Who are we?
SPA (pronounced 'spar') is the Software Practice Advancement specialist group of BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT. Read about our aims and mission here.
What do we do?
- organise regular events (currently in London only, but anywhere else where there is demand and a team to organise a session)
- organise and run the SPA conference series (including Mini SPA) and occasional lecture series
- run mailing lists
How do I join?
Although everyone can attend BCS SPA meetings, those attending more than one or two are encouraged to join BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, at the appropriate grade. You'll find everything you need to know about joining SPA here.
What else is on this site?
Lists of past and planned events are here, including presentation materials and/or notes in many cases, along with newsletters and other useful materials. There used to be a wiki for discussion of related topics, but it was not used much and so the content is now offered on a read-only basis.
You can jump from here directly to the London Meeting Programme and to our playlist on YouTube.
Affiliates
There are a number of friendly organisations whose goals are broadly sympathetic to those of SPA, and with whom SPA has had cross-sponsorship or other arrangements in the past.
Where's OOPS?
Find out why BCS OOPS changed its name to SPA. Or read more about SPA's thirty year history.
News
SPA Conference
The annual BCS Software Practice Advancement conference "Software in Practice" brings together experts and practitioners to share the latest thinking in software development. Recordings of past conference sessions are available.
No conference is currently planned for 2024. It's a lot of work to put together a conference and the level of participation in recent years has been frankly disappointing. Please get in touch with the committee if you would be interested in reviving the annual conference.
Please contact us if your organisation might be interested in sponsoring the next conference.
Next evening meeting (London)
9th (!) October 2024, 18:30-20:00. Chris Jones, CryptoQuantique: Using cloud-based dev tools to simplify Post-Quantum security for the IoT from chip to cloud. BCS London and live-streamed.