Viva, Lab Exams & SEMESTERS!!!
--What more can accurately describe the topic??
Bye-bye to blogger till I get through these alive..
--What more can accurately describe the topic??
Bye-bye to blogger till I get through these alive..
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Workshop (aka) Wasteshop
"How cool it would be to make our own robot!!" was the one thought in mind.. My friends and I were very excited before Kriya'09. My ultimate aim, though being that of belling the cat, this tech stuff did attract me very much. After all I do have an open mind that is curious to learn as much as possible. With amazing visions of a machine obeying my commands, I registered for the Robotics Workshop that was scheduled to be conducted in our college.
The event was postponed by one month due to political problems. Still, our enthusiasm remained unchanged.
On March 7th 2009, the beginning signs were themselves not good. What was scheduled to begin at 9.00 a.m was postponed to 10.30 a.m and then extended to "in a short while" which ultimately turned out to be 11.40 a.m! My freshness of mind had gone and within the first few introductory sentences given by the person from the respectable company, I experienced simultaneous grumbling of stomach and drooping of eyes. In a semi-conscious state, I realised that he had asked for a definition of a robot for nearly 40 mins and then, not being satisfied with the students' answers, he defined a robot as "something which cannot be defined"!! He probably expected a biiiig "WOW" from us but got nothing other can cold stares. Then he went on to teach us about resistors and capacitors and motors- stuff that all engineering students would know by the end of their second semester at the maximum! A student explained the reason for the correctness of Faraday's law of electromagnetism as being the fact that it was discovered by a great scientist in an earlier century. He won a T-shirt and a motor as goodies!
The much-longed-for lunch break came at 1:45 p.m when I was sure that my gastro-tract was full of acid due to long starvation. After the lunch we were still optimistic because we were yet to receive the kits. Well my fingers hesitate to type the word- but yes, KITS was what they had named those collections, each consisting of 2 resistors, 1 capacitor, 4 transistors, 1 LED, 1 solar panel, 1 battery and 1 motor and most importantly 1 TOOTHBRUSH. The total cost of those components, including the plastic box they were contained in, would not exceed Rs.200. And we had paid Rs.3000 for the workshop!
Later that evening we were declared the first team to have finished connecting a circuit first and were given a t-shirt. Surprise would understate the feeling we had. After all, we struggle with breadboards and circuits twice every week!
The two reasons for our attending the second day of the workshop:
1. We had submitted the DD for Rs.3000
2. We were still hopeful that something useful and advanced would be taught that day
We were gifted with another day of late-lunching. A solar bug, a fully assembled circuit on a PCB was provided and some tentacle soldering on it was assigned as homework to us. This was also beneath our expectations. We had wanted to learn more! At the least, we would've liked to assemble the solar-bug itself from the discrete components. Soldering two springs on it would be no big learning experience.
The afternoon session was dedicated to a presentation about the organisation that conducted the workshop. The worst part of the day was when a co-ordinator told that he had known about the low-quality of the workshop but being the co-ordinator had prevented him from warning us beforehand.
Probably the two things I learnt quite well from this workshop experience are the practical working of motor and most importantly, to not participate in these kind of workshops again without a complete knowledge of how it would benefit me.
The event was postponed by one month due to political problems. Still, our enthusiasm remained unchanged.
On March 7th 2009, the beginning signs were themselves not good. What was scheduled to begin at 9.00 a.m was postponed to 10.30 a.m and then extended to "in a short while" which ultimately turned out to be 11.40 a.m! My freshness of mind had gone and within the first few introductory sentences given by the person from the respectable company, I experienced simultaneous grumbling of stomach and drooping of eyes. In a semi-conscious state, I realised that he had asked for a definition of a robot for nearly 40 mins and then, not being satisfied with the students' answers, he defined a robot as "something which cannot be defined"!! He probably expected a biiiig "WOW" from us but got nothing other can cold stares. Then he went on to teach us about resistors and capacitors and motors- stuff that all engineering students would know by the end of their second semester at the maximum! A student explained the reason for the correctness of Faraday's law of electromagnetism as being the fact that it was discovered by a great scientist in an earlier century. He won a T-shirt and a motor as goodies!
