Merry Christmas

I have often seen comics or cartoons about my first love [ie Physics], But I have never seen a cartoon about my new field: Geoinformatics.

I saw a nice one from a really funny comic writer: Xkcd. You can check out more of his cartoons on xkcd.com

Wish you all a Merry Christmas & a rocking new year

Some Stupid Quizes

I have found this site that has these silly quizzes, which answer questions like:

1. What Breed of Puppy Are You?
2. What English Speaking Country Are You?
3. How Much Lust Do You Have?
4. Are You a Slacker?

SO i gave some of them, just for Kicks, and here are the results:

Your Dominant Thinking Style: Exploring

You thrive on the unknown and unpredictable. Novelty is your middle name. You are a challenger. You tend to challenge common assumptions and beliefs. An expert inventor and problem solver, you approach everything from new angles. You show people how to question their models of the world.

What's Your Thinking Style?

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You Are 28% Paranoid Schizophrenic

You're pretty grounded, though you have your occasional paranoid moments. Just make sure to ignore those voices in your head!

Are You A Paranoid Schizophrenic?

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Your Expression Number is 1

You have the skills to be a top executive or businessperson. But first you must develop your natural capacity to be a good leader. You are truly original - with a creative approach to life and a very sharp mind. You reach for the sky, and you have the potential to reach it. Assertive and straight forward, you have little need for supervision. You are self-confident, self-reliant, and courageous in your convictions. While you sometimes fear loneliness, you prefer to be left alone. A bit self centered, you may be hard to life with at times. You also have a strong dominant streak - which can push others away at times.

What's Your Expression Number

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You Are The Opposite of Machiavellian

You don't have a cynical, power hungry bone in your body. Honest and kind, you believe being a good person is the most important thing. While your upstanding morals should be admired, be careful! You're at risk for being manipulated and toyed with.

How Machiavellian Are You?

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Your Hidden Talent

You have the power to persuade and influence others. You're the type of person who can turn a whole room around. The potential for great leadership is there, as long as you don't abuse it. Always remember, you have a lot more power over people than you might think!

What's Your Hidden Talent?

You Know you have Changed places

It about 5 months, since I shifted to Pune, and some recent incidents have caused me to reconsider whether I should now stop calling myself a Mumbaikar.

You know your old home is less than a home when:

1. You can't switch off the fan in your sleep, coz you have forgotten which button is for which electrical device.
2. You find yourself saying 'I left it at home' and you mean your new place.
3. You don't have the keys to the main door.
4. You have forgotten the placement of the various channels on your Television.
5. The new watchman asks you to sign in when you enter.
6. You find that your wardrobe has other people's stuff in it.
7. You get to eat your favorite food for every meal.
   

My Home

Several People have been asking where I am staying at the present moment, so I thought of puting up a picture: Click on it to see a larger image.

Secret of Longitivity

This is just so damn funny! I was rontflol when I saw this:

The Visit to Xavier's- I

This post is dedicated to Chitrak, who made a very passionate and scary request for it.. ;-)

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So I finally paid a visit to my alma mater, i.e. Xavier [It sounds so weird to call it that, rather than my college, but well change is always weird in the beginning.]. I am here in Mumbai for my diwali vacation, and I had many reasons for going to Xavier's.

As I was entering the gates, I realised that I did not have an id, and the watchman would surely ask me for one. Thankfully, it was the lull time of afternoon during the vacations, so the guard was not too interested in checking who was an authentic student and who was not. But just to prove a point, I asked for the entry book, and entered my details. There you have to mention who you are going to meet, and I was stumped for a while. Should I write that I am here to meet Terry, or should I write that I am here to visit the Physics dept, or should I say that I am here to sit in the foyer and bird watch, or am I here to claim my refund from last year's fees, or am I here to buy a T-shirt or two. Finally, I realised that I am a Physics pass out, so with loyalty towards Lr 14, I filled the Physics dept as my official destination.

On entering through the door, my legs surprisingly took me to the Heras notice board, which I used to look at only during the Maritime course. By the time that I scanned the board, and found nothing of interest, I was struck by a thought; will I meet anyone who remembers me, or will I be able to see only strangers in the campus? I shouldn't have worried. As I entered the first Quad, I noticed a lot of familiar faces. Most of them belonged to people from the SSL, and so my eyes jumped towards the SSl Notice board (let me explain here that I was primarily here to meet Terry, to request him to let me attend the rural camp, and had chosen this day as the initiation meeting was to be held, which I meant to attend.) I saw that the time had already passed, so I could continue with my aimless wanderings in those memory-filled corridors.

I saw Arjun, who told me that he would be coming to camp, so I was slightly placated. As I left him, I saw Achintya sitting in the tunnel, with someone from his usual crowd. After the perfunctory greetings, we got to the real thing, the usual Physics talk: abusing the professors, and at the same time saying how lucky we are (should it be were?) to be in Xavier's. Talking to him brought back memories of our foyer chats; some things never change. He mentioned how Rajesh had been prowling Orkut, and had found a couple of communities (you know what I am talking about) which do not show the dept in good light. Those were not Rajesh's words. He used the phrase 'Pattwardhan fan site'. See, I do not have anything to worry about, I already have passed out of the dept, and so I can bitch about it openly, and betray all the inner workings to the world at large. However, for people like Achintya, who have to meet the concerned professors day in and day out, those things can pose a dilemma. I was so busy laughing, that I did not correctly hear his reply to Rajesh.

As we were conversing, he came to know that his Ithaka practice was cancelled for the day. So after cursing the Ithaca people, we got back to cursing the Physics dept. He even went to the extent of declaring that he would be majoring in Maths. Physist are prone to making hollow threats. Since there was no special reason to hang out in the tunnel, we proceeded to the foyer. As I saw that wonderful place, it brought back so many memories, some bad, but mostly good. As I tried looking here and there, trying to locate the various spots I had stood at (and the garbage cans too) I spotted Rohit. He has been doing MSc Physics at National college, but has been missing Xavier's (well, who hasn't been?). He was there to collect the refund, just like me. With a fellow lr 14 sufferer, I decided to pay a visit to the dept and entered the Junior Lab. I saw Rajesh chatting with some of the junior students, with Veda standing in the background, doling out her motherly advice. Both of them recognised me and were asking about my whereabouts. They were interested in the news about other students. Veda was quite interested in Rahul's whereabouts. On hearing that he was working in the Diamond Industry, like all of us, she too was surprised.

Pune Diary

On the road home from college, I saw this board, stating:

This road is maintained and repaired by MSRDC.

Now don't get me wrong, we see these kinds of boards in Mumbai too, especially the new concrete ones. On several of these boards along Link road in the Western Suburbs, the BMC has pasted its own logo, because they claim that they have done the actual work. The new roads are much better than the old ones, and both these authorities are trying to claim the goodwill of the public.

Not so in Pune. This particular road - University road- is nothing to be proud of. It has portholes, the size of graves, and the metaphor in my opinion is entirely appropriate. The traffic is so bad that it can take up to 25 minutes for a distance of about 400m. Not bad considering the road has been narrowed down to less than 5m due to construction activity, which has already extended beyond its completion date. In short, this ain't no expressway.

This would raise the important question: why would MSRDC claim that it maintains this road, when it is clear that it does not?
Methinks that this board has been put up by the PMC rather than the MSRDC.
Let me explain. Pune has horrible roads. They are narrow, Unplanned, with an excessive share of two-wheeler traffic. The buses that run on them look so broken down & ill-maintained, that would not even be accepted in Sub-Saharan Africa. The portholes are so numerous that it is hard to figure out which is road, and which is a porthole. They would be an excellent training ground for WRC enthusiasts. A common joke in Pune goes thus: 'In the rest of the country, you drive on the left of the road. In Pune, You drive on what's left of the road.

