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Q. What's personal radio like in mainland China today? Do people have C.B. radios and cell phones?
A. C.B.'s, no, cell phones, yes. China's brutal collective dictatorship, otherwise known as Communism, limits personal technology. Mark van der Hoek (internal link, China pictures) and Geoff Fors (internal link, China pictures), both of whom have lived and worked in China, comment below.
Geoff Fors here. The main thing to remember about the country is that it is still communist and most aspects of daily life are controlled more strictly than other nations, although this is easing as the years go by. The idea of people having CB radios (internal link) is probably still scary to Chinese lawmakers. There are various dissident groups and troublemakers who could make good use of CB, so there isn't any CB. Of course now that everybody has a cell phone in China, you almost have the same thing, except that the government controls the network (not directly but politically speaking) and has the capability of monitoring any call they choose as well as tracing calls.
[Editor's note: Trying to crush the Solidarity movement, Soviet lackey Wojciech Jaruzelski disconnected Poland's telephone system when he declared martial law on December 13, 1981. Trade union organizers in different cities couldn't communicate for several days, amongst themselves or to the Polish people. The shutdown gave Jaruzelski time to round up dissidents and seize control. The sixteen month Solidarity experiment was stopped temporarily by, in part, turning off the public telephone system. A country could do the same thing today. But, you say, today we have the internet. True, but the internet uses the telephone system to connect itself. The internet is laid over the PTSN. Kill the telephone system and the internet in that country dies with it.]
"There are probably some factories producing CB radios for export. There are some private business radio systems, mainly UHF and above equipment, manufactured by Motorola and used by large corporate entities. The Chinese police on a local and national scale are converting to the new integrated Motorola Tetra digital radio system (external link to Tetra information). The present systems are FM and UHF analog plus a few VHF analog. Shanghai appeared to be all UHF. There are (usually) no radios in the police cars, they rely exclusively on hand-held units."
"There is amateur radio to a limited extent in China. Something like 10,000 licensed amateurs, most of whom use club stations. I can't lay my hands on a Chinese amateur frequency allocation chart at the moment but I believe they either have no 2 meter band or just a restricted 144-146 range allocation. There is UHF activity on the 432 MHz amateur band but most of it is not repeaters, just simplex. There are a few UHF repeaters, in the Beijing area. At the time I was there at the end of 2001, there were no UHF repeaters in the Shanghai area."
"Nearly all of the amateur gear in China is Japanese made, e.g. Kenwood, Yaesu, Icom, etc. and some rebranded equipment which seems to be made by Yaesu but labeled with a Chinese name. I recently saw some HF transceiver equipment which bears no resemblance to anything Japanese I am familiar with, which may be an actual Chinese made product ("Oriol" name) or it may be a Japanese domestic item which hasn't been sold in the United States."
"That's what I know about amateur, CB and business radio in China. Military radio is a different subject; I am in the process of compiling a web directory of Chinese military radios, 1949-80 + -, with photos and specs."
Regards, Geoff Fors
"Mark van der Hoek here. Cellular radio is all around China. GSM and CDMA are both used. My first project there was the deployment of a new CDMA system for a GSM operator. My second was for a CDMA operator. I heard of a possibility of an iDEN (Nextel type) system being put in Shanghai earlier this year, but I don't know if that project was completed. It would have been fairly small scale."
