Busy Beaver

Picture Source: Irasutoya

Every semester, the the computer science students council awards the Busy Beaver, a prize for courses that have been rated as outstandingly good by students in the evaluation forms. We currently award the prize in three categories: basic lectures, core and advanced lectures, and proseminars and seminars.

In the following table you will find the modules and lecturers that have been awarded the Busy Beaver in the past.

The name Busy Beaver is derived from Turing machines with special properties.

Feedback

If you want to propose a lecture for the busy beaver award or simply want to provide feedback for an outstanding lecture, write a mail to busy-beaver@cs.fs.uni-saarland.de!

Winners

The following table presents the past winners of the busy beaver award

SemesterBase LecturesCore or Advanced LecturesProseminars or Seminars
WS 23/24Foundations of Cyber Security I – Dr. Ben Stock
Differential Equations in Image Processing and Computer Vision – Dr. Pascal Peter

and

Mobile Security – Dr. Sven Bugiel
Differential Privacy: Mathematical Foundations and Applications in Machine Learning – Dr. Franziska Boenisch
SS 2023Concurrent Programming
– Prof. Dr. Holger Hermanns, Felix Freiberger
Usabale Security & Privacy
– Dr. Katharina Krombholz
Specification-Based Testing and Debugging
– Prof. Dr. Andreas Zeller, Dr. Dominik Steinhöfel
WS 22/23Bioinformatik 3
– Prof. Dr. Volkhard Helms

Special Price of the Jury:
Introduction to Algorithms and Data Structures
– Prof. Dr. Karl Bringmann
Hands-On Dependability
– Dr. Andreas Schmidt
Wireless and Mobile Security
– Dr. Mridula Singh
SS 2022Foundations of Cyber Security II
– Dr. Michael Schwarz
Embedded Systems
– Prof. Dr. Martina Maggio
Build an 8-bit Computer from Scratch
– Prof. Dr. Sebastian Hack
WS 21/22Grundlagen der Theoretischen Informatik
– Prof. Dr. Markus Bläser
Semantics
– Prof. Dr. Derek Dreyer

Modern Methods in Drug Discovery
– Dr. Michael Hutter
Privacy of Machine Learning
– Dr. Yang Zhang
SS 2021Big Data Engineering
– Prof. Dr. Jens Dittrich
Algorithms for Sequence Analysis
– Prof. Dr. Sven Rahmann
Touch and Haptic Interfaces
– Prof. Dr. Jürgen Steimle
WS 20/21Programming 1
– Prof. Dr. Bernd Finkbeiner
Side-Channel Attacks and Defenses
– Dr. Michael Schwarz
– / –
SS 2020– / –– / –– / –
WS 19/20– / –– / –– / –
SS 2019Nebenläufige Programmierung
– Prof. Dr. Holger Hermanns
Differential Equations in Image Processing and Computer Vision
– Prof. Dr. Joachim Weickert
Selected Topics in Mobile Security
– Dr. Sven Bugiel
WS 18/19Grundlagen der Cybersicherheit
– Dr. Ben Stock
Malware Analysis and Intrusion Detection
– Prof. Dr. Christian Rossow

Image Acquisition Methods
– Dr. Pascal Peter
– / –
SS 2018Programmierung 2
– Prof. Dr. Sebastian Hack
– Prof. Dr. Jörg Hoffmann
Web Security
– Ben Stock
Program Synthesis
– Eva Darulova
WS 17/18Programmierung 1
– Prof. Dr. Bernd Finkbeiner
Modern Methods in Drug Discovery
– Dr. Michael Hutter
Einführung in Data Science
– Prof. Dr. Jens Dittrich
SS 2017Nebenläufige Programmierung
– Prof. Dr. Holger Herrmanns

Grundlagen der Cybersicherheit 2
– Prof. Dr. Christian Rossow
Image Compression
– Dr. Pascal Tobias Peter
Einführung in 3D User Interfaces
– Dr. Florian Daiber
WS 16/17Mathematik für Informatiker III
– Prof. Dr. Joachim Weickert
Malware Analysis and Intrusion Detection
– Prof. Dr. Christian Rossow
Recent Topics in HCI
– Felix Kosmalla
– Christian Lander
SS 2016Bioinformatik 2
– Prof. Dr. Hans-Peter Lenhof
Automated Reasoning II
– Dr. Uwe Waldmann
Computer Vision for Computer Graphics
– Prof. Dr. Christian Theobalt
– Dr. Christian Richardt
– Dr. Dan Casas
WS 15/16Bioinformatik 1
– Prof. Dr. Hans-Peter Lenhof
Differential Equations in Image Processing and Computer Vision
– Prof. Dr. Joachim Weickert
Advanced Data Analysis with Matrices and Tensors
– Dr. Pauli Miettinen
SS 2015Programmierung 2
– Prof. Dr. Sebastian Hack
Topics in Algorithmic Data Analysis
Dr. Jilles Vreeken
Affective Lighting
– Dr. Sven Gehring
– Dr. Markus Löchtefeld
WS 14/15Grundlagen der Cybersicherheit
– Prof. Dr. Michael Backes
Elements of Statistical Learning
– Prof. Dr. Dr. Thomas Lengauer
Multi-View Data Mining
– Dr. Pauli Miettinen
SS 2014– / –Image Acquisition Methods
– Prof. Dr. Weickert
– Pascal Peter
Hacking
– Prof. Dr. Michael Backes
– Prof. Dr. Christoph Sorge
WS 13/14Programmierung 1
– Prof. Dr. Holger Hermanns
Automatic Planning
– Prof. Dr. Jörg Hoffmann
Advances in Image Processing and Computer Vision
– Prof. Dr. Joachim Weickert
SS 2013Informationssysteme
– Prof. Dr. Jens Dittrich
Elements of Statistical Learning 1
– Prof. Dr. Dr. Thomas Lengauer
– / –
WS 12/13Bioinformatik 1
– Prof. Dr. Hans-Peter Lenhof
Telecommunications 1
– Prof. Dr.-Ing. Thorsten Herfet
Non-Traditional Data Management
– Dr.-Ing. Sebastian Michel
– Dr. Rainer Gemulla
SS 2012Mathematik für Informatiker 2
– Dr. Oliver Labs
Optimization
– Dr. Reto Spöhel
– Dr. Rob van Stee
Mobile Interaction Design
– Markus Loechtefeld
WS 11/12– / –Image Processing and Computer Vision
– Prof. Dr. Joachim Weickert
– / –
SS 2011Nebenläufige Programmierung
– Prof. Dr.-Ing. Holger Hermanns
Database Systems
– Prof. Dr. Jens Dittrich
– / –
WS 10/11
SS 2010
semesterbasic lecturescore or advanced lecturesproseminars or seminars

Before that there were no distinction between categories.

yearmodule
2009Practical Aspects of Security
– Prof. Dr. Michael Backes
2008Correspondence Problems in Computer Vision
– Dr. Andrés Bruhn
2007Cryptography
– Prof. Dr. Michael Backes
2006Differential Equations in Image Processing and Computer Vision
– Prof. Dr. Joachim Weickert
2005Constraint Programming
– Prof. Dr. Gert Smolka
2004Programmierung 1
– Prof. Dr. Gert Smolka

Automated Reasoning
– Dr. Uwe Waldmann
2003Theoretische Informatik
– Prof. Dr. Martin Skutella

Differential Equations in Image Processing and Computer Vision
– Prof. Dr. Joachim Weickert
yearmodule