I am in Paris
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Launch Service Cup 2010
It is my third year to chair Service Cup. In 2010, the theme is “Applications and Algorithms on Clouds”. We want to see business applications as well as algorithms run on commercial or private clouds. As clouds software and hardware are available now in many ways, it is possible for universities and companies to launch clouds project. I should say, it is also a learning process for me to this new topic. However, I believe it is an interesting and promising direction for business as well as research. The difficulty for us is to attract participants. I am afraid that not many universities or professors are working on this yet. However, to be the first to do it is interesting.
Wednesday, December 09, 2009
Reborn of Computer Labs
A chronicle article proves my idea – the computer labs used for teaching need to reconfigure themselves in order to be better used. Most students, over 85% as the article says, have their own laptops. The pattern of the usage of the lab is changing. Students can work on their own laptop at a more comfortable places like in their own bedroom or even in their own bed. The lab becomes a gathering place for discussion. Students meet in the lab to discuss and synthesize their project work, present their work to the others. For the sake of training, I also encourage the students to do a full development cycle from installing the development environment to testing and deployment. Sometimes, this can only be done on their own machine. For example, our lab discourages the students to install certain type of software. Also, in a lab, the development environment is set up for them. They can jump into coding directly. It is enjoyable, however, they will find they are left alone if they do not know how to set up the environment at workplace.
Second, the lab should provide something beyond the capacity of their own laptop, for example, expensive software and powerful computation resources. They should be able to use them from remote access from their own laptop. I find the students do not fully use what we have invested in computation resources. Even for research like machine learning and data mining, the graduates still do their experiment on their own laptop or PC. An experiment can take several days. They should be trained to write concurrent algorithms for their algorithm. Or simply submitting their jobs to a powerful multicore computer can save their time.
Second, the lab should provide something beyond the capacity of their own laptop, for example, expensive software and powerful computation resources. They should be able to use them from remote access from their own laptop. I find the students do not fully use what we have invested in computation resources. Even for research like machine learning and data mining, the graduates still do their experiment on their own laptop or PC. An experiment can take several days. They should be trained to write concurrent algorithms for their algorithm. Or simply submitting their jobs to a powerful multicore computer can save their time.
Monday, October 26, 2009
THE University Ranking and University Qualities
Times posted its 6rh edition the THE – QS World University Ranking recently and received wide responses. By the way, I got my Ph.D. from the No. 49 and am also an alumina from the No. 29. But this does mean too much. What I am interested is the criteria: Academic Peer Review (40%), Employer Review (10%), Faculty Student Ratio (20%), Citations per faculty (20%), International Faculty (5%) and International Students (5%). Only the first, the second and the fourth of the criteria make sense to me. I am working in an engineering faculty where we can easily get a lot of points on international faculty and students. I credit this to the subject and the immigration policy. This is just by nature. Every engineering faculty may be the same. I know that some of the names in the list are known only locally, not internationally. I do not know how these names are compared. I also know that there are also well known universities are not in the list. So who cares about this list?
Everyone is thinking the problem of what makes a good university. Different people have different criteria, because they are looking for different things. It may not be the research citation, and it may not be the international faculty. People who pay the tuition may think more the employer review or the start-up salary. People who do research may think more a specific domain. So a general ranking may not concern. For a university, I would say, to be generalized and try to be the top in the list won’t make sense for long. In the future, a university should be good in one dimension, not in multiple dimensions.
Everyone is thinking the problem of what makes a good university. Different people have different criteria, because they are looking for different things. It may not be the research citation, and it may not be the international faculty. People who pay the tuition may think more the employer review or the start-up salary. People who do research may think more a specific domain. So a general ranking may not concern. For a university, I would say, to be generalized and try to be the top in the list won’t make sense for long. In the future, a university should be good in one dimension, not in multiple dimensions.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
The Iceland Strategy on Data Center
Probably no country was hit by the economic crisis than the Iceland. Pulled back from banking industry, Iceland turns back to its rich nature resources again. The following is based on a yesterday BBC report.
This time, it is about data center. It is said that the data centers produce CO2 as much as the aviation flights. Iceland’s cheap and renewable energy, cool climate and water make it an ideal place for building data centers. Actually data centers are built and the Americans are attracted.
This is also what I think for Canada. Canada also satisfies all the above merits. We need to cultivate these skills among our students.
This time, it is about data center. It is said that the data centers produce CO2 as much as the aviation flights. Iceland’s cheap and renewable energy, cool climate and water make it an ideal place for building data centers. Actually data centers are built and the Americans are attracted.
This is also what I think for Canada. Canada also satisfies all the above merits. We need to cultivate these skills among our students.
A Concordia Alunima
Saturday, October 03, 2009
The European School vs. the North American School of Research
I like the European school of research. Here people are trained well. The atmosphere of research is strong. The struggling and surviving atmosphere is less. I feel that research can be a part of your life, a part of your life style. We do not link research to the pure interests gain in our lives. In North America, research is a tough career. The successful rate is so low that only the most ambitious and persistent people can survive.
The Europeans have their deep heritage in research. Their training in philosophy and logics is sufficient when they begin their research at a young age. They are used to analyze problems in a systematical way and tackle difficult problems very early due to their background. And there are many good institutes where the research atmosphere is strong and financial supplies are sufficient. You have almost no problem to take research as a part of your life and a part of your life style. I like this kind of sophisticated atmosphere. I feel relaxed in my free thinking. However, their “engineering” skills are also too sophisticated. I found sometimes they make simple problems too complicated. Sometimes, a 50 pages report can be summarized in 2 pages. The ideas are simple. However, to particulate it, it involves deeper skills, not the other sense.
The advantage of the North American school of research is that they change fast. They dare to abandon some old “productive” topics to try something new. The progress can be fast. However, their professors are too, too busy that their students are lack of supervision. Sometimes, the papers are clearly not reviewed by their profs, because they are very coarse. But if well written, the North American style papers are very clear and straightforward. And most of the time, they are accompanied with good motivations and concept proving experiments.
The Europeans have their deep heritage in research. Their training in philosophy and logics is sufficient when they begin their research at a young age. They are used to analyze problems in a systematical way and tackle difficult problems very early due to their background. And there are many good institutes where the research atmosphere is strong and financial supplies are sufficient. You have almost no problem to take research as a part of your life and a part of your life style. I like this kind of sophisticated atmosphere. I feel relaxed in my free thinking. However, their “engineering” skills are also too sophisticated. I found sometimes they make simple problems too complicated. Sometimes, a 50 pages report can be summarized in 2 pages. The ideas are simple. However, to particulate it, it involves deeper skills, not the other sense.
The advantage of the North American school of research is that they change fast. They dare to abandon some old “productive” topics to try something new. The progress can be fast. However, their professors are too, too busy that their students are lack of supervision. Sometimes, the papers are clearly not reviewed by their profs, because they are very coarse. But if well written, the North American style papers are very clear and straightforward. And most of the time, they are accompanied with good motivations and concept proving experiments.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
On my jogging route today
I have a luxury jogging route in Paris – across the Museum Louvre, through Jardin Tuileries, arrive at the Place Concorde. After glazing at the Arc de Triomphe and other things, like the Hotel Crillon at the Concorde and the Tour de Eiffel at the far left side, I run back. I love Paris, because it always tries something new, sometimes obscured. See what I saw today in the Jardin Tuileries (all shot with iPone):
Dinner in Sky: 50m above. The platform is hung by a crane.
New obscured sculptures around a fountain
The Museum Louvre from the Jardin Tuileries
