Well, today was the day when we found out whether Team 3 Pair had made it into the final 12 students. After spending the morning presenting their idea in the expo part of the competition we all went in to the large hall to find out who had been picked. Sadly, 3 Pair was not one of the names that was called out, so for the UK the 2006 competition is over

Rather sad really. This evening we were in the bar pondering life, the universe and everything,  I did feel it necessary to remind everyone that life hasn't been that unkind. Staying in one of the best hotels in India, drinking free beer, with a trip to the Taj Mahal tomorrow, if this is hard times, give me more...

Team 3 Pair did a first rate job. The code they wrote, the presentations they gave, the passion that they brought to the project all do them enormous credit. I am soo proud of all of them. But they didn't make it. Such is life. For them and all the teams that didn't make it today I give you a couple of lines from If, a poem by Rudyard Kipling, one of my favourites.

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same...

After a really good nights sleep, I got up and staggered down to breakfast. Today is the day that “Team 3Pair” from Hull got to strut their stuff on behalf of the UK. So it was on with the “Team Supporters” shirt and off to their first presentation.

The first part of the contest is the called the “Lightning Round”. This is because the rounds are short, and does not involve any high voltages or bolts of thunder. The idea is that the teams are given a seven minute slot to introduce themselves and get across the gist of what they are trying to do. Team 3Pair give good lightning, they were on shockingly good form and their presentation really made the sparks fly (that is all of those jokes out of the way, I put it down to the malaria pills I’m taking).

After that, feeling it was time for some rest and recreation, we headed across to the “Leisure Mall”. As we were one of the first teams to present, this was just about deserted and so we had the pick of all the attractions. As we waited for the bowling alley to warm up (I didn’t know they had to warm these things up, but there you are) we played pool. I can’t play pool. After committing a couple of miscues which cost me and my partner the game we moved onto the bowling lane. I didn’t think I could do bowling either, but my first attempt made all the pins fall down (which is apparently a good thing).

Pop quiz. How many pins did this ball from Andy knock down.

As the game progressed I managed to make the pins all fall down a couple more times. I put this down to the “magic pink ball” that I (and pretty soon everyone else) was using.

..and what is wrong with this picture of James bowling….

After that we went off to prepare for the second presentation, which was much longer, at 20 minutes, and is where the team had to deliver a proper description of the system that they had made, and why they had made it.

Perhaps we should call them “Team Three Prayer”….

Good to go.

After twenty minutes of presentation and a gruelling bunch of questions it was time to eat. So we went to the hotel restaurant for dinner. And I committed one of the gravest social faux pas that I have ever managed to achieve (and that is saying something). As we went around the table I noted that my wimpish colleagues were all going for dishes from the non-Indian part of the menu. After a sequence of requests for Arabian, Japanese and Italian dishes went down I thought I’d show some support for the locals and ordered an Indian chicken dish which sounded nice (although I have of course now forgotten what the name was).

When it came, artfully arranged around the plate, I tucked in, feeling very smug – even though the meat did not actually seem very chickeny. Only when the waiter brought the final dish to the table did the awful truth emerge. I had of course been eating the Arabian lamb one dered by Mark. Mark was very good about it, and swapped my proper dish for his half nibbled one.  However, I then compounded my bad behaviour by eating all the nan bread, even though it was meant to be shared amongst three of us. The good news is that my meal was delicious. The bad news is that I am now known as "food stealer Rob" and people don't like sitting next to me at meals.

For the rest of the afternoon we hung around the bar, checked our email and talked to some journalists. Tomorrow lunchtime the team will find out if it has made the next stage of the competition, the top 12.

Local music

In the evening we found that our meal was accompanied by some local musicians. I wanted the chap on the right to be playing a very small instrument, so I could use my "baby sitar" joke.

I spent most of today trying to avoid going to sleep. The plan is that if I can stay awake until my normal bedtime I can get my body into the new time zone by brute force and ignorance.

It didn’t go too well. Every time I sat down my eyes closed automatically and I drifted somewhere with all of the characteristics of sleep except the ones which make you feel better when you wake up.

