Aussies-Deadlines-Ponnappa-ToI. Change.

Australians, notwithstanding the unrelated fact that they are bad losers, have implemented the two-innings-in-a-limited-overs-match format, the advertisement for which proclaimed the beaten-to-death cliche of "the only constant is change".

Ofcourse, things change. For starters, I am writing again. I am not 22M anymore, as the badge on my blog currently claims. I am 23M and firmly on track to hit 24M soon. I don't even stay in Chennai, fortunately or unfortunately. I stay in Bombay now, fortunately. I am not reachable on Facebook, as I was for most of the last year or two in college. My roommates have changed. I am earning - that is a welcome change. I am not my own boss anymore - I have a real boss, one with flesh and blood. The deadlines are not flexible, infact, they are as good as engraved in stone. Most of my clothes are clean as are my utensils. Oh, I have utensils too. Women around me cannot be referred to as chicks, females or girls anymore. They have to be referred to as women - sometimes out of compulsive polity and other times due to the organisational policies. Bunking the 8 'o clock classes is not an option because there are NO 8'o clock classes anymore, there are only 8'o clock reviews, the kind your boss would not appreciate if you miss. On another note, 8 AM in India is not just 8 AM in India anymore - it is 10.30 AM in Singapore and 3.30 AM in London. And it is 15 minutes away from the first daily submission routine, at 8.15 AM.

Apologies are now apols, presentations are now presos, "dude" has now become "mate", and "Fuck you" has now become "Sure, Sir". Change can be good and intoxicating. This change, from the wilderness of a student life to the almost artificial, perhaps farticifial, and forced-discipline of corporate life has been good and intoxicating, both, and promises to be better.

That India could get 101 medals in any sporting event is a change that is hard to believe. Much like the fact that they let someone like a Kalmadi take charge, in the first place. And when at it, Lalit Bhanot, too. [Lalit Bhanot and Kalmadi warrant an entire blog, not just blogpost, on them - they are a writer's dream]. The Games did much good. The opening ceremony, the unprecedented medals tally, performances in track and field, young sportsmen from the lesser known places of the country, the amazing victory in 4X400m women's relay, Saina Nehwal and Ashwini Ponnappa, the closing ceremony - indicate a welcome and a long, long overdue change.

One thing, though, has not changed and that is the ever-so abysmal quality of reporting by M/s Times of India. That their headline article could actually say "2 parts to Hindus, 1 part to Muslims" - in big bold letters on a day that could have left the nation torn just goes to show that someone very high up in that organisation is either deranged or just plainly incapable of being at the helm of the mouthpiece of a progressive nation. Somethings, after all, never change.

A post on the blog after such a long break warrants an explanation on the underlying motivation. Much thanks to Archana for pepping me all the time, to mom for candidly admitting that she missed my blog, to sister for blatantly admitting that she missed my blog and to a few others who did mail and "facebook-message" me prompting me to write. What tipped it off, though, was a rather unexpected fan mail (Fan mail!!) from Divish, from IITD. Thanks, Divish. :-)

Wiki - the super tripper

On this Friday night at exactly 3AM when I was incessantly clicking the 'random article' link on Wikipedia, I realised the immense trip value embedded in it.

I started off with the Kardashev Scale -

"The Kardashev scale is a method of measuring a civilization's level of technological advancement... The scale has three designated categories called Type I, II, and III. These are based on the amount of usable energy a civilization has at its disposal, and the degree of space colonization. In general terms, a Type I civilization has achieved mastery of the resources of its home planet, Type II of its solar system, and Type III of its galaxy."

Then came Mr. Arthur C Clarke, with his three laws of prediction:

1. When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
2. The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
3. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

And his fourth law:

For every expert there is an equal and opposite expert.

Parallel to this is Gibson's law:

For every PhD there is an equal and opposite PhD.

In between somewhere, I jumped to "Star-lifting":

Star lifting is any of several hypothetical processes by which a highly advanced civilization (at least Kardashev-II) could remove a substantial portion of a star's matter in a controlled manner for other uses.

