Tech Floss

A look inside the world of

Software Engineering

Google Fiber: is it worth the cost?

Get the lowdown on hacking from industry experts Will a high school robotics

team help you get a job?

How 30-year old software can run on a modern PC

+

See how the internet has

transformed over the years

|1

Table of contents 4 6 8 14 16 22 24 28 2 | Tech Floss

About the Authors Learn more about the flossers.

Letter from the Editor Insight on the workings of our ‘zine!

Engineering you for Success

Get the lowdown on how to be a successful software engineer from Industry Experts!

Browse Some Browsers

See the history of some popular web browsers! There are more than you might imagine.

Hackers: The Pirates of the Modern World A look into the big and lucrative world of hacking!

x86 Technology

Learn about how this 38 year-old processor affects us today. (That’s virtually prehistoric!)

Fiber: Friend or foe

Everyone is talking about Google fiber. But is it really worth it?

The History of the Internet Back in my day, we actually talked to each other.

30 34 38 42

Chips: Not the ones you eat Visit our Patreon and chip in.

Living the Future

Where we’re going, we don’t need roads!

Robotics all the way

Did that middle school robotics team you dropped out of help you in any way?

Code Language Hierarchy For today’s lesson: The rise of the middle class

All body font is in Bell MT size 10-11. Cover font is Hacked by david libeau. Cover image by Krishanu Ray created in blender and rendered in Luxrender.

Table of Contents | 3

Contributors

Krishanu Ray is a freshman at LASA. He came from Kealing middle school, and is interested in programing. He likes to think that he is good at 3d modeling (he made the cover photo). In his free time, he does homework, extra credit, and Quizlet. He has been voted the biggest nerd on the team, and for good reason—he read an entire APES textbook, a UNIX guide, a guide for industrial instrumentation, and the documentation for the sun fire x4600, just for fun. He BASHes you with AWKward puns that he has no reGREPs for (if you get that, you are a nerd too).

4 | Tech Floss

Kristen Teal is a freshman who thinks that she could do perfectly well in life without any more schooling, even though high school has its perks. When she has a free moment, which, sadly, does not happen nearly as often as she would like, she finds herself writing, playing the clarinet, or trying to figure out how to make the little turtle go across the screen with block coding. When the holidays roll around, she adds baking piles of cookies to that list.

On Saturdays when nothing is going on, Kristen enjoys watching Netflix, even though she’s probably never going to catch up with all of the shows she’s watching. Twenty years from now, the only goal she has is to be having a life she’s happy with, which may or may not be harder than it sounds.

Chris Leight is the average nerd a LASA. He enjoys building things, especially robots. He also worships his favorite cat: Charlie. He likes fishing and kayaking on Lake Buchanan. He is also a member of 5998, a LASA robotic team. He is excited that he is going to the school his sister went to for high school. He loves having no homework and hates English class vehemently.

He enjoys playing Magic The Gathering and wishes he could take part in a Magic Pro Tour. He wants to be an engineer when he gets out of college.

HOW Editor

Kristen Teal

Associate Editor Krishanu Ray

Design Assistant Yazan Abughazaleh

Chief Executive Kristen Teal

Picture Editor Krishanu Ray

Design Director Yazan Abughazaleh is a 15 year old freshman who loves technology and gaming. He currently wants to build his own gaming PC to be able to use cheats in games and likes playing Pokemon. His vehement dislikes include English class, football, and soccer. Yazan enjoys playing Fallout, Pokemon, and Halo along with many other games.

Yazan also runs an amazing YouTube channel with his friends called Dabro Team.

Yazan also adores his old fuzzy cat, Lulu, as if she were the love of his life. He is also the definition of a nerd as he memorizes the specs of any electronics he likes.

Braedon Gardella, 14, lived in an Airstream for two years with his family while traveling around America.

He is currently a freshman at LASA High School, and when he’s not studying, he’s juggling. He likes math, science, and mountain biking.

He has lived everywhere, from Connecticut, Texas, and even California. He plays pick up games of soccer every week, and is constantly complaining about how sore he is. English is something he doesn’t like, but he is good at it. Braedon also is allergic to basically everything; from animals to nature, he isn’t happy.

Braedon Gardella

Contributors Kristen Teal

Krishanu Ray Yazan Abughazaleh Chris Leight Braedon Gardella

Publisher MagCloud

Contributor’s Page | 5

Letter From the Editor

6 | Tech Floss

B

efore I say anything, I would like to thank you for reading our maga zine. Me and my g roup spent weeks getting the bare bones of our magazine down, and weeks after that tweaking ever y detail until we reached the deadline.

Having someone who is willing to read something we’ve spent so much effor t on is tr uly an

amazing thing.

I supp ose you’ re wondering about the name we settled on. It might remind you of the High-Tech Dental F loss you find at Walg reens. We did that on pur pose. Let me e xplain.

This magazine is chock-full of nothing but technolog y. The idea is that it “flosses” your br ain and cleans it out so we can put new ideas in, and give people new ideas in a completely non-1984 way. I know I am not the only per son who’s wished for a flying car, or looked at Tony Stark’s robots and realized how much they would help me.

We made ar ticles to tell you about the latest and g reatest in the tech field and the people it includes. These people are working on tomor row’s iPhone, and the people who are making the future piece by piece, code by code.