Joe Wilson opening the presentation

Fortunately I managed to get myself over to the Imagine Cup Final launch event. Joe Wilson of Microsoft showed us some video of students doing great things and then talked a bit about the passion that you need to have to be a developer. Actually, I’m not going to claim to be particularly passionate (at least not in a blog that other people might read) but I do agree that when you are writing a program you are doing a bit more than just stringing statements together to get something to work. You are making something with the aim of making people happy.

From coding for your own amusement to making multi-tiered applications of frightening complexity (like some of the contest entries) the net result of your work should be a bit more happiness in the world (or – at a pinch I guess you could settle for less unhappiness). Whatever, as far as I am concerned this means that you should really engage with your task, respond positively to problems (or challenges as they are sometimes renamed) and work to get others enthused about what you are doing. And of course strive to do the very best you can. Kind of the Imagine Cup in a nutshell I guess.

The next speaker was Sheila Gulati of Microsoft India. She welcomed us all to her country, noted that the ride from Delhi to Agra would make a great XBOX game (it would) and told us of the pride she takes in the progress that her country has made in the software field. Then she said something which I found interesting. She said that people visiting should “let India happen to them” rather trying to view it from the perspective that they brought with them. I’m beginning to see what she means.

These are all around the hotel.

We are presently in the rarefied, air-conditioned environment of one of the poshest hotels I’ve ever been in. Yet there are things around that constantly remind you that you are not in Kansas any more. The beautiful little shrines around the hotel to the various gods, the pleasure that people take in helping you out, the fact that everyone you pass will say “Good Day”, the amount of smiling and eye contact that is involved in even the simplest transaction. For a reserved Englishman like me this is all quite alien, and really rather nice. I’m looking forward to seeing more of the real India later in the week, when the pace slackens a bit and we can go out and take a look around.

But back to the competition and the opening presentation. At the end of the speeches they introduced a drumming double act whose name, to my great shame, I’ve presently forgotten. I’ve not forgotten what they did though. Both of them were amazing, one was surrounded by drums of all kind, and a large smattering of 21^st century technology. The other simply sat down and played what appeared to be a very simple hand drum. Put them together and the range of sounds and the rhythms that they produced were incredible. Their hands were moving so fast that the cameras which were relaying their performance onto the big screen quite literally could not keep up.

They finished off by handing out some instruments so that we could all join in. I got to play a big silver tambourine, which the family will be pleased to hear I will not be taking home. Then they called down all the people from around the world who set up the competition and made it the roaring success it is.

The makers of the Imagine Cup

After that we had our evening meal out in the gardens, inside a giant gazebo, with fans blowing a mist of cool water over us and ever attentive waiters handing us beers. Then, with my body clock finally asserting itself, I staggered back to the room and settled down to a deep sleep.

The first thing we had to do was fly to Delhi (actually a plane did all the hard work – I just sat and watched telly and luxuriated in the emergency exit seat legroom that I ended up with – thanks BA). Once at Delhi we caught a bus to a complex just outside town for a quick wash and brush up before the ride to Agra, competition HQ for the next few days.

Everyone has been fantastically welcoming. The team who greeted us at the first pit stop were really excited about having us here. We were a bit jaded, in that we had just had a long flight. But to us it was just early evening. To the home team it was after midnight, and they had obviously been working like mad all day to set things up for our arrival. To get from Delhi to Agra we had a four hour night drive. At first it was dark, but as we got to our destination the sun came up and we got to see more of the countryside.

Agra sunrise

Driving in India is interesting. It involves a lot more use of the horn than back home. And there is always the possibility that might be a cow stood in the middle of the carriageway just around the next corner. When the road side cafes feel the urge to drum up trade they simply put up a road block outside their establishment to give you more time to read about their special offers.

However we all got here safe and sound after around a days solid travelling. (I felt quite proud of this until we met up with one of the Microsoft chaps from Seattle, who had spent 47 hours getting here).

The courtyard outside the room

The hotel is very impressive. Nice and cool and with big rooms and the most attentive staff I have ever experienced. Everyone seems determined to do their utmost to make your stay a really happy one. I think they are going to succeed.

This is the first time that I have ever flown east on a trip away. The fact that I have up until now only flown west, never had a problem coming home, and anyway there is only a four and a half hour time difference to India has lulled me into a false sense of security.

