Implications of Warne's retirement

Job opening

Applications are now invited, in India, for the post of next spiritual 'guru'. This position is very challenging because it is equivalent to that of a CEO of a large, financially successful corporate organization. There is exactly one opening and competition is high.

The key roles and requirements of the job are listed below:

1. The role requires you to be the public face of a large establishment. You need to be charismatic, a good public speaker, and be able to carry yourself well in the presence of VIPs.
   
2. Ability to amass large amounts of real estate both in India and abroad.
3. A decent understanding of science, Chemistry in particular, to be able to synthesize chemicals in liquid/powder form. These chemicals must resemble substances that have a religious symbolism, for example, holy ash (vibuthi).
   
4. Ability to exploit science to appeal to faith.
   
5. Sleight of hand. Further training in sleight of hand will be provided based on the selected candidates current abilities.
6. Ability to create mass hysteria for no apparent reason. This ties into requirement 1, of being charismatic.
7. Ability to keep secrets - very important.
   

Perks: All your expenses - including medical expenses - will be taken care of using other people's money. The disadvantage is that you will have to be celibate (or atleast appear so to the public).

Indians to stay off social networking in attempt to support Anna Hazare

Anna Hazare recently gave the war cry to Indians to battle corruption and the masses rallied around him; masses including corporate honchos, actors, sportspersons, celebrities, pseudo-celebrities, and celebrity wannabes.

The knee-jerk reaction to this war cry was creating pages on Facebook/Orkut and other social networking sites to spread the cause and using these pages to put pressure on the government to pass the anti corruption bill. Ideas floated initially to post the colour of ones piece of clothing associated with corruption - analogous to the case when women posted the colour of their bra on facebook to spread awareness on breast cancer. Because no piece of clothing could be associated with corruption, it was decided to post the colour of one's purse or wallet instead.

Later, the net-savvy Indians decided that in order to further their cause, they would now stop using social networking sites after realising that the chances of Indian politicians having Facebook and Orkut pages and being interested in the colour of their wallets and purses, is quite close to zero. They have now declared a blanket ban on social networking usage catching (primarily) their supervisors, system admins, and ISPs unawares.

While the sudden drop in traffic was surprising to ISPs, who suffer loss of revenue and system admins, who see a sudden change in traffic patterns, the worst hit has been company management - across the board -which has not been able to deal either with the sudden spurt in productivity, or with the money suddenly made available due to reduced electricity and bandwidth usage. Sources from different companies have stated that hasty meetings and adhoc committes that includes HRs, managers, and system admins, are being setup to handle this unforseen situation.

It happens only in India

Rather puzzled seeing IIIT-Bangalore playing host to the 20th Intl. WWW Conference while the conference is actually being held in Hyderabad. Usually, an educational institute in the host city, hosts the conference; so would have expected IIIT-H or some other university in Hyderabad to play hosts. Well, all I can say is "it happens only in India" ;-)

Airport wifi

Boston's Logan International Airport has free wifi, but for that one needs to either take a survey or watch an sponsor advertisement. Well, 30 seconds, so I watched the ad. Chicago, O'Hare, there were hajjar SSIDs. In Beijing, one needs to get a user id and passcode from the airport lobby office.

Whatever it is, no comparison to Vancouver International Airport! No ads, no username, no password. Just connect, and browse. :)

Pita pizza ;)

1. Unleavened bread - Pita/Roti
2. Sauce spread on it. I used pasta sauce.
3. Finely chopped onions.
4. Grated carrots
5. Grated chesse - I used Cheddar and Gouda.
6. Salt, pepper
7. In the oven for 10 mins, allowing the cheese to melt.
   

Quick to prepare and fingerlicking good. *drool* :)

Pesto-potato in gravy

An attempt at improvising with cooking, proved rather successful - made basil pesto-potato in onion-tomato gravy. Quite easy to make, though it did take a bit of time. Should warn anyone intending to read this recipe further (and have the balls to try it later :P) - I don't measure. I use my cooking experience to infer how much of salt and spice is required.

So, brave hearts, here goes...

1. Boil nugget potatoes until cooked.
2. Remove the skin, and chop the potatoes into 2-3 pieces if you feel like it. I would, coz that increases the surface area.
3. Add basil pesto and coat the cooked potatoes. You could use some other pesto too, but basil pesto has a wonderful aroma to it. :) Besides, if you stop at this step and add salt and pepper to the potatoes, you have yourself a nice side dish to munch along when drinking beer.
   
4. Grind blanched tomatoes, onion, ginger and garlic into a paste.
5. Heat olive oil an add the paste and a bit of water (if you want a slightly diuted gravy). Pesto is made with olive oil; and contains generous amount of it too for preservative purposes. So, watch the amount of oil you use to cook the gravy. I didn't account for the oil in the pesto, so the dish had more oil than I would have liked.
6. When the gravy is about half done, add in salt to taste. And add the pesto coated potatoes. If you roll the potatoes around the gravy, the pesto will spread out. The other option is to not do so, so that the pesto sticks to the potatoes.
   
7. Cook on low heat, allowing for the flavour of the gravy to infuse into the potatoes. The oil will soon separate from the gravy, and the dish is done.
   
8. Your choice : adding angrezi spices - thyme, oregano etc to the dish towards the end.
   
9. I had it with rice.
   

Mamta launches dharna against ICC

The ICC has decided to move the India-England match scheduled to be held at the Eden Gardens, Kolkata to the Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bangalore. The ICC said that the delay in the stadium renovation work forced them to take the decision. Following this announcement, Mamta Banerji, called for a press conference and announced that the Trinamool Congress will hold a dharna to protest the decision as it affects the employment opportunities of the people of Kolkata.

