normally it does not happen, but today i got some free time.
saw 2 harihar nagar, loved it. same old formula works. just to refresh memories, saw the original in harihar nagar too.
others should look at this movie to learn how to make sequels
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Oracle Buys Sun - What Does It Mean for Oracle BI&DW?
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via Rittman Mead Consulting by Mark Rittman on 4/20/09
So you've probably heard the news now, that Oracle have agreed to buy Sun, the makers of Solaris, SPARC chips, lots of application servers, servers and storage units and of course Java. IBM were originally in the running but backed-off due to anti-trust concerns, now it looks like Oracle have won the prize. So what does this mean for Oracle business intelligence and data warehousing?
Well, to be honest it's not all that clear, especially seeing as Oracle's favoured hardware partners and operating system seem to be HP and Linux rather than Sun and Solaris. Sun weren't an especially big player, directly, in the BI&DW market, although their hardware used to power most cutting-edge data warehouses back in the late 90's and even today, those customers who've not gone down the RAC route tend to use Solaris and SPARC hardware to host their large-scale data warehouses. I've not personally perceived Sun as being so relevant these days, with the architectural advantages of SPARC chips being less pronounced these days, and a general move amongst the industry towards Linux and commodity blade hardware. Sun do in fact have their own DW appliance initiative, in conjunction with Greenplum and PostgreSQL, which presumably won't be around for much longer, and in fact it's in this area that I can see Sun's hardware business having its focus in the future - as a means for Oracle to build off of what they've done with Exadata and Database Machine to create highly-tuned, highly-optimized appliances for the running of Oracle databases, application servers and Fusion applications.
I guess also part of the move was defensive in that Oracle wanted to firstly, make sure whoever bought Sun had the same commitment to Java (on which most of Oracle's products are based), and secondly make sure someone like IBM didn't get Java and therefore place much of Oracle's architectural underpinnings in the hands of a major competitor. Oracle's own BI products are a mix of pure Java (the legacy BI tools like Discoverer), bits of C++, Java and .NET (from the Siebel side) and a mish-mash of lots of technologies from the Hyperion side. Going forward, I would imagine this means Java will be even more central to Oracle's (BI) tools strategy, we'll have even more Java application servers (though presumably Weblogic will stay the strategic direction), and we'll have even more focus on end-to-end BI and DW appliances; and maybe, we'll see mySQL start to appear in entry-level BI products from Oracle, or even have Oracle BI support/ship mySQL in the BI SE One variant? We'll have to wait and see.
So, it's a takeover that's obviously not got BI and DW as it's rationale, but I think we'll see spin-off benefits in the areas of DW appliances, more optimized storage solutions and perhaps optimization going through to the server, network and even the operating system level, especially if the engineers behind Solaris and ZFS start to contribute towards Oracle's Linux, storage and hardware strategy. For the time being though we'll have to wait and see what happens, one thing I do know though is that surely, they'll either have to run a technology Open World and an apps Open World separately now, or maybe even move to Las Vegas in the future if Oracle want to run a single annual event for all their customers?
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Sunday, April 12, 2009
Brijesh Nair: Campaign Videos of Dr Shashi Tharoor – A class of its own!
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via Kerala Blog Roll by Brijesh Nair on 4/7/09
You may have seen the campaign videos of lot of candidates but may not have seen one like this for a long time. A campaign video that talks only about development and nothing about politics. An indication of things to come? All vidoes are only around 1 minute long.Dr Shashi Tharoor's vision of Development Dr Shashi Tharoor talking about the need of a vision for Trivandrum's Development DrThings you can do from here:
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Should Indian Outsourcing Be Banned?
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via Thought Clusters by Krishna Kumar on 4/11/09
James McGovern, of Enterprise Architecture, writes:
So, if quality can be lower in enterprise in-house software, then that allows for lower-quality resources from Indian outsourcing firms to maintain it. Remember that good is good enough and it doesn't make sense for architects to expend such energy churning on better ways of developing higher quality working software.
Indian outsourcing has caused many to lower their standards and therefore the opportunity to abuse is rampant. Methodologies such as extreme programming encourage merciless refactoring while Indian outsourcing has taught us that refactoring is nothing but overhead as you have to write comprehensive documentation in order to get working software. Sometimes the effort but into documentation makes refactoring a non-starter.
