TOPPER

As the calender year is approaching its last-days, we could find the top 10 stories of 2003 at every news portal. I found a good article in Computer World that lists the 'Ten Stories That Rocked Your World'. There is another article in MSNBC 'Science highlights of dark mysteries' that enumerates the top 10 breakthroughs in Technology. Here is CNN's list 'Top sci-tech stories of 2003'. A lot more articles are yet to be discovered....

CHRISTMAS TIME...

Y'day, I had a nice time at Rajesh anna's home. As soon as I entered his house in the morning, I could find a well-decorated christmas tree placed in the living room and also a few changes to the home-settings. My brother's friend's family joined us for lunch and we all had a fun-filled chat soon after.... In the dusk, we spent our time watching a DVD movie ("Bruce Almighty") and then, I came to my appt late night...

SPENT THE DAY WITH MY COMP`

Nothing much today... I was just installing the drivers and a few applications to my laptop. It was infact like a house-arrest... I was medling my comp for the whole time at home. Anyway, I went shopping to Super Target and Alberston in the early morn and got some tasty cakes, cookies and an apple pie at the post-christmas sale. Thats all for today~

INDRA - TOO GOOD A MOVIE...

Today, I saw the movie "INDRA" for the 2nd time. What a movie... Its just great. Hats of to the entire team and special hats to Chiru. Its a great piece of action-display by the Mega Star. I am now really disappointed for having missed his latest movies "Tagore" and "Anji". May be I will watch them during my summer hols in India. Just cannot offord to miss them ~

WHAT MAKES A COMPANY GET ON TOP...?

Suddenly, I started to ponder over what factors make an I.T company to get on top of the world. Infact, this could apply to any company... (I.T based or non I.T based). I listed out the following 9 factors for success... I could get this insight from various articles that I have read...

1. Play it positive... A recent survey of 300 CEOs found that corporate managers are showing a growing interest in boosting company revenue rather than just cutting costs.

2. Marketing- Bring together business process expertise and information technology expertise. Knowledge is power… Act smart to the market demands. Plan ahead and be first to get the market-information on your table. Act fast and on a timely fashion. To be at the right spot at the right time matters the most. With this regard, Bill Gates has been a very smart entrepreneur…

3. Focus on a wide scope of customers (BIG, MEDIUM, and SMALL). "The IT industry's not the same old industry we've been used to in the last 10 or 15 years...This is a customer-driven industry, not an IT-driven industry based on what the industry thinks is right" IBM's chief financial officer, John Joyce said.

4. Good Human-resource management. Effective Team organization & team efforts, Simple organizational structure, Fun filled environment and highly energetic & capable developers.

5. Time bounded service delivery. Punctual in its business operations such as product delivery dates, milestones, etc… Have a leeway for the process completion before setting the deadline.

6. Quality Product development. Quality of the product should be given the paramount importance. Don't settle for anything less. "A lot of time is saved if things are done right the first time" as said by the entrepreneur Steve Jobs.

7. Good Customer support. The management should always be accessible to the clients and its customers. This includes post-delivery product support.

8. Deliver Wholistic Products... Customers are increasingly seeking packaged solutions to specific business problems rather than making technology purchases in a piecemeal fashion.

9. Simplicity of usage (user-friendly and simple). The product should give minimum workload for its users and easy to understand interfaces. On observation, we will notice that Microsoft products deliver an exceptional user-friendly interface. This is why Microsoft stands out from the rest… and has successfully monopolized the O.S industry.

GREAT GOING I.T... KEEP UP THE PACE !

The I.T industry has started to climb up the same ladder that it has once got down. I.T markets have now stabilized and started making growth to reach the peak spot. I got the info from the MSN.COM which states that ....According to a survey made by the Bureau of Labour Statistics (BLS), the top 7 fastest growing occupations projected for 2000 to 2010 are all I.T based jobs. They include

1. Computer Software Engineers, applications

2. Computer Support Specialists

3. Computer Software Engineers, software systems

4. Network and Computer Systems Administrators

5. Network Systems and data communications analysts

6. Desktop publishers

7. Database Administrators.

Thats a good news to all of us... especially for students like me who will step into the industry within a year. Great going I.T.... Keep up the pace !

80/20 principle...

Today, I read an article abt the 80/20 principle in MSN, which said that 80% of the success is brought by the first 20% of the effort. This is a very true observation made by an Italian Economist Vilfredo Pareto. This article triggers in me, yet another observation made by a famous entrepreneur -Steve Jobs. He said that a lot of energy is saved if you do things right the first time.

But, mind you.... The last 20% of your efforts is that which will distinguish you from the rest. Your accomplishment will stand out from others and goes beyond your predefined objectives only if the concluding 20% of your total efforts are put right. So, I could conclude that the initial 20% and final 20% is what matters the most. If these lie on the right path, the filling is always a smooth sailing... and accomplishment is sure to happen ~

LOOKING UP AT THE DOWNTOWN...

For the first time in 4 months of my stay in Dallas, I visited the Dallas Downtown. I had nice fun travelling by "DART" transport, changing buses, boarding the metro trains and trying to discover routes by reading the map. I was accompanied by my friends Vijay and Govi all through my trip. Vijay was the one who travelled twice by DART earlier to this trip. So, he guided us in catching the right bus/train. Actually, the process of finding the right one is very simple. At any point of time, we can call the toll-free dart number for help, and they would guide us in planning our trip.

