Yesterday was the IBM Technology Day. I had registered for it, for I did not want to miss anything important, but at the same time, I had this beast of Barrons wordlist over me.



Still, I decided to go for it. It was in A2 hall. The talks were on Multi-core Architecture and Web 2.0. It was mainly for CSE and MCAs, but it was made open to other departments like ECE (why? :( ).



Had a nice chat with one of the IBM guys about the upcoming challenges in Linux and computing in general. During the lecture of Web 2.0, the speaker urged us to implement some of the technologies he was speaking of. I got up and told him about all the things Delta has done like RSS Feedreader, AJAXed student search, wikipedia, books, songs, etc. I also mentioned about “Spider” forums. (I am not sure if I showed off too much).



Then at the end, I gave a lot of ideas that IBM can help our institute with. I have to take a poll on these topics and see what the junta is interested in.



I talked to Sagar and Ramona today. They have been my closest friends. They cheered me up.

நான் விழும் விழுது தான் ஆனால் ஓர் நாள் மராத்ாய தங்குவான் …

நான் விழுவாத ய பிடிக்கத்தவேர்கள் எழும் போது என்ன செய்வார்கள்

well this is not a big deal, generally….



but till date i never felt a need to have a net connection at home.

reasons do vary…



for the first 3 years, i was literally living in office (used to spend around 14hrs a day (many times weekends included))….next 1 year was spent on CAT…and another year in US…and the last year with the thought that nothing to browse(this is the phase when an individual hates her/his job :)).



now suddenly, there seems to be lot of reasons to have a net connection at home…

nothing has changed drastically on the surface though….but the thinking process has changed…and the urge to do something on my own has increased manifolds :)



so..lets see how things go…

தமிழ் இல் தட்டச்சு செய்ய



http://www.quillpad.in/tamil/

I finally got an “official” confirmation from Google. I am getting my offer letter today.



GRE Prep has started but not picked up momentum yet. Hope it does. Delta-spider war has began. Delta has a good headstart now. :)

I had my final exam today and the paper being easy,the exam was a breeze.So 3 weeks of rest follow for me after a busy month of classes.After my exam,I happened to read this:

http://21writersblock.blogspot.com/2007/08/youve-got-mail-again.html

Now the author happens to be someone I am very fond of,and her earnest appeal to people in general to find a way to explain the idea of arranged marriage didnt fall on deaf ears.I took upon my frail shoulders the onerous task of removing the stigma(if I may call it that) associated with an “arranged” marriage.I know that the tone of my writing puts the word “arranged” at about the same level as the word match “fixing” in cricket.A thousand pardons for that inadvertent error.At the outset, let me issue the usual disclaimers that am neither married nor in love,and any views that I may express may be taken with many grains of salt.



To any prospective girls who might have an outside chance of falling in love with yours truly–I agree that after reading this your feelings for me would probably be not far from that you share for a brick on the road,or the friendly neighbourhood bulldozer, for that matter.I hasten to add that I am a romantic at heart,and its just my other side taking over for a brief period.I may be guilty of bringing down something as intangible as love,to something as mundane as mathematics.However,there are similarities-both are abstract:)) to start with.But if you look beyond the obvious ,am sure the parable am going to narrate will prove most instructive.

I shall assume that most of my readers are familiar with some numerical techniques for finding roots of equations.But the person for whom the post is intended, though clever, almost certainly doesnt,so a quick introduction.

A function f(x) is said to have a root at c if f(c)=0.Now consider an equation like f(x,y). The point (i,j) is a root if f(i,j)=0.

Consider an equation like x-cos(x+4)=0 or better still sin(x)-log(y) +6=0

I ask you to find a root of the equation.

To come to my point,I need 2 names.Lets take,err…preetha and preethi,for want of any better names:)).I give this problem to both of them, and allow them use of an elementary calculator.

