Enlightened ... There are no special effects.

There have been a few tweets from Google about teaching technology to parents.  My brother and I had made a few attempts, but my parents were least interested.  My father wouldn't try anything other than solitaire games and my mother is happy with her books.  I used to feel that she must be thorough with all those stories, but at her age she must be forgetting a lot. Now coming back to teaching technology, I didn't want to try again, but my father gave a chance.  He complained about the cost of his cough syrup.  I thought I could explain it.  I could visualize the travel of that fifty rupee note from my father's pension account. Preparing for a long story, I started - "Appa, are you proud that I am earning so much?"  He didn't see any sense in my question.  He appeared confused, "Why?  I'm always proud of you.".  I continued, "Good, let me tell you how I make so much money and that will answer your question on the price of cough syr...

I wasn't a big fan of predictions, but I surprised myself at deciding to learn Astrology from my neighbor.  I flirted with palmistry when I was in college.   Going all the way to learn Astrology is not something I could have predicted with my limited knowledge on palmistry. It is one of those impulsive decisions I am known for.  Last year, I decided to try my hand at learning to play Veena, it has been going on fine so far, except for the occasional guilty consciousness for not practicing enough, only when I see Rajesh Vaidhya on TV. Coming back to my Astrology, I started with all earnestness, met the teacher on a Vijyadhasami day, gave a token guru dakshina, bought his book and two big workbooks - one as a notes book and the other as a record note.  I  called up my parents to send my horoscope and everyone's they know of.  I searched for the horoscopes of Rajini, Jayalalitha and even Karunanidhi.  Who cares if he doesn't believe in it! ...

Disclaimer:  This write-up is supposed to introduce you to the procedures and is not a legal advice.  Always consult a lawyer worth his salt before signing any documents.  Feel free to contact me to suggest corrections or need more clarity. We were busy during the first half of this year in two real estate transactions - the sale of our apartment and then the purchase of an independent house.  After that, we got a number of queries from our friends on the procedures; so, I thought of documenting the experience. I'll skip all the steps involved until the buyers and sellers have met and agreed on the transaction.  Let's focus on the procedures alone. The seller will have to give the buyer copies of the following documents. The sale deed that is the proof of your purchase Encumbrance Certificate for at least about 30 years.   Parent Documents - Documents that trace the ownership of the property / its parts for the past 30 years.  In ad...

Thanks to Endhiran and its translations in Telugu and Hindi, there will be more talk on what all can a Robot do or can't do in the days to come.  As a below average student of computer science, I set out to think through what are the possibilities.  Here is my serious below-average analysis of the possibilities. The Sense of I My favorite topic.  What do humans mean by their sense of self?  There is  physiological self, that is one's identification with his/her body.  And there is the psychological self - that one identifies himself as a Hindu, Tamil, Communist, Educated, CEO etc.  I believe both are possibilities with machines.  I use the term machine to refer to the Robots with their knowledge base and their decision support systems. Physiological Self of a Machine:  The physiological self is to present to protect itself - that an organism is not simply a collection of sensory organs, but something that coordinates actions between th...

I was lying down staring at the ceiling fan. The fan had a circular metal piece at the center and it had the radii with ridges.  When the fan is on, I can't see the ridges, but all of us a sudden I felt I'm able to see the ridges for a fraction of a second.  I realized I could see the ridges when I was blinking my eyes.  I wasn't sure whether the vision of ridges precedes the act of blinking or the other way around. The theory behind the persistence of vision is still being debated or debunked.  Instead of banking on a theory, I have my own explanation. As the fan center rotates at more than 24 cycles a second, the ridges are not visible.  We can compare this to the movie watching experience where 72 or more still images are produced per second to create an illusion of motion.  When I blink, as the last image captured by the eye is processed by the brain, it doesn't have a succeeding image to perceive a rotating circle.  So, the last image is exper...