The Dallas Downtown is too good... (obviously). From here, we boarded a train and had our way to Plano Downtown... then we got into a bus to reach Collin Creek Mall. We killed our time there... and to give a final touch to our trip, we tried to visit the temple at South Irving... But we could not find it out. May be next time, I need to ask my seniors for the exact location of the temple before starting our trip from the univ. It was a great day at the end. On returning home, we tried to check out our grades from my univ server... but the server was shut down... It was a nice day at the end.

THE MUCH AWAITED LAPTOP

The delivery date of my laptop as mentioned in the DELL official website is December 8, 2003... but the delivery time was not mentioned. So, I had to sit at home waiting for my laptop in the morn. In the afternoon, I was accompaniedby my friend Vijay for lunch. Soon after we had our lunch, I slowly started getting impatient and restless to stay at home... Suddenly, I heard someone knocking my door firmly. I opened the door, and it was indeed the delivery guy. I was infact waiting for this "knock knock" since morning. I put my signature on an electronic tool and got my laptop delivered.

Vijay and I opened the parcel, got my laptop out and, we quickly connected it to the adapter. We then plugged it into the socket and switched it ON... The Windows XP home edition came up and we could start working on it straight away. The keyboard is damn good and it just requires a feather-touch to press a key... but I felt uncomfortable handling the touchpad (which was a replacement for the mouse). May be I'll get used to it very soon... ~ Later in the evening, I went shopping and on returning to the univ, I registered for a Wireless connection from my laptop to my campus server. Thanks to dad for letting me get such a wonderful laptop...

MERA BHARAT MAHAAN

I just came across an interesting article in "The Economic Times" about "Brand INDIA", written by Kumar Mangalam Birla (Chaiman, Aditya Birla Group). Check out this link: http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/msid-331534,curpg-2.cms. It makes every Indian proud of his nation... and there are lot more related articles written by various other Big-Shots of INDIA. Check them out ~

HOLIDAYS - ITS JUST THE BEGINNING

All my exams got over today... and my holidays start off from tommorow. A lot of interesting things to do during the hols... having big plans to master all the flavors of JAVA by the end of Spring'04 semester. So, I need to start learning them right away... Having had the basics of Mobile computing, I am greatly fascinated towards "Pervasive Computing". I am also having in mind to develop a technical survey paper on this area of Computing, and later try on simulating / programming the possible solutions under the guidance of my professor. Hope my prof considers me for an independent study in this area of computing... Right now, I am just waiting for my laptop to be delivered to my appt ~

A VERY DIFFERENT DAY !...

I enjoyed my bday... though being away from home. In the morning, I was woken up by my mom's phone call, and then all my near & dear ones wished me on my bday... My friends Ajit and Vinodh also called me, but I was not there at home to receive their call... However, I got their message recorded in my voice mail.

At 10:30 am, I chatted with my parents with my webcam beside me... They all greeted me and were happy to see me in new clothes. Later in the day, I had my lunch at my brother's home, made some shopping at Walmart and then, had a nice nap on returning home. I spent my evening by studying at the library... Overall, its been a nice day ~

SEARCH FOR A PIC ...

Just trying my options of changing the look and feel of my blog site. Not the format nor the template.... just the picture at the left corner of this site. I spent some time browsing at the pictures at google as a quickie break from the studies. Still looking on for a perfect pic... Plz mail me if u have one !

A COSTLY BIRTHDAY GIFT....

10 more hours to go for my b'day... and on today morn, I got the birthday gift parcel from my parents... The gift was sent by Fedex... Hey! Fedex service is really wonderful... and too punctual. The parcel was delivered at my door step at sharp 10:30 am as mentioned in the website.... In the gift box, I could find delicious sweets from the best sweet shop in Chennai... more than 4 freaky T-shirts, few documents,sweaters, CDs, books and other stufff... Its a great gift from my parents and sis. Thanks a lot ! They are tooo good !

A costlier gift is... a laptop. I found a nice deal for a laptop with the highest config seen so far from Dell . There was a $450 rebate for 5150 model of Dell Inspiron series. So.... I was fast to act on it. I got permission from my parents....At once, they agreed and gave me complete freedom to purchase the stuff... I then spoke to Rajesh anna regarding the config and discussed with him about how good was deal. Finally... we all decided to get that laptop. It was overall a spontaneous and a fast decision taken to purchase this laptop....

I NEED TO REBEL AGAINST MYSELF !

While being in solitude, a question just propped up in my mind... Am I SUFFICIENTLY pro-active ? ? ? Thanks to Rajesh anna for all the motivation he has given me... I know for sure that I have been pro-active to accomplish many of my goals. Doubtlessly, I am in the path of getting high on life.... But now, I am pondering over 1 question... Can I accomplish things at a faster rate? The answer from me to this question is YES YES YES. I feel like rebelling over the bounds that I have set for myself. Having purchased a laptop now, I am looking forward for a great progress at a faster rate for the times to come ~

A lot more could have been done during this Fall semester in addition to my academics, but I failed to hasten my progress... I could have mastered all flavors of JAVA, or I could have gained expertise in VC++ or C#.... I could have worked on a project on mobile applications out of self interest... But, I only concentrated hard on academics and the grades, and prioritized others later in the list... I actually had the intent to specialize other skills apart from academics, but time just passed away faster than I could realize. Anyway, I am happy to have realized the fact pretty soon. I have lot more time and opportunity to explore. Now my immediate target is to gain mastery in Flavors of JAVA by the end of Spring'04 semester. I am literally challenging myself to achieve it.~ The light courses that I have taken for Spring'04 semester will help me to accomplish this task with ease...

