Skip navigation

Category Archives: School

Phew… long time no post.

Man… it’s been a while since I wrote anything here. I’ll try to keep things going more often, even if it just is a blurb here and there. Here’s a list of the things that have happened since I last posted:

  • Almost done my research for my masters. Only a few more months until I’m done!
  • Dave Matthews Band concert at the Gorge! Amazing times with friends. Good music, lots of raw dogging (if you weren’t there, don’t ask), and plenty of empty Corona bottles.
  • Upgraded the main video card in my desktop to an XFX ATI 4890 (900Mhz core, 3.9Ghz Mem). This thing screams…
  • Upgraded my desktop and netbook to Win7 RTM. This is a legit final build copy (I’ll be buying my licenses on Oct 22), and it’s awesome. There’s a couple of small quirks when it comes to UltraMon and some other apps, but those will be sorted out soon enough.
  • I became the guild master of our guild in World of Warcraft (I’ve been playing for about a year now). Herding cats is fun!!

I think that should do it for now. Like I said, there will be more frequent updates in the future. =)

Yay!!! Halfway done exams

So yes… I’ve been neglecting this site… It seems Dreamhost had a bit of a hiccup with one of their switches a couple of days ago, so if you couldn’t see the site, that’s why.

In the process of looking up that information, I found out some pretty funny information about my hosting. The server that does the PHP is called ‘ritz”, and the server that does my MySQL is called “tramp”. I guess you could say my hosting package should be called “The tramp on the ritz”.

Anyways… I’m halfway done my exams. That’s the main reason why I haven’t written much here lately. I’ve got 8 in total. The 4 so far have been alright – I just need to pass everything to get through this term, and thereby my degree. Wish me luck…

Almost done…

So… I’ve only got about three weeks left of my undergrad. I’m really dying here. I just want it all to be over.

Things that await me this summer:

  • Setting up a 20 node computing cluster (each node has 8 cores)
  • Scuba Diving trip to the Red Sea
  • Month long Europe trip with friends
  • Starting on graduate studies work
  • Road trip with my girlfriend

So… you can see that I’ve got a whole lot more things that I’d rather be doing than the end of this degree. Grumble…

Graduate School

I GOT IN!!!!

I just got an e-mail from Dr. Konrad Walus of the Electrical Engineering department here at UBC telling me that he just signed off on my application for a Masters of Applied Science. I’m gonna be working on a pretty wicked project, and I get to manage a computing cluster.

Needless to say, I’m excited. :)

It’s that season again…

No, I don’t mean Christmas. I mean exams. In other words, hunting season for my profs, and I’m the game.

I just wrote my Math 400 final about an hour ago, and boy… did that ever suck. I don’t think that I failed, but it definately didn’t go as well as I had hoped. I’ve got my graphics final tomorrow, but I’m not terribly worried about that. Some reading to do tonight and a good night’s sleep should help me do well.

Speaking of my graphics course, here’s an image of my final project. My friend Andrew and I wrote our own raytracer engine, and after 7 hours on a Celeron D 2.6GHz machine, that image was created. I’ll admit, the code is horrendous, and there’s still a bug with reflections off planes, but other than that, it’s wicked in my opinion. :D

Part way through…

Ok… so I’ve made it though the first bit of the hell…

I got a midterm back in my Computer Graphics course that I wrote last week – 22/27. Not too bad considering I lost most of my marks on stupid math errors rather than the harder questions later on in the test.

As for the midterm I had today… let’s just say that I’ll be happy with a pass… It totally destroyed everyone I talked to afterwards. Stupidly convoluted and long questions – the kind of stuff that you’d probably need more than 90 minutes to slog through properly.

On a good note – both my assignments are due Friday, meaning I can take a bit more time to do them properly. I started on math today, but I’ll have to take a longer look at it to figure out what’s going on.

Anyways – I gotta get to bed. Tomorrow I get to work with Mike Chin on a power supply… w00t!!!

2 days…

Ok, so the next couple of days are going to be hell. I’ve got a lab to finish up my 1PM today (in between classes), a lab to do at 1PM, a midterm tomorrow evening which I know absolutely nothing about, and then two assignments due on Wednesday. I’ve asked my Optics prof if I can have one of the assignments due on Wednesday extended to Friday… I’m hoping he’ll say yes.

After all that though! On Wednesday afternoon, I’m meeting with Mike Chin from www.silentpcreview.com regarding a hardware reviewer position he has available. For everyone who deals with computers a lot, this is the kind of job where manufacturers send you stuff, you test it, and then tell the rest of the world how good (or bad) it really is. If you haven’t seen the SPCR site yet, I suggest you do so now. The site has LOTS of great information on quiet computing – something that I think is getting more and more important as computers get more integrated into our daily lives. I spend a good deal of money and time making my desktop system as quiet as possible. The result? You can sit right next to it and barely hear the thing. The loudest parts of it are the hard drives, and that’s mostly because I haven’t got a chance to build my own drive enclosures for them (commercial ones are $25 or more a piece… and with 4 drives – eep). In any case, it’s definately not the loud whirring tower that you might have sitting next to you or under your desk.

Then I get to go out to PoCo (Port Coquitlam) to watch Lost with Katherine… I wonder what they’re gonna do to Saywer this week… :-|