Well I have discussed with a lot of my friends, and can still discuss with anybody who's interested to go for MS, why does one want to go for MS abroad. I mean why does one want to waste 2 years of his/her precious life and go for MS and still be at the same place.
Imagine taking a break from your routine life (leaving current job) spending around 20 lcs going for MS, coming back and joining the job again. Though i know that the new job would definitely be better and more reliable but at what expense.. spending a lot of money, and 2 yrs of life. Instead why don't people prefer going for a good job, gain some work experience and then look for promotion or hop jobs. I guess i we try hard, we can land at similar or even at a better place than that in case of MS.
Hey, I am not talking about the people interested in Research field. Hats off to those people, and I know that MS is definitely made for them. its not that I am completely against anyone going for MS, but what I really emphasize is you should be very cautious while investing your 2 yrs of your life, coz that's a big thing.. 2 yrs are the most that are required to change your life completely.
Though a lot of my friends have countered me by saying that once you do MS from US via GRE, you enter a better life and work at a US firm. But my point is why does one want to go for a job at US. Is a job at US confirms you a healthy and better life? I don't think so, I don't feel that just by going to US, you have a warrant to a successful life. I somewhere feel that we can have a better life and better prospects while living in India, where no one would ever look down on you or hate you because you are an alien to their place.
So when you are going abroad for a MS or PhD, think again, maybe another better opportunity is waiting for you somewhere!
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Standstill
Well my exams are over, though left with a couple of pracs on next week, but I am trying to plan something for the vacations. It looks like I am at a standstill, I mean I have over 2months vacations ahead and I have almost nothing planned and no work to do.
Well the only thing I could do this winter is to go for some freelancing, i mean I could try out some decent projects and earn out my pocket money and other expenses. I might go for the guy who's offered me to do some iphone game for him, or try out some websites for projects. Lets see how far does it go.
As far as the learning new technologies is concerned, firstly i never trust the coaching institutes to teach us something. Coz all they do is to get u cram up the tutorials book of their institute, and no practical experience ( i mean realtime projects). Instead I prefer going for Googling the stuff and get some ebooks to help me out. But for now I can't even think of doing anything, learning new technology or practicing any new framework.
Or on the other hand I can get my funda's of c/c++ clear and prepare for some interviews (if I even sit in another company :) ) Ok so I have a few options, but I am still not sure where am I heading, specially when I have over a 2 months break ahead !
Well the only thing I could do this winter is to go for some freelancing, i mean I could try out some decent projects and earn out my pocket money and other expenses. I might go for the guy who's offered me to do some iphone game for him, or try out some websites for projects. Lets see how far does it go.
As far as the learning new technologies is concerned, firstly i never trust the coaching institutes to teach us something. Coz all they do is to get u cram up the tutorials book of their institute, and no practical experience ( i mean realtime projects). Instead I prefer going for Googling the stuff and get some ebooks to help me out. But for now I can't even think of doing anything, learning new technology or practicing any new framework.
Or on the other hand I can get my funda's of c/c++ clear and prepare for some interviews (if I even sit in another company :) ) Ok so I have a few options, but I am still not sure where am I heading, specially when I have over a 2 months break ahead !
Thursday, November 8, 2007
Imagine Cup R1 M1
As I discussed last time, I participated in Microsoft's Imagine Cup Algorithm Challenge Round 1 Match 1 started on 25th Oct. Today it ended with me ranking 197. It was a hard time for me, I tried my best to get a good rank, but there were people who tried harder than me. So the next match is starting on 22 Nov (right in the middle of my exams), so I don't know how I am gonna cope with it. I will have try very hard to get a rank of top 50. Yes that's what required to qualify for round 2. That means I have to work atleast 4 times as hard as I have worked this time.
Imagine Cup is in form a game called Herbert (a Robot) that crawls all the way collecting white dots and avoiding gray ones. All we have to do is write a code to collect all the white dots. And the size of the code determines the points we get for that level. Smaller the code, more points we score. I believe that I had made a good start, coz I am playing for the first time and there are people with previous years' experience in this game and they know all the tips and tricks to get the optimal codes.
