Manoj

Tribute to Steve

2011-10-06T14:37:00.005+05:30

It took me a second to realise what had happened when I read the title Steve Jobs — 1955-2011. As the truth that Steve had passed away sunk in, I was overwhelmed with emotions. For millions of people including me, he was a source of inspiration. His rich charisma, confidence and wisdom does indeed create reality distortion fields, which with time became a reality. He disrupted and reinvented many industries which many dream of doing at least once. The tribute coming from people across all fields including politics is a testament to his greatness.

Click here to see a fitting video tribute by Gizmod.

"Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything - all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.'' - Steve Jobs

"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice.'' - Steve Jobs

"Stay hungry, stay foolish." - Steve Jobs

"Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn't matter to me ... Going to bed at night saying we've done something wonderful... that's what matters to me." - Steve Jobs

The world rarely sees someone who has had the profound impact Steve has had, the effects of which will be felt for many generations to come. For those of us lucky enough to get to work with him, it's been an insanely great honor. I will miss Steve immensely. - Bill Gates

Flimpressions

2011-05-16T00:26:00.011+05:30

I am, like a film buff and enjoy watching lot of films. Started from Kollywood and Bollywood movies, later on moved to the more glamour less Malayalam movies and then to Hollywood action films, slowly with time added those classics and highly rated films to my viewing list. Very recently German, Japanese and films from languages which I do not understand sneaked into my viewing list.
The more films I watch, the more fascinated I am at the different ways the movies are used to express the creativity of the people involved. Grown up watching movies involving love and parental sentiments in the south and all the glitz and glamour of the Bollywood movies, I was surprised at the varied subjects and horizons the directors were reaching out in the film from other industries. My first Hollywood movies experience was the Jurassic park and I am pretty sure most people in my generation had their first peek into Hollywood through that movie. Some of my classmates had watched Terminator and Rambo style movies for all the action and blood that it threw on the screen. We were in 3rd or 4th standard at that time. For all the hula and hype surrounding the Jurassic Park, I was least impressed and did not understand what was so great about it - A few monster sized animals moving around killing people? - Nah - I was not scared - I still loved tamil films and was scared of the big mustached villans! The second one was The Matrix and no wonder the only thing interesting about the film was the gymnastic styled fight sequence and the number falling graphics! I left the movie hall cursing my friend for taking me to a movie which neither of us understood. I have come a long way from that point and am in a mental state to appreciate all those films.
I personally think you can never completely understand why you like a particular movie. Its probably because it evoked some of your own experience in a sublime and silent way or probably it exposed some part of you like your own contradictions and vulnerabilities. There are movies which created those "ah" and "Is that not true" moments. Also watching movies from other culture keeps pushing the horizon of your thoughts further and further. Some movies try to communicate messages at different level with subtly hidden meanings and there are movies which has those crazy and farfetched ideas that you keep thinking about when lying alone in the bed at night. And last there are movies which everybody says is intelligent but nobody understands it - like you know what.
Right from the cinematography, the tone of the film, the character building, the background music, the settings, the actors, the screenplay etc plays an important role in making you like or do not like a film. In short its never easy to say why you like a movie and all you can do is sit back, enjoy the magic and cherish the experience it creates because there is no formula for creating a good movie.

Online Privacy Issue

2011-01-15T14:22:00.002+05:30

Recently during a chat, a friend said to me that he suspected Google was reading his mails as he was seeing lot of ads on a product he was planning to buy. He had discussed about those product with some people over chat and mail. I had known that Google does read through the mails and provide targeted ads whenever possible. In fact they have been doing this for pretty long time and I was surprised that only now he was noticing it! Needless to say he was pretty pissed off and astonished to find this!! A similar conversation with another friend, this time about Facebook, and as I expected he was not aware of the many privacy related issues that came with using Facebook. I told an example of how I had googled the name of some complete stranger and found the Facebook page on top of the Google search result. I could access many personal information about that person including likes, location etc. This happens 99%(yeah I made up that number) of the time because the user has not set the privacy settings of his/her profile properly. Reason - they do not know that it could be viewed by a total stranger! Worse, most of them do not know that such privacy settings exist!

In both the above instance, the real problem was not that those two companies choose to impose their own definition of privacy, but that the users were 'blissfully' unaware of it! Lack of awareness and understanding about the privacy issues among the end users is what needs to be addressed. Once they are educated on this they would choose more wisely on what services to use and what information to put up on the internet.

The Story of Ashton (and many of the Software engineers out there)

2010-12-15T10:35:00.005+05:30

Came across an Interesting answer by Joel on Programmers Stackexchange. Have reproduced it below. The story is pretty long, but well worth the read.

The Story

Ashton was your classic corn-fed farm boy. His parents had been hippies who never really managed to get their acts together until his mother inherited 15 acres in a rural part of Michigan. The family moved out there, bought a couple of dairy goats, and struggled to make a living selling organic goat cheese to the yuppies at the Ann Arbor Farmer’s Market.

From the time he was ten years old, Ashton had to wake up every morning at 4:00 a.m. and milk those damn goats, and it was exhausting. Ashton loved going to school because it meant he wasn’t working knee-deep in goat poop. Throughout high school, he studied his ass off, hoping that a scholarship to a good university would be his ticket out of the farm. He found college to be so much easier than farm life that he didn’t understand why everyone else didn’t get straight A’s like him. He majored in Software Engineering because he couldn’t imagine engineers ever being required to wake up at 4:00 a.m.

Ashton graduated from school without knowing much about the software industry, really, so he went to the career fair, applied for three jobs, got accepted by all three, and picked the one that paid the most: something insane like $32,000 a year, working at a big furniture company in the southwestern part of the state that manufactured cubicle farms for corporations all over the world. He never wanted to see a farm again, so he was determined to make a good impression on his boss, Charlie Sherman.

“That’s not going to be easy,” his cubicle-mate, Jeff, said. “She’s something of a legend here.”

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“Well, you remember a few years ago, when there was all that uproar about Y2K?”

Ashton was probably too young. “Y2K?”

“You know, nobody expected that all the old computer programs written in the 1960s would still be running in 2000, so they only had room for two digits for the year. Instead of storing 1999, they would store 99. And then when the year flipped over on January 1st, 2000, the computer systems crashed, because they tried to fit “100” in two digits.

“Really? I thought that was a myth,” Ashton said.

“At every other company in the world, nothing happened,” Jeff said. “They spent billions of dollars checking every line of code. But here, of course, they’re cheap bastards, so they didn’t bother doing any testing.”

“Not at all?”

“Zilch. Zero testing. Nada. And lo and behold, when people staggered back into work on January 2nd, not a single thing worked. They couldn’t print production schedules. They couldn’t get half of the assembly lines to even turn on. And nobody knew what shifts they were supposed to be working. The factory literally came to a standstill.”

“You’re kidding,” Ashton said.

“I shit you not. The factory was totally silent. Now, Charlie, she was new then. She had been working at Microsoft, or NASA, or something... nobody could figure out why someone like her would be working in our little armpit of a company. But she sat down, and she started coding. And coding. And coding.

“Charlie coded for nine days straight. Nine days without sleeping, without eating, some people even claimed she never went to the bathroom. She went from system to system and literally fixed all of them. It was something to behold. My God, there were COBOL systems in there that needed to be fixed. The whole factory at a standstill, and Charlie is sending people to the university library in Ann Arbor to find old COBOL manuals. Assembly-line workers are standing around shivering, because even the thermostats had a Y2K bug. And Charlie is drinking cup after cup of coffee and typing like a madwoman.”

“Wow. And she never went to the bathroom?”

“Well, that part might be a little bit of an exaggeration. But she really did work 24 hours for nine days straight. Anyway, on January 11th, about five minutes before the day shift is supposed to start, she comes out of her cubicle, goes to the line printer, hits a button, and boom! out comes the production schedules, and the team schedules, and everything is perfect, perfectly formatted, using a slightly smaller font so that the “2000” fits where it used to say “99,” and she’s even written a new priority optimizing system that helps them catch up with 9 days of missed production without pissing off too many customers, and all the assembly lines start running like nothing was ever wrong, and the heat comes on, and the invoices come out printed with ‘2000’ as the year instead of ‘19100,’ and after that day, nobody found a single bug.”

“Oh come on!” Ashton says. “Nobody writes code without bugs.”

“She did. I saw it with my own eyes. The first day back they ran two days worth of cubicles without a hiccup.”

Ashton was dumbstruck. “That’s epic. How can I live up to that?”

“You can’t, buddy, nobody can,” Jeff said, turning back to his computer terminal, where he resumed an online flame war over who would win in a fight, Spock or Batman, which had been raging for over four months.

Not one to give up, Ashton swore he would, one day, do something legendary. But the truth is, there never was another Y2K. And nobody, in that part of Michigan, gave a rat’s ass about good programming. There was almost nothing for the programmers to do, in fact. Ashton got dumb little projects assigned to him... at one point he spent three weeks working on handling a case where the sales tax in one particular county was wrong because some zip code spanned two different sales tax zones. The funny thing was, it was in some unpopulated part of New York State where nobody ever bought office cubicles, and they had never had a customer there, so his code would never run.

Ever.

For two years Ashton came into work enthusiastic and excited, and dying to make a difference and do something terrific and awesome, while his coworkers surfed the Internet, sent instant messages to their friends, and played computer solitaire for hours.