From an email I sent to my brother: Dear Bro, We started talking about moral correctness coming in the way when you want to worship.  Let me start from the childhood and work my way through on this topic.  Don't expect smart one-liners or punch dialogs.  This is logic. Have you ever wondered on whether a 2-3 year old kid cares about God, deity etc.  Ignore the knowledge thrust upon them.  They really do not have an opinion about God.  In fact, they do not need an opinion about God.  Because their consciousness hasn't evolved fully and there is no "I".  Their consciousness isn't limited to their physical body.   What adults think of consciousness is often their own identity.  Everything you think you experience is through this identity.  But what is this identity made of?  In the beginning it just starts with a name - your name.  Then you start identifying with your family, village, city, region, country etc.  Th...

In response to Ram's blog  Perceptions of Indian Developers in the West On comparing the capabilities of developers, here is a typical experience. We took over a significant but small piece of software couple of years ago.  It was written by one person in C, way back in late 1980s.  Let's call him Adam.  Adam had used an environment that was available then.  He had no version control and no documentation.  It had been backed up on another server.  That was the only version available outside of Adam's machine. Though the organization was particular about software development standards, this one was left as is - for fear of breaking anything or antagonizing Adam or both.  It was a program that was closely guarded, possibly not out of any insecurity, but just circumstances.  It was using Adam's own data structures, could have been rewritten to make use of databases and other libraries.  But not done, for no one saw value in...

வியாழக்கிழமை.  காலை ஒரு மணி நேரத்தை வாரந்திரப் பத்திரிகைகளில் வீணடிக்கும் நாள்.  இன்று கொஞ்சம் குறிக்கோளோடு பத்திரிகைகளைப் பார்த்தேன்.  நித்யானந்தா விவகாரம் அடங்கியதால், அதைப்பற்றி எதாவது வித்தியாசமான கண்ணோட்டத்தைத் தேடினேன். ஜக்கி பற்றிய இரண்டு கட்டுரைகளில் எதுவும் சிறப்பாக இல்லை. அதனால் நான் சென்ற வாரம் எழுதியதை கொஞ்சம் விலாவாரியாக தமிழில் எழுதலாம் என்று எழுதுகிறேன். நித்தியானந்தா போன்ற விஷயங்கள் தினம் நடந்து கொண்டிருக்கிறது.  சம்பந்தப்பட்டவர்கள் உங்களுக்கு அயலார்களே. நீங்கள் மதிக்கும் ஒருவர் இப்படி நடந்துகொண்டால் நீங்கள் என்ன செய்வீர்கள்? அது உங்கள் குருவாகவோ, கடவுளாகவோ,தலைவனாகவோ, நெருங்கிய உறவாகவோ அல்லது நீங்களாகவோ இருக்கலாம். உங்களை கலங்க அடிக்க, ஒரு நிகழ்ச்சி தேவையில்லை. செய்தி போதும். அது அதன் வேலையை செய்ய ஆரம்பிக்கும். நீங்கள் கோழையாக இருந்தால் செய்தியை மறுக்க ஆரம்பிப்பீர்கள்.  அப்படி ஒன்று நடக்கவில்லை, இது திட்டமிட்ட சதி போன்றவை இந்த ரகம்.  சமீபத்திய மறுப்பு, கம்ப்யுட்டர் கிராபிக்ஸ் சதி. நீங்கள் அடாவடி பார்ட்டியாக இருந்தால், மறுக்...

Ram had written about one side of the Nityananda event.  I want to focus on another aspect of it - coping with your faith shaken up.  To start with spirituality is not about "them" but is about "you". The followers of Nityananda must be really troubled by the recent events.  It doesn't matter whether the event was real or doctored.  The very information is enough to trouble them.   When Dayanda Saraswathi's  belief was shaken up , it triggered the creation of Arya Samaj.  Another extreme event was a family suicide in Trichy when they realized a sick member of their family can't be cured by their belief.  There are more common cases like some of my agnostic friends who have faith in the legal system.  They do get shaken up when they learn that the system is not all that clean.  They contemplate relocating to another place where the system isn't so badly corrupted. At times of crisis, it is hard to keep the faith because of the flow o...