She said "This decision of the ICC has taken because Vijay Mallya gave the Sharad Pawar and ICC peoples free beer. It is not the right! If match is not here, many people have no work. Parking boys, policeman, groundnut shop, popcorn shop, pickpockets, beggars - all peoples have no work. Central government, state government should answer."[sic]

She also added that the scheduled dharna would be peaceful and no CPI party members or offices would be harmed.

PM acts to reduce food prices in India

Despite food prices in India rapidly leading to a crisis situation, there appeared to be no attempt by the Government to tackle the situation. Not even a press release was forthcoming from either the Agriculture or the Finance ministries; nor did the PM's office speak.

However, it has come to light that the PM's silence on the issue was intentional and the PM was not sitting inactive. Inspired by the likes of Irom Sharmila, Dr Manmohan Singh had undertaken the "Vow of Silence" or maunvrat till the prices of food items reduces. The silence which was mistaken for inaction appears to be the action itself.

However, the maunvrat was not without its share of issues. The SGPC Sikh religious governing body excluded meetings from the vow allowing the PM to speak. However the PM insisted on no-exclusions vow leading to a standoff. This conflict of interest between duty and austerity was resolved when leaders explained that duty is also a part of religion and the PM relented to speak for 5 minutes in every meeting to put forth his views and vote on resolutions.

BCCI puts Lalit Modi on IPL auction

The player auctions for IPL 4 are scheduled today and as few as 12 players are being retained by their current franchisees. Add to that is the introduction of 2 new franchisees - Pune and Kochi. As the auction action heats up, the BCCI today entered the fray by placing its best "player", Lalit Modi, in the auction pool.

At a base price of 22 crores, Modi is the most expensive player. However, BCCI Treasurer N Srinivasan said that the price would not deter buyers. He said "1 Modi is equivalent to 100 other players (think Rajnikanth in Basha). Sachin and Dhoni are at a price of 1.8 cr each. We calculated 2 cr * 11 players would be a reasonable price for Modi. With his match fixing and betting contacts, you can win the IPL 4 without taking the field even. 22 cr is a small price to pay for the glory of winning IPL 4".

All 8 franchisees are reportedly considering the offer seriously.

Sreesanth gets Australia bowling coach offer

After witnessing the performance of India's maverick bowler in the test series against South Africa, Australia has approached S. Sreesanth for the role of bowling coach for the short time between the end of India's tour of the Proteas and the start of the 2011 World cup. The Cricket Australia (CA) spokesperson Peter Young, addressing a conference yesterday said "We realise that this is a short time frame, but after his impressive performance in the series we decided that his services would help the Australian ODI squad." Australia has been going through a bad run in the recent times with England retaining the Ashes after winning the Boxing day test. Another important factor that influenced CA's decision was James Anderson statement that the tricks he learnt from Zaheer Khan helped his bowling in the ongoing test series.

S. Sreesanth initially declined to comment, but later confirmed the offer after Andre Nel wished him over the phone and requested that he break the news to the press. It is also learnt that seeing the Aussie batsmen struggle against Graeme Swann, CA approached Murali Kartik to bowl to the team at the nets and expect to hear from him in the next couple of days.

Zeno... my philosophy guru.

According to Philosophy Guru, my reccommended philosophy guru is Zeno of Citium (not Zeno of Elea).

Your recommended philosophy-guru is ZENO OF CITIUM.

Key fact: He taught in a stoa, the Athenian supermarket, and hence founded the school of philosophy called Stoicism.

Must have: An interest in everyday life, for it is there that you learn life's big lessons.

Key promise: An ability to face anything, no matter how disastrous.

Key peril: To be "stoical" is to turn your back on passion.

Most likely to say: "If you have integrity, no-one can harm you."

Least likely to say: "Forget prudence! It won't help you anyway."

Connected?

Was reminded of this dialogue by Jhanvi in लगे रहो मुन्ना भाई:
इन्टरनेट की दुनिया के तो "touch" में है, लेकिन पड़ोस में कौन रहता है, जानते तक नहीं
मोबाइल, लंद्लैन की भरमार है, लेकिंग जिगरी दोस्त तक पहुंचे, ऐसे तार कहाँ है?


We live in a connected world. But are we really connected?

An antacid tablet reacts with water in space

Inferences...

Social networks have become prevalent - there is one for every purpose, career, travel, books etc. People are spending a lot of time on it, sharing minute details of their lives on it. So I had a question : Can the information that is shared by a person on social networking sites be used to infer that person's personality. Specifically, can the photographs that a person shares on such sites be used. The profile pic is probably the first one anyone intending to do such an analysis could look at. Follow that up with the photos one posts, looking for specifics like : how many have people in it, how many are of family, how many have that person itself, what is the mood of that person in the photograph, what activity does it show the person doing?

Can one draw an inference like : X's photos always have X. So, X is a very gregarious person. But X's photos do not have family. So X guards his/her privacy when it comes to friends and relatives.

Maybe something else like: Y's photographs do not show him/her, therefore "place some inference about Y".

Or something rather obvious: Z's photos show Z in lots of outdoor activity. Z likes adventure.

I bet such a study has already been done or is in progress in some psychology/sociology department in some university. The question is how could such information about us be used for/against us. The most obvious being targeted ads. But as a revenue model, that is so passe. Something's gotta give and something is definitely in store for us. Sooner rather than later.

3 idiots

Managed to watch the movie in its entireity. I guess that statement sums up my 'review' of the movie that has been the subject of many positive reviews, topical discussions and resounding financial success. The movie is an adaptation of 5 Point Someone. I've seen the theatrical performance by Evam, which was wonderfully done.

