PENGGUNAAN EUROCODE DI MALAYSIA: SATU KECELARUAN?

Eurocodes adalah satu code of practice yang baru-baru ini diperkenalkan di Eropah bertujuan untuk menyelaraskan prosedur-prosedur rekabentuk kejuruteraan awam di antara negara-negara di benua tersebut. Untuk UK dan negara-negara ‘sekutunya’ seperti Malaysia, perubahan ini bermaksud perubahan dari British Standard (BS) kepada Eurocodes (EC). Kesan daripada fenomena ini, sekarang berlakulah tempoh transasi di fakulti-fakulti dan jabatan-jabatan kejuruteraan awam universiti-universiti di Malaysia dimana subjek-subjek rekabentuk telah mula diajar berasaskan Eurocodes dan tidak lagi BS.

Namun, apa yang menggusarkan saya adalah apabila dimaklumkan oleh kenalan-kenalan di industri yang menyatakan besar kemungkinan Eurocode tidak akan diamalkan oleh industri di Malaysia dalam masa yang terdekat; 5 tahun dari sekarang pun belum tentu.

Berdasarkan scenario di atas, tidak kah ternampak seperti berlaku kecelaruan diantara universiti dan industri?

Kenapa industri belum mahu lagi menggunakan Eurocodes? Jawapannya mudah, kerana tiada keperluan, atau kata lainnya tiada membawa keuntungan.

Memanglah dahulu pernah berlaku perubahan penggunaan code of practice ini seperti CP kepada BS. Tetapi perubahan CP kepada BS melibatkan perkara-perkara fundamental, sebagai contoh, dari elastic design kepada plastic design. Industri bersetuju untuk berubah diwaktu itu kerana ia membawa keuntungan. Seperti yang kita tahu, plastic design lebih menjimatkan berbanding elastic design. Kata lain nya, guna BS lebih untung dari guna CP.

Sebaliknya Eurocode tidak melibatkan perubahan fundamental (kalau ada pun tidak significant). Falsafah kewujudannya bukannya supaya rekabentuk lebih selamat atau lebih jimat tetapi sebaliknya adalah satu 'perlarasan' atau standardization di kalangan negara-negara eropah supaya syarikat di Sweden boleh bid job di UK dan konsultan German boleh dapat projek di Holland.

Jadi saya sendiri tidak nampak sebarang unsur yang boleh memaksa industri di Malaysia berubah menggunakan Eurocode. Berapa banyak sangat syarikat Malaysia yang hendak ke eropah? Apatah lagi bila tiada penguatkuasaan undang-undang oleh kerajaan akan penggunaannya di Malaysia. Lagipun, takkanlah kerajaan hendak memaksa sedangkan selama ini pelbagai code boleh digunakan i.e. LRFD, CP, BS, Japanese, Australian. Jadi betullah kata industri, “tiada keperluan”.

So, kalau industri nampaknya tak mahu beralah atas alasan yang cukup kukuh dari persepektif mereka iaitu “Eurocodes tak bawak ‘untung’, at leat not for the time being”, apa yang perlu universiti lakukan? Berikut adalah beberapa kemungkinan yang boleh diambil:

1) Teruskan mengajar Eurocodes dan terus mengharapkan industri melatih semula graduan dalam penggunaan BS

2) Ajar semula BS dan berhujah, jika diaju soalan, bahawa Eurocodes tidak relevan untuk Malaysia, sekurang-kurangnya tidak buat masa ini

3) Atau ajar kedua-dua sekali; BS dan Eurocodes tapi ini bermaksud penambahan jam belajar yang sekarang ini pun sudah terlalu padat.

Jika ditanya apa pendapat saya; berdasarkan scenario sekarang, saya lebih prefer yang no 2).

PEKERJA SWASTA MELAYU BERILUSI?

