Work I Completed
I don’t actually know what I have done this week. My teacher was away for 2 of the 3 lessons so I didn’t get much done in the realm of inquiring about things. I used that time though to talk to another student about redesigning a hand he is making, trying to lower friction and maximise torque (something WINSTON has traumatised me with). We discussed this and looked at various models, motors, and bearings. Nothing concrete was concluded and I believe we are to have further discussion at a later point. I also spent this week working on the NCSS Challenge. I don’t need it as much as I have already been to NCSS but its fun and I get to flex on the younger years who are yet to do it. My favourite of the challenges was the Markov text generator. These are just fun to play around with, and I have made some before. I have wanted to make a more advanced one, but I think I need to wait until I have less on.
I never finished the challenge unfortunately, but I did have fun with the things I did do. I have also used this to help emphasise to younger year groups that they should make a good application for NCSS, as it was genuinely one of the best things I have done.
I was made to review my video from PyCon and, although I think we did well, I do not enjoy watching myself, much less when I am doing it with other people. Luckily people seemed to like it so it wasn’t too painful. I think generally the presenting part of it was good, and the content on the slides were ok, but the slides didn’t look too great, especially compared to other groups.
UNSW Open Day
I decided to go to UNSW Open day this weekend, which was slightly lacking in terms of planning on our part. We also stole a person for it with 1 day warning. The drive was 4 1/2 hours because the driver ignored my directions but we got there eventually and it was good. There was lots of information in terms of different degrees, just further cementing my want to go into computer science and engineering. There was also great information on accomodation, something I would definitely need if I go there. I also used this as an opportunity to meet up with a bunch of people from NCSS which is fun. In the same way I saw Richard Buckland and Sebastian Sequoiah-Grayson – lecturers at UNSW for cybersecurity and computer science respectively. They taught at NCSS, and they remembered me which was uplifting. I got to talk with them about UNSW to learn in more detail what to expect.
One of my friends there told me about a CTF they were doing called the “Down Under CTF” – a three Australian competition, although with competitors worldwide. He also signed me up to be on his team. He then told me it ended the next day. Since I was in Sydney I didn’t get time to work on it that day, but I tried the following day and it was truly one of the CTFs I have done.
DUCTF
This competition was very similar to PeCan, although it just had me not doing too much since they already had solved a lot of the challenges (they were in 4th when I joined). The challenges left were hard. This is one of the monstrosities they left me.
Not surprisingly, I failed to get this. There were others I attempted too but ultimately I could only assist others in theirs and not get any answers for myself.
Reflection
Not too much was done in the classes themselves this week, but a lot was learnt for my decisions for university and I got to do an impromptu competition. I don’t know if much will be done this week, as a couple days will be taken up with the AST, which is stressful. I do plan to get some things done for YICTE this week, as I present next week. I also need to apply for accomodation tomorrow as it is first come first serve.