"Oh, what Geoff said about China producing look alike equipment. That's common over there -- a Chinese company partners with a foreign company and a plant is built to produce the foreign product with the Chinese firm's name on it. The product is exactly the original except for the name. Then the Chinese brag about what a great thing they've produced! "
Best, Mark van der Hoek
More abbreviations
MCDST: Microsoft Certified Desktop Support Technicians
MCSA: Microsoft Certified Systems Administrators
MCAD: Microsoft Certified Application Developers
MCSE: Microsoft Certified Systems Engineers
MCDBA: Microsoft Certified Database Administrators
October 5, 2004
"Whosoever shall entertain high and vapourous imaginations, instead of laborious and sober inquiry of truth, shall beget hopes and beliefs of strange and impossible shapes." Francis Bacon
Great reading from Arcchart.com:
"US spectrum wars
The saga of US spectrum policy is starting to read like a soap opera from the days of Prohibition. A few powerful bodies control a commodity that is tightly restricted, putting it at the centre of increasingly expensive and destructive turf wars. All attempts by the current US administration to liberalize availability are hitting bitter opposition from the controlling powers -- the major cellcos and broadcasters. The ongoing battles over allocation of spectrum in the 700MHz and 800MHz bands illustrate the vicious delaying tactics and lobbying techniques that can hold back attempts to open up new wireless services. And these raise fears that the much anticipated auctions of valuable 1.9GHz assets could be similarly marred, severely holding back the US' urgently needed liberalization of spectrum. . ." --> (continues at Arcchart.com, external link)
More abbreviations to come
I'll have something on professional degrees later today, in part of the continuing discussion written about below.
October 4, 2004
Spent Saturday on my friend's 17' hardshell sea kayak, floating down the lower American River. He's a scuba diver and he spent much time doing salvage, looking for wallets, watches, and whatever, that spill off the many rafts that ply this beautiful river. He didn't find anything valuable that day but we did pull out hundreds of aluminum cans off the bottom of the river, with thousands more waiting to be taken. Dan gives this aluminum to an old gentleman at his apartment complex, who in turn takes them in to the recycler to supplement his income. I sampled for gold on the bank while Dan dove. Always good to have someone on top. A nice day.
An unknown kayaker charges through the American River's San Juan rapids
Now, back to telecom . . .
Academic titles, mostly American useage:
Doctoral degrees:
In the traditional, classical sciences:
Ph.D.
In the engineering sciences, including electrical and electronic, often
Sc.D. or ScD. Sometimes called a D.Sc. In the United Kingdom, however, the D.Sc may be a higher doctorate. DEng and EngD for Doctor of Engineering are also seen.
Masters' science degrees:
Usually written as a Masters. MIT calls their Masters of Science degree a S.M. Most universities are more conventional, using terms like the following: MEng for master of engineering or MSTC for Masters in Telecommunication. The list can be endless: MSci, MChem, MComp, MMath, MPhys, and so on.
Bachelor of science degrees:
B.S., B.Sc., or Sc.B.
Examples abound: BASc, Bachelor of Applied Science; BCompSc, Bachelor of Computer Science, BEng or BE, Bachelor of Engineering; BMath, Bachelor of Mathematics; BTech, Bachelor of Technology; BSEE, Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering.
October 3, 2004 late night update
Stick with me here, this gets a little complicated. A reader named Fadi commented, thank you very much, that MSCE typically stands for Master of Science in Civil Engineering, not Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer. One is MSCE, the other MCSE. See the difference? Microsoft has a whole host of other titles with similar lettering: MCDST, MCSA, MCT and so on. These get too easily mixed up with genuine, university granted titles. Which is why I want to write about this subject this week, to go through as many abbreviations as I can, put them together as a list, so that it's easy to tell a persons' qualifications or background. Perhaps a few British titles, non-nobility, of course :-), as well. Stay tuned, at the end of this week this should all make more sense. And if you have any comments or contributions, please feel free to e-mail. Tom
October 3, 2004
This week, a focus on job titles, licenses, and professional accreditation in telecom.
From Mark van der Hoek, Senior RF Engineer.:
"RF Engineer is a very broad term. It simply means an engineer who works with RF: Radio Frequency stuff. Kind of like saying 'mechanic'. Well, what KIND of mechanic? Passenger cars? Diesel engines? Does he only work on transmissions? Big truck transmissions? Or does he specialize in fuel systems? These are all mechanics.
RF engineers may work on designing RF circuits -- the actual hardware. They may design cellular networks. They may design and optimize cellular networks (most will do both -- and I wouldn't hire anyone who hadn't done both unless he were very fresh out of school.) They may work on transport described below, designing microwave networks. They may work on radar systems. They may do all of this at some time in their career. As to kinds of engineers, well, we could go on forever. Let's look at just one today, a transport engineer"
"Transport has to do with getting the phone calls from the cell site back to the switching center (the MTSO, in cellular terms) and from one switching center to another. These may be between different MTSOs in the cellular network (Verizon Los Angeles has perhaps a half dozen or so) or between the MTSO and the landline phone companies. It will involve either microwave or leased lines of some kind. So a transport engineer is focused on this area. He's often an RF engineer, but focused on transport."
