DIADEM

The world of Geeks

2010-03-20T10:39:00.000-07:00

The World would have not been what it is now without the geeks. They have changed it forever, for good. Who's a geek? A geek tries to find reason for everything that happens around him. He enjoys reasoning about things. Finds joy in testing various technologies and derives pleasure in making changes to them. One who isn't foolishly romantic. Talks more about ideas than about people. Who takes criticisms constructively and enjoys being called a 'nerd'. So, what have these people done to this World? Well, they have done almost everything that makes this World look beautiful!

History has seen some fabulous geeks like Steve Jobs, Paul Allen, Bill Gates and many others who made the impossible possible. Steve Jobs showed an artistic approach to manufacturing computers. He integrated user-friendliness and efficient computing into what we call the 'Macintosh Computers'. His product was a big hit. Bill Gates and Paul Allen achieved similar success but through different approach. They made computers usable by the laymen. Geeks are not confined only to computer industry but also every such field that incorporates scientific principles.

What reputation they enjoy among the public? Well, the reactions are mixed. They are praised for the achievements they have made, glorified for their vision and are role-models for many budding young wizards who want to bring a change worth appreciating. They are also tarnished with a term 'nerd' often used in the negative sense. Geeks are socially inept, not without a solid reason. They are so much engrossed with their work towards accomplishment that they involuntarily forget to socialize. Socializing is about you knowing many people and many knowing you, in turn. This happens to geeks naturally once they achieve success in their mission.

The Graduate's Life

2009-10-03T12:16:00.000-07:00

Each day breaks with so many activities piled up for the day. The obvious candidates will be the assignments. I never knew the meaning of assignments until I stepped into graduate school. Some assignments are fun to solve and you enjoy every moment of problem solving. Some others literally suck the blood out of your body. Those deadly deadlines keep haunting your dreams ! You may forget to brush, eat or even breathe but not those deadlines. Assignments before exams are the craziest one could ever imagine. The pressure is so much that you don't have time to think of what can be done but you feel relieved if you are done for the moment.

Cooking is yet another time demanding activity amidst this hectic schedule. The worst scenario, according to me is cooking when you are hungry. Even worse will be when the food is not actually edible after it is cooked !! But then again our friend assignment will demand our company and immediately we forget our mess with cooking. Social life is something graduate students must learn by taking extra credits ! Strange but true is this fact that almost every graduate student is deprived of social life and is limited to a problem solving machine which responds to external stimuli !

The concept of weekend is redefined for graduates. Weekends are an excellent opportunity for them to stay alive for next one week, meaning finish their home works and assignments. The universities are so generous in offering you weekends to solve the problems. Forget those partying habits at least for the first semester, else you will be screwed. Google calendar will be of immense help because every hour a day has its due! But then again the pleasure of seeing your grades after this battle is something beyond the explanation in words !

Ice Cream Social

2009-08-20T19:44:00.000-07:00

Having spent almost three weeks in US, I discovered one common practice among Americans which they use to socialize new people among themselves. It's by inviting people for a sponsored ice cream party. This is a party where people come and get to know others when they are enjoying cups of ice creams. When I say cups you must have comprehended the meaning that it's unlimited! One such happened in my apartment where the owners of the apartment invited the guests of each home for the party during one fine evening. We were able to talk to other neighbours whom we couldn't meet otherwise because since it's a place where graduate students stay who are always studios, meetings like these provide a good opportunity to know about each other a easier job.

The second ice cream social was at International Student Center of my University. It was to bring all the newly enrolled graduate students together. We had students from China, Russia, Uruguay, Taiwan, Middle East and of course India. The organizers conducted some cool games which were entertaining and at the same time helped students of one country know the students from other countries better. Games like saying hello in the language of foreign language of any other foreign student brought cheers to students. There were also prizes for small events. The prizes were like free tickets to fun events within the college. Everyone of us had good scoop of Strawberry, Vanilla and Chocolate ice cream. Later we parted our ways, but only for the evening and to stay together for at least two years.

Independence Day celebration by ISA

2009-08-18T20:42:00.000-07:00

The Indian Student Association of Kansas State University arranged for a flag hoisting ceremony followed by a dinner at Long's park at Manhattan, Kansas. It was the first get together of all the Indians associated with the University and I was extremely happy to meet them all so soon at a very special occasion. There were two flags, American and Indian. The American flag was hoisted by an American Professor and the Indian flag by the Head of the Department of Computing and Information Sciences. The glad thing was that we had many Americans participating in this function.

The dinner served after the ceremony had something special in it. The dishes were raji ma, pakoda, jeera rice, some side dishes and Pepsi . These were prepared by some Indian students and Indian home makers in USA. They were so good that we felt like we are eating Indian food. There was one retired Professor from Vet-Med who sang a song about Mahatma Gandhiji. Everybody listened with patience and appreciated the song after it was completely sung.

There were also other performances like guitar by a Masters student from Mechanical Engineering, song by a small Indian girl and a group song. There were some prizes distributed. They conduct ISA cricket tournament. There were winners and runners-up. There were other events for which prizes were awarded like badminton, table tennis and so on. I met all the seniors of all departments. Luckily met three people from Tamil Nadu. Then met all the current year students. Finally the evening ended saying adios amigos to all the Indian and American friends.

What I Miss

2009-08-14T21:33:00.000-07:00

The stay at the States though sizzling leaves me with sad memories of things which I enjoyed while at India but miss them badly here !! The fresh tea from mom tops the list eliminating all contestants. As soon as I get up, I used to walk up straight to the kitchen and grab a cup of tea and those awesome Britannia Marie biscuits. Then comes the daily edition of the famous 'The Hindu'. I have spent so many mornings deeply engrossed into this popular daily. The ride on my Kawasaki. Though it's not a bike with high power engine or enticing accessories, I feel nostalgic when I get memories of my bike. I also miss the daily morning ride on it during which I drop my dad at the station.

The bus trip to my college deserves a special mention here. Though it's only a 20 minute journey from my home it's just an awesome ride with friends. The trip is even more exciting when we are returning from college after any function at the campus. The bus used to thunder with sudden claps and also resonate with musical melodies. The colony in which I lived has some evergreen memories attached to it. My neighbours who always ensured my wellness until I was there, I miss them a lot. The badminton ground is a cool place to hang out for me almost from the last semester of my college till I left to US. There used to be people of all ages thronging this place and it was so good to be there in the evening.

Well, I am deeply missing my friends. There are no words to describe how bad I miss them. The farewell at the airport still stands as a framed picture in my mind. Actually I never expected so many people to come and was simply moved by the gesture. I just felt I am so lucky to be blessed with a bunch of nice buddies. There were also friends who wished through phone and I am ever thankful for their wishes. These are no formal statements because I am saying this from my heart after realizing how much they mean to me.

My mom and dad. I just can't express the way I am missing them. My mom used to sacrifice all her happiness so many times just to satisfy me. Of course nobody could find a noble heart than his/her mother. I am too blessed to be a son of such a kind mom. She was not just my mom but my all time friend, listener and pacifier of my worries. In short she was a part of me ! My dad. He was and continues to be the guiding lamp of my career. Always wished that I stayed top of every competition. I wish those small fights with my dad. We used to argue on lot many issues. I miss all my relatives especially my grand parents and my uncle. But, life needs to go on and memories are the fuel that keep the journey perpetual !!

My first seven days in USA

2009-08-09T16:25:00.000-07:00

Well, it has been a week since I landed in USA and am simply amazed by the professionalism and commitment to obedient civic life of the Americans. Professionalism seems to be in their blood. Whatever be the job they do you can see the perfection. They don't hire inefficient people for any job, how small it may be. Adequate training is provided before someone is assigned a full time job. The apartment in which I live has got a IT services help desk where they help in providing wireless access to residents. I have never seen such efficient group of guys who are working on fixing the computers. They are well trained and are able to fix any type of bug, on whatever platform your computer operates upon.

Then you have Walmart where you get everything. The shop is massive with employees always on their heels to help you. Whenever you ask for a product the helpers there take you to the place where the product is available and leave only when the customer is satisfied that he/she has got the product they wanted. Ofcourse, the boards in Walmart clearly say you where to find what. Everywhere you can see this commitment to offer best services to the customers.

When it comes to public life, Americans are the best I feel. The way they drive on the road simply astonishes you. Whenever there's a stop sign they stop their car even when there are no vehicles to cross by. When somebody is crossing the road anywhere the cars stop at a distance of 5 metres to ensure the person's safety. But, people here cross only at the zebra crossing. There's is one request button which one must press to cross the road. Once the request is accepted green light glows and you can cross the road. Everywhere you can see Americans working cheerfully. They enjoy what they do. It's just a lovely place to live in !! Will update more....

To US through air

2009-08-04T17:42:00.000-07:00

Hello folks, back to blogging after a very long time. Hope you all doing good. I just got settled down at Manhattan, Kansas. It's a beautiful town with very friendly people. The college campus huge, bigger than our IITs. The library is awesome. The people here do craziest things on earth. Well, it's a different life here than my Chennai days. I am learning to cook here, which seems the primary skill to be possessed by every Indian to survive here. Food is very costly if you eat outside. So cooking is the best option. I can't cook sometimes and I sometimes I sleep hungry. Planning to change this bad practice. Fine let me describe my flight experience. It's crazy and well, it was little horrible for me.

The flight booking was in jet airways, 1 am flight on the morning of 31st July (IST). The flight took off on time and the food was satisfactory. I felt kinda sick in the flight because the food was just not like how I expected it to be. But then I overcame that sickness. The flight reached Brussels, Belgium at 7:30 am (local time). Then had to board the same flight after roaming around the airport. Again the food was satisfactory. Later reached New York at 12:50 pm (local time) and it was time for tragedy. It started to pour heavily. Many flights were cancelled. My itinerary from New York was like this, New York to Chicago and then Chicago to Kansas City. I must reach Chicago by 9 pm to catch the flight to Kansas city. They delayed the flight at New York and I reached Chicago only at 11 pm and ultimately missed the flight.

Had to sleep the whole night at the Chicago airport since outside accommodation was costly. The food too was costly at the airport. So it was a struggle against the odds. Then at 4 in the morning next day, approached the airline officials and got a ticket , of course of no charge, for the 7:30 am flight. Had a coffee at the airport, which was my only food for 10 hours. Then got the flight and reached Kansas city by 8:30 am. Waited for another one hour and Indian Students Association people picked me up. At last now settled with an apartment. This journey has taught me how mentally tough a person should be to face life. The Americans are very very friendly and you can see professionalism in everything they do. Will post more, till then adios.

Ideas, Events and People

2009-04-23T21:05:00.000-07:00

The human mind is so quick in its thinking ability and can run into complex conclusions at lightning speed. This ability of the human mind has an effect that depends upon the way we utilize its potential. From the past the universal objects about which this mind thinks about can be grouped into three main classes, ideas, events and people. Whatever the human mind thinks of will easily come into one among these three categories. Surprisingly, the effect of the human mind on the psyche of a person depends upon whether it thinks about the ideas, events or people. To understand this clearly, let me explain in simple terms and in the end you will be surprised to note that everyone of us have experienced such varying effects !!

Ideas are something that bring a change into this world. Good ideas are often aimed at bringing comfort to lifestyle, to alleviate pain (both physical and mental) in short make our life simple. When our mind discusses ideas the atmosphere within the mind is positive and aimed at ensuring something good is done to people. This is a good sign and all the inventions in this world have been the result of such great ideas that originated from the minds of men of past. Inventions in every field like Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, Geography, Astronomy etc., have made our lives much simpler and only because of these novelties we are away from much of the ailments of nature. It's always advisory to discuss ideas whenever we talk with friends, relatives and even in a public meeting. By this way I don't mean that we need to be serious with friends, talking too serious equations, just we need to make sure that we always wish that each conversation spawns a little new idea. Bottomline, the ideas must never be crooked !!

Events are the occurences of the past. Events are the result of human actions and may have had a good or bad ending. Events often teach us a lesson of how not to live or how best one can live. It's always good to analyze the result of an event as it helps us to correct the mistakes one has done and in case of a good event, we can try to emulate. Beneficial events of the past include, peace treaties, revolutions in the field of food and medicine, economic resucitation, renaissance of culture and lot more. When one looks at the course of these events, he/she can realize how tough it is to bring a change into this world and what are the requisites to do so. Ofcourse, history has got some painful events like war and homicides that ought to be forgotten. Bad events shouldn't go unanalyzed because one cannot learn what lead to such a disaster! It is always good to learn from the past as it's funnily said, "one must learn from other's mistakes as he cannot commit all of them to learn!". So, when the human mind thinks of the events, there is a mixed impact of positive and negative thoughts.

The last class of objects of this Universe, according to our classification is the 'People'. This World is nothing without people. It's more interesting to analyze what people are made of. People are not absolute beings and are greatly influenced by ideas and events !! Sounds strange, isn't it? People in the past might have been free beings and had their own way of life and did what they felt as the right thing to do. The World today is not that similar to the World of the past. The commitments and responsibilities of people have gone high. The events in their lives have a greater impact on their actions. So, no person can be quoted as absolute and no person can claim himself to be living according to his own principles. But, the natural tendancy of human mind is to discuss loads about people !! We grumble a lot about people and their activities. The result is that we lose our temper and perform poorly in our career. Discussing about people is the worst form of human brain activity ! We discuss a lot when people go wrong and so little when someone does something great.

The conclusion can be clearly drawn. Discuss a lot of ideas, with your friends, parents and relatives. Ideas build our lives. You need not be a scientist to do this. Ideas can be for your everyday living. Don't discuss too much about events as there are events that might have made you feel lot lower in your life. The case of the human mind is to think of negatives first and so the negative events might cause you set back ! Keep discussion of events to a minimum and use them only to learn a few lessons and of course events that made you achieve greater things can be used as performance motivators for the future. Last in the list, 'People'. Talk about a person only when you want to admire him/her and when you want to emulate the person's traits. Never think about why a person is so bad in his life which will definitely leave you in a sullen mood. No person is absolute and events control them greatly. When the ideas are great, the events are good and the impact on the people is awesome. So, it's the ideas that are the source of good will and make your best attempt to generate good ideas. Often there goes a saying, "Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events and small minds discuss people", by Eleanor Roosevelt.

Kindly Listen

2009-04-11T09:31:00.000-07:00

This is one of the best lessons that life has taught me. Something everyone needs to follow in their lives. It's the art of listening. Here I am going to discuss what this simple listening can do to your friend. When your friend talks to you about your worries we at times don't bother to listen, knowingly or unknowingly. It really hurts your friend. People generally say their problems to those whom they feel reliable, lovable and whom they feel they are at ease. When he/she approaches with some sorrow and pours his/her worries it's like a slap on one's face when we refuse to listen.

