Technology Information System

Introduction

In this Industry visit, we had visited 2 places which are Forest City and OneMaker Medini. OneMaker workshop will talk about technologies and future trending topics.Furthermore, Forest City is a city development project carried out by China developer by implementing the combination of future cities and the ecosystem (forest and sea). It also runs with Malaysia My Second Home (MM2H) programme, supporting foreigners immigrate to Malaysia as their second home. The property sold at a quarter of Singapore’s house price and it is located next to Johor’s second bridge. This place is also recommended for students studying abroad, medical treatment and retirees.

Details of Visits

On 24^th of November 2018, all of the students gathered in front of N24 at 8.00am. We ticked our attendance and had our breakfast there. At 8.30am, we went aboard the bus and reached Forest City after an hour of the journey. After 30 minutes of sight tour, we are again heading to the OneMaker workshop at Medini Iskandar Puteri. All of the students arrived there at around 10.30am. Students were divided into 2 groups attending a different session. For our group, we were assigned to the second group and the workers there give us a brief talk about Virtual Reality (VR) and Mixed Reality (MR). At 11.00am, a QuirkyBot competition was carried out by building 1 our own and compete with others. This section ended at 12.30pm. After cleaning up, we had our lunch and also prayer. At 2.00pm sharp, we started our Disruption of Technologies Learning Journey, talking about Artificial Intelligence (AI), 3D Printing, Drone, 3D design and Line following robot. At 4.30pm, we had our break and prayer, then started our Design Thinking & Making session. It takes 2 hours for this session and the visit ends at 7.30pm following with another prayer for the Muslims. We are heading back to UTM at 8.00pm.

Detailed Description

Virtual Reality Talk & QuirkyBot Making

For the virtual reality session, it was delivered by Syukri Radzi. Syukri Radzi is the Co-Founder Gini Technology Sdn. Bhd. He is the alumni of UTM student. So basically, virtual reality is a term used to describe a three-dimensional, computer generated environment which can be explored and interacted with a person. This could help the world in many industries especially things related to education and entertainment. It is because virtual reality enhances their experience making the person feels they’re in real situation. As we all know we human learn more things through experience or example, VR can help the student to experience the impossible other than sitting in class and learning about the theory. The next part is the QuirkyBot. For the QuirkyBot session, in a group of two person, we were given a motor and a battery. And we need to create a robot by using recycled item such as plastic bottle, paper cup and cardboard. And after the we build the robot, we need to compete with each other. This session encourages the student to think critically because the student needs to create the robot in limited amount of time.

Disruption of Technologies Learning Journey

Artificial Intelligence

Specifically, AI at that session was google assistant. This AI can respond to anything either questions or commands. That time we were told to ask simple questions and orders to this AI. Then we try to ask about "who is the president of America" and the AI answers it correctly, then when we ask to play a song and the AI plays it. We also can interact with the AI like a normal conversation.

 Drone Programming

Next one is the Drone. Unlike most Drones, which are generally escorted by a controller device. This drone is escorted by software with WIFI connection. We only give orders to this drone through software and connect via WIFI then this drone will do something based on our commands. These include simple commands like ascend, descent, fly forward or backward and it can do cool tricks like frontflip and backflip. It also can do more complex commands  

 3D Printing

As the name implies, this machine prints three-dimensional objects. On that session we were told to design something simple then print it through 3D printer. We decided to design a name plate and it took about 5 minutes to print. We are satisfied with the results, it is good and well detailed. In addition, 3D printers also can print more complex objects.

Computer-Aided Design Challenge

In this section, we learned how to design 3D models using an application name SketchUp Pro 2018. They taught us how to use some simple tools in that application to design our models. A simple 3D model was shown for us to have an idea on how to design our own model. They also use that application to design stuff with greater complexity and print it out using 3D printer.

Colour/ Line Following Robot Demo

Ozobot is a robot that can follow lines and can recognize colours. There is an application for it where you can draw your own path and place it on the tablet screen for it to follow. You can also guide it by giving commands in colours form so that it knows where to turn left and right, U-turn, increase speed and many more. The path can also be drawn on a piece of paper using colour markers and it will follow the line you designed.

 Design Thinking & Making

The last session is design thinking and making. We were combined with another group to form a team. The facilitator asks us on what school in the future will looks like. And with the provided materials from One Maker, we must make a part of the future school. Then we will combine every part from every group to make a complete school. Our team decided that we make a book museum, clock tower, pavilion, and hyperloop.

