Vs
I have spent the last week debating with myself and some of my unfortunate friends on the above issue: Which one to buy?
Monday, November 13, 2006
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
Tuesday, November 07, 2006
Proof by oddity
Got this the last time I ran fortune.
Proof techniques #2: Proof by Oddity.
SAMPLE: To prove that horses have an infinite number of legs.
(1) Horses have an even number of legs.
(2) They have two legs in back and fore legs in front.
(3) This makes a total of six legs, which certainly is an odd number
legs for a horse.
(4) But the only number that is both odd and even is infinity.
(5) Therefore, horses must have an infinite number of legs.
Topics is be covered in future issues include proof by:
Intimidation
Gesticulation (handwaving)
"Try it; it works"
Constipation (I was just sitting there and ...)
Blatant assertion
Changing all the 2's to n's
Mutual consent
Lack of a counterexample, and
"It stands to reason"
Proof techniques #2: Proof by Oddity.
SAMPLE: To prove that horses have an infinite number of legs.
(1) Horses have an even number of legs.
(2) They have two legs in back and fore legs in front.
(3) This makes a total of six legs, which certainly is an odd number
legs for a horse.
(4) But the only number that is both odd and even is infinity.
(5) Therefore, horses must have an infinite number of legs.
Topics is be covered in future issues include proof by:
Intimidation
Gesticulation (handwaving)
"Try it; it works"
Constipation (I was just sitting there and ...)
Blatant assertion
Changing all the 2's to n's
Mutual consent
Lack of a counterexample, and
"It stands to reason"
Friday, November 03, 2006
More 360 bashing
By the way my previous 360 review doesn't hold. It seems that the game on demo is rendered only at a paltry resolution of 600x600 (info courtesy Rahul). Don't know why the Microsoft guys made such a dumb move.
Thursday, November 02, 2006
Me Delhi trip
I somehow managed to sneak around 12 days of holidays (begging and borrowing from here and there) and went to Delhi on Diwali. Few of the highlights of the trip include:
- Getting a bird's eye view of Diwali from up above the clouds. I'm not much of a cracker burster so I didn't miss doing that and yes if I had done it then I would probably be behind bars right now. By the way the aerial veridct is that the Delhi Diwali was much more festive and polluting than the Bangalore one.
- A defunct school reunion which happened on the next day I landed. I don't blame anyone, but it was a failure.
- I have gained a more than passing interest in income tax, mutual funds and the stock market. Reason being: I hate channel surfing and my PC was down, so this was the next best thing to do.
- I attended a rock concert (courtesty Rakesh) and didn't quite enjoy it that much. First, I hadn't heard a single song which the bands were playing (given that they were Indian and I don't listen to heavy metal) and second I couldn't grasp a single word they were saying (given that they were Indian and I don't listen to heavy metal). One new revelation which did come out of it was that of the Mosh Pit. If you are even .000093 % sane you won't be in one.
- Finally, Air-Deccan can't be relied upon to take you anywhere on time. You may reach before time or after time but never on.
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Long shot
I have spent a major portion of my college life playing multiplayer games on our LAN (ah.. those memorable days, afternoons, nights.) and arguably I was the best in house. Yes I was beaten many times, but my win percent was always high.
Anyway, anyone who is a gamer knows the value of a sniper. Be it when you are on top of the tower in "CTF-Face" (Unreal Tournament) or when you have the AWP in your hands in "Dust" (Counter Strike) You will be the most hated person by the opposition and the most valued by people (bots??) on your side. Anshul even prided in calling himself "Sniper-Krishna", because there was once a time when no one could get rid of him while playing in CTF-Face. That is no one ... other than me B-)
And then there are the classic snipers from the movies: "Saving Private Ryan", "Enemy at the gates", "Phone booth", "Behind enemy lines" (yes there is a very short sniper sequence during the end of the movie and we have watched it enough times to notice), "Band of brothers", all highly coveted positions. Of course of the lot the best sniper (according to me and Anshul) is the one in "Saving Private Ryan".
So, now having ascertained that we are huge sniper fans, when someone shows me this, my reaction is: "Damn! I got to have that thing."
Quick link thrown in as an after thought: Making your breakfast more interesting.