That’s not all of it. W hen we star ted, it might have been. But by the time we finished, ste pped back, and looked at what we’ve made, I realized that it’s also about inspiring our reader s. We wrote about all of these fantastic achievements in the hope that someone might make their own invention, that someone might create the ne xt big thing.

Maybe that will be you. So, in a message from all of us flosser s, I hope you enjoy reading our publication.

And now, with the g reatest pleasure, I give you Tech F loss.

Sincerely,

Kristen Teal Editor and Chief Executive of Tech F loss

Letter From the Editor | 7

Engineering You For Success

By Chris Leight

Empl oyment fo r so ftw are engine e r ing is g r owin g at a r ate o f 17% , mu ch higher t h an t h e av er age g r owth r ate o f all o c cu pat io ns, w h ich is 7 % .

Th e world o f so ft w are engineering is a t ur bu len t an d comple x place. Fo u r so ft w ar e e ngine e r s w h o h ave s pen t 30 plu s year s in this fi e ld, w ill give ad vice on h ow t o succeed .

“W h at I lo o k fo r in a so ft w are e ngine e r ? We ll, f i r s t of al l , we lo o k fo r peo ple w ho have r e ally go o d g r ades. We h ir e a lo t o f peo ple o u t o f co lle ge. B a s i cal ly we don ’t really co nsid er yo u much unle s s yo u got a 3 .0 or higher,” said Steve War nt j e s, V ice P res iden t of the Research and Develop me nt fo r P X I p l atfor m s an d mo du lar instr ument fo r nat io nal ins t r um en ts. “The o t her t hing we lo o k fo r is p r o ble m s o l vin g abil ity.”

Empl oye r s receive jo b applicat io ns and t h e y n eed s ome s or t o f screening pro cess fo r acce p t ance t o en s ur e qual ity. W hile famo u s peo ple w h o dr o p p e d o u t of h igh s cho o l have been su ccessful, t h e y ar e t h e m i nor ity an d mainly made their ow n co mp anie s. O f co ur s e compan ies check fo r pro blem so lv ing ab ili t y becaus e in t he tech w o rld co mpanie s ne e d p e o p le w h o can pr obl em so lve, to st ay ahead of o t h e r co mp anies an d companies also inclu de wo r k e t h ic in t h eir h ir in g pr ocess.

“

Right. It’s a battle.

”

`“A m as ter ’ s de g ree in eit her co mpu t er s cie nce, e le c t r i cal en gin eering, o r a bachelo r’s de g r e e in o ne o f t h e h ar der s ciences plu s a master s d e g r e e in a co mp u t er s cien ce r elat ed o r electrical engine e r r e lat e d f i e l d,” s aid Tim L eight, Apple CAD en gine e r.

8 | Tech Floss

“Anton Mikhailov, Software Engineer

Photo found on Flickir

B ack in t h e ‘6 0 s a p e r s o n co uld ge t a go o d j o b w it h a h igh s ch o o l dip lo ma, t h e n a b ach e lo r ’s. Now, i n o r de r t o le ar n eve r y t h ing, a p e r s o n ne e ds mo r e e d u ca t io n and s o p e o p le p ur s ue a mas t e r ’s.

“ G o t o a s ch o o l t h at ’s w it h in yo ur cap abi l i t i e s and h ow much yo u’ r e w illing t o w o r k in s ch o o l an d ge t go o d g r ade s, ” s aid M e lanie Ty p aldo s, r e t ir e d se n i o r m i cr o ch ip ve r ificat io n e ngine e r.

“ I fir mly b e lieve yo u can ge t a go o d e ducat i o n at any s ch o o l if yo u p ut yo ur mind t o it and yo u can ge t a b ad e ducat io n at any s ch o o l if yo u p ut yo ur mi n d t o i t .

S o I gue s s my p o int t h e r e is t h at yo u ne e d t o m ake t h e mo s t o f yo ur e ducat io nal o p p o r t unit ie s, ” s aid L e i gh t .

I f a p e r s o n go e s t o a s ch o o l w h e r e t h e y ’ r e b e h i n d t h e o t h e r p e o p le t h e n t h e ir g r ade s w ill s uffe r an d t h e i r G PA w ill lo o k unimp r e s s ive and s o co lle ge s o r co m p a nie s w o n’t b e int e r e s t e d as much . I f a p e r s o n go e s t o a s ch o o l in t h e ir ab ilit ie s but do n’t w o r k h ar d an d j u s t do t h e b ar e minimum co lle ge s als o w o n’t co ns i d e r t h e p e r s o n much .

“

The minimum is probably a bachelor’s.

”

“ De p e nds o n w h at fie ld yo u’ r e go ing int o. S o f t w ar e e ngine e r s find t h e ms e lve s in eve r y p o s it ion i n eve r y indus t r y t h e r e is. Yo u can b e in s ale s, yo u can b e in ch e mical e ngine e r ing, yo u can b e any w h e r e. S o, i f yo u w ant t o do ch e mical e ngine e r ing- like s t uff w i t h s o ft w ar e, yo u s h o uld t ake ch e mis t r y ; I did mat he m at i cal s cie nce s, w h ich is ano t h e r w o r d fo r ap p lie d m at h e mat ics. Tur ns o ut I didn’t act ually ne e d t h at or u s e i t but car t og r ap hy if yo u w ant t o do map p ing, a l o t o f r e ally s e r io us mat h if yo u w ant t o do image an aly s i s, ” s aid S co t t C o me r, fo r me r p r incip al s o ft w ar e e n gi n e e r at M axp o int .