Jeff, his cubicle-mate, only had one responsibility: updating the weekly Excel spreadsheet indicating how many people were hurt on the job that week. Nobody ever was. Once a week, Jeff opened the spreadsheet, went to the bottom of the page, entered the date and a zero, hit save, and that was that.

Ashton even wrote a macro for Jeff that automated that one task. Jeff didn’t want to get caught, so he refused to install it. They weren’t on speaking terms after that. It was awkward.

On the morning of his two year anniversary at the cubicle company, Ashton was driving to work when he realized something.

Not one line of code that he had written had ever run.

Not one thing he had done in two years of work made any impact on the world.

And it was fucking 24 degrees in that part of Michigan, and it was gray, and smelly, and his Honda was a piece of crap, and he didn’t have any friends in town, and nothing he did mattered.

As he drove down Lincoln Avenue, he saw the furniture company ahead on the left. Three flags fluttered in front of the corporate campus: an American flag, a flag of the great state of Michigan, and a white and red flag with the company logo. He got in the turning lane behind a long line of cars waiting to turn left. It always took four or five traffic light cycles, at rush hour, to make the turn, so Ashton had plenty of time to try to remember if any code he had ever written was ever used by anyone.

And it hadn’t. And he fought back a tear.

And instead of turning left, he went straight, almost causing an accident because he forgot that the left turn light didn’t mean you could go straight.

And he drove right down Lincoln Avenue, and got onto the Gerald Ford freeway, and he just kept driving until he got to the airport over in Grand Rapids, and he left his crappy old Honda out right in front of the terminal, knowing perfectly well it would be towed, and didn’t even close the car door, and he walked right up to the Frontier Airlines counter and he bought himself a ticket on the very next flight to San Francisco, which was leaving in 20 minutes, and he got on the plane, and he left Michigan forever.

Epilogue

The story continues: He thought things would be different in a company like Google and went onto work on Google Wave. Again, his code was never used by anyone....

Driving in the Rain - Again

2010-10-21T12:06:00.001+05:30

The rain usually brings the crazy me out. I started my two wheeler to come back to room. The engine roared to life exactly at the same time the rain drops fell on my hand. I had to drive one kilo meter on the opposite direction and then take a u-turn to get to the road to my room. I decided against my good reasoning not to do that and instead drive against the traffic and cross over to the right road in the junction ahead. The rain had made the visibility low and people more crazy to get to their home faster.
I put on my helmet, turned the accelerator and started driving against the traffic. Half the way I realised how crazy it was trying to do what I was trying to do. With the cars and jeeps veering off at the last moment to avoid hitting me and all the water mixed with mud from the road being splashed on me, I was to say the least - Scared! Thankfully because of the rain, the tantrums thrown at me by those drivers was not audible! Also there were no police because of the rain. After about three kilometers of this crazy drive, I reached the junction and took a left to the right road. Only at that moment did I start appreciating those "driving against the traffic" stunts shown in films. Soon enough I reached my room, all wet, dirty and relived. I swore to myself to never try this again.

Sandeep's Day Out - The Final Destination

2010-02-21T09:59:00.000+05:30

After getting out of the car, we ensured that all the passengers in the car were safe. Thankfully none of us were injured. We walked to the rear and gazed at the car. There was a dent at the right back. The lights were lying on the middle road, almost 30 meters from the car. The lorry was also parked behind us. We could see people flocking around us. We were not talking to each other aloud but our minds were communicating. All were mutually soliciting “What to do now?” Neither the Lorry driver nor any of the people around us uttered a word to us, but were gossiping among themselves. We were also not in a position to converse as none of us knew Kannada. Manoj & Sandy were most disturbed thinking how we would give an explanation to the whole incident. Time was moving fast & Vishnu suggested “Guys! We will leave this place first. Manoj, Hope the car would start & it’s you who are going to drive”. Sandy’s hand was still shivering; he still had not recovered from the gaffe that had happened.

Manoj, with fumbling hands took the car, I resumed my role of the co - driver & Sandy sat with Kandy. We could hear the sounds of the spring and little additional sounds generated by the car, till now who was a silent chap. We were comforting each other by saying that,"Accidents do happen & it’s not done intentionally and probably that’s why it’s called an accident”. We stopped the car after 3 – 4 kms. We all got down the car to figure out what to do now & how would we convey the whole episode. We had no words to say, there was no real excuse for us for what had happened. It might have been Sandy who drove, but we felt we all were equally responsible for our destiny. We said “Lets face the situation with courage; we shall inform what had happened & come what may, we shall face it together”. We hugged each other & our moods flipped 180 degree from gloominess back to cheerfulness. Tears of desperation transformed to tears of acceptance. I feel that was the greatest moment of the tour. We all were one there & I would cherish this moment my life long. We smiled at each other. I could see Manoj getting back to normal & he said in confidence, “I shall drive”.

We resumed the journey. To bring back Sandy to his normal self, we were cracking all kinds of jokes. During all this drama, Kandy lost his wallet. He was searching inside the car, searching out side the car & even searched Sandy’s Pocket. Manoj saw to it that we never crossed 40Kmph and we reached back to Gayathri Bhavan without any further adventure.

We returned back to Gayathri Bhavan & we could see Kandy still searching for the wallet. Kandy missing his wallet & Vishnu missing his date was the only the real tragedy of the whole tour. We all were standing outside the house & one of us casually remarked “After one year we would be laughing at the whole incident!”. Very true, today Sep-23-2008 marks one year of our action-packed trip & I can see at least 30 of you laughing with us.

Terrible Trip Sandeep's Day Out V - The Vantage point.

2009-10-15T19:50:00.001+05:30

The continuum that we enjoyed, the tales that we spoke, never compelled our minds to think about the food though our appetite can fill a loaf of bread each. The return journey to Madhur was quick as we felt. Just as we were about to enter the highway, I stopped the car and asked Manoj if he could continue the driving. Manoj looked grumpy, “What’s the problem”, I asked. “I feel nauseous”, he replied. May be due to the rough ride with an empty stomach would have caused this problem. We decided to stop the car at a near by restaurant and have our delayed lunch. Manoj asked me to drive until we have our food so that he can take control after the refreshment. Pushing the pedal we started to move forward. After driving through gutters and troughs, highway looked much comfortable for me. Driving with no interruption we met with the first signal on our way back. Our car was the last to miss the green signal and was made wait in the first row for the next. Vishnu who had been silent all the while was only estimating the time at which we will reach home. “tok tok tok” we heard a knock at the left rear window. Kandy, who had been sitting closest to the window, opened it to see a woman with a basket selling boiled groundnuts (with shell). Without any hesitation Kandy pulled his wallet and bought a packet of it.
Eating the nuts we went in search of a restaurant. Vishnu who had been at the co-driver seat was breaking the shells and giving me the nuts. Kandy who was tired and feeling sleepy went low in his seat to make himself comfortable for a small nap. Seeing the sign board displaying ‘Bangalore 30km’, Vishnu turned back to Manoj and asked “Machu we had a great tour. Why were we afraid to take the car? See we have accomplished.” “Certainly”, was the reply. The accent was sharp, crisp and oh so pleasing. The thought of accomplishment was a bit too early for us. There happened something which I would never forget in my life, not because it was pleasurable but it obliges to get erased from my memory.
.
.
[Drivers point of view - Sandeep]

