High quality of second-year project work on display

Software developed by second-year computer scientists in the School of Electronics and Computer Science was last week demonstrated to representatives of Southampton International Airport and IBM Hursley, who were the project sponsors. The demonstration was the culmination of a semester's hard work by students on the second-year group software engineering project.

The project, set up by the ECS course team (Mike Poppleton, Bob Walters and Rowland Watkins) in collaboration with Airside Operations managers John Hamshare (photo, on the left) and Mark Gibb, is a Stand Allocation System for the Airport. The system allows manual as well as automated management of the allocation of arriving and departing planes to stands. John Hamshare said that he was impressed as usual with the quality and enthusiasm on display, particularly by the group showing a 3-D version of the airport.

The leading project group from the whole ECS second year - this year electronic engineers - also demonstrated their work, and were awarded a prize of £50 each by James McGowan of IBM Hursley. The group will go forward to IBM's national Thinkpad Challenge competition between undergraduate project groups in September.

Mike Poppleton commented: "Thanks to all involved, mostly the students, discussions are now under way on further project collaborations between ECS and Southampton Airport."