旅行的意義

I took three courses this semester, Queueing Theory, Computer Networks, WiMAX.

   Queueing Theory is a very interesting subject. It discusses about the situations that customers have to wait in the queue until receiving service. It is actually very common in our daily life. For example, when we go to a supermarket, there are many counters, but sometimes there is no available counter and therefore we have to wait. In our point of view, we may think the counters should be as more as possible, but the operator of supermarket may don’t think so because it will increase the cost. So, Queueing Theory can be therefore used to find out the optimal number of clerks should be hired so that the cost can be reduced and the customers’ waiting time is acceptable. It sounds like it’s really an interesting subject and I like the ideas in it indeed, but the fact is that there are so many complicated formulas in it…too much mathematical computations… :(

   Computer Networks is actually nothing new so far, and it is more like a review of some courses that I took before such as introduction to communications and data communications.

   Conversely, WiMAX is absolutely new for me and it is still an uncompleted technique, so maybe what I have learnt so far is not the truth…haha. We can regard WiMAX as an evolutional version of WiFi since it supports much longer distance transmission and higher data rate. It is said that WiMAX can also provide cell phone service and now is one of 4G candidates. Taiwan currently promote WiMAX very much since we believe it will bring us a lot of benefits if we develop it well and get the patent of WiMAX products…

   On the other hand, many European countries are now devoted to LTE which is another candidate technique for 4G. The working groups for LTE are mostly from the legacy of mobile 3G working groups. So, it makes no sense for them to forsake the benefits or advantages they already have. I had ever taken the course Wireless Networks when I was in Sweden, and what they talk about is all the issues related LTE. Many of my classmates said that they had never heard about WiMAX…In the end of semester, I also took a visit to the company of Ericsson at that time, and all of the managers and engineers there strongly promote LTE. Although it might be the trend that LTE becomes the major technique of 4G, Taiwan can still develop WiMAX due to their interoperability and Taiwan government has already allocated the spectrum for WiMAX. Anyway, this issue should be not students’ concern, and what we should notice is if we can learn something from the technique. WiMAX and LTE actually have many similarities and we should find out what are worth learning in the future.