FUGU MAN มนุษย์ปักเป้า

I'm back (to my blog) :)

2008-10-29T00:11:00.002-05:00

It's been a while since my last post :P

(sorry, folks, for not being updated)

The reasons why I disappeared from my blog are:

1. While I was in Thailand, I really had no time updating my blog.

2. I was preparing for Mathematics (Numerical Analysis + Partial Differential Equations) and Computer Science qualifying exams. Preparing for three of them at once was quite a pain in the ass, taking almost all of my available time.

3. After the qualifying exams, I was busying with the research. Both coordinating with Monn and doing mine (trying to make some good progress).

However, here I am .... WOO HOO!!!

I finally managed sometime for my blog again.

Here are some of my updates:

I. I just received an e-mail stating that I passed both Math and CS qualifying exams :)

(Warning: too details contents. If you don't want to pay attention to the details, please skip)

I'm glad I passed both of them, since I really don't want to waste a lot of my time memorizing Numerical Analysis formulas and methods, practicing PDE and memorizing almost all of the well-known algorithms ever again!!! That's so harsh to me forcing my brain to record all these stuffs. In my opinion, even all PhD students need to be an expert (or something similar) in their fields, they need not to memorize a lot of stuffs. In reality, what they use are their aptitude, and their skills (analysis skills, creativity skills, etc.). So, qualifying exams should aim for evaluating those kind of stuffs. Oral qualifying exams would be a great option, as I think students will have more chances to communicate with the committee, convincing them that they really do know their stuffs. Open-book test would be another good choice, too, as students won't have to put much efforts in "memorizing" but "braining" stuffs.

The tests I took were not so hard. First of all, the PDE, most of the problems were quite straight-forwarded. If I know, and understand, the method of solving various forms of PDEs, I can solve it :) Luckily, I knew them (credited to Monn, who show the light of understanding to me, while the freaking teacher cannot). The hardest part of the PDEs would be the integral. Imagine that you have to do integrate something like ∫x^2 sin(nπx) dx or ∫ cos(x) sin(nπx) dx in almost all of the problems, you may (or may not) go crazy. Lucky for me (again) that advance calculators are allowed in the exams in Louisiana Tech University. Students just have to show the proctor that the calculator memory was cleared. I used TI-89 titanium for this PDE exam, and I can easily passed :D One of my committee told me that I got 90+ from the PDEs. :D

The Numerical Analysis was not hard, too. Memorization is the most hardest part in this exams. What funny about this exam of mine is that I did not use the "programmable" capability of this calculator for solving numerical methods in the test :)

For Computer Science exam, it was too easy, so that I could easily do a lot of stupid mistakes. For example, one of the problems was "What is the notion of stack overflow and stack underflow". The problem before this one was something about programming language stuffs. So I was thinking too much in this problem, and then tried to describe the stack overflow error in programming. :P How dump I am!!! Luckily, in overall, I passed the test.

II. I was accepted as a student volunteer in Super Computing 2008 conference at Austin :D This time I will bring more free stuffs home.

III. One of the new professor offer the Parallel Algorithm class next quarter. Yeeee ha!!!! I am really glad to participate in this class.

IV. I am so sleepy right now -_-

I will be busy as usual. Hopefully, I'll be able to update my blog more often.

Fug

I'm home

2008-07-14T02:31:00.003-05:00

After almost-30-hour traveling, MLU (Monroe, LA) -> ATL (Atlanta, GA) -> ICN (Seoul, Korean0) -> BKK (Suvarnabhumi, Thailand), I felt tired, but happy. When I saw dad, mom and my sisters , waiting for me at the airport, I felt like I was home--even the Suvarnabhumi airport was not mine :P

The trip hour look tiring, but the tiring process was actually started before the tirp. Our departure time was 6.00 am (approximately) from MLU to ATL, so we had to depart our apartment at 4.20 am--driving from Ruston to Monroe. Talking about the wake-up time, if we slept, we had to wake up pretty much super early. Our regular sleeping time is 2 AM. Mon and I didn't sleep, as we were afraid that we might wake up late and miss the flight. We watched 10,000 B.C. (a movie) to keep waking us up, but Mon told me that the movie was so boring, and then she took a little nap.

July 12th, around 4.00 am CDT (Central Daylight Time), I called Dr. Box to remind him about our flight as he promised to take us to the MLU airport. He picked up the phone and thanked me for the reminder--he forgot!!! (he confess to us later during the way to the airport).

4.20 am CDT (approximately) Dr. Box came to our apartment, and took us to MLU.

5.00 am CDT (approximately) We arrived at MLU, checked in, and waited for almost an hour to board. Here, we checked in only two luggages (one is mine, another one is mon's). The rest--my backpack, Mon's backpack, 21" luggage (packed with Wii, and other electronic stuffs--we don't want to load this luggage under the plane because of the fragile items in it), and a business/computer case (loaded with books)--were took onboard. They're pretty heavy -_-.

6.00 am CDT (app.) The plane depart from MLU.

Approximately 8.30 am EDT (Eastern Daylight Time) The plate arrived ATL. The flight took around 1.30 Hr.

