BloggeD

Understanding Blogger Template - 3

2009-02-05T15:17:00.003+05:30

The blogger template is a xhtml document which is rendered based on variables. These tutorials aims at helping to understand the blogger template and hence to experiment, learn and change it. Blogger template has mainly three types of variables one which controls the flow of the code, one which pulls data from the databases behind and the third are expressions. This variables are then distinguished with the help of following xml namespaces.

This is third in the series of the three tutorial for Blogger Template and deals mainly with the explanation of the expr: namespace and understanding its usage. The other tuts are:

Blogger Template Explanation - Sections, widgets, includables, includes. b: namespace

Blogger Template Explanation - Data access. data: namespace elements.

Blogger Template Explanation - How to use expr: namespace - customize links.

Expr namespace is simple but its usage is very important. Expr is basically used in conjuction with data tags. For making the blogger engine aware that the xml tag attributes coming next are having data tags in them and have to be parsed. Whenever there is a tag say anchor tag, you will have attributes like href and in that case you want the href link created dynamically with help of some data say data:post.url then you will have to use href as expr:href.

Simple implementation of expr:href in the title includable.

This includable is the title section of your blog. Check the usage of expr:href with the anchor tag.


<b:includable id='title'>
 <b:if cond='data:blog.url == data:blog.homepageUrl'>
  <data:title/>
  <b:else/>
  <a expr:href='data:blog.homepageUrl'><data:title/></a>
 </b:if>
</b:includable>

See this code below for understanding the implementaion of expr:src and over other such tags. It is being used for parsing the data tags in image img tag attributes.


<a expr:href='data:blog.homepageUrl' style='display: block'>
 <img 
  expr:alt='data:title' 
  expr:height='data:height' 
  expr:id='data:widget.instanceId'
  expr:src='data:sourceUrl' 
  expr:width='data:width' 
  style='display: block'
 />
</a>

As you can see how expr tag is applied to the attributes selectively. Wherever data was to be used expr is applied and in style where data tag is not required the expr is ommitted. Therefore the expr namespace variables are all the attributes which might have some data namespace variable inserted in it. So use expr for data tags used in any attribute values like expr:title, expr:id, expr:onClick and so on. These attributes can be for any xml tag. I have seen it in anchor a, image img, span, div, select, input, button etc., so pretty much everything.

Example Social Bookmark StumbleUpon button for Blogger.

This code listing below explains how to insert stumble upon button for blogger. Although it serves as an example on how to do this but my main focus here is on the usage of quotes. So check how the single and double quotes are used in expr:href for creating and using the url to submit and/or thumbs up the specific post correctly. It generally does not matter that you are using single or double quotes, but when your attribute has to use both of them single quotes decide the attribute opening and closing and double quotes are understood as part of attribute.

Blogger uses single quotes for attribute values, and double quotes within, so change your code as necessary. Within the attribute value, if there are extra single or double quotes as part of the original code, e.g. Javascript, you need to escape them. Also check that the ampersand '&' is converted to '&'. So you might have to create your url in this way. Check more on the stumble upon post url on their site StumbleUpon http://www.stumbleupon.com Widgets and button section.


<a 
 rel="nofollow" 
 target="_blank" 
 expr:href='"http://www.stumbleupon.com/submit?url=" + data:post.url + "&amp;title=" + data:post.title' 
 title="StumbleUpon">
 <img 
  src="../stumbleupon.png" 
  title="StumbleUpon" 
  alt="StumbleUpon" 
  class="sociable-hovers"
 />
</a>

Example Social Bookmark - Add Digg to Blogger

Again although the below code listing is an example of Adding Digg to Blogger template, my focus here is on the escaping done while using javascript. Check how data:post.url is used while inserting it in the javascript variable digg_url. You can use this code to display a counter of diggs done for your post in a neat compact manner on your blog. Check out the digg documentation of this on the http://www.digg.com tools section.


<script type="text/javascript">
 digg_url = &#39;<data:post.url/>&#39;;
 digg_skin = 'compact';
 digg_window = 'new';
</script>
<script src="http://digg.com/tools/diggthis.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

So as you saw proper escaping of quotes is done above. Although this is not direct example of the expr: tag usage as javascript onclick or anyother such event is not used here. But you got the logic right? But if you didn't check this code listing displaying the button to add comments. This is generally found in the footer section of your post and its obviously customisable :).


