http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog Fri, 12 Mar 2010 19:31:41 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Meru Cabs is one of the supposedly better managed cab services in Bangalore. They started business here when the new airport (BIAL) was commissioned, and have since then expanded from providing only Airport Pickup/Drops to general, intracity services. In fact, their advertisements (primarily on FM radio) focus on their availability ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2010/02/meru-cabs-do-not-rely-on-us/ First it was Apple that decided that it wanted to name its phones as "iPhone", a name copyrighted by Cisco. Understandable, given the former's success with the "I" Pod earlier. But what's it with Google now deciding to name its new phone "Nexus" One, which is a renown brand for ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2009/12/why-is-everyone-borrowing-ciscos-brands/ Getting older versions of eclipse on karmic seems to require a few additional steps. While 3.5.1 (Galileo) is packaged with karmic, there are some quirks in the UT interaction which makes it difficult to use. In addition, I needed 3.4.2 (Ganymede) for rssOwl - an eclipse based rss reader I ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2009/10/getting-eclipse-3-4-x-working-on-ubuntu-karmic-beta/ Saw this on one of my friends' accounts, who happens to be married. http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2009/09/so-much-for-google-adsense-and-contextual-search/ Despite using Ubuntu for the past 3.5 years, and fastidiously upgrading the the latest and greatest version when it came out (Ubuntu releases a new version every 6 months), I dropped the ball on linux usage a year or so ago. I still updated it on my system (Lenovo T61 ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2009/04/ubuntu-whats-improved-in-a-year-and-half/ Saw this at one of the premier management institutes in India : Good to see such student/institutional initiatives, but wonder how many people avail these. http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2009/04/recession/ There are many web services these days for online storage and file/folder sharing. Most are free for the first few gigs of data, after which they start charging a monthly fee. The one that is the best, and more importantly, most intuitive for non-geeks is, by far, Dropbox. What sets it ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2009/03/get-dropbox/ Today is a relatively safe day for people to venture out on the streets of Kolkata. The CITU, a politically backed union, has supported a strike by the state's bus and auto drivers. The reason - not speed regulators, fuel price, or fare hikes, but something more gory - the ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/12/kolkatans-are-safer-only-for-today/ At work last week, there was this new funda of awarding a "Woman of the Month" award to a woman employee. While the idea is good, and we lesser mortals have no idea of the criteria for selecting the person, it got me thinking on who all would I give ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/09/superwomen/ 10 Weeks of classes, followed by another 10 weeks of project work (no classes). So effectively, this phase of in-class education is to end by November :) Courses I have taken this quarter: Spreadsheet Modelling for Business Decisions (SMBD) - A good analytical course which focuses on solving problems using spreadsheets. The ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/09/the-final-stretch/ Settling marital (or non-marital) tiffs just got hi-tech. Rather than limiting the people you consult/crib-to  about your spouse/partner to your friends/family/colleagues, you can now wash your dirty linen in the cyber-world. Online site sidetaker allows both partners to post their respective sides of the tiff, and allow the members of ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/09/marital-dispute-resolution-online/ I am one of the cynics who belive that going to the gym is a waste of effort (no pun intended) - you keep walking on the treadmill or cycling, and you do not go anywhere :) While I still stand by the statement, given that my company is providing a ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/09/keep-running-reach-nowhere/ Some of the marketing courses I did required a lot of searching for advertisements of various products in the print media. I typically used to search on google images, and try to find these ads. However, this was very inefficient and ineffective - lot of missing ads, multiple searches required, ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/09/finding-print-advertisements-online/ .. And the penultimate one where I needed to attend classes, at that. Had a couple of good finance subjects, which had topics related to bank management and the overall banking industry (Commercial Bank Management) and Financial Statement Analysis (FSA). Both were intense courses, which require a lot of practice ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/09/another-q-goes-by/ This movie, "The World's Fastest Indian", was being aired on Zee Studio today. It is a story inspired by the life of Burt Munro, a Kiwi who holds numerous speed records till date on sub-1000 cc bikes. This is one of the movies which highlight human perseverance and the will to ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/08/the-worlds-fastest-indian/ The 62nd Indian Independence Day is the same as the 100th day of me losing my independence.  