História da Unicamp

A Unicamp é uma das melhores universidades do país. Os alunos são altamente capacitados e podem ser comparados com os alunos das melhores universidades do mundo. Este documentário sobre a história da instituição é muito interessante, mas cabe algumas discussões sobre o momento que vivemos hoje. Falo pela ciência da computação, não sei qual é a realidade de outros institutos. Destaco dois pontos principais: contribuição com a indústria e internacionalização.

A ideia do Zeferino era contribuição com as empresas médias e pequenas e colaboração com as grandes ("as grandes empresas devem pagar", como ele bem colocou). Acontece que a burocracia para isto é enorme e acabam desestimulando muitas delas. Ainda não entrou na cabeça de muitos dos líderes da universidade que empresa não é inimiga da liberdade de pesquisa. Já tivemos parceria de sucesso, como por exemplo IC e Intel, mas que por algum motivo que desconheço foi terminada. É latente a necessidade de facilitar essa colaboração, não podemos ficar limitados a financiamentos de agências de fomento.

Internacionalização é outra ponto precário na instituição. A ideia de colaboração com o exterior é ótima; porém, ainda não despertaram para uma barreira que outros paises não impõem: a língua portuguesa. Conversando com amigos indianos, chineses e coreanos percebi que o Brasil está atrasado. Nestes países a maioria dos cursos de pós graduação são ministrados em inglês. Por que aqui tem que ser em português?

Acompanhei o fracasso que foi a tentativa de trazer um aluno chinês para o metrado. A universidade não mostrou o mínimo de preparo. Enquanto em outros países aceita-se inglês como língua para documentos no Brasil, eles devem ser em português; funcionários da DAC, não sabiam inglês para ajudá-lo; ao aluno não foi oferecido nenhum curso preparatório de português(a UFRGS, por exemplo, oferece cursos preparatórios e só depois o aluno começa a fazer as disciplinas). Resultado, o aluno foi desligado do programa por insuficiência de nota após 6 meses, pois não entendia a aula.

A Unicamp é uma das melhoras universidades brasileiras, mas tem muito a melhorar ainda. Precisa reduzir a burocracia para as empresas poderem colaborar de maneira mais efetiva, bem como oferecer seus cursos de pós graduação na língua inglesa. Desta maneira, atrairá mais recursos e mais alunos estrangeiros.

WikiLeaks the new source of information in Brazil. Bad journalism?

Everybody who follows the news in Brazil is getting use to reading and watching facts revealed by WikiLeaks. The information is irrelevant for most of Brazilian people, but the press insist on increasing the importance of the facts. The news is generally sensationalist and involves the USA. For example, the news about F-18 Jets. It is known in Brazil since January 2010 that the Brazilian Air Force have passed over the Rafaele Jet, even though the president Lula and the Defense Minister prefers the French tornado. WikiLeaks transforms fragments of speech into facts. The "organization" is becoming a source of information for Brazilian press, and this is dangerous when the information is not checked.

In an interview with the Estado de São Paulo the WikiLeaks founder said he had information that could interfere into the Brazilian election, but they didn't have time to publish them. People who have the minimal knowledge about Brazilian politics knows that it would be extremely improbable to affect the election of 2010, since president Lula had a very high popularity index. The less educated Brazilian people (the majority of the population) did what Lula asked them to do, that is, to vote in Dilma. Up to now, the facts that WikiLeaks has published about Brazil have not seemed that they would have affected the election. Small things, big buzz.

The news of today was the reveal of US sensitives. The list includes supply chains, communication cables, and pharmaceutical facilities. Everybody who likes war history or plays war games knows that these facilities are sensitive places. The only thing you need is to find them.
Most of these sensitive locations are very obvious. For example, the list includes the laboratory that produces Tamiflu. Tamiflu is produced by Roche, Roche is a Swiss company, Tamiflu stock should be in Switzerland. Brazilian press reported the leak, but did not discuss the content. So again, small things, big buzz.

WikiLeaks has its relevance when it leaks information. But, what they publish must be checked by the press when republishing. WikiLeaks is biased, and now that it has been persecuted by some institutions, it is imperative to verify the veracity of the information. Also, when it is possible, to present both sides. This is good journalism , something that some Brazilian journalists are not doing.