Anyway, anyone who is a gamer knows the value of a sniper. Be it when you are on top of the tower in "CTF-Face" (Unreal Tournament) or when you have the AWP in your hands in "Dust" (Counter Strike) You will be the most hated person by the opposition and the most valued by people (bots??) on your side. Anshul even prided in calling himself "Sniper-Krishna", because there was once a time when no one could get rid of him while playing in CTF-Face. That is no one ... other than me B-)
And then there are the classic snipers from the movies: "Saving Private Ryan", "Enemy at the gates", "Phone booth", "Behind enemy lines" (yes there is a very short sniper sequence during the end of the movie and we have watched it enough times to notice), "Band of brothers", all highly coveted positions. Of course of the lot the best sniper (according to me and Anshul) is the one in "Saving Private Ryan".
So, now having ascertained that we are huge sniper fans, when someone shows me this, my reaction is: "Damn! I got to have that thing."
Quick link thrown in as an after thought: Making your breakfast more interesting.
Monday, October 16, 2006
Ehh.. 3 more
Two movies and one gaming console. Here goes:
Pyar Ke Side Effects
Pros: Witty dialogs, Mallika Sherawat's acting.
Cons: The movie drags on a bit too much, Mallik Sherawat's acting.
Verdict: Average
Dor
Pros: Shreyas Talpade stands out! His mimicry is a refreshing change. Everything else.
Cons: None
Verdict: Damn good!
XBox-360
Ok this one won't be like the above two, because its not a movie and because I'm a computer guy.
The XBox-360 is Microsoft's attempt to get the gaming console into the Indian houses. If you take a look the Sony Playstation has been here in India since quite some time, but Sony never marketed it like Microsoft is doing (I hope you have seen the Akshay Kumar/Yuvray Singh ad). I had the opportunity of using the X-Box 360 recently in one of the many shops they were being demo-ed. So what is it like?
Not good!
I think the console is over-hyped. People come in already believing that the graphics are mind-blowing. For example the guys who were before me on the demo-stall were already like "Wow! Look how cool the graphics are!!" when the initial game video was playing!! Before I go on, I would like to point out that those guys were satisfied by the video alone, because they couldn't navigate the menu to actually play the game :D
I, of course, could.
The demo consisted of the X-Box 360 console (which comes in a slim gray cabinet a la the Dell cabinet) , the X-Box 360 controller and an exquisite 27" Samsung plasma monitor. The game on demo was some racing game whose name I forget.
So after navigating the main menu and starting a new game, what do I see? Jaggies!! A whole bunch of them. The anti-aliasing was rather bad. Now I don't know whether the X-Box 360 or the game was running on a low-performance setting, but that is what I saw and if they are going to show me something like that in a demo I won't take their side >:) and will assume that it was running on full steam.
I finished the race coming 2nd, but not liking what I saw.
The only good thing is the controller. It fits in my hands nicely and gives a nice force-feedback, but again I will be frank and say that this is the first controller which I have laid my hands on (which has force-feedback) so I'm bound to like it.
X-Box 360 is priced at 24K (including the controller). The one which comes with the wireless controller is priced at 27K (which includes a 20gig hard drive) and as Rahul pointed out: "You won't be playing on a 27" plasma, but on a 21" CRT (!!), so the quality is bound to decrease further from the demo." Other than that each game title costs around 2.5 K.
So what should you do if you have already saved a bit of cash for the 360? Well... assuming you already have a PC, an AGP slot (if not a PCI-X), and some green goodies: buy a massive Nvidia graphics or ATi card and live life in peace.
Pyar Ke Side Effects
Pros: Witty dialogs, Mallika Sherawat's acting.
Cons: The movie drags on a bit too much, Mallik Sherawat's acting.
Verdict: Average
Dor
Pros: Shreyas Talpade stands out! His mimicry is a refreshing change. Everything else.
Cons: None
Verdict: Damn good!
XBox-360
Ok this one won't be like the above two, because its not a movie and because I'm a computer guy.
The XBox-360 is Microsoft's attempt to get the gaming console into the Indian houses. If you take a look the Sony Playstation has been here in India since quite some time, but Sony never marketed it like Microsoft is doing (I hope you have seen the Akshay Kumar/Yuvray Singh ad). I had the opportunity of using the X-Box 360 recently in one of the many shops they were being demo-ed. So what is it like?