<div class='post-footer-line post-footer-line-3'>
 <span class='post-comment-link'>
  <b:if cond='data:blog.pageType != &quot;item&quot;'>
   <b:if cond='data:post.allowComments'>
    <a 
     class='comment-link' 
     expr:href='data:post.addCommentUrl' 
     expr:onclick='data:post.addCommentOnclick'>
      <b:if cond='data:post.numComments == 1'>
       1 <data:top.commentLabel/>
      <b:else/>
       <data:post.numComments/> <data:top.commentLabelPlural/>
      </b:if>
    </a>
   </b:if>
  </b:if>
 </span> 
</div>

The data:post.addCommentOnclick generates appropriate javascript based on your blog setting for example a popup window or comment post page. And data:post.addCommentUrl will generate the url pointing to the comments for the post.

This comes to the end of the three tutorials which I was intending to write on the blogger template. But If you want anything else to be added in this tutorial series let me know and I will do it.

If you have done anything interesting with the blogger template create a back-link to it in this tutorial. Please share you comments about the things discussed and add information that you feel will benefit others. Thanks for reading.

Understanding the Blogger Template - 2

2009-01-26T20:11:00.002+05:30

This is second in the series of the three tutorial for Blogger Template and deals mainly with the explanation of the data: namespace and understanding how to access its vars.

Blogger Template Explanation - Sections, widgets, includables, includes. b: namespace

Blogger Template Explanation - Data access. data: namespace elements.

Blogger Template Explanation - How to use expr: namespace - customize links.

Data namespace contains the most important tags as this is the way you access your data. Maybe I would write a separate blog for this one, but the basics are here. The namespace is basically a way to identify and maintain uniqueness in when large number of elements are present. The expression for identifying a element uniquely in xml documents is as in [namespace-identifier]:[the-tag]. The data here is the namespace identifier and have further unique elements. A namespace basically helps in identifying or giving a variable unqiue name.

There are many types of data variables. Some of them are available globally. By globally I mean they can be accessed anywhere whereas the certain tags/identifiers can only be accessed from certain widgets. That is how it works.

The Globally available data in Blogger template

This data is available everywhere in your page. So use it wherever you like. These are referenced as part of the "blog" data, i.e., to be used as blog.title for referring for the title of the blog. Don't forget to include the namespace data in the begining. This code listing will explain the usage.



<!--[The blog's title.]-->
<data:blog.title/> 

<!--[
The type of the current page. One of 'item', 'archive', or 'index'.
This var is quite useful for selectively showing content on 
different type of pages. Put an if and check if its index page or 
item page and then display selective content
]-->
<data:blog.pageType/>

<!--  [The URL of the current page.]  -->
<data:blog.url/>

<!--  [The homepage of the blog.]  -->
<data:blog.homepageUrl/>

<!--[
The title of the current page. This is often the blog title, 
but may contain additional information on archive or post pages.
]-->
<data:blog.pageTitle/> 

<!--  [The encoding to use for the blog, e.g. UTF-8.]  -->
<data:blog.encoding/> 

<!--[
Either "ltr" or "rtl" for left-to-right 
and right-to-left languages, respectively.
]-->
<data:blog.languageDirection/> 

<!--  [The autodiscovery feed links for the page header.]  -->
<data:blog.feedLinks/>

Apart from the data available globally there is data specific to specific widget types. Following is the list of widget types. For each of this widget there are different tags available and locally for each one.

Page Header

Blog Archives

Profile

Text / HTML / JavaScript

Feed

Picture

Labels

List

Link List

Logo

Blog Posts

Page Header widgets in Blogger template

This is basically used in the header section of your blog entry. Where the title and the description of the blog is given. This widget is a very simple one and has only two types of data variables for access. Note these don't require the usage as blog.identifier as in case of globally available data. This can be referenced directly in the Page Header type widget.


<!--[The blog's title. ]-->
<data:title/> 

<!-- [ The blog's description. ]-->
<data:description/>

Blog Archives in Blogger template

There are three types of display formats of blog archives- Menu, Flat and Hierarchy. If you're designing a new version, it's easiest to use 'FLAT' as the style, and then manipulate the rest of the data as desired. The key data are title, style and data . Data containing: the name of the archive duration; url of the posts; and post-counts in the duration.

title The title of the widget.

style One of 'MENU', 'FLAT', or 'HIERARCHY'.

data A list of each archive unit, each of which contains:

name: The name of this archive interval or period.

url: The link to the page containing posts from this interval.

post-count: How many posts there are in this interval.

Usage: Check the includable for flat. This can then be included as include in the main includable for display.



