Zhang Yuan watched the other man's expression. If he was the kind of person who thought, "I'm amazing, invincible under heaven," then a few casual words of agreement would do.
They weren't close, after all. There was no need to argue with him until they were at each other's throats.
But if he genuinely wanted advice, then exchanging a few ideas would be nice, too.
"No need to worry about it. Just say what you think!" Ye Kaifu hurriedly replied.
Zhang Yuan continued, "...This whole function is supposed to handle changes in the pressure on the gloves, right? In other words, it's the SDK interface for those leather gloves."
"Exactly!" Ye Kaifu's heart skipped a beat. He hadn't expected this kid to actually understand it.
"Since the data produced by the entire glove is simply too large, this algorithm selectively discards most of it. More than 70 percent of the data gets thrown away."
"That's right."
Ye Kaifu nodded again.
Zhang Yuan continued, "I don't think we should discard all this redundant data. The hand and arm have 22 joints, and just taking data from those 22 joints won't cause too much error. But without the details from the other areas, the result feels kind of crude..."
"I have a few ideas for processing this data that seems useless."
"The first is to divide the data into blocks and calculate their variance. Redundant data won't have much variance... That way, we can determine whether the data is redundant. It's better than throwing it away indiscriminately..."
"The second is that, after dividing the data into blocks, we can use a value function to calculate the value of each block... Suppose max[i][j] represents the optimal solution for adding the data from i to j, with the dynamic transition equation max[i][j] = max(max[i][k] + max[k + 1][j] + w(i, j))..."
At first, Ye Kaifu listened with growing excitement, repeatedly exclaiming, "That makes sense!"
But as Zhang Yuan went on, he fell silent, eventually becoming completely dazed.
Because by the end, he had no idea what Zhang Yuan was talking about...
What's with this max[i][j] stuff? What are you even doing?
Yet the aura of a stronger person made him unsure how to respond.
If he opened his mouth, he'd just expose himself as an illiterate.
"...The last thing I want to say is that although an arm has only 22 joints, it has at least 27 degrees of freedom, because the arm, wrist, and fingers can all rotate. Without those five degrees of freedom, using it would be like operating an excavator. You don't seem to have considered that..."
Ye Kaifu understood that. He knew the same basic fact, and he'd spent a long time thinking about it back then. In the end, though, he'd had to abandon the idea as a strategic retreat because it was too difficult.
Once the arm could rotate, the difficulty of modeling and design would rise exponentially. He simply had no way to solve it.
"So how do you think we should handle it?"
Zhang Yuan said, "Rotations can usually be handled with quaternions. Of the books on the subject, Quaternion Physics is a good one. A little background in complex analysis is enough to understand it."
As he spoke, his own train of thought gradually became clearer.
Being a teacher really did have its benefits.
"Quaternions..." Ye Kaifu knew the term, and he was already starting to believe Zhang Yuan knew his stuff.
He thought to himself, If he'd been on my team back then, maybe we could've won first prize?
The main problem is that my undergraduate university wasn't very good. There were too few geniuses I could compare myself to, and I got lazy as a result. But things are different now...
Soon, he was encouraging himself again. Work hard, fight! If I study hard, I, Ye Kaifu, can definitely surpass him!
He said eagerly, "Zhang Yuan, let me treat you to a late-night snack. I didn't really understand what you just said. Could you go over it again?"
"You still want to eat? It's almost eleven. You'll get fat."
Since he'd only eaten half a bowl of noodles, Zhang Yuan did feel like he hadn't had enough. He was a little tempted.
"Of course! The night's only just getting started!"
"Well... all right."
If your blood sugar got too low, your brain could turn stupid.
That was what Zhang Yuan told himself.
Better to act on temptation than regret it. The two of them slipped out of the dorm again.
University seemed to be the time in a person's life when they had the most energy. Before midnight, students generally didn't go to sleep.
The east gate was still as lively as ever.
Along the way, Ye Kaifu kept talking about all kinds of mechanical models, chip specifications, and the latest space weapons, speaking with exaggerated enthusiasm.
"...I really like the Enterprise developed by Eagle Country. The Giant Rock Turtle is pretty good, too. And our Flying Dragon is great as well—a proper sky carrier, equipped with the latest electromagnetic cannons."
"Yeah, these space weapons... are pretty astonishing."
After managing to understand what he was talking about, Zhang Yuan licked his dry lips. "Still, research on these weapons isn't moving very quickly right now, is it? The world is moving toward cooperation, not the kind of confrontation we used to have, so weapons research has slowed down, too."
Ye Kaifu was practically spraying saliva as he spoke, as if he hadn't had a chance to ramble like this in ages. "There are aliens out there! Isn't that Dyson sphere the driving force? Even if it's more than a thousand light-years away from us."
"How is something more than a thousand light-years away a driving force? If it were at Alpha Centauri, then it would be!"
"If we really enter the great spacefaring age, maybe everyone will be able to buy a private spaceship!"
"...That day will definitely come. I've already decided what to call my spaceship: Queen Elizabeth! I'll fly it into space and travel around!"
Seeing Ye Kaifu get carried away and start chattering on by himself, Zhang Yuan abruptly interrupted him. "Bro, you're never going to get a girlfriend if you keep this up!"
"Why?!"
"How do you know?" Ye Kaifu broke into a cold sweat and shut his mouth.
Zhang Yuan furtively looked around and saw that the blonde reporter he'd once bullied wasn't there. Only then did he relax and sit down in the chair with an easygoing air.
"Because you keep talking about Elizabeth and stuff in front of me. Based on that name, I can tell you don't have a girlfriend..."
"Isn't that a cute name?"
Zhang Yuan found it a little funny. "It is, it's very cute! But girls probably won't like it."
"Get together!"
"Get together!"
"Get together!"
Suddenly, the next table erupted in a noisy commotion. They'd been drinking a lot, and one couple even kissed amid the uproar.
It was no big deal. That kind of thing was perfectly normal in this day and age.
Faced with this public display of affection, Zhang Yuan glanced over twice, then lost interest.
Ye Kaifu sighed, looking a little envious. "The ones still on campus now are basically all top students, right? It's nice to be young. I really miss my university days."
"Most of them are probably top students, but not all. Plenty of slackers are trying to latch onto someone impressive and snag an award."
"Anyway, having a national-level award gives you more leverage, whether you're applying for scholarships or looking for a job."
That reminded Ye Kaifu of his own experience as a lovesick fool. He'd been used by that so-called "ex-girlfriend."
Well, calling her an "ex-girlfriend" was a stretch. They'd never even held hands. She'd just given him the title, and he'd willingly taken the bait.
What an idiot!
He said bitterly, "The worst thing about university isn't watching couples show off their love, top students show off their grades, and rich kids show off their money. It's watching couples show off their money, top students show off their love, and rich kids show off their grades..."
I wish I had a cute girl who genuinely liked me!
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