Co-incidence ? http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/08/independence-day/ Early morning (around 7:45 AM), Silk Board Junction. A man in a new Hyundai Accent - well dressed, probably well educated, is driving his new car. All windows rolled up, and reading the newspaper while driving - both when the car is in motion, and at traffic signals. This goes on ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/08/bangalore-drivers/ The Hindu has an article about grand educational center which is about to open in Dec 2008, at their Mysore campus. The center is housed in a grand architectural marvel bigger than Rashtrapati Bhavan in size. From the article: The GEC imparts centralised residential foundation programme for Infosys employees, including generic and ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/07/infosys-college-of-engineering/ Just a day after Bangalore, even larger number of similar blasts rocked Ahmedabad today. There are reports of around 8-10 such occurences, all of them low-intensity. What is more distressing is that most of these explosions were apparently within 2-3 minutes of each other. Even in Bangalore, there was news of ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/07/more-blasts/ A series of crude bomb blasts has taken Bangalore hostage since 1 PM today. Encompassing all areas of Bangalore, these low-intensity gelatin bombs have already claimed a few lives and seriously injured tens of people. No information yet on the identity of the people behind the blasts, or the reason. I ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/07/bangalore-blasts/ Google and Firefox are a killer combination if you are doing an involved search, and want to retain the information for later. Here's how: Perform the search. Open interesting results in new tabs Save all tabs which you find relevant, using Bookmarks->Bookmark all tabs (Ctrl+Shift+D). This saves all tabs in a ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/02/google-firefox-and-breadcrumbs/ Students of PGSEM at IIMB hosted Convergenz '08, an annual business event, on Sunday, 13th January 2008. The theme for the event was "Innovation and Product Management" The events organized were : Symposium, with a competition for IIMB students, who presented their take on strategic initiatives for various companies Corporate Quiz, with registrations ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2008/01/convergenz-08/ Oracle, the database and apps giant which is also on an acquisition spree these days, turned 30 recently.  This article provides some interesting insights into the history of Oracle, the evolution of the Oracle Database, and Oracle's entry into the Apps arena http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2007/06/oracle-turns-30/ Here's a nice poem to which I was introduced last week during a lecture for the course "Managing People and Performance" by Prof. N M Agarwal : To laugh is to risk appearing the fool. To weep is to risk appearing sentimental. To reach for another is to risk involvement. To expose your ideas, ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2007/03/on-risk/ I have been getting a lot of job opportunity related mails these days. Strange thing is, I  have not even accessed any job site or upgraded my resume since joining my present organization. So, my resume has been lying dormant for past 2 years and I still get offers for ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2007/01/job-spam/ I got the Nokia 1110i as a gift recently, which replaces my 2-year-old Nokia 1108. Both are pretty much the same, though I miss the 1108's handy torch. However, there is a wierd problem in the Nokia 1110i : Whenever I switch on the phone, the display shows "Message Sending ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2007/01/nokia-1110i-startup-bug/ IIM, Bangalore is conducting an open house session for people interested in pursuing the PGSEM Business Management course for working professionals, offered in Bangalore and Chennai. The sessions will be held on Sunday, 17th December 2006 (Bangalore) Sunday, 7th January 2007 (Chennai) Registration for the session can be done via this link. The PGSEM 2007 ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/12/pgsem-2007-open-house-and-application/ Via /usr/games/fortune : The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of. -- Blaise Pascal http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/12/quote-of-the-day/ There are a few classic bengali songs which are such classics, that even a non-bengali Calcuttan like me just can't get enough of them. Some of the most soothing numbers in the Adhunik (modern) Genre are Nilanjana (A set of 4 songs, of which Song 3 is ultimate), 2441129 (yes, ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/09/bangla-gaan/ It's holiday season here in Bangalore - and a somewhat unexpected one at that. Monday being a national holiday on account of Gandhi Jayanti, it was already a long weekend for some. With Wednesday (4th) having been declared as a Karnataka Bandh day, it didn't take long for people to ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/09/holiday-season/ ... are a bit less to write a comprehensive case analysis. Especially when the subject of the case does everything wrong. http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/09/1000-words/ Today's edition of The Hindu Business Line has an article about the PGSEM course, and it's unique value-add to software/IT professionals. From the article : "PGSEM endeavours to provide the most current executive general management education to middle and senior professionals of the software and information technology industry to pursue a career ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/08/b-school-for-techies/ This is the ultimate (so far) in Web 2.0 to the max .. meebo has come up with an ultra-nifty widget which allows web site visitors to chat with the owner - from the web page itself ! This even works when the owner is offline, of course. The utility of ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/08/meebo-me/ So it's been more than a month since I have joined PGSEM, and so far, so good. Since I was also interested in the Personal MBA concept and actually read quite a few books from the