S o a p e r s o n s h o uld t ake mat h e mat ics, p r og r am ming, and a w r it ing clas s. Howeve r, de p e nding w h ich s p e cif i c f i e l d t h at p e r s o n is go ing t o p ur s ue, t h e y w ill b e t ak ing diffe r e n t cl as s e s.

As C o me r s aid, “ I f yo u’ r e do ing p r og r amming fo r ch e mis t r y s t u f f yo u s h o uld t ake ch e mis t r y s o yo u’ ll h ave s o me t h i n g r e l evant in yo ur fie ld. ”

“

That first job is really going to dete r mine yo u r whole car e e r. https://www.flickr.com/photos/vancouverfilmschool/5391886424

”

Engineering You For Success | 9

10 | Tech Floss

Courtesy of Scott Comer

“ Well I u se the t o o ls t h at ar e available. S o me t ime s I wo uld w rit e pyt ho n scr ip t s t o analy z e my dat a b e caus e I wo uld have large amo unt s o f dat a t h at a p e r s o n can’t r e ally lo o k at intellig ent ly, s o I w o uld h ave t o w r it e my ow n lit t le script s t o analyze my dat a and t o p ut it int o t able s and t h ings that I c o u ld mo re clear ly unde r s t and, ” s aid Ty p aldo s.

“If I’m t aking car e o f a t r o uble t icke t , I fir s t lo o k and tr y t o figure o ut what t h e is s ue r e ally is ; I r e ad, t r y t o r e pro d uce it, and t hen, d e p e nding o n t h e nat ur e o f t h e t icke t , I take o ne o f sever al diffe r e nt p at h s fo r r e s o lut io n, ” s aid L eight.

Peo ple use t o o ls t h at ar e s p e cific fo r t h e ir j o b, s o de pending o n what type o f s o ft w ar e e ngine e r a p e r s o n is t h e y ’ ll u se d ifferent to o ls. T r o uble t icke t s ar e a go o d w ay o f mak ing sure a per so n can kee p t r ack o f and k now w h at p r o j e ct s t h at are in t ro u ble so t hat pe r s o n k now s t o w o r k o n t h e m.

“I get into the office, I s it dow n, p ut o n my h e adpho nes, I t hen log in, I t h e n ch e ck t r o uble t icke t s t at us t o see if t here [ are] any t r o uble t icke t s t h at h ave co me in ove r night. I deal with all t h e cr it ic al o ne s. T h e n I , [fr o m] 4 : 3 0 5:00, tr y t o make sure t h at ’s t h e r e no t h ing ab s o lut e ly cr it ical that has to be reso lved. Once I do t h at and t ake n car e o f any thing that co mes up, I go h o me. ” s a id L e igh t .

“The last 20 year s h ad b e e n fo r s t ar t up co mp anie s, co mpanies so small yo u co uld’ve p ut eve r y b o dy ar o und t h is kitchen table right here, 8 - 1 0 p e o p le. On a day - t o - day b as is putt ing eq uipment o n a r ack , h e lp ing a guy p ull ne t w o r k ca bles, buying o ffice fu r n it ur e fo r t h e ch e ap e s t p r ice, and t h e n to mo r row I’m build ing t h e we b s it e like t h e e nt ir e we b s it e and the d ay after to mor r ow I ’m do ing s o me t h ing e ls e. Wo r k ing with databases I us e mo de ling s k ills, dat ab as e mo de ling skills, o bject o riented p r og r amming is a mus t , k now ing h ow netw o rks w o rk and how t h e h ar dw ar e w o r k s, all t h o s e t h ings benefit me and t he way I w o r k . ” s aid C o me r.

As a so ftw are en gine e r a p e r s o n mus t face t h e p o s s ibility t hat they might b e go ing int o a w o r k p lace w h e r e t h e y might be w o rking in co nt r act s and w o n’t h ave a s t e ady p lace where they w o rk but r at h e r ch anging fr o m co nt r act t o co ntr act. However, if t hey ge t t o b e p ar t o f a p e r mane nt co r po r at io n, t hey might be w o r k ing in t h e s ame p lace ; h oweve r, they mo st likely w o n’t h ave t h e e xp o s ur e as w o r k ing fo r s t ar t u ps.

“

The building I work in has eight floors, each floor has a sea of cubes are about five feet high, everybody has a cube, I have a cube.

”

Engineering You For Success | 11

Browse Some Browsers I’ve been planning that one for a while

By Krishanu Ray

Opera started as a concept, and later grew into a successfull browser.

1994

1995

Netscape introduced Javascript to the internet, but was taken over by internet explorer.

Opera photo By Opera / Anti - Opera logos, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=43529820

Internet explorer was first released in 1995, for windows 95. it was the most popular browser in 2002-03.

information from http://meyerweb.com/eric/browsers/timeline-structured.html

Netscape Photo By 摩茲拉 - Netscape 7.2 browser, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=39935912

12 | Tech Floss

We use them every day, without even giving them a thought. They are everywhere, on your computer, your phone, and even in some fridges. We take them for granted, but they are instrumental in the spread of the internet.

