H2G2 - 2 thumbs up !

In fact three thumbs up :-)

Just came home after watching "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy". The movie was indeed much better than what I expected it to be after reading those rave reviews on the internet. Darth Jennings has gone about doing the cinematic adaptation of the book really well. In terms of watching this movie, those who have read the book will feel like they are reviewing the book at 10 times the speed with some unheard incidents and for those who didn't get a chance to read the book would thoroughly enjoy the movie.

I was quite curious to see Zaphod's characterisation in the movie and found it really convincing. One of the most hilarious sequences in the movie was the fly swatter one where a fly swatter appears from nowhere and hits anyone on the face Vogsphere who tries to think originally. The entire crowd burst out in laughter during this scene. Quite not sure if most of the crowd were Doug Adam's patrons of the book. Aparently, this scene was written by Doug. Adam specifically for the movie version.

I felt the original plots described in the book have been shrunk in the movie to an extent that it lost it's wit, humour and intensity. Particularly, the scenes where Zaphod's spaceship is attaked by a thermo-nuclear missile when they try to land on Magrathea, the book version is far better than the movie version.

Finally, The $6.50 that I spent for the movie was indeed worth while ! whilst, the $12 for "Mumbai Express" was a complete waste of money.

How to survive a Code Walk-Through

I trod on this funny piece recently, originally from here:

"
A) Wrong.
Submitted code:
#include
main()
{
printf("hello, world\n");
}
Minutes of Review. Attending: Parity Stob (Programmer), Bill Dull (Token Peer Group Representative), John Straight (Testing), Ron Little (Design/Chair), Cheryl (Minutes).
1. Bill Dull said that Parity Stob had forgotten to do an opening comment. Ms Stob replied that she didn't think that it was necessary with so short a program. Mr Dull said, 'It may be obvious to you what it does, Parity, but it won't be so blooming clear to the poor man that's got to maintain it. I haven't been an AP/2 for 15 years without learning anything.'
The meeting actioned Ms Stob to add an opening comment.
2. Ron Little noted that the "hello, world\n" string was not capitalised, as it was in his design document pseudo code. Ms Stob pointed out that it was not capitalised in the master design document, from which Mr Little's document was derived. Mr Little stated that the master design document fell beyond Ms Stob's remit.
The meeting actioned Ms Stob to capitalise the "hello, world\n" string.
3. John Straight enquired if printf() returned a value. Ms Stob believed that it returned the number of bytes written to stdout. Bill Dull observed that it was company policy (and had been for 15 years) to collect all return values. Ms Stob enquired what the Dave Allen she was supposed to do with this return value once she had collected it. Ron Little reminded Ms Stob that the purpose of the meeting was to discover errors, not to correct them.
The meeting actioned Ms Stob to record the return value from printf().
4. Ron Little asked, 'What if printf() fails?' Ms Stob replied...
(Minutes continue in this vein for several pages)
...actioned Ms Stob to obtain a printout on nice green and white stripey paper.
The meeting adjourned. Ms Stob has 74 actions against her, plus one oral disciplinary warning (level 1). The code is to be formally re-reviewed, when Ms Stob has actioned the actions.

B) Right.
Submitted code:
#include
man()
{
printf("hello, cheeky");
}
Minutes of Review. Personnel as before.
1. Ron Little said, 'Talk about Freudian slips; isn't it main (), not man (), hur-hur-hur, eh Parity?'
Ms Stob replied, 'Yes Ron, you're right, what was I thinking of.' John Straight said, 'You were still distracted when you typed the string!'
Ms Stob couldn't think what had come over her. Bill Dull said that the } was out of alignment. Ms Stob was covered in confusion.
Ron Little said that, technically speaking, the meeting should minute actions against Ms Stob, but - hold on a sec. Cheryl love - since it was Our Parity, we'd say no more about it.
2. Bill Dull said he would go ahead and get them in at the EEPROM and Eaglet. A pint of Best, a monkey-juice for John and two halves of cooking lager top for the girlies, all right?
Ms Stob said that the girlies would have vodkas and tonics, thanks Ron.
3. The meeting adjourned. On the way out, Ms Stob winked at me.
"

Pleasant Surprise !

This happened around the weekend. Out of thin air I received this email and thus the email thread:

"
From : Aruna x madhav19 at the raet %$^&*!# preiod com

Sent : Friday, April 15, 2005 9:59:03 PM

To : sbeashwar at the raet htomali preiod com

hello!

How are u?What are u doin now?May be u r in touch with a few of ur school classmates but I don't think there's any rapport with the school.