So with the experience of one game, lets see where will I end up in Match 2 of this challenge :)
Imagine Cup is in form a game called Herbert (a Robot) that crawls all the way collecting white dots and avoiding gray ones. All we have to do is write a code to collect all the white dots. And the size of the code determines the points we get for that level. Smaller the code, more points we score. I believe that I had made a good start, coz I am playing for the first time and there are people with previous years' experience in this game and they know all the tips and tricks to get the optimal codes.
So with the experience of one game, lets see where will I end up in Match 2 of this challenge :)
Friday, October 26, 2007
Indian Rupee - stronger by the day! :) OR :(
After Chetan Bhagat's Five point someone, maybe we can write a novel on Thirty nine point something.... As Indian Rupee is getting stronger everyday, it has now reached "39.x" mark and its not far away when it would touch the 35 mark. So now what should we do, be happy coz our currency will finally get the status we deserve, and finally some good amount of investment in non Indian companies will take place, or should we be sad as now FDI will reduce, outsourcing to India will be drastically reduced and the day is not far when the reverse flow will start.
I am definitely unhappy, coz it has landed me in not picking up projects and even if I pick, I land up with very less in my hand. So what should I do, leave the projects, leave the work and just concentrate on studies, then I realise what good are the studies gonna do to me? I have decent acads and they r not gonna change in 2 sems... So I try helping myself with the other type of stuff and enjoying my last yr in college. I don't know where will I be landing next yr!
As far as the money is concerned, I'll adjust myself with a bit of lesser money, infact it also helps the country get some foreign revenue (hehe, well one way of supporting it). So wat next, I am having my exams round the corner so may be I'll have to take a break from this blog for a while!
Oh yes lately I have also participated in Imagine Cup Round 1 Match 1, and I am stuck at some score... I am not able to crack other levels. Don't know agey kaise badega and my rank is just falling down and down... The fight is ON
I am definitely unhappy, coz it has landed me in not picking up projects and even if I pick, I land up with very less in my hand. So what should I do, leave the projects, leave the work and just concentrate on studies, then I realise what good are the studies gonna do to me? I have decent acads and they r not gonna change in 2 sems... So I try helping myself with the other type of stuff and enjoying my last yr in college. I don't know where will I be landing next yr!
As far as the money is concerned, I'll adjust myself with a bit of lesser money, infact it also helps the country get some foreign revenue (hehe, well one way of supporting it). So wat next, I am having my exams round the corner so may be I'll have to take a break from this blog for a while!
Oh yes lately I have also participated in Imagine Cup Round 1 Match 1, and I am stuck at some score... I am not able to crack other levels. Don't know agey kaise badega and my rank is just falling down and down... The fight is ON
Thursday, October 18, 2007
Not a winning Prodigy
A few days back, rather about 2 weeks back I received a mail from our college explain details of a competition called Google Product Prodigy. I was thrilled with this contest because I had wished for such a competition. Though there was a small constraint, that only two entries were allowed from the college. I knew that with an idea that was already in my mind, I would be definitely able to clear atleast the college level.
So I called up a couple of my friends and discussed this stuff with them, and we decided to work together. Well I really don't wanna discuss the idea here, but I believe it was something I have never seen implemented anywhere and was thus supposed to be unique. So we started with the abstract that was to be provided to the college and we dedicated 2 days (rather nights) discussing this topic and preparing abstract. On the last day, we took a printout and provided it to the Department for approval.
We expected the results to be out soon as there were only a few entries submitted for it. The results were to be announced in the end of the day.. so I went back home as I had some work pending. Later it was announced that all the teams who submitted their entries have to report to the department for a basic overview of each project. As I was not in the college by that time, I told my friends to report at the department for the same.