So it's no wonder that the PMC has been facing a lot of flak, with the mayor even threatening to resign, if the roads were not repaired. Some Guy in the PMC must have realised that if there was a way to decrease the brick-bats, it could at least name the road that were not under its jurisdiction. It's like when we were kids. If some toy broke, we would say, "Don't blame me, he was playing with it"



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On the 7th of Sep, there was a small function to sing 'Vande Mataram' in my society. Now I live in a sort of old-age home, with a majority of the population over 60, so you can imagine that there was a lot of enthusiasm to celebrate it.
I happened to be wearing a crème coloured T-shirt and my brown coloured Shikari Shambu shorts. Some one cold have easily described me as a cross between Jeff Corwin and a RSS volunteer. Further more I was the only fellow below the age of 30. So it was no wonder that people were looking at me with wonderment.
A large tricolour was attached behind the podium, and there were speeches noting the history of the song. Before we sang the song, it was announced that keeping the sentiments of certain people in view, only the first and accepted verse would be sung. The Old Timers were visibly dejected. Further more the anchor explained, that the song would be sung to the original tune. The Old Timers smiled.
Then people began to sing. I haven't heard such an out of tune, inharmonious song before. People were singing it on their own tune, at their own speed; it was total cacophony.

But it's the though that counts.

Vande Mataram

Tomorrow happens to be the date that the GOI wants students to celebrate the centenary of a wonderful song, Vande Mataram.

There has been much controversy over this issue:

Firstly experts claim that 7th of Sep 1906 has no significance for this song. History records that Bankim Chandra Chaterjee wrote this song in 1875 and an abridged form appeared in his 1882 Magnus Opus Ananda Math. It was well known but it made its mark in 1905, in the struggle against the partition of Bengal. It was the December of 1907 that it was adopted by the Indian national Congress. So why was this particular date chosen? Only Arjun Singh knows, and we can't be too sure about his judgement.

Secondly there are questions about its secular credentials. It was no doubt written as a prayer to Goddess Durga in 1875, but it had a wider & different meaning in 1905 and was explicitly adopted by the INC, as an anthem, dependent on that fact. There will always be people wanting to pick up fights, and appear Victims. There will also be lots of people wanting to believe in conspiracy theories, despite evidence to the contrary. A case in point being the forward going around on Orkut that Jana Gana Mana being a homage to George V. Tagore had laid that controversy to rest years back, but these people were neither born then, nor do they have the brains to accept his defence.

The words 'Vande Mataram' have been a wonderful rallying point for millions during the freedom struggle, and even today to signify the Mahatma's presence in Munabhai lage raho, the lyricist had to come up with the song 'Bande me tha dum, Vande mataram'.

Frankly I don't care a damn about any of this ignorant crap. It's a wonderful song that is very beautiful when you hear it. Even if you do not know the meaning of the words, the words have a very musical air about them. It expresses wonderful ideas, and conjures up a very beautiful image in front of our eyes. It is sad that the people have had to been reminded about it and some elements are forcing people to sing the song.


Also read this wonderful article by H. Y. Sharada Prasad.

A Political Song

Finally here are the accepted lyrics of the song.


[This is from a Picture I took in Trimurti bhavan last year]

Discover: The Bike & Biking

It's been two weeks since I have been riding my new bike, Discover from Bajaj. As Chit asked for the pics, I thought that I might bundle a short post along with those, detailing my first experiences of riding in Pune, which is considered the two wheeler capital of India.

When I took admission in Symbiosis Institute of Geoinformatics, [SIG for short; ] I had realized that I would have to bike everyday to college, since it's about 7.5 K.m. from home, and no India city can boast of such an efficient and comprehensive Transport system like Mumbai.

With this am in mind I had asked my cousin brother to teach me some stuff, coz he is a total petrosexual, and he bikes to his college in Andheri. The first two sessions went exceedingly well, but at the end of the second session, after riding beautifully for two hours, I skidded on a turn, just below my house.

After scraping my skin and injuring my ego, my knee was immobile for almost a fortnight, so practicing more was out of the question. By the time I could flex my leg, it was time to shift to Pune. Thus When I bought the bike, and took delivery on the 31st of July, all I had, was the experience of about 3 hrs, that too on safe roads which were unfrequented by traffic.

So Was I prepared?
No.
Was it stupid and naive?
Definitely.
Was it fun?
Not so Much.
Am I better off because of it?
No doubt about it.


The roads in Pune are terrible, and with the incessant rains, they have literally gone down the drain. You cannot figure out whether you are driving on Gravel or the ruins of a road. And on my everyday route, they are building a flyover. This has slowed down traffic so much that it takes about 25 minutes on a 600m stretch. The portholes on the road are numerous, and the surface would provide excellent practice for future astronauts, wishing to travel on the moon.

It was in conditions like these that I am learning to ride. The thing about learning on your own is that there is no one to tell you where you are going wrong. In fact you do not even know whether you are going wrong or not. Thus you keep on repeating the same things, and wonder why you are not getting the expected results.

For example: My bike is a 125 cc, electric start version. The important point is that you don’t have to go in neutral every time, and kick start it. You can just press the clutch, press a switch, and the engine roars into action. This means theoretically you can start in any gear, though it is not recommended. What happens when you do this is that you have to delicately let go of the clutch and rotate the accelerator at the same time.

As it is, my hands are not very delicate. They are digital, not analog. I can give either full force, or no force; something in between is very difficult, and almost impossible to control. Because of this, the engine used to stall, frequently with a lot of traffic honking behind me. You can imagine how difficult it must have been for me, and how much of a handicap I suffered.

Today, it struck me that I did not suffer from this problem when I was using the kick start, and this solved my dilemma. While using the kick start, I used to start the motion in first gear, which is made for exactly that reason. Using the electric start, I used to try to start moving at a higher gear, and these usually fall when the bike is in motion.

If someone was teaching me, he would have found this fault long back, but learning on my own, I had to figure it out by myself. After this, I truly enjoyed riding for the first time in a fortnight.
It was this moment of self discovery that I truly cherished; I also understood why I love Physics, but still hated it in TY.

It was this self discovery that I was missing in TY. Earlier I could calculate and derive formulae and model situations, and they corresponded to reality. In TY, I could follow the derivations, but they did not relate to an immediate reality for me. I was missing the feeling of figuring out things on my own; the mythical 'Joy of finding things out'.

On this note, let me show you my bike


 

The Great Divide and Biases

There has always been a wall, on the wrong side of which, I often find myself. This wall apparently divides the fun loving people from the serious minded people. I call it apparent, because I do not think that this distinction is a valid one.

Most of you, would have been accused of being serious and sincere [I am not quite sure of what sincere exactly means in this context, though I include it, because I have been accused of being so, more then once], because you love doing things, which the world at large, finds to be boring and useless. But we still do them. Why? Simply, because it is fun.

I read Shakespeare in archaic English, not because it makes me look smart, but because it is so much fun. I love having discussions about philosophy and finding answers to abstruse questions, because it is fun, and I find it enjoyable to do so. I find Physics wonderful and interesting, not boring and useless.

This wall exists for people who do not find these things 'fun'. They would not willingly undertake tasks like these. It is for this reason that they think all those who undertake these 'endeavors' are serious people who are different from the world at large. What hurts even more, is that they assume I am incapable of having fun.

This just goes to show that we are so keen to label people and slot them into certain stereotypes. We would rather believe people who are different to us in certain things, to be different in other things as well. It sure is difficult to know a person, but I bet that you'll find you have plenty in common with any given person. You just choose to notice the differences, focus on them, and use them to define a Person and judge him.

I believe this stems from the old Brain/Heart divide. It is often [and wrongly I might add] assumed that evryone has an emotional side, while only a select few have an intellectual side. This makes it socially acceptable to have 'emotional talents' like singing and dancing, while Intellectual pursiuts are only for the chosen few, as it cannot be apreciated by everyone.

I have often seen that those who the world calls 'serious' do not make this mistake; this is really not surprising. I would not call someone who loves talking, singing and dancing fun loving, because according to me everyone is fun loving, the only difference is the source of their enjoyment. This view I derive not from some intellectual reasoning, but from everyday experience. I know people from both sides of this mythical divide and know that they are not unlike each other. Sure, if given a choice I would spend my time with people who have more things in common with me, but that does not mean I don't mix with the 'other' group.

This quality has given rise to humorous comments from others. Like yesterday, a girl asked my friends, 'why does he hang out and speak to you?’ This question is a loaded one, and has two implied meanings, none of which I agree with. Firstly it implies that my friends are not worth hanging out with and talking to. Secondly it implies that I should not hang out with people who seem different to me. Both of these, as you can imagine, are totally unacceptable and ideas
not worth following.

Only if people did not jump to conclusions, rush to judge people, and be content with their judgment, the world would have been an easier place to live in.

Some Things That Amaze Me

It is said that when one spends time along with oneself, it will lead to self realization, about self, about the surroundings and and finally the universe.

Here are some things about me that amaze me:

• That I miss the madness called Mumbai
• That I judge people by their way of speaking English
• That I value sophistication so much
  
• How conservative & tradational my ideas are about feminine beauty
• How much I miss the sea
• That I can be so snobish
• That my background in Physics & thinking can be so useful

Humour and the Blasts

Here are 2 of the funniest cartoons I have seen on the Blasts:

This one from the AsianAge:

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While this one is from DNA

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It seems some of you didn't get it, that the thought I had last expressed was a sarcastic one. I wrote that coz some sill hack would soon claim some numerical reason for the bomb blasts happening on 11/7/2006, and I wanted to pre-emept that.

And low and behold, I got two emails claiming exactly that.

The first one claimed:

11 minutes 7 places 8 blasts.
Tuesday was the 11^th day of the 7^th month, in the year 2006; and we know the numerical root of 2006 is 2+0+0+6=8

while another claimed that :

The blasts happened on 11/7/2006; Now 1+1+7+2+6=17; 1+7=8;
now we know that 8 is the number of Saturn, which brings along calamity and destruction; Further more 8 will explain why bad things happen on the 26^th; becaue 2+6=8 [refer to my earlier post: 26, The bad luck day!]

The thing with numerology, and especial this hindsight kind of numerology is that once you have a series of random numbers, you can definitely find some complicated formula which will fit that data. I'll start believing in numerology, once they effectively predict a future event, and it happens exactly when they claim it will happen.

Mumbai Train Blasts

So Mumbai now suffers from Terrorist attacks after the onslaught of Rain and hooliganism in the matter of 10 days.
They have attacked trains, which as you know are the lifeline of Mumbai. They have not only been well planned, but well executed as well.

If you look at it, they are quite different then the 1993 bomb-blasts. Those were targeted at prestigious places like Air India Building and Passport office.

This time the bastards have acted smartly. They have targeted those places which are frequented by the common man. They want to spread panic, terror and mayhem among the ordinary citizens of Mumbai.

Think about it: As an ordinary person how many times do you go to the Air India building and the BSE? Wouldn't you spend more time in the trains everyday.

With these blasts wouldn't you worry a little bit before taking a train? But the sad thing is that you have no choice. There are very few people who can travel by car or bus to work. About 5.5 Million people travel by train everyday, and some of those who left today morning, won't be reaching home tonight. Really sad to think about it. May god give strength to the families of the victims.

A totally inappropriate thought now:
Today is Tuesday, If you look at one of my earlier posts, http://dev3.blogspot.com/2005/08/26-bad-luck-day.html
Most of the incidents mentioned, also happened on Tuesdays
A lot to think about tonight.

Tags: Mumbai, Bomb blasts, terror, trains, terrorists

Feynman

Whenever we think of something, we often have thought along similar lines before, and we extrapolate that thought process to solve this new problem. Other people might call it 'Assuming'. Nothing wrong with it, except for the fact that this thinking becomes sort of mechanical and very often we do not understand the problem in a fundamental way. Feynman was never like that. He would like to understand a problem from a fundamental view in a sort of unconscious way and he would often come up with a totally new and better way of looking at the problem. His thought process was a very unique one, because he refused to have any preconceived notions and assumptions, looking only at the relevant factors. For example look at this link:

If Richard Feynman applied for a job at Microsoft

let me quote to show you how he thinks:

Interviewer: I mean, why are there round ones at all? Is there some particular value to having round ones?

Feynman: Yes. Round covers are used when the hole they are covering up is also round. It'’s simplest to cover a round hole with a round cover.

If you have more time, look at this link:

Richard Feynman and The Connection Machine

Tags: Feynman, thinking, though process

Pune

I have been enjoying a much needed vacation here in Pune, and Here are some bullets:

• Pune is well known for it's arrogant shopkeepers. After hectic shopping at West side we proceded home for lunch and we got a call from them explaining that there was some billing problem, so they asked us to come back. We thought that they had forgotten to bill something, and so were asking us to pay more. We asked them to come home. When they came home, they tallied the bill and told us that they had wrongly billed us for an extra Rs 499, which they will return! Punyat Ase hi hote!
• I am busy noting all the good eateries in Pune and today, I found the Pune University canteen to provide a heavenly Vada Sambhar.
• I also took all my younger cousins to watch Krrish and I might write abt it later.
• Now I am highly knowledgeable about Bey-Blades, which I am told is the latest rage amongst kids today.
  

Movies & more

Most of you know that I have a chronic affliction of watching movies, even bad ones. While chatting with someone, I was accused of wasting time watching movies, which according to him, I could have better used, by making something of my life.
I strongly disagreed with him, and here I would like to note down the things I have learnt from movies, which I could not have got from any other source.

Lessons from Movies

• The best time to do a quick Reconnaissance of a room, and check out the entry/exit points, as well as spy on the people present, is while doing a complicated dance, with atleast 50 extras dancing the same step in sync.
• 
  
• [On a related note].. The easiest way to gain entry to a high security party is to masquerade as a dance troop.
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• There are 2 ways in which a boy can meet a girl in college; firstly by having a big fight & secondly by being very clumsy and running into [literally] her, which result in both of you dropping all your stuff on the floor, thus giving ample opportunity for both of you to take each other's stuff.
• 
  
• If you meet someone and start off on the wrong foot, and you don't know their name, chances are high that, you will be spending a lot of the next day and a half, either saving the world from Nuclear disaster, or saving the POTUS, or falling in love, and quite possibly all three.
• 
  
• The skill most required of a criminal, is an ability to dance well.
• 
  
• If there is a shootout between rival gangs, the newbie will have the best aim.
• 
  
• The best time to have a secret, heated discussion with ur significant other is during a ball dance.[Ok I know I am coming back to dancing, but that's what I have noticed]
• 
  
• A Spy has the best sex life. [Even Arnold in True Lies has one by the end]
• 
  
• A porn star can pretend to be a hot school teacher and no one but the priest will know her true occupation.
• 
  
• Mafia Dons can't plan their next move unless the are being fitted a suit by an exclusive & expensive tailor.
  

These are the thing I have learnt in the past 3 days by watching movies, what have you learnt?

Tags: Movies, Life, lessons

Finally

I just read this link: Google route to track militants

Till some time ago, we used to read how pissed the Indian authorities were with Google earth [even APJ Abdul Kalam had spoken out against Google earth]. They were worried that terriorist and Naxalites could use Google Earth to undermine the security forces.

Now the army has realised that two can play at that game. Let me quote:

....that the satellite pictures would be able to pick out the green cover and the terrain clearly, enabling the forces to plan much better. They said it would be like flying over the area physically, instead of depending on two dimensional contour or relief maps.

Maybe now the Indian Government will realise that the benifits of Google Earth far outweigh any risks associated with security issues.

Google Earth, India

Wow! did you read this?

I have just read a column on rediff.com Mukesh Ambani's great gamble . I would suggest that you read this.
My jaw just dropped when I read about Mukesh's plan. Let me quote

coming up across India's commercial capital, on as-yet fallow land in what is just another squalid suburban slum, is India's first 21st century megapolis. With its own dedicated airport, a rapid transit sea-link connecting it with Mumbai, and living conditions on par with the swankiest, most sophisticated cities of the world.