The movie definitely makes its point against the Indian undergrad education system. But as a cinematic experience, it was a letdown, especially after what Rajkumar Hirani has given us in the past - the well made Munnabhai movies. One can understand some amount of drama added to the script to cater to popular taste, but a cast that has two 40+ year old men playing the part of 20 year olds is difficult to digest. The ridiculous wig and accent that Boman Irani's character had were probably not necessary. Not to mention many recycled jokes - which we shall forgive. The last straw was the newborn baby coming 'back to life' (?) when it hears 'All is Well'.

Chetan Bhagat is alleging that he wasn't given due credit. If I were him, I would actually not bother about credits and actually try to distance myself from the movie.

Simply put: "Movie देखके मज़ा नहीं आया".

If I have to see '3 Idiots', I'll look at myself in the mirror; thrice over. That's sufficient.

Hitler reacts to auto strike in Bangalore

Obviously, this video is filled with kannada expletives and swear words, and is not recommended for young viewers (less than 18 yrs).

Social Networking

Indian companies say social networking sites (like Facebook) are affecting productivity. Not surprising. But,
the 'revelation' has come ~3 years after the PhD-Comics strip below.

Skhizein (Jérémy Clapin,2008)

Wow!

For all his flaws, Modi seems to do good too

The Gujarat assembly has passed a law that makes it mandatory for people to vote in local body polls. This MUST be extended to larger levels - state and general assemblies. This bill does add a fair share of work for government agencies - ensuring that all the eligible people in the constituency are listed in the voter's lists and maintaining up-to-date. And for the citizens, ensuring that their names are in the list corresponding to the constituency they reside in. Its generally accepted that India has been repeatedly plagued by low voter turnout, especially in the urban areas (though I need to show figures to prove this). 62% (in 2009 General Elections, as reported by The Hindu Business Line) is still too close to 50% for my comfort. I couldn't cast my (postal) vote 'coz my name was missing from the voter's list, though apparently it mysteriously re-appeared on the day of voting. Let's see how effective this move is.

Life in the Freezer

GUBA has the 6 episode BBC series Life in the Freezer (1993) dealing with the life of the flora and fauna on and around the Antarctic continent. Yes, Sir David Attenborough does the narration. :) The videos are embedded below, chronologically from parts 1 through 6.



http://www.guba.com/watch/2000878117



http://www.guba.com/watch/2000878176





http://www.guba.com/watch/2000878527



http://www.guba.com/watch/2000878524



http://www.guba.com/watch/2000878175



http://www.guba.com/watch/2000878186

The Knack

TheKnack
Uploaded by jamsoun. - See more comedy videos.

value education

I dont know if it is supposed to be called comedy or tragedy but imagine being stuck between four walls and learning “values”. Values themselves are conditions that tell us what is supposed to be good or bad and it tries to tame the natural human instinct. This human who is claiming to have an interactive session about values has left his senses at home and is trying to teach values to people who have gone beyond rules, beyond values or even beyond civilization. What this person is doing here is meta-value education, teaching conditions within closed conditional doors. He is asking us “Who are you?” and we are supposed to try and find out an answer and the answer is something unique in the individual. My question is “Who is he?” To teach about values you have to move away from it, just like we understand the presence of something by its absence. The person seems so obsessed that he probably breathes values. Being and orator and giving juvenile activities to adults who can think for themselves is not enough knowledge to talk about the much hyped values. This person says “In order to be a good human being you should have these values...you can copy down” I felt like i was undergoing torture where something was being forced down my throat even though I did not like it. Who is he to define a good human being? This itself shows that values are criteria that one has to satisfy in order to be called good. Does just values make up a human being? I guess this person probably needs a lecture on how to let people grow and have them develop a personality of their own. More derogatory (as i consider it) was “Are you from science, because science girls do not talk”. Really? Please somebody teach him some essential skills to understand that if somebody does not interact, it could indicate “Will you please shut up because we are not listening”. His eyes are clouded and the person cannot see for himself and is trying to cloud our eyes, make us all a “bakra” (like my friend termed it) so we look at life in a better way. Paradox or what?

“greatest inspiration comes from biographies of great men” this person said. I think the greatest inspiration can be from oneself. The reason why we do not have enough biographies or people reading it is because we keep looking outside for inspiration and not within oneself. The inspiration for this tyrannical rant (as my brother would call it) is when I disagreed with everything he spoke and looked within myself as to why I did not agree...if I had not done what I did then I would have probably been writing notes.

“you should join satsang, have a guru and not leave the path of karma”. Interpreting this in kannada, “sat” means the dead, “sang” is association and “karma” means pain in the ass. This man here has been in the association of wrong people, has become brain dead and he cant think for himself and he is a big karma for his listeners.

All that values do is curtail individuality and the one who propagates it wants everybody else to be “good human beings” like themselves.

God bless the needy and not the greedy!

Re-envisioning HCI

10/GUI from C. Miller on Vimeo.

LOTR! Alternate Story

Reposted from Funny Junk.

Oliver Sacks: Tales of Music and the Brain

Watch Oliver Sacks: Tales of Music and the Brain in Educational & How-To  |  View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

A 5-minute preview of the documentary Tales of Music and the Brain. For full 50-minute documentary, click the video or the link below it to Veoh.

Manning Park Trip

E.C. Manning Park is a large natural reserve ~200 KM from Vancouver. We folks from my research lab went on a weekend camping trip to the place over the long weekend ending on Labour Day in Canada (7th Sep).


View Larger Map

Most of us landed, Friday evening at the Lightning Lake camp site. No idea why it is called Lightning Lake, might be a native name translated to English.


