YOU ARE THE AUTHOR - Write to SLEN: February 2013

Papers published in the Journal

by Eng. M Chandrasekera/Qatar

This is not the first time I am writing about this matter. However, the previous Editor chose not to publish my letter due to some undisclosed reasons.

Controlling floods in Colombo city through rain water harvesting

Eng. M. Chandrasekera, CEng FIE(Sri Lanka), MICE(UK)

Lusail City, Qatar

25^th January 2013

I find the above Article which appeared in The Island on January 4, 2013, written by Dr Tanuja Ariyananda, Director of the Lanka Rain Water Harvesting Forum (www.lankarainwater.org) is thought provoking.

Rainwater harvesting by itself is a good concept especially as a low cost, viable option for obtaining safe drinking water for peasants in the arid zones of the country.

Late Professor Fred Bartolamus the Mathematics Professor par Excellence

Eng. MK Chandrasekera/Qatar

13^th January 2013

Having read the Rnjan Abeysekera’s letter on Prof. Bartholamus which appeared in the Sunday Times on the 13^th January, my memories of this great human were re –awakened.

Whither Sri Lanka (as sung by Sunil Perera - Americave mehema unath Lankawe meva wenne ne !!!)

Eng. M. Chandrasekera/Lusail City/Qatar

25^th February 2013

Let me refresh the readers a bit about our ‘paradise island’. What I give here is common knowledge to all of us but for some strange reason we take these things for granted and mind our own business.

Blog in Sinhala and Tamil

Blog in Sinhala and Tamil - සාකච්චාව සිංහලෙන් සහ දෙමලෙන් කරමු

ශ්‍රී ලංකා ඉංජිනේරු ආයතනය අලුතින් පටන් අරන් තියෙනවා බ්ලොග් කරන්න, කරලා අපේ අදහස් හුවමාරු කරගන්න, ප්‍රශ්නවලට උත්තර ලබාගන්න. සමහරවිට අපේ මිත්‍රවරු අදිමදි කරනවා ඇති "කඩුව" හරඹ කරන්න. එකට උත්තර තියෙනවා. යන්න මෙතනෙට :

http://www.google.lk/intl/si/inputtools/cloud/index.html

SMS ගහනවානම්, මේ වැඩෙත් මහා දෙයක් නෙවේ. දැන් මේ වචන ලීවේ එම අන්තරජාලීය උපකාරය යොදාගනිමින්

සොයුරු,

අර්ජුන මනම්පේරි

IESL - Project Excellence

Attached picture is an excerpt from the IESL Finance and Procurement Committee report for the February 2013. With The Council approval IESL has initiated "Project Excellence" to improve internal operations / productivity, deliver a better member experience, and use Internet to reach out to the society.

IESL launches Project Excellence

What does a web browser do?

By Tharindu Weerasinghe [MSc.Eng, BSc.Eng(Hons)]

In the contemporary society, with the various technological influences, even a 3 year old kid would know the term “Web Browser”. Due to the fact that internet is pretty closed to many families, children know that they need a web browser to surf internet. But most of them and also most of the general public are not aware of the functions of a web browser beyond the fact that it shows us web pages that are requested by us. This article will give a simple overview of web browsers. But please note that there are many complex aspects web browsers when it comes to completing its main objectives.

Single Membershp Form for IESL

New single form is now official. This single form is just two pages and has replaced about seven forms. For details you can go to the Member Portal on our website (www.iesl.lk) and extract explanatory notes and the form. The form itself can be viewed below.

http://www.iesl.lk/Member%20Area/MEM-FO-01%20%20Membership%20Application%20Form.pdf

IESL Membership Division

Message from the President: IESL is moving to a world class membership management system BY APRIL 2013.

It is absolutely critical that your membership fees are paid and your personal data is up to date and DIGITALLY available to us not later than February 28th, 2013.

If you have not done this, DO NOW, please go to: http://www.iesl.lk/iesl2/

URGENT - REGISTER ONLINE IF YOU HAVE NOT DONE before Feb 28, 2012

Dear MEMBER,

URGENT CALL FOR ACTION:

If you are a "current" (membership fees paid at least up to 2012, you need to pay for 2013 now if not done) Fellow, Member, Associate Member, Associate, Companion, Affiliate, or Student, you MUST register online without any further delay. The online registration process has been active since September 2012 and more than 2000 have already registered. You can access the registration link from any Internet connected computer (from an internet cafe, need not be yours) at:

http://www.iesl.lk/iesl2/

Sun: Trust and mutual understanding
Moon: He and She, in the past
by Tharindu Weerasinghe (AM 9615)

He looked at the skies…,
No Sun, but found the empty clouds
with pale orange….
He wandered as a cloud for a few seconds,
Felt like the Sun will never turn up again…
Saw the moon but not in full….

-Tharindu Weerasinghe
(AM 9615)

Teacher…

Teacher… by Tharindu Weerasinghe (AM 9615)

No glittering jewellery
No rapid feet
Like the hay-days Yet,
The jewellery owns a proud story
He, danced with glory,
Not because of coins but the dignity
Now, he smiles with serenity,
Seeing his students in act...

Like him in his hay-day

-Tharindu Weerasinghe (AM 9615)

National Engineering Conference, 18th ERU Symposium - 2012

February 27, 2013, at 9:00 a.m., Faculty of Engineering, University of Moratuwa, Sri Lanka

Do we have a habit of giving honest feedback?

by Tharindu WEERASINGHE[MSc.Eng, BSc.Eng(Hons)]

Almost all of us like others praising us; on the other hand, many of us don’t like somebody criticizing us or giving negative feedback on something we have done. Even kids feel very happy if we praise them. Parents are advised to appreciate their children after a good work that they have done. It is a morale booster. It is natural that all human beings like praising. But in reality, we don’t find appraisals all the time.In a nutshell, we need feedback on our work, our behavior, and our attitudes to develop ourselves. To build up a good personality and character feedback is essential. Accepting honest feedback is our duty. Acting upon those feedback are our responsibility.

Presented by: Eng. Luxman Graciyas Jansz

Machinery Safety is a difficult area to carry out training for. In an ideal world, any course would be based around a machine in a realistic environment so that participants could inspect and assess the machine as part of the training. It's not practical to put a machine into a training room, nor is it safe to troop a course of participants into the production environment to look at machines.

What is Insurance? Things that all Engineers should know about Insurance

This Article is based on a discussion held by me with the well-known Insurance Consultant/Loss Adjuster/Presenter, Eng. Sreenath Bandula. Amarasekera C Eng. via Skype.

Interviewed by,

Eng. M. K Chandrasekera/Lusail City/Qatar

Peradeniya Snaps Two e-Swabhimani Awards

Two teams from the Faculty of Engineering at Peradeniya won national best e-content awards (e-Swabhimani) under the following categories:

e-Science and Technology— Mr. Upul Senanayake, Mr. Rahal Prabuddha and Dr. Roshan Ragel for the project titled An Open-source Framework for Lead Identification in Drug Designing

e-Enternainment and Games— Mr. Ajitha Samarasinghe, Mr. Samitha Marasinghe and Mr. Lakshan Priyadarshana for the game named Eat ‘em All

Sent by; Udayapriya Wickramasinghe

Senior Lecturer/ Director, Industrial Training and Career Guidance Unit, Faculty of Engineering, University of Peradeniya