Finagle's law:

Anything that can go wrong, will—at the worst possible moment

Remember Mr. Murphy?

Hanlon's Law:

Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.

Sturgeon's law (and without meaning disrespect, infact as a matter of offering my respects, I think Mr. Sturgeon was a seasoned stoner):

The first is: "Nothing is always absolutely so".

The second, and more famous, of these adages is: "Ninety percent of everything is crud." (The last word is typically misquoted as "crap".)

Occam's Razor, now famous thanks to Dr. Gregory House: entities must not be multiplied beyond necessity.... Occam's razor may be alternatively phrased as pluralitas non est ponenda sine necessitate ("plurality should not be posited without necessity").

Hofstader's law (he could probably be the only guy who beats Sturgeon):

Hofstadter's Law:

It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter's Law.

And to end this post, the Drake's equation:

"It is an equation to organize our guesses about the potential number of extraterrestrial civilizations in our galaxy, the Milky Way. It is used in the fields of exobiology and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI)."

And well, just as a reassurance, the Mediocrity principle:

The assumptions of mediocrity principle is the notion in philosophy of science that there is nothing special about humans or the Earth.

A post for the times when I did not post

I must admit I have not been too busy. On the contrary, time has been rather generous on me. Blogging, I realised, is just like my dual degree project - DDP - (it is a year-long project that one needs to finish in order to graduate and redeem the times spent during college) - when you start your DDP, there is a lot of motivation to keep working every day and finish it bit-by-bit. After a fortnight, it is "there is always a next week".

Nonetheless, I am thankful to three specific people for rekindling the blogging energies in me - Archana, who for reasons beyond my conscious understanding, likes my blog. Laddoo, who had the time and inclination to remind me, from halfway across the world, that my blog "needs attention". And my Mommy dear for diligently following my blogs without any attempts to 'censor' them to make it suitable for all ages. The tipping point, though, was this blog - one of my faculty member's blog. If a professor can find time to write a blog, so can I! For those who have read my previous posts, the same professor has been referred to, in a couple of previous posts too, albeit not in the most recommended manner - atleast not for a final year student with an incomplete DDP.

To be blogging on a Tuesday afternoon is sure sign of atleast one of the two things: an uncontrollable desire to write OR an outlet to kill time. I suspect it is a holy combination of both. My guess is that it'll stay this way for the better part of this semester - until May, or until I finish my DDP, whichever is later.

Quotable Quotes from my Viva

Prof. A: "You know what? Vikas was supposed to get a Nobel prize for his ppt, but last minute he got pipped." (Prof. A to Prof. B, with all his sarcasm in the world, when I just entered the Viva room.)
Me: Sir... Err.. Umm.. Err.. Okk.. Sir

Prof A: "Ya ya, Vikas will make a good ppt. So be very careful!", throwing caution to everyone in the room, for no real reason.
Me: Sir... Err.. Umm.. Err.. Okk.. Sir

"Vikas, I don't want a sales pitch. Better show me some meat." Prof. C after looking at my first slide.
Me: Sir... Err.. Umm.. Err.. Okk.. Sir

"So, you are basically saying that if we decrease usage of vehicles, we can save energy. Thats all?" Prof. A after I had explained for over half-an-hour on how we can save energy in the transportation sector.
Me: Sir... Err.. Umm.. Err.. No.... Sir

Me: "Sir, there are two sides to the climate debate...."
Prof. A : "That everybody knows. Tell me what you have done." (It's unfair! It's not common sense!)
Me: Sir... Err.. Umm.. Err.. Okk.. Sir

Prof. A."You went and worked with economists and became one yourself. I wanted you to convert them to technologists!"
Me: Sir... Err.. Umm.. Err.. Okk.. Sir

Prof. C. : "What you said over the last 20 minutes is just common sense. Show me some mathematical models"
Firstly, it was NOT common sense. I swear by god. Secondly, and I quote myself "But Sir, my company did not want me to develop mathematical models, they just wanted a framework."
Prof A. : "But that is what I want you to do: change the way they work!"
Me: Sir... Err.. Umm.. Err.. Okk.. Sir

