Most people now talk about frequency, time table / GPS updates to gauge the reliability of the service and even transit companies in some way or other try to improve the service around this with GPS info systems at bus stops (MTC started in chennai and BMTC in Bangalore has been running a pilot for quite a while now) and MTC also makes the GPS info public in the site www.alert.net.in/eta (which hardly 10 people know of and works only on Internet Explorer). So at least transit companies are trying to make an minuscule effort in a positive direction though they need to travel a long way in making things passenger friendly.

Ride comfortness :-

Okay, not everybody gets a seat. But overcrowding the bus and charging premium luxury fares is sheer exploitation. I happened to fight with the MTC crew yesterday (588B – TN01-8609) particularly when the driver was stopping at each stop and asking the people standing by to hop in and the bus would be empty in next couple of stops when it was clearly not the case. Unlike the normal buses, Volvo buses are closed door air conditioned buses. Having 100 people in glass case is not a luxury travel(not even average level of comfort) and getting in and out is like experiencing overcrowding in Mumbai Suburban trains. Overcrowding in closed buses will lead to suffocation as there are no windows and no one cares about safety.It would create a stampede if the bus door gets jammed after an accident. Just because people have the money to pay for the ticket doesn’t mean you have to exploit them. The crew in most cases are greedy.Corporations too. We will get back to reasons / solutions later in the post.

What further surprised me was there was no mention of “capacity” inside the bus. Normal city bus has a capacity of 48+25 and have them written on the front on the bus behind the name board. A B7RLE made by Volvo India has a seating capacity of 40. I today got another shock when i saw 40 straps hanging on the 335E Volvo in Bangalore, which indirectly says the corporation wants 40 people to stand and travel. This is the true face of “comfortable Volvo travel” in India. We as straphangers need to make sure that Volvos are not mumbai suburban trains of our cities.

Reaons for overcrowding:-

1. Demand Supply management

Lack of enough fleets is one major cause. Chennai city alone is well short of some 2000 buses and when it comes to Volvo segment, it hardly has 100 fleets which is too less and when distributed across routes(for social reasons) the number of fleets on a particular route is handful and cannot cater the demand.When i argued with the conductor about overcrowding, he thrown me this point. Passengers are waiting for buses for long time, and hence they board even crowded buses.Valid but overcrowding the buses will not improve the face of public transit. Why is it so difficult to operate fleets based on demand, now that reports out of ticketing machines can clearly help visualize the demand.Are the authorities doing anything here? Bangalore through its capacity has some how overcome this reason of lack of buses, but not on all routes. The city needs more buses too.335E is not overcrowded on weekdays since the frequency is around 7 minutes, but during weekends / festive seasons it simply cant handle the load of outstation passengers reaching majestic.

2. Inefficient Route management

Route planning needs to be proper. Lack of depots make the Volvos run more idle trips causing bleeding losses. For instance 335E on mornings run jam packed to ITPL but around 10-11 am one see some 20 Volvos returning back to KBS with 2 or 3 passengers. 588B/588C in Chennai ws also the same. Just to cater the tourist demand in the evenings around 10-15 Volvos travel more or less empty to Mahabalipuram.

3. Greedy Crew / Corporations

Part of the crew’s share of wage comes from the revenue they collect and this makes them over crowd. Again due to idle running trips, crew try to double the revenue on the crowded trip and overcrowd. How many times have you heard “Holagade hogi” / “Thalli Ulla ponga”. Corporations also remain silent on this since half the trips run on loss. Ideal way for corporations is to make money through travel passes instead of selling tickets and delink the collection incentive for the crew and standardize their salary.

I will be doing some more study on this shortly and probably reach out to the corporations. Lets not make our volvos as mumbai suburban trains! As a start there should be display of what is the capacity of the bus inside it.

For Bangalore related city commute please follow http://praja.in

For Chennai related city commute and straphanger issues like these, please follow @straphanger_in http://straphanger.wordpress.com/ and articles by Ajai Sreevatsan on The Hindu

There is one awesome mobile app ngpay which is simply too good and gives you a direct access to bank literally in addition to lot of other key m-commerce options. I have been using this app for more than a year and have always been impressed with how they provide value on your finger tips. But last saturday i was slightly let down by it and i was more pissed off by their social media team.

I was on dire need of cash for personal emergency on last saturday and bank being holiday for bakrid, the only option was just to take out of ATM. I exhausted my 10k limit on other bank ATM(Our town had only one ATM functional at that moment) and was thinking how i can get as much as i can. That was the time to check out HDFC Fund transfer on ngpay. I tried to transfer 10 k to another HDFC account and it failed. Then i did a 5k, it succeeded. When i called up HDFC customer care why it was not allowing and whether it was problem at HDFC or ngpay, i was told HDFC allows till 10k, So i called up ngpay customer care to get a clarification why i was not allowed to transact when i have funds and HDFC says the limit is 10k per day. The call was not attended for ~5 long minutes and i got pissed off. To vent out my frustration i wrote this tweet. Left it then and made ways to get money.

Monday morning rush hour to office i get a call from ngpay asking what was my issue. I explained the problem i faced and got a clarification saying RBI limits fund transfers to 5k per day and merchant transactions can be up to 10k per day. Fair enough, HDFC is not aware of this, ngpay being in core m-commerce domain may be best persons on RBI’s m-commerce policy. I thanked him and left to my office. Again after an hour i got a call from another person asking if am satisfied with response to my query. Obviously the person wasnt happy with my tweet and was insisting that i update it. I was also told about other mechanisms of contacting like customer support like emailing , using the “Contact” option in the application etc indirectly to imply  that ‘I need not tweet if i dont get support, there are other ways of getting it too’ .Once again i was reminded that “it would be great if i updated my twitter status”. Probably what they expected was  a tweet like “ngpay customer care rocks! they promptly called me seeing my tweet”, but i wrote this “Okay.@ngpay seems to have ‘rot learned’ customer service through social media.I will write more on it soon.at least tweets get some response”.

Let me explain that tweet. While i completely appreciate ngpay for embracing new media like twitter and responding to customers, I find very few Indian companies actually learn the art of customer service and making the customer more comfortable using these new media.ngpay too has areas to improve along with others like tatadocomo,redbus_in many others.

I might be wrong in all fronts, but am just writing my thoughts below. The brands which adopt new media use them to do a better brand management. So they have to learn that there will always be detractors for the brand as well as attractors. So when they get the free branding from customers who are satisfied, they should understand that they will also get detractors automatically when the customers are dissatisfied. So instead of asking the ‘dissatisfied’ customer to change their views and propagate them, they must provide more value to get the positive sentiment back on new media possibly from the same person and others.

What ngpay did wrongly?

1. While they saw my tweet and called back, am damn sure their process hasnt changed you may still get call waiting for 5 minutes and may not be called back until you tweet something like i did. They didnt take my critical feedback in complete sense and act on it, they just asked if my query was resolved. It is critical that you improve your voice support since its all related to money. I will not be transacting if i know that your customer support is pita and i may not get attended after a possible failed transaction worth 10k.

2. The person who spoke second time, actually did more damage (So much that it has given me energy to write such a long post when my blog is nearing death). The person spoke about contacting through email, Contact us instead of tweeting a critical feedback.Now among call centre,email,contact us, twitter, only call centre and twitter are real-time communication tools. If i had ability to email [access to computer], i would never used ngpay firstly, have used net banking and everything would have been peaceful. “Contact us”(basically will again email you) is again a passive option and am not sure to get a response soon. I thought twitter was a real-time tool, perhaps i should have realised your twitter account is just there for sake of it when i tweeted nice things about ngpay and found you retweeted after days. So lesson is if you are on twitter, make sure you check the account twice a day(at least) and not only monitor it on 9 – 5 during weekdays. I would also suggest you to read this article to get a sense of why i called customer care and then tweeted instead of emailing.

Related read :- Cleartrip-Kiruba Incident

I typed the above sometime in July and i stopped it and didnt publish that time.So what else is keeping me going? Justifying that i was busy at work all along the year will be a lie, though it can attribute to 50%. So what are the other acitivities that i did? Apart from work, been doing quite few things that bring in some satisfaction. Be it hanging around with busroutes.in guys and making some tiny contribution in python/php/testing or literally roaming around the streets for mapping e-city / hosur or attending the Wikipedia Meetup 3 and getting hooked into it or making my first article appear on the DYK section of the main page or participating in Wikipedia takes Chennai, it was all pure fun and learning. Came across a bunch of awesome people in the process of doing these things. Been to college couple of times during the alumni meet and then for software freedom day, it was just refreshing to breathe the “old air”. So stressed office schedules + Parallel activities like above + travelling home twice a month leaves no time for blogging. I have been tweeting heavily though for quite sometime now. Follow me there. Hope i will update this blog soon and will not keep it idle for a year.

Last week i decided to get a bike.I was looking at gear cycles alone prior to looking at the prices.I went to a wrong shop where the guy said “we have cycles from 7000 to 1 lakh Sir”. I said Ok thanks. Finally got into right store and was in diliema to get a whether to get a Photon or a geared cycle as i loved Photon in school days and it was saving my pockets too but finally settled for geared “Hercules AXN 6SP” on Sunday

Hercules AXN 6SP

Cycled 3 km from Ulsoor to Domlur and then last monday started to office and had a bad start.Morning was fine and at 10 pm hoping to pedal back, it couldnt have been worse. Flat tyre on first day.Thanks to my friend, i kept in hand and came home in bike.Then fixed the puncture and Saturday morning i decided to have some cycling excercise. I went to Shantinagar BMTC bus stand to book tickets for home. I took the main road for most part along this way . Sloppy terrain helps in some places and is a show stopper in others. I covered a total of 13 km in just under an hour.Cycling at the morning was too good in the climate.

Time up.. gotto cycle to office

On otherside of life been involved with several things i relish. Premanand and me took a Ubuntu Installation ‘hands on’ workshop  @ SSNLUG in an effort to retrive the sleeping club.Presenting something for the first time to a complete set of new audience was a thrilling experience that too with 0 preparation.Pics are here. Post about that coming soon! . As part of extended work been looking into CCNET and just being amazed the way it does everything and the way its written. At home been looking into Google data Contacts API for doing something. Last week went to barcamp chennai (Yes will post one on that seperately) and to sum up in a word its ‘awesome!!!’. Again going to diwali for this weekend for a 3 day holiday.

Reminding myself on what am supposed to write after this post sometime soon.

1.  SFD @ SSNLUG — Experiences of last minute things
2. Barcamp Post
3. Travellogues and rant

It was all decided on a conf call on thursday night.

Friday night 9 pm :- Dinesh picked me and we were heading to Praveen place at nagawara and went to Praveen’s place.Raj joined as around 1030. We were chatting till 1230 at his place and then started. The road going towards airport was awesome. Dinesh frequently touched 87 and occasionally 90+. Then we had a break just before Airport flyover and had tea. Started around 2:45 from there and started towards ChikBallapur. The road wasnt that great as it was from Hebbal flyover till Airport Flyover.Steadily went in 40-50 and reached the town of ChikBallapur around 330.[We were assisted by Google Maps to reach ChikBallapur, For those who dont have, just go straight on NH7 and after Devenahalli untill you cross 3rd level crossing,you reach ChikBallapur] We struggled which way to go to reach the downhill from there. Different people had different answers and we dont know whom to believe.Worse is more than half of them dont know that such a place exist. Finally we reached the downhill at 4. There we need to register for forest entry and optionally take a guide(200 Rs). From then on its walk walk walk. Initial enthusiasm lasted till 530 am and after that i was like tired. We sat and had snacks we had taken, glucose and continued. Finally reached the peak at 615 am looking for sunrise. But sun was late and didnt come till even 740. We had nice photo sessions and were chatting.Photos to be uploaded soon to my picasaweb. It was a well needed rest i must say and the climate was awesome.Wind was very strong.Completed all that we had bought and were reluctantly started moving down. Moving down was little bit of tough task as the fog had settled in and made the rocks slippery. Yours truly slipped at lot of places and at one place was saved by dinesh who had slipped just before me and was in a position to reach me easily. Then we moved down slowly and finally reached at 915.
Then started back and started straight to Hebbal. We thought of having some cool drinks but some how came till Yelahanka were me and dinesh had some rest and some cool drinks. Traffic started from this point.The BIAL volvo services most of which run empty in night were now filled with people. Again it was a long journey for us from Nagawara to Domlur. Finally reached around 1115. A memorable trip.

For people willing to go, please take

1. Toolbox for bikes and firstaid kit for emergency. We almost felt the need of them
2. Enough water. Make sure each one has atleast 1 Litre of water for self.
3. Emergency lamp helped us though torches will be suffice for individuals.
4. Try to have a drawing of route you are gonna travel. Though on highways we had google maps, but we almost wasted 45 minutes finding the road to downhill.

Nicely taking rest as i walked looong way. Was a good weekend stress buster after a tight week.

Nokia E51

When all the buzz is on iPhone, its really a cool mobile from Nokia having all the equivalent features and a more simplistic form factor and ‘more like a cell phone’ makes it feel the owner ‘being home’ instead of carrying a big jumbo without compramising on the feature set. You can read the specs by clicking above pic.

7 daysA month into it, what am i upto. Well firstly its been a hectic week since i got this phone, so really not much of time to get used to it. Just uploaded few mp3s, activated GPRS and downloaded few apps.Lot more can be done. One striking feature this mobile with which i was very much impressed was (No its not aGPS, not WiFi, not 3G). Its a very good feature supporting accessibility for visual impaired. Yes text to speech / Voice Aid.If this feature gets into basic mobiles technology will truely empower those people and transform thier lives.Also this features helps us too when it announces the caller name at the start of ring tone, so that we can know who the caller is even when the phone is inside our pockets. Just checked that this feature is also present in Nokia N73(which share a lot of things in common).

Coming to the features, 3G is absolutely useless as of now in india unless spectrum allocation is done for which atleast it may take a year or 2 hopefully. Sooner the better for me

WiFi is good, but havent tested as all the signals i recieved so far are encrypted corporate networks.Will try out soon in some CCDay.Also planning to get got a Wireless router and using WiFi at home.Seems good EDGE / GPRS is fine but airtels rate is costly for 140 per week.(Though cheaper option if am roaming for a week without a computer, i get a complete substitute for 20 per day which anyway i will spend for cafe).

Built in radio,music player,real player(though havent tried a single video yet) tries to satisfy entertainment needs.Integerated Email with push mail support, office docs,pdf viewer/editor,WiFi it has all thats needed for a miniature substitute for a laptop for a person who always needs to be upto date.

Applications currently installed :-

1. GMail – Obvious
2. GMaps – aGPS works great, maps even remote places like ‘Vengambakkam’ near Kalpakkam.I was surprised.
3. Google search
4. Fring — Skype + Gtalk voice calls free decent chat interface.
5. Watrpad — Supposed to be a book reader.
6. Teashark — browser based on the same engine used by safari.(Yes you got it. No Opera)
7. mChek, ngPay — mcommerce.
8. mundu Radio. Finally i get to listen some free tamil radio in bangalore for free.
9. Others arent worth mentioning after trying.

Photo clarity is fine.

Overall totally using it.(One more long time draft coming out )

Yet another weekend,planning to go home on friday.This time 5 of us booked ticket.(Naanga onne sendhaale nalladhu nadakkathu)Till tuesday morning it was peacefull,it turned ugly when cinema halls were attacked in bangalore.From that day, i constantly kept watch in thatstamil to get updates.It became worser day by day.Thursday night it was clear that people had to suffer.All TN bound buses started from Hosur only.We were lucky to board a private bus in madiwala to hosur which went in some rural route and dint go via the Hosur road after electronic city and somehow reached hosur by 2100. But bus was rescheduled to 2330 so that people can reach hosur by that time.Heard from one my friend that buses are blocked on hosur road by ‘activists’ and that he had walked from Attibele to TN border.Had horrible time in hosur to find a decent hotel(All were worse than the muniyandi vilas types).I must say onward journey dint give much of discomfort for us though it would not have been the case for many. After MKs statement, one hoped everything came back to normal and i cancelled my KSRTC ticket on sunday(i repent now) and booked SETC on monday from my place.

Monday :

1930 : Bus started but the conductor gave tickets only till hosur and did not assure bus would goto bangalore.

0245 : Bus reached hosur and after 5 minutes conductor told buses wont go beyond hosur. S**t.Came to road there are hundreds and hundreds of people standing like us.None of the KSRTC bus stopped, no means of transportation.

0300 : Finally some auto drivers started cashing in.For a 6 km distance to the border the fare was 50 Per person.Got one by 0315 and reached border by 0345.Then started walking till Attibele bus stand which was roughly 3-4 km.

0400 : Got a city bus going to KR market and then got a bus to my place and reached room by 6 am.

Horrible journey from 0200 to 0600.

Well all this is experienced by lots of people who went home for 3 day holiday.Reason was the act by few morons who even reported that the problem is as related to power projects initially.

I am not supporting either side. Violence should be handled strictly  whoever is doing.Its like the little brother of terrorism.I dont know what is going to happen as now the elections are over.

One good outcome personally was that i learnt train is little comfortable for return journey starting 2315 at chennai and reaching at 0530 and can be booked (horribly) via irctc. I hope the APIs reach out soon and private websites give booking facilities.

Last movie seen in a theatre:
Vellithirai

What book are you reading?
Seldom read.While travelling i think it was “Fundamentals of Technical Analysis”

Favourite board game:
Chess (if that is considered as one)

Favourite magazine:
Thuglak (Tamil)

Favourite smells:
Petrol, Ghee

Favourite sound:
Few good horns

Worst feeling in the world:
Feeling alone in difficult times

What is the first thing you think of when you wake up?
What’s the time? and sleep again

Favourite fast food place:
Not very specific, more specific on what i have

Future child’s name:
Excuse me! ( Naa petha magane Excuse me!! LOL)

Finish this statement, “If I had a lot of money I’d…”
know how much is “lot of money” and probably ask for me

Do you drive fast?
I seldom drive(No bike)

Do you sleep with a stuffed animal?
Well, NO!

Storms – Cool or Scary?
Cool

Do you eat the stems on broccoli?
No

If you could dye your hair any colour, what would be your choice?
No colors please. Black or white(when i get aged)

Name all the different cities/towns you have lived in:
Kalpakkam, Bangalore

Favourite sports to watch:
Table tennis

One nice thing about the person who sent this to you:
Nice friend with a good guy image

What’s under your bed?
Carpet

Would you like to be born as yourself again?
Yes

Morning person or night owl?
More of night owl

Over easy or sunny side up?
I dont eat eggs (If its related to eggs–Thats what i got when i googled for the phrase)

Favourite place to relax:
Beach.. ( I have a long pending draft on beach.. hope one day it comes out)

Favourite pie:
Choco pie

Favourite ice cream flavour:
Butterscotch,Pista

You pass this tag to –
Alagu Jegadesh Ravikumar Revathi Sanjeev (If you can tag yourself that will be great too)

Of all the people you tagged this to, who’s most likely to respond first?
If i tell to my roomie, he will do it. But I wont, Lets wait and watch.

Due to worst mistake done by dear pal sanjeev (he read reviews of all movies for 2 hours and booked the worst rated,he says its the problem with the site) during online booking,first movie was worst one “Thotta” on Mar 2.Then back to work and had the “hectic” 10 days release period.Since i had to exhaust remaining 8 tickets, went to 10000 BC and “Black and White” with colleagues in bangalore.Yes the second one being a hindi movie,but now able to understand normal conversions,so movie wasnt so hard to understand.Last week back to chennai for cousin’s marriage and went to movie called Vantage point.It was interesting in first half,then it was more like Gaptain’s movie with all sort of unimaginable stunts.Met few friends on sunday and went to a good movie atlast in the 10 tickets.Vellithirai was a good flick.

Travelling to and fro to chennai by bus on weekends is pathetic.I wonder why trains are always full.There will be 10 buses lined up and you never know which one you booked for.For 11 clock bus, i came to know that my bus is cancelled and i had to board another bus(1045) only at 1050 and the bus left at 1055 though i was in bus stand at 930 itself and whenever asked about my bus,got a casual reply,it will come and even the conductor doesnt know properly what is the timing.When asked my friend that is it the case only with SETC,he said its with every bus service(even the private fellows).

Meantime i started my hands at cooking also,starting from milk,noodles to ready to eat are now common things.Once a week ‘trying’ to cook rice also But washing vessels is a major pain.

Meanwhile me using windoz, as im unable to(not finding time to) configure my cable internet in ubuntu.Initial googling gave very little results.So if any of you know to connect cable modem in ubuntu,please ping.Expecting some change in Ubuntu 8.04 due next month.Its nice to internet at home.Am almost back to college days, catching up online with friends,(now started blogging also ),orkutting,watching lollu sabha by downloading,browsing freely.

I have started liking this game tribalwars and playing it for 2 weeks like mad. I dont know when my next post will be, Untill then keep visiting

Environment : LAMP

Tools

• OpenFire - Chat Server based on XMPP (Jabber)
• PHPBB3 - Php based forum software
• Trac – Web based Project management Software  and Issue Tracker
• SVN – Subversion repository system
• OpenGrok – Source Searching utility

Openfire

• Download the tar.gz from igniterealtime ,untar and put the directory into /usr/bin
• Give Execute permissions to the openfire script file in bin using chmod
• Start the server using /usr/bin/openfire/bin/openfire start
• Run http://localhost:9090/ from browser
• Select EmbeddedDB & Give LDAP auth info.Create groups and add all users in one LDAP Group as mutual friends

      Troubleshooting

• /usr/bin/openfire/bin/openfire start | stop | status for checking the status/starting/stoping the server
• Check the permissions of the openfire.xml file
• view the stack trace in nohup.out

PHPBB3

• Download PHPBB3 tar.gz from web.
• Extract into /var/www folder and give write permissions for others so installer can write the config file
• Create database in mysql
• Give MySql settings while installing,login to ACP and create the forum.
• Use LDAP settings for making it LDAP and chose auth type as LDAP
• For migration give the old database name and table prefix name and migrate

Trac

• Use Easy_install and install from the latest svn source.
• Create environment using tracadmin command.
• On a standalone trac system user the createUser Python script to generate the user.passwd file.

