Smile in the sky!

I took this snap on monday using my mobile. Two stars and moon gave this beautiful formation! :)

Gift from Jimdo, or just a Spam?

I am not sure if you know about Jimdo. I had blogged about the service some time back but, this time around I have a different reason to write about Jimdo. For an intro, Jimdo is a free web site creation tool. The service allows you to build your pages integrating images, video with different designs.The service also boost about the feature of copying themes and design of other sites in simple steps. Recenlty, I got a mail from one of the employees from Jimdo (atleast he looked like) and that's when all things started!

This was an unusual mai. Basically, the content was posted through my Jot Form. The message was from some one named Till and claimed to have the mail id "till@jimdo.com". There is the message:

We from Jimdo would like to send a little "Thank you" to all who have been spreading the Jimdo news online throughout the past 1.5 years.

Therefore we would appreciate if you could send us your address as soon as possible.

With regards,
Till

And my response to this mail not with a mail with my address, but a simple note to know if this was genuine! And so far no reply. So was this whole thing fake? Or is somebody making trouble for Jimdo?

Sabeer Bhatia launches SabseBolo

The Hotmail founder Sabeer Bhatia has yet again launched an innovative product. He has announced the launch of India’s first free, reservation-less audio conferencing facility! The product is called SabSebolo and is in Alpha stage. But is it going to be another hit?

Definitely , the product is very innovative. Anybody can access the service and is available 24/7. The main advantage is there is no need of internet or any downloads. All; you have to do is log on to SabSebolo.com and enter your email id and password. Once you create an account you get your permanent conference id and a pin and you are ready to do conference call at any time.

To make a call you simply dial +91-22-3980 4444, enter the conference id and pin. You can have a maximum of 10 participants in the call. The service seems to absolutely free, but you will have to pay the phone charges for making the call (charges applicable as per your service provider). SabSebolo also has a paid service where in conference calls can be recorded and tracked. They also plan to release online tools for conferencing scheduler, conference manager, dial-out service, voice broadcast, voice telecast etc..

With the young generation using SMS as their main communication, will Bhatia pull this off? Will corporates take a taste of this service? Bhatia has presently introduced this only in India, but will be introducing the international version too.

In between vacation!

Was quite busy the last week to blog, and this weekend i am sitting across the arabian sea on vacation! So for the next two weaks I will blog little and will be roaming ;)

New features for Techno Paper

My blog just got new features and they are :

1. Tag Cloud: The Tag Cloud displays all the labels in my blog. It's a better way of displaying my labels as it will take less space compared to blogger's default list style. You add the tag cloud to your blogger too. Visit phydeaux3 , which provides you the complete guide for installing a tag cloud onto your blogger.
   
2. Search: I have removed my Technorati search. Instead Techno Paper will have a new Google Custom Search widget on top right. The custom search have better features compared to my previous search. I have also put a custom search on my web site which is capable of searching in both, my site and blog.
3. Feeds: The modification in this is still not complete though! I have removed some of the feeds and arranged it (Looks much better now). I am planning to remove some of it again and change its layout.

That all for visible changes! You will find some more changes next week ;)

Digg goes out of service?

Digg, one of the community-based popularity website goes out of service just after multiple entries regarding HD-DVD key. You can also find entries that say "This page does not contain the HD-DVD key"! For example check this out. But look at the URL and you will see that the page indeed do not contain the key ;)

I found that the entire Digg site was not down! Instead the entries that contained the HD-DVD key had the page shown on the right and other Digg entries worked fine.

After a break...

I am back after a small break! and I have lot of things to catch up with... From my office works, my site updates and off course my blog!!! and there is lot to talk about.

First, I am over with my Masters course from VIT. My final review of the project turned out to be one of the best review I ever got ;) Second, After a long time.. I went home!

On the technical side... My first update today was for my web site. I just added real time visitor stats on my site. The service is from statisfy.net. Which have built a good mash up using Google maps. You can view my real time stats here. Thats not all... Google have come up with their new stuffs and I am behind. With new features from Google in Gmail, Calendar, etc. Another news making camp is Microsoft, Adobe and Dojo.. ( I will write seperate blog entries soon.. so watch out).


And for now... I am at my office desk ;)

A quick change!

Every blogger during his blogging career goes through this period. He gets bored with his theme and hunts for new one. When I hunt for new themes, my eye catches only the WordPress themes and even at times I have thought of shifting to it. But, end of the day; I keep what I have because i am a Google fan ;) .

For the past few days I was on hunt for a three column theme for blogger and finally found something that suits (but still not happy with)! And here it is, I have converted my blog to a three column blog and I am quite happy with the looks :) . Even though this is a real surprise move, I am working on some small changes into this theme. I plan to bring in a Tag Cloud rather than have the tags listed. Apart from that, I also plan to put in links to my friends blogs.

You will find these updates when I publish my next blog entry, till then bye bye!