9-10 am EDT, I was hungry and find something to put into my stomach. The panda express was my choice.

Sometimes around 10 am EDT, while we're using a free WiFi at the food court, we found a pianist and a saxophonist playing a Jazz music (together). I saw them exchanged their business cards, so I think one of them would be a tourist. By appearance, I guessed that the black guy should be a US, and the chinese-looking guy might be a tourist. It was like they were having a live and improvising show.

These artists were so cool

1.15 pm CDT, the plane depart from ATL to ICN (Korea). In summary we were at ATL, waiting for the connection flight--for approximately 5 Hrs.

The flight from ATL to ICN took approximately 15 hours, we virtually "lived" on that plane. The food was tasting great!!!

The air hostesses were cute and very polite. I did not sleep much on this flight (maybe only a few hours) as there were so many movies I'd like to watch available in this flight!!! There was a touch screen LCD monitor in front of every seat (actually, at the back of every seat) and you can interact with it!!! Movie, music, information, games all on your demand. There, I watched "August rush", "Spiderwick Chronicle's", "Vantage Point" and a documentary about the earth. This was quite an entertainment, and I was so happy to fly with Korean Air.

By the way, their English was terrible and horrible. I have to focus all of my hearing sense and guess almost every terms they said when they try to report me something via the central speaker. To choose a meal, I picked whatever I understand the terms in its name. For example, I had two choice in my first meal "Korean ... (I could not pick the rest)" and "...(something) bi bob". Oh shoot!!! The politeness and cuteness did not do anything in the English speaking ability. My intuition told me to say "the Korean". That's it :) Lucky me, this Korean something tasted very nice.

The Korean something I had as the first meal

Approximately 15 hours later, around 5 pm KST (Korean Standard Time), we arrived ICN. Here, we had to pass security checkpoint again (the first time we were checked at MLU). My carry-on luggage was suspected, as I expected (becuase there were a lot of electornic devices in it). A staff opened my bag and seemed to be surprised. She picked my wireless router (Mon want to use this one at her house) and ask me, "What is it?". "Wireless Router", I answered. She got confused, like she didn't understand what I was saying. I repeat agian, "It is a wireless router". "wireless ruuter?", it was like she didn't understand the word "router", or maybe my toung was suck so that she couldn't comprehend what I said. However, she didn't have any problem with me, and I can safely passed the security checkpoint.

My hunger and desire for Korean food drag me and Mon to find something to eat. Food in ICN airport was expensive. This meal cost around $20+ (or 20,000+ won).

My dish

Monn's dish

PEPSI in Korean

In addition, we were too clever about the currency. In ICN, we expected that they would only use Korean currency (won), so we sought for currency exchange. We bought 38,xxx won (didn't remember the exact number) for $40. Then, we went to the food court (it's time to eat hahaha). Near the cashier counter, we realized that they accept USD, with the same conversion rate at the currency exchange. SHOOT!!! If we buy USD back with the leftover (from our meal), we had to pay 1,0xx won for a dollar!!! Holy cow, that was expensive. So, mon had to carry the leftover to Thailand and change them to Thai Baht later.

Approximately 8.30 pm KST, after spend most of the time waiting for boarding (around 3 hrs), we depart KST to BKK. I was so happy to see Thai air hostesses in Korean Airline (they were just Thai--by nationaligty, or speaking language--not Thai Airway hostesses). I spent most of the time sleeping in this flight. And then, after approximately 5 more hours in flying, we arrived Suvarnabhumi around 11.50 pm ICT (Indo-China time, or Thai time).

All the custom processes were quickly proceed, and then we waited for the bags. We got our bags, then went home.

I'd heard from Nimon that Tee+ were also there at Suvarnabhumi airport. I was so sorry for you, Tee+, my friend, I didn't see you (I dunno where were you waiting). However, many thanks for your big heart to be there.

Ironically, I will have to depart from BKK to Egypt tonight (July 15th) T_T

See you all again after July 20.

Trip to National Laboratory - Day 3 (Our free day)

2008-06-09T22:16:00.010-05:00

After our presentation day, this day (May 9th, 2008) was our free day--meaning that we could go anywhere we wanted to (woo hoo).

The plan was driving to the forbidden cavern in the morning (James looks really want to go there) and to Rocky Mountain National Park in the afternoon. So, as the schedule was pretty tight, we started off early.

The drive was pretty long (we took like an hour), long enough to disturb us and question us if this place was really exist? Even we got a Global Positioning System (GPS)--branded Garmin--we were just not sure if the way we drove was the right way. The streets were so ... local .. or, in fact, so rural to us. We were just surrounded by trees, fields and barnyards!!!

We were becoming more and more anxious ... and suddenly, after making a turn (I didn't rememer left or right) over a hill (or something else), we found a HUGE factory!!! (in a middle of nowhere!!!). This was a moment which I called a "HOLY SHOOT" moment. It was a mixing of anxiety with sudden surprise.

After a while, we arrived the forbidden cavern. A lot of children were there and it was so chaotic!!! Children (I believe, all over the world) never stop playing and being naughty!!! However, they were going back, so we were not worried much about them.