Here is the history of the web browser.

Firefox started in 2003. It remains as the second most popular web browser used in the world.

2008 2003 Google chrome is currently the most popular browser in the world.

It contains several new features, and is up to date.

Chrome image By Unknown - Google Inc. http://www.google.com/press/images.html, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=19554055 Firefox image By Sean Martell for Mozilla [2][3] - http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/styleguide/identity/firefox/branding/, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=29365482 IE image By Microsoft - Extracted from this color and this shape.This file was derived from:Internet Explorer 10 icon.svg, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=25997921

Browse Some Browsers | 13

Hackers: The Pirates of the Modern World

by Kristen Teal 14 | Tech Floss

Circuit boards have come a long way since their beginning in the early 1900s, and have vastly evolved even since the first legitimately operational boards were made in the 1940s.

Photo by Kristen Teal

Hackers: The Priates of the Modern World | 15

T

he man walking toward the Detroit automobile design plant looked like someone who belonged. Using this to his advantage, he managed to walk right in while being a total str anger. Finding an empty office, he opened his laptop and got to work, no one the wiser that the per son who walked in was about to have ever ything about their company in the palm of his hand.

Dan Teal, the principal engineer at Sophos, designs security software for his job. The company he hacked into 19 year s ago was paying him to find out where they needed to beef up their security. Their defensive software might have been up to par, but their physical security was woefully inadequate. Hacker s still use this technique today along with sever al other s, breaking into industrial and per sonal databases. There

“

An artist’s representation of the binary that’s scrolling by behind the scenes.

Photo by BenjaminNelan

The bad guy doesn’t have to hack into you from the outside world, if the bad guy’s already inside the door.

16 | Tech Floss

”

are ways to stop th em, but it is hard to do that if there are some aspects of security that are left unattended.

“The bad guy doesn’t have to hack into you from the outside world, if the bad guy’s already inside the door,” said Teal.

Teal used this str ate g y to g reat effect.

“So needless to say, in one week, I had penetr ated their entire company. And that’ s just because it was a combination of me being able to bluff my way inside….

I looked like I fit in, and I looked like an auditor; people pretty much ignored me, and once I was already inside the perimeter it made my hacking job much easier,” Teal

Many people don’t think about how much effort went into and is still going into protecting their iPads and other devices from hackers.

Photo by kaboompics

said.

Companies need to fix this issue, as the amount of infor ma tion being stored in cyber space has only increased. New d ata estimates that 1.3 trillion gigabytes of information are stored online.

“The problem with security, physical, infor mation, any type of security, [is that] you can lock down something really hard, but then you can’t use it,” said Patrick Vetter, the assistant d irector of the Research Security Ser vices at Applied Research Labor atories.

So companies can pay as much as they like to be an impenetr able for tress, but there does come a p oint where security becomes a hindr ance.

“There’s this kind of “x” [where as] security [goes] up, functionality goes down. So you have to think about which are the most impor tant. Confidentiality, inte g rity, or availability?” said Charisse Castagnoli, an inde pendent security consultant and lec turer.

People have paid attention, the year s of security messages star ting to get through to the population.

“W hat has dr astically improved, I think, is people’s behavior. The user s of the computer s. …. That’s the big dr astic change I’ve seen. It’s the user s themselves now, paying more attention,” said Vetter.

There are many security measures to help people on their way. There’s defense software in nearly ever ything someone can find for sale, but some people still do not adhere to basic security tips: changing passwords constantly, making them secure, do not look at suspicious emails, and do not download from suspicious sites.

Not following those simple guidelines just make it easier for hacker s to become someone else for a day.

“Identification is a ver y hard subject. How do you prove that you are who you say you are?

Especially if somebody knows your name, your date of bir th, your place of bir th, your social security number, your cur rent address. How do you prove that that is you or not you?” Teal said.

Of cour se, the answer seems simple. Use a unique fea-

ture, like a finger print or a retina. These pieces of te chnolog y have allowed the field to come far, but they still have a long way to go; it is not that hard to get into someone’s account if all they have set up is a finger print scan.

“You know, by the time computer s get smar t enough to defend what we have today in computational inter net connects and stuff like that, we’ ll have some other sor t of networking type that we can’t envision today, or we’ ll have combination human-computer networks that we can’t envision today,” Castagnoli said.

That does not mean that the security that e xists now is garbage.

“Defensive software has gotten better, but it’s always a r ace,” said Teal.

And this r ace is driven by the desire to kee p p ossessions close and belonging only to one per son. The need for privacy and kee ping infor mation safe has always been impor tant.

“All infor mation is valuable, but not all infor mation is classified,” Vetter said.

The people making the security prog r ams work hard to kee p all infor mation safe, but it’s not an easy job.

“The offensive team only needs to find one mistake, but the defensive team has to defend the whole line. So, if you have tenac ity and patience, or can obser ve the right way, that’s an easier Hackers: The Priates of the Modern World | 17

path than tr ying to defend,” said Castagnoli.

So even though coder s tr y so hard to make their prog r ams the best they can be, hacker s can often find a small gap in the security, allowing them to slip through.

