Degree completed

After five years of intensive work, I've finally completed my degree in Informatics Engineering (I think Computer Science is a valid synonym for that) at the FIB Faculty. This has concluded today after I defended my PFC, the project that concludes the degree. So you can now call me engineer :-) Yay! In other words: I'm free until October, when I'll start a Masters in Computer Architecture, Networks and Systems (CANS).

July 6, 2007 · Tags: pfc
Continue reading (about 1 minute)

PFC report almost ready

The deadline for my PFC (the project that will conclude my computer science degree) is approaching. I have to hand out the final report next week and present the project on July 6th. Its title is "Efficient resource management in heterogeneous multiprocessor systems" and its basic goal is to inspect the poor management of such machines in current operating systems and how this situation could be improved in the future.

June 19, 2007 · Tags: cell, linux, pfc, ps3
Continue reading (about 2 minutes)

Piled Higher and Deeper

I've been told today about the Piled Higher and Deeper website, also known as phdcomics (easier to remember). And so far I'm hooked. I love this comic strip! May it be because I'm already involved in the research area due to my PFC and I know what they are talking about? Possibly. And it also illustrates what I can "expect" if I finally enroll in a Ph.D. course.

May 24, 2007 · Tags: pfc, phd, research
Continue reading (about 1 minute)

Building an updated kernel for the PS3

The mainstream Linux sources have some support for the PlayStation 3, but it is marked as incomplete. Trying to boot such a kernel results in a stalled machine, as the kernel configuration option says: CONFIG_PPC_PS3: This option enables support for the Sony PS3 game console and other platforms using the PS3 hypervisor. Support for this platform is not yet complete, so enabling this will not result in a bootable kernel on a PS3 system.

March 16, 2007 · Tags: linux, pfc, ps3, yellowdog
Continue reading (about 5 minutes)

Building the libspe2 on the PS3

The Linux kernel, when built for a Cell-based platform, provides the spufs pseudo-file system that allows userland applications to interact with the Synergistic Processing Engines (SPEs). However, this interface is too low-level to be useful for application-level programs and hence another level of abstraction is provided over it through the libspe library. There are two versions of the libspe: 1.x: Distributed as part of the Cell SDK 2.0, is the most widely used nowadays by applications designed to run on the Cell architecture.

March 14, 2007 · Tags: cell, pfc, ps3, yellowdog
Continue reading (about 3 minutes)

PFC subject chosen

A while ago, I was doubtful about the subject of my undergraduate thesis (or PFC as we call it). At first, I wanted to work on a regression testing framework for NetBSD. This is something I really want to see done and I'd work on it if I had enough free time now... Unfortunately, it didn't fit quite well my expectations for the PFC: it was a project not related at all with the current research subjects in my faculty, hence it was not appropriate enough to integrate into one of these work groups.

January 27, 2007 · Tags: cell, pfc
Continue reading (about 1 minute)

A subject for my undergraduate thesis

It has finally come the time when I have to choose a subject for my undergraduate thesis on which I'll be working on full time next semester. My first idea was to make a contribution to NetBSD by developing an automated testing framework. I have had interest in this for a long while (I even proposed it as part of this year's SoC), and there is a lot of interest in it within the project too.

December 15, 2006 · Tags: netbsd, pfc
Continue reading (about 3 minutes)