True Lite.

Macbuntu

2008-08-02T03:00:00.010+05:30

Some one suggested I move to linux/OS X.

Goodness of both is what I wanted. So here is my ubuntu(dual booting with windoze) skinned to look like a cross between Tiger and Leopard.

Ubuntu hardy has problems with my laptop, a HP 530 especially the graphic card. Hardy has 2.6.24-16 kernel. This cant recognize my graphic card (Intel 945 GME) as a special case of Intel 945 GM. I patched the Kernel with a fix to the mesa/drm library(if you own this laptop and u r running hardy then, google for the fix...don't ask me) Sort of worked half assed. So I moved to 2.6.24-19 and it works like a charm.

The attack of the clones

2007-03-13T05:42:00.000+05:30

My dad is a typical Indian consumer. Something which tags free along with something else catches his attention. So he bought an AC because a mp4 player came along with it. I am trying to do an analysis of indian consumer mindset, rather, I want to write about the mp4 player(I googled for some reviews on it and I could not find any).

It is called the HAV Viewpod. It is a inexpensive imitation of the iPod Nano. It looks sleek(almost fooling you into believing it is the iPod Nano) from the outside. Touch a button and expect something to happen. Nothing. Silence. Then you try pressing the buttons. Buttons say "kat kat" when you press them. From this you start getting an eery feeling of remembering other cheap imitation electronics. But wait we do not need to resign ourselves to bad fate yet.

The interface is a look-a-like of a ZUI( try googling zoomable user interfaces). It looks very much like a true ZUI.
It works on the long press/short press combo of button clicks to move in and out of menus. Start playing the music. You will immediately realise that this is not the best music player around. But it playes almost all popular audio formats.

Now for the video playing capabilities. They shipped a Video transcoder and a player in a small CD along with this player. Now the capabilites of the player are impressive. For someone like me who has had frustrating experiences trying to port different video formats to different other video formats for different reasons, this is a pleasant surprise, It converts almost anything I throw at it into a video format(.amv) the Viewpod can play. The video quality is not exactly bad. It is almost like a Divx ripped off a DVD (which means - it is decent). It also provides other trivial capabilites like viewing images and text files.

I actually extrapolated the price from ebay. If my guess of under Rs 3k is right, this is value for money.
If these south east asian clones can come up with such atrociously inexpensive imitiations, they bloody well have a huge market out there. With a bit of working on aesthetics and fine tuning, they will give the big guys a run for their money.

A small vacation and some soul searching. 2.

2006-10-11T05:18:00.000+05:30

A typical problem in a lot of families is that folks tell their children (with words and actions) that they are no-good, worthless, useless drains on their parents' happiness, pocketbooks, and patience. Given this scenario, a few of my friends became convinced that they were just 'no good'.

Sample 'useless' first, easier. No one can be classified as useless, because they aren't really supposed to have to make themseleves useful.

Look at the natural world. What is the use of a tree? Well, it has many uses, but it isn't 'trying' to be useful. There's the difference. It's just doing what it wants (or so we assume) and in the process of doing that it does its job in the natural order of things. Despite all the rantings of moralists, all of us are in the same boat.

The only way to do an ounce of good in the world is to do what we want.Whatever makes us happy, or at least what distracts us from our misery. How does doing what we like do any good?

Observe people who seem to be trying very hard to be useful. Are they doing good things for people around? Or, do they make everyone around them miserable with all their moral uppidyness and incessant busy bodying?

I suspect it is the latter(coz that is what I generally do). The people who really do others some good are the people who are doing what they like and who aren't very interested in being useful. They are usually interesting to be around, because they are doing things that interest them. They are often fun to be around, because they appreciate fun and know how to laugh and not take anything too seriously. They inspire other people to figure out what it is that they want to do by example, thus causing more people to be interested in life and interesting to be around, fun loving, etc.

Out of all the people we meet in life, these people who are doing their own thing are the people who have the most profoundly positive impact on us and thus make our lives richer in the most fundamental, meaningful way. Can you really call that useless?

Sure, working in a kitchen will feed people, but if you're being a martyr about it because you don't really want to be there, everyone around you will see right through you and hate you for being moralistic and insincere, and you will end up doing more harm than good.

Now for worthlessness, once the stigma of uselessness is overcome, we are halfway to getting over worthlessness. Because worthlessness is often a moral judgment we place on ourselves when we think we are useless. You don't even have a right to be here.