McGovern's recent posts have been pretty cynical about Indian outsourcing and I suppose it has some roots in his actual experiences. So I am not going to quibble and say he is wrong, because he will be obviously right with what he has experienced personally. That being said, I think he has a limited view of why many companies outsource outside the United States, including to Eastern Europe, India and East Asia.
What I am writing below is based on meetings and conversations with CEOs, VPs and other executives in charge of outsourcing decisions. Obviously, you cannot take any one person's word at face value, but when you hear the same reasons cited by multiple people, you start seeing trends. Let me start with saying that cost is a major factor, but not for the common reasons you would think. No executive talks of costs in the context of replacing existing costly resources with new inexpensive resources. Instead, the typical reasons cited are as follows:
- There is an unfulfilled project need, but the existing software development team is busy with tasks. How do we increase the development team without incurring too much additional cost?
- The existing team is busy with maintenance tasks. How do we get them to work on new tasks and move the current maintenance work to someone else without incurring too much cost?
- We have a project that is low on our priorities, but would be very helpful to get done. If we can get it done at a lower cost, it could go up the priority list and approved faster.
- We are uncertain about our revenue stream and do not want to add long-term obligations on our payroll.
- We want someone who has done this kind of work before and can therefore do this at a lower overall cost. (In many cases, the existing development team does not have any experience in the new work that is being proposed to be outsourced.)
Cost is an important (if not the most important) factor because it is the easiest and most unambiguous one to measure. The compensation of most executives is determined by how much money they could make or how much they could save. But to assume that they are only obsessed with the bottom line figure is wrong. If that were the case, every action could be taken by only considering the short-term cost analysis, where you don't want to introduce any new costs.
But as you can see, in the above cases, although the executives are trying to save money, overall they are increasing costs. They are not shutting down the existing development team. They are augmenting the team with new members for the purpose of performing projects that add to the company's value. This adds more costs, so what the executives are doing is not so much as reducing costs, but reducing the rate of growth of expenses.
They could do this in a variety of ways, of course: Hire permanent workers, hire consultants, hire interns, buy off-the-shelf products, outsource to a local firm, outsource to a firm somewhere in the United States, outsource to someone outside the country, automate. And each has its pros and cons. The cost of the project is affected by risks of each approach and this includes quality too, because poor quality increases maintenance costs too.
There are two arguments that cannot simultaneously exist, which is that foreign programmers are both inexpensive and of poor quality. If an inexpensive foreign programmer produces code of really poor quality, the rational thing to do for a cost-conscious executive would be to use only domestic programmers. There would be no point in outsourcing if a programmer in an outsourcing country is more expensive than one in the United States because their poor quality cancels the benefit of their lower per-hour costs. One could argue that maybe some executive are dumb, but that does not account for the tens of thousands of jobs that have been outsourced.
The assumption that Indian outsourcing is associated with low quality may be satisfying to some United States programmers, but it is a dangerous assumption for several reasons.
- Even assuming that Indians are bad programmers and executives only outsource based on per-hour cost, there are plenty of inexpensive outsourcing destinations for software development. Eastern Europe is particularly strong in software outsourcing and they have very competitive rates combined with excellent developers coming out of first-class universities.
- It is difficult to envision sustained low quality from any outsourced-to country. It will improve quality through greater exposure and experience, or die a quick death. Unless you think that any country is culturally indisposed to quality, which I find hard to digest. They used to say that about the Japanese in the '50s. Look what happened.
- If outsourcing is ever banned, employers and executives will look to control costs through other means. If a company is not growing fast enough to exceed its costs, it will bleed people and go out of business. In any eventuality, people will lose jobs. Outsourcing is a good scapegoat, but it is only the symptom of a larger concern within the company.
I call it dangerous because it doesn't help the displaced American programmer from understanding the high-level economic trend that is causing the job loss. Both national parties in the United States (and most parties in the Western world) are non-protectionist. They favor free markets and open trade. This means a much more competitive market for all companies. Blaming any one element that causes job losses in a particular sector is missing the bigger picture.
For instance, as Nick Carr wrote in "The Big Switch", a trend that will cause the loss of many IT jobs is the rise of cloud computing. It will mean the end of many system and database administration jobs, as small and large companies move their data and processing to the servers of Amazon, Google and Microsoft. Is it worthwhile to complain that cloud computing may perhaps have less performance than a finely-tuned Oracle machine on a Solaris box? It may be satisfying to think you (as a sysadmin) have been replaced by an inferior solution, but that satisfaction is all you get.