Draft of BCC ( Bloggers Code of Conduct)

Tim O'Reilly recently called for a Blogger's Code of Conduct after some firestorm about violent and disturbing anonymous comments popping on one of the blogger's site. People have started contributing to a draft a Blogger's Code of Conduct. Here is the latest extract from the conduct:

1. We take responsibility for our own words and for the comments we allow on our blog.

We are committed to the "Civility Enforced" standard: we will not post unacceptable content, and we'll delete comments that contain it.

We define unacceptable content as anything included or linked to that:

• is being used to abuse, harass, stalk, or threaten others
• is libelous, knowingly false, ad-hominem, or misrepresents another person,
• infringes upon a copyright or trademark
• violates an obligation of confidentiality
• violates the privacy of others

We define and determine what is "unacceptable content" on a case-by-case basis, and our definitions are not limited to this list. If we delete a comment or link, we will say so and explain why. [We reserve the right to change these standards at any time with no notice.]

2. We won't say anything online that we wouldn't say in person.

3. If tensions escalate, we will connect privately before we respond publicly.

When we encounter conflicts and misrepresentation in the blogosphere, we make every effort to talk privately and directly to the person(s) involved--or find an intermediary who can do so--before we publish any posts or comments about the issue.

4. When we believe someone is unfairly attacking another, we take action.

When someone who is publishing comments or blog postings that are offensive, we'll tell them so (privately, if possible--see above) and ask them to publicly make amends. If those published comments could be construed as a threat, and the perpetrator doesn't withdraw them and apologize, we will cooperate with law enforcement to protect the target of the threat.

5. We do not allow anonymous comments.

We require commenters to supply a valid email address before they can post, though we allow commenters to identify themselves with an alias, rather than their real name.

6. We ignore the trolls.

We prefer not to respond to nasty comments about us or our blog, as long as they don't veer into abuse or libel. We believe that feeding the trolls only encourages them--"Never wrestle with a pig. You both get dirty, but the pig likes it." Ignoring public attacks is often the best way to contain them.

Now the question is how will this work out? Will the Code of Conduct live up to for what it was created for? You can always find the latest draft and also contribute here.

Did someone from Microsoft visit me?

Usually I do not give much care to details of my site visit statistics provided by statcounter. One of my friend who has a link on my site found a unusual entry in her statcounter report. She a entry from Redmond,USA and the ISP was Microsoft Corp. Since her entry's referring link was from my site, I too had a detail look at my report. This is what I found:So, was the person from Microsoft?

End of Transition Period!

Let me present you my renewed blog! The Techno paper!! My work just delayed the transition. I was planning to put a custom template and due to lack of time couldn't do so. But I am happy with the new template and will start blogging! I will not be updating my old blog from now on and all the old post have been transfered!
Any suggestions and comments on my new blog is welcome!

Transition Period!

My blog and site are going through a change! It has been long since i have done major "look and feel" to both. For history i am going to put what my blog looked like before change and will later update this entry to reflect the new changes. Lets see what i can come up with ;)
I am also thinking of changing the template.. either i will come up with my own template or get one that's freely available on the net!

Online Task Manager

Todoist is an interesting Web-based task manager which is worth looking into. It comes with a very simple and fast interface. I am really impressed with the functionality it provides. Its ability to nest sub-lists, and track projects with multiple actions is very interesting feature. Apart from these features another important feature is the keyboard shortcuts (which we all look for) and can slice and dice your tasks by date.

What drew me to this web application even though you can find many such web and desktop application is its clean interface. Ease to use – from signup to working! The signup is very simple with just the email address and password. On logging in you are provided with the simple interface I was talking about. Initially you need to create project and by default you will have a project named: Learn Todoist. Going through this itself will make you familiar with the feature set of the application. When adding items to the “to do list” you have the option of setting priorities , format text, links etc and you can also reorder the items by simply drag and drop!

For me Todoist is yet another web application that Google should look forward to acquire! ;)

Bill Gates' High School Speech!!!

A few months ago I read an article about Bill Gates' speech to high school kids about rules of life in Deccan Chronicle . I also cut out the article and had it with me (even though i am against his business ideas) till the last days in VIT hostel. Here is the extract of the great speech:

RULE 1: Life is not fair - get used to it.

RULE 2: The world won't care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

RULE 3: You will NOT make 40 thousand dollars a year right out of high school. You won't be a vice president with car phone, until you earn both.

RULE 4: If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss. He doesn't have tenure.
RULE 5: Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your grandparents had a different word for burger flipping they called it Opportunity.

RULE 6: If you mess up,it's not your parents' fault, so don't whine about your mistakes, learn from them.

RULE 7: Before you were born, your parents weren't as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you are. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parent's generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

RULE 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers,but life has not. In some schools they have abolished failing grades and they'll give you as many times as you want to get the right answer. This doesn't bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

RULE 9: Life is not divided into semesters. You don't get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you find yourself. Do that on your own time.

RULE 10: Television is NOT real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

RULE 11: Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll end up working for one.

