pjbooks Chapter 150 The Personnel Are All Gathered
Chapter 150 The Personnel Are All Gathered
Chapter 150 The Personnel Are All Gathered
The office fell silent the moment the black cloth was pulled down.
Li Hu's hand remained suspended in mid-air, not lowered.
Chen Long's hand, which was pushing up his glasses, froze. The glasses were only halfway up when he stopped pushing them up.
Xu Zang leaned forward slightly from the sofa, not by much, but this was the first time he had leaned forward voluntarily today.
They had never seen that thing on the table before.
It's not Nokia, not Motorola, not Samsung, not any other phone on the market.
The silver-white metal body has curved edges instead of straight ones, so it should fit comfortably in the palm of your hand.
The front was almost entirely a screen, pitch black, like a mirror reflecting their faces.
There's only one round button at the bottom of the screen, sitting there all alone, like a chess piece.
There is no keyboard. There is no flip cover. There is no slider cover.
There was nothing there.
Li Hu reached out and picked up the phone, flipped it over and glanced at the back. There was a circular camera opening in the upper left corner, with a very thin bright edge around the edge that reflected slightly under the light.
A logo, a perfect circle, is engraved in the center of the back shell, resembling a sunrise.
Below is a line of small print: OrientTech.
"This is—" Li Hu's voice was a little dry, as if something was blocking his throat, "You made this?"
Lin Dong nodded.
He leaned against the desk, hands in his pockets, watching the three of them react.
Li Hu flipped his phone back to the front and pressed the round button with his thumb.
The screen lit up.
It's not the small square screen of an old-fashioned mobile phone; the entire screen is lit up.
The logo of Dongfang Technology appeared on a black background; the small sun had a bright edge that glowed faintly in the darkness. It lit up for a few seconds, then disappeared.
Rows of round icons appeared on the screen, neatly arranged and brightly colored.
He had never seen an interface like this before.
It's not a text menu, it's not a black and white screen, it's colorful, it has icons, and you can tap them directly with your finger.
He stretched out his finger and tapped an icon.
The screen switched, and the animation was very smooth, like a finger pushing a piece of paper across.
He ordered another one, and then swiped past it again.
He tried swiping up and down with his finger, and the screen followed his finger without lag or dragging, as if it were glued to his finger.
"Holy crap," Li Hu said. He swiped a few more times, faster and faster, and the screen kept following him, never falling behind.
He stopped, stared at the screen for two seconds, then looked up at Lin Dong: "Who wrote this touchscreen?"
"Zhou Chengyu," Lin Dong said, "a PhD from Harbin Institute of Technology."
"Harbin Institute of Technology?" Li Hu was taken aback. "You recruited him?"
"Um."
Li Hu opened his mouth, then closed it again.
He looked down at his phone, swiping his fingers across the screen as if checking something.
Lin Dong looked at his fingers.
Every stroke of that finger across the screen was the result of countless sleepless nights Zhou Chengyu had spent working on it.
Lin Dong lost count of how many times Zhou Chengyu ran the data, from 14.9 milliseconds to 11.5 milliseconds.
But now, with Li Hu's move, he has seen the result.
This is enough.
Chen Long also reached out his hand.
He took the phone from Li Hu, but instead of tapping it, he looked at the frame first.
My fingers traced the edge of the metal, feeling every curve.
He flipped the phone over to look at the back, held it up to the light to look at the bright edge of the camera lens and the sunrise logo.
Then he pressed a button on the side, the screen lit up, he tapped and swiped a few times, then put the phone on the table and pushed up his glasses.
"This curvature," he said, "is quite difficult to manufacture."
Lin Dong's lips twitched slightly: "Li Guohui spent two months working on it."
"Li Guohui?" Chen Long asked.
"The factory manager in Dongguan," Lin Dong said. "He used to make molds, and I took over his factory. He adjusted the toolpath four times for this mid-frame. The first version was off by 0.5 millimeters, the second by 0.3 millimeters, the third by 0.15 millimeters, and it was only on the fourth version that we got this level of precision."
Chen Long nodded and didn't ask any more questions.
Xu Zang was the last one to receive it.
The way he held his phone was different from Li Hu and Chen Long. He didn't look at the appearance or touch the frame; he just turned on the screen, tapped one icon, then another, and another.
He opened several apps, then double-clicked the circular button. The icons on the screen started moving—not refreshing, but shrinking, one by one, revealing the apps running underneath.
He swiped a few times, closing one icon after another, then pressed the round button, and all the icons shrunk back, returning the screen to the desktop.
