Wendy will fly to Dallas, TX tomorrow to attend the Microsoft Tech·Ed 2003. This is her first to go to U.S.
Impacted by SARS, some flights were canceled. So it is not easy to go from Shanghai to Dallas. She has to fly to Tokoyo via ANA, then to Chicago and at last to Dallas.
© 2003 Jian Shuo Wang
Today, the national travel administration lifted the travel ban within China. It is very good news for travel agencies. Now, travel in provinces not in the WHO’s travel advisory list is allowed. After Guangzhou and Hongkong was removed from the list, Beijing, Tianjing, Shaanxi, Hebei and Inner Mongolia are still regarded as SARS affected area.
Changes in the vistors of this site
Another change also happens. Before March, lots of visitor comes to my site when search for Pudong airport. My site was listed as #1 in the search result.
In April, seldom can I see anyone is searching for Pudong airport, since most of the trip were canceled. On the contray, most visitors come when searching for “SARS Shanghai” or “SARS Pictures”
Now, the good news, the trend to search for Pudong airport raises dramatically again while SARS searcher descreased even faster. It is insteresting that all the metrics are related to each other.
I love technologies, especially those changing people’s life. Just as ClearType and MovableType, the TerraServer is always my favoriate when I need to show somethinng amazing to my friends. Using TerraServer, you can see anybody’s house like a hawk. It gives you the real photographic picture about any location in U.S.
Sample
If you have any valid U.S. address, you can see the house from the sky. For example, if you know the address of the famous Space Needle in Seattle:
400 Broad St.
Seattle, WA, 91109
You can get the following image free of charge.
Image courtesy of the U.S. Geological Survey
See the UFO-like tower in the middle of the picture?
How to get the sattelite image of any place in U.S.
It is simple two-steps. Step 1, get the precious latitude and longtitude of the location. Step 2, query it in the TarrerServer.
Get the percise location of the place
The easiest way is to use MapPoint. It can convert any location in U.S. to geographic metrics. For example, if we want to find out where Space Needle is, enter the following information in to Mappoint
400 Broad St.
Seattle, WA, 91109
It looks like this. Click Get Map button.
As luck would have have it, you will get map of Space Needle as blow:
Put the URL to get the aerial image
Now it is the time for you to copy the URL of page containing the map and paste it into the box blow. Remember to copy all the content in the address box of your browser. Then click the button below to get the aerial picture of location shown in the map. A seperate browser window will pop up.
Does it work?
If you see the map of the location, congratulations! You can even zoom in at MapPoint and you can compare the map and the sattelite picture. Here is the zoomed map for Space Needle.
Compare with the sattelite picture above and you will find it very interesting that they match each other exactly.
If it does not work, there may be some problem with either the URL or my code. Here is the trick behind the code.
You can get the latitude and longtidue directly from MapPoint URL. In our Space Needle case, the URL is
http://mappoint.msn.com/(exncyg550lzl4y551bdeo145)/map.aspx?L=USA&C=47.61963%2c-122.34886&A=7.16667&P=|47.61963%2c-122.34886|1|400+Broad+St%2c+Seattle%2c+WA+98109|L1|
Notice the part in red? It is Latitude and Longtitude of the location (after removing the seperator “%2c”). Using these numbers to query at http://terraserver-usa.com/geographic.aspx and you will get the same result.
One step further
The astonishing thing in this modern world is, you know everything. You can go one step further. You can see may people’s house from a single telephone number. Want to have a try? Here is a sample. The phone number of Space Needle Administration is
(206) 905-2200
You can open a browser, go to http://google.com, paste the number (206) 905-2100 into the search box, and click Search.
Here we go. Here is the information returned as the whitepage feature of Google:
Space Needle, Administrative Office, (206) 905-2200, 203 6th Ave N, Seattle, WA 98109
Now you have the address and you know what to do next.
This trick works for most business and personal phone numbers, but you cannot always find the address from a phone number.
About TerraServer
The images in TerraServer is provided by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). The images are in the public domain, and are freely available for download and re-distribution. The highest resolution is 1 meter for 1 pixel, which means every single pixel of the image represent 1 pixel of the land. So you can recognize cars, houses but not individuals.
What do you think
At least I was very astonished to find out that everyone’s house is open for visitors from the sky. I have tried to many locations I received and feel a little bit worried what if someone combine these pictures with a hidden GPS data in your car? They can see your car on the screen as you move. :-(
Resources
Update May 30, 2003
Thanks Li Jingyi for commeting below and refered me to Space Imaging. I have ever seen the Shanghai 2002 photo somewhere else but didn’t realize it comes from Space Imaging.
There are so mucn larger, better and color sattelite images on the site. Here are some most interesting one I saw on the site:
Lishui, Hainan Island, South China Sea
Credit: spaceimaging.com
If someone print it out and it can be the best map possible in the world for that area. I even think treking around the area is also interesting with the help of this “map”.
As shown in the map above, the elevated road at left bottom conner is under construction. It connects Xujiahui and Xinzhuang. Here are some pictures I took for the construction site.
Below: Taken at Jiangjiang Park Station. The McDonald’s sign before the construction site.
© 2003 Jian Shuo Wang
Below: Elevator is installing the steel frame to the poles.
© 2003 Jian Shuo Wang
© 2003 Jian Shuo Wang
Learn to drive
I passed the traffic rule examination today. Then I will begin my journey to learn to drive. The exam offers 100 questions and you need to answer 90 or more questions correctly to get a pass.