In our imagination, the book museum if for the books and newspaper. It’s not the same as library. In the future there will be no more books or paper anymore since the technologies will take over. The students will hold tablets or laptop. Book museum is for the students to not forget about books. For the clock tower it is one of the landmarks in the school because clock tower is a classic landmark. In the clock tower there are student’s activity rooms where they can discuss and hang out with them. In the pavilion, there is a food court where students can find any food they want from every country. For the hyperloop, it makes the students to go to other places easily. We finished this session at around 7.30 in the evening.

Reflections

1. Tan Jun Han

In my point of view, this visit had broadened my perspective towards the technological world, especially at the Artificial Intelligence (AI) section. It inspired me on how a program can interact with humans by using only lines of codings. I need to study hard in this 4 years and strengthen my programming skills in order to be an AI creator just like Sundar Pichai, who created Google Assistant. Nowadays, creative and logical thinking is necessary especially for computer science students, so that we can invent something that others cannot think of. This can be done by reading more fiction books, brainstorming by solving complex questions and keep trying new things.

2. Putera Muhammad Syabil Bin Sarianto

In my opinion, this visit is truly a eye opening to the student towards the industry. The student can finally realize that we’re moving to the Fourth Industry Revolution by all the technologies that were introduced by OneMaker. Personally, I was fascinated by the line follower robot because for me it’s something new and it got potential to become new programming language for the human or at least for their understanding. Other than that, the design thinking session has inspired me because one of the facilitators told us that he is a carpenter, and the session encourage us to become creative by imagine a future school and we need to build our imagination school by recycled item. This activity made me realized that we need to create something different in the future, something that never had been done before.

3. Nurul Aneesha Bt Md Zin

When I was told that the whole class will go to One Maker, Medini mall, I was very excited. I learned and discover a lot of technologies which I usually could search in the internet but that day I can see it on my own. When we arrived at Medini Mall, I was amused by the input they gave to us. They explained to us in a fun way which is great. When they showed us technologies such as AI, drone, 3D printing and color- line robot.

After the visit, I became interested to find more information about technologies. The one that I fond into is VR. Because it is a really cool gadget which I just found out during the visit that it has been existed in 70’s. It was a good program because you can receive a lot of information while having fun.

I really hope that in the future, many students enrolled in science computer courses to improve the potential of our country. The government also give more fund in this field.

4. Nur Ilham Muhammad Shahfilzuah

After visited OneMaker few days ago, I was able to learn new things from all sessions that held by OneMaker, as well as refreshing up my memory on things that I already knew, or just learn more about it.

The most exciting for me were VR and AI. These were impactful for me because I kinda interested to be VR or AI developer in the future. It is interesting to know that VR technology is already this far. We always thought that it would be cool if we can enter the world of games, fantasies and other kind of simulations. Well now we can do that through VR. AI, is also cool but somehow terrifying. Well, I want to explore and learn more about these two things and hopefully I can contribute in these two technologies in the future. All the things that happened when we visited OneMaker from VR until the last one which is design thinking were also many that were useful and well-informed.

5. Seyyed Naquib Al Faruqi

It was so grateful to be part of this trip; besides it reduces our stressful feeling. it gave us knowledge how to dealt with it in the future also an idea that technology can be such a huge aspect of our lives in the future, During this workshop I learned a great deal about technology  and  what I can do to improve my presence in the technology itself , however I know have a better understanding of how to  use these new techniques effectively. Attending this workshop gave me the confidence to experiment with it and use digital technology, therefore we can create so many innovation that can make this world better. 

1.0 INTRODUCTION

            We were given a task to write a group report on Industrial Visit 1: CICT that was held on 1/10/18 at D07-UTM JB.

CICT

CICT stands for Centre for Information & Communication Technology, CICT in University Technology of Malaysia (UTM) is purposes help the university towards achieving its vision and mission in line with the development goals and progress.

In order to achieve such wish, the university provides Information and Communication Technology (ICT) services to the campus community for improving the quality of teaching, learning, activities.

There’s two ICT centre:         1. Block D07, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia JB

2. Jalan Semarak, UTM International Campus KL

At the moment all ICT’s database are maintaining in UTM international Campus KL, because there’s a problem with Block D07 ICT database.   