View Larger Map

There wasn't any activity on Friday barring dinner. Saturday, we went on a 13 km hike around the lake, followed by a late lunch, some football/volleyball & dinner. It was quite cold Saturday evening, and I woke up with body ache the next day. The cold had 'penetrated' my sleeping pad and bag. It was a 'civilised' camping, and the campsite had well maintained bathrooms and hot water. A hot shower was all it took to relieve the pain. :)

Sunday was mostly lazy. Some folks had to leave; and they did. The rest played a bit of volleyball and then went boating on Lightning Lake.

I was rudely woken up Monday morning by the sound of my alarm going off. Till then I was sleeping peacefully in the warmth of my sleeping bag. I woke up, but unable to open my eyes (my skull cap had slipped over my eyes) or move (I was in a stage similar to anesthetic awareness for a moment), the first thing that crossed my mind "Has the tent collapsed!?". Looking back, that moment was really fun. Luckily, I was back in my senses quickly and was able to extricate myself from the confines of my sleeping bag and tent.

Breakfast was followed by departure - and we were back at our respective homes by late afternoon.

Sita Sings the Blues

Part 1

Full Playlist on YouTube.

Come Fast Krishna

I was traveling in Bangalore recently, when, from somewhere, the song “Krishna nee begane baaro...” crossed my mind. I began contemplating and saw how “begane” our lives were moving.  Going at this pace, we might be extinct by the time Krishna arrives. Twenty two years it has been my journey, and God knows how many more to come. I do not remember the day I was born, but my childhood feels like it was only yesterday that i used to play with my baby sitting friends and then school, college and now even post-grad studies! Looking back at my own life, I want to attempt to answer the question "What am I?" a little different from what is generally asked by most teenagers. Yes, I know I am human, but I do not intend to settle with answers like that. Have i done anything significant in these years? And what can be considered significant? If I go on like this, then there will be way too many things that require explanations. Apart from being stuck in the race to be the best, learning that tomato is a fruit and Freud is a maniac, have these 22 years been helpful to understand or answer the question I have been waiting to answer? I heard Bob Marley's words, “The plant takes you to yourself”. No, I am not advertising illegal substances, but can just something as simple as grass (the plant) show you what you are? I am waiting... to try, to investigate, to discover.

As I type. it is a year since I left home to catch my flight to Vancouver. Been a journey since then.

Starter

I am just another software company employee who is so busy that i hardly get time for anything. This has been talked about too many times. Even my girlfriend keeps hanging up cos i do not spend time with her, “I am sorry my dear compaq with core 2 duo..I still love you” ya thats the way I get my laptop working. Anyway I recently suffered from lots of problems like backache and common cold that never saw its culmination. Thanks to all of that my doctor prohibited me from touching my second girlfriend “Bajaj Wind 125”. I had also heard about so many efforts to save energy and use public transport etc so I thought it might be a good move not only to increase my environment credentials and also try and set right my health. I waited at a shelter-less bus stop near my house and boarded a bus that was quite empty so I even got a seat. I was getting used to the bumpy ride when this guy in khakhi clothes stood next to me. I looked at him and said “boss full tank”. He was just staring at me and it was only after that I realized I was not in a petrol bunk. It was my first bus ride and I am sure to remember it.

Nostalgia... 1996

Over the last couple of weeks, there have been news articles about the arrest of an African-American scholar by some white police officer in the USA. This led to a row over racial profiling forcing US President Obama to intervene.

The entire event however reminded me of a Sam Jackson-Nicholas Cage movie titled Amos and Andrew. I had to force myself to watch this movie on the evening of 21st Oct, 1996. How do I remember the exact date? Was the movie so bad that it left an indelible mark on me? No.

21st Oct 1996 was also the day that India faced Australia in Bangalore in the 3rd match of the Titan Cup. After restricting Aus to 215, India lost wickets early and were on the verge of losing. But Tendulkar and batting heroics by Srinath and Kumble ensured India won - last ball of last over, 2 wickets to spare.

I had to watch the match, but also couldn't - India was losing, can't bear that! So was switching channels between Star Movies and Star Sports. Nice match, nice memories, I like. :)

HDD Weight

Does the weight of your hard disk increase as you install more programs? Some people seem to be worried and have posted questions. Read the entire thread on the Microsoft forum for a hearty laugh.

Ho(r)ney bees

How does Pranab Mukherjee describe the average Indian taxpayer?

Watch the video below, from 2:35 and specially from 2:50.

Cyborg Name

ROTFL!!

Get Your Cyborg Name

Going by 'Nocturnal Troubleshooting', I guess Customer Support won't be a bad option for me as a profession.

Foreign Accent Syndrome

I StumbledUpon a page that listed a bunch of 'bizarre mental disorders'. In the list was Foreign Accent Syndrome. It is a rare medical condition (mostly brought about due to injury), which causes the afflicted to speak their native language with an (apparently) foreign accent. There have been 50 recorded cases of this.

I guess the key word here is 'recorded'. If we were to record cases, then there would be a few hundred thousand (if not million) cases in India alone. And the condition wasn't brought upon them by trauma. A short visit to any natively English speaking country (US, UK etc) seems to be 'injury' enough. ;-)

Videos..

Rangashankara Viral Ad Campaign



Yesteryears' superhit: Tum Tu There Pardesi

Stupidity... taken to all new levels... down

Google has recently announced plans for the Chrome OS. And many articles have popped up on the www including one on CNET by Peter Glaskowsky.