Ramai pekerja swasta Melayu yang merasakan pekerjaan mereka seterusnya, periuk nasi mereka tiada kaitan dengan kerajaan hanya kerana mereka pekerja swasta. Atas keyakinan ini, mereka berilusi bahawa 'perubahan' yang mendatang, jika berlaku, hanya akan memberikan kesan minimum kepada mereka. Tetapi, ramai daripada mereka yang tidak sedar bahawa syarikat-syarikat tempat mereka bekerja yang kebanyakkan berstatus bumiputera masih lagi mengharapkan kontrak-kontrak dari kerajaan.

Memanglah pekerja-pekerja swasta melayu ini tidak pernah merasakan 'direct contact' dengan kerajaan kerana mereka hanyalah pekerja yang menjalankan tugas yang diberikan oleh bos-bos atau tuan punya syarikat, tapi tanyalah pada bos-bos ini, berapa banyak kalikah mereka 'naik-turun' pejabat-pejabat kerajaan untuk mendapatkan projek? Dan tanyalah juga pada bos-bos Melayu ini, jika 'dipaksa' untuk bersaing atas 'tanah yang rata' dengan 'bos-bos' bukan bumiputera, adakah mereka yakin mereka sudah bersedia? Jika A sudah bermodal sendiri tetapi B bermodalkan pinjaman, pada saingan di atas 'tanah yang rata', siapakah yang akan menang tender? Apa agaknya akan terjadi pada pekerja-pekerja swasta Melayu ini jika 'bos-bos' mereka kalah dalam persaingan tersebut?

Begitu yang bekerja sendiri. Mungkin kerana anda menjual goreng pisang di pasar-pasar malam, anda merasakan kerajaan tidak memainkan peranan dalam kehidupan anda. Tapi saya percaya, sebagai orang yang berniaga, anda mesti faham berapa pentingnya untuk mendapat tapak untuk berniaga; lokasi dan kekerapannya. Memanglah anda mendapat permit tapak dari majlis-majlis perbandaran tapi anda perlu ingat, pegawai-pegawai majlis boleh memberikan permit tersebut 'sesuka hati' kepada anda adalah kerana dasar tersebut di'pelihara' oleh kerajaan. Sekarang ini pun anda sudah bergaduh sesama 'sendiri' merebut tapak, bagaimana pula bila nanti anda perlu bergaduh dengan 'orang lain'? Anda ingat selama ini 'orang lain' tidak mahu masuk kah ke 'pasar malam' anda?

Tetapi kepada yang menjawab mereka tidak berilusi malah yakin mampu bersaing walau apa keadaan sekalipun, tahniah saya ingin ucapkan. Dan sesungguhnya ini yang sangat ingin saya dengar dari mulut seorang Melayu; 'tidak gagap bila diusul, tidak lari bila beradu'. Wasalam.

Abang Ghaf Reflection on the Issues of Innovation

Below is the view of Abang Ghaf on Innovation. Since I took this from him, I italicized the wording. Happy reading.

Everything is cared to nurture the brains to actively be innovated in all faculties . Nutritionists announce that rice water is nutritional for the brains . We use to hear that practice makes perfect , so does the brains need practices . Besides , the key to designation is the requirement for a conducive environment of innovation to naturally developed .

Schooling and training are worthy for insight in trust for innovative minds toward technological building up . The priority area targeted is at our National schooling of vocational training of the secondary level . With much awareness and concerned , 80% of our work force are dropouts and in great need for proactive trainings for our human resource .

With due respect , our vocational secondary level is in need for overhaul . There are shortfalls of fundamental to ensure of being creative and innovative in their natural course . Lack of contents that could drive off for creativeness and innovative minds at this training juncture is assumed neglect . In absent , these have discouraged and hampered the minds to be sensitive toward of being innovative , creative , lost the element of curiosity and to be habitually challenging thus unproductive .

In referring to specific case about our vocational formal training , if we look at its curriculum , syllabus and practical workshops , the pedagogy is missing to meet the higher form of innovative minds which are in demand and that required initial training at the secondary level . And therefore the technological training is under stressed , they are far behind so thus the minds of the trainees too .

