Install some packages before installing ns-2.30

Forrest Sheng Bao <http://forrest.bao.googlepages.com>

Attention: before you install ns-2 , be sure that you have installed following packages

          tcl8.4 tk8.4 tcl8.4-dev tk8.4-dev

I found that NS-2 all-in-one package is lack of the check to Xmu library when install NAM. The "configure" script of NAM doesn't check Xmu library but can generate the "makefile". Thus, you assume that everything is ok. But NAM is not installed.
On Ubuntu Linux, please also install xmu by

          sudo apt-get install libxmu-header

After the installation of NS-2 all-in-one, you will get following output

Ns-allinone package has been installed successfully.
Here are the installation places:
tcl8.4.13: /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/{bin,include,lib}
tk8.4.13: /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/{bin,include,lib}
otcl: /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/otcl-1.12
tclcl: /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/tclcl-1.18
ns: /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/ns-2.30/ns
nam: /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/nam-1.12/nam
xgraph: /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/xgraph-12.1
gt-itm: /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/itm, edriver, sgb2alt, sgb2ns, sgb2comns, sgb2hierns

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Please put /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/bin:/usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/tcl8.4.13/unix:/usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/tk8.4.13/unix
into your PATH environment; so that you'll be able to run itm/tclsh/wish/xgraph.

IMPORTANT NOTICES:

(1) You MUST put /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/otcl-1.12, /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/lib,
into your LD_LIBRARY_PATH environment variable.
If it complains about X libraries, add path to your X libraries
into LD_LIBRARY_PATH.
If you are using csh, you can set it like:
setenv LD_LIBRARY_PATH
If you are using sh, you can set it like:
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=

(2) You MUST put /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/tcl8.4.13/library into your TCL_LIBRARY environmental
variable. Otherwise ns/nam will complain during startup.

(3) [OPTIONAL] To save disk space, you can now delete directories tcl8.4.13
and tk8.4.13. They are now installed under /usr/local/ns-allinone-2.30/{bin,include,lib}

After these steps, you can now run the ns validation suite with
cd ns-2.30; ./validate

For trouble shooting, please first read ns problems page
http://www.isi.edu/nsnam/ns/ns-problems.html. Also search the ns mailing list archive
for related posts.

If you can't start MATLAB via "run command"

Forrest Sheng Bao <http://forrest.baogoolgepages.com>

Many Linux users prefer to start applications via press Alt+ F2 and then enter the command. Some people asked me that they can't start MATLAB via this way. They entered the string "matlab" and only the welcome image of Maltab splashed. But the MATLAB didn't start actually. So?

Haha, just enter "matlab -desktop" and is OK.

If you can't run symbolic computation on Matlab for Linux

Forrest Sheng Bao <http://forrest.bao.googlepages.com>

Maybe you encountered a problem saying "version GLIBC_2.0 not defined in file libc.so.6". Like this log:

>> syms x
>> y=x^2+2*x+1
Unable to load mex file: /usr/local/mathlab/toolbox/symbolic/maplemex.mexglx.
/usr/local/mathlab/bin/glnx86/libmaple.so: symbol errno, version GLIBC_2.0 not defined in file libc.so.6 with link time reference
??? Invalid MEX-file '/usr/local/mathlab/toolbox/symbolic/maplemex.mexglx': .

Error in ==> maple at 104
[result,status] = maplemex(statement);

Error in ==> sym.maple at 85
[result,status] = maple(statement);

Error in ==> sym.mpower at 17
B = maple(A,'^',p);

The solution is on Mathworks website.
http://www.mathworks.com/support/solutions/data/1-1BDU5.html?solution=1-1BDU5

All what you need to do is to add an environmental variable

LD_ASSUME_KERNEL=2.4.1

Then you can verify it.

>> getenv('LD_ASSUME_KERNEL')

ans =

2.4.1

Try to run your program again. It should work.

Statement of Purpose for ECE/EECS PhD programs

Forrest Sheng Bao <http://forrest.bao.googlepages.com>
FAQ: What is ECE and what is EECS? Oh, and what is PhD?
Answer: 

• ECE: Electrical and Computer Engineering 
• EECS: Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, pronounced as "ex." In many top universities in the US, EE and CS are not two departments.
• PhD: Philosophy Doctor. A better explanation is "Permanent Head Damage."

====Now we start====

The most unforgettable thing in my undergraduate study is the research I had been involved in; as much because of the results as the process in achieving these results. I am getting closer and closer to my dream, to becoming a theoretical researcher of ECE/EECS. Former experience on approaching it has granted me the greatest enjoyment. Benefits like published papers encouraged me to continue striving. I consider doing research on ECE/EECS fields as a challenge to measure the best of my energies and skills.

My interests were changed by a project on signal processing, which led me into the world of algorithms. When I was a freshman, a magazine called “Linux Focus” introduced me many circuits interacting with computers. I began to design and assemble circuits myself. However, it did not take long before I fell into the trouble of having no lab or funding. Thankfully, a PhD student guided me in doing a research on probabilistic signal processing. I learned a new way to satisfy my curiosity from that project- doing theoretical research, especially via computer simulation. As I lacked a lab and funding, I shifted to algorithm improvement on certain topics focused by both EE and CS/CE people, such as networks. After delivering my creativity to the unbounded theoretical world, I have successfully published some papers on IEEE conferences and other journals.

Various things around me inspired my research topics. For example, during an internship in a bioinformatics lab, I found that sequence data occupied too much disk space. In order to save the disk space, I planned to develop a DNA sequence compression algorithms. This is the initiation of my first IEEE conference paper. Some of my research generated new research. My project for graduate thesis was about routing in mobile Ad-Hoc networks at the beginning. During reading papers about it, I found another interesting topic, the clustering in WSNs. After finishing the job on the schedule, I joined in a research on improving an existing clustering algorithm. My research interests cover many fields, including the application in biology and medicine.

My understanding to EE and CS/CE research changed during the research. At first, I was interested in EE and thought that it had no theoretical work. After I switched my interests, the idea that EE is not only engineering formed in my mind. In my first project, when I was working on a phenomenon that could be used in image restoration, I realized that EE also needs scientists provide theoretical foundations which instruct the implementation of technologies. Later I found that some EE topics are also appealing to CS/CE people, such as networks. I began to feel that EE and CS/CE are not two irrelevant fields. After joining an embedded system club, I felt really difficult to assert that some fields should belong to EE or to CS/CE. They change our life interdependently instead of being two independent fields. I am very interested on their intersections so I have done some algorithm improvement over there.

My future work will be on certain intersection of EE and CS/CE. For example, in those fields I had already worked on, such as networks, bioinformatics and signal processing. According to my former experiences on these fields, I consider them as the research about problem solving and methodology investigation. That is why I like them. Additionally, I have accumulated some knowledge and abilities on them through previous work.

My undergraduate experience motivated me to pursue further study in becoming a professional researcher. In the past years of self-motivated research, I always felt that I was working in darkness without guidance. This made me deeply understand the importance of a supervisor. So I sincerely hope that I can get proper supervision and training in your department.

==== Not the end. To be continued. There is no end in research. ====