MAVS

2007-10-04T03:05:00.000-07:00

Good News !!
Not for Fox though...

Futurama is back , and now we know in what form. The hilarious show will be returning back as a full blown movie. Frankly speaking its a first day first show for me, although it could turn sour due to the length of the movie, we are quite used to watching 20 minutes of fun packed Futurama, but sounz very exciting anyways. Seeing the sheer anxiety in the market for the movie which is due for release in November ( hope its a world wide release ), Fox would be cursing itself for taking the show off air, although Family guy was not a bad substitute but it was a bit harsh to remove such a series.

Cant imagine characters like Fry, Bender, Zap and others ( and guess there will be some new characters also ) packed into one movie. One thing for sure is loz of other guys have rolled up sleeves to roll out similar productions, would we see Family guy getting rolled into a movie, only time will tell, for now if you are a futurama fanatic you have exciting times to come.

You can lay your hands on the trailer here ....................

Wait on .. for the actual show..

2007-08-23T02:57:00.000-07:00

Nothing against Sony, they manufacture product of amazing quality, but there are certain things that don't go down too well with the sony consumers. One being arrogance with which the company operates. Take this, a company recalling its laptops and says the the reason is a minor glitch, well as we came to know much later the minor glitch was related to batteries exploding.
There is always someone from Sony, who will always be ready to create more dilemma when you are looking for assurances. The rootkit episode where they secretly installed scripts to monitor consumers, the spokesperson from SONY justifies it by saying "most consumers don't know what a rootkit is, why care for it". Imagine a company suing other, you would believe there must have been grave infraction committed by the company being sued. Now take this, SONY sues Lik Sang ( heaven for Gamers all over the world ) for selling PSP's in Europe. Sony sues people for selling its products, yes that seems to be the case.

Question for SONY lovers, Why would any company relying on customer satisfaction and brand recognition do something like that. Making a portable device sounds good, loading it with your proprietary hardware devices no that good. Who would waste 1500 bucks for a SONY movie disk for his PSP, when he can buy the same DVD for half the money. Thanks for APPLE we dont have a proprietory music format for SONY music players.
Its like rolling out a car that runs on SONY fuel, a Operating System that runs on SONY machines, the days are long over, and people have started embracing Open Source. Probably SONY should take a leaf out of MS, long gone are the days when you can force issues on consumers, they want there freedom and if you are good they we will keep coming back to you.

2007-08-10T07:10:00.000-07:00

Numbered days to go for 20/20 world cup and very little is being written in Indian media about the event, showing the interest the event has generated in Indians. Though the event could be seen as a blessing for two players. The two who were decisive in Indian team fortunes till some time back, till the selectors turned backs on them.

One went on to become the vice captain, famous for his quote "If the ball is there to be hit, I'll hit it", until of course the ball started going straight to fielders or hitting the stumps. Virender Sehwag seen as the answer of all Indian worries is struggling these days, and struggling big. While most of the players have started playing in county cricket, Sehwag has not been able to do so. The only cricket he has played in all these days is for his company. Real big tournament for him and he will have to perform big for having any fancies whatsoever of returning to Indian team.

The other player who seeks a solid performance is Harbhajan Singh. Well the 20/20 format wouldnt particularly suit his kind of bowling, but his experience with English 20/20 circuit should prove critical. Unlike Sehwag this lad has been in touch playing in county circuit, so has better chances of adjusting rather quickly in similar conditions in SA.

Both of them have the talent with contributing with both bat and ball and have the right aggressive attitude much needed for the shorter version of the game.

2007-08-02T08:28:00.000-07:00

And India finally wins ........ After a long ( and I mean real long ) a performance worth remembrance from Men In Blue. Kartick deserves all the accolades for his wonderful achievements. Though it would be juvenile discussing about all the sledging that happened in this match, it would be remembered by many because of that. Sledging was believed to be big and hard boyz .. when palyers like prior, kevin, kartick etc etc .. it turns out to be rather comical.