October 2, 2004
Q: I'm a telecom recruiter and I'm confused about all the different titles and abbreviations used in this field. What's the difference for example, between, a P.E., which means Professional Engineer, and a MCSE, which stands for Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer?
A. A state issues a P.E. to someone calling themselves an engineer. Usually in a field we think of as true engineering: construction, electrical power distribution, public utilities design, you know, civil engineering. The requirements and tests needed to get a P.E. are very, very tough. Quite often you're entitled to be an expert witness in court if you have a P.E.
An MCSE, by comparison, is a company granted title, for someone who has passed Microsoft's own testing. Your past experience, credentials, and references aren't checked before getting certified, you just need to know their material. Two titles with the word engineer in them, but with vastly different requirements.
The lnstitute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, or IEEE (external link), usually called the I-Triple E when speaking it, serves electrical, electronics, and computer engineers. Here's their position on the title Engineer:
"IEEE-USA recognizes that the title, Engineer, has a multiplicity of meanings within the context of laws of various U.S. jurisdictions. All jurisdictions protect the titles Professional Engineer, Licensed Engineer, Registered Engineer, or some variation thereof, to refer to individuals licensed in those jurisdictions to practice engineering. In addition, some jurisdictions protect the title, Engineer, with no qualifying words added. The purpose of protecting these titles is to ensure that the public can easily identify those individuals who possess the requisite skill, knowledge and competence to protect public safety, health and welfare in the practice of engineering. Generally, the public interprets the term, Engineer, to mean a person who is qualified to practice engineering by reason of special knowledge and use of the mathematical, physical and engineering sciences, and the principles and methods of engineering analysis and design, acquired by engineering education and engineering experience.
It is our position that the title, Engineer, and its derivatives should be reserved for those individuals whose education and experience qualify them to practice in a manner that protects public safety. Strict use of the title serves the interest of both the IEEE-USA and the public by providing a recognized designation by which those qualified to practice engineering may be identified. The education and experience needed for the title, Engineer, is evidenced by:
"Graduation with an Engineering degree from an ABET/EAC accredited program of engineering, coupled with sufficient experience in the field in which the term, Engineer, is used; and/or Licensure by any jurisdiction as a Professional Engineer."
October 1, 2004
The F.C.C. steals Doraemon ?
Unbelievable! The F.C.C. is now using Doraemon's image for their kids' site. Doraemon is equivalent to Mickey Mouse in Japan, a much loved cartoon character. I've written about him over the years, such as this blurb from 2002 (internal link, bottom of the page). But the F.C.C. doesn't call him Doraemon, they call him Broadband. And now he's brown, not blue. This is very sad. Would you like Mickey Mouse to be called Broadband? Or Charlie Brown turned blue and called Narrowband? No credit given to revered creators Fujimoto Hiroshi and Motoo Abiko. Perhaps the F.C.C. felt safe poaching his image because the Doraemon cartoons have not been dubbed in English or released for American television. None of his cartoon books are in our language. Still, that doesn't make it right . . .
April 15, 2006 update. The F.C.C. is still using this image without credit. Arrgh!
To view the piracy go here:
http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/kidszone/
Turkey vultures migrate?
Yesterday I saw at least 50 of these disgusting but essential birds soaring above Auburn, California. They're common to the Sacramento foothill and valley areas but I've not seen more than 10 or 12 together before. I understand now, however, that in the fall in California they migrate south to lower California, Arizona, and Mexico. For more general information on buzzards migrating go here:
http://www.valleywild.org/tvfest.htm (external link)
"Vultures have red featherless heads, curved whitish beaks, six foot wingspans, and eat carrion (dead and decaying flesh). You will often see them roosting in groups and during the fall migration, around October, scores will fly overhead in a southerly direction. Kern County has a Turkey Vulture Festival in late September."
Selected Daily Notes Archive
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