The Akashic Field Chronicle

If you’re doing research work (in school or otherwise), or if you’re seriously considering a career in the field of research or maybe the academe, then you probably know by now how important it is to publish your work. As they say, in the academic world, it’s “Publish or Perish”. Basically, you’re only as good a researcher as the output you produce and the papers you publish. That isn’t entirely true of course, but it definitely helps if you publish frequently.

I’ve recently been working on a paper about my preliminary thesis results and plan to submit it in an IEEE Conference. There is a certain pride in publishing one’s work to an international conference. Especially if you get to travel and present it. Even though I’ve only done it once before, I can definitely say that it’s one of the highlights of my career so far.

ICIAS 2007 – KL, Malaysia

LaTeX

If you plan to write a technical paper for a conference or even better, for a journal, then I definitely recommend that you invest some of your time to learn LaTeX. It’s the best way to create great looking papers that conform to all formatting standards, without having to worry about every single detail. LaTeX allows you to instead focus on the content of your paper. Similar to how Content Management Systems (CMS) allow you to produce great looking websites without having to deal with the nitty-gritty of web design.

The basic concept is to let the computer handle the formatting of your paper through a set of typesetting algorithms. As the writer, all you have to do is to tell the LaTeX system which parts of your paper are to be formatted with which styles. Be it a figure, a table, a title page or actual content. Almost all major journals and conferences have what we call LaTeX classes or templates. Just download the particular template you need, and it will have all the formatting instructions to give you a perfect paper (at least as far as looks are concerned, the content is still up to you of course). For those in the Electronics field, you’ll probably be interested with the IEEEtran LaTeX Class.

What about MS Word?

Ok, so you’re more familiar with word processing in MS Word. Or maybe the LaTeX code you’ve seen so far seems to be a bit scary. That’s why I say learning LaTeX is an investment. The learning curve is a little steep, but that’s only at the start. Once you get the hang of it, you’ll discover that a lot of you’re time in MS Word is spent moving stuff around and trying to fit figures and text where they’re supposed to go. Instead of worrying about what to write, you’re wasting you’re time changing font sizes, alignment, pagination, and other stuff that the computer is supposed to handle for you.

Even though the code maybe a bit daunting, after trying it out for a few days, you’ll learn that the syntax is actually quite simple. Plus, most of the code is provided for and can be downloaded straight from the net.

Still not convinced?

Here are just some of the features I love about LaTeX:

• You worry about content, not formatting. That way you end up with good content with perfect formatting that’s going to adhere to standards.
• Rendered formulas and equations just look stunning (see image below).
• BibTeX (part of LaTeX) allows you to manage all you’re references in a database and not have to worry about creating your bibliography.
• Citations in BibTeX format are available in CiteSeer databases and even in IEEE Xplore. So you don’t even have to type them.
• Figures are arranged by the computer. No more worrying about moving stuff around only to find that a single paragraph you inserted made everything move around again. (Waaaah! Don’t you just hate that?!)
• It’s open source and it runs on virtually all platforms. No need to “borrow” a copy of M$ Word from a friend.

Samples!

Here are a few snippets of actual LaTeX documents:

The Fast-Fourier Transform in all its pristine LaTeX beauty

Look Ma! No typing required. Thanks to BibTeX.

To see more examples, I suggest you look at the official IEEETran Documentation, since it was created entirely with LaTeX.

LyX

If you want to try LaTeX right now but don’t want to learn all the commands. You can install LyX, which is a graphical front-end to LaTeX. It runs on Linux, Windows and a lot of other platforms and it’s very easy to learn. Just run through the tutorial that’s included with the program. I do have some issues with it, and I tend to get better looking results, especially with IEEE papers, when I hardcode in LaTeX. But it’s definitely a great way to start learning about LaTeX and start producing some good looking documents.

Once you’re comfortable with LyX, you can start playing around with the code. It’s a very easy transition since LyX has the ability to export directly to LaTeX code. If you don’t know how to do something in LaTeX, just use LyX and then export the code. That way you learn even more and eventually you don’t even have to go back to LyX anymore.

Hopefully I’ve convinced you by now why you should be learning LaTeX and throwing away MS Word. Watch out for my next post, where I’ll be showing you the programs I use to write IEEE papers as well as provide you with a few insights on how to get LaTeX up and running on your system.