Andy prior prompting from behind stumps to Kartick, mate Dhoni wouldnt have played that shot. Well Andy has got all the right in world, but the one thing he forgot was, to have a glance at the score board. Andy was least embarassed giving batting lessons, taking into consideration his dismal performance.

And yeah about Kevin, there is a very fine line between sledging and being human. What Kevin did, well the whole world saw that saw that from this side of the line. Throwing gums is okay Kevin, but then you should have guts to accept what you did. You are a wonderful batsman, but yeah you are also a blot on English culture of handling situations. No wonder then, how many countries you have played for. But trust me on this Kevin, no country is gonna teach you how to be a human. Sreesanth was far better in accepting what he did and having enough balls to apologise for that. Kevin, anyways forget lemme not write about a moron looser anymore.

India has got a huge challenge up their hands to pull off the next one, or atleast manage a draw. No doubts English would come all guns blazing ..

2007-07-27T00:49:00.000-07:00

Waiting for the big clash, England vs India. Well so much has been talked and written about the fixture, would be sad if rain washes it out. Sticking to the optimistic line lez hope it doesnt rain and we get to see quite and interesting fixture. To start Michael Vaughn would be cursing rain gods for the outcome of the last fixture, but does he has any right to do that ? Looking at quite an mediocre play that was put by the English side ( except of course by Kevin ) the result was quite apt.
Same performance against any other formidable team and Michael would have ended up on the loosing side, no wonder last ashes was a 5-0 whitewash for aussies. India on other hand didn't performed that badly, yes they ended up on the verge of loosing, but that was no surprise for the Indian cricket followers. There are a lot of positives for Indians from the last fixture and Kartick is definitely the biggest. Oozing with confidence and determination , has shielded the fragile Indian middle order very well. The moment of the match was definitely the wicket of Collignwood , the way he was dismissed exposed that Ganguly is not the only one whom you can bounce back to pavilion.
Another positive was the way big four played, agree they didn't managed any runs but they looked quite positive and confident in contrast to jaffer and probably all English batsman who managed big scores but were edgy throughout. So expect some runs from willows of Dravid, Sachin, Laxman and Saurav next time they step in to bat.
Yet another positive was the exposure of the English bowling. Indian were fresh and generally loose out their tour initial test matches within 4 days, that exposes lack of a bowler on english side who can run through the oppositon. Sidebottom and Anderson are fantastic bowlers but dont have the steam to last long. Monty, well he is a talented bowler and demands attention and respect of Indian batters but they are quite used to this quality of spin bowling.
Dhoni seems to have found his lost touch back and is all set for yet another big knock.

So in all we are in for a nerve wrecking match.

England
positives ...
Home Ground ..
Kevin .. and Paul Collignwood ( the FIGHTER )
negatives ...
Michael under presure ..............

India positives ...
Kartick and Dhoni back in form.
Bowling which has prooved to be handful.
The big four itching for runs.
Momentum
negatives ..
Bad record in english conditions ...

2007-07-09T01:47:00.000-07:00

Anathema for Stored Procedures .....

Those in IT industry writing financial softwares know how evil yet useful stored procedures can be. Have you been in a situation wherein you have to improve the response time of your application involving execution of complex queries, but your manager says .. "No SPs here please". Although stored procedures are often viewed as the anathema of the “Write once, run anywhere” goal of Java, I have seen cases where an application that took 10–15 minutes to run as pure Java ran in well under 10 seconds with a stored procedure. The users of that system do not care about the purity of the application; they care about being able to use it to get their job done.

The question is how bad a situation has to be to force the use of SPs. SPs are useless or can even degrade the performance if used used for firing some simple queries, but can be an asset for handling any complicated business process, involving large number of complicated queries.

Guess experience comes in handy while identifying justified use of SPs, and considering how SPs behave on different platforms doing a bit of testing comes in handy before jumping into the final implementations.

