Rebirth: Starting from Lighting Up the Tech Tree

Chapter 063 Family Banquet

At six o'clock in the evening, Zuo Cheng appeared downstairs at Yu Ying's house on time.

He wore a dark gray casual suit with a white shirt underneath, and no tie. It was the most formal outfit he could think of, neither overly formal nor lacking in respect.

Yu Ying was already waiting downstairs, wearing a light blue dress and her hair half-tied up, looking more gentle than usual.

"Are you nervous?" she asked.

"A little," Zuo Cheng honestly admitted.

Yu Ying laughed: "My dad's not going to eat you."

Yu Ying looked at him, her eyes softening: "Brother, I'm so glad you could come."

Zuo Cheng took her hand: "Let's go."

Yu Ying lived in an old-style residential area in Hangzhou, on the third floor. The motion-activated lights in the hallway were dim as Zuo Cheng led Yu Ying upstairs.

The door opened, and Yu Ying's mother, Liu Fang, greeted her with a smile: "Xiao Zuo is here, come in quickly."

There were seven or eight dishes on the table, all home-style dishes: steamed sea bass, braised pork, garlic scallops, and a pot of pork rib soup.

Yu Jianguo was sitting on the sofa reading a newspaper. When he saw Zuo Cheng come in, he put down the newspaper and stood up.

"Hello, Uncle Yu." Zuo Cheng bowed slightly.

"It's good that you're here. Please have a seat." Yu Jianguo smiled, much more approachable than during their previous two meetings.

At the dinner table, Liu Fang kept putting food on Zuo Cheng's plate and asking him all sorts of questions. Yu Jianguo didn't talk much, but he would occasionally chime in, making the atmosphere more relaxed than Zuo Cheng had expected.

"I've heard of your Sky Dome project," Yu Jianguo suddenly spoke up. "Has the third phase of bidding started?"

Zuo Cheng nodded: "I just received the tender documents."

"It's quite large, isn't it?"

"Eight hundred million."

Yu Jianguo frowned: "CEFC Group is involved too?"

"Yes, they signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Blue Bay Communications."

"It's not easy." Yu Jianguo put down his chopsticks. "CEFC has a deep-rooted presence in the telecommunications industry; its technology, connections, and capital are all superior to yours."

Zuo Cheng remained silent. What Yu Jianguo said was true, but Zuo Cheng possessed something Hua Xin lacked: memories of his past life and a system.

"But I have faith in you," Yu Jianguo suddenly changed the subject. "You're young and energetic, and your technological approach is cutting-edge. CEFC's approach is too outdated; it'll be phased out sooner or later."

Zuo Cheng was somewhat surprised: "Uncle Yu, you..."

"Having taught physics for over twenty years, I still have some insight," Yu Jianguo smiled. "Your IoT terminals are very well made. I studied the one Yu Ying brought back; the design concept is very advanced."

Yu Ying added from the side, "Dad took that terminal apart and studied it for two days."

"Xiao Zuo, I called you here today because there's something I want to tell you." Yu Jianguo put down his wine glass, his expression turning serious.

Zuo Cheng sat up straight.

"Yu Ying will graduate with her PhD next year, and her research area is a good match for your 402 department. I'd like to ask if you need someone to do academic research?"

Zuo Cheng paused for a moment, then understood: "Uncle Yu, you mean...?"

"Yu Ying doesn't want to go to a big factory, nor does she want to stay at the university. She said she wants to work with you guys." Yu Jianguo looked at Zuo Cheng, "But I have to ask you first, are you welcome?"

Zuo Cheng looked at Yu Ying, whose head was lowered and the tips of her ears were slightly red.

"Of course you're welcome," Zuo Cheng said without hesitation. "402 has been looking for someone who understands both academia and engineering, and Yu Ying is the most suitable candidate."

"It's not just that," Yu Jianguo continued. "Yu Ying's mentor, Professor Li, is a leading authority in the field of satellite communications in China. Collaborating with Professor Li would be very helpful for the Sky Dome project."

