Welcome to lanther.co.uk

Welcome to my website. Please feel free to browse at your will, using the menu on your left. The main page below is home to my (long neglected) weblog for those of you that are bored enough to take an interest in what's going on in my life :-). I'm currently a Principal Scientist at Adobe, working on the architecture for asset management and collaboration in Creative Cloud. Prior to this, I was the lead developer for Creative Cloud Libraries - a revolutionary new way of sharing creative content between different applications, devices, and people. I previously helped to develop Adobe Scout, which was a visual profiler for Flash and AIR applications. Prior to this, I was a researcher in the Language Based Technology group at the Technical University of Denmark, Copenhagen. I was part of the MT-LAB project, which is a collaboration between DTU, Aalborg University, and ITU, investigating formal verification techniques for advanced software systems. My particular research was concerned with probabilistic and stochastic analysis of distributed systems. I did my PhD in the Laboratory for Foundations of Computer Science, University of Edinburgh, supervised by Professor Jane Hillston. Previously, I studied at Robinson College, Cambridge. I originate from Bridlington, a little sea-side town on the Yorkshire coast. In the summer of 2005, I was a Senior Technical Associate at Fraser Research, in Princeton, New Jersey. Non-academically, I've been studying Japanese since January 2006, and I have been playing the fascinating game of Go since September 2006. I was previously the president of the Edinburgh University Go Club, and was a member of the Japan-UK 150 sub-committee for Scotland. My current grade is around 3kyu. Other than that, there's not much else to say. Feel free to enjoy the site! 楽しんでください！ Michael Smith

Sunday 27/11/05 @ 04:59 pm

Holidays are coming...

December is fast approaching, and with it the hectic run-up to Christmas. Sitting here, armed with my advent calendar, and with plenty of Christmas shopping under my belt, it seems like I should be prepared for it. Unfortunately, it's precisely this apparent sense of security that all too often hits you from behind when you're least expecting it. Hopefully this year, that won't happen.

So, another two weeks have passed, and without much to say for themselves. My work seems to be progressing, and I'll be talking about it at next week's PEPA club, and teaching has continued as usual. Next week is the last week of teaching (woohoo!), but unfortunately for me, I've been roped into covering for a few people, so I'll be doing almost twice as much as usual. As much as I've enjoyed it, I won't be doing any demonstrating next semester (which is possibly a dangerous thing to say before things are finalised). I'm hoping to do some more tutoring however, which is much more fun that wandering around answering dumb questions for four hours. Example conversation:

Student: I'm stuck on this question.
Me: What particular part of it? Show me what you've done.
Student: I don't even know how to start.
Me: Well, this is very similar to [insert question] that you answered last week. Do you remember?
Student: No.
Me: Well, let's start from the beginning shall we...
[detailed step-by-step explanation follows, with student nods]
Me: So, do you see how to do it now?
Student: No.

Honestly, it's like banging your head against a brick wall!

Next weekend, Sandy and Elisabeth arrive, so it'll be great to see them again. Sandy's giving a seminar on Monday, and Jane and I have been sorting out arrangments for meetings with people etc. I'm hoping that it'll go really well! On the 18th December, Alex and Carl will be arriving, so we should have a great time. There's so much going on here at Christmas - Princes Street is all lit up, and Princes Street Gardens have been turned into a veritable Christmas playground. Big wheel, ice skating, Christmas markets, the whole lot. I'm travelling back down to Brid on the 21st (with Carl and Alex), so I'll then be back for a whole two weeks.

With any luck, this Christmas should be great, though I wonder whether the parents' dancing will be as wild as last year. Yes, I remember, and in case you forgot...

Let the countdown begin!

Monday 14/11/05 @ 10:49 pm

Some things are best left unexplained...

Sunday 13/11/05 @ 07:06 pm

St. Marty Party

As everyone knows, November 11th is St Martin's day, who of course is the patron saint of wine. To commemorate this important occasion, Matija religiously organised a get-together yesterday evening - in other words, a St. Marty Party! Being prompt and British as usual, I was the first to arrive, but before long, the continental slackers showed up, and the festivities began.

In fact, the wine went down so well that we soon needed to make an excursion to top up the supplies.