Listening to problems has a great role to play in medicine too. Doctors and nurse develop this quality which helps to cure their patients. Many patients who are in a pitiful state with the disease ruining their life, the time the doctor spends listening to patients' worries cures them before hand. When you listen you assure that you still love them, you want them to get better and you spend your most valuable asset, your time. No gift can be more precious than the time you spend listening to someone. Never shrug off and quit when someone wants you to listen, they say you with this hope that you will bring peace to them. So, next time when you are wanted to listen be happy that you are going to make someone settle in tranquility.

Gender and Friendship

2009-04-08T07:33:00.000-07:00

Hello ppl !! Back to blogging after a long time. Fine. Let me start this season with a common yet so sensitive topic that discusses the influence of gender in friendship and if at all gender has any role in friendship. We all live in a society, of course this 'all' refers to city dwellers, in which job opportunities are equal for men and women, where people are very social, where there is no shyness in moving with the opposite gender. These are the brighter side of the issue that gender has been removed out of focus when it comes to employment and commerce. There is yet another, not much openly discussed issue which analyzes the effect of gender in friendship.

Well, friendship is a beautiful relationship which involves two or more people who understand each other and stand by each other in all circumstances. It is a selfless binding where one does expecting nothing in response. What role has gender got to play in this purely personality based relation ? Personality here means what thoughts the person is made of. Two people like each other and become friends because one likes some character or trait in the other. The trait is unique to each person and absolutely has no influence from the gender of the person. People are bound together with this admiration for that trait which attracted them to be friends. It's too mean to bring in gender here and spoil the very sancity of friendship.

The yet another pitiful incident being the narrow mindedness of the very broad minded society, as it calls itself. Try to look relationships between the opposite gender in the name of sacrifice, care and affection, rather than in the name of mere attraction. People don't realize how deep the wound is that they cause by insulting friends of this sort. The irony is that when people start to look on this narrower prospective, they tend to feel that friendship with opposite gender is a sin and stay aloof from the masses, ultimately ruining themselves. So, next time you see a boy and a girl as great friends think before you utter words not in good will of those friends but on your own future as stated just above.

Religion and Thought

2009-01-30T06:29:00.000-08:00

This post takes inspiration from the great saint that this beautiful country, India gave this World Swami Vevekananda. The ideas here are a blend of this great man and mine. Religion is one among those beautiful things that humans started from the pristine period. People became disciplined and got motivated to relieve themselves of this worldly pleasures and started believing that they can sense that extra-sensory perception that remains beyond our five senses. Busy is the stature of human life now and people can spare time to meditate towards the concept of religion, only with low probability. But these small percent of people who do are the ones who are actually happy in this Universe, believe it or not! Realizing the truth relieves us of all the misconception that we have on this very existence.

Now plunging exactly into the topic, religion grouped people with similar thoughts. Similarity means masses who believed in particular preaching and that particular path alone leads to realization. Religions started in the earlier period, when man's intellect started developing. There are no newer religions. One amazing fact is that these religions have their followers multiplying rather than dwindling in numbers. This means more and more people are ready to search the true meaning of this existence and to get cleared themselves of as to who controls this massive structure of galaxies. Every religion sent a message to it's followers to spread love and not to argue which religion is the best in the World. No single religion can answer the question "who controls this Univers?". The concept of God evolved as follows.

Every single action of living thing in this Universe involves some amount of intellect involved. The mind co-ordinates beautifully with the body and thus manifests itself as actions. This leads to perception of intelligence by fellow creatures on this planet. We breathe in and breathe out air. We drink in water and also water drains from our bodies and one day we came here and one another day we'll go back. This makes sense as on one day this Universe originated and yet another day it will go back, both scientifically and philosophically. Even physicists claim that this Universe originated from a single compressed mass that exploded itself into it's constituents. Human mind has this serpentine habit of thinking of varied causes for an event and one possible solution that can satisfy human intellect has been put by.... ? Can you guess who or what was it, well it was the concept of 'religion'.

Earlier concept of religion proclaimed that every single occurrence on this Universe air, water, intelligence are the manifestation of a single force. Since life originated from a single protoplasm and this by itself composed of inorganic materials it can be traced back to a single entity that remains as the cause of every single event till now! As years rolled by many religions claimed this concept to be true, this should be because human intellect is limited and everyone that uses it to the fullest will arrive at one single logical conclusion. Since many got the similar conclusion and came up with their names, a Universal name "God" was accepted. The projection of that supreme is this existence, this universe. Religion is a collection of people who believe that particular practices bring them closer to realise this supreme, the supreme what these religions proclaimed was not personified. They personified only to make people more convincing, to make people come out of the miseries of common man's life and become one with the cosmos. The miseries are artificial and foreign to the creation and anything foreign would intoxicate human minds. So, as long as religion breeds realization and more refinement it will remain extremely popular else a similar search would continue but with another name, because the intellect is ever growing.

Media and The Red Letter Day

2009-01-23T17:40:00.000-08:00

Come Republic Day or Independence day and guess what's with the television channels? Programs featuring actor interviews and just-released movies! Each National festival of our country is under this similar fate now. Soon a day would come when the public would feel that whenever there is a day full of these crazy filmy programs, it's something to do with our country! The amount of money these channels spend for these programs can be utilised to produce programs that portray the glory of our country through innovative programs. People avoid programs that are dull, usually. If these producers are creative, as they call themselves, they can project the beauty of our country and the laudable achievements that we have made in a people friendly manner.

It's not fair to blame these channels completely. People of our country have this nasty taste for themselves. So, these producers fearing loss of business avoid taking risks telecasting patriotic programs! This could be solved only through a shift in our public mind, their ideologies and their desire. We should love our country for it is, it's geographic and cultural diversity must be admired. The best people of a country make the best use of their varied resources that are intellectual and natural. We can stand tall among world nations by boosting higher our tradition and our customs. To do these, the media must provide a helping hand. Creative programs depicting the battles that we fought and also attractive dramas must be telecast especially on Red letter days.

People must stop enjoying these small desires, at least on these days of National importance. We need to keep telling our self our glory, our strengths, our uniqueness and only by this we can say how powerful we are to this world. When our people are unaware of our prowess, it's so difficult to prove it a point to this world. It's a hope that these producers would realise the problem soon and try to pull our people out of this imaginary world and show them what India is. The sooner they do this the better it would be.

Why We are?

2009-01-18T06:17:00.000-08:00

Years have rolled by, man thinking on this million dollar question "Why we are into this Universe?". Some say it's by chance, some claim that we are here for a purpose. So recondite is that purpose that no one has clearly figured out as to why we are here! Rational thinking led us to create newer dimensions in life. Adding facilities to our living, in fact eased our way through life. Earlier scientists, who in contrast with current day scholars aimed at research that helped unlock the mysteries of laws of nature. Newton defined the laws of motion and popularised the theory of light, Ptolemy proposing his heliocentric theory, Galileo with his own experiments on stars and many more laudable men. These men took us to some extent in realizing that this world does not exist as such, but governed by some law, in simpler terms bound!

If this is the case, how do we just come into this universe? What is that purpose that we are intended to achieve? Nobody knows. We wanted to be relieved off the mysteries of this life and meditated towards a pure soul, called God. Some argue that God sent us here to serve people and called that is the 'purpose'! But, if we are sent to serve others, whom does the served by serve? Or does that continue as a chain. If at all it happens as a chain, what is the purpose of the very first man? Whom did he serve? No clues here too. The evolutionary theory states that man evolved from a monkey. This evolution applies to the monkey too, which implies that the monkey must have evolved from some other primitive organism. So, coming again what is the purpose of that primitive organism on this Universe?

Physics has one interesting area of research, 'atomic research'. Which defines that every composite matter on this Universe is composed of atoms, which too are decomposable. If the most primitive organism that first evolved on this earth can be traced, then what is the purpose of that organism? Yet again, that organism can be considered to be composed of chemical components, which in turn decompose to molecules and finally to atoms. So, it seems that there is nothing as such called 'living thing'! It's all how these atoms combine to form molecules and various combination of molecules resulted in first organism and there on evolution has started! So, it becomes little clear that until the cause of existence of atom is questioned this is the answer. Phew! I muddled up so much... This is my solution for our existence folks! Do comment if you got an alternate....

From conscience, with Love

2009-01-09T18:01:00.000-08:00

Ryan has been greatly helped by his conscience on many critical occasions of his life. The moment was so surprising when his conscience spoke about its own credits to Ryan. So, here goes the soliloquy of Mr. Conscience.

Dear Ryan, I have been with you not since you were born but when you started reasoning things. The type of reasoning that you do with me is totally different than that you do with Mr. Intellect. I have always insisted you to be 'just' with people and hold on to morals, how hard the situations may be. I have been motivating you to learn your purpose of existence on this earth. Your intellect guides you only on things that help make this life more comfortable, or even move you from one misery to the other. I always struggled to liberate you from the fetters of this common man's life. This, I never did on a spiritual note but on a realization flavor. I wanted you to realize the existence of things. Realization in it's true sense means analyzing and accepting things in their true nature, not a pinch more or less. It's only with the help of me you always tried to unlock the mysteries of this very existence.

Money has been your motivation in life, no doubt aided by your intellectual mind. Whatever you did was to earn the most amount of comforts in life. It is good as long as you desired for what it's within your capacity. When you long for something that's out of your purchasing capacity, greed creeps into your mind. You make desperate attempts to acquire those material comforts in order to satisfy your greed and not you! This is because greed has kept you so unhappy and when you got what greed wanted, you are satisfied not because you actually got that thing but because you are away from the shackles of greed. My duty at those times was to illuminate your mind with thoughts pertaining to transience of material wealth. How wealth degrades with time, this was most important of all teachings that I made to you.

You always had qualms about desire and it's effect and as usual tried in vain to quit desire, only to free from the thought and not from desire itself. Desire is the personal liking to something, loss of which leads to dissatisfaction. The degree of dissatisfaction is directly proportional to the amount of liking that one has for the substance and not to the size of the substance desired. If you like a pen immensely and a car superficially, the unavailability of a pen hurts you more, not the car. But then desire helped you to climb up in your academic career. You earned better grades and secured a great future. After achieving so much you were still worried about quitting desire. You were so poor that you didn't realize that desire to quit desire is in itself desire embedded in it! When you start living for others and start learning to understand nature and with no more personal intentions, it's that moment you have quit desire completely.

Yet another thing you confused yourself with was 'good and bad' syndrome. I got you cleared off this issue through a simple term 'perception'. There is nothing that can be termed in a wholesome as good or bad, only the way we see and who sees it makes the difference. when I cut down a tree that was a hindrance to the public, am I doing good to the public or harming the tree? This shows nothing can be absolutely called good or bad. Stating in a more complex term, the doer cannot comment on his actions but only the influenced can say if it's good or bad, but again no universally agreed upon answer. No universal answer implies no action has been unanimously accepted as good or bad by people of the world. Things that bring most benefits are termed as good and vice-versa as bad. So, I advised you not to involve too much with this complicated issue and do deeds that benefited most people.

I'll speak more............

The New Year

2008-12-31T17:19:00.000-08:00

It has become almost habitual for everyone of us to plunge into party mood on every new year's eve. This celebration of ours is of course aimed at welcoming yet another year of happiness and prosperity. But, do we just focus on just the new year day i.e., Jan 1 and fail to make the most out of the remaining 364 days? I guess, this is the scenario! What does a new year mean? If not as a general opinion I would like to project my thoughts here as simple as possible. The year that has gone by might have given us all sorts of experiences ranging from sadness to extreme happiness, failure to pinnacle of success and countless. We might have done some highly noble deeds and at the same time harmed a few hearts, with deeds and words. The year is the excellent opportunity to put all our negatives on a hold and gear up for the future, retaining those noble qualities.

Yet, I haven't mentioned what we need to do as we usher in to the new year! Well, here is one short list of activities, which I have shortlisted through my observation and experiences. The first and foremost would be adjust with the circumstances. There are many people who decline to bend for the situation. They command the similar requirements even knowing that it's not available. This is not fair as we need to travel places around the globe. It may sound so silly but you'll realize its worth only when you start working for a concern. So be prepared. Next would be, analyze things better before you speak or do. This is an elementary fact, but i feel that everyone of us forgets it with high probability! Analyze the people around you and also the situation before you proceed with your word or action, because it will decide how good you are with people or even the otherwise!

Moving on, concentrate more on retaining your friends rather than trying to make new ones. Many of u would take this sentence in the negative sense. "Concentrate" implies 'give extra efforts to'. So take efforts to keep your current friends from moving away, because that's the toughest thing since you need to take care of friends with varying attitudes. Making new friends doesn't require any effort, as they come when they like you, without any stimulus. When your current comrades are not reciprocated by you, you may lose a valuable asset. So be warned. Further, try to use knowledge for the welfare of people and country rather than to showcase your grey cell potential alone. This is the trend with almost every learned men/women nowadays. Learn to educate others. This should be the motto and this is how many world nations stand tall. So drop all your pompous display of knowledge and start working on how you can be worthy to your country, after all it's you who has to take care of your mother, i.e., your country.

A final note will be don' t take what people do to you for granted. Nobody does something to you without a pinch of care imbedded in it. So try not to harm them at least, if not you reciprocate to the fullest. These are my simple observations that can be embodied as traits of human behavior. Some may be tough to practise, but am sure the effects are divine. If you are ready for all these rejuvenations then you are ready to party out! Finally, be humane in your behaviour and be concerned in your attitude. Happy New Year friends!

Hyper-Media

2008-12-26T09:08:00.000-08:00

The role of media, especially television is so commendable these days. The news channels in particular provide us with the latest update of events occurring in the most isolated part of our country. We come to know about the celebrations that create a jocular mood among the public or the deadly terror attacks that leave people maiming and their relatives in a sullen mood. We get to know about the stock rates at the share markets and views of educationists on various critical issues. All these services from our visual media make one doss their hats in respect. But, there is yet another issue that sometimes, can tarnish the image of these media enabled services. That's none other than going 'hyper' over the issues.

To get clearly what the term 'hyper' really means when we throw accusation at the media, the recent coverage of Mumbai terror attacks can be taken as the impeccable exempli-gratia. We, the citizens of India were deeply drowned in sorrow on viewing those harrowing attacks on our fellow countrymen and we really appreciated the media lens men for getting the glimpse of the happenings, in real time. But, this note of praise soon ended when the news channels started dealing with news as 'commodity' as a well known national daily rightly quoted. The channels started flashing sophomore news on the screens terming it as 'breaking news', even as the officials were waiting for confirmation from the personnel inside the action points.