Preetha,being a highly whimsical girl and a good programmer,insists on the following idiosyncrasy.She wants to arrive at the solution by chance alone,so with the help of a random number generator,she tries out numbers one after the other and tries to find if any of them is a root.Sometimes its love,oops! sorry, root at first sight.But often the random numbers turn out too random,and try as she might,picking a root by trial seems too difficult for some equations.But she is delighted whenever she does stumble on the root by chance:)

Preethi on the other hand is a girl singularly devoid of such eccentricity.She consults a book of numerical recipes and hits upon tried and tested techniques like the Golden Search method,Newton Raphson method,bisection method or for more complicated functions,Steepest Descent method and so on.The way these methods work is as follows.

Instead of choosing at random,from the general behavior of the given function,a smaller region is identified in the search space,where a root is likely to occur.Once the region is identified,simply do what Preetha does at random-try out numbers in the region and see which one fits.Notice that in the end, you dont accept a number as a root without checking its functional value.So you are not compromising in any way:))

The general name for such techniques is quite appropriate-Directed Search methods:))

Some more comments on this technique are warranted.An equation can have more than one root.But they all might not lie in the same search space.Also let us recognise a tacit assumption we have made that the equation in question has a real root,which might even be false.(sorry!!)

Assuming that both Preetha and Preethi arrive at the same solution,lets now explore the matter further.For one thing,would you expect that Preetha is happier than Preethi just because she “found” her root by chance alone?Likely not.Now how viable is Preetha’s method? If she has time till kingdom come,its a foolproof method.But if you are short of time, then trusting the God of Randomness is not highly advised.

Then there is the problem of “irrational” roots:) In such cases people stop their search once they find an integer value sufficiently close to the root.:)How close?That’s decided by the Convergence Criterion -the mathematical term for this.

Also let us remind ourselves that the best method actually would be to graph the function and simply determine all the roots by inspection. But such a process is feasible if you are looking from above ,which we are not.

Having said all that,when I have an equation of my own to solve,I will give the random numbers a chance first:)To my dearest random root finder I have this to say-I do wish with all my heart that the correct number pops up soon.Randomly,or with an algorithm,does it really matter ?:)

I believe in the fact that if you wish something for others,it comes true.And I say this in all seriousness.

Sometimes bloody technology poses more problems than it solves..First it was my I-pod which started misbehaving (It hung comp-style! Wouldnt budge from its display screen..maa kasam). The wretched thing wouldnt even turn off.

Since my dad had used it last, he was the one who had his heart in his mouth. I wasnt to keen on screwing it any further by giving it to some local god-forsaken electronic-waalaa..So I did the best thing possible i could, albeit not the smartest of things..starved it for charge for like 2 days till it went off..then charged it again till it was full.. n Eureka, it sprang to life. See, sometimes it helps to have engineers in the family! We never practice what we study and what we practice isnt worthy enough to be studied..

The next day the computer started showing signs of insanity. It would boot (phew..so it wasnt a HD crash) but i just had a desktop for show..absolutely nothing else on it!! I later found out that it was a virus at work corrupting the OS which was later fixed by an old batch-mate of mine.

A few days later,I decided one fine morning that I would meet by college friends(Pall and Pam) who had started off with their training in Pune. Well not exactly Pune..but a place between pune n mumbai,on the city’s outskirts,which houses a certain automobile giant. I had to take directions by phone from good ol’ Pam at literally each step of my journey. Everything went off quite well.. till i got down at a place called chinchwad,where it was my cell phone’s turn to give its quota of problems.

“Network busy” it said and to make matters worse there was no charge(so.. not just the cell phone, hutch was also partly responsible)!! Shit..I had to reach pam somehow.. otherwise I would be stuck in this damn place the whole night.

There are times in life where one desperately wishes actress Kajol to pop out of thin air and give a Tata Indicom, saying ” Network problem?? Switch to tata indicom!Ye aapka saath nahi chodega”.

This was just one such occasion!

After about 15 attempts on my side and as many attempts by Pam we finally got to talk to each other again and he found out my exact location. Pam was just the same as i had seen him last before leaving college. Not that i expected him to change.Its his nose which really stands out even today. The same nose which withstood the much talked about nose-operation. Today, he was in traditional gear- kurta and he was all cool n relaxed.





