Under the Southern Skies

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2011-11-27T19:13:00.000+11:00

[repost] 555-logic: designing digital circuits with 555s only!

2011-03-04T23:57:00.001+11:00

The basic idea of 555-logic is to implement digital logic circuits with 555 ICs only. This gives advantage that a relatively higher and wide range of power supply voltage can be used, limited by the specification of the 555 IC (4.5V - 16V). According to Shannon through his famous 1937 Masters thesis at MIT, any combinational logic circuits can be made with switches. With semiconductor technology, these switches can be in the form of transistors. To use 555 as a transistor switch, one can utilize the internal pull-down transistor of a 555 (Figure 1).

Figure 1 Using the transistor of a 555

There is a restriction on how to use this transistor as its emitter is connected to ground pin (1). Even though one may be tempted to connect that emitter (or ground pin) to something other than ground voltage, this will not guarantee to work since the ground voltage is needed by other parts of the 555 IC to function. Therefore, the use of the 555 transistor as a switch is restricted to the implementation of pull-down network of switches with no cascading of emitters to collector of another transistor. This leaves a reasonable choice to implement a NOR gate. A NOR gate can be made with two pull-down transistors with collector pins connected together forming the output. A pull up resistor is to be connected between these collector pins and VCC, and a 555 can be used for this since a series of three 5ks resistors exist in a 555. The implementation of such a NOR gate with 555 is shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2 Implementation of NOR gate with 555

A NOR gate is said to be a minimum set for implementing logic functions, since NOR gates can be made into any other logic gates. But it still would be better if other form of basic logic gates made from pure 555 can also made. One obvious logic gate with a 555 is the inverter, which has actually been shown above in Figure 1 (see pin X').
To implement digital sequential systems or state machines, a form of memory such as a clocked flip-flop is needed. A 555 chip contains an RS flip-flop, so it makes real sense to try to make use of it as a clocked flip-flop. The main difficulty on using this internal flip-flop is that the R and S inputs are fixed to other components inside the 555, namely the comparator outputs. By carefully controlling the signaling of input pins connected to those comparators, one can obtain a level-triggered as well as edge-triggered D flip-flop with a 555. A positive level enabled D flip-flop with 555 is shown in Figure 3. To make this edge triggered, we can actually make a master-slave arrangement but since this would require a larger amount of 555s, in this work we built a short pulse generator instead to make the level-triggered flip-flop into an edge-triggered one. The circuit on Figure 4 is a negative-edge triggered D flip-flop designed using the above approach.

Figure 3 Level-enabled D-flip flop

Figure 4 Negative edge triggered D flip-flop

The logic between data and clock sources inputs with the 555 can be made with 555 logic (using NOR and NOT gates), and the resulting circuit realization is shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5 A 555-logic-oriented implementation of circuitry for D flip-flop with 555.

With these NOR gate, NOT gate, and a edge triggered D flip-flop made solely from 555, it is time now to test this concept in real scenario. An added bonus for this 555-logic concept is that the same 555 can be used as the clock source.

Case study: synchronous 2-bit grey code counter
Let us now consider a 2-bit grey-code counter that counts in this following order: 00, 01, 11, 10. A synchronous topology is chosen in this case study to emphasize the synchronously clocked sequential digital circuitry can be made. Using a general state machine topology, where states are fed back to flip-flops that holds the state information, through some combinational logic block, we can try to implement the following truth table:
Q1 Q0    NextQ1 NextQ0

0    0        0             1
0    1        1             1
1    0        0             1
1    1        1             0

Using sum-of-product and simplifications principles, we can get:
NextQ1 = Q0
NextQ0 = not Q1

The implementation of the above logic function can therefore be made as seen in Figure 6.

Figure 6 Test circuit of synchronous 2-bit grey code counter

The circuit on figure 6 implemented with only 555s (except timing R and C for clock generation and series R for LED indication on outputs) is shown in Figure 7. The clock generator is a 555 astable multivibrator circuit with R1 = R2 = 1k2, and C = 100uF.

Figure 6 A 2-bit synchronous grey-code counter implemented with 555s.

A video showing real experiment of the circuit can be seen in the following video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpmp9uvjrwU

Conclusion:
555-logic proposed in this work relies on NOR gates (needs three 555s, OR one 556 and one 555), NOT gates (needs one 555), and negative-edge triggered D flip-flop (four 556s and six 555s).

(originally posted by Irfan in http://hobimikro.blogspot.com/2011/03/555-logic-designing-digital-circuits.html)

Brief Summary of 2010

2011-01-01T03:13:00.002+11:00

Time pasts particularly very fast this year, with quite many "significant" events happening, certainly worthy to mention in this blog.

Facebook is still the big magnet anytime I go online, giving bad influence on my other former habits: blogging. It has this update status feature, so whenever I have something I feel like to shout out to friends, I normally pick up my phone, open up Opera Mini, open m.facebook.com, then go update my status. Very simple, and in terms of friends' response, I've got far more friend response in facebook than if I did the same "status update" thing in my blog.

Nevertheless, despite my lack of blogging activity in 2010, I feel obliged to continue my long tradition (hah, long? blogging since 2005 and you call that long?) of writing in this blog of mine.

Okay.

So here are brief updates of 2010, most of these events caused major changes in my life, and some merely caused significant trouble.

1. Up until mid 2009, it was not certain who might be 'the one' for me. It changed in August 2009, and now I am very fortunate that I get to marry my Vita, in 2010.... :D

2. Just before marrying Vita, I was largely occupied with a job-related event: Kompetisi Roket Indonesia, Korindo 2010. I was made in charge of the UGM's part of the job as host, perhaps because no one else had been involved since this the beginning of this annual event that was first launched 2 years ago. It was painful. The loss of UGM student team in this competition (under my supervision) also adds up to the pain.

3. Research life was not too bad. At least I got one research grant, but again, it is very painful. (note that I am using the word 'is', it's still a work in progress -_-"). And the topic itself is not actually within my academic specialisation, but more like my extracurricular interest? It's already end of the year, and I haven't done the final report, haven't finish the accounting and its reporting, and also, haven't finished business with the industrial partner. Please God help me on finishing this off before I move out from UGM.

4. I got accepted as lecturer in ITS, therefore I have to move out from UGM in the next semester. This one might sound quite controversial. All I can say is that this decision has to be made as a responsibility to my wife and family. And this decision was a really hard decision to make considering my already-very-comfortable-working-environment in UGM. This decision was a response to a job offering, and the idea and initiative did not come from myself. The down side of this decision is that I will certainly move out from Jogja. All my friends are in here, and I almost know no one in Surabaya. Again, please help me God on this one.

5. My academic life in 2010 started not too well, but in mid 2010 it got very well. In this semester I am teaching all electronics: Analog Electronics, Basic Electronics (for IT), Industrial electronics (for industrial engineering). Also, I made a self-made op amp using 5 transistors for the praktikum in my lab. I'll try to post something about this later on.

6. Merapi erupted. Volcanic ash fell over Yogyakarta, including UGM, my house, almost everywhere here got covered in white ash. It fell twice in Jogja, and remains of the ash can still be seen today. It is not water soluble, and it feels pedih in your eyes.

I'll stop writing now, it's a few minutes till midnight. Welcome 2011.

Mengenai Kuliah Elektronika Analog

2010-01-07T16:37:00.000+11:00

Berakhir sudah kuliahnya. Kemarin baru saja UAS. Dan dari penampakan sekilas raut wajah mas-mas dan mbak-mbak mahasiwa kemarin, ada kemungkinan beberapa anak cukup mawut ujiannya. Meskipun, kayaknya banyak juga yang keluar dengan wajah sukses, keluar beberapa menit sebelum waktunya berakhir.

Cuma yang saya sesalkan, kemarin ruang ujian kenapa rodo' ramai ya? Kenapa ada lembar jawaban yang diputar posisi nya ke depan, memudahkan anak di depannya untuk duduk rodo' menyamping dan menoleh ke belakang, untuk kemudian, mbaca? Kenapa, meskipun semua rumus penting2 sudah ditulis di papan tulis, masih saja tengok kanan tengok kiri, bisik kanan bisik kiri seolah kurang yakin dengan kemampuan hebat diri sendiri yang entah kenapa kurang disadarinya?? Entah apa lagi yang bisa terjadi lewat HP yang dipegang terus, semoga itu dipakai sebagai kalkulator saja...

Dengan beberapa pertimbangan, sepertinya nanti nilai akhir mata kuliah Elektronika Analog adalah dari UTS (40%) dan UAS (60%) murni, tanpa ada persentase dari tugas, karena soal-soal UTS dan UAS sudah dirancang untuk membuktikan tugas benar-benar dikerjakan sendiri atau tidak....

Dan kemungkinannya scoring-nya begini, tapi nanti lihat keadaan lah:
D < 50
50 <= C < 75
75 <= B < 85
A >= 85

Tawaran TA (utk TE dan TI UGM)

2009-12-17T11:03:00.000+11:00

IDE JUDUL TUGAS AKHIR
(untuk TE dan TI)

Topik Mikrokontroler
(tersedia 2 SBC Mini2440, bisa dipinjam di lab)

1. Implementasi Klatt Speech Synthesizer pada Single-board Computer ARM Mini2440 dengan sistem operasi Linux/Windows CE untuk pengubah teks ke suara Bahasa Indonesia (TE & TI)
Program pembangkit suara berbasis formant dalam C++ sudah tersedia, pekerjaan yang diperlukan adalah integrasi, dan mem-parsing teks bahasa Indonesia untuk kemudian menghasilkan parameter2 yang dibutuhkan speech synthesizer, dengan intonasi dan nada yang nyaman didengar. Selain itu, program perlu di-porting ke Linux pada target ARM mini2440 yang sudah memiliki sound card. SBC juga sudah memiliki USB port, jadi disambung ke keyboard bukan masalah.

2. Pengembangan Human Machine Interface untuk industri berbasis SBC Mini2440 dengan protokol Modbus dan TCP/IP. (TE dan TI)
Targetnya adalah membuat produk serupa dengan Magelis HMI keluaran Schneider. Karena SBC memiliki layar touch screen dan memiliki port serial dan Ethernet, maka berpotensi untuk dikembangkan menjadi HMI serupa dengan Magelis yang mampu berkomunikasi dengan PLC, dan dapat juga diakses melalui web. SBC yang tersedia adalah Mini2440 dengan OS linux. Pengembangan GUI bisa dengan Qt, KDE, atau Java.

Topik Efisiensi Daya Listrik (Power-efficient Techniques)

3. Studi atau perancangan rangkaian Power MOSFET untuk driver motor dengan penekanan pada efisiensi daya listrik. (TE)
Pada robot Kontes Robot Indonesia dari Tim UGM, permasalahan pada driver motor berupa masalah panas yang sangat berlebih (boros tenaga) dan cepat rusak sering ditemui dalam beberapa tahun terakhir. TA ini bertujuan menganalisis sumber permasalahan secara ilmiah dan detil, serta mencari upaya perbaikannya.

4. Studi atau perancangan rangkaian regulator tegangan berefisiensi daya tinggi dengan sumber tegangan batere / panel surya. (TE)
IC konverter DC-DC sudah banyak ada di pasaran, namun ketersediaannya di toko lokal dirasa kurang. TA ini bertujuan mencari solusi untuk robot-robot KRCI yang konsumsi daya-nya besar namun perlu teg. stabil, misalnya untuk sistem digital (5V) dan servo motor (6V) dengan sumber tegangan baterai 12V. Atau diambil studi kasus lain, yaitu studi pengembangan sistem mikrokontroler bertenaga surya tanpa baterai.

5. Studi atau perancangan rangkaian driver LED dengan efisiensi daya tinggi. (TE)
Penerangan dengan LED sudah banyak dilirik dan dipakai (traffic light, papan informasi, kendaraan). TA ini bertujuan mencari desain driver LED yang baik, terutama dari aspek efisiensi tenaganya. Bisa dikaitkan juga dengan efisiensi daya listrik per kuat intensitas cahaya yang dihasilkan.

Any enthusiast's dream?

2009-11-20T15:09:00.000+11:00

Being old sometimes makes us forget small little details of our childhood. For instance, a 'normal' adult might say "Oh sh*t, it's raining! And sh*t i'm wet!!"...

How could he or she forget, that when they were still a kid, rain means: playing time!!!, or "ujan-ujan-an" as we Javanese call it :D

Kids love rain.

Well, maybe not everyone.

But what I actually want to point out in this stupid blog update is that I should have been much much much more thankful for what is provided for me in my current Electronics Lab here in UGM.

There are so many items in this lab that should be like what a rain is to a child... (or "toys", in kids language). Here's the list:
- Complete (though simple) PCB prototyping workshop, including several LCD monitor computers, a laser printer, an iron, cutting tools, grinder, electrical drills, and small bowl to do chemical etching...
- soldering iron
- abundant supply of common electronics components: resistors, capacitors, transistors...
- adequate adjustable power supplies with overload protection --> there's no need to make one
- 4 channel 100MHz oscilloscopes and <2MHz function generators --> troubleshooting pal
- lots of breadboards
- Development boards!!! Two Altera Cyclone II FPGA boards, a box-full of ARM development boards (milik pak Eka, dititipkan di sini hehehe), three ARM Single-board computers. A Schneider Twido PLC, and several Atmel AVR USB programmer cables.

Not to mention, a very great atmosphere. Pak Parman, the laboratory technician here is a very nice man. He even bought me gado2 for lunch today!

Now the problem is, me being here for quite a while apparently haven't resulted in anything 'substantial'. Well, early this year we did get involved in a business project, producing not less than 150 controller boards, which unfortunately did not perform well in the hands of the customers. Academically, no important research has been finished during this nearly 2 years of me being here, other than some pretty good students final year projects that I supervise. Some final year projects went out very well, like Agni's one (he presented his paper in our department's national seminar), and just recently, a department-funded research was completed in this lab, despite its lack of awesomeness (and lack of students involvement not to mention... -_-).

I need a performance boost. But how?? :-/
Yoroshiku onegaishimasu

Komputer saku linux

2009-09-11T12:05:00.000+10:00

Dua minggu belakangan ini disibukkan dengan ngutak-atik sebuah komputer satu board (single board computer), RRC punya, bernama Mini2440 alias FriendlyARM (www.friendlyarm.net). Ukurannya kecil, 10 senti kali 10. Isinya lengkap: Flash 64MB, ethernet controller, USB host, audio card, serial port, LCD TOUCH SCREEN, buzzer (gak penting), ADC, general purpose IO, dan SD card reader!! Niat semula ingin gampang, tinggal mrogram under linux, kenyataan berbicara lain..! Kernel linux bawaan dari pabriknya belum sesuai harapan! Alatnya punya sebuah port I/O general purpose, eh jebul Linux bawaannya tidak menyertakan driver untuk mengakses port itu??

"Untung" website http://www.friendlyarm.net menyediakan file-file lengkap di website nya, berikut MANUAL cara menggunakan. Walaupun isinya tulisan KANJI semua, dengan bantuan Google translate bisa lah diikuti isi nya sedikit sedikit -_-"

Ya.. ternyata kernel linux nya perlu di-configure ulang...

Tapi kalau nggak begitu, mungkin hingga saat ini saya jadi belum pernah mencoba meng-compile kernel linux sendiri... :p

Oya. Ini foto alatnya:

Rencananya alat ini akan diprogram supaya:
1. Bisa jadi webserver sebagai interface dengan sensor-sensor dan peralatan rumah tangga, dan memiliki dukungan terhadap dynamic dns,
2. Bisa berkomunikasi dengan perangkat lain menggunakan protokol MODBUS, dengan jalur fisik serial RS-485.

Kalau ada yang punya pengalaman embedded-linux, mohon di-share ya pengalamannya?? Yoroshiku onegaishimasu...

Salah pilih caleg...

2009-04-23T14:08:00.001+10:00

"Kemarin nyontreng apa, mas?"

Begitulah pertanyaan yang kudapat berkali2 dari beberapa teman, setelah pemilu kemarin...

Dan kalau boleh jujur, sebenarnya dalam hati ini saya golput, tapi meskipun keyakinan hati ini golput, tindakan ku berbicara lain... Sebagai warga jogja yang baik (halah :D), TPS di perumahan pun kudatangi bareng Ibu dan adikku tanggal 9 April kemarin (which supposed to be a very-long-week-end but wasn't)...

Dan seperti biasa, pagi sebelum berangkat kita rembug-an dulu... sebaiknya pilih apa (sekarang pertanyaan nya ganti, jadi pilih siapa)...

Walhasil,

Bapak ngasih list nama:

1. DPR RI: ??????
2. Propinsi: Dr. ......
3. Kota: (inisial T)
4. DPD : ????, ST

Nah, mengingat selama tahun 2009 ini saya lebih sering 'error' (intensitasnya rada meningkat sejak Maret), yang seharusnya caleg utk DPRD kota saya milihnya adalah caleg berinisial T, malah itu kupakai untuk memilih caleg DPR RI (kebetulan nama depannya sama, inisial T juga)... i mean, i mixed the two names...I was utterly confused at that time... :-[

Dan belakangan, setelah bapak dan ibu tahu kalau aku 'salah contreng' caleg lain, saya dikasih tahu begini,

"Oh, itu kan yang kena kasus KORUPSI dulu itu bukan?"

("sh*t", pikirku... what a waste of vote, salah pilih deh...)

Kemudian, utk caleg Kota, saya pilih kandidat yang direkomendasikan temen sendiri, dan kebetulan adik kelas SMA (yang kemudian setelah temenku separtai dgn ybs tahu, malah saya dimarahi kok asal pilih cuma krn rekomendasi satu temen).

In short, aku merasa kemarin salah pilih dua caleg, yaitu yang utk DPR RI dan KOTA.

Yang caleg utk kota ga masalah, krn kayaknya ga lolos (eh, apa lolos ya ga ngerti ding). Tapi untuk DPR RI, menurut KR sepertinya beliau bakal bertugas (lagi)...

Tapi ya wis lah, I don't really care anyway... I'm actually golput, karena merasa ga ada pilihan sreg... (patokanku sederhana sih, yang kulihat adalah apakah partai itu sudah punya calon Menteri Keuangan, dan siapa kah dia, dan apa visi+programnya... jadi menteri keuangan bagiku lebih penting dibandingkan wapres...)

Five basic electronics components

2009-02-18T04:55:00.000+11:00

Electronics can sometimes look like magic. If there was anyone who jumped right into the current time from say, a century ago, that person would definitely be amazed of today's common electronics products.

But no matter how wonderful it can get, electronics is not rocket science. It is still easily understandable by anyone (anyone willing to, that is :D).

As I was preparing my first lecture in the Electronics class this semester, it came to my consciousness that actually any physical objects, as far as electronics circuit is concerned, can be modeled into five basic components.

These five basic components are:

1. voltage source (including the controlled type)

2. current source

3. resistor

4. capacitor

5. inductor.

By this I do not mean that there's only five electronics components that exists. They're actually dozens of types, or even limitless. But all of those can arguably be represented by an equivalent model consisting a combination of those five basic components.

I found a term used for this idea, called "Lumped Element Model" (Anant Argawal, 2005), which is a type of circuit abstraction, made to simplify calculations, analysis, design, and probably optimization methods.

I'm just wondering whether my understanding (about there's only five elementary components) is correct. Can anyone comment on this? I would really appreciate that...

"Because you're Chinese"

2009-02-06T04:19:00.001+11:00

Saya ini orang Indonesia dan bersuku Jawa, tapi tampaknya ada saja beberapa teman ku semasa kecil dulu di Primary School ku (di Sydney) yang benar-benar mengira semua Asian itu adalah Chinese. Dan sebagai seorang anak Asia yang pernah tinggal dan besar di kota "bule" itu (dan jujur sebetulnya Sydney itu juga Yunani dan Arab sekali kadang), ada lah kejadian-kejadian yang sangat SARA, misalnya ketika waktu itu ada teman (bukan temen deket sih, bahkan aku lupa namanya sekarang) membagi2kan makanan snack nya ke temen2 yang lain... TAPI TIDAK KE AKU... dan aku ga bisa lupa apa yang dia katakan waktu itu, "because you're Chinese"....

Seandainya saya memang Chinese (ada juga lho bbrp temen sampai SMA pun yang mengira saya Chinese), what's the problem with that???#%!

No offense, saya ga menuduh Australia itu rasis. Alasan saya menulis ini adalah karena kelihatannya masalah ini tidak hanya dialami orang luar seperti saya... tapi juga orang Australia sendiri yang kebetulan berketurunan Asia seperti Vietnam, atau Cina, dan Indonesia bahkan...

(hihihi alasan sebenarnya kenapa saya kepikiran nulis ini adalah karena nonton video Youtube si Natalie Tran yang sempat bilang, "I've copped a lot of s**t being an Asian kid in Australia..." ya kira2 begitulah yang dia katakan, padahal dia orang Australia lho... :p)

Orang Australia secara umum baik kok dalam menerapkan sikap tidak rasis... Mereka kelihatan kok berusaha untuk tidak rasis, mungkin kalian yang pernah ke sana bisa mengerti apa yang kukatakan ini...

Di tempat lain mungkin keadaannya jauh lebih parah tanpa kita sadari,, dan kalaupun kita sadar, mungkin kita ga mau mengakui... :(

Karena alasan inilah, saya mengajak kita "Say No to Racism"...
^_^

ps: pertanyaan: apakah Yahudi bisa dikaitkan dengan sebuah 'ras' tertentu? :-?

Film-film keren

2009-01-30T12:54:00.000+11:00

(ini adalah terjemahan tulisan yang sebelum ini persis ^_^)

Semester ganjil berakhir sudah! Pekerjaanku juga.... finish :p (ga ding, bercanda... berkhayal)

Eniwei, aku merasa beberapa minggu terakhir ini koq sangat berkesan ya? Sangat berkesan karena beberapa film super keren yang kutonton di minggu-minggu kemarin ini...

1. My Sassy Girl

Saya mulai dari film terakhir yang saya tonton aja ya? "My Sassy Girl". Ini adalah film komedi romantis yang aslinya dibikin di Korea, dan belakangan dibuat versi Hollywoodnya tahun kemarin. Yang kutonton justru versi Baratnya dulu sih... (yang dibintangi Elisha Cuthbert yang cute :D). Dan saat itu aku malah belum tahu e kalau ada versi aslinya yang Korea... Baru beberapa hari berikutnya lah yang Korea kutonton...