“And so we really want to improve security, get rid of passwords. I’m on a mission, get rid of passwords!” said Castagnoli.

The password issue might not be so notable if ever yone was vigilant about what they used as one, but kee ping a constant watch can get tiring, and people will choose a simple, easy-to-cr ack password just because it is easier to remember.

“The best password is more of a pass-phr ase,” Teal said.

So, even though it might be daunti ng to make a 50-digit password, if it was a simple phr ase, such as “roses are red , violets are blue,” it wou ld be easier to remember a password because it was a memor able, uncomplicated phr ase.

“The key is to have something you can remember and you kee p it different for all the different

“

sites. That’s the best password,” Teal said.

Individual user s aren’t the only ones who can benefit from this advice. In fact , they might need it less than companies. Teal highlighted this issue, saying that companies have some improvements, but they are still having some difficulties and are still getting hacked.

The hacker s breaking into other people’s accounts have their own reasons; companies have money, and money, coincidentally, is one of the main motivations of hacker s. Even so, they do not always have wanton destr uction on their minds.

“If you just line these guys all up, they’ re all bad guys, because they’ re all doing something nefarious, but there’s a r ange of how bad they are.” said Castagnoli.

Not all hacker s do what they do for a purpose that’s as questionable as other s, so can they all really be so bad?

“We haven’t had a hacker yet - with one e xce ption - who’s physically hur t a pe r son.” Castag noli said.

If you just line these guys all up, they’re all bad guys, because they’re all doing something nefarious, but there’s a range of how bad they are.

”

18 | Tech Floss

The hacker mentioned hacked into a gaming site and altered the games so that the blinking nature was changed, and as a result, some e pile ptics had e pile ptic seizures, Castagnoli went on.

“They probably really don’t mean to hur t anybody but they never suffer the consequences, so they don’t have to inter nalize what they do,” said Castagnoli.

In this light, hacker s are not ver y different from some people in reality. There are people who have a network of people sur rounding them, fixing the messes that the per son made.

“You can see society re presented across this hacking community... all the way from criminals to, mor ally, ver y good people,” Castagnoli said.

Hacker s even made their own society and communities. This social str ucture might also be a reason as to why hacker s are so dedicated to what they do.

“Any time you’ re in a community, it reinforces your per sonal beliefs about your own behavior,” said Castagnoli.

And those beliefs var y; from ethnicity to religion to education, no two people see the world in e xactly the same way.

“One per son’s view of the common good and another per son’s view of the common good is never the same,” Castagnoli said.

Views of the common good can be polar opposites at times, with one per son honestly believing that doing the ille gal thing is right. To know which view is le gal, though, the laws have to be clear and concise.

“In law you have to have, especially criminal law which is what this is associated with, ver y bright line r ules. …. And in computer s, unfor tunately, ever heard the e x-

Dan Teal’s home office boasts an impressive array of computers and plenty of space to write code.

The code for YouTube, a site that has an occasional problem with malware-loaded advertisements. pression, when all you have is a hammer, ever ything is a nail? We have no other tools right now e xce pt these ver y [r ules].” Castagnoli said.

Sadly, the r ules of cyber netic law are poorly undeveloped, as these issues have been around for such a shor t time. On the bright side, they can only improve from here. It takes e xtreme patience and wit to bring down a hacker, and many hacker s get away with heinous crimes, but maybe one day, this will change.

Maybe one day, a justice system will e xist to kee p those hacker s at the bad end of the spectr um in line.

A keyboard for a Windows computer, whose brand is more appealing to hackers than Apple.

Hackers: The Priates of the Modern World | 19

x86 Technology: It might be in the machine you use right now

1 2 1.

Modern x86 processors have integrated GPU’s (graphics processing units) that share RAM with the processor. These GPU’s are very low end and cannot perform many graphics intensive tasks. What they can do is drive a monitor to watch videos or do word processing.

2. The memory interface is what sends and receives information from memory.

3. Processor: A modern x46 processor usually has two or more pro-

cessing cores. The Intel core i7 die shown here has four processor cores done in a 22 nanometer fabrication process. This processor has hyperthreading technology and is a 64 bit processor.

4. L3 cache is a type of

memory integrated with the processor. This usually stores active tasks and allows the CPU to perform the tasks.

5. The memory controller is what controls the sending and receiving of

and what allocates RAM for each task.

20 | Tech Floss

data to the RAM

The technology present in an x86 processor

By Yazan Abughazaleh

3

5 4

An Intel 8086 processor released in 1978. This is the first x86 processor. It is a 16 bit processor clocked at a frequency of 5 megahertz.

An Intel core i7 6700K processor. This is popular with gamers due to its high single core performance. This is a 64 bit processor with a base clock frequency of 4 gigahertz.

x86 Technology | 21

Fiber: Friend or Foe Google Fiber & its affect on communities & its members

By Braedon Gardella

G

oogle Fiber is not only leading the inter net industr y with speeds of 1 gigabits per second of upload and download speeds, but in empowering the community and industries to develop new things that allow more meaningful impacts in communities.

