Minutes of the 15th EG-ICE Assembly

2nd July 2008, Plymouth UK

Introduction

Ian Smith welcomed the participants.

The minutes of the 14th EG-ICE AGM were approved and there were no matters arising.

Chairman’s Report

Ian Smith thanked Yaqub Rafiq for the excellent meeting and his personal involvement in organising such a well attended workshop.  He admired the range and variety of topics and new disciplines that participated in this workshop.

He was encouraged by the strong participation of researchers in the construction area and this is positive for the future EG-ICE workshops. He also welcomed the growth in sensor and data interpretation research which lead to excellent papers submitted to this workshop.

Ian also commented on the status of the group, saying that it is at a turning point. In the Plymouth workshop we had 58 abstracts, 53 participants, 50 presentations and 12 PhD students, which is unprecedented in previous workshops.

He also welcomed news such as new positions becoming available in Cardiff and stated that such events are good opportunities for the EG-ICE to add new members.

Vice Chair’s Report

John Miles reiterated the importance of participation from the young members of the EG-ICE.

The improvements in the ASCE Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering were welcomed and he stated that the editorship of Jim Garrett and Lucio Soibelman has made a difference. 

It was mentioned that he is no longer the European Editor of the journal, having instead become the Speciality Editor for Non-Standard Applications and he reiterated that while the journal is maintaining its standards, the number of submissions from European authors has declined markedly in the last year.

ICCCBE 2010 will be held in Nottingham, where Walid Tizani will be the host and he welcomed EG-ICE participation in this conference.

John mentioned that Haijiang (Michael) Li has just started as a new member of staff in Cardiff, Yacine Rezgui has also just started and soon there will be openings for further new faculty positions in Cardiff.

 

Report from the Secretary/Treasurer

Yaqub Rafiq presented the following financial report:

 

Transfer from Cardiff University on 3/07/2003         2912.60

Income

Expenditure

Source

Date

Amount

 

Source

Date

Amount

 

Balance

EG-SEA-AI Fund Cardiff

03/07/03

£2,912.60

 

Delft Dinner (EG-ICE 10th anniversary)

Jul-03

£443.19

 

£2,469.41

 

 

 

 

EG-ICE Domain and website etc. fees to (Seán McAndrew)

Dec-04

£47.88

 

£2,421.53

 

 

 

 

EG-ICE Domain 2005               

Apr-05

£6.30

 

£2,415.23

 

 

 

 

Adam's Radziejowice        Accommodation for guests in Warsaw

Jul-05

£179.14

 

£2,236.09

 

 

 

 

EG-ICE Award Plague

 

£35.00

 

£2,201.09

 

 

 

 

EG-ICE Domain 2006            

 

Paid by UoP

 

 

EPFL (Ascona 2006)

15/12/06

£3,686.30

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

EG-ICE Domain 2008            

 

To be added

 

 

 

 

 

 

EG-ICE Account Renewal 2008            

 

To be added

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Total

£6,598.90

 

 

Total

£711.51

 

£5,887.39

There will be some contribution to EG-ICE funds from the Plymouth 2008 event once the final bills are settled.

Yaqub reiterated that one of the good uses of this fund is to encourage more PhD students to participate in the future EG-ICE workshops by offering discounted registration fees.

He also mentioned the importance of inviting good keynote speakers to encourage good participation.

Yaqub mentioned that Plymouth was a good PR campaign for the EG-ICE and we should keep this going to encourage more participation.

Collaboration with other groups and committees

·         Ian Smith is a member of ASCE TCCIT ExCom and ASCE GCEC ExCom

·         The group has good contacts with CIB W78

·         EG-ICE is actively involved in the ASCE Global Centre for Excellence in Computing (ACSE GCEC). Ian mentioned that over 750 slides on different topics have been produced and the contribution from EG-ICE has been more than 50% of the target body of knowledge.

·         John Miles is the Chair of WC6 “Information Technology” of IABSE. Ian mentioned that 50% of the membership in this group is from industry members.

·         Ian and John are Board Members of ICCCBE

·         Ian is a Committee Member of the European Conference of Process and Product Modelling. Their next meeting is in Nice in September and he will explore opportunities for better coordination and collaboration

Next meeting

It was decided to have the 16th EG-ICE workshop in Berlin, Germany. Wolfgang Huhnt has generously offered to be the host for this workshop. The dates for the 16th workshop will be fixed in the next few weeks.

Adam Borkowski proposed Poland and Markku Heinisuo proposed Finland for a future EG-ICE workshop.  Walid Tizani proposed that the 17th Workshop should be held in Nottingham during the next ICCCBE conference. The location of the 17th workshop will be confirmed at the next AGM.

Varia / Discussion - activities of the EG-ICE

Ian Smith welcomed William O’Brian’s invitation for the EG-ICE to have a session in the 2009 ASCE International Workshop on Computing in Civil Engineering in Austin, Texas.  Members please get your abstracts ready for this event. This event will be from 24 – 27th June 2009.

Ian Smith pointed out that the special issue of the group journal (Advanced Engineering Informatics) would be prepared from the papers presented in this workshop. John Miles will be the Guest Editor. He mentioned that papers submitted to this issue must be significantly extended (about 20 pages) with additional results and a comprehensive literature review. The time for full paper submission will be October 2008.  Ian mentioned that the group’s journal has improved its impact factor to be >1 which very high for an engineering publication in this field.