I always tried to maintain the right lane of the road just because I was not in a competition to race other vehicles and was driving at an average speed of 70km/hr so that the vehicles which want to overtake me can do it without taking much risk and blowing the horn repeatedly. I saw a lorry with no load moving just in front of me in the same right lane, with a little slower speed. I thought of driving past this lorry which I had been doing for all the vehicles that was traveling with a speed less than mine. I checked for the vehicle that were coming behind me with a top mirror and identified one blue colored Swaraj Mazda racing just behind me. My instinct acquainted me to allow the vehicle move forward and then go to the left lane. As thought, after the passage of Mazda I pushed the left indicator and switched over to the left lane. By that time, Mazda had crossed the lorry and was in the same left lane. There was a wide gap between the Mazda and the lorry where I can comfortably overtake the lorry and reach the right lane. I pushed the pedal, speed was increased when immediately I realized that the Mazda had pushed its brake and was about to stop all of a sudden. The gap started closing; the fear in me hitting the Mazda head on came over, even if I apply the brake. With a bold decision I pressed the accelerator to the maximum so that I can seep through before the gap gets closed. The lorry driver was also reluctant to lower his speed. With blowing horn I pushed through the gap. Eyes keen on the edges of the car I almost crossed when “thud”, I felt a push in the car. The right indicator at the back along with a small part of the car was hit by the lorry. The only thought that came over my mind was that none of us were buckled with seat belts. I felt a jump of the car and steering out of my hand. The car was heading towards the median that separates the road between the vehicles coming to Bangalore to the one going to Mysore. With my left hand I managed to hold the steering and turned it to the left knowing there wouldn’t be any vehicle since the Mazda had stopped behind. Thank God! It was a power steering which helped me to pull the car to a halt under a tree beside the road. Horrified I was, cursing the lack of maturity I had, I turned to see Vishnu who seemed to be troubled. When I saw down he was trying to split open a small groundnut shell. Succeeding his attempt, he ate the nuts and said, “Guys get down”.
[Co driver - Vishnu]
As a very responsible co – driver, I used to help Sandy in doing judgments all along the homecoming, which I am sure he would be grateful to me. After buying the ground nuts, I was more concerned about the groundnuts than our lives which we had surrendered to our driver Sandy. As I was busy breaking the groundnuts, I saw a van in our same lane (left) & lorry in the adjacent lane & we were heading towards it. I was convinced in Sandy’ driving skills by then & expected that he would take a sensible decision on his own & kept mum for this time. I guess, he was confident enough to squeeze through & of course he did. While overtaking, I heard a “Thud” & the car bent to the left, I saw all the ground nuts kept on the dash board falling down. I realized that the car had hit the lorry. By that time I split open the nut that I had in my hand (This had not fallen down), the car was parked. I looked at Sandy. I could see myself in his eyes. There was dead stillness inside the car. I broke it by uttering” Guys, Its hit, Get down”.
[Passenger who was awake - Manoj]
At one signal we bought some groundnuts and were eating it. It was after this, things took a wrong turn, along with the car. At one point Sandeep decided to overtake a truck. He changed lanes and was pressing the pedal. That’s when he noticed that a van before us on the same lane was suddenly slowing down – of course it was coming to a halt! The gap between the truck and the van was closing down... Sandeep continued pushing the car through the gap until 3/4th of its length when the truck hit us in the rear end and the car went out of control. But for Sandeep's quick reflexes and presence of mind the car would have crossed the median and gone to the other side of the road. He was able to catch the steering wheel again and brought the car back to control before parking it on the left side of the road. I still remember those sequences in slow motion as I was watching him from the rear seat. Apparently Vishnu and Kandy did not realize the magnitude of what could have happened, because Vishnu was still trying to spilt open the shell and Kandy just woke up from his sleep to a nightmare!! Vishnu after successfully breaking the ground nut and eating it said – “let’s get down!”.
[Passenger who was sleeping - Kandy]
I was a little tired and wanted to eat desperately, I could not prevent myself buying ground nuts with SHELL (cause of Vishnu’s “historical event”) and I went on finishing it very quickly. When quarter of it remained, I heard that they were probing for a hotel, So I closed my eyes for a while.
And after a while,
Suddenly…. I felt that the car was oscillating slightly and for an instant, the car was in air and I opened my eyes….. Sandy’s arms were moving very rapidly in counterclockwise direction and the car was stopped. I was quick enough to realize that an Accident had occurred and we all wanted to get down, to see if any damage has occurred for the car. None moved and everybody was reluctant. And then the “historical event” occurred, which I missed to seeL. I think the taste of ground nut has forced Vishnu to do it.
Vishnu asked us to get down.

Terrible Trip - Sandeep's Day out IV

2009-09-30T21:33:00.001+05:30

Post by Kandy…

We drove further 30 kms down the Mysore highway. The speed at which we were cruising had increased after Manoj had the food. I should say, he was driving fantastically, the reason being, he had the complete control of the speed and every criticizers silence after the "laugh-out-loud scene" described by Sandy, could be taken as the evidence.

We really missed our roommates . We wished they too were with us for our first road trip @ Soliton. We reached Madhur in 1 hour. By enquiring at one or two tea shops we found the "Left" that would take us to our destination. As soon as we took the left Manoj took a break and Sandy took over. I guess he had been waiting for this situation to emulate Michael Schumacher.

Fortunate for us and unfortunate for Sandy, the road was worse than what we expected. It was full of gutters and holes. As and when the speedometer touched 30Km/Hr, we found ourselves in front of a trough and he was forced to decelerate and he understood the situation and showed some noteworthy driving on rare occasions. But on the course of journey, he kept asking me regularly [Hmm…. I became the only victim and I don't know why?], about what I felt about his driving. I wanted him to look confident, so I told that he was driving better and there was some truth in it. But we made fun on him when ever he fumbled, which he did not take seriously. Journey was becoming little dull, so to boost our sprits we switched on the radio.

We realized that we had had traveled 80Kms from Bangalore when we couldn't tune in to any of the channels. Soon we reached ShivanaSamdrum!

We parked the car and hopped out. A gentle wind blew into our face as if welcoming us. My oh my, what a view it was – the Niagara of Karnataka. The water was milky white and looked like a silky white hair of the Hill. I stood still for a moment and was lost in the beauty. We walked down the hill to the valley to experience the splendor. There I felt as is if the silence was made up with the sound of the stream. Enough of poetic expressions. At the same spot there was water falling from 3 hills. We hired a coracle and rowed near to each of the falls that usually only men with guts like us do :). As we rowed nearer & nearer the turbulence created by the massive fall was causing our coracle to dangle & that was a real test for our nerve. To add to our excitement, the rower started spinning the coracle rapidly. We screamed in ecstasy but still every one of us was very keen in getting photographed.

Once back to the land, we looked around & noticed the amused looks of the people around and realized that we were the only stags out there. Vishnu looked at the watch & reminded us of time. He hurried us uphill so that we could get back to our house before dark. We smelled something fishy on his artificial worry & later we discovered the reason was that he was going out on a date that evening. Anyways, it was already 3 PM, we decided to return back & for the sake of Vishnu we skipped our lunch & satisfied ourselves with 'Good Day'...

We were invigorated by the nature & we bid adieu to ShivanaSamdrum. Sandeep hit wheels & Vishnu positioned himself in the co driver's seat, I & Manoj were relaxing at the rear. By 4 Pm we touched the Mysore Highway. Even though the road was terrible our experience until now was wonderful.

In all the excitement and bliss we never realized that we have not fastened the seat belt. By 5: 00 Pm we were 30 Kms away from Gayathri Bhavan. One of us exclaimed "Thank God! Vishnu's dream didn't materialize!" I guess we overlooked the remaining 30Kms.

To be continued….

Terrible Trip – Sandeep’s Day Out - III

2009-09-17T13:08:00.001+05:30

This post was by Sandeep himself…!

Sandeep's Day Out- Drive the car, Push the car !?!

The quest for the BLR-Mysore highway was still pertaining in our minds, because at some signal we have to take a left turn so that we can muster into the highway. The road looked decent but the traffic did not. As usual Vishnu had his own way to pass the time by speaking his “19 to the dozen”, myself and Kandy commenting on every “fact :)” that he was explaining. In all this excitement I forgot to notice one thing, the driver of the vehicle was not responding to what ever our tongues were wagging at. He looked very serious, sitting straight and cautious on the road. Though the meter reading did not cross 30km/hr (due to traffic) at any part of the time, I felt its better not to disturb his concentration. It was Kandy who used to pump Manoj with one identical question, “Is everything alright?” Manoj would respond back with an “hmmm” reply.
Things were moving smooth on the ride. At one point of time, we could see that the roads were completely packed in a still position. Oh that was a traffic signal! The signal looked big enough for us to conclude that to be the junction which connects the highway. Manoj looked relaxed; he was waiting for this point to ease himself from his upright position thinking the traffic would be less and roads much smoother than what he was riding. With all excitement Manoj pushed the left indicator despite the fact that there is still a half a km journey to the signal. The car crawled like a snail and at last we took a left for the second green signal.
The road looked narrower than what we had expected it to be and only very few vehicles took a left turn at the signal. The road went steeper and steeper, a feel of ambivalence took over us whether to proceed or not. We stopped the car beside the road and thought of asking the commuters who were sitting at the teashop for directions. They informed us saying this was not the signal were we had to take a left, but the third after this.
‘A waste of time!’ we felt. We got into the car and now we had to take a U-turn and go back to the signal. Manoj ignited the fuel, gear was pushed to the first position, handbrake was released and zoom the car went in the reverse direction. With astonishment, Vishnu asked “why are going backwards, we cannot reach the signal this way, go front and take a U-turn.” But the fact was Manoj couldn’t push the vehicle forward in the slope due to steep ness, by the time he releases the clutch the car moved in the reverse direction. I saw the sweat in Manoj’s face so taking the responsibility of a co-driver I asked “shall I take on the wheels?” Abruptly Manoj pulled the handbrake and opened the door. I was so happy for the confidence Manoj had on me, but unfortunately he moved to the rear end of the car and was staring at the wheels behind. Kandy who accompanied him was discussing something seriously with Manoj. After a few seconds I and Vishnu got out to see what these guys were up to and saw something which I can describe as a laugh-out-loud scene. Both Manoj and Kandy came running to the car with two big stones to keep behind the wheels preventing it from rolling down. “Thank God, Manoj did not ask us to push the car!” It was such a funny sequence which we could not control our laughter until we reached the correct signal.

The road was clean and smooth; we were able to realize the shooting up of Manoj’s confidence with the speed of the car and there we went zooming the highway. Vishnu who had been sitting like a slackened rope enjoying the ride jumped up suddenly and said “Manoj stop the vehicle near a hotel, I can feel butterfly churning in my stomach, am hungry.” There we stopped at a small hotel beside the road and attacked our breakfast. The day before our travel (after the practice session in driving) at around 11.30 pm, I and Manoj made a quick visit to the office to browse for the directions to reach Shivanasamudram. We learnt that we had to take a left diversion at a place called Madur. After the breakfast we settled in our respective seats and having keen eyes on the sign board, we continued our journey in search of the name called ‘Madur’.

Terrible Trip - Sandeep’s Day Out – II

2009-09-14T23:52:00.001+05:30

The second part was from my point of view.

5:30 AM - Nothing Significant

6:30 AM - These pesky mosquitoes :(...

7:04:32 AM - I hit Vishnu in his head with a heavy ‘pillow’ and woke him up before he could add more horror to it. It was already seven and there he was sleeping nice and tight. He opened his eyes and looked at me as if he was looking at a Ghost, & yelled “Oh! My God!”, apparently still in his dream land. We were already late and to exacerbate up the situation he recited the whole of his delirium to us! A pleasant way to boost our morale!Huh!