  $python trac-digest.py -u username -p password >> /path/to/users.passwd

• And edit the trac.ini file with path info and Source control locations

SVN

• Do an apt-get installation of SVN
• edit the apache.conf and make a alias for svn and give auth info
•  Create the password file using htpasswd

  $htpasswd /etc/apache2/dav_svn.passwd -n username

• Give write permissions for the SVN Parent Dir

OpenGrok

• Download the tar from here
• Untar, Host on tomcat
• Edit the SRC_ROOT attribute in the web.xml
• Run the indexer periodically.

Things i learnt from this excercise :

• Brushed back my mysql basics
• Learnt CronTab and wrote few shell scripts  to do daily backup.
• Learnt little bit of Python.(Still learning!)And am finding it more and more interesting.
• Shell access is way to heaven. cPanel,Webmin is for kids

And a great news is my system is up and gotto install Ubuntu Gutsy today after having installed Windoz yesterday(for my TV Tuner) and try learning some python daily.Got to have some form of internet(Have relaxed this from Broadband) as its getting difficult to have a system without net and feeling the pain.

Catch you often @ LogicMobile too..

JWordpress doesnt seem to work and development is not active (and no developer doc in english).

Testing a Photo Moblogging client by blogplanet. Its posting but without Titles for the posts. Seeing all this, im seriously thinking of writing a moblogging client in J2ME (Though i dont know J2ME, development shouldnt take more than a couple of weeks.) XMLRPC rocks!!

And I found twibble for mobile, and guess i will start twittering often.

Using the full power of my Nokia 6021 bought 2 years back with GPRS,J2ME support for 7k that time.Now that GPRS is cheap(15p for 10KB is cheap and with no rentals) ,i browse occasionally on Opera Mini,using MoneyManager to track expenses, and started exploring on Mo(micro)blogging. Have to look into lot of other interesting apps. I gotto get one dictionary too.

Once again apologies to feed subscribers.You may recieve some more in the days to come.

Be there on Nov 17,18 2007.Register Now

XamppLite is a cool “double click run xampp server”.The first choice of wiki was Moinmoin and learnt how to setup one after spending lot of time(thanks to my 0 knowledge of python). Then tried WUBI – Windows based Ubuntu Installer. Pretty straight forward and neat installation(very much needed for novices but further improvements can be done).Tried installing and configuring phpBB, mantis.

Reading about LDAP / MSMQ / openGrok / lucene. Have to read mono, python and lots more to do.

best site seen off late –  www.YourBillBuddy.com — Analyse your mobile bills.

BCB5 is on its way and very much interested to go for the first preparation meet this weekend.I just kept asking this question to myself on do i need to close the blog? Its probably the one of those times where the blogger is suffering from no posts syndrome due to busy/lazy status. People give your views.God give me time to blog

This year guys have come up big with Paradigm’07, and let me wish them a huge success.

Paradigm — Revolutions begin here.

I was having tiffin in canteen,

Guy : Kaisa Hai

Me : Achi Hai.

Guy : You must say Acha Hai, its masculine gender.

Me : Crap, Gender for thing? explain me why achi hai is wrong.

After several attempts he fails to convince me.I asked the same thing to many mates,everyone was laughing but none of them could convince me.

One guy tried by saying,

If he asks Kaisa Hai, You must answer Acha Hai,

If he asks Kaisi Hai, You must answer Achi Hai,

Now I replied, then how should i start asking. We spoke for almost an hour about this. In English & in Tamil AFAIK there is no gender for non living things(objects). We ask How is it? Epdi Irukku? et al. How / Epdi doesnt have gender.

Can any hindi speaking person convince me on this. The answer may change my thoughts on learning hindi and can motivate/demotivate my learning desire.

OTH, We had a nice laughing session and that guy will never talk to me in Hindi.. lol..

PS: I tag this post with Tamil lol

Sun says, “…. JDBC is the trademarked name and is not an acronym; nevertheless, JDBC is often thought of as standing for “Java Database Connectivity.”  ….”

I knew the above fact a long back but couple of days back when i googled about the same for getting a link which states this fact , i got this link through which i also came to know about AJAX.

AJAX != Async JavaScript And XML. Its a lot more than that.I knew that to, but was surprised to see the list of other acronyms for ajax with similar pronunciation with better sense from Bye Bye “AJAX,” The Age of “Ajax” Is Nigh which says

If AJAX is indeed an acronym (which it’s not) then a comment on the article points out some others as:
AJACX: Asynchronous JavaScript, CSS and XMLHttpRequest
ADJACS: Asynchronous DOM, JavaScript and CSS
ADHJACS: Asynchronous DOM, HTML, JavaScript and CSS
AJACHS: Asynchronous JavaScript, HTML and CSS
AJACS: Asynchronous JavaScript, HTML and CSS

Any networking guys who are clear about TCP/IP. I vaguely remember someone saying TCP/IP is not an acronym by itself(i couldn’t get a link while googling) , where as TCP & IP are seperate acronym. Any other acronyms(?) like these which people often use unknowingly??(Both tech and non tech welcome )

Lot of things happening and time is flying. Got struck with Bangalore rains and just learnt that life in Bangalore is not too cool when it rains.Had to clear the mess caused by rains and then travel on the same night last week which was hectic.Consolation – met few old(?) buddies in a small getto in chennai.This week again flied away,moving to new house again within a month[:)][:(] because of the havoc by rains.I’m just thinking of writing some post or the other.I have been writing diary entries for long time now.[[cries]].Guess BCB4 tomorrow will be a nice experience.Looking forward to it.

Barcamp Bangalore 4 (BCB4) ,is an Unconference which provides a platform for like minded people on various interests to meet up and network.BCB4 is slated to be held @ IIM Bangalore on 28th,29th July. Just check out the various collectives and edit the wiki to register(Registration is Free). I have registered for Internet Collective & Blogging Collective. Waiting to meet few old friends and make new ones. Sad part is I would be able to attend only on sunday as i have office on saturday too

Update ::

I have registered for BOJUG Collective too and may go on Saturday also. Yippee !!

Reason behind Name ‘Bar’Camp :: (Nothing do with drinks )

“Foobar” is a common placeholder name used in computer programming or computer related documentation. When US-based tech publisher O’Reilly invited some friends to a “Foo Camp”, for “Friends of O’Reilly”, it was but natural that others responded with their own version, dubbed the “Bar Camp”, the twist being that anyone who wanted to come could feel invited. Barcamps have since grown into a worldwide movement of such ad hoc, participant driven events. Anyone can organise a Barcamp. In Bangalore, the first and second events were organised by completely different teams, while the third is the result of their combined efforts.

Hope to see you there.

Waiting for 5 day week schedule, so that i can relax on weekends.Friends please check and update my new mobile @ my orkut profile (Cant even link here )

Hard to leave my home and friends with whom i spent the most part of 20 years.The beach(i wrote a draft yest abt it) which i will miss badly,will miss all my school, college buddies most of whom will be settling in chennai. I planning to start write diary regularly if not daily.So even when im offline, i will have some content to post from my diary when am online.

Till then.. Keep bustling and keep in touch

UPDATE :: 18/06/2007

Thanks to sumit‘s laptop and free net @ room, im back online.Atleast for coming week i will be online.Its awesome to browsing sitting on the bed at this cool place.Entered ‘corporate’ world today.

Have to prepare for interview, update resume.None of which i did. Kept alarm at 430 am and planned to do them on the D day.Thought of catching 6am ECR bus.

June 1 ::

Failed to wake up to alarm.It was ringing from 430am every ten minutes. 5:21 am Alarm ringing.. woke up. Preparing resume with few corrections, Took printouts by 6 am. Went to bath by 6:05. Dressed and started from home by 6:20 thinking of boarding 118 EXP @ 620.Realized just before leaving that scooty was punctured last night. Yikes.. Have to walk all the way. the 118 EXP left earlier. So had to walk 3km all the way to ECR. reached ECR @ 630. No bus. Finally got a SETC bus @ 640.No place to sit but boarded it thinking he would go fast as it doesnt stop at hotel/go inside mahabs. But the bus was not in great condition either,was going @ mere 55 – 60 kmph. To add salt to injury,the driver stopped for 10 minutes at a place to buy mangoes in the countryside.Came to guindy by 815 am.Skipped breakfast, Waited for the Ponnamalle bus.the one which came was crowded and its not best choice to board when you are going for an interview.Boarded a share auto to Porur.Then boarded a deluxe bus from there to Ponnamalle. On the way @ 840am i called Raj and he said he is in seminar hall. Oops, i thought am already late to this interview too like i-flex which i missed for the same reason. Without asking a question i boarded an auto and paid 40 Rs for a distance of 3-4 km.(I never knew coll will be near,ended up paying heavily )

Test started only by 10. I was nervous initially, took too much time to solve basic quantz problems(i never had practised solving those RS agarwals in last 6 months).Went section by section.It was over by 1115. Then was chitchatting and went to lunch by 12.Came back,finally results were announced by 2 pm. When they said 17 / 200 odd are shortlisted i kept my fingers crossed. My name was the last to be called out.Deep Breath!! Interview @ 3 pm.

I was called first as i chose JAVA in the test and tech interview was around for 25 mins.Took it easy and maintained cool even when i didnt knew the answer,Did it decently,within 5 minutes i was told, was shortlisted for HR. Its my first HR interview, just went in and had a chat with HR for about 15 minutes,again i was told to wait.Another round of tech for 10 minutes, at the end of which they were satisfied.Huge Sigh of relief!!

Had to wait for an hour till 530 to get the offer letter.Then completed formalities and left the place @ 6pm.The long walk was a much needed one, and was recollecting things i did from the morning.Boarded a deluxe bus fare ticket costed just Rs.5 but i was ready to even shell out 50 Rs for it given the state of mind i was in.(Just then found out i was cheated heavily in the morning).Went to ponnamalle bus stand and took ordinary bus to guindy from where again i took another ordinary bus to home(Usually i wont travel in these buses and travel on express even on footboard to reach home faster). All i needed was a seat in bus and lots of time to inform all my well wishers.Those 2 hours my eyes and ears were glued to cellphone I didnt do anything special for this interview,(remember i prepared/updated the resume just hours before in the day) its all the prayers and wishes of best buddies which got this offer.May be it was god’s will.Thank god

Last one week was very hectic.For the first time I was offline when sem results came and I breathed heavily after hearing the word “pass” from Karthi.Mission AU accomplished after lots of pain. Coming 5 days will be even more hectic.Have lots of things to do before i can pack off to bangalore. Just editing few of the many drafts to make some post before i hibernate completely.My posting freq will be arnd 2 posts/ month from now on i guess,Considering i will have complete net access only when i come home.

So go and add yours!!!

PS : Lot of orkut related posts coming soon.watch out.Im just lazy to edit and post.

Code is only in green text on a black background

code is inherently cross platform : In independence day, whatshisface-math-guy writes a virus that works on both his apple laptop AND an alien mothership?

Man those guys are million times better.

Cut the shot.Back to Kollywood TamilNadu, India. Lets see the relationship between computers and heros here.

Though directors havent ventured much with computers, the preliminary (read  only) purpose to use computer is to search a criminal from records.Let me give you few examples.

1)Captain Vijaykanth‘s comedy is endless.Let it even be one of the best movies by him,he never fails to entertain.In the movie Ramana he gets a floppy disk from his student.Puts in his PC, Windows media player opens(a video plays) and he tries to enter something(trying to query for criminal) and gets the info and decides to nab him.Wow awesome.Only captain can run a 3 minute video from a floppy disk,Only he can type something and get results in a windows media player.

2) Anniyan tried to use the web much like 4 Students did but Anniyan was worse and 4 Students was better.One must watch the anniyan website scene.No words to describe it. lol

3)Citizen was another great comedy.Ajith would be a serial killer killing people with a fake identities that no one would ever know.When CBI suspects him and raids his place,they find an astonishing evidence in his PC. It will have a presentation of all his identities and the list of persons he is going to kill/already killed.Why in a world would a secret serial killer make such a presentation and keep in his system.Is he a CEO and ppts are his day in & day out?

God knows when these crazy filmi people catch up with computers!!

Disclaimer :: Long post on college life..

My circle was expanding, 5th sem was the most enjoyable sem.The AJP class comedy,Classroom games starting with Dias Tennis,then squash in the new block.We even had a seperate room for squash.Symposium which gave me first sense of team work,movement with seniors.The “Debugging” which we organised bought premkumar and me closer.The 5th sem tour to bangalore and get-together did gave us a break from routine.Online activity increased among everyone.I would be starting the “mokka conf” as and when i find more people and things will be total fun.The most memorable conf was building story based on boogaji’s creative works.There were also few flame wars in yahoogroups and yours truly had always been part of every war .Late night chats with fellow nocturnals like Achu, HOD niggy, Ragesh brought us even close.The exam hall tension was even more great fun.More than 10 of us sitting near the class,those 2 hours we study and still have fun.Yogi’s tension,LIC narasimhan’s gethu, Dicha Library’s (sure!) questions which made me pass most of the times.One the whole 5th sem was the evergreen sem of our class.The postponement effect of CSE ‘B’ reached annauniv and sem was also postponed due to rains.Klueless 1 solving was at peek during those days when me and ooba worked together online after long time after a OPC in 3rd sem.

Sixth sem was even better.Classes seldom happened.Me and “machi” premanand shared great rapport during this period.The “mini” project and maxi experiences from it are sweet memoirs when looked back now.Fellow geek and a caring buddy,my first linux guru.His words “machi ..” will be fresh in my ears.Few staffs got some cool insults from cool dudes deepu, hostel prasanna.Then the C# comedy project which me and vikki did.The compiler lab comedy which me and VK did.Had nice time going to guys houses.The Sun Tech days experience,tragic death of vasanth all seem to have happened within seconds.
Orkut had given us an extra space to hang out and fake profile episodes by pandiya and deepu provided us awesome fun.Instincts was another awesome time,had nice moments for 2 days on informalz stage.SSNLUG was formed after a LDD by ilugc people.Elections which never happened,What an awesome week.We the mod squad(Merchants of death..lol, we moderators, achu,aswath,sanjay,me) were trying to help organize things.As individuals we learnt what is what in politics better.We had great time.The treat at anjappar followed by cricket @ vinod’s place just before 6 sem exams was one of the best get-together apart from joe’s treat,dicha’s sis marriage i had attended.

Those one night stands before the exam and phone study(story listening/telling) all through night with CRK.

Seventh sem started with a pain of missing few seniors,then the work for symposium Paradigm2k6 started.and i was also trying my best to make things happen @ SSNLUG. Jakku became close during this time.Classroom football, 5 cards which i taught to guys became hot favorite and a day isnt complete without it from then on.The OPC experiences,the night before paradigm(deserves one post,will write later),had many experiences to share which will make this post endless.Met some really cool juniors during this time.The comprehension comedy which me and prem did in 5 mins over phone,solving klueless2 again as a team,the status message war between me and mokkapair- rb hotted up before each UT on the preparation(Though only vikki,sanjay,only a few more know how i write my UTs ),the night at hostel with raj before the arrear which made me all clear. The tour was awesome to say in a word on which sanjeev has written all the posts.Me and sanjay shared almost everything in those 10 days.Last few days inside classrooms were pleasent initially.Blogging became hot among mates and new bloggers thala whose part timejob is to kalaai me & sanjay have been making few great stories .College Day and Farewell was enjoyed well.The last few days when i was undergoing trauma,my friends stood for me as pillars to make me what i am today.

Will miss all the OA !sure!,weight ra nee,maar thaar,guhuhu, juniors and all you people who somehow or other made an impact on me.May the future show us all the doors and let us be together forever. BackseatBoys will always be there.

Well many moments might have not been covered.Cricket was one thing i had never been(probably once) along with backseat boys

4 kilometers of a journey which passed through bumpy rides,super highways,how many ever kilometer im destined to ride,this 4 will have the best lap timing

The most cherishable day:

When you ask any college student,the most obvious thing would be cutting classes and going to a movie.But this movie we watched comes in the most cherishable moment for an all together different reason.Since our college is in remote place,watching movies in theater cutting classes is too difficult with no means of transport to go outside.So it was a typical ordinary day in 4th or 5th sem.(My mind says 4th sem, but release date of the movie is June 2005[but tat movie came after a long delay and possibilities that we might have seen before release on theater on PC,ok leave that.]) We all went to vinod ram’s room @ Gents hostel-I.Since nothing was happening in class, almost everyone(even 100% attendance ‘fruity’ was there) came to his room.Though few of us already watched the movie,we decided to watch the movie ULLAM KETKUME.20 guys on a room,we dint had proper space to sit back but we enjoyed to the core.Whats special about the movie was, the story was tailor made for our class.We had each character of the movie in our class.Each scene was “localized” and it was one ‘heaven’ of a time.Shyam — Sam, Arya — Ramprasad, Parthasarathy ,Venkatadhiri(Palam) — Fruity library so on.. Im not going on further, guys i guess you can recollect the other chars and the stories.

College Life — Ullam Ketkume More!!

And the prize goes to Kadhal Doctor for guessing it right.He gets a moser baer DVD of ullam ketkume. Lets not indulge in piracy.(ahem ahem).Sorry if you are angry with too many outgoing links,was just visiting each page of the college life through those pages

Last but not least.Apart from commenting on the post, If you like Feel scribbling anything on my slambook,please do it here

Second sem was again meeting new people,but this time we know we are going to stay with the group for next 3.5 years.Being a short sem,just had time to make acquintances with people around and had laughing/sleeping sessions in classes where one lecturer says only 7/35 of them passed in this subject last year while another blessed half of us to gracefully fail in exams.Had a rocking subject called Engg Drawing.(School friends know once i even failed in ART in 8th standard, such was my acquitance with pencils and charts).Intellectual discussions with Ragesh was side dish for every lunch.I was still an introvert owing to my not so bright acad-life.

Most part of 2nd year went like this(pic above).sitting in the free space outside the class and chit-chatting.Occasional visits to hostel to write CDs.It was during this time “logic” was born.I still dont remember the exact reason for the name,though many things come close and people often say thats the reason.My bond with Anna strengthened.Hope he remains my anna forever.I was also seeing the outside world quite a bit.Went to symps,then the year long Java @ NIIT where me and nitin learnt lot of things other than java.We had a great time together and there was no hotel/fast food in adyar locality which we dint taste.Hope we cherish atleast a few more moments like those in future. I was also slowly becoming online junta(in dialup days).Yahoo Chat helped me in creating strong bonds like Joe, CRK, RK and my circle was slowly growing.Symposium,College Day,Bus day were fun filled unlike ever.

One of the most cherishable moments in 4 years happened in this period.(4th or 5th sem, im confused,dont remember exactly, mind says 4th ,but facts say it must be in 5th,anyway try guessing.)’Backseat boys’ guess and comment.I will keep it suspense for now,let it be climax,i will reveal in part 2.

Clue : It was just an ordinary day, all of us(more than 20 of us for sure,few unlucky ones might have missed) enjoyed the moment to the core. The answer will be title of the next post and winner gets a ‘memorable’ gift from me. You can comment any number of times with any amount of guesses

And please make guesses because even if its wrong(not matching with my choice) at the end of it we will have a collection of best moments we had together.

Still to come:: Weight ra nee,Oh Soltaar da, Guhuhu, Surree… Letter, Naalaikku,Maar Thaar — Story of 3rd, 4 th year.Keep watching this space.

Some of the positives are more n00b friendly.Add/Remove programs will really make things easy for windows users to migrate.Universe repos added by default.Better support for my ATI card through proprietary driver.But still 3D Desktop isnt working . It just took me 4 hours to set things back to normal settings and installing all required things.Sudoku and Chess added to games Feisty is all set to give tougher fight to windows.

To download goto — http://releases.ubuntu.com/feisty/

To request free feisty CDs — https://shipit.ubuntu.com/

Disclaimer : A loooong post….

Buildup to the event :

Having participated in several OPCs(though i had never won), those 4-5 hours on a sunday would be mindboggling and while i try to code atleast 1 or 2, the race of programming prodigies will be hot in whichever OPC it may.The thrill of leading the scoreboard can be relished only by participating in one.I was desperate to have OPC as part of Paradigm2k6 when the first meeting(somewhere in July 20th) for the symposium was held i insisted, explained everyone about OPC and took incharge of conducting the OPC event along with Siddharth(Ooba). None in my set had web programming experience,so was very tensed about developing the system untill i met junior coolgoodfriend – JeyaGeethan(g10). He sounded pretty confident of getting the site ready.We decided to have it on Sep 10th, sunday before the symposium scheduled on Sep 15th.