I Have Reservations

Arjun Singh's announcement on 5th of April about reservations for OBC's in Centre funded educational Institutes of Higher Learning has started quite a debate. I have followed this debate in the press, TV news Channels and on the internet with great interest, and I am still not satisfied.

Reservations have been an emotional issue since the days of the British. If you remember school history they were first introduces as a solution to separate electorates in the 1930's. Reservations in Governmental jobs and educational institutes were introduced by VP singh on the recommendations of the Mandal commission. The first wave of reservation was greated by self-immolation of young students in Delhi.

Fifteen years have passed and this time the issue is much more serious. What is different this time is that the OBC's will be at the receiving end of the charity and the total scope of reservation will reach 49.5%.

Its no wonder then that there has been passionate pleading from both the supporters and the opposers of this move. The problem with this debate as I see it is that it has been more of a rabble-rousing, emotional inciting then a logical persuasive way of making the other side understand your point of view.

Both sides have been using anecdotal evidence to promote their cause and recalling hearsay and extreme stereotypes of the opposing camp to malign them. It just so happens that those who are opposing this move, tend to be better looking, more educated and are used to captivating others with their sophisticated and suave ways.(for example look here)

The supporters will talk about B R Ambedkar, and how he gave a voice to millions of Dalits. They will remind us that the so called education institutes produce professional who will happily sell their soul and leave for America for a Dollar Salary. The opposers will introduce anecdotal evidence about how students from the reserved categories fail to keep up with the work at IIT.

I will not get into specifics as I am not an expert on these issues, but I will try to look at some of the arguments as logically and rationally as I can.

1] The Supporters point out that the Upper Casts make up only about 16% of the countries population, but their fraction in the professional as well as higher educational streams is more then the proverbial Lion's share. I agree with this point, but not with the conclusions drawn from it.

Let me give an example. The Parsees are a miniscule portion of India's populace, but they have been responsible for so much. According to one study, 7% of India's population depends directly or indirectly on the TATA group of their daily bread. They have been responsible for so many institutions that are well cherished in Mumbai..... Most of the capital in the stock market is held by people form Gujarat.

While the statistic that, there is such a miniscule proportion of the disadvantaged sector in the higher institutes of learning, is shocking, these people fail to follow their logic and ask for the same data from the 10+2 and Graduation level. They do not want to talk about the reasons behind these numbers. I can't see how you can solve the problems without going into its causes. Its like a doctor giving cough medicine to a patient who is coughing without ascertaining whether the patient has AIDS, TB or just plain flu.

2] The opposers of the move regale us with tales of reserved seats candidates doing badly at IIT/IIM.  I can't use this as a factor in reaching my decision, as there is no hard evidence. All I am asking for is some Freakonomics type of research. Here is how someone can do it. Take data containing marks for all years from say 3 IIT's, 3 IIM's 3 NIT's and 5 Medical colleges from the last 15 years and 5 other colleges and see if their is some correlation between the scores of those who got in on Merit and those who got in on Reservations. Further more you could actually then see how both the groups progressed and you could even see how much each group improved over the duration of the course after normalizing scores for each group separately. After someone does this study, use this data to actually see how helpful reservations have been for those who have benefited from them.

3] The supporters claim that these institutes have been set up by the Government to help India.  Sorry they have not been set up for this purpose. Look at the mission statement of IIMA  let me quote: IIMA's mission is to help India and other developing countries improve their managerial practices....Objectives:...To provide learning facilities to men and women of exceptional calibre for pursuing careers in management or becoming teachers and researchers in different management fields.I don't read anywhere.. Help Indian citizens get better jobs...or anything like that.  At most they say...To participate in and contribute to the formulation of public policy, which would provide answers to questions of social importance. These reservations at this time seem to be a political gimmick without actually any thought being put into it. It seems there is more to this announcement than is visible [I am talking about Arjun Singh's political ambitions]

It’s not as if anyone wants to help the OBC's. As I see it, no one is questioning why in the first place so few people of these particular casts fail to score high on the entrance tests. Is it because they can't put as many hours in to study as those of the higher casts do? Or is it because they lack certain skills which those from the higher casts are gifted with. Or is it genetic and their brains work in a different way then others and hence they can't score as high? [Like blacks scoring lower on the SAT's in the US]. Further more, aren't these entrance tests an indication of how well you have done so far? And wouldn't there be a high chance that this level of performing would be carried over in the future?

When I look back at this, I wonder why I staunchly support reservations on the basis of sex but not cast. I think it is so because I fear that these concessions will not be used by those who actually need them, but by those who are already empowered. This is why I would strongly support reservation based on economic status. I believe that once you become rich enough [how rich is a different question] you should stop being a burden on the government and society. This is an important issue and we all need more inputs before we can decide on it.    

The Ekka speaks

I have long respect Amir Khan. Whenever you talk to this man and listen to him, you realize that he is saying it with sincerity and after a lot of thinking. He has a lot of things to say about the media.
In this Interview to tehelka he talks about his views on the media and why he has stopped talking to reporters.

One of his quotes just say it all :

First of all, it’s meant to be a watchdog of society not a lap dog! Very broadly speaking, I feel the media has a grave responsibility as far as news reporting is concerned. They should be accurate in their reporting and they should weigh which news is more important in terms of how it affects society and people and, at a national level, what is important, as opposed to some titillating news about some celebrity.

I get a lot of newspapers at home (all of 780 grams on a weekday and 1110 on a Sundayy. I have actually measured it.) and I find that most of it is full of crap.
One of the Jain Brothers wants to give away the Times free to the readers, and I think they would still make a lot of money from the ads and the 'news' that they print on payment of money. Asian age is good only for the Oped articles, and HT is still trying to be different. And don't even get me started about the News channels.

The things that the media would like to call 'news' just makes me cringe. Its high time someone said something about all this, and I am happy that Amir has put forward his thoughts.

Hypnagogic Musings

There are times when one has had a hard day and wishes to switch everything off. Something similar happened to me yesterday. After the exam, I had coffee at CCD and went to the station. The day being a Saturday, the crush dense load was missing and I happened to get a place to sit at Charni Road. The train happened to be the 'illenium Rake'. I haven't named it so; The M has actually fallen/stolen from the coach. The interiors might be shiny and open, a refreshing change form the old shit coloured coaches, but the seats suck. Firstly the place between seats is too small, and with my long legs, it hard not to hit the facing co-passenger in the groin. Secondly the distance between the back of your head and the wall behind it is about 4 inches, so its very hard to sleep.(ok I'm digressing)

Thankfully I had got a window seat and I had nothing better to do, so I started snoozing. I was sitting in an awkward position and had just had black coffee, so its no wonder that I found myself drifting from consciousness to alertness and back again. This continued till I made myself at home in the Hypnagogic state.

This is a state in which one is not quite dreaming, but neither is he fully awaking. You might be vaguely aware of what's happening around you, but its a weird state to be in. The curious thing about all this was that I was aware of all this and did a very Feynman'isque thing. I started to observe that there were times when I was not aware of my Hypnagogic state. Everytime I came back, I knew time had passed but couldn't tell how much or how I knew.

I remember having had experiences like this before and now that I try to analyze, I can see that the common thing to all of them is that I have been in this stage right after I stopped doing mental tasks which were excruciatingly exhausting. Today's task being keeping all those equations and theories in my memory. What I think happened was that after this hard works, the brain cells to protect themselves switched off or something. I realize that I am not being very lucid or even articulate here, but bear with me.

As the exam was over, I no longer had to remember all that stuff, so it was like my brain was formatting itself. I don't know if what happens at the neuron level can be compared to the hard disk, but that's the best way I can put it right now.

As I reached Borivali, the sun had set and darkness had fallen. Then this deep gloom came over me, which I have recognize whenever my body/or my unconscious gets confused. I know its night but I am not quite sure that its time for nightfall. In my gloom i felt that it was quite dark. To check I looked at the streetlamps, and many of them were infact off. I am not implying that in some mysterious way my mental state affected the halogens and switched some of them off. All I am just saying is that since I was in a particular state of mind,I remembers the darkness. It affected me, because I was partial in that mood. If I had been cheerful or something, I would not have noticed the partial darkness.