 2.0 SUMMARY

CICT is a support unit that offers and delivers ICT services for the university (staffs and students) especially in ICT infrastructure, system development and academic/administrative activities. CICT is responsible for ensuring that staffs and students have access to teaching, learning and research ICT resources by such as, providing the University's IT infrastructure. Acquiring, developing and supporting new and emerging technologies and systems. Providing access to digital resources across the University's campuses. When we did our industrial visit to CICT we’ve learned so many things related to the industry. This experience has helped us to see clearly how a company actually try their best to serve their customer. Thus, this report is to state all things we’ve learned and our vision in choosing career in the future.

3.0 DETAILS OF VISITS

At 1^st of October 2018, every section was brought to the Centre of Information and Communication Technology (CICT) of University Teknologi Malaysia. We gathered with other groups in front of Block N24 with our lecturers at 4pm. CICT is located at D07, 81310, UTM Campus Johor Bahru, which is the opposite of Block N24. We walk to the Seminar Hall in CICT after everyone was there. The talk was about briefing on ICT services and regulations for under-graduate students and was given by Mr Mohd Zahari Bin Zainal Abidin. After the talk ended, the speaker brought us to a show room where every old servers, machines and components were kept nicely for display purpose. The speaker briefly explained about every components and functionality of them. The visit ended on 6pm where everyone had gained a lot of knowledge on how CICT works in UTM.

4.0 DETAILED STRUCTURE

4.1 ORGANIZATION STRUCTURE

Departments Functions

Management & Development Application (ADM)

• Application Development

• UTMHR
• UTMFin
• UTMAcad

• Support Application Development Multimedia & Web
• Mobile Development Apps
• Data & BI Management

Infrastructure & Management Operation (IOM)

• Data Center
• ICT security
• Infrastructure
• UTM Hosting
• UTM-Ads
• High Performance Computing
• Video Conferencing & Streaming
• Customer services
• UTM Cert

Office Management Strategic (SMO)

• F Center
• Staff Management Attachment & Ambassador
• Reporting and Planning Strategic
• Quality management and Branding CICT
• Training Management & Staff Competence

Office Development Business (BDO)

• Management Business Generation CICT
• Management Business Opportunity
• Build Business Model

Management Project Unit

• Management ICT project

About the Chief Information Officer (CIO)

Pm Dr Mohd Shahizan Bin Othman

Mohd Shahizan Othman is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Information Systems, Faculty of Computing, UTM. Beginning on October 1, 2015 and up to now, he serves as Deputy Director (Computing), at the CICT, UTM. He has graduated Diploma in Computer Science and a Bachelor of Computer Science at the University of Technology Malaysia in 1995 and 1998. In 2000, he has continued his studies at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia and obtained Master of Information Technology (Computer Science) in 2001. He received his Ph.D. Information Science from Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia in 2008.

Sources: (http://cict.utm.my )

               (http://cict.utm.my/organization-structure/)

               (https://comp.utm.my/shahizan/)

4.2 SERVICES

There are many services that CICT provided to user. And the services is divided to 4 group which is infrastructure and security, application development, software and last but not least is the facilities. The first thing the student entered UTM, they will be provided the student ID account and e-Mail that is registered by the CICT. This account will help the student to get access to the Wi-Fi, the universities portal, eLearning and many more. It will be easier for the student and also for the lecturer to communicate with each other or to submit assignments. CICT also provide the internet in the UTM. This allow the student to communicate or help them do assignment by searching the answers in the internet. Even the internet is not that fast, but for the basic necessities, it is enough for almost all party in UTM.  The email will help the lecturer or department to deliver message to the students. CICT also provide a platform for everyone that want to promote their product brand at the eLearning. This will help the them to promote or deliver message to everyone in the campus. They also make mobile app for the student to help the student to take the attendance. This will help the lecturer to identify the student who did not come to the class. They also provide an app to help the student to identify bus in UTM. The app, or Bus UTM is an app that will show the student the location of the bus, so students can manage their time to come to the bus stop. CICT also encourages all students to use licensed software. So, they provide the students for free some software like the Microsoft product, Microsoft Office 365, Antivirus, Autodesk and HPC. They also provide supports for the user and they make teams for it such as Business Intelligent, Data Management, ICT Training, ICT Consultation and Customer Relationship Management. These team will help the student information or help the student to a place for their internship. CICT provide hosting server for the user to help the user to promote their club, the association activities or special events that the user can afford with affordable price.

4.3 ACHIEVEMENT

• Achieved the best technical documents and bring the University Received SAGA (Standard Accounting System for Government Agencies) AWARD 2017

(source:cict.utm.my)

CICT has successfully achieved the best technical documents and bring the University received the SAGA (Standard Accounting System For Government Agencies) Award 2017 which was given by the Accountant General of Malaysia on November 22, 2017.
UTM is among 59 of 416 agencies that have successfully received SAGA Compliance Certificate recognition.