The vocational blue print should be revised and the proactive metrology to be implemented according to technological needs , changes and has had to anticipate for new technological challenges . It should be done 20 years ago . As a result , we find automative mechanic become ' replaced mechanic ' and welders just become robots to welding . They stop at that .

Creative and innovation for minds are fundamentally designation to conduct , in teaching , training and learning . And if the responsible director of the Ministry is just researching on how to have the new blue print posted on the the drawing board , it would take another 25 years before we could see a certified innovative minds in our vocational schools thus our technological industries are dimmed .

In the area of vocational automative , the definition of being innovative is simply the setting up of the right environment . The process of training which allow the trainees to be innovative . Meaning by emphasizing , 70% is vocational and 30% is academic . The 70% of the vocational is divided into two parts . One is learning via computed lab and the other half is the workshops with technological appliances , hands on training for the trainees .

We can just imagine the effectiveness learning via computer . Eg. on automative , here the students can vitalize the total designed engine . They can overhaul the engine and gain fast understanding of their functions , dissect them to parts and place them back . The innovation prevails .

In this program the understand level is elevated . In this process also their extra thinking miles trigger their creativity and innovative . And above all , it is exciting and interesting which create curiosity which is the premise of being innovative and creative at the prime age of the secondary level .

I TRIED TO DO DA'WAH AT IC ONLY TO BE SCOLDED BACK

When I was at Imperial College I tried to do da’wah to my fellow non-Muslims friends only to end up with them saying back to me, “Airil, if Islam is so great, tell me what is so great about you, about your country? Aren’t the Muslim’s countries are the poorest, and ones that always at war. What are the Muslim contributions to this contemporary world ?” and so on which stroke me like a lightning. How can we do da’wah, how can we promote the syiar of Islam if people do not even want to listen to us in the first place simply because we are ‘nothing’, we have ‘nothing’. Look around us, look at the computer, the lights, the fan, the air conditioner, the cars, the plane, the ship, which one is ‘ours’? Out of thousands books at the Kinokuniya’s Science, Engineering and Mathematics sections, it was hard for us to even get ten books authored by Muslims.

From that very day, I have made a pack with myself that; there will be no longer a day without knowledge for me. I will go on jihad by striving to be the best and the smartest in the field so that when I want to talk about Islam, people will listen just as they listen to me when I talk about mechanics and finite element.I must earn their respect and trust by first being the authority in my fields, then maybe this one of the way I have the chance to say whatever I want to say and preach whatever I want to preach and this way, there will be a better chance for some of them to agree and to follow. InsyaAllah.

INNOVATION: NAJIB HAS GOT IT RIGHT BUT……

Innovation. Our prime minister has got it right when he said Innovation is the way forward. Our oil is diminishing, our service economy is threatened by China, tourism is not much a revenue, so what is left? Being an education hub might be, but what can really attract a large group of international students if not for the worldly-famous innovations coming out from our higher institutions. So its all coming back to innovation, isn’t? This paragraph only echoed what I wrote two years ago (see post Kepentingan Mempunyai Universiti-universiti Bertaraf Dunia, 5^th of February 2009):

“disebabkan ketiadaan teknologi asli kepunyaan Malaysia untuk dijual, ketika ini negara kita hanya menjalankan urus-niaga bersifat perkhidmatan (services) dan orang tengah, (selain aktiviti-aktiviti konventional seperti pertanian dan penjualan sumber-sumber bumi yang akan habis seperti minyak dan gas) dimana Malaysia terpaksa bergantung pada negara lain yang akibatnya menjadikan Malaysia sentiasa menjadi pengikut (follower) kepada kuasa-kuasa besar dan bukan pendahulu (leader) lalu terdedah kepada ancaman-ancaman politik, ekonomi dan sosial”

But, what is innovation and how it relates to the sustainability of our economy, society and country? Innovation from my own point of view is an act of modifying existing technologies so as to add its values both economically and socially for the purpose of self-enhancement and commercialization. Creating a new technology is not necessarily an innovation as creation would be a better name for it. Creating a new feature or function of an existing technology, on the other hand, would come back to the aforementioned act of modification.

