My last Post

The first post in this blog starts off by describing my aspirations in life and the purpose of my visit to USA.

Personal goals and preferences change with time... and so does mine. After a fabulous 7-year stay in United States, this may be the perfect time for getting back to my homeland (India), and achieve my entrepreneurial dreams while staying close to family. So, here I am in Chennai - India.

March 15 is my last working day in American Airlines as a Programmer Analyst. Now, I'm marching towards creating something BIG by entering into the world of business.

This is the last post for this blog... to mark the end of my stay in USA. Now, this blog of mine can be regarded as biography of my life in United States. I will keep you all posted of my ventures in India with a whole new blog (Cognitive Insight).

Thank you all for reading my blog... and Au revoir :)

This blog statistics as on March 18, 2010:
First Post was on Aug 9, 2003
Last Post on Mar 17, 2010
Total Posts published: 471
Total unique visitors: 68241

UPDATE: My new posts are at "Cognitive Insight"

Back to home

Back to home (Chennai - India)!!!

Timeline of Life

Check out Rise of Life at National Geographic!!

New-Gen Marriages in India

Analysis vs Instinct! Whats ur pick? For a girl in love marriage, she has to love the guy n thats all it takes to marrying him! But in arranged marriage, she usually considers the guy to be a part of the package deal (family, location, job, etc). She will go ahead with the marriage if she likes the package. A question to ask is if she will still be willing to marry him without the package deal and just for him... If so, that will be the best of both worlds:) Ofcourse, same applies for a guy too!!

Its instinct vs analysis! Love marriage is more of instinct n infatuation... while arranged one is based on analysis n prediction. Both have their plus n minus~ Luckily, the current gen in India is adopting a hybrid culture to bring out the best in both worlds - "Instinct after Analysis"...

Its similar to arranged marriage, except for the concept of platonic dating prior to engagement. Its a perfect time to break the ice, build a rapport, exchange flashbacks and build confidence in one-another. If things go good, the next step will be marriage. Otherwise, the search continues... It all sounds like an algorithm for a happy marriage :)

Couple of Love quotes I'm impressed:
You don't marry someone you can live with - you marry the person who you cannot live without. - Unknown Author

If you love somebody, let them go; for if they return, they were always yours.
And if they don't, they never were. - Kahlil Gibran

Related posts: Logic and emotion in decision making of a marriage

Aim of Life for Wanna-preneurs

Here is a very good pic I found while browsing the web. This pic represents my true intent and that of several other wannapreneurs... Click to enlarge!

5 Ways to Scale Your Web Application

Writing web applications is a time consuming process, and when the application begins to get popular, it may not have been built to scale and handle volume. A great example of this is Twitter, a popular web 2.0 application that often has downtime. Here are some ways you can build your application with scaling in mind.

1. If you can, build your application with scaling in mind from the ground up. Write tighter code, test it against perceived loads, and continually try to lower the amount of time and resource usage required to run the application.
2. Build your application on cloud computing. Services like Amazon's Cloud computing service allow you to host your code, databases and files on their servers, and can scale instantly with your demand. It also saves you money in the long run, as you don't need to constantly plan to build new servers, database clusters and bandwidth.
3. If you're not using cloud computing, try using a grid hosting company. These are companies that can give you instant access to more resources as soon as the demand rolls in. The difference primarily lies in the pricing – cloud computing companies charge based on actual usage, while grid hosting companies will charge based on the amount of "slices" you need to meet your requirements over a month.
   
4. Optimize your databases and queries. If you're not a true expert in Databases, hire a freelancer to optimize your code. Correctly writing queries, caching queries that are run often, and correctly building the structure of your database can make or break a web application.
5. Use reusable, well documented code. Try not to reinvent the wheel –find classes and functions that have already been proven in the field, and use them for the heavy lifting part of your projects. Use frameworks and coding methods that have already been proven, and don't try building a heavy use platform on new or untested code.
   

This is a guest post authored by Maya Richard, who writes on the topic of high speed internet. You can email her at mayarichard@gmail.com with any feedback.

Mind Matters

I just heard the discourse by Swami Swaroopananda on "Mind Matters". Its an excellent speech as you can expect from the great master. Here is a snippet of his teaching. Please listen to the original discourse on CD if possible.

When matters matter, matters mind; When mind minds, matters don't matter.

If the body is unattended... it stinks! does'nt it? It needs daily bath, deos, etc...
What would happen if the mind is unattended. Mind is the real treasure, and the body is just a casing around it. So, Mind Matters!