DUA-DUA-NYA SANGAT KEREN ! LIMA BINTANG ***** (SANGAT DIREKOMENDASIKAN)

Kisahnya sangat sulit untuk ditebak. Dan bagusnya lagi, banyak kata-kata mutiara di film ini. Kalimat favoritku dari yang versi Hollywood itu adalah ketika Jordan Roark bilang ini ke tentara yang mau bunuh diri, "We have to stay alive... because we have to know how the story ends". Nah di versi Korea aslinya, ada juga kalimat yang mirip itu... "Jika ingin belajar (cinta), kita harus tetap hidup." (hehe, iya sayangnya cuma bisa ngerti lewat teks terjemahannya)

Soundtrack-nya keren-an yang asli (judul lagunya "I Believe"). Tapi di versi bule nya, ada juga tuh lagu bagus, yang dimainkan sewaktu mereka berdua menari semalam suntuk? Judulnya apa ya, adakah yang tahu??

2. Red Cliff (part 1 dan part 2)

Saya juga sudah menonton "Red Cliff", dua-duanya, part 1 dan part 2. Yang part 2 masih diputar di bioskop di Jogja lho, jadi bagi kalian yang haus darah dan perang, buruan saja ke Amplaz (itupun kalau kalian di Jogja tentunya), terus tontonlah film ini. Film ini berkisah tentang awal-awal cerita legendaris "Romance of Three Kingdoms". Kalau kalian tidak asing dengan nama-nama tokoh: Cao Cao, Liu Bei, Kong Rong, Zhou Yu, Sun Quan, nah Anda WAJIB nonton film ini. (peringatan: menurut wikipedia, ada beberapa perbedaan penting antara kisah di film ini dengan sumber aslinya)

Pada dasarnya ini kan film tentang perang. Jadi bersiaplah untuk melihat darah muncrat di mana-mana. Film ini juga ada humornya, dan kisah cinta nya juga (percaya nggak, ada yang berfikir bahwa penyebab perang di film itu adalah karena wanita? dan perang di film itu gagal menang juga karena wanita itu??)

Yang paling kusukai dari film ini adalah, selain adanya pemain cute Lin Chi-Ling yang berperan sebagai istri Zhou Yu, adalah bahwa perangnya sendiri sangat "nyeni". Bayangkan, ini cerita di abad 3 masehi, dan mereka sudah punya panah yang bisa diisi ulang, dan armada kapal mereka sangat sangat besar.

Dan iya, soundtrack film ini juga enak untuk didengar...

3. Perempuan Berkalung Surban

(to be continued)

Movies movies movies

2009-01-30T01:05:00.000+11:00

As the semester ended, so has my work. (no, this is just a wish, it's totally not true)

Nevertheless, I felt that these past few weeks was very... memorable. Memorable because of some very good movies I've watched during those weeks.

1. My Sassy Girl

I'll start from the last movie I watched on DVD. "My Sassy Girl". It's a romantic comedy, originally a Korean movie (2001) and then adapted to an American remake in 2008. I watched the remake first (starred by the super cute Elisha Cuthbert ^_^), without knowing there was actually a Korean version one (which in fact was the original one). A couple of days later, I watched the original one.

THEY WERE AWESOME ! FIVE STARS ***** (TOTALLY RECOMMENDED)

A totally unpredictable story. Yet it contains many words of wisdom. My favourite quote is "We have to stay alive... because we have to know how the story ends" --from the american remake. A comparable sentence actually existed in the original Korean movie, which unfortunately I can only understand through Indonesian subtitles... "Jika ingin belajar (cinta), kita harus tetap hidup." :D

Soundtrack-wise, the original is better ("I Believe"). But there's a song in the remake that I really liked, you know near the end when both danced all night? What song was it during that scene??

2. Red Cliff (part 1 and part 2)

I've also watched "Red Cliff", both part 1 and part 2. Part 2 is still on the cinemas here in Jogja right now, so for you who loves blood and war, quick go to Amplaz (if you're in Jogja, that is :D), and go watch Red Cliff 2. It's a movie about the early part of the famous Chinese Romance of Three Kingdoms. If you're familiar with these names: Cao Cao, Liu Bei, Kong Rong, Zhou Yu, Sun Quan, then you'll definitely should watch this. (caution though, wikipedia says the movie has substantial differences then the original Romance of Three Kingdoms)

Basically it's a movie about war. So get prepared to see blood everywhere. It also has some humour in it, and some love stories (can you believe that the motivation for war in this movie was because of a woman, and that battle was lost also because of that same woman?)

What I like most about this movie, apart from the cute Lin Chi-Ling acting as Zhou Yu's wife, is that the wars themselves were very artistic, or "nyeni", as we Javanese like to say it. Just imagine, it's the 3rd century, and they already have those portable harpoons (what's the correct word for this weapon?) and the fleets were HUGE.

And yes, its soundtrack is also a very good listen.

3. Perempuan Berkalung Surban

The other VERY interesting movie I watched recently is "Perempuan Berkalung Surban.", starring Revalina S. Temat. She's actually very adorable, but in this movie, you might not see her laugh, or even smile often. The whole movie is dominated by scenes of her sufferings. Any tortures that you can think of, any tragedies that can be ever imagined, have been experienced by this very strong (and don't forget, cute) lady. Okay, I may be exagerating, but I feel it necessary to warn you: this movie is not a 'hiburan', it's not very entertaining (despite the very cute face of Revalina). But it does not mean that the movie isn't good. It's actually one of the best quality Indonesian movie that I've ever watched. It's a long film (more than 2 hours long), and has many words of wisdom in it as well. And for the whole 2 hours, it's either sufferings that we're watching, or great wisdom and philosophy...

And there's Jogja in it! :D

So, if you're into women's rights, justice, and freedom, (and cute Revalina), this is the right movie for you =D

(ps: this movie is based on a novel. To my astonishment, I found out that the story in the novel is actually shorter than the one in the movie. The novel is also rather 'explicit' in portraying Anisa's (Revalina) experiences as a wife. Might not be suitable for minors :D)

4. Transporter 3

Transporter 3 might still be on the movies here in Jogja now. Car-driving-wise, this movie is actually comparable (or maybe even better) than Taxi (Queen Latifa), Fast and Furious, Italian Job, or Dukes of Hazard. I don't really care about the story line... okay the story is not bad, well, okay maybe it is bad. But the driving and car chasing scenes are the best! CMIIW, was it an Audi that he was driving in the movie?

The best scene in the movie: bicycle chasing car scene... :D

5. Artificial Intelligence

This is not a new movie. Yup, I'm very late. It's a story about a robot kid that is programmed to have an unconditional love to 'his mother'. It has a future setting, where the Earth is no longer like the way we know it (sea water surface has risen, drowning many big cities in the world).

The best scene of the movie that I liked most is a scene towards the end, where the kid (David) had the chance to meet his mother for the last time. It was so touching, I really think anyone watching this scene would not be able to stop their tears dropping.

Now that the new semester hasn't started yet, I plan to watch the following movies:
- Bedtime Stories
- Australia (does anyone know when will they play this in Jogja? Amplaz has a poster of this movie, saying "Coming Soon")
- any other suggestions?

Teaching something that you don't know

2008-11-26T21:47:00.000+11:00

How would you feel if you were told to teach something to some other people which in fact you're not too good about it, but the others think that you are? Oddly enough, this situation happened to me THREE times in just one week!

First, i had to fly to Lampung last week to help a company doing recruitment tests for another company, and 'all i had to do' was to test the applicants' technical skills, particularly about their power electrical engineering skills, which I know almost nothing about it (yes i am an electrical engineer, but i've been too much into electronics such that i've forgotten almost everything i've learnt about power systems). I was told about this (that I needed to assess their power electrical systems knowledge, not just general electrical engineering) just two days before the interview tests.

Second, i had to teach a statistics lab class (in civil engineering department, not EE), replacing a senior lecturer in my department. I've never used statistics for any of my research or work, so practically i know NOTHING about it. Again, i was told about this only two days before the class. To make it worse, i had to deliver the lecture in English. Although it didn't turn into a disaster, there were moments in the class where I 'silently' panicked because of my inability to answer some very simple questions from the class.

The third one is the worse among all three. It happened this morning. At 8.30am, my lecturer (well, he's actually my colleague now but i still consider them as my teacher) called me at the Lab and asked me to do a favour for another lecturer. They wanted me to replace him teaching for a workshop scheduled on 8am that morning (yup, it was late). I tried to refuse, saying that I know NOTHING about the topic that is meant to be delivered (they wanted me to teach about SCADA). But he managed to persuade me with sentences like, "yang PEDE saja, mas", "gakpapa, nanti terserah aja mau membahas apa, dibawa ngalor ngidul juga gakpapa". I panicked. So i agreed to do it, and there I went, rushing to the hotel where the workshop is to be held. Luckily, it was like a "private" workshop where there was only one attendee. We ended up discussing various topics, particularly in digital communications where he feels that he needs to know more about it. Overall, I would say the "workshop" this morning went out quite okay.

To be honest, I really felt stupid doing those stuff (teaching or doing something you're not too good at), but my advice to anyone who would probably encounter a similar problem: try to stay calm, be honest to your audience, try to shift the focus towards the participants (try to be a great listener, encourage the audience to speak up their minds and show their potentials), and work out on problems together... on the spot. Communicate.

:-(

Stupid Ants

2008-11-14T17:07:00.000+11:00

Researchers say that ants have some sort of intelligence, particularly as a group (ant colony intelligence, as they call it). But I find that this 'colony intelligence' can lead to a mass suicidical behaviour, as shown from numerous casual observations that i've made.

In other words, i think they're still stupid even in a group.

I drink coffee almost everyday, with at least 3 teaspoons of sugar in it (i know... i'm sick). Like most of us, I drink coffee rather slowly. Which means, my coffee cup spends most of its time on my table, or desk, or any flat and hard surface that I feel suitable. (my hard springbed is one of them)

Now.

In almost every occasion, whenever I leave the cup of coffee too long on the table, i'll normally find around 2 or 3 dead ants floating on my sweet coffee with non-fat cream. Which is still okay. This is still reasonable.

But when I leave the cup of coffee more than a day, the number of ant casualties will usually be enormous... By enormous i mean like the whole surface of the cup of coffee cream will be covered with freaking dead ANTS! :-(
(i know... yuck!)

What were they thinking of???

Or could it be that once an ant drowned on the 'sweet creamy pool', then the next ant tries to save her? But of course, ants can't swim, so this 'rescuer' will also be destined to meet her fate in that already cold coffee... And then it goes on and on and on again.. Poor thing :-(

If so, they may not be stupid after all. Perhaps they simply care too much for each other...

ps: the ants i'm talking about are the very tiny ones (and cometimes smelly too)

Nomer HP

2008-11-12T17:20:00.000+11:00

Gara-gara membaca blog nya Aya, aku jadi kepengen juga menulis sesuatu tentang nomer-nomer HP yang pernah kumiliki selama ini, berikut cerita nya masing-masing.

Nomer HP pertama saya adalah 08562905080. Kumiliki sejak sekitar tahun 2002. Ibu saya sering menyebut nomerku yang ini "gosobo", karena memang angka-angka nya bisa dibaca seperti itu. Kenapa bisa dapat nomer ini, saya betul-betul lupa. Yang jelas ini SIM card kuperoleh tanpa harus beli. Mungkin menang semacam door prize atau sejenis kuis gitu, di Jogja. Oh, jadi inget. Ini nomer hadiah doorprize di Warnet. Kalau ga salah warnet Blangkon-net. Hehe iya... Terus, yang kuingat betul, waktu itu aku juga dapet nomer IM3 gratis yang lain, dan kuberikan ke om ku di Jakarta, karena nomernya nomer Jakarta (dapet dari hadiah lomba). Nomer IM3 ini betul2 bisa memenuhi kebutuhanku sebagai seorang mahasiswa waktu itu, karena selain pulsanya tergolong murah dibandingkan yang lain, nomer ini bisa buat 3-detikan :D (eh yg lain juga bisa ya waktu itu?). Handset ku yang setia memakai nomer ini adalah Siemens M50 dan Siemens M55-ku yang sekarang ini entah bagaimana nasibnya (dua2nya hilang kayaknya)

Nomer HP kedua saya adalah 0422767218. Jangan heran dengan angka depannya. Ini memang bukan nomer Indonesia. Sama seperti Aya, sepertinya para mahasiswa Indonesia yang baru datang ke Sydney banyak yang digiring untuk memakai Optus, hehe... Nomer ini kudapatkan di sebuah pom bensin BP di corner Anzac Pde - High Street, Kensington NSW. Kenapa bisa beli disitu? Karena diajak oleh Ary, temen satu SD ku yang juga satu kost-ku di sana... Nomer ini berhasil menemaniku selama satu semester di sana, sampai akhirnya aku harus beli HP baru (berikut nomernya).

Nomer HP ketigaku adalah 0433273581. Tadi sebelum nulis posting-an ini, jujur aja aku sempat lupa berapa ya nomer HP ku di Australia. Tapi setelah kucoba mengingat2 kembali (sempat nge-search di milis juga tadi :D), akhirnya bisa ingat kembali. Mau tahu gimana bisa inget? Awalnya, aku cuma ingat depannya: 0433. Jadi sistem penomoran telpon di Australia itu begini. Kalau depannya 02, berarti 02 itu kode area (NSW, termasuk Sydney). Kalau depannya 04, berarti itu adalah nomer HP. Nah kalau setelah 04 ada angka 3-nya, biasanya itu adalah nomer Three, walaupun ini bukan jaminan, karena di Australia kita bisa migrasi operator tanpa perlu ganti nomer. Kembali tentang gimana cara mengingat kembali nomerku. Ternyata, tadi itu saya nyoba membacakannya dalam hati, "zero four double three", lalu secara ajaib bibirku bisa melanjutkan sendiri... "two seven three... five eight one." Aneh ya? Bisa inget kata2nya tapi nomernya sendiri lupa...

Nomer itu tadi kudapatkan bersama dengan HP baru yang kubeli dengan plan 24 bulan kontrak pasca bayar dari Three.Yang menarik dari plan ini adalah angsuran harga HP-nya sangat ringan, cuma $0 per bulan! Iya, berarti gratis, hehe... Padahal HP nya ga jelek2 amat lho, bisa 3G... (Sony Ericsson K608i) Nomer ini telah setia menemaniku studi di Australia, dan nyaman sekali bisa dipakai roaming di Indonesia dan negara lain...

Nomer HP berikutnya yang kumiliki, dan masih kupakai sampai sekarang adalah sebuah nomer Simpati yang kubeli secara sedikit terburu-buru juga, yakni di Stasiun Tugu Yogyakarta. Harganya sedikit lebih mahal dibandingkan di luar, tapi waktu itu karena sesuatu hal, betul-betul butuh nomer baru, ASAP. Nomernya adalah 081392201XXX. Nomer ini adalah nomer yang terpanjang dan tertidakcantik yang pernah kumiliki, namun kumasih setia menggunakannya karena sudah terlanjur dipakai terus sejauh ini... repot kalau harus ganti lagi. Selain itu, layanan Simpati dengan Simpati PeDe Rp0.5 perdetiknya terlalu menggiurkan untuk dilewatkan begitu saja...

Sebenarnya, kalau kalian punya buku yellow pages Jogja, namaku bisa dicari di situ. Ada nomer Flexi-nya, tapi sebenarnya yang megang adalah ibuku. Dulu pakai namaku karena disuruh sama Ibu untuk menguruskan pendaftaran flexi pascabayar di Plasa Telkom... :D

Lalu, di luar nomer2 di atas, sebenarnya sudah tidak terhitung lagi berapa nomer yang kubeli sekedar untuk kukorbankan, entah itu karena harganya sangat2 murah (Mentari), atau karena ada promo internetnya (Axis), atau karena pengen telpon murah ke LN (XL). Dan pernah juga karena kebetulan bawa HP milik jurusan yang kebetulan adalah HP CDMA, jadi terpaksa beli Fren. Rata-rata nomer HP yang bisa dikorbankan ini cuma bertahan kupakai antara 1 hari sampai 1 minggu...

PR berantai dari Yona

2008-11-06T05:55:00.000+11:00

Uhm, entah kenapa tiba2 Yona jadi rajin sekali nge-blog lagi ya sekarang, dan tiba2 kemarin ngasih PR berat e... :-(

Jadi begini aturannya: (copy paste langsung dari http://nauvalisya.blogspot.com)
"1. Setiap Blogger harus memuat kembali peraturan ini di blognya.
2. Setiap Blogger membuat 10 fakta/kebiasaan tentang dirinya.
3. Pada akhir penulisan 10 fakta tersebut, dilanjutkan untuk memilih sepuluh orang yang belum menuliskan fakta tentang diri mereka masing-masing.
4. Meninggalkan komentar untuk mereka yang ditandai dan undang mereka untuk membaca blog kamu."

Here we go. Inilah 10 fakta dan kebiasaanku:

1. Mataku sipit. Most of the times I don't realize this, but occasionally I still wonder how can I be sipit, considering nobody in my family is like me... :D

2. Saya tidak boleh mendonorkan darah. Alasannya adalah, ini kata dokter sih, saya ini kekurangan enzim G6PD, kepanjangannya glucosa-6-phosphate-dehydrogenase... ketahuannya waktu masih SD dulu sempat mengalami darah pecah sampai perlu ditransfusi darah segala... Defisiensi enzim ini merupakan bawaan genetik, dan sejauh ini aku belum pernah nemu e, orang yang sama denganku... Oya, btw, sekedar informasi aja ni, golongan darahku AB :D

3. Sering kehilangan barang. I know, I'm so parah about this one. Sejauh ini, saya telah bertanggung jawab karena keteledoran saya atas hilangnya 1 buah sepeda motor (milik kakak), 2 sepeda (1 karena tidak dikunci), 2 PDA (1 jatuh, 1 ketimpa), 1 buah mobil (untungnya ketemu kembali keesokan harinya), dan 3 kali dompet jatuh (1 kali ditemukan kembali). Tolong doakan saya ya, semoga yang seperti ini tidak bakal terjadi lagi... (amin :-s)

4. Suka pemrograman. I must thank my father for the computers we had in our family, since around 1987 (pernah ngalami punya Apple, pernah IBM XT-compatible, pernah 486-SX, pernah Pentium I-66 MHz, dan sekarang masih ada tuh Pentium III di rumah sejak thn 2000). Jadi inget, dulu waktu SMP pernah ke Gramedia nyari buku untuk mencatat daftar interupsi untuk penanganan mouse di DOS, sampai ketahuan pak Satpamnya terus ditegur, hehe. Oya, tapi kenapa ya aku tidak memilih menjadi seorang programmer? Hmm... etlis, I still do programming for my electronics projects, hehe...

5. Film horor membuatku kehilangan selera makan. Terutama kalau ada adegan monster yang menjijikkan, selera makanku bisa hilang seketika...

6. Cenderung tidak suka masakan kari. No offense, I'm not too much into Indian food. They're actually very tasty and spicy, but some bad experiences made me to be like this now, like one day I had this red chicken on one fine afternoon, and at the night on that same day, it had to come out again, upwards :-(

7. Penggemar kafein. Kopi, cappuccino, coca cola, pepsi... hmm... i think i can't live normally without them :-(

8. I still call Australia home. Jangan salah sangka, tanah airku tetap satu, tanah air kebanggaan kita semua, INDONESIA. Tapi karena ada sedikit "masa-lalu" saya yang kuhabiskan di bawah sana (sebuah tempat indah bernama New South Wales), apalagi Adnan (adikku) dulu lahir di sana, i reallly do sometimes call Australia "home". Bukankah "rumah" adalah tempat di mana hati kita terpaut di situ? Selain itu, ada lagu keren lho berjudul "I still call Australia home", dan sampai sekarang kadang terhanyut oleh liriknya... (pertama dengar lagu itu jauh sebelum mengenal lagu Indonesia Tanah Air Beta) :-(

9. Suka telat. Jadi, sekali lagi jangan salah sangka. Jangan dipikir karena saya ini "still calls Australia home", ternyata budaya tepat waktu mereka gak kuterapkan di diri saya ini. Oya. kayaknya gara-gara sifat suka telat (dan menunda-nunda) ini ya kujadi hobi ngebut (karena telat)? Hmm... walaupun perlu diakui bahwa saya suka telat, tidak berarti saya menyukainya... :-s

10. Kurus. Bisa dibilang aku ini kurus. Bahkan agak underweight. Entah kenapa ya, walaupun sudah makan cukup banyak, tapi tiap kali nimbang, pff... beratku ga bisa naik-naik. Mentok di 55 kg. Padahal tahun lalu sempat bertahan di sekitaran 60-kg. Uhm... maaf ya, Yona? Janjiku belum bisa terpenuhi :(

Hihihi, begitulah fakta dan kebiasaanku... Sekarang giliran-nya teman2ku berikut ini, hehe (tapi gak harus sih, kalau sibuk ga usah gpp lho :p):
1. Rere
2. Fikri
3. Sunu
4. Momon (tapi jangan ding mon, rasah lho, awas)
5. Tika (tik, jangan juga ya, i like your blog as it is...)
6. .... (dipikir nanti boleh ya, sedang buru2 harus berangkat ke kampus ni :D)

Kuliah untuk Ujian

2008-10-29T22:02:00.000+11:00

Last week, my Elektronika Komunikasi class had their mid term exam. I was appointed to teach two parallel classes of that subject, and to my astonishment, the number of students who attended the test actually doubled from the amount I normally encounter during class! For this I sometimes feel that I have failed to be a good teacher.

I was a student too once, and I can admit that I (too) did kuliah just to pass the exams (and get wonderful grades too if possible). This was mostly true for all those boring mata kuliahs that 'they' forced me to take. Well, there wasn't actually too many of them, but there's always a few once in a while. Now back to the Elektronika Komunikasi mid term surprise. Fyuh, those students have crossed the limits, i think. I believe there's a discipline issue to be soughted out in here. I'll try to be more strict tomorrow in class.... (but I wonder how..)

I teach 4 and a half classes this semester (it's actually 5 in the first half, and 4 in the second). Among those, there are two subjects (three classes) which I'm not truely excited about, to be honest. It's not about their topics. But it's more about the general goal... In those classes, I started with a certain goal in mind. However, my goals totally changed as time progresses. Why? Because the students aren't like what I expected.

I'm an electronics teacher. Every subjects I teach this semester all have the word "elektronika" in them. But I'm often bothered with the fact that in some of my classes, the materials I'm supposed to teach will probably never going to be used in my student's future carreer. That's another reason why sometimes I change my goals, sometimes even the teaching materials. Maybe I worry too much.

For example, in "Teknologi Piranti Elektronika", my biggest concern to this day is whether this subject can actually be useful for the students or not, considering this class is for the information technology students, not the EE ones. Okay, maybe there's no doubt the subject will indeed be useful even for them, at least to give them insights. But then many other question arises.

How MUCH should they know? (I mean, how much should those IT students know about electronics?)

Are they OBLIGED to actually know about it? (is electronics a fundamentally important subject for IT guys?)

What's the best way to ASSESS their knowledge on this subject, given that this subject is taught only to give them INSIGHTS? (this class covers a very wide range of topics but not in a great detail. in other words, almost no maths or any design methods involved)

But, rules are rules, exams must still be held, whether I like it or not (i'm also sure everyone in the class would vote for no exam).

