June 2, 2009 · 11:22 pm

Whirlwind Daughter Tour

My daughter Jessica was with us for a whirlwind visit after her
Sophomore final exams at
Carnegie Mellon University (in Pittsburgh, PA) and before
starting her summer internship with the

World Organization for Human Rights USA in Washington, D.C.
We had not seen Jessica since January, so the whole family (and
her boyfriend Matt) took turns enjoying her company. We are all
very proud of our busy and clever girl!

We went to the movies (seeing
Star Trek and
Wolverine), many doctor visits for Paul, Paul’s annual

IEP to set up his classes and support for next year, and shopping.
Jessica also joined us tutoring for Studio 17 at
SMUM, and we had two nights of
playing cards and board games. She and our little neighbor
Sonia even washed the dogs. I think Jessica caught up on her sleep
in between all the visits. We look forward to seeing Jessica again
in August for a few weeks before CMU starts again. Until then, we go
back to reading Jessica’s blog for updates. I am very glad she is a good writer…

waiting for the doctor

waiting for the doctor John Plocher, Jessica Dickinson Goodman, Paul Dickinson Goodman photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson 		Jessica and Sonia wash the dogs

Jessica Dickinson Goodman and Sonia wash the dogs photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson 		Matt, Jessica, Paul

Matt Holmes, Jessica Dickinson Goodman, Paul Dickinson Goodman photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson
waiting for the doctor

waiting for the doctor Jessica Dickinson Goodman, Paul Dickinson Goodman photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson 		Studio 17 Tutoring at SMUM

Studio 17 Tutoring at SMUM photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson

Images Copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson

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June 2, 2009 · 10:26 pm

SEED Mentor Matching Off to a Good Start

I started the mentor matching cycle late last week for the 15 June –
15 December 2009
SEED and PreSEED worldwide Engineering mentoring terms.
Sheri Kaneshiro is providing support for the extensive SEED
web tools designed by Tanya Jankot while Tanya is on leave
with her new baby. It takes Sheri and me a little longer to
work everything out but we are making good progress now.
Since the first invitations to 80 potential mentors went out
on 27 May, there have been 12 acceptances (5 for SEEDs
and 7 for PreSEEDs). 68 to go!

Today, I was happy to confirm the last of the 15 rematches for mentees from
four terms whose mentors left Sun since February 2009. SEED has a
standing offer to re-match any mentee whose mentor leaves Sun within
three months of their original match. Rematches are for a full six
months. For some reason, rematches take longer than first matches
but everyone does get matched in time.

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May 26, 2009 · 8:51 pm

Estate Sale

One of my quiet joys on weekends is going to garage and
estate sales.
I am not methodical about finding garage sales: I go to the ones
I happen to see driving around rather than reading listings. However,
I am on the mailing lists of two estate sale companies called
“To Each His Own” or TEHO, and
“Unexpected Treasures”.
I usually find stuff of interest at their sales. If I have time and
the home being cleared is local, I try to attend the preview sale
before they open to the public.

Some estate sales are sad: I feel uncomfortable seeing wedding albums,
baby pictures, and hundred-year-old family Bibles available for a few
dollars. Others offer only stuff which is worthless to me, like Hummel
figurines, or cowboy, movie star, and military memorabilia. Last
weekend, however, John and I attended a very interesting sale. We got
there late but in about half an hour, we bought a laser level, ladder,
storage cabinets, antique keys and doorknobs. We had planned to buy
most of these things anyway and were happy to have them at about a tenth
the price of retail.

1910 original brass doorknobs

1910 original brass doorknobs photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson 		Antique keys

Antique keys photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson 		Laser leveling tool

LaserJamb leveling tool photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson

Images Copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson

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May 26, 2009 · 8:10 pm

Science & Technology at 49ers Academy, East Palo Alto

Gilda Garreton,
Valerie Fenwick, and I were
invited to visit the Media Center of the
San Francisco 49ers Academy
in
East Palo Alto, California, this week to talk about science
and technology in our lives. We spoke to the mostly-girl students of an
extracurricular course on media who are studying video production
skills and critical thinking.

