Wednesday, September 30, 2009

The invisible thread

Kevin Prohl
  • Eye contact, engaging story, gestures, relation, variation, tone; for the audience.
  • Imagery
  • Vocal variation, pause, volume, pitch.
  • Pictures, colour.
  • Have a lesson; a triad - in threes.
  • Take something away - "take away".
  • Impact openings - attract attention.
  • Convection, sincerity.
  • Connect to the audience.
  • Making that connection to the audience - the invisible thread.
  • "Ready, Aim, Blame"
  • "Hiss"

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Ray Avery

Went to MIT guys for advice on making incubator. They suggested a car part model. That seemed useless because repair would be very hard to do since each part would be custom made and very hard to service in a third world country.

The ideal would be to make something that did not require any repairing, at all.
  • Incubator - costs nothing and requires no replacement.
  • Snap fitting - no screw driver likely to be found in third world countries.
  • Making things indestructible - physically and electronically.
  • "Life Raft"
  • Eventual incubator can be sold in third world countries but also first world. "It is not a cheap knock off".
The baby generates the bugs (source). The air needs to be cleaned from within. Using UV LEDs to kill the bugs. LEDs also serves as an impromptu heating element. Air filters can be made self cleaning through periodic reversal of air flow into the incubator.

Monday, September 28, 2009

MikesBikes MCC Competition Final Results

MCC 2014 Scoreboard
From: help@smartsims.com
Sent: Monday, 28 September 2009 10:39 a.m.


Hi Company Managers,

The final rollover for the MikesBikes competition was processed over the weekend. Attached is the Scoreboard report showing all Firms' end placing ranked by Shareholder Value (SHV).

Congratulations to the teams below who placed in the top 3 spots for SHV:

1st - Meritocratic Society $92.41
2nd - OGC $86.50
3rd - Bradford Says Smack $82.14

We noted that the level of competition and decisions were quite high across the board this semester. There were many interesting decisions and gambles which paid off. Business by nature is risky, and the winning teams made calculated risks where other chose to play it safe or missed opportunities. We were also pleased by the decisions and results of the following teams, who we commend for succeeding to reach a high SHV:

OnePlusOne

iBike Pro

Storm of Action

FlowerPower

FlowerPower

Ring a Ling Bikes

We've also created an MCC news page to display previous winners and the current results. You can access this by following the link given below:

http://www.smartsims.com/news/mcc

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Kind Regards,

Danny Master
SmartSims International


IndustryFirmSHVProfitSales Revenue
AsiaMeritocratic Society$92.41$12,515,588$36,546,794
North AmericaOGC$86.50$8,463,745$26,985,872
EuropeBradford Says Smack$82.14$7,948,173$26,671,502
North AmericaOnePlusOne$55.95$4,050,075$29,585,905
EuropeiBike Pro$54.10$5,837,377$20,613,120
EuropeStorm of Action$51.36$5,788,154$27,711,565
AsiaFlowerPower$35.12$3,349,417$21,416,569
North AmericaVivo tinto$34.28$3,443,477$18,749,716
EuropeRing a Ling Bikes$24.77$2,100,923$15,166,398
AsiaSir McJoffalot$12.74$1,461,955$8,151,000
AsiaS & D Corporation$12.74$1,461,955$8,151,000
North AmericaTavron$9.55$197,243$5,166,590
AsiaAD & JD Group$6.39$107,530$16,129,164
North AmericaJuggernaut$3.97($816,215)$13,127,800
EuropeVans$3.71($141,349)$11,427,176
EuropePhoenix Bikes$3.40($1,984,644)$4,537,650
North Americalance's bikes$1.97($3,930,810)$10,200,944
AsiaLIFO$0.29$45,717$10,292,546


Thursday, September 24, 2009

A refined sensor-ability: Applying process algebra to sensor network analysis

Allan McInnes

Communicating Sequential Processes (CSP): mutually consistent denotationally; operationally; and algebraic semantics.

Refinement can provide verification.

Node modeling. Example node:
  • TinyOS: programmed in nesC; component-based; Event driven.
  • TinyOS concurrency: Interrupts (asynchronous) and Task scheduling (synchronous). Task scheduling done with a FIFO queue.
  • Model executed on FDR2.

Network modeling:
  • Time Flooding Synchronization protocol: same time base (only says all nodes will have the same time, whatever it is).
  • Model maxed out at seven nodes.

Further refinements:
  • Network level models against node models. High -> Low level.
  • Check fault tolerance in a network.

Friday, September 11, 2009

ECE Part 4 project on an intelligent online tutoring system

The Felder-Silverman model

  • Facts
  • Discover relationships
  • See it
  • Hear it
  • Logical steps
  • Random order
  • Try it out
  • Think it through

Testing -> Learning -> Application

  • What type of questions can be asked to students?
  • Notion of time to measure stress levels or improvement?
  • Rephrasing a question?
  • Active/Reflective
  • Sensing/Intuitive
  • Visual/Verbal
  • Sequential/Global

Thursday, September 10, 2009

Martin Evans - Nobel Leaurete

Never believe anything

Nullius in verba
Expect the unexpected

Pluripotental cells: including Mouse and man
Embryo equivalence: can be maintained indefinitely.

Derived from work of Berry where a single tumor from one mouse to
another and the cell could differentiate into the full range of cells.

Interrelationships of tumor cells and embryoid bodies.

Couldn't culture embryonal carcinoma cells.

Matt Kaufman. Activation of egg cell. Grow haploid cells?

Cell lines.
Lethal embryonic mutation.

Gene therapy not passed onto germ cells.

Having a defective gene may have disease resistance; Darwin
philosophy. Although it is bad to have two copies of the bad gene.

Isolated stem cells.
Regenerative medicine.

Induced transdifferentiation. Reverse engineer a cell back to the
beginning.