maloki

Since it was faculty day (no classes), Gene, Migs, Oyen & I went to Mall of Asia again.  We walked around, played the trivia game at the arcade and went ice skating.  Somewhere between those, we ate at Sbarro (well, Gene & I did while the others watched) for merienda.  We also ate at Iceberg’s for  dinner & dessert.

When we went to the ice skating rink, I was my usual self: scared again. o.o;; Well, I didn’t really learn how to skate the last time I was on the ice.  I was practically holding the edge of the wall (there weren’t really any handrails).  Anyway, I have made some progress since the last time and I think I’m somewhat getting it.

Oh yeah, it was the first time I ever slipped on the ice and landed on my soft behind.  I was really scared the last time so I guess I totally tried to avoid falling down.  I let my guard down on purpose hoping that I’d slip accidentally and well, I did.  It actually felt less painful than I expected and I felt more comfortable on the ice.  I’m still no pro…or can even skate at normal speeds but I did gain more confidence(?).  “What doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger.”

We had a break (had dinner) and then went back to the ice.  This time, I slipped again with the help of Gene.  Ok lang talaga Gene, thanks for the memories This time, I got two cuts on my left pinky finger and bled.  While on the ice, I seemed to have bled a lot which probably got Gene worried (ok lang talaga, just in case you’re still bothered).

I stepped off the ice (the others also followed) and sought for first aid.  The guy at the counter led me into one of the dressing rooms where another staff member was dressing her own wound.  Nainis nga raw siya sa guy na iyon kasi hindi man lang daw siya tinulungan.  Anyway, after cleaning my cuts and dressing it with a band aid, she told me about her wounds.  She got them just the day before on the bus.  The scabs were really visible from where she got scraped.  We talked a bit and I gave my thanks.

The others went back on the ice while I took a break.  Since there wasn’t anything to do, I had some nachos from the snack bar. Not really that great, but it was enough to satisfy my old craving for nachos many months ago.

After eating, I tried to practice my balance off the ice and finally went back.  I still was struggling with the skates but I think i did better this time around.  I somewhat got it.

Anyway, getting sleepy now (gah, early morning Senior’s Pabaon in a few hours..). Alright, until next time

Filed under: Uncategorized by Loki
View Comments

2 things remain unclaimed right now:

1. our reimbursement for what we spent for the ASPC2007
2. my last paycheck from Chikka.

Reason for #1? I don’t remember it when the cashier is open.  Pathetic reason but true ).  I usually miss it because my attention is elsewhere.  Sad.

Reason for #2? I’ve been really busy.  Yup. Research, readings, rest. Three urgent R’s right now. Well, there are also others on the list but focusing on myself, that’s what’s urgent.

Ok, really busy. Academics + org + family + social.

We recently went to Bicol for a wedding. Ironically, I got sick on the day of the wedding so I wasn’t able to attend o.o;;.  We were able go around Bicol the day before to buy stuff and tour the place but I think I got tired from the trips.

Strange thing: during last year’s storms, I heard that the Cagsawa ruins have been covered in mud.  To our surprise (well, fortunately) it’s still there.  It’s just pretty sad to see that all the stores around the ruins were gone.  The path going to the ruins was also messed up.  We had to cross a makeshift bridge (strong flowing river below included – but it was somewhat shallow).  My lil bro has a movie of me crossing…maybe I’ll post it on my multiply sometime.

In addition to that, I was surprised to see that the special halo-halo they sell in Tiwi now has a branch in front of Metro Gaesano…”djc Halo-halo”   Well, there are a lot of places in Tiwi that looks a bit worn down that sells great halo-halo. Halo-halo with cheese on top, eaten with barquillos.

I got some great photos but I haven’t gotten to uploading them yet…

Hmm…what else has been going on?  Well, I’m taking CS290 and I’m not quite sure what thesis topic to get into.  Two main topics surface: Graphics and Human-Computer Interaction.

I have been into graphics since before and got really interested when I took a course on PC/Console game development and worked on OpenGL.  After that, I also learned about procedural generation.  This seems like an interesting topic but I can’t find something to do with it.  I mean, there are a lot of applications but I can’t think of anything new to do with it.

How about HCI? Well, I also find it interesting to empower people in their use of programs; allowing users to use applications without affecting their productivity (usability vs usefulness).  Another aspect could deal with the physically challenged, the young and the elderly.

As for my actual thesis this year….well, it’s not getting as much attention as it deserves right now (Sorry, Billy).  Our thesis involves a lot of pattern recognition.  We want the computer to “recognize” the image so the computer has to “know” or “learn” the patters to match these images with.  Interesting too.

I hoped that our proposal on a 3D interface for manipulating objects using a web cam/web cams.  Probably it couldn’t be implemented in one year so it wasn’t suggested to us.  Instead, we got a pattern recognition one.

