How To Get Involved in Europa

This document contains a necessarily incomplete list of possible Europa student research projects. If you are interested in pursuing any of the projects below, or one of your own design involving further study of software component engineering principles and practices, please contact Prof. Tim Long (long@cse.ohio-state.edu), Prof. Bruce Weide (weide.1@osu.edu), Dr. Paolo Bucci (bucci@cse.ohio-state.edu), or Dr. Wayne Heym (w.heym@ieee.org).

Your Responsibilities

Student research projects may be conducted by individuals, but small (typically two-person) teams are preferable for most activities. You should plan to spend about 6 hours per week on a project, averaged over the term. You should expect to be accountable to the project leader(s) and to your teammate(s) by meeting project deadlines and giving periodic reports at Europa group meetings, possibly including a paper that could be submitted for publication and/or a senior honors thesis. You also should plan to attend a group meeting each week and provide feedback on others' work and presentations.

Your Rewards

Typically you may count a few hours of independent study credit (but often not all the credit hours you will receive) toward your technical elective requirements; you may decide to continue on a project and do a senior honors thesis in this area; you can tell prospective employers and graduate schools that you've worked on a research project, and possibly that you've published some paper(s) about your work; and when grant money is available we can pay you an hourly stipend of about $9/hr. But don't get involved for the credits or a padded resume or the money.  Do it for the experience and because you want to learn -- about what computer science and engineering research is like, and about the subject matter of that research.

Where The Money Comes From

Many students are surprised to learn that someone is actually willing to pay you to do research. We tap various sources of funds for this.  The diversity program in the CSE Department is coordinated by Prof. Tim Long (long@cse.ohio-state.edu). This GE Fund-sponsored program includes a special Undergraduate Research Opportunities (UROP) category with funding for minority and women undergraduates to become involved in faculty-led research projects. Awards pay undergraduate research stipends. Applications for these awards are due in early fall quarter, and sometimes in other quarters. Similar opportunities are sometimes available to highly-qualified male non-minority students through supplemental funding of RSRG work provided by other sponsors.

Index of Project Areas

Project ideas in red could have serious publication potential.

Software Composition Workbench

There are many subprojects related to the Software Composition Workbench (SCW). The SCW is being developed using Java, so the first thing you'll have to do is to learn Java. Please contact the SCW designer and lead developer, Dr. Paolo Bucci (bucci@cse.ohio-state.edu), for more information.

Design

Component Implementation

Testing and Verification

Performance Analysis

Student Support

Teaching Support

Other