What is the answer for the American programmer? If you cannot lower one's wages, you has to provide greater value. Quality is greater value, but that may not be enough to justify those higher salaries. Corporations (and smaller companies) with access to the entire globe may not agree to the monetary value you place on your existing skills and quality. So the right answer is what new portfolio of skills will appeal better to employers and executives?
Better code quality is not enough. If you improve it, there is no guarantee that the Eastern Europeans and Filipinos will not equal you tomorrow because they are learnable skills. But the American programmer will always have the strength in understanding American businesses, rules, customs and traditions. They can be better analysts and managers. Although the Internet has dulled this advantage, Americans can take greater advantage of the wealth of experience in Silicon Valley and other technology hotspots as well as the many first-class universities in the US to become better architects and designers in emerging technologies. Finally, they can embrace globalization to obtain greater value through mixing and matching development resources from across the world.
Krishna Kumar
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Saturday, April 11, 2009
Neelakantan: The Nano is beautiful
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via Kerala Blog Roll by Neelakantan on 4/10/09
Had a first chance to get a dekko at the Nano. The dealership was closed for the day, but it was visible through the glass and the rolling shutters which, very conveiniently had grills that ensure visibility.<br /><br />Could not see the interiors, but from outside it is superb. <br /><br />And I was not the only gawker. There were others too craning their glimpse to get a dekko of this new beauty on the India roads. People parked their cars and got off to take a look - all this when the dealership was closed...<br /><br />And it is making waves in all cities. Heres a <a href="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Cities/Mumbai-cobbler-books-Nano/articleshow/4387327.cms">cobblers story from Mumbai</a>. Here are two stories <a href="http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News-by-Industry/Bookings-for-Tata-Nano-begins/articleshow/4383169.cms">from ET</a> and <a href="http://www.dnaindia.com/slideshow.asp?newsid=1246798&amp;sldid=1">DNA</a>.<br /><br />Anybody who wants to say Indian Industry is not innovative? Now?<br /><br />Sigh. More Nanos means citizens will demand better roads which this central government has done their best to not provide. Clearly, this is a conspiracy against SUV owners whose vehicles dont need any roads...<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='http://res1.blogblog.com/tracker/9505017-4047520061627096113?l=ecophilo.blogspot.com'/></div></content>Things you can do from here:
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Thursday, April 9, 2009
Nano unplugged
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via Goergo by Petlee Peter on 4/8/09
The much awaited people's car, the Tata Nano is finally here. On display at Tata car dealer showrooms in Chennai city, the Nano is attracting festival crowds. Two-wheeler users who were looking forward to upgrade to a car see the Nano as light at the edge of the tunnel. Ergo checked out the Nano LX (hi-end model) on display at TAFE Reach Ltd on Anna Salai recently.
Quite a sleek and stylish looking car, the Nano is the first Indian car with a rear engine. So the front interestingly makes room for the stepney tyre, tool box and little luggage room. Nano has a 624 cc rear engine boasting 35 bhp with a top speed of 105 kmph and a mileage claimed to be over 20 kmpl in city riding conditions.
According to C R N Prasad, GM operations of TAFE, the Nano is a revolution in the Indian car market. "The Nano is the most fuel car and is easy to maneuver on city roads. It is also 21 percent more spacious for passengers that any other small car in the market today and has a good ground clearance of 180mm," he adds.
Beaming a chic dash board and comfy and spacious seating for four, the Nano LX comes with an air-conditioner with heater and power windows only in the front.
"Initially people had doubts about the car. After seeing the car on display many are convinced to a very high extent," says P. A. Krishnan, Senior Manager, TAFE attributing the booking applications for the car pouring in at his showroom.
July, 2009 is likely to witness the first 1lakh Nanos being allotted to lucky applicants selected from across India. And the first car is expected to hit the road by October this year.
Tata Nano is available in three models
Nano LX – Fully loaded version with AC, power windows, central locking, fog lamps and tubeless tyres. Available in colours Champagne gold, Lunar silver and Sunshine yellow.
Nano CX – AC and tubeless tyres. Available in colours Racing red, Ivory white, Summer blue, Champagne gold and Lunar silver.
