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This is the website and GitHub repository for the (Tools/Software for) Scientific Computing and Research @ UM Club (SCRUM Club).

The purpose of the SCRUM club is to explore and learn about software/tools for scientific computing and research. A good example of such a tool is R, a free and open-source software environment for statistical computing and graphics. We will therefore devote a lot of our time to teaching/learning about R, especially at the beginning. Later on, we plan on discussing/covering other topics, some of which are mentioned here. All club members are invited to suggest additional topics.

The club is open to students at all levels, post-docs, staff, faculty members, researchers, and essentially anybody interested in learning more about software/tools for scientific computing and research. There are no prerequisites for joining the club (except for having an interest in the topics we want to cover). Also, you do not have to be affiliated with Maastricht University to attend -- the '@ UM' just refers to the fact that this is where the club is located. Finally, there is no need to sign up or register for this club; just show up as as often as you can!

Meetings take place every two weeks on Wednesdays from 16:30 to 18:00 (we will reconsider the meeting day, time, and frequency occasionally). The schedule and topics for upcoming and past meetings can be found here.

We debated whether to start an R User Group in Maastricht (there are already several such groups in the Netherlands, but none in the South). However, we decided to make the purpose of the club more encompassing, as we want to explore other tools/software and topics as well (see the list of topic ideas). However, R is, and will remain, a major focus of the club.

To get things going, we will devote a number of meetings to teaching R. As members become more experienced, our goal is to slowly transition to other meeting formats, where members and guests/speakers can present advanced applications/examples and other software/tools. In general, we would like to see members 'take charge' over time -- proposing topics, giving presentations, suggesting improvements to these pages, and so on.

In general, 45-60 minutes of a meeting will be devoted to more direct teaching and/or presentations (for the first few meetings, probably even a bit more time). The remaining time is 'free hacking' and hangout time where (a) newcomers can examine the materials from previous meetings on their own (and, as needed, with the support from more experienced members), (b) members can explore other topics, and (c) members can just mingle with like-minded individuals.

Since meetings are meant to be 'hands on' (i.e., to the extent possible, we will demonstrate, try out, practice with, and play around with the software and tools we discuss), make sure to bring a laptop to the meetings. For the most part, it should not matter whether you use Windows, MacOS, or Linux/Unix, but occasionally software may only work under certain operating systems. We will deal with these issues as they arise.

All materials (e.g., code, lecture slides) will be openly and freely available via this GitHub repository. That way, members (and those interested in joining the club) can always check and stay up-to-date with what has been covered in previous meetings.