I love travel. The passion to travel to the most nature places was strengthened during my last visit to Daocheng.
Some readers complained that I didn’t give the Chinese name for the wonderful place. This is the complete address in Chinese
I remember the journey started with a simple note:
I will be away from the Internetized world for the next 8 days. From 6:00 AM tomorrow, I will be on my way to Daocheng, the lost Shangrila in China.
When I wrote the entry, I didn’t realize how amazing the trip would be and the memeraizable journey ahead. After I returned to civilized world eight days later, I brought 200+ ditigal pictures, 100+ traditional film pictures and a long story.
The passion drives me to plan for my trip to Kanas Lake
Now, I am planning my travel schedule of this Oct holiday again. My eyes focus on the most northwest part of China – Kanas Lake – the “beautiful and misterious” lake, according to the Mongolian name. I marked the location of Kanas in the China map below:
Credit: Map borrowed from ChinaTour.com
Kanas pictures
My friends Tang sent the following pictures to me via email. It is so beautiful, isn’t it?
Resouces for Kanas
With the help of A tour Guide for China Hikers, I created the draft version of the route map:
Go to Kanas
Here is my draft plan:
If anyone has been there, please advice. Thanks.
Update: July 1, 2003
Detailed Kanas Plan is released.
SARS Update
As always, I will have to update you about the SARS situation in Shanghai. With the eighth imported SARS cases, which is a train attendant from Guangzhou, the city got seriously alerted. Most of the passengers in the same train have been found and quarantined, but there are still two persons missing. Today, 9 new cases were reported all over China. All new cases were found in Beijing.
Update: July 31, 2007
Isaac Mao finally visited Kanas, and took great photos from the lake. He posted his short travelogue: A wonderful view from my Kanas Lake memory.
Let me steal one photo from his blog:
Credit: Isaac Mao
This is the forth article of a series of article on the daily life in Shanghai. From the changes in MY life, you may get some idea about the real situation in Shanghai.
Taxi
If you read about my previous “Daily Life – SARS Related“, you will know that I pay specially attention to taxis and taxi drivers.
Recently, nothing changed since the new regulations take effect on April 20. The daily disinfection does not stop and the 7 color tags rule is still working.
The taxi drivers still wear masks at work. They will remove it, hanging the masks on one ear for fresh air and put it on when passengers get on to the taxi. It is hard time for them – financial surfer due to lack of passengers and physical surfer due to the annoying masks.
TV
Any crisis will give literature and art a bigger room to grow. It is the case of SARS. I saw some wonderful campaign on SARS on local TV.
The first one was shown from two weeks ago. It featured a little girl waiting for her mother who is a nurse in hospital. The recent one featured “I love Shanghai. I believe in Shanghai” from about 6 General Managers of foreign companies, like Siemens. Here comes the third one. It is about the contribution those people who got quarantined for SARS. Five (maybe five) persons of different occupation repeated the same sentence. “This is what we should do, because I love Shanghai”. I regret that I cannot show it in this webpage for you. It was really well done.
Well. This is what we call the morale building, isn’t it? These campaigns gave the nurses, the foreign invested companies and the people who got quarantined a lot of support by showing understanding and appreciation for their contribution.
City landscape
The city landscape does not change even a little bit because of SARS – if there is any change, it should be the emerging of new buildings. Below is a picture I took from a building near the Bund, facing north.
© Jian Shuo Wang
In the picture are the lower houses near Fuzhou road. The road on the right is Jiang Xi road and the intersection of the two taller building is Fuzhou Road. Nanjing road is about three blocks further. Shanghai has been cloudy like this for about a week and maybe will continue to be. Nothing affected by SARS, right? But mood of the people inside the houses has been changed greatly. SARS dramatically slowed down the pace of the city.
© Jian Shuo Wang
Above is the same scene looking a little bit eastward. You can see a small portion of the Huang Pu river on the right corner.
© Jian Shuo Wang
Sunsetting in Xujiahui, looking west. More and more new buildings appeared in the Hong Qiao Area. In the scene is the tallest building in Hong Qiao – but I forgot the name. Let me check it out later.
The figure
Today, 8 new cases were reported, among them,
Beijing 5
Shaanxi 1
Inner Mongolia 2
Good number. I was worried when I see the number of 40, 40, 34 in the last three days. Now the number goes down again.
Date – New cases reporeted
May 25 – 16
May 24 – 34
May 23 – 40
May 22 – 40
May 21 – 12
Other news – Earthquake
This afternoon, someone sent email to me if I feel the move of the floor. I didn’t pay attention to it since I think it is joking. Later, I saw this: Strong earthquake shakes Japan – Magnitude 7.0 trembler strikes northeast, felt in Tokyo.
Later someone reported that they feel the earthquake in Shanghai. Really? I didn’t.
Online broadcast
You should see the video between May 26 11:00 PM to May 27 11:00 PM.
Read more:
This entry is more technical then before since above all, I am still a technical guy in the IT industry. I cannot help mentioning something about the software, so that you still treat me as a person who knows computer. :-)
I have a laptop. Wow. Yes. I have a big, heavy, old-fashioned, less-powerful Dell Latitude CPx H500GT laptop.
To keep the system as quick as possible and as fresh as possible, I reinstall the system every two months. That gives me flexibility to install software without worrying its compatabilty issue. Yes. There are some “bad” software just want to break the system or other application by leaving a lot of things in the system, ovewriting other application’s compontent. Even worst, some spyware keep poping up advertisement and record my activity….
