19th April 2005
I have backdated some of my blogs, just in case none of my friends realize. Please look at my previous blogs if you think I have not updated my blog at all, especially for the 17th and 18th of April, because I will try to update my diary every weekday, when I have access to the internet through Siemens.
I will describe the first day of work in my previous blog, (what a curious way of phrasing a sentence! Just like me telling you what I WILL do in the PAST.) Meanwhile, here’s my second day:
I went to work to find out what on earth Ethernet is, and all those jargon of Switches, Hubs, Bridges, Repeaters, and what my department does in actual fact. Do you know what a PLC is? I wish I have an inkling of what it is remotely, but apparently it is supposed to be this terminal that directs your information to the receiver. I.E I instruct my younger sister boon boon to bring me some water (like real!) but because boon is in the living room and I in the bedroom, she cannot hear me. So my Jie, being in the kitchen, acts as the PLC, because she is able to receive the info I sent out and relay to Boon. And she does not only do this for me, but for my father, who wants to send a msg to my mom, and my brother, who wants to send a msg to coincidentally, boon too. So the PLC receives and relays messages (by repeating it to the next hub) from any terminal that is linked to it, just as my Jie repeats the msgs sent to her.
Now, the problem is that, my Jie has a limit to how many words she can listen to or speak at the same time. So if my dad and I both speak at the same time, she cannot receive anything. Thus this results in a collision. But clever us, me and my dad, both have the sense to wait till the other is done before speaking to my Jie again, thus we are equipped with what is called basic manners, or what the computer people call “Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Detection”, which is a scheme that governs the way computers ‘talk’ to one another. This means that each individual computer, when met with a collision, basically waits for a random period of time before talking again, and this amount of time, being random, hopefully prevents another collision. The more the number of collisions, the longer the period of time the computer waits. ( Just like me and my dad, I wouldn’t be so stupid as to interrupt him so many times at one go, would I?)
Are you lost yet? If you are, imagine that I had to read up on all these in German! It was basically dictionary day for me today.
Take a big breath, for here we go deeper. What are Switches and Bridges then? The problem with the old Ethernet that I have just described to you is that there is absolutely NO security. I.e All messages have to pass through a common medium (the air) and gets sent to all the terminals. So even I can get a message from my dad, which is meant for my mom. This means that I can eaves drop on all conversations, or even interrupt some, or confuse my Jie by bombarding her with many useless messages. Then her message-carrying speed greatly slows down, and meanwhile, I get to listen to all the messages (assuming that I can speak and listen at the same time=)) What switches do is to recognize what terminals usually receive messages from what terminals, and dedicate a channel to this way of communication. (I am a little hazy here, do feel free to correct me if you know more, please!) So security gets a LITTLE better, as Jie wouldn’t automatically tell me Pa’s message to Ma, BUT I can still intercept the message by various methods (by faking Ma’s voice, for example). And the speed that Jie does the message-transferral is much faster, and her bandwidth can be used to the greatest extent and advantage.
Still have to find out more about bridges, Gateways, smart Ethernet, etc. Can’t say more here=(
I had my first choir practice with a mature German choir tonight, and it is really one of those practices in which I laughed as much as I sang! My landlady invited me to practise in her choir as well, which is holding a small concert in a church on 5th June in Amberg. (not Hamburg) The Chorleiter (or conductor) was a standing joke=) He cracks really funny jokes in the middle of the practice. They have rather good resounding basses here, only a little tone-deaf though. There is one part in the Ave Maria, when they came in on a horrifyingly wrong low note (much too low, sounded like a foghorn) and they had to hold it through like NINE bars. Can you imagine the sound? The entire choir was in harmony but for THEM. I was so amused that I started on a fit of giggles and had to stop singing to control myself. Then the Chorleiter said, “Ich habe gedacht, dass die Loch Ness Monster in Schottland nicht mehr existiert, aber es lebt noch in unserer Probe.” (Translation: I thought that the Loch Ness Monster of Scotland has gone extinct, but apparently it is still alive and healthy in our choir practice.) It was then that I couldn’t control myself and HOWLED with laughter…HOW EMBARRASSING! But it was really really very funny! The people around me just looked so amused, and one said,” Sie kommen ja zurecht mit der Probe!” (Translation: You adapt well to the practice!)
Then there was another time when he tried to signal for us to come in loudly, so he opened up his arms like he had a big belly, and the singers thought that he meant for them to breathe in deeply, so everyone breathed in so deeply and held their breaths, and the next coming in was… abysmal, followed by laughter in unison. What really surprises me is the complete feeling of Gemeinschaft (community) over here…everyone knows or makes an effort to know everyone else, and goes around shaking hands and talking during the break and before the practice starts. It is wonderful, because the enjoyment is clearly visible.
Am having an absolutely wonderful time here in Germany. It is just a little too cold, like 7 degrees and it is raining outside, so I go around in almost winter clothes to survive it all. Don’t worry, I just look a little odd, while some people are just in simple shirts and jeans, because they drive to work, and I walk/jog through a forest for about 20 minutes before I get to the office. But the view is worth it, anytime.
Spring is a season to ‘spring’ for joy=) My Cherry tree is blossoming beautifully, hopefully the weather is not so cold that it freezes the bees and keeps them from pollinating my cherry blossoms. “Sakura…Sakura…” You really have to see it to sing the song from the heart, I guess=)
Love ya all, and best regards, (I can’t send you warm ones because I don’t have any..)
Ting =)
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