Each channel wanted to prove its supremacy over the other and in the race failed to bring in the feeling of national sensation into the minds of citizens rather made them irritated with half-baked news that were later stated as false by the same media that reported it. The news correspondents at one point even questioned the rescued hostages who obviously had had a gruelling experience. This showed the media's hunt for news that made them go mad at the hostages. I duly respect the news correspondents who spent hours covering the events of terror attacks, even risking their lives. At one point, the media started reporting the commando plans even! This portrayed their cursory act towards news coverage and how unmindful they were of the consequences of revealing the very sensitive army plans. The message is simple. India is a democratic country where everyone has fundamental rights to his/her own credit. The media has the full freedom to write or telecast anything they wished. It would be more sensible if this freedom is used for what it is intended for, of course with minimal recklessness and maximum enlightenment!

Solitude

2008-12-19T05:04:00.000-08:00

In this busy world most of the children are forced to experience solitude or loneliness. This pushes them to extremism of boredom leading to depressed minds. Often this may lead to detachment from life and may impose a negative impact about life in to the young minds. They may turn shy and become less sociable. But, does solitude have any positive influence? Well, like two sides for a coin, benefits of solitude are aplenty! First and foremost we get to know the challenges of maintaining the house. It's not an easy task to look after your living place. You need to answer people of diverse disciplines from electricity to dairy. These experiences will lend us the helping hand in our future. These minutes of direct interaction with these people are otherwise unavailable.

Many feel that being alone drives your mind towards deleterious thoughts that may affect your intellect. The wise uses it the other way. We can use our solitude as a blessing in disguise, an environment that is calm enough for one to think on. A noisy place is not ideal if one wants answers to his questions, be it scientific or spiritual. Yet another impact of solitude is the confidence that it leaves on the person it affects. Devoid of people to help, a solitary being plunges in to activities all alone with the only weapon 'confidence'. When we get constant pushing from friends and well wishers in solving our issues we only become too much dependent upon them. This by no way means that the help they render is useless, it only highlights the conducive nature of solitude. Thus, next time when you feel lonely be proud of it since it has greater benefits of leaving you undisturbed from gossips and at the same time be sociable.

When fishes go fishing

2008-12-12T18:47:00.000-08:00

Terrorism has spread its wings so wide all over the world that nobody has got any clues as to how to suppress it! The major flaw lies in trying to eradicate the effects of terror every time rather than taking measures to uproot the prime cause of this ugly act. Nobody has ever thought as to why most youth resort to this deadly act of massacring people. The cause needs to be analyzed from the destitute point of view to get a clear understanding of the reason as to why these youth fall prey to terror groups. As always, survival is the key for any human being in this world and everyone looks for a chance to edge over the other. In this race for supremacy, the brainy community enjoys the top luxury and amasses most of the available wealth through business. The poor go poorer. This is not a imposed stature on the poor but it's their only option as they have no other means of livelihood.

From where do the so called terrorists spring from? They are initially one among the billions in this big world and trying to earn their living as everyone do. But, these youth have a family that is unable to sponsor them a day's meal. Under the pressure to live in this world somehow these youth resort to some illegal activities in their childhood. Their minds, from then on refuses to cooperate for any productive activity in life. A sort of addiction. The already existing terror groups look for these kind of hapless young men and mesmerize them with offers such as compensation for family and canvassing in the name of religion. As these men are already in a sullen mood they immediately yield to the bait of those illicit groups and start working for them as suicide bombers!

The leaders of the world who have great care in reviving this only living place in this Universe so far, must try to find all these young minds with anger on life and try to relieve them off their poverty. It's human nature to look out for obvious means of earning wealth, not fearing of the consequences. These minds must be ignited with good thoughts of peace and also they need to be convinced that prosperity springs from peace. This can also be done on a humanitarian basis, educating those juvenile criminals about the ill effects of taking a weapon that will ultimately end as noose for their own neck! This cannot be called a novel way of eliminating terror as it'd been carried out for sometime in the past time, must be done on a full fledged basis. It's high time for us now to prevent these maniacs from hunting men as some fishes go for the kill of fellow fishes. In both the cases, the result is adverse

Indian Pot-Pouri

2008-12-02T01:50:00.000-08:00

Why is it so difficult in a country like India, where taking some crucial decisions by any leader always beckons criticism? Why is that any measure or an act finds colossal time to get itself implemented despite its immediate allocation of resources? Well, this one is best answered by analyzing the people of India rather than its administration. India is a land of people who are from variety of races and religion. They speak multifarious languages and follow a myriad of customs. They have plethora of cuisines and piebald of clothing. In a country of such diversity it becomes extremely difficult to arrive at one single conclusion before imposing an act as part of the constitution.

Any decision taken in our country must not affect the sentiments of the masses. The sentiments may be religious, customs performed throughout time or their aesthetics. When several of these factors contribute to the glory of particular group of people it becomes mandatory for the leaders of our country to take decisions such that none of the groups get agonized or feel that their glory is being tarnished. Each state in India has got its own tradition and none of them, of course would like to give up their prosperity, under any case whatsoever. This is not an accusation thrown at the organization of our country, but a description of the demographic layout of our nation. Leaders taking strategic decisions in country like India must analyze the consequences in terms of mentality of all the groups of people who would be affected.

Yet another conflict that arises during decision making is due to the large population of our land. This huge population count has led to various economic classes. The leaders have additional burden of making sure that their decision suits all those classes and none of them is dissatisfied. India is the biggest democratic country in the world and its constitution is so big only to make the law benefit all the classes of people. So, lets not simply accuse our leaders for not taking the most accurate decision for the very first time since it may also due to the fact that they might have come to that conclusion, excluding a class of people by mistake. By this point I by no way support politicians who take crude decisions. Its only an observation that would corroborate good leaders who take strategic decisions. For other reckless leaders, the preliminary task is to first understand that they have been elected to work for the people.

Love out of(f) life....

2008-11-21T05:43:00.000-08:00

It was drizzling outside and Ryan was watching over the window that provided a graceful view of the beautiful pathway in front of Ryan's house. It looked as if it was a path leading to heaven. So magnificent it was in the drizzling rain. As Ryan was looking through the window, drops of raindrops were pouring over his head and trickled down through his lips into the floor. Ryan tasted those fresh raindrops and was enjoying the rain when the water turned salty. Ryan wondered if the ocean went over the sky, though it sounded crazy. But, Ryan realized that it was not the result of ocean over the sky or of any supernatural phenomenon, those were his tears that rolled down his cheeks and into his lips. Ryan was surprised that his emotions over powered his intellect that they expressed themselves as burst of tears. But, Ryan was not so surprised of this emotional outburst!

Well, Ryan is like any other ten year old living with his working parents in an apartment in Utopia. Both of his parents were working and they leave home by 7 am and Ryan sees them only at 7 pm. Ryan always got the best in his life, best house, best food, best education and everything that a 10 year old needs. But, Ryan missed out the parental love, which Ryan has rated as his prime requirement. He wanted to be with his mom, wanted her to teach him lessons and feed him food. He started feeling that life is full of sacrifices where loss of one leads to gain of another. His parents used to convince him saying that earning now will provide him a better future. They used to say him about the financial burden. Ryan is so intelligent that he understood all these factors.

Inside Ryan was this longing mind, that even though it was convinced that his parents are working hard only for his wellness and the ultimate benefits are only for him, the need for that emotional comfort kept haunting his mind and made him a wistful creature. He was not sure if the trend in global education is the cause for all these increased burden on his parents. The world was initially with men working hard to earn the family's living and the mother takes pains in bringing up her child. She gets immense joy in seeing her child grow in front of her eyes. But, the race for survival in today's world has made even that holy heart (mom) to hurry towards office. Ryan was upset at his mother's pains in working too.

But, what will this ten year old do? He was eagerly awaiting a change in his family. Ryan also knew that the change is to be brought all over the world. Distribution of wealth rather accumulation, elimination of black money, terminating education as a business commodity and so forth. But, this little mind, not want of killing his joy of enjoying rain, slowly subsided to the window pane again and once again looked at that heavenly pathway. He was still confused as whether his parent's efforts to bring the love out 'of' his life to him, leading to taking the love out 'off' his life! Drops trickled down his cheeks this time too, but were not salty as those salty ones had had their emotions!

Vox Populi

2008-11-08T06:48:00.000-08:00

The people of America have spoken out (vox populi). Its "Election America" and finally the race to White House has ended with a spectacular showdown with Barack Hussein Obama becoming the 44th President of the United States. The leader in himself has an excellent orator, a powerful lawyer and a strategic leader. The America that 'was' when he started his election campaign bore no resemblance with the one it is currently in! Lets put aside Obamian tactics and the disconcerted situation that Americans are facing now. The focus of this post is to analyze the attitude of the two candidates for the Presidential election that was expected to be a tight finish but it proved the other way with Obama getting the clean chit!

The famous speech that fetched Obama this scintillating victory was delivered by him at Illinois, the constituency from where he was elected. His speech clearly enunciated his background i.e, who and what his parents were, about his education and his entry into the US Senate. The comparison can be started right away from this point. Indian politics has its own flavors. Each one accusing every other candidate. Obama never accused McCain publicly, instead he insisted on how his principles and ideologies will take America to a new dimension both in terms of wealth and intellectual enrichment. Politicians in every level, in India concentrate mainly on acquiring crowd and make impossible promises. The decency that Obama and McCain maintained during public campaigns is worth emulating.

The post electoral reactions from these two candidates was even more amazing. McCain calling up Obama and wishing him good luck in his tenure! Never can we imagine such a noble gesture from a single politician in India, how nobler he may be in other spheres of life. Politics in India is simply considered as a race to power and not as an opportunity to take the lead in improving the nation's prospects with immediate involvement. McCain announced that he would render full support for the decisions that Obama would be taking in the future. Such is the trust of an opposition on the ruling party. Indian politics and politicians must learn a lot of moral lessons from one of the finest elections and these lessons are worth learning too.

Rejuvenate admissions

2008-11-02T18:04:00.000-08:00

Admissions for most educational institutes, if not for all in India are based purely on the higher secondary school examination marks and the entrance test scores. One good aspect of this metric is that students with high problem solving skills enter into the institutes. But, there is the darker side of this procedure. Students with not so good attitude enter into institutes and violate the very purpose for which the institutes have been established. Mere numerical abilities don't command an excellent character from the student. These abilities can be acquired by anyone through rigorous preparation and regular practice. To be more precise these abilities are not inborn but imparted.

Then what's that thing that is unique or which distinguishes one from the other? Its the passion for study and the future goal the students wish to achieve through their course. Studying high speed databases to steal money would be of no use to society and would go to trashes! The motive behind study is all the most important. In this aspect, its better we learn from other nations. Countries like the USA and almost every European nation adopts this policy where they require a letter written entirely by the student stating his purpose of study. This letter will speak one's heart and any artificial manipulations will be easily found out by the evaluation team. Numerical scores are also taken into account by the selection team and an overall criteria is established which determines the student's admission into the university.

Yet another policy that is outstanding with foreign universities is their selective appraisal of undergraduate courses for admission into graduate courses. For example, if one plans to do an MS in Computer Science and submits his undergraduate score sheet, the evaluation team evaluates his/her performance in courses pertaining to computer science only and give lesser importance to courses not so related to computer science. This method of evaluation clearly filters out students who have a zeal for computers. Similar methods can be adopted for other engineering disciplines. Still, the post graduate admissions for IITs follow the entirely mark based metric and it must be revamped. It would be a sea change if this procedure is adopted for undergraduate courses whose admissions strictly command a high numerical score and not measure of other required skills. This all round evaluation of candidate avoids future complexities like lack of required skills during job interviews, where the candidate is required to take up special soft skill classes. Research oriented minds can also be found out with ease if multiple criteria are established. Lets hope for this method to get established in India in the earliest possible time.

Prediction

2008-10-30T18:59:00.000-07:00

Solving a problem requires good professional skills but predicting a problem in prior needs extremely good analytical skills. Predicting problems early helps us to plan the solution in advance so that the problem can be solved with less side effects. A good example would be the kathiapara project. The traffic at kathiapara has been heavy for a quite long years. Had we anticipated this traffic a bit early, the project could have been implemented without the traffic chaos that has been affecting commuters through the junction. The analysis could have been made using the data such as number of vehicles in the city, the purchase ability of people i.e., if the purchase ability is more, more people would buy vehicles and therefore will lead to increase in traffic and similar other factors.

Predicting problems also has many other advantages like adequate planning of resources, developing an accurate plan, establishment of an efficient implementation team, creating a co-ordination among team members (which is otherwise impossible, since we would be concentrating more on the problem rather than team co-ordination). A separate team can be dedicated for prediction of possible threats and problems, the team must be provided with the necessary details from all departments to derive out the possible problems in the future. Software industry also requires anticipation of problems in the software. It is better to predict the possible bugs that may creep in or possible points of system crash. This will help in embedding proper recovery measures into the software. But, its always better to be cautious that we don't predict too much and create unwanted complexities. A good planner will anticipate problems that will occur in near future with high probability and solving which will benefit most number of customers.

Fostering research

2008-10-27T16:26:00.000-07:00

This article suggests an idea to foster research at professional educational institutes. This suggestion is an amalgamation of solutions that will finally produce the tendency of research amongst the students and professors. The problem, first with the professors in colleges is that they are satisfied with the salaries they get and don't take the risk of investing time into projects that command more time and resources. The other problem in which the professors are involved is the state where they are payed minimal salary. When the professors are provided with a salary that is not in par with their work, they naturally lose interest with the institution they work in and in the end have absolutely no interest towards research.

Not to blame the professors all the time, students on their part also are a major cause for research not being done at colleges. Students look for enjoyment all the time and when it comes to project, they do it for name sake or some even make an "outright purchase!!". When one student of a class does this, it spreads to everyone in the class and the whole class gets infected by this syndrome and no body does a worthy project "on their own!". One way to encourage research among students is to award good cash prizes for outstanding research done. But, the originality of project must be taken into account. Only through pure commitment from professors and students can a good research project evolve and this is entirely a collaborated work rather than a success of an individual!

