The experience, The Idea and The genesis of a Multiple OS terminal simulator:

It was in my second year-second semester that I had written almost all the programs for DBMS lab. The same were followed by everyone in class. My internal exam went good. I still remember that day which haunted me for at least 6 weeks until my results were out. It was my external lab examination. I was extremely confident that my performance in exam and viva voice would be good. But things didn’t really go as expected. I faced a problem with the Oracle client that we used in our lab. It got stuck oftentimes and I was literally pissed off. I changed my system and started typing again. But still I faced the same problem. I felt like screaming aloud until my vocal cords busted out. It was a strange feeling – Mixture of frustration and desperation I should say. But the faculty members who recognized my work earlier in the semester gave me full marks.


After my results were out I never really gave it a second thought and it was one of those faded memories back in my mind. In our 4-1 we are supposed to do an industry oriented mini project. I always wanted to do a project that would help me learn something new and give me ample amount of work satiation. Without giving a second thought on who should I approach regarding the topic, I rushed to my mentor and one of my all time favorite teachers---- none other than my HOD. He gave me nearly 6 -8 ideas explicating each idea in detail. Out of all these one idea sounded pretty much interesting to me.

When the load on the server increases, then it may lead to server crash. So we can develop a load balancer that distributes the load across a cluster of servers. When I came back home and googled about this topic I realized its significance. Later, I came to know that the reason why my Oracle client got stuck up in my second year lab exam was due to the excessive load on the server. It was kind of weird coincidence. And soon after reading about it I made up my mind to take it as the topic for my mini project.

Initially I was a bit skeptical about my ability to complete the project in time. But I must really thank my guide who gave me loads of freedom and soothed my mind whenever I was worried about a certain aspect in the development. Talks with HOD regarding the project always left me with many more ideas for implementation. Finally after 1 month of intense coding and debugging I could come up with a simulator. My project got a unique advantage from the programming language that I had used for its development. Since java is platform independent, by changing the OS on the server side I can simulate the same OS on the client side. This feature turned out to be an add-on to what was already developed. So I called it a Multiple OS simulator. Adding to this it balances the load across a cluster of servers.

During my course of development I could explore Ubuntu which is a flavor of Linux. I worked with Fedora earlier. Ubuntu is not much different. I even loved the Unix platform. Everything can be done by configuring few files in the file system. Whenever I changed a few files in the file system and observed things working, I felt as if I’m some Albert Einstein or some great scientist/computer professional [it was just because of the pleasure I derive while working….I know it’s weird…but it gives me lots of excitement and happiness]. I learned some aspects of networking and could actually implement them in my workstation.

Coming to the hard times during the course of development, I jabbed my sand bag when ever things dint go as expected. [Oh yeah I was so very influenced by Sylvester Stallone in Rocky].Many of my friends developed web applications and I cursed myself few times for not choosing my current topic for main project [since I would get more time] when I observed the progress in their projects. But then with God’s grace things worked quite well just when the screws were tightening up and I completed my work 2 days before the last date for submission.

All the project reviews went well and people appreciated my effort. I should thank my team for having faith in me that I would complete things in time. They are the prime reason why my reviews went smoothly without any discrepancies. They adapted themselves so well according to the situation and did a great job in the viva-voice. I was harsh sometimes at them but still they gave me good moral support and never mistook my intentions. What else can one ask for when he/she has such a team which supports you morally and delivers at peak times.

On 24th September I completed delivering my presentation and told myself ALL IZZ WELL. And yeah “all went well” without any problems. Other friends of mine developed some very good applications as well. I, without sounding cocky can say that my class is the BEST when it comes to web development. Our class breathed a sigh of relief when we are done with our reviews.

The entire course of mini project development was awesome. It gave me lots of confidence and happiness. I hope I could implement this sooner or later in my department so that my juniors could find this app of mine useful. Some of my faculty suggested putting it up as a paper in some renowned Journals. I should give it a thought again. But for now I’m happy that I completed my work. ALL IZZ WELL 