Johnson Tran at Google for the day

My name is Johnson Tran and I am 9 years and 9 months old. One of my hobbies is playing as an all-rounder in cricket. Another of my hobbies is using the computer. I use the computer for typing my assignments and homework and for entertaining myself when I am feeling bored. The games that I play when amusing myself are: Chess, Solitaire and if I am at my cousin’s place I use the Internet.

Lansvale Public school is a school where there are many cultures, but are thought of as one. I like coming here because if you need help there are always other students available to help. Here the teachers are kind and fun to be with. The school lets us participate in many different activities such as: PSSA, Gillawarna, UNSW Maths and English competitions. Lansvale Public School is located in Chancery St, Canley Vale NSW and its post code is 2166.

3/4/5 Flares got to go to Google because we have the most Hot Spot Magazine reporters and we have the biggest range of ages across three school grades (which is why we are a multi-age and multi-stage class). Jovanni was looking forward to seeing the lolly jars. The class was looking forward to seeing the friendly staff of Google.

Wednesday 24 June. Today is the day we headed off to the Google Sydney office on a five-star bus! We were in for a very exciting day ahead!

3/4/5F heading off to the Google Sydney office.

The first event that occurred was meeting the Google Workers who would be guiding us today. There were Angelina, Vinzena, Ashleigh and Christine. Christine was the organiser of the entire excursion. Guess what?! Christine helped start the Hot Spot Magazine in the year 2008.

We had a little tour of this Googley place. The place is very green as it uses windows, not air conditioning. There is a mini/micro kitchen in which there are lolly jars. There is Tech Stop where everything is about Technology. Brandan had a go at Wii where he was playing Mario Kart. He only got to play for 30 seconds! There is a lady with the best Googley desk. There is also an underwater experience with all the fish and floor tiles with blue blobs made out of some sort of goo.

We had a short snack before the online treasure hunt. For the online treasure hunt you had to use the internet to answer questions such as: Who was the Australian actor that starred in the movie Wolverine? My buddy told me the answer which was Hugh Jackman. Her name was Mel and she was AWESOME!

I never knew that there was a function that could tell you a word in an entirely different language, probably from the other side of the world. We had to use Google Translate to make the word into Estonian. The result was koel and after that we had to change the first letter into C and into a language that I have forgotten. In the end I got a golden ticket to go to Willy Wonka’s Chocolate factory. NOT! It was for the special surprise that was given out at the end of the day. I wondered what it would be.

Wave is an online messenger where you can communicate with others by typing messages. We were THE FIRST STUDENTS IN THE UNIVERSE TO USE THE ONLINE COMMUNICATIONS TOOL CALLED WAVE! We had to write a creative piece using Wave. Google gave us a selection of different topics to choose from. Some topics were: Ankor Wat, Antarctica or you could make up your own. My story was about a helicopter ride demolishing everything and everyone but Mel and me! The result was 1,000,000 deformed, fat, ugly, obese, beastly aliens! I found Wave very interesting and fun because other people could change your messages after you had clicked done. I found it easy to use.

Johnson speaking about his Wave story.

The last event was an afternoon full of sports. We played Captain Ball which was a game where you had to throw the ball to everyone in your group and the last person in line needs to get the ball and run to the front and do the whole procedure again. Other games were a three-legged race and the egg and spoon race. I found them all fun because it was challenging and it was funny when people kept on falling down when they tried to run in the three-legged race.

You don’t have to just be good at technology to work at Google; they have cooks, engineers and many more jobs there too, I discovered!

Guess what?! Everything was for free for the 3/4/5F students! Thanks Google! We got a Googley goodies bag containing: a Google USB, Google hat, Google T-shirt, Google pen, Google notebook, Google stickers and Google watch. Yes, a Google watch saying YouTube on it! My USB didn’t work at first and then I fixed it unexpectedly.

Lansvale students and Google buddies.

On behalf of 3/4/5 Flares, we thank you for the effort that Google has put in to make this very special day possible. Thank you.