Touch of socialism

2008-10-24T21:20:00.000-07:00

Graduates of engineering studies are nowadays eyeing at starting their own companies in other words wishing to become entrepreneurs. This is a good sign which will contribute towards nation building. But for the business to succeed what do you think is the most essential ingredient? Of course, the first option that comes strikingly forward is the "love for money". This quality is the most important because without a want for money, you can never make a successful business. Fine, but to keep the business surging ahead there is yet another feature that needs to be embedded in the business process. Guess what? Its socialism or love for customers!!

This may sound a bit too excessive for the one who wishes to do a lucrative business. Believe me, without loving your customers you can never bring improvements in your business. Trade must be customer centric, whatever changes you bring to your business see to that it benefits your customers ultimately. Care for customers can be brought into products that you deliver by maintaining good quality raw materials and ensuring long term usage. This quality applies to both software and manufacturing industry products. Retaining your customers is also possible only when your customers realize that you care for them.

World famous industries like Reliance, Microsoft, Apple, General Electrical, Ford all have succeeded only after realizing what their customers want and producing the products that conform to customer satisfaction. So, whenever you plan a change for your business process first study customer reaction to your existing process and try to predict the effects of customers that would result from the change you plan to bring in your business. No product, that is technically precocious, but less customer friendly manages to bring valuable returns for your business. So, young tycoons realize this golden trick, I might call it, that caring for your customers is the prime virtue that will keep your business rolling for many a years.

Animated Learning

2008-10-22T07:34:00.000-07:00

The topic by itself is too interesting to discuss. Some of us are actually following it, for others here is this post which throws light on this beautiful form of learning. Every subject in the educational field has got its own domain of knowledge. The knowledge of each subject is inculcated into student's mind through books, audio clips and video strips. But, in our country education is mostly text oriented with exception on some parts where audio and video content may be used.

Plunging into the topic, animating what you learn is nothing but remembering what you read or hear as a sequence of events. When you study some complex text, say about psychology of human beings, it would be very hard to remember the text as such and may lead to easy deletion from memory. On the contrary, if the psychology note describes different characteristics of humans and if the student imagines these features in terms of pictures of human faces showing similar characteristics then it would never be forgotten. Similar justification applies all science subjects like Physics, which of course requires lot of imagination, Biology, Chemistry and Math.

Engineering could also be made so enthusiastic if one studies everything in correspondence to real world happenings. A good example of one such methodology is the object oriented programming in computer science, wherein the real world objects are converted into logical objects into the system. Such is the educational process and it would be highly successful with much more animation being done in remembering things. Animated learning also greatly helps in remembering what you hear for a longer period than just remembering things as such, particularly when the listening period is short and the content you hear is complex. Competitive exams that have listening skills test how accurate the students are in recollecting what they hear. Under these circumstances it is better to form still images of what we hear and believe me this surely helps you score better than taking notes of what you hear! So, animated learning is a magical tool that helps you learn better, faster and more importantly retain whatever you learn for longer time!!

Emotional Needs

2008-10-20T08:14:00.000-07:00

This post is dedicated to all those people who have been wistful in their early childhood for want of emotional comfort. Emotional need, like any other needs like material and physical is a vital entity in shaping a child's future. A child under the watchful eyes of a strict father grows out to be an obedient, calm and a being with no love for socialism. Being strict on the parent's part is good unless it doesn't affect the child's emotional balance. A child in its early stages looks out for comforting gestures from his/her parents. The emotional gesture will help in creating a confidence in the kid's mind that there is someone who will support him/her in all endeavors.

Satisfying a child's emotional needs include talking to him in a friendly manner, taking time in listening to his problems and giving him advices that boost his morale rather than tarnish his confidence. Bringing up a child on purely a academic note will make him handicapped on other spheres of life which include moving with society and facing different challenges. Criticizing a child too much would too affect his emotions leading to a inferiority complex. Guidance to children must be such that the child must feel that he/she must do what his parents say out of love, not by force or through intimidation. Threatening a child with harsh punishments will help parents get the things done by the child, but the results will be poor and also this will only be transient. Though I am too young to comment on this aspect, this post is no literary script but a result of careful observation and analysis.

How the space smells??

2008-10-18T21:18:00.000-07:00

The most amazing result from NASA is that the space smells like fried steak, hot metal and the most interesting, welding of a motorbike!! A steak is nothing but meat or fish that is cooked quickly! NASA is using these findings now to simulate a condition that is akin to the space which would prepare the astronauts for the space conditions. NASA has commissioned a research project with the help of a chemist Steven Pearce, who will be simulating the lab conditions that would have the smell of space as described above. At last, mankind is successful in smelling the space!!

The US Hegemony

2008-10-14T22:14:00.000-07:00

The world has witnessed some 40 years of US hegemony (dominance). They have been dominating almost every commercial field ranging from food, agriculture, medicine, engineering and many other fields not only in terms of quantity but also in quality. US has been the pioneering nation in taking the first step towards a novel field. Of course, in the case of space exploration it was the Russians who took the lead but the Americans quickly caught up and now they lead the research in exploring the space and beyond. When it comes to engineering, the premier engineering institutes are located in the American states, MIT, Stanford, University of California-Berkley ( Which pioneered in creating the socket concept used in Internet programming) are to name a few. Not to forget the mind boggling basic sciences research at Harvard!

The Film industry of the US based at Hollywood rocks the World with its awesome movies that keep the people dumb struck for ages. The music bands that originate from this Western country have got fans larger than any personality in this world! I can hear you readers grumbling as to why I am iterating the points that everyone knows! rite? Well the scope of this post is to analyze the cause for US' success and to discuss the possible measure that we could take as Indians to rise in par with this country.

To start with, lets analyze a common man's attitude. Every single person on this earth wants to do only things that interest him. When he is forced to do something that doesn't rejuvenate him, he naturally produces a bad result and this would invite poor impression on the person from his superior, be it in school, college, work place or sport coach. Now, in the US nobody does that doesn't interest them. A swimmer in the US is never forced to take up a course at Stanford rather he is advocated to take part in World Aquatics Championships, a rock star finds his way by producing albums that mesmerize the crowd, by the same token a math student finds his way into top notch institutes only because he does what that "interests" him.

Now the problem with Indian educational system is that we look upon education as a lucrative and a easy option to earn money. The success rate as a sports person in India is much lower when compared to an engineer in India. A gifted singer has to struggle through unbearable hurdles to project himself to the selectors. Education in India is looked upon as a mandatory asset to everyone which is good from one point of view but at the same time it deters the hopes of children gifted with some other talents. A child with some other talent like painting, is not encouraged to pursue it as his career rather is asked to keep it as an extra-curricular talent and study some blah blah degree course. The pain of not being allowed to paint through his life will reflect on his studies where the dissatisfaction will lead to poor grades and ultimately he will perform sub-optimally.

The only way to alleviate this delicate problem that has crept into our intellectual society is to allow children to pursue their ambition right from their childhood. The US dominance clearly teaches us this lesson. The people in every department in the US are those who have pursued their passion as their career. Some examples from multifarious fields include Michael Phelps, Pete Sampras, famous music bands like Blue, Backstreet Boys, Beatles, Pink Floyd, educationists like Paul Krugman, inventors like Charles Babbage, entrepreneurs like Bill Gates, Warren Buffet to name a few. I accept that our country too boasts of people who have anchored their names in many fields but there would have been many such ones had our people be allowed to pursue the song of their heart, their passion. So, lets think on this and bring in a intellectual revolution that would surely put India far ahead of its competitors.

Attitude

2008-10-05T04:25:00.000-07:00

This post discusses the most vital virtue needed for almost every human being in this world. That virtue is none other than, "attitude". The education that we acquire at schools and colleges will give you an insight into what our forerunners have done exploring this nature. There is yet another feature unique to every individual in this earth and that is "talent". Whatever endevour we undertake, talent and education lend us a helping hand in tasting success. But, the noblest quality that takes us even beyond is our attitude
.

There may be people who might haven't had a formal education. Those people would not know how to go about in life in earning money and to rise high in their lives. But, there would be some urge inside their hearts that keeps on telling them that they need to surge ahead, that they need to prove their worth! Thats none other than their attitude. This positive attitude of theirs will keep their efforts going on, will keep their optimism evergreen and finally take them atop the victory podium in their life.

Attitude not only helps us in tasting success, but also helps us in making a better living. Looking at things with a positive attitude gives us a peace of mind and motivates us to do things that are beyond our capacity! Many of us would have experienced this phenomenon. When you lack this positive attitude towards life, everything looks unwanted and everyone will look fiendish to our eyes. We tend to hate others and lose hope in ourselves and finally fall into a wistful life, longing for sympathy and mental calmness!

Right attitude at the work place is also a key to earn better positions in an organisation and also will motivate our colleagues. Always try to do the best out of available resources and don't grumble on the nonavailability of suitable materials to achieve a task. If at all we aren't capable of doing a job, its better not to comment on people who do the job with fullest dedication. This kind of teasing will not only harm the doers but also instill a negative attitude into our minds thereby our mind gets rusted, refusing to take up any innovative jobs! I have seen people who just sit back and comment on people who try to turn the tide. So, to conclude keep your mind free of unwanted thoughts, keep your optimism high and always wish to rise in life along with others rather than rising alone!

Concept Vs Syntax

2008-09-24T09:11:00.000-07:00

Having done 3 1/2 years of engineering, it looks very obvious to me that many of us concentrate on getting the syntax right rather than absorbing the concepts. Concepts are implemented using programming language syntax, which are of course necessary. But, students tend to give more importance to syntax rather than the concepts that these syntax statements emphasize. This is not the consequence of the students' interest. The laboratory examinations of engineering colleges focus mainly on programs that are strongly syntax oriented. In the earlier years, lab examinations were conducted with the questions being provided on the spot. This made the students' mind to do some brainstorming and get the problem solved. The case is entirely different in our colleges, where the same programs would be provided and the one with the best memory passes out clean!

Many of us would have heard of state-of-the-art software products like Linux and Face book which are nothing but projects that were done by two engineering students in their colleges. These two software, obvious enough, are ruling their own domains of implementation. What made these people to develop such innovative software? The primary reason that I would give is that the educational system there demands students to produce such a project to get their course completion certificate. The students would naturally put their grey cells to work and come out with a novel solution that will naturally act as a trend setter for future projects.

To sum up, unless we revert back to the method of the past, where lab questions for the end examinations would be provided on the spot, we can never expect students to do extremely great innovations in the software field. The lighter side of this issue is that, since the lab exercises are syntax oriented students pay very little heed to the instructor's words and spend the hour gleefully chit-chatting! I had been the victim of those "Don't talk!" people who eargerly await to see someone talking in the lab and hand them over to higher authority! If we have a challenging task at hand, why do we think of whiling away the time?? We can't blame the system as a whole to take responsibility for this poor situation but its also on the students' part to get the better half. This situation should change, else computer engineers will become idiot-boxes, repeating the syntax alone rather than climbing up the innovation ladder!

Infrastructure & Mathematical Libraries

2008-09-12T07:05:00.000-07:00

India is country that has produced mind blowing Mathematicians since time immemorial who took this world on their stride. Their theorems on number theory were something that no one could imagine of! Computer Science is an applied field of mathematics, where the mathematical principles are applied to solve the problem rapidly. When this is the case, why is that we don't produce efficient computer scientists as we produced Mathematicians, when its just an application of those glorious mathematical principles? The European and American countries hold the lead in fields of Computing Sciences. Its time for us to sit back and do a little brainstorming so as to find out where the problem lies.

Colleges are places where the young Engineers are groomed for the industry. Its the place where students are being made employable. An ideal ground where the scientific principles are put into action. Ironically, most of the college labs, particularly computer science labs lack infrastructure needed for high speed computing. The fault is not only on the infrastructure but also on the care taken in keeping the software library updated with the latest in the market. Computing sciences require high end software mathematical libraries as the normal compilers do not support high speed operation on large numbers. Most colleges are not even aware of these packages and therefore the onus on the students who have to search and collect these software themselves.

Onus here refers to not only the effort taken in locating Mathematical libraries but also to the fact that most of these libraries are not freewares and therefore require an amount after which the software unlocks. The institutions must take efforts at least to fund these amounts to purchase these software on students' requests. Its a pity that most colleges lack such software where the Internet-Superhighway is extremely pervasive and information is omnipresent. This calls for an urgent improvement in the infrastructure of colleges and will also help the colleges themselves to raise to the ranks of premier institutes like the IITs.

The students have a burning passion to do high end projects in computing sciences , for which high quality software is needed. The institution on its part is required to pay heed to student requirements and provide them wit adequate facilities rather than just iterating the derogatory statements like "finish the projects within deadline". Statements like these will drive students to frustration leading to sub-optimal projects, which are projects only for name sake. I hope, in the near future a sea change in infrastructure will occur and an era in which the computer scientists from India will soon begin. I can hear some of you referring to those top positions in foreign institutes being held by Indian Engineers, but those people are from top notch colleges like IIT. The solution is as simple as this. Satisfy the students' needs and they will rise to glory!

Learn How to find things....

2008-09-04T23:15:00.000-07:00

We are living in an era in which information is freely available. Whatever may be the area, whatever may be the subject, you get the answer in a second. The trend in problem solving nowadays is to figure out where to find the information rather than building an application from scratch. We want to solve the problem quickly rather than proving our technical expertise, when it comes to pure problem solving. We need to sacrifice our personal ambitions while trying to solve problems. Searching for an information not only requires special skills but also sufficient training in handling the information source, say the Internet.

Once given with a problem, the first thing to look for is the essential steps required to solve the problem. The second one will be look for the tools to implement them. The next step would be not to start working with the application but rather looking for an already existing tool. This not only saves us time, but gives us a confidence that the problem is half solved. Later, try to modify the tool according to your application, which is possible in most of the open source tools. This is the basic principle used with the Object Oriented System Design Methodology to write softwares.

There is yet another crisis with this Object Oriented Systems Methodology. When programmers use an already existing object in their application, their Manager often questions their skill sets!! Because, he feels that they don't have a brain of their own! This problem is somewhat difficult to tackle, because it deals with the psychology of the Manager. The programmer needs to convince his Manager of his skill and expertise. So, a sufficient trade off is required between using an existing object and writing your own applications and a clever programmer always find the fine thread connecting these two.

Educate thru interest not thru force!

2008-09-02T07:24:00.000-07:00

Hello ppl! Back again, this time with a more controversial topic to discuss. Education and how it is being handled in India. Education is a virtue, a precious commodity and this must not become an object of business! The second aspect regarding education is, how its being brought into student minds. Its a pity that education is being imposed into young minds rather allowing them to enjoy a lovely feeling called "education". Yes, education is a lovely feeling, it has a gentle breeze in it, a feeling called "awareness". The pleasure of knowing something can only be felt!