<!--[ Simple usage of title ]-->
<b:if cond='data:title'>
 <h2><data:title/></h2>
</b:if>

<!--[ For a includable flat type ]-->
<b:includable id='flat' var='data'>
 <ul>
  <b:loop values='data:data' var='i'>
   <li class='archivedate'>
    <a expr:href='data:i.url'>
     <data:i.name/>
    </a>
    (<data:i.post-count/>)
   </li>
  </b:loop>
 </ul>
</b:includable>

Profile Widget in Blogger template

This is the profile of the author. There can be one author of a blog or maybe the blog has a team of authors. For a blog with a single author, the profile widget contains the following information.

title The title of the widget.

userUrl The author's profile URL.

location The location from the author's profile.

aboutme The "About Me" information from the profile.

displayname The author's display name.

photo The user's profile photo, made up of the following:

url: The photo URL.

width: The photo's width, in pixels.

height: The photo's height, in pixels.

alt: The "alt" text for the photo.

Team blog widgets contain less information compare to single blog widgets. The tags are:

title: The title of the widget.

authors: The list of all authors, each of which contains the following:

displayname: The author's display name.

userURL: The author's profile URL.

If you want to design your template to handle both single- and multiple-author blogs, you can use the data:team variable to distinguish between the two cases as shown below.



<b:if cond='data:team=="true"'> 
 <!--[display multiple authors] -->
</b:if>

Text / HTML / JavaScript Widget in Blogger template

HTML / Javascript and Text widgets are very simple widgets and contain only two data elements.

title: The widget's title.

content: The content of the widget.

Usage of title and content is similar in all widgets (refer Archives code usage above).

Feed Widget in Blogger template

Feed widget like any other widget has tags for accessing its own information and along with that has feedData. This feedData contains all items in the feed. items being like title, published date, author, summary etc. So basically this feedData is a set of data. You may now have remembered the loop tag (check the previous tut in the series), we have to use that to access each item from the set of items.

title: The widget's title.

feedUrl: The URL of the feed.

feedData: The items in the feed, each of which contains:

title: the item title.

str_published: When the item was published (nicely formatted in blog's timezone).

published: When the item was published (in seconds since epoch).

str_updated: When the item was last updated (nicely formatted in blog's timezone).

updated: When the item was last updated (in seconds since epoch).

author: The item's author.

summary: A snippet from the item, if available.

alternate: Where to get more information about this item, which contains:

href: The permalink of this item.

type: The content-type of this item.

Picture Widget in Blogger template

A picture widget contains a single image, and provides all the relevant data for that image.

title: The title of the widget.

sourceUrl: The URL of the image.

width: The image's width, in pixels.

height: The image's height, in pixels.

caption: The image caption.

Labels Widget in Blogger template

The labels widget includes a list of all labels that are in use on the blog.

title: The widget title.

labels: The list of labels, each of which contains:

name: The text of the label.

count: How many posts have this label.

url: A link to a page displaying posts with this label.

List Widget in Blogger template

The simplest form of a list. Each item is just a single piece of text, without any different types of data within it.

title: The widget title.

items: The list of items.

Usage: Similar to link list below.

Link List Widget in Blogger template

A slightly fancier list, where each item has two parts to it: the text and the link.

title: The widget title.

links: The list of links, each of which contains:

name: The link's text.

target: The link's URL.

Usage:



<!--[Check the complete implementaion of the linklist widget. ]-->
<b:widget id='LinkList1' locked='false' title='More Blogs' type='LinkList'>
 <b:includable id='main'>
  <b:if cond='data:title'>
   <h2><data:title/></h2>
  </b:if>
  <div class='widget-content'>
   <ul>
    <b:loop values='data:links' var='link'>
     <li>
      <a expr:href='data:link.target'>
       <data:link.name/>
      </a>
     </li>
    </b:loop>
   </ul>
   <b:include name='quickedit'/>
  </div>
 </b:includable>
</b:widget>

Logo in Blogger template

It doesn't get any simpler than this one. Just one piece of data here.

fullButton: The URL of the Blogger button you've selected.

Blog Post Widget in Blogger template

This is the central part of any blog, and the most complex. You should definitely consider simply making modifications to one of the default templates before writing a blog posts widget from scratch. But however you want to do it, here's all the data available in this widget.

feedLinks: A list of feeds for this page. On the main page, this will contain the main blog feeds; on item pages, this will also contain comments feeds. The blog post widget has a includable created as feedlinks, which in turn uses another includable feedlinksbody. Each item in this list contains the following:

url: The feed URL.

name: The feed name (i.e. 'Posts' or 'Comments').

feedType: The type of feed (Atom or RSS).

mimeType: The mime type of the feed.

olderPageUrl: If there are older posts than the ones on the current page, this is a URL to those posts. Context-sensitive for page type. (Not all pages will have this link. use if)

olderPageTitle: Title of the link to the older page of posts.