–

A while ago, I watched a Jap film with Oyen for her Jap class.  I agreed to go with her since I find cultures interesting (be it our own or of others) and this film was one way of exploring cultures.  Moreover, the idea seemed fun.  And well, it was

Eiga Sai: Japanese Contemporary Films – The Japanese film fest is being presented by the Japan Foundation this month at the Shari-La Plaza cinemas.  The event just started so there are still a lot of screening times for this month.  In addition to that, the films will also be shown at the UP Film Institute and the Cultural center of the Philippines during early July.  The films include Kamikaze Girls, Hotel Hibiscus, No One’s Ark, Inochi, Out of this World, Harmful Insect, The Stars Converge, Blue Spring, Blue, and Shangri-la.

The movie we watched was Kono yo no sotoe – Club Shinchugun (Japanese Title) or Out of this World (English title) (2004).  It was about war, jazz and the people.  Well, I’m not really good at describing the movie so just check the link.

It was a really good movie and we enjoyed it.  I laughed out so loud but didn’t really care since a lot were also laughing out loud as well.  The film seemed to have a simple setting but it revolved around the different characters.  What’s pretty neat was that the film was able to cover each of the characters’ stories and giving each the attention they deserve.

Oyen says Kamikaze Girls is also quite interesting…Maybe I’ll check it out (and maybe the other films as well, wakekekeke)

Filed under: Uncategorized by Loki
View Comments

Main Entry: civ·i·lize
Pronunciation: ‘si-v&-”lIz
Function: verb
Inflected Form(s): -lized; -liz·ing
transitive verb
1 : to cause to develop out of a primitive state; especially : to bring to a technically advanced and rationally ordered stage of cultural development
2 a : EDUCATE, REFINE b : SOCIALIZE 1
intransitive verb : to acquire the customs and amenities of a civil community
- civ·i·liz·er noun

-Retrieved on May 23, 2007 (1:50 pm) from the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary

Is online registration really that much more advanced than the random number system? Well, although the registration system is online, this seems to be a step back.

(Warning: Might get geeky so skip the next two paragraphs if you want to avoid it)

The Registration/Enlistment process online for seniors today is very much as expected: server overload and all that. AISIS takes a long time to load on IE (and never on Firefox). Handling multiple concurrent requests is quite a problem with the internet these days. Since before, there was the Slashdot effect (more commonly known in the less geeky circles as the Digg effect). “The Slashdot effect is the term given to the phenomenon of a popular website linking to a smaller site, causing the smaller site to slow down or even temporarily close due to the increased traffic.” (from the link)

At Chikka, I recently read a thesis dissertation on Staged Event-Driven Architecture: An Architecture for Highly Concurrent Server Applications (Why I read that? Well, maybe next time…). This system was designed to handle concurrent/simultaneous requests from clients. Instead of accepting all requests and trying to serve all of them (and then breaking down in the end), this system aims to serve at least majority of the users. The server doesn’t break down, but is just busy handling the important requests. Putting this into context, this could be that the server continues handle those who have already logged in until they have finished with their enlistment. Meanwhile, those who haven’t logged in yet are put in a queue. This system could be better* than what we have now but I don’t think that this is much of a stop forward.

If you compare queuing in long lines and the online registration, we can say that the online registration is technically more advanced but is this more orderly? The online registration seems to be even more chaotic as users race each other to get into the site. When everybody wants to go in a small door at the same time, nobody gets in.

Now, what would be a more civilized registration process? If we look at the bigger picture, how many students are actually satisfied with their class schedules?

Those with lower random numbers tend to register for a class they like. However, if their friends all have higher random numbers classes would close even before their friends could enlist in the class. This is also true for those with higher random numbers, except that the classes that would be still be open are those nobody wanted. Whatever schedules we get, we just learn to live with it.

How about we put in more control to these things? What if we can organize ourselves and talk about which classes we want to take. As for teachers that give a lot of load or are scary during class, we can negotiate and compromise. This way, we are together with our friends in most of our classes. Even if we get bad teachers, the journey wouldn’t really be as lonely as when we register in that class alone (ex. the class closed before anyone else you knew could enlist in that class).

After this, we could carry on with our normal registration procedure (be it online or not) and we are all happy at the end of the day. The talks of compromise could take a while but that’s only for the short term. we could talk about this through online conferences, discuss it in a web forum or meet personally. In the end, we’ll have better class schedules (or if not better, more bearable classes because we have our friends by our side).

This idea may seem impossible but I’d say this is more improbable. Ok, there are people who always want the best schedule. Sure, there are people who always want the best teachers. Yeah, there are little whiny girls or guys that don’t see that there are other people in the world. What we basically need is discipline, cooperation and communication. Not surprisingly, this is what we also need to build a better society for our country. Why not we start in our little community that is Ateneo?

–

*The original author mentioned recently noted that a thread-based implementations in C preform faster than a JAVA-based implementation of SEDA.

Filed under: Uncategorized by Loki
View Comments