PREPARING FOR THE WINTER

Today, I went with my bro, sis-in-law and vini to Allen mall, where there were nice deals on show... I desperately needed a protective wear as the winter is approaching quickly... So, I purchased a winter jacket (Tommy Hilfiger) which was sold at half its price at its wearhouse outlet. On our way back home, we dropped by Starbucks coffee parlour, and a toy store to make few small purchases. Lastly, we had a small fudge cake together at my home.... It was a nice day ~

DOCUMENT IT !

Its a routine activity to document every stage of development while building a computer based application for a project. We document the progress to record the outcomes of the experimental trials during project development. Why not it be applied to LIFE. Living a lifestyle itself is an experimental project... why not document the progress? ? ? Ya ya ... I mean exactly what u r thinking of... Why not maintain a personal diary in which we record all our personal feelings clubbed with unspoken words from our inner voice. Its a nice fun when we browse through the writings later in course of time. Maintaining a paper-based diary is always a pain in mind. But now with the advent of blogsites, maintaining a personal weblog is very easy...

So, I thought of creating a personal blogsite (not to be made public) for my personal reference and also to document my unspoken feelings and thoughts. This is very much different from this blog site where I express my thought to the outside world. It will be a nice fun to browse through my writing when I feel bored. A lot can be recalled tooo...

WHY NOT THERE BE A SECRETS-TELLING DAY ? ? ?

We have days for every silly thought possible. Why not there be a day for people to uncover all the secrets that they managed to hide throughout the year. This is a nice thought as long as people reveal the true secrets. Anyway, such a day can also be treated as a day for surprises and unexpected revelations from the unexpected ones. WARNING !!! The day is sure to end with surprises, but no guaratees abt merriment...

A better thought is ... celebrating SECRETS DAY on April 1st, so that we can merge this day with FOOL's day. A revelation can smartly be converted into an act of fooling a person after observing the post-expressions of the listener. HOWZZZZZ IT !!!

GREATE DEALS ! ! !

Great deals were offered today (the day after Thanksgiving).... I got up early and went to my friends' appt at around 6:00 in the morn. But to my surprise, no one opened the door... may be they were fast asleep or they might have left for shopping... Well~ anyway! I went to the nearby shopping centers by walk. I had my way straight to "Super TARGET", made a glance at the offered deals , and got the items in my list placed into the shopping cart. They were just personal stuff ... CD/mp3 player, skull-cap, geans and a webcam. Atlast, I got myself a webcam that my parents suggested me to get it long time back. I got a fairly good deal out of them. I spent nearly 2 hrs shopping at TARGET.

Then, I went to STAPLES which is located just beside TARGET... I found an amazingly good deal - HP Digital cam for $99. I bought it at once ... having in mind that my dad wanted to get one... Got to wait & hear my dad's response to this ...!

THANKS ... GIVING ... DAY !

Happy Thanksgiving day to all my dear ones.... ~ This day is very well celebrated here in US. Actually, I liked the motive behind celebrating the Thanksgiving day - we wish people to express our gratitude or thankfullness for all that they have done to us. I feel that celebrating this day makes more sense than any other commercial-oriented days. Well... Lot of great deals out there for the thanksgiving day... I have just a small list of items to purchase. Catch u later ~

GLAD NEWS !

My friend Ajit has got a scholorship for the spring and summer semester' 2004 at TAMU (Texas A&M University). I just got a mail from him today abt this surprising news. He must have been a lot happier than everyone... Great job Ajit !

WATCHING THE WHOLE NIGHT PASS BY !

I was awake the whole of last night to complete my project in AOS. It was just a night before the day of submission, when I realized that my project's architectural design was incorrect. So, I had to make changes to the design logic, and the corresponding code right away. I worked on the code that whole night. At 4:00 AM, I and my friend came out of our lab to feel the chilliness in the breeze outside. As I opened the door and placed my foot out of the building, a cold wind blew across my face, making me shiver for a second. Well.... it was refreshing, and then we returned to our lab.... and finally it was at 10:40 AM, when i got my desired results. Thank god... my efforts were not wasted.... Altogether, it was a damn good experience ...

FEELING HOMELY !

Its after 2 days that I chatted with my parents this morning (obviously using the yahoo messenger)... and i feel comfy after that... Chatting with mom, dad and sis has been a part of my daily routine. Sometimes... I feel that I can afford to miss any of my routine activities, but never miss chatting with my parents & sis. Even after 3 months of stay away from home, its hard for me to live without chatting with them every morning... Infact, that's the first thing that I do in the morn ~

BTW, my sis suggested me to use a special kind of service provided by www.skype.com, which incorporates a better voice-chat technology than any of the usual messengers. Infact Skype uses P2P Telephony (peer-to-peer) to connect an individual to other users - not to share files this time, but to talk for free with family & friends. I downloaded it today... may be I shall try it out tommorow ~

3 IN 3 DAYS... THREEEE MUCH !

My 3 acad-projects should be... and will be completed by the end of 3rd day from now. Very busy until then.... and very little work thereafter ! Meanwhile, I am thinking of various options to carry out my Masters.... taking up a thesis option (or) will an independent study serve me enough? ? Take a semester break for interns or find one for summer...? Take 4 courses this sem or settle down for 3...? May be...I need to discuss these ones with my acad-advisor and seniors..... and bug them with my questions~

FINALS...

Today, I had the final exam for the course 'Mobile Computing Systems'... The examination lasted for 75 minutes... and the questions had only a little relevance to the actual content of the course. Most part of it was meant to test the creative thinking in us to solve a mobile communication problem. This is infact an interesting approach as there are no fixed answers to the questions. Hmmmm ! Awaiting for the results...

