 11. Can meet you after that. Otherwise, tomorrow before 3 or after 11. pajh --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Fools! Seize him! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2003 23:15:10 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document Behold the Cascade Initial Document. Marvel at its glory. Comments to me ASAP please, as I'm mailing this to Jacques on Wednesday. Many thanks to Martin for help with crafting such a Document. PS: We have meece. pajh --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Fools! Seize him! [ Part 2, "" Application/POSTSCRIPT 62KB. ] [ Unable to print this part. ] Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 00:06:03 +0100 (BST) From: michael eng Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document * pajh@ed.ac.uk-san ga 2003-10-20 no 23:15 (+0100) ni kakimashita > Behold the Cascade Initial Document. Marvel at its glory. Firstly, thank you Paul and Martin for your efforts so far. I see no problems with the guidelines set forth in the Document. However, you may wish to clarify where the Cascaders come from. They are `selected from within the School'. By whom, and with what criteria? I am slightly concerned that we have no initial measure of whether Cascade is providing a quality service or not, or even if this is in any way desirable. However, I understand that we may wish to let this lie for now, given that the Document is Initial. `The effectiveness of the Cascaders depends on them having a good awareness of available resources and individuals' areas of expertise'. I read this as Cascaders must have a clue. But how do we know if they do or not? Most importantly: will the meece sit on the LCD monitors? Paul have you tested this? Michael -- _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 00:20:52 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, 21 Oct 2003, michael eng wrote: > Firstly, thank you Paul and Martin for your efforts so far. Aw, shucks. > I see no problems with the guidelines set forth in the Document. > However, you may wish to clarify where the Cascaders come from. They are > `selected from within the School'. By whom, and with what criteria? Criteria have been left fuzzy. We shall, at some stage in the near future, apply amongs the 3rd and 4th year undergrads, and probably the MScs, for volunteers. Anyone who shows sufficient Clue gets their moose of office, for definition of Clue to be left for future long drawn-out discussion. Essentially, we want [Cc]ascaders to have some knowledge, some experience, and a halfway-decent ability to communicate. Eventually I shall provide in the Handbook a list of Other Resources that they can point people to if they don't have the answer themselves. This and your other point are indeed valid. However it is not in the nature of the Initial Document to address them... this is meant mainly to introduce us to the teaching staff at the School. As indicated in the Document, further guidelines are to be drawn up as we get a little more experience of doing this. This applies to recruitment processes just as much as it does to cascading processes. > Most importantly: will the meece sit on the LCD monitors? Paul have you > tested this? I have thoroughly tested this with the flat screens at Forrest Hill and Sam. Due to the presence of legs, I can happily confirm that Sam drapes himself very nicely over the edge of a TFT. It's almost as if he was designed for it. I presume the same to be true of all his cousins. pajh --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Fools! Seize him! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 01:00:24 +0100 From: Martin Ling Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, Oct 21, 2003 at 12:06:03AM +0100, Michael Eng wrote: > > `The effectiveness of the Cascaders depends on them having a good > awareness of available resources and individuals' areas of expertise'. I > read this as Cascaders must have a clue. But how do we know if they do > or not? I wrote this bit, and I actually didn't quite mean that; what I'm saying is that they need to know people, and have some idea of who might know what. As I see it the big stumbling block to students asking each other for help, in particular of people in the years above them, is that they just don't know anyone. So I've stressed the role of the Cascader as being to say "oh, you should ask Fred over there. Hey, Fred, come give us a hand will you?" - basically breaking the ice. Or in some cases "hmm, try this chapter in xyz book" (this is the sort of thing that's more likely to come from a shared list of useful resources for common difficulties than the Cascader's own knowledge). Of course, if they can answer the question themselves that's great, but it's the other cases that really show how a cascading system should work. Perhaps that guideline could put this more clearly? Martin -- http://the.earth.li/~martin/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 01:16:50 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, 21 Oct 2003, Martin Ling wrote: > On Tue, Oct 21, 2003 at 12:06:03AM +0100, Michael Eng wrote: > > > > `The effectiveness of the Cascaders depends on them having a good > > awareness of available resources and individuals' areas of expertise'. I > > read this as Cascaders must have a clue. But how do we know if they do > > or not? > So I've stressed the role of the Cascader as being to say "oh, you > should ask Fred over there. Hey, Fred, come give us a hand will you?" - > basically breaking the ice. > > Or in some cases "hmm, try this chapter in xyz book" (this is the sort > of thing that's more likely to come from a shared list of useful > resources for common difficulties than the Cascader's own