Enlightened ... There are no special effects.

Many in Chennai seem to have a premonition about the Oct 26-27 rains. A few months ago, writer Sujatha wrote about Mumbai rains and guessed that it might be the same with NE monsoon for Chennai this year. The local government seems to be slightly more prepared than their usual mode. So, heavy rains were expected and it did rain. Thank you Nature! On the preparedness of Chennai Corp, it seems they have improved. Some three years ago, on a nearly similar situation, people were stranded for hours together at Anna Salai. It took me 2.5 hours by bus to reach Adyar from Vadapalani. I was lucky that day. This time, police and Corp officials were seen on many roads. Water clogged roads were promptly closed and diverted. South Chennai has been fairly well managed. On North Chennai... it is altogether a different story. I had been to that part of the city for just 3-4 times, didn't stay long enough on those occasions to like the place. That's for another blog. Coming back to the rains, t...

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/community/chats/trans/sql/sq0529pm.mspx What a dumb message! If my query contains an ignored word, why the hell SQL Server can't ignore it. Thankfully, Yukon fixes the problem. A work around is given in http://staff.interesource.com/james/

Get set for the mother of all strikes We had seen relatively few strikes when NDA was the ruling coalition. When UPA came to power, the communists and socialists came out too - like the cockroches that come out when the place is dark. And they are naturally followed by strikes. During NDA government, the Supreme Court banned strikes; Tamil Nadu government crushed striking state government employees. The employees managed to get no sympathy from the common man. The strike fizzled out. I'm sure the state government employees will not think of strike for another 10 years. By that time, a new generation of lazy sloths would be there and will not remember the lack of sympathy and will probably announce a strike. Or there may be better set of responsible people who will be serious about their work - some wishful thinking. Strikes by polical parties are also low in number - you will have to give some concesssion to communists - can't call a bunch of lunatics as a political part...

How Microsoft can 'kill' Google | The Register Enough had been said in Slash Dot on why this won't work. I strongly feel that Microsoft is beginning to lose. In spite of the power and ability to crush competition, Microsoft hasn't been able to defeat Quicken in accounting Software domain. Way back in 2000, a Microsoft Money team member admitted that they would never beat Quicken. What each team in Microsoft has is paronia. That has kept them beating rivals like Netscape. With just a sense of paranoia and no innovation, it is hard to stay ahead. And innovation with out paranoia doesn't help either as we saw with Netscape.

Om Malik’s Broadband Blog » Google Made Opera Browser Free Just proves that good products don't have to have a sales team sweat it out for bringing in revenue.

Posted over 2 years ago on rediff blogs. "CMM, ISO and all such process stuff Indian companies claim about are a big illusion. The way I see it is - all these 'so called' standards are thrust upon the naive Indian businessmen by the white man to continue to control the third world. But the big picture isn't all that bad. Looks like it is pay-back time now. Big American companies pay a fortune to have the 'process' they introduced in the projects executed by Indian companies. The general assumption is process == quality. In some dumb organizations within these companies documentation == process. So, what does it really mean to have a CMM level x or an ISO certification? Customer satisfaction? May be. More business? Very likely. Real quality? Doubtful. Quality is not something that process alone can bring in. Before this becomes a commentary on Zen and the Art of .... and before my PM comes and asks for estimates I'll stop now." I think CMM has lived i...

Gov. Jeb Bush's son arrested in Texas Some 30 years from now, he is sure to run for Presidency. I hope, he won't be a danger to himself then, but not sure he won't be a danger to others - that's a trait that runs in the family.