A quote from the article:

"Turning the Chrome browser into the Chrome OS is technically straightforward, though of course it'll take a lot of work. A browser already has most of the key elements of any OS: application programming interfaces (APIs) to allow application software to display content and accept user input, store and retrieve data from mass storage, communicate over the Internet, and so on."

I am unable to control my laughter over this guy's ignorance of computers. And he is a tech analyst!!! Poor guy doesn't seem to know that the browser needs the OS achieve each of the 'element' that he lists. He doesn't seem to know that anyone with a bit of programming experience can write a simple app to read a file system and send it over a network. Well...

FF 3.5 - ACID Test

FF 3.5 (released yesterday) scores 93 on the ACID3 Test. Not bad. But one point less than the previous version. :)

Intel has come up with a new set of marketing names for its Core brand of processors. My first reaction to this news was to shake my head in disapproval.

Intelligence... human/machine

Machine learning algorithms have their limitations. They can find interesting, funny relationships. Take the 2 screenshots. The first one shows an image of a TATA Nano and relates it to a news item concering a student of TISS (TATA Inst. of Social Sciences) . The key thing here is the common word TATA.


The second one is in similar lines. The Indian Govt had something to say to the Pakistan Govt on the same day that India won their T20 WC warmup match against Pakistan. :D
Or finding some interesting correlation between why Adobe flash doesn't work on IE8 and SFU business. ;-)



Other funny output can be due programming blunders. Like the Y! weather page telling that "tonight" will be "sunny". Nights can be 'clear', of course, but never heard of them sunny. Or just plain... having a playlist of size -1 (minus 1)! :)



Click on the images to see the bigger versions.

LHC

A short video on the LHC at CERN.

Austin Powers Credit Card

Did you know: There was a limited edition Visa Credit Card called the Austin Powers Titanium Visa Card. Named after Austin Powers, the International Man of Mystery.

Don't believe? Check slide 11 in the Credit Card Flashback slide show on BigMoney.

99

From the hindi movie 99

"दिल्ली में लड़की का नाम या तो पूजा है या नेहा"

So far, this statement has been a tautology. I have come across a bunch of instances conforming perfectly to the 'rule' above.

megaphone hack

Spy Megaphone Hack - Click here for more blooper videos

What!er

Basha vs. Anthony - Paper Presentation

Ahem! Ahem!

Photo in the Deccan Herald newspaper (1st May, 2009) after the 3rd phase of polling in the general elections.

Passport

Searching on Google Image Search for 'India passport' threw up a page from Frogview among others. It was captioned 'The Most Beautiful Passport in India'. That page had the image below. Would this not account as an invasion of one's privacy?

Axiomatic love theory

प्यार किया नहीं जाता. प्यार हो जाता है.
As you might have realized, this is a typical Hindi movie dialogue.
Happened to be watching a Hindi movie. And in the course of the usual melodrama, Som proposed: Axiomatic Love Theory(ALT).

The first axiom of ALT has already been shown.
Axiom 2: प्यार करने वाले से निभाने वाला बडा है.

Okuribito

Okuribito (Departures) won the US Motion Picture Academy Award for Best Foreign Film - 2008. Recommended!

"ಒಕುರಿಬಿತೋ" (ನಿರ್ಗಮನಗಳು) ೨೦೦೮-ನಲ್ಲಿ ಉತ್ಕೃಷ್ಟ ವಿದೇಶಿ ಚಲನಚಿತ್ರ ಆಸ್ಕಾರ್ ಪ್ರಶಸ್ತಿ ಪಡೆಯಿತು. ತಪ್ಪದೆ ನೋಡಿ!

R

A quick and dirty intro to R statistical package (by me).

ಪೇಟೆಂಟ್

ನನ್ನ ಪೇಟೆಂಟ್ ಅರ್ಜಿ ಯುನೈಟೆಡ್ ಸ್ತೆತೆಸ್ ಪೇಟೆಂಟ್ ಕಛೇರಿಯಲ್ಲಿ ದಾಖಲಾಗಿದೆ. ಭಾರತದ ಪೇಟೆಂಟ್ ಕಛೇರಿಯಲ್ಲಿ ಕೂಡ ಅರ್ಜಿ ಸಲ್ಲಿಸಲಾಗಿತ್ತು. ಆದರೆ ಹುಡುಕಿದರೆ ಏನು ಮಾಹಿತಿ ಸಿಗುತ್ತಿಲ್ಲ.

ಯು.ಎಸ್.ಪಿ.ಟಿ.ಓ. ಅರ್ಜಿ ಸಂಖ್ಯೆ 20090080442

Smale's Paradox

Happened to find this video on another Ananth's blog. Awesome video. Math, topology and stuff.

Vijay Dhobi

Awesome! Vijay Dhobi is probably the standing round the corner with his pushcart pressing clothes at Rs 2 per piece of clothing. And Vijay probably does not know that his store had made it to Google Maps and he 'world famous'.


View Larger Map

Novell's Linux ads

All 3 ads.

Lenovo X-300 vs Apple Macbook Air

Macbook Wheel

Apple Introduces Revolutionary New Laptop With No Keyboard

Wait for the new version. It comes with no keyboard, no display, no hard drive. Wouldn't that be awesome? ;)

Everyone wants a piece of apple.

TV Classics - 1

Ek Titli...

Sameera Reddy's character got admitted into University of Berkeley, San Francisco. Should be a new one. ;-)

Dada and Jumbo hang up their boots. Big shoes to fill. Literally too in Anil Kumble's case ;).

Natwest Series Victory


Anil's 10 wickets @ Kotla

Election in Canada

Elections were completed in Canada and the result was that the Conservatives led by Steve Harper are back in power. Fine. Nothing I will be concerned about much as long as my funding stays. :)
The interesting part is that there is none of the election fanfare that one sees back in India. Elections (especially the campaigning) in India are loud, colourful, fun even bizarre at times. Here, the elections are so quiet, I didn't know when it happened.

