I have not too much time to update this blog. Really, I never had time to do it, but now I’m aware of this fact but I’m not going to give up now. Last months were very hard but results where positive: I passed more exams than ever, and, in two months I’ll begin to work in my final degree project as I’ll try to pass the last subjects.

There was another reason to be busy: I began to work in the Territorial Studies Lab. I’m updating the databases of the provincial GIS. We use GISEiel, a derivate of gvSIG (so it’s free software), against postresql databases. It’s not a very complex work but it’s very interesting to familiarize and reflect about how the territory was built.

Some of the following posts are about the lost events and thoughts in this ending summer.

Two interesting libraries that will help you in FEM analysis: libmesh, a FEM framework,  and PETSc, the linear/non linear equation parallelized solver.

Via DM, materials engineering consultant Adam C. Powel’s Opennovation.

I have already written about my affection for the OpenVMS-VAX/Alpha platform. Via Hacksize I discovered a howto about running OpenVMS on a virtual system running in a PC. I didn’t know about The Computer History Simulation Project before. It seems a very necessary project nowadays.

Of course it’s better to have an VAX or Alpha machine to work with it. And it’s highly desireable HP will release any day that wonderful OS forgotten in a DEC office drawer :-P.

About history of computing, I found another interesting web page: An Illustrated History of Computers.

Around 410 Spanish credits (not ECTS) and many, many years, today I received my last class in the School. Civil engineer Álvaro Vázquez Herrero from Exconsa Ltd. talk us about foundations, project management and the life.

Of course, today I remembered my first lesson and the professor who taught it.

A day like this 125 years ago, the Brooklyn Bridge at NY was opened to the traffic.

photo: Brooklyn Bridge, 1896. By Geo. P. Hall & son

The history of this suspension bridge is the history of the family Roebling: John A. Roebling, that projected and died in the beginning of the works; his son Washington who took up again the project and got descompression illness because he worked into the pneumatic caissons; and Whasington’s wife, Emily Warren, who became one of the first female construction manager of the history supervising the works and passing on her husband’s orders.

Science, aesthetics, poetry and heroism. Those were essence of Brooklyn bridge, essence of real Civil Engineering.

Thanks to… errr… Pensamiento I discovered a very interesting tool based in OpenCascade. This program is called Salome, and it provides a framework to build a pre- and post-processor for numerical analysis. The screenshots are very impressive:

The list of partners of the project it’s very impressive too

Today I pre-registered in the Spanish Civil Engineers College. It is a step that usually we take when we are in the latest year of the degree. It has some advantages for students, but, it’s more important, it is an interesting window to see what is happening with the profession.

Of course, I don’t forget the more ancient Civil Engineers Association. I become a member some years ago. It was the original defender of civil engineers in Spain, but it turned its operations because the foundation of the College. Today is a reference in activities that promote good technical, social, human practices.

(And yes, I saw the banner “optimized for IE6 and 1024×768″: next generations will have to do an effort to change some things )

…and I suppose the time will certify that the last saturday has dead the last decent president of Spanish democracy until today.

In memorian, civil engineer Leopoldo Calvo Sotelo (1926-2008).

It seems the designer of the street where EmilioJ lives doesn’t know the cul-de-sac. Even if you doesn’t like the traditional solution you have new styles [ISon21,ES].

Last year my friends Marta, Raquel and me did a work about the lighthouses system of the Laxe, and Corme. After the field visits, the main work were to show some proposals to remodel the lighthouses and give them new uses in the future. The Laxe and Corme lighthouses would had a new auxiliary building for scientist and students who wanted to watch the whales, and the Vilán Cape lighthouse would be re-structurated to host a museum. Last Friday we did a presentation in my School about this work, and we were not sure how was those ideas accepted.

Today I read in a local newspaper the Port Authority of Ferrol-San Cibrao will take similar actions near Prior lighthouse. So, we feel supported in our little madness

I’m enjoying a lot at this time reading the book “Eduardo Torroja, Engineer” (Ed. Pronaos, 1999, dual Spanish-English) by José Antonio Fernández Ordóñez and José Ramón Navarro Vera. It’s a very complete book about one of the greatest civil engineers of the history: the technical-artistical historic context, the relationships with another great engineers, and exhaustive review of his works:Zarzuela Racecourse, Algeciras Market, Sancti Spirit Chapel… and, of course, the milestone Frontón Recoletos.

I found via En.Wikipedia an… errr… brochure about this book

Mike West (Cowboy Programming) released an interesting, two-part article about simulating fluids (visual simulation, not mechanical simulation): Practical Fluid Dynamics. The article was published in Game Developer Magazine (March and April 2007).

Via Hackszine.

As I had arrived to Segovia at night I missed great part of the Castilian landscape. Back to Galicia by car, I could appreciate its plainness and I could imagine the field of gold it becames in Summer.

(yes, this photo is very similar to a well-known wallpaper ;-))

We crossed too Duero riverside and Bierzo vineyards, and we could see how the Civil Engineering overcame the Piedrafita do Cebreiro pass to build a highway that joins Galicia and León.

Castilian towns are different than Galician ones (concentrated vs. scattered land occupancy). I could prove it along my route, and I could see it in situ when I arrived to Segovia.