knowledge). Furthermore, possibly "That's a network issue: you need to speak to the tech support people" or "php.com has a great set of documentation on this sort of thing" or even the erstwile "You'd have to ask a [Dd]emonstrator about that". Suggest keeping the wording as quoted, and adding "Cascaders will be provided with a list of useful resources for most common types of questions, to be referred to if they are unable to provide adequate help themselves" or something similar. What to put in said resource list is, of course, open to suggestion on this list/long drawn out discussion. To pre-empt a possible objection: we do not simply provide the list of resources to all students because it will be of some significant size, and will require some degree of Clue in order to navigate it. Furthermore, the originally quoted sentence from the Document above suggests that [Cc]ascaders will have some awareness of /which/ of a given set of resources is the most appropriate one for the current circumstance. pajh --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Fools! Seize him! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 01:43:31 +0100 From: Rupert Hair Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: RE: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document > From: cascaders-internal-admin@inf.ed.ac.uk > [mailto:cascaders-internal-admin@inf.ed.ac.uk] On Behalf Of > pajh@ed.ac.uk > Criteria have been left fuzzy. We shall, at some stage in the > near future, > apply amongs the 3rd and 4th year undergrads, and probably > the MScs, for > volunteers. Anyone who shows sufficient Clue gets their moose > of office, > for definition of Clue to be left for future long drawn-out > discussion. Has the aim to provide a means of getting help on non Inf specific subjects been removed from the proposed incarnation of Cascade? I mention this as you seem to be saying that only "3rd and 4th year undergrads, and probably the MScs" will be considered as possible Cascaders. Although lesser undergrads do not know as much Java etc they may have other skills that are in demand. Rupert _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 01:49:49 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: RE: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, 21 Oct 2003, Rupert Hair wrote: > Has the aim to provide a means of getting help on non Inf specific > subjects been removed from the proposed incarnation of Cascade? No no no. From the Document: "We expect the majority of questions to be related to material taught on Informatics courses, or to use of School computer systems. However, there is no restriction placed on the remit of the scheme and we hope it will encourage students to discuss any topic of interest to them." > I mention this as you seem to be saying that only "3rd and 4th year > undergrads, and probably the MScs" will be considered as possible > Cascaders. I specified these only as pools from which recruiting shall take place. Anyone else with sufficient Clue will also be able to note the existence of the Scheme, and volunteer if they so wish. 3rd/4th years and MScs are simply those groups that we shall get Inf to email round asking if anyone wants to join in. > Although lesser undergrads do not know as much Java etc they > may have other skills that are in demand. Indeed so. pajh --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Fools! Seize him! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 02:17:45 +0100 From: Martin Ling Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, Oct 21, 2003 at 01:43:31AM +0100, Rupert Hair wrote: > > Has the aim to provide a means of getting help on non Inf specific > subjects been removed from the proposed incarnation of Cascade? No; see the section 'Coverage'. > I mention this as you seem to be saying that only "3rd and 4th year > undergrads, and probably the MScs" will be considered as possible > Cascaders. No-one's saying this. A suggestion of *recruiting* from that demographic existed in the draft agenda for last Wednesday's meeting, and I assume that's where you're inferring this from. The School hasn't expressed any wish to limit Cascadership on these or any other boundaries, and I don't think that we should do either. In fact I'm sure it would be a very definite advantage to have Cascaders amongst the lower years. However, do remember that the most important part of the role is to direct questions appropriately, not necessarily to answer them directly. This thus relies more on knowing the School and the people in it well, and having broad awareness of topics and the content of courses, than it does technical knowledge. I'd say that people who've built up the appropriate background before reaching third year are probably going to make themselves quite obvious anyway. I think active recruitment from those years would probably be counterproductive. I'm not, of course, saying anyone who's made it to third year would make a good Cascader. But I'd say they're sufficiently more likely to be that it's worth advertising the opportunity to them. Martin -- http://the.earth.li/~martin/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 11:50:11 +0100 (BST) From: michael eng Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document I wonder what Pine will put in the In-Reply-To if I reply to three mails at once. * Martin Ling-san ga 2003-10-21 no 01:00 (+0100) ni kakimashita > On Tue, Oct 21, 2003 at 12:06:03AM +0100, Michael Eng wrote: > > > > `The effectiveness of the Cascaders depends on them having a good > > awareness of available resources and individuals' areas of expertise'. I > > read this as Cascaders must have a clue. But how do we know if they do > > or not? > > I wrote this bit, and I