2007-04-30T01:45:00.000-07:00

McGrath has retired .. sigh of relief for many around the world who were at the recieving end of his immaculate bowling.

Most of the cricketing world would miss a supreme bowler, who always let his performances to be a defense against critics of his falling pace and age. He made us believe that you don't have to be in Shoiab's and Lee's class to run through the opposition. Surely the fans would miss the modest looking ferocious fighter of all times. His achievements for the Australian cricket are second to none.

Retirements on such a high, particularly by McGrath and Flemming sends a deafening message across and particularly to a team like India. Surely when you achieve a stature like these players have, no selector can drop you, but the inner conscious always reminds you that now is the time to retire gracefully, before you become a burden on the team by repeated failures.

Retiring cricket is such a huge challenge for Indians that most of them have to be shamefully dragged out of it, we all know the names of such Indian cricketers. Well no such challenges for McGrath as is reflected from his interview prior to finals, "Just another day
in office".

2007-04-19T11:47:00.000-07:00

Government of India as if not already embarrassed, sought to re appeal in the Supreme court against the stay on OBC quota on the grounds that the earlier decision was a mere suggestive remark made by the judge. Well to quote the judge Arijit Pasayat, "I was appointed as a judge on March 21, 1989, and since then I have stopped giving opinion ". That should be sufficient for government to understand that any order passed by a session judge is directive to the government and not merely an opinion. This is just not any other tea sipping session where we all pass our comments and leave up to the other persons will, whether to follow those or not. This is a written court order idiots, these are not suggestion as me or any other naive person would understand that, but government decided to set aside careers of so many innocent and went ahead with the review petition. Now comes the best part, government says its not a review petition, then what the heck is that.

As we have seen our honorable minister catching up sleep every now and then, one more occasion he is caught off guard, not knowing what he is doing. This has become, to the bad luck of innocents, more of a ego issue for Mr Minister than anything else.

2007-03-28T10:37:00.000-07:00

India's defeat in W.C.

Was hearing to news other day when Mr. Pawar decided to get up and give a quite touchy speech about the loss of his boys in West Indies. Presure ( please try not to laugh on this one ), was what according to Mr. Pawar responsible for Indias dismal performance in world cup. Intellectuality hits all time low when politicians make speeches and this one was no different. Is it wrong on Indians part to have high hopes from the elite 15 selected from the very rich talent pool of cricketers.

No is my answer. Cant handle presure , no room for you sweetie, probably you better off joining Indian politics for the obvious reasons. Mr. Pawar wouldn't have ever in his lifetime seen the atmosphere of a private company, where a sword is hanging right over yours head and you got to perform well over yours capabilities, that too keeping in mind that lots of other lifes depend on how you perform. One mistake and thats it, end of road for you, either bosses way or the highway as they say. The battle is on, and you got fight every second you are there. What people expected from Indian team is not to win the world cup but to atleast perform on a reasonable level. Mr. Pawar was least embarrased when India had to wait for the outcome of Bangladesh and Bermuda match, think thats the lowest time of Indian cricket that this generation would have witnessed.

Right presure can get onto you, but there are situations when it can be understood. First match presure, last match presure, boy what sort of presures you have. Presure gets on to you be the fear of loosing, anyways how many matches has India won this year, they must have conquered this fear and presure long time back. FYI Australia, SAF etc dont have any presures, people in those countries are totally hopeless about their teams, isn't Mr Pawar.

Mr. Pawar is so sympathetic towards the team not because he is a admirer of cricket or Indian team but because he knows that the buck stops with him. If the players, coach and board is responsible, so is he. Politicians do know very well how to downplay their role in defeats.