newerPageUrl: The newer equivalent of olderPageUrl.

newerPageTitle: The newer equivalent of olderPageTitle.

commentLabel: The phrase to use to show the number of comments, e.g. "comments."

authorLabel: The phrase to use to indicate who wrote the post, e.g. "posted by."

timestampLabel: The phrase to use to indicate when the post was written, e.g. "posted at."

postLabelsLabel: Phrase to introduce the list of post labels, e.g. "labels for this post."

backlinksLabel: Phrase to describe backlinks to this post, e.g. "links to this post."

posts: A list of all posts for this page. Each post contains the following:

dateHeader: The date of this post, only present if this is the first post in the list that was posted on this day.

id: The numeric post ID.

title: The post's title.

body: The content of the post.

author: The display name of the post author.

url: The permalink of this post.

timestamp: The post's timestamp. Unlike dateHeader, this exists for every post.

labels: The list of the post's labels. Each label contains the following:

name: The label text.

url: The URL of the page that lists all posts in this blog with this label.

isLast: True or false. Whether this label is the last one in the list (useful for placing commas).

allowComments: 'True' if this post allows comments.

numComments: The number of comments on this post.

showBacklinks: Whether to show backlinks for this post.

numBacklinks: Number of backlinks for this post.

addCommentUrl: The URL of the 'add a comment' form for this post.

emailPostUrl: The URL of the 'email this post' form for this post.

editUrl: The URL of the edit form for this post.

feedLinks: A list of feeds specific to this post. (This is different from the overall blog feedLinks, as it may contain a feed for the post's comments, for instance.) Each contains the following:

url: The feed URL.

name: The feed name (e.g. 'Posts' or 'Comments').

feedType: The type of feed (Atom or RSS).

mimeType: The mime type of the feed.

comments: A list of all comments for this post (on item pages only). Each contains the following:

id: The numeric ID of the comment.

body: The body of the comment.

timestamp: The time the comment was created.

author: The display name of the comment's author, or 'Anonymous'.

authorUrl: URL of the comment author's profile, if the comment is not anonymous.

deleteUrl: The URL for deleting this comment.

isDeleted: Whether this comment has been deleted. (The text of deleted comments is replaced with a placeholder.)


<!-- [Using feedlinks ]-->
<!-- [feedlinks for the blog can be used displayed using the elements in this way. ]-->
<data:feedlinks.url/>
<!-- [whereas feedlinks for a post which include e.g. comments can be shown this way. ]-->
<data:post.feedlinks.url/>


<!--[
if inside a includable and a var is assigned to it while using the include 
then use it in this manner
]-->
<b:include data='post.feedLinks' name='feedLinksBody'/>
<b:includable id='feedLinksBody' var='links'>
 <b:loop values='data:links' var='f'>
  <a class='feed-link' expr:href='data:f.url' expr:type='data:f.mimeType'>
   <data:f.name/> (<data:f.feedType/>)
  </a>
 </b:loop>
</b:includable>

So from the above list the data elements which are in the main list can be accesed directly like in case of blog feedlinks above. The sub-lists to the main can be accessed using the dot operator i.e., similar to object oriented programming where the [classNameVar].[objectVar] gives you access to the object variable of a class. So to access variables deeper in the list keep using dot operators.


<!--[
For accessing the comment id you will have to use either the 
includable method shown previously or use this one.
]-->
<data:post.comments.id/>
<!-- [but you should use includable as they are cool :) ]-->

Sometimes when you try to use this data elements directly it gives error. Either your widget / section won't work or something like that would happen. One of the reasons is that you can't use this expressions directly. You have to use the expression namespace which I have introduced you in the previous tutorial. As the tutorail on data namespace has already got to big. I will continue the expr:[vars] namespace in the next tutorial. Althought I guess that won't be this big :).

I have tried to explain a lot of things here. But if you want or have a better explanation add it up in comments. If you have any doubts put them here would answer them if I know :). Let me know thy feedback.

Understanding the blogger template - 1

2009-01-24T02:01:00.002+05:30

Blogger Template Explanation - Sections, widgets, includables, includes. b: namespace

Blogger Template Explanation - Data access. data: namespace elements.

Blogger Template Explanation - How to use expr: namespace - customize links.

Before you start experimenting with your blogger template I will suggest you do two things. Create a sandbox blog which you should delete once you are done experimenting, so that the url is free for some other poor blogger. Now Download the current template of your blog i.e., you should backup both your widgets and the template file itself. You can search for how to do this on google or wait until I write one tutorial on that :).