actually didn't quite mean that; what I'm saying > is that they need to know people, and have some idea of who might know > what. I'm concerned that by doing this you leave the door open for cronyism. The meritocracy of Cascade should be based on what you know, not who you know, surely? However I do realise that this is a 'Cascaded Learning Scheme'. There just needs to be the right balance. * pajh@ed.ac.uk-san ga 2003-10-21 no 01:16 (+0100) ni kakimashita > To pre-empt a possible objection: we do not simply provide the list of > resources to all students because it will be of some significant size, and > will require some degree of Clue in order to navigate it. I don't like this idea of withholding information. For example I would imagine that a cascader will soon be asked "How do I get DICE X11 windows on my Windows PC attached to Resnet?". Does the cascader really want to go through the whole procedure with the student every time? Cascaders will almost certainly be busy people with degrees to do and so on. Why not make a list of Frequently Given Answers available on the web, as a resource for when there are no cascaders around? This boosts public confidence in Cascade and Cascaders' Clues and I feel doesn't risk the role of the Cascader, if that's your concern. * Martin Ling-san ga 2003-10-21 no 02:17 (+0100) ni kakimashita > However, do remember that the most important part of the role is to > direct questions appropriately, not necessarily to answer them directly. > This thus relies more on knowing the School and the people in it well, > and having broad awareness of topics and the content of courses, than it > does technical knowledge. I do not want Cascade to be another group of clueless people whose sole purpose is to redirect folk to other folk. We have enough of those in the University already. -- Michael Eng Dept. of Theoretical and Applied Linguistics, The University of Edinburgh, Adam Ferguson Building, 40 George Square, Edinburgh EH8 9LL, UK. E-mail: meng@ed.ac.uk | Fax: +44 131 650 3962 | http://www.ed.ac.uk/~meng/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 13:32:49 +0100 From: Martin Ling Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, Oct 21, 2003 at 11:50:11AM +0100, Michael Eng wrote: > > > I wrote this bit, and I actually didn't quite mean that; what I'm saying > > is that they need to know people, and have some idea of who might know > > what. > > I'm concerned that by doing this you leave the door open for cronyism. > The meritocracy of Cascade should be based on what you know, not who you > know, surely? However I do realise that this is a 'Cascaded Learning > Scheme'. There just needs to be the right balance. The meritocracy should be based on how useful/helpful you are as a first point of contact for questions. Your useful/helpfulness may stem from your own knowledge, awareness of other resources, awareness of other people to ask, skills in encouraging the questioner to figure out the answer themselves, or any combination of these or other factors. > > To pre-empt a possible objection: we do not simply provide the list of > > resources to all students because it will be of some significant size, and > > will require some degree of Clue in order to navigate it. > > I don't like this idea of withholding information. For example I would > imagine that a cascader will soon be asked "How do I get DICE X11 windows > on my Windows PC attached to Resnet?". Does the cascader really want to > go through the whole procedure with the student every time? Cascaders > will almost certainly be busy people with degrees to do and so on. I think we've got a bit muddled here, and I think it's my fault. I put in the guideline about maintaining a knowledge of existing resources (including people), but I didn't actually envisage a list. Lists of resources are often bloody useless. And in fact the bigger they are the less useful they are, because they give you no clue which to look at. And this is just for written resources. Listing useful people to talk to is even more pointless. There's no substitute for someone who can look at your problem and point you in the right direction to solve it. *This* is what Cascaders, one way or another, should be able to do. > I do not want Cascade to be another group of clueless people whose sole > purpose is to redirect folk to other folk. We have enough of those in the > University already. Nobody is suggesting that. But I didn't make things particularly clear. Does what I've said make more sense? Paul, could I have the LaTeX source to tweak? Martin -- http://the.earth.li/~martin/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 13:48:52 +0100 From: Martin Ling Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, Oct 21, 2003 at 12:06:03AM +0100, Michael Eng wrote: > > I am slightly concerned that we have no initial measure of whether Cascade > is providing a quality service or not, or even if this is in any way > desirable. However, I understand that we may wish to let this lie for > now, given that the Document is Initial. We're stating we will be monitoring the performance of the scheme with a view to enhancing/adding means of communication, and even aside from that we obviously want to have an idea of how we're doing. Of course we'll pick up some impression of this ourselves, but we should at least consider being a little more rigorous. A survey among students after an initial period? Perhaps some logging by Cascaders, if this could be streamlined enough not to get in the way? Anything that gives us hard numbers... This sounds like management, doesn't it. Performance Evaluation Strategies or something? Kate? ;-) Martin -- http://the.earth.li/~martin/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 