After they'd been all gone (I didn't mean dead here), I looked around and found a weird stuffed animal.

This cavern has an interesting entrance.
There's nothing much inside the cavern ... actually, it is boring :P

Next, we went to Smocky's Montain National Park. I was too lazy to post the pictures here, please see my Picasa album instead.

Fugu Man

Trip to National Laboratory - Day 2

2008-05-19T23:05:00.000-05:00

On the second day (May 8th, 2008) we started off early as usual, leaving the hotel around 7 AM. I decided not to take my camera with me because I presumed that the security in this National Lab would be pretty strict and fooling around taking pictures would not be allowed.

Before I further tell the National Lab stories, I would like to complain about breakfast in the hotel in US. We had a free continental breakfast provided by the hotel at that morning. At the first time (long time ago), I thought that hotel breakfast here (US) would be similar to those in Thailand. In fact, they are waaaaaaay different. In Thailand, the hotel provided good buns, ham, sausage, fried eggs, cornflakes, fruits, real milk, reduced-fat milk, etc. But here, they provided just apples, bananas, buns, cornflakes, skim milk. And that was it!!! HOLY SHOOT!!!!

OK, back to the trip. Before we arrived the National Lab, Dr. Box told us that somewhere around ORNL was a nuclear waste and urenium (that US sieze from some other contries--I didn't remember exactly what coutries are they) junk yard. This urenium and nuclear waste made me thought about three wig shop in that departmentstore that Dr. Box stopped by to change his Time Capsule. I bet these nuclear waste had something to do with those baldy problem!!!

We arrived Oak Ridge National Lab (ORNL) around 7:30 am. As I thought, the security was strict. The front gate of this national laboratory looked like not a front gate at all. It looked like a little toll station on the toll way. In that mini station, there were security guards screening the cars. We had to declare ourselves, and reasons why we were there. Mon and I had to give them our passport. After our identities were granted, we then further drive to the working building, which took around 10 - 15 minutes. Dr. Box even said that the security fences (from nowhere--we can't see) will be activated if someone tried to break through the security checkpoint.

Afterall, we all arrived at the reception desk safely (around 8:30 am).

There, we had to request our badges which were valid only on the day we had business with ORNL, i.e. 1 day :P Plus, escort was required all the time (we couldn't fooling around by ourselves).

The presentation went pretty well (I couldn't tell much about our discussion). After the morning sessions, we all had lunch at ORNL canteen. The foods were suck and expensive!!! Believe it or not, my plate you are seeing below cost me 5 bucks!!! I took this picture with my cell's camera, so please don't complain about the quality.

In that afternoon, we had a little ORNL tour. The host (ORNL staffs) brought us to their super computign room (The Jaguar; please see http://top500.org/system/8372 for more information) which stays at #7 on the top 500 recent list (please see http://top500.org/list/2007/11/100). Here, I just knew that they didn't serious about taking pictures T_T. I should have brought my camera with me.

Next, we went to the visualization room (so cool) which had a lot of high-resolution screens. This visualization system could be used to help analysts better understand their problems (as good visualization should do). For example, the screen in the picture below illustrates global various global activities (world temperatures, earthquake, etc... I can't remeber :P)

And this was the end of the tour. We continued our talk in the late afternoon. Everything went well, and in the evening, we had a nice local dinner.

--END OF DAY 2--
[TO BE CONTINUED ON DAY 3 ...]

Trip to National Laboratory - Day 1

2008-05-18T22:22:00.000-05:00

Folks,

Long time no see :)
I have no excuses for not being updated for a while except that I was so (extremely very) busy.

Papers... Report... Presentation... Proposal... Helping People... and many other things.

OK, let's end the nagging busy things.

Today is Sunday May 18th, 2008--the third day after my final exams in this quarter (Spring).
Today is the day that I had some free time to update my blog!!! (T_T so sad, isn't it?)

I would like to start updating my blog with this entry: the trip to Oak Ridge National Laboratory --for mid-year project presentation and discussion--with Dr. Box, Mon, James and Clayton (my friends in Dr. Box's lab).

We had to drive from Ruston, LA to Oak Ridge, TN. This would take approximately 9 hours for non-stop driving!!! So, we all had to leave early. The rendezvous was Wednesday, May 7th 6:30 am, @ Nethken Hall ,Louisiana Tech University. The time had to be strict as we were having sooo long trip and we could not lose a minute!!!

At 6:30 - Dr. Box called me and told me that he's leaving from his house -_-"

However, he arrived Nethken Hall around 6:40 am (that's forgivable :D ) with a white, nice, 7-seated minivan--Nissan Quest. And our trip had begun.

Dr. Box was the first hand to drive. I admitted that I didn't remember many things during the drive as I spent most of my time sleeping :P Anyway, we had the first stop at ... I didn't know what to call ... maybe a tourist information service at Mississippi River. Here, they provide free drinks and coffee!!! Even the coffee taste so-so, but it's free :) This is very good for tourist.

For the rest of the first day ... nothing was interesting. Just drive and drive. We stop sometimes to fill the gas and have lunch.