As I trudged back home, I remembers that Homes had once remarked to Watson that the 'nothingness after a case' was a funny experience (or something to that effect) I think he was referring to this very feeling.

A filler

As exams are upon us, I am more and more inclined to waste my time doing things which have no relevence to studies.

• Given that I like reading and writing tech related posts, along with the fact that it is almost confirmed that I am going to become a techie, I thought it to be prudent that I set up a tech blog. I have, but theres nothing on it write now. After I post something, I will put the google reader here, so that you can see what I have posted where.

• I can sense the summer aproaching. Today I had the first mango of the season. It was so sweet and wonderful, I just felt as if I was in heaven.

• For the simpsons fans here are two videos.

• Firstly you can see the opening credits with real people. Its brit thou, so the Marge's driving wheel is on the wrong side. Here it is:

• Secondly see the voices of Simpsons do various impressions. Its a laugh riot.
  

Securing Your Computer

After some recent conversations with a few friends, I realised that a lot of people do not know the ways in which they can secure their computers from Viruses and other maladies due to using the computer over the Internet. Hence I felt a tutorial was in order.

You have come here probably for the same reason. Do not panic! It is quite easy to protect your computer from most of the problems you will encounter on the web.

Firstly let me lay my cards on the table. Most of use pirated versions of Microsoft’s Operating Systems, Windows 98 or Xp. If you are one of the lucky few who has a Mac, hats off to you, this tutorial will be of no useless. I also assume that you have an internet connection; otherwise you will be safe from most of these problems.

Step 1
Firstly install a good anti-virus programme and regularly update it. An Anti-virus is your first line of defence. It runs in the background all the time and prevents viruses from running in the first place.
Computer Viruses not only reduce system performance but they can potentially destroy data and allow a third party complete control over your computer.
No PC today should be running without an updated Antivirus program. Updated means that the Antivirus program should have a current virus pattern, reference or definition file from within the last seven days. E-mailing, file sharing, disk sharing, and simply browsing the Internet can all potentially cause a computer virus infection.

Most of us still use the anti-virus programme which the Computer guy had installed. It probably will be a Norton or a McAfee, and its subscriptions usually end in a year. What this means is that the software cannot be updated after a particular date, which will render it impotent against viruses found after that date. Getting an Anti-virus need not make a hole in your pocket. There are several free antiviruses any of which you can download and install.
I would suggest AVG Antivirus 7.0 Free Edition. This product has been continuously refined since it was first released in 1991 and now offers very impressive protection capabilities. Additionally, it's relatively small, light on resources, has regular automatic updates and handles email scanning. There is a free and a pro version, the only difference being that the free version has a few non-critical features disabled and has no direct technical support. Even so, it's an impressive package and offers the financially challenged a real alternative to the major anti-virus suites.
Download it at http://free.grisoft.com/freeweb.php/doc/2/ (15.8MB)


Step 2
Now that viruses have been tackled, let us look at the second group of irritants, Spyware
Spyware - "Hidden software that gathers information about a computer user without the user's knowledge or informed consent, and then transmits this information to an external entity. This also includes Malware products which perform the delivery of unrequested advertising (Pop-ups in particular), re-routing page requests to illegally claim commercial site referral fees, and installing stealth phone diallers.”
So now how do you protect yourself? Which are the softwares that you need?

If you have a genuine Windows Xp [i.e. a non pirated version] then Microsoft has got an excellent product for you; Microsoft' has just-released Windows Defender program [1] which is currently available as a free beta. Defender is the latest re-incarnation of the excellent Giant Antispyware product that Microsoft purchased late in 2004. It's a notch or two better than its immediate predecessor Microsoft Antispyware, itself a very capable performer. Importantly, it appears to have the best protective capability of any of the free anti-Spyware products.

Now if you belong to the majority and have a pirated version of Windows, don’t worry; I suggest two free products: Ad-Aware SE V1.6 [2] and SpyBot Search and Destroy V1.4 [3]. Both work well together and between them you'll get excellent protection. If you have a relatively fast PC, I suggest you turn on the TeaTimer option when you install SpyBot. It will give you reasonable active protection but at the cost of eating up some of your processing power.

Download them at:
[1]Windows Defender ( 6.4MB)
[2] http://www.lavasoftusa.com/software/adaware/ (2.7MB)
[3] http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.html(4.8MB)
Step 3
Within the last year and a half, a new type of irritant has become stronger, the Trojans. They are programs that appear legitimate but do something illicit when run. Just like the wooden horse the Greeks gave Troy as a "gift", users mistake the Trojan for a useful or interesting program that they choose to download. Once installed and run, Trojans can secretly open remote access channels to hackers, relay passwords and credit card data or destroy user files. It's similar to a virus but generally does not replicate itself.
Ewido is the best of a new crop of anti-Trojan programs. It emerged as was one of the few products that could reliably detect polymorphic and process injecting Trojans that were totally missed by anti-virus products like Norton and AVG. Unfortunately the free version of Ewido doesn't have a memory monitor and this omission significantly reduces the level of active protection provided. However the on-demand scanner is excellent. I recommend that all average PC users who don't have an anti-trojan scanner download Ewido and scan their PCs weekly. I suspect you may be surprised at what you will find. Ewido is also pretty good at removing some Spyware infections so bear that in mind next time you encounter a Spyware product you can't remove with normal anti-Spyware products like Ad-Aware. Note that Ewido only works with Windows 2000 and later so Win 9X users should consider the free version of a2 (a-squared) anti-trojan as an alternative. It's not quite as effective as Ewido but is still an excellent product. High risk PC users such as P2P file sharers and frequenters of hack sites should however consider the industrial strength protection of Trojan Hunter or the full version of Ewido both of which offer the active protection they need. Note: The free version of Ewido is actually the same as the paid version but after 14 days the active protection (i.e. memory monitor) becomes non-functional.
Download it at http://www.ewido.net/en/ (2.2MB)


Step 4
Now that you have followed the above steps, there is only one remaining step, between you and a secure PC. You need a firewall. A personal firewall is a software application which filters traffic entering or leaving your computer. When you're connected to the Internet, information is flowing to and from your PC in a near-constant stream through your PC's "ports". There are thousands of "ports" and they are like little gates that let information in and out. If you leave your PC's ports open and don't monitor them, you're at extreme risk.
No other single product class seems to cause as much angst to average users in their installation and day-to-day use as Firewalls. That's why my choice for "best" goes to Kerio Personal Firewall the product that seems to cause the fewest problems for users yet manages first rate protection as well. Kerio dropped the free version in late 2005 but thankfully Sunbelt Software, the makers of the excellent CounterSpy anti-spyware scanner, picked it up and will continue making it available [1] under the name of Sunbelt Kerio Personal Firewall. Note that the free and paid versions of Kerio are the same. If you don't buy the product some advanced features are automatically turned off after 30 days. The latest free version (V6) of the ZoneAlarm firewall [2] comes in as a good second choice though it can be a troublesome program on some PCs. It's also a very cut-down product; each new version of the free ZoneAlarm seems to have fewer features while its commercial big brother grows ever more bloated. More adventurous users might like to try the now discontinued Sygate Personal Firewall. It's still available from numerous download sites [3] and is an excellent and robust firewall though not the easiest to set up. Another tricky product to install is NetVeda Safety.Net firewall [3] however its performance is quite outstanding and it offers application control and content filtering as well. This highly capable product deserves to be better known and experienced users should definitely put it on their short list.
Download them at:
[1] http://www.sunbelt-software.com/Kerio.cfm (7.3MB)
[2] Zone Alarm (9.0MB)
[3] http://www.snapfiles.com/get/sygatefw.html (9.1MB)
[4] http://www.netveda.com/consumer/safetynet.htm (6.3MB)