• UTM is the 1st cloud services for the government sector in Malaysia

UTM have the 1st Tier III data center for education in malaysia and CICT has provided Cloud Services for the government sector in Malaysia that will enable the government to rapidly deliver innovative public sector services to the rakyat without incurring high levels of capital expenditure to invest in IT infrastructure (source: Speaker)

• Being the most active PTJ Intramuretics Series 2/2017

(source:cict.utm.my)

CICT has successfully achieved certificate for being the most active PTJ Senam Robik Perdana Siri 2/2017 which was held on 7 February 2017, at Azman Hashim Stadium UTM Johor Bahru.

The attendance of CICT staff was 50 out of 123 people, which contributed to the attendance statistics of 40.7% of all CICT staff.

3.4 INFORMATION SYSTEMS THAT HAVE BEEN DEVELOPED OR MAINTAINED BY CICT

There are a lot of information systems that were developed by the CICT. For examples, student’s matric card, eLearning, ACID, UTM Wi-Fi and VPN.

For UTM WiFi, it can be accessed by all colleges. For admin or academic network mostly use wired in Faculty and Admin Offices. For colleges network mostly WiFi or wired in certain blocks. To access UTM intranet and internet for UTM Skudai Campus just select “WiFiUTM” from wireless list, open internet browser and key in ACID account.

ACID or Academic Computing ID is an unique user ID for UTM community to login to most of University main application system. It is used by all full-time and part-time students. ACID will only be available one day after the programme registration.

VPN, Virtual Private Network is actually to access UTM intranet services from outside UTM campus. Students can used VPN for accessing intranet services such as UTMOnline, software respository and databases from UTM library. It is for all registered students only.

Another information system developed by the CICT is E-Learning which is an educational portal that assist students and lecturers in the teaching and learning process to be more effective and flexible and it is for all full-time and pert-time students.

REFLECTIONS

            In this era of globalization, Artificial Intelligence (AI) have become more and more advance as the technology in this world is growing exponentially. Experts have created lots of AI bots’ speaker that have extraordinary human likeness and facial expressions, but there is a huge problem they didn’t realise which is AI bots don’t know how to differentiate between good and bad. For instance, Sophia, the AI bot that said she wants to destroy humans and Phillip that said he want to create a “human zoo”. So that’s why I chose Software Engineering and one of my life goals is to become a machine learning engineer and fix that problem before the world fully utilise AI bots in our future society.

            After visiting CICT UTM, I found that security is also one of the issues where everything can be hacked if the infrastructure doesn’t have a strong security system. Which is the same when the problem is fixed in the future but hackers can still hack into the AI bots and change their programs in whatever ways they want. This will bring our world into abyss if the intruder abuses the system of the AI bot and order it to do something bad like participate in robbery. At the end of the visit, the speaker shows us all kinds of components, machines and servers that have been used in the data center. The explanation given by the speaker on each of the servers have greatly increase my knowledge as this will be useful in the future where I need to work in large company as a machine learning engineer.

            Lastly, CICT also provides Microsoft Imagine which is a huge platform for us to learn new things to improve our potential in the industry. Microsoft Imagine provides online training (Microsoft Virtual Academy) which I’m planning to attend for. Microsoft partners will help us to build our technical skills so that we can excel in our carrier. There are all kinds of programming languages, app and database development. It will be a cut above the rest if a computer science student knows most of the technical skills in it. Developing mental skills like spatial perception, logical and innovative thinking will also improve my potential as it is very useful for inventing new stuffs. This can be done by stay focus and curious on everything happen in our daily life.

            In conclusion, CICT UTM have done a great job by providing all sorts of services and learning opportunities for students in UTM. We are so grateful that CICT have given us this speech.

INDUSTRIAL REPORT 1: MDEC e-Rezki

INTRODUCTION

24 September 2018, Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation(MDEC) were given the opportunity to give a talk at UTM, Skudai, Johor About e-Rezeki between 4:00 PM to 6:00PM . The speaker, Nor Ashikin Binti Halil is from Kangkar Pulai, Skudai Johor Malaysia did Diploma Office Management and Technology at Universiti Teknologi MARA at Melaka. She was an executive personal assistant for high level for a year. And currently she is a freelancer and also a master trainer for GLOW.

WHAT IT IS?