The scenery we passed by during our trip was pretty much the same all the time .... (SUPER BORING). It was just a view of ... trees, grasses, some flowers, fields. And that was it!!!

I was so bored in the back seat of the car (actually, minivan; but, I may refer to it as car from this point on). But, finally, we arrived at Knoxville, TN, on where our hotel (Laquinta Inn) was located. We stopped at the mall called Western Mall (if I remember it right) to change Dr. Box's Apple Time Capsule and then we reached the hotel.

This is the boring first day story of the trip.

I will continue updating this Blog day-by-day. We'll be in touched.

TO BE CONTINUED (TOMORROW).

Blog update with TORNADO!!!

2008-02-07T09:08:00.000-06:00

Crap!!!! Shoot!!! (my new exclamation learned from my US friend)

This was 4 months of no update :p (a little bit guilty)
I didn't know how can I keep myself so busy that I completely ignored my precious blog!!!

Maybe it was because of my lifestyle here (very BAN-NOK).
Nothing exciting had happened to me much :)

But on Tuesday, February 3rd 2008, while I was typing my proposal document, I checked the Google stock price via my dashboard (the mac user, or mac lover would know what it is; or follow this link for more information DASHBOARD_LINK). Then, the red warning cycling text from the weather forecast (thanks to the weather bug weather forecast) captured my eyes. That was pretty long text, actually. But once I saw "tornado watch", I tried to tell myself that it might not be here. As long as I knew, Ruston Louisiana never had an tornado attack. Then, to see what exactly the hell was happening, I read more info from the web. And, SHOOT!!!! I saw my city (actually the whole parish--equivalent to county for other state) was in the freaking "tornado watch" zone. Imagine you watch a TV and see your house located in the dangerously-looked, red block. That was ... HOLY CRAP!!!!

Then, the golden fish and I decided to pack some of the valuable things we had, e.g. Wii, PS2. Just in case the "tornado watch" turned to "tornado warning"--and we had 15 min to leave the zone, or go to somewhere safe. We turned the TV on all the time, and fixed the channel at the Weather channel. Crappy, I had to continue typing my proposal in this situation.

Around 3 PM, we heard a report that there was a "tornado warning" at a town near us!!!
HOLY SHIP!!! (just an meaningless exclamation again) we became more and more nervous.

But then, nothing ever happened to Louisiana state zone, no tornado (even there was a warning), no flood, NOTHING!!!

Well, yeah, I was glad nothing happened around here (actually, there was a bit lament feeling for not seeing the real tornado)

And my plain life was then continue on ...

--------------------------------------------------------------------
P.S.1 I would try to experience something not ordinary in my life, so that I would have something to write here :p

P.S.2 The golden fish and I planned to go back to Thailand around mid July, and will be there until mid August. See you all there my friends WOO HOOOOO

Quarter begins didn't mean class begins

2007-09-05T10:26:00.000-05:00

Shame on me!!!

Fall quarter 2007 began at September 5th, I wrote down in my note, and keep counting down to that day (wishing it will come slowly :p).

And today is that day. According to my class schedule, I had a partial differential equation class today at 9:30 AM. I hate waking up early, and get used to 11 AM wake-up time during the summer. But today, I had to wake up so early (8:00 AM) for the first PDE class.

I went to the class a little bit early, 9:25 AM, and then the nature call :p

Since that time, nobody's at the class.

I went back to the class again at 9:30 AM sharp, still nobody's there.

I wait until 10:00 AM, no body came!!! HOLY SHIT, WHAT HAPPENING???? (I screamed in my mind).

Then, I decided to go to the instructor's office to ask him what happened.

Waiting at his office for half an hour (there's a student talking to him), and finally got the answer.

"The class begin at Sept 6th", he told me and showed the University calendar.

"WHATTTTTTTTTTT???!!!" (I shouted, again, in my mind).

We smile, and I laughed at my stupid (I was so humiliated at that time).

Now, I learned that the "Quarter Begin" day and "Class Begin" day didn't have to be the same day.

God!!!

2007-09-01T10:58:00.000-05:00

"For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything. [Hebrews 3:4 , New International Version]" is the sentence that drag me from my bed (actually, floor) to open the door this morning.

Two man ringing the door bell at my apartment this morning (around 10:30 AM). At that time, I was sleeping. I thought that would be the pest control service, at the first time. But when I opened the door and saw them, they dressed way too better than pest control service guys. Two old men with formally decent looks in their suits.

I kind of curious and thinking in my mind ".. are they lawyers and want to sue me with no reason?". But then, after we say hi, the white guy introduced himself and ask me about design and creation. I didn't remember the exact word but he ask me something like "Are you curious about existent of everything?".

Respectfully, I have no idea about :D

And then he showed me a bible and referring to those sentence I stated above.

I kind of admire him in his attempt to distribute his believes. So I didn't strongly reject his believes. All I said is just "I am not a bible reader, not at all :)" (I really talked with smile face).

The reality is I never believe that God creates everything.

My beliefs are all about Buddha Dharma, of course I am a buddhism.

