Today I just moved into my apartment. My mentor didn't set up my PSU account so I do not have internet. I also need to figure out what I need to do about parking asap tomorrow, so I don't get a ticket. It's been very stressful since getting to PSU, because I wasn't really told anything about what I need to do here to get my living conditions set up.

I meet with my mentor, and three of her students. One is working on his masters, and the other two, who are both women, are working on their PhDs. They are all working on individual research projects, and my mentor explained all of them to me, so I could better understand which project I would be most interested in and which would best fit my abilities. I was given some research papers to read on the topics while my mentor went to California for two days for a conference. When she gets back on Friday, I am to pick the topic I want to pursue. In the next few days, I am also to contact the other students regarding their projects if I have any questions about them.

I still don't have internet, which is quite frustrating. I was told it would take four days for my account to be set up, then I have to submit a request for internet.

Still no internet... It's starting to really get to me. This is the longest I've been without it. I didn't bring a TV; not expecting to have this problem, so I've had little to do in my spare time.

I read the research papers, and I have to say that I'm a bit intimidated by working with these students, considering how advanced these papers seem to be. There were quite a few extreme details that I didn't understand because I had never learned about them; being just a CIS undergrad student.

I met with two of the students to discuss the two research topics I was most interested in. One is about a brokerage-based approach for cloud service provider selection, and the other is on collective privacy management in social networks. Some of the confusing details in the papers were explained to me when I met with the students. I think I'm more leaning towards the privacy management project, it seems more relevant and important to me on a personal level.

I was finally able to get my PSU account and set up internet in my apartment to my great relief. Unfortunately students aren't allowed to have more than one computer (connected to the internet) because of the horrible way this college has set up student accounts and internet access. It's rather funny how backwards it is at this huge university compared to the three small state college's I've been to. They should have the bandwidth limit linked to a student's account, not a computer's IP address.

My mentor is back from her conference and we met again. She further explained what her and her students plans are for the two projects I showed interest in, and what she has envisioned for me to do on those projects. I was relieved to find out that nothing was too complicated with extensive coding. I eventually chose the collective privacy management in social networks problem. She then emailed me a list of social networking sites, some questions to answer about the sites, and some research papers about the topic. I am to complete a summary presentation on two of the papers and collect information on the social networking sites next week. I submit my completed work via email to my mentor on Thursday, then on Friday we meet to discuss the research.