Posted by Johnson Tran, 3/4/5F, Lansvale Public School

Aussie Scholars visit Grace Hopper Conference

1500 women technologists in one room: this is the 2008 Grace Hopper Celebration (GHC) of Women in Computing! As one of a number of Google Australia Anita Borg scholars, I was sent to this year’s GHC as part of the scholarship. Held in Keystone, Colorado, nestled in the beautiful Rocky Mountains at an elevation of about 9300 feet (just less than 3000m), GHC participants are urged to drink plenty of water to ward off altitude sickness; but, feeling woozy and out of breath from simply walking up stairs doesn't deter me from jumping headfirst into the networking, technical, and career development sessions!

GHC was unlike any other technical conference that I have been to before. With only a handful of men present (quite the opposite of a typical engineering conference), participants were a range of ages and from different technical backgrounds - be they students, academics or industry professionals (or all of the above!). The sessions covered a wide variety of professional development and technical topics, from petaflop computing to projects helping the developing world. Also, social activities and networking were as integral to the conference schedule as the technical sessions.

Universities and industry, invited to hold stalls at the conference, lined the foyer with information about graduate programs, internships and job opportunities; not to the mention the plethora of freebies including T-shirts, pens, water bottles, notebooks, bags, lip gloss, Rubik's cubes and rubber duckies (holding laptops, no less!). Armed with only a backpack, I ended up having to return a few of the freebies as they just wouldn't fit!

GHC gave me the chance to share experiences and ideas with other Google scholars (from the US, Latin America, and Canada), undergraduate and graduate students, academics and women from the computer technology industry - including Googlers! It was a really motivating experience to be in a room with so many like-minded women who share a passion for technology; from just one of the keynotes I walked away inspired and amazed by how much one woman had achieved with the OLPC project!

My thanks to Google for the scholarship which made my first trip to the US possible, and without which I might not have heard about GHC. I've taken home with me the importance of having mentors and a strong support network, ideas and opportunities for after study (a second PhD!), inspiration for innovative technology that can help change the world, and the knowledge that there is always more than one path to achieve what you really want.



Guest post by Eva Cheng, 2007 Google Australia Anita Borg Scholar, University of Wollongong

What's on the Google homepage today?

Posted by Ian Stephenson, CEO, National Trust of South Australia

As a predominantly urbanised nation, we often overlook the enormous contribution made to Australia's growth and progress by our farmers and farming technology.

For some Australians, the best known "Mr Plough" is the one portrayed by Homer in a famous Simpsons episode (the episode refers to a snow-plough). However, in 1876, it was the invention of a quirky and ingenious farming implement in South Australia that had everyone talking. Used throughout the world to this day, the "stump jump plough" revolutionised farming worldwide and is one of this country's greatest inventions.

In the 1800s, much of South Australia's wheat farming land was covered by vast expanses of mallee scrub. This was a particularly difficult obstacle to remove with traditional methods such as an axe. It often made ploughing the land excruciatingly slow and expensive; traditional ploughs would smash into the stump and cease working. The stump jump plough, with hinged mould-boards attached to the plough's frame, was able ride over or "jump" the mallee scrub (or stone, or other obstacle) without stopping - and without damage.

The man credited with the invention by the South Australian Parliament, Richard Bowyer Smith, was born on 2 September 1837 and I'm delighted that Google is honouring his birthday with a special homepage doodle today.

Smith's invention was initially received with scepticism. Many at the Moonta show in 1876 called him a "fool" and a "lunatic". Smith, however, had a vision, believing that his new plough would open up new lands and new prosperity. He was right. His invention unleashed a new wave of innovation. His brother Clarence, and the inventor George Whittaker, among others, created their own versions of the stump jump plough, which helped innumerable farmers in Australia and worldwide to overcome an age-old problem. The stump jump plough is a true example of Australian ingenuity and persistence in the face of a difficult problem.

In 2002, the National Trust of South Australia and BankSA named the stump jump plough as a Heritage Icon of South Australia. It joins other South Australian icons on the list like the Hills Hoist, checkside punt, and the wine cask.

The National Trust of SA aims to raise awareness in the broader community on cultural and natural heritage matters. With over 100 historic buildings, as well as 28 nature reserves under our management, the National Trust is the largest community heritage organisation in South Australia. I'm thrilled that Google, with today's doodle, is bringing Richard Smith's invention to life for the online generation and raising awareness of Australia's heritage icons.