Final words on Safety.
If you are really interested in making your computer safer, I would recommend you changing your browser. Internet Explorer (IE) is a competent browser but it has become such a target for malicious exploits that it is now a major security risk. Quite separately, the browser itself is now looking dated with most alternative products offering tabbed browsing and other productivity enhancements.
There are several excellent alternatives with Mozilla Firefox [1] the stand-out pick. It's safer than IE, so safe in fact that many users have reported no Spyware infections since they started using the product. It's also browses faster than IE, is very stable and is fully standards compliant. It loads a little slower than IE but once running, it positively zips along. With tabbed browsing and over 600 free extensions that allow you to customize your experience, it provides most users with a major surfing upgrade. Firefox is now my everyday browser though I still leave IE on my PC for the occasional web site that's designed around IE's non-standard features. If you need any further convincing then check out this IE to Firefox migration guide [2].
If you don't like Firefox then you should check out Opera [3]. It's always been the fastest and a full featured browser but until recently was only available as shareware or in advertising-supported versions. Now though, it's free. There's much to like about Opera but I do miss all those Firefox extensions.
Users who don't want to drift too far from the Microsoft stable can get some of the advantages of Firefox and Opera by using one of the many customized shells for Internet Explorer. These offer tabbed browsing and many other features missing in IE. On the downside they share most of the same security problems as IE as they utilize the IE engine.
The IE shell that I like most is a freeware product called Maxthon [4]. After using Maxthon for a while, Internet Explorer seems totally out-of-date and painfully cumbersome. Don't expect a lot of documentation though but if you read the FAQ [5] you'll have no problems. Some folks prefer the free Avant browser [6] to Maxthon. It's a close call; Avant has a cleaner look while Maxthon has more features. In the last analysis it's Maxthon's ability to accept Internet Explorer plug-ins that put it a nose in front.
Last but not least is the K-Meleon browser [7], a slimmed down cousin of Firefox that's optimized for Windows. Of the four browsers I use regularly, K-Meleon is the quickest loading and along with Opera, the fastest for surfing. On the downside there are only a limited number of add-ons and plug-ins available so you are pretty well limited to the features available in the standard product. If you are the type of person who prefers performance to bells and whistles you should definitely try K-Meleon.
[1] http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/ (5.0MB)
[2] http://www.techsupportalert.com/firefox.htm
[3] http://www.opera.com/ (3.6MB)
[4] http://www.maxthon.com/en/index.htm (2.0MB)
[5] http://maxthon.cafedeux.com/faq/
[6] http://www.avantbrowser.com/ (1.4MB)
[7] http://kmeleon.sourceforge.net/ (6MB)

In case you have some problems or questions, either leave them as comments on this post or e-mail me. My address can be seen on the right hand side column under the 'About me' section.

Nuclear Deal

Some of you might know that I harbor a deep interest in Strategic affairs, and my area of interest has been the Indo-US relations. Given this, it is no surprising fact that I have been following the meetings that are being held on the Nuclear Deal.

At the onset itself, let me say that I believe that our PM Manmohan Singh is an honorable man, one of the few who has any credibility left, and I do not believe that he talks with a forked tongue. He may not be a great orator, but who ever writes his speeches is an intelligent and sensitive person, and his speeches are some of the best I have ever read of any PM. His speech in Oxford, though it received a lot of flack, was an excellent piece of writing and communicated some wonderful observations. Read it here.

Yesterday afternoon, he gave a speech in the Rajya Sabha, detailing out the plans for the separation of Civil and Military Nuclear assets. He laid to rest the various doubts that many people harbored and washed away all doubts from my mind about the importance and need of this process.

Some history lessons are in order. India under the leadership of Nehruvian Ideas, refused to sign the NPT, because it was discriminatory. What it said was basically that, those countries who had nuclear weapons could keep them while others who had not developed them so far, could enjoy the Civilian uses with the help of abovementioned countries, as long as they promised to not develop nuclear weapons. It was a treaty to preserve the world order as of that day. Those countries who did not sign the treaty, like India, would not be helped by the 5 Nuclear powers, towards peaceful uses of Nuclear technology. With this in mind, it a matter of great relief the Canada and Russia has helped us in building several reactors.

Unlike the US which has great reserves of Uranium, India has large reserves of Thorium, so She decided to work towards Thorium reactors. We have not made much progress on this, having reactors with the Maximum capacity of only 220Mw.

With the Economy growing at an Tremendous pace, the need of infrastructure was greater then ever before. Electric power has become one of the most needed resources in India today. India had to look at other sources of Power, and Nuclear Power came at the top of that list. It was with these needs in mind that Manmohan Singh signed that Infamous July 18th agreement.

As Dr Sings said,

As India strives to raise its annual GDP growth rate from the present 7-8% to over 10%, the energy deficit will only worsen. This may not only retard growth, it could also impose an additional burden in terms of the increased cost of importing oil and natural gas, in a scenario of sharply rising hydrocarbon prices. While we have substantial reserves of coal, excessive dependence on coal-based energy has its own implications for our environment. Nuclear technology provides a plentiful and non-polluting source of power to meet our energy needs. However, to increase the share of nuclear power in our energy mix, we need to break out of the confines imposed by inadequate reserves of natural uranium, and by international embargos that have constrained our nuclear programme for over three decades.

According to me, the greates thing to come out of this agreement is that US has acknowledged India as a Nuclear Power, and has not asked her to give up the weapons.

But more importantly, in the Joint Statement, the United States implicitly acknowledged the existence of our nuclear weapons programme. There was also public recognition that as a responsible State with advanced nuclear technologies, India should acquire the same benefits and advantages as other States which have advanced nuclear technology, such as the United States. The Joint Statement offered the possibility of decades-old restrictions being set aside to create space for India'’s emergence as a full member of a new nuclear world order.

For India to get Nuclear fuel as well as the expertise she needs, all she had to do was separate her Civil and Military installations. The Civil installations would be under IAEA safeguard, while India could do what she wanted at the military sites. Even the choice of marking a site as Civil or Military lay with India. As the PM said,

We have ensured that our three-stage nuclear programme will not be undermined or hindered by external interference. We will offer to place under safeguards only those facilities that can be identified as civilian without damaging our deterrence potential or restricting our R&D effort, or in any way compromising our autonomy of developing our three stage nuclear programme.

Neither have our strategic interestss been harmed. Unlike what some people believe,

nothing that could compromise our nuclear deterrent has been shared with anyone.

I believe that this deal, when it goes through, will be one of the best things that could happen for India. She will be helped in building more reactors, thus generating more power, while being allowed to keep her weapons.

Some people believe that the US will not keep her part of the deal, coz this deal will not be passed by Congress. To them I will only say, that the Bush presidency has had an excellent history of passing legislation thru Congress, which neither the Democrats nor the Republicans wanted. Getting this bill passed is the work of Bush, and if Congress does not pass this deal, we have Bush to blame.

Improv Everywhere

There is this great site that I keep track of. There are a bunch of actors in New York who's aim are to improvise everwhere. They make funny scenes in public, and act calm all through out. Their McDonald's Bathroom Attendant was what had bought me to their site and I am hooked since.

Imagin you see a man trying to commit suicide by jumping from a ledge. His wife and co-workers come and try to dissuade him. Wouldn't you stop to look at it. What would happen if a fire man comes and brings along a trampolin for the guy to jump on to safely? and he does jump. Wouldn't there be a crowd waiting and cheering ? And what would happen if the ledge happend to be just 4 feet from the ground? To know more go to: Suicide Jumper

But they have outdone themselves this time. I have often wonderd what would happen if all the phones in the train compartment started ringing all the time? And what if the phones were at a place where there was no one to answer them? See thier great prank at : Cell Phone Symphony

Top Gear

I just finished watching the Winter Olympic special of Top Gear. For those who have no idea what Top Gear is, I'll say you are missing one of the best shows on the Telly.

Top Gear is presented by three blokes, Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond. They review cars in their inimitable style, sometimes even reducing cars to 'rubble via a series of trials, stunts and bizarre behavior'.

