So for all those people who don't read my blogs I've got information for you that you might never use ;)
I've moved to wordpress: arniealmighty.wordpress.com. All my previous posts on Blogger have been imported there.
Bye Bye Blogger!
Friday, May 18, 2007
Thursday, May 17, 2007
My new k750i
With myself assuming that I'm gonna get 14k out of working at TRDDC, before coming here, I bought myself a brand new Sony-Ericsson K750i. There were other reasons too - for example, I felt I really needed GPRS and a camera in Pune. My original plan was to take Dad's k510i, however elder bro had already taken it to Delhi by then (Ok, so he's doing a summer internship at DLF).
Anyway, so I'm no longer using my old crappy T290i.
The K750i is a great for its price (probably I used a similar phrase when I talked about my Dad's k510i). At 8.9K its got a lot of functionality. Its a kinda old model - around two years old. But most reviews call it the "old-is-gold". On Techtree, most of the about 10K phones are compared with the k750i (and its Big B k790i) - it was almost as if SE had bribed Techtree to do that! It might not be a phone to boast about in a blog - but hell, I've been using a T290i for the last two years - I've got the right to party!
So basic features? Class 10 GPRS, 2 MP camera with autofocus, nice interface, FM radio, bluetooth.
Probably the major difference between the 510 and 750 is the 2MP camera with autofocus - also the camera lens has got a cover!
For about the same price I could've got other 2MP camera phones with even EDGE. Well, but most reviews talked about the bad camera quality - no other phone in the range has autofocus, so I decided to fallback to the k750i.
While it took some time to get the hang of the joystick, I soon realized how it can make my mobile usage more efficient and fast.
Among the cons that I've noticed is the very bad sound quality - even while talking on the phone. And playing MP3s on the speaker phone is certainly not a good idea :) Well, but thats what the W series is for.
Its awesome to have GPRS and Java. The last few days in Pune, I've been taking 24hrs GPRS for 20 INR. The connection is terribly slow - lot slower than what Rajesh (a friend of mine) used to get at IISc during the KVPY camp. I've not been able to use the GPRS with my laptop - some settings problem - but during the restricted net access times at TRDDC I can ssh access.cmi.ac.in with MindSSH on my phone! (MindSSH is a java based ssh client)
Anyway, so I'm no longer using my old crappy T290i.
The K750i is a great for its price (probably I used a similar phrase when I talked about my Dad's k510i). At 8.9K its got a lot of functionality. Its a kinda old model - around two years old. But most reviews call it the "old-is-gold". On Techtree, most of the about 10K phones are compared with the k750i (and its Big B k790i) - it was almost as if SE had bribed Techtree to do that! It might not be a phone to boast about in a blog - but hell, I've been using a T290i for the last two years - I've got the right to party!
So basic features? Class 10 GPRS, 2 MP camera with autofocus, nice interface, FM radio, bluetooth.
Probably the major difference between the 510 and 750 is the 2MP camera with autofocus - also the camera lens has got a cover!
For about the same price I could've got other 2MP camera phones with even EDGE. Well, but most reviews talked about the bad camera quality - no other phone in the range has autofocus, so I decided to fallback to the k750i.
While it took some time to get the hang of the joystick, I soon realized how it can make my mobile usage more efficient and fast.
Among the cons that I've noticed is the very bad sound quality - even while talking on the phone. And playing MP3s on the speaker phone is certainly not a good idea :) Well, but thats what the W series is for.
Its awesome to have GPRS and Java. The last few days in Pune, I've been taking 24hrs GPRS for 20 INR. The connection is terribly slow - lot slower than what Rajesh (a friend of mine) used to get at IISc during the KVPY camp. I've not been able to use the GPRS with my laptop - some settings problem - but during the restricted net access times at TRDDC I can ssh access.cmi.ac.in with MindSSH on my phone! (MindSSH is a java based ssh client)
Welcome to TRDDC, Pune
Ok, so for those who don't know I've been at Pune for the last few days, doing a summer internship at TRDDC. Thats Tata Research Development and Design Centre, a division of TCS.
