ScotlandIS, Scotland’s digital trades body, has announced the 12 finalists at the 27th Young Software Engineer of the Year Awards, the ceremony recognising the country’s top undergraduate computing talent.
The event, on 5th October at Edinburgh International Conference Centre, will bring down the curtain on ScotSoft2017, the annual festival of ideas and innovation that showcases Scotland’s technology sector.
The projects shortlisted are all drawn from final year students studying computer science and software engineering in Scotland. Each university is allowed to nominate one student whose work will be judged on criteria that includes innovation, relevance and technical difficulty.
Helping young graduates
Graeme Smith, former winner and now Managing Director of Amazon Development Centre (Scotland) said: “I’ve seen the Young Software Engineer of the Year awards from both sides. The YSE award really helped me get attention from employers in the early stages of my career.
“As an employer, I’m proud to support the awards because it’s important to recognise upcoming talent and it’s been a great way for us to get introductions to these graduates, several of whom we have hired in the past.”
Shortlisted students are; Duncan Cameron (Heriot Watt), Patrick Jackson (Glasgow Caledonian), Arturas Molcanovas (Robert Gordon), Gala Malbasic (St Andrews), William Taylor (West of Scotland), Alexandru Zarafu (Aberdeen), Amy Parent (Abertay), Orisa Ngampakdeepanich (Edinburgh), Irina Camilleri (Strathclyde), Joe Barrett (Napier), Christopher Coyle (Stirling) and Martin Podlubny (Glasgow).
Focus on different areas
Polly Purvis, CEO of ScotlandIS, said: “The innovation and ideas that have gone into the shortlisted projects are outstanding and cover a wide range of industries. Each entry has identified an area where improvement could be made and delivered a well-researched and crafted product.
“As digital technology plays an increasing role in our daily lives, it is vital that Scotland equips itself with the skills to lead the way in this sector. It is the knowledge and inventiveness that is demonstrated in projects like this that will ensure we continue to deliver in the years ahead.”
Mobile messaging and crowdsourced cycle maps
Shortlisted projects include a table app to elicit pretend play for children with autism spectrum condition, a modular bus system for high-altitude balloon missions, a synchronous mobile messaging system and a smart mobile attendance system.
Two projects focus on bikes with one calculating suspension settings and the other on enriching cycling maps through crowdsourced sensor data.
Also included are a sensor augmented computer keyboard, a program for acquiring and analysing social media data and a JavaScript Runtime for hardware accelerated applications. Other titles to be nominated are ‘Quicky-Quickcheck for Dafny’ and ‘Using Google app engine to facilitate the delivery of content hosted on Google drive through the development of a Java Web application’.
ScotSoft is Scotland’s biggest and best digital technology event and also features a full day developers’ conference and a half day leadership forum.
For more information or to book tickets for the Young Software Engineer of the Year Awards visit http://scotsoft.scot/