I always keeps a list of software I will install after my fresh installation.
Operating System – Windows XP SR-1
I have been using Windows XP for some time. I especially love the ClearType technology which is one of the top three reasons I install Windows XP. Bad news is, it is not turned on by default. I will always following the below instructions to turn it on.
After that, you will see the change in all fonts – they become smoother, thicker.
Microsoft ClearType Homepage is a very good resource to get more about this tip. My friends are all very surprised when I helped them to turn this feature on. They shouted out, “Why didn’t you tell me earlier?” Well. Why not enable this on LCD by default? Note: There is no difference in the CRT monitor – the TV-like monitor.
My favoriate usability guru Jakob Neilson also thought highly of the technology. He has the same concern as I have – too few people know this great feature.
Productivity Tools – Office 2003
I always install Office XP in my previous reinstall. The killer feature I would say is the SmartTag technology, especially the one appears when I paste something into a document.
It really improves my productivity.
Recently Office 2003 hit beta and I begin to install this one. No report so far.
Microsoft Money
I will also install Microsoft Money on the computer too. It helps me to track my cash and bank account. Very nice interface.
Appendix
Some funny things. Fan is using Latitude C400 and today, I found an interesting article to help you run Linux on the system. What surprises me is, it can make the wireless card work.
Shanghai Map
I used MSPaint.exe to draw a brief Shanghai map and marked some places to live. This map may answer questions from my friends like where to rent a house….
The blue line in the map is Huangpu River. The black lines are bridge. The brown lines are elevated high way.
Nice weekend in Xinzhuang
It is a nice weekend. I spent the whole day at my friend’s house near Xinzhuang. We had perfect lunch and played XBox for about 2 hours, then we played table-tennis for the rest of the afternoon. The relaxing and meaningful activities are much better than staying at home – especially in the SARS situation when home is always the first chance to kill time at weekend.
Elevated highway
The elevated highway is extending ten more kilometers longer to the southwest part of Shanghai on the Humin road. The massive construction in undergoing, makeing the existing road wining through the construction site. The taxi driver operate the taxi to left and right just like in a computer game.
Below is for my reference only. No particular meaning for anybody else
Week TASKS TQ Actual ATQ
—-
Fan and I went to Sichuan Garden in Xujiahui for dinner today. It is a decent restaurant with reasonable price. It is located on the Gongchen Road, just behind the Grant Gateway.
Many people there
I still remember when we had dinner half an month ago at the same time in this restaurant, it is half empty. We two even occupied a large table near the door. There are still many empty tables.
Today, the news is good news and bad news. The bad news, people begin to line up to wait for an empty table. It is bad actually since ever Friday day, it is often hard to find a place in good restaurant. It seems the good time has past and we need to struggle to find a place to eat later. The good news is, obviously, the impact of SARS on hositality industry become weaker. People begin to go out of the door and rush to restaurant again.
The even better thing I see is, with the returning of customers, the restaurant strengthened the precaution measurements – the air condition is stopped, instead, it uses the fresh air. Waiters and waitress are still wearing masks.
I can feel the city is waking up and the prosperity and the energy of the city is coming back slowly.
The SARS champions
Opening my TV and I saw a series of SARS related champions. One is about the confidence of foreign investments. About 6 CEOs of major companies in Shanghai, such as Siemens, are repeating the same sentence in Chinese “I love Shanghai. I believe in Shanghai”. It is very impressive.
Shanghai government is always doing good job of buiding its image among citizens. It is seldom seen in cities in China.
WHO lifted travel warning to Hongkong and Guangdong
Effective today, the World Health Organization (WHO) is removing its recommendation that people should postpone all but essential travel to Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and Guangdong province, China.
Source: WHO website
New SARS cases
Yesterday, all the TV station in Shanghai printed rotating subtitle to their program. It reads:
All passengers taking training K48 (Guangzhou to Shanghai) on May 20 are required to register at local CDC. All passengers in the No. 2 train are quired to take quarantine. Tel: 62095600、62750270
It is because the new SARS case is confirmed to be a train attendant on tha train.
Also in these days
There are some interesting things these days. I am tracking all these events everyday.
CCTV broadcast China expedition team atop Everest
It was an exciting moment when I see the real time broadcast of Everest from CCTV-1 the day before yesterday. It is so beautiful, man! The camera sent back the picture form the top of Everest to my home – it is really an exciting moment. The hundreds of snow covered mountains are below the feet of the camera man.
“Everest, Mount,” Microsoft?Encarta?Online Encyclopedia 2003
http://encarta.msn.com ?1997-2003 Microsoft Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
There is even a flash showing the routines of the Everest.
Shanghai is a place with great restaurants and great people. I joined Willie to a wonderful restaurant named Red (website) on quiet Anfu road. The road is famous because the Shanghai Drama Center is located there. I visited the center frequently before SARS hit the city. (In case you want to know what happened to the center later, let me tell you, the performance was paused till now). It is the place mixed with the best environment and the finest culture.
The restaurant Red is a very unique. It occupies the whole 3-story house before the large grassland. If I can record the sound for you, you will hear the music and laughter from the second floor.
I had Pineapple Fried Rice there. It is very delicious. You can find it at the bottom of the decent menu.
