2 PCs, 1 monitor

Here's the solution to my 2 PCs, 1 monitor problem. An HDMI switch (not a splitter which would solve the opposite problem). The 2 outputs go into the main unit, while the attached 1m cable couples with the lone functional HDMI input slot in the monitor. Now I can have both PCs on and toggle between the 2 displays using the circular button on the main unit, instead of having to alternately plug separate cables in and out of the slot causing unnecessary wear and tear on everything. This switch is from Baseus and was the only model I found on the shelves at my local Challenger. So total budget overrun is now $23 for the extra HDMI cable, and $24 for the switch.

The new desktop powerhouse

A mostly easy and painless setup of the new Aftershock Ryzen 5 7600 + GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER rig. Essentially just plug and play. The problem I had was with my existing monitor which apparently has only 1 functional HDMI port. Maybe the other port needs cleaning, but my idea of sharing 1 monitor between 2 rigs isn't quite as seamless as I hoped.

Honestly, it's not the pretty lights and colours that attracted me, but the value I could get from each dollar spent. I do like the simplicity and neatness visible within the box through the plexiglass panels. Reminds me of a fishtank housing a family of tetras.

The corner of the monitor gives away the first game I'm playing on the new setup. Finally, Diablo 4 is running as quickly and smoothly as it should. It's currently Season 5, and I've been very lucky with the mythical drops of exactly the equipment I need from early in the playthrough. I picked up a Starless from normal Duriel, and an Andy's from normal Andy when the odds of any of them dropping from normal bosses are unrealistically high. Seasonal rewards give plenty of summoning materials to try for another mythical drop from Tormented Bosses, and I got a Tyrael's from Tormented Beast in Ice. Finishing the seasonal campaign with 3 separate characters provided enough crafting materials to manufacture my own mythic Shako. Now all I need to do is figure out which of the 3 characters is my favourite to bear this entire collection of treasures and blast the remainder of the season away to my heart's content.

Unboxing in the morning

My poor old PC has been struggling to deliver performance on the stuff I'm currently playing, and there's no way it'll cope with the new stuff coming up. He'll serve as my browsing and work desktop, but it's finally time to upgrade.

After holding off a little over 7 years, I finally decide it's time to get a new PC. I pretty much fell for the aggressive marketing that Aftershock PC puts out on social media. The timing was perfect, stars aligning along the return on an investment I made, and COMEX 2024 -- the time of year everyone who's selling IT stuff slashes prices like it's Black Friday. I shelled out for an AMD 5700 rig, with RTX 4070 graphics, upgraded to 32 Gb RAM, and 64-bit Windows 11. 

Aftershock wasn't kidding about next office day delivery. It's here, in a box, in my study, waiting to be installed. Thing is, although it arrived at about 8pm today (within 24 hours!), I wasn't ready for it to be delivered so soon. It stays in the box for tonight while I mentally prepare to roll up my sleeves for the grand installation come morning..

The baseball-equity cartoon

No, no, no. The above cartoon attempts to explain how equality does not necessarily mean fairness. Actually, what our three friends are demonstrating is criminal activity -- watching a game without paying for a ticket. How are these three moochers being fair to those people in the stands who paid for entry?

In the right panel, all barriers to accessing the game have collapsed. And because nobody needs to buy a ticket, the sport has no more money to maintain a nice, fancy stadium any longer; all the pros have lost their jobs. Goodness knows what our three friends are still watching. Happy now?

Unless... the transparent fence represents a TV screen? It doesn't cost as much to watch a televised game, and every viewer has clear line-of-sight to the action, regardless of how vertically-challenged they may be. The stadium still functions and the professional players are still employed.

All the tweaks we might make meddling with human political systems for the sake of 'fairness' will always leave some party or another dissatisfied. It is perhaps technology that is the greatest leveler in the end.

Footnote: Located the original artist of the graphic. Craig Froehle is now tracking in fascinating detail the meme he created. Click here for an interesting read into how it has spread in its many permutations since its conception in 2012.

Cut off

What the cutting off of civil service computers from the Interwebs really means is that the Gahmen is tired of providing free surfing privileges for us. Now if we want to surf, we have to pay for it from our own pockets. We buy our own workstations and subscribe to our own mobile hotspots. Guess the era of free Internet is over.

Edit 01:
Except for us in the education fraternity. Phew!

Hiddenradio2 -- big sound from a tiny can

Another early arrival -- my set of 2 Hiddenradio2 Bluetooth speakers. Ordered from Kickstarter more than a year-and-a-half ago, it arrived unexpectedly on my doorstep this morning.