8:04 AM - That was the time, beyond our doubts we commenced the exciting trip! It took us a few minutes to get settled in the car. I was in the drivers seat, Sandeep, supposedly my co – driver was beside me. Kandy & Vishnu were relaxing at back. All was set! I released the hand break, turned on the keys, shifted the gears, mildly peddled the accelerator, the wheels started rolling. Yahoo!! . Kandy uttered ”Manoj! Meduva ootada! Paathu Da!(Drive slowly and carefully)” & buckled his seat belt.

Our first halt in the expedition was after traveling 180 decimeter. The reason was that, I wasn’t comfortable with the height of the seat. So Vishnu walked back to the house & got a ‘pillow’ for me. I assumed that I am comfortable, even though it was the other way. At last we started the trip. Remembering that we need to fill up petrol - drove to the near by HP bunk & parked the car near the pump. The filler approached & noted with inquisitive eyes”The sticker says its Diesel!” We realized the goof up, to avoid the embarrassment; we pretended “Oh, Is Diesel the other side, huh??” We turned the car to the other side & filled in the right fuel. Thanks to him ;).

Towards North..Oops..West we went in search of the Bangalore - Mysore Highway.

Terrible Trip – Detailed Recollection - I

2009-09-12T23:05:00.006+05:30

You might remember the terrible trip we had about two years back to Shivanasamudram. For the first anniversary of the trip all of us who were part of it wrote a detailed – suppose to be funny – description of the whole experience on our company’s blog. I am reproducing it here with their permission!

The series of posts were named “Sandeep’s Day Out” as he was the unfortunate person driving when the accident happened and thus has become the target of all our teasing till this day :)! So the first post was by Vishnu and here it goes :

Sandeep's Day Out !

This incident that I am narrating now happened almost one year back. I shall try to recollect as fine as I can & I am sure that it’s going to be effortless for me & hope to entertain you. All the characters & incidents in this narration are real & original. Here we go!!
We had completed 3 months at our company by then & had been discussing for long time for having a break. One eventful weekend we decided to go for a one day trip. Oops, by “WE” I mean, Manoj, Sandy, Kandy & Vishnu.
We were discussing in 3rd floor on a Friday evening about the plan. We intended to rent a car & decided to go to Shivanasamdrum, about which we had heard from Mekhala earlier. As we were thrashing out, our MD was around and she suggested taking their car. She, out of curiosity, enquired if any of us knew driving. Manoj with hesitation nodded and said “I drive!” & added, just to reaffirm the qualm eyes of mine & Kandy,”In fact, I had driven to Chennai few days back”. Vishnu was convinced & confirmed the car from Mekhala. So after few more thoughts we decided to take the car. So that night with lot of enthusiasm & apprehension we went to Ganesh’s house & took the car. Our MD called back that night & reconfirmed that Manoj knew driving & he was who going to drive.

Just for a practice for the next day, Manoj & Sandeep took the car for a small test ride around 11 pm. Manoj came back after the drive & told ”All’s well! Even Sandy is driving decently. So we are going to blast tomorrow!!Yahoooo!!” .We decided to wake up @ 5 30am & leave by 6 30am.

The Next Day:
5: 30 AM
(Nothing really significant happened! Let’s move ahead)
6: 30 AM
Even now nothing great happened!!.
7: 04 AM
We were in the car. Manoj was driving. Sandeep was beside Manoj in the front & I in my usual way, talking nineteen to the dozen to Kandy. We were on Mysore Road, the traffic was pretty less as it was early morning. We were cruising at 90mph. Our adventure started from there. A black dog from nowhere just jumped in front of the car & Manoj was sensible enough to apply the hand breaks & car along with us overturned & I hit my head on the window glass!!
Oh my God….!!
To be continued!!

Graphical Programming and Text Based Programming

2009-08-01T00:07:00.001+05:30

I have been coding in G using LabVIEW for some time(last two years). For those who do not know what G and LabVIEW is here is a quick introduction. G is a graphical programming language where you write program using icons and wires which connect those icons. It is more visual and graphical compared to their textual counterparts. LabVIEW uses G to allow people to create code for industrial automation - quickly and efficiently. The main aim was to make it such a way that those who don’t code every day can use it to create quick solution for the automation they require. I have been working on it to develop similar automation solution for a client.

Recently I got a chance to work on text based programing and scripting(C, PHP, JavaScript and Perl). It felt really good to work on text based programing after such a long time. Some how text based programming feels more powerful and flexible. But the visual based programming is a lot easier to code and understand if rightly done. With a bit of decorative ability you can make the code look lot more appealing for another person to see and understand. Also most of the time you would be using the mouse to code – would save you lot of time if you are a slow at typing!

Notepad++ Is Good!

2009-07-18T16:18:00.001+05:30

I am to work on PHP, Javascript and Perl (after a long time working in LabVIEW!). I needed a good editor basically to help me out with syntax highlighting, group together opening and closing braces, and help organise the code in a better way. I came across Notepad++ and found out that it already supported the said three scripting languages and also many other like C which I might use in future. I was pleasantly surprised with its simplicity and all the features it supported. It was just the right editor I was looking for. Until I need Visual Studio style editing capabilities I would stick with this.

Alan Kay on OOP

2009-07-08T13:58:00.001+05:30

Happened to come across the definition of OOP by Alan Kay. For those who don't know who he is - he was the person who coined the term Object Oriented.
It was actually a mail conversation in which he explains what OOP means to him. Below is a small part of it:

OOP to me means only messaging, local retention and protection and hiding of state-process, and extreme late-binding of all things. It can be done in Smalltalk and in LISP. There are possibly other systems in which this is possible, but I'm not aware of them.

Visit the Site for the complete mail.

A quote of his which is among my favorites is:

I love Bournville

2009-07-02T14:43:00.001+05:30

I got this chocolate as gift from one of my friend for birthday and I instantly fell in love with it. I am a chocolate freak, but I hate dark chocolate. But this one was good! Its priced a bit high.
Visit Bournville website to experience a very interesting presentation on how the chocolate is made.
It even has a section on how to savour it!

King of Pop - MJ

2009-06-26T10:00:00.002+05:30

His were some of the very few pop songs I used to hear and his stage performances - it was simply brilliant. I was elated and was eagerly looking forward for his comeback tour. I have no word to express the shock and sadness when I heard the news of his demise today morning. RIP MJ.

Policeman in Rain

2009-06-25T19:58:00.003+05:30

Heavy rain with strong wind is the worst scenario you can be in when driving a two wheeler in a road where there is enough water stagnant to cover half of your bike's wheel. This time I was forced to drive in such a weather because I had a train to catch! As you can see this is an ideal situation for huge traffic jam as complete pandemonium prevails with everybody trying to reach home ASAP. It would at least take 3 hours in a situation like this to travel a distance of 15 Kms! As I was driving at snail's pace I was in for a surprise. There at a junction with no traffic signal - a policeman was guiding the traffic with only a hat and coat to protect himself ! I don't think any of his superiors would have asked him to do it in such a bad weather. To draw inspirations, sometimes all we have to do is look around.

Plain English Explanation of Big O

2009-06-21T17:03:00.001+05:30

I never really understood or tried to understand the Big O during my college days! Recently I spotted a plain English explanation of this in Stackoverflow. It is a pretty long but pretty good answer : "Explanation of Big O” .

Information overload

2009-06-19T16:42:00.001+05:30

That is what my hard disk would say. Lots of articles, coding snippets, notes, videos, PDFs etcetera etcetera. Once upon a time - long long ago, I used to organise files into appropriate folders. Whatever I did, after sometime I would find myself with files strewn around the hard disk.
I am thinking of testing the following things to solve the problem: MS Onenote, Evernote or a Personal Wiki.

Opera Unite

2009-06-19T16:29:00.001+05:30

Opera again differentiates itself from other browsers with a new set of features in Opera Unite. Some cool concepts in this beta version. Do try it out!

Bangalore Rains

2009-05-23T12:37:00.001+05:30

It rained and it rains in Bangalore after a long time. Instead of being happy this time I was angry again - because it started right at the time I was about to go home from office. After 30 minutes of wait, it looked like it had stopped. Wasting no time, I was off in my two wheeler. Hardly 2 Kms, and it started raining again with all the force it could muster :(. I was in no mood to stop and take shelter, and decided to drive the rest of 15 Kms in that heavy rain itself! The traffic was lean, and the roads almost empty which is a rare experience in Bangalore. Probably I was the only crazy person to drive a two wheeler in this weather! With no rain coat to protect myself, I was drenched to the skin by the time I was half way through. The helmet was acting as the cap. The few people who had dared to come out in this weather - in their car or in Autorickshaws were giving strange looks at me. But I decided I would enjoy this trip - after all its not every time we become crazy enough to travel in a rain like this. The rain was coming straight into my face, the roads were barley visible, the heavy wind was causing me to shiver in cold - and I was enjoying them. Except for the jump into few potholes on the way, the whole experience was good. Thankfully I was spared with a slight cold the next day.

Why Do I Blog?

2008-09-11T22:40:00.002+05:30

Quite a lot of things happened in the last three weeks. One among them - We now have a blog for our organisation !! Its a place to sort out ideas, happenings, announcements, and all other sort of thing related to the company. Any employee can post and only the employees can read.