That was why I spent the last two meetings discussing question samples. Yup. It's my own style of PBL (problem based learning) LoL! Naah, just kidding. It's nothing like the real PBL. All I did was I gave them questions, then I answered them by myself. And this was all done in writing, where I wrote directly in front of the class (I was kind of hoping the students will pay attention to me, which they did :D)

However, by doing that, I've put myself into something that I actually dislike: "kuliah untuk ujian". Not "datang kuliah untuk ujian", but more like "memberi kuliah untuk persiapan mereka ujian." Call me too idealistic, but I really thought the main reason I give lectures is to actually teach students some very important materials that they would use, at least in one point of their lives, as engineers, of course. I put great hopes to these students that one day, they would actually use the materials they get in my classes to solve their own engineering-related problems. Or at least, I want the materials I teach to be useful for them in understanding other important things in other subjects. Or, this is probably the greatest among my hopes, I would really be happy if someone can actually get a PhD one day, inspired by a problem related the subjects I teach.... :D

Another case of "teaching for exams" crime that I've done is in those Elektronika Komunikasi classes. So far, we haven't touched practical electronics issues in adequate proportion. We've been stuck in theories, formulas, and question samples. And please bear in mind that these classes are for the Diploma school, where practice is more valued than theory (am i right?).

I've decided to take a different approach after this midterm exam. We'll have to see how it goes.

It's Ramadhan! :-)

2008-09-01T22:29:00.000+10:00

Probably no one would argue that Ramadhan is indeed a very special month... well at least for us Indonesians. We've got shorter working hours, and long holidays at its end (for idul fitri). People will most probably go "mudik" to their hometowns, reuniting with their families and friends.

Hey... Ramadhan's actually also special for every muslims all over the world.

On this first day of this fasting month, my mind brings me back to approximately a year ago.

Ahh... yes... those were the happy yet stressfull days of graduate school in UNSW.

It's not easy to forget how lucky we were for all those FREE IFTARS every single day! ^_^
(contrary to the popular belief that fasting will cause you to lose weight, i actually GAINED weight)

I can see the warm square house hall, with its light brownish carpet, covered with ugly blue or transparent plastic sheets for us to sit down: rice with yoghurt, soup, thai food, indonesian nasi goreng, hariri chicken, HUGE DATES, fanta, grapes, apple slices, poured with vanilla light cream.... yum! :D

And now, after 3 times going through Ramadhan in Sydney, I am sooo lucky to have this Ramadhan back in my hometown! :-)

It's way more "ramai" here!

Mosques are packed.

Kolak and fruits are sold almost everywhere.

Radio shows are more religious than usual. More religious songs are also played. New ones too. (i think i heard Gita Gutawa's voice singing some sort of a new arrangement of a well-known Javanese Islamic song.. i'm pretty sure it's her voice... does anyone know about this? is there anything else i've missed while i was in Sydney??)

Anyways,

Let's wish and pray to God that this Ramadhan will be our best one ever.

Amin...

Control engineering = maths + fun?

2008-08-09T14:17:00.000+10:00

Control is one of the main use of electrical engineering. We study how to control stuff (machines, motors, switches, devices) using our knowledge of maths, physics, electronics, and also software programming. And believe me, it involves huge amounts of maths...! (at least that's what you'll think if you read any textbook on Control Enginnering)

Maths. This scary word once led me not to go further down the track of Control Engineering. I think i'm starting to regret it... :D

I can't forget a very good lecture on Control Enginnering by Prof. Kawabe from Kyushu, Japan, just a couple of weeks ago when he said,

"Control engineering is not maths. Maths is only a tool..."

Then he continued the first part of his lecture with no maths at all! He successfully explained basic concepts of control theory without any maths, totally different than what i've got during my undergrad years in Gadjah Mada... Had he gave that lecture to us 8 years ago, i might have considered a different career path... as a control engineer ;-)

It's true.

Control engineering is fun.

There's always a REAL problem to solve. Whether its simply controlling the speed of a 3-phase induction motor using soft-starting, or whether there's a gigantic manufacturing plant with hundreds of sensors, dozens of actuators, and hundreds of meters of wiring, a REAL problem (usually these problems correllates to ca$h in the case of manufacturing plants) will always be there for us control engineers to handle.

And the tools that's available for this control thing is also not less interesting. In fact, they're more like toys to play with! ;-)
(reminds me of Lego)

With computer technology, we now have very small programmable controllers, more commonly known as PLCs or programmable logic controllers, that are so easy to program, and so powerful with their ability to control and monitor the process of a whole plant.

I've spent the whole past week attending a training held in my University. We learned how to use Schneider's PLC products, including Twido, and it turns out to be a very exciting experience.

It would be more interesting though if I really had the chance to actually use these toys in real factories.... i wonder how "fun" would it get =D

not just an ordinary week

2008-08-02T09:31:00.000+10:00

There's been almost too many things happening the past week, some very interesting, a few so annoying, and several were infact fascinating. It didn't feel as long as a week, it went so fast that I am now wondering how on earth can today be a weekend again!??

The happy stuff first. I've got my name listed in IEEExplore, since my conference paper was accepted. I think i've posted something about it. Then there's the examination results of my thesis, i need to do a minor revision. Prof. Kwok congratulated me already for this in his email. (still working on the revision, though)

The interesting part. Pak BST and I went to Solo for some business trip (please bear in mind we're academics, not business people... nevertheless our purpose to go there was more commercial-minded in nature). We discussed our problems and business goals with someone from ATMI, the technical school whom we trust to work on the packaging work of 'our-future-products'.

Also, last week was probably the coldest week i've ever encountered throughout my whole life in Jogja. It's over now though, yesterday was warm as usual.

Another interesting thing, Prof. Kawabe from Kyushu University visited our department. He brought with him some very interesting insights and opinions about us. He thinks our department has something not many other schools have: we made some of our own lab experiment modules by ourselves. Hey, see? We should be self-confident with ourselves :-)

Now, the annoying part. I was driving my parent's car last sunday, and when I drove across a wide intersection, I smashed a motorcycle who turned right not far in front of me from the opposite direction. It was as if he was blind and did not notice that I was very close to him when he decided to turn --without any signals of course--. I had to bring him to the hospital since he was shocked and did not move at all right after the crash. (me too was shocked!)

After a CT scan and one night staying at the hospital, he felt much better and he had nothing serious to worry about. He's about the same age as me, and looking from the way he stares at me, I am pretty certain he doesn't blame me (he even smiled at me on the bed at the hospital). Nevertheless, I agreed to cover half of the medical treatment expenses... but none for his motorbike's damage cost.

This accident have traumatized me for a couple of days such that I can't drive normally without swearing and yelling to other motorists... I even prefer going to work by bus. I'm still recovering now, but I still choose not to drive whenever i can.

So, this is the lesson i've learnt this week:
JOGJA TRAFFIC IS RIDICOLOUSLY ANNOYING

Akhirnya masuk juga (ke IEEExplore)

2008-07-22T19:06:00.000+10:00

Entah kenapa pagi ini tadi aku seperti agak narsis, iseng googling nama sendiri digabung dengan nama supervisorku di UNSW dulu menjadi seperti ini: "irfansyah lehmann" ,

dan,

hihihi alhamdulillah ternyata google mencantumkan adanya link dari domain ieeexplore.ieee.org, hehehe...

Dan bener. Hihihi... sekarang namaku muncul kalau di-search di website http://ieeexplore.ieee.org, bisa dilihat saudara2x (iya, ini adalah promosi :p), link ke halaman abstrak nya yang langsung di sini niy:

http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpls/abs_all.jsp?tp=&arnumber=4567266&isnumber=4567221
(kalau ngga langganan, memang ga bisa dibuka full text-nya, maaf...)

Isinya adalah salah satu bab di thesis s2 ku, yang sayangnya gak terlalu memuaskan sebenarnya. Dan, hingga hari ini thesis s2 ku sendiri belum jelas nasibnya, apakah diterima, ataukah ditolak, atau diterima dengan revisi... :-(

(update berita terbaru, Prof. Kwok memberi kabar bahwa hasil dari examiner yang terakhir sudah masuk, jadi sekarang tinggal nunggu dari beliau nya aja)

Catatan harian yang terlupakan

2008-07-15T07:25:00.000+10:00

Yesterday i decided to do some maintenance work on my old Dell latitude which is getting slower and slower everyday. Page file usage, according to the monitor thing that shows up when you press ctrl-alt-del, was unbelievable high, more than 600MB! (my laptop has only 256MB of RAM)

So you can imagine how desperate i was to free up more memory usage (trading in this old laptop for a newer one did come across my mind, but soon vanished as i realised i had no budget for it :p).

As usual, when this happens, you can do several actions. The easiest thing to do is clean up the desktop (mine was full of icons).

And that's when i found an unfamiliar file called "worklog.txt".

I opened it.

Lol, it's my own stupid work diary! (i forgot i had one)

It's interesting to know that many of my plans written there were quite impressive, even though not much of these were ever carried out. (sad)

An example of what it said: (LoL i'm such a lazy bloke!)

Tuesday 22 April 2008 9.24pm

Woke up 9.30am this morning, got to work a bit late in the noon. Went to Ibu's kantor first to bring Polycrol for ibu.

Work done today:

1. Started panduan praktikum elkadig about programmable logic and VHDL. Made CUPL sample program (shift register) and has been tested. Remaining tasks: implement the same circuit in VHDL and decide design project assignment. Candidates for design project:
- simple hamming encoder and decoder plus error detection
- look ahead carry adder? (review adder structures)
- pulse width measurer (counter)
- customized stepper motor controller

2. Learnt WinSIM (simulation for WinCUPL) which gave me some headache. Still can't figure out why simulation results of the shift register sample app is still wrong (not completely correct). Will probably look at Cypress Warp for the simulation instead.

3. Downloaded and evaluated DIPTRACE free pcb design software. Looks okay. The plan is to create PCB designs for:
- GalBlast minimum effort GAL programmer
- JTAG ICE and ISP
- ATMega16 board
Also, managed to install Endnote. Proves handy for writing lecture materials (want to show proper referencing)

4. Decapsulated an AT89C51, and several discrete transistor components. Still puzzled on how discrete bipolar transistor components are fabricated, and what their structure should actually look like. (the decapsulated components were observed through the lab's microscope, and they look very interesting. make sure photographs of them are taken tomorrow morning)

5. Revised summary of bipolar transistor document for eldas class (a tiny revision). Still need to work on transistor biasing and small signal analysis. (not a big priority)

6. Helped praktikum elektronika dasar, and learnt that even though coupling capacitors on the input of amplifiers are supposed to remove any DC components, the fact shows that any DC offset from the signal source will distort the output signal, and in effect reduces gain. The cause of this problem remains a mystery, should try to look at this problem again.

Oh yeh just to show you one result i've got from the plans mentioned above is this picture: (microscope photographs)

Hmm... i think i'll keep this file on the desktop. Look's useful =p

Kopi Jos and Chitato rasa sapi panggang

2008-07-06T18:08:00.000+10:00

I want to talk about food this time.

First, kopi jos. It's coffee, with flaming hot charcoal thrown into it. The taste? Bitter, and chewy. You can have these in angkringans right next to Tugu Railway Station, Jogja, on the northern side of it. Don't ask me about its higiene. All i can tell you is that i survive.

And then, there's Chitato, without doubt one of the most popular potato chips in Indonesia. Surprisingly though, the one with "Beef Barbecue Seasoning" has a very spicy hot taste! I don't know why they did not put a warning sign "Caution: Spicy hot" so that people who can't stand hot food (like myself) wouldn't get harmed. (i get stomachaches everytime after eating spicy food) They also should put the word "chilli" or "pepper" on its package. (which they don't... hello? Balai POM?)

Great. Somebody's been googling my name!

2008-07-04T13:50:00.003+10:00

I started blogging since 2005 only because I knew a friend's blog which looked cool! (puji.blogspot.com, but apparently it's no longer maintained). Along the way, i've posted probably dozens of stupid posts, but who would imagined that some of those random thoughts turns out to be the reasons most of my blog's visitors came to pay a visit to the stupid blog of mine...

With the help of google analytics, i can know exactly how many visitors came to read my blog, with details of their location, time, url referral, and... most interestingly... search engine keyword.

According to google analytics' report of my blog, here's the ten most popular search engine keywords which led visitors to my blog for the past one year:

1. tinjauan pustaka
2. mikroprosesor
3. irfan
4. selamat lebaran
5. berpikir kritis
6. balik nama stnk
7. schmitt trigger
8. foto jogja
9. tips bangun pagi
10. astria nur irfansyah

Great. Somebody's been googling my name! :-(

"Maaf, Anda harus mengulang"

2008-07-04T08:44:00.000+10:00

Entah saya ini salah apa ya, baru pertama kali nya seumur-umur ikut menguji pendadaran S1, kenapa harus sudah langsung memberi nilai "TIDAK LULUS" kemarin...

:-(

But we had to. (penguji diketuai pak BST, lalu ada pak PYM dan pak Bondan)

Oke, saya memang masih baru di bidang belajar-mengajar ini, tapi setidaknya ada beberapa hal yang menurut saya penting yang harus dimiliki seorang calon sarjana (teknik elektro):

1. Kalau skripsi yang ditulis adalah pembuatan alat, maka sang mahasiswa ybs setidaknya harus tahu secara teknis dan mendetil cara kerja alatnya sendiri. Kalau tidak tahu kan berarti bisa dicurigai yang aneh2..

2. Presentasi skripsi harus mengikuti pola pikir researcher umumnya, yaitu (a) apa masalahnya, (b) gimana cara mengatasi masalah itu, (c) hasil yang dikerjakan, dan (d) kesimpulan nya, apakah berhasil atau tidak, dengan catatan atau tidak... Bagian kesimpulan jangan diremehkan, banyak yang salah tentang hal ini, kesimpulan itu harus didapat dari hasil kerjaan, bukan sekedar ringkasan pekerjaan... Dan, yang paling penting, kesimpulan harus ilmiah dan dapat dipertanggungjawabkan, jangan mengira-ngira atau asal nulis...

3. Istilah-istilah teknis sebaiknya dipergunakan pada konteksnya secara lazim... Penggunaan kosakata berbau teknis yang digunakan tidak pada tempatnya akan memperparah citra ybs, karena memberi kesan ybs seolah2 tahu padahal sebenarnya tidak tahu...

Buat mas yang kemarin kami "dadar", maaf ya anda terpaksa kami minta mengulang pendadaran... bukan mengulang skripsinya koq, cuma mengulang pendadaran... semoga nanti bisa lebih baik lagi ya... SEMANGAT!!! :p

Waroeng pinggir jalan beromzet Rp1miliar

2008-06-30T14:53:00.000+10:00

Siapa yang bakal nyangka, sebuah warung tenda di pinggir jalan kaliurang yang didirikan sekitar 6 thn lalu saat ini sudah berhasil berkembang sampai omzetnya Rp 1 miliar (menurut KR hari minggu kemarin).

Oya. Semua tahu kan Waroeng SS? Yang cabangnya ada di mana-mana itu lho...

Gara-gara mbaca beritanya di KR hari minggu kemarin, baru "ngeh" kalau Waroeng SS yang "pating tlecek dimana-mana" sekarang ini, tidak lain tidak bukan, berawal dari warung tenda kecil di pinggir jalan kaliurang, yang dulu kuingat betul...bukan karena sering ke sana, tapi sering ke warung di seberangnya hehe (Soto Lamongan Cak Narto? depan farmasi pokok e).

Wah bener2 gak nyangka... salut deh buat pemiliknya, saudara Yoyok Heri Wahyono...

Jadi kembali bermimpi tentang business plan ku sendiri... kapan ya bisa terwujud? :-(

(sumber: KR 29/6/2008, http://www.waroengss.com)

For the best prize ever, i'll go for it!

2008-06-24T15:45:00.000+10:00

I'm the kind of person that thinks that everyone's got a soulmate. I'm also the type of guy who believes in love before marriage, even though I know love after marriage should work just fine too (but maybe not for me, sorry).

I was talking to my Aussie pal the other day (well, she thinks she is Aussie, but deep in her heart i know she's still Indo). We were talking about, uhm, yeh, my love life (which i believe had never been worse before).

She told me,

"If i know the prize would be heaven, then yes! I will go for it!!"

She meant that she would marry anyone who she thinks can lead her to heaven, which is the main goal of her life (unlike my goal, which is money, she thoughts...). And that means she is willing to put aside feelings in taking such decisions.

Wow.

I would never imagined her talking anything like that, not from an Aussie. LoL

Masih tentang ahmadiyah

2008-06-11T08:56:00.000+10:00

Terima kasih utk semua teman yg membicarakan masalah ini, dari situ saya bisa dapat banyak hal, bahkan koreksi dari pemikiran saya yang pasti tidak luput dari kesalahan...

Entah kenapa topik ini ingin saya bahas lagi.

Sebenarnya, di mana kah posisi saya mengenai hal ini?

Saya menentang faham ahmadiyah, dan menganggap mereka bukan islam.

Ahmadiyah ini, dalam benak saya setara dengan aliran2 lain yang saya tahu, seperti syiah, sapto darmo (jawa), dll, saya gak setuju dengan aliran2 itu, dan kuanggap bukan islam juga.

Nah terutama dari kasus adanya syiah, saya cenderung bersikap membiarkan saja, mungkin ada sedikit perasaan benci, namun sekaligus terima kasih atas bantuan mereka dalam perjuangan di Palestina. Tapi tidak berarti saya harus membenci teman2 iran saya yang kebetulan syiah.

Nah sikap yang sama saya tujukan ke ahmadiyah. Saya gak ingin ahmadiyah berkembang. Saya ingin ahmadiyah bubar saja. Tapi saya yakin penyelesaian masalah ini bukan dengan cara negara (Indonesia) melarang faham tersebut. Karena ini menjadi tidak adil dengan faham2/aliran2 di luar agama2 yg resmi dianut di Indonesia.

Kalau ahmadiyah dilarang, mestinya pemerintah konsisten juga dengan melarang seluruh aliran kepercayaan lain yang mengambil akar dari agama2x tertentu, termasuk syiah.

Phuff... entah kenapa sekarang ini saya juga tidak sebenci seperti biasanya dulu ke orang2 israel (yahudi). Saya membedakan orang israel itu jadi 2, ada yg pro-zionis, dan yang tidak mendukung zionisme (kenyataannya ada lho yg tidak mendukung zionisme). Selama mereka tidak mendukung zionisme, yasudah, bukan masalah bagiku... Kalau mereka mendukung zionisme, baru bisa kubenci... tapi bencinya karena zionisme, bukan karena mereka yahudi.

Saya pikir SKB yang dikeluarkan pemerintah cukup mengekang ahmadiyah jangan sampai berkembang, dan di saat yang sama tetap menghargai pilihan masing2 individu ttg masalah keyakinan...

Ini sekedar pemikiran saya, masih bisa salah, maaf jika agak bersifat menyinggung...

About the Monas incident

2008-06-05T14:42:00.000+10:00

I agree that ahmadiyah is not Islam, and they should detach themselves from any Islamic symbols.

I agree that FPI's cause, in which they want the above statement to be enforced, is in line with the view of majority Indonesian muslims.

However, I also agree with the views held by AKKBB that freedom of faith should always be honoured in this free country of ours, including giving respect to those who call themselves followers of the ahmadiyah sect.

I've heard some people saying that AKKBB endorses the view that all religions and faiths are the same. I strongly oppose to such beliefs, because as a muslim, i am totally committed to this religion, and believe that other religions are wrong.

But,

But this does not mean that I have to oppose people who practices other religion or faiths.

For this reason, I blame FPI for whatever they've done, no matter what reasons they have.

And I do not blame AKKBB for expressing their views.

From what i've read in the news, all i know is that AKKBB only wants to remind us all that we should respect everyone equally despite their religions and faith.

And from what i've read, i could not come to the conclusion that some people accuses of, that AKKBB actually endorses the ahmadiyah belief. I couldn't find this fact, so

I am not in opposition with AKKBB.

(but if they do endorse the belief itself, instead of merely respecting its followers, it might be a totally different story)

And I am in opposition with FPI, for the unlawful violences they've caused.

Cyclone in Myanmar

2008-05-09T16:48:00.000+10:00

Our condolence to all the myanmar people who suffered from the devastating cyclone disaster.

Let us not forget to keep praying for those in trouble...

Why engineering students can't write good...

2008-04-26T15:59:00.000+10:00

Last wednesday was the due date for my latest assignment: writing a 1-page critical review on a journal article "Output Resistance of the Common-Emitter Amplifier" by Rode. I thought that this must be a good assignment to give, for several reasons:
1. the paper talks about the exact same topic we're discussing
2. i was curious about student's writing skills
3. i wanted to know how good the students are in understanding english language text...
^_^

I had just finished marking the whole class's work, and... phuff why am i not surprised to the fact that engineering students aren't good at writing??

Most of the students showed lack of Indonesian written language skills... (is 12 years of bahasa indonesia education still not enough??). On average, they also showed poor technical style writing skills.

When i told them to include their own opinions and critique of the original paper, i did not mean they could put in words like these:
- "menurut saya"
- "jujur saya tidak bisa paham"
- "Komentar: ..."

Some of my students must have not been paying attention as well: several papers that i read were more like TRANSLATIONS with HEAPS OF PAGES instead of a summary plus critique that i wanted.

But i don't blame them. As a matter of fact, I never got this sort of assignment before when i was still in undergrad. Apparently, my senior lecturers had barely ever teached good writing skills to the students. The only chance students can practice writing is during their thesis. And this might be a bit too late!

Let's hope we can all fix this up.

Ada yang pernah memprogram PLD?

2008-04-17T12:13:00.000+10:00

Dua minggu belakangan ini cukup banyak waktu + Rp yg kuhabiskan untuk "nyoba" pemrograman PLD (programmable logic device), yg pertama dari Atmel (ATF16F8B) seharga Rp10ribu di Audio (jogja), dan yang kedua = GAL22v10 seharga Rp18ribu dari Digi-ware.com (surabaya).

Yang jadi masalah,

sampai sekarang belum berhasil. Programmer "minimum-effort GAL programming" dengan program GALBlast, sudah kucoba, dan gagal... :-(

Sebenarnya gak terlalu besar manfaat menggunakan dua chip PLD itu, karena kemampuannya sangat terbatas dan "gak worth it" (dibandingkan dgn FPGA dan CPLD). Tapi terpaksa belajar menggunakan PLD "murah" itu karena dua hal:
1. murah dan mudah didapatkan
2. bisa digunakan untuk pengenalan VHDL!!!

Yup. VHDL. Bahasa pemrograman untuk mendeskripsikan hardware... :-D
(untuk bahan kuliah Elektronika Digital rencana nya...)

