/DEV/ZERO

Slides for the talk I give to students

Direct link :

https://docs.google.com/present/view?id=dffkwqq_27cqdjbbdj

I never thought i will be saying this, but after decades in waiting we finally have the innovative product Steve Balmer keeps talking about. And I have to admit its so simple and yet so amazingly "how did i miss that" innovation, it qualifies to be a downright genius.

Microsoft Instaload for AA and AAA batteries that lets you load batteries in any way you want

Why didn't _I_ think of that?

Atlast MS will have atleast _one_ actually valid patent.

Here are the links for original article

For slashdot article click here 

For orig story at windowsfordevices.com click here

Here is the Slashdot story :

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/06/28/151228/Supreme-Court-Throws-Out-B...

The courts always seem to have an upper hand in doing the RightThings(TM). The decision doesn't really impact India per say. But it does impact the economy that matters to IT Inidians anyway. This can very well be the beginning of the end of the ridiculous software patents. It was about time for some official entity to ridicule these.

Here is a detailed analysis from "End Soft Patents" :

http://en.swpat.org/wiki/Bilski_analysis_of_Supreme_Court_decision.

The USPTO has circulated this MEMO afterwards :

"Examiners should continue to examine patent applications for compliance with section 101 using the existing guidance concerning the machine-or-transformation test as a tool for determining whether the claimed invention is a process under section 101. If a claimed method meets the machine-or-transformation test, the method is likely patent eligible under section 101 unless there is a clear indication that the method is directed to an abstract idea. If a claimed method does not meet the machine-or-transformation test, the examiner should reject the claim under section 101 unless there is a clear indication that the method is not directed to an abstract idea. If a claim is rejected under section 101 on the basis that it is drawn to an abstract idea, the applicant then has the opportunity to explain why the claimed method is not drawn to an abstract idea."

 Badly missing couple of books i lost to termites a few years back

१. तोत्तोचान

२. देनिसच्या गोष्टी

Does anyone have a copy of these( in marathi ) ?

Totochan is avialable in english still, while a website hosts english version of "Adventures of Denis" but i lost the link (how could i :( )

UPDATE: Recovered the link. I should archive the pages somewhere in case the site disappears.

http://home.freeuk.net/russica2/books/den/book.html

'ओळखलत का सर मला' पावसात आला कोणी

कपडे होते कर्दमलेले केसावरती पाणी.

क्षणभर बसला नंतर हसला बोलला वरती पाहून:

'गंगा माई पाहुणी आली, गेली घरट्यात राहून

माहेरवाशीण पोरीसारखी चार भिंतीत नाचली

मोकळ्या हाती जाईल कशी बायको मात्र वाचली

भिंत खचली चुल विझली होते नव्हते नेले

प्रसाद म्हणुन पापण्यांमधे पाणी थोडे ठेवले

कारभारणीला घेवुन संगे सर, आता लढतो आहे

पडकी भिंत बांधतो आहे. चिखल गाळ काढतो आहे'

खिशाकडे हात जाताच हसत हसत उठला

पैसे नकोत सर, जरा एकटेपणा वाटला

मोडून पडला संसार तरी मोडला नही कणा

पाठीवर हात ठेउन नुसते लढ म्हणा.

After searching a lllooootttt and waiting for a loooong time; few weeks back I finally bit the bullet and deleted a large number of spam comments from the drupal site. 

Its really frustrating that drupal doesn't offer easy way to delete comments

E.g.

• all comments from a partcular node
• comments which meet particular criteria (e.g. name=blah or date < this day and > that day
• all comments :D

(Please let me know such a module if it exists).

I had to resort to editing the backend database myself by hand (in SQL). The donwside was, while deleting about few hundred thousands of them i may have deleted a few genuine.

I actually noticed one comment missing from one of the blog node pages. Since it was particulalry critical of me i didn't want the author to think i deleted it on purpose. But there was no way i could remember exact comment to recreate it.The solution as always was the mighty google. I just searched few words i remembered from the original comment in google cache and bingo... a cache entry poped right up. (so the comment is now recreated and unfortunately redated).

Scary goolge keeps watch on me.... i wonder when this stops becoming a help and starts becoming a threat.

उंची न आपुली वाढते, फारशी वाटून हेवा ।
श्रेय ज्याचे त्यास द्यावे; एवढे लक्षात ठेवा ॥

ती पूर्वजांची थोरवी, त्या पूर्वजांना गौरवी ।
ती न कामी आपुल्या, एवढे लक्षात ठेवा ।।

जाणते जे सांगती, ते ऐकून घ्यावे सदा ।
मात्र तीही माणसे; एवढे लक्षात ठेवा ॥

चिंता जगी या सर्वथा, कोणा न येई टाळता ।
उद्योग चिंता घालवी; एवढे लक्षात ठेवा ॥

विश्वास ठेवावाच लागे, व्यवहार चाले त्यावरी ।
सीमा तयाला पाहिजे; एवढे लक्षात ठेवा ॥

दुप्पटीने देतसे जो, ज्ञान आपण घेतलेले ।
तो गुरूचे पांग फेडी; एवढे लक्षात ठेवा ॥

माणसाला शोभणारे, युद्ध एकच या जगी ।
त्याने स्वतःला जिंकणे; एवढे लक्षात ठेवा ॥

One more proof that we are getting there :D

I tried to play a movie in totem and it crashed in gstreamer!!! tried to analyze the problem but no luck. All libs were at latest versions, i even reinstalled them from cache but nothing worked. Heh even rhythmbox gave the same problem.

And in the end solution turned out to be a good old style reboot Ha ha ha!!!! We are surely getting there.

UPDATE: The problem seems to be random ram errors (pun?). A quick memtest showed quite many error, am still investigating further. doesn't seem to be ubuntu's fault after all.

I created a small controversy a few days ago with my status line changed to "Exciting times ahead !!!" .... Well the time is here (and a time for explanation).

Yesterday was the last day for me at calsoft, my now "x" employer. I am joining the core team of a three year old startup "Cameo" with an agenda of expanding its horizons to new domains and ventures.

It feels great to be back in the game of thrilling ideas, challanging innovations and almost assured uncertainty.

As allways this will be the only exception post keeping in line with my policy of not blogging about it.

This post is suppose to travel straight through to twitter and facebook !!!  

It seems like a pretty good, well engineered service. But its always sad that in 21st century we still need third party services to join two communication networks.