There are different reasons how and why blog is used !! I also happened to read some blog posts on why people blog. I would also reason out why I blog. The hash one reason I blog is that I have no reason not to blog. Actually I started blogging just like that – I came across that term ‘blogging’, found out what it was and thought I would also make a space for me in the blogging world. Soon I found it would be a great place to express my thoughts and also improve my writing skill. I started blogging about my life, experiences, opinion and tech. Its a nice way to share. Some times it makes me think I start a topic out of no where and soon I find myself digging deeper into it and thinking more about it. It also helps me rewind. Just now I went back through the past posts and all those memories came flooding back to me!! And did I say it gives some sense of satisfaction whenever I post something! Actually I started out with three blogs – one would be personal experience, the other one would be my thoughts and ideas and the last one for funny and interesting things I came across the Internet. I soon found it difficult to update all the three of them and so have decided to keep only this one alive. I feel everybody should blog – all of them have something to share or show and by the way I know blogging is not the only way to do that!

Here is a collection of responses of several bloggers for the question why they blog: http://sandhill.typepad.com/sandhill_trek/2004/11/why_do_we_blog.html

Windows Live Mesh

2008-06-05T12:50:00.001+05:30

This is a link to an ad about Windows Live Mesh - another offering from Microsoft with a ‘Live’ tag before it and is in limited beta. Nothing great in the idea as such for now. Many of its details are still under wraps.

Live Mesh Ad

The reason why I posted the link - the ad is really good. Everything in ultra slow motion, to show how fast the files gets synchronized! ... Me want to make ads like this :)

Post Using Windows Live Writer

2008-06-04T13:45:00.001+05:30

This is my test post using Windows Live writer. This post was written when I was offline and is being published now…

Synergy - Power of combining Services

2008-05-24T16:32:00.004+05:30

Some time back I had written a blog post regarding how, different Google related services helps make some of my tasks easier by being able to intra use them.
Transferring a mail regarding a meeting to my calendar is just a breeze. This is what I called as Synergy. When different services are able to cooperate the value the end user gets is many times more than what he would get if it was used alone.
I observed that this is what is lacking in many other services. In the desktop this Synergy is what helps us to import charts from Excel into the word document and work with it. It was certainly a nice and thought full feature implemented by Microsoft.

Taking this to the next level - Synergy between many services and apps which are not necessarily from the same service provider but from many providers. Examples of this are http://twittervision.com and http://flickrvision.com - probably created for fun. Another service takes the list of house ads from craigslist.com and maps it on Google map. Now that is useful. I had made one such service back when I was in college. I used to feed the words from a word a day service into a service called twitterfeed which would broadcast it to my twitter account. So who ever was following the http://twitter.com/wordaday would get a new word every day in their mobile. A word a day in your mobile, achieved by mixing up three different services. Like everything else on the net this also got a terminology associated with it - Mash ups. With in some time we would be able to create new applications which are really powerful and useful and possibly overshadows the constituent services.

How do we facilitate more such services? The service provider can do this by providing APIs, or even an RSS feed helps. A third party can then come up with thoughtful ways of integrating these services into more useful service. In future we cannot expect all the service to be built by the same service provider. The movie about Google becoming the EPIC might be partially true. What probably can happen is that they will be providing the basic infrastructure and the third party will be building services upon it and some more will be trying to integrate it to provide more value to the user. Amazon and Microsoft are already into this fray. That is how services like cloud computing would be more meaningful.

Simple User Interface

2008-05-11T18:33:00.005+05:30

I happen to stumble upon a website called InstaPaper. The very first thing that caught my attention was the simplicity in design. Here is a snapshot of its home page.

It explains what the website is about in just two points. There is a link to 'log in' and another one to 'sign up'.
When I went to sign up I was expecting a big form with hell lot of fields which I usually fill with junk values. But there again - it asks only for an user name. That is what I call making the life of user much easier :). If you want to set the password you can do that after logging in. A sign up had never been so simple for me. And I instantly fell in love with this site. I have stated using it - but am not sure how much this site would be helpful. They have a simple idea - a way of bookmarking great articles. We can get a RSS feed of our bookmarks too. But seriously we have lots of other services like del.icio.us to do the job. But the point here was to highlight the simple and easy(as in easy to use) interface.

Sometime back I had come across a similar site which had an easy, quick and no frill signup process. Again all they ask is your e-mail address. The link to the site is http://www.protonotes.com and I have a screen shot of it below.

Understanding User

2008-05-09T14:07:00.001+05:30

The article in the blog Coding Horror makes up for an interesting read. The Link is http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/001063.html .I learnt a few things in the project I am currently involved - the most important being "Don't listen to your users". That's right, while it is important to have continues feedback from them, users are never sure of what they want. If you continue to listen to the user and try to satisfy their entire wish - in the end you will be left with a code junk. Well for the most part the software will work but when it comes to the issue of scalability, performance and improvements you will find the software would not be able to handle it. In the end it is all about finding out what features would be needed and will fit into the arch and convincing the user how the other features would be useless for them.

So how do you build the software if you don't listen to user at all? The answer is you should listen and then 'understand'. Well for the most part users don't know what they want and the solution they suggest may not be the best or even close to solving their problem. It's up to you to understand what user is trying to say rather than taking what is being said. Then find a solution. Give user what they need and not what they want. An example of a company which understood user needs and solved them was Google. Giving a powerful tool to find information in net, a revolution in user interface by keeping it clean and simple and enough space to store all our mails are some of them. No wonder they are the number one internet company and challenge giants like Microsoft.

Another example I could give would be in the case of web browsers. When browsing through lots of websites I used to be frustrated at the clutter of IE in by task bar. I knew the problem and had no idea how it could be solved. That is when somebody came up with the idea of tabs. Now that's a cool feature. Of late I have stopped using Internet Explorer and have completely switched to Opera. That is because Opera is trying to understand user problems and come up with lots of solutions in the form of innovations. There are many features like the Speed dial, Notes, Open in 'background' tab etc. which I use a lot. Some of their feature - like the mouse gestures, I don't use at all. But still I stick with Opera, reason: they try to understand users, they try out a lot of different things and so they have a better chance of striking the right solution to user problems.

The most difficult part: How to find user needs?

#1 Listen to users and then, try to understand. This probably comes with experience.
#2 Try out a lot of different solution and innovative features. Give them to the user. Then get feedback from them. Users are bad at suggesting solutions but good at choosing the best among a given set of features. So once you get the feedback on what they use more and what they don't use at all, it is easy to improve up on it. Also try to be proactive rather than being reactive. Try to think of problems that might be faced by user even before user identify it and the provide solutions. I think that is what Opera is doing.
#3 Observe users at work. You have a better chance of spotting what the user needs.
#4 Be the user yourself. Sometime this helps. If it is possible that you yourself can use the software, do that.

EPIC - Movie About Google

2008-05-08T14:27:00.002+05:30

I came across an interesting video. Epic is a short movie on how Google will be having a data grid on which all the users in the world will be able to store and publish their data by 2015. It envisions Google becoming very powerful by then. Makes up for an interesting watch.

http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/epic

I have a different opinion. Google started out as a David and was challenging Giants like Microsoft and Yahoo. In the process Google itself is becoming a Giant. So will there be another Goliath? The question would be "how long before it happens?".

User interface - Why? I

2008-05-04T20:20:00.003+05:30

Test Post

2008-04-27T19:18:00.001+05:30

I am posting this blog through mail. A nice feature I could use a lot. Just type in the outlook, press send and forget. It is published automaticaly when I connect to the net.I don't even have to open the blogger - now is that not nice.

A day without cell Phone

2008-04-05T23:35:00.002+05:30

How would a day without cellphone be?? Cell phone has become one of the important part of my body :). Apart from using it for speaking with my loved ones and not so loved ones I use it as my calender, clock, for games, radio or just look at it and play with it in my hand when bored. From time to time I use it to browse the net too.
So how would my day be without this smart little companion. That's what I decided to do - a day without cellphone. The night before, I put it up in silent mode away in my cupboard and went to sleep.
Next thing I hear my friend shouting at me - "Its already 8 sleepy head...". Oh!O... My bus was at 8:30... I fought my way to the bathroom got ready and caught the bus at nick of the time. Not soon enough I started missing it. It was as if I had lost a part of mine. Some of my colleagues complained that they were trying to contact me regarding some work and I was not picking up my phone. Then my friend came up and said my parents had called and were worried that I was not picking up by phone. And how do I know the time - only then I notice the office did not have clock any where and thank the computer...it has one. I missed the songs I used to hear during the long travel to office and back to room. And most importantly nothing to fiddle with in my hand when somebody was boring me :)... It was really nightmare and wished it would be one... and ....

I hear the familiar alarm tone of my cell phone... It really was a dream...thanks to my too helpful friend who had taken the cellphone, set the alarm and kept it beside my bed... I do not want to miss it again :).

The Tata and The Nano

2008-01-15T19:14:00.000+05:30

I could not contain my excitement and was awaiting for this day from the time it was announced. The looks of the car is average, and the features - sufficient enough. So what does this car mean for India - Well as an Indian it made me proud and an instant fan of Tata. Rather than compromising on important aspects of the car, Tatas used innovative technologies and practices to reduce the cost of the car. When others were taking a potshot at it, Tata showed the way. Cars would now be an affordable luxury for the millions of middle class people and the family members can now travel together, comfortably and safely in this car. Small is beautiful - that is what Nano is. A promise is a promise - and we salute you Tata for making this a reality.