வீட்டில் கெளதம் மேனன் படங்கள் பார்ப்பதில் ஒரு சௌகரியம் - சேனல் மாற்றலாம், ஓட விட்டு முடிவை மட்டும் பார்க்கலாம்.  மொத்தத்தில் எனக்கு கெளதம் மேனன் படங்கள் பிடிப்பதில்லை என்பது தான் உண்மை.  ஏன் என்று நண்பன் கேட்டான்.  உட்கார்ந்து யோசித்தேன். கெளதம் மேனன் படங்களுக்கும் மணி ரத்தினத்தின் படங்களும் கிட்டத்தட்ட ஒரே ஸ்டைலில் இருப்பது போல் தோன்றுகிறது. இருந்தாலும், கெளதம் மேனன் படங்களை வெறுக்கும் அளவிற்கு மணியின் படங்களை வெறுப்பதில்லை.  காரணம் இதுதான். இரண்டு பேரின் படங்களில் இருக்கும் பொது இழை - சாதாரண மனிதர்களின் அசாதாரண தருணங்கள். இரண்டு பேரின் படங்களிலும் முக்கிய கதா பாத்திரங்கள் கொஞ்சம் ஹாலிவுட் வாசம் அடிப்பார்கள்.  கிளின்ட் ஈஸ்ட்வுட் போல அதிகம் பேச மாட்டார்கள், மிக புத்திசாலிகள் - ஆனால் சூப்பர் மென் இல்லை.  அவர்கள் சாதாரணர்கள் என்று சொன்னாலும், அப்படிப்பட்ட மனிதர்களை நீங்கள் பார்க்க வாய்ப்பில்லை.  இதனாலே ஒரு ஒட்டாத நிலை இருக்கும்.  ஆனால் மணியின் படங்களில் சுற்றங்கள் இதை பெரும்பாலும் மறைத்துவிடும்.  நாயகனில் டெல்லி கணேஷ், ஜனகராஜ் க...

I'm not a big fan of parent teacher's meeting, for I have nothing much to communicate to the teacher.  And my son isn't of the same kind as his illustrious uncles who had their parents visit the school more often.  The usual conversation would be:  Teacher: He is a nice boy, he needs to improve on ... I: Thank you.  Does he interact with his classmates and teachers well? Teacher: Yes He is very obedient and polite. I: Thank you. The meeting would end there after I sign to log my attendance.  Most fathers I get to see have a similar conversation.  Mothers have longer, at times irritating conversations.  Since the teacher happens to belong to the same gender, she continues to answer politely.  I can't imagine how a male teacher would handle conversations with mom after mom.  Must be a tough job! I had a meeting today.  I knew the teacher already.  A distant relation.  So, I had one extra line to speak - ...

In Google Spreadsheet, the function ROUNDUP expects two parameters - the value and number of digits. But the second parameter is optional, defaulting to 0. If you had given just one parameter for the function, it works fine until you do an excel export. In Google spreadsheet, the formula was: =IF(ROUNDUP('Sheet1'!B52+'Sheet2'!B52+'Sheet3'!B52)-'Sheet4'!B51>='Sheet1'!B52,'Sheet5'!$E53,0.0) In the exported excel, it came out as =IF(((ROUNDUP((('Sheet1'!R[24]C+'Sheet2'!R[24]C)+'Sheet3'!R[24]C))-'Sheet4'!R[23]C)>='Sheet1'!R[24]C),'Sheet5'!R[25]C5,0.0) Really weird export. It took me a while to suspect that the missing parameter was causing the problem. Once the parameter was supplied, the exported excel looked fine.

Tired of being called to interview fresh graduates who can't think, I gave our HR person three sets of questions as follows. I didn't want to copy paste objective type questions. I wanted to see how they think, present etc. Set 1 1. Write the events that happen between requesting for a web-site address in browser's address bar and the retrieval of the web page. State your assumptions on internet / intranet, static / dynamic web sites. 2. Write a function (secondLargest) to find the second largest number in a given array of integers. (Expectation is just the function in such a way it can be reused in multiple programs with the most optimal solution in any programming language.) 3. Write a data structure in C/C++/C#/Java to store folders and files in a computer. Set 2 1. Give step-by-step instructions to go from your home to college. Be clear that a stranger to these places can simply follow the instructions and still reach the destination with no additional help. 2. Wr...