Gilda, Valerie, and I work in different parts of Sun. We got
to know each other well during our work on the annual

Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. Of course, we
talked about Engineering women in addition to telling the students
about our work and lives! I passed out Sun pens and stickypads plus

“Why Should Young Women Consider a Career in Information Technology?”
cards from the National Center for Women
& Information Technology as well as NCWIT’s

“By the Numbers” (compelling statistics on women’s participation in IT)
and other materials.

The students asked us questions and then
videotaped interviews with us. Each student very capably took on
a job: interviewer, director, camera operator, etc. This is an
impressive and well managed program. They even have their own
blog called Girls’ Tyme!.

San Francisco 49ers Academy

San Francisco 49ers Academy sign photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson 		Media Students with Rebecca and Valerie

Media Class with Rebecca Fisher and Valerie Fenwick photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson

Images Copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson

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May 20, 2009 · 6:19 pm

Women in IT: Think Globally, Act Locally

Last week I attended a fascinating
National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT) workshop
called “Women in IT: Think Globally, Act Locally”. In addition to meeting
many interesting and impressively accomplished technical women, I heard
presentations on research and programs to bring technology to women worldwide.

I found the talks about specific programs of most interest. For example:

    • Dr. Vivian Lagesen (Norwegian University of Science and Technology) spoke about perceptions of gender and computer science In Malaysia. CS is seen as a
      woman’s profession there because it private, indoor work.
    • Dr. M. Bernardine Dias (
      TechBridgeWorld       at Carnegie Mellon University) spoke
      about Information and Communication Technologies for Development (ICTD), such as:
      designing multiple mice for computers in education in developing countries, literacy
      games, and user interfaces for illiterate and semi-literate users.

After the workshop, there was a party to celebrate the

Computing Awards recently given to 32 young women in high school.

Workshop Program

NCWIT workshop program Women in IT Think Globally, Act Locally photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson 		Dr. Vivian Lagesen

Dr. Vivian Lagesen Norwegian University of Science and Technology NTNU speaking at NCWIT workshop photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson 		Small Group Session Leaders

Small Group Session Leaders at NCWIT workshop photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson
Dr. M. Bernardine Dias

Dr. M. Bernardine Dias Carnegie Mellon University speaking at NCWIT workshop photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson 		Dr. Lucy Sanders

Dr. Lucy Sanders at NCWIT event photo: copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson 		NCWIT Awards to High School Girls

NCWIT Awards to High School Girls photo: copyright 2008 Katy Dickinson

Images Copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson

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May 20, 2009 · 10:28 am

SEED Mentoring Participants Selected

On 14 May, the Global Sales and Service (GSS) executive Selection Committee,
made up of six Directors and Vice Presidents, picked the 23 new participants
for the 15 June – 15 December 2009
SEED worldwide Engineering mentoring term. This is the second GSS-only term
for SEED. There were 38 applicants this term. The selection was very difficult.
Participants in the SEED program were chosen based on professional
performance, manager and executive recommendations, and the other
SEED Selection Criteria.

The SEEDs in our second GSS term are an unusual group in several
dimensions: all men, mostly in Europe, plus two countries in which
SEED has not had participants working before: Hungary and Slovakia.
Compare to the more-usual demographic/geographic distribution of the
current PreSEED term announced on

8 May 2009.

The first GSS term also had some unusual metrics.
As I reported on
20 November 2008 and

5 March 2009, that GSS term included few women, and was widely distributed geographically, but ended up with 96% mentoring pairs working at a distance
(where the mentor and mentee are in another state or country). It
will be interesting to see how this second GSS term’s mentor matching
patterns work out.

The 81 new GSS SEED and PreSEED participants are now researching and writing their
3-learning-goal plus 10-name Mentor Wish Lists, due 22 May.