Google, the child of Alphabet, is already well known for their web browser, but it is a huge power and leader in the tech industr y. Google is star ting to provide Giga bit inter net across the US on March 30, 2011, called Google Fiber. Google Fiber wants to and is helping communities and ever yday people advance their knowledge and abilities by allowing them to have better access to the inter net and speeds. Google Fiber can do this by providing a fiber optic based inter net that has 1 Gigabit Per Second ( 1Gbps ) upload and download speeds.

“I’ve always tried to get the fastest inter net, so that’s the fir st factor. T he other factor was that the price was competitive, so it was pretty much a no-br ainer.” Geoff Duncan, a Google Fiber user, and small business owner said.

Google Fiber has ver y few things it could fix with the Wi-Fi. The speed is faster than anything before it, and faster than its competitor s. The price is lower than most and definitely lower than competitor s price for Gigabit inter net. “I can’t really think of anything they could improve on. They’ re already pushing the bar with high speed internet,” said Duncan.

“

They dug up a lot, it was a little annoying, there was just orange stuff in our yard constantly, and there were guys coming in and out getting the lines laid, so yeah, it was obnoxious, and took longer than they said.

”

Sunil Samantaray, a Google Fiber user.

Photo by Sunil Samantary

22 | Tech Floss

Providing Google Fiber and allowing people to have access to that resource is when the challenges and imperfections are discovered. In some cases, Google Fiber is one of the largest infr astr ucture projects that has been under taken within city limits. There is a lot of variables that need to work just right for Google Fiber to be installed and used in the communities.

“

Artwork done by Mike Jonston on the side of a Google Fiber truck. photo by Braedon Gardella

Jessica Reeves, a Google media re presentative, said, “We’ re building our network from scr atch. It’s a big job that requires hundreds of crews, thousands of people hour s, and enough fiber-optic cable to stretch from Austin to Canada and back.”

W hile Google Fiber is useful when installed, no one likes the months before with all the constr uction. Constr uction is where Google Fiber gets criticized a lot. In Austin, 245 complaints were filed relating to Google Fiber’s constr uction in their neighborhood .

Duncan said, “They dug up a lot, it was a little annoying, there was just or ange stuff in our yard constantly, and there were guys coming in and out getting the lines laid, so it was obnoxious, and took longer than they said.”

Google Fiber is and has been looking into ways to fix the problem of constr uction and any inconveniences customer s are e xperiencing with it. Google never had a lot going for it constr uction-wise. The companies already in the cities have and are putting up a huge fight to kee p Google Fiber out as long as possible, and Google has to change they way it installs the fiber optic lines for ever y city, so there is li ttle or no pr actice when star t ing in a new city.

We’re building our network from scratch. It’s a big job that requires hundreds of crews, thousands of people hours, and enough fiber-optic cable to stretch from Austin to Canada and back.

”

Fiber: Friend or Foe | 23

“

In fact, beyond speed you really feel no different, so it’s just overrated.

People can’t really put a finger on something Google is doing wrong with their technolog y they’ve developed for Google Fiber. The price and speed is something that some companies cannot kee p up with. Google is also a well-tr usted company that has a customer base that is the size of an ar my. All of these things are pulling customer s away from o ther inter net companies and into the Google Fiber community.

Sunil Samantar ay, a Google Fiber user, said, “I think with 300 Mbps with Time Warner Cable I was a paying $85. Now with the same price or even a few bucks less, I’m getting 1Gbps.”

Google Fiber is not really needed unless someone is working in industries that need a high upload speed, high video and audio quality, and need to r un software with high upload and/or download speeds. People have been voicing this opinion ever since Gigabit inter net was available to the public.

Samantar ay said, “In fact, beyond speed, you really feel no different, so it ’s just over r ated.”

Having too much inter net can impact people and what they do in their day to day life. It allows people to access things they couldn’t access before at a faster r ate, and with that power comes better oppor tunities to lear n and g row.

Reeves said, “Abundant high-speed inter net can provide the foundation for economic g rowth and improved educational oppor tunities, and it’s critical for innovation.”

Google Fiber has allowed for development in medical research and streamlining in what is already possible. With Google Fiber, hospitals are able to r un ever ything that needs Wi-Fi to r un much faster. It lets the machines chur n through data, or r un a test faster, or even find disease faster.

Reeves said, “In Provo, a geneticist is using gigabit inter net to help newbor ns in intensive care. He can download an entire human genome ( ~200GB) in a half hour, down from 77 hour s.”

24 | Tech Floss

”

Google Fiber can g reatly improve the quality of work and the way people do work.

If any business or work needs a computer their work speed can improve. Gigabit internet allows business to connect with their customer s, and have their work related websites and softwares r unning over time to get them the fastest response time possible.

Duncan said, “Being able to upload r aw footage for backup or not having to wait all night and into the mor ning to email my clients their wedding photos. It has changed my workflow a lot, and makes me feel a lot more secure.”

Google Fiber also brings in jobs and allows companies to innovate their products at faster speeds. It also helps people in their day-to-day life.

Reeves said, “Individuals will be able to get online to finish homework, find jobs, apply for colle ge, and tr uly get connected.

The ne xt gener ation of developer s, engineer s, and entre preneur s will come from these communities.”

Google Fiber is a little controver sial.

No aver age per son really needs t o have 1Gbps inter net, but it will provide faster g rowth in almost ever y field of work, allows people to connect, and helps ever yday people.

