Bristol LMFDB Workshop 2013

Bristol LMFDB Workshop, September 9-22, 2013

Workshop themes

(September 9-15) Core development of LMFDB pages. Particular goals are completing all remaining work for L-functions of degree at most 2 and designing pages for Hecke character L-functions.
(September 16-22) Development of algorithms for arbitrary-precision and rigorous evaluation of high-degree L-functions. Our ultimate goal is to allow the user to evaluate any numerical parameters appearing on LMFDB pages, including special values, zeros, etc., to guaranteed accuracy and high precision where feasible.

Confirmed participants and hotel dates

Samuele Anni, 8-15	Jennifer Balakrishnan, 15-19
Jonathan Bober	Andrew Booker
Volker Braun, 15-18	Alina Bucur, 10-15
Fabien Cléry, 8-13	Brian Conrey
John Cremona, 8-13 & 16-20	Paul Dehaye, 8-19
Lassina Dembele, 15-21	David Farmer, 8-17
Ralph Furmaniak, 13-22	David Harvey, 19-22
Fredrik Johansson, 16-22	John Jones, 8-16
Jon Keating	Kiran Kedlaya, 10-15
Patrick Kuehn, 11-22	Stefan Lemurell, 10-18
Pascal Molin, 8-18	Dave Roberts, 8-14
Michael Rubinstein, 13-18	Harald Schilly, 8-17
Haluk Sengun, 11-14	Nils Skoruppa, 9-14
Fredrik Strömberg, 9-15	Drew Sutherland, 20-22
Holger Then	David Platt
Mark Watkins, 14-20

Lodging info

All external participants have reservations at the Bristol Marriott Royal Hotel for the dates listed above (including bookings for double rooms for those of you travelling with your partner). All rooms are non-smoking and include free wireless internet, and we have forwarded all additional requests to the hotel.

Getting to Bristol

From London Heathrow:

The best option is the National Express bus. You can try booking your tickets in advance on the website, but you might have trouble without a UK credit card. However, it is not too expensive to buy tickets on the day from the central bus station in Heathrow. You should look up the schedule from Heathrow Airport to the Bristol Coach Station. There are three stops at Heathrow that you can choose on the website: T1 & T3, which is the central bus station servicing terminals 1 to 3, and separate stops for T4 and T5. The latter choices are for people who know specifically that they are flying into one of those terminals and are able to purchase their tickets online; otherwise you should make your way to the central bus station either on foot (from T1 or T3) or by the airport train (from T4 or T5). By the way, it is usually a lot cheaper to buy a return coach ticket rather than two singles, so it pays to look into your return travel at the same time.

On average it takes about one hour from the plane landing to arriving at the central bus terminal, but more if you have to transfer from T4 or T5. When buying your ticket in advance, a good rule of thumb is to add two hours to the scheduled landing time. If you happen to arrive early and there is an earlier coach available, you can ask the driver if there is space to take you. On the other hand, if your plane is delayed then you should go to the desk at the central bus station, and they will give you a later ticket for a small fee. Also note that Bristol might not be the final destination listed on the board in the central bus station; other common destinations for coaches servicing Bristol are Cardiff and Swansea.

On arrival at Bristol Coach Station, exit the doors at the end nearest to where the coach lets you off, and follow these walking directions to the hotel.

From Bristol Airport:

Exit the terminal, follow the signs to the taxi office under the canopied walkway, and book a taxi to the hotel. Note that there are two Marriott hotels in Bristol; yours is the Bristol Marriott Royal, next to College Green. You can pay in advance by card, but if necessary there is an ATM in the airport lobby.

From Bristol Temple Meads Railway Station:

Follow these walking directions.

From the hotel to Howard House:

Follow these walking directions. Howard House is the building at the corner of Queens Avenue and Elmdale Road. If the guard is not present in the lobby when you arrive then ring the buzzer for the 4th floor. From the lobby, take the elevator up to 4.

Schedule

As at past LMFDB workshops, we will discuss specific objectives at the beginning of each week and work out the detailed schedule as we go. We plan to operate on a basic 9-5 work day, but all participants will be supplied with key cards permitting access at any time. Coffee and tea will be provided each day at 9:30am and 3pm.

Some things to do in Bristol

Here are a few things to do while thinking about how to improve the LMFDB:

For those around at the end of the workshop, you'll have a chance to see all 80 Gromits from the Gromit Unleashed Exhibition. (See this page if you have no idea what the previous sentence means.)
There is a sightseeing bus that goes around Clifton and surrounding areas. You pay 12 pounds the first time you board the bus and can use the ticket for the rest of the day. See this map.
Bristol's most famous landmark is the Clifton suspension bridge. Here are some walking directions from Howard House. (These direct you to the bridge office/museum on the far side. The closer side is a good place to stop for a view and a picnic.)
Bristol Cathedral, located next to the hotel, is worth a visit.
You can take a boat tour of the Bristol harbour; just get on from the plaza down the hill from the hotel and buy a return ticket. The harbour boats offer easy access to the SS Great Britain.