Not good!
I think the console is over-hyped. People come in already believing that the graphics are mind-blowing. For example the guys who were before me on the demo-stall were already like "Wow! Look how cool the graphics are!!" when the initial game video was playing!! Before I go on, I would like to point out that those guys were satisfied by the video alone, because they couldn't navigate the menu to actually play the game :D
I, of course, could.
The demo consisted of the X-Box 360 console (which comes in a slim gray cabinet a la the Dell cabinet) , the X-Box 360 controller and an exquisite 27" Samsung plasma monitor. The game on demo was some racing game whose name I forget.
So after navigating the main menu and starting a new game, what do I see? Jaggies!! A whole bunch of them. The anti-aliasing was rather bad. Now I don't know whether the X-Box 360 or the game was running on a low-performance setting, but that is what I saw and if they are going to show me something like that in a demo I won't take their side >:) and will assume that it was running on full steam.
I finished the race coming 2nd, but not liking what I saw.
The only good thing is the controller. It fits in my hands nicely and gives a nice force-feedback, but again I will be frank and say that this is the first controller which I have laid my hands on (which has force-feedback) so I'm bound to like it.
X-Box 360 is priced at 24K (including the controller). The one which comes with the wireless controller is priced at 27K (which includes a 20gig hard drive) and as Rahul pointed out: "You won't be playing on a 27" plasma, but on a 21" CRT (!!), so the quality is bound to decrease further from the demo." Other than that each game title costs around 2.5 K.
So what should you do if you have already saved a bit of cash for the 360? Well... assuming you already have a PC, an AGP slot (if not a PCI-X), and some green goodies: buy a massive Nvidia graphics or ATi card and live life in peace.
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Three more
So here I'm again trying to amuse my audience (if any of it remains) and myself. So what do I have this time around in my bag of goodies? Well here goes..
With terrorism on the rise how do you educate people to take preventive measures? Well .. you show them pictures and hope that they don't misinterpret things.
It had always been a childhood dream to integrate emacs into the browser, so that I would be able to edit all the text areas with the help of the razor sharp editor :) A recent discovery lets me do just that.
There are normal ways to have tea and then there are some people who like to take some effort in doing the exercise.
Among other things I'm trying to learn how to drive (ride??) a bike (as in a bike with gears, I consider all things without gears a disgrace) so that on the long run I can buy a bike, drive (ride??) it, and not be at the mercy of the Bangalore auto-wallahs (who are the biggest dipshits I have encountered and till now there have been no exceptions)
With terrorism on the rise how do you educate people to take preventive measures? Well .. you show them pictures and hope that they don't misinterpret things.
It had always been a childhood dream to integrate emacs into the browser, so that I would be able to edit all the text areas with the help of the razor sharp editor :) A recent discovery lets me do just that.
There are normal ways to have tea and then there are some people who like to take some effort in doing the exercise.
Among other things I'm trying to learn how to drive (ride??) a bike (as in a bike with gears, I consider all things without gears a disgrace) so that on the long run I can buy a bike, drive (ride??) it, and not be at the mercy of the Bangalore auto-wallahs (who are the biggest dipshits I have encountered and till now there have been no exceptions)
Monday, October 02, 2006
Sunday, October 01, 2006
Stumbling through the weekend
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
Nightly enlightenment
Just came back from a fancy diner nearby which specializes in *cough* continental food. So you get into this place with all kinds of fancy light effects, plush interiors, the odd hukka lying in the corner. Don't know if this is the correct spelling for hukka, and anyway they don't call it hukka anymore. The newer, fancier name is "Sheesha".. you know like the mirror where you can see your reflection and all. Its just like that, except that you have a pipe coming out and you can actually get flavoured smoke doing rounds of your lungs if you suck on that pipe. You can share the pippette around with your friends, because you would be crazy if you could finish the hukka alone and also you would be crazy to go to a *cough* continental place alone and of all the things in the world start having a hukka... I mean what more could be wrong with you?
Anyway coming back to the previous thread of discussion, contrary to popular belief, smoking hukka doesn't make you high, of course if you are someone like Auto, then it will.
Wait! what was I talking about?