The much-longed-for lunch break came at 1:45 p.m when I was sure that my gastro-tract was full of acid due to long starvation. After the lunch we were still optimistic because we were yet to receive the kits. Well my fingers hesitate to type the word- but yes, KITS was what they had named those collections, each consisting of 2 resistors, 1 capacitor, 4 transistors, 1 LED, 1 solar panel, 1 battery and 1 motor and most importantly 1 TOOTHBRUSH. The total cost of those components, including the plastic box they were contained in, would not exceed Rs.200. And we had paid Rs.3000 for the workshop!
Later that evening we were declared the first team to have finished connecting a circuit first and were given a t-shirt. Surprise would understate the feeling we had. After all, we struggle with breadboards and circuits twice every week!
The two reasons for our attending the second day of the workshop:
1. We had submitted the DD for Rs.3000
2. We were still hopeful that something useful and advanced would be taught that day
We were gifted with another day of late-lunching. A solar bug, a fully assembled circuit on a PCB was provided and some tentacle soldering on it was assigned as homework to us. This was also beneath our expectations. We had wanted to learn more! At the least, we would've liked to assemble the solar-bug itself from the discrete components. Soldering two springs on it would be no big learning experience.
The afternoon session was dedicated to a presentation about the organisation that conducted the workshop. The worst part of the day was when a co-ordinator told that he had known about the low-quality of the workshop but being the co-ordinator had prevented him from warning us beforehand.
Probably the two things I learnt quite well from this workshop experience are the practical working of motor and most importantly, to not participate in these kind of workshops again without a complete knowledge of how it would benefit me.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
An Ice-breaker or Life-breaker ?
It was near midnight. That day's newspaper lay on my table. Some knowledge on what's going on in the world would be good for my mind before it dozes off, I decided. I opened a page at random and was drawn to a picture and the related article.
It was the report of the death of Aman Kachroo, a first year student of medicine. He was beaten to death under the name of ragging by his seniors in college.
"I was shocked!" would be an understatement.
I just could not understand why people of roughly the same age group as mine would want to beat a boy to death just because of his Kashmiri origins or whatsoever.
Ragging was meant to be an ice-breaker between the freshers and their seniors so that the latter group can then guide the former with regard to several aspects ranging from studies to arranging Industrial Visits ( the professional name for excursions in college :) ) But not many senior or junior students understand this. The seniors feel that ragging is a way of establishing their superiority over the new flock of students and the juniors in turn are scared to death when they see the seniors and they sweat from head to toe; they even shiver at times! My only question to these is: What's wrong in treating your junior as your equal?
People may find this queer but I never feared ragging when I entered college. In fact, once during the first few weeks of college life, I told one of my school teachers that college is boring because I didn't get ragged and actually one senior told me that she wouldn't even speak with me during the first year, for fear of being seen in conversation with a fresher, which amounted to ragging in the eyes of the staff members. Even this attitude made me very uncomfortable, for I wanted to move with them, as a friend, not to be alienated like an untouchable. But soon things got alright and we had a great interaction session (though we were almost ready to receive our own juniors by then :) )
The concept of ragging, if taken in the right sense, will be a welcome one among the students. But the main problem that makes ragging a negative issue is that the students, in their late teens, do not realise it when they cross the limits and end up inflicting torture on their juniors. They cannot be taught how to rag by a set of professionals, of course!! Most of these fatal results like in Kachroo's case occur because of the impression the society leaves on the young minds. They see the adults fighting for religion- and they too torture those belonging to the opposite religion/race. Any boy/girl brought up in a child-friendly environment will be a happy and level-headed adult who knows his/her limits. No young man or woman of twenty would want another dead, unless he/she belongs to one of those damned terrorist organisations. Right now, Kachroo's torturers would be feeling a remorse that is of a magnitude greater than any pleasure they could have derived by torturing the kid.
Ultimately, the responsibility falls on the society and the parents to see to that their children grow into normal adults. The colleges can initiate the interaction themselves. Things that are banned will only be executed with utmost enthusiasm (which does amount to brutality in this case ). So do not ban ragging! Instead, have it done, but under strict guidelines so that the limits cannot be exceeded.
The ultimate aim is the formation of a strong bond of friendship. It can be established sans torture, I say, out of personal experience.
It was the report of the death of Aman Kachroo, a first year student of medicine. He was beaten to death under the name of ragging by his seniors in college.
"I was shocked!" would be an understatement.
I just could not understand why people of roughly the same age group as mine would want to beat a boy to death just because of his Kashmiri origins or whatsoever.