Unboxed and activated (right), it looks like a soft drink can. The bottom layer is the speaker proper, while the upper bit is the casing that slides up and down on a smooth touch-activated mechanism. In fact, there are no visible controls at all. Just touch the top surface for on-off; start-stop music track; or draw circles, clockwise for more volume anticlockwise for less. Right now, I've got a single speaker playing music on Spotify. The sound is beautifully crisp, no hiss, no fuzz; lyrics, instrumentation and percussion sharp and clearly reproduced -- though given its size, it's not bass-heavy. Maybe when the app is released on the respective app stores, there'll be a software equalizer to play with. Still, sound projection is omni-directional, which means it should do well outdoors, especially when paired with its twin for a stereo effect.

For the moment, though, I'm thinking of keeping one unit at home and taking the other to work. Yes, there are times I need an easily set up wireless speaker system while being hard at work. This device should fit the bill quite nicely!

Little night light

Collected another quirky mail-order purchase. Meet the Firefly. It's a geometrically-shaped object you can hold in the palm of your hand and is powered by four AAA batteries if you want to carry it around. It also plugs into a wall socket if you just want it to stay put.

 What does it do? It's a laser lamp that casts a funky grid of blue light dots on whatever you're pointing it at...

like so. I'll probably use it as a night light until I can figure out what other uses I can put it to, like maybe to drive multiple cats nuts or something. I think it might also create a cool lighting effect on stage -- a star field or a magical environment that suddenly comes into being with a convenient push of a button.

I got this Firefly as a Kickstarter package that includes this handy carry-case and heart-shaped filter for a roomful of hearts instead of star points. Being a Kickstarter launch, inevitable production delays meant that I had to wait over a year before it finally arrived, just a little too late for Drama Night. But I'm sure I can find a use for it in next year's. For more details, check out the Parhelion website.

Old faithful

Having computer trouble again. My primary desktop PC became increasingly unbootable and for two days now I've been running between home and the shop. Bought a new power supply thinking it would fix the problem, but it just got worse. Today the service guy decided it was the mainboard that was giving trouble. The good news: the warranty is still valid. The bad news: it will take weeks of hospitalization to get the necessary parts switched out.

So my old faithful stand-by PC has now been pressed out of retirement to serve me once again. Spent much of the day updating software (though that's pretty much it for Win XP support). It runs like an old man: slow, clunky, even video playback is juddery... but it works!

Unfortunately, PC gaming is completely stalled for now; but maybe now I'll have more time for my dog. Walkies, girl?

Keeping it going

It's been a tiring, taxing, draining week. Never let it be said that JC1 was a walk in the park. Haven't had much time to post entries since term began, and am feeling too pooped to add much more in this one. A couple of pix then?

The dog's still undergoing basic obedience training; there's been no rain for a while; and the grass is brown. Everywhere.

I succumbed to the evil empire today and finally got my very own iDevice. Of course, I'd think twice about shelling out for it if it weren't heavily subsidised by a mysterious, unnamed benefactor; and having a retail membership discount making it an even sweeter deal. Also, ageing eyes needs a bigger screen to look at. There. I said it.

Go fetch!

Oh, my! A new package freshly delivered! It was supposed to be dog's Christmas pressie, but missed the date by a stretch. Better late than never.

The box graphic says it all. It's a ball launcher for dog to play 'fetch' with.

The overall design is reminiscent of an old-time spittoon. The hopper up top is where the ball gets dropped into. There is a click and a whirr, and seconds later the ball is ejected out the spout. Fun and games ensue as dog frantically tears after said ball, leaving a wake of destruction in her path. Lesson #1: clear the runway of foreign objects before attempting airborne operation.

The ammunition that came with the ball cannon. In all seriousness, despite the, um, nostalgic outward aesthetic, mechanically the iFetch is a nicely designed dog toy patterned after the tennis-ball launcher. Powered by wall socket or six 'C' batteries, the range can be adjusted from 10 to 20 to 30 ft. Launch trajectory is low to avoid unexpected crotch shots. Uncomplicated, hardy, and unlikely to break down easily due to apparently few moving parts, it's quite a good buy. This particular unit came at a Kickstarter introductory price, so that was even nicer.

A couple of points to take note of, though. Although the balls look like tennis balls, they're actually softer and smaller in size. For a small dog, that's fine, but for a big dog, could they be a choking hazard? Also, the long-term plan is for the dog to operate the iFetch by herself in case she has no one to play with when she's bored. However, there's some training involved that's going to take some time. There's a helpful training video on the website, so that's gonna be fun. Let's play ball!

Tiny charger

You know some people who carry "power banks" which are external battery packs for use when their cell phones are low on juice? This is the Fuel, the smallest in the family of such accessories. Purchased from Kickstarter, this pair was just delivered today, missing Christmas by a pinch of hairs.

While most other power banks sport fancy schmancy designs, Fuel has gone with a very utilitarian jerry-can look. Given the choice of red or green, the answer was obviously both.

Size-wise it's clearly larger than a 50-cent coin, but it's quite light and should still fit comfortable in a jeans pocket.

While it comes with a key-ring loop, it doesn't come with its own micro-USB cable, but since you're already charging your phone with one you don't really need the extra clutter of another one.

With the little rubber cap off you plug your phone in at the top. iPhone users will, of course, order a Lightning-compatible connector instead of the standard micro-USB one. Below, there are three LEDs that indicate charge status. There is also a nifty on/off switch to prevent the unit from discharging power when not in use.

A couple of small practical issues, though: you have to remove your phone cover to plug it in properly as the connector isn't long enough to accommodate the extra layer of silicone or plastic. Secondly, it fits into your phone cross-wise, so you don't want to have both devices connected to each other when you put them back in your pocket, unless you like your pockets lumpy for whatever reason.

Fuel is no substitute for your regular phone battery, but it is a handy emergency stand-by for a few minutes extra talk-time or sending a desperate slew of text messages out until you are able to charge your phone again.

Back in circulation

The old Samsung SIII has a new lease of life. The previous charging problems it had seems to have been resolved by replacing the original USB micro-B cable with a borrowed Blackberry one. Also borrowed are an external battery charger and a couple of extra batteries for additional support.

As for the battery drain problem, turning off most of the automatic notifications -- which involves logging out of the apps themselves -- now keeps the thing running a whole day before needing an overnight recharge.

The reason why the SIII is back in action is because the wife's iPhone crashed after installing the latest iOS 7 update and is now in permanent Recovery Mode. In the meantime, I'm learning to love the new Note 3.

The ICT-grade correlation

Despite the inroads that have been made so far, Education and Info-comm Tech (ICT) are still rather uncomfortable with each other. On one extreme, a school district willy-nilly hands out iPads to each kid as a substitute for text books, but is embarrassed when the delighted recipients break board-approved security settings and play games on them instead. Obviously iPads are not books and if you have to cripple an iPad so badly so that it can only function as a book, you might as well just stick to books. Or be prepared to discover that kids are smarter than you (give them credit for).

On the other extreme are schools that believe ICT is nice to wave around as a publicity thing, but don't actually maximize its potential because old suspicions still prevail. This is especially apparent when school authorities strongly advise the kids to cut themselves off social media a month ahead of the final exams in order to concentrate on studying from books. Such pronouncements ultimately undermine the value ICT has for learning, and so once again we have a might-as-well-not situation.

The suspicion of ICT stems from the initial (wrong) assumption that the increased use of ICT will result in a commensurate increase in 'A' grades. When the number of 'A' grades doesn't rise, it is considered sufficient proof that ICT is not as effective a learning tool as 'they' claimed after all. Suspicion confirmed.

It is indeed true that ICT use does not increase 'A' grades, but it is a seriously flawed assumption that the two share a direct correlation. If we're chasing 'A' grades we expect to find evidence that ICT has an effect on learning. No evidence will be forthcoming because ICT has NO effect on learning.

Shocked? Does this mean that ICT is of no use, then? Obviously not, because in not seeing what you want to see, you are also not seeing what there is to be seen. ICT may have no e-ffect on learning, but it does a-ffect learning. ICT use does not make people smart in the way that a crippled iPad does not make people book smart. ICT affects the way people learn, if you use the array of tools available to encourage self-directed, collaborative learning. ICT use changes the learning game from solo play to co-op play, and co-op play gives learners the ability to learn better, faster and more meaningfully than solo play.

So if people using ICT correctly become smarter faster, then why does it not translate into a bumper crop of 'A' grades? Because when they return to the exam hall, they're cut off from their learning networks and they're forced to play solo once again. How they are tested is not reflective of the kind of learners they have become.

I don't foresee the end of the solo exam format anytime soon. So schools must ask themselves: given the cheap availability and potential of ICT to build strong, affective learning networks throughout the entire learning organization, is our primary goal to produce kids who know how to get things done by working together and managing a broad, diverse range of networked knowledge curated according to individual interests and tastes; or kids who are divided by their ability and lack thereof to score 'A' grades within a narrow band of knowledge that has no contextual application outside the exam hall?

Fellow flailers!

Following up from my previous entry, I got to see a lot more of my colleagues who are enthusiastically flailing about in unfamiliar territory than I gave credit for.

The souvenir book (left) the organizers handed out is quite a thick compilation of lesson plans and strategies used across all levels of education designed to get the kids off their lazy butts and take a more active and purposeful role in their own learning.

Some of the stuff that I got to observe were tools I and anyone else have easy access to for free over the 'net. The strategies they shared were simple enough, and up to a point I'm using them the same way. It's good to know how closely parallel we are in our objectives, and even better to learn from the variations in the way we use these tools.

Dean Krishnan would be happy to see how so many of us are trying out new methods of student engagement rather than stick to the old tried-and-true formulas that we have grown accustomed to.

Maybe the four-lane highway we're all waiting for our pioneering flailers to construct is closer to realization than I had imagined...?

Creating intelligence

I've been reading Visions by Michio Kaku. Published in 1997, it envisions the future century based on the work and research that was taking place at that time. About 15 years later, today, already some predictions have come to pass surprisingly quickly, others still need a slightly longer time-frame.

But what I want to share is three paragraphs from Dr Kaku's chapter on Artificial Intelligence. What I see in them is a parallel between the approach one AI branch is taking to create smart machines and the approach we in education default to in trying to create smart kids.

"Although researchers of the two schools of artificial intelligence sit side by side in the same building, the lines between them are clearly drawn. On one side of the debate are the distinguished founders of artificial intelligence who have spent a lifetime programming mammoth computers to model human intelligence. Their inspiration for a thinking machine was a powerful digital computer -- the bigger, the better. Their strategy was dubbed the top-down approach; they believed they could program in the logic and reasoning ability necessary for a machine to think. They assumed that thinking machines -- like Minerva, the Roman goddess of wisdom, who sprang out from Jupiter's forehead fully grown -- would emerge fully developed from a computer.

Their recipe for building a thinking machine was simple: First pour the complex rules and programming into a digital computer in order to reproduce logic and intelligence, then sprinkle on a few subroutines for speech and vision, attach mechanical hands, legs and eyes... Voila! You would have an intelligent robot. Inside that robot's brain would be a complete representation of the outside world, a detailed manual that described the rules for living in the real world.

Their philosophy was based on the idea that intelligence can be simulated by a "Turing machine," which forms the basis of all digital computers. But the traditionalists soon slipped into a quagmire; they profoundly underestimated the enormity of writing down the complete road map of human intelligence. Their computer-based machines turned out to be pathetic, feeble creatures. The mobile robots built on their approach consumed vast amounts of computer power, yet they were surprisingly inept: agonizingly slow and timid, they frequently got lost. They were useless in the real world." (Kaku, 1997).

The other approach is, obviously, the bottom-up approach. This approach is the learn-by-doing, trial-and-error, develop-environmental-awareness-from-your-own-immediate-surroundings method. Dr Kaku is clear that neither is the "superior" approach and that for AI to be truly successful, top and bottom must meet somewhere in the middle.

Likewise for our kids. Based on their somewhat disappointing mid-year performance, they clearly demonstrate how their top-down learning method with heavy reliance on rote gives them a lot of information to reproduce in their essays, but very little ability to string a reasoned argument together that makes much sense. The kids may have a lot memorized, but ultimately it means nothing to them. They act like conduits, passing along information but none of it is real to them. Because they have no personal stake in the info, there is also neither structure nor framework in which they can manipulate the info to any purposeful use.

Below, I'm sharing a video clip that demonstrates how a bottom-up approach does seem to boost development in the kind of discourse required of the kids for GP:

Assuming the subtitles are legit (I'm a bit dubious of the jump-cuts), this 12-year old would ace GP already. At his fingertips are issues relating to politics, religion, socio-economic inequality, law and order, and human rights which he most eloquently discusses as he explains his purpose for not being in school today.

His intelligence stems from simply being aware of his immediate environment, exercising good sense and good judgement based on a value system that respects equality, freedom and eschews exploitation and the abuse of power. He reads the newspaper, listens to people, watches TV, reads from the Internet, and most importantly, uses his own brain. He lives GP, breathes GP, thinks GP.

A kid like this is likely to view with contempt any attempt by his teacher to give him a pre-digested 'reading package'. He might even burn it for being establishment propaganda. Our kids treat reading packages like the Gospel. 'nuff said.

Fibred up!

After getting the fibre line installed in my house I never activated it. That's because at the same time, Starhub upgraded my service to 50 mbps and gave me a free cable modem to supply the bandwidth. That was just shy of two years ago. Now Starhub's offering me a fibre upgrade and I've accepted. In a simple procedure, the 'hub rep hooked up the fibre gateway and wireless router for me. I'm downloading YouTube videos at 100 mbps in HD, with no buffering time. This is not to say that they're good videos or anything; it's just a speed benchmark I can appreciate. For all this combined with my existing cable TV subscription, the monthly bill comes down a couple of bucks. Nice.

Cherry red

Cherry red Pebble arrived a couple of weeks ago, but has remained unboxed until now. Initially purchased for the wife, but it's not quite her style. Been debating what to do with it. Thought of wearing it myself, but red really isn't my colour either. But I found a happy buyer in my neighbour, so I'll be selling it off at cost. Yay for colleagues with geek cred!

Once more around the Galaxy

Interesting that my friends know what I lack. There's the issue of a cell phone I either keep on silent or I just don't carry around with me, which keeps me incommunicado most of the time. That is a source of irritation for some quarters -- which I apologize for -- but I was waiting until I could re-contract with my service provider without penalty for a premature handset upgrade. 

The other thing I was waiting for was the unveiling of the iPhoney 5, but recent legal developments forced me to reconsider my potential ties with the Evil Empire.

And so, meet my newest mobile device, a Galaxy SIII in a slick pebble blue case. It boasts a big, beautiful, sharp (Super AMOLED) screen that my ageing eyes are so very grateful for; a fast camera that takes pretty decent pictures; and a whole bunch of other functions that could effectively take over from my current 7" tablet and still be able to fit in my trouser pocket comfortably 'cos it's surprisingly light for its relative size. My only problem with it after a day of use is that the smooth case is horrendously slippery. But that's nothing a silicone skin can't fix. Oh in case you're wondering what's propping up the SIII for the pix (above), that's Momo. Good girl, Momo.

In other news:

Pix from my SIII: the wife is embarking on a DIY home-improvement project. We're in Defu Lane to scrounge up some scrap planking, but wound up purchasing teak! A bit extravagant for what she's planning, I think, but if it turns out well maybe it'll be worth it.

And somewhere across the road, we pick up more supplies. Act like a DIY newbie and the vendors are sympathetic and offer a lot of advice. And I believe we still got away with paying reasonable prices for the stuff we got.

Hopefully, I'll be able to upload project details by next weekend when the work begins in earnest.

The "how far" question

Heeyyy, kids! It's model essay time again!

Been trying to explain to the kids why "to what extent..." and "how far..." questions cannot logically be answered with "to a large/small extent". The common error is to argue for and against the subject in order to somehow determine whether the pros outweigh the cons or vice versa. However, unless the essay identifies some criteria for this decision -- such as a value, a context or some other yardstick -- that decision is arbitrary and often baseless. Less skilled essayists are also likely to end up with internally conflicting arguments with little to no resolution.

"To what extent" and "how far" assume that the subject is already in play. In this case, the question "how far should a state have a right to monitor the actions of people within its borders?" the argument is not whether a state should or should not have or use its internal monitoring capabilities. Rather, the assumption is that the state does indeed have a right to do so, the question then being how much of this right is it acceptable to exercise before it becomes an unacceptable abuse of power. This is not a question for merely comparing pros and cons but a question of clearly identifying what is normal, acceptable behaviour of the state and what is clearly abnormal, unacceptable behaviour. And if at all possible, identifying some kind of general principle that can guide the responsible use of such power.

Hopefully, the kids will be able to see how this essay argues and resolves the above dilemma without tying itself up in convoluted knots. Ok, enough talk. Here it is: click here.

Behind the scenes: wrote another massively long essay but ruthlessly chopped it down to [close to] the word limit. Also replaced one of the original paragraphs 'cos it was sounding paranoid and pushing towards an extreme I did not want to deal with. Yes, I'm also aware that the conclusion is easier said than done. Sue me.

Thinking like a machine

"By forgoing an initial singular formula and using relational structures that recognize the rows, columns and diagonals of a boardgame, and making use of several different logic systems — including pure first-order, existential and guarded — a tailored formula could be devised from the data gathered from each logic. An added General Game Playing program helped the system learn how to play tactically, learn legal moves and, ultimately, win." excerpt from Computer Watches Humans Play Connect Four, Then Beats Them

I recognize this strategy. I use a very similar strategy to approach GP, especially for the essay Paper 1. It could also perhaps answer why I am having such a hard time convincing the kids to think like I do: I didn't realize it before, but it seems like this is how machines think and not human beings.

At least I know that what I took to be natural intuition can actually be a structured process. It's almost damn near impossible to teach people to be intuitive, but perhaps they'll be more open if they can see it as a process instead. *shoehorns it down kids' throats...