Today's plight of education is, particularly in India, we are forced into a rigorous course called "education". Forced tests, punishments and other unpleasant treatments. Why it is being stuffed into our minds? Why is that we are not allowed to think a moment and enjoy what we learn? Why is that examination still remains as the student evaluation criterion? These remain a billion dollar question in India forever! This is not the first time a student like me is feeling for this miserable happening. Many educationists have written columns of articles and many speakers spoke volumes about this issue. But in vain.

The solution is simple. People who are really interested in educating the masses must run the institutions. Education as a business object must be a punishable crime. No rule can impose the two above said principles. Its purely subjective. One has to be true to oneself and must look upon education as a way of making people realise what the world is and make the young minds feel at ease while learning.

Sizzling Schumi

2008-07-20T04:35:00.000-07:00

Gone are the days when F1 was a one man show with the German maestro who with this dexterous hands drove the red-machine to victory every other time. The driver, who had fans almost equal to Michael Jackson, made people frantic about this racy sport at least for a decade. Ferrari was its career best when schumi was its driver along with Barrichello. Both these men made sure that victory was the only result for the Ferrari, whatever circuit may it be, Silverstone, Magny Cours or Sepang. It was akin to the wave of the magician's wand when Schumi waves to the crowd atop the podium.

But then, every good run must come to a halt and so did Schumi. Fortunately, not for Ferrari. The Massa-Raikkonen duo seem to be doing a better job in retaining the name that the red-machine had during the tenure of Schumi. On the other side, the podium seem to enjoy this season with winners changing from circuit to circuit and this variety in the race results have also made F1 fans happy. The dominance of Schumi also yielded a boring sensation from other F1 patrons who felt that the sport had become one sided. But now, each race brings in different adventures, neck to neck podium finishes ( which was a rare phenomenon during Schumi's period when the German lead the race by more than a minute). In all, though the retirement of the flying German made F1 fans heavy hearted, it has also sparked a new phenomena of variety and surprising minutes in the world of F1 sport.

Trust

2008-07-18T05:40:00.000-07:00

Trust goes a long way in maintaining almost every kind of relationships. An employer must trust his employee that he will produce best results. This trust gives the motivation to the worker and he ultimately gives his best. A father must trust his son/daughter that he/she will come out with flying colors. The trust of his/her father will naturally induce the much needed responsibility to achieve the goals. The trust of a father is the best motivation a child needs to progress. In team games, the Captain needs to trust his players so that there exists a cordial relationship among the players and also between the players and the Captain. Lack of trust from the Captain will induce negative thoughts into the minds of the players.

When it comes to friendship, trust means a lot. One must trust their friends always. This trust does not come in just a matter of days' acquaintance. It takes a much longer time to build this trust. The situations during which you don't let down your friends are the basic building blocks of trust. The real show of trust is exposed when you support your friend(s) when the whole society is against him/her/them, when there is nothing wrong on his/her/their part. Trust helps in building strong relationship. Lack of this trust among friends will lead to superficial relationships that may break down at any time.

The most important trust, which I believe is to "trust yourself". You need to trust yourself that you are capable. Trust yourself that you are born to win. Trust yourself that you will bring glory to your nation, to your parents, to your family and all your well wishers. Have the trust in yourself that whatever job you undertake, will surely end in success. This trust in yourself is the first step to victory. This trust will put you miles ahead of your competitors and will surely help you scale greater heights. Failing to trust yourself will bring all your skills to nonentity. So, understand how vital it is this "trust" and try to incorporate this virtue into your life as soon as possible. Once you do this, you will have better relationships and success will become a habit!

Quantum Computing

2008-07-10T09:00:00.000-07:00

Gone are the days of Classical Computers that are designed using transistors. The era of Quantum Computing has dawned. A quantum computer works under the quantum mechanical principles of superposition and entanglement. In a classical machine data is stored in bits, whereas in a quantum machine data is stored as qubits (Quantum Binary Digits). The basic idea of quantum computing is that the properties of quantum can be used to represent data and quantum mechanics can be used to perform operations on this data.

The efficient use of quantum machines will be in the field of cryptography for cryptanalysis. The Shor's algorithm which aims to solve or crack the RSA algorithm will work perfectly in polynomial time if quantum computers are used. The RSA algorithm can be cracked if we are able to factorise a number 'n' into the two primes that constitute the product. The Shor's algorithm finds those two numbers in polynomial time while the other algorithms can solve only in exponential time.

The problems solvable by quantum computers area called BQP, "Bounded Error, Quantum Polynomial time". Quantum computers run only "probabilistic" algorithms. A quantum computer is said to "solve" a problem if for every instance the solution it provides is right with high probability. Even though, quantum computers are faster than the classical computers, quantum machines can't solve problems that are not solvable by classical machines. Since the quantum machines can be simulated using "Turing Machines", quantum computers cannot solve undecidable problems. But, a realization of quantum computers, which is still in the research phase, will add a new dimension to the Computer Science.

Nature and Discretion

2008-07-06T07:40:00.000-07:00

It was those periods of mankind when man knew nothing of this Universe and of the Earth. He was roaming over this planet as a pristine being and dint have rational thinking powers and powers of discretion. Life was peaceful as he ate the Mother Nature's offering of fruits and vegetables, and of course some animals. He was completely dependant on Nature and was thankful for what the Mother has given him.

Then this mind of man started pondering over things as to make life easy, it was then the wheel was invented, to make transport easier. This rational thinking of man did not stop with this and ventured deep into inventing many more things that made his life more easy. This led to a well settled life and a better understanding of the laws of nature. But, the confusing aspect, which I view, is when nature was sure in making the rules governing the Universe a profound for humans, why did we strive much to understand this recondite concept? Why do we strain ourselves beyond our limits to get things cleared about the periodic happenings of Earth and the Universe? Call it discretion or violation of the living rules?

Man was for long years only because he enjoyed the nature's offerings and dint get beyond his limits. He was in harmonium with nature and he enjoyed the every speck of his surrounding. The competition among the humans led to acquirement of wealth, leading to imbalanced distribution of property. This gave rise to greed and jealousy. Man had to think more and more to get over the other person and this led to a life of misery and man detached away from the pleasures of nature. He neglected nature and concentrated more on material life. Material benefits became a matter of prime importance for him and respect for humans was completely lost.

The life we lead today is not for us, but for our status, for what we want people to think of us, for what dignity we want in our society and so on... Many of us forget what happiness is and get ourselves going with this world. We don't spend a minute a day to think of what our real interests are and are we pursuing our passion. In today's world enjoying the nature and admiring it is too ambitious but try to make sure that you don't get yourself hooked up with the thought that you control the nature with technology and other gizmos. One thing that is proven right for sure is that our lifetime is strongly reduced once these innovations came into practice. In the older times people lived hale and healthy for longer years but now we battle with nature to keep ourselves alive!! One thing which I feel dangerous is that, too much investigation into something which is deliberately kept abstruse will bring unpleasant results unless it is done on gregarious grounds, example exploring "Nature".

Catchy & Crazy.....!!

2008-07-03T08:32:00.000-07:00

1. For those of you using Windows, do the following:

*Open an empty notepad file

* Type "Bush hid the facts" (without the quotes).

* Save it as whatever you want.

* Close it, and re-open it.is it just a really weird bug?You can try the same thing above with another sentence "this app can break"

2. The number of text messages sent and received every day exceeds the worlds population.

3. The founders of Google didn't know HTML and just wanted a quick interface, thats one of the main reason why the home page is so bare!!

4. The name "Google" comes from a spelling mistake, the founders intendent to write "Googol".

5. Google comes from the word googol, which is 1 followed by a hundred zeros!

6. The highest amount of money paid for a domain name is for business.com, $7.5 million.

7. 28% of IBM employees are Indians!

8. Bill Gates began programming computers at age 13!

9. Triskaidekaphobia is the fear of number 13 and Paraskevidekatriaphobia is fear of Friday the 13th.

10. The ZIP in Zip Code means "Zoning Imrovement Plan".

11. Each King in the Deck of playing cards represents a great King from the History.

1. Spades - David

2. Clubs - Alexander The Great

3. Hearts - Charlemagne

4. Diamonds - Caesar

Just for Laughs

2008-06-30T07:15:00.000-07:00

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A programmer is walking along a beach and finds a lamp. He rubs the lamp, and a genie appears. "I am the most powerful genie in the world. I can grant you any wish, but only one wish."
The programmer pulls out a map, points to it and says, "I'd want peace in the Middle East."
The genie responds, "Gee, I don't know. Those people have been fighting for millenia. I can do just about anything, but this is likely beyond my limits."
The programmer then says, "Well, I am a programmer, and my programs have lots of users. Please make all my users satisfied with my software and let them ask for sensible changes."
At which point the genie responds, "Um, let me see that map again."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

CIA - Computer Industry Acronyms

CD-ROM:

Consumer Device, Rendered Obsolete in Months
PCMCIA:

People Can't Memorize Computer Industry Acronyms

ISDN:

It Still Does Nothing

SCSI:

System Can't See It

MIPS:

Meaningless Indication of Processor Speed

DOS:

Defunct Operating System

WINDOWS:

Will Install Needless Data On Whole System

OS/2:

Obsolete Soon

TooPnP:

Plug and Pray

APPLE:

Arrogance Produces Profit-Losing Entity

IBM:

I Blame Microsoft

MICROSOFT:

Most Intelligent Customers Realize Our Software Only Fools Teenagers

COBOL:

Completely Obsolete Business Oriented Language

LISP:

Lots of Insipid and Stupid Parentheses

MACINTOSH:

Most Applications Crash; If Not, The Operating System Hangs

AAAAA:

American Association Against Acronym Abuse.

WYSIWYMGIYRRLAAGW:

What You See Is What You Might Get If You're Really Really Lucky And All Goes Well.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A man is smoking a cigarette and blowing smoke rings into the air. His girlfriend becomes irritated with the smoke and says, "Can't you see the warning on the cigarette pack? Smoking is hazardous to your health!"
To which the man replies, "I am a programmer. We don't worry about warnings; we only worry about errors."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Enigma Cipher

2008-06-28T08:07:00.000-07:00

There is an interesting encryption technique using some hardware called "three rotor machine" or "The Enigma Cipher". The device was invented by the Germans during the II World War. There will be three rotors, to start with. The plain text will be typed in through the key board. When the first character is typed, it passes through the first rotor and gets encrypted according to the position of the rotor, because the rotor has 26 teeth, one for each alphabet. The first rotor passes it's output to the second rotor and the encryption takes place according to it's position, similarly with the third rotor. The new letter that we get for the plain text character, will be bounced off a reflector and we obtain at the first rotor.

The beauty of this machine lies in the complexity that it imposes by rotating. Initially, the first rotor makes its first move for the first character and the other two rotors remain stationary. Once the first rotor completes 26 moves, the second rotor makes a single move. Even now the third rotor is stationary. Till now, we have 26x26=676 combinations, coz the first rotor makes 26 moves for each of the 26 teeth in the second rotor. When the second rotor completes 26 moves, the third rotor makes a single move. The entire process repeats now. To sum it up, we have 26x26x26=17576 combinations.

The initial position of the rotors act as the key. The decoding people must know the initial configuration to decode the message. In those times, the configuration was written on a diary which had the configuration for each day. This was insecure, coz if someone happens to get the diary, he may form the machine of his own. The Enigma cipher was broken(decrypted secretly) by Alan Turing (In picture) and group of scientists for America. Had this not been broken, the Germans would have had a different course of war!

Proxy Servers

2008-06-22T01:39:00.000-07:00

Many a times we have come across the term "proxy servers". Proxy servers are an intermediate link between the "client" and the "internet". When a client sends a request to the internet, its first received by the proxy server and then its forwarded to the internet. The reply from the internet reaches the proxy server and then the proxy server forwards that result to the client. People use different proxy servers depending upon their need. The major types are listed below.

Web Proxy:

This server is used to monitor the contents transferred over the world wide web. These are mainly used in schools, colleges and other institutions where the offensive contents and unauthorized sites need to be blocked for client accessing. In these cases, the client sends a request to the internet, which is received by the proxy server and it forwards the request to the internet. The reply from the internet reaches the proxy server and if any offensive or illegal content is present, the access to those contents is prevented by the proxy server.

Anonymous Proxy:

This proxy server helps to remove information that may identify the person, information that are confidential from the user's request. For example, while accessing the social networking sites like, orkut, facebook etc. the information is at the risk of being known to many people. So, these servers take care of what contents must be seen by which group of people.

Caching Proxy:

This is a special type of proxy in which the proxy server replies to the client's request without contacting the main server. This action is possible when the proxy server has some part of the contents in the main server cached into it's memory and there must have been some information sent to the main server by the proxy that it will be replying to the client directly. This ensures the clients get their queries answered very soon.

Forced Proxy:

Forced proxy just forwards the client's request to the main server in the internet everytime. The client will not know that they are using a proxy site.

Open Proxy:

Open Proxy enables that anybody can obtain a link to this proxy server and use it. This causes security to be breached and facilitates exploitation by spammers. Many organizations deny requests that come from proxies that are known to be "Open".

From the above discussion we see that, proxies can enable faster operation by quickly processing user requests and reduce the load on the main server by serving some of the requests on their own and they also act as firewalls for educational insttutions.

Internet Trivias

2008-06-21T19:49:00.000-07:00

1. Who coined the phrase 'World Wide Web'?

Tim Berners-Lee in 1990. He's also considered by most people as the person who started the whole thing rolling.

2. How did the Internet Start and Why?

It all started with the time-sharing of IBM computers in the early 1960s at universities such as Dartmouth and Berkeley in the States. People would share the same computer for their computing tasks. The Internet also received help from Sputnik! After this Russian Satellite was launched in 1957, President Eisenhower formed ARPA to advance computer networking and communication.

3. Who was J.C.R. Licklider?

Licklider is often referred to as the father of the Internet because his ideas of interactive computing and a "Galactic Network" were the seeds for the Internet. His ideas would be developed thru DARPA,(Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) in 1962. Later he would help form ARPANET and the Internet was on it's way.

4. What was ARPANET?

ARPANET stands for 'Advanced Research Projects Agency Network' Came about in the arena of Sputnik and the cold war. The militaryneeded a method of communicating and sharing all the information on computers for research and development. It would also be a handy communication system if all traditional ways were wiped out in a nuclear attack!

5. What was the First long distance Connection?

In 1965 using a low speed dial-up telephone line, MIT researcher Lawrence G. Roberts working with Thomas Merrill, connected the TX-2 computer in Massachusetts to the Q-32 in California. The phone lines weren't quite up to the task!

