Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Dan Abel: how to measure the quality of code

 
 

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via Planet TW by noreply@blogger.com (Dan Abel) on 12/15/09

I've been sharing this for a while, so I thought I should put it up here also, as its the soundest measurement I've found.


(from http://www.osnews.com/story/19266)

 
 

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Saturday, December 12, 2009

<3 this. Here is the link:...

 
 

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via STFU, Believers on 12/9/09



<3 this. Here is the link: http://www.shof.msrcsites.co.uk/pcxmas.html

(Thanks Jeff)


 
 

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Monday, December 7, 2009

Check the Current Geographical Location of any Indian Railways Train

 
 

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via Digital Inspiration - Technology Blog by pratham on 11/6/08

IndiaRail Info is an interesting Google Maps mashup that helps you visualize the current geographical location of any train in India. Just type train name or train number and check its exact location on the map.

indian train location
India Rail Info has a database of all trains and railway stations in India

For example, the Bandra Garib Rath Express (2910) has crossed Kota junction at 8:23pm IST. Unfortunately this site does not extrapolate this data to guess the location between two junctions, so the train is still shown at Kota. Thanks Info-Madness.

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  2. Please Add Your Name & Location on this Google Map
  3. Know the Current Location of your FedEx or UPS Shipments Via Email

Check the Current Geographical Location of any Indian Railways Train - Digital Inspiration


 
 

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Thursday, July 23, 2009

Gym

 
 

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via Humor Columns by Syndicated Writer Jason Love by noreply@blogger.com (Jason) on 7/22/09

Syndicated humor column about gyms and health spas by Jason LoveI joined 24-Hour Fitness because the salespeople don't slide notes across the table and say things like, "How 'bout this? Can you live with this number?" My answer to that question is always the same: "If you can't say the cost out loud, it's too much."

Some people avoid the gym for fear of others staring, but that's unrealistic because it means those others would first have to stop staring at themselves. Seriously, you don't want to come between the regulars and their reflections.

When a man falls in love with his own body, it's called an Adonis Complex after the Greek god of protein shakes. These guys develop their upper bodies until, like the Tyrannosaurus rex, they cannot reach their face.

"Hey, Bob. Can you get this itch on my chin? It's drivin' me nuts."

In the weight room they strain so hard, you can actually see their beards grow. I leave when they start making porn sounds -- all that grunting and groaning while the spotter carries on. "Come on, baby; do it. Show me what you've got."

When I bench-press, a machinist named Booker hovers nearby like an incubus, volunteering pointers. "I hope you know you're cheating your pecs with that exercise."

Booker demonstrates more painful ways to lift the weights, which brings us to Gym Rule #1: If you want to know the correct way to perform an exercise, the answer is, "Whatever hurts most." When you yelp involuntarily, you've got it!

I listened to Booker until that day I found him smoking Marlboros in the parking lot. After all the squats we'd been through! Booker averted his eyes the way Elizabeth Taylor might if you caught her giving marriage advice. So it goes.

You wonder why we don't take all this pushing and pulling energy and do something useful -- build a monorail or something. The treadmill extremists could power the whole city, clip-clopping along until management finally steps in.

"Sorry, Kitty; you've become entirely too thin. We're going to have to cut you off."

When did we become obsessed with xylophone ribs anyway? Our current Miss Universe has a size-22 waist, which makes her, technically speaking, a stick figure. Her boyfriend, also a model, reports four percent body fat. Can you see them rubbing around in bed? Talk about your fire hazards.

And why does Miss Universe always come from Earth? It's like the rest of the planets aren't even trying. Unless you count Tyra Banks.

Then you have the Spandex pants with the writing on the rear end. Ladies, what are you thinking? Don't you know how big men are on reading? One girl wore on her butt the Nike swoosh symbol, which in this case does not mean "just do it."

I prefer to jog al fresco. As comedian Daryl Rummens said, "I was going to join the gym but decided to use the ground for free." Maybe we should just build gyms on top of really steep hills. That way, by the time you reach the door, you're done!

I feel for people who frequent the gym but never see results -- men who can still pinch an inch on their forehead, women who could wear five-piece bathing suits. You wish they'd just say, "Screw it. I am in shape, and my shape is round."

I like to hang out in the steam room with the large, furry creatures who grunt but don't say much. It's like Gorillas in the Mist in there. Some brag about their steam-room stamina, which I believe calls for a sweat-off. Judges can stand outside while contestants stagger out and swoon in their little numbered vests. Last one out wins a pack of Marlboros.