He put down his phone, glanced at Lin Dong, and said, "Who came up with this interaction design?"
Lin Dong looked at him and said, "Me."
Xu Zang nodded and didn't ask any more questions.
But he tapped his fingers lightly on his knee twice, a gesture he only made when he was thinking.
Lin Dong knew what Xu Zang was thinking.
He was thinking about the logic of this interaction: Why double-click? Why zoom out? Why close?
The office was silent for a few seconds.
Li Hu was the first to speak: "Fourth brother, when did you start making this thing, no, this phone?"
"Last June," Lin Dong said.
"Last June?" Li Hu's voice rose. "Less than a year now?"
Lin Dong nodded.
He watched Li Hu's expression, waiting for him to process the information.
In less than a year, it went from zero to a prototype.
He knew how fast that speed was.
It's too fast, it's abnormal.
But he couldn't slow down. Apple was set to release the phone in 2007, and he had to finish making it by December 2006.
It's not that he wants to be fast, it's that the market can't wait.
He couldn't tell Li Hu these things.
You can't tell him that Apple is working on a groundbreaking product, or that it will be too late if it's not released in 2006.
He could only keep these words to himself.
But Li Hu didn't need to know any of that. All he needed to know was that time was tight and progress had to be fast.
Li Hu looked down at the silver-white machine on the table again, recalling the feeling of his fingers following the screen when he clicked on those icons. It was smooth and responsive, as if the screen was glued to him.
He had never seen a phone like this before.
No, he had never seen anything like it before.
Nokia couldn't do it, Motorola couldn't do it, and Samsung couldn't do it either.
This product has no rivals on the market.
"Fourth brother," Li Hu's voice turned serious, devoid of his usual playful tone, "Where is your system stuck?"
Lin Dong turned his laptop around so that the screen faced Li Hu.
The screen is full of numbers and curves, jumping around, the background data monitored by the system.
He looked at the numbers and knew in his heart that they weren't good enough.
It's far from being usable, and even further from being Apple-like.
But he couldn't let Li Hu see how anxious he was.
He needs Li Hu, but he can't let Li Hu feel like he's begging for help.
Li Hu is a brother, not a savior.
Between brothers, it's not called "helping out," it's called "doing it together."
"Inter-process communication," Lin Dong said. "It will lose messages under high load. It would take me at least a month to fix and rebuild it."
His estimate of "at least one month" is a conservative one.
In his current condition, it won't be finished in a month.
He is too tired.
After three months of intensive coding, his mind was no longer as clear as it had been at the beginning of the year.
Sometimes, sitting in front of the computer, staring at the screen, he couldn't write a single word. He needed someone, someone who could help him. He looked at Li Hu and thought, "That person might be him."
Li Hu stared at the fluctuating numbers on the screen for a few seconds.
Then he held out his hand: "Can I borrow your computer for a moment?"
Lin Dong glanced at him and pushed the laptop on the table toward him.
He was a little nervous.
It wasn't that Lin Dong was worried Li Hu couldn't write it; it was that he was worried about what Li Hu would write. If Li Hu wrote it too well, Lin Dong would feel like he had worked for nothing for the past three months; if Li Hu wrote it poorly, Lin Dong would be disappointed. He didn't want either of those feelings.
Li Hu sat down, his fingers landing on the keyboard.
The code appeared line by line, with white text on a black background, flowing down the screen like a waterfall.
Lin Dong stood behind him, initially watching, then remaining still, and then falling silent.
He saw it.
Li Hu built the framework from scratch.
Process management, memory allocation, message queues—each section is written cleanly and efficiently.
There were some ways in which things were handled that Lin Dong himself hadn't even considered.
Li Hu thought about it, and he thought about it more deeply than Li Hu. He thought he was the strongest among this group. He had twenty years of memories. He knew what would happen in the future. He knew which technologies would become popular and which directions would be successful.
But Li Hu didn't have any of those things; he relied on talent. Pure talent. The kind of talent that needs no reason, no experience, and that lets you know what to do at a glance.
The more he looked, the more alarmed he became.
He hadn't thought of the message queue priority design; he hadn't thought of the memory pool allocation strategy; he hadn't thought of the inter-process communication synchronization mechanism either.
What Li Hu was thinking wasn't just a little better than what he was thinking; it was a whole level better.
Lin Dong "knows what to do," while Li Hu "is born knowing what to do."
He took a deep breath, suppressing the complex emotions in his heart.
This is not a bad thing, it's a good thing.
The stronger Li Hu is, the faster the phone will be made.
