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In the past few days, I have found myself in Christchurch, Aotearoa, New Zealand. The formal reason is to attend and present at eResearch New Zealand, which, despite its size, is a world-class conference in terms of the quality of presentations, discussion, and international guests. With the first day for the Software/Data Carpentries held at the University of Canterbury, the rest of the conference has been held at the "Chateau on the Park" a somewhat bizarre place that combines modern materials with an Arthurian theme. I have written up more extensively about the conference, but to give a summary: there is extensive and explosive growth in the capability of AI/ML that is surprising even hardware vendors, there is an ongoing development in the NZ HPC space which correlates with UniMelb's own developments in architecture and training, and there are interesting institutional challenges for eResearch in New Zealand with the upcoming merger between the two infrastructure providers, REANNZ and NeSI. My own presentation, "HPC Bioinformatics Education: The University of Melbourne Experience", was well-received and is subject to ongoing discussion. Of course, the great benefit of such conferences is the meetings and networking; this was a great opportunity to catch up with some old friends on colleagues, especially including David Eyres from Otago University and Fracois Bissey of the University of Canterbury.
The location of the conference is probably at one of the most attractive parts of Christchurch, across the road from the Botanical Gardens, Hagley Park, and Mona Vale Garden Park. With extensive foresting mixed with the occasional sportsball ground, the small but beautiful Avon River meandering throughout, and close to the truly beautiful old buildings that make up Christchurch's Arts Centre (and, it must be admitted, the buildings of the private boy's school, Christ's College). It is all lush, and makes one feel of the upper-middle class regions of educated England, the sort of place that Professor Tolkien would feel at home; "a green and pleasant land", as Blake would put it. Of course, Christchurch was subject to some devastating earthquakes a little over a decade ago. Apart from the loss of almost two hundred lives, the city still bears some physical scars, with the iconic cathedral still a shell of its former self. Overall, however, the place has been rebuilt, and life has returned, more or less, to normal. Now that the conference is over, I will spend the weekend in further exploration before heading to Wellington.
The location of the conference is probably at one of the most attractive parts of Christchurch, across the road from the Botanical Gardens, Hagley Park, and Mona Vale Garden Park. With extensive foresting mixed with the occasional sportsball ground, the small but beautiful Avon River meandering throughout, and close to the truly beautiful old buildings that make up Christchurch's Arts Centre (and, it must be admitted, the buildings of the private boy's school, Christ's College). It is all lush, and makes one feel of the upper-middle class regions of educated England, the sort of place that Professor Tolkien would feel at home; "a green and pleasant land", as Blake would put it. Of course, Christchurch was subject to some devastating earthquakes a little over a decade ago. Apart from the loss of almost two hundred lives, the city still bears some physical scars, with the iconic cathedral still a shell of its former self. Overall, however, the place has been rebuilt, and life has returned, more or less, to normal. Now that the conference is over, I will spend the weekend in further exploration before heading to Wellington.