I've got lots to write about: Pune Chics (Hrushi and co were'nt kidding when they said Pune chics are hot!), the nice family I stayed with for the first few days, finding accomodation, blah blah blah.. but right now let me just restrict myself to TRDDC.
WARNING: Ranting, Ranting, Ranting.
In brief: I hate it here.
Ok, I can't divulge much of this - I don't want to break any clause of the four-page confidentiality agreement that I signed before joining here.
But I can assure you that it has nothing to do with Theoretical Computer Science.
Firstly, gmail, orkut etc are blocked. Of course - tech savvy as people here are supposed to be, we use other ways to access these sites. But still restrictions give a bad impression.
The first day I came here, I came in baggy cargos and shirt - typical of me. Second day, t-shirt and jeans. Third day t-shirt and jeans. Through these three days I see everybody wearing formals, and think to myself what a bunch of losers these people are.
Later, I was spotted by some high-profile guy (Brigadier, thats what some of my friends told me he's called) and asked me whether I've seen anybody with jeans and t-shirt in the office, and asked me to maintain office decorum. Formals. Jeans and casuals only on Fridays. Kinda reminds me of the uniformed days of school. A roomie - a guy from IBM - claimed that at his place the minimal restrictions were there are they were not even followed.
So guess what I've worn today: Jeans and the same (unwashed, unironed) shirt that I wore on Day 1.
After all, rules are meant to be broken.
Its also interesting to note the computer usage policy that I have to accept before I use my assigned computer. It asserts TCS's right to monitor everything I'm doing on my comp. And in fact they can do it - we've seen them remotely controlling some of the comps.
So guess where I am writing all this from? ;)
I have signed in for 2.5 months... Hmm... heh heh heh ... *villaneous laugh* more on this a few weeks from now :D
So after staying three days at Poumai's place, I moved into my new room for the next 2.5 months.
About 15 minutes and 7 rupees bus ride from TRDDC, and at 2200 p.m. this place sucks. For the next two weeks we (ah, introducing Anurag - an IITM metallurgy guy, so we will be roomies throughout this internship - we are working on different projects though) have been asked to stay in a four bed dormitory, after which we'll be shifted to a perhaps better room for two.
This place has got a bathroom whose taps don't work (the one which works works at a slow pace), a drain thats clogged. Downstairs they've kept corporation water in bottles in an ancient fridge that stinks (and has got a HUGE bag of dogs meat - meat for dogs - stuffed into the freezer non-auto-defrosting), and which people drink.
For the next two weeks, I and Anurag have been given a single cupboard. Well its got two halves to it, one half is sealed. So lets say we've got half a cupboard.
The story behind the other sealed half is interesting and has been passed down the generations of various occupants of the room. Apparently a girl staying in this room commited suicide by jumping down the building a few years back. All her stuff is in this cupboard. Sealed. Ah, I can feel shivers up my spine.
Finally, I slept at 5 in the morning today. Bed bugs. I wouldn't have slept by then too if not for Odomos.
Long live Pune. Long live TRDDC. Short live my stay here!
I've got lots to write about: Pune Chics (Hrushi and co were'nt kidding when they said Pune chics are hot!), the nice family I stayed with for the first few days, finding accomodation, blah blah blah.. but right now let me just restrict myself to TRDDC.
WARNING: Ranting, Ranting, Ranting.
In brief: I hate it here.
My Project
Ok, I can't divulge much of this - I don't want to break any clause of the four-page confidentiality agreement that I signed before joining here.
But I can assure you that it has nothing to do with Theoretical Computer Science.
Restrictions
Firstly, gmail, orkut etc are blocked. Of course - tech savvy as people here are supposed to be, we use other ways to access these sites. But still restrictions give a bad impression.
