It happens NOT only in India...

... this should be something new ahem!
Well, before coming to this mightily capitalist country, I had notions about it which kind of made me to assume a few things.
One of the things I assumed was that it's only in India and its sub-continent countries where people shun off their daily routine and business to watch an exciting game of Cricket.

I had a a hard labor job to offer today for un/loading of certain furniture items into a truck and then carrying them to my apartment.
It turned out that I had the feeling of what I can probably term 'negative Deja Vu'. At least a couple of guys I had a tryst with for this job either rejected or deferred the job after the Patriot's match of Football was through.
Indeed it happens NOT only in India!

On second thoughts, with such passion for the game, wonder if I should have fancied my chances to bet with them about the game results to do my job at a discounted rate, or even free! Probably next time...

Amazing Amazon

Recently happened to order this handset from Amazon for the home phone. When it arrived, found that the RJ14 cord is hard-wired into the handset, that is it cannot be detached from the handset. It also meant that I couldn't use my own wire which was plugged into a wall port, about 10 feet away.

What next? I just used the Amazon return/replace feature, chose the reason as 'Description incorrect on website', and was waiting for the next page to provide me details about the logistics to return the item (they usually pick it up for free, for Amazon Prime customers).

But, I was in for surprise! :D
The next page  gave me message about the refund being processed, and mentioned to my delight that there was no need to return the item!
Probably, it was an intelligent analytics engine that kicked in, found that the total cost of returning the item and the priceless customer's agony to the whole process for a reason which was reportedly their own mistake, was a lot more than the original cost of the merchandise itself - ~$9.

Isn't that amazing? No wonder Amazon continues to amaze and grow, even after scaling great heights already. The customer and his/her time is not taken for granted, PERIOD!

One for the road...

Composed this before my US move, in remembrance of the good times I had with my Indian team mates.

It is time to go a little far away,
To the land of MacDonalds and Subway,

I am sure going miss all the fun,
Most of which were PJs and making pun.

Be it the XITE events or a quick moment of gag,
Always made sure everyone had their tail wag!

Life in the team has been always in the fast lane,
But towards the end it has turned out to be sweet pain!

Not to forget the technical discussions,
Which bettered us at our professions.

I wish you all the very best ahead,
For achieving more than just butter and bread!

The hand that rocked the cradle...

... Now rocks the droid on Nexus 7.
Yes, my dear mother whom I got the Nexus 7 tab from my maiden US trip last year now rocks with her gadget.

I was pleasantly surprised to see how she can search and download games and spiritual stuff from the Google play store. And she does it without any help. It was just a few days back that I showed her how to use the Android marketplace, and now she's completely hooked on :) I see her play angry birds and racing games with ease.

Take a bow dear mother for being so smart even at this age, and of course cradling us into being smart fellas too!

And of course, thank you Google... This is a testimony to your simplistic yet powerful user experience!

It's uphill now....

... The same day 'she' hit the jackpot, 'her' master too hit a milestone.
Hitting 9 years of professional life, it has been one cherishing journey so far.

However, it's now that the actual uphill will start.... the expectations will now rise from both sides - the employer as well as the employee. It is gonna be fun as well as challenging going ahead...

Looking forward to more milestones in multiples of 9!

Running pride

Been over a month now since I got back to my early morning jog.
It was tough to revive because of the chilly winter mornings here in Pune. But am on the track now for almost 4 days in a week easily. And I am already eating the fruits of the efforts.
Here are some motivations I have to get out of the laziness shell each morning....
1. Gives me an immense sense of pride because am the only one I see running around in the early morning chill. Do you need a better reason than pride ever?

2. When I started, it was hard to jog even 200m before running out of steam. And now I can jog almost 1.2 kms before I run out of steam for a while, and again jog a little. And certainly I don't want to 'reset to factory settings' ... If you get what I mean!

3. I have started making some new acquaintances around ... From an overweight sardar in his 40s walking with a music player in his hand to a humble security guard from a nearby apartment with whom I share pleasantries. It feels nice to connect to strangers... Probably goes well with the loquacious me :)

4. The last couple of weeks at work have been awesome... Having a big share of the problem solving pie, with some simple yet thoughtful ideas has definitely showed me that I can think better and come up with fresh ideas with the early morning pumping up of the blood vessels :)

And lastly I have gotten 'My tracks' on my droid which records and gives me some stats of my run. So it tells and pushes me to do better each day.

Anyone wanting some free counselling on getting hooked on to this wonderful, smart, effective and yet free fitness routine, feel free to drop a note. I will be happy to help.

