Naehyuck Chang's Moment
The first Design Automation Conference I attended was DAC 2000 held in Los Angeles. During DAC 2000, I presented my first DAC paper on cycle-accurate energy measurement of ARM7 microprocessor.
But it wasn't just a theoretical paper presentation. I was very excited about the University Booth (Ubooth) participation. Our team occupied Booth 1 and demonstrated a prototype for the cycle-accurate energy measurement tool for ARM7 microprocessor with the title, "Energy measurement techniques for low-power systems." Until then, most Ubooth demonstrations consisted of poster presentations or software demonstrations. However, we put up an exciting show and began a new Ubooth culture. We had brought all the emergency debugging equipment including a digital oscilloscope, soldering tools, spare parts, etc., as well as the hardware prototype to guarantee 100% functionality even under all the possible adversity or catastrophe during transportation as we traveled more than 5000 miles.
We brought two big aluminum boxes with a custom wheeled cart specially designed for airplane check-in. Our team consisted of all our laboratory members. We put on custom T-shirts and tried our best to be like professionals. We had a great turn out and our Ubooth was very crowded with more than 100 visitors. Since 2000, we have been demonstrating big hardware systems every year.
Now, many other teams follow our demonstration style and show their hardware systems. After 12 years, at DAC Ubooth 2012, we demonstrated Hybrid Electrical Energy Systems. We again brought two big 19"racks weighing more than 300 pounds each. I drove a 23-foot diesel truck to transport the racks from Los Angeles to San Francisco and then back to Los Angeles. The DAC blog already contains a video of our trip.
At DAC 2012, I saw a big Ubooth team from Italy with members wearing the same custom T-shirt uniform, putting up their show. They reminded me of our first year DAC at Ubooth 2000 and made me smile. I had become the Ubooth Organizer and started the new YouTube video publication and just stepped down after serving for three years.
As I step down from the Ubooth Organizer position, I am very happy and excited to see some positive changes I have brought to DAC Ubooth culture and active participation from other team members.
Naehyuck Chang, ACM SIGDA Chair and ACM SIGDA DAC Representative.