After a tight hug and pleasantries, we got into a “luxury bus” (buses with proper BEST bus-like seats are called luxury buses there). We were meeting each other after a long gap so we had loads to gossip about. Thursdays ‘off’ for them meant that Wednesday nights were reserved for party time. I gathered from Pam’s tone that he did love his job, the place and his colleagues. Though he ruefully admitted that there were just 6 females in their batch of 100-odd .Not that Pam is a champion of women’s participation but he would have liked a bit more gender balance.

His talk then centred around a cute HR chick in the company (they only one) on whom the entire male junta had gone bonkers. She was on a short stay in the company to complete her PMP(post grad). A hundred hearts bled when she was later discovered in a coffee shop gettting cosy with her boyfriend..She left the company soon, so no big deal, he said!

I am happy for Pam. Pam, i feel, is on a mission to re-discover himself, exploring the fun-part of himself. The part of him which was in deep slumber during his pre-engineering days, when he was immersed deeply in calculus, organic chemistry, electromagnetism,IIT dreams and coaching classes. We partied in a smallish multiplex-cum-pub till 12.30..till we were absolutely sure that all of us were out of breath and there was no means of transport to take us to our place of stay. Even the last local had left! There were 10 of us including me,Pam,Pall and their work mates. We walked up to the main road and made up our minds to stop any passing lorry for lift. But it was a car which came to our rescue. Yeah u heard it right,CAR not CARS! All 10 of us go into it like mad cattle. I still dont remember which car it was, at that point we found such details pretty irrelevant. We just wanted to reach our place asap

(Ah..I know wat u r still thinkin..how 10 in one car? Sorry cant divulge details.)..

When we reached our destination i picked myself up with great difficulty. I was virtually squashed to pulp under 2-3 big butts and to say that it was excruciating pain would be an understatement.

Pam shares his flat with a guy who lives to sleep all day. The only indication of his “awakening” ,pam said, was when a female’s (his girl’s) voice came from his room.And that too only thursday mornings when she came to meet him.

The next day was spent roaming in the city with pam and 3 of his friends from mumbai. It had started to rain heavily and we were drenched to the core. The roaming included a trip to one of the prime CAT coaching classes in city since Pam had to kickstart his CAT-prep somehow with the help of a suitable test-series for a reasonable fee.

The lady at the desk greeted us with a smile and later found herself at the recieving end of Pam’s bargaining tactics usually reserved for vegetable vendors,which included some intermittent sweet talk as well.It was a cat-n-mouse game being played and finally it was Pam who had to conceede defeat. But Pam’s attempts at informal talk seemed to have aroused a sense of regret in her that she was just an ordinary graduate, having worked in this god-forsaken coaching centre for 7 years.

We then caught up with the latest movie “Partner” ,typical of the “Govinda timepass” genre. We were thoroughly exhausted by the time we reached the colony at around 11.

Amazing how company life can change you n ur habits; Pam was up by 7 the next day! He always carries to work a bag which has a John Grisham in it…lol..

He dropped me at the bus stop on his way to work as I bid adieu.



Regards



Vishwesh

So after 7 months of stay in Japan I am returning back to India today. Lately I have been busy travelling around Japan and did not find time to update my blog. I successfully climbed Mt.Fuji and went around tokyo. Will be writing a dedicated blog entry on my travel experience soon. So I am very happy to be going back to India and cannot wait longer to meet my mother.

My first overseas trip was a fun filled experience. Japan is a wonderful place with lovely people and really enjoyed being here. Expect another entry about my Japan experience soon.



Thanks to the AI flight being late I am able to write this from KIX(Kansai) airport. Hoping to meet all you friends in India. Will be in Bangalore from tomorrow morning. Just ping me and I will be more than happy to meet you.



Update: Was able to meet most of my friends and atleast speak to them by phone. Its always nice to speak to your close friends after a gap. I thoroughly enjoyed the company. I also visited my native in Trichy and saw Rajnis sivaji in a theatre there. Always a great experience to watch a Rajni movie in tamilnadu. On the work front I am back in Bangalore now and will continue working here for atleast 8 months or so.