There is so much to slog...

There is so much to slog,
No time to even update this blog.

Time seems to be flying each day,
And I keep moving ahead, come what may.

Friends and colleagues advice me to rest,
And probably spend some quality time in my nest.

They do care for my well being,
But I know this slog is just for the time being.

With almost 16 hours a day spent at work last week,
This slog is not for the meek.

This slog should result in a release soon,
Else I run the risk of being termed a prune! :)

There is so much to slog...

Spouse code-review :)

Heard of code reviews in the form of peer review, manager review, architect review, but I recently leveraged and probably innovated a better form of it.

I was at home, trying to resolve a critical issue at midnight. It did need some algorithmic changes and, with my tired mind, I knew I would blow up at least a couple of scenarios.
So, faced with this situation, I just looped in my ever cooperative wifey (she does follow this blog, so you know I have to use nice words :P).

Sitting down with her, she understood the scenario in a jiffy. And then we went through the loops covering almost all possible scenarios and voila, I had indeed missed a more than a couple of scenarios.
With no existing unit-tests sadly in place for this code, the review certainly helped. We spent about 40 minutes on this, and we had put together an flawless piece of code.

Thanks wifey, you were the technical savior that night!

Must I say now, code review begins at home?

To groom or not to?

I was at this interview drive on Saturday for almost 5 odd hours. Candidates kept coming in, and it was kinda fun (or may be I just tried to enjoy myself!) talking to and having discussions with seemingly potential candidates.

By the end of the day, rather by mid-day I actually started feeling sad for the IT population that I have been grilling for the last few years. In fact, one of the candidates from one of the most popular IT state of southern India, had come in with a 3+ years of experience to show on paper, but was one really ungroomed chap. With an unshaven face, donning a pair of sandals, and nothing much (in fact nothing at all!) to show off technically, he seemed like a person straight out of exile :-)

I felt kinda sad for such population, coming from a small hamlet, and getting a sneak into the IT industry they probably never underwent any grooming sessions or even cared for such a thing.
At least a couple of times, I thought about sharing my email address with him so as to help him groom a little, of course only if he showed any willingness to, and even help him with some technical skills. This could have helped him cracked future interviews, and I'd have gained myself some karmic points too :-)

Not sure if my professional obligations allow me to share contact details with a rejected candidate, if it does, I would love to get into this path to voluntarily help groom people.
Am sure it'd give immense satisfaction to help groom people from where they are, to a point where they could stride on their own...

New wine in old bottle

Pun intended on that of course...

And that is what I call, when you get a new lease of life at an old place. I cannot be more specific here for professional reasons, but it has something to do with my recent post.

Wishing myself lot of luck as I turn onto some new wine in an older bottle...

'Healthily Unwealthy'

Had some good sizzlers yesterday for dinner along with some good friends and poor jokes as 'side-dishes'.
Though the Sizzlers that we ordered were good for health, rather relatively better than other options while eating out, the check that came by wasn't correspondingly good for wealth.

Just made me wonder if there is a term like 'Healthily Unwealthy' or may be 'Unwealthily healthy' which means something is good for your health, but not so good for your wealth.

If something bad for your health is unhealthy, why can't something bad for your wealth be coined as 'unwealthy'? :-)

Don't fear the code, fear the licensing terms!

I was trying to modify some open source Javascript library today, when I realized that even if I modify and make it work as per my needs, that is only half the job well-done.

The product which uses the library might not be still shippable because of the library's licensing terms. And eventually, all the smart work done to modify the library would be just SHIFT-DELETED down a small recycle bin  :(

Just something to beware of when one takes up ambitious things like library modification.

On the lines of a popular bollywood dialogue, I'd say - "Code se darr nahi lagta sir, License se lagta hai..." :)

Why make a remake?

Watched the new(?) Agneepath over the last weekend, and found it just annoying and nowhere close to the original one. Hrithik seemed nowhere close to how BigB had enacted in the original one, the story line was just the same without any twist to keep me engrossed or entertained.
In fact, I would say the original version had a much superior screenplay especially during the climax when BigB walks through fire as bombs are hurled in his path, and that too during a time when technology was not as much a part of Bollywood as it is today.

The character of Mithun ('Krishnan Iyer M.A, NarialPaaniwala') who added a nice tinge of humor to the original movie is badly missed, and to me this remake just seemed to be an futile attempt at cashing in on 2 things - 1) Hrithik's fan following and 2) The fact that a lot of the current movie going lot hasn't watched the original classic.