14:01:02 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, 21 Oct 2003, michael eng wrote: > I'm concerned that by doing this you leave the door open for cronyism. > The meritocracy of Cascade should be based on what you know, not who you > know, surely? Both. And besides, it's less who you know than it is who{m,} you know /of/. > > To pre-empt a possible objection: we do not simply provide the list of > > resources to all students because it will be of some significant size, and > > will require some degree of Clue in order to navigate it. > > I don't like this idea of withholding information. Who mentioned withholding anything? I simply said that there will (eventually) presumably be a big list of websites and library books and [Dd]emonstrators etc. The objection I was pre-empting was that this list could simply be given out to everyone in Fresher's Week, and thus negate any need for people with meece. But it will scare everyone off if this happens. > Why not make a list of Frequently Given Answers available on the web, This has already been discussed and will happen in the future. > I do not want Cascade to be another group of clueless people whose sole > purpose is to redirect folk to other folk. No one said this either. But as a first point of contact, [Cc]ascaders cannot be expected to know everything, and have to know where queries should be redirected in such an instance. pajh --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Fools! Seize him! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 16:50:14 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, 21 Oct 2003, Martin Ling wrote: > Of course we'll pick up some impression of this ourselves, but we should > at least consider being a little more rigorous. A survey among students > after an initial period? Perhaps some logging by Cascaders, if this > could be streamlined enough not to get in the way? Anything that gives > us hard numbers... > > This sounds like management, doesn't it. And hence I'd rather not go down that road if possible. I suggest we pilot the Scheme for a couple of weeks or so, then have a get-together, possibly with pizza, where we shall discuss how it seems to be going. It's the qualitative data that's important. The kind of questions we get, whether they recur, the smile on a young student's face as she goes away helped, the eyes maybe a little wiser, the sweater maybe a little tight.... Ahem. Any concerns that may have arisen will probably have been discussed on this list before any such meeting, but they can, if necessary, be aired again. If we decide that we do need numbers, then ways to go about this can also be discussed at the meeting. I would, of course, like to keep it informal. It would suck hugely if every time a [Cc]ascader helps someone they have to hand them an appraisal form. pajh --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Fools! Seize him! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 17:26:39 +0100 (BST) From: michael eng Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document * pajh@ed.ac.uk-san ga 2003-10-21 no 14:01 (+0100) ni kakimashita > On Tue, 21 Oct 2003, michael eng wrote: > > > I'm concerned that by doing this you leave the door open for cronyism. > > The meritocracy of Cascade should be based on what you know, not who you > > know, surely? > > Both. And besides, it's less who you know than it is who{m,} you know > /of/. I'm glad that we are all agreed on the Importance of Clues, at least. > The objection I was pre-empting was that this list could simply be given > out to everyone in Fresher's Week, and thus negate any need for people > with meece. Well no, because in order to negate the need for Cascade, such a list would have to contain all required resources in the future. But this is not worth arguing about, since it wasn't actually an argument in the first place. With regards to measurement of quality, I would agree that handing out appraisal forms is not desirable for anybody. However, that doesn't mean that we shouldn't do any measurement. What if it turns out that Cascade sucks (in the opinion of our fellow students)? How will we know what's going wrong, or how to fix it? Or do we just assume that our fellow students are wrong, Cascade does not suck, and carry on? Since it seems that Cascade will operate via e-mail as well as in person, I would suggest that for the trial period at least, all e-mail correspondence is retained, and in this way we can gauge how things are working in part. I would also be in favour of the Cascader making a brief note of the kinds and numbers of questions they are asked during the trial period as well. I don't mean that Cascade should be run like a military operation, just that we do need some facts to review, come the time when we are reviewing things. Michael -- Michael Eng Dept. of Theoretical and Applied Linguistics, The University of Edinburgh, Adam Ferguson Building, 40 George Square, Edinburgh EH8 9LL, UK. E-mail: meng@ed.ac.uk | Fax: +44 131 650 3962 | http://www.ed.ac.uk/~meng/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 17:39:34 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, 21 Oct 2003, michael eng wrote: > I'm glad that we are all agreed on the Importance of Clues, at least. Indeed. > Well no, because in order to negate the need for Cascade, such a list > would have to contain all required resources in the future. But this is > not worth arguing about, since it wasn't actually an argument in the first > place. I would argue that it /is/ worth arguing about. I would also call you rude names, like Stinky. But that would just be because I'm at work and bored. > Since it seems that Cascade will operate via e-mail as well as in person, > I