James Hetherington

Ok, it didn’t quite work, but you get the point.

Hey, we invented Tulips!

That’s a flower.

Yes, we’ve been quietly growing flowers for 50 years. But now we decided to Call Them Tulips! The final flower!

Right, but it’s frustrating to ignore all the good work in growing flowers.

Yes, but you’ve gotta be Tulip ready!

Also I have loads of conferences coming up including one in the Pestilent States…

Non-sick employees are a more exploitable resource.

Double jabbed! Flu paid by UCL, covid privately. Would recommend.

Popes hate this one weird trick!

Photo shows a table covered in sticky notes

Research Infrastructure Engineers (RIE's) are the technical staff who build and maintain accelerated compute clusters. RIEs are invited to join the ACIT-Hub Training CoDesign Day on Oct 28 in Edinburgh to help define the training it offers: edin.ac/43f5VHR

caPitalising rAndom letters IN the title to Form the word yoU want is not cLever - PAINFUL. #reviewing

You know when you’re reviewing grants, and it’s like meh, meh, meh, WOW THIS IS THE BEST PROPOSAL EVER WISH ID THOUGHT OF IT, meh, meh, meh.

⏳ The DisCouRSE Network+ has launched its first Flexible Fund, offering up to £10,000 to support projects that strengthen leadership training and career pathways for digital Research Technical Professionals (dRTPs).

Find out more at www.software.ac.uk/news/discour...

I agree, but also, memorisable identifiers (like what three words or the xkcd password protocol) exist and should be used in place of opaque UIDs wherever possible.

Yes, there is too much boilerplate in current languages, and natural language interfaces will have a big role to play in tools for skilled analysts.

But “computer, please use this data to show the result I want” is going to create bad stats, and bad business decisions.

Code is the most productive, reliable and expressive way of describing mathematical ideas to computers.

I have worked building GUIs for designing system models, in industry and academia.

They seem attractive at first, but users realise that *they are more productive with code* once they practice.

You cannot safely do statistics or modelling without understanding the risks of lying to yourself.

If you have the intellectual ability to do this, the code is actually easy.

If you don’t, you will harm your company by trying.

Let’s just go over again why low/no code platforms for data analytics and computational modelling are Wrong.

I do this because I’ve just seen another advert for a tool “so all your colleagues can get insight from data regardless of technical ability”, and I need to call bullshit again. 1/N

“The sorry identifier magically produces a proof of anything, or provides an object of any data type at all.” lean-lang.org/theorem_prov...

Fermats margin proof was ‘sorry’ : #Lean4

What is the fractal dimension of the Jagged Frontier?

For advanced knowledge workers, there’s an assumption the job is 10% explicit learning, (self taught, conferences and formal courses), 20% on job learning, 20% faff, meetings and admin, and 50% productive.

This will change. Maybe 75% explicit learning, 5% faff and 20% productivity time.

ReSA Director Michelle Barker introduces the International Research Software Conference during RSECon25.

We’re excited to announce the International Research Software Conference (IRSC)!

7–8 September 2026 | Sheffield, UK & online | Co-located with #RSECon26 @society-rse.org

Learn more: www.researchsoft.org/irsc/

For updates, join: preview.mailerlite.io/forms/778129...

Image by @danielskatz.org

I this essay I will <etc etc etc>…

Germline enhancement was not the only technology the federation exercised a ban on, given the complete absence of anything resembling microblogging in the late 24th century.

The success of the federation in maintaining a technology forward culture despite selective bans must be further explored.

Fluent, generative natural language computing was *not* confused with AGI, given the ship’s computer and Data are clearly distinguished in capability.

The federation had carefully reflected on
mid 2020s IT shock as a partial cause of the Post Atomic Horror.

“Midjourney on the holodeck”.

Star Trek TNG anticipated recent advances in generative AI, from autogenerated UX in the bridge consoles to narrative generation via prompt in the holodeck, to deep research with the ship’s computer in episodes such as Remember Me.

Beyond ‘we used ChatGPT’: a new way to declare AI in research - Research Professional News Recording which tasks were done when builds trust and transparency, say Yana Suchikova and colleagues

Beyond ‘we used ChatGPT’: a new way to declare AI in research.

Recording which tasks were done when builds trust and transparency, say Yana Suchikova and colleagues.

www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-euro...

Glorifying violence or harm violates Bluesky’s Community Guidelines. We review reports and take action on content that celebrates harm against anyone. Violence has no place in healthy public discourse, and we’re committed to fostering healthy, open conversations

Using a lot of Just Block today. The Bluesky social protocol is sound.

Just a reminder that despite the horror the world and all the people in it are also really interesting valuable and worth our love.

Extra tables being brought in to the room for our discussion on GenAI and research software engineering at RSECon25. It’s going to be interesting…

Context: how is the way research grants are funded influencing the architecture of research software?