August 20th, registrations started.I started publicising a bit on orkut and we got good response.Towards the end we even feared how we could manage such a crowd using our system(Manual Testing of all submissions).Around Sep 8th,we had almost 250 teams registered.The system was ready and we tested it in lab.Since stubs and questions weren’t ready we just tested the web interface and thought it would be easy task on sunday.The system was good,we just asked g10 to make additional facility of a leaderboard and he said will make it soon.The question hunt was done by junior vettiarvind & his team.They indeed rocked. I took care of all administrative hassles of lab permissions,transport arrangement on sunday,uninterruptable power,high speed net(this is the highlight comedy).Since saturday and sunday were holidays i took extra care to make things ready on friday itself.I reminded SA of our college about the high speed net and asked him to block all connections to hostel for the next 2 days(Yes our college has 4Mbps shared connection and hostel guys download movies when connection is up and its highly impossible even to log into messenger leave alone browsing).Having trusted him, i went home and was planning to come saturday morning to install the test stubs,compilers and conduct a mock simulating the real one in every sense.

9th September :

I reach college by 11 am and walk all the way to dept and open the lab.Upon opening firefox, i was shocked.It took 300 seconds to load the default firefox google page.OMG college connection sucked.I thought we are screwed.Arjun(aju) always warned me about it and asked to hire an iway so that we can conduct the event smoothly.Curse me i dint take those words seriously.Adopted the wait-n-watch plan.Enquired one assistant in SA room and he said network is using 3.5 Mbps. How the hell when none in hostel nor anyone in depts except us have net.He asked to wait till SoMCA labs were closed at 8pm. 830 pm No respite. Connection still sucks big time. My planB was to have it in 4-5 people home(Sridharan was leading that and was prepared to help us) and coordinate using yahoo conference.I went for dinner at kelambakkam,all the way talking to one person or the other on the phone.Krishnan.C.R(CRK) came up with this idea of having it in Joshua(reanimator)‘s residence/office.Joe agreed,thank god we have a place with 10 computers and 1 Mbps connection(Yeah his office has hi-fi gadgets and cool connectivity).It was 10pm when we finally decide to have on joe’s place.I asked ooba to stay on joe place and install the test scripts/compiler on all systems.He must have had a sleepless night doing it.G10 is making final changes to the leader-board script and its not tested(!). Now i had to run to inform the staff coordinator who said he will come to college on Sunday to monitor the event.I get his number at 1130 pm after troubling few staffs late night.He couldnt be reached.I came to hostel by 12 and speak to g10/ooba about the number of people required(decided to have 10 mods) to conduct and finally go-to bed by 1.

September 10 :

I woke up by 5 am,goggled my mouth and left to josh’s place.Walk all the way to OMR to find any mode of transport to go.Finally at 6am i found 119 and boarded it and woke up aju who like few of us was having sleepless nights for quite sometime working for the symposium. He agreed to pick me at CMBT and we went to his place where i brushed and had a face wash.Then we left to CRK’s place where i had bath and aju bought us tiffin from a nearby hotel.I was calling ooba and asking about preparations, he said everything was perfect and people are on their way to joe’s place to help us out.We had breakfast and me & aju left to joe’s place while CRK joined us later.While travelling Vigneshwar(VP – President) called me and was trying to say (“Srini accident la manda udunjuduchu, heavy bleeding we are taking him to hospital, coordinate with ooba,manage the event”) and i heard it as (“CD cut,blood taking to hospital,coordinate with ooba”) [both of us were travelling fast].I understood something happened to someone and they are rushing to hospital

9am : We reached joe’s place and got the exact news from Ooba where he was alone.we were shocked,we dint know to continue or not.everyone left to hospital.It was rather a serious accident.a cut on the forehead.VP called us and asked to go ahead with the event and said he will take care of srini. It was 930 just 30 mins to go.Ooba,myself,arjun,crk,vinodram were the only ones at joe’s place.ooba was instructing us what to do.(None other than me and ooba had an idea even about the concept of OPC).We decided the testers and planned to start with 5 mods.We opened bang on 10 am sharp.I was also getting calls,sms from particpants with range of queries.g10 must have had tough time acting as 2 mods and also keeping an eye on the admin panel.Right from 1015 am submissions started coming in.Later Sanjeev,achu,madhu,yogi joined around 1030. Now we heard srini is being transferred to vijaya hospital for surgery.All of us were praying god..11 am,it was hotting up,many more submissions.We couldnt turn our head,we had to test the code with script and update status,as soon as we did, another submission will pop up.It went on mechanically till 1pm. Guys present there enjoying the thrill of OPC now.at 1 pm VP arrives and updates with status of Srini.He is undergoing surgery and his parents were informed and they had come to hospital.Raghul got some snacks to all of us and everyone was hungry without anything on stomach(some skipped even the breakfast).Finally it all ended at 230 pm and it was history that the site was perfect up and running without even a single hassle(Ofcourse we exceeded disk space & bandwidth[unexpectedly] for which we paid solidly to our host). Time to congratulate each other for the roaring success of our maiden venture.All though we were happy at the end of event,we couldnt digest the tragic accident to srini.We dispersed and srini was still recovering. While some met him same evening, i met him the next day,boy it was a major accident and he was forced to undergo plastic surgery to hide the scar.

The day was still not over for me.I had my lunch at 4pm and started to home on a overcrowded PRTC bus.Around 530pm the bus had a lucky escape when the driver managed to bring the bus to halt when both the back tyre on the left bursted and the bus came to grinding halt from 80kmph to 0 luckily without capsizing. Then i called my dad to come and pick me up.He came driving 8 km and on the way back our silencer bursted.I had to walk 2 km to home pushing the vehicle.

The day ended with seeing this mail from sanjeev to groups and it was really refreshing and the feel was heavenly.

What a fantastic start to P2K6!
The Online Programming Contest was a rip-roaring success.Inspite of the many obstacles that we faced during the build up to the event,once we got going,there was no looking back.

First and Foremost,we must be extremely grateful to Joshua(4 yr) who bailed us out of trouble by making arrangements to conduct O.P.C at his residence.The original plan was to conduct O.P.C at our college but due to unforeseen circumstances we had to abandon the plan and when was time was fast running out,Joshua helped us out.

The Stars of the event were…

L.SRIKANTH(4 yr)
M.SIDDHARTH(4 yr)
Kudos to the above mentioned duo who burnt the midnight oil to make this event possible..

Special thanks to JEYAGEETHAN,3yr CSE ( SuperStar of the event) for designing and developing the site & the system, single handedly which stood such a busy traffic, without even a single problem.

Special thanks to ARAVIND,MANI,C.KARTHIK-3yr CSE ( top coders) who chose the best of the questions which were really hard even for the toppers to crack ( 2 questions werent solved by any team throughout the contest).

It was really unfortunate that our Joint Treasurer. SRINIVASARAGHAVAN met with a freak bike accident just before the start of the event.After a minor surgery,his condition is stable now.. and LET US ALL PRAY FOR HIS SPEEDY RECOVERY.

The event was launched at 10 : 00 a.m and we downed the shutters at 2:30 p.m It was rapid progress all the way with many teams proving to be extremely competitive.We had teams from every nook & corner..IIT,CEG,PSG,MIT,CRESCENT,VENKATESHWARA,RMK,RMD,VELLAMAL to name a few..The results will be out very soon.. and as of now teams from IIT-KANPUR and CEG are vying for the top honours.

The following were the MODERATORS for the event

ACHUTHANANTHAN ARAVINDH(3 yr) M.S.ARJUN JAYAGEETHAN(3 yr) JEETHUKARTHIK(3 yr) JOSHUA KARTHIK(3 yr) C.R.KRISHNAN MANI(3 yr)
MADHUSUDAN RAGHUL RAJEEV ANAND V.R.SANJEEV SARANYAN SIDDHARTH SRIDHARAN L.SRIKANTH VIGNESHWAR PRATAP VINOD RAM YOGESH
and our heartfelt thanks to all those who helped us out

10 moderators,more than 100 teams,365 submissions in 4.5 hours,1000 HITS to the main site..september 10th 2006.. P2K6′s

O.P.C- INDHU VERUM TRAILER THAAN.. MAIN PICTURE NEENGA
INNUM PAARKALA.. BE THERE ON SEPT 15..P2K6..!

What a day it was .. 10th September 2006.. We did it!!!!!
15th September 2006 coming up soon!!

PS: Im kinda lazy(busy ?) to update here.. I will soon get out of the rough patch and write more soon..

I would call this as punishment tag as its very lengthy, Anyway here it is..

Favorite Color: Blue

Favorite Food: Masala Dosai,Sev poori, Mom’s Vathakuzhambu

Favorite Month: July.

Favorite Song    Mostly songs with nice lyrics..

Hindi:(Though i dont understand a word)
Bombay Vikings, Duur-String

Tamil:
Lots of them.One with good lyrics like Desam,Pudhupettai,University many more.. list is endless.. Offlate been listening to Kannadasan MGR Sivaji hits too..

English:
Vitamin C- Graduation, In the End-Linking Park,Vengaboys,The Call – BSB

Favorite Movie: Kamal Haasan Fanatic.All his movies, Iruvar, Maniratnam movies,University,Thank you for Smoking,I Robot,Day after tomorrow

Favorite Sport: Play – Table Tennis,Basketball,Chess , Watch – Cricket.

Favorite Season: Summer…Always hot machi!!

Favorite Day Of the week: Tomorrow ( lazy fellow )

Favorite Ice Cream Flavor: ButterScotch

Favorite Time of Day: 12 am to 3am.. daytime sucks..

8 CURRENTS

Current Mood: Happy

Current Taste: Sweet

Current Clothes: White shorts and White slack shirt.

Current Desktop: Dawn of Ubuntu in GNOME on Ubuntu 6.06

Current Toenail Color: Nope I don’t color my nails.

Current Time: 20:28 IST

Current Surroundings: An neat bed, a messy table with gizmoz gadgets rusty bookshelf.

Current Thoughts: Thinking whom all i can tag…

6 FIRSTS

First Best Friend: D.Satish

First Screen Name: saysri86

First Pet: I like them at zoo

First Piercing: Gotta be ears. I don’t remember.

First Movie: Aboorva Sagotharargal

6 LASTS

Last Cigarette: Never.

Last Drink: Alcoholic: Never. Non-Alcoholic: Coffee

Last Car Ride: Jan 21, 2007. Went to Central for sending off sister

Last Movie Seen: Varalaaru

Last Phone Call: College buddy Sanjeev

Last Book Read: Gate CS – 2006 I dont read novels(Read next post abt GATE)

Have You Ever Broken the Law: Who has lived without doing that

Have You Ever Been Arrested: Nope.

Have You Ever Been on TV: No.

Have You Ever Lied: Yes

Have You Ever Kissed Someone You Didn’t Know: Nope.

4 THINGS

Thing You’ve Done Today: Blogging After a long time

Thing You Can Hear Right Now: Sound of tap water,mom cleaning utensils,Washing machine…

Thing You Can’t Live Without: My PC,Internet

Thing You Do When You’re Bored: Will do something online, tweak with my PC,songs,TV
4 PLACES YOU’VE BEEN TODAY: Hall,Bedroom,Kitchen,Bathroom. lol Haven’t stepped out of home.

3 PEOPLE YOU CAN TELL ANYTHING TO: Dad,David,Sanjeev

2 CHOICES

1. Black or White: Black 2. Hot or Cold: Hot

1 THING YOU WANT TO DO BEFORE YOU DIE

Do something which will speak about me for atleast 25 years.

I TAG:

CRK, Ragesh, Sanjeev, Srikanth K, Vinod Krishnan, Revathi, Ponnarasi

I dont know how many of the above will write it.. if you consider writing, i can give concession like you can delete whichever things u dont like to answer

And for all the people, please stop tagging me for some more time..(atleast a month) let my blog contain some info other than tags.Yes im gonna write some entries,I swear i wont be lazy and do my 2 posts per week.

1.I dont know how this habbit came to me.I write the “hindi” alphabet ‘bha’ as in bharath in the air right from the day i knew that alphabet.Though i have no inclination to hindi,i still dont know that alphabet influenced me, So much that when i first put my signature it came along and now it may be a cycle.

2 . I like patterns in numbers and like to decipher the code,logic,meaning behind the series be it telephone,mobile numbers,STD codes,vehicle registration numbers etc.I can say the place of registration(even year sometimes) upon seeing regn numbers of TN vehicles.

3. I hate curd rice(have never tasted it so far and will not do it in future also) and people who sit with me for lunch/dinner (esp relatives in marriages) ask surprisingly “Dont you eat curd” blah blah.With thiruman on my forehead most of the time,they tend to assume that i too love curd.Its my taste buds man,why the hell you worry abt it.

4. I also have knack of keeping/assuming names of new people i meet based on their face. Most of the time (50% of such names,tats a good hit ratio i guess) the names i “keep” match with their original ones or atleast come close.

5. I have thought for long time now,i dint get anything that are unknown things.May be the passwords are coming to my mind. But i couldnt give them openly for the sake of tag

Now i dont know how many of my readers will write tags. Anyway let me tag Sanjeev, Ponnarasi Srikanth.K (annnaaa) and if you wish to write the tag yourself, you can tag yourself and write it.

With GATE coming in a fortnight and my preps are 0, i might stay away from blogging world for quite sometime, though i cant get a call with 2 weeks preps,i just need to get aleast a decent score for the 1000 bucks spent.

Is google spamming blogs?? I just saw this when i was clearing the spam comments filtered by Akismet.

By the by using Flickr for uploading pics for blog.Installed F-Spot and its integrating well with picasaweb. So Flickr for blogs, PicasaWeb for photo sharing.

Hits : 17000+

Posts: 60

Comments: 755

Lot of friends,This place indeed gave me a lot of things to cheer.

Happy birthday to you!!

Sleeping for more than 12 hours yesterday was one thing which i did for the first time in my life(AFAIK).Have to write few posts about the tour.Will write soon.Just transfered the pics from camera to PC. Uploaded a few to flickr. Im Confused to use Flickr or PicasaWeb. While picasaweb gives me 250 MB cap flickr will show only 200 recent photo,others are not viewable and also has a 100 MB/month cap. Any other photo sharing sites,please suggest.Dont say Y! Photos. It sucks…

And the newyear has come up great for Dataone users.Speed for home users have been increased to 2 Mbps and data limit is also increased.Read data transfers upto 4 GB is possible in 2-8 free time.Have to try it.

Im leaving this evening for a 10 day tour to Delhi,Chandigarh,Agra,Kulu,Manali,Shimla.Will be back on 6th Jan.Will be a great 10 days to cherish the last few days of college life.Will write about tour(lots will be there) after coming.Wishing you a very happy Xmas & New year.Till Jan 6, logiconline will be offline

And then the good things for the day.Was playing with my niece for good amount of time.Its so fun to play with kids and one can forget the world in the laugh of a kid.Awesome 3 hours, went like minutes.And at 10pm, sat for a meditation(BSM).Now this one really played a major role and made me relax during my standard 12.We had this session in our math tuition weekly once, and it helped.Try this you can really feel the difference.Im gonna pirate[;)] the CD, may be even rip it and practise it atleast while travelling in bus.

And finally now blogging, hopefully tomo will be good i guess.

PS : Do try the meditation if you have time,it rocks!!

Fifty 50, Safety Safety !!

Let me come to point, Fortunately or unfortunately people at university feel computer science/IT students have to learn certain technologies/current trends, programming languages. Now again these local authors try to capture the market, as they wouldnt like to lose money from these subjects too. The problem starts here.The people who write are themselves not well versed in that technology(exceptions are very few) because at first place most of them havent learnt those subjects while they are studying. People might know of a ‘self proclaimed thalaivar’ of all programming languages starting with “a character”.People read it. Now for my web-technology paper,i took a local author.Firstly damn the syllabus, people there are talking hell a lot of things(ASP,JSP,Servlets,JDBC,java network programming) which can neither be thought by a teacher, nor understood by a student within the course of study.Then the syllabus contains whole lot of outdated stuff, man they are speaking about java 1.1 and 1.2(FYI sun itself has announced the End of Lifecycle for 1.3 few months back i guess). Coming back to book, it has hell lot of errors, pieces of code samples which people might not understand because 4 lines of code without any explanation/understanding language doesn’t help. The height of comedy was this.Those guys framed a new expansion for the acronym PHP.Guess what it called “PersonalHomePages”.

The frustration i have is that, these people are misguiding masses who already dont have much exposure to technology.My word is read from “good” books/ browse the net even for your exam preparations for these kind of subjects.God save students from these kind of books.

Let me continue reading.

04/12/2006
Another update, today while reading more, the authors at one place mentioned, ColdFusion as a server side scripting trechnology as opposed to the addon CFML part which comes along with application server named ColdFusion. The book from first to last was entire comedy. By the by did the exam well, could have written it  a year back itself, all general questions in java & that too were program.. Cake with icing..

People who are interested about content management systems(CMS) and would like to get hands on with all of them without getting a server and hazzles and fear of doing something wrong, here is a free place for you to test out. OpenSourceCMS is there for you.

I have just started using Google Personalized Home, its nice, and while adding widgets i found this cool search tool. You tap your favorite music and get the details about songs which resemble your taps. check out Songtapper

My latest addition to linux blog feeds

/home/Liquadat on Fedora

Linux FUD - Fear Uncertainty Doubt — on Ubuntu

This move will make huge leaps in gnu/linux world. The classpath project might be dropped as the Sun’s java is itself on GPL now.I’m hoping the next set of releases of various distros will contain java and even jre plug-in bundled with firefox. I would also not surprised if some group of people come up with idea of having a java desktop system for gnu/linux competing against GNOME,KDE. Have to wait and watch if gnu/linux developers use java on desktop applications. If someone creates such a community, i will be happy to contribute to it. Back to sun & java, though its on GPL, the release of code will take some time.Anyway a good move by sun.

Some reads :-

i) Stallman looks on, as sun opens up

ii) The ripple effect of open java

iii) James Gosling on openjava part 1

iv) James Gosling on openjava part 2

Long live freedom, Happy bday openjava.

My exams are on the way next week. So will be offline for few days from the blogging world.

Bid adieu to Labs
Well the only i thing i really enjoyed in engineering(as far as acads are concerned) :: labs are no more.When theory papers are no way related to current world,Labs are the only place where you can find some place to have some fun.Especially computer labs are coolest thing for a person who wishes to explore PC.For a guy like me who likes to break through everything on PC,Labs were like playschool and with the staff(exceptions are very few) having subtle knowledge than us its even more fun.Its the only place of respite for me from those boring lectures of irrelevant things.But i get tensed when some *&+*_^& speaks too much saying “you can do that,this etc” without knowing a bit to code.Some labs were total fun and work to brains.Let me recollect each of them

Other dept labs : some &*%&(%&^_ kept it in syllabus. So have to do $#!77y labs like workshop,engineering drawing,physics,chemistry,electronic circuits.At the end of day,it dint serve more to minds rather than putting 90 marks and “boosting” so called percentage.

Data Structures Lab :: Coolest lab, Solid Staff who really rocks but for the time when she asks to put margins and other *&%^)%* for OBSERVATION.Learnt a lot in this lab.One lab i enjoyed the most,learnt lot.Only Lab when i did all programs to my satisfaction.

Digital Lab :: One of the most interesting lab, but for writing shit on records,obse and plucking wires, this lab involved too much of mind activity.Enjoyed it well.

System Software & RDBMS Lab :: A good lab,was decent,but syllabus sucked,dint learn much about any RDBMS software nor did System .Software Programs to my satisfactory level. Typical lab where staff used to give something and ask us try out.

OOPS Lab :: Again a solid lab,solid staff, but expts sucked to core.A 5th std kid will do what we did.very basics of C++.Not worth mentioning more.

OS Lab :: An average lab,handled by solid staff which churns out the mind on little bit of programming,little bit of API on *nix systems on shared memory.However more exposure to *nix systems would have made the lab more fun.

MuP Lab :: Again a good lab,which was handled by a staff who was the best teacher i have seen on lab classes.Churned out minds very well.For the first time,we had out of box expts on final exam.This is how i would like any lab to be.Got 75 only though.But it was the mark i deserved,rather everyone deserved instead of the usual pissing labs where they put 95+.

Network Lab :: A nice lab,but since we lacked exposure to *nix API, couldn’t enjoy much.Mostly done with mugging up the program as was all programs used the API. A choice of programming language of our own to implement it would have made it better.I would have made every program in java with ease without mugging it up for the exam.

Compilers Lab :: Supposed to be the most challenging lab for a CSE guy,but since we lacked behind very far on theory couldn’t enjoy as much as i liked to.Had some great moments (which Vinod knows) while trying to write code for something i don’t remember(i guess traversing through a tree and calculating some value) of a regular expression.

Web Tech Lab :: One of the few labs whose syllabus i liked, Java & Servlets covered it.But could code all the way and have fun,Symposium,other activities meant no time & I was getting carried away with Java.We did a better part of web-tech in maintaining our site www.paradigm2k6.com during our symposium than in labs.

Software Systems Development Lab :: Again got carried away in 7th semester and was having no time to code java for simple database connectivity and “”student information system”".Problems must be much more challenging & it should be tough even to design the system or analyse as such.What does Systems like Payroll processing have to analyse???

One Lab which would be in memory forever will be Data Structures lab, where in every moment including the final exam where i debugged singly linked list using pointers(those were early days with pointers).For relaxation,there is always proxy browsing and checking out cricket scores,playing games or “hacking system” and finding a way to break things which werent permitted to do.Giving programs to people through floppies,CD,sending them to groups,taking printouts,Giving instructions on how to execute programs,Segmentation Fault, login sharing,Labs were indeed the only best part of my acad life in college.Writing records are the worst part though.