Belajar VHDL biasanya kan dengan FPGA development board. Nah, kenapa aku ga pakai FPGA saja?

Uhm. Harganya e. Mahal. Di atas 2.5 juta rupiah... per modul. Toh niatnya cuma ingin mengenalkan VHDL. Bukan ingin penelitian pembuatan mikroprosesor baru misalnya... ^_^

Ada gak ya yg punya pengalaman ttg VHDL atau FPGA atau CPLD atau PLD sederhana ini?

My government made me did something stupid

2008-04-12T09:34:00.000+10:00

A couple of days ago I had some trouble logging in to my commonwealth netbanking account because apparently the bank blocked access to it. This led me to think at least two (make it three) possible reasons:
(1) i might have tried to login with the wrong password three times in a row. <-- impossible because i didnt do it.
(2) somebody else might have did it.
(3) somebody else might have illegaly gained access to my netbanking account, and withdrew all the money in it!!! <-- though less likely, it did worry me a lot!

On the same day, the bank sent me an email requesting me to call them by phone. They wanted me to confirm my recent transactions,

which i did on the next day. I called them using an XL bebas sim card and costed me only Rp5000 for a 10-minutes call! (so cheap ^_^).

After confirming my identity (through a long list of identification questions: name, dob, phone number, keycard number, last transaction dates), they told me that they blocked access to my account because the last login attempt was done through an unsecured bypass proxy.

Phuff...

I would never have used a bypass proxy if the government didn't block access to youtube and multiply in the first place!!! :-(
(the reason why they did this has something to do with the fitna movie. the fact that the government did block access to youtube & multiply shocks me more than the fitna movie itself!)

Yup. I was stupid. I should never ever again use any unsecured proxies to access vital and important websites potentially revealing my private informations.

note: access to youtube and multiply was restored yesterday. thanks, pak menkominfo...

Diodes: what are they?

2008-03-12T01:56:00.000+11:00

This post will be a bit technical.

So,

What are diodes?

Diodes are electronic devices capable of rectifying signals to one direction only. They are made by joining two types of semiconductors, a P type and an N type. One is full of free holes, and the other have many free electron carriers.

As far as a practicing electrical engineer is concerned, the internal physics of the operation of a diode may not be too important. The important things to be known however are their limitations, such as its forward-bias voltage drop, reverse breakdown voltage, reverse saturation current, reverse-recovery time, and maximum forward current. All of these parameters are usually provided by manufacturers through datasheets.

Forward-bias voltage drop is the amount of voltage drop that will occur on a diode if it is being forward-biased (i.e. anode more positive than cathode). On silicon diodes, the forward-bias voltage is around 0.6 - 0.7V. While it is very convenient to assume that this value is fixed at 0.6V or 0.7V, in reality however, this parameter is a function of the current flowing through the diode as well as temperature.

Reverse breakdown voltage specifies how much voltage a diode can handle such that current is kept from flowing in reverse-bias conditions. In silicon diodes, it may be in the order of 75V to 100V, but a special kind of diode called zener diodes are actually made to operate on its breakdown region, which is usually practically low. There are two causes of breakdown voltages: avalanche breakdown and zener breakdown. Since I can't remember how they differ, I woudn't explain it here.

Reverse saturation current is the tiny amount of current that flows in reverse bias condition. It's in the order of microamps and is usually not of a concern. But it's amount is crucial in estimating other diode parameters, as stated in the formulas relating diode voltage and its current.

Reverse recovery time is the period when a diode keeps conducting despite being suddenly reverse-biased from a previously forward-biased condition. Experiments shows that its amount is not a constant, but rather affected by the positive signal swing as well as the diode capacitances. However, datasheets normally gives a certain typical value convenient enough for us to use. A special kind of diode, the schottky diode, practically has zero reverse recovery time because the factors contributing to it does not exist in these diodes which are made from a semiconductor-metal junction.

Maximum forward current is the maximum current that may pass a diode without damaging it. Based on this parameter, people usually call diodes with large current capabilities as rectifiers, whereas diodes with smaller current capabilities (but with higher speed specifications) are more commonly known as small-signal diodes.

Still not sure how to teach

2008-03-05T15:19:00.000+11:00

Today is week 5 of the Elektronika Dasar class that i teach. We've finished discussing diodes 2 weeks ago, so I decided to give the students a quiz (without telling them beforehand).

And the results were almost as predicted: unsatisfactory.

I made it my intention to test them with simple questions but with slight "twists".

Question number one was about the basic rectifying behaviour of diodes. (21 answered wrong, 24 answered right)

Question number two was about zener diodes. The circuit topology was made exactly the same as in a previous assignment, but as I had suspected, not much of them really understood what they handed in. Only six students answered correctly in the quiz, while almost ALL OF THEM answered right in their previous assignments. Amazed? LoL.

The last question was a "twisted" version of a clipper diode. Instead of giving an output as a clipped version of its input, in this question I wanted the students to draw how to put a protection diode that can clip the input to a certain voltage (Vcc=5V). Only a few answered the right answer, but I admit for this question it might be a bit too hard to come up with the "expected answer".

Anyways, the bottom line is that it's very important to accurately know how the students are doing in a big class, and this can be done by giving assignments and quizzes, and teachers SHOULD evaluate the results ASAP (never postpone marking assigments to after exams... never!). It's one good way of getting feedback.

Electrical power

2008-02-23T11:54:00.000+11:00

We now live in a world where electricity and telecommunications are all taken for granted. People won't get amazed by a city lighted up by electrical power. It's the other way around: people will ask "hey, why aren't there electricity here?" if he or she finds no electricity around her in some place, i don't know. Uhm, it's the same too with phones. One cannot leave his or her home without bringing a mobile phone. It's like leaving without taking your wallet with you

;-)

We rely on both too much now.

But it's okay. As long as service companies who delivers electricity and phone services can keep up with the growing demand, it's okay.

People will suffer huge losses when these services gets disrupted. It's not hard to agree on that.

This makes me wonder, uhm, how did people live centuries ago when there hadn't been any electricity? How did people arrange meetings when there weren't any phones? How on earth did they survive??

Musim udan

2008-02-22T15:53:00.000+11:00

Sak menika nembe musim udan. Ameh saben dinten, udan. Biasa nipun udan e sore2, saged nganti deres sanget. Tapi menawi deres, biasa nipun buten suwi, namung sedelok.

Musim udan menika, sok ngantos saged banjir. Contho nipun Jakarta, sempat kebanjiran, saking parah ipun, jalan tol menuju Bandara nganti putus. Calon penumpang kudu numpak truk tentara men saged liwat.

Sak menika pantura nggih banjir, sekitar daerah Kudus. Selain iku, sak niki wonten gelombang pasang laut, akibat ipun kapal2 boten saged merapat wonten pelabuhan. Termasuk kapal2 ingkang mensuplai bahan bakar kangge pembangkit listrik, akibat e pasokan listrik sameniko terganggu kangge daerah Jawa lan Bali.

Mugi-mugi kito tansah sabar ngadepi musim udan samenika, katah2 berdoa wontenipun Gusti Allah SWT, mugi2 pinaringan slamet lan rezeki saking hasil bumi tanah Indonesia ingkang subur meniko...

What are western values, anyway?

2008-02-20T12:21:00.000+11:00

Having lived overseas for a couple of years (total almost 8 years including childhood) makes me think like anyone else there (in Sydney--whether i like it or not--). You may say, I've acquired some Western values, as the results of it.

Okay. Here are some of my thoughts which I think I got them from Sydney. Please tell me, are they that bad?

1. I think that you should always say "thank you" to anyone who's done something for you. (including saying thanks to the bus driver). But no, tipping isn't compulsory.

2. I believe you should always at least smile to your neighbour, or say salam to a stranger you've come across outside a musholla.

3. When you're in the class, you believe that not all of what you teacher say is true, and you should always be critical. This also includes TV news, books, and public opinions in the newspaper. It's a free country, so you can speak anything that you think is true, while still respecting others.

4. We are all mates. No tall poppies please.

5. Say what you want to say, don't keep it inside (like when you see a car not stopping on a red light, you have the rights to shout at em and call them whatever you think is appropriate :D)

6. It's your life, so "you can control where you go, you can steer" (man, i love this song :D from missy higgins - steer)

Sorry if it seems as if I've become a terrible person after living in Sydney a couple of years. I hope you can understand. And at the same time, I will keep trying to adapt back to Indonesian (well, actually in my case JAVANESE) values.

Really, was it THAT long??

2008-02-13T19:00:00.000+11:00

I now live in Yogyakarta, my hometown where I was born some twenty-something years ago. I just recently moved back from Sydney, where I did my masters degree for 2.5 years (phff... too long!!).

Now that I'm back, uhm, you see... it's not the same as it was before. Many of you might have come across the word "REVERSE CULTURE SHOCK" before, and uhm, the exact thing is what I think happened to me when I came back.

It's not that I am shocked or anything, it's just that, uhm, okay okay, i am. But not shocked about how hot and humid it is in Indonesia compared to Sydney, or surprised i am to see how everyone now seems to have the same hair colour. Nor am I unsatisfied with the "wild traffic" here. It's not that.

It's actually more about my attitude. And probably about my personal views and opinions. I realize now that I do not longer have those manners I used to have (as a matter of fact, I was shocked when I unconsciously handed over something to my own mother with my left hand... i really don't know when i started to get this un-Indonesian habit).

We are all expected, as we return home, to be able to readapt back. To adapt the changes of our surroundings, that's not too hard. It's only a matter of time, and we'll get used to it anyway. Different climate, for example. In my experience, it only took me less than 4 weeks to then feel 33 degrees as normal and 27 as cold (cold, not only cool, but cold). Adapting to the way we should drive in the new traffic conditions takes even shorter time: 4 days. (but to slow down my speed to less than 40kms/h on city traffic: 1 month :D)

Being able to hand over cash without worrying that we might make mistakes (or being handed cash without having to examine the coins and notes very closely): i think 1 week?

These all just flow naturally, and everything will be just fine in no time.

However, the hardest thing that I felt to change was attitude. It's HARD to change your attitude, or uhm, kebiasaan as we Indonesians say it. Especially if it's already planted deeply in your head, or even heart. I have to admit, i might now have developed some un-Indonesian attitudes.

One simple example. My last blog entry was about Suharto. Many people might think that I have total lack of respect to the deceased and his family, while actually I was just expressing my views of the truth, irrespective of the unfortunate circumstances.

Phfff.... please help me on this.

I'm still working hard to change my personal attitudes so that it is accepted within my own family (parents), and yet I feel that's so hard to achieve.

Seriously, has it been THAT long that I lived in Sydney far from my parents?? :-(

Semoga Allah mengampuni dosa-dosa kami dan dosa beliau

2008-01-29T10:46:00.000+11:00

Mantan presiden terlama kita, Jenderal Suharto, telah tiada.

Semua orang pasti pernah salah. Kudoakan semoga Allah mengampuni dosa-dosa beliau. Dan semoga Allah juga mengampuni dosa-dosa yang telah kuperbuat selama ini (termasuk karena telah berulang kali mengumpat beliau di banyak kesempatan)

Perlu diingat, meskipun jasa-jasa beliau sebagai Bapak Pembangunan sangat dimengerti oleh masyarakat... sebaiknya kesalahan-kesalahan beliau tidak kita lupakan begitu saja.

Ini salah kita mengapa sampai beliau tidak diadili.

Sekarang terlanjur sudah. Sejarah terulang kembali. Kini tidak ada kejelasan mengenai fakta sesungguhnya tentang beliau yang perlu diluruskan, demi anak cucu pewaris negeri ini.

Mohon tidak menyamakan "diadili" = "dihukum".

Maksud saya, dengan tidak adanya pengadilan terhadap Suharto, lalu apa yang akan kita tulis di buku2x sejarah SD sampai SMA nanti? Apakah beliau tetap kita sebut sebagai koruptor? Tentu tidak bisa, karena pengadilan belum membuktikan.

Ataukah beliau boleh kita sebut sebagai pahlawan?

Mungkin saudara-saudara kita yang jadi korban tidak meratanya pembangunan di era Suharto (terutama yg tinggal jauh di timur atau pelosok Kalimantan), atau penduduk Aceh yang darahnya tertumpah cukup parah, akan menolak menyebut Suharto sebagai pahlawan. Malah mungkin beliau akan dicap sebagai penjahat.

Presiden yang sekarang memang tidak se-berprestasi beliau dalam menjaga ekonomi bangsa (katanya, menteri2x yg sekarang kurang sip ya?)

Terlepas dari itu, semoga prinsip2 yang baik dari pak Harto bisa kita ambil, tapi jangan sampai melupakan kesalahan-kesalahan mendasar beliau, yang maaf, menurut saya punya andil besar dalam membuat bangsa kita terpuruk seperti sekarang ini.

What I've been doing all this time

2007-12-24T17:18:00.000+11:00

You can see it here.

That's not all that i've done, though. So many work had been done without promising results, so just couldn't bother to publish them. I know, it's ugly. (sad)

Again, about my car

2007-11-14T20:22:00.000+11:00

It got stolen yesterday. I'm not sure what time, i left the car parked on Willis St about 8am, and i returned back on 8pm just to find that it's GONE. I soon reported the missing car to campus security, then called the coppers to report it.

And...

What do you know,

the police have found the car tonight, parked on a parking spot behind a flat on Anzac Parade.

That was quick. Good job.

Warning: Shore break

2007-10-28T11:03:00.000+11:00

You know there's something wrong with the sea waves when you feel the unexpectedly high force of sea waves pushing you very strong... strong enough to make you turn upside down, losing control of your body's position, and losing track of direction (can't tell up from down). This is what happened to me yesterday as i swam on Coogee Beach.

It was a bit scary at the beginning. Sometimes, the waves looked calm, but oftenly they arrive in curly waves, huge ones, with a strong push. The back current was so strong too. I had to put enough effort to hold on still.

Thinking that swimming deeper offshore would be calmer with less waves, i waited till the sea calms itself, then make the swim of it up to the point where the waves haven't break. So i did it, swam there, and had some pleasant swim on the calm sea... maybe for 5 minutes. Getting a bit tired, i decided to get back up to the beach. As i tried, i realised that i was stuck! It turned out that i was not strong enough to swim back, since there's some sort of current pulling me away from the beach. So, i swam as hard as i could whenever there's a wave, and then rest & take enough breaths when there's back current. I couldn't feel the sand bed underneath me, probably the sea was more than 2 metres deep? Anyway, the idea of shouting for help did come across my mind, luckily i didn't have too. I felt the sand on my feet, so i stood up and walked to the beach with the water level approximately as high as my neck... until,

until all of the sudden,

a massively strong wave struck me, and pushed me hard, sinking me quickly, turning me upside down, making me face upwards (or was it downwards? sorry i couldn't tell) on the sand. As i rose up and went out of the water, a lifeguard came to me and asked whether i'm alright, whether my neck's okay or not. She told me she've already warned me, but i really didn't hear her.

Just few moments later, a sign saying "Warning: Shore break" was put on the beach, with a picture of a tumbling person and a wave.

"Oh, so that's what a shore break feels like...", i talked to mysef. Among the many occasions that i swam at sea, this never happened to me before...

What i want (in particular)

2007-10-19T15:22:00.000+10:00

Today's Friday prayers speech was very ... uhm... good. This is what the khatib told us. If you ask someone poor, what do they want? They would most likely answer they want to be rich. If you ask somebody sick, what would they want to have? A normal one would say, "i want to be healthy." If you ask a rich man, what does he or she wishes? They may answer, "I want to get richer." But suppose now, if you can ask someone who is already dead what they want, then would do you think that those dead people would answer?

Curious? Let me answer it after i tell you what I want, particularly those earthly-materialistic-oriented stuff. Here's the list:
1. Car: a Holden Commodore or a Toyota Corolla would be enough.
2. Mobile phone: a Sony Ericsson one, especially ones that are drop-resistant (is there?) and has FM radio on it. And of course, a decent camera would be just perfect.
3. Laptop: Lenovo Thinkpads. Preferably 12 inches ones, with an LPT port if possible.
4. House: a brick house with a lawn and a garage and a backyard on it so i can plant tomatoes, and can have a BBQ with friends at my very own house. Preferably in Randwick, NSW, with coastal views.
5. Motorbike: i'm not sure. Haven't followed the latest models for the past 2 years...
6. MP3 player: not really necessary. Should be included in my PDA. Oh yes! PDA...
7. PDA: a Windows-mobile based one, large RAM and a Wifi is a must. No specific brand. PDA-phone is okay too. If possible, should be easy to type in words on it.
8. Camera: DSLRs, preferably Canon EOSes.

Okay, that's more than too much to ask for. Anyway, back to the dead man's wish thing. The khotib says, one of their wishes, according to Quran, is that they want to live again just to stand up and pray a short two rakaat (unit) prayers to Allah. Simple. Yet so valuable, as what they dead people believes in. Which is also true for all of us still alive.

Another wish from a dead man is that he wants to live again and give money to charity. Because when you're dead, you bring no money with you.

I hope i can keep remembering the wisdom from the dead. I don't want to be too late to do something that i might regret later on.

Why I didn't work on new circuit ideas

2007-10-18T09:48:00.000+10:00

My thesis is about low swing interconnects. At the beginning, there was no clear idea on what method we should go through, or on what to do and how to do it. All that was given were circuits from other people. Then, my supervisor wants me to come up with new circuit ideas. That's fine, i thought. I straightly pursued this goal... which apparently proved fruitless due to my lack of understanding of even the basic circuits. So, my co-supervisor and I, even though a bit too late, decided that I should forget thinking about new and novel designs, but instead focus on FAIR COMPARISON. Fair comparison of different circuits appeals to me because, honestly, I don't quite believe the claims that's been made in papers proposing new 'novel' circuits. Look, there are many papers out there, claiming "...our new method shows up to 90% delay improvements and 50% power reduction than the circuit proposed in [1]..." Really? Is that true? Are you sure?? How did they compare it?

No, i wasn't sure. Then, early 2007 (can you see how late it is?) i attended an IEEE-sponsored guest lecture, by Prof. Oklobdzija, about energy-delay optimization methods. Wow, it gave me a huge insight on how to actually answer my questions. He suggested that comparing energy-delay tradeoff curve would be the best way to compare different circuit techniques.

Hence, this leads me to another problem: optimization. Well, actually in my early stages of work, i did do some limited form of optimization, which is fully trial-and-error-based. Apparently, that's not good enough, at least for me. So, my focus now is to find a formal method to design and optimize basic interconnect structures, so that i can then compare the energy-delay tradeoff between them, fair and square.

Sounds simple, but it's not. Prior to optimization, one needs to model the circuit accurately. Not just that, it should be accurate AND simple. Engineers hate complex formulas, and loves approximations. But that's sometimes impossible. No simple formulas can model short channel CMOS devices accurately these days. For instance, i had to discard all those simple basic CMOS drain current formulas from textbooks and use formulas from BSIM3V3 Spice manual instead. Many secondary effects that was neglected in the past can no longer be neglected in the 90nm technology node i am studying now. Not only does this different approach on short channel devices affect the way we estimate drain current, but also heaps of other things, most importantly for me: equivalent resistance, delay, power, and optimization methodology.

I think i'm more interested in modeling and optimization now than to actually come up with a new design. Just wish me luck so that i can submit my thesis on time. ( which is due december 2007)

How to know wednesdays from tuesdays

2007-10-10T16:05:00.000+10:00

If it happens to you that you forget what day it is: a tuesday or a wednesday, all you need to do is look at the petrol price at your closest petrol station. If it's ridicolously 20 cents more expensive than yesterday, than be assured that you are indeed on a wednesday.

Transistors

2007-10-04T13:34:00.000+10:00

Transistors are remarkable stuff. So tiny. Simple principle of operation. Yet so useful. In analog designs, they're basically amplifiers and filters. In digital world, they're simply switches. But how come i still don't understand some (maybe most) of their behaviour?? Is it because people are now making them smaller and smaller? (the newest intel processor uses the 65nm wide transistor i think) Or perhaps we now use smaller voltages? Dude, let me tell you one thing. There are so many interesting (or rather, strange and unusual) facts about these transistors that you can find out simply by running simulations on a computer, but not covered in enough details in any textbooks. Simple stuff like, in a normal inverter, why does a pull-up pmos get slower in charging a load when the source supply voltage is lowered? For extremely tiny transistors, there's also another interesting fact that lacks exposure in textbooks. In texbooks, very narrow transistors will get saturated faster with increasing Vds due to velocity saturation effect. What they do not emphazise, however, is apart from velocity saturation effect that's a function of the applied electric field across drain-source, there's another important factor that can affect drain calculation significantly. It's mobility degradation. It changes the mobility 'constant' which is actually a function of Vgs. Okay, please do get confused :-(

Hospital wards

2007-10-03T18:06:00.000+10:00

The Australian public was shocked last week after a woman miscarriaged in a hospital toilet without any medical assistance for more than two hours. An inquest into this matter revealed that the Royal North Shore hospital where this incident happened did indeed suffer from some sort of mismanagement. Budgets were cut just to give a false impression of a performance boost. This makes me think, public hospitals here in NSW are just as standard as in Indonesia. A couple of days ago i went to visit a friend who needed to stay at Prince of Wales hospital Randwick, because her trombosit level went dangerously low. The ward that she was staying in was no different than the wards in Sardjito hospital back in Yogyakarta. All are standard, clean, tidy, but not too fancy. I even think that in some parts of the hospital, Sardjito is a bit more sophisticated, like the secured doors in one of its new building. And one more thing. They all smell alike. A mixture of pine o'clean and medicines, kinda hard to explain. ;-)

Bad police(man)

2007-09-26T09:33:00.000+10:00

Today when i was eating my (very early) breakfast while watching TV, i was astonished by a very horrific news: a policeman tasered a woman 7 times during 4 minutes. Just to let you know, a taser can give up to 50.000 volts of electricity, enough to electricute somebody with shocking pain, but not deadly (despite the fact around 200 people died from tasers for the last 7 years). The TV news showed the video footage of the incident repeatedly, making me feel sicker and sicker as i watched it. The woman was a bit drunk at that time, but as far as i know from the news, she did not do any aggressive physical actions. All she done was just refusing the policeman's order to step out of a vehicle she was in, with a simple "No."

This appalling behaviour of a policeman in the US adds up to the common brutality of policemen i know that've been done in the past few weeks. Just yesterday, police officers in the US were reported to have tasered a uni student after he allegedly raised 'innappropriate' questions during a forum. Early this month, NSW police were acting brutal towards us sydneysiders! Yup, there were reports of some photographers pushed to the ground during APEC, and a father of two being detained for almost a day simply because he tried to cross a street before a motorcade was about to pass by. This makes me hate policemen. Sorry.