2007-03-27T01:38:00.000-07:00

Phrases that make my blood boil.
picked up ... read on ...
May or may not be:
Ever hear someone say "that may or may not be the case," as if there's some hidden third possibility that we weren't aware of? Thanks for pointing out the only two possibilities in the universe. These are the worst kind of people to talk to because they try so hard to be open-minded that it sounds like the debate in a political science class where no opinion is
too stupid for the professor to consider and the same fat kid keeps raising his hand to tell you his dumb ideas about free market capitalism as you fantasize about repeatedly stomping his face into a jar.

Well that's just your opinion:
Any time you say something wrong around someone who disagrees, they try to validate
their taste in music/movies/clothing by reminding you that you still only speak for yourself, as if their opinions are in jeopardy of being monopolized by your own. Everyone already knows it's my opinion by virtue of the fact that I said it, no need to restate the obvious .

I'm a child at heart:
eah, you're a child at heart, just as soon as children start going to work every day to rot in a cubicle for a meager pay check so they can drink their troubles away in a shitty bar for the rest of their lives. Unless you're an astronaut, secret agent, vampire
hunter, or all three, you're probably a sellout; screw you.

Hmmmmm / Uhhhhh:
It's especially noticeable when you go to a restaurant and the waitress asks what you want
to drink; there's always some fickle fingered thumbing through the menu, sounding off like a moron with "uhhhhhh...." as if the waitress is just going to walk away without taking your order if you don't give her an audible cue that you are still breathing. These are the same type of people who repeat the question you ask them to buy time when they don't
know the answer, hoping you won't notice that they're stalling. You don't need to make a sound while your five good neurons crank out the next malformed sentence from your cretaceous skull, numb nuts.

The grass is always greener on the other side:
The message that this proverb is trying to stumble through is that everything always
looks more attractive when you don't have it. I'm sure there are millionaires crying themselves to sleep every night because they don't live in a trailer park. Just face it: sometimes nobody envies you. There has to be a bottom and that bottom is probably you.

2007-03-12T02:46:00.000-07:00

The solution lies in effective collaboration.

Give a careful thought to what we were actually do when we exchange mails, chat or exchange docs or presentations. We are working on a activity. Simple as it may sound, its quite difficult to conceptualize in organizations day to day work. The activity may range from a simple task of deciding the layout of a web page to devolopment of a project module. The problem lies in how we conceptualize the activity.

Instead of making the technology work in manner we want, we work in a manner that is suitable to a particular technology. We get a word file, off we go create a folder for it thinking its logical, comprehendable and can be easily relocated, untill ofcourse we end up with a huge number of folders, one may be having all the FRD's, one with all the PPTs but how are we supposed to chat transcripts and emails and then correlate everything with each other. I am not suggesting its impossible to work that way, but its certainly not the most effective way.

Welcome to the realm of activities. Where you are the one who decides how the technology works for you. More than a technology its a approach, approach towards effective collaboration within and outside an organisation. Lemme get a bit more specific, we go back to our web page designing example.

Well you and me have a chat, they all go in one place and the place is certainly not yours archive niether mine. You ring me up and tell me about a URL that was particularly useful in yours analysis, the URL is stored in same central space, we exchange mails and yeah you guessed that right they go in the same central space. No more we store all the word, ppts etc in ours respective hard disks they all lie in the space. Now how to arrange all that material in a logical manner. We arrange that in a hierarichal manner, your views, my responses to your views, my views your responses, stage wise devolopment. A new devoloper comes in, what we share with him, the URL. Yeah only the URL and he can trace back to the step one of ours devolopment cycle. We save on, obviously on the dollors but also increases mine, yours and the new devolopers efficiency and overall the comapnies efficiency. Now comapny wants to know why the web page is white, simple go back to the URL find the activity designing web page and thats it. Every bit of information that the employees were able to lay hands on, lies captured there. Nothing and nothing of companies business logic is ever lost. Now you are in command how you wanna structure the tree of information, how the tree grows and what the tree captures. The technolgy allows you to bring all the storage techniques under one umbrella namely, emails,chat scripts, urls, pictures, word documeents, presentations, customer feedback etc etc. Now the most impressive thing of all, you never leave the url, yeah you never leave the url to open a word doc, not to play a video file, not to open presentaions etc.