Ahh... the *cough* continental place.. yes.. So we (notice the "we", because I'm not a crazy loner like you) went in. Our ordering strategy was something like this:
1) Look hither thither.
2) Look down on the menu.
3) Randomly hit at three spots on the menu .. and thats it.
Food comes, we eat. *cough* a bit more and leave. So what did I learn out of all this?
Well.. nothing. Thanks for wasting your time.
Anyway coming back to the previous thread of discussion, contrary to popular belief, smoking hukka doesn't make you high, of course if you are someone like Auto, then it will.
Wait! what was I talking about?
Ahh... the *cough* continental place.. yes.. So we (notice the "we", because I'm not a crazy loner like you) went in. Our ordering strategy was something like this:
1) Look hither thither.
2) Look down on the menu.
3) Randomly hit at three spots on the menu .. and thats it.
Food comes, we eat. *cough* a bit more and leave. So what did I learn out of all this?
Well.. nothing. Thanks for wasting your time.
Sunday, September 17, 2006
Vista RC 1
Rahul, having nothing else to do, downloaded Windows Vista RC 1 and has been generous enough to post some screenshots on his flickr account (which I have conveniently lifted and posted here). Word of caution, the guy has a monster graphics card, so lesser mortals are advised against doing such stunts:
My attempts at drawing
As it is quite apparent from my previous two posts: I can't draw. It was not always like this though.
I still remember that at one time in my life when I was in 5th standard, I actually won a painting competition organized in our colony. My drawing consisted of a teacher teaching a classroom full of students (or eggs, depending on who looked at the painting). That was the time I actually drew for fun (and won something for it).
Then came the time when we had this "commercial" art thing in school, where we were supposed to draw alphabets (!!), pots, different kind of obscure shapes etc. That was the time when I started losing interest in drawing.
Anyway, coming back to today or rather yesterday, when I bought this drawing ka book from a shop in Church street. I started reading and I was bowled in the 1st chapter itself.
I realized that I couldn't draw two freehand similar looking round shapes, however hard I tried. I sucked... big time. I filled up almost 4 sheets of paper with round shapes and not any two of them looked the same.
I guess I will try this for a few more days (As it is I do very little in the evenings, except read books). A few more pages won't do any harm.
Talking of drawing, slashdot had this link to a program called teddy created by a Japanese programmer which converts 2D hand drawn images into 3D (!!) Pretty interesting.
I still remember that at one time in my life when I was in 5th standard, I actually won a painting competition organized in our colony. My drawing consisted of a teacher teaching a classroom full of students (or eggs, depending on who looked at the painting). That was the time I actually drew for fun (and won something for it).
Then came the time when we had this "commercial" art thing in school, where we were supposed to draw alphabets (!!), pots, different kind of obscure shapes etc. That was the time when I started losing interest in drawing.
Anyway, coming back to today or rather yesterday, when I bought this drawing ka book from a shop in Church street. I started reading and I was bowled in the 1st chapter itself.
I realized that I couldn't draw two freehand similar looking round shapes, however hard I tried. I sucked... big time. I filled up almost 4 sheets of paper with round shapes and not any two of them looked the same.
I guess I will try this for a few more days (As it is I do very little in the evenings, except read books). A few more pages won't do any harm.
Talking of drawing, slashdot had this link to a program called teddy created by a Japanese programmer which converts 2D hand drawn images into 3D (!!) Pretty interesting.
Saturday, September 16, 2006
Weekend till now
- Munnabhai 2: Thumbs up! Rest is up to you to find out.
- Also got to look at the Dhoom-2 trailers and it too looks promising.
- Beer
- Bought three books: One fiction, One technical, One Arts(!!)
Result: Substantial amount of green leaves exhausted :(
P.S: The scanning happened at an angle. Its not a mistake ... its art !!
Friday, September 15, 2006
Innovation replicates
My humble tribute to the masters. Well I have little to do or blog about, but I like to think that I think.
Monday, September 11, 2006
Your neighbourhood pixel city
This is not only huge, but also for some reason reminded me of Lego bricks and Google maps.
Sunday, August 27, 2006
Compress and waste
Bangalore has now become a small place. It won't take you to be a genius to bump into people from your not so distant past. Especially with the kind of people our college nurtures and kicks out every year: The "aawara" types.