Hope ur music is still on.Pls. keep me posted.

Aruna maam,SSK.

"

yeah...! I have intentionally obfuscated the email address; beware of the mean world out there.

my first thought ! who is this intelligent spammer ? why in the world would my 10th standard math teacher try to get in touch with me :-)

My response:

"

Well, this is rather un-characteristic of the Aruna madam that I knew. Sounds more like a prank thrown by someone that knew both me and Aruna madam.

In anycase, I want to give you the benefit of doubt. With all due respect; please establish your identity by answering the following questions.

1. What was my 10th standard 1st midterm score on math ?

2. If that is difficult :-) tell me what was my street address when I live in abhiramapuram(I know that only she knows this and not any of my friends)

Or, is this the act of some super intelligent spam bot ?.... :-)

Vaithee

"Paranoia is Paramount"

"

got this reply :

"

Hello!
Iam the same Aruna maam(with or without respect)Butunfortunately I think I'll fail the test you've given me.The greatest mystery is 'what's so uncharacteristic'?? we had an alumni meet onFeb.thirteenth,your batch being represented by satish andHarikrishnan.
It was much later that Krithika's father came to school to re-establish ties on her behalf.

As I've succeeded inestablishing mail-contact with her,you happened to be the next victim.

I still can't figure out what' amiss in my mail.I can only give anirrelevant ans.to the qns. posed by you-----that I associated you as being a relative of Harini Kamesh!!
Though I can recall a visit to your house in abhiramapuram,I am unable to pin down on the street.
anyway if you feel convinced about the authenticity of my identity I would appreciate it if there could be some kind of a regular mail-contact atleast.
With best wishes,
Aruna maam.

"

My response:

" Oops.. please pardon my paranoic sensitivity !

Lot of things about your email led me to think that it was not genuine.

1. First, why would Aruna madam try to establish contact after 10 years ?

2. The irrelavant email address....(Some people still use the email facility provided by their ISP)

3. No subject line

4. The "uncharacteristic" part; use of chat abbreviations "u" "ur"..etc (she is not known to be this casual)

Moreover, my email box has been pounded with a lot of span of late. Particularly the classic Nigerian 419 scam has been driving me nuts, it invariably escapes all the freaking spam filter on the face of this earth.

....

....

"

the responses are actually reconstructed for the stupid hotmail does not retain sent emails by default. My immediate suggestion to my math teacher was to use my gmail address for correspondence. That reminds, yahoo too has increased it's email storage to 1GB but yahoo's email interface is so bad that you barely feel like using it, unlike Gmail, they give you the storage and also help you use it effectively.

Ok, what did we learn ?

Not all emails are spam particularly, not all those that seem like spam are spam.

Sometimes your knowledge about spamming becomes counter productive like in this case. Having said that, I've seen a lot people falling for the "Mr xyz you have won a ticket to Las Vegas" type emails.

No matter how intelligent a spam filter is, it will fail. This is a good test case for all those people trying to build a super intelligent spam filter.

The best spam filter known on earth for now is the one powered by the human brain. I can go on like this forever but, I can already see people trying to get on with their work which I will leave them to...so please carry on but, return later for more incessant rants, raves and reviews filled with repartee.

ok thats enough for today ! No no... not done yet :-)

I was watching this 6th ODI between India and Pakistan till 3 in the morning, I am now quite convinced that these matches are all spectacularly stage managed by the supremo of BCCI and the governments of both the states involved. India supposedly, being one of the best batting side in international cricket crumbles in 32 overs, all these seem like perfect non-divisive, harmonious politics...foul play, I mean (with much howling and gnashing of teeth). I am not going to blame them for wasting my time, that's my prerogative, I would watch India/Pak match even if it is setup, it's like watching WWF :-) I feel BCCI can make the matches more interesting if they can get Ganguly and Inzy shout at the microphone like the hulk hogans and the bambam bigilos pretending to be billegerent with ravi shashtri in between at his expressive best.

Ok, now this episode's contest question.. how many times did I use the word "Spam" first 3 entries will get the previlege to view an exclusive screening of my next post :-)

Now, this is desperation ! the height.

