Davide Sangiorgi
University of Bologna, Italy
I enjoyed FSEN 07 immensely, from all points of view:
scientific, cultural, and social.
The conference itself was excellent, with very good talks, and
plenty of opportunities to talk and discuss with other researchers.
There were a few paper presentations by Iranians, and these were
very interesting too. In fact, I realized in this trip that
the level of education and research in Iran is much higher than
one would expect. There are extremely brilliant students,
as I realized in the 2-days tutorial I gave at the end
of the conference.
We had a fantastic 3-day trip as part of the conference social events, to
Isfahan, a treasure of Iranian culture and heritage.
We also had a wonderful social dinner in Teheran, on top of a hill whose
name I have forgotten.
A strong memory of this trip is also the
hospitality and friendliness of Iranians. I had a number of pleasant
conversations with locals, both within the University and outside (in
Teheran and Isfahan). Even when conversations were difficult because of
the language, I would feel touched by the sincere smiles and eyes around
me. I found this even more impressive given that FSEN07 took place
during a period of high international tension, between Iran and Western
countries.I do hope to have other chances of going to Iran in the future.
In any case I wish that FSEN will continue as a conference series, and
strongly recommend it to researchers.
Peter Mosses
Swansea University, UK
To those doing research in Fundamentals of Software Engineering:
Please consider submitting a paper to FSEN '09 in Iran!
The previous conference in the series had about 100 participants from
15 countries, and was very well organised. If interested, you might
like to take a look at the LNCS proceedings of FSEN '07:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-75698-9
Jan Rutten
CWI, Netherlands; Vrije University Amsterdam, Netherlands
Participating in the FSEN conference in 2005 offered me the opportunity to learn more about
computer science in Iran as well as the country itself.
The level of research in computer science in Iran is high,
probably much higher than you would expect as a visitor from abroad.
There were talks at FSEN from both Iranians and visitors, and
most were of very high quality. The two FSEN awards, for the most
distinguished paper and presentation, were both won by Iranian
participants.
Impressive is also the level of education in Iranian university
students, which was illustrated amongst others by the many relevant
questions that were asked by them, during and after the lectures.
The country Iran, and most importantly the Iranians themselves,
were a wonderful surprise. Hospitality and friendliness are truly
impressive (and instructive). The country has a rich and very
interesting cultural heritage. Where on earth do you find taxidrivers reading
poetry while waiting for the next customer? The atmosphere, more generally, is
very relaxed and happy. Myself being from Western Europe,
the people and the way they behave reminded me very much of
Italy.
I hope there will be a next installment of FSEN, in 2007, and
I warmly recommend the event to computer scientists worldwide.
Mark-Oliver Stehr
SRI International
It is a pleasure for me to write this brief note about FSEN'05,
because it was a conference in one of the most beautiful and exciting
countries that I have ever visited. The excursions before the
conference, especially to the ancient ruins of Persepolis, were for me
a one-in-a-lifetime experience and will never be forgotten. The
hospitality of the Iranian people was visible everywhere. At no time
there was a moment to feel lost, because the organizers took care of
each individual request and every single detail, including visa
(another story for which this note is too short), accommodation,
transport, and other travel arrangements. Thanks to the organizers, I
had the great pleasure to stay in the new IPM guest house, with very
modern rooms, an extremely friendly staff, and a state-of-the-art
network connection to the outside world. The conference was held very
close to the surrounding mountain in the north of Tehran from where it
is possible to oversee the entire city. The atmosphere was relaxing
with many opportunities to exchange ideas, and the talks covered a
wide spectrum ranging from theoretical foundations to experimental DNA
computing, the topic of an invited talk given by Joost Kok that was my
favorite. It illustrated new opportunities arising from the faulty
nature of massively parallel biological machines to approach
computationally intractable problems. All in all, I was very
impressed by the breath of the conference, the high quality of papers
and talks, especially of local students, the interest of the audience,
the list of prominent speakers, and last but not least it was just
great fun to meet so many old and new faces. A wonderful place was
selected for the conference dinner. It was a Kurdish restaurant with
a beautiful view from the mountains of Jamshidieh Park, a large park
that is unbelievably lively till late in the night. Given that the
first IPM FSEN conference was such a big success, I can only recommend
participating in the next one (FSEN'07) to anybody who has a broad
interest in foundations for software engineering and beyond and has
the curiosity to visit a country which is truly amazing and out of the
ordinary.
Marcello Bonsangue
Leiden University
The conference included fairly formal lectures given by an
excellent choice of speakers both from the region and outside.
The program was very valuable to me as a researcher.
The social event was very well received. I liked the opportunity
to network with local researchers and gain better insight of
the iranian culture.
To summarize, the conference was a great success. My special
thanks go to Dr. Marjan Sirjani and her team behind the scenes
who set up the conference in a very professional way.
Dave Clarke
Centrum voor Wiskunde en Informatica (CWI)
I very much enjoyed my trip to Iran and the FSEN conference.
Iran is a very beautiful country. I was most impressed by the
hospitality and friendliness of its people. The conference was
well organized and the talks were of a high quality. A prestigious
collection of invited speakers topped off an excellent event.
I would very much like to come back.
Shahram Esmaeilsabzali
School of Computer Science
University of Waterloo
Well, the first thing that comes to my mind about FSEN05, is the quality of
workshop; it was beyond my expectation. Papers were selected thoughtfully,
and as such there were some coherent sessions during the workshop where you
could enjoy several related presentations in one session. Furthermore, the
quality of papers, presentations, and keynotes were really good. I remember
saying to one of the organizers of FSEN05 that, in my experience of
attending workshops, I believe FSEN is more like a conference than a
workshop. As the first workshop of the series of FSEN, I found it absolutely
good and enjoyable.
I should say here that Dr. Marjan Sirjani put a lot of efforts to make
FSEN05 a success. She was patient and helpful both through my many email
correspondences, and during the workshop itself. I did not join the workshop
trip to Shiraz, but I know that she put a lot of effort to make it possible.
I should say a big "thank you" to her!
Last but not least, I should thank enthusiastic student volunteers who were
always there for help. They went beyond their duties to help the workshop
attendees.
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