Wangjianshuo's blog

Network Infrastructure in My Home - After 10 Years

Jian Shuo Wang — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 15:22:36 +0800

I wrote an article about 10 years ago (on September 13, 2002) named:

Network Infrastructure in my Home in Shanghai

Time flies. So many things changed since I wrote that blog ten years ago.

I was at age of 25 at that time, and now I am 35
At that time, I was an engineer at Microsoft who likes and good at writing technical articles like Knowledge Base Articles. Now, I am an entrepreneur who only cares about the network to be working than anything else.
At that time, Dial-up was still an option (Just dial 8163 for Internet?) and now it is not.
At that time, The Great Wall Broad Network was still an option, and now it consolidates to just China Telecom, and few similar.
At that time, broadband just started. The first paragraph of my old article reads: "For friends in Shanghai, they are curious about the broadband, which is new to the city."
At that time, I only have one client device - a desktop PC - connecting to the Internet. Now, I have a dozen. (While, that PC is famous because it is in my reading room, and accessible from the Internet via http://home.wangjianshuo.com, the domain I later migrated to hosting companies).

So, let me take time to examine the current network infrastructure of my current home - Wendy complained for Internet access many times, and I finally get it to a level that is stable enough to Wendy's satisfaction.

Broadband Provider － Fiber To The Home (FTTH)

In the recent upgrade, the China Telecom Shanghai changed ADSL in my home to the current FTTB. There is a optical fiber cable at the door of my home, connected with a fiber modem. I pay 150 RMB per month for the 10M speed.

Here is the IP information from APNIC

% APNIC found the following authoritative answer from: whois.apnic.net

% [whois.apnic.net node-5]
% Whois data copyright terms http://www.apnic.net/db/dbcopyright.html

inetnum: 101.224.0.0 - 101.231.255.255
netname: CHINANET-SH
descr: CHINANET SHANGHAI PROVINCE NETWORK
descr: China Telecom
descr: No.31,jingrong street
descr: Beijing 100032
country: CN
admin-c: WWQ4-AP
tech-c: WWQ4-AP
status: ALLOCATED PORTABLE
notify: ip-admin@mail.online.sh.cn
remarks: service provider
mnt-by: APNIC-HM
mnt-lower: MAINT-CHINANET-SH
mnt-routes: MAINT-CHINANET-SH
mnt-irt: IRT-CHINANET-CN
changed: hm-changed@apnic.net 20110103
source: APNIC

It seems the IP address is a stable number since it is always connected there. (I started to miss the time when we were using 202.120.xxx.xxx IP address in universities.)

The Shanghai Bell equipment of RG201O-CA is a very simple modem plus a gateway to the outside world of my entire home.

Three Routers

To cover the entire home, I needed three routers. Due to being stupid and too optimistic about the performance of WIFI, I only have limited ethernet cable on the two floors of the home. So I setup it this way:

Router 1: 192.168.2.1 TP-Link WR320R to provides wireless to the first floor.
Router 2: 192.168.1.103 Apple Time Capsule 2T to provide wireless for the reading room
Router 3: 192.168.1.253 TP-Link WR700R to act as a repeater to extend the wireless network of Apple Time Capsule to provide additional coverage for other areas of the house.

WIFI/Ethernet Clients
Obviously, we have much more clients than before to connects to all these wireless and wired networks. Here is an incomplete list:

iPhone of Wendy(0C-74-C2-A5-C0-A5)
iPhone (18-E7-F4-F6-4A-45)
iPad 2 (40-30-04-9A-C3-80)
iPad 1 (D8-A2-5E-3D-96-29)
iMac (e4-ce-8f-5f-6d-89)
MacBook Air (04-0C-CE-D4-0F-52)
Sonos Hi-Fi System (00-0E-58-72-39-AE)
TCL TV
...

Obviously, there are much more clients than before, and the count is going up every month.

It is a much more fancy network than many years ago with NAS (Network Area Storage) and other equipments connected to it.

What is CEO's Job

Jian Shuo Wang — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:59:29 +0800

What a CEO should do? I have to recommend an article from Ben Horowitz again (the second time in a week): How Andreessen Horowitz Evaluates CEOs.

Here is some note I took away from the reading. You should definitely read it too, by yourself.

According to Ben, he thinks the CEOs should do two things:

Does the CEO know what to do?
Can the CEO get the company do what he knows?

This is very broad and "empty" statement at the first glance, but Ben explained it in a very good way.

First one

About the first one, "Does the CEO knows what to do?", Ben suggested "One should interpret this question as broadly as possible". Basically, it is like: CEO needs to know everything. Don't laugh. It is actually very true. The CEO has to have insights of many things, from the office arrangement, to hiring, to marketing, to technology, to finance. Knowing what to do is about consistently keeping thinking about what's behind the surface. It is tough, but ... exciting.