God create everything, then who create him?

F, my most erotic friend, said god is existed, no one created him. And he has such a power to create everything. Believe in god, heaven you go. Down to hell, vice versa.

My believe is, our soul is such a thing that existed without creation. And we reincarnate for a long time. The way to stop this birth-and-death cycle is Nirvana. There are such heavens and hells, but only our actions will decide where would we go. Good, go to heavens. Evil, go to hell. When the good or evil reaction force (from what we did) end. The other reactions from what we did would drive us to somewhere or give us something (we always did things).

With this topic, I spent time discussing with F for an hour or so. And there is, obviously, no conclusion since they are "beliefs" that hard to prove. Then F tell me the way to prove the existent of god by "praying". Just make a wish to the God as children ask something from their father, and put "in the name of Jesus Christ" in the end. Surely, I will do so, and we can discuss more about the result.

I will leave this topic just at this point, or it could be my dissertation for another religion philosophy degree :)

Use your own experience and wisdom to believe or not to believe in such a thing.

But the things I believed with all my heart is good people won't go to hell just only because they didn't believe in god (thinking about people before Christian era, wouldn't it so unfair to them?).

Fug U Man

Coke with Vitamin!!!

2007-08-28T20:03:00.000-05:00

Hi friends,

You might find recently about various variation of Coca-Cola.

Some basic example of them are Coke-zero, Vanilla Coke, Diet Coke, Cherry Coke, etc.

But here, in US, I found Diet Coke Plus - diet coke with vitamins and minerals!!!.

Check it out :)

Writing a service in Linux

2007-08-26T15:35:00.000-05:00

As Khem's request, today I will (try to) explain the simple way to write a linux service.

The linux services are nothing but programs running in the background (usually daemon) to provide their service. For example, the httpd (HTTP Daemon) provide HTTP server service which made your system be a web server.

Writing a Linux service is easy, it require only two major steps.

1. Implement your program as Linux daemon

2. Write the service script, usually simple shell script, and place it in "/etc/init.d" directory

Ah, and you should be the root to start/stop or add services.

Briefly, the daemon is a program that run in the background and had practically no parent (literally it had only init process - the pid #1 - be its parent). You may implement Linux daemon program using C by simply calling daemon() function (in unistd.h). After daemon() called, your program will be a daemon :)

Service script is somewhat easy to write, too. Check the code below for example. (Suppose that this code was in the file /etc/init.d/testservice).

Sample service script called "testservice"

----------------------------

1: #!/bin/bash

2: . /etc/init.d/function #Include some necessary function

3: case $1 in

4: start)

5: echo -n "Starting test service";

6: daemon /program/directory/test arg1 arg2;

7: echo;

8: ;;

9: stop)

10: echo -n "Exiting test service";

11: killproc test;

12: echo;

13: ;;

14: status)

15: status test;

16: ;;

17: *)

18: echo " Usage: service testservice {start|stop|status}";

19: ;;

20: esac

--------------------------------------

The "daemon" in line 6, "killproc" in line 11, and "status" in line 15 are bash functions written in /etc/init.d/functions. We include that file from . command in line 2. Alternatively, "source" command might be used instead of ".", for the code readability. The arguments in line 6 will be passed in the program you write.

Actually, you don't have to write the service script this way. You can make your own style, write your own function, define your command, or what not, since this is only the script being invoked via command "service".

You can even write perl script, or python, and put it in "/etc/init.d". Don't forget to change its permission to be 755 (executable). That's it.

When root invoke command "service your-service ", the service program will pass argument to "your-service" script.

By the way, as I shown you, Linux (I tested on red-hat based Fedora Core 5 and Cent OS 4) had already provided some convenient function to start/stop or check service status. It would be more convenient to write in the simple style I posted :)

***NOTE***: For some reason (maybe pattern matching problem), the daemon program name should not include "_" (underscore). My service (shell) script didn't work when I had a underscore in a file name.

Hope this might benefit you a bit :)

Fug.U.Man

Google Summer of Code DONE!!!

2007-08-22T22:43:00.000-05:00

OH MY GOD!!

Finally, my codes were done!!!!

(Actually, almost done, since the installation package still using shell script :(

OK, however I can have some free time to do more things I love to do :D

For your information, my ComSci friends, I wanna tell you that Linux and open source programs are great!!! But it took you some more time to work on, and had a very high (in my opinion) learning curve.

I worked on Fault-Tolerance High-Availability OSCAR, which will work on Linux cluster to enable fault tolerant job queue and job execution on MPI parallel programming (whomever would like to know more, please contact me :)

I didn't want to talk much about my GSoC here, just a few sentence complaint something happening on my project.

HOLY SH*T, many open source software had a great number of issues about dependencies!!!! And you might have to manually resolve those dependencies by yourself!!! (Again, ***MIGHT HAVE TO***, many of them were managed by packaging software like RPM, YUM, etc.) Installation alone might cost you more than one day.

If you use too new Linux distributions, the program might not support it. In consequences, you had to build it yourself from its codes. If some error appears, only you, the installer, would solve it T_T.