About the New GSS SEED Participants:
Location of Participants
Belgium   1,   4%
France   1,   4%
Germany   1,   4%
Hungary   1,   4%
Italy   1,   4%
Japan   2,   9%
Netherlands   1,   4%
Norway   1,   4%
Slovakia   1,   4%
Spain   1,   4%
Sweden   3,   13%
Switzerland   1,   4%
United Kingdom   3,   13%
USA   5,   22%
Gender of Participants
23 Male, 100%
6 are Managers, 26%
6 are prior SEED or PreSEED applicants, 26%

To learn more about SEED and to read SEED participants’ blogs,
check out
http://research.sun.com/SEED.

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May 18, 2009 · 3:13 pm

Sun Presentations at Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing

The Hopper conference
announced its acceptances yesterday. I just finished
collecting review results from Sun’s submitters. Sun staff submitted
or were part of groups which submitted 19 proposals to Hopper 2009 and
13 were accepted (69%) – Sun’s best acceptance rate ever! This includes
Susan Landau’s invited technical talk. The 2009 Sun presenters are from a very
broad range of Engineering disciplines: Microelectronics,
Software, Storage, Sun Labs, and the Systems group.

GHC 2009 will be held:

      Tucson, Arizona

      September 30 – October 3, 2009

Sun will be a

Platinum Corporate Sponsor for the Hopper conference again this year.

Also, my daughter Jessica
sent in two GHC 2009 submissions, both of which were accepted. This is
Jessica’s third Hopper conference and her second as an accepted presenter
(she started out on my

Girl Geeks panel in 2007). Jessica has just finished her Sophomore year
at Carnegie Mellon University.

Sun’s accepted submissions are:

    1. “Bits and Bites: Explaining Communications Security (and Insecurity) to Washington and Brussels” invited technical talk by
      Susan Landau
    2. “3D Collaborative Environments for Social Good” (Sun Proposal – accepted as a poster),
      Gilda Garreton and
      Nicole Yankelovich
    3. “Designing for the 100+ Year Archive” (Sun Proposal – accepted as a poster), with
      Cathleen Wharton
    4. “Developing sustainable technologies for an improved future” (panel submitted by Intel), includes Sudesna Dash
    5. “Formal verification on leading edge microprocessor design” (Sun Proposal – accepted as a poster) by
      Catherine Ahlschlager, Pamela Parish, and
      Shrenik Mehta
    6. “From Spec. to Silicon: Successful Validation of a Server-class SoC Microprocessor” (Sun Proposed Presentation), with
      Manisha Hardikar
    7. “Open Source Community Development” (Sun Proposed Panel), includes
      Valerie Fenwick,
      Teresa Giacomini, and others
    8. “Solving the Two Body Problem: Creating Technology While Maintaining Your Social Life” (NASA Proposed Panel), includes
      Katy Dickinson
    9. “Speed Mentoring for Latinas in Computing” (IBM Proposed BOF), includes
      Gilda Garreton
    10. “Technical Mentorship and Sponsorship: Why You Need It and How to Find It” (Google Proposed Panel), includes
      Cathleen Wharton
    11. “The Value of Awards & How to Get Them” (Sun Proposed Panel), includes
      Katy Dickinson
    12. Video blogging (Sun Proposal – accepted as a poster), includes
      Deirdre Straughan
    13. “Women and the Flat Connected World” (Sun Proposed Panel), includes
      Meenakshi Kaul-Basu

Some Hopper 2008 Photos:

Jessica’s Poster

Jessica Dickinson Goodman Poster Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing 2008 photo: copyright 2008 Katy Dickinson 		Sun Reception

Sun Micrysystems Reception Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing 2008 photo: copyright 2008 Katy Dickinson 		M Kaul-Basu

Meenakshi Kaul-Basu Panel Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing 2008 photo: copyright 2008 Katy Dickinson 		Susan Landau interview

Susan Landau interview Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing 2008 photo: copyright 2008 Katy Dickinson

Images Copyright 2008 Katy Dickinson

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