How innovation can sustain the survival of our society and country? The answer is, by being ‘renewable’ in nature. Innovations come from ideas which in turn, come from the brain of an individual within a society. So, as long as we can ensure the rebirth of our society, innovation is always a possibility. This is how ‘renewable’ an innovation can be and compare this with the diminishing state of the oil. Also it is ‘renewable’ in the sense that as compared to other revenue generating activities, Innovation demands less ‘material’ capital but more of ‘human capital’. This is what I meant when I wrote the post All We Need Are Books and Brain to Conquer the World on September 16^th. But having said these, it comes also with one condition, hence the word ‘possibility’ at the end of the of the sentence above.

Innovation, and sustainability for that matter will always remain a possibility unless we can breed our next and next and next generations to possess proper brain; smart enough, strong enough to have ideas than can lead to innovations. In other words, we need a clever and smart society to innovate. Do we really believe that we are the only one who has realized the importance of innovations? Come on, even the words come from somebody else.

Believing that anybody can innovate for me is immature, not wrong but immature. Immature in the sense that although it can happen sometimes and somewhere, the element of lucks always there to govern, so its more like a gambling. This ‘trial and error’ version of innovative works where innovators simply try things without having any ‘reason’ behind it and ‘principles’ that guide it, only consumes so much; money, time and energy with low rate of success. And in the time when the world is exponentially changing, the only option that we have is to be quick but correct hence the word effective.

Please, I am not being pessimistic on this issue, in fact I am full of confidence that Innovation is what we need, Innovation what we can do, and Innovation what we must do; the only way forward. If I am not confident, I would not even border to write this article. If I don’t believe that our society can change and improve, I would not even border to write anything in this blog, I might rather sit in front of the television wearing my ‘pelikat’ and just enjoy my life. But what I am saying is, if we want to do it, lets do it properly as there are best practices or proven methods that we can follow. Other words, there are ‘sustainable’ procedures in doing innovations. It’s funny this thing called sustainability; you sustain only if you can sustain.

I strongly believe, if we want to innovate, we must first understand in great depth the basic and fundamental principles which lie behind and that make up the technology we are about to innovate. Because only then we know what and how parameters to be adjusted?, what and how initial and boundary conditions to be modified?; what and how variables to be included? what and how equations to be solved? and among these which conserves and which optimizes the most? etc. The last two may be the most important; not ensuring the conservation of laws usually what leads to physical failure of the innovation and fail to optimize what makes an innovative work a waste.

I know this statement is going to be a controversial one because those ‘trial and error’ innovators who I have mentioned above would also like to claim that this has always been the case for them. This very dilemma is what I referred to when I wrote in a post on 14^th of March 2009:

“We can not even agree on what do we really mean by a conqueror (or to conquer for that matter)? Does our ability in applying the knowledge qualify us as the conqueror? Or is it the ability to understand the knowledge from the axiomatic and the hypothesis point of views, followed by the theoretical and the theorem levels and end up with all the innovations and the inventions what really classifies the status of a conqueror?”

All I am saying is, the problem with our present society is that we can not even get to agree at the axiomatic level on what are we? what are our strength and weakness? etc. And my claim on we’re not ‘there’ yet on this smart issue contained in the following writing of mine taken from the post All We Need Are Books and Brain to Conquer the World on September 16^th:

“But the realities are seeing, for examples, only two Muslims ever won the Nobles Prizes as compared to the 12 Chinese and Singapore universities at top 20 in the world in comparison with ours at top 200. I know people will argue about this ranking thing which for me just an immediate instance of how our people are so self-obsessed, cannot accept self-criticism and always like to blame others for their own lacking. Yesterday, after giving a business pitch at PECIPTA 2011 at KLCC Convention Centre, I went up to Kinokuniya and felt very sad to see out of hundreds (if not thousands) books at the Science, Engineering and Mathematics sections, it was hard to even get ten books authored by Muslims. If we really want Syiar Islam to be practiced throughout the world, we must start working in turning this ‘Kinokuniya scenario’ into those where it would be our books on those shelves.”

