:)
An SGML fan, an XML fan, and an HTML fan are watching a movie when they notice smoke coming out of a trashcan.
The SGML fan says “We must convince the theater management to hire an expert to write a DTD for emergency-announcements, and sell them an expensive application for archiving announcements, and get them to hire a team to convert all their old announcements to SGML!”
The XML fan says, “There’s no time for that! We must train all the audience members to recognise XML, and then start a committee to investigate the possibility of starting negotiations to form a working group to write a paper on the future evolution of emergency-announcement semantics!”
Meanwhile, the HTML fan takes out his wireless PDA and types in:
<h1><blink><font color=”red”>FIRE!</font></blink></h1>
which he quickly hacks the digital projection system to display, saving the lives of everyone in the theater.
Steve Jobs R.I.P.
“Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking.”
~ Steve Jobs (1955-2011)
The Adventures of a Cardboard box
Loved this video by Temujin Doran(website, vimeo channel). It is always that the memories that matter the most!
The Adventures of a Cardboard Box from Studiocanoe on Vimeo.
WordPress for Android and the HTC Inspire
Trying out the WordPress for android app now and it is slick. But rgarding the actual phone, I have been using the HTC Inspire for a few weeks now(my first android powered device) and I should say, I am not too impressed. The UI feels a little clunky and I am not sure if it is an android thing or something to do with the way HTC has skinned the interface.
The main reason I bought this over the iPhone was because this supported flash and surfing the internet on the move is my primary requirements. Some of my friends argued that for most purposes, common sites had their corresponding apps on the iPhone. But it would be stupid to keep swapping between apps, so I bought the Inspire over the iPhone(albeit bought it in a hurry without doing any research both costing the same on a two year contract).
But, I was in for a surprise! The default android browser keeps refreshing on its own for most sites like crazy without any user intervention! And you can’t use Firefox for android, because it doesn’t come with flash! What?? Drat.. Yes, you could use the Dolphin HD browser, but on the whole it wasn’t a nice experience.
Do your research before buying it. I had been a happy camper on the Nokia side for the past decade, but they seriously let me down with maemo and then with meego, and my Nokia N900 feels like an antique with no future ahead. :-/
Brown Duck
Posted to flickr after a long hiatus
A Bad Nightmare
A Bad Nightmare - Ace 2006 Documents
Sketched awkwardly on the Nokia N900 using the stylus 
For the uninitiated, I have been doing a MS degree that is partially managed by IBM and due to “administrative challenges” there is a huge backlog in issuing mark sheets even though its 4 and a half years since the course started. Taking a dig at that.
Mozilla Firefox: Is there a difference between Add-ons, Extensions and Plugins?
I was reading up some documentation about writing my own Mozilla Firefox extension when my close partner in crime, Vignesh, IMed me. When he found out what I was doing, he asked me what exactly the difference was between a Firefox Add-on, extension and a plugin.
After thinking about it for a while and coming across the same in the extension development documentation – I decided to write about it here..
In short, all extensions are also Add-ons, But “Add-ons” is an umbrella term for extensions, themes, plugins and language-packs.
Extensions
Extensions enable the user to alter the existing functionality of the browser or to add completely new functionality. Eg: Firebug, YSlow, etc.
Plugins
Plugins are libraries which are used by the browser to display/render stuff that it cannot do natively, Eg: Flash, Java, PDF etc.
Themes
Themes allow you to change the look and feel of the browser, allowing you to customize it to your liking. There are hundreds of free themes for download.
Now, If you were wondering what the difference was between a Firefox theme and a Persona, Personas are a special kind of theme which lets you change the look and feel without altering other components of the UI such as the navigations buttons, etc. It also lets you try and install new “personas” without having to restart your browser to apply the changes.
If you had this question lingering in your head, hope you found it useful!
Cycling Trip – Bangalore to Hosur
Background: Inspired my room-mate Sunil, to get a cycle. He purchased one yesterday, and then we contemplated to do a long ride, having never done anything over 50kms before (office commute is a total of 22km~ spread over the start and end of a day, hence not as tiring). We decided to ride up to Attibele on Hosur road and back, which would total ~50km. Then finding that Hosur was just another 5 kms away, decided to ride to Hosur Flyover – the main bus stop – and come back by late morning.
We planned to start at 5:30 AM, but due to usual delays which included my rear brakes getting dismantled(god knows why, it was ok yesterday) We started at 6:15 AM from Bilekahalli(near IIM-B) on our two MTBs. Touched Hosur road and then it is dead straight (it is called Hosur Road remember 
) Going was relatively easy.We stopped at Chandapura at the 16.5 km mark for about ten minutes to refresh ourselves, and then restarted cycling. We reached Hosur around 8:15AM for a total time of 2 hours.
Me, Standing next to the Hosur Road Flyover
After whiling away quite a lot of time there, and searching for a cycle shop to refill air, we started the return journey.
The return was a real killer, If I was a cat, I must have lost 3 of my nine lives. There was a strong headwind, really bright sunshine and huge inclines(from a n00b point of view). I reached Chandapura again and made my first stop. I realized then that my fitness levels were in the “unacceptable” category 
Drank some more gatorade and restarted cycling again, But the heat was getting me and my energy levels were sapping. At hosur, we originally had just Gatorade and one of those oats munch bars. I believe that was the first mistake we made(correct me if I am wrong) in not refuelling the “engine” 
Neither did we have breakfast, only a Nilgiris Cream bun.
I found moving on very difficult, and stopped near electronic city for a good twenty minutes under a shade of a fly-over going across the road above me, near the Elevated Highway toll-gate.
Then I restarted cycling and even the slightest inclines seemed to go at me. I felt really drained out and felt the need to drink something to get some energy, stopped at a small shop and had a cold Pepsi. It made me feel a little better and the hot feeling around my head reduced. Then I slowly trudged along, albeit grudgingly just wanting to finish the whole thing and honestly, thinking why on earth did I do this in the first place.. LOL. Each kilometer from then on seemed so distant. But now that I am home, I feel elated to have completed it. Many thanks to all the people who inspired me on Daily Mile and the Bangalore Bikers Club list
Raring to go again
Trip Statistics:
Distance: 67 km
Time: 04 hours 38 minutes
Overall Pace: 14.5 kmph
Route map and other info at DailyMile
BTW, my Iron Man housemate, Sunil, who is a regular at the neighbourhood gym reached an hour before me!
PS:- Also, took this lame opportunity to update my blog which has been in hibernation for a really long time
Everything is amazing and nobody is happy
My friend, Jax, tweeted today:
At the post office, the only counter that has business is the one for bills payment. Times have changed…
This set me off thinking, and I thought about all the things that we take for granted, Emails, Cell-phones, The internet, everything! Our whole life has changed, but still a lot of us keep complaining for really trivial things.
I recollected seeing this really humourous video and thought that you might like it too, check it out:
Louis C.K on The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien
Life is good, there are so many good things that make living a lot more worthwhile. Stay safe and enjoy the upcoming year with your family and friends.
Wish you a very Happy and Prosperous New Year 2010!