Segovia is well-known because it has one of the most importan Roman aqueducts. But there are more treasures: Mozarabic architecture in the streets, the church where Isabel the Catholic was crowned, the late-gothic cathedral, and the wonderful Alcázar.

Last weekend I went to Segovia to visit my friends Belen, Quico and their little children Carlitos and Julia. That was a fast, intense travel.

I got the Talgo train at La Coruña the Friday morning. The Talgo is one of the great products of Spain. It’s a confortable, fast and versatile train. It has only a fault: it has double glasses, so I had some problems to take photos. And I had reasons to take lots of photos. One, there is a beauty transition to see between the Galician mountains and the plateau of Castile. The other reason is all the great works (bridges, tunnels) for high-speed train and highways. You are lucky if you are a civil engineer in Galicia nowadays.

We beared a hard storm this week in the North of Spain. As result of it, a 10 m. wave sweeped away La Coruña’s promenade and destroyed part of it.

Today I read an interview to Macario Fernández-Alonso, the actual president of Port of La Coruña. And I got angry. The newspaper entitled it “experts say the next wave of the same height will take 40 years to return”. It is an usual misconception about return period that would dissapear going to the Wikipedia

But I made angry too because the journalist doesn’t know how to refer to the people that studies the waves in the sea. He referred them as “experts” or “meteorological experts”, and he/she used nowhere in the article the right name: C-I-V-I-L–E-N-G-I-N-E-E-R.

Related to the works in which I hardcode, I learnt about new (for me) technique to build concrete framework. Professor Fernando Martínez Abella showed us the post-tensioned slabs (losas postesas, in Spanish). This technique moves the post-tensioning from 1D (beams) to 2D (slabs). It allows to gain open space and reduce the thickness of pillars and frameworks in buildings.

The post-tensioned slabs must be built in situ, so the quality control must be high. It is one of the causes because they are few used in Spain since Javier Rui-Wamba introduced them in the Miraflores Apartaments in Madrid: specialized teams in post-tensioning are more expensive than working men without qualification.

The another main cause is only architects can sign building projects in Spain, but they have no formation in post-tensioning (they have not a serious formation in structures at all). So they project traditional reinforced concrete framework.

If you want read more about post-tensioned slabs, I found a very interesting e-book (in Spanish).

I have been very busy the last month. I made some tests and, the last week I had to finish some works. The most important of them consisted in designing and checking a reinforced concrete aqueduct.

Of course, we were not allowed to use specific-”black box” programs to do this work. Every calculation must be explicit, so we could do it on hand, with calculator, or using a spreadsheet. That was the majority choice. But it was not my choice.

As I hate spreadsheets, and we must show the calculations clearly, I got two windows in emacs and the g95 compiler, and I hardcoded all the formulas. No conditional or loop structures, only a pair of subroutines, to show the sequence of the process. I know it’s a kind of anti-programming style, but it was useful in this circumstance: easier of debugging than spreadsheet formulas, and easy to translate them to a LaTeX document.

I bore hard days sleeping no more than 4 hours. But I had some cpu cycles to remember some hacker histories about real programmers, and about real engineers. Some decades ago, nobody had a computer to do hard calculations. Even they hadn’t calculators. They made the work on hand and calculation ruler. Then I imagine Eduardo Torroja’s team fighting on works like the wonder Algeciras Market Hall.

I’m happy with my 1/10 of real programmer. But I should swap it for 1/100 of real engineer.

O vindeiro domingo día 17 de febreiro terá lugar unha manifestación a prol da construcción sostible do territorio, e en contra das actuais agresións que está a sufrir Galicia especialmente no tocante ó urbanismo e a protección do litoral. A respaldan algunhas organizacións de escala internacional como Greenpeace, e algunhas autonómicas, como a Sociedade Galega de Historia Natural. Pero o impulso principal ven de pequenas agrupacións locais, das xentes do pobo preocupadas polo que cada día ven facer ó asomarse ás súas fiestras, como Fusquenlla, de Pontedeume.

Na Alameda de Santiago de Compostela ás 12:00. Máis información e manifesto para firmar na web da plataforma.

El próximo domingo día 17 de febrero tendrá lugar una manifestación por la construcción sostible del territorio, y en contra de las actuales agresiones que está sufriendo Galicia especialmente en lo tocante al urbanismo y a la protección del litoral. La respaldan algunas organizaciones de escala internacional como Greenpeace, y algunas autonómicas, como la Sociedade Galega de Historia Natural. Pero el impulso principal viene de pequeñas agrupaciones locales, de las gentes del pueblo preocupadas por lo que cada día ven hacer al asomarse a sus ventanas, como Fusquenlla, de Pontedeume.

En la Alameda de Santiago de Compostela a las 12:00. Más información y manifesto para firmar en la web de la plataforma.

These weeks we can go in the city of La Coruña to a very interesting exhibition about Miguel Fisac, one of the greatest Spanish Architects in the XX Century. Fisac was know because his reinforced, prefabricated beams in buildings with bone forms. In those designs took part civil engineer Ricardo Barredo and Vicente Peiró,

The exhibition is enclosed with some speeches. Next Feb. 8th and 15th will speak civil engineers Luis Albajar and the great, great, great José Calavera.