People

The Original Mini-Term 2007 Team™

This is the NCSSM Grid Team. We feverishly started work during Mini-Term 2007 to bring the grid to life. See us at work….

Staff Leaders

Mr. Paul Menchini view Mr. Menchini’s blog entries
Mr. Menchini joined the NCSSM staff this year to teach the new Engineering classes. It was his vision of a grid computer here that inspired this project to blossom. He previously worked in the field as a computer systems engineer until he retired to teaching.
Dr. John Morrison view Dr. Morrison’s blog entries
The resident mad scientist of NCSSM, Dr. Morrison is the one of the computer science teachers here and is co-leader of the Grid Computing project. He has been here since 2000 and has since evolved the Computer Science Department to its greatness today.

Students

Bob Adams 2nd East, junior view Bob’s blog entries
Bob is a primary tester for the RSA-cracking project and semi-official supplier of foods that keep one awake and hyperactive. He likes to write to other people logged onto the grid server and scare the less experienced users.
Jennifer Cook 1st Beall, senior view Jennifer’s blog entries
A level 11 Accordion Thief, Jennifer was responsible for some critical Web site design decisions, including the lava lamp, and wrote much of the text of the site. Dr. Morrison is currently using some of his spare cycles (hah! a pun! did you see that?) to teach her the basics of Java during those rare times she’s not hiding under the desk (as in the picture at left).
Austin Ellis 3rd East, junior view Austin’s blog entries
Or, the other Linux user. Austin clears up some of the clerical trivia when he’s not busy trying to dist-upgrade his Ubuntu installation or keep himself from getting confused with the other two Austins. He BOINC-ified the RSA project as well.
Jake Guild 2nd East, junior
Jake is working on the RSA encryption software. He is an authority on brute force programming, and is the reincartion of Trogdor the Burninator, for he burninates thatched-roof cottages every morning.
Ankit Gupta 3rd West, junior
Ankit is writing programs in Java. (He is quiet as this description suggests….)
Jake Hamilton 2nd West, junior view Jake’s blog entries
Jake does the bulk of the programming for the RSA encryption program when he’s not doing other crazy stuff like racing chairs down the Reynolds breezeway with Bob and Roger.
Kurt Hasian 1st Hill, senior
Kurt is working on the second project of the scheduling program. He likes simple things like monkeys, typewriters (since he doesn’t have a working computer), Shakespeare, and occasionally a combination of all of them.
Brian Hulette 1st Hill, senior
Brian is working on client-server communication, and the scheduler with Kimmel. He does not like simple things like monkeys and typewriters. (Still up in the air on the Shakespeare verdict.)
Ben Ketel 3rd East, junior view Ben’s blog entries
Ben helped work on the Web site. He plays too much Guild Wars in his spare time and is learning too much from this project. His head is about to explode from the CSS. He also controls your thoughts… at least in your blogs.
Daniel Kimmel 1st Hill 4th West, junior view Daniel’s blog entries
Daniel is working on a second testing project, which is intended to sort out the complicated task of giving students the schedules they want. He is the only person in the group to have run Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux on the same machine (albeit mildly illegally).
Austin Page 2nd Hill, junior
Austin is working on dedicated client setup via custom spins of operating system installation media, and, contrary to this image, is not actually a purple rhinoceros.
Roger Que 1st Hunt, junior view Roger’s blog entries
The project’s token Chinese guy and standards-compliance nitpick, Roger was responsible for the initial design and coding of the Web site you see here, and currently maintains much of the site’s backend. In his spare time, he bows to the shrine of Helvetica in his dorm room and writes about himself in the third person.
Mario Scott 3rd East, senior
Mario is researching methods for the RSA project — if he isn’t checking his e-mail every 15 minutes. Mario also likes explosions. Really large explosions… as long as they don’t involve his computer.
Tyler Smith 3rd West, senior view Tyler’s blog entries
Tyler gets the dedicated clients up and running when he’s not assimilating them into the Matrix, or Skynet, or the Borg, or AM…. He also sits the closest to the distributed computing server, which imbues him with superpowers on an irregular basis.