ATLANTA – Dec. 15, 2011 – What makes a perfect holiday gift for the technology enthusiast? There are hundreds of lists out there that showcase the hottest electronics and “must-have” devices for this year’s holiday season. However, for those hard-core technophiles who are truly ahead-of-the-curve, smartphones and tablet computers are so last year. With 10 shopping days left, the Georgia Tech College of Computing has released its own unique spin on the traditional holiday gift guide, showcasing some of the year’s biggest research stories and providing top technologists with all sorts of “gift” ideas for this holiday season.

“They sometimes bristle at being called ‘elves,’ but we’ve got a College full of faculty and students who’ve been working very hard on these projects all year,” said Zvi Galil, John P. Imlay Jr. Dean of Computing. “We are, obviously, having a bit of fun in showcasing our research like this, but there’s also a serious point. Part of our mission is to help improve the world through education and research, and the projects in this gift guide can legitimately be counted among our efforts to give back to society—indeed, some are explicitly intended as computational ways to serve the social good.”

The Gift Guide includes projects created by students and faculty in the College and its three constituent schools: the School of Computer Science, the School of Interactive Computing and the School of Computational Science and Engineering. With 10 suggestions incorporating a dozen overall projects, the Gift Guide has something for everyone—or, at least, everyone who’s computationally minded.

Projects include:

• Percepto: iPhone puzzle game created by Georgia Tech undergraduate Daniel Hooper.
• 2012 Emerging Cyber Threats Report: annual report detailing the newest and most serious threats to cyber security in the coming year, prepared by the Georgia Tech Information Security Center and the Georgia Tech Research Institute
• Courteous.ly: Gmail application that allows users to see a prospective email recipients current email load, created by professor Eric Gilbert
• Home Network Management Tools: Three software packages that allow home network users to monitor and manage connection speeds, usage patterns and more; created by professors Constantine Dovrolis and Nick Feamster and research scientist Marshini Chetty
• Pipeline: Web-based collaboration system optimized for creative multimedia projects, created by Ph.D. student Kurt Luther
• Abelard to Apple: New book by former Dean Rich DeMillo that takes a 100-year look at the future of U.S. colleges and universities, including the role of new technologies in higher education
• PSI4: Suite of quantum chemical programs designed for efficient, high-accuracy calculations of properties of molecules, created by professor David Sherrill
• LifeNet: Software that allows users to create mobile ad hoc computer networks, designed specifically for use in disaster response; created by professor Santosh Vempala and master’s student Hrushi Mehendale
• Trimensional: App that turns any iPhone 4 into a full-fledged 3D scanner, created by research scientist Grant Schindler
• Simon: Socially embedded humanoid robot that can learn simple tasks from spoken conversations with everyday people, no programming knowledge required; created by professor Andrea Thomaz

Visit the 2011 Holiday Gift Guide on the College of Computing website!

DISCLAIMER: The 2011 Holiday Gift Guide is a lighthearted way to call attention to the College’s research. Though some of the items described in the Gift Guide are indeed available for purchase or free download, it is not intended as a practical reference for consumers.

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About the Georgia Tech College of Computing

The Georgia Tech College of Computing is a national leader in the creation of real-world computing breakthroughs that drive social and scientific progress. With its graduate program ranked 10th nationally by U.S. News and World Report, the College’s unconventional approach to education is defining the new face of computing by expanding the horizons of traditional computer science students through interdisciplinary collaboration and a focus on human centered solutions. For more information about the Georgia Tech College of Computing, its academic divisions and research centers, please visit http://www.cc.gatech.edu.

Contacts

Brendan Streich

Director of Communications

College of Computing at Georgia Tech

bstreich@cc.gatech.edu

404-894-7253