As for policewomen, i haven't quite experienced nor witnesesd any of their misconduct. Hmm... there was even once a policewoman who kindly told me not to walk through dark and quiet alleys as they can be dangerous, especially there in Kingsford.

Pantai

2007-09-25T10:20:00.000+10:00

Semestinya aku bersyukur sekali ya, dua tahun terakhir ini bisa tinggal di dekat pantai. Gak dekat2 amat sih, pantai Coogee yg terdekat itu mungkin 3km jauhnya. Tapi dari Randwick, 1km dari rumah, laut biru membentang sudah bisa terlihat, mirip background blog ini. Oya, background blog ini adalah pantai Manly, sama2 menghadap timur, ke Tasman Sea katanya. Kadang kita gak sadar betapa indahnya bumi ini, parahnya lagi, aku. Baru menyadari keindahan pantai yg, halah, cuma 10 menit dari rumah. Mungkin setelah lebaran nanti mau bener2 nyobain snorkeling di La Perouse, cari cumi2, terus berenang mengapung2 naik turun di ombak besar nya pantai Bondi, atau nyemplung dan berenang di laut super tenang di pantai kecil apa itu namanya yg dekat Watsons Bay? Oh iya, pengin ambil foto bawah air juga. Kamera tahan air sekali pakai yg kubeli dulu smp skrg blm dipakai2... Anyway... i think that's enough daytime dreaming for the time being. I better finish my stupid conference paper.

Illusions

2007-09-21T20:36:00.000+10:00

A couple of days ago i read a book titled "Quirkology". It's a book about our silly unconsciousness that we barely ever realise exists. One example from the book says that most people's old memories CAN BE manipulated by simply mixing some 'fiction' with truth from the past. An experiment was made, according to that book, by showing old photos from a person's past to him/her, and adding one manipulated photo that actually never existed. BUT those people eventually were able to 'recall' that moment on the fictitious manipulated photo.... silly huh? This reminds me of a terrible movie (well it's actually a great movie, i was just disgusted of how evil a man can be), "The Prestige". The power of a magician is not in his/her ability to do magic. It's actually the skill of illusions. Magicians are experts in creating illusions. They take advantage of our weakness as described in the Quirkology book. So, beware... this very world can be an illusion bwahahaha.... (urip iku mung mampir ngombe, as javanese people say)

Buka puasa: Breaking fast? Opening fast? Ifthar?

2007-09-20T06:07:00.000+10:00

(This isn't an iftar, but looks like one)

It's a bit hard to know exactly what words suits best to describe the Indonesian words "buka puasa" in English, especially if you were not raised in an english speaking country. I've noted some words that people here use, which has the same meanings as "buka puasa", which are: "eat", "break your fast", or "open your fast". The words to describe a gathering of fasting people who break their fast, which we at home call "buka bersama", is "iftar", or just simply "dinner". Speaking of iftar, during this Ramadhan i would try to come to these 'free' iftars at Uni. Even though the food does not always go along with my eating preferences (javanese cuisines, with lots of rice, veggies, not too spicy, but yes, sweet ;-D), may God bless all those generous people who donated these free food.

How late i realize

2007-09-09T12:48:00.000+10:00

I'm using cadence(R) to do all my circuit simulations. And i am using the cadence 90nm generic process design kit library for it. And... just recently i have realized that working with such submicrometer technology nodes requires more caution: most of the secondary effects that you thought would not affect so much turns out to be ... affecting so much. Far out. (sorry can't swear in this blog)

Anyway, currently i'm looking at velocity saturation and mobility degradation effects on MOS transistors, and how do they affect EACH OTHER, and how would it affect the way i calculate Vds in velocity saturation...

Wish me luck.

Songs with Sydney in their Video Clips

2007-09-04T01:58:00.000+10:00

Here are some songs that i like, apart from the fact that they sound okay, they also has video clips featuring Sydney... :-)

This one is Melanie Horsnell - All I want is love... the lyrics of this song includes words like "harbour bridge", "george st", and "L90" bus... I knew this singer from iTunes Australia when it gave a free track from her album. Never heard her through radio, though...

Damien Leith - Night of My Life. Australian Idol 2006 Winner! I think they took this clip around Surry Hills? Or Pyrmont? Or Ultimo? Somewhere near the city like that i guess, from the looks of it...

Missy Higgins - Steer. This video clip is notable for its usage of a Toyota Corolla CS, just like mine :D. Parts of Sydney city high-rised office buildings and a scene from inside a cityrail train can be seen here.

Kasey Chambers - Nothing at all. I think this song didn't came to be a top hit, although occasionally this track from her newest album did air on the radio quite often last year... Places i can recognize here is Hyde Park, and somewhere near Bondi Beach...

Did i miss anything else? There's another video clip, well, okay, a commercial, with Sydney in it. Qantas - I still call Australia Home, yes? Hmm... what else?

Commercials i like for their songs

2007-09-01T21:44:00.000+10:00

These commercials have great songs... some are fun, some are felt deeply in my heart :-(
Nine MSN - Mad World (sad one...)
NAB & AFL 2007 - Give me that thing (cute song)
Qantas - I Still Call Australia Home (this wasn't the exact version i saw when i was a kid, but close enough)

Honda - Impossible Dream (funny! singing while racing bwahahaha)

Tooheys - Tall Men (you can dance along with this one)

Praise God, i've been lucky!

2007-08-17T04:45:00.000+10:00

As i drove my car passing Sydney Park Road heading for work, the car i own suddenly stopped. Yup, without any warning, well actually there was a warning --empty fuel light indicator--, my Toyota Corolla '87 refused to move any inch more (okay, i'm exagerating...). My mobil just mogok... :p

This happened around 5.55pm. Yes! That's still RUSH HOUR. Not to mention, it's SHOPPING NIGHT. Sydney Park road westbound is a two lane road, and at the time of the incident, the left lane was blocked by a police car which was stopping a hatchback car, don't ask me why. I don't know. All i know is that Sydney Park Road became more congested than usual because of this. And when my car suddenly ran out of petrol not so far behind that police car, i think it became even worse... "bumper-to-bumber" if you know what i mean :p

"Calm down, fan." (i tried to calm myself)

As i tried to start the car repeatedly, it became obvious to me that my car was indeed out of fuel. But LUCKY ME, my car was on the left lane of the road, and it stopped just next to an intersection, so the disruption i caused shouldn't be that massive :D

AND LUCKY ME, after i called my boss telling her that my car got broken down on the road and i'll arrive at work very late, a man stopped his vehicle in front of me and got out of his car... and offered help.

He told me to steer the car while we push the car backwards together, so that the car wouldn't block traffic. We pushed the car into a carpark next to the place where my car stopped, i think it was the Sydney Park car park. Fyuh, now all i need to do was to buy fuel! Lucky me, i brought the 5L fuel can i always put in my car. Then i ran to the nearest petrol station, filled it up, and ran back to my car. Five litres of fuel got poured to the tank. Well, maybe less. It spilled a lot :D

Just when i thought i was the luckiest guy on earth, the car couldn't get started as i switched on the starter. I repeat it again and again, until the car's battery got fairly depleted... leaving no more power to turn on the starter again.

I tried to push my car alone, hoping it would start. Nope it didn't.

Now here comes another lucky thing for me.

A van stopped nearby, the driver offered help. He indicated that we should push the car up the carpark, then pushhhh fast. We tried twice, yet we failed. He helped me pushing the car to a more proper place: a proper parking spot.

I told him that i will call my friend for help.

"You are going to jump the battery?", he asked.

"Yes." i answered, then thanking him for his sincere help.

He was Hungarian by the way. A gardener. He also offered me a smoke after the first try failed.

As he left, i called Lissya. I don't know, i think i chose to call her because she owns a car, she attends no class anymore, and she lives the closest (Rosebery). Oh yes, actually i've already called her right after i called my boss. I asked her for help, but it wasn't decided yet whether she has to come over or not.

When i was certain that Lissya can rescue me, I told her to come. She was at Bondi Junction, reading a book at a bookshop i think, and i ruined her pleasent evening because of my silly mistake :D

Anyways, she finally found her way to come and help me around 7.30pm. We placed our cars next to each other... she parked on an empty spot, then i pushed my toyota next to hers (yup, her car's also a toyota), with Lissya steering my car as i push bare foot (my working shoes was freaking slippery!). Boy, was it SO tiring.

I connected her Toyota Echo's battery to my Corolla's rusty battery. I told Lissya to turn her engine on while i try to start my own engine. After some few seconds, my fuel-smelling-car finally managed to turn his engine on again!

Fyuh, how lucky i was...

Thank you heaps, Lissya.

bumi itu berputar

2007-08-13T12:49:00.000+10:00

Ini salah satu bukti konkrit bahwa bumi itu berputar:

Foto diambil dua hari yang lalu dari belakang rumah (Kensington NSW), menggunakan Pentax K100D Super, ISO 200, f5.6, exposure 20 menit, menghadap barat daya.

Kamar mandi di Sydney

2007-08-05T13:07:00.000+10:00

Seperti apa tho, kamar mandi di Sydney itu?
Kira2 seperti ini: (contoh sebuah kamar mandi rumah jaman londo)

Hmm... tong sampah di Sydney bentuknya seperti apa ya kalau boleh tahu?
Seperti ini:

Oya, da TPA nggak di Sydney?
Ada.

Pentas seni 'kampung' 17-an pasti gak ada kan?
Ada kok. Lha ini, ada peragaan busana ibu2 nya segala -_-'

Sekolahku yang kucinta

2007-07-28T22:37:00.001+10:00

IMGP0073
Originally uploaded by nurirfansyah

Kenangan tak terlupakan... Kensington Public School. Ada Mrs. Chorchren(?), Miss Mossels (?), dan Mrs Allen (?)

Pengadilan oleh pers

2007-07-25T15:21:00.000+10:00

Sejak Socceroos tersingkirkan dari pentas Asia Cup krn kalah dari Jepang, berita yang layak diobrolkan di blog jelek ini adalah tentang amburadulnya investigasi polisi terhadap tersangka terorisme berusia 27 thn, Dr. Haneef (duh, muda banget ya? Atau aku nya yang sudah tua tapi gak ngerasa?).

Dr. Haneef adalah dokter asal India yang bekerja di sebuah RS di Gold Coast. Beliau terseret jadi tersangka teroris, alasannya sepele sekali. Polisi federal Australia menuduhkan, SIM card HP milik beliau ditemukan di TKP upaya peledakan bom di Bandara Glasgow, UK, bbrp waktu lalu. Padahal, usut demi usut, ternyata SIM Card tersebut TIDAK ditemukan di TKP, melainkan disita dari tersangka teroris lain di Inggris, yang kebetulan masih saudara-an sama Dr. Haneef ini.

Waduh, gimana tho ini? Kok bisa ya AFP (polisi federal australi) seceroboh itu dalam mendakwakan tuduhan? Tapi itu semua dilakukan demi keamanan nasional, katanya.

Sebelum itu, pihak Imigrasi Australia juga sempat melakukan manuver utk tetap membuat Dr. Haneef dikurung. Mereka membatalkan visa beliau, dengan alasan perilaku yang kurang baik (padahal pengadilan belum berjalan), ditambah lagi alasan keamanan nasional yang lebih besar. Walhasil, Dr. Haneef yang hampir saja bebas bersyarat (bail, mbayar), terpaksa meringkuk lagi dalam tahanan.

Sekarang, ada isu baru yang dihembuskan pers. Disebutkan dalam The Age (atau the Australian ya, mbuh lupa), bahwa polisi menambahkan nama2 teroris ke dalam catatan hariannya Dr. Haneef, dan hal tersebut diakui sendiri oleh polisi seperti tercatat dalam rekaman interogasi terhadap Dr. Haneef. Nah, sejak itu, premiere Queensland lumayan mencak2. Mencak2 karena kesannya AFP bertindak tidak profesional sama sekali dalam urusan yang sebenarnya sangat penting (menyangkut keamanan bersama).

Di lain pihak, pejabat2 di tingkat federal seperti Alexander Downer dan John Howard sendiri menyesalkan pengadilan oleh pers ini, termasuk respon dari Premiere QLD terhadap masalah ini. Mereka meminta supaya pengadilanlah yang menentukan semuanya, dan berharap pers tidak bikin ulah yang bisa mengakibatkan pengadilan menjadi tidak berlangsung adil.

Anyway, fenomena ini cukup menarik karena beberapa hal:
1. Ternyata, meskipun citra islam (dan mungkin juga citra dokter dari India, sejak ada kasus malpraktek Dr. Patel yg kini jadi buron) cukup buruk di mata publik Australia, ternyata kalau sudah berbicara mengenai "fair go", publik Australia tidak lagi diskriminatif.
2. Pengadilan oleh pers itu bisa ngefek juga be'e? Kita lihat saja nanti bagaimana kelanjutan kasus ini...

Kitty Hawk di Sydney...

2007-07-10T10:26:00.000+10:00

So, i've submitted my abstract. Now what?

2007-06-27T16:38:00.000+10:00

This was my first time ever, that i submitted an abstract for a conference. Less than an hour before i really submitted it through the conference's website, i sent it to my supervisors. Quite surprisingly, one of my supervisor gave a very positive response. This never happens from him. I mean, the good response. Anyway, it does make this cold cloudy day just a bit brighter, for me at least... :-)

This is the abstract:

Comparison Framework for Low Swing On-Chip Interconnect Circuits

There has been many low-swing on-chip interconnect signaling techniques introduced to tackle the problem of inverse-scaling effect of on-chip wires. This paper proposes a comparison framework using SPICE-based simulations on the 90nm technology node, which is needed to assess the effectiveness of a certain interconnect technique over the others with a high degree of objectiveness and accuracy. Three low-swing techniques are included in the comparison, i.e. conventional level converter (CLC), pseudodifferential signaling, and current-mode signaling (CM). These techniques were chosen to represent significantly different driver and receiver topologies, where CLC uses inverter drivers, pseudodifferential are based on source-follower drivers, and CM has a low impedance termination at receiver end. In addition, an optimized full-swing repeater-based technique is included as a baseline for comparison. Wires are modeled as cascaded RLC segments, and the simulation setup will incorporate cross-capacitance and cross-inductance effect from neighbouring wires. Preliminary simulations on global wires show that inductance affects delay only up to 9%, however its effects on noise cannot be neglected. The main contribution of this paper is the identification of circuit and wire design parameters that affects performances the most, leading to a design guideline with reduced set of design variables for delay or energy optimization of each technique. Furthermore, trade-off between energy and delay using the optimization processes will be explored, resulting in a more objective comparison of different interconnect techniques in the energy-delay space.

So... all i need to do now is simple. Show results (yeah, easy for me to say!), and write the bloody paper (due on early november, i think -- if they accept my abstract that is...). Problem is, it's going to be one hell of a research thing... imagine the torture, imagine the sleepless sunday nights with Kim and Kushal, and the horrifying maths involved in the so-called circuit optimization techniques for power with delay constraints, including all those crosstalk noise and inductance effects. Not to mention the painfully slow parametric sweeps run by the sluggerish cadence analog artist tool, and those stupid traps of teeny weeny typos i might be silly enough to actualy fall into again and again, wasting all those precious hours and computing horse power for nothing. And the mystery of inductance, dude... it IS still a big mystery.

Anyway, one step at a time should do the trick. I've pretty much done the repeater insertion technique, and CLC. Probably, it's useful to know more about current mode signaling optimization? You reckon?

Hmm.... i better start reading more and more papers and books.... (have i told you i spent $15 for photocopying some chapters from IMPORTANT books i found at UTS library last night? yep. Their book collections are awesome. i couldn't stop wondering why our library aren't as good. anyway, must read them now, otherwise they'll end up in the bottom of a pile full of papers locked inside my drawer)

Research update 26/6/07

2007-06-26T11:04:00.000+10:00

It's been a while now since i last talked about my thesis progress. Not that i was too busy working on it that i had no time to blog, it's just that there hasn't been any good results yet.

Yesterday i had my third progress review, and it turned okay. Not too bad. They gave me satisfactory mark for the research progress. But still, heaps of works needs to be done, and quickly. I set my own deadline for submission on late November. At first they thought it's too quick, but they agreed anyway.

As you might already know, i'm working on low power on-chip interconnects. In english it might translate as "efficient wires inside microchips". There's nothing special about it. It's only about how to send signals through wires inside those stupid tiny chips with the lowest power consumption possible, while maintaining the required need for speed ;-)

The original idea was that i should come up with a new circuit design that at least can solve this problem, a new circuit that can outperform others. But bloody oath, that's too hard mate, even for an experienced designer. And not to mention the limited time i have now, it seems more impossible to accomplish this.

So,

My supervisor and i agreed, in order to finish this silly thesis on time, i would now focus on doing comparisons of different interconnect circuit topologies, in an highly accurate way. We've switched to this focus about two months ago, and work is still on progress. Well, actually the initial works i did at the very beginning of my masters was no different than what i'm doing now. But at that time, it wasn't considered too crucial. It was meant only to be a... some sort of a leaping point, for a new circuit design. So, not much attention was put into that, resulting in very crude work, with low level of accuracy.

Apparently, that's a big mistake. Even if my research goal now was still unchanged, i.e. making new circuit designs, this step must have been taken seriously with no rush, as it gives very valuable insights on how to do things properly, including how to design new designs effectively.

What i'm doing now is this. There are many interconnect signaling schemes out there, i absolutely don't know whether they are actually implemented on real designs or not, i don't really care anyway. But that's no problem. My work will compare at least 3 low power designs: 1 ordinary reduced swing drivers, 1 pseudodifferential circuit, and 1 current mode signaling. Plus 1 more from the normal full swing repeated interconnect.

Now what makes it interesting is, i need to optimize each of them, and i really do want to know how this optimization can be done. I mean, what factors affects most to energy and delay? What are the most important design parameters to look at? In a circuit, there are so many design parameters that you can change in order to get a best design. But that's too much. There must be a reduced set of design parameters to aid the design of optimized circuits, either delay optimized or energy optimized.

My work had at least formulated a methodology based on literature review, on how to optimize the normal full swing repeated interconnect, with the possibility of it to be implemented on the conventional low level converter technique.

The remaining tasks are even harder: finding a way to optimize pseudodifferential circuits and current mode signaling.

Just these two. Wish me luck.

Terima kasih.

2007-06-24T02:15:00.001+10:00

There's nothing else i can do but to say "Terima kasih."

Terlalu banyak orang di dunia ini yang... entah kenapa... sangat baik ke diriku. Pertama, ibuku bapakku dan masku. Lalu keluarga ku yang lain. Walaupun ini adalah wajar, tapi tetap, tetap saja jasa mereka tidak bisa dianggap sepele.

Yang tidak wajar, adalah kalau ada orang yang tidak terlalu kamu kenal, tapi mereka jadi baik ke kita. Kebanyakan teman2 ku baik begitu, sejak SD, walaupun tidak semua. Oh iya, jadi ingat. Jaman SD dulu, waktu aku di SD Kintelan dalam keadaan tdk punya teman byk dan tdk bisa berbahasa Indonesia, ada teman yang hampir tiap hari memberikan aku kelereng. Entah apa motivasi nya, yg jelas koleksi kelerengku waktu itu jadi banyak gara2 dia.

Dunia ini penuh dengan orang baik. Tidak pandang tempat. Desa, kota, Indonesia, luar negeri... semua dipenuhi orang-orang baik.

Di Sydney, sewaktu kecil, rumahku pernah kemasukan maling, dan saat itu hanya aku yang ada di rumah. Maling ini baik, dia mengambil betamax player dari kamar dengan ramah, bilang ke aku kalau dia temannya bapak. Lalu dia pergi tanpa melukaiku sedikitpun.

Di jogja, selain teman dermawan kelereng tadi, pernah suatu ketika aku melanggar lampu merah di ringroad barat. Tiba2, ada polisi meminta aku berhenti. Beliau mengingatkan ttg kesalahanku, lalu dia bersedia membantu menguruskan pengadilannya setelah kubayar sekian puluh ribu rupiah. Bandingkan dengan denda termahal yg pernah kubayar di Sydney sini cuma karena parkir mobil di pojokan persimpangan jalan: AU$177. Bebas korupsi sih memang yang ini, tapi kan rugi, lha mahal sekali.

Di Jakarta, bertolak belakang dengan pandangan umum bahwa kota ini tidak ramah, justru yg kutemui kebanyakan orang ramah. Tanya arah dan tanya jalur bus, jawabannya selalu jujur. Jauh dari kesan manusia egois. Manusia Jakarta sangat ramah. Ini yang kutemui sih. Tapi dari 12 juta orang penduduk kota ini, entah lah, menurut statistik, harusnya banyak juga yang jahat....

Tapi, di antara semua teman/kenalan itu, ada satu teman yang saat ini paling ingin kuberi ucapan terima kasih. Beliau adalah supervisorku (inisialnya saja yg kukasih: TL). Tiap kali berdiskusi dgn beliau, tidak terasa 1 jam selalu berlalu, dgn proporsi beliau yang lebih banyak memberikan ide, saran, dan pelajaran. Entahlah apa yang bakal terjadi tanpa beliau, bisa saja tesis ku lebih terancam lagi dibandingkan kondisi nya yg skrg yg sebenarnya memang sdh terancam :D

Jadi ingat lagu nya Julie Andrews "Something good"

Perhaps I had a wicked childhood

Perhaps I had a miserable youth

But somewhere in my wicked, miserable past

There must have been a moment of truth

For here you are

Standing there

Loving me

Whether or not you should

So somewhere in my youth or childhood

I must have done something good

Entahlah. Alhamdulillahirobbil'alamin.

Abad 21 begini, masih ngurusi begituan??

2007-05-28T18:53:00.000+10:00

Ingat pelajaran elektronika SMA tidak? Ingat kan ya soal resistor, kapasitor, kuat arus, daya, dll?

Itu pelajaran dasar elektronika. Dasar sekali. Sudah jaman dulu banget orang nemu itu.

Tapi silakan kaget. Di depan saya skrg ada paper berjudul "Resistive Power in CMOS Circuits" yang dipublish tahun 2004. Heh? Setelat itukah paper ini harus keluar? Atau mungkin hal sepele semacam ini masih bisa dijadikan perdebatan sampai sekarang?

Ternyata bisa.

Salah satu kalimat di paper itu berbunyi begini:

"Confusion, however, exists as to whether and how to consider resistive I square R power losses within the interconnect line."

Haha... tahu aja ni orang. I am one of those confused, to tell you the truth...

Lalu, ada tulisan begini:

"Greater line resistance can also increase the short-circuit power dissipation of the driver and the load gate."

Baruuu tadi siang diskusi dengan dosen. Beliau berpendapat bahwa line resistance tidak akan ngefek ke driver.

