Bill Mills on The Carpentries

Software Carpentry Bug BBQ

Wed, 04 May 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

Software Carpentry is having a Bug BBQ on June 13th

Software Carpentry is aiming to ship a new version (5.4) of the Software Carpentry lessons by the end of June. To help get us over the finish line we are having a Bug BBQ on June 13th to squash as many bugs as we can before we publish the lessons. The June 13th Bug BBQ is also an opportunity for you to engage with our world-wide community. For more info about the event, read-on and visit our Bug BBQ website.

Save the Date: Software Carpentry Lab Meeting May 10

Tue, 03 May 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

Software Carpentry’s next Lab Meeting calls will be at 14:00 UTC and 23:00 UTC, May 10th; all are welcome to join in to discuss what’s new and upcoming in the Software Carpentry community. Connection details are on the Lab Meeting Etherpad.

Our first feature for the month is the new Subcommittee and Task Force program, recently announced by the 2016 Steering Committee. Following on the success of our subcommittees in 2015, the Steering Committee has decided to open up the process of proposing and running projects and committees that advance Software Carpentry’s mission and enrich our community to all of our community members. More details on the proposal process can be found here; tune into the Lab Meeting to here more comments and ask questions from the program designers.

2016 Post-Workshop Instructor Debriefing, Round 02

Fri, 05 Feb 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

On January 26, we ran the 2nd round of Post-Workshop Instructor Debriefing Sessions. Rayna and Christina hosted the morning debriefings while Bill and Raniere hosted the evening debriefing. A topic of interest today was on installations. Read on for details.

Thoughts on the “check installation” scripts

There is in an ongoing discussion about whether or not the “check installation” scripts for workshop pages should be updated. So, we asked the attendees how often these were being using and how useful they were. Some comments we received were:

2016 Election: Bill Mills

Thu, 14 Jan 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

Meet Bill

I’m Bill Mills, a scientific software developer based in Vancouver, Canada, currently spearheading web development for the GRIFFIN collaboration at TRIUMF.

In two years with SWC, I’ve taught seven workshops in addition to five live Instructor Trainings, across five countries. Over the past year I have sat on SWC’s Mentorship Committee; my most visible work there was as co-organizer of our first Instructor and Helper Retreat.

Site Planning for the Instructor and Helper Retreat

Wed, 28 Oct 2015 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

With less than three weeks to go before Software Carpentry and Data Carpentry's first ever Instructor and Helper Retreat coming up on November 14, many of the lead organizers for sites around the world got together this week to discuss plans and ideas for the event. Our goal for the retreat is to create opportunities for instructors, helpers, and the community to get together to practice teaching, break ground on new lessons, and start discussions. Here are just a few of the ideas coming up that you can get involved with.

Announcing the 2015 Instructor and Helper Retreat

Tue, 22 Sep 2015 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

Update: to stay current, please visit the Etherpad at {{page.etherpad}}.

The Mentorship Committee is very excited to announce the first ever Software & Data Carpentry Instructors & Helpers Retreat, happening worldwide on November 14. We're inviting all Software and Data Carpentry instructors and helpers to get together at sites around the world for a day of sharing skills, trying out new lessons and ideas and discussing all things instructor and helper related.

Reflections on Claremont

Thu, 19 Jun 2014 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

The Claremont Colleges bootcamp just wrapped a couple of hours ago, and judging from my pile of happy sticky note responses, I think we nailed it pretty good. Things were a bit fast on the first day of intro shell and Python, but I think we hit something pitch perfect for day two on intermediate Python and Git. As this Python-heavy workshop progressed, some questions started coming into focus from student responses, discussions with instructors and organizers, and examinations of just how to teach this ascendent skill in scientific computing. To be clear: I have never taught our Python material, and I consider myself a fairly casual Pythonista. This is a debate that the masters need to consider, but I'm hoping here to use my agnostic outsider's perspective to help set the conversation up.

Uniting the Narrative

Fri, 04 Apr 2014 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

The Victoria workshop that just wrapped a few hours ago was my first stab at teaching SWC live, and I have to say - few things feel better in teaching than the tiny victory of having material that is right on pitch. I've had the lurking notion for years that the hilariously overshot lectures ('I need to cover the syllabus in half time so I can go on sabbatical'), conference talks ('One slide per 30 seconds for a solid hour seems reasonable') and lab presentations ('A 5 by 5 grid of histograms on one slide will communicate ALL the science!') were the tragic offspring of time constraints and one-upmanship, and in desperate need of a pan-academia slide deck disarmament treaty. I always pushed my students to strip it down, just hit the highlights and leave the details for the paper, because I always suspected that that little bit of entertainer's savvy was how we could really reach people: not by fact-bombing the audience into a glassy torpor, but by electrifying their curiosity just enough that the energy that propelled them forward was their own.