reading list, it would be nice to compare the two programs. Even though this ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/07/pgsem-vs-personalmba/ ... does not apply to me anymore .. :) I do not have a week end.. it's just a rotating set of days with work and studies .. Hectic..but fun .. as long as there are not too many quizzes like the two next saurday.. http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/07/have-a-nice-weekend/ PGSEM 2006 commenced on 17th June, 2006 with a day-long inaugural session. The activities for the day comprised of inspiring speeches by the IIM Director and the PGSEM Chair Person, a Case Study (which we were provided beforehand), and interaction with senior PGSEM students, apart from other administratrivia. And yes, ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/06/pgsem-2006-inaugural-session/ How is this for a life ? This guy has left his job(s) and is on a 22-month tight-budget tour of the world. What is it about Americans (or should I say non-Indians) that allow then to live happily in diverse professions, and enjoy life as it comes ? When will ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/06/around-the-world-in-22-months/ So Kaavya Viswanathan got caught, leaving the respected publishers red-faced. What can be done to prevent such incidents in the future ? How about using Google Book Search to check that the text has not been lifted from somewhere ? Sorry .. that is not possible: the publishers are against ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/05/preventing-kaavya/ PGSEM interview results are out. I got an offer for admission. Classes starting June 23rd, will be held every Friday and Saturday for the next two-and-half years. In case someone wants advice/help/tips/answers-to-questions on PGSEM, or is wondering what this is all about, please join the yahoo group. http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/04/pgsem-interview-results/ There is a debate raging elsewhere on whether employees are most valuable for firms, or customers. I have not gone through the entire discussion, but most entries seemed to be for either one of the two. My take on this would be - neither. In The Goal, Professor Goldratt has ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/04/employees-valuable-or-customers/ The Bangalore Edition of BarCamp is going to be held this Saturday (21st April) at Yahoo's Golf Link Campus. It is going to be an "unconference" with around 30 sessions on geek (NOT necessarily tech) topics ranging from Web 2.0 to Social behavioural patterns on Online communities to whatever the ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/04/barcamp-bangalore/ Seth Godin spoke at google, about google. Watch the video here. More later .. http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/04/seth-godin-on-google/ Google has lanched its calendar service, much like Yahoo's - but ofcourse, with its trademark simplicity, dynamic UI, and added features. Some of the key highlights : Ability to share Calendars with the world Multiple calendars per account Calendars can be overlaid into a single display, so that you can schedule across multiple ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/04/google-calendar/ The standard of Indian journalism and news channels scaled new heights today, with the "Breaking News" and endlessly-repeating-feature of the day being Mallika Sherawat's endorsement of the 7up brand. It is amazing how all these news channels can keep airing such kind of news, hour after hour, when there are much ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/04/news-of-the-day-get-real-guys/ Similar to the RHCE, LPIC-1 is the entry level certification for Ubuntu, announced by The Linux Professional Institute (LPI), a Linux certification organization, and Canonical Ltd., sponsor of Ubuntu. The Computer-based test will be available from June, through Thomson Prometric and Pearson VUE testing centres around the world. The exam price ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/04/ubuntu-certification-announced/ According to this article, a Swedish study indicates that prolonged cell usage increases the risk of brain tumor substantially. This contradicts other studies by the Dutch and British, that did not find any harmful effects in the radiations from TV and Cell towers. So, who is right ? I do not know, ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/04/cellphone-usage-increases-brain-tumor-risk/ Pandora is a free online personalised internet radio web site, which allows you to create "stations" based on a particular set of Songs/Bands that you want. It then adapts to the selection, and plays songs which possess the same characteristics - For example tone, beat, vocals. This is possible because these ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/03/pandora-discover-your-kind-of-music/ The PGSEM Admissions office has started intimating the candidates who have been shortlisted for PGSEM 2006 interviews, to be held on 14th and 15th April 2006. I received one such email, and am waiting for exact details regarding the interview timings. It should also be put up at the IIMB Website ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/03/pgsem-results/ A company had its entire website deleted by a googlebot that was indexing the site. Who's fault ? The inept programmers who used some bad programming practices on the site. read more | digg story http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/03/googlebot-destroys-incompetent-companys-website/ Ordered "The Intelligent Investor" by Benjamin Graham from Sapna Online a couple of days back. Received it today. One of the bilbles of value investing, this book is a timeless masterpiece and a must-read for any investor who wants to actually understand the machinations of the stock market and investing. ... http://employees.org/~abhinav/blog/2006/03/the-intelligent-investor/