I just love the way they pass the cars thru these stupid tests, spending a lot of money on every review. Here You can see them testing a car on the HMS invincible. Not only is it technically perfect, but aesthetically too.

Top Gear has had a history of playing a role in factoring the sales of some cars. If a car is disliked by the presenters, such as in the case of the Vauxhall Vectra, it can have a tendency to adversely affect sales. Top Gear is estimated to have over 350 million viewers worldwide.


In this weeks show, they make cars run on ice, race against a professional speed skater, play Ice hockey, even make a Mini do the Ski Jump.

For those of you who missed it, and have got a broadband connection, you can look at two segments:

1]Playing Ice Hockey with the Suzuki Swift:

2]The Mini doing a Ski Jump:
You should just look at James 'Captain Slow' May speaking eloquently about Trajectory and gravity

The Namesake

As you can see, I have been busy, after the end of the prelims. This template took me a long time to make, coz I had to start from scratch. A whole day spent [Not wasted]. If you really want to see the blog in all its splendor. switch to Firefox, coz IE will have some trouble with a few tags I have used.

After the exams, instead of studying I have been behaving like it were a vacation. Have already seen 4 movies, got my cycle cleaned, and read a really nice book.

'The Namesake' written by Jhumpa Lahiri, is one of the best books I have read in a very long time. The protagonist of the story is an Bengali ABCD born in the late 60's. His parents refuse to give him a proper name at birth, coz his great-grand mother wanted to name him and had sent a letter with her choice, but the letter never reaches its destination. The father calls him by the name of Gogol, his favorite Russian author. The kid begins to hate the name in school and finally changes it to Nikhil when he turns 18. How he struggles with his identity, form the basis of the story.

I have always been an anti-goat when it comes to reading novels. If a novel is popular, I suffer from the pressure of liking it, and most often I cant get myself to read it. That's the reason why I haven't read 'The God of Small Things' yet. This is also might be the reason why I cant finish reading a single page of Ayn Rand. I would rather pick up some obscure novel, which I had never heard of, and read it, rather then some novel whos author has had realms of newsprint written about him or her.

So when I had picked up Jhumpa Lahiri's 'Interpreter of Maladies' I was sure that I wouldn't last more then one story. Her name had cropped up all over the media 4 years ago, after she got the Pulitzer Prize. I was rather surprised when I liked her stories. Her slow style of narration hypnotised me.

Yesterday while doing nothing in particular, I chanced to find her novel: The Namesake. After reading it for two days, I cant say why I loved it so much. I can relate to Gogol, who has doubts about himself when no one else does. I can empathise with his insecurities. I feel the 'I am different' that he does.

But Lahiri's way of writing is something totally different. You are with the character, but not the character. So you can actually see the character as another person close to you; You don't try to imagine yourself to be in his or her shoes, because you have gone thru all those fictional situations along with them. It's like this: If you are in a particular situation, you know what you will do, but if your friend is in that situation, you don't think, you just empathise with him. Maybe this is why the book affected me so deeply and touched a chord somewhere.

Ms: Not a good Vista

Geeks the world over hate Microsoft, not because of Jelousy regarding Bill's enormous wealth, but because it makes bad products. There is a common saying among the geekdome:

The only Microsoft product that will not suck is a Vacume Cleaner.

You all have had problems with Microsoft's idiosyncrasies, be it with Ms Word or any of its Os's. It has been almost 4yrs after WinXp came out, and yet it cannot be called Stable. Microsoft claims that its new Os, Vista will be much better, but only a fool will believe them. However this post is not about the comparison of Vista with Xp. Its about upgrading your computer to Vista. Will people welcome Vista with open Arms? I don't think so. Why?

Read the following article on Bit-Tech

Vista is a hardware beast

A Tech Strategist within Microsoft, Nigel Page, has gone on record to discuss the hardware requirements for Windows Vista, due out next Christmas.

What he's said is kind of shocking.

System breakdown

Graphics: Vista has changed from using the CPU to display bitmaps on the screen to using the GPU to render vectors. This means the entire display model in Vista has changed. To render the screen in the GPU requires an awful lot of memory to do optimally - 256MB is a happy medium, but you'll actually see benefit from more. Microsoft believes that you're going to see the amount of video memory being shipped on cards hurtle up when Vista ships.

CPU: Threading is the main target for Vista. Currently, very little of Windows XP is threaded - the target is to make Vista perform far better on dual-core and multi-core processors.

RAM: 2GB is the ideal configuration for 64-bit Vista, we're told. Vista 32-bit will work ideally at 1GB, and minimum 512. However, since 64-bit is handling data chunks that are double the size, you'll need double the memory, hence the 2GB. Nigel mentions DDR3 - which is a little odd, since the roadmap for DDR3, on Intel gear at least, doesn't really kick in until 2007.

HDD: SATA is definitely the way forward for Vista, due, Microsoft tells us, to Native Command Queueing. NCQ allows for out of order completions - that is, if Vista needs tasks 1,2,3,4 and 5 done, it can do them in the order 2,5,3,4,1 if that's a more efficient route for the hard drive head to take over the disk. This leads to far faster completion times. NCQ is supported on SATA2 drives, so expect them to start becoming the standard sooner rather than later. Microsoft thinks that these features will provide SCSI-level performance.

Bus: AGP is 'not optimal' for Vista. Because of the fact that graphics cards may have to utilise main system memory for some rendering tasks, a fast, bi-direction bus is needed - that's PCI express.

Display: Prepare to feel the red mist of rage - no current TFT monitor out there is going to support high definition playback in Vista. You may already have heard rumblings about this, but here it is. To play HD-DVD or Blu-Ray content you need a HDCP compatible monitor. Why? Because these formats use HDCP to encrypt a video signal as it travels along a digital connection to an output device, to prevent people copying it. If you have just standard DVI or even an analogue output, you're going to see HD scaled down to a far-less-than-HD resolution for viewing - which sucks. This isn't really Microsoft's fault - HDCP is something that content makers, in their eternal wisdom, have decided is necessary to stop us all watching pirated movies. Yay.

Thoughts

Amusingly, Page admits that there are no monitors out there that will do HDCP, and that this is a problem. Frankly, it's the consumer's problem, however, according to him. "It's up to you [the users] to say, 'Where's my HDCP?'"

I'm more inclined to say to Hollywood 'Hey, STFU' to be honest.

One of the major problems is that Hollywood knows that Microsoft dominates the operating system sphere, and so it can arm-wrestle MS into working with it. If there was more competition, Hollywood would have to be a little more cautious about what it tries to get away with.

We come back to the age-old problem. Content is being forced onto us that is, to all extents and purposes, crippled. It's not like any of this stuff is actually going to make any difference - we're still going to have dodgy films on the net, probably in no less quantity than we have now - so why would be pay to be screwed, when we can just get an uncrippled version for free?

But, that's a little off topic. In terms of the hardware stuff, it seems obvious that hardware makers are rubbing their hands in glee. It's been hard to persuade people to upgrade their WinXP boxes, since they can handle pretty much anything thrown at them, unless you're a gamer. Graphics companies are going to be selling a bucket-load more GPUs, since now practically every system sold for Vista is going to need one. It's no coincidence that Nvidia is re-introducing onboard graphics for its motherboards very soon.

2GB of RAM for high-end systems is pretty chunky, and it could be that we start to see RAM prices go up as suddenly, a big percentage of systems are being built with 4 times the current requirement. If you thought SATA2 had been slow to take off, expect every new enthusiast chipset to have it built in next year, and for drive makers to start shifting over to it quick - if they're not building a huge number of NCQ drives by the middle of next year, they risk missing out on loads of orders come Vista.

For the complete interview go to APCStart.com.

Cricket for the Uninitiated

Some people find the game of cricket diffficult to understand.
Perhaps the following will help:

The game is played by two groups.

The first group is in and the second group goes out.

Some of the group which is in, go out.