PS :: I don’t like copying from Senior’s record where (s)he did copy from his/her senior.I feel its like licking vomit.And i strongly feel putting 100 marks on a lab paper for anyone(even for code guru) is a crime.Dont know why people put it.No one can master programming on a certain domain within 3 months and its severe stupidity to judge the knowledge of it with the “tough” 12 questions for cracking that also people mugup it up like shitty theory paper.

Much like Niranj got this email from paypal, I got a mail from UTI bank(??) I dont have a single bank account and its funny to read this mail. This is what it was

—————————MAIL CONTENT ————————————

UtiBank <customersservice@utibank.com> to me
Subj :: Important Message From UtiBank

Dear Utibank customer

We regret to inform you that your Utibank account could be suspended if you don’t re-update your account information. To resolve this problems please click here and re-enter your account information. If your problems could not be resolved your account will be suspended for a period of 24 hours, after this period your account will be terminated.

For the User Agreement, Section 9, we may immediately issue a warning, temporarily suspend, indefinitely suspend or terminate your membership and refuse to provide our services to you if we believe that your actions may cause financial loss or legal liability for you, our users or us. We may also take these actions if we are unable to verify or authenticate any information you provide to us.

Due to the suspension of this account, please be advised you are prohibited from using Utibank in any way. This includes the registering of a new account. Please note that this suspension does not relieve you of your agreed-upon obligation to pay any fees you may owe to Utibank.

Regards,Safeharbor Department Utibank, Inc

The Utibank team.

This is an automatic message. Please do not reply.

———————————END OF MAIL————————————————–

Now click that link, poor fellow tried to create a website(kinda exact replica though) in geocities primarily aimed at people 60+ who use internet only for e-banking, It just requires common sense to detect it. UTI folks what are you doing?

2. Gazzag ::

Nirenjan (Another Niranj in same post!!) wrote what i exactly felt about Gazzag and why i will never join it.Its again a hack network which steals your personal information and even your email. Check out what he has to say here .So a word of caution, never sign up in any online service that asks your mail ID(any existing account) and password to intimate your friends.Actually in TOS each service(be it yahoo or google) will mention clearly that dont issue use ID & password anywhere else which doesnt have their logo.

Alas 6:20 pm 29th october conquered it. Great work klueless team. Ragesh & Siddharth conquered before me..Kudos guys..
Im so excited winning an online event after participating N OPC’s.Just cant type in the words.hope to get some consolation prizes,though at this moment winning it is itself a pride!

View the blog.We are listed on Hall of Fame.. Ooba 12th,Ragesh 14th,Me 17th & Nitin 21st

Im in level 7. My friends are on 14.(I started late as i dint have PC at home for 2 days)Ragesh & myself are on level 15 completed. Latest updates from official blog denote that many people have gone till 16 completed.Now the most fascinating thing is blogs are inseperable part of klueless.Just see the number of responses.. wah its amazing. I wish they use a CMS in their own site instead of a blog next time as it would be easy searching.

Now a funny thing about klueless is,the mere mention of it will increase the hits to your page.wordpress is it.I got around 10 hits for just mentioning that in my blog.So expecting more as i would like to give some clues for few levels here.I wouldnt like to spoil the spirit of organisers,so would give klues only to first few levels.As and when the competition is getting over,will post klues for higher levels..

————– Nov 9:: IMP NOTICE —————-

Now today i got few pings on msgr asking to remove a comment.When i visited the comments,it contained all answers.SHIT.This is not place for such shitty people.I allowed so many comments only because people might find tough to search a 2000 comments post on original blog.Now if someone is posting spoilers here please let me know.Dont comment on same post.I might never see it.Comment on KlueLess Conquered if you want to say something to me.Happy clue hunting.

——————-END OF NOTICE —————————-

Level 1 :: pronoun – eye – read the sentence – event name

Level 2 :: No clues for this.You must know it.

Level 3 :: Pipes is the clue all the way(we had tough time in this)

Level 4 :: Its a movie name(A BIG klue)

Level 5 ::Think abt india’s great mathematician

Enough as of now. Will edit this post again and again… C ya good night(4 am now and i have college today )

30th Oct

Level 6 :: Again no clues for this

Level 7 :: Its a song ! (big clue)

Level 8 :: Shouldnt be tough either,press ctrl + A if you want a clue

Level 9 :: tilt pic 90 deg rightways. You must get it then.

Level 10 :: Wats in 115 units used to hear Ode to joy(BIG CLUE)
Nov 1

People have started my blog as mini official klueless blogs,conversing here.And i cant keep track of so many comments.Anyway clues for next set of 5 levels are here.

level 11 :: Read the rules page and come back. “Place the souls before doc “

level 12 :: Nothing to do with numbers.think on what you see

level 13 :: Sum of opp sides of dice is 7 (BIG CLUE)

level 14 :: How many times does he have to be wrong? The answer is a name

level 15 :: Whats wrong with Calc ?? M is W so ___ is _____

Nov 9::

level 16 :: where is cat? answer is 2 word in japanese (BIG CLUE)

level 17 :: You must be using it daily. See the title, font for clues

level 18 :: Look for patterns.If you are a CAT aspirant or MBA guy,you shouldnt ask for clues.100% logical
level 19 :: Look whats underlined. Why its underlined??

level 20 :: Read story from start and get the clue.Great clue at level 15. (BIG ONE)

Guess you guys will have great time through klueless.And thanks a ton for those following the comments and replying to help others.I guess Muthu is topping the list.Kudos guys.anyway i cant read the 400 odd comments.If you are done like me, lets wait for Klueless 3!!For others Happy klue hunting!!

Diwali 1991-2000 :: Those diwalis in childhood were filled with crackers alone(i remember only that) almost spending some 5 days with crackers,playing with them.Used to have competition on which apartments bursts lotta crackers and all kinda silly things.. Best days in 7th street, kalpakkam

2000-2005 :: Used to be the largest gathering of our gang.We roam around the township,bursting crackers all along the way,throwing them on each other,having loads of fun.Those rockets on beach,array of night items.After college,it used to be the very few occasions we all meet and used to have nice time at 9th Avenue ground.

For online geeks,watch out for iRising.Its online event conducted as part of management fest conducted by IIM Indore.It has range of online events like quiz,blogging,klueLess. Klueless last time was a big hit.Waiting for it this time.We spent 3 days last time and had amazing fun solving the puzzles and cracking each level.
I guess im sitting for long hours on PC,got my lab model in 2 days,have to prepare my comprehension project report for which i have prepared abstract alone. And then shitty people at AU preponing exams..still dont know when my exams start.. Tough days ahead

Do you have a gal who is just a friend? Are confused why the frequency
of calls increases as exams loom closer? Or why she always hangs around
with the moron who isn’t fit to wear Jeetendra’s white shoes? Here’s a
ready reckoner for you:

% Just a friend %
Well, you are like a show piece in my house. I will call you whenever I
need you. If you call me home the chances are 9 out of 10 times she
might say, “Oh Rahul, I am going out can you call me after 2 days??”
Rahul: “Where are you going Shilpa??”
Shilpa: “None of your business” and bangs the phone.(Useless
fellow.Hmmph! ).

% Good Friend %
You are like a TV remote control. I need you and I know that. But I try
using you when I really need you.
Rahul calls: “Hi Shilpa”,
Shilpa: “Hi Rahul. I am going out with family I will call you back.
Bye”
(Shilpa calls back after two days)
Shilpa: “What do you want Rahul? Why did you call that day?”.
Rahul: “Generally”.
Shilpa: “Oh ok. I got to go out. Will call you later. Bye.”
Will call when she needs lecture notes or some concert tickets.

% Very good friend %
Well you are like the pressure cooker safety value for the girl.
She will need you when she wants to bring out her pain or anger on
someone.
Basically, she wants to talk to you. And you are special to her.
Shilpa: “You know Rahul, Shekhar is not eating. He doesn’t sleep and is
not able to concentrate on his studies. I think he doesn’t like me
anymore.
And yesterday I saw him with another girl”.
Rahul: “Who is Shekhar??”
Shilpa : “My boyfriend.”
Rahul: Oh! ok.

% Best Friend %
You are like the auto rickshaw driver. She can’t live without you.
And don’t be mistaken. You are not her boyfriend. But you are allowed
to take her little doggie around the park so that he (not you!) can have
fun ..
Rahul Shopping. Rahul Movie. Rahul Coffee. Rahul,you pay. I am having
fun.

Rahul is now sure that he should go ahead and propose. He dares.
Shilpa: “But I thought we were just friends.
We should remain friends
Rahul. Plus, I have a boy friend you know that.”
Rahul: What?? (Rahul drinks all night).

% Best of the Bestest Friends %
Ok now you are really special. You are
dad-cum-boyfriend-cum-brother

-cum-everything.
Ultimately you are the darling servant of the girl. You take her
around.You make her project.
You do her assignments. You are allowed to take her doggie around. You
can hold hands on the beach.
You can see the sun set with her (because she wants to do everything
she drags you along). But but but… don’t be mistaken. She has a
boyfriend who works for a huge software company and earns 3 times the salary
you earn and has a flat in PoesGardenor Boat Club or Hiranandani area.
Shilpa: “Hi Rahul. I am getting engaged to Shekhar.
Shekhar this is Rahul,
he is my bestest friend”.
Rahul: Hi Shekhar . (Hand shake. Shekhar breaks Rahul’s wrist).
Rahul is now heart broken and wrist broken.

% Boyfriend %
Uh… No comments dude. You’re already Gone

For all Rahul type guys… Make sure that you tell Shilpa about Mamta.
And about Maya… and about Tina also…

This will open Shilpa’s eyes!!!!

Send it to boys to improve their Knowledge bank

Send it to girls who want to live in reality

Eventually… both will laugh

With the advent of computers, numerous things were digitized.They include audio,video,books and are available in digital format.Zillions of softwares are created as computing evolves through different era.The advantage of digital media was its ease in storage,sharing options.Though corporates took care in maintaining rights for these digital works, people with wrong minds made it a point to ‘steal’ them.Piracy in the context of copyright,patent and trademark law, refers to the unauthorized reproduction of copyrighted material that does not fall under fair use. We would discuss about origin of digital media piracy,means through which it has grown,pirate’s motive and urge, the influence of internet,business in the digital media market & piracy market, awareness levels & ethics of customers, the impact of piracy to multinationals & the governments,steps undertaken by various agencies and analyse the possible solutions and figure out a effective implementable mechanism which can be put into practical use to put a fullstop to the piracy menace which is spreading/has spread like a wild fire and swallowed worth billions of dollars both from corporate giants and various government entities.

After trying many colors to my theme,im finally settling to my old red.

And btb folks, Wish you happy and safe diwali!!

2.Can anyone ride a horse like him!!(16 secs)

links Courtesy : Nitin

2) Dataone Gaming plan 512 Kbps free??
Dataone has introduced(?? officially no signs though) a Game plan by which dataone users get hooked a 512 Kbps connection by just a click of a mouse.As far as i have heard there are no strings attached. Yet im not risking as BSNL people are so dumb like they give their bill after 5 months.Yes i got dataone installed on March 23rd.I got 7 days bill along with April month.But dint get April month’s dataone bill. Was happy initially thinking it has been a blessing discount due to carelessness.But now this month got a hefty bill of 1500 which on inspection showed the April Dataone bill as well People who try game plan here is a word of caution, The data limit still applies to you.In otherwords that plan would just increase the speed,So better dont put it coz you would browse heavily as its faster and cannot wind up within 1GB.Im deactivating tonight.Downloaded 1.2 GB OpenSuse Live DVD @ 58 KBps.Speed rocks and remember Speed kills as well!!

On 11/10/2006 the service was taken away from the site.

3) Life on ubuntu ::Registered user 8322
Its been nearly 3 months on ubuntu now.No problems till now but for few restarts while trying to upgrade for installing XGL.So left it as such.Picasa with wine is also too cool,thanks to Casanova.Few problems are

1. file transfer in GAIM,though i can send files,i cannot recieve files from friends.
2. Having a strange problem while viewing videos in YouTube, even though i mute my PCM volume, still getting sound while playing videos(Mom woke up and caught me twice in midnight when i told her i was coding )Guess Audio goes directly to speakers.
3. There is no flash v9 for linux,so couldnt view few sites.Adobe is hoping to make it by early 2007 and beta is released nearing.It has released dependent libraries.View them here

And by the by read somewhere shipit project has decided not to ship the next release Edgy Eft(in beta now)They are still shipping drapper though.Have to wait and watch if shipit project continues as people are very much aware of ubuntu to an extent that for few people ubuntu is only distro in linux.

4) Google and GPRS

Google has upgraded few of its services, Reader looks too cool now and it has also added mobile support to reader in addition to gmail.Im waiting for m-support for Orkut. Yeah my airtel offers me full GPRS(all WAP sites) for free at times though i can only browse Airtel Live site as per the free package.Would be great if Google also follows Yahoo in making a tie up with Airtel and provide the service free.

5) WebBadges
Scroll down and have a look at the WebBadges on the links pane,have read something about it, have also made my own badge,So if you are linking me,you can link via my badge too!!

I know its not too cool, anyway if you are artistic create yours by following the easy WebBadge maker.

Greetings

Saraswati/Ayudha Pooja went on well, but no rest for my PC, still running 24*7.Its a essential item you see.Pooja hols over,get back to work from tomorrow.

Last but not least, A Salute to Mahatma Gandhi on his Bday! Vande Mataram!!

Childhood

Sep 30, 2006 – 24 Photos

Tried Google’s Web picasa.Its cool, think will shift to it from Y! Photos(which is unlimited compared to Google’s 250 MB cap).Though it still doesnt have picasa for linux,its not a big deal uploading files.

Snaps of Team Paradigm !! After the ‘D’ day..

It was really tough i agree and i will still prefer to sit and code rather than taking such job. Did my part successfully and almost everyone did the same and it was a huge success after the rainy mess the night before.Will have to write 2 dairy entries for 10th and 15th september(most memorable days of college life so far).My 2 year dream of conducting an OPC in paradigm came true this year finally and i was managing that event.Full satisfaction after the great roaring success of OPC we conducted. Paradigm 2k6 saw the greatest success of a technical symposium with the amount of challenges we faced. It was success in every aspect. Over 3200 people participating in a single day it was indeed a feat to cater them all.. And we did it.

Work i did :-

Though small in amount i would never forget the joy in doing the work that were assigned to me. Webmaster of our official site(Yippee!!), OPC incharge,Systems incharge,CD creation,wrote an article for magazine(previous post), Managed registrations on the day. I had great set of people working for these tasks and everything was perfect.Last time i was in an event committee and it was very difficult on the management side than on the technical part of it(May be im fit for nothing in management   .
Well i have to write 2+ more posts tonight.. Im gonna bomb your feeds because of 0 posts for 2 weeks

What is Free Software?

“Free software” is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of “free” as in “free speech,” not as in “free beer.”
Free software is a matter of the users’ freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software. More precisely, it refers to four kinds of freedom, for the users of the software:

• The freedom to run the program, for any purpose (freedom 0).
• The freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
• The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor (freedom 2).
• The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits (freedom 3). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.

FSF is the primary sponsor of GNU project.FSF is completely against software patenting and proprietary business model

What is the GNU project?

The GNU Project was launched in 1984 to develop a complete UNIX-like operating system which is free software: the GNU system. Variants of the GNU operating system, which use the kernel called Linux, are now widely used; though these systems are often referred to as “Linux”, they are more accurately called GNU/Linux systems.

GNU is a recursive acronym for “GNU’s Not UNIX”; it is pronounced guh-noo, like canoe

GNU has been leading the FOSS(Free and Opensource Software) community in releasing several quality software which are “free software” .People by and large so far have been exposed only to proprietary solutions. Its use, redistribution or modification is prohibited, or requires one to ask for a permission, or is restricted so much that you effectively can’t use it freely.They are generally based on End User License Agreement(EULA) which limits the users to just use the software,doesn’t provide any freedom.Violation of that agreement can lead to prosecution.FSF on the other hand releases software on General Public License(GPL) which gives the freedom to access code,redistribute,release with a precondition that source must be released along with the software and it should be on the same licensing scheme(GPL).

Is there a difference between OpenSource & FOSS?

Yes there is a difference between the two.In open source software, the source code is available freely but one cannot modify and redistribute it.The licensing scheme differs in Opensource software like OpenSolaris and others which are open source but don’t give freedom.FOSS on the other hand is mostly released on GPL which gives the above mentioned 4 freedoms.

Advantage in using FOSS

There are range of products in the FOSS world,everything in a proprietary world has a equivalent FOSS product which is 1000 times of higher quality.The development activity is million times faster and the Software is created by hundreds of people across the globe 24*7.The community participation makes the software efficient with sooner bug fixes than in a proprietary model which is built inside 4 walls of the corporate office and takes months to identify and fix bugs.So you get an efficient,robust software most of the time free of cost and more importantly with the “Freedoms” mentioned above.

How can one contribute to FOSS?
FOSS world welcomes everyone who wishes to move out from using proprietary softwares.Using FOSS itself is a contribution.One can participate in community development and enhance the quality of the software.Internet binds these like-minded people through mailing lists,IRC,forums.They help everyone(mostly newcomers) and don’t expect anything in return for that because they feel its thier duty to do it as they have got freedom.Adapting to a FOSS environment(read GNU/Linux here) might need an interest.Its a learning curve and once its on the up,no one can pull you down from using FOSS and involving yourself in participating in community development.

For more about FOSS philosophy visit http://www.gnu.org,

read “The Cathedral & the Bazaar” by Eric.S.Raymond for knowing about opensource model
Note:The FSF movement is not against Microsoft or any other company for that matter.Its a movement which speaks of freedom to people who use the software
All trademarks mentioned above belongs to respective owners.This article is released under Creative Commons Share Alike License

Above article was written for my symposium magazine.FOSS gurus please do comment if anything is wrongly mentioned.

I was arranging for the event and was also involved in symposium works.. so almost no classes.I did everything possible except for making an effort to pass on circulars.I mailed to all possible groups, thought people will make it.Thought around 30 will make it.Transport for ‘delegates’ was a problem.Though i made it for prashanth decently, at the last minute ravi said he will come from his place instead of coming along with casanova.Poor guy would waited in bus stop 30 mins extra @ 6 in morning.

On D day::
Thankfully both of them boarded the right bus and came on time.We started very late, reason is obvious there were only 4 people who came. so around 10 casanova started on FOSS , Linux then when slowly the number rose to 15 he started python.It was cool,just learned the basic constructs.Well prashanth got a “”huge”" fan base at our coll.We had lunch and again we waited for people to come.Few of them who came in morning disappeared, but some newcomers were there.Ravi started with OO concepts and it amazed me..I guess i will sit with python for sometime now.Then casanova started his LDTP intro.Few of them are interested.lets c if he gets more people..

Well i wouldn’t say it as success nor failure, at the end of the day we had fun while learning and of course met my 6 month old chat friend in person.At the end of the day, we got something for the amount of effort we put in.Hope the future meets gets more people and ‘SSNLUG’ grows with time and produces FOSS geeks and contribute to society.Thanks for casanova and ravishankar for making it.By the by thanks for Yahoo chat for making all these possible.i never contacted prashanth before the day of event.

The usual Carnival::
Gathering of almost entire township for fun,food,entertainment and a rest for usual routine for a week long. Till my school days, it used to be a place to have fun by going to fun rides, playing thambola,eating out.From then on it has been a place to unite all of us,used to be an informal reunion of batchmates,seniors, meeting school teachers.Everyone would wait for carnival and people travel from where ever they are to meet thier friends and have fun.

This year::
It started on 10th, since on the first day nothing would have been started,i dint go.Next day i went with one of my friend,it was still deserted as people from outstation come only on weekends.I met Tamilvendan Sir fortunately.He was one among few who inspired me and instilled the urge to learn computer science.Nothing else special other than that.Food was crappy and costly,nothing much interesting but for a huge book stall.I decided to sit at home(lazy buddy ) on saturday.On sunday I was not feeling that well so decided could go on monday and met Niranj almost after 7 years and had couple of hrs chat with him.

Back to terror and security::
Well the world have seen lot of incidents of terror in the past few months including Mumbai blasts,West Asia crisis and the terror plot spoiled at UK.For few weeks there have been news that India’s “statergic” interests will be on high alert.After the US warning abt terror plots on nuclear installations things were too tight.On 14th morning i could see some hundereds of policemen have arrived at my place.I thought just for local security and security for plant.

That morning on my way to college i saw all roads leading to plant(even village roads where there is just a path) being blocked and checkposts have been erected.On the afternoon i got a message saying curfew is gonna be imposed. I came home around 5. my parents too voiced similar news.unfortunately our cable walah was doing some repair,so no TV too.. couldnt confirm with anyone.But we could see that carnival was going on without any problems,But none of them were interested to have fun when such a situation prevailed.Only today morning i came to know that curfew was only for surrounding villages and not for township.And yesterday Dataone too went off across the city (& state i guess). Imagine no TV no internet, undeclared curfew.between 14th August 6pm – 15th August 6am. People have just started to come out of thier homes,Hope i goto carnival and enjoy atleast today and meet my friends.

By the by HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY!! JAI HIND
Terrorism cant override human kind anyday.