Moreover, some program might had a very bad documentation, that would make a lot of confusions instead of illuminations (I guess mine is one of them T_T).

Some programs that you had to depend on to complete your work might produce some unexpected error without any clue!!! Even the Q/A mailing list support might contain some issues similar to your error experience, but it's possible that no one help you out in that Q/A mailing list T_T. ARRRRGHHHHHHH

By the way, there are a lot of program that were written with robustness, efficiency, powerful, beautiful, or whatever good :D

Especially the active open source project like Open Office, Lynx, Inkscape, etc.

They work almost like commercial softwares.

"Linux and Open Source Software" are great!!!

But they're two-edge swards.

If you understand what to do about them, you'll got a lot of advantages of free software :D

Within this week, I will begin introducing a bunch of free softwares I am using in my MacBook, with some easy installation tips :D for newbies (like me).

So, hope you all also enjoy my free software fever :D

HAIL THE FREE SOFTWARE!!!

Travel to DALLAS, TX

2007-06-20T23:06:00.000-05:00

After I (had just) got my driver's license, I was sooooo eager to get a car, obviously a used one (the cheapest price for a new car is around $15,000 ~ 490,000฿, while an average price for a good conditioned, used one is around $7,000 ~ 490,000฿)

Actually, I did research about used cars and new cars for a while, but couldn't do anything as I had no license!!! NOW IS MY TIME TO DO SHOP THEM HA HA HA

After I research the car price over the Internet, I found that, in the big city, I will, definitely, get a better car than those in my town, with the same rate. Spending a lot of time researching, Mon and I had Dallas as a conclusion for a shopping place. Moreover, we can go meeting Nunn (Mon's gig) at Denton (neighboring city).

OK, come back to the details of traveling to Dallas.

For your information, let me talk about Greyhound, the public ground transportation of US-คล้ายๆ บ.ข.ส. ประเทศไทยแหละ. Please remember that, in US, if you made a reservation pretty long time before the trip (e.g. 1 week), you will get some significantly discount. In my case, Mon chose to pay for the ticket one week before the trip, we got only $58 instead of $90.

I arrived the bus station a little bit early, and it surprise me. The greyhound bus station in my city was farrrrr more different than those in my imaginations (I imagined more than one :p). Take a look at the picture T_T

Moreover, it was 6 hours to travel with greyhound to Dallas (เมื่อยตูด อย่างแรง). Before we arrived Shreveport, the little Latin boy was so annoying. He kept crying and shouting (สาดดด เด๋วตบกลิ้ง ไอ้เด็กเวร). We take a long break (about 30 min.) at Shreveport, LA.

Shreveport greyhound bus station had a very interesting guard (see picture)

And then after we continue traveling, the other white children started playing and yelling!!! (and when they didn't had something they want, they'll start crying T_T)

By the way, we arrived Dallas safely :) - around 5-6 PM.

After we arrived Dallas, we go to "Enterprise" (the car-rental company), rent a car and drive to Super 8 Hotel. Here is a tip for anyone who didn't own any GPS (Global Positioning System, an expensive device being used for telling about 'WHERE YOU ARE' in the world and can give you the road direction to the place you want to go), you can use Google maps. It is very helpful.

Next day, we started to finding cars in our list...

Fortunately, the hotel provided high-speed internet (around 6 Mbps). I can use high-speed internet at my room, send a copy of google map to my mail and used share printer at the (very small) lobby to get map printed. By the way, with our bad luck and the suck of the traffic sign system here, we always get lost!!!

In the morning, we would like to go to a Mitsubishi dealer, but ended up with another Mitsubishi dealer. When I asked the dealer that is this the address I am seeking, he lied to me "yes, of course". Oh man... And he took me to test a car - Mitsubishi Galant, year 2000.

He tried almost everything to sold me that car. I tried to tell him that I just want more time to think about it.... At the first time, he tried to sold it to me at $9,500. I told him that I can't afford it... Hey tried to give me a monthly payment option (with some interest rate, as we knew). I never agree with this kind of option (why we had to pay more???). I confirmed him that I had only $7,000 to spend, and it is cash. Then he left me for a while ... and come back to told me that I was so lucky, with cash pay at that time, the deal can be closed with only $7,000. HOLY SHIT!!! $9,500 to $7,000 man.... Don't have to think about how much profit they made from selling used car. I drove that car and felt something bad about the suspension. After we check the car history from CarFax.com, we saw a lot of suspension repair/check/replace list... No doubt, this car might have suspension problem.

Finally, we can get out from that tricky dealer safely (phewwww)

We spent almost 2 hours with this dealer T_T (I tried to get out since 1 hr after we finished test driving)

After that, we had to go to meet another private car owner at Mesquite Mall. We had lunch at the A&W there.

When we met this private car owner (we trade privately, no dealer to make profits), we found that the Honda Accord Special Edition '97 is in a very good shape. Especially when comparing to its price - $4,900.

Monn (the Honda professional) said the engine is in a good shape, I felt the suspension is good also. Only some scratch on the exterior body, interior still very good.