BOREDOM IN AND OUT...

I dont know whats happening... i am just feeling bored with a lonely feeling within... Looking eager for the December hols to come soon! Let these 20 days fly away faster than normal. I have noticed 1 thing... Blogging sometimes pulls me out of boredom. Expressing my feelings and opinions in my blog and reading other blogs make me feel comfortable very often. ~May be this is the reason why, blog sites are mostly maintained by students (especially... the ones away from home).

VERY FEW TO CHOOSE FROM....

Oooops ! Very few high quality courses were offered this semester.... I could hardly short list 4 good courses out of which 3 has to be selected. I am left with no choice .... taking both my pre-requisite courses and one core course for this semester. They include Computer Networks and Probability & Statistics as pre-reqs and Computer Algorithms as my core course. I guess my friend Vinodh accompanies me for the Algos course and Vijay for the Probability course... Hoping to be left with ample time next sem...

CHATTING.... WITH MY FRND

Its was 6 months ago when I last chatted with my friend (Best friend once upon a time), Ramya... and it was today again... the Yahoo messenger did the service. She is doing good and is loaded with tons of work in her MBA program. The same is the case here with me... Work load to its max~ May be all Graduate programs are never different.

FREE STUFF...

As long as I am with my friend Govi... no problem in finding free stuff! He is too good at finding free stuff give-away spots in my campus and informs us about them~ Hmmm ! I just had a few cookies at the Dance program and doubtlessly, we were led by our free-GURU, Mr. Govi Pulliah...

DALLAS OR MADRAS ? ? ?

I fell into a state of dilemna of whether to stay here in Dallas for my summer hols and find an internship for myself, OR go to my home-city (Madras, India) for my 3-month vacation. ~ After a deep thought, I firmly decided to (Guess what ? ? ?)....

FLAVORS IN GOOGLE ...

I was aimlessly browsing the net this afternoon ... and to my surprise, I found a link to Google search engine's experiments page. Click http://labs.google.com to view the flavors of Google. Well done... Google~

LOOK AND FEEL..... GOOD OR BAD ? ? ?

Just to boost up the look and feel of my blogsite, I was experimenting with the layout designs and the color choices. I finally opted for this layout with a "wheat" colored background after spending more than an hour in working on its html codes. Hope this gives a better appearance than the previous ones... Feel free to let me know your remarks~

HEAT OR COLD! ! ! WHICH IS BETTER ?

We had 1 full week of chill weather with temperatures dropping down to less than 25F. Though withstanding the chill temperatures is not very easy for a usual Indian, I still enjoyed the experience... switching ON the heater and packing myself with fanciful jackets, sweaters, sweat T-shirts, jeans...! After a whole week of cold weather, today has been a day with its usual heat as one could expect in Dallas. The temperature controller is put back to its cooler mode of operation and the I got dressed in cotton T-shirt and shorts... However, I enjoyed and had more fun in the cold rather than the heat.

CHANGING MY STANDPOINT

As the academic pressure over me is building up in the form of programming projects and homework assignments, I had to change my standpoint from which I view these tasks. Earlier, I considered them as challenging tasks and worked towards achieving them. Though this viewpoint has created some motivation for a limited period of time, it infact created more stress in me to complete them. Now, I had to switch to another prominent standpoint where, I consider the programming projects as an exclusive opportunity to learn new languages & implement what I have learned. I should enjoy by programming rather than considering it as an academic pressure. I shall enjoy in doing what I have to do rather than being worried abt working over it.

MESSAGE TO INDIA BY LESTER THUROW...

Please click on the link below to have an insight to the article titled "Message to India" by the MIT economist, Lester Thurow. http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/wo_hariharan102903.asp
He has expressed a very note-worthy opinion about what India lacks now and what the government should emphasize in the upcoming years. Do not miss it !

THANKS TO YAHOO

Thanks to the Yahoo and the webcam technology... I could join my sister's b'day party and join the fun with my family members via web-cam and voice chat on yesterday. I spoke to my parents, grandparents, pini, babaye, my brother and my sisters. My bro (Pranavesh) and my little sis (Sindhu) were feeling very happy on speaking with me after a long time. It was nice to watch my sis (Veena) cutting the cake and celebrating the moments.

FAMILY

Do you know what Family means?
I just got an email from my friend (Santosh), in which he has defined the phrase as

FAMILY= FATHER AND MOTHER, I LOVE YOU
Thats interesting...

FOREVER - Dont use it

"FOREVER" is a funny term. Nothing is in our hands to retain the state forever. So, its always better to replace that phrase with "INDEFINITELY".

BE YOURSELF - The only way to enjoy LIFE

Least bother about what others think of you... Be yourself ! This is one of the most impressive features of American culture. On following this principle, we will soon experience the total freedom to enjoy life (but ofcourse, adhered to the society manners & rules). This is in contrast to the society-consious Indian way of living. Some good from here, and some good from there... make up the perfect life-style!

GREAT FUN ~

Yesterday, I had great fun celebrating the festival with friends, but sad on being away from my parents. Anyway, I called up my parents, grand parents, uncle, aunt and my cousins in India and wished them a fabulous festive time. I started the day by having my breakfast consisting of 1/2 dozen sweets and savories offered by the 'Internation Student Services' office in UTD.