6. When was the first mouse introduced?

The first computer mouse was introduced in 1968 by Douglas Engelbart at the Fall Joint Computer Expo in San Francisco.

7. Country with the highest percentage of net users?

Sweden at 75%.

Losing Your Temper....

2008-06-15T07:41:00.000-07:00

It's really painful when our friends or colleagues at business places shout at us for unnecessary reasons. Its mainly due to the fact that people who lose their temper feel that they are not being respected or their opinion is being flatly brushed aside. Among friends, one starts shouting at other because the other dint listen to his orders or did something he wanted. This often occurs when one of the friends is so dominating over others. Many think that showing a dominating character is a "virtue", but the truth is that it may land them into a land of troubles. Peers don't respect them and also their opinions and move with them for the sake of that association that they had with those short tempered people.

The general principle is that, try to respect the other person's needs and wishes and behave accordingly. True friendship lies in sacrificing at times our own wishes and trying to get the wishes of our friends' satisfied. We must be able to observe our friends' behaviour and be able to identify the way they adjust with us even though we are so rude at them and do something that is not desirable to them. When our friends are ready to bend their wishes for us, then it becomes a duty for us to reciprocate atleast some amount of this kind hearted behaviour if not fully.

Do not burst at your friends since because they say something against your opinion. Take time to analyze whats that so good in their view that it makes your's a little lower in grade. If you still feel your's is still better, then try to convince your friend politely by highlighting the inherent good qualitites of your idea. Even at work places, do not dominate or over power your team mates with your solutions. Ask your team members for their views and try to incorporate your proposals along with theirs. Be it friends or colleagues, respect to human stands tall amongst all vital characters for human beings.

Cold War Among Friends... The worst of all!

2008-06-08T21:12:00.000-07:00

Everyone of us in our life through our school to college must have experienced or at least witnessed the sort of misunderstanding that exists among friends termed as "Cold War". When friends are in cold war, they don't face each other face to face, they don't talk with each other. But, the most amazing thing is that they don't attack each other explicitly and also deliberately. This sort of bitterness goes on and on between them unless either of the two friends breaks the ice and speaks out.

The common problem among friends is that they think that they don't do any mistakes and any problem that occurs in the relationship is purely due to the other person. Everyone is liable to err and every single person must know this fact. When the other person does some mistake, it is the beauty of friendship that one must notify it to the other person rather than rebuking him severely. Think for a minute why the other person is not speaking out to you. Don't always look for the other person to satisfy your desires. Take some pain in getting done the things the other person likes to enjoy.

True friendship is when both the persons know each others' strengths and weaknesses and try to help each other in overcoming their weakness. When someone stops communicating with the other just because of some minor misunderstanding, then its not at all termed "friendship". There is selfishness creeping in here. Friendship is that where there is no selfishness and sacrifice is the most valuable gift that one can give to one's friend. Finally, don't forget your friends for what they are and also learn to rate your friends according to the care that they show to you. Showing similar reaction to all your friends may not sound well all the times. Cheers to friendship......

Good Friends...What it takes....?

2008-04-14T05:03:00.000-07:00

This article will surely be an eye opener for all those who fall under the category of people whom am going to describe. This world does not have friends who have the same attitude towards towards friendship always. One of them values the other greatly but the other may be of a cheap character like using his comrade. This is worst as slavery and leaves a tarnished feeling in the friend's heart.

If this is not clear, let me dwell deeper in to this. Some people make friends with other people just because they have got something to complement them(the self). Of course, friendship is complementing what the other has not got with him/her, but making friends for the sole purpose of it, is something that is rancid. The other person utilizes the other's potential and doesn't even bother to ask about his problems or not even cares to complement his weakness. This is not friendship, I guess! The irony is that the person who utilizes the other does not realize that the other party clearly knows the attitude of the other most of the times. So, those who belong to this category please beware, because you can be fired anytime!!

Friendship is a mutually beneficial behaviour and to one extent can be symbiotic, where one person benefits and the other, neither benefited nor harmed. But, the problem is that people tend to be parasitic and try to suck most of the resources from the other. There are also kind of people belonging to parasitic category but still produce an image that they are very friendly, which is a hilarious comedy for those who know them deeply!

Friendship does not lie in roaming with and chatting together. Its Tete-a-Tete feeling one has with the other. Good friends can read each other's mind and can heal each other's mental wounds just by good thoughts. This is called telepathy and it surely works among good friends and only pure friends can realize this mystical power. Money doesn't matter among friends but the timely help and the open mindedness are the most wanted attributes for great friendship. Don't be egotistic with friends and good manners is in not letting down your friend when in public and not in all those high-fi behaviours.

To give that final touch, always help your friend achieve his/her dream. Enjoy with your friend but never leave him gasp for breath to come up in life after that hourly enjoyment. A good friend is the one who is a strict teacher at times and a gentle comrade at the other. Prestige is not a issue in making friends. Even the son/daughter of your house maid can be your best comrade, provided you both decide to hold that thread of good friendship forever. Remember, friends acquired for the sake of status and pride will leave you off when the both leave you. Don't have a perception about people without ever having a word or two with them. Finally, try to estimate the amount of care the other person shows on you and rate your friends accordingly, because every one cares for you but with a different gradient....

Ferrari Returns...

2008-04-07T07:16:00.000-07:00

After the retirement of Michael Schumacher, Ferrari hadn't had any graceful races that gave them a neat podium finish. But, this season of Formula-One has been a great one so far for the Ferrari team. The race at Manama, where Felipe Massa clinched the top spot with Kimi Raikonnen in the second place pushed Ferrari to the second spot with BMW still in the first spot. But, Kimi leads the drivers' Championship table. Lewis Hamilton, the British rookie last year, who threatened to take the drivers' title last season was out of the podium in this race. To sum up, Ferrari is back with a bang and more action is on the go.

The Problem Of Stuffing Too Much...

2008-04-03T07:53:00.001-07:00

It is a usual event in engineering colleges in India to conduct repeated tests for students not bothering about their interests. In their first year, students simply do what they are told to for the fear of being punished was always there. Here again the goal of education fails, instead of imparting quality education to the students, it imposes a mere fear of the professors and the assignments are completed not due to interest but due to pressure.

As years roll on, students mature by mind and realise what's going on around them. What the industry needs from them. Is it the ability to merely fill the papers is the need of the corporates?? Or the ability to solve problems with common sense? Definitely the latter. But, what's that our college education providing us with? Loads and loads of subjects, totally of no hint to students as to where these are leading them into. Students get lot of things into their minds and finally fail to figure out what is the ultimate benefit of learning such subjects.

Stuffing too much into a young brain diminishes its ability to think on its own and imparts the habit of total dependency, wherein the mind expects someone to guide in solving any problem. We lose our originality and our productive power is almost gone. Once we dwell into the thought of whats the subject is all about, the semester exams sound an alarming bell and we are doomed to prepare for those "Discuss the foll..." stuff questions, which purely represent the author's view and the exam gives no freedom for us in proving our skill. Professors argue, when students continually complain that the subjects are theory oriented and when the question paper contains a problem, they fail to solve although they said they needed problems in it. The reality is the student is accustomed for theory papers that he must learn only those paragraphs from the book and the same old examples when certain questions are asked. But, when suddenly a problem comes in the paper, he is not prepared for this and the result he succumbs to this unexpectedness!

"Artificial Intelligence" is a subject wherein the student learns how to impart thinking ability into a machine artificially. But the exam tests actually the "author's intelligence", how well he has written the book, because the questions demand the students to reproduce whats given in the text book rather than asking them to think rationally. This is not the aim of education. All this type of learning will vanish from the student's mind once the exams are over. As Einstein has once said "Education is one that remains after he has forgotten all that he has learned". How much you retain is what that determines the success of an educational system. But, its otherwise here.

I usually stand amazed at the way students present their paper during semesters and the happiness they get out of it. The happiness of having decorated the paper thoroughly. Its a utter shame to do this at the engineering level. This occurs because, the student has been over stuffed with the subjects and he is unable to find the one that suits him the best and starts embarking on those semester and scoring in the same, which amounts to nothing to the outsiders. When there is a gap between the teaching period and the exams, when the student is allowed to experiment on his learnings, that is the period when engineering achieves its mission. Till then it is still a "Vision".

Mission 2020...Is it tangible....????

2008-04-02T05:13:00.000-07:00

The voice of our dear former president and a great educationist, Dr.A.P.J.Abdul Kalam is still echoing in the hearts of every youth in India. The voice that assured that India would be a super power by 2020. The dream of every individual who contributes for the Nation's growth is this!! Everyone is striving currently to make our India the Super Power in another 10 years. Its the dream that is being cherished by all the leaders of India who truly have interest in this Nation's development.

But wait!! Are we on the right road towards achieving that dream?? I fear We aren't. The trouble starts right at the top. The people ruling this country. Every politician who is elected is concerned very much in securing his post and to loot as much as possible during his tenure. The allocated funds for development activities are spend in the Minister's personal development. The usual note that these people sound is "Lack of Fund". But, when all the money is swallowed by these ruthless rulers, from where does one get money to bring a suitable change??

The next major issue is population. India has a commanding lead in this area and is on a flying start to beat China soon. Lots of campaigns, lots of awareness programs on television and radio, but the masss pay no heed for all the announcements and continue increasing the population and thereby inviting more trouble for the nation. The villages, where birth control is considered an offence, are the areas of primary concern where the population growth is exponential. They consider children as their asset and any damage to this ritual is subjected to severe punishment. This prevents even the Government to interfere and bring about any useful measures. The immediate task is to put a check on population growth in rural areas first.

The next area, obviously is to bring a sea-change in the educational system. Why is a contry like India, where education is given a top priority does not succeed at the corporate level? The reason is that we concentrate much on imparting education to children but fail to illuminate with the thought as to why they study and what changes that they can bring to our country. This is what the distinction between the education in India and the Foreign Nations. US and countries like France and Germany have got many inventors but we Indians, whom we call ourselves as the Brain-Factory of the World have produced only a few people who changed the way the World sees them. Ofcourse, am not here to blame the whole system of eucation here.. I have a valid explanation for this too. Read on....

Poverty... The unconquerable evil in India is a major hindrance for education in our country. A family where there are no scholars, when a child of theirs becomes the First scholar, the family wants him to capitalise on his learning and earn more for the family, rather plunge into research. In our country, as a general tone, research is set aside for people who have a good financial background. We are not talking of the middle and upper middle class as poor here. Peopl who can't afford food for atleast two times a day are the major concern. Ironically, in our country 75% of the population is under this category!!! Now this is what preventing our human resource to produce high quality research products. Well, India too had people from very poor background like, Dr. Ambedkar, Sir.C.V.Raman, Ramanujan, Dr.Abdula Kalam and a very few. This list of people, of no doubt have made the World to notice India as a emerging super power.

Now, the problem with our country is very clear. The rich gets richer and richer and the poor, poorer and poorer. When and only the wealth of the Nation is equally distributed among the masses, people start working with passion rather for those high salaries!! This one is a bit difficult in the current scenario. But, we as Engineers have a considerable role to uplift or forge our nation into a land of burgeoining technologies. Well, how are we going to do it? As it is well said, "Knowledge gets improved when shared". This also means that we can travel places for getting what we need. We must travel all around the World, learn the techniques that have made the respective nations the fore-runners in their World. The next step is to analyze the current situation here and adopt the policies that one has learnt around the World. Not clear, we must become Business-tycoons or to put it in a simple way "Entrepreneurs". If and only if we take the torch in our hand we can guide people better. By working under an employer for some period of time, we gain certain experience in us and must make the best of it when we become the leaders of a firm.

So, Engineers, the goal is set. The tasks made clear. Only remaining activities are commitment from us and the most important "taking the initiative". Once these two are done, then there must be no looking back. Lets join hands to bring out that New India which our Student-friendly scientist wanted.... India The Super-Power.. Isn't awesome to hear...

Reciprocate One's Love

2008-03-10T09:33:00.000-07:00

Many of us have been with various friends during different parts of our lifetime. Everyone of us have an amount of love and affection towards our friends. But, this love is different for different people. It depends upon the respect we have for them and the closeness of their relationship with us. Many of us do the this common mistake. We don't reciprocate other's love adequately. Many friendships have been broken due to this silly act.

Some have this common attitude, of treating everyone as their friends. This is an extremely good attitude that brings people together as a closely knitted group and helps in working together. But, what these people don't realize is that there are people surrounding them who give them the extra care they need when its most needed. It hurts a lot when they don't react accordingly and treat them as "just equal" like others. There is no meaning now in showing extra care. So, for those of you who love to make many friends be cautious that you don't leave those who trust you a lot "heavy hearted".

It takes lots of effort to make a good friend and even more goes in maintaining them. If the effort is not equal among both the parties involved in the relationship, then the relation doesn't mean the same to both the people. One values it dearly and the other sees it as a mere liability. There are other kind of people, who are too possessive. Possessiveness is good to some extent, but see to it that it doesn't ruin the relationship. Be possessive only if the other person likes to be possessed. I wish my friends will take this article seriously and make a good world of faithful comrades.

Live thru the transition....

2008-03-08T08:23:00.000-08:00

Well! The time has come for all of us to shift from College to Corporates. What it takes to be successful in getting into a corporate and further staying in it? The requirements are pretty different than those for the semester exams. Thinking out of the box, real time scenarios, experimentation and so on.. These are some of the key tasks one will be doing inside the corporates. Before that, there is something happening between this college life and the life with the companies. Yes, the transition.....
How it sounds:
Some welcome this transition with a broad smile, as it gives them an opportunity to try their hands with some real world problems. For some others, its a sudden act of "independence" which affects them, because they might have done everything under heavy scrutinizing and lack of this puts them under heavy pressure. Whatever may be the case, the transition is sure for all. Well, how to go about this? Primarily, a change of attitude is required. See every problem you study as a real world problem or at least associate them with a real world entity. Imagine some solution that could solve the problem even in the real world.
Learn the other way:
While learning the subjects, learn those subjects that really interests you with some passion which will carry you forward. Select your domain where you want to work, because it gives you two advantages. First, it gives you job satisfaction. Second, it enables you to deliver the best project as you love your job. Consider the practical aspects of the subjects and enquire whats really happening rather than just mugging up!!
Finally:
Successful people are those who grow through this transition and gain as much experience as possible through their projects. Mere theoretical knowledge will do no good. Projects lend you a helping hand when you want to explore things and don't take projects "a take it for granted aspect". Hope u enjoy this transition.. good luck!!!