We love this car, even it is old (10 yrs) but the condition is still good and we can save a lot of money (we don't have to spend all $7,000 budget, right?). We tried to bargain to $4,500 but the deal was closed at $4,700. It's OK :)

So lucky, we got a car in 1 day :) then we can return the rented car to Enterprise earlier, and paid only for 1 day rental, hippy :) - save more money.

After that day, we spent time to travel around Dallas and its vicinity, with Nunn.

Please see pics @ my web album, I already give stories with picture there.

So tired... so long story ...

Wanna talked a little bit more details, but I can't hold it any more T_T

Thanks for reading everyone

Regards,
Fug U Man

Say hello to my BLOG and my driver's license :)

2007-06-14T00:52:00.000-05:00

First of all, greeting my new blog. Everything in this blog, written by me, will be English, except for something that English can't give a right expression (e.g. เช็ดเข้เอ๊ยยยย)

Hoping that my friends gonna forgive me in changing blog address (again) and not writing in Thai.

OK, back to my story.

I'd just got a driver's license for a couple days, very proud of it (T_T).

Yes, I just said I am so proud of it.

First of all, let me told you how important driver's license is. The driver's license is an important photo ID card. Almost every where accept driver's license as a personal id card (แม่งใช้กันแทนบัตรประชาชนเลยครับ). And, of course, I can't drive any car without this license.

It's importance didn't make me sooooo proud of it, not at all. The hardness of getting this card did.

Before I was eligible to have a test, by Louisiana Law, I had to have a basic driving course certificate. This class cost me $35.00 (กรวยเอ๊ย แพงสาดดดด), plus I had to pass the after class examination (no less than 80%), or I lose my $35.00 for nothing (สาดดดด). Luckily, I passed this test and got a certificate. It seems like this test didn't give me any benefit (except for certificate to get a real test), but, by the way, it taught me quite a lot about basic law and rules of driving in US (แต่กรูก็อ่านเองได้สาดดดด หนังสือที่ DMV-Department of Motor Vehicle- เค้าก็แจกฟรี)

OK, that's the first step to get my driver's license. I had that kind of class last month, but didn't have enough free time (and also my friends, who had to took me to the DMV). Then, before going to have a test, I had to review all of content in the book, almost like I never had that class before. The difference is the teacher in that class will emphasize SOMETHING that might be in the real test (พูดตรงๆ แม่งบอกข้อสอบ).

And I took the paper test in the morning. The test was easy, and I could communicate (both listening and speaking) quite well this day (my communication ability is not steady, depending on .... I don't know ว่ะ แม่งแล้วแต่วัน) then I had some confident that the road test is gonna be not hard. It is quite easy to drive here. Almost everything is the same as it was in Thailand, just follow the direction of traffic signs (speed limits, etc.), except for the left-hand side driver and the right-of-way (ประเทศไทยชิดซ้าย ที่นี่ชิดขวา). Mon and I passed the paper test easily.

In the afternoon, I came back to have a road test. I didn't know what happen to me. At that time, I started to got bad communication. (Ohhhhhh sardddd).

Before I drove a car (borrow from my Thai friend here--thanks to you P' Kan--but the real owner is P' Kan's Korean friend), I had to demonstrate the basic car system, e.g. turn light, head light, and horn. My nervousness started to make me got worse communication (T_T). Luckily I can make a right guess about what she (the tester) said.

Then, I started to drive. The tester told me the way (which I had already learned from P' Kan, and from history, the route had never been changed), and I just drove as she said.

The speed limit was changed in some part of the road test, the tester waned me twice about the speed limit. I just follow the car in front of me, and not try to make a traffic jam. After she warned me, I slow down, and the traffic behind me started to be jammed.

In one little street (คำว่า street นี่มันซอยแล้วนะ สำหรับ US) I saw a stop sign (pretty close) and the tester told me to stop. She just said "stop". I thought she want me to stop at the stop sign (like warn me, as she did when she saw me drive over the speed limit), so I didn't pull over (แปลว่าจอดรถ). Then, she started to use a hard voice, I still didn't get her. Finally, she scold, "STOP THE VEHICLE COMPLETELY". กรวยเอ๊ยยยยย, I scream in my head, ใครจะไปรู้ป้ามึงฟะ ว่ามึงจะให้กูหยุดตรงนี้เนี่ย (before the stop sign about 10-20 feet). All I could say (at that time) was "sorry ma'am" (โวยวายเดี๋ยวมันไม่ให้กูผ่าน). Then she gently order me to back up (แปลว่าถอยหลังนะจ๊ะ), stop again and went forward.

After the hardest time (for me) in the test, everything was just fine :)

I had been warned about speed limit and changing lane without blind-spot checking, and passed the road test (WAHAHAHAHAHA).

Sooooo stress, man...

And I got my driver's license, just right after the road test (take a picture and got the card, sooo fast).

Ahhhh... just alleviate me one step....

Now I have to consider about buying a car, hard time again.....

The plan is we (Mon and I) will go to Dallas (near Denton, where Nunn'd just arrived) and get a car. There are a lot of good car there, and their prices are much more cheaper than in Ruston.