Knetwalk

Knetwalk is a new game I came across in KDE 4. Timepass game, where you need to connect all the client machines to the server using the connecting elements. This is one solution I hit where all clients are connected, but the game isn't over! Is that a bug? If I can connect all the clients to the server with fewer connecting elements, isn't that better?

A month in Canada

It is just more than a month since I came to Canada. Still remember the Sunday when I saw the rising sun just above the horizon at Bangalore and landed here, with the setting sun, just above the horizon. Sights to behold, both of them.




The photos above were taken at Deer Lake.

The weather has been pretty good for most part of the last month. Bright and sunny most of the time. But things are changing. Incessant rain is the typical winter weather here I understand.

The colours of fall are beautiful. Trees turning from green to yellow to brown.


Maple leaves however seem to turn a beautiful red. Now I know why the Canadian flag has a red maple leaf on it. :-)

MiG 35

Julley!

I had been to Ladakh recently, to have a short holiday and for a little bit of trekking. The first step in that was to get to Leh, the current district headquarters of Ladakh. From there onto Manali in HP and then driving to Leh.
In Manali, I visited the Hadimba temple. This temple is dedicated to the demoness from the Mahabharata. She Bheema marries and later gives birth to his son Gatothkacha.

The ride to Leh
The ride from Manali to Leh goes through multiple valleys in the Himalayas and one gets to see 4 mountain passes (Rohtang, Baralachala and Taglangla are the three I remember), atleast 2 (Chenab & Beas) of the 5 rivers that goes through Punjab, 3 high altitude lakes (Surajtal, Chandratal, Deepaktal).

Taglangla	Surajtal
Deepaktal

It is an 18 hour journey. Picturesque. But the road is not good in some places and can get uncomfortable. One can't complain though. The Border Roads Organization gets about 3-4 months of conducive weather a year. And that are the exact 3 months when there is heavy traffic on the roads with large numbers of visitors driving in and out.

The ride in a shared taxi will cost each person about Rs. 1200. It goes through the beautiful Kullu & Lahaul valleys in HP before entering Jammu & Kashmir.
The change in the terrain & the vegetation is clearly visible. From largely green mountain faces in Kullu and Lahaul, things change to barren mountain face post Lahaul, in Spiti and Kashmir.
The are patches of terrace farming & shepherds leading their sheep along the mountains for grazing.

Erosion


By the time we reached Taglangla (~5000m above sea level), the winding mountains, the heat and dust had already given me a severe headache. We stopped to get medical help at an army camp setup specifically to help civilans.

Other ways of getting to Leh:
- Do a 15 day cycle ride from Manali.
- Drive your own bike.
- Fly to Leh from Delhi.
- Take a 45 day walk to Leh.

Leh
Leh, is not as rustic as I expected it to be. It is no different from any other Indian town. It even boasts of a tennis court and golf course.

The Trek
The first day of the trek starts at Spituk. It follows a jeep train from Spituk to Jianchen. The interesting thing is that the trek begins by crossing a the river Indus. Lots of trekking groups are around in Leh. Almost all are from European nations (French, Dutch, Spaniards, Italians).

The camp at Jianchan is along a tributary of the Indus. The camp sites are owned by locals. There are small patches of cultivated land where wheat or jowar is grown. The rent at the camp site is Rs 100 per day per tent.
We were accompanied by 3 folks, cook Passang Bhutia from Sikkim, guide Ghulam Qadir (from Nubra Valley, Ladakh) and pony man Sonawangdeo.

The second day of the trek would take us from Jianchen to Gandala base. Gandala base is ~4500 m above sea level. And the pass itself is another 400m higher and after a steep climb. It was a particularly nasty day for trekking. It was bright and sunny initially, but the moment a cloud covers the sun, the temperature drops. One can sense it the heat-to-chill change clearly. Not that such a thing is uncommon at high altitudes. I had experienced this during the Saurkundi pass trek. But added to that was the intermittent rain.
The climb didn't seem tough till Rhumbak village.

House at Rhumbak

But from Rhumbak (3700m) to Gandala base (4500 m)is one tough climb. On the way we pass a 1 house village Urutse.

House at Urutse


The interesting thing about this section is the colour of the mountains we walk on. from white, to grey, to blue, to purple, it is one mindblowing experience. Not for the chromatically challenged ;).


Gandala base has 2 camping sites. Our tents were setup on the higher one. I was already drained and I don't know what energy reserve my body tapped into, to climb the rest of the way to the tent.


Each camping site has a restaurant run by the locals. It is a large tent where one can buy soft drinks, tea, fruit juices, omelettes, noodles, biscuits etc. There are no tent stays like the ones on the way to Leh. Tentstays allow people to stay overnight and provide mattresses and blankets.

Gandala base

Solar panels find a lot of use along the way to Ladakh and in interior regions where electricity cables cannot be laid.

Another construction to note is Ladakhi toilets. These are composting pits. After use, one has to dump a shovel full of mud into the hole. Over time, the decomposition leads to manure which gets used as a fertilizer.

Reaching Gandala base gave me severe altitude sickness, so I had to return. The main cause being the lack of aclimatization in Ladakh.

Returning from Leh to Manali was eventless, till we reached around Gulaba, a small village 20Km from Manali. A mudslide had blocked the road and bull dozers would not come till the next day. So a large number of people in cabs, jeeps, trucks had to spend the night in their vehicles. So I was in the Qualis for 32 hours straight, spending 2 nights in it. That was some event!! :)

On the return from Manali I saw a most beautiful sight. A layer of mist over the Beas for quite some distance. Unfortunately, the camera was in the luggage hold, so couldn't take a snap.