I was surprised that even it is Thursday (not Friday), there are many people there. Most of them are expats in Shanghai. It was called mysterious night. I don’t know what will happen there because I left before the program begin at 10:00 PM. It may be a good place to go if you just come to Shanghai and want to meet new friends. I am very happy to meet Annie, Robert and Tina there.
My New Sony DSC-P8 Camera?
The pictures were taken by the new Sony P8 camera. I still don’t have time to bring it out to take day-light photos since when I go out of the office, it is already dark. So I can only take the twilight photo. So far, so good. It is not a serious camara. Small, cute and very good capatibility with Windows XP are among the top reasons I choose this model.
SARS update in Shanghai
Lynne wondered why there is no SARS news from this web site. Well. It is my fault. I thought people just don’t care about SARS now so I am changing my topic. I will change back. So here you go.
Currently, there are eight confirmed SARS cases in Shanghai. The eighth is confirmed today to be a train attendant from Guangzhou. Among them, two died. No.
Annie reported that according SCMP.com, Shanghai government is considering relax the quaratine rules in Shanghai. Maybe people returning Shanghai will not required to take the 14 days in house quarantine. Note: This piece of news is not personally verified by me yet.
Coming back to my normal life, slowly
To be honest, I am relax recently and begin to meet people and go to restaunants recently, partly because the number of SARS is not increasing, partly because the strict measures already in place – I am having my temperature taken every morning, and every noon (if I leave the building). The number read from the therometer is strange – from 33.2 degree C to 36.5 degrees. Do they really think the 3 degree variation is reasonable? :-)
Metro (subway)
I took metro today since I need to met Willie on time and metro is definitely the fastest transportation tool in rush hours. I think it should be OK now. Actually, I havn’t took metro for about two months since end of March – can you imagine it? I did take metro in the last TWO months. I always walk or take taxi to avoid crowded place. I thought metro should be safer now. So I happily choosed to take metro.
But I was really scared when I enter the metro station. So many people are still wearing masks. On the contary, only few people in the street wear masks. In the train I took, 7 out of the 12 persons seated there wore masks. I must look stupid to have my nose and mouth exposed to the dangerous air.
After I get out of the train and return to the Nanjing Xi road, masks disappeared again.
My Starbucks trip
I took the photo of Starbucks at Shi Men Yi Lu metro station. Here is the logo. But I don’t think I have visited this store since this photo is not qualified as a unique photo for this Starbuck shop. I believe I will use some weekends to walk from one to the other until I touch all the 26 stores. Then I will take photos. The standard I set for the photo is, you can recognize the location of the store from the photo if you have visited the store.
© Jian Shuo Wang
My digital camera
You know what, finally, I bought Sony DSC-P8 today. I am choosing between Sony P8 and Nikon E4300. Thanks for Christina from Chinese tea and Li Jinyi to give me the suggestions. I feel a little bit embrassed that although Li is suggesting that Sony is so-so, I still paid for it and get one.
Nikon is good, expect the Purple Fringing
I like Nikon since it sounds more professional – actually it is profession in terms of image quality and the lens. But it is completely unacceptable for the Purple Fringing. Check the photos on dpreview.com. I found the same thing in many Nikon 885 photos on many other sites.
I am excited to have Sony DSC-P8
I proudly announce that I have digital camera now and I can add more pictures of Shanghai into this blog. My plan includes a series of photo for Starbucks – according to Luo, there are 26 Starbucks in Shanghai.
Many other friends also suggested me to take something and put it online, for example, the new Suzhou rivier, the new Lupu bridge… a lot of pictures. Now I can show more rich and informative Shanghai guide soon.
My new digital camera – Sony DSC-P8.
Annie in Pudong airport
Nice to hear from Annie. She is at the Pudong airport and she is able to access this webpage! Isn’t great. Read her comment and check out how she did it.
Note that there is a new Internet Cafe near the Gate 20 of Pudong airport with 6 clean computers.
Update: October 07, 2005
After two years, I still enjoy Sony P8 and took thousands of pictures and post it onto this site. It is a very cute camera. The best part is, it does not require any driver to transfer photos to a computer.
SARS is almost over, so I begin to visit coffee shops and meet friends. Tonight, I had a nice talk with Karine in the Starbucks in the Metro City in Xujiahui. I suddenly realize I need to turn my focus back to the amazing city itself instead of watching SARS everyday – the nice life will begin again.
Starbucks is Part of People’s Life
Source: Jian Shuo Wang’s All Starbucks Tour In A Day
With more and more foreign companies coming to Shanghai, the daily life changes. If you list some shops that affects the city most, I would list in the following order:
The most important reason it is affecting people’s life is the life style and the concept they bring to the city. People know how fast a lunch will be and how colorful and creative the furniture can be. We all learn how large amount shopping looks like and, for the Starbucks case, how relaxing it is to have a cup of coffee.
Wireless Starbucks
Today, I found three laptop computers in the Starbucks in Metro City at 7:00 PM. I even see the girl sitting besides me are surfing on the Internet. The homepage of Yahoo! appeared on her laptop – it is cool! The Tian Yi Tong really works. Fortunately, I have subscribed and I can enjoy the wireless Starbucks very soon. (I said very soon, instead of now because it takes 4 working days before the Tian Yi Tong is enabled).
Here is the list (in Chinese) of Tian Yi Tong covered Starbucks on 51wireless.com. It obviously is not the most updated information since Starbucks Metro City Shop is not in the list but is covered already.