I spent the rest of my time in the computer lab until 6:00 in the evening and then, my friends and I went to the nearby shopping area. It was here that we had a remarkable time with jokes and laughter for the next few hrs. It was 10:00 pm when we backed to our appartment and had dinner. We soon left to the open-floor dance event organized at the PUB in my university. It was nice fun .... When the event was over, we all went to the lab as usual. We had to quit the lab at 2:00 am, but we had a laughter-filled chat for 1 more hour in the open-air near the parking lot of UTD. I finally had my sleep at 4:00 in the morning. It was a nice experience...

HAPPY DIWALI ...

Wish all of you a very happy diwali. Enjoy this 'Festival of lights' with lots of fun and happiness...~

WHAT I LEARNT IS ...

What I learnt in this 2 months of stay in US:

Lesson 1: Observe everything happening around you.
Lesson 2: Be interactive and clear even the silly doubts you have. Its better to clear the doubts rather assuming and doing things wrong.
Lesson 3: Be challenging and take every work you get to perfection.
Lesson 4: Be confident in what you have done.
Lesson 5: Workhard and always finish you work in Time.

YOUR GIRLFRIEND

I just got this article from the internet. It sounds very practical and funny... Its all about YOUR GIRLFRIEND .................

This piece is meant for all the boys and for only those girls who take it cool ... ~
Which type of woman is your girlfriend?"
Is she an ....

INTERNET woman: Woman of difficult access.

SERVER woman: Always busy when you need her.

WINDOWS woman: Everyone knows that she can't do a thing right, but no one can live without her.

EXCEL woman: They say she can do a lot of things but you mostly use her for your four basic needs.

SCREENSAVER woman: She is not worth for anything, but at least she is fun!

RAM woman: She forgets everything you say when you disconnect her.

HARD-DISK woman: She remembers everything, FOREVER.

MULTIMEDIA woman: She makes horrible things look beautiful.

USER woman: She messes up everything she does and she asks always more than she needs.

CD-ROM woman: She is always faster and faster.

E-MAIL woman: Every ten things she says, eight are nonsense.

VIRUS woman: Also known as "wife"; when you are not expecting her, she comes, installs herself and uses all your resources. If you try to uninstall her you will lose something, if you don't try to uninstall her you will lose everything.

INTERACTIVE ANIMATIONS

Check out these links.... They are interactive animations...

http://www.trevorvanmeter.com/flyguy/

BUSY IN FREE TIME !

Hmmm! With all my mid-term exams getting over and just 1 project to be completed, the comming week is expected to be more relaxed and lightly loaded. This lets me to put off the academic pressure for a while. But, I may start working on some programming languages to make myself time-packed. Getting busy in a given free time is always a pleasure to me, but the vice-versa is a pain in the neck. . .

THE MISSILE MAN

Let us all wish our president on his birthday... Send in ur message to him directly by clicking on the link :

http://server1.msn.co.in/newpollvote/post.asp?QuestionID=3239&pollid=1488

THE COOLEST ONE

Its a very cold day today.... infact the coolest of all days during my stay in US. My first step out of my home today was in the morning at 9:00 am for jogging. It was a chill weather and the cool breeze over me made things worse. My hands started trembling in cold and i started rushing to the building as quick as possible. The same weather persisted ... forcing me to use a jacket the whole day~

2 OVER AND 1 TO GO...

Two of my mid-term exams have got over till date.... and 1 more to go! The exam held today was pretty cool. Its an open book test infact... But, the answers obviously are not in the book ~ Time is going interesting...

PICNIC TO FOSSIL RIM

I had a great time today with Rajesh anna's family at Fossil Rim. Its an Animal Safari located far away from the city (nearly 1 and 1/2 hr travel from my univ). The animals were left free to move in a forest-like environment and we could get into the safari in our own wagon. There were no lions and tigers ofcourse~ We fed the animals and lots of photos were taken.... A nice fun at the end. Thanks to anna...

NOTHING WORKED OUT TODAY...

Hmmmm ! At the end of the day, I just realized that nothing was working fine... Nothing worked my way today... Hope there is something wonderful awaiting for me tommorow....

THE MIXER

In the afternoon, I've been to the student-faculty mixer program organised by the ECS dept. There was a get-together lunch buffet (American food style), and a small game to mingle the gathering. The food was as usual bad as one could expect from an American lunch buffet. Overall, it was nice fun with gifts being given away to all students at the end . . .

GREAT WEEKEND !

It was after a long time that I met Subramanium uncle and aunty today. We had lunch together at Madras Pavillion, a very famous veg. Indian restaurant in Dallas. Later in the evening, anna had to leave to Deteroit... Soon after he left, we all went to 'Cottonwood Park' located around a lake, in which a few ducks swim across. The cool breeze accompanied with patches of sunlight between the trees created a pleasant ambience for me to relax out from my academic stress. I had a very nice time with all of them this weekend. . . It was a very nice feeling~

JOB-SEARCH SEMINAR

Today, I had the opportunity to attend a seminar by Bradley Richardson, author of the national best-seller JobSmarts® for TwentySomethings (Random House) and JobSmarts® 50 Top Careers (HarperCollins). The seminar was very informative as he was describing the most dynamic unconventional methods of resume writing and interviewing for job search. It was a new approach, which he explained with clarity and enthu... The seminar lasted for one and half hour with some time alloted for the questions at the end of his speech. A lot of hints were thrown at us, and it was upto us to put them into action ~

ART OF LIVING

A concert was organised by Art of Living group at the student union in my university. The concert was played by a guitar professional who also made us sing along with him in chorus as he played a few Indian tunes. It was nice fun. . . Later at the end of the concert, we had some silence observed (something similar to meditation), after which I found much of peace within and experienced a nice feeling... A lot of fruits were also offered meanwhile. Ofcourse, need not mention that America is a land of mouth-watering fruits...