Life is full of lessons

I learnt a good lesson in my life yesteday. I don't want to divulge into the details. But, I can't resist saying this; Human Relationships are one of the most complex things that I've ever come across in my life, its all fuzzy, one thing that I find very difficult to understand. I have not discovered anything new, its all said and experienced by people who lived before us. But, if you don't want to learn it the hard way, here it is:

"
nirmana-moha jita-sanga-dosa
adhyatma-nitya vinivrtta-kamah
dvandvair vimuktah sukha-duhkha-samjnair
gacchanty amudhah padam avyayam tat



TRANSLATION


Those who are free from false prestige, illusion and false association, who understand the eternal, who are done with material lust, who are freed from the dualities of happiness and distress, and who, unbewildered, know how to surrender unto the Supreme Person attain to that eternal kingdom.



PURPORT



The surrendering process is described here very nicely. The first qualification is that one should not be deluded by pride. Because the conditioned soul is puffed up, thinking himself the lord of material nature, it is very difficult for him to surrender unto the Supreme Personality of Godhead. One should know by the cultivation of real knowledge that he is not lord of material nature; the Supreme Personality of Godhead is the Lord. When one is free from delusion caused by pride, he can begin the process of surrender. For one who is always expecting some honor in this material world, it is not possible to surrender to the Supreme Person. Pride is due to illusion, for although one comes here, stays for a brief time and then goes away, he has the foolish notion that he is the lord of the world. He thus makes all things complicated, and he is always in trouble. The whole world moves under this impression. People are considering the land, this earth, to belong to human society, and they have divided the land under the false impression that they are the proprietors. One has to get out of this false notion that human society is the proprietor of this world. When one is freed from such a false notion, he becomes free from all the false associations caused by familial, social and national affections. These faulty associations bind one to this material world. After this stage, one has to develop spiritual knowledge. One has to cultivate knowledge of what is actually his own and what is actually not his own. And when one has an understanding of things as they are, he becomes free from all dual conceptions such as happiness and distress, pleasure and pain. He becomes full in knowledge; then it is possible for him to surrender to the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
"
Source: Bagavath Gita

A software engineering analogy :

Life is the abstraction, classes are creations of GOD, instances are living things. If there is a lot of behavioral/social dependencies, we are tightly coupling things; which is bad. Decoupled decentralized implemenations are always better and provide better stability. Hope I didn't screw up in this attempt :-) never mind, I sometimes try too hard and doesn't work always,though.

Well with all those things said, make no mistake; I am far far away from renouncing all earthly pleasures ! I wish I could it's just another wish like wanting to get into Google(yeah..ironical). To my immense gratification I am able to appreciate how profound and deep rooted these writings are that our ancestors left us. You have a problem with your life, you can almost certainly get an answer (look up Google :-) )

But on the contrary if we have all the answers then what are we looking for ? which means we are looking for something but we don't know what that is !! this is now boring..... let me get some sleep now.

Fool's day !

Has never been this foolish !

Google Gulp quenches your thirst for knowledge and comes in flavours ranging from Beta Carroty to Glutamate Grape. This was the best part:

"Google Gulp and Your PrivacyFrom time to time, in order to improve Google Gulp's usefulness for our users, Google Gulp will send packets of data related to your usage of this product from a wireless transmitter embedded in the base of your Google Gulp bottle to the GulpPlex™, a heavily guarded, massively parallel server farm whose location is known only to Eric Schmidt, who carries its GPS coordinates on a 64-bit-encrypted smart card locked in a stainless-steel briefcase handcuffed to his right wrist. No personally identifiable information of any kind related to your consumption of Google Gulp or any other current or future Google Foods product will ever be given, sold, bartered, auctioned off, tossed into a late-night poker pot, or otherwise transferred in any way to any untrustworthy third party, ever, we swear. See our Privacy Policy"

and what ! someone already started to trade Google Gulp Caps on ebay.

Next, Gmail's Infinite space thing, that funny free hand explanation for infinite space +1. The whole "Quota" counter thing was cool, If you notice closely it is basically AJAX and time in transition. However, Google's all time best is "Pigeon Pecking".

Ironically Google introduces new genuine products at round about the same time of the year, I think that is just to fool their competitors :-)
I like their perspective<=>philosophy towards life<=>work, should be really exciting to work for them, I wish I could !

Next was the Malwarlaria.B virus, supposedly the first lethal computer virus that spreads through humans. Folks, I need a break... I mean have to take a leak now.

The best one of the day, I was communicated my annaul appraisal rating today, I wish this was a Fool's day joke.

Most heart breaking, Paris Hilton named by the Open Source Development Legue as their next recruit in a bid to gain maximum exposure for FOSS, I personaly feel this is the joke of the year, so does Stallman.

Last, the iCopulate almost drove me crazy but, turned out not be a joke.

Oh..man this is getting out of hand, serious proof of water on mars !