星巴克远东店 全覆盖 仙霞路299号
星巴克古北店 全覆盖 水城路20号
星巴克鸿翔店 全覆盖 南京西路869号1楼
星巴克人民公园店 全覆盖 南京西路189号
星巴克豫园店 全覆盖 豫园九曲桥附近
星巴克滨江店 全覆盖 滨江大道富都段
星巴克力宝店 全覆盖 淮海中路222号
星巴克中信店 全覆盖 南京西路1168号
星巴克新天地店 全覆盖 太昌路181弄18号
星巴克东方巴黎店 全覆盖 南昌路559号1楼
星巴克美臣店 全覆盖 淮海中路937号
星巴克时代店 全覆盖 张杨路500号
星巴克遵义店 全覆盖 遵义路111号
星巴克嘉里不夜城 全覆盖 天目西路218号
星巴克正大店 全覆盖 陆家嘴西路168号3楼
星巴克嘉里中心店 全覆盖 南京西路1515号
星巴克美术馆 全覆盖 陕西北路888号
How Many Starbucks in Shanghai
It is an interesting question. I want to know the answer too. It has at least 18 shops. I am interesting to present a review for the Starbucks shops. I am planning to buy a digital camera within this week, so I believe I can warlk around and visit all the Starbucks shop and take a picture for each of them. Yes. I will do it within two weeks.
Actually, the reason I thought of this idea is because of SARS – indirectly related to SARS. During the long May holiday, we cannot go any where and it seems too dangerous to take taxi, buses, or metro. So I begin to walk. After the practice, I found I can walk much further than I can imagine. I usually take taxi or metro to work but recently, I will walk for one hour everyday from my office to my home. That is the reason I believe I can visit all the Starbucks by walk – it may take serveral days to do it.
Update Nov 22, 2003
Here is the full list from Starbucks Newsletter
Kerry Centre Add: No.1515 Nanjing(W) Rd. Tel: 021-52986431
Zhaojiabang Road Store Add: No.888 Shanxi(S) Rd. Tel: 021-54654992
Metro City Store Add: No.1111 Zhaojiabang Rd. Tel: 021-64268250
Lippo Store Add: 222, Huaihai Zhong Rd Tel: 021-53966379
East Paris Store Add: 559, Nanchang Rd Tel: 021-54652377
Xin Tian Di Store Add: Unit 1, building 18,North Blocks Xin Tian Di Tel: 021-63200137
Mei Chen Store Add: 937, Huaihai Zhong Rd. Tel: 021-64728339
Citic Store Add:CITIC square,1168, Nanjing West Rd Tel: 021-52984548
HongXiang Store Add: 869, Nanjiang Xi Rd Tel: 021-62581941
People’s Park Store Add:189, Nanjing West Rd Tel: 021-63271930
Yu Yuan Store Add:100, Yuyuan Rd Tel: 021-63552271
Far East International Add: 299, XianXia Rd Tel: 021-62350615
Gu Bei Store Add: 20,ShuiCheng Nan Rd Tel: 021-62091760
Bin Jiang Store Add: Fu Du Duan, Bingjiang Da Dao, Pudong Tel: 021-58781332
Times Square Store Add: 500,Zhangyang Rd, Pudong Tel: 021-58368819
Orient Meitha Store Add: No.98, Huaihai(C) Rd.
Tel:021 53858461
Super Brand Site Store Add: 168, 3F LuJiaZui(W) Rd.
Tel:021 50471106
Zun Yi Road Store Add: No 101, ZunYi Road
Tel:021 62592540
Kerry Everbright City Store Add: No.218, Tianmu(W) Rd.
Tel:021 63172662
Fuzhou Rd. Store Add: No.567, Fuzhou Rd. Tel:021 63222584
East Ocean Centre Store Add: No.588,Yan An Rd. Shanghai Tel:021 53855001
Update June 1, 2003
I have postponed my plane to visit all Starbucks to the end of June since the new DC I bought is not available for the first part of the month.
Interesting to read
The slight change of Starbucks logo.
My digital camera
More than one reader have requested Shanghai pictures. Yes. A picture tells more than a thousand words. I am considering buying digital camera serious to capture this fast changing city.
I have been very keen to Sony DSC P-8.
But after I found it has no manual function, I turned to Nikon Coolpix 885. Later, I locked to Nikon Coolpix 4300, which is about 3800 RMB now.
As you can see from my recent weblog entries, I cover less SARS recent than in the month of April. This is also a reflection about how people in this city thinks about SARS – when the temperature taking, the clean taxi and staying at home become a habit, people pay less attention to it, as it SARS has been in the city for 100 years.
Less new cases
12 new cases were reported with 7 in Beijing. This is a small number if you recall the 100+ cases per day time at the end of April. With the slowing down of new cases, the preventional measures are more and more strict in Shanghai. It is too early to say SARS is over, but it is obvious that SARS is approach to the end.
Still cannot travel
I still cannot travel outside Shanghai. It has been one month that the door of Shanghai closed. It doesn’t mean that I am not allowed to go out, just don’t want to wait for the long line of body temperature taking, the form filling when leaving and entering Shanghai. The 14 day quarantine is also too long for me to step out of Shanghai.
I subscribed Tian Yi Tong
I subscribed Tian Yi Tong this noon. Of cause my temperature was taken when I entered into the branch office of Shanghai Telecom and taken again when I returned to the place I work. It reminded me that someone has complained to the city government that their business nature requires them to walking around the city. Sometimes they need to have their temperature taken more than 6 or 10 times a day. Some of the theremeters are infrared, but there is still some normal one. So it cost them about 1 hour every day. They want the government to issue some kind of form so they can have their temperature taken only once. Good suggestion, isn’t it? :-)
Well. Back to the topic. I used 110 RMB to subscribe Tian Yi Tong. Then I will get a USB wireless network card and an Access Point.
