Graham/Rexford talk on GENI/CCC

The CRA has the slides for a presentation by Susan Graham and Jennifer Rexford at the Grace Hopper Conference: Introducing the Computing Community Consortium. It's a nice talk covering the CCC, GENI, and some of Jennifer's current research.

FIND Meeting

While at ISIT, I missed a FIND (Future Internet Directions) meeting. (You may have to register -- give your name -- to get access.) FIND is, as it says on their overview page, "a major new long-term initiative of the NSF NeTS research program. FIND invites the research community to consider what the requirements should be for a global network of 15 years from now, and how we could build such a network if we are not constrained by the current Internet -- if we could design it from scratch."

The page on the meeting is interesting in itself if you want to see what's going on with the FIND program (and maybe get ideas for future proposals). What is also interesting to me is this requirement of the program that PIs are supposed to get together at meetings roughly three times a year as part of the grant. This has not historically been how the NSF operates, though I hear it's common for DoD funding. I doubt the approach will necessarily spread to theory; it seems to me that it makes sense for FIND because it's such a highly targeted initiative, while theory grants cover a much more diffuse range of activities. But it may be that in the future we can expect more money being funneled into similar targeted initiatives -- with similar requirements.

More on Cyber-Enabled Discovery and Innovation

SIGACT chair Richard Ladner asked me to continue spreading the word about the Cyber-Enabled Discovery and Innovation (CDI) initiative from the NSF. In particular, he asked me to point to Sanjeev Arora's article in the last SIGACT News (which seem to require an ACM password) and an article in the last Notices of the American Mathematical Society.

You might wonder why this is something that I (and many others) are pushing so hard. I think it's because we've seen the writing on the wall. When you look at the available theory funding available from the Computing and Communication Foundations Division (and the Theoretical Foundations Cluster within), it's pretty small. This is odd and frustrating, as theory seems to be thriving quite healthily, and to continue building on our successes, we need adequate funding.

The good news is that theoretical research often does well with these cross-cutting programs. When the SIGACT committee looked at the numbers, we found that back in the days of ITR, theorists were getting substantially more (something like 2 times) as much funding from ITR grants as from Theoretical Foundations grants! We've also had a lot of success with Cybertrust. These other pools of money are funding a lot of theory research, because we've been diligent in applying.

Long-term, this is something that we as a community need to try to fix. The baseline funding for theory needs improvement, and we have to keep letting the NSF know why. But for the foreseeable future, we have to take advantage of these kinds of funding opportunities as they arise. And the best way to take advantage of the CDI opportunity is for lots of theorists to send in lots of great grants.

CCC and CDI in the CRA

Great stuff in the May Computing Research News. First, a Computing Community Consortium (CCC) piece by Bernat and Lazowska that everyone should read. Look at the prominent discussion of theory and the new CDI initiative!

1. Algorithms as a lens on the sciences: Beginning in the mid-1990s, several individual theorists became concerned about the field, where it was going, and how it was funded. There was considerable dissension, with the claims that the field was too inward-looking and too hung up on mathematical elegance as opposed to relevance. Events overtook discussion as theory became highly relevant to web-based applications, protocols, and other areas. Simultaneously, theory funding was dwindling so SIGACT set up a committee to look at these issues. It concluded that new directions that connected theory to other intellectually challenging areas would take funding pressure off the core (since folks have more sources to go to, leaving the core for folks who were uninterested in application areas). A workshop series on network computation led to NSF’s SING program, but SING had no money of its own and actually resulted in a decrease in theory funding. The SIGACT committee went back to work and developed the idea of algorithms as a lens on science. This idea went forward as a White Paper to appropriate folks within NSF. Eventually, after working its way through the internal NSF budget process, it resulted in a large new FY08 request—Cyber-Enabled Discovery and Innovation (a foundation-wide program beginning at $52 million in FY08 and intended to grow to $250 million in FY12).

This is an example of an idea begun by a few individuals, nurtured within a professional guild, supported by a federal agency, and turned into a major funded program—but not without a few bumps.

As part of that SIGACT committee, I think this is a good rough description of what we've been doing. Now that there's money going into the CDI program, theory people need to be sure to apply to get their share. Start thinking now, and there will be more on CDI in this blog coming up.

Also in the May issue is the Taulbee Survey. As far as I know, the primary use of the survey is for faculty to look up how much they should be paid. But there's other interesting data too!

The total Ph.D. production between July 2005 and June 2006 of 1,499 represents a phenomenal 26% increase.

And another nugget:

Actual Bachelor’s degree production in departments reporting this year was only 3.1% lower than the projection from last year’s reporting departments. From this year’s estimates, it would appear that another 16% decline is looming. If this holds true, it would represent a drop of more than 40% over a three-year period.

The news is much better when looking at new Bachelor’s degree students. For the first time in four years, the number of new undergraduate majors is slightly higher than the corresponding number last year.

I'm hoping they're right and that the number of new majors will start going up again...

CCC Update and Funding Opportunity

The Committee for the Advancement of Theoretical Computer Science (or CATCS, a commitee under SIGACT) is trying to spread the word about a new proposal of the CRA Computing Community Consortium (CCC). The proposal is designed to provide seed funding for new visions in computer science, with the goal of developing NSF programs to support these visions.

This may sound rather grandiose, but there's clearly room for theory to contribute. CATCS has been putting a lot of effort into providing vision for the Cyber-Enabled Discovery and Innovation (CDI) program that will be beginning soon, as well as trying to inject more theory vision into the GENI program (as in this report). As individuals and as a community, we have to make an effort to promote theoretical computer science, especially in the early stages when NSF programs are being developed. Funding apprarently begins with having your vision understood and accepted.

If you have a vision idea, please apply. If you're concerned about doing it on your own, contact a CATCS member, and we'll see if we can help get a group together, or otherwise assist in organizing a larger effort. There's an (out-of-date) list of members here, but you can always mail me if you like, and I'll pass things on.

This effort is a further sign that the CCC train is moving full steam ahead. Theory should be hopping on for the ride, and making sure we don't get left at the station. Since I know nothing about trains, I'll stop the metaphor there.

Finally, I have been informed that the slides from the CCC talks at FCRC are on-line. Enjoy!