Internet access at work

Some days ago, I read an article showing how the employers crack the internet access restriction systems of their companies. There were many methods, one of them was an excel spreadsheet like system that allow an user to post twitter messages as if he were working on an spreadsheet. The article showed many arguments supporting internet access restriction at work. Reading the article reminds me a conversation between two supermarket stock replenishers while I was gathering some cookies. One guy was teaching the other how to use VNC to access his home computer and have unrestricted internet access. They were very far from being geeks, they were justing sharing one more way to cheat the supermarket internet control system. Deny the internet access is an invitation to cheat and this creates a cat and mouse game between the company and its employees.

In contrast, at my university, we don't have any internet access control system. Once we follow the rules (basically do not share copyrighted material), we can access any web site. Personally, I never saw a student at the lab where I work accessing porn sites for example, we can but we do not do. If we had any kind of access control system we might try to crack it, as the stock replenishers did. If we didn't do, the temptation would be very strong. For the university it is easier to present the rules and make students follow them, they do not need to deny access. Once we do not follow them, we will face disciplinary proceeding if we are caught. Criminal law works this way, we can do anything we want, but we must be prepared to suffer the consequences.

Some companies argue that allowing deliberated internet access decrease their employees productivity; however, they forget that we are experiencing the internet era and if an employee want to access the internet he will. He can buy a smartphone and pay for a 3g internet access and the problem will be solved, for example. The only solution will be keep the employee cellphone while he is at work. It is created a dictatorial company. The solution is not deny, it is more an education issue.

In conclusion, an educated and conscious employee will know when it is time to open a web browser to procrastinate and when it is time to work. They should be evaluated based on their productivity and not based on the time they spend "working". Restricting internet access will only encourage cheating and the cat and mouse game will never come up to an end.

A shame, pathetic.

Sometimes I feel I am a clown.

Sunday, July 25th 2010, 9:00am(BRT). I woke up early to watch Hockenheim GP 2010. The Brazilian driver was at the first place. Then a "instruction" came from his engineer saying that Fernando Alonso were driving faster. Some seconds later, Alonso overtook Felipe Massa. What a shame Ferrari! The drivers will ever deny, but it was clear that it was a team instruction. Sport has been becoming an environment where business surpass ethic and personal values, where people are bending economic interests. Competition does not exist, it is part of the past.

Felipe Massa stuck by his team which pays his salary. Alonso, too. The villain was Ferrari that allowed this uncomfortable situation. I fear about the sport future. I hope that F1 is an exception. The economic interests won. The competition? Who cares when team, sponsors, managers are all the winner.

Imagine a situation where a powerful company sponsors two important soccer, basketball, volleyball, or whatever popular sport teams. Suppose that there is a third team that is not sponsored by this company. They are competing and the company order to its teams to arrange results in order to preserve the company interests. I hope never see this situation, but I don't think it is impossible.

I'm not a clown. Clowns are people who think and act as if we were.

Google vs China: Who is the winner?

Since January, I have heard, read and talked with people about the conflict involving Google and Chinese government. If you don't know what is going on, I'll tell you briefly. In January, Google told that it faced "highly sophisticated cyber attacks" from assailants that were against Chinese human rights activists. Google didn't say explicitly that the attacks were done by Chinese government, but it is implicit. Then Google has decide to not censor their searches at google.cn, showing Chinese that they are in favor free speech.

Google has failed at China. Talking geek's language, Baidu rules there. Yahoo, MSN, and some others internet companies have failed as well. Facebook is not as spread in China as it is in other countries, too. Since China has been growing rapidly for years, the country will become the number one economy in the world in just some years. But, being successful at China is tough. Foreign companies are trying to make business there more and more. But it seams they are not so welcome.

The nearest foreign companies' rival are the local companies that make copies of their products and sale them supported by the government. Ethically speaking this is not correctly, but it seams that, for Chinese government, it is perfect acceptable.

When I studied English at USA in a school for foreigns, I could know some Chinese students. They were very intelligent students, but they had difficult for understanding implicit facts, they were not able to see beyond. They have difficult to show their opinion. But it is not their fault, they had learned since they were a child that they were not allowed to do so.