Kinda long time without posts. Well life got little busy @ coll as its the last year i spend there…And come august we need to start for our department symposium,and being final year,this time entire responsibility is on us.Just gotto arrange things to make it a grand success and maintain the reputation of the brand name “Paradigm” with colleges across the state and country.For people who don’t know about Paradigm,next post is coming up shortly.I’m into technical team which provides software and systems which will be put into use on that day.So had hours of planning,designing. Me not yet into coding yet,guess will get into it pretty soon.I must say i have got wonderful set of juniors(who have become close to me in few days) to complete my task. Im almost just doing the coordination job rather than coding which i would love to do any-day.Im also in-charge of OPC(first time in history of SSN) held as part of paradigm.Hope everything goes well.

 Being in final year, one wouldn’t have much classes,so its fun rest of the time.Me getting into playing gully football inside class(some consider i play well,i myself donno how) and having nice time there.And there are few occasions when u sit alone with empty desks in the class.. They are the best moments to look back at ur coll life.Its hard to think of leaving all my pals after coll life.. I know they wont leave my life and memories will be afresh.Okay Okay times there for farewell posts.. rite now enjoyment without sentiments.

And im hoping to organise seminars for “ssnlug” which i started in spur of a moment.Since i must do justice to what i did, just asked my friend Casanova aka Prashanth to come and take a session on python.He was kind enough to give his consent to visit our college on 19th August.Another online friendship gonna get into reality.. Casanova waiting to c ya man…and also hoping that linux enthusiasts at our coll come in huge numbers(anything more than 30 ) and make it a success..

And did i tell you im yet to make my PC alright.. its almost 1 month im running on Live CDs.I have become too lazy to install an OS.donno wats the reason.I guess im just content with browsing(just checking mails,orkutting has also come down heavily) and chatting..GAIM is heaven….but it sux to download flash plug-ins every-time i boot for viewing my blog stats..

Netaddiction

Now my friends know the amount of hours i spend online,Inspite of that i got a decent score of 47. Which it says “u r an avg user”

You are an average on-line user. You may surf the Web a bit too long at times, but you have control over your usage.

Now i doubt that calculation method though i answered honestly. I may evaluate myself to 60.But anyway if wat that website is true means i hav no problems in my life

Had a lot of thoughts to write,but sorry not much time now.Now using Google reader,its so cool,Thats coz my feedreader went down along with my windows which was already full of spywares & m$ also detected its not genuine.So showing middle finger to m$w!n.

Im very much pissed off and very much happy coz my windows crashed again.Im on ubuntu Live now.
Im pissed off coz my precious data (12 GB songs ) are lost temporarily.Im happy coz theres no problem in my online activity thanks to ubuntu Im thinking of installed Kubuntu coz review of tat was nice.. Have to experiment.But no time.Have loads of work

Hope to refresh u soon with my thoughts..

I sign into my msgr, got a offline sayin “Indian govt bans blogspot inside India” WTF was my reaction.This is against the fundamental freedom of expression.How can they do it.. I was puzzled but wasnt worried coz my wordpress worked On googling i got this link which apparently said govt asked to remove some 20 sites/blogs. But almost all ISPs across India have decided to ban entire ” *.blogspot.com ” inside India.

For someone looking for loopholes, u can always use netvibes,my yahoo or other online feed aggregators. If u still want to browse www.pkblogs.com is a better option.It was started by pakistanis as pakistan banned blogspot since march 2006.India joins the elite group of China,Iran,Pakistan in doing this ******* act..Being a democratic country this is pure shit.Right to speech and expression is out of netizens.Thank god wordpress escaped from hit list of blogger,typepad,blogs,geocities.

The reason is silly.

Sources in the government said that a circular was issued by the Home Affairs Ministry three days back asking the Ministry of Information and Technology to block the 12 websites which posted content maligning India.

Officials defended the decision saying, “We would like those people to come forward who access these (the 12) radical websites and please explain to us what are they missing from their lives in the absence of these sites Source:Hindustan times

They forget india is a democratic country and millions are being deprived of freedom of expression since they found some 12 were against the nations interest..Silly..

It might be brought to notice that google earth was in for a ride few months back. But they couldn’t eventually do anything till date. I can view certain places of India’s “strategic” interest clearly sitting in front of PC, so can any t*****t and plan a attack.They leave out big issues, make fuss out of these small ones. Sadly even mumbaihelp.blogspot.com the one about which i told in my last post is also on the receiving end.

With tTechnology no one can stop people, that too in computers.New proxy servers are on the rise since yesterday.
Some proxy servers are
h**p://pkblogs.com/
h**p://www.ninjaproxy.com/
h**p://hidemyass.com/
h**p://www.inblogs.net/

I hope this ban is temporary.. anyway I’m hearing certain isp are allowing access to blogspot now..I just heard the Chief of ISP Association of India saying sub-domains can be blocked so that a large domains like blogspot isn’t blocked.. anyway have to wait and watch.

In the mean time i suggest people to move to wordpress, yet another reason to move to wordpress. Best to have your own site at 5gigs.com and install wp or other blogging API and post the blog there..

The previous restriction on Internet by govt was banning yahoo msn user chat rooms stating child p0rnography.It was acceptable to an extent.But blocking blogs are too much.

By the by My Mournings to those hundreds of people died in Java coz of Tsunami, i was tense for few moments when they gave warning for andaman, Tsunami Plz don’t come again..

Few examples are

1. People giving water to needy

2. People giving lifts to fellow humans.

3. Students shown playing football  saying that they have the spirit..

Mumbai i would consider not a place to be in when they say giving water,lifts which are basic humantarian are considered as a “SPIRIT”. It shows it lacks the same on an ordinary day.The same “effect” was shown for the floods also.Dint floods occur in other cities in India,then y the fuss abt mumbai alone.So its kind of evident that mumbai isnt that humanitarian in general..(I dont mean any offense or to create any hard feelings for mumbaikars)

Any way here is a nice website for those who look on information about the incident.It contains all contact info,lists of ppl died,injured etc. Hats off to those who made it..

http://mumbaihelp.blogspot.com/

May the souls(Also the ones who lost/losing lives on J&K daily) departed due to terrorism rest in peace and peace return to India

Easier path–>not reached many heights
To start off as i had mentioned in my previous posts on school life,Though I was provided with requisite facilities,i wasn’t a studious boy,took life day by day without any goal in life.My first “moral” failure–> my tenth results.Though considering my performance till 9th std, 10th results was better though it(74%) was way below even to the “respectable” 80% for a fwd caste guy in the age of reservations.It was during those holidays when i don’t know i would get a computer science stream or i would get commerce(those days commerce was looked down heavily). I never felt that im a dumb coz of my marks, coz i know they dont directly reflect my intelligence level.But wat to do,there is something called system,so was obviously worried abt my future.It was during one of those days I went to my cousin’s marriage.Im sure you would have come across few old retired people in family who keep on commenting/doing some thing in the name of advising to others(esp to children) during occasions like these. I was the victim that day for that gentleman as i was the “child” of the entire family with board results.I was humiliated by that gentleman, he asked me to start a “potti kadai”(small shop on street) or a liquor shop to come up in life.Imagine a 15 yr old guy being screwed like that for “not scoring 95%+”. I did my course in C/C++ in SSi,i found tat i got some talent in myself that i can at least survive without those ways told by the gentleman.I got computer science luckily in school.I nurtured the same and was again restless in 11th std.. I dint get as many marks i wished as i couldn’t adjust to “state board” quickly

Harder path:
In 12th std With the help of tuition’s i got through my studies,it wasn’t problem.But change of house,principal forcing me to lead the school TT team for 2 week long tournaments.It was hell of harder path.I wouldn’t forget even a single day in that year 2002-03. The day when i got struck in a place without buses to home due to TN bandh on kaveri,roaming on streets for entire day,attending school in color dress without bathing… The innumerable days i have waited hours for a bus,travelled on foot-board,no.. of days without proper food.That was indeed HARDER PATH. For all that i got a decent score of 275,though dint go to counselling as i got to my favourite course in a reputed coll through management quota.For my performance i got a good yield

Life these 3 years wasn’t as hard as it was those days,my coll life had flown away,learnt a lot,both on academics/life. Tasted lot of failures,recovered from them.Had few fruitful moments too..

Harder path i may travel:
I sat for cts yest, though did well,i wasn’t shortlisted in test as i have arrears.It was disappointment for few seconds, then thought will sit in next company. I guess they wont shortlist ppl with arrears,but included us in eligibility just to chuck some peopl out for the sake of shortlisting.So I’m not gonna trust in any of campus recruitment’s which mock at me.I would obviously have to take a harder path,sit for a off campus, or in best case(I’m not saying it worst )happily work in a starter company for 18 hrs a day for a few thousand bucks for few years.But that will make me stronger.5 years down the line I would have come across many experiences both in life & industry than my friends who are placed now.I may then travel leaps N bounds.Surely 10 years down the line i will make people those people who mocked at me to look upon me..
As they say failure is a delayed success..

That’s the way to take life..Lets c if my intuition becomes reality.. Some astrologer said i may become a spiritualist,i shunned my mom for trusting in astrology, but as time goes i guess it may well become reality

திராவிடர்களுக்கு குறிப்பாக தமிழர்களுக்கு என் வட மொழிகளின் மீது ஓர் வெறுப்பு? 1960 களில் இந்தி எதிர்ப்பு போராடங்கள் அரசியல் ஆதயங்களுக்காக தமிழர்களை தூண்டி, அப்போராடத்தில் "வெற்றியும்" பெற்றனர்.அதன் விளைவாக ஓர் தலைமுறை முழுவதும் இந்தி பயிலாமலே கற்றனர்.சிலர் வட மாநிலங்களில் சந்தித்த பிரச்சனைகளால், இந்தியின் முக்கியத்துவம் அறிந்தனர். ஆனால் இரு தலைமுறையாக தமிழர்களில் பலர் இந்தியின் சாயல் கூட தெரியாமல் இருந்து வருகின்றனர்.ஆகையால் அறியாமையினால் அவர்களுக்கு ஓர் வெருப்பு..

திராவிடர்களும் திராவிட இயக்கத்தின் தொடக்க வரலாறை இங்கு படியுங்கள்.

தமிழை வளர்ப்பதற்க்கான முயற்ச்சி என எண்ணிக் கொண்டு பிற மொழிகளை வெறுப்பது வெருப்பை காட்டுவது மிக வருந்த தக்க செயல்.ஆனால் சிலர் தமிழ் காவலர்கள் என சொல்லிக்கொண்டு இச்செயல்களில் ஈடுபடுவது தமிழை மெல்ல சாகடித்துவிடும்.

காலத்திற்க்கு ஏற்றாற்போல் தமிழன் மாறாமல் இருந்தால் தமிழனே இருக்க மாட்டன்,பிறகு  தமிழ் எப்படி இருக்கும்? அதே நேரத்தில் தமிழ் அடுத்து வரும் சந்ததியர்க்கு சரித்திரமாக ஆகிவிட கூடாது.தமிழை கணிணியில் பயன்படுத்துவது அதன் வளர்ச்சிக்கு ஒரு பாதை. தமிழை செம்மொழியாக்கி விட்டால் அது வளர்ந்து விடாது, மக்களுக்கு தமிழின் மீது உள்ள ஆர்வத்தை பெருக்க வேண்டும்.

அதற்கு தமிழை  பள்ளிகளில் கட்டயப் படுத்துவது விடை அல்ல.அவ்வாறு திணித்தால் சிலருக்கு வெருப்பு தான் வரும்.பொருத்திருந்து பார்ப்போம் தமிழ் எவ்வழியில் செல்கின்றது என…

எழுத்துப் பிழைகளை மன்னிக்கவும்

தமிழ் வளர்க

For the benefit of those having problems readingm tamil fonts
inththiyaa — mozhi  veeRubaadukaL
 
inththiyaavil thaan eththanai mozhikaL.. naam mozhikaLukku appaaRpattu oRRumaiyaaka iruppathu veeRu enRaalum, inggu sila nadaimuRaip pirachchanaikaLai paarppoom.
 
inththiyaavin theesiya mozhi inthi. aanaal arasu nirvaakaththil aangkilam.
 
mozhi viththiyaasangkaL:
 
inthiya mozhikaLil sila inRu peechchu vazhakkil mattum thaan uLLathu. uthaaraNam:thuLu, eNNaRRa vada kizhakku malaippiratheesa mozhikaL.ithanaal ammozhi makkaL thangkaL adaiyaaLam izhappathu maddumallaamal avarkaLin kalaachchaaraththaiyum tholaiththuvidukinRanar.
 
thiraavida/ vada makkaL mozhip pirachchanai

thiraavidarkaLukku kuRippaaga thamizharkaLukku en vada mozhikaLin miithu oor veRuppu? 1960 kaLil inththi ethirppu pooraadangkaL arasiyal aathayangkaLukkaaka thamizharkaLai thuuNdi, appooraadaththil "veRRiyum" peRRanar.athan viLaivaaka oor thalaimuRai muzhuvathum inththi payilaamalee kaRRanar.silar vada maa-nilangkaLil sanththiththa pirachchanaikaLaal, inththiyin mukkiyaththuvam aRinththanar. aanaal iru thalaimuRaiyaaga thamizharkaLil palar inththiyin saayal kuuda theriyaamal irunthu varukinRanar.aagaiyaal aRiyaamaiyinaal avargaLukku oor veruppu..

thiraavidarkaLum thiraavida iyakkaththin thodakka varalaaRai inggu padiyunggaL.

thamizhai vaLarppathaRkkaana muyaRchchi ena eNNik koNdu piRa mozhigaLai veRuppathu veruppai kaadduvathu miga varunththa thakka seyal.Anaal silar thamizh kaavalarkaL ena sollikkoNdu ichcheyalkaLil iidupaduvathu thamizhai mella saagadiththuvidum.

kAlaththiRkku ERRaaRpool thamizhan maaRaamal irunthaal thamizhanee irukka maattan,piRagu  thamizh eppadi irukkum? athee neeraththil thamizh aduththu varum sanththathiyarkku sariththiramaaka aakivida kuudaathu.thamizhai kaNiNiyil payanpaduththuvathu athan vaLarchchikku oru paathai. thamizhai semmozhiyaakki vittaal athu vaLarnththu vidaathu, makkaLukku thamizhin miithu uLLa aarvaththai perukka veeNdum.

athaRku thamizhai  paLLikaLil kaddayap paduththuvathu vidai alla.avvaaRu thiNiththaal silarukku veruppu thaan varum.poruththirunththu paarppoom thamizh evvazhiyil selkinRathu ena…

ezhuththu pizhaikaLai mannikkavum

thamizh vaLarka
 

How many days have you been in need of a Office package software, for keying in reports,other statements which must be given within a specific deadline.Working in our own PC & saving them,mailing within deadline works well if u don't have a bad day..On a typical bad day,u may come home from work around 7 & would be needed to finish a work before night & send them to your boss.You switch on the system,bang it comes the typical blue screen of the world's finest brand of OS.SHIT!!! will be your reaction,you need to reinstall the OS & install these packages which itself will take 2 hours & then sit for work..Even worse is when you don't have a backup of the document elsewhere other than the desktop.It couldn't be still worse that after installing the OS & drivers,when you search for the Office CD,u remember your friend has taken it a week back and haven't returned it..So here comes a new invention which makes our work easier..

Writely & SpreadSheet from Google

Writely
A product originally created by a start up company, later in March 2006 google acquired it & added one more feather to its cap.Initially free sign up account,after google's acquisition became a typical google service which requires invites from people.I got a invite from a friend in orkut(thanks to orkut )The features are good.It has all the basic features of a word processor, the additional features which add the icing to the cake is document sharing & publishing.Like a typical blog,other personal data managing web services it allows 3 levels of abstraction.

1. Personal data
2. Data which can be shared with known people
3. Data which can be viewed by public

U can collaborate a document with fellow colleagues, it maintains revision histories which i guess is very important when creating project reports which need team members input & a collaborative work.Sharing of each revised document will be worst & there wont be any centralised data which is consistant.
Another feature is saving, It allows you to save as HTML, RTF,DOC,Openoffice format, PDF(but for PDF u need to be premium member,tats sad).The autosave feature which has become popular after AJAX works well.The integration with blog is cool,but google doesnt support thier fast improving rival wordpress..Thats shit for me..Well anyway its a cool web-app which is usefull

Drawbacks::

1. Not a free signup & since not many use this its kinda difficult to get invitations from friends circle,so social networking is best way to get invitations
2. Printing problems, i havent printed through online, but it would be waste if there is not proper printing support
3. PDF option could have made free & one of the major drawback is its doesnt work well in some linux distros as it was built in ASP.NET,Google is trying to come out with MONO support,but it may take some time & older versions of linux cant run this..

Spreadsheet
Sharing the above features with respect to online document management system,this is a work from Google Labs,which too is amazing,supports basic operations of spreadsheet processing software,Though it would be too much for asking for charts,graphs etc Google spreadsheet provides basic functionalities of an spreadsheet program.The format modifiers,Sorting functions, & an array of math functions which provide all basic stuff needed to be in a spreadsheet application.It supports XLS, CSV(Comma Seperated Values) format. Donno if it works on GNU/Linux systems,but anyway another useful product

I got few invites to both these apps,those interested comment here,Check the world by yourself.Even when M$ was on planning stage of Office Live,Google has moved a step forward & got these 2 products.Only thing is it needs more publicity & invites must be easily available which will make this a huge hit similar to previous google's invite only service liike GMail,Orkut

Orkut My first perception::

It was July 2004 i guess,when i got my first invite to orkut,at that time i had dial-up, when i read some reviews,i wasn't convinced and thought it was usual names-db,hi-fi,friend-finder stuff where very few people will be there & networking with them is pretty difficult & its a service which collects user info for spamming with those catchy stuff for youth.So since i couldn't hang out much on Internet in the good old days of dial-up,i simply let the invite expire,though i was always a net savvy person who explored almost every beta service on web {i had 1 GB yahoo china account through some hacks,when yahoo all over world gave 100MB & Y! india gave just 4MB}. I was in hifi, but found it was only used for b-day remainders,may be the web services provided those days weren't tat good as the technology N the bandwidth-constraints did any thing good to it either which led to a failure model among these social networking sites.

Orkut My first hand experience::

It was Jan 2006, winter holidays when i was asked by my friend to join the orkut world to see what people have been doing.He taught me the concept of scrap,community etc,
While i was still in dial-up,i rarely go that side,as it takes huge time to load each page which will have N pictures..I dint like the open scrap book concept at all,but for which orkut resembled any-other social networking site.Initially i added only my classmates/they added me..Later i joined some communities, I was elated to find a community for my township kalpakkam,where i got in touch with few school seniors passed out..I got in touch with Niranj tat way, lotta lost friends frm then on through that community.almost some 20-25 with whom now hav a contact.. orkut rocks for these reasons..Then added few bloggers onto my list as well,few college mates & life was sailing slowly in orkut untill Broadband came..It was mid march i guess,frm then on i dint have restriction on time i spend on internet(i mean time restriction for which i need to pay for),since it was a 24 hr ON connex,i was browsing as N when i was free…

More onto communities::
Since it was nearing election time & as I was also keenly interested in politics,i frequented the then 400 odd tamilnadu politics community which has now grown by 50% & im one of the active participants.Initially a silent spectator,later on took part in some discussions, made few friends frm tat community which included the owner Gops.I was also participating in kalpakkam community & my school community to find more N more friends.Was also there in my star Kamal Hassan community,got a lotta info abt him,The no.. of communities increased rapidly & at present its at 150, mostly the comms may be spam comms or play comms.But i find some usefull comms in orkut in which i participate..

Friends::
This is one of the few positive aspects of orkut i admire at.. It helps u to find ur lost ones almost pretty easily..U must know atleast anyone detail to trace him/her like college or the place where they were brought or thier favourite hangout.. U name it they have a community & by this way u can find them easily.I was identified by my cousin's cousin Jugger whom i last met arnd 3 yrs back through my participation in a community & with help of my pic..I got the phone no.. of my childhood friend through a friend of my friend whom i lost contact after 2nd standard..ORKUT ROCKS in these man..

Fake profiles::
Now this is serious fun element in orkut & is in thing these days..some days back few of my friends created fake profiles impersonating each other & posting abt each others imagnary girlfriends & it was a total fun & we enjoyed it..But the fake profiles provided me more enjoyment.. There was a community called Tamil in which some fellows put some posts which affected sentiments of certain sections of the community,upon posting thier opposition to such post, they were banned or given some unrelated reply..This irritated them(incl me but i was off for my exams) a lot,they started a anti-moron community,devised statergies & planned a calculated attack on the community & kept posting worst things about those morons using fake profiles of those morons … It was indeed great fun..

Porno stuff::
How can one leave this when we are talking about internet,this is omnipresent & its also in orkut.SHIT.. there are a lotta brazillian profiles which contain porno content which often spam you or the communities.. leaving aside that, i heard frm my friend tat CNN IBN once did an expose on how the sites like orkut help in local porno makers by morphing.. So for all those ladies,plz dont put any closer,clearer pix of you..Be carefull

Im against scrap chats as its international waste of bandwidth & anyday Instant Messaging rocks..but for those orkut freaks chk this firefox plugin out.. Its cool & helps in easier orkutting for chats..Click here for that plug-in…Another way to spread firefox!!
My conclusion::
After these 6 months, orkut has now become a friendlier foe which kills my time,but im happy tat not all the time i spend in orkut is waste..It has indeed changed my internet habbits, made me little bit informative, created a platform for finding new friends, but one cannot ignore the side effects of orkutting which was mentioned in the previous post….Orkut revolutionised the concept of community networking,may well be an example for future social software which will include more room for every person to maintain a website as such in a easier way..