Click here to read Part II of this post

This post is a continuation of my previous post about stock trading.

As I’ve mentioned on Part I, I started experimenting on stock trading just a few weeks ago. I had absolutely no prior knowledge about stocks, or any kind of formal investment for that matter. Everything I know, I learned from the web and from this one-time free seminar conducted by CitisecOnline. My primary motivation isn’t really to make a lot of money (that would be great though), but to learn how the system works. Considering the minuscule amount of money I’ve invested, I don’t think there really is much to gain besides experience.

The plan is very simple:

“Learn as much as you can without losing too much, and by the time you do have enough money to get serious, you’ve already learned enough not to lose a lot”.

- A Friend of Mine, on trading stocks (paraphrased)

Swing Trading

There are different types of stock traders in the market. I’ve decided early on that to keep it simple, a single strategy would be best. Having too many considerations when making a decision is a great way to get confused and find yourself in deep shit. These are just a couple of styles you can choose from (lifted from swing-trade-stocks.com):

1. Position Trader - These are usually institutions, or large investing bodies that hold on to a stock for a very long time. I takes a lot of money to be a position trader and also a lot of patience since your money will be frozen for a very long time.
2. Momentum Trader – These are short-term investors that start investing when a stock is showing momentum (i.e. going up and going fast). Once they see the momentum is running out, they sell immediately and therefore make only a little profit. To compensate, they do this a lot of times, even within a single trading day.
3. Swing Trader – This is my preferred strategy since it involves less time and effort than momentum trader. I can’t really devote too much time on this, because I’m also trying to finish grad school and teaching at the same time. To explain what swing trading is, I think it’s best to give an actual true-to-life example. Here is my very first (hopefully successful) swing trade:

Philex Mining Recent Trend

About a week ago, I bought a few Philex Mining Stocks (Stock Code : PX). It was showing a decent amount of up trend and I decided to hop on board.

The key to swing trading is to look for uptrending stocks similar to PX. I drew a makeshift trend-line (blue) to illustrate my point. After you find an uptrend stock, you don’t go ahead and buy! (I was stupid enough to commit that mistake very early and I’ve learned my lesson now, thank you very much)

What you do instead, is to wait for a pullback. This is when the stock price starts to fall during an uptrend. There is very high probability that when it starts to climb up again it will try to stick to the previous uptrend. It’s amazingly simple really. You buy it at a low price (therefore lower risk) and you buy it during an uptrend (higher chance of success).

Of course you can’t be 100% sure that it will indeed go up again. For the keen observers out there, you probably saw on the graph that just a few days ago, I was looking at a potential loss if I decided to sell, since PX was falling until the end of the week. If everything goes as planned, this lowered price would attract demand and therefore possibly pull back the price next week. Fingers crossed.

CitisecOnline Features

The plotting software I used in the graph above is just one of the many nifty features of CitisecOnline (my online broker). It’s a java applet that can run on any properly enabled browser. I use Firefox 3 in Ubuntu Linux and everything works great.

Some of the other very useful features include:

1. Regular Reports - There’s a ton of news clips and other information right at your finger tips that could potentially guide you on which stocks to avoid and which ones to buy.
2. Investment Guide – The site ranks various stocks as either good or bad and offer a recommendation on whether to buy or not. I think this is probably more useful to Position Traders and not short term traders like me.
3. Technical Guide – Now this is what you’d want to look at if your a swing trader. It’s a list of active stocks and whether their in an uptrend, downtrend, or sideways trend. There’s a lot more information there including support, resistance, etc. (You can learn about these terms on any swing trading site).
4. Forums - Discuss with fellow traders about your opinions regarding market stuff.
5. There’s a lot lot more, so just go over to the CitisecOnline site and get a free trial password.

The Real Deal

So far, I’ve been very positive about trying out the stock market. I just like to end this post with a warning. You can, and will, lose money when you trade stocks. I’ve only been at it for a few weeks and I’ve already lost some (albeit, a very small amount). So don’t come running back here and blaming me for encouraging you to try it out. Remember, any good investment has its risks and its corresponding rewards. The more potential rewards, the more risk there is.