Somehow, the subject of gherkins arose, which lead to much confusion amongst the non-British - in the end we had to resort to google to explain the concept, which is apparently dubbed a "small cucumber" in all cultures but our own.

What are gherkins? We just don't know

All this talk of pickles left Ezra somewhat bemused, to the extent that he began writing notes to himself in German, on the back of a maltesers wrapper...

"Mein kopf hat geboomt"

Whilst the Internet was present, Matija brought out some inside information about his supervisor...

"Gordon Plotkin must never see this!"

Of course, we couldn't put a bunch of Computer Scientists together without category theory being brought up. When it was realised by some that the course was over, there erupted a cheer of elation. This didn't stop Michael from writing down the definition of when a functor has a left adjoint though!

"No more category theory!"

As we entered the early hours of the morning, people started to leave, and the party came to a close.

Ezra, Jaro, Michael, Jorge, and I also left shortly afterwards, as soon as the admiration of Matija's socks was over.

"Nice socks - is that ANSI?"

All in all, a fitting tribute to that most alcoholic of saints!

Monday 07/11/05 @ 11:01 pm

Ghosts, Fireworks and the Pickle of Happiness

The last two weekends have been more than a little busy, what with people visiting me, and me visiting people, and all that that entails. To put it simply, my family came up to Edinburgh for halloween (being such a haunted, spooky city), and I went down to York (visiting Carl and Alex) for bonfire night. Good times were had by all, and we mostly avoided getting into a pickle (ignoring the magical ones for the time being).

On Friday 28th October, my parents arrived, with both brothers trailing. I managed to slip away from work in the early afternoon, and meet them over at my flat. They were all so happy to see me, they didn't stop smiling all weekend.

Seriously, we weren't going to a funeral; that's just the way they usually look ;-). The German guy in the middle is Alex, one of my continental flatmates.

We spent Friday afternoon having a wander up to the Royal Mile, having a pleasant (if windy) drink, before heading up to yonder castle. Ali was so excited at the experience, we couldn't shut him up. After admiring the architecture, the Scottish crown jewels, and (in my dad's case) the latrines, we went back home for a rest. The evening was spent at a pleasant Italian restaurant, followed by a bottle (or three) of wine back at my place, before my parents and Ali retired to their hotel, and Chris (who was staying with me) and I went to bed.

The next day was really rather hectic, starting off at 10am sharp, at the Edinburgh Dungeon. This was quite insightful, uncovering some shocking truths such as mother Mary's witchery - she's always talking about working with "the staff" at school, so it's becoming quite clear what she's really been up to all this time! After emerging from the dungeon, we walked around the New Town for a while, stopping for a coffee at BHS. Rather than walking back up Cockburn Street, the way we came, we decided to climb up to the castle via Princes Gardens, which was a nice stroll, but left Chris worse for wear. Lunch entailed the usual indecision, so I dragged everyone to one of my semi-usual haunts for a bite to eat and a sit down.

In the afternoon, we went on a tour of Mary King's Close. Now this is excellent, and I'd highly recommend it to anybody. Basically, a few of the old closes coming off the Royal Mile were built over, when the new City Hall was built, in the mid-18th century. However, parts of the streets still remain, deep beneath the new buildings, and we were taken on a tour of these passages and homes. It's very interesting and historical, with the odd ghost story thrown in too. Once the tour was finished, we were all pretty tired, so we headed back home for a rest, and my parents took Ali to the music store to buy his birthday/chistmas present - an electric guitar of all things!

Saturday evening, we ate at a place called the Buffet King - an all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet. It was actually pretty good, and in any case set us up for the late-night ghost walk to come. Meeting at 10pm, we set off on a guided tour through the streets of Edinburgh, taking us into the haunted vaults, deep beneath South Bridge. Apart from a group of giggle girls, dressed up as fairys, that I felt like throwing off the castle walls, it was an excellent tour, and the guide was very atmospheric. Since the tour didn't finish until 11.30pm, we were all pretty tired that night.

On Sunday, my parents decided to leave fairly early, so that they could have a slower drive back along the coast. I said goodbye to them, and settled down to a pretty quiet day, with a bit of reading and some preparation for my usual Monday morning teaching. The rest of last week passed fairly uneventfully, and it was my turn to give the Computation and Logic talk, for which I presented a proof of the Church-Rosser theorem, amongst other lambda-calculus related stuff.