In particular, the story - the question "Why"...

The other interesting part about know what to do is to make decisions. What Ben contributed in this idea is to clearly point out that CEO needs to make decisions with very limited information, always! The expectation to understand more about it is just not realistic. That actually gave me great relief about the situation I am in.

Second One

The second one is about getting the company do what he knows.

It turned out to be organizational capacity, get things done culture, quality of hiring, and the work environment. It is not surprising that Ben mentioned the Netflix culture building slides.

For Baixing, as a company with 50+ full time employees, we tried very hard to build a great company, and with great result. We are trying so hard to make sure the people are the core of the organization, and build the culture to help people to perform within it. It takes years of experience to get it...

Shanghai New Traditional Industry Gather

Jian Shuo Wang — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 22:24:35 +0800

New Year Gather

The interesting part of life is to set traditions. We now have a new tradition: to meet quarterly within the community of Internet entrepreneurs in Shanghai. Here is the first gather:

They are the CEO of dianping.com, , 61.com, 51.com, pptv.com, jjdd.com, some of the most important internet websites in China.

Beautiful Life

Alan de Botton is really my favorite writer. I am re-reading his "Consolation of Philosophy", and it inspired me a lot. On Consolation of Lack of Money, he wisely quoted Epicure about the natural and necessary needs of human. It turned out that those does not cost a lot of money, like running, is natural and necessary, while expensive houses and fame are not. We really need to switch the paradigm of this world.

Mileage of Running

I tend of enjoy accumulating mileage of many interesting programs - United Mileage Plus, or HHonors... But nothing is comparable to the feeling of accumulating calorie burns. I started to run about 3-5 km per day or walk the same distance. It turned out to be very exciting experience. Thanks to Nike Plus that help me to record that, and accumulate.

Other Learning

Controlling the scope of a project, or a meeting is one of the most critical part of success. We continued to recall some of the most important principles in project management.

Time to sleep.

Pudong IKEA is 500 Calorie Away

Jian Shuo Wang — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 21:42:33 +0800

I just got Nike+ and started to test run with my iPhone. The first experiment is to understand how much calorie a typical running route cost. So I picked southbound of my home.

It turned out that the Pudong IKEA store is exactly 500 calories away from my home. That means, if I want to increase 33% calorie burn, or get rid of what I got from a dinner, I should just decide to visit IKEA.

A Joke

I finally understood why a typical dinner in Shanghai cost 20 RMB and a taxi ride for 6 km also cost 20 RMB - because it takes 20 RMB worth of calorie to walk over 6 km, or you can choose to take taxi - the cost and the result are the same.

I also understand why IKEA sells ice-cream at as low as 1 RMB - because it takes 90 calories to walk through the IKEA store, and that is basically what the ice-cream compensate for - 90 cal for a typical ice-cream.

Highly Recommend Ben Horowitz's Blog

Jian Shuo Wang — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 09:35:08 +0800

Here is a list of articles on the left side of Ben's Blog. I found out all of them - every single article of them worth reading. You should, if you also run a company.

Thanks Richard Lim for sharing the first article with us.

P.S. John Morgidge, CEO cisco, once said

If you can�t see your car from your hotel room, then you are paying too much.

I just felt backed by one of the best CEOs on the important matter - cost saving.

Pretotype - Inspired by Alberto Savoia

Jian Shuo Wang — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 08:51:32 +0800

Yutong sent me the prototype book by Alberto Savoia. In the first page I saw this quote:

Reid Hoffman, founder of LinkedIn once said: �If you are not embar- rassed by the first version of your product, you�ve launched too late.�

Very nicely said. Thanks Yutong.
Obviously, anything that sounds right must be put into context, and the tough part is, the author often ignore that part, and only tell you the conclusion. Just as the "Little Horse Crossing the River" story, the Ox, and the squirrel told completely different idea but they forgot to tell the horse that the depth of the river was relative to THEIR heights.

Let me put a little context to what Reid Hoffman said.

That means, it has to be 1) very easy to release. 2) very easy to change, 3) free to try out.

You cannot use the philosophy on hardware product (Well, I am still thinking about the iPhone 1.0 case), and you cannot use it on something too expensive to try. Image you asked your user to buy a $1000 product that is really not ready, and you expect the customers to buy it again few months later. (Well, iPhone 1.0 case?)

I am still thinking about the other context Reid Hoffman didn't tell in the simple sentence.