05/06/2006 — A long tiring day..

Like a typical exam day, it started at 2 am with phone discussion of all units with C.R.K, there was absolutely no pressure as the exam was considered a cakewalk..The usual last minute preps with "backseat guys". The exam was kinda OK but not as easy as we expected.Then since it was last exam, i decided to goto friends house.It was a very long journey to sanjeev's house.We reached at 315 & then had lunch at hot chips,then went to his house and relaxed sometime.We had planned a get together for bday(belated surprise treat by  us) of Vinod at pizza hut.So started at 445 & then went to vikki's place frm where we(crk,sanjeev,vinod,josh,vignesh,me) went to pizza hut, madhu & venkat joined..celebrated his bday with cake & pizzas. It was almost 7 when we started frm there.I initially planned to visit my sis place,but it was too late,so decided to get back home.. Madhu dropped me at mylapore, where i waited almost 25 mins for a bus to thiruvanmiyur(worst experience),then a share auto ride from there..again at thiruvanmiyur it was 20 minute wait for bus & finally boarded at 815 with a seat on foot-board,tat too lasted for a very short period,reached home by 930.. Was happy to see my internet connection back on track which went down the night before..was checking my mails & responding to them,then the ever time consuming orkut.. Had lotta of new threads in diff communities as i was away for a day, Was almost 1230 when i was done with tat.. Decided to watch Iruvar DVD got from crk(Wonderful movie half of which i watched on Sunday without even thinking of starting prep for the C# exam next day)..But my f**king system rebooted asusual,i was frustrated, but on the other hand was kinda happy seeing the match as India were playing well..It was tea time there,so i came to my room thinking i would sit on comp,but i couldnt remember anything,i got up at 6am and my dad yelling that TV was on whole night..I actually planned to write this post the night itself,but writing it at 7am, so that the day would start fresh considering i cleared a pending job…

Happy hols for fellow mates…I will keep writing frm now on…Juggernaut is back

Here i put some titles so that i wont forget to write them in the future

•  The iWD tag(tagged on March 6th).. i would rather write on woman in society in general,issues,rights etc
• Story of my computer life part2(part 1)
• Developing apps with JavaDB, derby a lightweight database
• My gnu/linux installations & experiences
• Overhyped media… on deaths(reg live telecast on funeral)
• Shitty correction-my life under AU part2(part 1)
• Reservation issue(growing complex day by day)
• My life in orkut,orkut story-Part2(part 1)
• What is practical in college?? story of a college student's technical knowledge
• Last but not least, my thamizh post for the month..(not a good start to break my resolution of 1 thamizh post per month..) but typing in thamizh takes a lot of time..already did some ground work on a article.. will post that along with next month's article..

And a lot more.. which i feel like writing now N then…. Bye 4 now

Why this Result??

Well termed as the most toughest election in history of elections, Battle of freebies, You can have a look at the fever TN had..While opinion polls said it was a 2% adv JJ,what made DMK bounce back…For this historic election even the turnout was historic 70%.. kudos to youth who have come a long way from their usual attitude towards politics..

The most underestimated factor in this election was DMDK aka captain katchi.. Being a person favoring third front(indirectly him),i thought he was making comedy when said both Dravidian parties are announcing freebies as they got insecure due to arrival.. well those statements might have been over exaggerated ones..but he made diff.. 9% vote share amounting to 20 Lakh votes across the state is not a joke considering the only factor was his cine image & he had literally no media vehicle(TV, even paper media) with him..All the votes were clearly in favour a third front..For those who predicted he would get defeated badly at his own seat.. people gave a good blow.. U know the party opposing him in virudhachalam fielded 4 other "vijayakanth" hoping to split the votes..

Coming back to what made DMK in winning seat,it was the usual anti ADMK people including govt employees & a huge list of people who have been affected by her..But she too got votes of women folks(tats stupid..when does this nation gonna improve if women views "woman" as a criteria for voting,i hate woman for few reasons like these..will come up with a post sooner or later),& those who got those 2000 & bicycles as (bribe..i would like to call that way) . I would say the so called hero of election, the DMK manifesto s**ked, no one would want so many freebies,they just want the basic infrastructure in health,roads etc..

About particular const & some parties..

Chengalput (my area)

Well its the shitty thing that has happened again, the PMK, a caste based party has won in my area,15 years in a row.. its 0 development.Another reason why i think India will never improve is caste based voting..

LP:

Well i have made fun of the party frm its inception,a party without clear statergies,no stand on any issues, only having brand IIT.. but what was shocking was the response it got.. 10900 votes in mylapore..(though its a educated area,its still an achievement for the kind of campaign its taking.. the sms orkut fwd mails way).. infact instead of DMDK it was LP which was decisive factor in mylapore seat,S Ve Sekar the comedian has won..

Thiruporur(My college area)

Another major disappointment was admk losing the thiruporur seat.. It was in this area jaya's farm house is..i travel in the entire route,i know but for jaya's special attention this area would never had got the attention it got..accepted that she did put roads for her comfortable travel,but she did built a bus stand,introduced new routes,made what not for the people of that area.. 

Captain's seat

Virudhachalam being stong hold of pmk due to s**kin caste votes dint stop captain from entering the assembly after winning by a huge margin..

PMK

Well this time pmk has licked defeat slightly though it won 18 seats, 18 seats was coz of dmk factor, it has certainly lost its caste factor & more people arent voting just because of caste these days.. good for TN,democracy

BJP,other chotas

Its time for these people to pack thier bags,or atleast allign with the 2 to withstand.LDMK its better to go with DMK..i dont know why parties like FB, BSP,SP,JD exist in TN..

Here is a place where you can check all stats..EC Website.It contains info about all the states

Well lets c if this govt withstands 5 years more importantly MK withstands 5 yrs..

I have just shifted to wordpress..Well from the day i saw wordpress API,i was impressed but i havent thought of moving from blogger.. But my new friend Thilak insisted me to switch over to wordpress & said that transistion is easy with a help of a tool.. So i created a demo account & within 10 minutes all my posts including comments were into wordpress..The thing i found impressive about wordpress was the category & recent comments which help a lot..surveys show categories increase readership by 40% & recent comments is such a nice feature for the blog owner.

I found these things difficult in wordpress,inspite of these disadvantages i still leave blogger & will continue only here..

1. Templates cannot be previewed or manually changed
2. Couldnt have those firefox ads as they contain pic & is not allowed by WP

But still i prefer this wordpress template.. its amazing..

Hope to provide u better writings…

Well I was a guy with zero planning on future..I take things as N when it comes during school days..Till ninth std,I had no idea of wat i would be..i wanted to be an electrical engg simply coz my grandpa was one..so at starting of tenth std,my dad told there are 3 branches in 11th.. Comp MPC, Bio MPC ,Commerce,Since i was worst in art,i hated biology which my sis has told me contains lot of pictures..So my dad told get good marks to get a compsci seat.Those days i was dumb in math,avg scorer in others(65%) as i used to concentrate more on my TT & video games..I just studied only day b4 exams[even now same case].

The first time i saw comp was at my mom's office during my 7th std where she let me to type something after opening m$-word[simply coz she doesnt know anythin else in computers].I have played the game solitaire in my cousins house, but i dont even know how to open the game..

Class 10 was over.. 4 months holidays..i was just spending those days watching movies & playing TT in nights.. many of my friends went for a computer course in UNIX,C,C++.. since they all were newbee to computers they learnt everything frm scratch incl basics,office etc..The result was out..i scored just 74%.. since the usual cutoff for compsci 80%,i thought i wouldnt get a compsci seat..So my dad insisted me to go for a course..i was reluctant..finally i joined in SSi for a course on UNIX,C,C++.

Since some of the batchmates knew basics of computer,they started with shell,kernel N abt UNIX stuff like that..i was lost in jungle..Then i asked the staff to teach me right from scratch..First unix classes i just noted down those commands written on board.. tried them in lab session without any knowledge..Then we comp illitrates were having a seperate class on basics,HTML,Office.. i liked that class very much..

By the time UNIX course has ended & we moved into C..asusual i typed the programs written on board.. We had a lot of fun in the lab.. since it was 24hrs lab.. N we ppl having no other job will goto the lab & do all things other than covering the portions taught..Making powerpoint presentations,playing TD6 in the lab,hearts in network,sending mails,msgs in the unix environment…

One fine day i was caught by the centre head while playing games..so he asked me to write a C program [i donno something silly with arrays]..i said i donno.. N also said that i was just typing out the programs N dont have ability to write on my own..he adviced me for half an hour..he gave wat is life blah blah blah which at tat point i took in one ear N left it out through other..i asked my sister abt the program as she had already studied C C++[she was also school topper in good old compsci syllabui of dBase,Lotus etc]..she told me something,i read the book.. next day i did try something out on lab.. all of which actually ended up in a failing note only..

I was taking C C++ lightly at tat time, N was concentrating on HTML more as it was on compsci syllabui..it was easy.. after a long time when the list was put up by the school. thank god i got compsci as many toppers prefered bio..There was still a month to go before school opens..so i started designing something using HTML..Those were crorepati days..so i just made a simulation of the same using HTML linking webpages..then school days started..we still dint complete the course..[supposed to b a 3 months course but we did it for record 8 months.. as we did all sorts of nonsense other than attending classes N allowing staff to complete..

Since i knew the basics,i was one among the very few in the class who has seen computers before 11th..intro to windows.. HTML were cakewalk.. it was during C, that i got the concepts wat i learnt in SSi came to my help.. I began to understand how the program works..Started writing those small ones[comparing 2 no..s,sorting] on my own..I was the only guy in that class who used write programs on own..

I was the only one who learnt BASIC frm 11th std math N wasted 4 days to try a program which would convert any given no into words..[1700 line code]..but one of my school sir told the same can be done in 100 line C code..I got a nice bulb…I had a very nice interaction with my compsci staff Ms.Sujatha Pradan,Mr.TamilVendan & my math sir Mr.Ramachandran who not only raised my math skills but also thought me how to think analytically..

Again for 12th std we went to Aptech,this time since SSi was running on loss,it was closed[if guys like us join,wat else will a centre do ],So this time StarOffice,VB,Java, spl course based on 12th syllabui..StarOffice was a cakewalk..we knew MS Office na..next it was VB.. it was awesome to work in VB..did a small graphic app in that which draws a heart[basic idea took frm 12th book,extended to do some graphics,like drawing an arrow between 2 hearts].Then came java,to tell the truth i hated java those days simply coz it was OOP, & we dint learn C++ properly in SSi course[we never learnt sincerely there].but since the syllabui was mostly based on 11th std C,again it was cake walk for me.. this time many joined course with me,so i had some competition in my class but still we never had time in those unforgettable days.Btw my studies in state board got improved..my math was helping me a lot..i even got 2nd rank in my class once..[never thought of it,after getting 18th rank in 11th std].So 12th was over..Luckily i got into SSNCE with Comp as my branch..so the journey goes on.. meet u on part2 where i will tell about my experiences in my coll which kindled even more interest

A place called 'Orkut'
Cover-Story
Named after its creator "Orkut Büyükkökten" a Turkish engineer working at google, Orkut is one of the most popular chat sites on the Internet. Orkut was launched on 22nd January 2004 and gained popularity almost immediately. It was able to attract 1,000,000 people by July 2004 and by September in the same year, the number of its users reached 2,000,000! Haseeb points out the pitfalls faced by people who use orkut.

By Haseeb Ahmed

A ceremonial click on Yahoo Mail on Yahoo's main page is how I normally start using the net. What next? Msn? Surprisingly the answer is a big no! I have had enough fights with my friends through that devil of a messenger! Orkut? Definitely! For the more naïve ones amongst us, it is an online community connecting people through a network of trusted friends (or so the website claims!) When I first got to hear about Orkut, I was all excited and geared up! I wanted to join it at the earliest. However, it was not until a friend invited me to join that I could finally make my profile on Orkut and start adding people to my friends' list.

On the onset, I wasn't a frequent user and didn't join many Communities (or groups as you may call them). My main interest lay in seeing whether any new people added me or not, besides any new scraps (messages) I might have. Being able to renew contacts with old school and college mates, it was nothing short of a joyride. I remained on the lookout for coming across familiar faces and names.

After the passage of some time, I started joining communities. That too by the dozen! If it wasn't about French fries it was about Brain Teasers. Be it NUST or PAF College Faisal Karachi, I had to join them all. It seemed like I was on a mad rush to increase the number of communities I was a member of!

Then came a phase when I rationalized. I was spending way too much time on Orkut. Meeting old friends and acquaintances was exhilarating, but was it worth it? I mean, except for a few occasional scraps here and there, the front was all silent. There was no real contact between us. We had moved on with our lives and there was precious little that was common between us now. Standing at different places in life, we could no longer relate; the charm of interaction in real life was clearly missing.

Being a member of the countless communities was no fun either. I hardly went to these communities or checked out what was happening there. I was also inundated with messages of joining yet more communities or voting for others to become Mr. or Miss Orkut/Pakistan/USA….

It took out the fizzle from the ecstasy of frequenting Orkut. I was disillusioned, but I wasn't alone either. There were lots of friends of mine who felt the same. Based on our collective thoughts and deliberations, I reached the following conclusions.

Orkut is a wastage of time
Once you log onto Orkut, there is no end to the time you'd spend there. It could range from forty-five minutes to an hour or even more. You'd go about checking your scraps and replying to the ones you wish to. You'd be checking out the profiles of many, especially of those who've added you to their lists. If you happen to be the founder of one or more communities, you would be visiting your communities as well. Then there are times when the site doesn't open your required page inscribing 'Bad server, no donut for you'. You have to try again and again. Without realizing, it easily takes up half an hour of your time. Half an hour of your life wasted! No big deal! But multiply it with 30 and then tell me if it matters to you or not. The same time could have been utilized in some meaningful activity but it's not to be.

There's no privacy
Imagine a place where everyone can know all about you. Your likes and dislikes. Your messages. Your friends' names, their views and extent of your closeness with them. Even your pictures are not secure. Anyone can peep into them and send you stupid messages afterwards. In fact, many of my female associates were bound to take off their display pictures or photo albums owing to misuse of their photos by senseless guys. Given such circumstances, how can anyone feel comfortable or safe!

Orkut is not proper form of communication
I haven't been able to stay in touch with my old mates and fellows through Orkut. Their presence is indicated by my friends' list only. We hardly scrap each other. There would be many who would claim to have found their lost friends and chums through this website. But by and large the case is otherwise. Even when we stumble across old class fellows and friends the relations are not so warm and cordial. Believe it or not but we all have different priorities in life and time cannot be rewinded – no matter how hard we try!
As for your other friends, you can very well chat with them over Msn or call them up if you feel like talking to them. There's no point in scrapping them on Orkut if they're just a call or sms away.
Yes, we agree that a night before a project submission Orkut is a viable communication option if your messenger is not working, but do remember that such occasions are rare. We could be overjoyous on getting a certain scrap, too, but it still lacks the personal touch of a call or sms. Moreover, it could be days before we log onto Orkut and see the intended message. It's thus not a channel of instant communication either, unless the other person checks his mail and scraps every half an hour!

It is irksome
If your Orkut experience can be summed up in a nutshell it would be 'irksome'. How else would you explain guys tipping girls on this website? Go to the scraps portion of any female friend of yours and you are bound to come across superficial messages like 'Hey, this is Asim from Lahore. You are cool. Wanna be friends?' or 'I am Ahmad. I live in Karachi. You also live in Karachi. So why not meet up sometime?' This harassment is going on with single and married females alike. A lot of my female colleagues and friends are wary of Orkut for this very reason. "I don't go to Orkut anymore as I hate getting all those stupid and nosy friendship messages from guys. I haven't even put up a picture, yet I get such annoying messages regularly," one female confided in me.

Your frustration definitely knows no bounds, guys! How can you expect a girl to 'be friends' or 'meet up' a total stranger? Don't you think you're moving too fast? And what does sending such messages to every other girl on the website reflect? Is female companionship the sole purpose of your life? Put in the shoes of those girls how would you feel? Come on, guys, give the poor girls a break. Life's not a mushy romantic movie. You need to find the purpose of your life and learn to respect all those around you and not hound them day in and day out. The only way forward is mutual respect between the sexes, trust Us!

Nothing short of a 'popularity contest'
I have no objection to allowing people to add me as friend. Some of them turn out to be old friends and associates. Others are my readers and fans who wish to correspond with me or know me better. I appreciate all of them. However, I am not willing to let anyone add me for the sake of adding. You come across many people having friend-count up to 1000 or more. Are all these people their friends? No way! Most of them are randomly added just to increase the friends' list and then show off to the world how popular they are. You would even find girls from Brazil, Italy and France added in their lists. I have even found people scrapping me: 'Hey, I added you but I don't know you. So who are you?' There are those too who forget after adding me and ask me why did I add them? Got the point people???

Communities!!!
Why is everyone so pushed to form communities of their own? Today I ask you all. Everyday I get atleast ten requests to join communities. "Air force ke cheetay", "Leather Belts", "Lahori Food" so on and so forth! Why force people to join your community? Spreading the word around is fine but this is crude! Why can't these people limit themselves to publicizing their communities on other communities' message boards? And frankly speaking I find most communities indulging in frivolities like 'Rate the person above you and complete the story'.

In a nutshell
Summing it up, I would say that I am neither against Orkut nor its usage. It is rather an innovative idea of bringing people together. I am only against its purposeless use resulting in wastage of precious time, especially of students who need to focus elsewhere. Moreover, such websites are no good in our local environment where we haven't learnt to respect the privacy and freedom of others. We discriminate on the basis of gender and try to force ourselves onto others without rhyme or reason. Doesn't it speak volumes about our obsession of getting others to like us and forcing our opinions down the throats of others? Why can't we accept that there would always be those who would dislike us? Until and unless we learn to respect the choices others make for themselves, sites like Orkut are bound to cause trouble and discomfort to the large majority of its users, especially females.

END OF MAIL

Some of the reasons why i ask "do u yahoo!! gimme ur id" to a newly found lost friend.. N start chatting there…I will write my orkut experiences both positive & negative in a few days..

These are the thoughts running on my mind when i think abt these parties..

Let me do an analysis on some factors..

What if DMK(+) comes into power?

1. As he said rice has to be given for 2Rs,free TV,free Land,scrapping of Loans with interest, but all these at what cost.. eventually the govts exchequer is gonna be 0 soon..
2. There will be some vindictive action against the current govt, & this may lead to no developmental activity or any usefull thing done atleast till the next LokSabha elections come.
3. On the otherhand, people wont be troubled like in the previous rule,but the developments will be slow,silent,but yet they will happen,Coz they have to show something on Sun TV na…

What if ADMK(+) comes into power?

1. Again if they come to power,atleast half of thier copied manifesto which again will cost exchequer heavily as already she has spent a huge chunk by giving cycles, Rs.2000 free for flood affected etc..
2. For god sake there wont be any vindictive action,the current cases against DMK will continue in a slow manner, & those against 1991-96 govt will continue even slower..
3. Guess she wont be torturing people like she did previous time saying "arasu gajaana gaali aaga irukku", but still her autocratic rule will continue,developments will be little faster,but again since she wont cooperate with centre,that will bring down the pace..

Im leaving out chances for DMDK… comeon people be realistic its first election,let them aim at trying to get double digit seats & atleast 4 digit votes in all seats.

About Lok Paritan,I wish they retain the deposit in all areas they contest..One reason being the seats they are contesting for already has a heavy competition & also Coz the "student" support they claim wont actually turn them big,coz sms,mails,orkut alone cant bring some into victory.. moreover i was sad that they chose only "educated" areas that too in city.They must have acted fast,gathered people and stood atleast in all the cities in tamilnadu,that would have got atleast a greater attention towards them.And like any other educated IITian/IIM they never focus on rural areas.. If you are into politics then goto rural places, coz no.. of educated who vote is very less & u cant ask people who generally dont vote to vote by ur "educated" campaign.Here is one post by my friend casanova on LP .

Coming onto my view on the 2001-06 govt & 2004-current centre..
Well 2001-2004 was with 0 development in TamilNadu… not much in stake for people like us..what made worse was the dumbest education policy,govt employees strike,anti conversion law(still exists mind you),attack on media,satisfying personal interests, vendetta..

For all this people gave a benchmark judgement, 40/40(39/39-TN).But after that govt has become very kind..handling of tsunami,floods were indeed good.. better roads all over the state.(only in last yr of 5 years mind you).But the people from centre(13 dumba** as called by current …) have indeed done some work.

The thing about alliance & star power..
This has indeed created bubbles in the already hot politics, Vaiko shifting sides, Sarathkumar changing sides for some strange reason,Visu entering politics into ADMK coz of sniff in SunTV.Simran joining ADMK(lol y does she enter this arena.. not her cup of coffee),Vijaya TR(aka LDMK founder aka dandanakka man) joining hands again with MK,1 Crore drama with my thalaivar kamal[good that he kept away] ……lot of drama which first had our GAPTAN entering the frey after a long wait..Guess these factors will contribute only very little fraction to the final mandate

Its gonna be stiff competition & election(/)climate is getting very hot… days to come will be more interesting….
read the disclaimer for those people who wish to pounce on for the stuff written,though ur comments on a democratic mode is always welcome..

Btb its my study hols.. so have to start studying.. No more 2 posts per week though i may write when i feel bored..