There are really only two moral beliefs about people, either people are basically good, or, they are basically bad. 99.9 percent of the world's population believes that people are basically bad, and that is a problem. If it is true, that people are basically bad, then there is no hope for us; democracy is obviously doomed, and a benevolent monarchy is impossible because no basically bad person could stay benevolent once they had all that power.

Again observe people around. Once we get to know them, we realize that. Everyone on the planet is in exactly the same state of moral worth, because we are all doing the best we can with what we have. Poor upbringings cause many people to not have much to do their best with, but hey, that's life.

Criminals believe they are powerless, so breaking the social contract is the only way they think they can get what they need and manage to feel somewhat powerful. People without that hang-up can see that cooperation and respect are really how things get accomplished, but both of these types of people are simply trying to live a fulfilling life using the methods that they think have the best chance of working.

So, people are basically good. They are all trying to do their best. They often just need to overcome a few inner demons and behavior patterns that aren't really working for them.

Obviously everyone is in the same boat. We are doing the best we can with what we have. We are already living the most moral and correct life. There is nothing more that we can do at this moment to be better. We are already good ppl. We do not have to strive every moment to be better than it is possible for us to be. Smile and be yourslef. 'I am OK'.

What we can do to improve, although, is to learn where our blind spots are. People who at first glance are just plain old bad people are on further investigation suffering from horrendous misconceptions about how the world works. We also have misconceptions about the best way to get what we want. Wake up and find those misconceptions Man! why did I beat this topic's catch phrase into the ground, over and over? Well, I was just doing, you know, that thing I said ;-)

A small vacation and some soul searching. 1.

2006-09-29T04:56:00.000+05:30

I come across people who look happy. I wondered. Are they kidding themselves?
Are they ignoring the ugly truth about life that stares at them and pretending that some happy fantasy world that exists only in their heads is real?

A bit more thought. That is exactly how every happy person in the world should act. They are as close to reality as I was.Reality looks neither good nor bad, a very plastic inkblot sort of thing that can be bent and twisted in many directions depending on my beliefs.

Reality is one thing and truth is another???

Okay so what about the Truth? That is a complicated question, but I guess, it would suffice it to say that what is really going on is so strange, so complex, and so far beyond our everyday understanding, that it bears no relationship to Happiness.

Happiness, a state of the mind, a notion I had imposed on the world around me, doesn't depend on anything that has or has not happened in the past, nor does it depend on my future prospects (thank God, eh?).

All I needed to do was 'just decide to be happy'. The answer feels aggravating. Whether or not my logical mind thinks it is rational to be happy and whether or not my moral sense thinks if I deserve to be happy.

Ol' posts filtered. 1.

2005-08-16T04:34:00.000+05:30

Some lines I read.

What would you do if every time you fell in love, you had to say good-bye?
What would you do if every time you wanted someone they would never be there?
What would you do if your best friend died tomorrow and you never told them how you felt?
What would you do if you loved someone more than ever but you couldn't have them?
Some people live, some people die, some people dream, pray, hope, wish and love?
But I want to tell you I like you and you are a very nice friend.
If I died tomorrow, you would be in my heart, would I be in yours?

For some reason it made me wonder what I would do in those situations - one of the advantages of having next to nothing to do is that you can think about the most useless things imaginable, but then I realized that I was running short of time (as usual), and moved on to other things, firmly convinced that the only people who have the luxury of 'discovering themselves' are the bored and the unemployed.

I was both of those things for a while, in the sense that I had taken a break from work to do something better.

Anyway, I had worked with one of those flexi-hour schedules. It ain't bad => you can work when you want. The only problem is the possibility that you'd have to work so much that 'flexi-hour' equates to '24-hour'. I loved it most of the time, but there were times when I wish I had more time to smell the flowers, particularly when I was working on some boring stuff that left me feeling as though I hadn't 'achieved' anything at all after completing it but also that I truly had nothing worth mentioning to do.

I said something along those lines to a friend a while ago and he replied saying that, "Shukar kar saale, most people would be very proud of such an achievement".

I can't help but wonder, 'Proud of what exactly? Of turning work into a narcotic and of working till my brains are in a state of permanent stupor even though they hadn't produced any results that would make a tangible difference to me or anyone else?' Frankly, I'd be happier watching the clouds and dreaming big and better things.