Earthlings

Earthlings.....

Warning: Viewer discretion advised.

Happened to venture into a Reliance Fresh outlet. Must say, there was nothing fresh or refreshing about the store. Most of the fruits & vegetables had wilted and wrinkled. Fresh? Not even remotely.
I took the name of the store to signify fresh natural produce. No synthetic stuff. No packaged stuff even. But some things, fresh fruit extracts say, need to be packaged. But there was enough synthetic stuff and packaged stuff to bring me down to reality.

Reliance Fresh is Unreliably Stale!

All Too Human!

The Beeb has a series titled "Human, All too Human" that discusses the life and works of philosophers Sartre, Nietzsche & Heidegger. Hope they feature more people, say, Wittgenstien, Godel and without doubt Immanuel Kant.

I Want My Father Back (Part 2). A highly recommended documentary on farmer suicides, the events over the past 3-4 decades that led to it, globalization, MNCs & industrialization of farming.
A must watch for all the people who believe globalization & technology are good things. Specially the city bred no-nothing-of-the-world "Westernized" consumerist.

Shettihalli

Church
Originally uploaded by Ananth Narayan S

Me and a friend biked to a small village called Shettihalli near Hassan recently. Shettihalli's claim to fame is an old, abandoned church. The structure gets submerged in the river water during the monsoon. But since it is summer now, the water has receded.
The place is ~20KM from Hassan, off the Bangalore-Hassan-Mangalore highway. On the bypass, one can see a board that reads "Gorur 22". The approach to Shettihalli is the next left turn. There are lots of people around to ask for directions. So one can't get lost. :)
From the main road, only the top and the water are visible. Makes for an amazing view. The ruins of the church are pretty impressive too. Unfortunately, as is the case with most of our old buildings, this one too is vandalized :(. But it is a place where one can spend a few mins in silence and solitude.
Apart from the place, the journey itself is quite nice. 400 KMs in a day is definitely tiring, but enjoyable nevertheless.
If anyone is driving past Hassan, I would strongly recommend them to take a short detour, visit the church and then resume their journey. Just make sure NOT to dirty the place.
Photos from along the journey and from the church itself @ my flickr stream.

Happened to find this interesting photograph through Stumbleupon. Not sure if it is real or a hoax, but powerful nevertheless.

Poor quality news

I like The Inq's style of writing. Adding a humourous & witty twist to every news item they post. Like the one on the BBC not being able to handle criticism. The BBC might have drawn lot of flak, for instance its iPlayer not being supported on Linux and Mac. It is however, respected for the quality of news. Our own "BBC Wannabe" NDTV however has to improve manifold.
First stop plagiarizing the layout and color scheme from the BBC.
Second get the closed captions at the right time.
Third get the names of people displayed at the right time. Almost always, the name of the person is never displayed when the person is on screen.
Finally, stop misinterpreting and misrepresenting. 2 simple instances recently seen:
A Tibetan national says that their struggle is going to get more aggressive. The news reader says "Tibetan struggle is going to get more violent". Violence and aggression are not the same. Like Denzel Washington says in Cry Freedom to the lawyer in court "I see confrontation here, I see no violence".
Second Kiran Bedi doesn't want to carry the torch since the extreme security "cages" the torch. News headline reads that "she feels like a caged human".

The XKCD domain is throwing me a page from Questionable Content (another comic). But trying to load a previous comic. So trying to load comic 404 gives a HTTP 404. Now that would make a straight out of HTTP geek-dom.

Wierd "Also try"

Searched for a self portrait of surrealist painter Salvador Dali. And Yahoo threw an interesting set of "Also try" links. Orson Welles, fried bacon, french television. No idea how these are related to Dali.

Meanwhile, Santhosh Guru has decided to start www.sangoo.org. A non profit portal. SANthosh's answer to Google and Yahoo! Sangoo- Sounding the death knell for both.

Google-kkum, Yahoo-kkum sangu daan! :)

When cartoon life captures real life!
Read this: http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/WaterCooler/story?id=4323900
And have a look at the Dilert comics from 20th-26th Feb.

2 Treks

Happened to go on 2 treks in the last 3 weeks. Both in the Western Ghats, around the Charmadi Ghat region. The first one was to a mountain named Amedikallu near a town called Shishila. Shishila is ~20 KM from the holy place of Dharmasthala. The trek didn't involve covering much distance, like Kumaraparvata. But was real steep & extremely tiring. And things don't get better if one gets multiple bee stings, do they? It is one trek I would definitely think more than twice before attempting again.

The second one, more recent was from Durgadahalli (the village of the fort) to Ballalarayana Durga, to Bandaje falls and terminating at Mundaje (near Dharmsathala). Ballalarayana Durga was built by Ballala Raya (as the name suggests), but apprently was later captured by Tipu Sultan. The trek was via Bandaje Falls. About 600 feet high. The view looking down from the top of the falls was awesome.

The trek was planned so that it would be mostly climbing down. So it was not tiring. But as usual, the ankles and knees took a severe beating.

Photos of both treks on my Flickr page.

Fat? No food!

StumbleUpon happened to throw up a Mississippi State Legislation (HB 282) which prohibits food establishments from serving food to obese people.
Link : http://billstatus.ls.state.ms.us/2008/pdf/history/HB/HB0282.xml

Forget freedom of choice, privacy, liberty for a moment. It is ridiculous, hilarious and scary that people require legislations to make them eat healthy.

iRack

Jujubi!!!