Ragging was meant to be an ice-breaker between the freshers and their seniors so that the latter group can then guide the former with regard to several aspects ranging from studies to arranging Industrial Visits ( the professional name for excursions in college :) ) But not many senior or junior students understand this. The seniors feel that ragging is a way of establishing their superiority over the new flock of students and the juniors in turn are scared to death when they see the seniors and they sweat from head to toe; they even shiver at times! My only question to these is: What's wrong in treating your junior as your equal?
People may find this queer but I never feared ragging when I entered college. In fact, once during the first few weeks of college life, I told one of my school teachers that college is boring because I didn't get ragged and actually one senior told me that she wouldn't even speak with me during the first year, for fear of being seen in conversation with a fresher, which amounted to ragging in the eyes of the staff members. Even this attitude made me very uncomfortable, for I wanted to move with them, as a friend, not to be alienated like an untouchable. But soon things got alright and we had a great interaction session (though we were almost ready to receive our own juniors by then :) )
The concept of ragging, if taken in the right sense, will be a welcome one among the students. But the main problem that makes ragging a negative issue is that the students, in their late teens, do not realise it when they cross the limits and end up inflicting torture on their juniors. They cannot be taught how to rag by a set of professionals, of course!! Most of these fatal results like in Kachroo's case occur because of the impression the society leaves on the young minds. They see the adults fighting for religion- and they too torture those belonging to the opposite religion/race. Any boy/girl brought up in a child-friendly environment will be a happy and level-headed adult who knows his/her limits. No young man or woman of twenty would want another dead, unless he/she belongs to one of those damned terrorist organisations. Right now, Kachroo's torturers would be feeling a remorse that is of a magnitude greater than any pleasure they could have derived by torturing the kid.
Ultimately, the responsibility falls on the society and the parents to see to that their children grow into normal adults. The colleges can initiate the interaction themselves. Things that are banned will only be executed with utmost enthusiasm (which does amount to brutality in this case ). So do not ban ragging! Instead, have it done, but under strict guidelines so that the limits cannot be exceeded.
The ultimate aim is the formation of a strong bond of friendship. It can be established sans torture, I say, out of personal experience.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
A Great Experience
Participation is always more important than winningNothing could have been more precisely said, as I realized today.
Well, for the past one month I'd been feeling restless in classes. Nothing interesting was being done with my time and I assure that the vlsi classes are seriously considered a waste of time widely in my class. While most students use the time for the finishing of their record and observation works, I used to read story books. This was definitely an enjoyable pastime for that one hour but my active spirit could not just rest satisfied. Then dawned the idea of working on a project. Conveniently my dept announced an intra-college project presentation event. I had a relatively acceptable idea to work on and it has been a seriously great learning experience.
By "learning experience" I do not mean the technical learning alone. The concept involved was very simple- something that anyone who has attended a couple of micro processor programming classes can finish in a matter of probably three to four days. We learnt a lot of things which would be actually useful for life. A person can very well finish his/her lifetime without knowing how to program a microprocessor. But any adult who was born and brought up in a city must know the whereabouts of every nook and corner that matters in that city. This is precisely what we learnt very well. We got lost in several roads and ended up in places we hadn't even heard of, while getting the components to be used for the circuitry. But it is a fact that I wouldn't be relating this as a pleasant experience if Mr.Martin Cooper hadn't invented the device in my hand that I used to call up people who knew the area and reach the destination safe.
Then came the tryst with the dept lab attendants who are not quite enthusiastic about entrusting the students with their precious components. Here our guide helped us a great deal. He deserves a seriously large amount of gratitude from us for all that he has done for us. For one thing he did not shirk our idea away as silly or unrealistic. His attitude always has been that of "we shall try it out. it will be a study." Also his presence in the lab while we were working with the circuit was very useful so that our doubts were cleared then and there. He seriously has a computer-like memory and is specialised in many areas of ECE. We were lucky to get him to assist us.
The next hurdle was with the circuitry itself. There were a lot of technical problems related to the interfacing assembly language code and a detailed explanation of those would be boring for u readers. After several hours of code cracking, the circuit started working finally! A few accuracy problems were there. We could have left them as such. But we didn't and we increased the code complexity and ultimately on the night before the presentation, the code didn't work at all!