So all we need is a cultural revolution and by this time my critics will say “hah, another big words from him” and “typical him, idealistic and impractical”. I know all these will be thrown at me. But I am a man who do not believe in cutting corners or short-cut. We can excel but work-hard, persevere, big-hearted, brave we must be. This is what I learned so far in this life; especially from my experience in IC London and in developing my group of students who produced ERCAD software. So real these experiences I can never turned back. On the question what do I mean by cultural revolution, I would say lets start with the revolution of Budaya Ilmu and on what I really mean by this, those really and sincerely want to know my views on this, please read my posts in 2009 as there were all extractions from a bigger volume of my writing on Budaya Ilmu (huh! it has been three years since I wrote those, how time flies!).

Finally, let me conclude this article with my opinion that the measure of smartness of a society is represented by the rate of coming to an agreement on one particular issue; the smarter they are, the quicker they agree and vice versa. In turn, to innovate we must be smart and this only requires us to be quick to agree and most importantly quick to UNITE!.

ERCAD: MY FIRST FE SOFTWARE DEVELOPED TOGETHER WITH MY STUDENTS

Alhamdullilah, after almost 4 years of devotion, my postgrad students and I have finally completed an engineering software named as Educational Reinforced Concrete Analysis and Design software or ERCAD Version 1.5. List of my students, listed as board of directors of Scylla Operation Sdn. Bhd. is given at the bottom of this article. The source codes of the software have been written totally by my students hence the claim of Malaysia first 100% homegrown software. ERCAD automates the analysis and design of RC structures for low and medium rise buildings. For the analysis, finite element method has been employed in obtaining the values of the stresses, forces and displacement whilst BS 8110 is the basis for the design procedure. The development of the software is benchmarked against two established software; ESTEEM and ORION.

Figure 1: Plan view modelling feature

The project have been funded by KPerak Inc with the collaboration of CREAM-CIDB. KPerak is a Perak State Government agency that responsible for the development of Perak into a fully developed knowledge-based economy state by 2020 through various ICT initiatives. The project received about RM1 million investment from KPerak.

Figure 2: 3D-Rendering feature

The software has been beta-tested at a consulting firm in Subang for two months and obtained approval from various universities. The software also has received support letter from Jabatan Pengajian Tinggi, MOHE for commercialization purposes. As far as sale and marketing are concerned, we have started the activities in August and so far able to sell 7 units while more deals to be sealed under next years budget.

Figure 3: FEA ouput (bending moment diagram)

As a byproduct of this project, all the eleven students of mine has established a company called Scylla Operation Sdn. Bhd. The establishment is to ensure the continuity of the work and to fill the vacuum that exist in this country; Scylla Operation is the first company that able to write finite element software fully from scratch without the need to venture with international parties in source code development. Visit Scylla Operation at http://scyllaoperation.com/.

Figure 4: Detailing output (beam)


Figure 5: Detailing output (slab)

Figure 6: Detailing output (column)

List of my postgrads student cum BOD of Scylla Operation Sdn. Bhd is given below:

Mohd Hamidi bin Harun

Mohamad Iqbal bin Badli

Abdul Azim bin Mohd Samiin

Mohd Al-Akhbar bin Mohd Noor

Mohd Zhafri bin Jamil Abd Nazir

Muhammad Nor Hafidzi bin Mahat

Norhidayah binti Rasin

Mohd Farhan bin Mohammad Foad

Erwan Hafidzi Kasiman

Mohd Shahrul Nizam Ardianshah

Mohd Sharaffuddeeen Suhaimi

FREEMASONRY STORY AND HOW IT COMPARES TO US

Introduction

Many claim that the world is ruled by Freemasonry through proxies. Although the masons deny it and keep saying that “we are not a secret society but a society with secrets” but clues around us only tell otherwise. So, how they came to power? The answer is by possessing both, wealth and knowledge. Elaborating on these and relating them to our current depressing situation are the intentions of this article.