would suggest that for the trial period at least, all e-mail > correspondence is retained, and in this way we can gauge how things are > working in part. Yes indeed. Further, you will recall that one of the points in favour of establishing an RT queueueueueueueue was that all tickets are logged and open for others to see. This essentially becomes an automatically generated FAQ. A problem may arise at some stage when we need to combine the data from various sources (email, RT, personal contact) but I'm sure we shall manage. > I would also be in favour of the Cascader making a brief note of the > kinds and numbers of questions they are asked during the trial period as > well. Fair enough. I would say only the pertinent ones, but of course we won't know what's pertinent. Furthermore, if in the course of helping someone, anyone comes across, for instance, a particularly useful web resource, make a note of it. > I don't mean that Cascade should be run like a military operation If so, I should have got a job lot of those godawful Hero bears instead of the meece. pajh --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Fools! Seize him! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 18:17:21 +0100 From: Kate Ho Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document Righty-o, As I've just spent the last 30mins wading through the emails and another 2 hrs before that on a lecture on "Concepts of Information Systems" I can rant and rant and rant. But I can fortunately express restraint. Here are my points: 1. Paul, whenever anyone suggests something, you always seem to reply with "We have already talked about this, and are implementing it in the future ... " blah, blah, blah. As a important manager type person, I don't want to hear you tell me that you've discussed something once someone else has mentioned it. If you want to do the job properly, write a list down of exactly what you've discussed. It might be painful, and it might be hard, but lets see exactly what ideas and concepts you've come up with. Otherwise, don't waste my time. 2. People who re-direct me to other people are just people who don't know their stuff, and should not be on the cascade scheme. It reminds me far too much of call centers where mindless idiots transfer you from endless departments and you have to explain yourself over and over again. I strongly suggest that a skills database be compiled and implemented before any meece hits the TFT screens [that actually means implemented, not "we'll do that in the future" - that's wimp-talk. We don't allow any of that here.] I understand that it might be a bit strong. But if you really want a feedback/quantitative data, one of my recommendations is to implement a "2-hop rule" - where Cascade should aim to have most (90%+) questions answered without the questioner be passed on to more than 2 consequtive (sp?) cascaders. 3. What is "Clue"? Define it. Then tell me how exactly you can measure it and hence assure me that Cascaders really have "Clue". Like Lecturers/Coaches/Teachers - how do I really know you know what you're on about? 4. Nothing has been mentioned about how cascaders are picked (still!) Three simple words: sort it out 5. One very, very last point. Your perception of how its going is going to be completely different from a fresher. If, at the end of your trial period, and you receive good feedback from the cascaders, then you define that as a job well done. In fact, it might be an illusion as you do not involve a larger feedback circle. [Scenrio: At the end of your trial period, you get positive feedback from the Cascaders. You have a sufficient number of enquires and you seem to have answered them well. You roll out the scheme properly. In fact, the scheme was not very sucessful. The reality is that not many students know about it. And of those who did, they found the system to be flawed, but in true British (or freshers) style, they decided not to use it rather than complain. The number of enquires might have been high, but in fact, they actually came from the same pool of people over and over again.] You might think it won't happen, but trust me, it can and its very, very real. Whilst learning about cases of failed information technology implementation (which, in this case, it is) lack of planning is amongst the highest causes. And I have a horrible feeling it might make a fantastic technology implementation project for someone. I trend to agree with Michael in that I think you have to define some goals that you want to achieve in order to say the trial was either a sucess or a failure. You want to, at the end of the trial say : "We deem the cascade scheme a sucess because x% of 1st year Computer Science students have contacted us and hence show that Cascade Learning Scheme encouraged better and more dialogue between students in higher years and those in lower years ...etc" If you don't want to go down that route, don't call it a trial period. That just confuses people. There's my advice. You may take it or leave it. I'm not too bothered. Kate _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 18:53:12 +0100 From: Martin Ling Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, Oct 21, 2003 at 06:17:21PM +0100, Kate Ho wrote: > > 2. People who re-direct me to other people are just people who don't know their > stuff, and should not be on the cascade scheme. Sorry Kate, but that's nonsense. There isn't a person in the world, let alone the School, who is able to answer every question. If you think that is the way things should work you have missed the entire point. Can people please get it into their heads that there is a difference between helping someone find an answer and passing the fucking buck. PTFB: A: I'm having