After an hour or so.. I received a message saying that we were not selected. I don't know what happened and how we were not selected. I just wished that I could have got a chance to talk to them... Probably it might have made a difference. But now who cares, we might get more of those chances in future.. So probably we are not winning prodigies.
So I called up a couple of my friends and discussed this stuff with them, and we decided to work together. Well I really don't wanna discuss the idea here, but I believe it was something I have never seen implemented anywhere and was thus supposed to be unique. So we started with the abstract that was to be provided to the college and we dedicated 2 days (rather nights) discussing this topic and preparing abstract. On the last day, we took a printout and provided it to the Department for approval.
We expected the results to be out soon as there were only a few entries submitted for it. The results were to be announced in the end of the day.. so I went back home as I had some work pending. Later it was announced that all the teams who submitted their entries have to report to the department for a basic overview of each project. As I was not in the college by that time, I told my friends to report at the department for the same.
After an hour or so.. I received a message saying that we were not selected. I don't know what happened and how we were not selected. I just wished that I could have got a chance to talk to them... Probably it might have made a difference. But now who cares, we might get more of those chances in future.. So probably we are not winning prodigies.
Monday, October 1, 2007
Microsoft TechMela
On Tuesday, Microsoft organised TechMela, an event to focus on the web and software enterprise solutions using Microsoft Tools. So as per my interests, I attended the workshop on "Web Application for Enterprise". Though it was a bit more on enterprise side, but was worth attending even after taking a day off from college.
The gathering was decent, i mean not a big rush i was expecting for a free event. The major reason would be the Weekday effect. Anyways, they had great food and great workshop, that was important.
The workshop was further divided into six sessions, taken by different so-called Evangelist. The first session was of building an enterprise grade rich web app in 15 mins, and i was going to bet that he won't be able to do it in 15 mins. But i underestimated the visual studio power, after lots of chitchat in between, he was able to complete it in 25 mins (oh offcourse he skipped the part of database creation which i was counting on initially :)). Anyways, that session was really basic, he told us bout the basic usability of AJAX toolkit in enterprise apps.
The next session was more of my type, they showed us PHP on Windows, though it's just a simple thing, but using FastCGI with IIS was what that made it interesting. They showed how the use of FastCGI over tradition CGI for perl and PHP would speed up the process and reduce server load. Though they didn't show any real application in PHP, but they showed a comparison between CGI, FastCGI and FatCGI with enabled caching.
The next good session was that of SilverLight and AJAX. SilverLight as some of you might be knowing is an add-on launched by Microsoft which enables users to view pages coded in XAML. They actually converted an image into xml code :0 The image (also including media file) was made in their software called Expressions, whose code is pure XML which they call XAML. This silverlight made them do stuff only made for high speed internet, work correctly on normal broadband connection. That was really impressive. AJAX part was again the same, showing the different tools available in AJAX library and toolkit that comes as an add-on of Visual Studio.
There were a few more sessions, one was on MSDN and other other developer resources offered by Microsoft and other on best practices to follow in an Enterprise, but those were not of that interest to me, to write bout them. Though I have attended the webinars of two of the speakers who came for the workshop, but this truly was good experience for me. For the first time I came in direct contact of the actual people behind these things. Well there's a similar workshop on 13th this October, i hope to attend that too.. Lets see what they have this time!
The gathering was decent, i mean not a big rush i was expecting for a free event. The major reason would be the Weekday effect. Anyways, they had great food and great workshop, that was important.
The workshop was further divided into six sessions, taken by different so-called Evangelist. The first session was of building an enterprise grade rich web app in 15 mins, and i was going to bet that he won't be able to do it in 15 mins. But i underestimated the visual studio power, after lots of chitchat in between, he was able to complete it in 25 mins (oh offcourse he skipped the part of database creation which i was counting on initially :)). Anyways, that session was really basic, he told us bout the basic usability of AJAX toolkit in enterprise apps.
The next session was more of my type, they showed us PHP on Windows, though it's just a simple thing, but using FastCGI with IIS was what that made it interesting. They showed how the use of FastCGI over tradition CGI for perl and PHP would speed up the process and reduce server load. Though they didn't show any real application in PHP, but they showed a comparison between CGI, FastCGI and FatCGI with enabled caching.