Prof. A.: "Just because you are thanking me, don't think that I will give you extra marks", when I was at the Acknowledgements slide.
Me: Sir... Err.. Umm.. Err.. Okk.. Sir

Prof. B : "You should put the source of data in every slide, unless ofcourse you deliberately want to confuse us.."
Prof. A : ".. which he is very capable of."
Me: Sir... Err.. Umm.. Err.. Okk.. Sir

***************
Well.. you win some, you lose some.

It won't be a herculean task to figure out who was the BOSS today in the viva committee. And who was looking like a big big loser.

Well.. you win some, you lose some.

PS: Fellow mates can add their quotes in the comment section, or let me know so that I can add an _update here. :-)

PS2: An old post on quotable quotes from Inter-IIT Sports Meet 2007 can be accessed here

The new whiz-kid on the block! ISC Topper:

"City boy tops ISC with 99.25 %" screams a TOI article. It turns out the city is Kolkata.

Disclaimer: You may stop liking me if you are one of those people who don't think evil people should exist on this planet. On the other hand, if you are one of my ex-es or their friends, you anyway don't like me, this post will give you one more reason.

Excerpts from the post:

Subhajit had succeeded in beating over 50,000 students to the top spot. With cent per cent marks in maths and computer science, the St Joseph's College student notched up 99 in physics, 94 in chemistry and 97 in environmental studies. He scored 98% in English and 92% in Bengali.

Surprisingly, the first look at the marks he obtained don't suggest they'll result in 99.25%. Indeed, (100 +100+99+94+97+98+92)*100/700 = 97.14 %.

Now, I wonder what's wrong. Am I missing something? Is there another subject in which Subhajit scored 114 out of 100 (which probably is not a feat considered worthy of a mention by TOI) so that the percentage makes sense? OR is it another of those TOI articles where they fabricate details/title to sensationalise the article? If it is latter, TOI needs to fire their chief sensationaliser. Notwithstanding that fact, 97.14 (or 99.25 as the case may be) is an amazing feat.

Subhajit Ghosh isn't the average nerdish topper. "He paid a lot of attention to what he studied, rather than how much. He spent time on solving question papers and also went through the study material other than his prescribed books. He only took tuitions in English and Bengali, the rest he prepared by himself," said father Subhashis.

OK, let me be mean. (Yes, you are welcome to leave those anonymous comments! :-P ) No one would come on national newspaper and accept that he is a nerdish topper. I was not, and I am sure neither were you! AND we all paid a lot of attention to what we studied, rather than how much. We all spent time on solving question papers and also went through the study material other than our prescribed books.

Tuitions! HAH. I did not take any tuitions, not even for English and definitely not for Bangla. Did you?

But here is the clincher:

The Kolkata boy is now looking forward to testing his academic mettle at the finest engineering institutes in the country. "I am looking at either studying aerospace engineering at IIT-Kanpur or mechanical engineering at BITS, Pilani. I've given the competitive entrance exams and I'm expecting to rank between 500-600 in the IIT-JEE," said Subhajit confidently.

This, IMHO, is the cue when we should all pray "Bhagwan iss ladke ko satbuddhi dena." If some dude (with a 99.25 TOI %) is getting a rank between 500-600 in the JEE, WHY, in this whole white world would he take Aerospace engg. There are no god-damn jobs in that department. And no Subhajit, you will not be working on Airplanes and satellites and shit like that. You won't even be recruited by Boeing or Airbus. I know you want to join NASA and emulate Rakesh Sharma but I doubt even if ISRO trusts an Aero engineer from an IIT. Next, Mechanical engineering from BITS Pilani? - IMNSHO - It will be a disaster dear topper. I am told their dream job is with John Deere. I'll leave the smart readers to figure out the rest.

And I almost missed this point: How can he so confidently suggest that he is getting a rank between 500-600 in the JEE. I am sure the JEE chairman himself may not be in a position to make such comments. Anyone who has written JEE can vouch for this fact. I think this is a result of all the fake ranks that the FIITJEEs and likes dole out on their website. But then, this guy is a whiz-kid, with a 99.25 TOI %.