Isaac
Isaac has mentioned the webcam in his personal weblog and the group blog CNBlog.org. Isaac is right. Webcam is not something new. Most of them has disappeared. I am not sure how long I can keep the webcam operation. Maybe I will just shut down the cam in one month, when one of the criteria (see the Criteria for me to pause this service section) is reached. The other possibility is, I will keep the webcam online, for about 6 months? I have never think of the possibility of writing the weblog for more than 3 months – I offen start something new passionately, but fail after some short time – from one week to one month. So it real surprises myself that I have been writing for this weblog for more than 8 months. Still remember, the first entry of this weblog written on Sept 11, 2002.
Webcam
The webcam is online from 8:35 PM today and may be turned off at 11:30 PM today.
Updated: Recent schedule May 19, 2003
From May 19 to May 23, the camera will be offline from 00:00 AM to 7:00 PM (most of the day time). It will probably online from 7:00 PM (or 8:00 PM) to 11:00 PM. From May 24, it will extend to day time and aiming to be 50% of the time (12 hours everyday). From June 1, I hope I can operate it 24 hours a day. The tag above indicate the status of the server (online or offline).
On May 23, my 130 RMB for all-you-can-eat package take effects. So I don’t have to pay for every minute my server is online. By June 1, I should have a dedicated server for this service.
You are watching Shanghai in real-time.
I am very happy that I have the passion to setup this Shanghai webcam again. Through this webcam, you can see part of the Shanghai – at the intersection of Cao Bao Road and Xi Qin Road in Southwest Shanghai. The camera is placed at the south window of my apartment, directing to the outside. The high building on the left is the Shanghai Everbright Exhibition Center. There is a 4-star hotel and some office buildings in this thirty story huge building. On the right, the lower building with a blue arch is the Shanghai Everbright Convention and Exhibition Center. It is one of the three major exhibition venue in Shanghai. Typically, the exhibition center’s schedule is completely full until end of 2004, according to news sources. However, as you can see from the video, it is closed. All exhibition from the end of April is canceled.
You can also see the road between the exhibition center(right) and the office building (left). It is called Xi Qin Road. The traffic is low. In the distance are some residential buildings which were just built 2 years ago.
1. Frequently check this page
You can frequently check this page – in the morning, in the afternoon or in the evening; when it is sunny, cloudy or rainy. At different time and condition, you will see the different sceen of Shanghai.
2. Put it on your own web
If you have a website or personal homepage, why not put this webcam into your own page? Just insert the following HTML code to your webpage.
<SCRIPT language=VBScript src=”http://home.wangjianshuo.com/scripts/webcam/Shanghaiwebcam.cgi”></SCRIPT>
The webcam and the broadcasting server is hosted in my house.
3. Put this webcam into your computer desktop
You can easily open a small window on your computer desktop and see Shanghai in real time through the window. Sounds cool? Here is how you can do it.
Requirements: You must use Windows XP.
You will see the webcam appear on your desktop. You can adjust the size of the window to just fit the Windows Media Player.
4. Create your own webcam like this
Why not create your own webcam and broadcast your window scene like this? The only thing you need is a computer, a broadband network connection and a webcam. I have wrote about Real-Time Stream Broadcasting Cookbook. Hope it helps.
5. You tell me what you want to do with this cam
The only limit if your imagination.
Important notice
This is no garentee for up time. As you can see, this is only non-profitable personal website. Unlike writing articles and hosting the site, which is just my free labor and small amount of fixed host rental fee, hosting a webcam is not cheap. A 24×7 webcam needs:
I will setup a watch dog to report on the online time of this service – may publish a schedule for the “show-time”.
Check the status of the media server here. If it shows “Shanghai Webcam Server is Offline”, it means I have turned it off to save bandwidth, save electricity and avoid the noise of the computer fan.
Criteria for me to pause this service:
One of the following reasons will force me to pause this service:
Support me to continue this free service
You can support this webcam by the following ways:
Please use the comment system to let me know whether you can see the video. Report to me if you cannot see anything.
Sample pictures
Below are the sample views.
2003.05.19 at 10:35 PM with very poor light condition.
Update: This Service Paused May 26, 2004
This service is paused after I moved my house to Pudong. Please wait for further notification of the status of this service.
I have been dreaming wireless world for a long time. Today, I am so excited to setup a wireless world in my home – the wireless base station and wireless network card.
Connecting everything together
I bought the Microsoft Wireless Broadband Base Station NM500 months ago. Today, I finally find some time to set it up. Below is the diagram about how I connect the ADSL modem, the wireless base station and the existing hub together.
This is a very typical network diagram in Shanghai – I was using dial-up, then changed to Great Wall Broadband and finally, I found ADSL is still the best home network solution.
Laptop without wires
It is very cool that my laptop can directly connects to the base station via wireless connections. I just carrying my laptop to everyone of the room to test the signal – it is still satisfactionary. Now I can lean on my bed and type these words. Fantastic!
Equipment
The AP, as I mentioned, is Microsoft NM500. It is something around 129 USD when I bought it.