Relations Vs Education

2008-03-02T06:39:00.000-08:00

Prologue..
Relations and Education, I think are the two most important factors which affects most of the people throughout this World. This is because both these can contradict each other under many occasions, and even land you into a dilemma when it comes to decision making. Education ......Well, it all started when man started understanding the Nature. The deeper he learnt about it, the more interested he became and the more he learnt. This, on one hand enabled him to create a better place to live in.
Employee and Employer...
Then came the period when people started a concept of "working". Under this, people work for somebody and get their equivalent amount either as gold or as any other commodity. Then, the World's population increased and there was a competition for earning this so called "job". It was at this time, the concept of "evaluating a person if he is employable" started and then came learning what other people have done already, which is defined as "EDUCATION". With this trend, people started losing their originality since they became more and more of the other person than being themselves.
The Link....
You may wonder, how this affects human relations. Well, I ve the answer. Initially, people done their own business and exchanged their goods for goods that they are insufficient of. But, since "working for others" has aslo started, there arose the competition among the masses, then followed, pride, jealosy, egoism and all the evil that men shouldn't posses. So, man who paid lot of interest to human relations, now diverted towards "winning over others". The "care for all" concept is gone all over now, retorting back to the books. False relations started growing just for the sake of getting things done and the true love perished.
The Panacea...
Is there a solution for this? Well, every problem has a solution, as it should be. Do not confuse education with relationships. Be, who you are when you are with the people around you. When it comes to learning, develop an attitude that what you learn is surely going to serve this society. Because, something that doesn't help this society improve isn't worth learning. From the time immemorial, the aim of education was to make people happy by understanding nature. Tats why, we study weather conditions to fore-warn the people of impending cyclone, have thousands of sensors to indicate forest fires to save trees and wild animals and so on... What I say here may sound too elementary, but this is something everyone has seems to forgotten.
Please Do This....
Finally, everyone of us is going to move into a service oriented industry that caters to the needs of people. Whatever project you do, remember that you are doing it for a same person like you, because its the general public who is going to get benefitted by it. You can see the relationship thread running here. What I say here is, education is meant to keep relations intact rather to alienate people. Don't argue over unimportant aspects of education with peers or even with professional. Speak up only if its worth arguing such that the result is an enhancement in human relations. No big deal, the World is meant to be happy always, tats why we learn..... and this learning must make us happier and happier as we learn something deeper and deeper..think on............

Whats Technology all about??

2008-02-29T01:24:00.000-08:00

Technology is a word that has got many abstract meanings in today's world. It sounds different to people from different domains. To a doctor it means something that enhances the way he handles his patients. To a poet its merely an element to sing about. To a teacher its something he has to keep learning on and on, because technology has no bounds on grounds of its development.

But, the unbelievable truth is that Engineers are the first people who get affected or benefitted by a wave called "Technology". Its their life that sees a round about change. First, whats this technology all about. To be precise, it is a tool by which an engineer enhances the life-style of common men or civilians. Its also the same cause for which science and inventions have strived for, all through the centuries.

Technology aims at easing the day to day activities of mankind. There is one important thing that every engineer needs to realise. Whenever he embarks on a new thinking that ultimately leads to a new idea, it must be based upon the central idea of helping the common people. It must aim to solve a major issue among the masses. Edison has once said that "I don't invent things that don't benefit the people ultimately", which literally means, he doesnt invent things that don't sell in the commercialmarket.

The IT majors all over the world do only this kind of job, identifying people problems and defining new solutions. Ofcourse, thinking out of the box, which means out of the ordinary is necessary to solve these problems, but doing so should not complicate the problem solving process itself. So, its high time the engineers realise that its for helping the common people for what they graduate and technology is one powerful tool in their hand. I wish every engineer follows this fine thread and keeps this world closely knitted through the concept of "Engineering".

Chasing Your Dreams......

2008-02-27T08:08:00.000-08:00

Everyone of us have a dream of our career, which we like to pursue in our future. This dream enables us to create a vision of our destiny and helps us to act towards it. The most important aspect here is not just dreaming of our future but how efficiently we move towards it. The preliminary task here is finding exactly where our interest lies. Without knowing this aspect of our's, its extremely difficult to figure it out what our future is.

Once you find whats that interests you or about that which you are passionate about, start working towards it by channelising your enery and your mental powers. Narrowing your thoughts towards a particular domain is extremely important here, because it enables you to analyze a particular area in detail. Once you have done this, the next thing is the learning process. Learning can be done through doing some innovative projects in your period of study that corresponds to your domain. This hands on experience on a particular technology helps you better to step ahead on the same field.

When you do a project on your area of interest, you have a chance of learning the various aspects of diffeent modules that are used in it. This is certainly useful when we do a real time project in the same field. When you are doing these, you realise that your dream is getting into reality slowly. This is what we call as "Chasing your dream", because a good dream is very encouraging and motivating, but when you start working with it the hurdles that occur in between seem that the dream drifts away from you. Thus, it becomes mandatory to chase your dream and achieve it to have a satisfied job experience.

The Flow of Life.....A Realisation...

2008-02-24T05:53:00.000-08:00

Life is the best teacher for many and of course its for me too. It has taught me how to enjoy success and also how to learn from my failures. But, there s one different aspect of life which everyone hates to endure, "going through tough times". Life is good when everything goes our way and we feel "at the world's end" when something goes against us. This kind of experience, I believe everyone of us would have endured for sure.

There have been occasions when we enjoyed a lot with our friends, tasted success in whatever we did and to sum up "everything went our way". Those were the periods when we thanked God for giving us this beautiful life. But, none of us ever wishes to even think of those periods when failure was our way of life and tragedies were the day-to-day events. This is the other part of life, or to put it simpler, the other side of the coin. The two aspects of the life are inseparable. Lets see how to view this befuddled part of our life.

Life is a flowing river that takes all who are in its way, the same manner a river takes all those particles floating on it. The particles pass through the smooth water surface, through cool waters and surrounded by lush vegetation. But, they also stumble upon hard rocks and flow from high cliffs. The same anomaly can be employed here, people as particles of river pass through happier moments also through the darker periods during their life. What is implied here is "everyone must accept the flow of life".

Sometimes life lends you a warm touch and at other times hits you with a hammer. A clever person recognises the hammer as the alarm to change his course of action to become a better individual and acts accordingly. Next, life doesn't always provide you with the same resources, as I said, warm moments and hard times are provided as mandatory to every individual. Also, the two of them are never permanent. One succeeds the other and may be their effects are permanent. But, a even more intelligent person changes those effects due to bad times into better ones when he s through better times!!!

Accept the flow of life as it treats you. Don't stand against it. This doesn't mean you must give up when there is no hope of continuing further. Efforts are different from flow of life. What you do constitute the efforts and the rest come under the forces of life. When you have done your fullest and if still something goes wrong, then it indicates something better awaits you in the near future and its going to be a surprising turn of events. Everyone must do what is expected of them and the result then doesn't affect them, because they will surely be rewarded some day if not immediately.

To conclude, nothing is lost when something is lost. Not everything is achieved when success is tasted, finally "Don't let success reach your head and failure reach your heart"......Accept life as it comes to you...........Life is beautiful##

Adorable Hyderabad...... A Travelogue!

2008-02-23T06:08:00.000-08:00

On Wheels...

The sight of the barren land was boring to see through the Hyderabad bound Deccan Express but that's all I could see through the train window until the train reached Secunderabad. It was a well built industrial city nearer to Hyderabad. When the train crossed Secunderabad, the beautiful city of Hyderabad unfolded before us with its dazzling beauty on the emerging lights of the day's sun. People exercising around and the gorgeous Hussainnagarsagar lake with the Buddha in the middle made us awe-struck!! There were many commercial outlets by the lake's side including water theme park, food court, verandas and many more...

The Autos!

Have you ever seen an auto driver in Chennai charge you on a meter basis? You wouldn but it would be the period of your grandfathers! But the auto drivers in Hyderabad are really good natured that they drive their autos around the city with their meters set in. I was really surprised to see an auto man asking me to pay him as shown by the meter. This is what that makes Hyderabad a beautiful city compared to Chennai although its bigger than Hyderabad. They are very friendly too. when you climb into their auto they get you to the exact location even if they aren't aware of that place, they ask the address from the passers-by and take you exactly there!!

Road Rules...

The second most fascinating aspect was the discipline among the four Wheeler drivers. They were having their seat belts fastened always when they are driving and following the lane rules perfectly. No rash driving. Next, the city roads were very very neat , not even a speck of dust on the road!! Chennai people have to learn a lot from them. On the whole , the city was very beautiful and adorable. Its a perfect destination for tourists. There are also innumerable shops selling embroidery articles, that range from shawls, bags and other gift articles.

Charming Charminar!

Now, I would like to say about the beauty of Charminar. Its a gateway standing in the center of the city. It has artwork embedded on it and there are two staircases, one to alight the gateway and another to descend down. Its a massive structure and has streets around its periphery selling all fancy articles. Many Muslims throng to this place as a majority. The guava that's being sold at this gateway's entrance is simply sweet!!!

Cuisine:

The food habits of people here differs completely from those of the Tamilians. One thing I observed was that they drink a lot of tea. They probably hate Parotas I think but prefer lot of Chappathhis. The side dish that they have for these dishes is very rich in protein and people here seem to have a passion for food, the Hyderabad briyani deserves a special mention here!! Non vegetarian food is predominant here. The vadas that they serve here are slightly larger than ours and tastier too!

The Language....

I know Tamil and English, written and spoken, but Hindhi, I can comprehend what people are saying to some extent and speak at a normal pace. People here speak hindhi and telugu predominantly and nobody wanna speak English!!! I felt extremely difficult speaking in hindhi to auto drivers who had no knowledge of English except for 40 rupees, 50 rupees and so on......!!! Its good for people visiting hyderabad to get well versed in Hindhi.

Finally.. about the people..

The people of Hyderabad are very friendly. Ready to help you anywhere anytime. They are very good in their hospitality and also stick to moral ways in whatever they do. This keeps the city going at good pace i think. My request for all my friends would be to pay a visit to this beautiful city and admire the "InCreDiblE IndiA"..........Adieu@

Think Different.......

2008-02-20T05:28:00.000-08:00

Thinking has been man's gift bestowed upon on him by God. Inventions rolled out of this great human brain once he started thinking rationally. Further inventions improved the quality of life and also his own intelligence. But, who were these people who have made these remarkable events happen? Were they those "who take things for granted", were they "who study religiously and industriously?, were they "who never break the rules and follow the line laid in front of them?". No!! Not at all!!

History bears witness to those great inventions. Inventors were always those who thought "different". They normally questioned the occurence, rather accept them as they were. They thought of a better alternative that usually looked awkward at first. When the first computer was developed, it was everyone's ridicule who saw such a huge machine doing basic arithmetic. But, today is the day where machines challenge men with their own intelligence.

Bill Gates, the owner of the Operating System giant that probably covers the whole of this earth, was fired from his school for setting up a program in one of those early network machines that ultimately crashed the network. What Gates did then was a little mischievous act of getting into those machines and exploring a bit. Later he with his friend succeeded in fitting a memory into a desktop computer which marked the era of today's PCs. Conventional methods will never yield a fascinating solution because the method by itself isnt fascinating.

"You laugh at me because I am different, I laugh at you because you are all the same!!" said Bernard Shaw. The fear of facing a ridicule haunts everyone who starts on with a new idea. What he must realize is those who ridiculed him are the ones who will be praising him when he succeeds. Thinking different allows you to stand distinctly in a crowd. Peopl eagerly await a person's action who thinks differently out of their curiosity. Its often confusing for many when they see mischievous people shine better compared to those all time studious ones in many fields. The real reason is the mischievous ones always hate going by the rules whenever they are given a task which is their usual habit. This even reflects in their jobs that ultimately leads to the evolution of a new idea. Its also true that studious ones too are mischievous many a times which according to me is a good combination.

According to me Engineering education provides you with the necessary tools for building newer applications rather than simply repeat them. Ofcourse, there are those exams that demand reproducing whats in the text books, there are those periods between the commencement of the semester and these exams where the mind can be used resourcefully to think on a new idea. It need not be a great revolution in his/her field but can be a smaller module that when added to the existing system will greatly improve the performance. Innovation is the key to progress of technology or else it will become stagnant without any development for which thinking different is the key ingredient.

So, put on your thinking caps on...would you like to be one among the equals or first among them??? clearly the choice is urs...... happy thinking@

Hurray! Hurray!..... Blu-ray!!!

2008-02-19T06:47:00.000-08:00

Every one of us knows about DVD which is expanded as "Digital Versatile Disk". There are two standard formats for the manufacture of DVDs till now. They are the HD-DVD format and the other one is The Blu-ray format. These two formats are incompatible and are arch-rivals of each other. However both these formats have increased the DVD storage capacity from 4.7GB to 20GB-25GB.

Sony and Philips were the giant manufacturers of DVD using Blu-ray standards. Toshiba and Hitachi used HD-DVD standard. The real problem arose when Hollywood released their movies on DVDs that had multiple standards like Fox, Warner and Sony for Blu-ray and Paramount and Universal for HD DVD. This lead to the purchase of different DVD players for different standards. In a reamarkable turn of events, Toshiba has decided to exit from HD DVD business leavin Blu-ray as the only single standard available for DVDs.

Toshiba withdrew mainly because Warner Brothers one of their major supporters have decided not to use HD DVD standards and business giants like WalMart and NetFix have adopted to Blu-ray standard. Technology wise, HD DVDs are easier to produce but their storage capacity is 15 to 20 GB versus 23 to 25GB for Blu-ray.

Due to this diversification in standards people started downloading movies from the internet rather buy DVDs that had two different standards that necessitated purchase of many DVD players. This problem of downloading pirated movies over the internet has come to an end with this single DVD standard. Indian CD and DVD manufacturing giant Moser Baer is very happy and sure of increasing its capacity of production since the format is standardised. The current disk production is 3.2 billion per year which Moser Baer is sure to increase. In all, its Blu-ray's time to rake in the profits!!!! Hurray Hurray Blu-ray!

Coffee With JAVA-Part One

2008-02-17T05:51:00.000-08:00

Here I am to start a series of sessions on JAVA, the programming language of the future! In this first session we will see the most fascinating feature of JAVA the "Applets". Applets are applications that are transported across the Internet, accessed from a Web Server and installed automatically on a client system and run as a web document. The really good aspect of applets is that they access only a limited part of the client's memory and thus reduces the risk of virus attacks and ensures data integrity.

