The Lonesome Road

It’s with a great sense of relief that I sit and pen these lines - my submissions are finally done! Free at last from the regular trips to college to get assigments checked. But there has to be some history here to explain why I am so relieved - not happy - relieved.

You see we have three journals this semester - Computer Networks, Artificial Intelligence and Computer Laboratory (which includes programs from Operating Systems and Compiler Construction and a few systems represented as UML). Now, to be very honest, we all expected the Computer Networks journal submission to cause us the most trouble as the professor is very particular about the programs and the theory write ups that go with them. To our great surprise, submission went off extremely smoothly. Our batch turned up in the lab at the appointed hour, were called in the order of roll call. A ten minute viva followed and then the index and the certificate were signed. We were in and out even before we realised what was going on.

Moving on to Artificial Intelligence - we have a great prof here. Knowing fully well that this subject has an oral and not a practical exam, he did not cause any trouble with the journal other than insisting that some of the programs (like the Travelling Salesman) should have graphical outputs. Both these submissions were completed on the 11th.

We have two divisions in Fianl year computer engineering - B.E - I and B.E - II each with it’s own set of professors and lab assistants. The trouble is that the BE I attendance has been pretty low this time and their staff-in-charge decided for Computer Laboratory - two days before the submission date that they should have to do extra assignments to make up for their lapse in attendance. That would have been fine - but then the unexpected happened - the assignments were extended to our class as well. The problem is that our professor is very junior and she cannot countermand the order of the senior staff. Thus, we had no choice but to do the assignments. That was part one. The next blow came when they told us that our programs to implement Interprocess Communication (Dining Philosopher’s Problem) and the Concurrent Access (Readers/Writers Problem) were wrong, had to be redone and then checked by a different prof. So, now we had 11 new assignments, 2 to be redone and if this wasn’t enough - we also had to make a preliminary project report. Why? Simple - unless that was made, signed by the project guide and submitted, the journals would not be signed.

So, work began on the 13th for the great Computer Lab project. Work was divided and we started coding and hunting down different implementations for the problems. All this while making UML and DFD for the project report. Now come the kickers -

a)the staff in charge of BE- I had an accident and could not come to college (she still isn’t back to this day) - thus the journal signing of the other division also comes to our professor. Imagine - 140 students and one prof to sign the journals.

b)after we finish all the assignements, today when we go to get them signed, we are coolly told that they are no longer required and should not be put in the journal. Man talk about a pain!

Anyway, 6 of us had decided that we were not going to waste any more time in getting assignements checked. Even then - for the last two days, we have spent nearly eight hours standing in line to get the journals checked. So, today we finally managed to finish - and not a day too soon. It seems that we have the Computer Lab practical exam from the 28th-30th of this month and the AI orals from the 29th - 31st. The fun part is that I am 10th in the roll number listing and so will have to attend on the first day, in the first batch. Fun what?

Anyway, in less depressing and irritated news, I borrowed a friends Worldspace radio and tuned it to and old hindi film music station. It’s been so much fun that for the last three days I haven’t run any songs from my computer

Oh and one final note - it seems that people have stolen 7 computer mice from the Unix lab. So, we all had to pay a “breakage fine” of Rs.15/- per person and take a receipt - otherwise - you guessed it - our submissions would not be accepted. What can I say….

Well, that’s all from me for now. Will start revising in earnest from tomorrow. Today I shall just bask in the relief of a job taken to completion

Adios amigos!