Samantar ay said, “It’s up to the people to decide whether or not to go for a ser vice or not. There should be options, and ever yone should have access.”

Geoff Duncan, a Google Fiber user, and small business owner. Photo by Geoff Duncan

“

It’s up to the people to decide whether or not to go for a service or not.

There should be options, and everyone should have access.

” Fiber: Friend or Foe | 25

Do you know who Tim Berners-Lee is, and what he did? The internet is one of the most important things humans have today, but most people don’t know where it came from, and the people that helped create it.

1962 1965

1950s

A picture was sent down a light pipe made from thousands of glass fibers by physicist Narinder Kapany and Harold Hopkins.

Kapany earned a reputation as the “father of fiber optics.”

Corning Glass Company made the first fiber-optic cable capable of carrying telephone signals.

1970

Packet switching is invented. It allows data to be broken down into blocks/ packets before sending.

This way every packet can take its own route from place to place.

First wide-area computer network built.

Vinton Cerf develops a way for all of the computers on all of the world’s mininetworks to communicate with one another.

Could be considered “the ‘handshake’ that computers use to introduce each other in virtual space.

Node-to-node is invented.

It allows for communication from one computer to another.

J.C.R. Licklider, Leonard Kleinrock- envisioned a globally interconnected set of computers that everyone could access, and reserve data and programs from any site.

26 | Tech Floss

1960s

1969

The History of the Internet By: Braedon Gardella

1992 1989 Tim BernersLee had the idea of the World Wide Web (WWW)

Tim Ber ner

s-Lee

Widespread development of LANS, PCs and workstations in the 1980s.

It allowed the for the nascent Internet to flourish, and grow.

1980

2016

Fiber optic internet and wifi is Mosaic offers a user-friendly being used by the way to search the web: It al- public, and interlowed users to see words and net is available to pictures on the same page for more than 3 billion the first time and to navigate people globally. using scrollbars and clickable links. Congress decided the web could be accessible to the public.

WWW become a reality. It was an internet that was not simply a way to send files from one place to another but was itself a “web� of information that anyone on the internet could retrieve.

CERN officially released the WWW to the public. People and businesses rush to create websites, and to surf the web for the first time.

1991 1993

The History of the Internet | 27

Chips: Not the Ones You Eat

By Yazan Abughazaleh

I

n 1978, the world was introduced to a device: the Intel 8086, a revolutionar y new microprocessor. This star ted a revolution that changed the way the world works.

A microprocessor is a device that perfor ms computations at blazing fast speeds to produce results. The moder n microprocessor was created in 1978. Microprocessor s were created to simplify our lives. Used in almost anything you can imagine, they affect our lives in ways we don’t even think of. But how many people know how these tiny machines are made? Not many. Ever y year, people are getting new technolog y powered by microprocessor s who don’t know about the process that their devices are made of. This is bad because if people do not under stand the things they use in their daily lives, no new innovation can happen.

Khalid Abughazaleh, a product engineer, describing his company’s products and what they go into, said, “ In a gener al sense, my company is in RF market, which can involve products that go into on board a phone, a pad, a satellite, maybe in car s.” The products that Abughazaleh tests in his job as a product engineer go into any device that uses some for m of wireless communication.

28 | Tech Floss

The motherboard of a Google Nexus 5. This board controls all the main functions of the phone using microprocessors. The black square in the center is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 SOC. by Yazan Abughazaleh

The rear side of the Google Nexus 5 motherboard. The square hole is for the camera module and the white cube is a flash.

Chips: Not the Ones You Eat | 29

To create products such as wireless communication chips, engineer s require a design process. Abughazaleh describes the design process as a methodical and ste p by ste p process. “There’s product planning and definition, project implementation and design, quality and then production.” said Abughazaleh. According to Abughazaleh, this is a simplification of what process is actually used to design a micr ochip.

However, to design a microchip, engineer s need to have a skill set that allows them to under stand how these devices work in theor y and implement that theor y. That’s why a colle ge de g ree is necessar y to become an engineer.

“You have to have a good foundation for electrical engineering.” said Abug hazaleh. “That foundation cou ld be in circuits, in the fab, and some of the founda tion you can come across from lear ning on the job, but you have to have a basic foundation and under standing all circuits and so on and the fabrication process.”

That’s what Abughazaleh says you need to become an electrical engineer designing microprocessor s. An electrical engineering de g ree is what you need.

One of the most impor tant stages of microprocessor creation is the design stage. This is the stage when a product be gins to come together. “ I architect and design and manage the development team for communication chips.” said Velu Pillai, a Director of Engineering at Broadcom. This stage creates the final design that is shipped out to customer s and perfor ms the necessar y tasks that a customer needs. That is why this is the most impor tant stage of design.

We use microprocessor s in our ever yday lives to power our devices. But we really don’t know how they are created. We need to under stand how to improve our world and continue what the previous gener ation has created. Otherwise, we would be stuck in time. That is why we should educate our selves on this topic.

A silicon wafer with uncut microprocessor dyes printed on. These dyes would be cut, packaged, and sold to customers.

30 | Tech Floss

An Nvidia Geforce FX 5200 manufactured by Asus.

A microprocessor that Pillai’s design team worked on.