I feel my head has been injected with rice pudding under pressure. The thinking bits in my brain are fighting with other bits which only want to sleep. If the following posts don’t make much sense then that is pretty much par for the course from me. If they seem dafter and more ramblesome then ever then I apologise, I hope that normal service (and mental function) will be resumed soon.

After having arrived and got unpacked we headed back into the city for a “Good Luck” meal. Andy Sithers had heard good things about a Belgian restaurant and so we went there. In my mind Belgium is famous for two things; chocolate and not being famous for much. I really had no idea what to expect.

Andy Sithers said we should take the stairs at Covent Garden. So we did. On the way up and on the way down..

It turns out that Belgium cuisine is actually great stuff. The Belgians (or at least the ones that operate the place we went to) are very good at sea food and a whole bunch of great tasting dishes. We all had something different and it was all wonderful. They make their own beer too, which is also good stuff. And, for reasons which were never properly explained, they also serve all this dressed as Trappist monks. If you are after excellent food you should go there.

The team with their beer menus. Like the sound of that.

Tube Travel

The flight leaves tomorrow morning, and so we are having a night at the airport so we can get an early start. The train journey was smooth and on time. Then I had to face around an hour on the tube to get out to the airport, which I suppose could have been worse. It wasn’t that hot, but the carriages were packed and I had the dubious pleasure of staring at someone’s armpit for much of the journey. I don’t think they enjoyed the experience much either.

Firstly an apology. I've not been on the Spoke as much as I would like. However, as a form of redress I'm posting my Imagine Cup Final 2006 posts on here. Enjoy....

I’m heading out to India tomorrow. Today is the first leg of the journey, when I, Andy from Microsoft and the team all meet up at Heathrow Airport in London.

So this morning I sallied forth to the chemists with my copy of “Which”, the consumer magazine, which recently published a foreign travel special. In amongst a whole slew of scary statistics about how likely you are to fall ill if you ever leave this sceptred isle were some recommendations for various potions and lotions which would keep the nastiest things at bay and reduce their effect as much as possible.

With a bit of luck it all stays in the boxes....

This is of course insurance, in that I’m buying it because, having spent 35 quid on the various cans and tablets; with a bit of luck I’ll not have to use any of the stuff. Of course if I decide to take a chance and buy nothing then I’m pretty much doomed. Then again, I’ve not had a lot of success in the past second guessing fate...

Some time back I got the game Animal Crossing for my Nintendo DS. I played it for a while and then I left it for a week. The game is aware of the passage of time. This means that when I go back I'm bound to an earfull from Tom Nook for not being around. A similar thing happened with my copy of the Brain Training game. I'm afraid to go back to them because know I'll get told off.

And then we come to the Spoke. I've not been around here much lately. Sorry about that. I've been hyper active on www.robmiles.com for some reason though. But this doesn't make me feel any better about not being here. Fortunately people like Alfred are still out there keeping things moving, it was his post that put me on to the new Microsof tRobots:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/robotics/

Wonderful stuff. What, with this and the .NET Micro Framework, UMPC, Vista, Office 12 etc etc etc there is just so much going on that I wish there were three of me just to get around to playing with it it all. Which is really nice if you think about it.

Contrary to the name, I think this one is going to be big. Really big. It raises the prosepect of development for tiny embedded devices with the same ease as we can write code for desktop PCs. I've started a special section on this framework over at my other blog.

Went to the Dalby Forest today. The weather forecast was pretty horrible, it is a Bank Holiday and so we knew we were taking a gamble. But it paid off. Weather was great and it was very quiet when we arrived. We had a walk around the Bridestones. These are lumps of stone which for some reason or other haven't eroded like the rest of the valley. So they stick up out of the ground in a rather impressive way.

By midday we confidently expected to be underneath a lot of rain, but as it turned out we weren't. We even had a chance to walk around Staindale Lake.

There are more pictures on Flickr

There is only one game that I will claim to be any good at. Oh, I can play tennis, and squash, and I have even been known to turn up to (as opposed to play) rugby and cricket. My game of choice is table tennis. I have been known to beat people at that game. And I really, and I mean really, enjoy playing it.