The group that is out, tries to get the group that is in, out.

When one of the group that is in, is out, he goes in and the next one goes out.

Then when all of the first group (except one) that is in, is out, the second group that is out goes in.

The first group now goes out and tries to get the second group, who now are in, out.

Only when both groups have been in and out twice is there a conclusion.

This is how the game called Cricket is played!

....From Mind Your Language!

Paheli Solved

I am so happy to hear that Paheli did not win an Oscar Nomination.
  
    Amol Plaekar, the director of this movie is a world class actor who has entertained us with his down to earth roles in Movies like Golmal, Choti si Baat, Rang Birangi and countless others. His movies as director like Daayraa, Kairee & Dhyasparva were excellent. His 'Thodasa Roomani Ho Jaayen' was a unique film with its rhyming dialogues. This continued till he started casting People from the mainstream cinema like Sonali Bendre in 'Anaahat' and SRK and Rani in 'Paheli'. I often wonder why these great parallel cinema directors start spewing such crap after they become a little successful and have Bollywood stars ready to work with them.

    SRK on another note is a person I actively dislike. He may be the media's 'Badshah' Khan as well as the most popular star overseas, but the only instance in which I can remember him acting is in 'Swades'. He is a non-actor and none of his films, neither 'Asoka' [I had heard of Ashoka, but who is this Asoka?] nor 'Paheli' are world class movies.

    The way the story of Paheli was handled was absurd to begin with. The story of a Ghost falling in love with a beautiful Girl, had a lot of potential, but it was all squandered. The movie was so (unintentionally) funny that I went berserk laughing in the theatre. The people around me were looking at me in a funny sort of way, and the girl I had gone with, began to seriously question my sanity. Next day in college, when I announced that I had seen the movie, the first thing Dustin asked me was, “So how did the Ghost get Rani Pregnant?"

    If they had nominated Paheli, all hell would have broken loose on the pages of 'Bombay Times'. They probably would have declared SRK to be 'The Greatest Actor of the Third Millennium' or something.

    Not that I am saying that India does not produce good movies which the world (America in Particular) can enjoy. I watch only English and Hindi Movies, and yet I can name at least 3 good ones.

  1] Iqbal, a story of the struggle of a deaf & dumb Boy to achieve his dream of being a member of the Cricket team, would have been universally loved. We also know that the Americans have a weakness for sports heroes.

    2] Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi, a wonderful movie about Human relationships in troubled times, ‘A clash between idealism and realism', would have been a good choice. U should watch it just for Shiney Ahuja's great acting and Chitrangada Singh, who gave a wonderful performance to steal our hearts.
  
  3] Yahaan, a sensitively made movie about love under the dark shadow of terrorism, in Kashmir was also a good movie. The American's are suckers for terrorism related movies, and we let that go!

    These 3 movies are from the commercial part of cinema. And I don't even know about Marathi or Bhojpuri or Bengali or south Indian Movies. Just makes one wonder how many great movies are made in India.

    Its High time we stop our obsession with SRK and Yash Chopra type of movies and look at the great variety that we have to offer.
    

Unbounded Creativity

Everyone will have to agree that this year's Physics Batch has been excessively blessed with creativity. There are some who can sing, some who carve, some who draw really nice cars, and others who can write beautiful poetry.[Sadly neither sarchasm nor cynicism can be called creative, so with a heavy heart, I will have to be ommited from this list of these wonderful people.]

For those who disagree, let me provide some proof:

The Time: A lazy saturday morning.
Oscar like usual, was nowhere to be seen even by the second lecture. Suddenly we get this message from him:

Those foyer chats amidst the chaos,
the stories zealously shared.
The end shall sure be a loss.
To leave am I prepared?

Now oscar does write good poems, but what was bugging us was the fact that he was happily frolicking out somewhere, while we were suffering one of the worst tortures know to man, which some people might prefer calling 'A Veda Double Lecture'. We asked him to come out of hiding and join us in our misery.
He replied:

Hiding amidst the chaos,
As veda tortures the few.
I shall not be at a loss,
the loser shall be You. ;o)

We realised that oscar might be a lucky rascal, coz he might be snoozing at home, while we were undergoing this torment.
Also, receiving unilateral creativity from someone once, is allowed but twice, that would be accepting defeat. Thankfully Chitrak's mind came to the rescue, and that's when we sent him this message.

That's what you think my friend,
while you may have slumbered,
the year draws to an end,
and ALL our days are numbered.

Is India No 1?

What happens when an Malaysian woman who is in Mumbai to make a documentary, meets two Chinese industrialists, and has an conversation weather India is better or China?
Read Here

M.S.D.

The second test Match had become such a boring affair that Mahendra Singh Dhoni handed over his pads to skipper Rahul Dravid, and took the new ball (and for the record, did a fair approximation of a seam bowler, both in his run up and with his deliveries that touched the 121 kmph mark). And just to rub it in, Yuvraj Singh shared the new ball with his wicket-keeper. (Late into the evening, the Pakistanis were to respond by giving the new ball to Shahid Afridi and Younis Khan).

A Mega-trend

Today's Times of India has a good article on the Economic reach of India in this globalized world, by Swaminathan.
Quite a read. Makes one's heart swell up with pride.
Read it at:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1372145.cms

Me, Marathon & her

Today was the Marathon Day. Now those who have no idea as to what that is, let me enlighten you. This is a day when South Mumbai's arterial roads are closed to traffic, so that it is easy for the 30K odd people who have registered, to move along them. About the same number show up, Line the streets on a sleepy and foggy morning in January so that they can cheer up the masochists who have decided to run either 42 or 21 Km. The not so brave souls who register for the Dream Marathon (7 Km) are the majority and great fun to watch. Yours truly has been running the Half Marathon, a distance of 21097m for the past two years. The route starts at the historic V.T. Chowk (Even though I am a Maharashtrian, I refuse to call it CST) leading to Nariman Point via Fountain. One then has top run along the Scenic Marine drive, via Kemp's Corner, till Worli and Back. This year they decided to apply a lot of things they had learnt in the past two years, and there were a lot of changes.
Firstly my race was at an unearthly time of 7 in the morning, and I had to be there by at least 6:30, which was all fine except that it meant I would be leaving my house by 5 in the frigid cold morning. I happened to reach the station by about 5:17 and the first person I see on the 5th platform is a fat guy with read colour on his face. He seemed to be holding a yellow coloured Bib, which meant he was out to enjoy the Dream Marathon. Soon I saw a lady holding a blue coloured Bib with the word veteran underscoring her number. Soon the train chugged in & as always I jumped in, along with the red faced dude. After hanging out for sometime, I saw that Khalik and Anurag were there as well, sitting right in front of the red dude. Time was passed by the usual tomfoolery on the part of Khalik.
After we alighted at Churchgate, Anurag disappeared in the quest of some Chick, Leaving me along with Khalik. We managed to reach Azad in once piece, and after depositing my stuff at the counter, we started walking to warm-up. Khalik apparently wasn't too keen on it, and I didn't push him. After a couple of rounds, who should we walk into? Isha and Karan. Apparently they had both planned on participating in the Half Marathon, but due to some unfortunate accident involving a swimming pool, Isha would not, and Karan was going to be the sole one doing so.
Both of us left the couple, in order to answer nature's call before running. By the time we returned, Both of them had disappeared, and we also realised that not much time was left, so we proceeded to the Holding area, and within a couple of minutes, we were left out on Mahanagpalika marg, which was when I lost Khalik.

Congratualtions to Oscar for finishing the full Marathon

P.s. I almost forgot about 'her’. After completing the race, I was drifting back inside Azad, when I remembered to take my Participation Certificate. As I trudged towards the counter, my tired muscles could hardly control my posture. At the counter there was a decent female who was asking names and writing them on the certificates. As My turn came, I leaned on the table, coz my legs were too tired to support my weight. I also was quite dazed, and apparently while giving her my name, I must have also given her one heck of a smile, coz she blushed like hell and turned Beet red. I quickly made my escape, before things escalated.