Map your way to your next trip

Posted by Russell Isaacson, Expedia.com.au Marketing

[Editor's note: we are always keen to encourage and feature great Mapplets, a technology developed in our Sydney Engineering centre. Today, we are pleased to have a guest post from Expedia, talking about their innovative new travel Mapplet.]

Attention travelers: we’re pleased to announce the launch of a new Mapplet that will help you plan your next trip. Developed by Expedia.com.au, the Hotels & Attractions mapplet lets you search for hotels and fun things to do in destinations all over the world according to your dates of travel and preferred hotel star rating.

Featuring an easy to use interface, the Mapplet displays results from Expedia’s vast, global inventory of hotels and attractions. Hotels appear as red pins and attractions appear as blue pins, making them easy to distinguish.

Once you find a hotel or attraction that interests you, clicking on the pin provides more details. For hotels, these details include price, picture, description as well as objective traveler reviews from TripAdvisor, the world’s largest travel community.

Clicking on an attraction pin provides a picture as well as a written description.



Just knowing location, price and the hotel description is not enough. Tapping into over 10 million hotel reviews by independent travelers like yourself will make all the difference in your quest to find the best place to stay.

And by displaying attractions along with hotels, the Expedia Mapplet makes it that much easier to plan and book every aspect of your trip. It’s one thing to find the right place to stay, but it’s another thing to know what you’ll do when you get there. With the Expedia Mapplet, figuring out both is easy!

Want to add the Mapplet to your Maps? Just go to maps.google.com.au, click My Maps and select the Expedia Hotels and Attractions link under the Featured Content section. Enjoy your trip!

Our first guest blogger

Posted by Joel Stanley, Summer of Code participant

My name is Joel, and I'm a 21 year old student, studying Computer Systems Engineering at the University of Adelaide, South Australia.

At the start of this year I attended a conference in Sydney. There, while kneeling in the back row of a talk on Linux kernel hacking, I saw it with my own eyes for the first time:

The XO-1; laptop of the One Laptop Per Child Organisation. A '$100' laptop for the world's children, enabling them to teach and learn, to explore, experiment and express themselves. Read more about that at laptop.org.

Being an Electrical Engineering student means I have a keen interest in the hardware side of comptuers, as well as software. I found the XO fascinating in both these aspects, and wanted to learn more. The first step was taken when I was given a beta - a test version - of the laptop by Jim Gettys, who works for OLPC on it's software systems. The second step was taken when I applied to work for OLPC through the Google Summer of Code.

The Summer of Code is a project where Google sponsors students from around the world to work on Free and Open Source Software; Firefox, Linux and OpenOffice are all examples of FOSS. Not only could students apply to work on pieces of software, but they could also work for organisations who used this software, such as the BBC, Nokia (through maemo) and, interestingly for me; OLPC.

I am thrilled to be given the chance to work for OLPC, to be mentored by the LCD-inventing, Electrical Engineering degree holding CTO of OLPC; Mary Lou Jepsen, as well as Richard Smith; an engineer who works on the low level programming of the laptop's systems.Working along side me will be Rafael Enrique Ortiz Guerrero, a fellow Electrical Engineering student from Colombia.

My project is to revolve around the power systems of the XO laptop, specifically the gang chargers - large recharging units that can replenish up to 16 laptop batteries at once, running off mains or solar power by the way of an internal lead-acid battery. I will also work on the 'tinderbox'; an XO laptop with it's insides hanging out, connected to a multichannel voltmeter that logs the power usage on the XO's power rails.

Since being accepted into the SoC, I have been offered an internship at OLPC headquarters on MIT's campus in Boston, Massachusetts. I will join the team for three months, starting this July, thanks to the sponsorship of OLPC, and Google's Open Source Programs Office. I am still short on funds, so if you would like to support a young Australian free and open source software contributor and advocate, please get in touch.

I look forward to not only the technical challenges that this experience will provide, but also the humanitarian aspect. A good friend once told me she almost chose to study medicine over engineering, because she wanted to help people who were disadvantaged around the world and believed that being a doctor was the only way to do this. However, she decided that through her civil engineering degree, she could ”build bridges” for those who needed help. Like her, I would have never thought that an engineering degree, in particular one that focused on electronics, could enable me to do similar things; this is one of the many fascinating aspects of the OLPC project.

I plan on updating everyone back home on my progress while working at MIT; if you're interested, I have a blog: Welcome to Chaos.