My suggestion to the reader, would be to learn as much as you can before putting in any money. There’s a lot of stuff lying around that could get you up and started. There are even simulated stock markets. These are online games (not as flashy as Ragnarok though), where you can start to trade on the PSE using fake money. Head on over to the PSE Stock Trading Game or CitisecOnline’s Virtual Tycoon if you want to give it a go.

Good luck! See you on the trading floor.

(just drop a line if you have any questions)

It’s simply amazing how easy it is today to start trading stocks in the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) and how very little money it takes to start investing. Just a month ago I had absolutely zero knowledge about the stock market. Except maybe for the fact that a lot of people make money on it and even more people end up losing their shirts. Through a series of serendipitous events (or maybe just a series of coincidences, depending on how you look at it), I found myself learning more and more about stock trading. Now, I’m sitting on top of a few stocks in my portfolio and writing a little about how I started.

The Pursuit of Happyness

This might sound lame, but the spark that started it all was this movie with Will Smith and his kid. It’s funny since it’s not even new and I just happened to catch a screening of it in HBO. The Pursuit of Happyness is a movie based on the true story of Chris Gardner, who basically went from rags to riches and now has his own brokerage firm. It’s a really great movie, both touching and inspiring.

After having seen it for the second time (I happen to catch it again and couldn’t resist), I thought, “Hmmm.. I could do that… I’m good with numbers!”. So I Googled “Philippine Stock Exchange” and started reading about what it actually takes to trade stocks. There’s so much about it on the net, but I found the following particularly useful:

1. Philippine Stock Exchange – This is the website of the only stock market in the Philippines and there’s enough information here to get you started.
2. How I Started My Online Stock Trading Activities – This Multiply Blog describes how you can start trading with minimal capital using BPITrade (more about that later).
3. PinoyMoneyTalk.com – Learn the basics of the stock market. What is a stock? How do people make money? Or even more important, how do they lose money?
4. Swing-Trade-Stocks.com – Probably my favorite site about stocks. It details one strategy that offers low risk with reasonably good returns (Swing Trading). The author writes very clearly and is very easy to understand. I recommend that you read this if you want to start with stocks.

CitisecOnline

The first thing you do after deciding you want to get into the stock market is to choose a broker. A broker (like Will Smith’s character) is a person (usually a whole bunch of them) who will file your buy and sell orders for you. These are the guys you’ve seen in movies shouting and waving at each other on the market floor. It’s a bit expensive to hire a live broker (an actual person) to trade for you. Especially for guys like me with only a little money to start with. The Internet to the rescue!

I decided that an online broker is more to my liking. You just need a computer and a connection to start filing your orders. After reading #2 on my links, I though I should open an account with BPITrade since I already have a BPI bank account and the starting money (5000Php) is so small. After a little more research, I quickly discovered that a lot of people don’t like BPITrade and besides the small starting capital, there really isn’t any reason to choose this broker. I also tried their test account and the user interface is archaic html or something. It sucked.

Just a few days after that, a friend of mine texted me if I wanted to go to this free seminar by CitisecOnline about starting in the stock market. He had absolutely no knowledge of my sudden interest on the market and I guess the timing was pure coincidence. He basically heard it from a friend, who also heard it from a friend. So we went to the seminar which is housed in the same building as the PSE in Ortigas. The seminar is FREE and there is no obligation to start an account. Plus, they give you free drinks (C2) and Dewberry biscuits.

After the seminar, we opened a free 7-day trial account to test out their services. You can go ahead and do that by heading on to their website and clicking the trial account button in the login page. Their site is so much better than BPITrade and considering that this is where you’ll be doing most of your trades, user-friendliness is definitely a priority.

Once the 7-day trial was over, my friend and I decided that it was time to start with real money. It takes 25,000Php to start an account with them. Note that this is usable capital. It’s what you use to buy stocks. It isn’t payment, so you still own that money.

But wait!!! They also have a student discount (if your a student in a university or something, even gradschool), wherein you can start with just 5,000Php! How’s that for small capital?! Good thing we already went to the seminar so we had application forms and everything. We just had to file our requirements and come up with the money.

Click here to read Part II of this post.

(If you have questions, just post a comment)