Li Hu pressed the last Enter key, the compiler started working, and it began running.
A message popped up on the screen: "All tests passed." He leaned back in his chair, turned around, looked at Lin Dong, and raised an eyebrow: "Don't understand?"
The weight on Lin Dong's heart eased a little.
For the past three months, he has been carrying the system alone. When he can't write anymore, there's no one to discuss it with; when he makes a mistake, there's no one to point it out; and when he finishes writing, there's no one to tell him if it's good or bad.
Li Hu is sitting here now, writing for half an hour, and the code is twice as good as he expected.
He suddenly realized that these three months hadn't been in vain.
"Third brother," he said, "you're quite something. You kept that a secret pretty well."
Li Hu chuckled twice: "Of course. I told you, I'm a system genius."
Lin Dong picked up the phone and handed it to Li Hu.
"Is it enough?" Lin Dong asked.
Li Hu was stunned for a moment: "What?"
"Is your skill level good enough for my phone?" Lin Dong asked.
Li Hu took the phone. He knew Lin Dong was reading what he had written and that he understood it.
He also knew what Lin Dong had understood; his level was higher than Lin Dong had expected.
He felt a little proud, but mostly reassured.
Lin Dong needs him, and he can help Lin Dong. That's enough.
"Fourth brother," Li Hu said earnestly, "I'll write your system for you."
Lin Dong didn't say anything.
"It's not about helping," Li Hu said, "it's about joining in. I want to work with your phone."
Lin Dong looked at him.
Li Hu's eyes were different from usual; there was no joking or carefree expression, only seriousness.
Lin Dong had never seen him with this expression before.
He knew Li Hu was serious, and he knew Li Hu wasn't acting on impulse.
He had thought it through before he spoke. The tension that had been building up in Lin Dong's heart for three months eased a little.
"Have you thought it through?" Lin Dong asked.
Li Hu nodded: "I've thought it through."
Lin Dong turned to Chen Long and Xu Zang and asked, "What are your thoughts?"
Chen Long and Xu Zang exchanged a glance and said, "501, we can't break up, we have to join."
"Okay," Lin Dong said. "Then let's do it together."
Li Hu laughed, jumped up from his chair, and patted Lin Dong on the shoulder: "That's more like it. You've carried the burden for three months by yourself, that's enough. We'll carry the rest together."
Chen Long adjusted his glasses, said nothing, but a smile curved his lips. Xu Zang picked up his water glass, took a sip, and also remained silent.
Lin Dong looked at them and said, "The company will have a year-end bonus. You'll get it based on your project contributions. Once the system is sorted out, you won't be shortchanged."
"
Li Hu was taken aback for a moment: "Fourth brother, we didn't think that much about it—"
"I've thought about it," Lin Dong said. "You're not here to work for me. If it's successful, we'll all share the profits."
Li Hu looked at him, scratched his head, and didn't say anything more. Chen Long pushed up his glasses, and Xu Zang picked up his water glass and took a sip.
"Okay," Li Hu said, "then let's do it together."
Lin Dong didn't say anything more.
He walked to the window and opened it.
The April wind blew in, carrying a hint of dampness and warmth. The sky in Shenzhen was hazy, but there were lights in the distance. He stood there for a few seconds, then turned around.
"Regarding the system," Lin Dong said, "Li Hu will lead the effort. Chen Long, you'll be in charge of the chips. Xu Zang, you'll oversee the testing."
The three people nodded.
"We need to speed things up," Lin Dong said. "It's scheduled for release in December, which is eight months away."
Li Hu sat back down at the computer, his fingers landing on the keyboard again: "Eight months is enough."
Lin Dong looked at him, at the lines of code that popped up on the screen, at Chen Long picking up the phone and touching the curve of the frame again, and at Xu Zang covering the black cloth back and then uncovering it again and again.
He recalled three months ago, when he sat alone in this office, staring at the screen, wondering how the system would continue writing.
Now, he is not alone.
He walked over, stood behind Li Hu, and looked at the code on the screen.
Li Hu wrote very quickly.
Every line is perfectly timed, no more, no less.
Lin Dong looked at it for a while, then pointed to the screen: "Here, the message queue priority can be adjusted again."
Li Hu glanced at it and nodded: "Yes. I'll change it."
After revising, continue writing.
Lin Dong didn't say anything more, just stood behind him and watched.
Outside the window, the sky in Shenzhen slowly darkened.
The office lights were on, and the sound of keyboards clicking never stopped.
The tension that had been building up in Lin Dong's heart for three months finally eased completely.
It's because someone else is sharing the burden with him.