The first day I came here, I came in baggy cargos and shirt - typical of me. Second day, t-shirt and jeans. Third day t-shirt and jeans. Through these three days I see everybody wearing formals, and think to myself what a bunch of losers these people are.
Later, I was spotted by some high-profile guy (Brigadier, thats what some of my friends told me he's called) and asked me whether I've seen anybody with jeans and t-shirt in the office, and asked me to maintain office decorum. Formals. Jeans and casuals only on Fridays. Kinda reminds me of the uniformed days of school. A roomie - a guy from IBM - claimed that at his place the minimal restrictions were there are they were not even followed.
So guess what I've worn today: Jeans and the same (unwashed, unironed) shirt that I wore on Day 1.
After all, rules are meant to be broken.
Its also interesting to note the computer usage policy that I have to accept before I use my assigned computer. It asserts TCS's right to monitor everything I'm doing on my comp. And in fact they can do it - we've seen them remotely controlling some of the comps.
So guess where I am writing all this from? ;)
I have signed in for 2.5 months... Hmm... heh heh heh ... *villaneous laugh* more on this a few weeks from now :D
My new room: Good night, sleep tight don't let the bed-bugs bite
So after staying three days at Poumai's place, I moved into my new room for the next 2.5 months.
About 15 minutes and 7 rupees bus ride from TRDDC, and at 2200 p.m. this place sucks. For the next two weeks we (ah, introducing Anurag - an IITM metallurgy guy, so we will be roomies throughout this internship - we are working on different projects though) have been asked to stay in a four bed dormitory, after which we'll be shifted to a perhaps better room for two.
This place has got a bathroom whose taps don't work (the one which works works at a slow pace), a drain thats clogged. Downstairs they've kept corporation water in bottles in an ancient fridge that stinks (and has got a HUGE bag of dogs meat - meat for dogs - stuffed into the freezer non-auto-defrosting), and which people drink.
For the next two weeks, I and Anurag have been given a single cupboard. Well its got two halves to it, one half is sealed. So lets say we've got half a cupboard.
The story behind the other sealed half is interesting and has been passed down the generations of various occupants of the room. Apparently a girl staying in this room commited suicide by jumping down the building a few years back. All her stuff is in this cupboard. Sealed. Ah, I can feel shivers up my spine.
Finally, I slept at 5 in the morning today. Bed bugs. I wouldn't have slept by then too if not for Odomos.
Long live Pune. Long live TRDDC. Short live my stay here!
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
She will be loved
A few days back, while I was doing nothing useful, a nice tune gets into my head. It keeps playing in there -- I've heard it before, few times, but can't make out the wordings. Ah, must be something on my playlist, let me play it...
Unfortunately with 7 GB of songs that I don't listen to, my playlist is a big bad place. I decide to use Amarok's random playlist feature - I kept playing random songs, moving back and forth in the song to find out the particular tune.
I end up hearing the crappiest of heavy metals, hard rock, and low-budget bollywood... Once in a while, the songs that I've always loved start playing, but this time I just couldn't stand it... where was that tune?
To make searching easier I deleted 4 GB of the crap that I don't listen to. That had been on my TODO list for months.
But still no sign of my song.
At this time, am getting frustrated, desperate - I really want to hear that song. I searched through my elder bro's collection, on my destop. Its sad you can't search on a tune on Google.
It took me two days to recollect few of the words at the right places - falling rain, will be loved... Ok then "google will be loved falling rain lyrics"... Bingo! I got it. (Actually it turned out to be pouring rain, but Yaay!) Finally, after knowing the songs name, I was able to find it on
So then, the song is Maroon 5 - She will be loved. As it turns out, I've been enjoying that song little too much in the last few days, I just can't stop listening to it (I have to admit though that the lyrics isn't very meaningful). And my younger bro's threatening me that I better stop humming that tune :P
Unfortunately with 7 GB of songs that I don't listen to, my playlist is a big bad place. I decide to use Amarok's random playlist feature - I kept playing random songs, moving back and forth in the song to find out the particular tune.