So the XBOX 360 Table Tennis game by Rockstar was of more than passing interest to me. Particularly as it only costs thirty quid. This means of course that I have bought a copy. And I have spent the last couple of hours playing it. It is very, very, very, very good. Have I mentioned it is good?

The controls are simple, but you can do a lot with them. You have to watch the other player and the way they hit the ball to work out what it is going to do. Where you are standing affects how much you can do. I've found myself taking part in the game in just the same way as I do in the real one.

The presentation is not particularly impressive, but everything is as it should be. The animation of the players is smooth and I like the way that their clothes flap about. The sound is spot on, you can get a feel for what is going on by the noise the ball makes as it hits the table and the bat.

I've won one tournament and it was fun. I've not quite got the hang of the controls yet, I tend to forget to make my player swing his bat, so that he just stands there like a dummy as the ball whizzes past. But I'm pretty sure that I'll get the hang of things quite soon. I've played a couple of XBOX Live games (lost one won one) and the experience was very smooth.

You can have a lot of fun with a simple bat and a ball. What Rockstar have done is taken that fun and put it into a video game. If you have an XBOX and a liking for ball games you should get this game.

...we're back, and we're taking calls. Things have been mega busy since I got back from MEDC. And I've been spending all my free time playing with my other blog. And so the Spoke has been off my radar for a while. The students have just about all gone away, although Team Three Pair are still here working on their Imagine Cup entry and the postgrads are all getting into project mode. As for me, I'm finishing off marking and playing with the .NET Micro Framework. (which is really neat by the way).

Will I ever stay anywhere as posh again?

Well, today I packed up all my stuff ready for the journey back. Every time I go abroad I end up buying a new bag to take stuff home with me. This trip was no exception. I got a rather racy red number (should show up well on the luggage belt) for 14 dollars into which I can put all the presents that I bought for the folks back home. Just to make sure that they are sincerely pleased to see me.

Then, having purchased the jelly beans for number on daughter, it was off to the airport.

This is the 'Vegas arrivals. Note how there are slot machines so that you can gamble even as you wait for your suitcase to appear.

I took me a while to time this photograph correctly, but take a close look at the screen at the far end and....

Imogen Heap is playing 'Vegas!

Very surprised (and impressed) to see that Imogen Heap is playing 'Vegas. We saw her live in York a few weeks back and she was jolly good. If you are in 'Vegas you should drop by. Or you could save the travel and just buy the album "Speak for Yourself".

After that surprise it was onto the plane for the journey back. I've found a way to survive long journeys. It is called the Archos AV500 and Veronica Mars technique. I managed to watch five episodes whilst waiting on various planes and in airports. If you have not seen it before, I'd advise you to take a look. Take a bit of Buffy, a pinch of OC and add just a smidgeon of Twin Peaks and you have Veronica Mars. Snappy, sassy and set in a High School campus. More stereotypes than an advertising excutives handbook, but quite fun nonetheless.

And then back home for blessed sleep.

Being on top of a bus does have its advantages...

On the final day of my visit to 'Vegas I thought I'd take a trip around. Now, I always try to make use of public transport when I go abroad. In the 'states this is usually a good deal because taxis can be expensive and you do see a lot more of the local life by catching a bus. So I did. I bought a five dollar ticket which entitled me to a day's worth of travel and set off to take in the sights. And the Las Vegas Outlet Mall where I planned to buy some trousers. What a jet set lifestyle I have eh?

Anyhoo, I got on the bus, driven by someone whose nametag said was called "Jimmy". Jimmy obviously went to the "Attilla the Hun" school of customer relations. He contrived to be rude, unhelpful and unpleasant in around five words and three gestures. Then someone on the bus took a bit of a turn and had to go and sit down for a while at the stop. Jimmy first ignored the problem, then went outside and shouted at them for being unwell, then, when the person had wandered off in search of a cool drink, called for an ambulance, stopped the bus service called and threw us all off onto the pavement. Nobody liked Jimmy. His replacement, who was so efficient I've forgotten his name, turned up in a virtually empty bus a couple of minutes later. And the really good news was that I got to sit on the top deck, in the