E-Mail
Chat
Shopping
Information gathering
Airline Reservations at a click
News
e-governance
Sharing entertainment [ said its never ending list.. so leaving it here]

Well offlate the web has focussed more on individual users as an entity rather than an organisation/enterprise. So then came blogs/wikis which can provide as much & even more valuable information.But the problem is the way these data are organised.Its fragmented to a very large extent..

We still find google useless as it doesnt understand our exact needs & gives u millions of pages,none of which we have interest.

Ben Hunt writes abt Web 2.0–The future of social web experienece.

Well in todays world ppl find it difficult to share huge data[not those copyrighted ones which can be easily obtained in many illegal ways] between thier peers,sync them.Sooner or later there is gonna be an architecture in which all ur files are on a webspace & ur local hdd will become a cache of it..[Not to mention the bandwidth then..everyone will b on T1 line !!]. So no problems of syncing data when u travel..

Already Online products are on web with Microsoft Office Live,Windows Live, Google has brought writley-The Web Word Processor
couple of spreadsheets s/w too is online now i guess.

Any article abt Web2.0 doesnt exist without mentioning abt AJAX. To get a touch N feel experience try Google Suggest.

Dion Hinchcliffe writes in depth abt Web2.0 in his blog.This post by him on Web2.0-State of Web made me exploring what exactly web 2.0 will be in future.

10 years down the line we will be talking of Web 3.0 or even higher versions.. thats IT for you…Change is only permanent in this industry & no one can guess the pace easily..

What kinda power(s) would you choose, if you could undergo bad-ass mutations? You can mention a maximum of 3 powers you'd like. And try to be imaginative….

1) Before i eat something,i must be in a position to say i like the taste of it,so that if i dont like it,i wont eat it & waste the food.. Im very particular about taste….

2) I must be able to fly to home & sit in my PC & return back to same place if i need to wait in a Queue for long time… I hate waiting….

3) I Must have a brain which can view the movie upon seeing the poster itself(i know its old… pattinathil bootham technique. but still a nice one)

I tag all those who read this blog…

@Knowledge & Expression: atlast i wrote the tag quicker…

My motherboard burned… servicing not possible.. Im in cafe now paying highly for browsing(30 Rs per hr in my village)..Its hard to spend nights without getting sleep..

Hard without checking mails.. Though i chk my primary yahoo on my mobile.. Msgr on mobile needs a lot of improvement.. Chatting through it is highest degree of punishment u can give a person who was 24*7 online…

Just ordered a new PC.. rather upgrade.. trying to be back in a couple of days…

To top it all im having lab exams.. i donno a line of code in it.. Walking in & Walking out of them… ((

Just when i badly need PC.. i miss it.. I have treated my system badly.. I accept it.I never clean the table.. occasionally clean the system,dedfragment.. never shutdown for weeks.. But for all that this is a high punishment…

I miss u my MAN.. I just cant live without you..

Atlast a tribute for my old Captain which lasted for 5 yrs.. Salute.

P3 866 Mhz 256 MB Ram on a 815 board.. U r gone now..

Eagerly waiting for new one.. tats
P4 3.0GHz 1GB ram on 915 board..

topping it is my old(rather upgraded)160+40GB IDE hdd with a DVD combo & DVD RW+… well tats wat my machine one dreams as home PC now..

Well it is 12th std, right from day1 ppl say abt cutoff,engg education etc.So asusual i was bang on for first 2 months.I was a mediocre in my 11th.If i use my 11th marks, i would have around 230-240 as my cutoff.Im not a studious person.I like math, hate the Phy,Chem.So since my dad told u must get 280 atleast to get a paid seat in good coll.So i started mugging crap.2 months went on well.Then we shifted house,which meant i would have to travel for school,tuition for 1 hr everytime.

My typical day::
Get up at 5am, catch bus 530am, phy/chem tuition 6-7, getback home by 730am.Schoolbus at 9am(Spl classes mean 815 am bus)
Getback frm school at 430 pm. Bus 630 pm Math(Gunns) tuition 7-8pm return home 830pm
Sundays will be double burden with test series in AIMS & the above tuition centres.

Well i was there at my home only to eat N sleep.Never studied at home.With all these,my hard work paid off in quarterly,now i was feeling confident of the achievable target(280).Then came another challenge.. Inter AECS TT tournament at Managuru(AP).I was obv choice along with my classmate who were representing our school for past 5 years.Princy almost forced us to go there.Infact we missed the OOTY tour for tat.But the burden added is practice i needed to go.So its now 430-630 practice then some snacks,willing away time & 7pm to math tuition.

To top it all, the 8pm bus journey.Boy o boy,crowded to core.. those footboard journeys chatting with cleaner,we guys had a great time.Got idea of what life is from unique experiences.

The Quarterly holls was spent in Manuguru..(one week) We won the southern region championship,obv another challenge came on the way.We were asked to play national level AECS tourney at Mumbai in December hols.I missed first revision entirely, second revision on the day after arrival.Btw my academics wasnt letting me down,it continued well.Come Jan, it was all serious, no play.But still travelling 3 times a day,going & writing tests everywhere,it was fun,mental torture.I had no entertainment(dint opt for cable conn at new house).Onlything was FM. mind u those days it was only AIR FM

Gone march, exams went on well..(i watched world cup final on giant screen, having comp sc exam in a day.. comp sc always my cake).Then the comedy called enterance coaching. This was the time i had for breathing after 10 long months.Mornings were free.. classes frm 4-9. back home at 930.. i must say i enjoyed too much in this period.

Results came.. TNPCEE was ok with 84%. then board chem let me down with cutoff of 275.Got SSN after failing to make it in PSG MSc integ.Atlast, 2002-2003 acad yr ended with a happy note.

lackness is in Students &…

It would say the institutes eye on industry-institution interaction is just opening up.In my 3 years of College life,Only this year i have witnessed so much interaction.Coming to FOSS, I would say its mainly due to students & partly due to the "bookish" attitude which our curriculam prescribes & the industry which gives importance to it.

Thx for the software industry for limiting restrictions to 60%, else everyone would have been 90%+ with no practical knowledge.Today there are people doing lot tech stuff but score 60-70%.Only very few in the range 85%+ do these stuff while they are in coll.

Coming back to students fault::

Recently our coll had a LDD by chennailug members which was arranged by one of our alumini,who is a active LUG member & involved in FOSS campaign.It was a saturday,our coll said its working to compensate holidays,yet only very few came.It was just 30 in audi with capacity of 1000+. One of our staff felt disgusting & we tried to convince those came to attend & finally made it 150.

Students arent interested in these stuff.They think its waste of time sitting for these stuff.Im sure they would realize after they goto industry.

Institution's response::
Sadly very few institutions respond well to these kind of interactions.Its partly coz of the quality of people who come to teach.[sorry there are a few,who do keep updating,inspiring students],but mostly they would be out of date with the industry & tech world.So they cant inspire people to work.So ultimately people endup reading books alone.

@Toufeeq on ur comment in ur blog
As you said u dont have many interested, But the one-man army thing is a huge task..

By the way,I have just started a lug in my coll,which had pretty lukeworm response(30/1000+),hope to have more sessions & awareness about FOSS in my coll,sadly its exam time soon & i will be in coll for only one more year.I guess to do more for it next year.

1)A guy in punjab was billed 48000Rs for internet usage.. The error was the employee wrongly entered his plan as 250(no download, 400MB) but the guy used it thinking he is in plan 500.. finally he got some respite after days of fight..

2)In Kalyan Telecom Dist.. 1GB was treated as 1000MB.. but hey its correct by defns, but BSNL all across country treat it as 1024MB. Here is a eyeopener on GB & GiB

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gigabyte

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_prefix

3)BSNL Dataone's website used to check account details is sick..It says use IE.. im running GNU/linux, so wheres IE.. shitty ppl couldnt even write a webapplication in jsp common to all platforms/browsers.

Btw atleast the ADSL modem is compatible with Linux.. So atlast im in linux connected to net.. GAIM is my chat client,Mozilla as Browser, Finding download managers other stuff which i miss frm windows here.. But things here are of high quality unlike in Windows..

Looking to explore the world of GNU/linux with internet..

My School Team mate K.Shamini was part of that team.. Amazing isnt.. Brings me old memoies back of TT & fun we all had.

It was indeed a moment of pride, for me on seeing her winning laurals for India.She has been a child prodigy in TT.. She started in UKG.. tats toooo early.

About Kalpakkam & TT::

Well being in a rural setup,Kalpakkam dint have infrastructure it has now when we were growing up,but the sport of Tabletennis has always had a special place in kalpakkam.Through efforts of many, our school AECS started encouraging TT frm tender age of 5.From the day one,we had one or the other making into state rankings in thier set.It was almost guys sport untill this girl came.She is 2 yrs junior to me but had loads of talent frm day we started.For the guys in our set,defeating her is a achievement[i did thrice!!] during our practice sessions.She was queen of kalpakkam TT in her 5th std.[remember kalpakkam has decent players fighting on state arena].Our school had good support for TT.We had daily practice sessions, weekend coaching classes.My first tour with my school team was to kotagiri(near ooty) when i was in 7th std for inter CBSE schools tour.tat was a gr8 fun for a week. Need a seperate post for tat alone.Had gr8 time with psbb guys.we guys lost to Sarath Kamal's team[Again Hero of Indian Gold medal in commonwealth]there.. but the one
week playing cards,sharing the room,alone for long time leaving parents.. gr8 experience.

My TT continued till my 12th std though i was out of competition after my 8th std as i dint maintain or improve my game.We had coach till 5th std only.After that its what we have learnt by practice..

About Shamini::

Well We knew that she would rock the world from the moment when she was queen of kalpakkam TT in her 5th.. She had determination of very high calibre.. Over & above a great support from her parents.I must say her dad almost spent his entire life thinking about her.He gave her best of coaching every weekend travelling 200 kms for coaching sessions.She made her first steps through cadet ranking.she was winning.{{I went till pre quarters in sunjunior level.[tats my achievement!!]}}She won a gold for India in her 7th std in Hungary.From then on she shifted school to chennai to get best in coaching.. She then represented nationals kept winning them..But poor girl always comes one rank below par as there are ppl well above her age in the category.She would definitly have a crack at Olympic gold & that day is not too far.

About Experiences::

Well it was a tiresome practice for all of us daily 6 hrs almost.. But when we get onto tours we make sure we enjoy.The train journeys we had… The kotagiri tour was indeed a lifelong memory..Kabilan,Me, Sudarshan,Shamini,Shalini,Preeti.. The CBSE tournaments in PSBB, We guys never won,but girls won single handedly coz of her.She was the tiniest of the lot,so we called her mini.She was one girl in group, who will make comments on everyone.But offlate she has become a typical shy type girl i guess.. Havent seen her for more than couple of years..But watch her matches in TV when i know she is playing.

Kudos girl.. Wish you all the best for your bright future.. Bring that Olympic gold.. its gonna happen sooner or later i tell u..

Movies I would watch over and over again:
Anbae Sivam,University,National Treasure,Home Alone seires

TV shows I love to watch:
Lollu Sabhas,Chidambara Ragasiyam[Naga serials],Interviews with gr8 personalities

My favourite foods :
Pani poori on the roadside with friends
Cheapankizhangu fry
Masala Dosa
Vatha Kuzhambu

My Greatest Heights :
Represented my school TT team for several years;Some what successfull..
One of the computer geeks in my class frm 11th std.
Our vocabuilder software[mini project] came first of the lot.(3)

My Hangouts
mostly 127.0.0.1
Beach on weekends

Things that I hate
reading books,drawing & fine arts stuff,india's rural infrastructure

Great Personalities I would like to dine with
I would rather like others to use my name for this in thier books

Things I dream often
Dreaming of designing & solving a complex software,but most of the time it remains as a dream.

What Lurks in Its Soul?

By David A. Vise

Sunday, November 13, 2005; Page B01

The soul of the Google machine is a passion for disruptive innovation.

Powered by brilliant engineers, mathematicians and technological visionaries, Google ferociously pushes the limits of everything it undertakes. The company's DNA emanates from its youthful founders, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, who operate with "a healthy disregard for the impossible," as Page likes to say. Their goal: to organize all of the world's information and make it universally accessible, whatever the consequences.

Google's colorful childlike logo, its whimsical appeal and its lightning-fast search results have made it the darling of information-hungry Internet users. Google has accomplished something rare in the hard-charging, mouse-eat-mouse environment that defines the high-tech world — it has made itself charming. We like Google. We giggle at the "Google doodles," the playful decorations on its logo that appear on holidays or other special occasions. We eagerly sample the new online toys that Google rolls out every few months.

But these friendly features belie Google's disdain for the status quo and its voracious appetite for aggressively pursuing initiatives to bring about radical change. Google is testing the boundaries in so many ways, and so purposefully, it's likely to wind up at the center of a variety of legal battles with landmark significance.

Consider the wide-ranging implications of the activities now underway at the Googleplex, the company's campuslike headquarters in California's Silicon Valley. Google is compiling a genetic and biological database using the vast power of its search engines; scanning millions of books without traditional regard for copyright laws; tracing online searches to individual Internet users and storing them indefinitely; demanding cell phone numbers in exchange for free e-mail accounts (known as Gmail) as it begins to build the first global cell phone directory; saving Gmails forever on its own servers, making them a tempting target for law enforcement abuse; inserting ads for the first time in e-mails; making hundreds of thousands of cheap personal computers to serve as cogs in powerful global networks.

Google has also created a new kind of work environment. It serves three free meals a day to its employees (known as Googlers) so that they can remain on-site and spend more time working. It provides them with free on-site medical and dental care and haircuts, as well as washers and dryers. It charters buses with wireless Web access between San Francisco and Silicon Valley so that employees can toil en route to the office. To encourage innovation, it gives employees one day a week — known as 20 percent time — to work on anything that interests them.

To eliminate the distinction between work and play — and keep the Googlers happily at the Googleplex — they have volleyball, foosball, puzzles, games, rollerblading, colorful kitchens stocked with free drinks and snacks, bowls of M&Ms, lava lamps, vibrating massage chairs and a culture encouraging Googlers to bring their dogs to work. (No cats allowed.) The perks also include an on-site masseuse, and extravagant touch-pad-controlled toilets with six levels of heat for the seat and automated washing, drying and flushing without the need for toilet paper.

Meanwhile, the Googlers spend countless hours tweaking Google's hardware and software to reliably deliver search results in a fraction of a second. Few Google users realize, however, that every search ends up as a part of Google's huge database, where the company collects data on you, based on the searches you conduct and the Web sites you visit through Google. The company maintains that it does this to serve you better, and deliver ads and search results more closely targeted to your interests. But the fact remains: Google knows a lot more about you than you know about Google.

If these were the actions of some obscure company, maybe none of this would matter much. But these are the practices of an enterprise whose search engine is so ubiquitous it has become synonymous with the Internet itself for millions of computer users. And if the Google Guys have their way, their presence will only grow. Brin and Page see Google (its motto: "Don't Be Evil") as a populist force for good that empowers individuals to find information fast about anything and everything.

Part of Google's success has to do with the network of more than 100,000 cheap personal computers it has built and deployed in its own data centers around the world. Google constantly adds new computers to its network, making it a prolific PC assembler and manufacturer in its own right. "We are like Dell," quipped Peter Norvig, Google's chief of search quality.

The highly specialized world of technology breaks down these days into companies that do either hardware or software. Google's tech wizards have figured out how to do both well. "They run the largest computer system in the world," said John Hennessy, a member of Google's board of directors, a computer scientist and president of Stanford University. "I don't think there is even anything close."

Google doesn't need all that computer power to help us search for the best Italian restaurant in Northern Virginia. It has grander plans. The company is quietly working with maverick biologist Craig Venter and others on groundbreaking genetic and biological research. Google's immense capacity and turbo-charged search technology, it turns out, appears to be an ideal match for the large amount of data contained in the human genome. Venter and others say that the search engine has the ability to deal with so many variables at once that its use could lead to the discovery of new medicines or cures for diseases. Sergey Brin says searching all of the world's information includes examining the genetic makeup of our own bodies, and he foresees a day when each of us will be able to learn more about our own predisposition for various illnesses, allergies and other important biological predictors by comparing our personal genetic code with the human genome, a process known as "Googling Your Genes."

"This is the ultimate intersection of technology and health that will empower millions of individuals," Venter said. "Helping people understand their own genetic code and statistical code is something that should be broadly available through a service like Google within a decade."

Brin's partner has nurtured a different ambition. For years, Larry Page dreamed of tearing down the walls of libraries, and eliminating the barriers of geography, by making millions of books searchable by anybody in the world with an Internet connection. After Google began scanning thousands of library books to make them searchable online, book publishers and authors cried foul, filing lawsuits claiming copyright infringement.

Many companies would have reached an amicable settlement. Not Google. Undaunted, Google fired back, saying copyright laws were meant to serve the public interest and didn't apply in the digital realm of search. Google's altruistic tone masked its savvy, hard-nosed business strategy — more books online means more searches, more ads and more profits. Google recently began displaying some of these books online (print.google.com), and resumed scanning the contents of books from the collections of Harvard, Stanford, the University of Michigan, the New York Public Library and Oxford. But legal experts predict that the company's disruptive innovation will undoubtedly show up on the Supreme Court's docket one day.

From Madison Avenue to Microsoft, Google's rapid-fire innovation and growing power pose a threat of one kind or another. Its ad-driven financial success has propelled its stock market value to $110 billion, more than the combined value of Disney, Ford, General Motors, Amazon.com and the media companies that own the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. Its simplified method of having advertisers sign up online, through a self-service option, threatens ad agencies and media buyers who traditionally have played that role. Its penchant for continuously releasing new products and services in beta, or test form, before they are perfected, has sent Microsoft reeling. Chairman Bill Gates recently warned employees in an internal memo of the challenges posed by such "disruptive" change.

Microsoft also worries that Google is raiding the ranks of its best employees. That was threatening enough when Google operated exclusively in Silicon Valley. But it grew worse when Google opened an outpost in the suburbs of Seattle, just down the road from Microsoft headquarters, and aggressively started poaching. Microsoft finally sued Google for its hiring of Kai-Fu Lee, a senior technologist who once headed Microsoft's Chinese operations. Lee is now recruiting in Asia for Google, despite a court order upholding aspects of a non-compete clause that Lee signed while at Microsoft.

Google's success is neither accidental nor ephemeral. Brin and Page — the sons of college professors who introduced them to computing when they were toddlers — met in 1995 at Stanford, where they were both Ph.D candidates in computer science and technology. They became inseparable and set out to do things their own way. Professors laughed at Page when he said one day that he was going to download the Internet so he could improve upon the primitive early search engines.

Seven years ago, Google didn't exist in any form beyond a glimmer in the eyes of Brin and Page. Then in the fall of 1998, they took leaves of absence from Stanford, and moved their hardware into the garage and several rooms of a house in nearby Menlo Park. Armed primarily with the belief that they could build a better search engine, they have created a company unlike any other.

With Brin and Page setting the tone, Google's distinctive DNA makes it an employer of choice for the world's smartest technologists because they feel empowered to change the world. And despite its growing head count of more than 4,000 employees worldwide, Google maintains the pace of innovation in ways contrary to other corporations by continuing to work in small teams of three to five, no matter how big the undertaking. Once Google went public and could no longer lure new engineers with the promise of lucrative stock options, Brin invented large multi-million-dollar stock awards for the small teams that come up with the most innovative ideas.

A good example is Google's latest deal — a far-reaching, complex partnership with NASA, unlike any agreement between a private firm and the space agency, to share data and resources and employees and identify ways to create new products and conduct searches together in space. Although NASA is a public entity, many of the details of the partnership remain hidden from public view.

Despite all that has been achieved, Google remains in its infancy. Brin likes to compare the firm to a child who has completed first grade. He and Page gaze into a glittering globe in the Googleplex that shows billions of Google searches streaming in from around the world, and notice the areas that are dark. These are the places that have no Internet access.

Quietly, they have been buying up the dark fiber necessary to build GoogleNet, and provide wireless Web access for free to millions or billions of computer userspotentially disruptive to phone and cable companies that now dominate the high-speed Internet field. Their reasoning is straightforward: If more people globally have Internet access, then more people will use Google. The more books and other information that they can translate into any language through an automated, math-based process they are developing now, the more compelling the Google experience will be for everyone, and the more wealth the company will have to invest in their vision.

Supremely confident, the biggest risk that Brin, Page and Google face is that they will be unable to avoid the arrogance that typically accompanies extraordinary success. Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos jokes that Brin and Page are so sure of themselves, they wouldn't hesitate to argue with a divine presence.

But the fact remains that they are human beings, and inevitably, both they and Google will make mistakes. Unless any of these prove lethal, however, Google — through its relentless focus on disruptive innovation — appears likely to wreak havoc on established enterprises and principles for many years to come.

Author's e-mail: vised@washpost.com

David Vise is a Post business reporter and the co-author with Mark Malseed of "The Google Story," published this week by Random House

I was thinking of writing the tag, but then the week went very quickly,So i will write the tag abt International Womans day b4 the next one comes ..I dont know how time goes so fast,everyday i sit in computer frm 530pm to 230am.So just thought of listing what all im doing looking on to screen daily,so that i can get some more time for usefull work.

My day starts at 6am,browse till 0615,then get ready to coll,back at 1700,switch on pc[rather shake the mouse to move it frm standby mode].Tats it.. nowadays my frequency of watching news channels has drastically reduced,Only serial i try to makeup is Chidambara Ragasiyam & LOLLU.But missed them too coz of this intelligent box.