Here's the wicked part of my post: (skip it to spare yourself the BP rise. If you are a faculty member in the anti-ragging department of IITM, you are prohibited.)

Here's my wish: I hope this dude comes out with flying colors and joins IITM and he gets Alak and he is in 357, (which will be empty next semester; I'll stay in 358) so that I can send him to Minar at 1.30 in the night to fetch Egg Biriyani! And r@g him till he breaks down.
MUHAHAHAHA. Worst case, if he joins IITK, I'll hunt him down in December during the inter-IIT and send him to their Minar!

[I used r@g because I don't want to end up in jail 'chakki-peesing' for ragging. What if the goons at MHRD have a Google alert for 'rag'?]

A Computer Scientist's view of The Wall

Rahul Dravid, the Wall

The following algorithm has been devised by Mr. Anurag Verma. He is a '07 batch alumnus of IIT Madras pursuing his Ph.D in Operations Research at Texas A & M University, USA. He was a student of Computer Science with a keen interest in OR. An avid cricket-lover, he also captained the IIT Madras cricket team to win Gold in the Guwahati Inter-IIT in 2006.

Ok. Enough. Laddoo is basically a cricket fanatic. He was my captain in the above-said year and a very very good friend. He is the muggu cricketer type and boasted of a nine-point-infinity CG. Cricket is his religion. Left-arm-fast ..Sorry, Left-arm Opening bowler and Left-handed batsman, he was Shtudd! Rahul and Sachin are his idols. We all love Laddoo.


---------------------------------------------------------------
Following are snippets of the chat I had with him:

achcha, i loved the dravid algo - i thought i'll reproduce it on my blog with your permission

Laddoo: zaroor... but BNU license agreement ko follow karna padega

*GNU

me: woh kya hota hai

i will credit you and put your orkut/facebook link

Laddoo: pata nahi.. bas naam pata hai

me: oh peace...

Laddoo: kar le... koi tension nahi

me: cool..

Laddoo: me also will get publicity

---------------------------------------------------------------------

So here is my part of the duty:

[ I tried linking the Orkut and Facebook profiles but the Google server says this :(

ERROR

URL contains illegal characters

]

Laddoo on Orkut: Anurag Verma

Disclaimer: I am following the GNU license agreement. :P

Weird USB Drive

Came across a cool gadget online. They call it the Sawed-off USB Flash Drive. It was featured on Gizmodo yesterday. It is actually a USB Flash drive capable of storing 2 GB data. It is time we rephrase the age-old phrase to "Don't judge an USB drive by it's looks." :D

Cool thing!



Amd I quote a comment from one of the websites "This looks like it is aching to be thrown away by mistake. "

Inter-IIT Sports Meet: Quotable Quotes

My fascination with the Inter-IIT Meet continues..

Tit-Bits from my cricket team:

Quotable Quotes:

"Yaar, match jaldi khatam karo, khana khatam ho jayega" - Suri, invariably in all the matches.

"Yaar, meri ball middle stump pe daalu toh in-swing hoti hai... off-stump pe dalu toh swing hi nahi hoti" - Laddoo, since his first year.

"Bikash spoke abouse words" The (Bengali) umpire in the IITM vs IITG cricket match jotting down in his diary after Lays ( Vikas) cudnt hold back the joy of getting a batsman bowled.

"IITM cricket team is the most disciplined team" Umpires.

Day 3: 6.30 am. Gigolo: " Naib get up, aaj FOG ( more like 'FOAG') nahi hai..practice time pe shuru jar sakte hain"
Naib: " Shit Man!!! !@#!@"

"I am sorry, very sorry. I dont like to hurt anybody" DB, after hitting Naresh on his toe in practice.
"You bowl so wide down the leg side, the square leg ( not even fine-leg) fielder has to run to field the ball." - Karthik Naib.

"If team needs" - -Ayush, hiding all his joy after he was asked by the coach if he could open the innings for IITM. He still claims that he was all serious.