For all the teasing, though, I've come to admire the simplicity of gymfolk. One guy wears a shirt that says, "I'm not smart, but I can lift heavy things." That's like one step away from enlightenment.

So I've decided to leave behind philosophy and current events in favor of my own upper body development. I will match wits with neckless men and use my sleeve as a nose rag. I will lounge naked in the locker room and dry my pubes with the bolted-down hair dryer. And if anyone comes near, I'll have them scratch this godforsaken itch on my chin.

 
 

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Tuesday, June 30, 2009

How & What Mobile Phone Services does India use – Report

 
 

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via Trakin' the india business buzz by Arun Prabhudesai on 6/22/09

India is currently the 2nd largest Mobile Market in the world after China, adding nearly 10-12 million subscribers on average monthly.

At the end of April 2009, Indian Mobile subscriber base was pegged at 403.66 million, as per recent TRAI number.

Most of the Metro's and big cities have nearly come to a saturation point, however, the current phase of growth in Indian Mobile Market is in Rural areas that is now accounting for majority of growth in mobile space.

Having said that, I thought it would be interesting for our readers to know how 270 million odd Urban subscribers use their mobile phone

So here you go, some of the numbers may surprise you, while some may disappoint, but it sure makes a good reading.

Which Indian City Uses Social Networking maximum through its mobile phones?

City-wise-mobile-social-networking-usage

Nearly 10% Delhi Mobile subscribers use Social Networking services on their mobile phones, followed by Mumbai & Chennai. No doubt, I see hoards of Delhites, tweeting from their mobile phones !

Which Social networking site is most favoured by Indian Urban Mobile Subscribers?

Most-popular-Social-Networking-site-india Okay, we know Orkut is the king in India be it web or Mobile, but what in the world is "Mycantos", which accounts for nearly 4% of urban India using it?. I am also surprised that twitter does not find any mention here – Isnt it part of a Social Networking Phenomenon?

Which is the most favoured Mobile Search Engine by Indians?

India-mobile-phone-search-engine-usage

Nearly 18.5 million Indian Urban Mobile subscribers used their mobile phones for searches, with Google taking the numero-uno position with 5.76 million followed by yahoo with 4.58 million.

Which mobile site is used daily by Indian Urban Mobile Subscribers?

Mobile-site-used-daily-IndiaAgain, no surprised here – the winner is Google followed by Yahoo. Nearly half of Urban India uses Google daily on their mobile phones.

Which IM application does Urban India use on its Mobile phones?

A quarter (25%) of all urban Indians who use IM over their phone do so from an application that came preloaded in the phone.

    • Pre-Loaded IM Application – 25.7%
    • Web Browser for IM – 19.1%
    • Third party downloaded IM app – 16.8%

Which is the most popular IM service used by Urban Indian Mobile Subscribers?

popular-IM-Service-Indian-Mobile-Subscribers

Aha…surprises here – Yahoo! Messenger has narrowly edged Google's Gtalk to become most popular messenger service with urban Indian mobile users, with a 18.3% market share followed closely by Google Talk (17.8%). Nice to see Yahoo beating Google, atleast somewhere :). I am sure though next few months will see Google coming to No.1.

Which Indian Mobile service provider offers the most reasonable prices, Reliable Customer Support and diver range of Products?

Indian-Mobile-best-Service-offering

The state and Government run companies seem to score well in reasonable offerings column, while MTNL and Vodafone score in the reliable customer support offering. Aircel followed by Airtel top when it comes to offering its subscribers diverse range of mobile products.

Do Indian Mobiles subscribers participate in Mobile Contests?

Offcourse they do, that too in large numbers!

Indian-mobile-subscribers-SMS-contestAlmost 60% of Females have participated in 1 to3 SMS contests and though this is higher than their male counterparts, in frequency of participation males outshine females.

And what is the source of these SMS Contest? offcourse, it is dominated with TV.  all reality TVs, song and dance shows choose their winners via some or the other SMS contest and India just loves it.

have a look

Indian-mobile-subscribers-sms-contest-source 

86% of all SMS contest originate from TV, followed by Newspapers and Internet.

Mobile VAS services report

Here are some numbers on how Urban India uses the Mobile Value Added Services offered by Telecom providers.