Yes, I know am too late to write this, now that the movie has already moved out of most cinema houses, but then am not a movie buff to watch remakes on the first day/week/month of the release!

I know, but still I don't know!

It has happened more than a couple of times with me, and it continues to!
Every now and then, when I think am getting into some kinda messy situation, someone just like a messiah comes and gives me a piece of advice, which seems just logical and right to do at the moment.

A fast friend just gave that to me today and voila`, it worked!
I am no more thinking about what I was thinking... and I realize that there are somethings you have to just take in your stride and move on. Unimportant things which bother you, if thought about too much, can just lead to negativity and frustration, just ignore them!

Simple fundas of life - some of which I know, but still I don't seem to know :)

My dear friend, you are wonderful, thanks for giving me that talk - you have done it, once again!

When tables turn around - from being an interviewer to an interviewee

Have been taking technical interviews for quite some time now in my career. It started at the company where I spent a major chunk of my career so far, in between some excellently talented folks.
It was fun, and also a learning experience to visit engineering college campus placements, interacting with the placement heads there, getting some respect (after all we were there to recruit their folks :-) ), eating some good lunches and of course getting to evaluate to-be graduates.

And it has been almost the same experience while interviewing experienced candidates. The discussions are probably more interesting and mature (than fresh grads), and makes me learn a thing or two each time too :-)

So here am I, have been taking interviews for at least the last 5 years, and easily interviewed at least a 100 candidates if I make a rough estimate.

Given all that, the other day when I had to appear for an interview myself with a client, incidentally for whom I carry out interviews too, it seemed a difficult mountain to climb when I was first told about it. I was confident as well as a bit nervous, I was sure and yet a bit unsure...
What probably caused me more stress was the apprehensiveness about the possibility of flunking it and losing all my confidence of even interviewing future candidates for the same client :-)

Thankfully, it turned out good and I am through :-)

Still, a lesson learnt - No matter how good you are at questioning and evaluating, it's all together a different mental ball game when being questioned, grilled and evaluated.

It's that day of the leap year...

It's that day of the leap year,
Birthday on which do the school kids fear,

No idea why we have such a calendar,
So what if it was a year that is regular,

It's that day of the leap year,
Which you can keep aside for an extra beer,

An extra day it adds for you to earn your salary,
So does it add a day to everyone's diary,

It's that day of the leap year,
Between 2 seasons, it is neither foggy nor clear!

JogSessed

Realized that I have gotten so much attached and used to the jog-walk interval training each day After-A-Days-Work, that I find myself upset if I happen to miss it any day. Not just that, at times I even avoid catching up with friends or defer shopping for groceries just because I might happen to give the routine a miss on that evening.

This is quite a transformation from the situation about 2 months ago, when I just couldn't push myself out of the house to get moving. The secret to it has been just the courage and will power to get started, and once out of the comfort zone, it's now only about being with the flow each day...
Not just that, I know that once I take a break from this schedule, it'd be really difficult and painful to start all over again!

Ok now am a regular blogger, regular jogger, regular coder (it's my job!)... lets see what's next...

Not Sure...

Not sure what to write today,
Or may be am not in a mood to say,

In either case it has been peaceful of late,
As each passing day takes away a date,

Not sure how far in life I can run,
But I need to promise myself that I will have fun,

Fun with what I choose to do,
At the end I will just have myself to prove,

Not sure when would I attain that one dream,
But am sure it is not just a whim!

Never stand begging...

"Never stand begging for what you have the POWER to EARN!"

Came across this lovely quote today. Indeed very inspirational and apt at this moment for me...!

Often, these 1 liners help you get the required thrust to take the joystick of life back in your hands instead of waiting on 'auto' mode for things to happen to you.

Reminds me of a discussion I had with a chum sometime back when he quoted someone  - "Either make things happen, OR they will happen to YOU!"

Complimentary Motivation!

I was at a wedding ceremony of one of my first cousins a couple of days back.
It's always a great feeling to meet close family members at a single place on such occasions. Otherwise, we are so busy with our lives that we hardly get to visit each one of them separately.

Coming to the point, the 2nd best part of the wedding was me getting some compliments for getting leaner :-) Yes, the jogging trails I have been leaving behind after a day's work each day for the last month or so has begun to give results.
And what could be a better proof, motivation and encouragement to continue doing it, than getting compliments from people in such social gatherings :-)

That apart, I have started feeling more energetic, more fresh, less stressed and of course started feeling leaner after I got back to this routine. Certainly, the self coined mantra and realization of 'Body vs Mind' has worked for me...