Why is that we want anything that we want. In my case and most others, it starts with Education.
Why Education? To get a Job
Why Job? To earn Money
Why Money? To buy Things
Why things? To get Happiness!
Why Happiness? ? ? No answer. Thats final!

We only want something, so that we can finally be happy. Afterall, we are all seeking anything that can lead to happiness.
Education -> Job -> Money -> Luxury -> Happiness!
Music -> Melody -> Peace -> Happiness!
...

In this ever-changing world, can there be permanent happiness? As a child, we seem to be happy but cry all the time. As an adolescent, we live with a hope of happiness. Finally as adults, many sadly conclude that there is no happiness.

There cannot be ONE situation in life that can give happiness to everyone on the planet. So, When matters matter, matters mind.

Our wisdom gurus (rishis) have taught us the art of right contact of the mind with the world. Happiness and Joy does not depend on the objects and situations in the world, but it depends on the condition of our mind. So, When mind minds the mind, matters don't matter.

As our mind, so is the world.
The world we experience is according to the condition of our mind. If the mind is joyful, the world appears beautiful; If the mind is depressed, the world appears gloomy. You can compare it to perspectives of a man who has fallen in love, and the man who just got dumped.

Life is a series of experiences, and the whole world is a pair of opposites (Heat-Cold, Joy-Sorrow, Beauty-Ugly, etc). Even if sorrow comes, it is not permanent and it has to change. Nothing is permanent and everything changes. Whatever happens, consider it as the lord's wish and it happens for the best. If we can fine-tune our mind around this concept, we can have a positive perspective towards Life and stay happy all the time.

Attitude of our mind is very crucial. An optimist/realist will look out for opportunities, while a pessimist looks out for calamities. Everyone of us have a limited self image. When the mind decides that we cannot do something, we will not even try it. Only when we break the barriers in our mind, we can shoot for the stars.

Here is a famous joke. According to laws of aeronautics, flight is impossible for a bumble bee due to its huge body and tiny wings. However, the bumble bee does not know about this and continues to fly. Like the bumble bee, we should forget the constraints and "Just Do It". On a similar note, watch out for the movie YesIsTheNewNo by Jim Carrey.

Eventful trip to India

After my return from a fabulous trip to India, I find myself in doldrums. I had a great time during my sister's marriage (in India)... Though two weeks is too short a trip for this joyous occassion, I still had a blast. The only stuff I did during my trip (Sep 27 - Oct 12) was to eat, have fun, and sleep. Good times~

Check out my Sister's website for updates on her wedding photos, and the rest.

We like in circles!

We all want something... As mentioned in pluggd.in, its the Circle-of-Life. A wants B, B wants C, C wants D, and you know... D wants A. Here is a good AD.

Expressing in Sanskrit is now more fun

After the success of Sanskrit-Digest, we are now offering a couple of fun ways for students to express in Sanskrit on the web.

In a survey, a consistent pattern was noticed among several Sanskrit students. Many students in India study Sanskrit during their school days, but they do not get an opportunity to speak or use the language after graduation. As a result, they forget the language very soon.

These students should be given opportunities to converse in Sanskrit on a regular basis, and they should be fun too. So today, we're launching Sanskrit-Expressions - An online community tool that will enable interaction among Sanskrit learners. It has two components to it: Word-Game and Two-Liners.

The Word-game helps the users build their Sanskrit vocabulary steadily, while the Two-liners will encourage them to frame short-sentences and converse in Sanskrit. Further, the users will have complete control over their data (create/update/delete) at all times. One can also keep track and follow other writers via RSS feeds. These tools are proven to be effective tools in the past, and are used in several domains. Now, they are available to the Sanskrit community for the first time.

I conceive this as a proof-of-concept to fix a commonly observed problem which hinders the spread of Sanskrit. If user response for 'Sanskrit-Expressions' is on a high note, new features such as Online-Chat-Rooms shall be soon be launched.

Thanks to the sincere efforts of several NGOs such as Samskrita Bharati which enabled many to embrace Sanskrit in their daily lives. Regular Sanskrit workshops are conducted by Samskrita Bharati in India and abroad. With increasing number of Sanskrit teaching institutes, it is now important to retain the interest of the people and help them stay in touch with the language. Engaging in Satsang and community-meet is a good way to appreciate the language. For the Computer Savvy, online tools like 'Sanskrit-Satsang' can help build an e-Community for Sanskrit speakers.