Actually, it is a very expensive equipment. You know, in Shanghai, the Shanghai Telecom offers Tian Yi Tong, the wireless access solution for home and small business. Before May 20, for existing ADSL user like me, I only need to pay 110 RMB for:
Tianyitong or another Wireless network card?
I need another network card for my other computer. You know, both of Wendy and I are using the laptop frequently at home so one wireless network card is not enough. Now I need to make the decision whether to buy a new wireless network card (150 RMB should be enough to get one on EachNet.com), or subscribe Tian Yi Tong (110 RMB plus 20 more RMB each month). I have seen the network card of Tian Yi Tong – it is pretty good.
The best thing of Tian Yi Tong is, with the extension of coverage of public access point, it will be very cool to broadcast what I see to my friends online if I am in Starbucks, or KFC…
Taimei asked me whehter you should by a wireless AP and network seperately or subscribe Tian Yi Tong. Well. If the current price of Tian Yi Tong remains, subscribe Tian Yi Tong is definitely cheaper (310 RMB in total or 110 RMB for ADSL upgrade). I haven’t decided because I already have the AP.
Not sure what the price will look like after May 20. Maybe much higher. Then buying the equipments seperately may be a good choice.
One of my most active reader, Caroline, recorded her trip back to Shanghai. It is a series of interesting posts. Thanks Caroline for sharing the experience with us. I’d like to quote it here.
May 09, 2003 Caroline heard of the quarantine rule and was pretty worried
More bad news, I am in Hong Kong right now, and am planning on coming back to Shanghai next Wednesday, and the Shanghai Health Bureau put out a notice saying that people returning from SARS affected areas HAVE to be quarantined for 2 weeks! Locked up in my own home for 2 weeks! What am I going to do? They are planning on sending health officials from my xiao qu to take my temperature twice a day!
May 14, 2003 Caroline returned to Shanghai
I am back in Shanghai. At the Hong Kong airport my temperature was taken before I got on to the airplane. After the plane landed at the Shanghai airport, some health worker came on to the plane and took all our temperatures. Then we were let off the plane. At the health checkpoint, out temperatures were taken again.
When I got back to my xiao qu, I went to register myself, and my temperature was taken again. Then I was told to stay put in my home until the 27th.
What a bummer! Let’s hope SARS will be history soon!
May 15, 2003 annie asked how the quarantine will happen
hi caroline,
glad u got back safely! where did u go register? how did you know where to go? who told you to go where? are they bringing you food to eat? are ppl coming to check your temperatures everyday???
take care!!!
still in hk,
annie
May 15, 2003 Caroline described the measures in her xiao qu
Hi Annie, the local qu wei hui people were pounding on my door one day before I arrived back in Shanghai, asking my ayi whether anyone has gone or is back from SARS infected area. So I decided to turn myself in before they execute me! :-)
Dr. Wu came to take my temperature this morning, but I will call her everyday at 10am and 2pm to tell her my body temperature. Someone from the qu wei hui called me at 11am to see whether I needed anything (and probably see whether I have sneaked out of the house). So I am laying low.
It is very true. In many residential area (xiao qu), the resident committee, which is the lowest level of government organization and commonly formed by retired old ladies, is working very actively to investigate the coming and leaving people in the area. They almost know everything. There is debat that whether they will violent the privacy of the residents. :-)
In my area, the telephone number of the residential committee has been posted everywhere and asking people to register at the committee upon returning to Shanghai.
If you are interested in how a short trip will look like, check Dr. Irons’ great article Flight to Shanghai: A Journey in the Plague Year
About Caroline
Caroline owns a website at ceramics.com.hk and two pottery workshops.
The Fringe, 2 Lower Albert Road, Central, Hong Kong SAR
Tel: (852) 2525 7949 Fax: (852) 2525-79012nd Floor 220 Taikang Lu, Shanghai 200025, PRC
Tel: (86) 21 6445-0902 Fax: (86) 21 6445 0937
Taikang road is just at the center of Shanghai, near the south-north elevated highway.
Check out Caroline’s exhibitions.
I am very interested in the workshop and have decided to visit the workshop. I mean after Caroline get out of her quarantine period and comes back to the workshop. She also offers pottery class. I will describe my experience there and share with you. Maybe Caroline also have something to tell you about her wonderful potter workshop too.
Caroline is also the top commenter of the month of April 2003
This morning, when I steped into the Bund Center where I work, the guard stopped me and politely asked me to have my temperature taken. He used the hand-held mini infra red thermometer to point to my head. Just in 1 second, he allowed me to go into the building. It seems other buidling around the has implemented the same rule.
I am really impressed by the effecient of the government now. I don’t know why, but all the departments of the government is working closely. I am always surprised by the speed of the roll out of an action. When I found one change happen in one place/organization, it will happen on the other very soon, sometimes just in one day.
SARS cases in China
The good news is, the number of the new SARS cases in China is 55 today, among them 39 are in Beijing. I still feel bad that 55 is still not a low number, but it is much smaller compared to the numbers before. Very encouraging number!
Online trading boosted
The new car number plate auction will be held online on May 24. It is the effort to use the online trading to avoid gathering.
Update on SARS Situation in China
Thanks Luo for providing the valuable information for us.
