Title: View from the Chair

Author: Martin Moene

Date: 01 January 2017 21:22:15 +00:00 or Sun, 01 January 2017 21:22:15 +00:00

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Today is Thanksgiving in the U.S. That means a four-day holiday for some of us. But there’s no rest for the weary, as I have to get this article written, and then I have to finish my Hour of Code [1] presentation. I committed to talking to approximately 50 ten- to 13-year-old students (5th through 8th grade) on December 5th, which is just fantastic because I have absolutely no recent experience talking to any large group, and less experience talking to children. If I survive the experience, I’ll provide you with an update in the next CVu.

Diversity statement

The Diversity Statement was given final approval during our bi-monthly committee meeting held on November 19th, and has been published on the ACCU website [2]. Thank you to all who participated in its drafting and refinement.

ACCU Conference 2017

The 2017 ACCU conference is scheduled for Wednesday, April 26th through Saturday, April 29th, with pre-conference tutorials on Tuesday the 25th [3]. The schedule for the conference will be announced on January 20th. The conference once again will be held at the Marriott City Centre in Bristol, UK. Members of ACCU get a discount on the conference – if you are not already a member, please join the organization and take advantage of the benefits of membership. Go to https://accu.org/index.php/joining to get started.

Just announced (well, ‘just’ being while this was being written) – Herb Sutter will be giving one of the keynote presentations at ACCU 2017.

Code of conduct

The conference committee has published a Code of Conduct on the ACCU website [4]. This Code of Conduct will apply to all events run under the aegis of ACCU and all its local groups, and will evolve as necessary. If you are running an ACCU event, presenting at an event, or planning to attend an event, please be aware of your rights and responsibilities under the code.

Election of officers

The ACCU Annual General Meeting will be held in conjunction with the conference, on Saturday April 29th. An important part of the AGM is the election of officers to serve on the committee for the coming year [5]. Serving on the committee is a great way to give back to the organization. To find out more about being a committee member, or if you are interested in serving on the committee for the 2017–2018 term, please contact me or one of the other committee members.

Conference web site improvements

The new conference session proposal submission system has been up and running since mid-November. After a bit of a shaky start, the major problems were sorted and the system made available to prospective speakers. Conference Chair Russel Winder reports the system is not pretty, but is functional. He is hoping that this time next year it will be a lot smoother, and prettier.

Committee spotlight

Matt Jones has been a member of ACCU since 2005, and our Membership Secretary since 2014 (taking over from Mick Brooks after his seven year term). Matt started programming with BBC Basic, and then learnt C on a summer job between school and VI form. He did a four year mixed electronics and software degree at Southampton, but took all the software options. He’s been programming professionally for over 20 years, becoming freelance 2 years ago. He works mainly in C++ but occasionally reverts to pure C when required, and sometimes Python. Most of his work has been on large real time and/or embedded systems. When bit bashing he misses the freedom of working at high level, but when the tables are turned, he eventually gets bored with the abstracted nature of high level code and yearns to get dirty with hardware again. At the moment he is writing GUI code in C++11 and Qt 5.7 – about as advanced as he’s ever been!

The duties of the membership secretary are varied. Usually the signup/pay/renew cycle is handled electronically by the web site, and automatic credit card payments are handled via Worldpay. Corporate members who require invoices, and members who pay by standing order or cheque, have to be dealt with by hand which includes poring over the bank statement once a month to tie payments back to members. Once a month, the address lists for the magazine have to be prepared and sent to the company who print and distribute them for us. Once the paper copies are out, the excess from the print run is delivered to Matt’s house, where he stores them for up to a year. This is in order to supply back issues on request, for members who have missed copies, and marketing hand outs (e.g. for local groups, and at the conference). Postal delivery problems (i.e. ‘Return to sender’) also end up in his post box, at which point the member is contacted and the problem resolved. Matt knows his local post office quite well. Official duties include preparing a yearly report for the AGM, regular reports to the committee, and being a signatory for cheques.

Call for volunteers

I have been ‘advertising’ for an auditor (to replace me) for the past several issues, without success. It has been suggested that perhaps the duties of the auditor were unknown and mysterious – a description of the position does not exist on our website or in the constitution – and this could be the reason no one has stepped forward. Well, I can rectify that.

The role of an ACCU auditor is to conduct a high-level review of the accounts which have been prepared by a professional firm of Accountants using information supplied by our Treasurer. The auditor is expected to question any unusual transactions, ask for evidence to support transactions, verify assets, and ensure that the accounts provide an accurate statement of ACCU’s financial situation. A detailed investigation into every single transaction is not usually required, nor is the auditor expected to duplicate the work of the Accountants.

The work is not particularly difficult; it’s a bit like balancing a cheque register. Familiarity with, and access to, Microsoft Excel is helpful as that is how the records are kept.

There should be two auditors at all times, serving two-year stints, with one auditor being replaced each year. By design, auditors are separate from, and independent of, the committee. Auditors report their findings to the committee. If all is in order the Chair signs the audited financial statement on behalf of the organization.

We still have several other open positions:

• The ACCU web site uses Xaraya, a PHP framework that has been moribund for the last 4 years at least, and a replacement is overdue.
• We are hoping to recruit someone to assist Martin Moene with the web site sys admin duties.

Please contact me if you are interested in any of these positions.

Local groups

Nigel Lester, our Local Groups Coordinator, reports that local groups Meetup membership has grown by five percent in the past two months, and by approximately 50% since the beginning of the year. To those of you who have joined a local Meetup group this year – welcome. If you have not already done so please consider becoming members. Membership entitles you to print copies of our journals, discounts to the annual conference, and the ability to participate in the direction the organization takes through voting and committee activities [6].

Finally, with magazine production schedules being what they are, by the time you read this our calendars will have rolled over to 2017. On behalf of your ACCU committee I wish you a happy, safe, healthy and prosperous New Year.

References

[1] Hour of Code https://hourofcode.com

[2] ACCU Diversity Statement https://accu.org/index.php/aboutus/diversity_statement

[3] ACCU 2017 https://conference.accu.org/site/index.html

[4] ACCU Code of Conduct https://conference.accu.org/site/stories/coc_code_of_conduct.html

[5] I know that we just had a Special General Meeting and election. The realities of CVu’s publishing schedule means that this issue may be a little early to be thinking about the AGM election, but the next issue may be leaving it too late.

[6] Yes, I am aware that this magazine is distributed and available online to members only; however, copies are made available to local groups, so I am hopeful that this message will be read by prospective new members.

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