Sweet, I lost my 4.0
This might come as unnatural but I honestly feel great. Since I received an A- on my Computer Scientist and Society class this semester, my 4.0 track record is ruined. While I feel that Dr. Leiss' grading policy is a bit eccentric, I still respect the effort and vigor that he puts into his class.
What this leaves me now is a reminder that I have to try harder in everything that I do. As one says (and I summarizes): It is not possible to achieve perfection. But if you aim for it, you might reach exellence.
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Silent my new computer
One of the biggest grief that I have with my new computer is the fact that it is much louder than my own one. I traced the components down and figured out that the free-after-rebate Coolermaster PSU is the culprit. So right after I receive the full rebate for this product, I went out and try to mute it. Alas, the internet came to rescue. Somebody mentioned swapping out the fan of the PSU. I have never tried messing with the PSU before, but for the sake of learning, I gave it a go anyway.
I looked around for silent fan. At first I thought I would give a Vantec 120mm a go as I have read some good reviews about it. But then, since Directron carries a Scythe S-Flex 120mm 1200RPM for $12, I made the purchase and picked it up the same day. There are other version of this fan too that runs at 1600 RPM or 800 RPM. Reviews say that this fan is very quiet despite its rating is 20dBA. I would definitely recommend the 1200RPM version from my experience with it.
The disassembling process was quite straight forward but then I came across a minor problem. The fan inside the PSU is connected to a 2-pin socket while my fan is 3-pin. I was panic for a bit. Then I found this tutorial. Basically, I remove the plastic socket and then plug my 3-pin connector in so that red goes to red and black goes to black.
I booted up my computer again and voila it is whispering quiet. ^_^ I can finally sleep now.
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Matte screen rules
I have been complaining again and again about the glossy screen that I have on my laptop. I think it was the worst decision that I have made when I purchased it. Not only is this glossy screen useless in a well-litted environment like my lab and my library, it hurts my eyes by giving me reflection of light sources that I won't normally get from a matte screen. It is true that the color of a glossy screen is more saturated and thus gives a sense of better color to movies watched in dark lighting environment, such color is not a true representation of real color. That is, for photo processing or design related works, a matte screen is a very bad choice.
For a developer like me, I think matte screen is absolute needed. Most IDEs have buttons and status reports and all other kind of feedback that is placed all over the screens. The reflections on a glossy screen prevent me from seeing them all in a clear manner. IDEs generally have light background which is okay. However, nicer IDEs like Textmate and E have dark themes which improve viewability. However, these themes intensify the problem on my glossy monitor. Overall, I think that glossy screen is for playing. Like a post found in this thread, if you are seriously considering using your computer to do any work, get a matte screen.
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My parents are visiting soon
My parents are coming to visit me for a month starting next Monday. I better finish cleaning up the apartment plus all the finals that I have. Since I will be on travel for a while. Expect some downtime in my blogging. However, when I am back, expect lots of pictures and release 1.0 of BibSync - a biobliography management tool. Wait and be surprised Endnote Web.
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Everybody and their brothers are coming up with free JS gallery scroll (rotation) scripts. More than a year ago, I came up with a basic image scrolling script for CBL website. UH NSMIT website was nice enough to took it and implemented it on their website too. Back then, there was no decent JS-only image scrolling script so mine was concocted with Mootols revision 83. Fast forward to today, I saw this rotation script on UH Student Handbook website. I thought: "Wow, that's neat". It turns out that the landscape for image rotation script has changed. Now, you can find many more JS scripts that make use of Mootools simplicity to do things like Fluid Anchors, Smooth Gallery.
What strikes me even more is the quality of Jon's code for his Smooth Gallery. The code was written in nice JSON and Javascript OO. I actually picked up quite a few tips and tricks from his code. It's a definitely good code if you want to take a look.
So what is left for me? I actually have just launched the new website of the lab which uses a newer version of my image rotation script. My script provides the ability to have a list of activators for the images so users can move quickly between images. I add tootips option to the link so users have a bit of clue what they are looking for. I am planning on incorporate this extra feature into Jon's script and ask him to release it along with his bundle.
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Around a year ago, I tested out Intel Math Kernel Library (MKL). My task was to implement a function that calculate the distance between a point and triangle in 3D. According to Intel Vtune, this function is what our algorithm (which deals substaintly with 3D objects) uses the most. Even when not compiled using Intel Compiler, Intel Math Kernel Library performs extremely well for the task at hand. A minor change to MKL gives a 100% improvement in term of speed. Excited by this possibility, I wanted to rewrite this whole function to use Intel Compiler in conjunction with MKL. However, this task was postponed due to some other deadline at the time.
Yesterday, determined to give these performance libraries from Intel a better look, I downloaded Intel Professional Suite for Linux. Intel is nice enough to offer their full suite of professional development tools on the Linux platform to non-commercial developers for free. To my delight, Intel has worked hard to improve their installation compatibility with Ubuntu. Installation packages which used to give weird errors now blissfully run through. The installation of Eclipse extension is well documented. I simply add the correct path to the list of extension paths and Eclipse picks up the new configuration and plugins from Intel. Things were going well.
I decided to give the beloved "Hello World" program a run. This is where I get stumped. The wizard for creating a new Hello World C++ project does not allow me to specify Intel Toolchain. "Weird!", I told myself. I spent several hours last night trying to figure out what was wrong. This morning, I found out that Intel extension for eclipse is not compatible with Eclipse CDT 4.0 x86_64. I found this out while digging through the confusing naming of different architectures (IA32, IA64, EMT64, Intel 64). So, I am here again, back to square one.
My hopeful wishes of finally be able to show my fellow lab mates how cool Intel toolchain is on my Eclipse x86_64 has come to a halt. Come on Intel, I have been to your campus and met your great minds. You can do better than this. Give us 64-bit compatible toolchain and we will grab it and run like crazy hackers who found zero-day exploits. After all, 64-bit has been around for long enough. It is time that at least academia (aka my work) makes the jump. Please Intel.
I am planning to try using GCC with MKL. If I am lucky, I still might be able to harness its power. For the next post, I will give some details on how it goes. I will probably throw in some CPPUnit testing to make sure that the function still work as it is expected.
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