The Intrusive Rediff Window

2008-01-07T10:40:00.000+05:30

I don't know what is in the mind of developers in Rediff( http://www.rediff.com ). Try browsing their website - the intrusive nature of their page puts me off. When I
am browsing another website while allowing this page to load it jumps up trying to grab my attention. Mostly when a window wants to grab users attention its task bar icon blinks and waits patiently for the user to open it. But that is not the case with a browser loaded with rediff, it becomes the most intrusive thing. I don't know if there are any way to prevent this from happening.

Google Evil?

2007-12-15T13:31:00.000+05:30

As far as I remember I started my internet life with google. Can't imagine how life would have been before Google. From the time I became a memeber of this vast community of netizens I have been using Google as my gate and map to internet.
Its really astonished that how much of information (personal included) is available with google now? Right from the mails, docs, friends list in orkut, to thoughts on the blog, search terms, interests, disinterest and even the house address through google map - almost most is with google now. And am sure this is the case for many. The rate at which this gaint is able to process data into information, the amount of data it is able to store and the wide reach it is able to get through the net - one word for it - powerful. Power is almost always misused.
Now what makes me think or not think that google might not misuse these data? Or what if the data falls into the wrong hands. May be solution is to use different portal for different service like say mail use hotmail, for search use google and soon. But almost most of the service become more useful only when they are interlinked. For example a mail regarding an appointment can easily be transfered to my google calender and a reminder automaticaly set. The docs can easily be opened even on a computer which does not have MS Word or better can be saved in Google docs and shared if required. My contacts from orkut can be easily accessed thorugh GTalk and I can easily chat with them. I cannot imagine how difficult it would be to interlink this if I am going to use different portal for different service. . . So for now am decided to trust Google and its security system until some better system or service comes up with a better solution.

Spoon Feeding!

2007-10-29T15:52:00.000+05:30

I am just surprised at why many people are using spoons to eat their food. I wonder if it gives the same pleasure and comfort of taking the food by your hand mix it in right proportion with the side dish and putting it into your mouth! Of course some sort of food stuffs is easier to handle with spoon than our hand - ice-cream being an example. But I see many people use spoon for the sake of using it. Today I saw some of those spoon feeding people trying hard to eat a "Vada" with spoon (for those who don't know what it is - it is a dough nut which is bit spicy and not sweet). It felt like the Vada was playing "Catch me if u can" with that person! I just felt like shouting at him “Why the hell don't u use the hand?".

Complete Electronic Transaction

2007-10-17T08:47:00.001+05:30

I was just wondering how it would affect us if all sort of money transaction was made electronic. We will not be carrying cash in the hand and all the shops would accept only card - debit or credit. No form of hard cash transaction would be possible. I think this will first and foremost bring out the black money as all transaction is going to be routed through banks and government can easily keep a tab on it. This would also prevent bribe in the form of cash to certain extend. This would make begging impossible. We no longer have to worry about soiled and torn notes. No problem of giving exact change. The advantage seems to be many!

A Terrible Trip

2007-10-04T09:08:00.006+05:30

We started towards Shivanasamudram "Early morning" at eight. It was our MD's car. The route - for first fifty kms is an NH... drove through it like a breeze. Then some bumpy roads and we were at Shivanasamudram. We were having a really exciting time by going near the falls in that small round boat and doing all other stuff. We wanted to drive back and reach home before it grew dark - we left by around three. The tour was over. But the trip was not.
On reaching the highway Sandeep wanted to drive and so he was. After some distance Sandeep asked me to take over - but the sleepy me asked him to stop in a hotel where we can refresh and then refreshed me can take over. It’s between this time that things turned the wrong way along with the car.

Sandeep decided to overtake a truck. When trying to do so - the truck hit the car at the rear and soon the car was out of control. But thanks to his quick reflexes - he caught hold of the steering and was able to park it safely by the road side, else the accident would have caused injuries to the inmates too. The tail lights and indicator were broken and a big dent at the rear of the car . . . Sandeep was too shocked to drive the car again. I drove it back home. There was this strange vibration coming from the engine - and latter learnt that the engine was dislocated from its engine bed - because of the impact of the accident! A trip to remember for ever :)

Edit : For the first anniversary of our trip all of us who were part of that eventful trip wrote a detailed – suppose to be funny – description of the whole experience on our company’s blog. I am reproducing them in this blog with their permission.

It was a series of posts and the links for them are below:

Terrible Trip - Sandeep's Day Out - I

Terrible Trip - Sandeep's Day Out - II

Terrible Trip - Sandeep's Day Out - III
Terrible Trip - Sandeep's Day Out - IV
Terrible Trip - Sandeep's Day Out - V
Terrible Trip - The Final Destination - VI

Room Cleaned and Reflection

2007-08-31T19:19:00.001+05:30

We tried to ignore it. We pretended as if it was good. But it exceeded our tolerance level and so at last we decided to clean the house. It was reasonably big and housed eight of us. We mopped it clean and the tiles were shining again. I had rarely if so ever helped my parents clean, back at home. But now I surprise myself :) . . Only when we are out of the familiar and comfort zone and move out, we discover the world around us and end up discovering ourselves.

Reasons Why People Buy iPod?

2007-07-25T19:40:00.000+05:30

I have not seen much advertisements for iPod...at least here in the area where I live.
Then Why is it that its selling like hot cakes? And you know wat - I am thinking of buying one.... I was on that side of the group which believed iPod was just another fancy electronic good, it sleek design, clarity of sound and brand apart. But still I thought the music from my PCs speaker or head phone was more than enough. But still I am forced to change my thoughts of late. Reason the one and a half hour travel I am now making to reach my office.All the people I see around have ear phones plugged to their ears. One, it helps to pass the one and half hours, two - music is good for us(?!), three - it helps shut off the noise from the traffic around you. And it can double up as a pen drive - helping me to carry data with me. Should I buy or not?......I wish I could find some thing to plug into the nose to prevent the polluted air from getting in :)....See oxygen please!

Harry Potter and Deathly Hallows Plot Spoiler

2007-07-22T17:19:00.000+05:30

Answers to who dies in the Last part.
Will Harry Potter die?
And answers to many other questions are NOT given here :)
I just added this post to see if this makes any difference to the number of view or page ranking. Or may be this is blocked by Google in its search result. Does sharing of the plot have makes anybody target for action through law? I wonder - anyhow please note this is just a test( I should have done it sometime before itself :|). I don't even read this books even though I am feel its and interesting book. But I got that book on the day of release itself - Still I may not read it... :)

Harry Potter - and the huge money that goes with it

2007-07-22T16:59:00.000+05:30

Don't worry - this is not plot spoiler or any where near it. Actually I have not read Harry Potter except for the third book. I happened to read an article about the amount of money that was spent on maintaining the security of the book and secrecy of the plot. It was a staggering 20 million in dollars. And was thinking if there might be a cheaper, smarter way. May be make the book in E-Format and those want to buy will get a secret password on buying, which will allow access to it on the day of release. But that's a very bad idea as putting it on the web itself makes it more insecure. It will be easy for a person to share it on the web and many other infinite ways. And I read another blog which suggest that they be allowed to buy a book without the last three chapters. One who buys the book will get a access to that last three chapters in Internet on the release day. Even though this too has its own disadvantage - this is an idea worth considering. Can anyone else think of better ways?

The Talk Gadget

2007-07-22T16:47:00.000+05:30

Well as it is with Google - they release products wihout any info or ad. And I found out one recently. I am not sure how long it has been around, but it was certainly useful addition I was searching for on Google Talk. One of the main features I miss in GTalk which is in Yahoo was the conference option which allowed more than two people to chat with each other. And by chance I happened to see this tool called Talk Gadget which is the web page version of Gtalk(that is u can use chat from the web browser like in Gmail), and it has lots of cool features including the Conference ability :).. Just explore to find more... - http://talk.google.com.

And at Last - the Last

2007-07-18T19:57:00.000+05:30

And atlast those sweet college days came to an end.. With heavy heart am blogging the few thoughts about the last few days of the college.
We were eagerly awaiting for the farewel party - because of the feast it had to offer and we would be officialy inducted into the alumni. But a strike - which I thought would never happen in our college, happened. Initially the cause seemed to be worth but latter found out that most of the students were just taking advantage of the strike for their own personal interest.

Due to that we were asked to vacate the hostel as soon as possible. Within the available time I took my friends to my home. Spent a day and night there. After that went back to hostel and one by one everybody started to leave. Last minute photo sessions and stuffs were on. Soon it was my time to leave home.... Rest is better understood and untold.

Oxygen Please!

2007-07-18T19:55:00.001+05:30

Anybody out there thinking of a great business idea to start... I have an idea. Like the petrol bunks in the city just start a bunk which sells oxygen. How to pack it and bring the cost down is the real challenge. But why start a oxygen selling bunk? Well if you happen to travel in two wheeler or walk through the city streets then you will know why!? Even a five minutes walk is enough to fill your lungs and suffocate us - that's the amount of smoke, primarily due to vehicles. I wonder at the number of private cars and bikes in the road. You know what amazes me the most - I see many cars with single traveler. What a waste..