Zuo Cheng's heart skipped a beat.

"I see."

The meal lasted two hours. Before leaving, Liu Fang slipped a bag of fruit into Zuo Cheng's hand, and Yu Jianguo patted him on the shoulder: "Keep a good job."

Zuo Cheng and Yu Ying went downstairs; the neighborhood was quiet in the night.

"Thank you," Yu Ying suddenly said.

"What are you thanking me for?"

"Thank you for letting me join 402."

Zuo Cheng stopped and looked at her earnestly: "Kongkong, 402 has never belonged to me alone. From the day it was established, it was built by everyone working together. Your arrival is icing on the cake, not charity."

Yu Ying's eyes sparkled under the streetlights.

"Moreover," Zuo Cheng smiled, "with you joining us, the technical proposal for Project Sky Dome will be even more convincing. You are Professor Li's prized student."

Yu Ying smiled and said, "Then I'll go talk to my advisor about collaborating tomorrow?"

"good."

Zuo Cheng escorted Yu Ying back to her dormitory building, watched her go upstairs, and then turned to leave.

Instead of going straight back to his dormitory, he drove to office 402.

At one o'clock in the morning, Chen Hao was the only one still working overtime in the office.

"Brother Cheng?" Chen Hao looked up, somewhat surprised. "What brings you here?"

"Couldn't sleep, came to check on you." Zuo Cheng took off his coat and hung it on the back of the chair. "How's the framework for the distributed algorithm coming along?"

"The basic logic is written, but there's a problem," Chen Hao pointed to the screen. "The convergence speed of the gossip protocol isn't fast enough. With two hundred satellites, it would take ten iterations to reach global optimum."

Zuo Cheng frowned. Ten iterations meant excessively high communication overhead; the bandwidth of the links between satellites was limited, and frequent communication would slow down the entire system's response speed.

"let me see."

Zuo Cheng sat down next to Chen Hao, staring at the code on the screen.

This problem is difficult to solve. The advantage of the gossip protocol is decentralization, but the cost is slow convergence. To speed up convergence, a lightweight coordinating node might be needed, but that would increase the complexity of the system.

Zuo Cheng closed his eyes and brought up the system interface in his mind.

Current score: 123 points. Tech Radar is in cooldown mode. Two more temporary ability technical analyses remain, valid for six days.

"Using technical analysis."

[Technical Analysis Launched]

[Objective: Optimize the gossip protocol]

[Consumption: 1 technical analysis session]

[1 times remaining]

A cool sensation flooded his mind. Zuo Cheng felt his thoughts become exceptionally clear; the system's assistance allowed him to quickly grasp the mathematical essence of the protocol.

The core of the gossip protocol is random propagation, but this randomness leads to slow convergence.

A thought flashed through Zuo Cheng's mind. What if we changed the random selection to a biased selection, allowing information to propagate preferentially to the nodes with the most severe information gaps?

Each node maintains a state vector, recording the differences in information with its neighbors, and prioritizes exchanging with the neighbor with the largest difference.

He wrote down several formulas on a piece of paper to verify convergence. The modified protocol reduced the number of convergence rounds from ten to five.

"Chen Hao, let's try a different approach." Zuo Cheng pushed the paper over. "Instead of using purely random gossip, let's use a biased one. Prioritize exchanging with neighbors who have significant information differences."

Chen Hao took the paper, looked at it for a while, and his eyes gradually brightened.

"That does work..." he muttered to himself, "The complexity doesn't increase much, but the convergence speed is twice as fast."

"Give it a try, and we can discuss any problems tomorrow."

Zuo Cheng stood up and patted Chen Hao on the shoulder: "Get some rest early, don't stay up too late."

"Um."

Zuo Cheng walked out of the office. The night sky over Hangzhou was still starless, but he felt much more relaxed than when he arrived.

The family dinner went smoothly, and a breakthrough was found in overcoming the technical challenges.

Everything is developing in a good direction.