I'll post the car buying experience again when I got one.

Thanks to whomever be patient and keep reading until this line :)

FUG U MAN

Suvarnabhumi

2006-09-27T07:54:00.000-05:00

Today, Sep 27, 2006, I, Mr.Fug, had a chance to use the Suvarnabhumi Airport. This airport had been promoted a lot by the government (Mr.Thaksin Government). The airport is very HUGE, a lot more huge than Don Meung the old air port. Despite its HUGE, we still had some critics about Suvarnabhumi Airport. My experience today told me that Suvarnabhumi had only one advantage, HUGE.

Here are my, and my friend -- called N for abbreviation -- experiences at the Airport today.

5.30 AM - I woke N up in order to prevent ourselves going there late. N had to go to Narathiwat today for taking picture with Her Royal Highness Princess Sirindorn, as his father asked. So, I had to drive him there.

According to our plan, N will fly to Narathiwat at the morning and fly back to Bangkok in the evening with N's mom using Songkhla Airport, because there is only one flight a day for Narathiwat. That flight will fly from Bangkok to Narathiwat and fly back to Bangkok immediately.

6.00 AM - We leaved our resident, too early, too clumsy, too sleepy. But we had to do like this. Traffics in Bangkok might be very terrible.

6.30 AM. We arrived at the Airport. "WHAT THE FUG!!!", N exclaim with me, "We arrived too early, I need more sleep time!!!!." We go to Thai Air Asia counter to check-in, but it was too early, pretty operator told us that we can check in after 7.30 AM.

We were hungry a little, then we looked for something to eat. What a surprised, almost all fast-food shop here were closed, not yet decored. The only one place that allow us to eat was a no-name cafeteria, acuatlly we didn't recognize its name.

7.20 AM. We finished our breakfast. N would like to use toilet, then we sought for it. Fortunately, the toilets in Suvarnabhumi are not hard to be found. Despite this was a very new airport, and it was very promoted about its glamour, the toilets were not looking good as I and N expected. They were looked like toilets in Siam Center. Luxurious as Siam Paragon or more is what I expected to see. N also claimed "It looks dirty, man".

7.30 AM. Thai Air Asia counter was opened, N was the third queue in the line. Unbelievably, we have to wait for half an hour for checking in!!! The pretty check-in operator said it was something wrong about the check-in computer system. "WHAT THE FUG!!!!!", N exclaimed in his heart, I can read it from his face.

Besides, there are very few seats there, most people have to stand for waiting. At this time, I think the airport was bad designed, and not focused on the conveniently services.

8.30 AM. We went to the gate, waiting for boarding, so bored. Surprisingly, I saw a bird flying over my head, in the terminal. "How the hell can that bird come in???", N asked me with a mocking in his voice. "Can we rely on the airport security???", he kept murmuring.

9.30 AM. We were on board, Thai Air Asia flight FD3151. Only a few minutes later, we saw a few engineers were going into the captain room, and N saw one of them reading the Plane Manual (it is a book like car manual in our cars). "WHAT THE HELL IS IT TODAY???", N exclaimed with me again. "CAN WE FLY TO NARATHIWAT SAFELY?", he doubt. Next couple minutes, the sweet-voiced air hostate announce that we had encountered some technical problem. She apologize and wanted us to leave the plane and go back to the terminal (at the gate).

"WHAT THE F...CKING THAI AIR ASIA!!!", N harshly exclaimed (in his heart).

We wait for another hour, during that hour, the air hostate declared a few times which inform everyone that you have to wait and wait, if the plane were going to be worked I will tell you.

10.30 AM. After a moody hour, she, the air hostate, announce that the new schedule for the flight was 12.30 pm. "WHAT THE FARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGG", N was so upset.

We wait upsetingly til that time. Before we on board, second-time on board, N's dad called to N, and told that we must be too late, her royal highness will fly back before we arrived there. This truely very deeply disappointed N, but he can lay it down soon.

12.30 PM. We were on board. Thai Air Asia technician were still fixing that plane, fortunately, they arrange another one for us. We are flying to Narathiwat.

N didn't change his mind, he didn't cancel the ticket, despite this late. he think at least we fly to visit his father, even a couple hour.

2.25 PM. We arrived Narathiwat. We greet N's dad at the Narathiwat Airport, and then he told that we can fly back to Bangkok for now because all N's mom business here were finished!!! "WHAT THE HELL!!!", N scream (surely, in his heart).

We wait for N's mom about 5 minutes and we went back to the same plane we came.

WE STAND ON NARATHIWAT SOIL ONLY ABOUT 5-10 MINUTES!!!

And we flew back to Suvarnabhumi Airport.

3.55 PM. We arrived at Suvarnabhumi Airport.

SAADDDDDDDDDDD

ALL I NEED IS 'U'

F...CKING THAI AIR ASIA!!!

My (and my neighbor's) roof

2006-09-11T00:16:00.000-05:00

From The Roof of My HOME @ Sriracha

Fug's first post

2006-09-11T00:11:00.000-05:00

Yeah, account for the title, this is nothing more than my first post. Just it :D