Team Xormis Advances to MIcrosoft's Imagine Cup World Finals

In addition to the traditional software development competition, for which Team EDUC8 from NCU/Jamaica has already won the regional finals, the Imagine Cup has additional awards for which teams from around the world can compete for. There are six awards this year, and students from the CIS Department have submitted entries for four of these:

• Internet Explorer 8 Award
• Interoperability Award
• Next Generation Web Award
• Windows Phone 7 Award

Further information on these and other awards may be found at the following site:
http://imaginecup.com/CompetitionsContent/Competition/awards_at_a_glance.aspx

Please note that teams who compete for these awards are doing so against a number of others from around the world. Team Xormis, who placed 2nd in the Regional Finals of the Software Design competition, had previously advanced to the 2nd round of the competitions for the Internet Explorer 8 and Next Generation Web Awards, and is also competing for the Interoperability Award.

Early this morning, the results were announced for these awards. Competing against the rest of the world for these awards, I am pleased to announce that Team Xormis from NCU has been selected as one of the only 3 Finalists for this award and will be traveling to Poland this year to compete against two other teams from Indonesia and Brazil for the top spot in this competition.

Visit the following website to see all the finalist.
http://imaginecup.com/Competition/Finalists.aspx

The following link provides more information about the Interoperability Award.
http://imaginecup.com/Competition/mycompetitionportal.aspx?competitionId=42

The members of Team Xormis are:

• Shawn McLean
• Dwayne Samuels
• Derron Brown
• Markel Mairs
• Kenrie Hylton (Mentor)

The is a phenomenal achievement!! We congratulate Team Xormis for this historic success, as well all other participants in this year's Imagine Cup competition for their efforts. This means we will have an unprecedented two teams from NCU participating in the World Finals this year!

And the winner is....

On Wednesday April 28, 2010, three teams from the Department of Computer & Information Sciences at Northern Caribbean University presented their projects for the Multi-Country Americas Finals of the Microsoft Imagine Cup competition. It is the first time that multiple teams from the same country were able to compete at this level not to mention from the same university. The teams went up against a number of other teams from various countries around the Caribbean and Central America.

Each team worked extremely hard to get to this point and develop worthy, remarkable solutions. All three teams presented their projects well and we are proud of their efforts and achievements to date.

Unfortunately only one (1) of the ten (10) qualifying teams could be selected to represent the region at the world finals in Poland in July of this year and the winner is........

Team Educ8 - "Project eSCAPE” - Northern Caribbean University - Jamaica

Best wishes to the team as they continue their journey in a bid to lift the take home First Place in the World Finals.

Imagine Cup 2010 Update

Congratulations to Nicholas Brown (Meteor Strike), a freshman in the Department of Computer and Information Sciences, for advancing to Round 2 in the Game Design category of the Imagine Cup 2010.

Imagine Cup 2010 Update

Congratulations to Teams Educ8 and Xormis for advancing to Round 2 in the Next Gen Web Award of the Imagine Cup 2010

Imagine Cup MCA Regional Finalists announced

The finalist teams for the Microsoft Imagine Cup Multi-Country Americas Regional finals have been announced today Monday January 11, 2010. The finalist teams represent Jamaica, Guatemala, El Salvador and the Dominican Republic.

Below is the list of teams that will participate in the regional finals:

Jamaica

• Project Xormis - Northern Caribbean University
• Project eSCAPE - Northern Caribbean University
• Project A.L.E.R.T. - Northern Caribbean University

Guatemala

• Uniendo pacientes y médicos a través de una herramienta tecnológica – Universidad Galileo
• VIVIENDO LA MATERNIDAD CON TECNOLOGIA - UNIVERSIDAD MARIANO GALVEZ DE GUATEMALA
• Control de la Prenatalidad - Universidad Rafael Landívar & Universidad San Carlos de Guatemala
• ReStudy: Estudiar es para todos - Universidad Rafael Landívar

República Dominicana

• Learning Touches - Instituto Especializado de Educación Superior Loyola
• Software Enviroment Clean Out - Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo y Universidad APEC

El Salvador

• HELPLA.NET - Universidad de El Salvador
• Tutor Virtual de Matemáticas para Educación Primaria - Universidad de El Salvador

The winner of this regional competition will go on to represent the region at the world final in Warsaw, Poland.

ServerQuest II

Do you remember playing the vintage computers games King's Quest or Leisure Suit Larry? If so, you should enjoy Microsoft TechNet's ServerQuest II game. It emulates the same sort of pixilated graphics and cheesy humor as those classics, but it's aimed at IT professionals and computer specialists.

In the game, which is created with Silverlight and runs in your browser, you play an IT pro (either Matt or Alicia) whose objective is to keep the network running smoothly while encountering a host of technical problems that are presented as games and puzzles, ranging from the absurd to things you might encounter in the real life of an IT pro. As you work through the tasks, you'll learn about and use Microsoft technologies to solve problems, encounter hidden Easter Eggs, earn geek points, and get to post your high scores for others to compete against. The game is really very humorous -- and you might even learn some interesting troubleshooting techniques as you play.

Writing the Imagine Cup Proposal

A proposal is simply a description of what your project is and how you and your team will go about it. The proposal should be no more than 4 pages long and should include, but may not need four main the following, a Problem Definition, an Overview, Technologies Used, and your System Architecture.

The outline below gives suggestions on what can go into a proposal. Your proposal does not have to look like the outline below, for example any sub-header may be a main header. However you may write your proposal this outline may help you by giving you a starting point. Please note that the outline below is not a proposal, it is only an outline of a proposal.

• Cover
• Title


• Team Name
• Project Name
• Team Members
• Contact Info


• Intro
• What is this document for?
• What to expect in this document?


• Problem Definition
• What is the problem you are trying to solve
• How you plan to solve it
• Brief description of project
• Generally how it works
• Who will benefit
• How your project applies to this year's Imagine Cup Theme


• Technologies/software/tools
• Any tools you might use in your project


• System Architecture
• A description of your architecture
• A visual representation of your architecture