5AM Ramblings » IAP http://juchiu.scripts.mit.edu/blog Jason's blog of his day Fri, 17 Jul 2009 12:56:14 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.3 en hourly 1 6.091 http://juchiu.scripts.mit.edu/blog/2009/01/29/6091/ http://juchiu.scripts.mit.edu/blog/2009/01/29/6091/#comments Thu, 29 Jan 2009 09:51:21 +0000 Jason http://juchiu.scripts.mit.edu/blog/?p=233 Crossing Mass Ave, passing the Wright Brothers Wind Tunnel, entering building 34, and entering my class on the third level, I take a seat next to Yuzhi for the first class.  I listen to the professor begin to talk about what we will be doing in the class and do a quick explanation of resistors and circuits.  We finish the first class and some of us head to lab.  We learn how to use multimeters, scopes, signal generators, and soldering irons.  Each of us even was allowed to keep a multimeter for ourselves.  The next time we have class we learn about BJTs and op amps.  The LA had fun making fun of the girl next to me because she was a bio major from Wellesley.  She also happened to blow an op amp, which apparently does not happen very often.  The op amps let us do fun things like integrate signals and amplify signals.

The third class we play with timers to do things like turn off an LED after a calculated time.  The professor also plugged in a capacitor the wrong way into a breadboard.  Although we were prepared for it, the sound was still surprisingly loud from such a small object.  Charging a polarized capacitor the wrong way will quickly make it explode.  The fourth class we learned about digital circuits and how to use gates to do boolean algebra.  We also moved from the small lab we were in to the 6.111 lab with their larger, better equipment.

For the last class, we only made one final circuit.  It was a digital lock where depending on the sequence the switches were depressed, the LED would turn on.  We used a combination of NAND gates, AND gates, and shift registers to make the circuit.  It took me almost the full four hours to make the circuit because first, I wanted to make the wires look nice, and second, because the LAs would refuse to help if the wires were not multiple colours.  We got to take this circuit home to be able to show off.  I’m quite glad I made it pretty.

Be anal about the appearance of things you can bring home to show off.  Pretty things are more fun to present.Breadboard

]]> http://juchiu.scripts.mit.edu/blog/2009/01/29/6091/feed/ 0 Food in the North End and Mystery Hunt Practice http://juchiu.scripts.mit.edu/blog/2009/01/16/food-in-the-north-end-and-mystery-hunt-practice/ http://juchiu.scripts.mit.edu/blog/2009/01/16/food-in-the-north-end-and-mystery-hunt-practice/#comments Fri, 16 Jan 2009 11:31:49 +0000 Jason http://juchiu.scripts.mit.edu/blog/?p=222 It was Meghan’s birthday on Friday so we went to a restaurant in the North end to celebrate.  Earlier in the day Kevin and I had gone to the Galleria so I could pick up a card and gift for her.  When it was time, I met Meghan in the Student Center with all her friends and we all walked to Kendall.  On the subway, we realized she had no idea how to get there and we might become hopelessly lost.  At least her other friends knew where we were going.  We make it to Haymarket and walk down the street to the restaurant.  Our group barely makes it there with a little time to spare before the reservation.  The maitre d’ seats us upstairs on a long table.  We had our pasta and paid.  As we were walking back, we went to Mike’s Pastry for, well, pastries.  I got myself a chocolate chip cannoli.  We made it back to campus and split up.

The next day, I woke up fairly late and realized it was about time to go join ATS and do a practice Mystery Hunt.  I went out to the Student Center and found Wei in the PDR.  I pulled out my computer and began working on the first puzzle.  I was invited to a Google Docs file where we were collaborating on answers.  I invited Vivian in to help out as well.  Even though she was still in Texas, it would be good to practice.  After a while, not many were focused on puzzle solving anymore, and were doing other things.  There were cards flying around everywhere and Nick finished folding his flower.

Nick

Group

Free time is precious.  Abuse it.

]]> http://juchiu.scripts.mit.edu/blog/2009/01/16/food-in-the-north-end-and-mystery-hunt-practice/feed/ 0 Plans for IAP http://juchiu.scripts.mit.edu/blog/2009/01/07/plans-for-iap/ http://juchiu.scripts.mit.edu/blog/2009/01/07/plans-for-iap/#comments Wed, 07 Jan 2009 12:24:22 +0000 Jason http://juchiu.scripts.mit.edu/blog/?p=206 A preliminary list of my IAP plans

  • 6.091 Intro to EE Lab Skills
  • Mystery Hunt with ATS
  • Make a successful install on my reuse machine
  • Nuke my computer and start fresh
  • Spend more time with friends
  • Eat healthier
  • Learn to cook
  • Exercise more
  • Try to find time to visit friend at Yale
  • Charm School
  • Learn Dvorak keyboard layout
  • Many non-credit classes
  • Spend more time in Boston
  • Find a normal sleep pattern by the end of IAP
  • Relearn violin?
  • Read a few books
  • Enjoy MIT
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