"Our real batting starts after nine-down"
-common joke/reality during inter-IIT, as the last wicket partnership was the largest in the first two matches against KGP and Bombay.

"Haven't you all had... what do you call it in hindi - 'maa ka doodh' ... " - Karthik Naib, giving an inspiring speech to players in the team meeting after the loss against KGP in the first match.

"It was a clean strategy... you should save experience for the end" - Laddoo, trying to justify the decision to send Dharik (one of the main batsmen) 9 down. Dharik and Teju ended up winning the do-or-die match against Bombay for Madras by scoring 26 in 2 overs with just one wicket left.

"Machcha, Saarang choreo nite in jan da... practicing" -Sudheer Raj (member of saarang choreo team too), explaining the bemused captain of why he was doing strange things standing at deep mid-wicket.

"When is the next train back home?"
- The most common answer when the team members were asked what they were thinking at 65/9 (chasing 103) against bombay?

QUOTABLE JEERING QUOTES:

"Laddoo piss gaya" - IITG chap when laddoo got hit for a four.

"He is Lays?? where is Kurkure?" PJ by opposite captain during a Practice match.

"Beta don't get bored out there!"
-the all so over-confident Delhi coach to the two batsmen after Delhi was 50/0 in 7 overs in the semis.
They ended up getting all out for 103.

"I was unlucky to get bowled" Delhi batsman.( As if we are all lucky to get bowled)

"Tailender batting pe aa gaya" Aimed at one of our top batsmen after looking at his batting by KGP guys.

"Khushu Sir, Aaram aaram se khelenge" Delhi spectators.


HILARIOUS INCIDENTS:

IITM bowling first. Four overs up. Bowler at fine leg asks for Water. The 12th man by now is pretty experienced, so he takes 2 bottles of water, 3 packets of glucose and 2 bottles of pain-relief (??!!) spray. The whole of the team converges in on the sprays.. and any fielder who has even touched the ball once is complaining of pain.

At the other end of the ground, the team's premier fast bowler has lowered ( yes, he has) his pants and the whole team is watching in disbelief the sight of the 12th man kneeling on the ground and spraying at the bowler's what-we-would-call 'Groin' for sake of decency.
The names of the bowler and the 12th man withheld on request....

-----------------
Ayush, batting against Delhi. The situation is tense. We need to hold our wickets. The Delhi fielders are trying to intimidate Ayush and Laddoo, the two batsmen in the middle by sledging.

Ayush plays a ball to a fielder and wanders out of his crease. The fielder warns " Saale, crease ke andar aaja varna maar dunga". This happens twice. Third time Ayush says, " Bhainchod, kya bolta rehta hai, maarta toh hai nahi".

Oops... Then the fielder catches hold of Ayush's collar on the field. And our man, Ayush is unnerved. Ayush still maintains he was not afraid of that chap...

--------------
Practice Match, Chemplast. Dharik is wicket keeping in place of Naib. Lays is the bowler. Lays calls out dharik by his name ( which any sane keeper wud understand to be a signal that next ball is a slower ball.)

Dharik replies loudly: " Haan haan, samajh gaya". Batsman seemed to be amused. The next ball ( slower ball) was hit for a four.

--------------------------------------
First match at Inter-IIT v/s KGP. Ayush is full enthu, he brings his Digicam to the field hoping to take pictures after the match. We lose pretty miserably. The team management blames it squarely on the presence of the cam and the bad-luck it brought. (Non-performing) cricketers are superstitious, you see. As a result of this, there was no cam in any of the matches ( all of which we subsequently won). So we end up with no photos of the matches. Btw, Just when we were almost ( almost) sure to win the finals, we sent our poor freshie, the Sardar to get the cam all the way from the hostel. So, we have something to cherish.

-----------------------

In Shillong, Durgesh, the team's left arm spinner fell down into a Drainage ( while pissing) ... LOL!!! He came back stinking and wearing borrowed clothes.


*** Compiled with special inputs from Laddoo, the captain.