A SAMPLE JAVA APPLET

import java.awt.*;
import java.applet.*;
"angle brackets"applet code="App1" width="200" height="60""angle brackets"
public class App1 extends Applet{
public void paint(Graphics g){
g.drawString("My First Applet",20,20);
}
}

The Explanation for this code is given below:

The "awt" class in JAVA called as Abstract Windows Toolkit must be imported. JAVA applets communicate with the user using awt tools only not using the conventional console input and output methods.
The "Applet" class must be imported for every applet in JAVA and the applet class must be an extension of the Applet main class.
The paint() method belongs to the "awt" class in JAVA and takes a graphics device context as an argument. It is defined in awt and must be overridden in the extended class.
Inside the "App1" class you have another method "drawString()" which is the member of "Graphics" class. It takes three arguements, the text to be displayed, the x and y coordinates on the screen.
The JAVA browser window starts at (0,0) on the left top of the window as the origin.
The HTML code at the top specifies the size of the window, in the place of "angle brackets" type "<".

Compiling and Running the JAVA applet:

Run "cmd" from your start menu. The DOS interface opens. Using "cd" command move to the appropriate folder where your JAVA compiler is stored. Usually its better to copy the JAVA compiler so that it has the path C:>\jdk1.3\bin>.

Type edit filename.java at this instant, in our case, App1.java and type the program shown above in the editor window that opens.
Save the program and you will be at the command prompt again.
To compile and run:C:>\jdk1.3\bin>appletviewer App1.java.
The output looks like this

Features:

Applets do not have main() method.
Applets must be run only under java compatible browsers
I/O consoles dont work with Applets.

...............The Aroma will continue.

THE VOICE OF INTUITION

2008-02-16T19:09:00.000-08:00

The voice of intuition is the Voice of Wisdom itself. It is present in almost all the human beings and there is just a difference of degree. The Voice of Intuition is within you also and it is up to you to listen to its directions or disobey it. If you will disobey the Voice it will cease to guide you. Intuition becomes weaker, when you do not pay proper heed to its Voice. The Voice of Intuition seeks only the best for you and aims at your total well-being.

The Voice of Intuition belongs to the realm of extra-sensory perception. We will use the expression ESP for this to denote the realm of human thought beyond the field of sense organs and reason. This is the super-sensuous realm and reason is not applicable to it. ESP enables us to predict the future and to afford guidance to solve the problems which confront us. It is useful in almost every walk of life, be it business, politics, statesmanship or any other field of activities. When we follow the guidance of the ESP, it tends to grow and to make us better and stronger persons in our own field. The lawyers and the doctors are equally governed by the guidance that they receive from their power of ESP.

Dr. Douglas Dean interviewed a number of top businessmen such as William.C.Durant, the founder of General Motors, Conrad Hilton, International hotel magnate, Chestor Carlson(in the picture), the inventor of the photo copying technique and a few others... He came to a conclusion that..... ESP is an essential ingrediant in business life where decisions have to be made about future events, often without enough information to justify them. Businessmen use it every week, every month, every year, continually.. They pile up tremendous profits yearly because they really are stupendous at this ability".

Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill, Frnaklin Roosevelt, Dr.S.Radhakrishnan and a few others , were all guided by their very strong ESP and followed the commands of their intuition. They listened to their Voice of Intuition and were able to take decisions of very great significance, involving the detiniesof millions of the citizens of their country. A very young lady, Nettie Colburn Maynard, wa very close to President Lincoln, and while in trance, is reported to have laid very great emphasis on the necessity of the abolition of slavery. Here Lincoln's voice of Intuition coupled with the message received through the young lady, Nettie, was the motivating force behind the historical decision taken by the President for the abolition of slavery.

Winston Churchill had invited three ministers to a diner during the Second World War. While the dinner was going on, he had an 'intuition'. He immediately got up and went to the kitchen, where the butler and the maid were busy cooking the food. He instructed them to put the dinner on a hot-plate in the dining room and vacate the kitchen. It was observed that within less than five minutes , a bomb fell at the back of the house and the kitchen was totally destroyed. Every one was saved as they had just one instance of the Voice of Intuition obeyed by the great statesman. His intuitive powers helped him throughout his life and he had made it a point to obey the Voice without raising any question.

Benjamin Fairless, former Chairman of the Board of U.S. Steel said that while you obey your 'Intuition', "you do not know how you do it; you just do it." With regular practice, you will find that there is a very close relation between following the commands of Intuition and making rofits in business and achieving the goal of one's life.

DIN'T EXPECT THIS TO HAPPEN!!

2008-02-15T17:14:00.000-08:00

I was very excited of the tour to Madurai to present my paper at the most prestigious "Thyagarajar Engineering College", the Stanford of the south or the Anna University for the South Indians, on the 15th of February. We booked a ticket for a bus run by the Tamil Nadu Government that was scheduled to arrive at 8 pm at Tambaram. We reached the bus stand at 7 pm and waited for the bus to arrive.

Then came the confusion... The bus dint arrive till 8:30 wherein the buses scheduled to arrive at 8 pm have arrived. We waited and waited and at last got frustrated and approached the time keeper of the transport corporation. He was such a responsible person that he gave a very brilliant answer saying plainly, "The bus will arrive since it has not crossed the bus stand!!!!". Whats the use of technology that has developed heavily but does not help in communicating this very vital information of when the bus will arrive?

Time rolled on. It was 11 pm. The still dint arrive. At last we decided not to wait anymore and decided to take a bus to Trichy and get another one to Madurai. But we werent sure of getting there early. Still we kept our hopes alive. We got one private bus to Trichy and the tragedy

started all over. The bus driver was very reluctant to start the bus since the bus wasnt full. Finally, he started his Mercedes at half past eleven and we breathed an air of relief. This dint end..After driving for some 15 minutes, he rolled into one petrol bunk and stayed there for another half an hour for fuel. I was feeling that we have done a terrible mistake by getting into this bus. With no other go, we slept silently hoping to reach Trichy somehow by 7 the next morning.

It was 6:30 in the morning the next day and Trichy was beaming with sun shining brilliantly over the eastern sky. I was sensing a smell of victory of reaching the place atleast by 7. Ofcourse, there was that toughest assignment of reaching Madurai by 9! It sounded impossible at first but the confidence and desire to reach the college stayed us alive.

When we stepped out of the Trichy bus a middle aged man came running to get us into a bus for Madurai. The bus was cosy and looked the best one to travel to Madurai. We went in demanding the driver to start the bus as early as possible. Promising us he seated us in one of those seats and there was one Vikram's hit films running over the television at the top. Inspite of these frustrations we enjoyed the movie!!!

The road fro Trichy to Madurai was a lush green country side with barely people goingb walk. Then came the most harrowing part, the bus driver was very reluctant to drive the bus over 30 km/her!!! Even the slowest of the tortoises could overtake our bus. It was 130 km long journey which we hoped to end in some two and an half hour, but that seemed too optimistic for us. He drove the bus and parked it in fron of the so called hotels halfway between trichy and madurai that had nothing to eat except for some old packet chips. There were some tender coconuts to drink. That gave us some energy, cos it was last night since we ate a crumb of bread.

Then the bus rolled on and reached Madurai at 10:30 for beyond our expected time and it was not the appropriate bus stop. So we took another bus from there and reached the other bus stand and took an auto to 100 rupees and reached the college at last!!! The event "paper presentation" has commenced and our slot has been postponed by those kind hearted organisers. We dint take bath, no break fast and had one of those hostel rooms to rest. With our head reeling, we entered the presentation arena , which was simply fascinating and waited for our turn.

They called our name and we climbed into the diaz. I felt a sort of dizziness and everything was simply revolving around me. We made a good presentation that satisfied us but there was one student judge who asked some "for asking's sake " questions trying to dethrone us. We, suffering from loss of energy yielded to his plot and ended in me shouting at him!! In all it was a "Big Mess".

The total mission was a failure and I turned towards J and said, "I dint expect this to happen". For which he replied, "Nor did I!" We, with a heavy heart, boarded the Pandian Express and reached Tambaram the 16th morning hoping not to do a mess like this in the future!!!

WHAT IS TRUE LOVE?

2008-02-14T03:26:00.000-08:00

One day a young man was standing in the middle of the town proclaiming that he had the most beautiful heart in the whole valley. A large crowd gathered and they all admired his heart for it was perfect. There was not a mark or a flaw in it. Yes, they all agreed it truly was the most beautiful heart they had ever seen. The young man was very proud and boasted more loudly about his beautiful heart.

Suddenly, an old man appeared at the front of the crowd and said "Why, your heart is not nearly as beautiful as mine." The crowd and the young man looked at the old man's heart. It was beating strongly, but it was full of scars. It had places where pieces had been removed and other pieces put in, but they didn't fit quite right and there were several jagged edges. In fact, in some places there were deep gouges where whole pieces were missing.

The people stared -- how can he say his heart is more beautiful, they thought? The young man looked at the old man's heart and saw its state and laughed. "You must be joking," he said. "Compare your heart with mine. Mine is perfect and yours is a mess of scars and tears."

"Yes," said the old man, "yours is perfect looking but I would never trade with you. You see, every scar represents a person to whom I have given my love - I tear out a piece of my heart and give it to them, and often they give me a piece of their heart which fits into the empty place in my heart, but because the pieces aren't exact, I have some rough edges, which I cherish, because they remind me of the love we shared."

"Sometimes I have given pieces of my heart away, and the other person hasn't returned a piece of his heart to me. These are the empty gouges -- giving love, is taking a chance. Although these gouges are painful, they stay open, reminding me of the love I have for these people too, and I hope someday they may return and fill the space I have waiting. So now do you see what true beauty is?"

The young man stood silently with tears running down his cheeks. He walked up to the old man, reached into his perfect young and beautiful heart and ripped a piece out. He offered it to the old man with trembling hands. The old man took his offering, placed it in his heart and then took a piece from his old scarred heart and placed it in the wound in the young man's heart. It fit, but not perfectly, as there were some jagged edges.

The young man looked at his heart, not perfect anymore but more beautiful than ever, since love from the old man's heart flowed into his.

IN MEMORIUM OF EINSTEIN

2008-02-14T03:05:00.000-08:00

Albert Einstein's Swiss Passport.
Little Albert encountered the first "wonder" when his father showed him a compass that deeply impressed him.
About the compass, the first "wonder", he wrote:
"I encountered a wonder of such a kind as a child of 4 or 5 years when my father showed me a compass. That this needle behaved in such a determined way did not fit into the way of incidents at all which could find a place in the unconscious vocabulary of concepts (action connected with “touch”). I still remember – or I think I do – that this incident has left with me a deep impression. There must have been something behind things that was deeply hidden. To things which man sees from childhood on in front of him he does not respond to in such a way, he does not wonder about the falling of bodies, about wind and rain, not about the moon nor about the moon not falling down and not about the difference between the animate and inanimate."
Why did Einstein stick out his tongue to the photographer?
Albert Einstein and the Aydelottes were just returning from an event which had taken place in honour of Einstein. Einstein was, though already sitting in the car, still bullied by reporters and photographers. They didn’t let him be and he is said to have shouted: "That’s enough, that’s enough!" However, these words didn’t hinder the photographers from taking some more pictures of Einstein and his companions. And when he still was asked to pose for a birthday picture he really grew tired of the journalists and the photographers and as encouraging words didn’t help any more, he stuck out his tongue to his "prosecutors". The photographer Arthur Sasse pressed the button of his camera in just this moment.
Einstein liked the picture very much. He cut it into shape so only he can still be seen. Then he had made several copies of it and sent the thus "manipulated" picture as a greeting card to friends later on.
In this form we know it today and though it isn’t shown here the reader clearly remembers the picture with Einstein’s tongue.
At age 6, Einstein began playing the violin which would become both his hallmark and psychological safety valve later in his life. He was taught by rote rather than inspiration and seven years would have passed before he was aroused by Mozart into an awareness of the mathematical structure of music. Although amateur, Einstein would always enjoy playing the violin. At this time, Einstein also entered the Luitpold Catholic elementary school.

CSE-3A@MYCOLLEGE.COM

2008-02-14T02:38:00.000-08:00

Our class is one of those academically over-conscious, practically yet to develop and staff-repeating classes of Indian classrooms. We have all types of technocrats in our class. From those who take class notes 'letter by letter' and those who don't even hear a 'word' about whats that happening.

I am unable to figure out the happenings in my class clearly. I would rather blame it on the system of education than upon my college. Taking raw notes unknowing of how far those concepts can be implemented and repeating the same for a lofty 90% in the semester seems very hopeless for me.

Its always good to be sharp with the theory behind the happenings, but where have the implementations gone? A mere hectic 7 hour a day wont suffice for the growing competitiveness in today's World. I can see the repeat my schooling in my third year!! No room to think on our own. The assignments in each subjects add up to everyday's mess. Those are the ones copied from some "ABC" book written by some "XYZ". Those are copied again by classmates to be submitted on time to the lecturer. Writing of these during class hours is another offence!

The unit tests add as a serious trouble to those who want to learn by concepts and not merely by-heart. Short period of study followed by some "explain the stuff" questions in 2 marks that eat away ones time result in frustration and lead to shabby work at last. The main aim of the these tests is dashed by not adhering to the capability of students. To be sure, these tests do not provoke any fruitful thoughts.....

These things leave me in only one stae "CONFUSED". I couldn judge if this is good or bad, better or worse. But, it has become a daily event in the day of a cse-3a student..

.........To be contd......

THE ART OF BEING YOURSELF

2008-02-14T02:26:00.000-08:00

Well! This seemed to me the best topic to be chosen for discussion, when it matters to reach the top of the world. The term "world" varies with people, depending upon their area of interest, their attitude and so on.

To be precise, it may be defined as their area of competitiveness. Each individual has got some uniqueness that distinguishes him/her from others. This is what makes everyone special. Infact, this uniqueness is very much mandatory to classify individuals. Then why do people lose their originality? Losing originality is very common among people who try to impress others. We can see such actions in shows where "talent exposure" is the key point.

But, when we note it very keenly people who have succeded have been those who projected their own traits, rather imitating others.Secondly, interviews are places where we are forced to lose our identity. We in the process of impressing the employer try to speak or do that don't even match our character. This even though fetches an attractive job package, makes us feel 'cornered' at some point in time.

So, think about it! Its good to emulate the refining qualities of great men, but at the same time we must make sure that "we are what we are". Everyone must have an inherent passion which drives him/her to praise them for "whom" they are and for "what" they are actually for!!!