But all this is a rumor! Bill Gates never delivered this speech! Recently my friend send my this link that says it all. But the trouble is this was published in a newspaper!!! Many of you would agree that Deccan Chronicle is gossip paper but see how media have diverted from its real goal. The goal to spread the right information!

First day in Office!

I am one day late to write this blog, but here is my experience on "First day in office". Basically it was good! The whole day was a mixture of formal and informal events. but there are funny events that happened even before I reached the office. Our report time was at 10.30 am, but my friends and I left the guest house around 9.15 am. As all of us are not familiar with Bangalore city we had hire an auto. The great day was struck with a mishap when the auto refused to move forward after running few kilometers! So we where near "Silkboard". The next auto trip started from front of Silkboard building after some help from some Patni and Wipro employees. And we finally reached Honeywell Campus at Banargatha road sharp 10:30 am! But we where not still inside. Security took away 15 minutes in printing our temporary IDs, and finally reached conferences room on "Pluto" around 10:50. But we had little trouble in entering the office wing since we didn't have our access cards.
The first event was submitting our documents that we where supposed to carry and that took away 2 hours. during this time our snaps where taken for our Access cards. And then the big lunch! After lunch we here supposed to move to new Honeywell campus called Orion. So we picked our shuttle from Pluto to Orion at 3. In mid way we met with a accident when one heavy truck brushed our shuttle (bus). But it was a minor one and we moved on :) . Orion is new campus and the only building is named Alpha. We where to meet our manager in Alpha 003 at 4:00 pm and we did. Alpha 003 room's discussion included our introductions, interests etc and we where out by 6 pm. But the real fun started now. We played Table tennis will 7.30 and left home once we where tired! So my first day in office was good!
And this blog is being written from office and its my second day. i will be assigned to my project today and the meeting is scheduled to be at 5:30!

Reaching a milestone!

On October 10th, I setup my personal website at googlepages. My site is registered with the Google Analytics service and I have been tracking my site's performance. Now after a month I have crossed a milestone! My number of visits crossed 100! I am all happy about what I have achieved so far.

Upon reaching this milestone I have updated my site by giving it a new look and new pages. Two new pages series "TechnoPaper" and "GPC Corner" has been added to the site.
"TechnoPaper" column will have some of my technical articles hosted. It will be related to my programming experience and observations. Whereas the "GPC Corner" will be about Google Page Creator. I plan to publish what all I study from building my site. It would be any "Tips and Tricks" pages, but will have some of the things that I am trying out in GPC.

Before concluding let me show my Map Overlay:

Re blogging!

Its being long I blogged! Reason? very simple... I didn't get time for it. It just like any other school children who would say "I didn't get time!". But, I have been busy. Getting to do my final semester project at Honeywell is no easy thing. I reach my hostel room late in night and no studies after that.. every month our great friends (HTSL executives) come to take a non-stop class..
Ya its good to study new stuff. but its too much !

So the next Q is will i be regular from now on in blogging? NO!

:)

What a day...

What a day! Today our 5^th semester started off. We are having our class from 7.30 am to 1 pm and for the best we had two hours of Java lab which we some how killed by shit-chat! The class was good part of the day. Actually my friend and I had planned to go out to town in evening... And we did...

Returning back to campus by 5.30, we headed straight to PAT (Placement And Training) centre to get updates of our friends who where appearing HCL Ltd’s interview... and to our surprise we got the news that results are out…! While moving to nearby computing centre my mind ran through the seq of writing exams and did a analysis of what I might get… and I got 8.76 GPA..

Here are my CGPAs for all the four semesters!

Semester	CGPA
I	8.78
II	8.86
III	8.93
IV	8.83

Hand of God goal

June 22 of 1986, Maradona scored Hand of God goal against England during the quarter-final match of the FIFA world cup in Mexico. In the same match his second goal is named Goal of the century. Maradona used his left hand to score the goal and Argentines won 2-1, and the legacy of this event perhaps best symbolizes the rivalry between the two football teams.


After the match Maradona said "a little with the head of Maradona and a little with the hand of God" which is one of the most famous quotes in sport!

Maradona's site : http://www.diegomaradona.com/ingles/iindex.html

June 21: Summer solstice in the Northern Hemisphere

Today is summer solstice! It is the day of the year with the longest daylight period and hence the shortest night. This day usually occurs on June 21/June 22 in the northern hemisphere and on December 21/December 22 in the southern hemisphere. This year it has fallen on june 21.
At the time of summer solstice, the earth's is in such a position that one hemisphere is most tilted towards the sun, causing the sun to appear at 23.45 degrees above the celestial equator, thus making its highest path across the sky.

During the summer solstice in nothern hemisphere the sun appears to be directly overhead at midday along an imaginary line on the Northern Hemisphere at latitude 23.45 degree north known as the Tropic of Cancer.Similarly during the summer solstice in southern hemisphere the sun appears to be directly overhead at midday along the imaginary line Tropic of Capricorn.