List of my activities

1)Internet
2)Minesweeper & offlate FreeCell freak
3)iTunes always runs on background.[10 GB of songs! wat more gr8 tool,lot more than winamp]
4)Programming [again offlate has come down to 0]
5)Formatting & installing all kinda OS[i do it atleast once a week, hate them these days]

Internet::
Now this is where i waste a whole lot of time.Im one of very few,who is always online.While downloading stuff & messenger was my only form of wasting time till few months ago.Latest craze is on blogging,orkutting.Also waste lot of time moderating msgs to groups & organising my mailbox.Theres again 'n' mail ids,which i check daily which are subscribed to various lists,groups.

Orkut::
My initial perception about it was "Yet another hi5 kinda network used to remind abt bdays".So dint join it when i recieved a invite almost a year & half ago.Then later on friends said abt how ppl are jobless & wash thier dirty linen in public.I was invited to view activities of my friends by one.So i joined.But then i found a gr8 concept of communities.Its actually much more than a forum.Then lot of friend finding activity was there.I got some 20 contacts with whom i lost touch almost some 3-5 years ago.Also i have learnt manythings from community ranging from caste to politics to computers to tamil… list goes on.. Also try to participate in them actively

Tech stuff::
This will help whenever im in need of a help or theres something happening on tech arena.Even wikipedia has helped me moulding me a lot these days.Read pros & cons of rival technologies,compare them but always has the tendency to allign to antigoogle,opensource,java way..

Gaming::
Since my system[p3 866Mhz,256MB,200GB] cant accept even a very little load, Minesweeper,Freecell are only games i play.Even pinball makes my system cry.I loved minesweeper,but no more interested in it,as i reached near the world record.Now onto freecell.This lets u manages the resources available to u wisely & win.My stats are very poor[50%],trying to improve.

iTunes::

This is amazing piece of jukebox software i have ever seen which runs across platforms.Now though i have edited the ID3 tags of all songs i download then & there,I edit tags of my old MP3 CDs which all have artist title as thier info.But to say it has saved me lotto time compared to winamp.Now listening to wide range is easier…

Formatting & installing::

Now another key area i waste a lot of time,Almost i will install an oS atleast once a week as my system will slowdown, or i will do something to crash my boot loader.Latest craze is linux. I sat a whole day trying to install my modem,tried 4 diff distros yet cant get my modem installeed.

Other activities::

Write a lot of CDs & maintain a collection,Troubleshooting PCs,beach on weekends,occasionally reading stuff read something related to studies.So let me see when i get time to write my next blog..

Btw i have failed again to keep up my 2 blogs per week.. )

I havent seen what is failure till i entered college. That would be the case for most of us doing a BE/BTech under Anna univ.A very few pass out without keeping a arrear(say atleast a temp one which lasts till reval).Everyone knows its shitty correction…Now let me write a blog about my life under this univ,exams,results,revals,arrears….

My First Sem::

Well straight from school, where i felt 185/200 in board chemistry was a failure & was fed up as my cut off came around just 275. Well god had more lessons for me it seems.185/200 is no more a failure mark.The most toughest of the lot was E-Mech.I flunked in those cycle tests(first time in life), so was really scared of it.In the study leave,i went for tuition to my sister's friend who made my whole approach towards subject a lot easier.I got 90% in model(only sem we had model exam!)But i got a feel i would get 90%+ considering the fact that we had 4 labs.But when results came it was a utter shock.I got 26/80 in my chem exam.I was shattered.My FIRST FAILURE in my life.The next day onto my college,i was feeling humiliated as only some 15 or 20 failed in my college of 420.I was one among them.I was speechless for one week.Everyone told u will clear in reval.I too hoped it as i did well and was expecting above 60 in tat paper.It was a long wait for 40 odd days till one fine evening i heard from my dad that i have cleared by a huge margin.I must say i got good support but for which i would have committed suicide.My parents dint tell anything.Believed on me & gave me encouragement that i will clear my paper.My avg was 83.5%(tats highest till now)

My Second Sem::

Well the month immd after the first sem exams was followed by prac exams of first sem.Then time got on soon.I was in a new class of 60,getting on with new faces.Bang in middle it came, the first sem results.In second sem,My worry was about Eng Graphics.I was poor in drawing,hate it,sole reason y i took computer grp in my +1.[Of course now couldnt imagine life without computer].Since it was a lab paper,i wasnt worried tat much.My discrete math teacher used to tell us 'only 7 out of 35 passed in the paper'.But i always kinda liked that subject. Logic na… Datastructures was a cakewalk for me,this time i concentrated on chem so tat it doesnt let me down,Math was not a prob till 1st year,never bothered on English,So it was the turn of SemiConductor Physics & OptoElectornics or SPOE as we called.More than half of the class flunked in cycle test,We had 'n' no.. of retest in which again most will flunk.We had a very good teacher who will try to explain things but except one guy [ragesh]the whole class will sleep.So when the results came in,it was a major shock.More than 60% in my class had arrears[many flunked in my coll too].But this time i was bit more courageous while it was the turn of those 'first-timers' to feel the heat.I must say even after reval many incl me dint clear it up though a few did.One unlucky fellow like me was vinod[guy who was ambitious of IIT],he got phy & chem left after reval which cleared DataStructures alone.Now my average got flunked to mere 73%,

My Third Sem::

Well third started of with a big bang, was actually nice entering into dept,i felt no need to mug up shit like phy,chem here after as its gonna be computers.But again i was wrong.there was more to come.There was Electrical.I felt why should i still mug up shit about motors.Algorithms,DBMS,Sys soft were interesting & so was Digital systems.Math was getting tougher to me,as i came without preparing tests after tests.Time went soon, we had our dept symp & were helping seniors in conducting the mega event.When the time table was put up,i had Algorithmsa on Wed morning,SPOE in thurs afternoon followed by Electrical on Sat morning.That left very little time for my electrical.We had loads of stuff in DBMS to read.I prepared it with fear as i dint have confidence on myself as far as Electrical was concerned.So it was SPOE which was left on deal.So it came to end of wire,we had just 24 hrs between the exams,So after reaching home vinod rang me up & we started at 7pm.We did something over night & said we can do it in morning.We sat together on that morning,did some work usefully, but while entering into hall none of us had confidence of clearing.When i saw the paper,it contained all questions which i left.So i wrote something i knew.. & we all came back after writing 1.5 hrs and left it to gods grace.I did other subjects quite well though i dint match to my potential as i was getting carried away by SPOE everynow & again, feeling for it.When the results came,it was another bang,most of the 60 odd who wrote SPOE cleared.I was one of the few who still had it.Thankfully i learnt Electrical,in which i cleared.So i was havin SPOE carried away again.My percentage was 74.5% which was low considering 80% was easy & many had that mark..

Well i think this itself is a long post,So my 4,5 sems will come in next post.. Will write it soon

I must point out what i read in that community a serious flaw in the movie.It was maddy donating blood, technically its not possible as he consumed alcohol last night & it could have been very well due to that the boy could have lost his life..

But critics apart, One movie which deserves OSCAR.. Anbae Sivam ROCK. If u havent seen the movie,go watch it.

Well its budget time now, most of us would watch only one segment in that. TAX because that decides many things and has a cascading effect.

Why are people taxed?

It is for the basic functioning of govt. It can prepare new schemes to uplift the poor & infrastructure of the country. Well this is what we all are taught in school. But do we really care about how the money is spent. Most of us know only a little portion of sum allocated for schemes are reaching the needy. Rest is in the hands of politicians, govt. officials, contractors. They in turn evade tax & total money is getting accumulated in hands of few, so revenue to govt. gets decreased & ultimately taxes are increased.

Where is the money spent?

Well you will get the graph with portion of one Re spent on each sector & the same for revenue. Before that let me tell you where are we losing our money.
**Developmental schemes: Typically food for work, employment guarantee scheme, etc. [Politicians would have a major share of it]
**Infrastructure schemes: Roads, Railways, Medical, etc [senior govt. officials have major chunk of it]
**Defense: Well no one knows exactly but most of which are spent on the border… [Let’s leave it for the 'sake' of security of nation
**Research & Development: Being a son of one who works in R&D, i know thousands of crores of Rs are being spent rather wasted in the name of R&D .Literally speaking there is little or 0 developments from these investments. Will need a separate post to explain things on what I see...

Why was India not developing at the same pace when it had closed economy?

Well the answer is present implicitly in the previous answer. We had closed economy till early 90's.All the tax we paid got into black hole called corruption & govt. couldn’t work on infrastructure, couldn’t provide employment. So it opened up the economy. We had some growth before the IT boom in the fields of automobile industry & electronics, communication. But the incoming of IT to India overshadowed the growth of these sectors & have created a thousand times employment than the govt. can ever imagine. So India is growing at a larger pace due to large inflow of money for the IT&ITES services.

On Taxes for the high earning class (typically the software guys)
Well to tax further more on these guys will make India back to square 1 & it can’t grow due to the corrupt politicians. Soon India will become a 'poor' country then. Taxing on middle class is not possible by any govt. considering the coalition politics on centre.

Where does the govt. can get the money then?
Well mostly govt. gets its revenue from indirect taxes. India pays one of the heftiest service taxes of 10.2%. It was estimated that 5-7% of our entire GDP came from Service tax. There is always import duty on many items. Only electronics item’s import duty was reduced to make the IT boom into a larger one. Oil has one of heftiest tax but again govt. gives subsidy to stabilize the inflation rate & to keep the interests of middle class.

On Fringe benefit tax…

There is a general perception that these days’ youth in IT field earn lot & therefore they were the soft targets as usual. Often called as Fraud bad tax, they target on the ‘perks’ given to them. Telephone bills, car allowances, flight tickets, med-claim & whole lot of allowances. I said soft targets because all these are enjoyed by the higher rank govt. officials, ministers, M.L.As, MPs. Why doesn’t the govt. tax them? These people enjoy lot more than their working counterparts [IT guys]. Because reason is obvious no minister would like to tax himself more

Hoping for a 'GOOD' Budget..
Well Im a novice in the subject I have written, so if im wrong plz correct me.

PS: Politicians in the above post refer to corrupt ones.

Since i maintain this as a place from where i can recollect my past, i put the first article[before blogging], my day on Dec 26th 2004. I posted this to many groups so that they can feel the effect of that from a personal prospective.

Its dedicated to all those who were affected by tsunami,this was written on 28th Dec

Hello friends

Im a member of this group for few months now.I feel
It is my duty to inform about the calamity that shook
people's heart.

Im now feeling that "EVERY MOMENT I LIVE IS DUE TO
GODS GRACE"

Note : All the incidents narrated below
actually happened in Kalpakkam township and mostly
seen by me.Anyway u have been listening to news.Plz
try to help the victims or just PRAY FOR US.

***********************************************
NUCLEAR PLANT IS SUPERSAFE-WORRY FOR AFFECTED PEOPLE
***********************************************

Tsunami @ Kalpakkam-The day it was…

It was supposed to be a usual Sunday morning. I woke
up at 0430 itself as i dint get sleep.I was browsing
the net from that moment. Suddenly at around 7:15 am
my friend from Beasent Nagar called me and said he
experienced a mild earthquake.I didnt feel any sort
of thing from the moment i woke up.He said the
situation now is better.I was bit worried at that time as my
dad and sister have just left for chennai around 6:40
am.

I then started chating with couple of my friends. I
enquired both of them and they said there is no loss
due to quake.It was around 8:45 am ,the second time
when my friend called up and just said that he was
willing to visit my place and stay here for a week
to spend the holidays,the phone line was cutoff.
Within seconds power-supply was also cutoff. I heard some
howling noise,people shouting, some running on
streets.I opened the door and saw people being taken
from water.It was like sewage water initially which
just entered our street which is in uphill of
slope.I got down to see what actually is happening?

I saw it was just within 10 metres from my doorstep
water has come with a greater force and as it was
slope, it came till peoples shoulder.Some of people
playing in nearby ground rushed and are rescuing
persons only whose hands were visible.We took them
to our houses and provided some confidence,first
aid,food and slowly enquired.I took my vehicle to actually
make a call to my dad.My friend took a rescued old lady
in his bike and made her sit in his house.I tried to
contact my dad but didnt get him.Two of my friends
and i tried to have some kind of view of overall
township started our bikes.We crossed our house in another
way to see few of vehicles rolled over on road.The road
was full of mud.A Sumo has crashed into a shop.We
tried to cross the BRIDGE which connects the two
spheres of Kalpakkam Township.We saw it was badly
damaged,had holes in it.We just had a single way.We
could not get into other half as it was full of
water upto 4 feet.I returned to my home.

By then the people in Central Avenue,Sadras East,Two
Churches and those who were on the arterial road
were in worst condition.Many were pushed by tides
force and travelled nearly 500 metres without swimming,some
got hold of tree branches,some fell into partially open
& partially closed strom water drains.Some came NUDE
after water washed away everything.We dont know
that this happened throughout the continent.Everyone was
instructed to goto terus.A whole lot of people
gathered there.Few children without parents,Few
mothers crying without small kids.I saw a tide which
came as high as church in the sea.Now it was the
second time it striked.This time the damage was
heavier as more people were on roads to
rescue,search thier loved ones.I just called my friend through
intercom and asked him to keep in touch with my dad.
Around 11 am someone told Marina is suffering
from similar fate.

By now rescue operations were in full swing, Single
vatch of Army has come in to rescue people.I heard
Radio news to know that this is even more
disasterous.Starting from Sumatra till Srilanka.By
now they said 30 bodies were present in our Hospital
which was even flooded as it was very near to the coast.

By noon the colony was asked to vacate and busses
were operated to and fro to nearby Anupuram Township
which is 10 km away from shore.My mom and I were
tensed as we could not get any information from my
dad, so didnot leave our house .Around 3pm my dad
reached Anupuram and searched us.Later he said he
will be coming home as soon as there is a bus there.I
went to bus stand to receive him.I saw my friend who was
searching his father, Headmaster of our high school
who was on duty to hold a national level symposium
for which students have come from around the country.
luckily they were saved. This time the water had
drained and we crossed the bridge which had big
holes in the middle. Now we understood that the second and
third attack which came around 1 pm is still worse
than the first one. We saw cars lying in backwaters
which was 500 metres from the main road thrown by
tide. We went to school where his father has left a
note that he is safe in Anupuram.Houses opposite to
school which were hardly 300 metres from shore were
badly hit.There were sofas,TVs lying on road.
Unfortunately those houses are Bungalow type and
dint have a terus.

On returning we saw a hand cut off separately on
road.My friend also said that my classmate's father
has expired that morning due to the tide as he was
on road to buy milk.The worst part is that my classmate
himself searched for hours before he identified at
mortuary where hundred bodies were lying. I
returned to home to see my dad and sister arraived from
Chennai safely. My dad said we all were asked to
vacate immidietely as 48 hours warning was given. It
was 5 pm and we started packing some clothes,
certificates,some cash and left home.

One must remember the communication link is totally
cutoff . Though some had Cell phones neither it dint
have Battery as power has gone in morning itself nor
there were no recharge coupons available as all
shops have closed.We were transported to Anupuram township
by department buses which were pushed into
evacuation services.

There were thousands on the road there. Few persons
were seen distributing food packets, water etc.We
thought of leaving to Chennai but the buses were
pressed for rescuing people from Kalpakkam.Few maxi
cabs were filled with as many as 35 people traveling
in it.We got into my father’s friends house who was
kind enough to accommodate and provide some food and
shelter. On next morning (27th Dec)we somehow
reached Chengalput with greater difficulty and then went to
our relatives house. On seeing reports of
electrocution in the church that is at stone throw
distance from my house is shocking.We stayed there
and watched the news. Chennai was even more tense as
roomers spread about Karunanidhi’s health. After
calling up an official in Kalpakkam we returned to
our place on 28th afternoon after getting assured that
power supply, water are getting restored. As a sign
of luck Telephone got restored. Everything is getting
back to normal. Office is scheduled to commence from
29th. Even now only a few are staying at Kalpakkam
as many are still afraid off. Information centre is
setup here. For those who need essential information mail
me,I will try to provide as far as possible.

Many of my friends are worried ,some lost their
loved ones.100s are homeless though alternate measures are
provided for the worst affected.Im sending this mail
at 12 am hoping my experiences would cause a person
to contribute atleast an atom size contribution . So
please contribute as much as possible in any form
either money or rescue and rehabilitation
items,food,MEDICINES,clothes,etc to any organization
working for relief. On seeing TV I feel that
Nagapattinam,Srilanka Thailand are adversely
affected.
Please PRAY God for early restoration of Normalcy
throughout the World.

Bye
Srikanth.L

Has it fueled premarital sex.Lets see

“Dont flush condoms here”. This is a sign board in front of Bangalore BPO’s TOILETS.This was made cover story on a sunday magazine in Indian Express.So whats that about.The story goes likes this,During night shifts, young BPO Employees take breaks in couples & f**k [since they are educated,they use condoms].They throw them in toilet & flush it.During a sewage block,sanitary staff found condoms being flushed from toilets blocked & took bags of condoms.

So are we Indians who proclaim to have a very great tradition,drifting away from them.These young people enjoy & dont think about basic human values & ethics our elders have followed.Where has this sudden change come from? Many would say due to WESTERN EFFECT. Thats blabbering to core. It was a complex function that has fueled this attitude towards youth.

1) Lack of parental influence due to busy schedule of both of them
2) Sudden flow of huge amount of disposable income
3) Scientific Development on issues regarding premarital.Sexercise is advised today,so there can be parlours soon like oxygen outlets.Branding Redlight areas )
4) LARGELY DUE TO TABOO SURROUNDING SEX.

Well i would like to finish it off by saying,its due to lack of god fearing & respecting values.But these people will one day face troubles when they see thier children f**king with thier own friends in public or Mom feeling the need to check if condoms are present everytime thier daughter going out. That day is not far in India..

Best remedy is not to publicise about use of condoms excessively,but educate children about the ill effects of having multiple sex partners,impart our tradition to them & eventually bring one-one relationship atleast in next generation.Thats the best way to fight AIDS

Dont publicise too much about using condoms,that will make even the young minds feel that its perfectly OK to have sex with anyone provided we use condoms.

PS: Sexercise is actually advised only with one partner.. & in positive sense. Im not gonna mind if someone feels bad abt me after reading this one.

Well i have noticed that conferences like these being held in star hotels for lumpsum[15000 Rs for 3 days] mainly targeted towards professionals.So initially when i saw the ad, i wasnt attracted. When i came to know it was being offered for Rs.500 with 3 days lunch & goodies,i thought i would have a go & explore java some more.

On the day before i just went to thier site & saw the agenda.I was like a schoolboy lost in crowd.I dint understand what the abbreviations meant.I downloaded materials,tried to have an intro,i was blank on more than half the topics being covered.

I went there & had 4 sessions,i sat 2 sessions in which i have sound knowledge.They were a real treat. The keynote with contests on java's power using apps built were too cool.The judiciary software rocked & is being currently used in India. It was a day of mixed thoughts & exposures in java.At the end it was a great Q & A session which only 20 of us attended. Mr.Peter, Mr.Sundararajan ( www.blogs.sun.com/sundararajan) were amazing.I got a T Shirt for asking a Q.To our surprise we all got a bag(worth 500 by itself!!). Though music night by Shiv mani was arranged, i left coz i had 2 hr travel to reach home.

Day2::

Well day 2's first session was on a dry subject. Next was java puzzles. Boy i loved it.Though i couldnt get through,i was ultimate fun.During the afternoon i sat for netbeans session & mobile progming.Mobile prgming attracted me. Was very eager to attend the next day.

Some of new things in java industry which i never heard till that day were
BEPL
SOAP
JSF
AJAX(i have heard but knew nothin on it)
CVS
Profiling
Performance monitoring

Day 3::

It was NetBeans day. Having done a project using it, i was eager to know more on it.To my disappointment there were some repeats of day2, Mobile programming using netBeans created lot of enthu in me.Sadly none are there now.On the whole it was good exposure into netBeans

Coming onto general things,We had reasonably good food all three days with coffee breaks.It was during one such breaks we knew about solaris.The guy who explained about solaris rocked.Though we dint know any internals or ground work on solaris,he explained from core.

During these 3 days,my day started at 6 in morning, boarded the bus at 630.Went to Trade Centre,Sat through sessions,came back at 7pm,boarded bus to reach home by 930. Went to bed. I was totally cutoff from rest of the world(Internet mainly)

After sun tech days, my knowledge on java became 0 comparing the rapid development in one year span.Well i think i will catch up with technology one day or the other…….

Java rocks

During my early days onto internet i thought that blogging was actually no.1 useless job, as most maintain it as a open personal diary.like they start with 6'o clock write what happened till 10pm dialy.Around six months before i found some usefull blog sites containing interesting articles, suddenly i started reading personal experiences of them containing philosophical & social concern.Then i moved onto tech blogs. Man without tech blogs life wouldnt have much easier for them.

Finnaly i was too much attracted towards blogs that i started my own. I dont even mind if only a few or none read them, It would be useful to organise my flow of thoughts at a particular point of my life.

Since i totally forgot about blogs,for long time i post them in bulk..

Read it….

I hope to provide a nice mix of tech,reality, informative blogs N update my blog with atleast 2 posts a week.Hope i can make it.

For strangers im Srikanth doing my 3rd yr Computer Science Engineering in SSN College Chennai. Known as logic on my friends circle, Im a person who thinks rationally & dont feel much even if im alone in a place for days together.Hope u can know me completely better only if u get to me with ur idealogies as they differ frm person to person.

Got to find stuff for writing my next post. Gotto go Bye