Oke, yang kedua ini mungkin bukan pelajaran SMA, tapi seharusnya hal-hal sepele seperti ini sudah ada kepastian nya dulu sekali, ketika teknologi CMOS mulai diperkenalkan awal 60-an dan booming awal 90-an... atau ... kapan ya CMOS mulai booming? Hmm... mungkin memang teknologi CMOS masih agak muda ya pancen e... bukti nya di pelajaran SMA tidak disinggung dulu itu? Sekarang sudah masuk belum ya?

Anyway, beberapa journal paper yang membahas teori dasar sederhana semacam ini banyak yang masih dipublish akhir2 ini... di abad 21 bayangkan... di jaman orang sudah sangat melesat jauh nemu cloning, nanotubes, micromachines, quantum computing, dll...

Moral of the story: publish yuk? :D

Membedakan karena kulit, rambut, dan mata nya beda...

2007-05-22T05:08:00.000+10:00

Sudah sering buanget kita dengar cerita perlakuan buruk orang lain di luar negeri terhadap TKI kita misalnya, atau pandangan sinis bule terhadap saudari2 kita yang berjilbab, atau gerutuan nenek2 kulit putih ke orang kulit putih cenderung kuning yang terkesan suka nyelonong, misalnya...

Sikap rasis begini, memang memalukan. Tapi, sadarkah kita, di alam bawah sadar, sebenarnya kita tidak kalah rasis? (yg kumaksud dgn kita adalah kita warga Indonesia sebangsa dan setanah air)

Contoh. Banyak saudara kita yang beragama Islam di tanah air tercinta kita, ternyata punya kebencian berlebih ke orang Yahudi. Memang kupikir alasan kita untuk itu cukup kuat, tapi kebencian kita cenderung menutup mata bahwa sebenarnya tidak semua orang Yahudi itu jahat. Pernahkah kita ketemu dan kenal langsung dengan orang Yahudi? Kalau di Indonesia pasti akan sangat jarang. Kenyataannya, mereka biasa2 saja kok orangnya. Prejudice kita saja yang membuat kita seolah buta. Dan sikap ini memang dipanas2i oleh media di negeri kita yang secara kasat mata memang anti-israel (untungnya sih ;D tapi entah di lubuk hati mereka gimana). Perlukah kuingatkan bahwa kita masih sama2 mengimani nabi Ibrahim?

Kedua. Kita sendiri sering berlaku rasis terhadap bule. Setiap bule yang kita lihat pasti kita asosiasikan dengan budaya barat yang buebas, pergaulan kumpul kebo, budaya minum, dll. Belakangan ini, kita juga punya praduga bersalah bahwa mereka benci Islam. Well, mungkin ini memang benar adanya... tapi tidak berarti kita harus punya jarak dengan mereka. Just take it easy, anggap ga ada apa2? Temani dan pergauli sewajarnya lah mereka, kalau perlu disahabati... Kita juga, jangan sok suci. Di Indonesia mungkin keadaannya sama parahnya walaupun ga seterbuka di sini...

Ketiga. Dan yang ini tidak perlu melihat keadaan di negara lain. Cukup melihat ke dalam kita sendiri, di Indonesia. Ingat kerusuhan '98? Siapakah dari saudara kita yang terpaksa meninggalkan rumahnya? I need not mention it kan? Saudara kita yang kebetulan dilahirkan sipit (me myself is sipit, so i'm allowed to make such comments huahaha) banyak yang diuber2 our so called 'pribumi', entah itu karena iri cemburu atau apa entahlah... Kuakui saja, memang ini memilukan banget. Jadi malu rasanya. I'm not chinese, but at one point in my life (when i was a kid), pernah mengalami diskriminasi dengan alasan begini: "because you are chinese...", kata 'temanku' waktu itu.

Damai yuk damai damai... saling pengertian po' o... :D

So you want to take a research degree...

2007-05-20T02:45:00.000+10:00

That's good. There's absolutely nothing wrong with doing a PhD or a master's degree with research. But if you decide to do so, just make sure:
1. You believe that the 2-5 years time you spend is really worth it.
2. You have a strong interest in the research topic you're about to take.
3. Some supporting background, may that be experience or knowledge, in you research topic would definitely help.
4. Better get a really good supervisor for your thesis work. By saying good, i mean that he/she should at least have followed the latest development on the subject. Or even better, she/he had actually worked with significant experience in the topic you are about to dive in.
5. Being idealistic is a good thing. But sooner or later you will inevitably learn that being realistic helps more often ;-)

So good luck to all. And to myself... :-(

Kabut pagi...

2007-05-15T09:02:00.000+10:00

Ini seri foto kabut pagi yang melanda Sydney kemarin. Peristiwa ini cukup mendadak dan aneh. Pukul 5.30 pagi (msh gelap) kusaksikan sendiri langit nya cerah dengan gemerlap bintang2. Pukul 6.30, ketika sudah agak terang di luar, baru kusadari ada kabut. Aneh kan?

Anyway, begitu tahu ada kabut, i quickly grab my gears and head to the city. Dalam benakku, aku pengin ambil foto mirip punya Peter Lik, yang foto harbour bridge berkabut dan ada kapal lewat kalau tidak salah dan ada matahari terbit, keren deh pokoknya walaupun BW. Ini foto2 gagal yang kudapat... selamat menikmati kalau bisa :-(

On Global Warming...

2007-05-09T05:16:00.000+10:00

Dari tumpukan file lama, entah kenapa sampai nulis beginian, tentang global warming...

A few moments ago I watched on television, a speech by a prominent economist from England. His name was Sir something Stern. Shoot, I’m terrible at remembering names.

The main point of his talk was that global climate change is a real thing, and it would cost much more to us if we don’t do anything about it than if we start to do something to reduce the effect as soon as possible. He described that the effect of global climate change will differ in many countries: in Australia it would be a severe drought, in China it would be the melting of the himalayas. Most of these effects are water related, and also not less important is the temperature change itself. By 2000 something, there will be an increase of 5 degrees celcius on average. As you might remember a few months ago there was a heat wave which striked Europe and killed several hundreds of people, mainly the elderly. This might become an ordinary phenomenon in the near future.

To tackle this global problem, each nation must cooperate and collaborate in a joint effort with the same commitment and goal to reduce gas house effects. There has been an increasing concern not only among the rich countries, but also the poor and developing countries regarding this issue. For example, Indonesia which is now number three in emiting carbondioxide in the world after the US and china due to its severe deforestation has raised concerns to fix this problem.

Global climate change is a serious problem, and it would cost less to us if we act now to stop it. Very important our “green policies” and actions and investments might seem now, but the effect will not be felt in at least 30, 50, or even 150 years. Yet this is the only viable option to do, and it can be done. Hence, in addition to efforts in reducing gas emmision, adaptation to the global climate change in the future is also equally important.

That’s a brief summary of what I can remember of his speech. This reminds me of a discussion broadcast on ABC a few weeks back, about global climate change and how it can affect Australia. As we all know, Australia has a rich source of coal, and they are exporting it to the world. This coal mining industry contributes largely in the Australian economy. It may also be a common knowledge that coal is not a clean source of energy, despite its still dominant use in the world as source of electrical power. This poses a difficult question to Australia: knowing that Australia will suffer from worse droughts in the future due to climatic change, can Australia discard coal technologies and use other energy source alternatives to make a cleaner air? And is this economically feasible?

The discussion went into a sort of a debate, one side still holding on the idea that alternative sources of energy cannot replace the conventional sources like coal, gas and petroleum to meet energy demands.

Now back to my thesis. About low power interconnects. Hang on. If you like to connect one matter to another, actually global climate change and interconnects are related in some way and another. First, heat is a common enemy in both cases. Excess heat trapped in the atmosphere is what causes trouble on earth. Similarly, excess heat caused by extremely fast clocking in integrated circuits can potentially limit chip performances, and power dissipation (you might consider this a more polite way of saying “heat”).

Secondly, both problems can be aleviated by using power more efficiently.

Because I am more interested in chips rather than the global warming of the earth (well, at least in the time being, because I’m almost dead meat here racing with time to finish up my bloody thesis), let us discuss more on this topic.

...

Maag, perih, mual, walhasil... muntah

2007-05-02T03:53:00.000+10:00

(WARNING: the following content might not be suitable for people who are easily offenced by talks about some abnormal human physiological process)

"Semuuut semut kecil, sayaaa mau tanya... apakah kamu, di dalam tanah, tidak kegelapan??"

Sori, baru saja iTunes ku nyetel lagu ini... krn lucu, kuketik saja di sini... sbg pembukaan, hehe. Pembukaan yang ngawur :D

Anyway, kemarin sore adalah sore paling menderita yang kualami sepanjang 2007 ini.

To make it short, this is what happened:
- 1.00pm: started to get hungry
- 1.30pm: had indian chicken with salad for lunch
- 2.15pm: felt worsening stomach pain
- 4.00pm: stomach pain got pretty severe, went home to take obat maag, went straight to bed
- couldnt remember: vomiting
- soon afterwards: vomiting again
- maybe 1 hour after: last vomit (i think that was the last chunk of chicken that went out...)
- 2.00am: woke up, feeling much better
- 3.00am: had late dinner at McD Kingsford

Kejadian ini cukup mengherankan, mengingat betapa mendadaknya 'serangan'. Sebenarnya, apakah penyebab sakitku ini? Apakah ayam yang kumakan? Maag? Atau masuk angin? Atau kurang tidur?

Mari kita tela'ah satu-satu:
1. Ayam yg kumakan
Ayam yang kumakan adalah ayam yg dimasak ala india. Lupa namanya. Bumbu nya kemerahan. Baru kali ini si memang, makan menu itu. Dulu beberapa kali makan di tempat itu tdk ada masalah. Pernah sekali makan nasi yang agak pedas, perut lantas mual. Tapi itu satu kejadian di antara mungkin 5 kali aku makan di situ. Di jewels of india, kantin badabagan UNSW. Mengenai kehalalan mereka, dulu pernah tanya apakah daging mereka halal, mbak nya bilang iya. Hafiz juga, bilang halal dan pernah mengajak aku makan di sana. Regardless, i think i might not come back to them in the near future. Sebenarnya ga terlalu doyan india.

Dulu sekali pernah juga mengalami sakit perut perih setelah makan ayam Oporto dan minum pepsi saat perutku kosong. Tapi tidak sampai muntah waktu itu.

2. Maag
Jarang sekali aku kena maag. Biasanya kena kalau skip makan. Pagi kemarin sarapan nasi cukup byk dgn telur. Perut ku tidak kosong jadi mungkin bukan ini penyebabnya.

3. Masuk angin
Gejala masuk angin kan biasanya pusing2 kan? Ini tidak ada pusing2. Pusingnya setelah menahan rasa sakit perut ga ketulungan, selama berjam2 di kasur rumah. Tapi mungkin juga sih ga nyadar kalau masuk angin, apalagi di musim gugur skrg ini suhu udara turun naik seenaknya...

4. Kurang tidur
Dua malam terakhir memang tidurku cuma 5 jam per malam, kira2, dengan jam tidur menyerupai Adhika (mulai tidur saat subuh). Rata2. Mungkin ini ngepek juga? Entahlah.

Aya, kalau km baca ini, kira2 diagnosismu gimana? :D Kenapa si orang bisa muntah?

Hobi foto jadi makin menggila

2007-04-30T01:11:00.000+10:00

Alkisah, sekitar empat bulan yang lalu, mas Anton mengenalkan padaku sebuah website forum penggemar fotografi yg sepertinya cukup populer: www.fotografer.net. Waktu itu, ketertarikanku pada forum ini tidak seberapa besar. Tapi, semuanya berubah ketika mas Awe suatu hari, selepas solat jumat di kampus, tanya ke aku: "Fan, fotografer.net harus bayar ya?"

"Hah??" Sing bener ae, batinku...

Penasaran, kubuka account FN ku yang sebulan lebih tidak kubuka. Ternyata ada aturan bahwa anggota diwajibkan upload minimal 11 foto di bln pertama, dan minimal comment sebanyak 30 buah. Demi mengejar syarat minimal itu, hampir tiap hari deh comment foto orang dan upload foto sendiri... sampai saat ini.

Ternyata dampaknya cukup besar. FN sangat addictive, duh.

Anyway, ada yang menarik dari FN ini. Bagi yang blm tahu, di FN, foto kita akan dinilai anggota lain. Semakin tinggi nilainya, semakin bagus berarti foto nya. Cuma, yang menjadi fenomena hasil pemantuan selama ini adalah, ada beberapa kategori foto yang lumayan dijamin bisa dapat nilai tinggi, asalkan tidak ada cacat teknis lho ya. Yang pertama adalah foto model perempuan. Semakin cakep modelnya, biasanya makin tinggi nilainya. Kedua, adalah foto landscape, terutama yang nightshot atau foto saat senja. Ketiga, foto IR. Lalu, foto macro. Dan, foto olahan digital sangat umum di FN, smp smp orang harus bilang secara explisit seandainya foto nya asli tanpa oldig :-)

Banyak hal yang bisa didapatkan dari FN. Yang paling jelas, kita jadi tahu foto yang digemari banyak orang itu seperti apa. Foto yg bagus itu seperti apa. Cara mengambil foto yang bagus gimana, jadi tambah ngerti.

Foto-foto yg diupload di FN umumnya bagus semua. Dunia ini jadi terasa begitu indah. Banyak objek foto menarik yang sama menariknya seperti kalau kita baca koran, hehe.

Satu hal yang tidak terduga di FN ini, yaitu kita bisa ketemu teman lama! Yup, setidaknya ada 3 teman lama yang sudah kutemukan di FN sini... Dan juga, teman baru dapat juga bbrp, hihi.

Oh, iya. Kebetulan ada satu foto yg entah gimana akhirnya dikasih nilai sama banyak orang, walhasil sempat masuk foto pilihan editor minggu lalu. Fotonya yang kupasang di atas, hehe...

Kecanduan FN

2007-04-16T23:13:00.000+10:00

Mohon bantuan bapak2x, ibu2, dan saudara2x sekalian, saya sedang butuh bantuan nya agar kecanduan saya terhadap www.fotografer.net bisa dikurangi. Sekali lagi, mohon bantuannya, dan terima kasih.

Autumn in Sydney

2007-04-12T12:10:00.000+10:00

Lokasi: dekat Wenthworth Park, Pyrmont NSW
Kamera: Pentax SP-500, lensa Formula-5 zoom 70-205mm, tanpa filter, film Fuji Superia 200

Briliant idea, but still not there just yet...

2007-04-05T14:21:00.000+10:00

This is an idea of a current-sensing-powered-from-the-driver-circuit from my supervisor, which i tried to implement:

And this is what the test results looks like:

(the wire is a 1um wide 3mm long metal, with a full swing CMOS driver)

Looks ugly? Yup. You can say that again. Especially the triangle wave... that's horrible.

Very well. I'll keep trying.

Lagu ngetop di sini tapi sepertinya tidak ada yg tahu di Indonesia...?

2007-03-21T23:29:00.000+11:00

Menjelang Commonwealth Games 2006, lagu Shannon Noll - Shine sempat populer sekali:

Selamat ulang tahun bridge...

2007-03-19T08:47:00.000+11:00

Kemarin, Sydney Harbour Bridge genap berusia 75 thn, sedikit lebih muda dari Suharto? Anyway, jembatan ini megah banget e kalau dipikir2. Berdiri kokoh sejak sebelum perang dunia kedua, dilalui jutaan kendaraan tiap tahunnya, dan yang penting: bentuknya cantik. Seperti gantungan baju (coat hanger) orang sini bilang.

Pengalaman berkesan ku di Harbour Bridge paling lama tu pas diriku masih sekolah di Kensington Public School, waktu itu kita la' sedang dalam perjalanan pulang naik bus dari Taronga Zoo. Nah, njuk teman2 dekatku dan aku duduk di kursi belakang waktu itu. Pas kita nyeberang jembatan, pas tengah2nya guyon dengan teman, moso' ada supir bus di belakang bus kita yang lucu e... kacamata hitamnya dinaik turunkan, seolah bilang halo ke kita.. piye yo pokoknya lucu lah supirnya. Kita semua tertawa . Hhh... ga terasa itu sudah 20 thn yang lalu...

Kembali ke ulang tahun jembatan ke-75. Untuk memperingati ulang tahun jembatan, kemarin itu diadakan kegiatan Harbour Bridge Walk. Mlaku nyeberang jembatan, bahasa jawanya.

Sesuai panduan pengelola acara, kita naik kereta ke stasiun North Sydney. Yang suangat berkesan pas naik train dari Wynyard ke North Sydney itu pas trainnya di atas jembatan. Wuih, biasanya yang menarik untuk dilihat kan laut atau opera house. Kali ini lain. Yang menarik adalah jembatan itu sendiri, di tengahnya kosong ga ada mobil, tapi penuh orang jalan kaki dengan topi hijau semua. Wuih.

Iya, stasiun North Sydney itu yang sempat heboh beberapa hari yang lalu ada beberapa kereta yang mogok di sekitar stasiun itu, menelantarkan 4000 penumpang yang harus menunggu sampai 3 jam di dalam kereta hingga akhirnya dievakuasi.

Lupakan masalah kereta mogok. Kembali soal Harbour Bridge Walk. Pengamanan di sekitar acara cukup terancang rapi, banyak polisi bersliweran.

Antusiasme warga Sydney untuk menghadiri acara ini sangat besar. Terlihat jalanan penuh dengan penyeberang jembatan.

Oh iya, kemarin ada wartawan Channel 7 yang terkenal itu lho, duh lupa namanya. Beliau sempat mewawancarai seorang bapak2 yang dulu pernah mengikuti acara peresmian jembatan ini tahun 1932.

Harbour Bridge Walk ini berujung di dua tempat, satu di Wynyard (ini yang dekat), satunya lagi di Darling Harbour, melalui motorway di antara gedung2... mirip di Jakarta rasanya.

Acara ini berlangsung terus sampai sore, sampai gelap malahan. Dan pas gelap itu, pengunjung diberi topi gratis oranye yang ada lampunya. Beda dengan yang pagi. Ada atraksi warga asli Australia (aborigine) juga pas malam ini, dan jembatannya diberi efek kabut dan pencahayaan yang buagus.

Begitulah, kemarin benar2 berkesan. Jembatannya sangat mengesankan.

Plat nomer aneh2x

2007-02-27T11:26:00.000+11:00

Plat nomer mobil di NSW itu kalau dilihat sepintas, seperti tidak ada aturannya. Sebenarnya, standar jumlah karakter adalah 6, diawali dengan tiga huruf lalu diikuti tiga angka. Yang baru2 belakangan ini biasanya 2 huruf - 2 angka - 2 huruf, biasanya diawali AB, AD, AE macam di indo hehe.

Atau kalau mau yang model Uni Eropa, jadinya adalah N xxxxx. N artinya NSW.

Atau kalau rela membayar lebih, ternyata bisa juga pesan sa-enak-e dewe, maksimal 6 karakter.

Misalnya, kaya'e ini ada orang yg lahir di Inggris tapi njuk merasa Australia sebagai tanah airnya:
* Pommy = orang inggris. Diambil di parkiran Eastgardens.

Atau, mungkin saking bangganya jadi pulisi, sampai2 plat nomor mobilnya dibuat jadi seperti ini: (sori burem, but i can assure you it does indeed say "POLISI")
Diambil di Brisbane.

Yang punya mobil ini punya semangat juang yang sangat tinggi, membela kebenaran dan jalan yang lurus :D
Di Marricville community centre, sesudah sholat Idul Adha thn 2006.

Sedangkan si pemilik mobil ini, hmm... entah kenapa mungkin dia memang chubby orangnya? Entahlah... sulit sekali menilai krn aku tdk berhasil mendahului mobil itu utk bisa melihat lebih dekat supir nya bener tembem gak...
Diambil di Anzac Parade Kensington.

Yang terakhir ini, ingin menegaskan bahwa mobilnya bukanlah gerobak atau andong. Tetapi sebuah mobil. Iya mobilnya adalah mobil. Got that... -_-"
Diambil di Anzac Parade Kingsford

On doing a PhD...

2007-02-16T17:05:00.000+11:00

After jumatan i met mas AZ. He told me about his plans to end his study by the end of this semester. Which means... he won't get a PhD for it... but just a masters degree. "WHAT!?!?" was my response to this unbelievable and shocking news. I mean, oh come on. Why, mas? Why??

He said that he wants to stay here. In Sydney. So he reckons he won't need to have a PhD degree anymore. He has the cutest lil girl in Kingsford, he has a nice flat unit (he rents it though, not own it). He got married here, and he feel comfortable living here with his family. Oh yes, his wife is an Australian Permanent Resident.

His supervisor once asked him, which one would AZ choose, his study or his family. The answer seems obvious now.

This reminds me of my own father, Bapak. My little brother was born here when my father was at the last years of his PhD. But somehow my father managed to work it out, i mean, keep doing his PhD until completion. Oh yes, just to let you know... exactly 20 years ago, on 16 feb 1987, my brother was born. Here in Sydney. At that time, my mother too, was still working even after my brother was born. I remembered ibu used to work night shifts, so we can take care of Adnan (my brother) while ibu goes to work.

Back to my father. Do you know Bapak's favourite place at home? First, his desk. Yes, his desk. With piles of papers, folders, books, and stacks of pens on top of it. He would stay there, hours, doing everything from preparing lecture materials, or correcting student's exam papers, to reading heaps of university grant proposals.

Bapak's second favourite place at home is the living room where bapak reads the newspaper. I wonder why we still subscribe to that freaking stupid KR. Anyway, it still makes a good afternoon read. I mean, it's better than nothing.

Bapak takes his job home. You might have heard that some lecturers do not like to be disturbed at home. My father is the opposite. He likes to bring his work home. He even do not hesitate to SMS his students. Or call them. Yes, my father sometimes call his students, for example if he won't be able to come to class.

Guests who come to our house are mainly students. They often come in groups, for some thesis consultations with Bapak. One day, Bapak called me to get out to meet somebody, who turns out to be my high school pal!! Whatta? Apparently my father's student who came was my pal's girlfriend -_-" That's why he was there, at my house.

Shortly speaking, it seems clear enough that my father is indeed a hard working type of person. Not like me. (shame on you, irfan!) And no wonder he can finish his PhD quite on time.

On having a car...

2007-02-15T16:16:00.000+11:00

The car i bought last year was a cheap car. As you would expect from a cheap car, it lacks some comfort that you would normally find on a "standard" car. It's not that bad though, the engine keeps running, the transmission is smooth, and the steering wheel seems to be light and responsive though there are no power steering on my car. The battery is top notch, the starter motor never lets me down, and the suspensions... man... it's even better than my friend's new Holden Barina.

But there are some other things that you must consider if you want to buy and own a car in NSW. You must put aside around $500 for the compulsory third party insurance, should you need to renew the registration of your car. You need to allocate some $350, minimum, for roadworthy certificates, new tyres, and other small services you may need before getting a new rego. And of course, a not too much $250 for the rego itself. And all of this cost, is the cost i must pay. Alone.