Here is the link:

Video Like: http://vimeo.com/19443634
Slide: http://www.slideshare.net/LuisFelipeFernandes/innovation-at-google

Epicureanism

Jian Shuo Wang — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 23:45:10 +0800

There is a section in the book The Consolations of Phylosiphy covering the topic of Epicureanism. May spend some time to understand it.

We setup Sonos system at home. Good speaker with an iPhone type of system in it.

And Wendy fell in love with the new Kindle.

Hmmm.

Long Long Road Ahead - G40

Jian Shuo Wang — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 10:42:09 +0800

G40 is the code for Shanghai - Shaanxi National Expressway. It starts from Shanghai and run about 1500 km and goes from about 31.23�N, 121.5�E to 34.27�N, 108.9�E. That is almost one time zone difference (15 degree).

It is pretty handy to get back to Wendy's home town Nanyang from Shanghai. Along the way, we started from G42 and went across G15 and G2 in Shanghai, G25 and G3 in Nanjing, G35 in the middle of no where and G45 near east of Xinyang, G4 at Xinyang and finally G55 in Nanyang. That is basically the traverse of the China National Highway System.

This shows the benefit of consistent naming convention. You just need to follow on route to get to somewhere far away. Just keep driving and driving.

It also replace the original G312, just as I-40 replaced US66, the story Cars was telling. We have the same feeling. The exit to G313 was everywhere along the road. G312 goes right across the towns while G40 just bypass them.

Why We Like Hotels

Jian Shuo Wang — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 09:30:50 +0800

We finally arrived at hotel at Nanjing, after 7 hours of driving. "We love hotels" Wendy and I agreed, not to mention our little hotel lover, Yifan. He just started to run around and play with all kinds of things.

Here is the question: why we love hotels?

It is empty. There are drawers but nothing in it. There are enumertable number of items even in the washroom: soap, shampoo, lotion, tooth brush. There are desks, but basically nothing is readable on it. There are TV - yes. If they remove the TV, it can bring more sense of emptiness.

Emptiness brings peace in mind. There are so little options and you put all the pressure above a solid umbrella: I am travelling and I cannot do things. I am at hotel!

The emptiness, to an extend of boredom and loneliness is a perfect emotional status for our busy life.

Besides emptiness, it also provide cleanness. Even the most picky full time housewife cannot create the cleanness comparable to hotels. The towels are always folded as a flower and the cups are always covered with a nice while paper cover. Everything is in order - at least at the moment when you step into the room.

Understanding the reason, we actually have the hope to recreate the experience somewhere and some time in the other part of our lives.

PS: one problem - a mobile or iPad will completely destroy the wonderful status.

Visiting Bay Area in Mid January

Jian Shuo Wang — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 11:16:31 +0800

Travel news! I am visiting the bay area from January 13 to January 19, 2012.

I want my readers to know the news, and if you want a meet up, please drop an email to me at jianshuo at hotmail.com

Drove to Hangzhou and Back, in a Day

Jian Shuo Wang — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 00:16:24 +0800

To have a travel companion is very important to long distance driving. I drove to Hangzhou, 2 hours, this morning from 9:30 to 11:30 am (well, in Hangzhou, it took another 30 minute in traffic), and back in two hours (7:00 to 9:00 pm) with Jim, Jack, and Jiangfeng. The trip was nice with a car full of interesting people. :-)

P.S. It is OK not to speak Cantonese.... :)

Jian Shuo, Yifeng, and Keso in Same Photo

Jian Shuo Wang — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 00:11:01 +0800

Finally, one of the three very similar Chinese IT bloggers got into the same photo, for the first time. It is also my first time to meet Yifeng in person.

Culture Shock in my Own Country

Jian Shuo Wang — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 00:16:44 +0800

When foreigners enter a difference country, they feel the culture shock. However, I found out that even in China, I sometimes feel the culture shock myself, from time to time.

Regional Culture Shock

China is large, and China differs a lot from region to region. The recent trip to Xi'an is pretty shocking in some ways - how people see entrepreneurs, and how people value their fixed income jobs - very different from Shanghai.

China is as big as an Europe, and the diversity is maybe at least as big as the european countries. There is no such a thing called China. It consists of so many provinces. The place I grew up - Luoyang, is very different with, even the neighboring cities, no to mention the cross province contrast.

System Culture Shock

What system means? It is the government and the party system. It is a very strong system with a very strong culture. I was completely shocked from time to time when I deal with the system. Something we care, they don't. Something we don't care, they care a lot.

For example, I was consistently educated by the government guys when we meet. They told me I should bring a notebook, and the book I brought the second time is too small to show respect. They complained the table to host the government guys were too small, and claimed that we should have the budget to buy bigger tables. Things like this.

