About me

My name is Philippe Virouleau, and I’m currently a compiler engineer at Quarkslab. I contribute to the development of our obfuscating compiler based on LLVM (Quarks App Protect, formerly Epona), and to our whitebox cryptographic library (Quarks Key Protect, formerly Navi).

I graduated from Ensimag in 2012, after which I started working for two years with Thierry Gautier and François Broquedis on an OpenMP source to source compiler project named Kstar.

In 2015 I started a PhD under the supervision of François Broquedis, Thierry Gautier, et Fabrice Rastello in the MOAIS (then CORSE) teams (Inria Grenoble). During this PhD I started using and developing extensions for the OpenMP API, which we use to target the runtime developed in the AVALON team, xKaapi. I successfully defended my PhD on June 2018, and the manuscript is available on HAL.

I then took a post-doctoral position at Inria Bordeaux, in the STORM and HiePACS teams. I work closely with Emmanuel Agullo, Olivier Aumage, and Olivier Coulaud on the topic of using standard parallel programming model (ie: OpenMP), to target heterogeneous architectures through the StarPU runtime.

My research interests focus on compilers and runtimes, and particularly on how they can interact to get the most performances out of recent architectures.

Given what my main hobby is (see below), you will find on this website mostly cubing or computer science related stuff, as well as some random stuff (sometimes only available in French…).

Contact

The best way to contact me is by mail : philippe (dot) 44 (at) gmail (dot) com.

Publications

Hobbies

Speedcubing

Speedcubing is the activity of solving twisty puzzles (such as the Rubik’s cube, known as the “3x3”) as fast as possible. I started cubing in 2008, and it has been my main hobby ever since!

Luckily, my best official solve during a competition has been recorded, you can check it out here!

Achievements

As of today, I attended more than 130 competitions in 25 countries, broke 19 national records, and earned the following 9 national titles in various events:

• 2016 : 3x3 Fewest Moves
• 2015 : 2x2
• 2014 : 2x2, 5x5, 6x6, 7x7, Clock
• 2010 : 2x2
• 2009 : 5x5

You can see my full profile here.

World Cube Association

The World Cube Association (WCA) governs competitions for twisty puzzles. Every competition must have a “main judge”, called the “Delegate”, who makes sure the WCA Regulations are followed at all time during the competition.

I became a WCA Delegate back in 2010, and since then my cubing interest has more and more leant towards the organization of competitions and developing Speedcubing in France and in foreign countries.

In January 2016 I joined the WCA Regulations Committee (WRC, in charge of managing the WCA Regulations applied in official competitions), and also the WCA Software Team a couple of months later (which I lead for a year).

Between 2018 and 2020 I was appointed as the WCA Senior Delegate for Africa.

Association Française de Speedcubing (AFS)

The AFS is the French organization for Speedcubing, its aim is to develop Speedcubing in France and help organizers to host competition, by providing funding and/or a legal structure to get venues.

I have been its president between 2014 and 2018, and I am currently still actively involved in the association. Part of my involvement is to develop and maintain the AFS Website.

Travelling

I started travelling a lot when I started to do international Rubik’s cube competitions, such as European and World championships.

I enjoy it a lot, and I always try to discover a country/a city through the eyes of locals (they know the good places for food!), that’s why I usually prefer to stay with someone living there instead of booking a hostel (i.e. couchsurf). I still have a lot to discover, especially in Asia, where I only visited a couple of countries.

Less time-consuming stuff

I play(ed) table soccer a lot, especially for the Grenoble team, with whom I went to the national championship several times.

I also like skying, and “playing” chess.