I end up hearing the crappiest of heavy metals, hard rock, and low-budget bollywood... Once in a while, the songs that I've always loved start playing, but this time I just couldn't stand it... where was that tune?
To make searching easier I deleted 4 GB of the crap that I don't listen to. That had been on my TODO list for months.
But still no sign of my song.
At this time, am getting frustrated, desperate - I really want to hear that song. I searched through my elder bro's collection, on my destop. Its sad you can't search on a tune on Google.
It took me two days to recollect few of the words at the right places - falling rain, will be loved... Ok then "google will be loved falling rain lyrics"... Bingo! I got it. (Actually it turned out to be pouring rain, but Yaay!) Finally, after knowing the songs name, I was able to find it on
sl5 in the Siruseri Lab :)So then, the song is Maroon 5 - She will be loved. As it turns out, I've been enjoying that song little too much in the last few days, I just can't stop listening to it (I have to admit though that the lyrics isn't very meaningful). And my younger bro's threatening me that I better stop humming that tune :P
Project Looking Glass - yet another Window Manager?
In other news (or news which is hard to locate on the net), Beryl and Compiz have merged. So I'm stuck with a buggy Beryl from Ubuntu, and am waiting for the first merged release.
In my search for a better compositor, I came across Metisse and Looking Glass.
Metisse's concept is cool, it focusses on more on desktop efficiency, rather than great looks. Its called a 2.5D desktop. My best attempts at installing it failed, it'll be a while before I try it again. Apparently the Mandriva 2007 Spring Edition comes with Metisse bundled.
So I decided to try out Looking Glass. Looking Glass was a breeze to install, Sun provides a repository for Ubuntu from where I could just apt-get. After install, all I needed to do was logout and login back with Session type "Looking glass".
Looking glass is at the other extreme of Metisse - so I felt. Its more effects and no desktop efficiency. I might be wrong, I haven't worked with it for too long. But at the effects it does a great job! Technically LG demands a Graphics card - technically I have a Intel Integrated Graphics card, and it gave me decent results - not as smooth as Beryl. The cool features are of course how we can write notes at the back of the windows, and arrange windows to the corners of the screen. And the nice application list bar at the botton of the screen (I badly want that in Beryl - oops, compiz). You can do a lot more, which you usually won't want to do. And there are a lot of experimental 3D interfacing apps, which I felt are mostly crap. And by arranging windows in space (which extends to the left and right of your screen), everything eventually tends to get inorganised.
I could probably use it to impress some friends some day, I can't get work done on it;)
Long live Compiz!
(And for those who haven't noticed, I'm back into blogging:P )
In my search for a better compositor, I came across Metisse and Looking Glass.
Metisse's concept is cool, it focusses on more on desktop efficiency, rather than great looks. Its called a 2.5D desktop. My best attempts at installing it failed, it'll be a while before I try it again. Apparently the Mandriva 2007 Spring Edition comes with Metisse bundled.
So I decided to try out Looking Glass. Looking Glass was a breeze to install, Sun provides a repository for Ubuntu from where I could just apt-get. After install, all I needed to do was logout and login back with Session type "Looking glass".
Looking glass is at the other extreme of Metisse - so I felt. Its more effects and no desktop efficiency. I might be wrong, I haven't worked with it for too long. But at the effects it does a great job! Technically LG demands a Graphics card - technically I have a Intel Integrated Graphics card, and it gave me decent results - not as smooth as Beryl. The cool features are of course how we can write notes at the back of the windows, and arrange windows to the corners of the screen. And the nice application list bar at the botton of the screen (I badly want that in Beryl - oops, compiz). You can do a lot more, which you usually won't want to do. And there are a lot of experimental 3D interfacing apps, which I felt are mostly crap. And by arranging windows in space (which extends to the left and right of your screen), everything eventually tends to get inorganised.
I could probably use it to impress some friends some day, I can't get work done on it;)
Long live Compiz!
(And for those who haven't noticed, I'm back into blogging:P )
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