Also with the number of software companies recruiting and henceforth increasing the influx, something like this is bound to happen. Not that I'm complaining. I welcome the company of the enlightened souls, from the past, into my present.
The list includes Anshul, Auto, Naagu, Lino, Alan, Siddharth, Venkata, Pylee, to name a few. This list, of course, is not complete and I expect it to be ever expanding.
Having such a companionship does have its benefits, in that you can spend your weekends fruitfully... uh.. yeah.. well.. mostly... that is, if the fruit is beer.
The interesting thing is that Bangalore is blessed with pleasant weather all throughout the year, and you would rarely feel thirsty. But that doesn't stop people from hitting the pubs. But then thirst is really not the reason people drink, is it? Nah..
Hmm.. I went and started conjuring up new theories, so I will end with a non sensical note, just to show that I haven't lost my insanity.
If you ever have the fortune of going abroad, please do the following exercise:
a) Find a sufficiently crowded place.
b) Start doing Bhangra or any random desi dance move.
c) People will start thinking that you are part of a bollywood movie and actually stand and watch.
d) You can then proceed and deliver autographs at your leisure to the poor unsuspecting foreigners. Maybe even be kind enough to be a guest in a local talk show. Who knows what fame will bring you?
Ah... the pleasure one can get in wasting other people's time.
Also with the number of software companies recruiting and henceforth increasing the influx, something like this is bound to happen. Not that I'm complaining. I welcome the company of the enlightened souls, from the past, into my present.
The list includes Anshul, Auto, Naagu, Lino, Alan, Siddharth, Venkata, Pylee, to name a few. This list, of course, is not complete and I expect it to be ever expanding.
Having such a companionship does have its benefits, in that you can spend your weekends fruitfully... uh.. yeah.. well.. mostly... that is, if the fruit is beer.
The interesting thing is that Bangalore is blessed with pleasant weather all throughout the year, and you would rarely feel thirsty. But that doesn't stop people from hitting the pubs. But then thirst is really not the reason people drink, is it? Nah..
Hmm.. I went and started conjuring up new theories, so I will end with a non sensical note, just to show that I haven't lost my insanity.
If you ever have the fortune of going abroad, please do the following exercise:
a) Find a sufficiently crowded place.
b) Start doing Bhangra or any random desi dance move.
c) People will start thinking that you are part of a bollywood movie and actually stand and watch.
d) You can then proceed and deliver autographs at your leisure to the poor unsuspecting foreigners. Maybe even be kind enough to be a guest in a local talk show. Who knows what fame will bring you?
Ah... the pleasure one can get in wasting other people's time.
Thursday, August 17, 2006
Results out...
and I passed. Our university did a grand job of letting us hang by the thread, playing with our feelings and giving all of us a lot of false alarms (as usual). The result was supposed to come out "tomorrow" around 2 months back, but it came today... so.. uh.. whatever..
So now I can sleep peacefully and not have dreams where I get 3/100 (serious) and find out that I lose my job because of that.... gave me the creeps the other day.
The results getting published also means that I have to make the grand trip back to Cochin and meet the familiar faces which are slowly fading away. So that should be nice.
Other than that I managed to blow some of my salary by doing some shopping. Both the amounts (amount spent and salary) are strictly confidential and are left as an exercise for the reader to speculate :P . The clue is that I brought 3 shirts and an iron.
Peace.
So now I can sleep peacefully and not have dreams where I get 3/100 (serious) and find out that I lose my job because of that.... gave me the creeps the other day.
The results getting published also means that I have to make the grand trip back to Cochin and meet the familiar faces which are slowly fading away. So that should be nice.
Other than that I managed to blow some of my salary by doing some shopping. Both the amounts (amount spent and salary) are strictly confidential and are left as an exercise for the reader to speculate :P . The clue is that I brought 3 shirts and an iron.
Peace.
Wednesday, August 09, 2006
What's new?
The blog post frequency has literally fallen to an all time new. I myself am not visiting my blog to see how many hits I have got (hey cmon.. everyone does that) and ergo increasing the hits. I didn't see any movies in the past weekend, so I don't have any movie reviews to bore you with. I did go to a 5 star resort as a part of a company trip. I have a few photos from that trip, but I will show you the one that matters (rest are inconsequential):
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