THE INTERNET REBORN

Hey... i read an interesting technological update about replacing the Internet with something faster, more secure, and vastly smarter. Welcome to PlanetLab. The project is called PlanetLab, and within the next three years, researchers say, it will help revitalize the Internet, eventually enabling you to

• forget about hauling your laptop around. No matter where you go, you'll be able to instantly recreate your entire private computer workspace, program for program and document for document, on any Internet terminal
• escape the disruption caused by Internet worms and viruses-which inflicted an average of $81,000 in repair costs per company per incident in 2002-because the network itself will detect and crush rogue data packets before they get a chance to spread to your office or home;
• instantly retrieve video and other bandwidth-hogging data, no matter how many other users are competing for the same resources;
• archive your tax returns, digital photographs, family videos, and all your other data across the Internet itself, securely and indestructibly, for decades..

Its interesting .. isnt it? Awaiting to use it....

THE INSCRUTABLE AMERICANS...!

When I was reading the book titled "The Inscrutable Americans" written by Anurag Mathur, I just had a thought of including this in my blogsite. I feel that the book is a hilarious satire on both Indians and Americans. The author greatly describes the true feelings and crazy doubts lingering in the minds of Indian students who have come to US. I recalled the memories of my personal experiences here in America, as I kept turning the pages of this book. I do suggest every indian student aspiring of comming to US to read this book. Hope your trip is not as screwed up as the one of Gopal ( the main character in the book)

STRESS RELIEVED

At last... i submitted my AOS (Advanced Operating System) project today ! But soon... my prof gave us the 2nd project to be submitted next month. I need to hurry up in getting a strong hold on Threads in C and Java... and ofcourse theory too~

THE CAREER FAIR

It was the first time for me to enter a CAREER FAIR. I had with me few copies of my resume in my backpack. The fair was held at the Activity centre of UTD. The entry process was pretty simple. I just had to register my name and show up my univ ID to enter the hall. The officials then handed to me a few papers which contained information about the companies which had its participation in the fair. This set of papers was the key for me to know more about each company and its contact info.

At the fair, there were nearly 50 companies.... and out of them, I could spot out 2 famous well known ones. Each company had its desk and separators inbetween one another. It was more like an exhibition in Madras. I handed over my resume to many of the company officials and enquired abt the internship programs and CO-OPS. I spent nearly 2 hrs in the hall and felt it worthy.... Finally, i went home carrying a lot of brochures and free stuff ...

THE STORY BEHIND THE MOON BELIEF

If you look up tonight, you will see a pretty full moon. Among the 12 occurrences of full moons in a year, the full moon in August(in lunar calendar) is one of the most important days for the Chinese around the world, next to the Spring festival only. It is called "Mid-Autumn Moon Festival" which has a similar meaning as Thanksgivings in US.

It is the date that the families get together, chat together, laugh together and have dinner together with specially-made moon cakes in this beautiful moon night. I know that I am away from my family, and cannot get together today in US. All that I can do is to see the moon at night knowing that the beloved others are seeing the same moon today, and quietly missing each others. Happy moon festival for all of you . . .!

DO U WANT UR WISH COME TRUE ? ? ?

heY... I got an interesting news from my sis today. Its about a simple trick to make a wish come true. TRY THIS OUT. . . But, this works only for tonight (Aug 10, 2003). Those who are late reading this message, u have missed trying it. ~All that we need to do is to look straigt at the full moon and make a wish. It appeared silly to me but who knows... angels may be everywhere in a hyper-active state tonight. But now . . . what to wish for ? ? ? My mind is going blank :-)

THE SPLENDID MOON

Tonight, i just happened to look at the moon and found it to be very wholesome and splendid. It had a unique glow around it and a red border at the circumference of the glow. I called on my friend and asked him to have a look at it, but he only commented it to be a usual scenario. I dont know why... the moon appeared so unique to ME tonight.

F.R.I.E.N.D.S

I met my friend Ajit who is doing his M.S in Texas A&M University. We had a gala time last 2 days, roaming about in Dallas, and also chatting a lot about our new experiences in US. The week-end went on ... great ! We imagined how spledid it would have been, if rest of our friends were here toooo. Hope they join us next sem.

FITNESS FIRST

Today, I had my morning jog and some running on the thread-mill (gym) soon in the morn. Hope this works out . . . so that I can go early to bed and early to work from tommorow.

BUSY TIMES AHEAD

Today, I had a big project assigned by my professor. The project report need to be in the international standards... It needs a lot of research, coding, designing, analysing and proposing a new solution to the given problem. As the project details for my other courses being assigned, I seem to have busy times ahead.

FREE COOKIES . . . AND LOTS OF FUN

"An Emerging Leadership Program" was the name which drew my attention in the UTD schedule. So, I attended the program to see what it is all about. I found its about fun, group games and playful time, which emphasise team-work and breaking the ice with each other during the initial classes. They offered me very-tasty cookies and the lemonade for free. I had a fun time and eventually never had the feeling that i was doing a Proffesional Masters degree. The program will extend for 2 months and held once every week. . . Hmmmm ! got to check out whats-up for the next week.

CHATTING 'N WRITING

I had a nice time chatting with my parents and my sis using the yahoo messenger today. I could not use the voice chat due to the unavailability of a good headphone/mic. But, i did enjoy typing to put my thoughts into words. I felt more comfortable than talking by phone. Once I was done with it, I infact started waiting for tommorow's chatting time ... May be, I will get a new good headphone set right today. . .