Last weekend was bonfire night, and since York was having various special events for the 400th anniversary of the attempted explosion, I headed down there to meet up with Carl and Alex. Once again leaving work earlier than usual on Friday (I mustn't make this a habit :-S), I caught the train down to York, arriving at about 5.30pm. Carl met me at the station, and we walked over to his house, where we spent a much-needed quiet evening, involving excellent omeletes and a number of amusing programmes. The highlight had to be the film Mahoujin Guruguru: The Pickle of Happiness! Tremendously funny, I'm determined to get hold of the entire series - whilst it's not available to buy in the shops, bittorrent is my friend :-).

On Saturday morning, Carl and I headed into York in time to meet Alex. Well, we were on time, but Alex was late ;-P. This did, however, give us time to look around Travelling Man, and a few other interesting shops, before getting over to the bus stop for 12pm. Carl was very impressed with the Merchant Adventurer's Hall, while we were waiting.

Finally, Alex arrived, in true "classy chick" style!

The first trip of the day was to check out the expensive jacket that Alex liked the look of. A bit pricey, but undoubtedly nice.

We stopped off in Borders for a coffee, while we decided where to go for lunch.

In the end, we found a nice little cafe, where Alex and I each enjoyed a giant Yorkshire pudding/casserole, and Carl a toasted sandwich. After lunch, we resumed shopping, and Alex dragged us into Debenhams to look at shiny dresses (she's a magpie, I tell thee!). I had the last laugh though, as I dragged everyone into the mensware section, and proceeded to expand my wardrobe. I even bought a nice new stripey shirt! All this shopping made Carl come over all funny, though.

There was supposed to be a plethora of street entertainers, so we went in search, and found a couple. Nothing much more than the usual though, which was a bit of a let-down. As it started to get dark, we wandered through the Shambles, towards York Minster.

Now this, at least, was a sight worth seeing - the Minster was completely lit up, in vibrant colours, and the bells were chiming out for a good half hour. There were throngs of people - it's the busiest I've ever seen York, for certain!

After admiring the lights for a while, we popped into a nearby cafe for a quick drink, before rushing back out to see the fireworks. It was a nice display, but not as impressive as I thought it might be - then again it's hard to compare them to the American extravagances I've seen. Once the display finished, we queued up for the park and ride, even bumping into Saira! It must be more than three years since I'd last seen her!

Back at Alex's car, we drove to our usual haunt for dinner - namely the Black Bull. A pint of Carling and a stilton/mushroom burger rounded the evening off, before we dropped Carl off, and Alex and I drove back to Bridlington, for the night.

Sunday was yet another hectic day. It began in the morning, when Alex came round (this time, after I'd woken up and dressed ;-), and we went to see my grandma. This was something of a surprise for her (hopefully a pleasant one ;-).

We even bumped into my Aunt Christine, and Steve, who just happened to be visiting that day. The last time I saw Christine was during the summer, in Princeton (and it was raining then too ;-).

After saying our farewells, Alex and I popped into town to Argos, to pick up a few things (including one of those cassette adapters so I could play my iPod in the car), before driving to... yes, you've guessed it, Hornsea! The chocolate shop was awaiting our visit as though nothing had changed.

After a very nice lunch (I had a slice of quiche, and Alex had a jacket potato with tuna), we just had to round it off with dessert, and boy what a dessert!

By the time we were finished indulging ourselves, there wasn't long before I had to be leaving for Edinburgh. We did, however, have time to walk around the Bridlington town centre one last time. See if you can spot the irony below ;-)

The Promenade is the same as always - some things just never change.

And as we walked towards the seafront, I just had to get a snap of the old Indian place - it used to be very nice, until they started getting overfriendly. We really won't be going back there after last time.

The sea was a little choppy, but the harbour was unchanged. All the attractions were shut down for the winter, and it was rather bleak and windy.

Once we were fed up and cold enough, we headed back to my place, where I chatted with my parents for a bit, before they drove me through to York. I was just in time to catch the 6.05pm train, and despite playing musical chairs with reservations, and being forced to stand all the way to Newcastle, I arrived in Edinburgh in one piece, and was back home by 9pm, in time to prepare for today's teaching, and the start of another week in the life of a PhD student.