this problem with XYZ... B: Sorry, can't help you, call XYZ support, bye! Cascade: A: I'm having this problem with XYZ... B: What's happening exactly? A: Well, foo and bar happen. B: Hmm, not sure what's going on there. Try asking XYZ support, and let me know if they can't help. Note the latter. Redirection does not have to be single and final. The goal of the Cascader is to see that the question gets answered; this might require more than one attempt. Martin -- http://the.earth.li/~martin/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 19:23:10 +0100 From: Nicholas Wolverson Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, Oct 21, 2003 at 06:53:12PM +0100, Martin Ling wrote: > On Tue, Oct 21, 2003 at 06:17:21PM +0100, Kate Ho wrote: > > > > 2. People who re-direct me to other people are just people who don't know their > > stuff, and should not be on the cascade scheme. > > Sorry Kate, but that's nonsense. > > There isn't a person in the world, let alone the School, who is able to > answer every question. If you think that is the way things should work > you have missed the entire point. I was going to make this reply, and then I read on to Kate's 2 hops thing. > Can people please get it into their heads that there is a difference > between helping someone find an answer and passing the fucking buck. Read Kate's email again. I think that point 2 is badly worded and overly aggressive [1], but still has a good point to make. There is a danger of people passing "the buck" of answering a question around, but on the other hand people have different skillsets. If somebody comes up to me on seeing my moose and asks me an AI-based question there's not much hope of me answering it unless it's very basic, but others would be able to help (perhaps Alex, or AI demonstrators during lab sessions if they still have them). Conversely, if somebody asks something about induction or automata I'll be able to play with their minds^W^W^W^Whelp them. [1] Kate, I suggest you follow the widely recommended strategy of saving controversial emails etc. to read over and possibly edit when you're calmer. I know I've regretted flames in the past... -- Nicholas Wolverson _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 19:19:41 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, 21 Oct 2003, Kate Ho wrote: > 1. Paul, whenever anyone suggests something, you always seem to reply with "We > have already talked about this, and are implementing it in the future ... " > blah, blah, blah. Indeed, we have already talked about all the points you raise in your email. But this once I shall go over them again. > If you want to do the job properly, write a list down of exactly what > you've discussed. http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/private/cascaders-internal contains a full and complete archive. If anyone want minutes of those meetings we've held in person, just ask. And furthermore, if /you/ want to participate in the Cascade scheme, /you/ do the work. I'm not here to babysit you, and I am certainly not here to cut your emails into bite-sized chunks that are easier for you to swallow. Further-furthermore, the Cascade Initial Document is by its very nature a precis of all the things we've discussed. > 2. People who re-direct me to other people are just people who don't > know their stuff, and should not be on the cascade scheme. So you propose that all [Cc]ascaders are required to hold a doctorate in everything they might possibly be asked. I'd love to see /your/ ideas for the recruiting process. > "2-hop rule" We'll have none of this nonsense. I apologise for presuming this to be obvious, but I was expecting a one-hop rule to be in place without having to specify it. > 3. What is "Clue"? Clue, n. 1. An intangible substance, much like Slack. 2. The ability to be an effective Cascader. It's going to be very difficult to define Clue in any terms other than that, since that is why we need it. Assume that it's a combination of: i) familiarity with the course materials and general computing concepts ii) understanding of what problem people /have/, rather than what problem they tell you they have iii) problem-solving ability iv) the communicative ability to express solutions to others v) courage to admit when they don't know vi) knowledge of alternative sources of help vii) sentience viii) other. > 4. Nothing has been mentioned about how cascaders are picked (still!) Plenty has been mentioned. We shall get Inf to post around the 3rd and 4th year undergrads and possibly the MScs, asking for volunteers. Volunteers will apply to me. A group of Core Cascaders will decide, according to criteria not yet finalised, whether or not they have sufficient Clue. > 5. One very, very last point. Your perception of how its going is going to be > completely different from a fresher. Yes, indeed. It may surprise you to note that this completely obvious point had in fact occurred to me. I plan to ask some freshers how they think it's going, possibly even lots of freshers. > Whilst learning about cases of failed information technology implementation > (which, in this case, it is) lack of planning is amongst the highest causes. This is not an information technology project. > If you don't want to go down that route, don't call it a trial period. Nowhere to my knowledge have I ever called it a "trial period", except possibly once or twice for linguistic variation on "pilot period". It is not a trial period. It is a pilot period. It might be worth having some goals that we can claim to have met, but there are problems with your suggestions. For instance, what percentage of first-years should we /expect/ to have given assistance to? How many times per individual? Since (effectively) no one has done this before, there's no way to predict how many enquiries a Cascader will get or of what nature. This is why we're having a pilot period, so we can familiarise ourselves with the kind of help that's required of us. It would be useful to be able to say, e.g. "Cascade has answered n questions this week from m unique individuals", but without branding people whom we've already helped I can't see an easy way to go about this. Perhaps someone else has suggestions. We shall pilot the scheme informally for a few weeks, and jot down notes on the amount of type of cascade help that is granted. Then we can look at formalising some statistics. We need observations before we can formulate an hypothesis. pajh --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Fools! Seize him! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 19:55:29 +0100 From: Martin Ling Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Tue, Oct 21, 2003 at 07:23:10PM +0100, Nicholas Wolverson wrote: > > I was going to make this reply, and then I read on to Kate's 2 hops > thing. Sorry, but I don't really see the point of that either. There is no point at all in setting some arbitrary hopcount target on the steps required to find someone a good answer to their question. It is in the interests of everyone involved that the hopcount remains low, and in the cases where it is forced to be higher there's nothing we can do to stop it anyway. "90% of calls to be answered within two minutes" is a meaningful target. You can take actions (e.g. increasing staff) to improve your performance related to it. It's always preferred for calls to be answered sooner than later (since all your employees are equally useless drones sitting at identical terminals, there's no point anyone waiting longer for a different one). But we are not a call centre. We are quite fundamentally different; the Cascaders are volunteers who *want* to be asked questions; if they don't they can put their moose away. There's no point in them passing the buck unless the question will actually be quicker or better answered by somebody else, and if that's the case there's no point discouraging them from doing so. "The goal of a Cascader is to see that a question is answered - well, or quickly, or both, depending on the circumstances of the questioner." The success of Cascade can be measured on how well the Cascaders fulfil this goal. The quality of a Cascader can be measured on how well they in particular fulfil this goal. How they do it we should neither care about nor dictate. Martin -- http://the.earth.li/~martin/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 22:44:08 +0100 From: Martin Ling Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: [cascaders-internal] Revised document Proposed revision attached. Comments, please! Martin -- http://the.earth.li/~martin/ [ Part 2, Application/POSTSCRIPT 193KB. ] [ Unable to print this part. ] [ Part 3, Application/X-TEX 6KB. ] [ Unable to print this part. ] Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 10:53:24 +0100 (BST) From: michael eng Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document * Kate Ho-san ga 2003-10-21 no 18:17 (+0100) ni kakimashita > 3. What is "Clue"? Define it. Then tell me how exactly you can measure it and > hence assure me that Cascaders really have "Clue". Like > Lecturers/Coaches/Teachers - how do I really know you know what you're on about? "Clue" is the having the skillset to deal with a quantity (no, I can't put a figure on this quantity at this stage) of the questions that are directed at you, or having enough knowledge of the field to redirect the student to an appropriate response. As Nick and Martin have pointed out, it's not realistic for a Cascader to be an expert in every field. Say, for example if a AI student comes to a Cascader asking about PDP++ and the Cascader happens to be a computer scientist. A clued up cascader would know that this was outside their field and suggest that they ask an AI Cascader, or might be able to invoke 'rpm -q' to find that it is STILL NOT INSTALLED and suggest that they contact Support, or ssh to an old-DICE host where it is actually installed and run it there. None of this requires knowledge of PDP++ itself, but knowledge of the Informatics environment and knowledge to find out how to fix things. That's the kind of clue I think we're looking for. Now, ideally, all Cascaders would have a skillset where they would be able to answer the vast majority of the questions posed to them. That's fine, but we don't yet know the nature and number of these questions. Which is why I am suggesting that we monitor this during the initial period, and review this again regularly in the future (say, for two weeks each term). This will allow us to have some direction in recruiting Cascaders, such that we are looking for skills in demand, rather than just shooting in the dark for generic "Clues". Michael -- Michael Eng Dept. of Theoretical and Applied Linguistics, The University of Edinburgh, Adam Ferguson Building, 40 George Square, Edinburgh EH8 9LL, UK. E-mail: meng@ed.ac.uk | Fax: +44 131 650 3962 | http://www.ed.ac.uk/~meng/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 14:02:02 +0100 From: Martin Ling Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Wed, Oct 22, 2003 at 10:53:24AM +0100, Michael Eng wrote: > > This will allow us to have some direction in recruiting Cascaders, such > that we are looking for skills in demand, rather than just shooting in the > dark for generic "Clues". Er, wasn't it you that started this by saying "I read this as saying Cascaders should have Clue"? The revision I posted last night defines the role of a Cascader and specifies the recruitment requirements