Nano basic – Non AC and tubeless tyres. Available in colours Racing red, Ivory white and Summer blue.
For more details log on to www.tatanano.com
How to own a Nano
Application form to book a Tata Nano is available for Rs. 300 at all Tata Motors showroom and also at Tata Sky outlets, Titan watch showrooms and Westside clothes store.
Customers can draw a cheque or DD for an amount of Rs 3,125 (amount for Nano basic only) from any State Bank of India branch. The chellan should be attached along with a filled form and can be submitting at a Nano application counter at any Tata Motors showroom in the city.
The sale of application forms and acceptance of booking will start from today and end on April 25th. The lucky draw to pick 1 lakh Nano car winners through out the country will commence on July 25, 2009.
Nano merchandise
The people's car has also merchandise like phones, pen drives, clocks, mugs, key chains, mouse pads, magnets, pen sets, pencil boxes, water bottles, T-shirts and caps that is on sale at all Tata Motors car showrooms and Westside store from today. Merchandises can also be bought online on www.tatanano.com.
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Sunday, April 5, 2009
Pandora rockssss!
I heard of pandora internet radio before, but i could try it only today. And I am impressed. I discovered new bands and songs all of them matching the style of music i like.
Pandora starts from one song or band you like, and then it analyses it and starts playing similar sounding songs , and it really works! Its part of the music genome project, and for every song it plays, you can click on yes if you like the music, and no if you dont.This way it builds up your persona, and soon you have a complete playlist of like sounding music.
I still cant figure how it categorizes the songs and hits me correct.
Pandora starts from one song or band you like, and then it analyses it and starts playing similar sounding songs , and it really works! Its part of the music genome project, and for every song it plays, you can click on yes if you like the music, and no if you dont.This way it builds up your persona, and soon you have a complete playlist of like sounding music.
I still cant figure how it categorizes the songs and hits me correct.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
Reasons for using Internet Explorer
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via GraphJam: Music and Pop Culture in Charts and Graphs. Let us explain them. by Cheezburger Network on 3/9/09
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Chennai’s ‘floating police station’
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via Goergo by Petlee Peter on 4/1/09
Eighty-four of the 85 police stations in namma Chennai boast of stylish white Hyundai Accents bearing beacons. One of them has no car but something bigger and better – a state-of-the-art speedboat costing a whopping Rs. 1 crore. The B6 Port Marine police station inside the Chennai Port, perhaps the only police station in South India with a speedboat patrol, keeps vigil over the seas from Ennore in the north to Thiruvanmiyur in the south.
With a strength of 27 policemen patrolling in three shifts, the boat is referred to as the 'floating police station'.
The history of the floating police station dates back to 1895, when a police constable was posted on the sands following an increase in ship traffic on the Madras shores. Later, in 1910, the Marine and Harbour police were formed due to the escalating number of thefts from anchorage ships.
The first patrol boat under the Port Marine police station, E.L. Stracey, was sent out to sea on March 28, 1990. The Port Marine team has a history of stringent surveillance and had even captured an LTTE boat two years ago. The hi-tech boat in use was handed over by the then Shipping Minister T.R. Baalu on May 4, 2007.
Under the guidance of an Assistant Commissioner of Police (Port Marine), the team of armed policemen (one Sub Inspector and four constables) and two rescue divers scans 5 nautical miles for pirates and monitors movement of fishermen near large anchored vessels.
"We scan the waters thoroughly. Apart from that, deaths, thefts and any other kind of criminal activity within 5 nautical miles in the water comes under our jurisdiction," says Mohammed Mutahir Hussain, AC, Port Marine police station, amidst a patrolling shift on Tuesday afternoon.
According to Inspector Sheik Ahmed, his patrol team also does surveillance on the waters near the Kasimedu fishing harbour. "There is a possibility for fishermen to find a bigger catch where the ships are anchored and some might even try to enter the ships to commit theft," he adds.
The speedboat, owned by a private operator and rented by the Chennai Port Trust, is a 310 bhp twin-screw engine with 250 rpm and a top speed of 16-18 nautical miles per hour.
With a capacity for 12 persons and sleeping space for six, the boat is equipped with advanced communication facilities, including GPS and radar. This patrol vehicle of the City Police costs the Chennai Port a daily rent of Rs. 26,000 only.
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