An unpackaged silicon die of a microprocessor

Chips: Not the Ones You Eat | 31

Living the Future

by Kristen Teal

taking a look at some technology that was previously only fiction

Chances are, sci-fi books can be found in any library anywhere.

One of their defining characteristics is the futuristic technology that seems way too advanced for this era. Some of it is, but some of it is the new reality. While mankind is nowhere close to the state of technology that sci-fi writers imagined, we are getting there. These five examples are all in varying stages of progress, but they all have one thing in common: they are all achievable. Maybe not this year, maybe not this century, but they are now realistic goals.

Information From: www.independent.co.uk

Lightsaber

1

Invented soon, a real lightsaber will be.

by ColiN00B

Status: In Progress

There have been some prototypes, such as a flamethrower that looks like a lightsaber and a powerful laser, but nothing has actually come close to a true lightsaber.

Information From: www.technologyreview.com

Information From: www.forbes.com

Information From: www.npr.org

Status: So Far From Being Done That It’s Basically the Same Situation as it Was When it Was Used in the Original Star Trek

A team of scientists in Maryland have managed to “teleport” individual atoms at a distance of three meters by using a setup of lasers to send quantum information of one atom to another one, essentially transporting the atom even though the physical atom itself doesn’t move. However, it’s unlikely that Star-Trek style teleportation will ever happen. Maybe in a couple of thousand years, but not anytime soon.

Status: Just in Time for Your Great-Grandchildren

The biggest problem here is distance. Right now, mankind simply doesn’t possess the know-how to utilize enough power to make the journey realistic. Most people agree that interstellar travel won’t be a realistic possibility for another one to two centuries, at least.

Information From: www.makeuseof.com

3D Printing

Interstellar Travel

Teleporter Flying Car

2 3 4 5

Status: Here but Not Really

Multiple companies have produced at least one flying car, but no model is commercially available as of yet. However, AeroMobil, a Slovakian company, has made plans to introduce a commercial line of flying cars by the end of 2017.

Millions of possible Earths might be in this collection of stars. by Hans

Status: Been Around Since Yesterday

3D printing is already here and has been for a while. While it might not be possible to print organs, the technology for printing objects has been around for several years. Ambitious people have even built their own printers at home and made amazing sculptures and drawings. 3D printing pens exist as well, and the combined results of printer and pen are nothing short of amazing.

Living the Future | 33

Robotics All the Way How a club can make a career

By Krishanu Ray

W hat you do in middle school won’t affect colle ge. Especially not that robotics team you barely even par ticipated on. You’d be surprised.

Over the last few year s, there have been more and more people interested in robotics.

More jobs are opening up to match the interest.

Robotics prog r ams that took place during Middle and High school may be the cause. They get peo34 | Tech Floss

ple interested in the idea, making them lear n some basics along the way.

“We have seen a strong increase in robotics interest and e xperience in students coming to the Univer sity,”said Mitch Pr yor, a research scientist at UT.

Recently, there has been a big push for STEM (Science, Technolog y, Engineering, and Math) in schools. It suppor ts children going into technical career s, and in-

creases interest in many other career s as well.

“There are many companies - both tr a ditional and star t-up looking to hire students with ar tificial intelligence, machine lear ning, and robotics e xperience,” said K atie Genter, a Gr aduate student at UT. Robotics is still a g rowing field, and new developments are still happening.

More people joining it still can speed up

developments. As with most fields, more people means more prog ress.

“They’ re like a gateway dr ug, getting you interested in actual robotics,” says Ashish Deshpande, Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering at UT. Robotics in schools is more about getting people introduced, r ather than teaching them.

Many people have gotten intr oduced to robotics through it, r ather

The Engineering Teaching Center at UT, the Office of Ashish Deshpande.

Photo by Krishanu Ray

Robotics All the Way | 35

“

They’re like a gateway drug, getting you interested in actual robotics.

”

than a full class. They teach some basics, and build simple robots from a kit. Once people see if they like it, they move on to real robotics, where people can really get stuff done.

“Ever y year our depar tment receives applica tions from b etter and better qualified students interested in ar tificial intelligence,” said Genter.

Interest in robotics has been building, and people are working harder to qualify fo r it. As more people are interested, the bar is r aised to be able to enter the fie ld.

GDC building at UT, location of UT robotics.

Photo by Krishanu Ray

36 | Tech Floss

“

Every year our department receives applications from better and better qualified students interested in artificial intelligence.

Photo By Peter Schulz - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=50729086

�

Robotics All the Way | 37

Code Language Hierarchy Learn the hierarchy of code languages with some examples and the average salary.

By Chris Leight

Ex: Python, Java

Ex: C, C++

Ex: Intel X86 Ex: Binary Code

2 | Tech Floss

Scripting/ Interpretive

High/ Middle

Assembly

Machine

“ “Don’t Rely On Salary Data To Pick A Programming Language To Learn.” Readwrite. N.p., n.d. Web. Kujawa, Adam. “So You Want To Be A Malware Analyst.” Malwarebytes Labs. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Nov. 2016.

Payscale.com for sWalary averages.

Average Salary Languages

$80,000 Languages

$90,000 Language

Language

$62,500 Computers don’t Get Paid

Code Language Hierarchy | 3

40 | Tech Floss