Alright, that's no problem. Money is not the issue. Well.. maybe to some extent, it is.

But the main complaint that i would like to put forward in this post is, by having a car, you will be deemed to have an extra responsibility to the society (i.e. friends). You should be able to carry other friend's luggage. You should be available to take your friend to the airport. You are supposed to pick up your friends, or take them to wherever they want to go. Because you now own a car, you will have the responsibility to be active in the group's activities, especially as transport volunteer.

It's not that i'm not sincere in helping you guys, but i just feel that the car i have.. instead of making more spare time for me to do this freakin' thesis, apparently i have less time now. Well, this may not be 100% true though. But this is, at least, what i feel... It is a real pleasure, and an honor, to be able to help anyone with my car. It is sometimes my duty to do so. But.. again... i may not have the time to spare... Not anymore.

Foto Opera House dengan Bulan

2007-02-14T11:16:00.000+11:00

Foto ini diambil Jumat tengah malam kemarin, tepat sebelum kita* beranjak pulang dari "leyeh-leyeh" di Pylon Harbour Bridge yg selatan sisi timur. Tanpa diduga, bulannya tiba2 muncul, padahal tadinya tidak ada.

Lumayan lah, ternyata Pentax SP-500 warisan bapak masih bisa sedikit diandalkan untuk foto ginian... :D

Dan alhamdulillah, walaupun lensa tele ku sempat jatuh dan sekarang "ogak-ogak", kenyataannya fotonya masih lumayan tajem.

Cuma nyeselnya, kenapa ku harus makai film murahan Konica Minolta, yang ISO nya tinggi pula.. ASA 400...

* kita terdiri dari: ary, brian, lissya, anita, anton, ita, aya, lana, tari, yoga, fachri, aku.

Modeling the wires: a simple one

2007-02-13T06:18:00.001+11:00

Speed or power. That was the question we asked on our last post. What if we want BOTH?

That's human nature. Human beings tend to be greedy. Sometimes a bit cruel too (e.g. i just squished a mozzy who wanted death: it bit me on my arm :D)

Back to interconnects, a fast and low power one that is. How do we get both of them?

In engineering, this daunting task is often called optimization. To do some silly optimization, one should model the problem with some mathematical expressions. To make life easy (that's what we engineers are here for anyway), modeling of physical properties and electrical characteristics of devices are normally made as simple as possible: simplification and approximation must be used whenever possible.

Alright, let us start with some maths from now.

Bakoglu, 22 years ago at 1985 modeled the wire system as consisting of a resistive driver, a lumped RC network as the wire, and a capacitive load at the receiver. You can read his paper titled "Optimal Interconnection Circuits for VLSI" for more details. From the way he drew the symbol of the load, which was the gate of a MOS transistor, it was obvious that voltage mode signaling was assumed.

A good approximation of the wire delay, he said, is:

T = 1.0 * Rint * Cint + 2.3 * (Rtr * Cint + Rtr * Cl + Rint * Cl)

and neglecting Cl, then

T = (2.3 Rtr + Rint) Cint

where Rtr = driver resistance, Rint = wire resistance, Cint = wire capacitance to ground, and Cl = load capacitance.

The driver's resistance, which is also the on-resistance of a MOS transistor is:

Rtr = (L / W) / (u * Cgox * Vdd)

And the resistance of the wire is a bit simpler, perhaps we all know this one from high school:

Rint = resistivity * Lmax / (Wint * H)

Wint times H is simply the cross-sectional area of the wire.

Now, he formulated the optimal cross-sectional area of the wire to be:

Wint * H = resistivity * Lmax / (2.3 * Rtr)

It seems that he chose the delay from wires to be roughly equal to the delay caused by the driver. Normally, the H is fixed for a certain technology. So the variable parameter we can play on is the width of the wire, Wint. The above formula enables us to find a minimum value of the interconnect width, with a reasonably low delay as possible. This idea is cited in Adler's paper "Repeater Design to Reduce Delay and Power in Resistive Interconnect" (1998).

Furthermore in his paper, Bakoglu explains about repeaters and inverter chains (cascaded drivers). Combining both will produce the shortest delay possible, where the extreme lower limit is the propagation delay of a lossless transmission line, where the speed is:

v = c / SQRT(dielectric constant of medium)

Interconnects... speed or power?

2007-02-13T06:16:00.000+11:00

For general integrated circuit logics, why are low voltage being used?
- First reason: to save power.
- It follows CMOS technology scaling. That is, shrinking sizes of transistor dimensions. Which means, more transistors can be fit into a chip. Which also means, chips can get smarter, and faster at the same time.

But, what about low voltage interconnects? What about on-chip wires??
- Yes, their size won't get smaller. In fact, they will get more complex and probably longer since you will now have much more things to connect to inside a chip, and not to mention the fact that they make chips a bit bigger nowadays?
- So, yes. It's not a good news for interconnects. Yes, low voltage will save power too in the case of interconnects, BUT due to the above circumstances, longer delays will occur... and higher noise interference?

So at least, we had identified two contradictive problems for interconnects: speed and power.

Naturally, if you just follow the technology scaling trend without doing any clever solutions to the interconnect, then these interconnects will get slower and more power consumptive.

Now, it all depends on what is it that you actually want? Do you want speed? Or are you more concerned with power?

Cara bangun pagi

2007-02-11T07:22:00.001+11:00

Bangun pagi itu kadang sulit. Ini ada beberapa tips untuk bisa bangun pagi:

1. Jangan tidur larut malam.
Kalau perlu, tidurlah jam 8 sore. Selama musim summer di mana azan isya' datang jam 9.30-an, bolehlah tidur lebih telat.

2. Tidur di meja.
Kalau terpaksa tidur larut malam, misalnya karena ada acara TV yg bagus,
cobalah untuk tidur di meja. Terbukti cara ini bisa membuat tidur pulas, badan segar, tapi tetap bisa bangun sekitar jam 4 pagi atau kurang. Coba buktikan sendiri. Pastikan meja cukup panjang dan kosong. Meja kelas atau meja di lab adalah contoh yang ideal.

3. Pasang alarm ganda
Maksudnya, pasang alarm di HP, di jam beker, dan di HP satunya lagi kalau punya. Pastikan semua memiliki fasilitas snooze. Dan jangan lupa untuk mengatur alarm pada jam yg pagi sekali, seperti 4.30 misalnya.

4. Minta dibangunkan teman.
Cara ini lumayan efektif karena setelah dibangunkan, otomatis akan timbul perasaan tidak enak ke teman kalau kita tidur lagi setelah susah-susah dibangunkan. Teman tersebut tidak perlu berada serumah dgn kita, karena jaman sekarang sudah ada telepun dan HP. Yang penting, jangan buat HP jadi silent, dan sebaiknya mesin telepun dipasang pada volume keras agar terdengar ketika kita masih tidur.

5. Carilah tempat tinggal yang dilalui rute bus.
Bus kota biasanya mulai beroperasi dini hari. Suara gemuruh bus kota di keheningan pagi bisa menjadi alat efektif untuk mengusik kita dari tidur.

6. Tidurlah di ruang yang terkena sinar matahari pagi.
Seandainya keadaan memaksa kita untuk ketiduran hingga matahari terbit, maka dengan tidur di ruang yang terkena sinar matahari pagi secara langsung akan sedikit banyak membuat kita terbangun secara alami. Jangan tidur di ruangan yang gelap sepanjang hari, karena badan akan menganggap bahwa hari adalah malam terus, sehingga 'tertipu' untuk menginginkan tidur lebih lama.

7. Peliharalah ayam di dalam rumah.
HP anda tidak perlu ada ringtone ayam berkokok. Pelihara saja yang aslinya. Lebih efektif karena lebih sulit dimatikan.

8. Pilihlah kelas pagi.
Jika anda masih kuliah, carilah mata kuliah yang kelasnya pagi, kalau perlu yang jam 9 pagi, atau jam 7 kalau di Indonesia. Dengan demikian, kita dipaksakan untuk bisa bangun pagi.

9. Carilah tempat tinggal yang sangat jauh dari kantor atau sekolah.
Lebih jauh rumah kita dari kantor atau sekolah, maka biasanya kita akan bangun lebih pagi, karena kita butuh waktu lebih lama untuk perjalanannya. Lebih bagus lagi, carilah tempat tinggal yang jarang dilalui transportasi umum, sehingga kita bisa lebih 'on-time'. Tempat2 yang ideal untuk ini misalnya Bankstown, Mt. Druitt, Parramatta, Marsfield, Sutherland, Liverpool, Blacktown, Hornsby, dsb. Untuk Jogja, contohnya adalah tinggal di Klaten, Wates, Pakem, Dlingo, Tepus, Solo, Magelang, dsb.

10. Minta dibangunkan ibu.
Bagi yang masih beruntung bisa tinggal bersama orang tua, minta lah ibu untuk membangunkan. Dan cara ini di antara cara-cara lainnya adalah yang paling enak dan menyenangkan, karena ibu biasanya akan membangunkan dengan penuh kasih sayang.

Pecel itu enak

2007-02-08T23:18:00.000+11:00

Pecel itu adalah makanan yang enak. Pecel biasa ada di Jawa, terutama Jawa Tengah dan Jawa Timur. Makanan ini berisi sayuran rebus seperti kangkung, cambah, bayam, lalu ditambah dengan bumbu kacang yang lezat. Dimakan bersama nasi putih yang hangat dengan peyek atau krupuk, duh enak sekali.

Di Jogja, pecel kadang disebut SGPC, singkatan dari sego pecel, atau nasi pecel. Warung SGPC yang terkenal ada di dekat UGM, nama tempatnya lupa. Sebelah utara fakultas kedokteran hewan, persis di pinggir selokan mataram. Tapi di situ tidak terlalu murah. Kalau mau pecel harga ekonomis dan enak, mungkin bisa ditemukan di rumah2 penduduk, di desa terutama. Sekitar jam 5.30-6.30an pagi. Yang kutahu seperti itu, sewaktu KKN dulu di desa Bulu, Sukoharjo, ada ibu2 jualan pecel enak sekali, cuma Rp500,-. Padahal itu tahun 2001. Kalau pakai telur ceplok nambah Rp1000 kalau tidak salah. Lupa. Pokoknya murah sekali.

Di Surabaya lain lagi. Kalau beli pecel di warung, siap2 lah dengan air minum yang banyak. Soalnya, standar pedes nya di sana lain dengan di Jogja, jadi bagi yang tidak terlalu tahan pedas seperti saya, sangat disarankan untuk meminta pecel kepada penjualnya agar diberi lombok sedikit sekali. Pedasnya sedikit saja. Itu nanti akan terasa seperti pedas sedengan di Jogja. Secara default, mereka akan memberi pecel dengan tingkat kepedasan maksimal. Tapi ini bagus juga sih, bisa membuat badan berkeringat, lumayan mungkin bisa mengusir masuk angin. Katanya bisa untuk mengobati penyakit cacingan juga.

Warung pecel yang pernah kucoba di Surabaya ada di dekat hotel Santika, dan satu lagi dekat Gubeng. Yang di dekat hotel Santika sangat sadis. Rasa pecelnya sangat didominasi oleh rasa lombok. Membayangkannya saja sudah membuat air liurku keluar deras. Mengerikan.

Sebenarnya pecel itu mudah membuatnya. Tinggal beli bumbu instan pecel di White Lotus (bagi yang tinggal di Kingsford dan sekitarnya). Bumbu pecel instan biasanya masih padat, jadi harus diencerkan dulu dengan air panas secukupnya. Kemudian beli sayuran apa saja asalkan hijau, lalu tambah cambah, atau tauge, atau bean sprout bahasa sini nya. Belinya tidak harus di White Lotus. Boleh di Paddy's, boleh di Woolworths. Kalau mau dekat, coba ke IGA, semoga ada di sana. Sekali lagi, ini bagi yang tinggal di Kingsford dan sekitarnya.

Untuk menambah efek segar, pecel nya ditambah ketimun juga tidak apa-apa. Malah bagus. Setelah semua sayuran dan bahan terkumpul, sayuran2 tadi seyogyanya direbus. Di rumah. Timunnya jangan tapi. Kalau mau di rumah teman juga boleh, asalkan temannya tidak berkeberatan. Kemudian, nanak nasi sampai mateng.

Setelah jadi semua, ambil nasi dan taruh di piring. Masukkan sayuran2 rebus dan potongan ketimun dipiring tadi, lalu taburi semua dengan bumbu pecel yang encer. Pecel siap dimakan.

I spy... with google

2007-02-05T07:05:00.000+11:00

Do you know someone and probably you want to know more about them? Well there's some good news, because you may spy on his/her life with the help from Google. (well this can be a bad news too)

Okay, as a start... try typing in your own full name in Google. Click Search, and even though you may not be a celebrity, you would probably find heaps of pages with your name on it. This includes mailing list archives, student/staff directory, your own blog, others blogs, discussion forums profile pages, and even friendster profile pages. If you had made a publication, or if your name made it through to the media, well get ready to get even more"exposed" to the whole public.

I typed in my mother's name, and Google showed me about where my mother works. I typed in my father's name, it also gave information on where my father works. I typed in some friends' names... Google showed me a glimpse of my friends' interests through the mailing list and discussion forums they participated in.

I typed in my own name, and ... what do you know... Aya's blog came second on the list, much higher than this stupid blog of mine.... :D

They say it's the worst drought in 100 years...

2007-01-29T09:57:00.000+11:00

It's all over the news and radio, and television. New South Wales is facing the worst drought in a century. And if water levels continue to get low, the state government already has the initiative to build a desalination plant, probably somewhere near Botany Bay is what i've heard last year, to fulfil the city's water demands. And now, some water restrictions are already in effect, limiting people from using water for watering their gardens and filling their pools.

But, with all these worry on the harsh drought and stuff, why is it that the water we get from Sydney Waters pipes never stops running? Not to mention, they are still drinkable too.

Indonesia, in contrast, a country with so many islands and mountains with all of these tropical rainforests and no deserts... should have never worry about lacking supply of water, but unfortunately it does happen in some areas. Gunungkidul, Wonogiri, even Jakarta and Yogyakarta my own hometown, all of these places I know had some water shortage problems in the past. I remember during one musim kemarau or dry season, we couldn't take wudlu at our school because the water doesn't run. On the news, I remember seeing people buying clean water from penjual air keliling, in Jakarta, our own capitol city.

Wouldn't it be nice if we also had water restrictions, without cutting off water supply from PDAM secara bergilir?

(the impact of the drought in NSW is mostly felt by farmers apparently. To help them, Woolworths Ltd had donated all of their profits on 23 Jan 2007 for these farmers in need. And just as a side note, starting today, Woolworths Supermarket staff will wear a new uniform: green shirts, i got mine last night :D)

Happy Australia Day 26 Jan

2007-01-27T01:04:00.000+11:00

Australians all let us rejoice
for we are young and free
with golden soil and wealth for toil
our home is girt by sea

Our lands abound in nature's gift
of beauty rich and rare
in history's page let every stage
advance australia fair

in joyful strain then let us sing
advance australia fair...

I never had the slightest feelings of being not proud becoming an Indonesian. So why do i have this strange yet strong feelings whenever this song is sang?? Perhaps it's because I've known this song long before I knew "Indonesia Raya". I have a bit of an emotion to this song, apparently (and perhaps, unfortunately).

Happy Australia Day.

ps: apologies for possible incorrect lyrics of the song, i only wrote what i can remember without looking at other sources.

Howo panas

2007-01-23T16:45:00.000+11:00

Menindaklanjuti keinginan sebelumnya dan dukungan dari seorang teman (Aya) untuk posting dlm bhs Jawa, postingan kali ini akan membahas mengenai "hawa panas" dalam bahasa Jawa ngoko.

Wis pirang2 dino iki howo ne panas buwanget. Winginane tekan tigapuluh sembilan derajat, bayangkan. Wis koyo mlebu oven, atau mirip nek sirah adewe dicedakne karo anglo sing murup hiihii...

Wuh, saking panas e, cah2 do males metu. Milih leyeh2 di rumah, di kamar, sing adem. Jendela ne dibuka, tapi angin seko njobo malah luwih panas. Tapi nek ditutup jendela ne, rasa ne sesek. Duh serba salah.

Heran nya, orang-orang sini tu malah dho buka-buka'an tho pas musim summer ngene iki. Astaghfirullahalazim, kayak e pancen kudu melatih mata ini ben ga nglirik sana sini.. :( Orang sini lebih suka kulitnya coklat, kwalikan e adewe.. pengin kulit sing putih. Mbuh kenapa. Luwih seksi po yo dipikir nya? Padahal menurutku... biasa wae. Malah bahaya lho, nek uwong terlalu sering berjemur... iso keno kanker kulit. Medeni tenan, astaghfirullahalazim...

Oh iya, jadi nek musim panas ngene... memakai topi dan kocomoto ireng itu penting sekali. Topi, supaya melindungi wajah kita dari sengatan UV, dan kacamata hitam untuk mencegah mata keno katarak, katanya mas Ahmad.

Musim panas neng kene resmi nya mulai 1 desember. Saiki wis akhir januari, jadi tinggal sak bulan ngkas, njuk musim semi. Mumpung musim panas ngene iki, sakjane paling asik iku berenang di pantai... selagi airnya masih tidak terlalu dingin.

Prisoner Theme Song - On The Inside

2007-01-22T11:22:00.000+11:00

He used to give me roses
I wish he could again
But that was on the outside
And things were different then

We build our world together
With a love so clear and strong
But that was on the outside
Where did I go wrong?

Chorus:
On the inside the sun still shines
And the rain falls down
But the sun and rain are prisoners too
When morning comes around

Last night I dreamed we were together
Sharing all the love we'd known
'Til I had to face the nightmare
Of waking up alone.
(Lynne Hamilton - On the Inside)

Duh, suka banget aku dengan lagu ini... :(

"Prisoner" ini adalah sinetron Australia yang lumayan terkenal jaman dulu...tahun 1980-an... sampai aku ikutan nonton segala ahaha... beneran... kemarin baru saja beli DVD boxsetnya untuk Ibu. Mengisahkan tentang drama kehidupan wanita2 yang menjadi penghuni Wentworth Detention Centre. Iya, penjara hahaha. Lumayan lah, sekedar untuk mengenang masa lalu.

Lidah

2007-01-17T23:34:00.000+11:00

Belum lama ini dapat forward-an email (atau baca di blog orang ya?), tentang kisah seorang pegawai Pos yang mengalami sesuatu pada lidahnya. Di situ diceritakan, menurut CNN, ada seorang cewek pegawai Pos yang suatu hari pernah menjilati banyak amplop surat. Itu lho, lem di penutup amplop surat. Banyak banget. Malamnya, orang itu mengeluh lidahnya agak sakit. Besoknya diperiksa ke dokter tidak ditemukan masalah apa2. Tapi sakitnya tidak hilang. Lebih parah lagi, ternyata lidahnya makin sakit dan agak membengkak... dan dari mulutnya keluar kecoa! Akhirnya dia ke dokter lagi, ke rumah sakit malahan, untuk meriksakan lidahnya. Duh kasihan sekali, ternyata ditemukan telur kecoa di dalam lidahnya yang lembab itu.

Sungguh menjijikkan cerita ini, tapi kuyakin ini sekedar hoax. Tidak perlu dipercayai sebagai kisah nyata sebelum dapat konfirmasi. Apalagi, telur kecoa itu bukannya besar2?? Sebesar butiran beras kan ya? Yang hitam itu? Terus, berita itu membawa-bawa nama CNN pula.. salah satu ciri hoax haha :p

Masih tentang lidah, tempo hari si Erwin cerita ke kita tentang salah satu nasihat bapaknya. Ayahnya pernah berkata, "Erwin, words are different than money. When you spend money, you can still get it back. But when you say something, you can't take back your words." (Waktu itu Erwin ngobrol sama Bashar dan aku, jadi pakai bahasa Inggris hehe)

Wuh, gila. Iya bener juga ya nasihat bapaknya Erwin. Jadi, jangan ngomong apa2 deh kalau ga perlu hihi.

Yang itu tadi masih ada kaitannya dgn lidah kan? Lidah, selain buat merasakan enaknya rawon, bisa juga buat ngomong, jadi ... ya... ada kan hubungannya? (berusaha mencari pembenaran judul postingan ini)

Satu lagi, yang terakhir... tidak terlalu penting si. Tentang lidah lagi. Lidahku tepatnya. Ternyata... bahasa Jawa sudah terpatri di dalam lidahku. Kalau bicara bahasa Indonesia, medoknya pasti keluar. Bahkan yang lebih parah, kosakata yang kupilih ketika berbicara dgn teman2 yang tidak berbahasa jawa, kadang2 adalah kata2 Jawa tanpa kusadari... misalnya "mbuh", "thok", "peyok", dan mbuh masih banyak lagi. Parah banget e. Sampai sms pun, kata tanpa makna "e" kadang kutambahkan seperti, "ku br bgn e..."

Nah tapi yang parah, jawa ku itu cuma jawa ngoko. Bahasa Jawa kromo yang halus itu masih sulit sekali bagiku... lebih susah ketimbang bahasa Inggris :(

Nggih ngaten meniko. Kulo tiyang jogja boten beres. Boten saged ngendikan ngangge coro alus. Boso inggris nggih boten saged lancar. Menawi ngendikan kaliyan rencang2, kathah ngangge boso Indonesia campur Jawa...

Hmm asik juga kali ya kalau posting-an ku sekali2 dalam bahasa Jawa. Mungkin besok lah, mau posting dlm bhs Jawa hahaha :p

Pesimism: a self-fulfiling prophecy

2007-01-12T17:22:00.000+11:00

"Have We not opened your breast for you? And removed from you your burden. Which weighed down your back? And have We not raised high your fame?

Verily, along with every hardship is relief.

Verily, along with every hardship is relief."

(Quran, Al Insyirah 1-5)

Today is Friday. Yup, Jumat, or Jemowah, as we Javanese sometimes called it.. because we have our Jumat Prayer today. On Fridays. It's Arabic... you know... it is...

And today, the speech on the Jumat prayer at our uni was about optimism, as opposed to pesimism and despair. But before i talk about pesimism, i want to share some funny illustration that the khotib explained this afternoon:

"It has been scientifically proven that one year after somebody had a car accident, their level of happiness will be restored to a normal level just like everyone else. And the same thing applies to a person who won a lottery, he/she will be happy for a short time, and after a year, their happiness will reduce to a level just like before.

But if one must choose between those, who would answer "Uhm... that doesn't really matter, because either way, we will get happy anyway at the end..."?"

As i look to myself, what the khotib said when he was delivering his speech, was like a strong reminder of what i have done wrong all this time. I was too pesimistic. The khotib said, "Pesimism is a self-fulfiling prophecy. In many times, what they are pesimistic about will become reality..."