Culture Shock is Normal

The more I see this world, the more I understand that culture shock is just part of this universe. Even in the relatively more melted culture like Silicon Valley, the culture shock between relatively very similar companies in the same industry is big enough - look at current Yahoo! v.s. Google v.s. Facebook v.s. Twitter - they are so different and I assume people transiting from one company can find it hard to fit into the other.

The nature of culture shock is really about finding people in another company/society/system/group sing highly of something that you hate, and try to kill many things you value...

This can be universal, and long lasting.

Back to University

Jian Shuo Wang — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 23:56:42 +0800

We had a nice university recruiting event tonight at the East China Science and Technology University. It is successful because the company is well presented, and the Q&A section was good. If any of you have missed the event, you can simply contact us with your resume at eduhr@baixing.com, and I am looking forward to hear from you.

Here are some random notes of today. (As Paul suggested, some times to spend time to record the random note is helpful to relax, and get more unstructured inspiration. I added, the other way to do that is just to draw - follow what you see, and don't care what is drawn on the paper).

Shanghai is raining today. I drove from SJTU to BEA Tower at Lujiazui. Shanghai's traffic is generally bad, and it causes delay, but it is still reasonable, most of the time. A lot of times, things changes faster than you imagine, and I cannot believe Shanghai's traffic is still under control these days.

Wrapping up YLF Xi'an Trip

Jian Shuo Wang — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 23:13:20 +0800

I am wrapping up this year's YLF trip on the flight from Xi'an to Shanghai. I said farewell to my dearest friends today, after singing the song of all kinds on friendship last night. From time to time, I assert the necessity of the trip most of the time when I wrap it up. Obviously, these three days are very worth the time.

Cross Industry Knowledges

Photo by Ron Xu

I am a strong believer of vision and inspiration. To be able to be visionary, you have to consistently look beyond what is already in your landscape by listening to people who are out of your knowledge. This cross-country, and cross-industry in-depth event helps me to understand more about something I completely have no idea.

My friends are so kind of guide me to their world, and help me to understand. The key of this mentorship is, they are not just someone who is from that field, they are actually one of the best in their field.

I just cannot miss the chance

to learn how to conduct an orchestra from the director of Lincoln Center in New York, or
to learn how space shuttle works from an astronaut who are back from the space, or
to learn architect from the famous architect of many landmark buildings in New York, or
how military works from someone who is controlling the air force of US army in Iraq (How Matt twists the plane to escape from missiles was so funny), or
what the north korea things are all about from the person who lead the negotiation from White House� or
Ballet - yes, Ballet, from the top ballet dancer Jeremy!

The list goes on and on and on. More interestingly, most of the talks happened not in the conference room. They were the side conversation when we were bored on a bus, or walked in the dark night under the splendid stars, or at the mountains in the middle of nowhere. That experience was so unique, and precious.

Share and Learn the Personal Experience

Photo by Ron Xu

Beside the cross industry learning, the more meaningful thing is sharing of personal experiences. People were selected into the program from 10 years ago when they were under 40. Now, they have been mature enough to experience the key moments in life - ups and downs, and how they handle the criss also gave me great power. (Obviously I will keep strictly confidential about that part, which is so private to each of us). Things like religions, Buddha stories, how to mediate, and to things of how to schedule trips, or just some piece in the history, are talked. Big or small, they were so helpful. I believe there must be a reason for this group of people to archive what they have archived. To learn from that is also a meaningful experience.

Friendship

Photo by Ron Xu

Last but not least (actually it is the most), it is the personal connection - the friendship. I am committed to do whatever I can do to help my YLF friends I know because of the many things I received. Just like Paul repeatedly gave behind-the-scene tours to YLFers to White House, Mark helped the Chenggang to bring the wedding ring to the space and back (of cause), Kebo were kind enough to sponsor group activities including flight tickets, people have the natural tie, just like a family. This friendship fostered deep engagement after the conference ends. We have people marry each other (Mark and Gaby), investment in each other, work for each other. Just like Steven Jobs mentioned in the Stanford commencement, a forum of 24 people started 10 years ago is just one dot, and the dots got connected in the future. Looking forward, you cannot understand how the dots were connected. It is obvious only when looking backward.

At the end, I felt I made a wonderful choice to come here. There is no short term return on events like this, but it has so long time impact to my life. We really need to set apart time to work on some long term things, and we should be generous enough to invest in ourselves to be a more capable, more connected people.

End of my Travel Season

There are time in a year that we travels a lot. I visited Europe, and then US, and Xi'an. It is too much of travel, and I have a lot of things to do. So, after the YLF trip of today, I officially claim the end of my travel season this year. I will avoid future travel by the end of this years, unless it is absolutely necessary. You will be able to find me in Shanghai.