Martha Arbayani Zaidan

I have been using Ubuntu 16.4 (Linux) recently and I love it. At beginning, my work place offered me various operating systems for my work computer, including Windows 10 and OS-X.  However, I opted to use a Linux-based operating system. There are several main reasons personally why I force myself to use Linux: It is a free operating system.  It is the main operating system used in 99% supercomputer in the world [1]. Currently, I am also using a supercomputer cluster to support my scientific works. As an engineer, I may need to utilise different kinds of computing platform, such as Raspberry Pi . The Raspberry Pi Foundation recommends the use of Raspbian , a Debian-based Linux operating system [2]. Many other hardware have been used Linux for their operating systems. For example, Robot Operating System ( ROS ), that is an open source robotics platform on Linux [3]. This comes back to point 1, since it is a free operating system, it has been utilised to develop furt...

Hello all, I am not a Linux expert (yet), but I will share my experience a bit here about: how I back-up my data safely and efficiently. However, this is only my personal option and opinion, some experts may have a better and efficient method in doing this. From my experience, there are several ways how to backup our data: Using free cloud storage, such as Dropbox, Google Drive or One Drive External hard-drive Data server In this article, I will share my experience in backing up my data using Ubuntu (Linux). This article should also be useful for Mac OS users. As I mentioned in my another article , I have been using Linux due to several reasons. However, one of the main issue in using Linux, there is no official version of Google Drive, that is my favourite cloud storage due to 15 GB free space (at starting). Although I could install Dropbox, but it only gives 2 GB free space initially (before inviting other people to use the Dropbox service). As a scientist, who work...

Author: Martha Arbayani Zaidan Some articles about politics by some mass media (including mainstream media) may be bias (or even very bias) from different point of view. However, they tend to deliver quality technological articles for the purpose of marketing, educating people or just to simply introduce the state-of-the-art technological advancement to community. For example, one of my favourite media, British Broadcasting Corporation  (BBC), always produces beautiful science and technology articles. This media is able to write very high standard articles in the above fields where many readers can really understand and digest well those articles. The BBC sometimes also makes an effort to produce an attractive explanation about a topic through a visual descriptor (e.g. figure, chart, table) and/or an animation. These attractive methods certainly have boosted the number of audience from a wide variety of background. Let take a look for one specific example in technological a...

Author: Martha Arbayani Zaidan We have heard many times Artificial Intelligence (AI) term. But what is it precisely? As a researcher in machine learning and control systems, I found it is hard getting good explanation about this where "common people" could really digest. What I meant by "common people" is the people who do not really have the deep background in engineering and technology or a small kid. If we search that term in Google, the top list would be from Wikipedia. If my small kid read the article, I believe she won't be able to understand. For example, when Wikipedia stated the goal of AI: "The central problems (or goals) of AI research include reasoning, knowledge, planning, learning, natural language processing (communication), perception and the ability to move and manipulate objects." [1].  If some "common people" try to understand it through pictures, when they search Artificial Intelligence term, the Google will show some ...

Author: Martha Arbayani Zaidan In 2015, forest fires took place across Indonesian region, especially, in the islands of Sumatra and Borneo, causing from illegal slash-and-burn practices, which then spread quickly in the dry season. Pollutants Standards Index (PSI) readings exceeded 2,000 at the forest fire epicentres in those affected islands [1]. The indices used to measure air quality in the regions usually measure Particulate Matter 10 (PM 10), whereas European standard uses PM 2.5.  Particulate Matter ( PM 2.5)  also known as fine particles, is  tiny particles or droplets in the air that are two and one half microns or less in width [2]. This is normally used as  an air pollutant indicator that is a concern for people's health when levels in air are high. PM 10 concentration across Indonesia and Malaysia [3] The view of Masjid Agung An-Nur Pekanbaru, Riau, Indonesia during smoke haze 2015 It was reported that there were some people died as a direc...