The next good session was that of SilverLight and AJAX. SilverLight as some of you might be knowing is an add-on launched by Microsoft which enables users to view pages coded in XAML. They actually converted an image into xml code :0 The image (also including media file) was made in their software called Expressions, whose code is pure XML which they call XAML. This silverlight made them do stuff only made for high speed internet, work correctly on normal broadband connection. That was really impressive. AJAX part was again the same, showing the different tools available in AJAX library and toolkit that comes as an add-on of Visual Studio.
There were a few more sessions, one was on MSDN and other other developer resources offered by Microsoft and other on best practices to follow in an Enterprise, but those were not of that interest to me, to write bout them. Though I have attended the webinars of two of the speakers who came for the workshop, but this truly was good experience for me. For the first time I came in direct contact of the actual people behind these things. Well there's a similar workshop on 13th this October, i hope to attend that too.. Lets see what they have this time!
Saturday, September 8, 2007
Web 2.0 - The geek speaks
Alright as promised here I am with the geeky version of web 2.0, the new internet thingy. Don't worry i m not a geek.. so I'll explain only the basics. This is regarding the workshop i took last week on web 2.0.
So web 2.0 is not a technology but a concept.. it not like just another web technology which comes almost every month. This term was introduced in a seminar by O'Really and is considered to be the next generation of websites. Now internet and websites are no longer viewed just as a network but is now acting as a platform. Web2.0 is based on the "architecture of participation". The concept highlights the importance of users as the providers of content so as to get a remixed and enriched content by the users themselves. So users have changed from consumers to contributers.
Now the content need not be only provided by geeks but by the common man. Web 2.0 focuses on dynamic sites backed by large databases which keep on growing with time. So this concept is not to change the technology but to change the people.. The mentality of people and society should be changed instead of technology... Content is the key element and not the design or technology. Its the data that they want and not the user interfaces. So no matter what technology is used web2.0 concept is applicable to all.
Web 2.0 not only includes quality content provided by the users but it is also a mixture of rich internet applications and interactive user interfaces. Thus websites like pixenate (online photo editor) and google docs also come under web 2.0 tag. These websites harness the power of Javascript to improve the users experience.. Majority of the tasks are performed on the browser (client) itself and thus server side scripting is not the major issue..
So to get going with developing first web 2.0 application all you need to know is basic html and one of the server side technology plus a good knowledge of client side technology like javascript. Rest depends on our imagination.. how far can one think of! and as the Idea people say "an idea can change your life...
So web 2.0 is not a technology but a concept.. it not like just another web technology which comes almost every month. This term was introduced in a seminar by O'Really and is considered to be the next generation of websites. Now internet and websites are no longer viewed just as a network but is now acting as a platform. Web2.0 is based on the "architecture of participation". The concept highlights the importance of users as the providers of content so as to get a remixed and enriched content by the users themselves. So users have changed from consumers to contributers.
Now the content need not be only provided by geeks but by the common man. Web 2.0 focuses on dynamic sites backed by large databases which keep on growing with time. So this concept is not to change the technology but to change the people.. The mentality of people and society should be changed instead of technology... Content is the key element and not the design or technology. Its the data that they want and not the user interfaces. So no matter what technology is used web2.0 concept is applicable to all.
Web 2.0 not only includes quality content provided by the users but it is also a mixture of rich internet applications and interactive user interfaces. Thus websites like pixenate (online photo editor) and google docs also come under web 2.0 tag. These websites harness the power of Javascript to improve the users experience.. Majority of the tasks are performed on the browser (client) itself and thus server side scripting is not the major issue..
So to get going with developing first web 2.0 application all you need to know is basic html and one of the server side technology plus a good knowledge of client side technology like javascript. Rest depends on our imagination.. how far can one think of! and as the Idea people say "an idea can change your life...
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