Sunset @ Arabian Sea

Sunset @ Arabian Sea
Originally uploaded by Ananth Narayan S

One of the many (probably the best :-D) photographs taken during the visit to Karwar, Kaiga and Dandeli over the last weekend. Click on the image to navigate to my Flickr page and view the rest.

Pirates of silicon valley

IMDb page : http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0168122/

Google Video Page : http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1552555273778978142
Yes, the movie. All 1.5 hrs of it.

Boycott.....

An anonymous reader on /. says that he/she can't bear to buy Lenovo laptops (a Chinese company) due to the atrocities and human rights violations committed by the Chinese.
Going by that, probably the whole world must boycott IBM, Credit Suisse and other big names since they had very close business alliances with the Nazis during WW2.

Related:
Boycott Made in China
Banking with the Nazis (Google Video)

Adblock

Yes, Minister Developer

Have been feeling like James Hacker (the eponymous minister from the famous Yes Minister series) at work for quite some time now. Why? Coz there has only been "lots of activity, no actual achievement"!

Looks like all I can do is to ROTFL at myself, the "enlightenment" that has dawned on me and at the comparison I have come up with.

Revolution OS

Google Video Link

Good Copy, Bad Copy

Good Copy, Bad Copy
A documentary about copyright and culture. (~1 hour)

Skandgiri

The Hillock
Originally uploaded by Ananth Narayan S

Last weekend, bunch of us went to scale Mt. Skandagiri. :-) Well... it is a hill ~70KM from Bangalore and not too far from Nandi Hills. The hill is in Kalavara village, so is also referred to as Kalavara Betta. We left @ 2 A.M. and reached the base at around 4.

We were hoping to catch the sunrise from the hilltop, but it was so foggy we could see the sun only when we were half way through our descent. Added to the fog was wind, so strong we had trouble walking steady.

A flag post marks the summit and signals the end of the trek. On the top is a temple that also doubles up as a shop to enterprising people who sell water, tea, bajji, even puliyogare!!

Any time later in the day, the ascent is a non event, but climbing the hill at 4 in the morning in heavy fog, darkness & faulty torches was a different experience.

The strongest argument in favour of social networks.

PhD Comics - Comic 877

Saw this image on Boing Boing.
ROFLMAO!!!

Cumulate labs

Cumulate Labs (courtesy Stumble Upon) has this neat Web 2.0 based online drawing software called Cumulate Draw. This, I speculate, is the kind of application that a company like Google would like to acquire. Google already has online documents and spreadsheets; and the Google SketchUp drawing/modeling tool. Cumulate Draw could probably be the online version of MS Visio.

Inside the Digital Dump

Inside the Digital Dump (opens in new window), an essay in pictures on the effects & economics of dumping of old computer hardware in developing nations.

Un-Green Apples

Greenpeace's Green Electronics listing ranks mobile and PC manufacturers on their green policies, i.e. eliminating harmful chemicals and taking responsibility for discarded products.

Apple has been ranked last. See the irony. ;-)

Richard Dawkins and Neil DeGrasse Tyson

Petronas Ad

Petronas Ad. Enjoy!

Novell has come up with some cool Linux ads.







This is IBM's earliest Linux ad.

Kumaraparvata trek

Way To Kumaraparvata
Originally uploaded by Ananth Narayan S.

A bunch of us went on a weekend trek to Kumaraparvata near Kukke Subrahmanya. Pretty tough trek with a steep climb. The heat and humidity didn’t make it any easier. Walking inside the forest areas was better, atleast there was some shade. But the complete stretch past "Giri Gadde" (mountain grassland) was grueling. With hardly any trees, we were exposed to the sweltering heat of the midday sun. Reaching Bhattara-mane seemed to restore all the energy that had been spent climbing all the way there.

An awesome meal later and the trek resumed. At one point, the guys who were ahead stopped at a peak and started to cheer and clap. At last we had reached. No, not quite. At that peak, one person pointed to a flag in a distance and that the peak where the flag was planted was the place we had to reach. It was so far, I almost gave up. Well, somehow we all found the energy to walk ahead. Surprisingly the walk was not as far as expected.

Kumaraparvata - shrouded in clouds, sight to behold. We spent the night on the peak. No tents though. :-) The next day morning we were able to catch a glimpse of the solar eclipse. A five hour descent followed by an 8 hour drive by my bike back to Bangalore. An enjoyable weekend!

Outlook Error

Outlook Error
Originally uploaded by Ananth Narayan S.

This is the error message Microsoft(R) Outlook (R) spat out when I attempted to close a PST file. What a descriptive error message!!
But what takes the top spot is neat little popup message I got from Microsoft (R) Windows Media Player 10 (R) that said "God Damn Exception". I never encountered the "God Damn Exception" again.

Yahoo results and Google results for the query OUTLOOK SUCKS !

When I bought an iPod shuffle, I presumed that it would be like any consumer electronics device. Charge the device, copy the MP3s, start listening. Didn't know that the iPod needs to be "initialized" using iTunes software and iTunes is needed even to transfer MP3s to the device. It seemed that the device wouldn't even charge before the initialization. Pathetic!

The bigger problem is that there is NO version of iTunes for Linux. Running iTunes on probably Linux requires Wine or CrossOver Office.

Also, iTunes seems to multiplex songs before copying them to the iPod. Files copied through Windows Explorer are just files. Occupying space on it. This was another thing I didn't like.

DEATH TO PROPRIETARY INTERFACES!!!

Interesting, I haven't seen any 'open source' efforts to engineer an MP3 player. Well... such a player must also support Ogg Vorbis, maybe FLAC too. I am waiting. :-)