How Freemasonry Possesses so Much Wealth?

The history of Freemasonry can be traced back to the era of the crusades. During the ruling of the Christians, the Holy Land was ruled or managed (the latter should be the better word) by English knights called Knights Templar. Logistically away from Europe, these knights got a hold of the land to themselves and making so much wealth to the extent that European kings asked them for financial support during wars. At the same time, rumor has it that the knights also creep into mysticism and some says that this was due to the interactions they had with Muslims mysticism/Sufism. The crisis started when a King (I just couldn't remember, I think it was the King of France) plea for support was rejected by the Templar resulting in the King reported the infidelity of the knights of mysticism practice to the Vatican. Having believed the heresy, the Vatican launched the attacks on the knights; those captured were burnt to death and those escaped settled mostly in Scotland which at the time was at war with England hence willing to provide protection. The knights brought together with them voluminous wealth. Wanting not to be discovered and influenced by their mysticism practice, the knights started to communicate subversively and in mysterious manner i.e. ritual, signs, rhetoric language, etc. The wealth inheritance as well as the mysterious cultures was later evolved into Freemasonry (of course with some influences of/collaboration with the Illuminati). This was how Freemasonry inherited so much wealth.

How Freemasonry Possesses so Much Knowledge?

The wars of crusade also exposed the European to modern knowledge developed by the Muslims only to make them realized the orthodoxy of the churches. Again, this has triggered the attacks of the Vatican hence the churches on the learned European only to make the latter, in ensuring the survival of the knowledge they have acquired, to perceive subversive movement as the only way out and Freemasonry was already there to assist. This was how Freemasonry inherited so much knowledge; with submissions of the learned into the secret society. For your information, Royal Society, the oldest and the biggest academic society in the world was founded by a group of masons who attended regularly the talk by Christopher Wren and who all have decided to put aside their contradiction in politics and religions (England was at civil war between King Charles II and Oliver Cromwell as well as between Church of England and the Protestant), for the sake of knowledge. Sir Isaac Newton was a mason and was the second intake of the society, imagine that.

How this Story of Freemasonry Compares to Us?

Orthodoxy of churches: This is equivalent to the orthodoxy or stupidity of our society, BOTH SIDES. Both sides are seemed to be detached from present realities. The world is changing so much and so quick that they just cannot keep up with it.

King’s report on infidelity: This is similar to our culture where we easily call others who do not agree with us as infidels.

Vatican believed in heresy: This is comparable to the culture of our society of believing anything blindly, again BOTH SIDES.

Mistreatment towards the Learned: This is equal to the present state faced by the young ones in Malaysia where many of them are labeled as Wahabi, Syiah, Secular, Pluralist, Extremist, Modernist, and Idealist etc by the old ones, again BOTH SIDES.

THE NEED FOR INTELLECTUAL ONLINE NETWORKING

Although it’s a vicious circle, i.e. academic system produces government but in turn, it is the government who produces the academic system; but I believe, the best way to stop such a cycle is to start at the level of academic for three reasons; 1) I’m in academia so this is the only medium I have and 2) to mold a young student who yet to have any stubbornness should be much easier than to those who already has it is own opinion and 3) we do not have alternative to stop the cycle at government level. So, maybe what we need now is a free-from-partisan-politics-intellectual-online-networking or F²P²ION. It does not have to be formalized and stay virtual online like this would be the best, where Malaysian academics and intellectuals can unite, share a common goal that is ‘to acquire knowledge to conquer the world’ and to put aside any differences especially on ‘partisan politics’ during the course undertaking. Output from this networking must however be manifested and materialized in our lectures and teaching. This is how we can trigger the Butterfly Effect out of our networking. And with this I hope we can ‘reconfigure’ and ‘restructure’ our society under the time frame we bought from our siding with the current government. Just an idea to share. Wallahhualam.