Benjamin Burton

Welcome to my website at benburton.org!

• Mathematics: I am a half-mathematician, half-computer scientist at The University of Queensland (UQ), in Brisbane, Australia. For more on my mathematics, see:

  • My university website at UQ;
  • Regina, a large body of software for computational topology that I have been working on for over 20 years now.

• Outreach programmes: I spend a lot of time with outreach programmes for talented secondary school students in mathematics and computer science. These include:

  • The International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI), which is the premier competition for programing and algorithm design for secondary school students. I spent 10 years as a leader of the Australian delegation, and I am currently an elected member of the International Committee that oversees the IOI. We also hosted IOI 2013 in Brisbane, Australia!
  • The National Mathematics Summer School (NMSS), which gives talented and enthusiastic secondary students a taste of research, and what doing mathematics is really like. I have been involved as a tutor and lecturer for over two decades, and currently serve as Director of NMSS.

• iPhone/iPad/Watch apps: I write apps in my spare time; all of these are apps that I use myself. They include:

  • Modular Arithmetic, to do arithmetic modulo N;
  • PDF Projector, to project your PDF slideshows onto an external screen;
  • References, to browse through your BibTeX databases;
  • Talk Timer, to discreetly track time while you give a talk;
  • Inkpad Libre, which is the open-source continuation of Steve Sprang’s excellent vector graphics app for the iPad.

• Social Media: I mainly use social media for social purposes (so, for instance, you won’t see much mathematics there).

  • Instagram (@burton.bab): Most of my social media activity is here.

  • Twitter (@BurtonBA): I use twitter very, very rarely, but this is my account.

  • Facebook: I am largely avoiding Facebook completely these days; you will find me there but please don’t assume I’m paying any attention. :slightly_smiling_face: