Cyza Sector

I conducted my first experiment yesterday. The aim was to identify problems in my experiment and not getting results yet. But, while running the experiment, I can do some multitasking in my laptop .

Sorry, I know the quality of the video is poor. I took it from my Sony Erickson K810i. Maybe, later I’ll record it from my Panasonic Lumix digital camera instead.

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Today, I blog from my youngest brother new HP netbook which he got when he ordered streamyx for my parent’s house.

What is my experience using a netbook?

Hmmm…this is tricky but I’ll be honest… I’m not use to the keyboard. It is almost the same as other laptop keyboard. I feel like there are less keys in this netbook. There’s no page up and page down keys. I’m not sure of other keys.

A significant point that I dislike is the small monitor. I can’t really blame it too much because this is a netbook and it is suppose to be small. I feel like my overall view is very limited.

Nevertheless, the small size and mass of this netbook are the plus points. No doubt of it!

Do I want to use a netbook?

No!!! Not at all despite of the fact that it is lighter and smaller than a laptop. I still prefer carrying my Toshiba or HP laptop instead of using a netbook.

Please, no offence to netbook users. I just speak my mind…

What to do if you want to blog, but you are not in the mood, just like me in this Monday blues?

You post your recent photos… aha….as simple as that…and now you have a blogpost that consists of that thing that can describe a thousand of words… Agree?

Those are random photos taken in March… No particular reason why I picked those photos… Just for the sake of letting you guys see something interesting. To make things spicier, I’ll let you interpret the pictures yourself.

As a person who are always hooked to the net, in other word, often staying online, can you stand a day offline? Or 1 week offline? I’m throwing this question to learn and comprehend how extreme netizen like me and you can cope without the magic line (internet connection)? I’ll share my experience on how I managed to overcome the situation, the emotion and strength during this long festive break. I’ll share it later when i reach home and united with my wired broadband… I’m now in Kuantan…

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One day after the above entry was written…

Now, I’m in my wife’s supervisor’s house, in Kuantan and the beautiful part is he has streamyx wireless broadband installed in his house. So, I took the opportunity to do some work that I have to do before checking my emails, updating my blog etc. I found that my blog was badly attacked with spam since I was away for 2-3 days from the internet. I hate spam!!! This shows that I need to installed a more powerful plugin to inhibit bad spammers from bombarding my comment box with a dozen of links.

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OK, back to the first paragraph above about what to do and how to overcome yourself when you don’t have the magic internet connection with you. This tips do not apply to those who have celcom or maxis wireless broadband… You are always connected to the net whenever you want. People like me don’t have those broadband yet because I already have streamyx at home and also wireless internet at office. But, I do plan to get myself a prepaid broadband soon so I won’t suffer the way I am now…

Allow me to share my experience on how I spent my time and how I managed to leverage my desperation from the the absenteeism of the net.

1. I must be mentally strong This is very important. I think I managed that well enough.

2. I use Celcom service from my wife’s hand to stay connected to the internet using your handphone (if your handphone can browse the internet). I chose to surf 1 day (RM6) or 7 days (RM20) and send an SMS to 28882 and wait for further instruction from Celcom. Surfing from the handphone may not be as satisfying compared to surfing on a pc or laptop, but it is still a better alternative rather than not knowing what is happening in my email, Facebook and blog…

3. Now that I don’t have that much time to spend online, I can do some house keeping in my laptop. That simply means clearing what is not needed in my hard disc, sending documents to the most suitable folders and so on. Now, my desktop is clear and I’m happy.

4. I also now can spend more quality time with my kids and family. This can be done via several ways such as watching TV together (done that), brought my family to a mini zoo in Kuantan (done that)… and others…

Well that’s it… I’ll still be in Kuantan without the true internet connection till Friday, possibly. After that, then I’ll be in my house in JB and back to business…

Last week, I attended Matlab training with my wife, a training that I organized on behalf of the post graduate society (I’m the post graduate society president in my faculty). My pH.D supervisor also participated in the same training and sat next to my wife. On one of the break during the training, we chit chat about our kids… how our kids are performing in school, how they are progressing etc…

She (my supervisor) highlighted that her son who is in standard 4, is crazy about Farmville. It is difficult to go anywhere because he will always want to get back home, to be online, and work on his farmville in his facebook account. I was amazed that his son has already explored the net and meddle with facebook, uploading photos and videos.

After the training, in our white Proton Exora, on our way back home, I discussed with my wife about our kids. We think it is time for us to seriously expose our kids to the computer and internet. Before this, Ikhwan (standard 2 primary school) and Marsya (6) has been exposed to flash games and youtube. Alya (5) will tagged along with her brother and sister infront of the laptop(s).

Maybe now is the time for Ikhwan to utilize the laptop (or computer) for his early education. There are some online tutorial in the net which we or the school can subscribe. Maybe he can also learn to use google to learn many things, off course with our supervision.

Maybe we should get a dedicated personal computer for the kids…

What do you think? Is it too early?

I just visited the PC Fair in UTM and I bought myself few items to ensure some smoothness in performing both my offline and online duties. So, what did I got for myself?

1. New Sensonic wireless mouse – RM68. I never bought something like this before. I think this is the most expansive mouse I have every bought. I nearly opted to buy a Sony wireless mouse which cost RM98. But, well…what the hack…Too expansive…

2. New notebook cooling pad – RM10. I really need this. My older cooling pad produce nasty weird sound and I hate it. Hence, I get myself a shining blue cooling pad which is cheap but impressively do the job. I’m planning to get another one for my home. With this, I don’t need to carry around my laptop cooling pad.

3. New vacuum cleaner for my laptop keyboard – RM5. I’m not really impress with this small tiny vacuum. I cannot feel the suction. I don’t think it is sucking the dirt on my laptop keyboard. I think it is very bad investment. Luckily it is only RM5, so the damage is not that bad…

Everything is cheap. I don’t like to waste money buying expensive items. Why don’t choose a cheaper one which can also perform the job equally well.

As I’m writing this post I’m in Nanyang Education Center (NEC), Nanyang Technological University, staying alone with my white Toshiba laptop. I’m in Singapore attending a Catalysis Engineering Symposium.

I’m writing this post purely to release my tension on preparing a technical paper to be submitted to a local conference held this coming December. The paper must be submitted in 1-2 days time. I’m very exhausted mentally and physically, but this task need to be completed ASAP.

Oh… I just want to sleep now… or should i drink my hot coffee which i just prepared now?

I missed my country… In Malaysia, I can pray easily anywhere… ;(

Working on Saturday is not really fun because of the fact it’s already weekend!!! However, working on a Saturday is still better than working on weekdays. The working mood is barely there and the mind keeps thinking of what to do after work and on Sundays. That is not exactly the right attitude for an employee but that’s the truth. The productivity of work decrease towards the end of the week.

As for me, besides the unproductive day at work, I met up with an old colleague who work overseas. We chatted, exchanged stories and updated each others with what was happening around us. Meeting up with him was really great and truly inspiring.

After work, I met up with my beloved wife at a shopping mall in Skudai. We had a good and peaceful lunch. Once in a while, it’s really good to be alone together without the kids (we left the kids at home for a while with our maid). Then we went to a furniture shop and bought a beautiful pair of chair set come with a rounded glass table which my wife admired so much. Soon, we challenged each others at the bowling alley. Off course I won the battle, I’m the man!!!

In the evening, we hosted a family dinner which for the first time managed to gather/unite after 1 year. My parents (a retired chemistry professor and housewife); my 2nd brother (an assistant manager from a local telco company), his wife (a medical doctor), their daughter; my younger sister (SIA stewardess who just returned from Japan), my 3rd brother (an architecture student) and my 4th brother (an engineering student) and my family were under one roof and enjoyed a warm nice home cook meal prepared by my wife. Besides catching up with each others stories, we snapped photos, checked on each others new gadgets, watched the live soccer telecast together – Arsenal versus Spurs which end up 2-1.

The next day was a new Sunday. Unlike other Sundays, we woke up early because I want to get myself a new laptop. I already surveyed the model, specifications and prices of the laptop. We went to Landmark IT Mall in Johor Bahru and seek for the desired laptop. Unfortunately, the laptop was out of stock (since the recent PC fair). I was really furious because the shop told me that they still have the model when I called a day earlier. The same goes to other PC shop in the mall. I was really disappointed but I accepted it.

We then went to another mall and also a hypermarket for lunch and some minor groceries. Then we went for swimming at Sofitel Hotel, Senai. Swimming has already became our routine weekend activity ever since my wife joined in as a recreational member in that 5 Star hotel. My kids enjoy playing in the kiddy pool while my wife love swimming to exercise and keep her on shape. I swim as well to reduce my expanding belly!

After almost 2 hours in pool, we went to another mall in Skudai and managed to get hold of the HP Compaq laptop that I hunted. I upgraded the RAM from 512Mb to 1Gb. Well, that’s enough for the time being. Perhaps I’ll upgrade the RAM further later in future. At least I already settled 1 out of 5 short term goals that I set last month. In fact now, I’m typing this post using the new laptop! I’m so excited and pumped up with this new laptop. A big thanks to my friend who helped me installed the OS for my new laptop.

Finally, what could make the weekend perfect for me? It was the Super Sunday live soccer match between the Red Devils and Everton. It was really a superb match with Ronaldo (I know some people hate him! but I fancy him and his skills) scoring twice for Manchester United victory, 2-1. I jumped and shouted like mad as Ronaldo scored the penalty which was just 2 minutes away from full time. That was the weekend icing. The game really conclude a fantastic weekend for me.

In short we bought a gorgeous new chair set, lunched and played bowling with my wife, gathered the entire family member, bring the kids to the pool, owned a new HP Compaq laptop, and witness Manchester United victory against Everton. Surprisingly, I forgot to go online on Sunday due to the hectic activities.

What about your weekend? What would make it a fantastic weekend?

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While I was checking my MyBlogLog account, in the “stats” section, I saw few sites “where readers came from”. They came from Google search engine. I never thought this blog will be listed in the search engine that fast since I just seriously managed this blog end of last month. I thought the crawler will take longer time to identify and acknowledge my content.

Here are some of the posts that appear in a considerably good position in Google search engine.

When a person search “Citibank AirAsia Compaq notebook”, zakiyamani.com will be in position #2 (1st page)

When a person search “credit card promotion pc citibank”, zakiyamani.com will be in position #7 (1st page)

When a person search “N95 pricing”, zakiyamani.com will be in position #12 (page #2)

To be honest, I never expected zakiyamani.com pages to be in Google search that fast. I strongly believe part of it should be due to the detail description for the blog post title. For example, I made a longer title post – “Maybe a PC Instead of a Laptop“, instead of “Getting A PC”. Definitely there are various other factors determining the position of the blog in the search engine. I’m going to do a little bit research on it later and hopefully I can optimize it. It is my desire to improve the blog’s page rank, alexa and technorati ranking. Bottom line, I’m impress with the blog performance so far, after considering it has been around for just below a month. What about your blog?

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You don’t need to have a lot of equipments/gadgets to launch and maintain your blog or website. I myself run my blog from just one little corner inside my master bedroom (my work cubicle!). Initially I began with just a broadband connection, a laptop, a free blogger.com platform account, no blogging skills, zero blogging techniques knowledge, a family digital camera, a high hope and belief, a lot of hard work and sacrifice. A few months later, after further digging, exploring and learning, I decided to blog using wordpress with my own domain and hosting. Those were the only investments I made so far.

That laptop and the broadband connection are the only equipment and service I used up till today. I still don’t have a printer, scanner or other latest tech gadgets. More impressively, I also know some bloggers who do not even have a computer and blog from the cyber café or library. Wow!!!….that’s pretty hard to beat.

I’m planning to get a new PC to cope up with my blogging. On top of that, I hope to get a 4 in 1 printer, a new digital camera and a router to support my growing activities. Maybe I’ll get them in the second quarter next year. What about you? What’s your blogging tools/equipments?

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