BOOKS AT MY REACH

Got books from the library today... Hmmm ! got to read them all...

HOME SICKNESS

CHASED BY INSECURITY AND FEAR

The moment I shifted to my new apartment yesterday, I had a feeling of insecurity and a pinch of fear. In the afternoon, I attended a career seminar to learn about the effective job search strategies and then, I was sitting in front of the computer during the rest of the day. I was puzzled and lost . . . Just before sleep, I tried to figure out whats happening to me. Then, I thought this may be called "Home sickness". . . Thats what I guess~

NOW, CHARGED UP

Today morning - Wondering how to get rid of homesickness, I happened to browse through the articles in my own website and read the article "A Call to the Youth of India - Swami Vivekananda". This article charged me with boldness and courage, and gave the motivation to face the world, just on time when I needed it. . . You too can read the article at http://ktaneer.tripod.com/coolpersonalsite/id4.html .

NEIGHBOURS COME CLOSER

Hey... an interesting news that I read at MSNBC news reported from space.com...
Aug. 26 - As if executing a cosmic air kiss, Earth and Mars came as close as they desire in Wednesday's wee hours during a historical event that has captivated the attention of skywatchers around the globe. The two planets will be separated by 34,646,418 miles at 5:51 a.m. ET.

EXPERIMENTING AT THE KITCHEN

My experimenting with cooking starts tommorow. Got to wait and see how it works. I now wanted to follow the American belief -"Convenience is the tastiest dish of all". I may start off with simple dishes... and continue the same strategy for atleast a week...

WANA GO HOME AFTER WORK???

Want to go home after work ? ? ? The answer is obviously YES from all of us. Then, why the hell do most of the people don't return to the homeland once they are done with their purpose (work) at abroad. I really appreciate and admire the ones returning to the mother-country once their target or purpose is achieved. This speaks abt the spirits and values of one-self...~

DONT MISS THIS...

I just came across a very interesting site - a personal site of a person named Summit Gupta: http://www.cecs.uci.edu/~sumitg/ Dont miss checking it out... especially the India Links section and his essays...

IT'S HOBBY TIME

Can collection of items keep your time going interesting?? YES~ It does make time exciting at all moments of life. I once collected stamps and coins of different countries… My fascination for coins have started again. I am now in collecting the American quarter dollor coins. Each 1/4 dollor coin has a representation of 1 of the 50 states in US and its interesting in collecting them.... help me out if u have any.

I also wana have a click at some cool photo shots and place them into my pool of photo collection. Its also nice to be send greetings on special occasions to everyone possible. This habit itself can be a hobby to me….

COUCHES FOR FREE

I got my couches free from Popsi anni's friend, who was shifting off to a new house. Thanks to her… Today, I rented a U-haul to shift the couches to my appartment at Waterview Pkwy. The transport is a little expensive ofcourse ~ Hmmm.. I need not worry abt getting the couches anymore…

MY LEARNING STARTS

My classes have started and I initiated my preparations for my next class straight away… The first 4 chapters of "Advanced Concepts of OS" is my target to be completed before Tuesday.

ON MY WAY TO JAVA

The time to learn Java has come. I was instructed to do my project work for the course "Software Architecture and Design" using coding in Java. I just have an overview about Java programming as of now, and I must be able to pick up the whole thing soon…

SEEDLESS WATER-MELONS

I love water melons, but for the seeds. We brought home a water-melon, and my anni chopped it without delay to store it in the fridge. After I had my dinner, she handed me a bowl of water-melon slices. To my surprise, I found no seeds and then I came to know that seedless water-melons which also retain their usual sweetness are available here in US. How good it would be if these are available in India. My parents and my sis could have had it tooooo…

THE STARTER FOR MY MASTER’S

It was an interesting day today as I had my first day of classes for my MS coursework. The class rooms here are highly equipped and I could find a totally different ambience than the ones in India. There are monitors, a projector, electric plug-in facilities in front of each seating, push-back chairs, and highly decorated interiors.

The prof stepped in sharp at the right time, distributed a paper in which the details about the course schedule, course content, grading system and the list of books to be referred are printed. The One and half hours from then just vanished…I had my second course after a break of 1hr 45minutes, and I found it interesting too…

RED SIGNAL FOR IDLENESS

It was a pleasure to have had the rare opportunity of being jobless, without responsibility and spending time idly for the last 3 months (May'03 to July'03). The 3 months of idleness comes to an end today, with classes beginning to mark the start of my academic life at US.

THE CHILDISH ME

Had great fun with Vinieth, playing childish games, watching cartoons and I infact found myself like a kid. No other work for today…… had a tasty sweet bun for breakfast, biryani for lunch and Idiayappam for dinner…. Nice nap in the afternoon and TV watching for some time… and I eventually never felt bored~

MONEY-BACK POLICY

HEY... The good thing here is that the vendors give prior importance to the customer satisfaction. There is a money back policy on all products at all shops, provided the customer has the proof of purchase (bill/receipt) and given off before the last day of return. This is very impressive … isn't it?

THE PLANNER

Hey… I got myself a UTD planner for the academic year 2003-'04. I felt it's important that I schedule my work and plan my academic year to make the best use of my college days. I kinda go lazy to spare time for planning my things out. But now, its time to get more organized…

REGISTRATION

Registration for the courses is done soon after the CS advising session got over and a major decision is made for this sem. Now, I jus need to excel in them …

ASSEMBLING IT !