At least there were two friends who told me that I should not be too pesimistic.

The first person to tell me that was my boss at Woolworths, Priyani. One day, she passed by while I was packing some dessert, and said to me, "Astria...so .. how's it going?" (ehmm... my first name is Astria, so that's how they call me)

"Well... i don't know... (just see for yourself is what i meant actually :p)," i replied.

"Oh come on, boy. Don't be too pesimistic." She tried to calm me :p

The second person, among those who reminded me that I'm a pesimistic guy was Aya'. I told her that I regret doing the research topic i'm working on now. Boy, it's hard! Not to mention, it's mostly boring as well. Aya', instead of using the word "pesimistic", said that psychologically, whether it is under my consciousness or not, i am killing the spirit and motivation that i need to get this thesis done. Some cool definition for 'pesimism', don't you think? :p (jangan GR ya, Aya'... if you can read this hehe)

On the other hand, optimism is one obvious characteristics of the true believers, as the khotib today mentioned. For with every burden, there is a relief... as mentioned in the Quran i quoted at the beginning...

a matter of time...

2007-01-10T01:23:00.000+11:00

The year has just changed, it is now 2007.. not 2006 anymore... better get used to it, mates.

And it's already day 10 of this new year, believe it or not. Astaghfirullahalzim, man... wasn't that quick??

Speaking of time, there are some interesting things that occured to me in these couple of days... all about time. Yesterday i needed to call an old friend, she's in Indonesia. Working. And because of the time difference between Sydney and Sampit (the place where she's working), i decided to wait until it was dark here in Sydney. I certainly didn't want to disturb her by calling during working hours.

At 20.40 AEDT (Australian East Daylight-savings Time?), i called her... and guess what... she was still at work. Pff... i forgot. During summer like this, AEDT is 4 hours ahead of WIB, not 3 hours as it used to be during the rest of the year.

This afternoon, i had a chat with Adhika. We talked about that all this time difference is sometimes weird. It's already a bit unusual for us to have magrib very late (8 pm in Sydney), so how strange can it be, suppose human beings live in some other planet where each day has 28 hours??

Hmm... this reminds me to some silly thing that happened early this summer. It was the first week of daylight savings. You know that we have friday prayers starting at 1.15pm at the Uni? Okay. When the daylight savings started, i added one hour to all prayer times that i am already accustomed to... at that time, of course. So for example, subuh was usually 3 am, now becomes 4 am. Magrib that used to be 6.30pm, then became 7.30 pm. And so on, and so forth. And bad luck for me, i did that same principle to friday's prayer time: i went out from my lab to go to the Jumatan at 2pm. It was wrong!!! Friday prayer's time was carefully chosen at 1.15 pm so that it need not change throughout the year!!! And stupid me... cause I already knew this before. Somehow, i just forgot. Unconsciously, but.

One more thing... still about time. Today, i was considering to resign ASAP from my part time job at Woolworths. I felt that i have not been working the enough hours for the more important thing: my thesis. I work 16 hours per week at Woolworths, and i am supposed to work 40 hours per week on my thesis, that's 8 hours of thesis work per day. Alright, so if i sleep 8 hours per day, and working on my thesis also for 8 hours each day, then i should have 8 hours remaining for my other activities. Hmm... that's not little... So, if i work 5 hours per shift at woolworths, i should still have 3 hours left to do something else. Okay, minus transport time, say... 40 minutes, just make it 1 hour. That leaves me with 2 hours to eat, taking shower, prepare brekky+lunch+dinner, go shopping, killing time, playing games, watching tv, chatting, blogging. That's not enough, ay?;)

But it ought to be enough. I was there once. Two years ago, I was working full time at two places... and it did work. I wonder how i managed my time those days... wow...

Hmm.. the worst problem i have now is that my thesis is running late, it's behind schedule. I need to catch up, and perhaps 8 hours per day for my thesis is not enough?

Alright, that's enough. No more time to waste.

BDESIGN 1.00: sebuah software kenangan

2007-01-08T12:23:00.000+11:00

Setelah tadi pagi iseng membuka2 kembali file lama, sampai harus bongkar2 kantong CD segala, akhirnya kutemukan CD yang berisi dokumen2 berusia hingga 10 thn lebih.

Salah satunya adalah program yang kunamakan Basic Design versi 1.00 (hihi, iya.. versi satu kosong kosong). Waktu itu bahasa pemrograman yang kutahu hanyalah BASIC, dan ... oke singkat saja, inilah cuplikan gambar programnya:

Ini salah satu program "lengkap" pertama yang kubuat... dan menurut tampilan "help" program ini, software jelek itu dibuat sekitar Mei 1996. Lumayan... lumayan lama... Kaget juga si tadi lihat itu... Mei 1996 ... berarti program itu kutulis ketika aku masih SMA kelas 1, mau naik kelas 2. Iya betul. Waktu itu diriku masih belum bisa Pascal.

Fungsinya apa? Program ini mirip seperti program untuk menggambar di layar ponsel, jadi cara menggambarnya dengan menggerakkan kursor ke atas, kiri, bawah, kanan. Tapi jangan salah, waktu itu kalau tidak salah ingat, tanganku belum pernah menyentuh benda bernama HP.

Selain itu, di program ini kita bisa mengganti warna tinta, dan kalau sudah selesai, gambarnya bisa disimpan. Ketik saja "help" untuk daftar perintah yang bisa diketikkan. Semua perintah dimasukkan lewat ketikan, bukan dengan menu yang bisa diklik dgn mouse ... hihi.

Ini file executable nya kalau mau: BDESIGN.ZIP. Sayangnya aku belum nemu source code nya.

Duh, kenapa aku tidak menjadi programmer saja ya? Dan duh... jadi kangen komputer XT yang di rumah di Jogja... sudah rusak tapi.

Bocoran desain alat fingerscan

2007-01-08T10:15:00.000+11:00

Entah angin mana yang membisiki aku pagi ini. Tiba2 saja kuteringat pekerjaan2ku yang kulakukan sebelum pergi sekolah lagi di negeri selatan ini. CD wallet kubongkar, fyuh... akhirnya CD berisi backup data komputer kerja ku selama di PT Gamatechno berhasil kutemukan... dan untungnya masih kebaca.

Sepertinya tidak ada salahnya kalau kubocorkan sedikit tentang desain alat yang kami rancang dan buat waktu itu (2 thn yg lalu)... yaitu sebuah ambisi untuk meniru produk serupa di pasaran. Harga di pasaran waktu itu Rp 14 juta perbijinya, padahal dari hitung2an kita, produk itu bisa ditiru dengan modal mungkin Rp 1 juta, tanpa biaya research dan gaji developernya :D

Walhasil, inilah rancangan yang dibuat:

Seingatku, sistem awal yang berhasil dibuat sudah mengakomodasi semua komponen di gambar itu... iya betul. Mas Enjen yang berjasa mengurus segala kemumetan soal menghubungkan alat kita dengan LAN. Sedangkan perananku ngurus yang lain-lainnya: sistem mikrokontroler AVR, display, keypad, menghubungkan dgn modul fingerscan fujitsu (yang anehnya diproduksi di Cina dan lebih aneh lagi, manual pemrogramannya pun dalam tulisan Cina!!), dan pembuatan kerangka program sistem ini. Terakhir sebelum kutinggal dulu, lumayan kok alatnya sudah mbentuk walaupun agak buggy...dan secara software belum sepenuhnya memenuhi spesifikasi yang diingingkan.

Kenapa sistemnya dibuat dengan komponen2 tersebut?

Sudah kusinggung tadi... kita berambisi meniru produk serupa di pasaran. Itu lho, mesin absensi dengan sidik jari. Sudah populer kan sekarang?

Ini sedikit cuplikan dari dokumentasi teknis proyek fingerscan nya:

...

1. Mikrokontroler AVR ATMega162

Mikrokontroler ATMega162 dipilih terutama karena memiliki dua port UART, yang dibutuhkan untuk sambungan ke modul fingerprint biopass dan modul embedded webserver siteplayer. Selain itu, ATMega162 memiliki interface RAM eksternal, sehingga pengaksesan periferal dengan mode memory-mapped I/O bisa lebih praktis pemrogramannya.

Periferal yang memory mapped antara lain:

- LCD (alamat dasar 8000h)
LCD ini menggunakan mode addressing motorola sehingga butuh sedikit rangkaian logika tambahan untuk pengaksesannya.
- RTC (alamat dasar 9000h)
- Keypad (alamat dasar A000h)
- SRAM eksternal (alamat 0400h – 7FFFh)

...

2. Modul Fingerprint Biopass

Modul fingerprint Biopass menggunakan sensor Fujitsu (jenis kapasitif), kemampuannya:
- kapasitas internal 32 user
- matching 1:1 dan 1:N (1:N khusus pada mode standalone)
- matching harus di modul (data FFD yang dikirimkan keluar dari modul tidak bisa diolah, hanya bisa disimpan)
- komunikasi dengan luar menggunakan RS-232 9600 bps

3. Ethernet webserver Siteplayer

Modul ini berfungsi agar sistem dapat dikendalikan dari web. Cek www.siteplayer.com:
- Belinya di digi-ware.com, harga Rp400.000.
- Kapasitas ‘webpage’ sekitar 700kbyte, disimpan di flash
- Memiliki SRAM sebagai penampung objek-objek, dimana satu objek paling besar berukuran 254 byte.

Komponen Trafo 10-Base-T diperoleh dengan cara kanibal LAN card rusak.

4. Atmel Dataflash AT45DB041B

Atmel Dataflash ini adalah flash memory dengan kapasitas 512 kbyte. Dataflash ini tersusun atas 2048 page, dan masing-masing page memiliki kapasitas 264 byte. Antarmuka yg digunakan adalah SPI. Fungsi dari IC ini pada sistem adalah untuk menampung data sidik jari hingga mendekati 4000 user. Jenis kemasan IC ini yang digunakan adalah yang berkemasan 8 pin SOIC.

IC ini bekerja pada tegangan low voltage Vcc 3 volt. Data input (SI) dan clock (SCK) dari luar boleh bertegangan 5 volt, jadi dapat langsung dihubungkan ke sistem digital 5 volt. Namun agar data output (SO) dapat dibaca oleh sistem 5 volt, maka pada rancangan digunakan IC buffer 74LS125. Perhatikan bahwa IC tipe LS ini menganggap tegangan input 3 volt sbg HIGH. Jarang IC tipe HC yang memenuhi kriteria yang diinginkan pada kasus ini, karena itu tipe HC tidak dapat digunakan untuk tujuan ini.

5. Subsistem Keypad

Keypad digunakan sebagai antarmuka masukan dari pengguna. Dalam sistem ini, keypad digunakan untuk:
- mengatur mode kerja sistem (presensi atau registrasi user baru)
- memasukkan nomor induk pegawai untuk tujuan presensi maupun registrasi baru.
Untuk meringankan kerja mikrokontroler utama, pembacaan data keypad dikerjakan oleh mikrokontroler lain (AT90S2313). Mikrokontroler ini bertindak sebagai keypad controller. Alasan penggunaan mikrokontroler ini dan bukannya menggunakan IC keypad controller yang sudah jadi adalah karena ketersediaan mikrokontroler yang lebih melimpah di pasaran dan bisa lebih fleksibel.

Hhh... sayang sekali topik S2 ku sekarang tidak ada sangkut pautnya sama sekali dengan pekerjaanku di Gamatechno ini. Padahal ini sepertinya sudah agak mendarah daging denganku... Nyesel ambil topik tesis microelectronics... :(

Cuaca aneh... di mana-mana...

2007-01-07T01:58:00.000+11:00

Kemarin di telpon, ibuku minta diriku untuk hati-hati. Hati-hati karena ada badai dari Indonesia, tepatnya dari Sulawesi, bergerak mengarah ke Australia. Itu kata Ibu sih... duh kenapa ya aku selalu lupa. Ibuku kemarin punya nama untuk badai ini, dan menurut beliau, badai ini yang menyebabkan kapal2 banyak hilang dan tenggelam... dan pesawat udara juga.

Kata mbak FM, salju belum turun di New York, tempat tinggal beliau. Iseng tadi malam googling, dapat sebuah artikel tertanggal 4 Jan 2007 dari CNN berjudul: "So... you call this winter?"

Wah betul... di sebagian besar Amerika Utara, winter nya hangat.

Dan di sini, far away down under sini, sekarang seharusnya musim summer. Musim panas, mirip-mirip cuaca di Indonesia, lah. Seharusnya. Tetapi, yang terjadi agak terbalik dengan di Amerika sana. Summer sekarang dingin! Oke... mungkin agak berlebihan. Yang tepat mungkin: summer sekarang sejuk...

Saking sejuknya, natal kemarin Australia mengalami white christmas... ada salju di beberapa daerah pegunungan di selatan NSW dan sekitar Mt. Buller Victoria, dan di Tasmania. Seharusnya tidak ada salju di musim ini... di gunung sekalipun. Soalnya gunung di sini lebih pantas kalau disebut bukit daripada gunung :D

Tapi gpp... alhamdulillah malahan. Soalnya summer Australia yang normal itu betul-betul panas. Tahun lalu seingatku ada 3 hari di mana suhu nya > 40 derajat celcius... serasa disentrong hair-dryer. Iya, natal dan tahun baru di Australia harusnya panas menyengat... bukan adem dan sejuk seperti yang kemarin ini.

Begini suasana sore 31 Desember 2005 (tahun lalu):

Lokasi: Macquaries Point, Sydney NSW

Bandingkan dengan suasana 31 Desember 2006 kemarin, sore hari:

Lokasi: Bradfield Park, Kiribili NSW

Walaupun alhamdulillah di sini... tapi tetap... semoga keanehan cuaca di mana-mana ini tidak meminta korban lagi di Indonesia :(

Tahun Baru 2007

2007-01-04T01:57:00.000+11:00

Yang memotret ini adalah Teddy, sore itu, kira2 jam 6.30, kita baru tiba di stasiun Milsons Point, sudah turun tangga pula... smp aku tanya ke Teddy, "Ted, mau foto dulu ngga? Keliatan Harbour Bridge lho dari sini...". "Oh, ya ayo.." jawab Teddy. Teddy adalah temanku yang baru saja datang ke Sydney. Berlibur. Oh iya, jangan tertipu dengan sepinya tempat ini. Kereta yang kita tumpangi penuh sesak, dan aku sempat membuat malu.. Di stasiun Wynyard aku nekat masuk kereta pdhl sdh penuh dan pintunya dah hampir nutup. Bisa masuk si, tapi tripod yg kucangking pakai kecantol pintu segala... smp perlu ditarik kuat2 baru bisa lepas dari cengkeraman pintu kereta... Duh malu -.-"

Lagi2 Teddy yang mengambil foto ini. Aku dah cerita belum ya? Dari stasiun Milsons Point tadi, sebenarnya kita berniat ketemu Ita', untuk nantinya ke rumah Jennie... "ibu" nya Ita' di sini... Rumahnya adalah sebuah unit apartemen di Kiribili, dekat tempatku berdiri di foto ini. Tempat kerumunan orang2 ini adalah di taman Bradfield... duh nyesel knp tahun lalu tidak ke sini.. soalnya jauh lebih tertib, sepi, dan tidak kalah bagus spotnya... bandingkan dgn tahun lalu aku mesti pagi2 dah jaga tempat di Macquaries point...

Ini diambil dari balkon rumah Jennie. Ada aku dan Ita' tu kepalanya kelihatan dikit haha...

Teddy dan aku. Belakang itu ada Rick (suami Jennie), John? (bapaknya Jennie), dan Karl (rhs).

Sudah magrib. Ga denger azan si... tapi jelas la ya, gelap gini.

Fireworks buat keluarga dan anak2... yang jam 9.00 tgl 31 Des 2006. Itu gambar gantungan baju nya melambangkan apa ya kira2? Jembatan harbour bridge mungkin ya? Soalnya memang jembatannya kadang disebut sama orang "coat hanger" gitu... Oh iya betul, betul. Tahun ini jembatan itu genap berusia 75 tahun... Sama pak Harto tua-an siapa ya?

Kembang api tahun baru 2007. Bagus si... alhamudlillah bagus :-S

Tahun ini ada kembang api yang dinyalakan dari atap2 gedung... tidak seperti tahun lalu. Lumayan... lumayan...

Alhamdulillah, bisa menyaksikan kembang api lagi di sini kemarin itu. Gak tahu deh ceritanya kalau tidak ada Ita dan "ibunya", atau kalau disuruh kerja pas minggu malam, atau kalau thunderstorm benar2 datang seperti yang diramalkan. Dan alhamdulillah-nya lagi, berangkat dari rumah untuk nonton fireworksnya bisa sore sore, gak perlu pagi seperti tahun lalu haha :p

Why did they build the great wall of China??

2006-12-29T17:34:00.000+11:00

Ini iklan sudah lama dan basi sebenarnya... tapi gak papa lah dimuat di sini... siapa tahu ada yg belum lihat iklannya... di TV... di Australia sini.

Jadi begini, ini ada iklan internet broadband "Bigpond" dari Telstra yang ku-capture dari halaman Yahoo Mailku bbrp bulan yg lalu:

Hmm.. gak lucu ya? Iya sih, seharusnya klip video ini dilihat dulu:

Lucu gak? :D

Dan.. belum lama ini ada iklan yang sama sekali tidak berhubungan dengan Telstra. Kali ini iklannya tentang pameran Great Wall of China di Powerhouse Museum Sydney. Lucunya, seolah2 ceritanya nyambung dgn iklan Bigpond...

Just some random pics...

2006-12-18T12:16:00.000+11:00

I think i'm starting to regret that i have chosen to buy a Canon Powershot 530 as my new digital camera. It was supposed to be a fine and cheap replacement to my Canon Powershot A75, but apparently it's not as good as i thought i would.

Maybe that explains why i am more than reluctant to bring my camera everywhere i go, unlike it's older brother who made a good company to me, taking good looking memorable shots in the most unexpected places.

Mate, the battery life is horrible..! This is the main reason why i don't bring my camera so often now. It's always out of battery!

And then, its ISO speed can't go down to 50. Despite it's ability to zoom higher (equivalent to 200 mm?), my new Powershot has smaller lens compared to my older Powershot. This leads to a smaller range of aperture, and this is utterly dissapointing to be honest. I can no longer take low light pictures without beefing up the ISO speed --> grainer pictures.

Anyway, there are, at least, some pictures that i do not mind to share, here ;-)

This is the Chinese Garden, at Darling Harbour Sydney. It's a very quiet and peaceful cool place, perfect for those who wishes to get away from the hot and crowded and bustling city of Sydney. The person shown in this picture happens to be a friend of mine, and she came to Sydney for the U2 concert one month back. Entry fee = $5 (concession).

Yup, we have Australian Idol too. Every year. Since 4 years ago, i guess... maybe... The grand finale this year, and last year too, was held here, at Sydney Opera House. I voted for Jessica Mauboy: first, because she is half Indonesian, and second, she has a strikingly marvelous voice and a constantly smiling face :-)

Not bad, she became Runner-up for Australian Idol 2006. Not bad at all, for a 17 year old girl...
(i saw her too that night, when she entered the venue on a horse cart, smiling while she waved her hands to all the crowd)

This is a picture of Agung and Adhika, my room mates. I repeat, my room mates. On the background you can see the Customs Office building of Sydney Airport. I took this picture as we walk towards a free parking area across that bridge, not too far (and not to close either) to Sydney Airport. We had to park a bit far, otherwise I would have to pay $13 per hour for parking inside the Airport which is absolutely not worth it.

This year's summer is extremely weird. It's not that I hate it, not at all. As a matter of fact... i like it, because the summer this year is not (up to now) as hot as we feared it would be. In fact, it's been raining several days during this summer. And one day, it also snowed in some places in NSW last month, believe it or not. For a guy who has a car with no air-conditioning like myself, this is a blessing :-)

The picture below was taken at Railway Square. The rain was quiet heavy that afternoon. It didn't hail, though :-(

This last picture is from the Sculpture by the Sea, from Bondi beach to Tamarama Bay (hope i spelled it correctly). It's an annual event held there, exhibiting a wide range of sculptures and contemporary art.

That's all. Now i should get back to work :D

Komentar tentang "Far Away Down There"

2006-11-29T11:18:00.000+11:00

Kesan pertama yang akan muncul ketika orang membaca postinganku berjudul "Far Away Down There" kemungkinan besar akan sama: "wah ini irfan pasti sedang home sick."

Sebenarnya bukan itu si maksudku. Ya... mungkin ada benarnya, tapi bukan seperti itu. Diriku sedang tidak kangen parah dengan Jogja. Kalau boleh kuceritakan latar belakang penulisan tulisan yg stupid itu, begini lah kisahnya:

Sejak beberapa waktu lalu, wallpaper komputer ku dan wallpaper profile friendster ku aku buat sama, yaitu foto pantai parangtritis, menghadap ke laut selatan, ada dua dokar di situ. Nah, tiba2 saja aku teringat tentang masa kecilku dulu. Dulu sekali. Dan aku agak ingat, tapi lupa siapa yang nyeletuk duluan di antara kami, entah itu ibuku atau kakakku atau aku sendiri. "Eh, kalau ke sana terus... bisa sampai Australia," sambil menunjuk ke arah laut lepas... sambil membayangkan sebuah tempat bernama Australia, yang saat itu betul2 aku kangeni. I missed Australia a lot, believe it or not. Jadi ada betulnya kalau aku dibilang home sick, yang bener home sick nya ke rumah kita dulu di Marrickville terutama.. dan sekolahku di Kensington, lengkap dengan teman2ku yang bisa ngoceh dan main dengan bhs yg sama denganku, waktu itu.

Nah, sejak beberapa waktu lalu ini... setelah 1.5 thn kembali di Sydney lagi... aku agak sering sliwar sliwer di sekitar Marrickville dan sekitarnya. Betul-betul membuka kembali ingatan lama. Beginilah gedung flatku di Marrickville yg pernah kutinggali 18 tahun yang lalu:

Pengumuman: Blog baru ku

2006-11-28T16:57:00.000+11:00

Dari pengalamanku... kalau kita punya lebih dari satu blog, biasanya hanya salah satu yang rajin kita isi dan kelola. Yang satunya? Males. Just to let you know, diriku punya blog di FS, ada lagi blog dari Yahoo (namanya 360 bukan ya?), terus ada lagi yang lumayan baru dari VOX. Tapi ya itu... males diisi.

Dan skrg keadaan ini semakin kuperparah dengan membuat satu blog lagi.. khusus tentang perkembangan thesis ku. Kunamakan blog itu Irfan's Thesis Progress. Terdengar membosankan? Memang iya. Semoga saja niat ku bisa kujalankan dengan konsisten sampai thesis ku selesai. Amin.