in relation to this. I'd really appreciate your comments on it, and likewise everyone else. I'd like to be able to take this back to the School fairly soon; we did say a week. N.B. this means resolving any further outstanding issues ASAP, not leaving them hanging. But we are now leaving go-off-and-think time for the harsher pastures of feel-free-to-submit-a-patch, IYSWIM. Martin -- http://the.earth.li/~martin/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 15:10:21 +0100 (BST) From: michael eng Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document * Martin Ling-san ga 2003-10-22 no 14:02 (+0100) ni kakimashita > Er, wasn't it you that started this by saying "I read this as saying > Cascaders should have Clue"? Yes. That's why I was trying to clarify what I meant. > The revision I posted last night defines the role of a Cascader and > specifies the recruitment requirements in relation to this. I'd really > appreciate your comments on it, and likewise everyone else. OK The lifetime of this document should be limited until the end of the trial period. At that point, we may wish to tear it up and start again, depending on how well it goes. I think you've stated this somewhere, but this needs to be made clearer (ie. at the start). On assessment for selection; what assessment? We still haven't worked anything quantifiable out. You should make it clear that support provided by Cascade is on a best-effort basis; it is not the responsibility of the cascader to ensure that a problem is resolved, but they should do so to the best of their ability. We still have no goals for the trial period or any way of measuring success. Oh, and you misspelt `launch'. Michael -- Michael Eng Dept. of Theoretical and Applied Linguistics, The University of Edinburgh, Adam Ferguson Building, 40 George Square, Edinburgh EH8 9LL, UK. E-mail: meng@ed.ac.uk | Fax: +44 131 650 3962 | http://www.ed.ac.uk/~meng/ _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 12:52:50 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Wed, 22 Oct 2003, michael eng wrote: > The lifetime of this document should be limited until the end of the trial > period. At that point, we may wish to tear it up and start again, > depending on how well it goes. I think you've stated this somewhere, but > this needs to be made clearer (ie. at the start). Have added a subtitle "Initial Proposal" and made it clear in the covering email that the document is subject to change. > On assessment for selection; what assessment? We still haven't worked > anything quantifiable out. We don't need to for the Initial Document. Probably a job for another Document. I agree we need to work on this, but the Document needs sending. > You should make it clear that support provided by Cascade is on a > best-effort basis; it is not the responsibility of the cascader to ensure > that a problem is resolved, but they should do so to the best of their > ability. There are plenty of places where it says "where possible" etc., and also that Cascaders are volunteers. > We still have no goals for the trial period or any way of measuring > success. Random Idea: at the end of the trial period, we go back to Jacques and ask what he thinks. > Oh, and you misspelt `launch'. Fixed. Document sent. I've tried to address your concerns, but we were running out of time. I think it's good enough. Many thanks to all who helped, particularly Martin. pajh --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Fools! Seize him! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 13:42:44 +0100 From: michael eng Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Thursday, Oct 23, 2003, at 12:52 Europe/London, pajh@ed.ac.uk wrote: > >> We still have no goals for the trial period or any way of measuring >> success. > > Random Idea: at the end of the trial period, we go back to Jacques and > ask > what he thinks. Very well. In that case, you should warn him before the beginning of the trial period. > Many thanks to all who helped, particularly Martin. Ditto. Is this now going to receive a diff from the Inf side, or is that it final, Cascade's fate is sealed, etc? Michael P.S. Still waiting for committee go-ahead for Compsoc events upcoming -- _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 13:54:56 +0100 (BST) From: pajh@ed.ac.uk Reply-To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk To: cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk Subject: Re: [cascaders-internal] Cascade Document On Thu, 23 Oct 2003, michael eng wrote: > > Random Idea: at the end of the trial period, we go back to Jacques and > > ask > > what he thinks. > > Very well. In that case, you should warn him before the beginning of > the trial period. Indeed. I don't suggest that `asking Jacques' should be the total of our performance appraisal, but it might go some way towards it. > Is this now going to receive a diff from the Inf side I hope not. As mentioned, Mike has all kinds of plans for the future, but I've tried to make it clear to him that we'll consider these at a later stage. > , or is that it final, Cascade's fate is sealed, etc? We have made every attempt to stress that the document is an Initial Proposal. But yes, if it makes you feel any better, your fate now rests in my hands. *dons iron boots for crushing purposes* Note: that last bit was ironic. I'm being ironically repugnant. It's all right. pajh --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul A J Hamilton School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Fools! Seize him! _______________________________________________ cascaders-internal mailing list cascaders-internal@inf.ed.ac.uk http://lists.inf.ed.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/cascaders-internal