Hey… let me tell u in brief how the education system works here at UTD… There are nearly 40 courses offered by the CS dept. We need to prepare a schedule of 11 courses which spreads for a span of 4 semesters (ideal). So eventually, we assemble the coursework and the syllabus for Masters Program based on our interests…

IN THEIR HEART...

Tonight, I spoke to my parents, grand parents, my uncle, aunt, my little brother and my sisters living in India. I felt contented on speaking to everyone at home, and had a warm feeling of being in the heart of all my dear ones.

MY BROTHER -> MY GUIDE

Today was a great day… experiencing a mix of entertainment, shopping, relaxation, and a discussion on career aspects. In the evening, we went to a splendid picnic spot named "Founders Park" near the Dallas Fortfurt airport. Here, planes are landing and taking off without any obstacles to disturb my view, and I could get a pic of the entire airport at a glance. We stayed here for a few hours, relaxed ourselves and I got plenty of suggestions from my brother about my academics. This was very useful and motivative… & I felt a sense for gratitude for him. He is certainly my guide to enable me have a successful career…

THE JOURNEY OF SEVERAL MILES STARTS WITH A SINGLE STEP

Today, I had my orientation session from 9.00 AM to 5.00 in the evening, and it marked my starting point to my Academic life at UTD. It was well organized and it gave me a lot of info about the general procedures at UTD & the US customs, and facilitated me to meet several new students (most of them are either from Bombay or Hyderabad).

They also provided us with free breakfast and lunch. The American kind of food is funny, but stuffy. It comprises a lot of fresh or semi-baked vegetables, fruits, baked corn, pizzas, bread sticks, veg-fried rice, stuffed capsicums and glasses of Coke. I had a campus tour soon after the orientation session got over.

When I came home, Rajesh anna had just arrived from Deteroit. He had his shower and we all went to the MALL (the biggest one in Dallas). It was interesting…. I had a big cone ice-cream, which was delicious. I never happened to have such a kind of ice cream in India and then, I had the burger on our way back home.

THE SMALL GREAT PLACE

I called up my parents and spoke to them for nearly 10 - 15 minutes by phone. I felt very happy talking to them and felt like meeting all and have fun with them. Anyway, 10 months is not very far off before I meet them. The university is good and people there are very friendly. It's a small university in terms of area, but a great place to study in. There are T.T tables, swimming pool, a gym and a big library, TV room, and many more. I liked it….

All the formalities including registration for the classes can be done only after the orientation session on 15th Aug. Until then, I am just knowing people, professors and the university.

THE DREAM-LAND BEFORE MY EYES

I got my on-campus apartment reserved today and I was lucky enough to get it immediately without having to wait for it.

Soon after we (Rajesh anna, anni, Vineith and I) had our lunch, we went shopping and then to the grocery stores, pizza Hut and the famous Coffee shop in Dallas. They are no different than in Madras (Chennai). Just as I finished eating my last slice of pizza, I got a call from my friend Ajjit - a student in Texas A & M University.

Here in US (Dallas), the roads are too good to describe. The traffic is less and driving ought to be a pleasure. Everything is calm and lifestyle is so casual that I felt very nice about. Life at US is really a pleasure to feel and convenient to handle as a student… Don't know yet about the professional life here ~

REACHING OUT FOR A DIAMOND . . .

REACHING OUT FOR A DIAMOND

For the first time in my life, I've got to take up a different path, a different vision and a different living from those of my parents. My feelings at this point are substantial as they are burdened with the three heavy stones of responsibility, insecurity and loneliness. I got blessing from my grand-parents, my parents and then my uncle & aunts, and then said a big BYE BYE to all of them… Now my journey to life starts.

I got my immigration checked, and then I stepped onto an escalator which took me higher and gently away from my dear ones. I could see my mother weeping and shaking her hands firmly. I felt very senti about that and also realized my deep love and passion for my beloved ones there...

As the escalator took me higher, I felt that I was going to a higher pedestal of life and to achieve a greater purpose. Once I got seated in the plane, I became more enthu to make my career dazzle like a diamond. I realized that my purpose of departing to US is to snatch the diamond-like career, get on top of the world, and finally come back and bring glory to the motherland….

THE VERY VERY RICH

Hey… my 22-hour flight journey to US gave me ample time to relax, recall the most cheerful and enjoyable moments of my life, and read books. For the first 2 hours of my journey, I was struggling to go to sleep and simultaneously recalling few of the great moments of my life… Many came to my mind ~

Then on reaching Frankfurt, I had to catch up with a connecting flight and hence I reported to the appropriate gate, where I found a friend of mine traveling to Dallas. On boarding the flight to Dallas, I took in hand a book titled "THE VERY VERY RICH", by Steve Mariotti & Mike Caslin. It gave an illustrated profile of America's best known Entrepreneurs and describes what it takes to make it as an entrepreneur. The profiles of Jeff Bezos, Henry Ford and Thomas Burrell gave me an encouraging spirit to make my mark in the history of entrepreneurs. . . ! Do U know the message that I got from that book..?????

"GET ON TOP OF THE WORLD"… This is the message from my father, and this is eventually the message unspoken by all the entrepreneurs of the world. But, each of them had their own style of expressing their success story.

LANDING AT DALLAS

I had a comfortable travel and things were simple and easy to deal with. My father's friend's son (I call him Rajesh anna) came to pick me up from the airport. We went to his house and very soon, I started having a feel of staying in my own brother's home. The kid - Vineith is a playful and a very interesting person to spend time with, and anni is a very kind woman. I instantly became one in their family and had my time going great….!