Google has courageously decided to fight against Chinese government censorship. The question is: If more then one sixth of the planet is silenced by them, will Google be able to win? Chinese government has already told that Google will have to account for their acts. I just have to wait for the next facts.

The modern life dependence on electricity and communication

Today, people, devices, computers are interconnected. You can contact other person whenever you want. You can find thousands of articles about a topic in seconds. People are getting used to having whenever they want in just few clicks. They text, send email, make searches on the web, use computers, watch TV, cook use the microwave. All these modern life habits are based on communication and electricity. The concept is so coupled that electrical facilities are also interconnected being able to communicate with each other. When one fails, it creates chaos on people life.

Last year (2009), Brazilians have experienced a huge blackout. After five hours, people were out of water because water pumps were powered off. Since the traffic lights were powered down, traffic jams were caused. People were unable to communicate; cell phone towers were not working because of the lack of electricity. Usually people only notice that something is important when they don't have it. Electrical power is among them.

Talking about communication, I notice that when a communication failure happens making people unable to access the internet, they feel disappointed. Being out of the internet for a long period causes an emptiness feeling. People feel as if they were not part of the world anymore. Not being able to check the email for some days causes anxiety and the impression that you are missing some important messages. Modern people are addicted on communication.

Reading an article on "The New York Times" [1] talking about a paper that reveals a theoretical attack on "a small U.S. power grid sub-network in a way that would cause a cascading failure of the entire U.S", it became clear to me that people must reduce their dependence on electrical facility system and communication networks. I don't mean that they must stop using electronic devices and become isolated from the world, neither I mean that a catastrophe will happen that the world will be in the darkness and on silence. I mean that we must find an alternative way for living when we are out of electricity and when communication devices fails, specially if this period is relatively long.

References

1. Paper in China Sets Off Alarms in U.S. By JOHN MARKOFF and DAVID BARBOZA

Here I am. No, I haven't forgotten this blog

Hi there! I 'alive. Long time without a post. But I haven't forgotten this blog. Today, I'll write about what I have been doing. Basically, I'll talk about my research and my daily life. Here we go.

Since my last post, things have changed. That time, I was an MSc Computer Science Student. Now, I'm a PhD student. I just skipped to PhD directly (thanks to Institute of Computing of UNICAMP professors and my mentor).

Thus, as PhD student I have to expand my work, so I have one more month to outline what I'll research for the next four years. I won't change the whole topic, it will still be about analyzing power on data center, but my former work must be expanded.

During this three months, I have studied the Apache HTTP Server and I've profiled it. Thus, I've developed a library to use the Intel Core 2 performance counters, so that, I could profile the server. At this moment, I'm working on a model using this information. Sorry, but I can't give further details currently. I'm going to release this library as soon as I can. It will be under LGPL.

I have to developed it because I couldn't find any solution that makes possible to profile a program the way I need. This library runs under Linux, also, it needs a custom kernel having some custom system call. In the mean time, if you need more details about it, just ask.

On December 4th, I dislocated my elbow. I was playing soccer (the finals of our internal soccer tournament), when I was hit by an adversary player. I fell. The result? Ten days using a splint and 20 more days recovering the arm mobility. Now, I'm OK. But, sometimes, I still remember that I fell.

This semester will be hard. Many conferences deadlines, I have to write my PhD project, and, on the top of that, I assigned for two obligatory subjects. I was missing having classes. Last year, I just had them in the first semester. Anyway, a little pressure is always good. I thing I work better with a little pressure.

To conclude, I want to share my indignation against my hometown (Ribeirão Preto) authorities. I'll need to pay a fine for jumping the red at 3:42 am. Fair, OK? Not really. Let me explain why.

As everybody might know, we have much violence in Brazil. We are used not to stopping at the red light at the late night because you are giving opportunity for thieves to steal you. The police advises you to not stop for a long time on the red light at late night. But, somehow, I was fined. My loss? About US$ 100,00 and seven (seven of twenty) points penalty for a year. In that city, you have to choose: Give your money to a stealer or give you money to the State. At least, the State doesn't threaten you with a gun.