The Shift

2007-06-29T09:23:00.000+05:30

It has been really long time since I blogged... Not that I had no net access - I have been sitting before a computer with 24X7 net connection almost 12 hours a day for the last one month. Not that I was very busy - of course schedule was bit tight, but I have been having enough time to browse a lot. The reason I was not blogging was because I was just settling down into a new environment, trying to take a breath of it and feel it. Viola - I just jumped from the blissful college life to the corporate life. But the jump does seem to have many changes except that I am missing college friends and the hostel room and life-I miss you all-. As it has been training for last one month - It has been sort of classroom( each of us have been given a computer in the class, sort of good!!!)environment. The culture in the company seems to be good too. Other students in our batch - sorry - other freshers in our batch are nice and fun minded people. So it has been sort of smooth transition except for the food :(. I am missing home and also the hostel food :). And the blog missed the last part of the college life...which was interesting with many unexpected things happening. Updates on that will be in nxt blog.(and watched Sivaji for just Rs.50, in AC balcony!!!)

Part 2

2007-04-26T21:08:00.000+05:30

Final Project Presentation

At last the day arrived - Project Presentation. Project - Something which is suppose to be application of things we have learnt during last four years. Our first step towards "true engineering" (guess why I used this term??) ;). It went off fine - We were allotted the last slot because of the number of members in our project. We got a "good" remark from the external and also we were the only team to get three A+ - but knew it would be the mark put up by our HOD tat would come in mark sheet. First it was Power point presentation and question answer session. Only in the evening and that too for the sake of formality, the external checked out the project implementation. But because of the nature of our project we were able to show the implementation along with the ppt.
Details about my project - here(will provide the link soon)

The Visit

Well this is a long interesting story too.... Breaking this up into several sub topics would be better. So here we go.

Invitation from a friend

It was a sudden, unexpected and totally unplanned trip. Returning after project presentation,Agnesh said we go to his home town Pollachi. A scenic place beneath the beautiful Western ghat ranges, Pollachi is a place blessed by nature - evident from the greenery around it.First a bit hesitant, but soon everybody decided to leave by the next day morning. Myself, Laks and Bhuvi were playing cricket (computer game) and as it is the case while playing games - time flew like anything and before I could wink it was four in the morning. Time to go to Pollachi.

To Pollachi

I slept through the whole travel - about three hours. We reached his house (a really BIG one). Saw his pets - birds, then had our food and I slept again. At about the noon we were off to Monkey falls - a touris spot 25kms away, in his Ambassador car. The falls was closed because of lack of enough water. But we managed to bath in another falls which was actually leakage water from the near by damn. Fun, fun and pure fun for next two hours, a never ending enthrallment.........On return journey - went to a dam - no water in it too. By 5 we reached his home. I slept again!!!

The Black Thunder

For those who wondering wat Black Thunder is - it is a theme park situated strategically under the Ooty hills, near Mettupalayam. That was our destination the next day.We started off at 8 in the morning and managed to enter the park at 1 in the noon. After keeping our things in the locker we were ready to rock the park - but we were unaware that it was the park which was going to rock us!!!
First it was to a illusion ride(nothing much about it), then it was Thrillarium. Thrillarium was a beautiful concept in which we are made to experience the motion which goes about in a movie - a nice concept well implemented. We had the experience of being inside the movie.
Then we were off to water rides. The first ride itself took the hell out of me.....we were made to slide in a steep slope - from a large height. Many more water rides followed - all of them thrilling and exciting. The tallest boy in our group (6.3) was stuck in tube slider - but he was determined to go thru it and made it on the third try - of course pretty hurt. After the previous rides I was bit afraid to go thru it, but constant nagging from Mul made me to take it. In another ride with May I was on the verge of getting my head hurt!!! But all of them took the life out of us!!!

After that it was time for some relaxed fun - so we went to the wave pool - had really nice time in it. About two hours we would have spent in it. When in the pool, it started Raining!!!! Perfect...Just perfect!!! Our happiness knew no bounds.... The wind, rain and wave pool - the perfect way to spend the noon. Even the trees around us were dancing :) . .Next it was boating - the boating spot was a perfect scenic location. Right under the hills. The rain and cloudy atmosphere made the hills look all the more beautiful. It was a perfect fusion of dream and wishes, redefining reality, a tryst with heaven. The lightning was occasionally illuminating the hill top. I could not have asked for more - the perfect spot it was.Next we went to the lazy pool. Soon it was time to leave - because of rain all the land games were shut. We were wet with water for the whole day.

Another Unexpected Visit

As we were coming out of the theme park, Sakti Saravana invited us to his house!! Great! We went to his house by night. All his family members were very cordial and made us feel at home. The next day went to Avinashi Lingeshwarar(excuse me for the spelling) temple and happen to see the huge temple car. We left from there in the afternoon after a good lunch. On the way back to college - plans of going to a movie were drawn. "Maya Kannadi" was the movie - went with lot of expectation but Cheran(director) broke it all. A boring film.

Part I

2007-04-12T17:26:00.000+05:30

It has been quite some time since I blogged. But it was worth not to blog and I hope it will be worth the wait for you too for I am gonna share some of the most worth full happenings and moments taking place in my life.With CyberRaaga (our symposium) getting the best symposium award in our college ;), I was left in its hangover for a few days. The heat of the project got me out of it.My initial thoughts - What!! Am I out of mind...Promising something which I had dreamt of during in my not so lonely dreams and thoughts?After Some days - How am I going to convince our HOD? What to do in the project (or what project?!) - may be simulation will do...pause
In the mean time the fever of farewell caught up. The song of "April Matham" (a film) was suddenly getting more attention. The wordings of those songs became more meaningful. Plans of visiting each other’s house were drawn up. A forgettable incident (not about it now) paved way for an unexpected, exhilarating, eventful and unforgettable whirlwind three day visit to friends' house in Madurai!!.....pause
A bolt from the sky - our MD offered to give us the kit required for the project. A hope of light sprung up still shadowed by the magnitude of the project. A one day visit to b'lore with batch mates for getting the kit - we walked long and hard there. Due to some flumbing by Ezil Arasan, so characteristic of him, we lost the return bus and again due to his speaking skill (or torture?!!) the agent agreed to put us in another 10:30 bus and we returned to DGL.....pause.
The last day classes came and it was an out and out photo session day. We were making a hell out of the place in lab - the staffs choose to ignore us for obvious reason. We were there in the class even after the last hour (for the first time) till the HOD drove us out. Mean while a three day round trip to my native along with friends for a family function. Well it was a mixture of experience, some lessons learned!!
.....At last!! Dream or reality? I managed to bring out a decent looking robot out of the huge assortments of pieces available and even made it follow a line. My project was suppose to be maze solving robot but ended up doing line following (much simpler) because of lack of time and sensors. May be in future I will catch up with my dream project...!
Then it was time for a formal farewell party...arranged it in A1 plaza. Fun and frolic - went up until late night. Some opened their heart, we all gave a farewell speech - I was abt to say something but ended up saying only half of it.
Hmmmm..... Wat next...the events continue and I will be putting it up as Part2...may be more nostalgic and Namkeen! :)

Pretty Busy :)

2007-02-17T12:00:00.000+05:30

With a lot of symposium and project work, days have become pretty short for me. Thought final sem would be the most free and fun filled days. But it has turned out to be straight opposite. With new specs thrown into my project I am at loss on what to do or rather how to do(will rant about all those latter). Add to that some symposium work and you have the perfect recipe for a tight schedule. Not that I am not wasting my time - I just woke up from 6 hours of sleep!! Miles and miles to go before I sleep...
(nightmare) and the seventh sem results have been announced!!(pretty good result for me)

Get-together

2007-01-21T10:21:00.000+05:30

Excitement, eagerness and nostalgic, that was the environment at hotel Udayam on 16-01-2007. Excitement of meeting long lost friends eagerness to know how we fared during last six years and nostalgic - you know why. If you guessed it right - it was the get together of our 10th std batch mates.
Being too inexperienced during the farewell, we had lost contacts with each other and had merged into the fast paced life. After six years we regroup to discover that we had only lost the contacts, the bond we shared, the friendship we cherished - was still alive.
Recollecting memories, sharing experiences of last six years, enjoying the company of each other and finding smile on each others face....tats how we spent the four hours. Being Pongal holiday, there were not much people around making the environment all the more perfect. Again we had to part with each other, but this time with promises to keep in contact. A promise we all knew we would keep. The reunion will be a memory to cherish for life.

Ant Hunt

2006-12-17T00:41:00.000+05:30

Suddenly the monitor started flickering and it went blank. As I was sitting stunned, it came back to life again. After that, it became regular, sometimes the screen went blank, sometimes the image would shake violently, or the screen was full of lines. As I was wondering what was happening, I noticed ants crawling in and out of the monitor.... :-(. This was not the first time the ants had made the electronics equipment their home. Sometime back they had damaged the phone by building a nest inside it, then it was my computer's speaker and now they were inside the monitor too. Why they were inside and what the heck were they doing? May be they were nibbling at the wires inside the monitor. If they continued to be inside then I knew

I would not be able to see my monitor alive again. It was time to think of various options. One-I could open the monitor and catch them one by one. But it had its own risk and demerits. Risk - I could damage the monitor myself when trying to open it. Demerit - catching the ants - one by one - was not a good idea. So what should I do???
That’s when an ingenious idea struck me. I decided to lure the ants into my trap. Similar to a mouse trap, I decided to create an ant trap. I would place some sweets near by the monitor and lure the ants out of it. Then they would be taken and dropped somewhere outside!!! In order to make it easier to carry them, I decided to place the sweet inside a tray. Carrying a tray was much easier than carrying the sweet with the ants on them... Patting myself for such a bright idea, I went ahead with it. Soon enough the ants started coming out of their home (monitor) and were relishing on the chocolate bar I had placed. Carefully I carried them outside and disposed them. I realised that if the ants have to be completely removed, the process has to be repeated a few more times. Do you think this helped me to regain my monitor??