1. BEJING
The number of new cases of SARS reported in Beijing has been falling for several days in a roll. On Wednesday, the city reported 39 new cases and five deaths, bringing the cumulative number of infections to more than 2,300 and total deaths to 139. Quarantine orders on three hospitals and a residential neighborhood have been lifted. So far, 16,197 have been released from quarantine and 8,813 people are still under observation. (RTHK, Foreign Affairs Office)
Last week, WHO extended its travel warnings to include Tianjin, a nearby city that has reported 171 SARS cases, 102 suspected case, and nine deaths as of May 14. Over 2,000 people are in quarantine for having close contact with SARS patients and suspects in the city. (RTHK, Enorth.com)
2. SHANGHAI
Shanghai reported one more confirmed SARS cases last weekend, bringing the number of confirmed SARS cases to seven. One of the confirmed SARS patients is an American. Of the 10 suspected cases, one is Japanese. One of the SARS patients has died. So far, only one death has been reported. (Shanghai Municipal Health Bureau)
Taxicabs drivers are now required to wear gauze masks when working and nearly 50,000 taxicabs are required to be disinfected everyday. In addition, the taxi drivers are required to fill out forms recording the time and place of entry and exit of every passenger. They must then submit the forms to their companies at the conclusion of their work day. (Xinhua)
Shanghai plans to extend its current quarantine and health monitoring measures to include all travellers passing through the city from any of China’s 26 SARS-affected provinces. It was not immediately clear if foreigners would be forced to abide by the same rules, but all travellers will be subject to more stringent health examinations. A mandatory 14-day quarantine for Shanghai residents arriving from the SARS-crisis areas of Guangdong, Shanxi, Inner Mongolia, Beijing and Hong Kong was ordered a week ago. (Shanghai Municipal Health Bureau)
3. NANJING, JIANGSU
In the nearby province of Jiangsu, seven SARS cases and 19 suspected cases have been reported. More than 10,000 people are in quarantine in the provincial capital of Nanjing, which is just 290 km northwest of Shanghai. New anti-SARS measures include putting incoming travellers from SARS-affected areas in quarantine for 15 days. On Monday, local authorities have shut 566 hotels, saunas, hair salons and Internet cafes in a bid to prevent SARS from spreading. (Channel News Asia, China.com.cn)
4. HANGZHOU, ZHEJIANG
More than 1,700 people have been quarantined in Hangzhou where four SARS cases and five suspected cases have been reported. Some 1,200 were put into isolation following the confirmation of three cases of SARS over the past two weeks and another 500 joined them over the weekend. (AFP, China.com.cn)
My readers are telling me that the site is simple and easy to use. Here are some samples:
Jian Shuo Wang’s blog – SARS and life in China, including photos and interesting conversations. Nice simple design too. — kim gilmour
I found out your web site seriuos and well arranged ,simple but efficient.. — David
I am very happy to know that. Want to know the reason why this site is easy to use? Why the design is simple but effective? The answer is, I am interested in usability and has paid a lot of effort especially on usability of this site.
Added weekday to date
Under each title (in the headline of homepage or in any individual article), there is a date of the article. I changed the date from the format of “May 10, 2003 10:38 AM” to “Saturday, May 10, 2003 10:38 AM”. Note that weekday was added to the date.
People are more interested to see whether the entry is created today or yesterday – which is more easier to identify by weekday, instead of day of the month.
MORE NEWS to PREVIOUS HEADLINES
On the homepage, I changed the title of the second section from MORE NEWS to PREVIOUS HEADLINES
The first action after a reader read the headlines is, I bet, to find out previous headlines. So the term “PREVIOUS HEADLINES” may reflects the task better.
Added “Other entries (complete list)”
In the PREVIOUS HEADLINES section, I list 5 most recent entries. There is a big usability problem with this design since people will get very confused in the following two situations:
1. The user are not interested in these 5 articles and want to read more
2. or the reader has visited the site 10 days before and interested in the headline, but now the headline is removed from both the current headline or the 5 previous headline. Where to find it?
So I added “?Read: Other entires (complete list)” and give the archive page more exposure.
Added “Last 20 comments”
Under the COMMENTS section, I listed 7 comments. But any list of recent entries, just like the previouew headlines section, needs a link that leads longer list. So people can find their comment even it is removed from the list on the homepage.
I wrote about my dream travel destination at the begining of April. Now I found another place that is exteremely beautiful, even comparable with my previous Daocheng trip. Its name is Tahiti. Here are some pictures of the wonderful place.
Pictures credit: TVB via OnlyLady
This page provides very good information about all the travel related articles.
The alarm level of Shanghai is raising to the newest level.
Taxi
From yesterday (May 11, 2003), all taxi drivers are required to wear masks. I noticed this at the morning. The taxi driver told us that they will be fined if not wearing masks.
No outside cars – residential garden
From today, the residential garden I live have post the notice that no cars from outside garden are permitted to enter the residential area. It includes taxis.
Temperature
The building I was working in has lined up a 10 meters long table at the lobby. Three ladies were sitting at the table. Anyone entering the building will be required to wear their employee card with pictures. Others will have their temperature taken at the tables.
Universities
There is a strictly seperation in Shanghai Jiao Tong university. Every student have two options: on campus or off campus. If you choose on campus, you cannot step out of the gate of the campus. If you choosed off campus, you can enter the campus and attend classes, but cannot enter the dorm and library. The status cannot be changed if you have made the decision, which means if you choosed off campus, you cannot return to the dorm again.
How local medicial workers handle suspected SARS cases
Here is a group of picture about the whole course of the suspected SARS cases in bus. Since the site is in Chinese, let me explain the pictures.
Thanks Kevin11 to take the pictures and share it.