Lets discuss the advantages of such a system in place.

Reviews : Reviewer asks you about the mehodology you followed, show him the URL.
Easy no more messy searches through mails, harddrives, networks etc.

Templates : How about getting all the templates being followed unknowingly within the organisation recoginsed and put down at one place. Can include almost
everything, Procedure to make claims, procedure to work towards a bug
fixation problem etc.

Time Effectiveness : Effective collaboration obviously brings in effective time usage in the
comapany. No longer employees search for the information at
different places. Also it saves on time to search for softwares to render
that information.

Cost Effectiveness : Time is Money as they say. The scenarios have changed a bit today.
Money to time proportion has grown rapidly, so the more time you save
you save much, much and much more money.

Unending support for kind of Information : Imagine a new kind of format rolls in. Simple
provide the application server the new plugins, thats it, Activities
supports the new format.

2007-02-16T05:18:00.000-08:00

Well my first scrap...
So lemme scrap about the thing I really excited and confused about.

"Collaboration" small word for those who go by definitions and here is how wikipedia defines it "Collaboration refers abstractly to all processes wherein people work together —applying both to the work of individuals as well as larger collectives and societies."

Ask Manager of a resaonably sized organization and you will get the other side of the story. Collaboration in simple words mean "Life is tough for you Mr Manager","Mr Manager can you get me a two year old chat transcript",'ah! and what about the mail that I sent you a month ago" and "the hyperlink that we used in preparing the FRD." and so on. Collaboration in corporate world means you get the message surely, reliably, quickly and the most important aspect is it stays there. It stays there and in a manner thats comprehendable, rational and wishfully hierarichal, we dont wanna spend an entire day to find a document in my archive file of say 50GB, do we ?

Collaboration or rather Effective collaboration is one thing every organization strives for and there are reasons they strive for it. The biggest reason is the reason that would sound most logical to 90% of us. "Dollors", yep its the savings and really big savings that effective collaoration brings in, that is driving more and more organizations to achieve that.

Consider this ... Me working on a devolopment module for six months and then I decide to get a move on and quit the module. You join in, well congratualtions and welcome, what all you need from me ? Baffled how in the world can a new devoloper know what all he needs from the old devoloper. Ok lemme see what I got for you, well there is a mail that has initial descriptions of the project, then there is FRD ( word doc ) and hey hang on I have some chat transcripts that might be useful for you and ya there is of cource a ppt that lists our build resources blah blah blah..............................Hang on man, gimme a break am I supposed to go through all that.... Isnt there a single place where all my mails, links , chat transcripts, disscusions within team, discussions with customers, their opinions and god knows what else lies.
Have we missed something in here, hope not because the new guy will really be screwed if we have but there is no way to be 100% sure.

Now lez move on to a slightly different example. We wanna design the structure of this page. Simple, lez get started ...
Going by my opinion we should have a greyish background and blackish text, what u got to say abt it.Nops I say we have to maintain a white background and black text, this is official web page. Ok we settle on that.. but the font should be courier. No again it should be georgia.
Lez say "AB" joins in ... The first remark he makes is why dont we have a greyish backgroud !!
Me and you may be amused but the comapny is not. Comapny wastes man hours in explaining to "AB" why the background cant be greyish. What if "AB" gets the earlier scripts, company saves "dollors".

Now the big question "How AB gets the chat transcripts ?". Dont tell me you didnt saved them because I didnt. Even if I had saved them, I have around 10k chat transcripts, instead of me wasting a day lets allow "AB" to waste up some time. Easy, well not so, a big organization will always have people joining and leaving. What if you and me quit the comapny ? Nobody know why the web page is greyish, that may sound amusing but the crux is "company is doomed". Its not sure what and why things are as they are.

So whats the solution to all this mess....................