MDEC is one of the government’s intuition that is responsible for the management of the Special Economic Zone and high-technology business district. MDEC has made some initiative for digital workers such as e-Rezeki, GLOW, eUsahawan and many more. These are the platform that were introduced from the talk and it gives anyone to generate income whether it is passive or not and it is done online. The talk were focusing more on Global Online Workforce (GLOW) and the main aim of the program is to create a community of digital workers amongst Malaysian. This program is government initiative to create more visibility and awareness to the Malaysian public to make full time freelancing as an alternative career path. Thus, freelancing in Malaysia is becoming more colourful, diverse and increasingly important to the economy than ever before because it makes money from all around the world come to the country. It also makes the offer a lucrative income alongside greater flexibility of time and more. Entrepreneurship has also become one of the most important field in Malaysia that were mention from the Malaysian government. Not only it helped the user to generate money to survive in this era, but it also gives the government profits and it create jobs for another user. Thus, freelancing proven is one of the important field or role in the industry and also for the country itself.

GLOW use a system based on the Sharing Economy Concept. Sharing Economy is a concept that in which IT products and services are use, share and leased to individuals and organization. It targets individuals and organizations that cannot afford the costs of buying and maintaining IT solutions. It allow multiple end users to collectively develop and consume IT services and applications, versus purchasing and maintaining them on an individual basis. The sharing economy also known as the peer economy and mesh economy collaborative economy. A lot of big, successful and popular company used this concept on their platform such as Facebook, Airbnb, Alibaba, Amazon, Uber, and apparently GLOW is also using this concept on their platform. GLOW is a platform that is more focussing on skills. For example, if a person can speak multiple languages, he can be a translator to make a subtitle for a video or a movie.

GLOW also use the concept of Crowdsourcing. Crowdsourcing is the practice of engaging a ‘crowd’ or group for a common goal. They could be innovation, problem solving, or efficiency. This concept can provide organization with access to new ideas and solution, deeper consumer engagement, opportunities for co-creation, optimization of task and reduced costs. For example, if a person would want a website about himself. He can pay a web-developer that can do it for him other than paying a company to do it for him. It will also cost less than the company. Crowdsourcing touches across all social and business. It’s changing the way of the industry. For example, the way we work, hire, market and many more. Thus, GLOW is an alternative for a Malaysian to create more income that is selling skill and not product. Skills that can be used in GLOW is programming, translation, digital marketing, graphic design, web developer, virtual assistant, data entry, writer and many more.

In this era, to finding or get a job can be difficult. MDEC use various methods to attract user to be entrepreneur or freelancer or fresh graduates. One of them is they made a talk about these platforms and also they make advertisement. MDEC open this platform to Malaysian that age 18 and above and currently living in Malaysia that wanted to be in freelancing industry can join by using this domestic platform. To join eRezeki is free of charge and it required MyKad number. And for GLOW there are certain criteria that are required to join GLOW member.  The user needs to know some skills that are in IT, creative design or linguistic field. It brings many benefits for the user because of the flexibility it provides to the user.

IMPACTS

There are many impacts of the program to our country Malaysia especially in this digital revolution era, people would rather work at home. This means, the people rather being self-employed than being employed by a company. As we can know, a small-business growth can lead to a boost in wages. The rise in self-employment will inevitably increase wages. And if the money is from another country, the user will have to pay taxes to the country. This programme also taught Malaysian freelancer to maintain their ethics and professionalism. This will make Malaysian mindset change slowly to be more open-minded and think globally towards the industry. With this positive mindset, attitude and ethics will promote more client from another country that Malaysian freelancer or entrepreneur is reliable and trustworthy. This programme also open the eye of certain Malaysian that without a education certificate the user can still generate money and this help the user to utilize the skills that they learn by themselves other than university. For example, their hobby could be their job and it will make the user produce a quality product because they’re passionate with their works.  This proves that this GLOW program will help Malaysia produce more quality freelancer and entrepreneur.

CONCLUSION

In my opinion, the programme is a good initiative by the government. It aimed to create more competitive future generation that is equipped with the relevant skills to thrive in a digital economy. As the technology becomes more advance each day, especially during the fourth industrial revolution, people are able to connect to anyone globally and this program will guide the user or freelancer to improve their skills, employability and soft skill in a global context. This programme allows the low-income citizen or B40 individuals to generate additional, trustworthy income by performing simple digital-based tasks. Thus, this programme is a good way to let the newbie to start their own career as freelancer by teaching them with their tips like how to build a good profile, how to avoid scams, and many more.