SMS Based Value Added Services

India-MObile-VAS-Services

Nearly 56 Million urban Indians used a VAS related SMS subscription service in March/April 2009 – out of which Reliance Mobile CDMA accounted for a quarter of all subscribers to VAS SMS subscription service, followed by Bharti Airtel (18%) and Vodafone (14%).

Which is the most popular SMS service used by Urban India?

Most-Popular-VAS-service-Urban-India This number actually surprised me – I had thought News and probably Jobs would garner most votes, but NO – it is Jokes that used by 52% of Urban Indian Mobile users followed by Astrology.

Once conclusion I can definitely make from these numbers is that majority of mobile users in India fall into Age group of 16-25 years !

Which are the popular VAS options that Urban India likes?

Indian-mobile-Popular-VAS-options 
No surprises here – Unlimited Internet Access & better offers on SMS bundles are the two VAS options that Indian urban mobile phone users look at while deciding on a service.

Which is the most popular M-Commerce Activity for Urban Indian Mobile phone users

Popular-Indian-M-Commerce-activity

Nearly 98 million of all mobile users have used mobile phones to recharge their card or pay their phone bill –The second most popular M-Commerce activity is buying movie tickets (39.67 million)

Which is the most popular VAS service used by Urban Indian Mobile Phone User?

Indian-popular-VAS-service

"Finding out who called" and "informing people when busy" are the two other most popular Value added services used by Urban India. Missed call alerts is used by almost 110 million urban Indians while Talk/Voice SMS is used by almost 80 million.

Note: The above graphs / numbers are created by www.vitalanalytics.in. (let us know if you have any questions on these numbers)


Comments

  • June 23, 2009, Siddhesh writes: Good analysis, Arun. Some interesting figures there. Any particular reason why MTNL is rated so highly? Also, social networking on mobile puts interesting figures too.
  • June 24, 2009, India doesn't like anything Chinese. But China likes Indian spices | China, India writes: [...] That's not it. BSNL has recently imposed a virtual ban on Chinese equipment manufacturer following the advice of DoT. Huawei and LTE are the leading telecom equipment manufacturers of China and the world and DoT do not want them to be operating in sensitive zones. Sensitive regions are the areas having borders with China, Bangladesh, Myanmar and Pakistan. A major blow for the telecom companies trying to operate in world's fastest growing telecom market. [...]
  • June 24, 2009, Harpreet writes: Amazing facts ! Great Job.....Would love to read more abt these in future as well.........
  • June 25, 2009, ghosh writes: Good report! But keeping in mind the total GPRS/data enabled handset users, as per industry reports, total GPRS/data users in the country would 9m across( IMAI report 2008). That essential means if we take the total users in 4 metros- its about 64m and out of which users of Social Network services is about 4.2 m. Which would mean approx 48% of the total GPRS / data handsets enabled users use their handsets to access social networks. Or in other words it means out of every 2 data users approx 1 users user uses their handsets to access social networks. This looks a tad high. Even if we double the data users from 9m in 2008 to 18 m in 2009(not likely) even then it means 29% users using their handsets to access social networks. of data users use their handsets to access social networks. Given the current state of congestion for voice calls on various networks it seems though possible might be unlikely.
  • June 25, 2009, Arun Prabhudesai writes: Ghosh, you got the maths perfectly I must say. However, if a user has gprs, I am sure most of them will use for 2 things...email & social networking, so 48% although a bit higher is comprehensible. I will put this question across to the surveyor and let me see what he has to say.. Update: Here is the reply from the surveyor
    To answer your comments around social networking, Social networking sites can be accessed via sms as well, you dont necessarily need gprs enabled handsets to access the same, the numbers we have take that into account
  • June 26, 2009, Venkat writes: Can you help me make sense of the "SNs favored by Urban mobile subscribers" number? The number on the graph is not clear - is it 11.4% or 21.4% (31.4%?) for Orkut? Question 1: Hard to believe that Orkut is almost (at least) double Facebook's usage ON MOBILE in URBAN areas? That's an interesting insight if it is true. If the biggest player here is 11 or 21%, does this mean that there is a very long tail of SNs being accessed from mobile? (The graph obviously doesn't cover these 100 or so players with less than 2% share of the mobile SN usage pie.) Venkat
  • June 26, 2009, Arun Prabhudesai writes: Venkat, Thanks for dropping by..here is your answer
    The number is 11.4% for Orkut, facebook though increasing is still behind;( http://tr.im/pQRD ) article on business week, that further solidifies this. Anything under 2% we do not track, due to the low usage we will not be able project the numbers reliably.

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