Vacation Again

2006-12-13T09:52:00.000+05:30

After a hectic shedule of exams, I have before me a long stretch of vacation again. With nothing better to do I turn to blogging. Some of my friends have gone for training session in their companies and others are busy hunting for project topic. I am yet to start any serious thinking on my final year project. Hey I noticed something strange now.... I was pressing the number key '1' instead of the fullstop key. Know why - maybe I am SMSing a lot these days (for those still wondering - in mobile phone pressing 1 brings up fullstop in SMS mode). Hmmm I think I have been wasting lots of my time.
ok let me too start my project hunt.

It’s Raining Men

2006-09-08T19:35:00.000+05:30

Well it seems the monsoon season has set down. It was raining heavily yesterday. Of late I used to hate rain as it used to spoil my schedule, virtually locking me inside the house (well inside the hostel as of now). Adding to that, I easily catch cold. But yesterday it was something different. I was in a bad mood for some odd reason and was sitting inside the room depressed. That’s when I heard some one calling my name from outside. It was Sengol, a childish person he is, I wondered why he was calling me. When I went out I was surprised to see that it was raining heavily and I had not even noticed it. The room and the depression had completely insulated me from the outside world. It was heavy rain along with strong wind. That’s rare to happen because when there is strong wind the clouds would move away and there would be no rain. The wind was making strange patterns on the air with the rain droplets. trust me it was a treat to watch that. The wind was so strong that the water was pushed inside the corridor and it reached the entrance of our room. The rain droplets touching my face was so enthralling and exhilarating that all thoughts that seemed to congest my mind was oozing out. Many students were dancing in the rain, some had started making boats and leaving it in the water puddles that had formed here and there. Some students were shouting out of happiness and joy. At the end of it all, my mind was completely free. It seemed the rain had washed away all my worries.

Terr-r-roar

2006-08-14T12:41:00.000+05:30

Here they go again. Thanks to the alert British police men, they nipped the threat at bud."Al Qaueda has moved from being a terrorist organisation to being a state of mind." This was the statement in a popular newspaper. How true! Indian police men need to take a cue from their British counterparts. Certainly the British politicians mean business when it comes to controlling terrorist. Compare that to our own Mp-ji-s and PM-ji-s, who stop with giving out statements and visiting the victims. With Independence Day so close, will I be able to roam the streets with out any fear or will the shopping mall in which I am present be the next target? Certainly we Indians should not be afraid and allow the terrorist to win - as this is what the terrorist want - FEAR, FEAR IN THE MINDS OF PEOPLE. Lets never allow them to succeed.
As I said earlier - We are lions and we walk that way!

Busy bee

2006-08-02T10:12:00.000+05:30

With lots of placement (ok ok...off campus) activities going on, and soon to be inaugurated department association, the past few days were abuzz with lots of activities. In the midst of all this I along with some of my friends were asked to take classes for our juniors regarding - placement!!! Only god knows how I got placed and here I find myself advising my juniors on how to talk and act before an interviewer. To top it all, the series tests (that’s unit test) were also conducted...I was so bored that I preferred to sleep instead of writing the test. The end result will be known when the marks reach my home.....

>--Final Year →

2006-07-22T13:44:00.000+05:30

Ah! At last here I am - in final year of my college. So what does being in final year mean? Ragging juniors, being the king of college, breaking windows knowing that u will be spared being a final year, well if you were imagining up all these thoughts, then you are wrong coz none of this can happen in our college.So what real difference does it make being in a final year? Well being in a final year mean the same - we are in the "final" year of our college life. being in final year means we have got only one more year left to bunk classes, enjoy mess food, play pranks on others, teasing each other, groups studies, late night before exams and all those 'stuffs' which we do in our college. Being in final year also brings with it some responsibilities - Searching for job, organising functions, doing projects and things. So it’s that year where u are going to enjoy a lot and complete our responsibilities. So no time to waste....

Bomb-Bay

2006-07-15T13:33:00.000+05:30

The changing of name from 'Bomb'ay to Mumbai seems to have done nothing to prevent serial bomb blasts. But, it seems that this is all that our politicians are capable of doing. The hollowness of statements by our prime minister 'ji' and Sonia 'ji' only increases the agony of victims. While other countries are strengthening the anti terrorist laws, we were scraping POTA here. While the politicians are safe with the cordon of black cats and police, who is going to protect the common man? Shifting the blame on Pakistan and some unknown terrorist group does not solve the problem. The real culprit is the politicians and police, who have failed again and again in this.

The only optimism that evolves out of this chaos is that the terrorist have again failed, to instill fear in Mumbaikars. Some points to note:
1) Within midnight the hospitals announced that their blood banks were full and they did not need any more blood.
2) The next day there was near 100% attendance in all the office and schools.
3) Buses and trains were packed to the full as usual.

As time passes, the event will fade out of our memory, until another bomb blast awakes us to this real nightmare.

Back To College

2006-07-09T10:05:00.000+05:30

Well, after the much enjoyed holidays, it was time to go back to college. It was accompanied my shifting rooms in the hostel. The new room, to say the least, resembled an old, unkept dungeon. Also I managed to get the worst place in the room. The cot of mine is actually 'fixed' between a wall and a cement shelf. It’s so congested that u may have difficulty breathing sitting there. If u want to image my plight, I feel like an elephant hanging from its tail, when I sleep there. Add to that lot of dust and cob webs. That’s my 'new' room.
And in the college, the first few days were filled with training program for placement. I was so bored sitting in the class and auditorium that I jumped back to my home. Well had slight fever and cold. I think I caught that from my room mate.
Again got to go back, let us see what the final year in my college holds for me....

Home Alone!!

2006-07-04T00:12:00.000+05:30

I was all alone in my house for 2 days, left to take care (read as "feed") of myself. The very same day I was awake till late night...well actually till early morning ( 6 am :O ) watching films (gosh! Here I go again) and checking for mails which actually never came. Soon I started seeing stars and moons around me.I was hallucinating.
Then, everything went blank and I was woken up at 12 noon (thanks to my friends).It was time to do something adveturous...."Hey!Wats that....ha!I was hungry. HOTEL....NO - COOK!!!" I concluded, cooking would be challenging enough.Ok..now what to cook? Why not leave aside the same boring Dosas,idlis and...TRY SOMETHING NEW!!! This was getting more and more interesting untill I finished cooking the invented dish. With nobody around I was left to
taste(read as "test") it....and belive me it did not taste that bad. Atleast I was able to satisfy my hunger with that.
Then lay the herculean task of cleaning up the mess I had created in the kitchen and not forget washing the utensils. Know what...I was off to hotel next day.

Believe it or not

2006-07-03T00:01:00.000+05:30

There have been many intances of India being fooled in bussiness with other country. One of them in which urnaium rich soil was sold at damn cheap rate to another country and importing uranium extracted from it at sky rocketing price.
Adding to the list, I heard in tv today that ATM cards were first designed in India and the technology sold to US at 1 million dollars and know what happened....?.....US sold that to rest of the world for 700 million dollars!!? Policy makers, are you hearing? All that you can do is be happy that a person who built a "Dutch" company and is now producing 10% of steel worldwide ....as having Indian "roots".

Past 10 days

2006-06-28T12:51:00.000+05:30

Well past 10 days went off without any notable events. Happen to join a community website called orkut. Was able to connect with some long lost friends. Watched X-Men 3. It was much much better than first two. It has prety good sound and visual effects combined with good screenplay. Also met some school friends last week end. Had prety good time with them. Some of them are placed and the rest waiting for interviews.
I was so bored at one time that I even tried to capture the nature in a camera...ended up taking some pictures of goats, cows and the trees around my home! Let me try moving out and find some good spots..till then....

Movie...Movie

2006-06-12T12:52:00.000+05:30

I had nothing better to do than sleeping. So went to get a CD of 'any' film. I was offered "Thalainagaram". But I could not sit past the first 10 min of that film. D0-n-o why but I did not feel like watching it. Then I started watching Mummy, Mummy Returns and The scorpion king. All the 3 at a stretch. Am watching them for 3rd or 4th time. But did not feel bored. What next?

Exam Fever Over

2006-06-06T18:04:00.000+05:30

Well, this time exams schedule was a bit short because of the reduction in number of holidays between successive exam. Thank god, we were spared the usual month long tension as it was reduced to only 15 days. Got a month of holidays ahead of me now. What do I do in this time. Take a break from studies and sleep?!

Happy and Sad

2006-05-08T23:37:00.000+05:30

iGate came for the campus interview two days back and 18 students from our college got placed.Lakshmi Narayanan of our room also got placed :-) . Now, 4 of our room members(in hostel) have been placed. Good thing, yeah! But there were disappointments too with Raja Sengol, Vijay, Muthu and Balaji failing to make it to the final.There must be something better waiting for them. This year, it seems placement is good in our college. May be fuelled by the boom in IT industry.
On the same day I became angry on some account and that resulted in a bitter event.....I usualy don't lose my cool but that was a result of some accumulated set of events. Friends do understand that....right?
Ok.Bye for now.

Wishes

2006-04-14T21:53:00.000+05:30

Hai,
This being my first post, it also happens to be on the Tamil and Kerala New Year.
Wish you Happy and Prosperous Vishu and Tamil puthandu( I enjoy both...he..he). Actually I am a Tamilnadu Born Confused Malayali(TBCM)..!