I was a half-zombie that night ( actually yesterday ). In addition, the knowledge of who would be judging the event gave me a very unpleasant feeling for we have not had a pleasant teacher-student relationship this entire semester.
Anyways I had a blind belief that if we did the coding again today morning it would work for sure. And thank heavens it did!!
Well the presentation was not entirely successful. We did have several glitches and forever there resided an inferior feeling because the other participants ( all seniors ) had greatly-packed and fully functional end products as exhibits. We were presenting our circuit on a breadboard!! Most of them had won prizes in several inter college events in the state with the projects they were presenting and ours was nothing compared to those.
Still, everybody encouraged us. I am infinitely thankful to all my seniors and teachers who encouraged our work saying that this is just the beginning and it is a very good one at that. It really boosted our spirits.
The viewing of other exhibits also added a great deal to our knowledge. We also got to communicate with many seniors and even some juniors. A really pleasant experience!
Ultimately at the end of the day the list of teams getting through to the next round was announced and as expected we were not in the list. But we got participation mementos and we left quite contented and determined to win the next time.
The greatest part of the day came when we were waiting for the bus in the stop. I got a call from a classmate asking me to meet the not-so-pleasant prof who was the judge. We went back to the college expecting a scolding for wasting time on such a silly venture. Wonder of all wonders!!! He gave us a gift!! A portrait of a landscape.. And he encouraged us to improve a great deal and assured that if we work on this very idea (that I have rated as silly) for the next couple of months, we could have a completely functional working product which would be commercially very useful. We just couldn't believe our senses of hearing and vision! This very prof used to scold me and my teammate for absolutely nothing on an almost daily basis just a month back. Also two other very much knowledgeable and experienced staff members were there to encourage us.
Things couldn't have been better for us at the end of the day. :) We went straight to the hostel then and informed our other teammate as well as the other girls there.. Wow!! What fun we had, relating the experience to them !! Our happiness when shared really was multiplied a great deal!!
It does sound like a story with an "all is well that ends well" theme right?? :) :)
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Another Issue of Religion??
Terror has become synonymous with religion, in all aspects. By religion's terror links, I do not mean only the saffron versus green crescent fracas which has been on since before I was born. The latest religion of the world has been struck by terror. Cricket- the universal religion- or so it has been claimed to be by many- took a hit from gun-men's bullets- at the place which used to be part of our Motherland a six odd decades ago.
The facts of the matter, I need not present, for there are approximately 5 to 6 news channels which will air, 24X7 at least for the next couple of weeks, the video grabs of the terrorists shooting out at the Srilankan team which was touring Pakistan, with excited journalists in the foreground narrating the happenings and posing questions like " Was this a failed abduction plan?", "Will all the gunmen be caught?" never omitting the newly evolved punch - "SMS your comments to ------ ".
First of all, I was dumbstruck when I saw those videos of men (who must not have seen life before 1980 at the least) shooting freely at the van, hurting many, killing half a dozen cops and two civilians, while they themselves got away scot-free, on MOTORBIKES!! Wow!! What a protective nation Pakistan is, of its fearless citizens like these gun-wielding men!
The cricket grounds of Pakistan will not meet foreign shoes' soles for the next couple of years at the least. Well, this should not bother those brave youngsters, should it? After all, they have put a temporary stop to the development of a mere game that was threatening to be a universal religion. And no religion other than their own one should flourish, should it??
The facts of the matter, I need not present, for there are approximately 5 to 6 news channels which will air, 24X7 at least for the next couple of weeks, the video grabs of the terrorists shooting out at the Srilankan team which was touring Pakistan, with excited journalists in the foreground narrating the happenings and posing questions like " Was this a failed abduction plan?", "Will all the gunmen be caught?" never omitting the newly evolved punch - "SMS your comments to ------ ".
First of all, I was dumbstruck when I saw those videos of men (who must not have seen life before 1980 at the least) shooting freely at the van, hurting many, killing half a dozen cops and two civilians, while they themselves got away scot-free, on MOTORBIKES!! Wow!! What a protective nation Pakistan is, of its fearless citizens like these gun-wielding men!
The cricket grounds of Pakistan will not meet foreign shoes' soles for the next couple of years at the least. Well, this should not bother those brave youngsters, should it? After all, they have put a temporary stop to the development of a mere game that was threatening to be a universal religion. And no religion other than their own one should flourish, should it??
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