2009-06-10 Ioke : A folding language, Firewalls and IPCop

Ioke : A folding language

From Sweden, direct to Chicago, Ola Bini, will speak about why he created Ioke; a new language for the Java Virtual Machine that attempts to push the expressive boundary of computer languages.

With influences from Io, Self, Smalltalk, Lisp and Ruby; IOke can be used to build prototype based object oriented systems and Domain Specific Languages.  The talk includes interesting IOke features:  the object and macro systems and its integration with Java. 

Ola Bini is a Thoughtworks developer, core JRuby developer and author of ‘Practical JRuby on Rails' (Apress). He programs in Java, Ruby and LISP and has worked on several open source projects. He likes to work on languages, regular expression engines, data serialization parsers and other things found at the borders of computer science. Read about Ola, Ioke and more at: http://olabini.com/blog

Firewalls and IPCop

What do you know about firewalls? Firewalls are an integral part of network security and since the 1980’s have evolved from filter systems on stateless packets to stateful filters that correlate protocols, ports and applications.  This talk will discuss general firewall principles and a contemporary example: IPCop.

IPCop is a cut-down Linux distribution that operates solely as a simple-to-manage firewall on a PC-based appliance.  IPCop starts off with strict rules that allow users to do common tasks.  Further customization allows the user to set up rules for TCP/IP traffic that is allowed past the firewall: email, web-browsing and more. IPCop, an open-source project, has encouraged development of addons including QoS, email virus checking, traffic summary, and enhancing proxy control.

Our speaker is Dr. Stephan Von Bechtolsheim (Purdue).  He works for Advocate Healthcare and is well-known for his series of books on TeX.