To understand/experiment with your blogger template I will suggest don't do it on your blogger "Edit HTML" page. Use the template that you downloaded with some advanced text editor. I would recomment Notepad++ but you can use whatever you like to understand your blogger template.

The blogger template is a xhtml document based on http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml specification. The following namespaces are used in the blogger template:


<html
 xmlns  = 'http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml' 
 xmlns:b  = 'http://www.google.com/2005/gml/b' 
 xmlns:data = 'http://www.google.com/2005/gml/data' 
 xmlns:expr = 'http://www.google.com/2005/gml/expr' 
>

These namespaces will be used throughout the xml document to fetch and display data. So this tutorial is going to explain mainly the variables in the 'b' namespace. The variables in this namespace mainly control the layout and control flow of the template. This helps in placing the elements on your blog at certain location and if-else conditions as well as loops. More about the namespaces later.

The template is mainly divided in sections. This sections will include widgets. Widgets will have includables. includables are useless unless you use it by using the include tag.

The Section Tag.

Section tag determines the division of your blogger layout. The section cannot contain any code directly. Only widgets are to be inserted inside it. Following is the format and attributes are supported by the section tag.


<b:section [attribs] >
</b:section>

id (Required) A name identifying the section must be unique. This id can be used to identify the section after the blogger rendering is done. These section tags will show up as div tags having the same id.

class (Optional) Common class names are 'navbar,' 'header,' 'main,' 'sidebar,' and 'footer.' If you switch templates later, these names help Blogger determine how best to transfer over your content. However, you can use different names, if you like. You can use them to stylize your content.

maxwidgets (Optional) The maximum number of widgets to allow in this section. If you don't specify a limit, there won't be one.

showaddelement(Optional) Can be 'yes' or 'no,' with 'yes' as the default. This determines whether the Page Elements tab will show the 'Add a Page Element' link in this section.

growth (Optional) Can be 'horizontal' or 'vertical,' with 'vertical' as the default. This determines whether widgets within this section are arranged side-by-side or stacked.

The Widget Tag.

Widget Tags are included inside section tags. There are two ways of viewing the html code on the "Edit HTML" page. One is simple form which gets displayed by default. The other is by using the "Expand Widgets" checkbox. In the simple form the widgets are included inside the sections with the single tag format i.e., opening and closing tag in one.


<!--Simple form.-->
<b:widget [attribs] />

<!-- Expanded form. -->
<b:widget [attribs] >
</b:widget>

A widget may have the following attributes:

id (Required) May contain letters and numbers only, and each widget ID in your template should be unique. A widget's ID cannot be changed without deleting the widget and creating a new one. Similar to the section tag's id, widget tags also get converted to div tags having the id same as used here.

type: (Required) Indicates what kind of a widget it is, and should be one of the valid widget types listed below.

locked: (Optional) Can be 'yes' or 'no,' with 'no' as the default. A locked widget cannot be moved or deleted from the Page Elements tab.

title: (Optional) A display title for the widget. If none is specified, a default title such as 'List1' will be used.

pageType: (Optional) Can be 'all,' 'archive,' 'main,' or 'item,' with 'all' as the default. The widget will display only on the designated pages of your blog. (All widgets display on the Page Elements tab, regardless of thier pageType.)

The widget types that can be specified are: BlogArchive, Blog, Feed, Header, HTML, SingleImage, LinkList, List, Logo, BlogProfile, Navbar, VideoBar, NewsBar.

The widget in simple form will just show you the placement of the widget. But if you need to edit the widget itself, then switch to the advanced form i.e., Expanded widgets.

The includables Tag.

A widget is a collection of includables and typically a main includable. Includables as their name suggests are piece of code that can be put together to avoid repetetion. This includable then can be included in one more places. Apart from removing repetition the includables also help in understanding the structure of the widget. Includable tag is also part of b namespace. So it will have the tag in this manner.


<b:includable id='[some-unique-id]' [attribs] >
</b:includable>

The includable tag has the following attributes:

id: (Required) A unique identifier made up of letters and numbers. Note: a widget must contain atleast a single includable and the id for that must be main.

var: (Optional) An identifier made up of letters and numbers, for referencing data within this section. The data will be referenced similar to the namespace i.e., if var='a' is used then the title in data can be referred as a:title.

The include Tag.

The includable created above needs to be included in the widget for that we use the include tag. If your widget is having only a single includable then in that case the id of that includable should be main and for that a separate include is not required. That single includable will be included by default. The include tag contains two attribs mainly name refers to the id of the includable and data refers to var of includable. The includable tag is self closed and another closing tag is not required. The format is as shown.


<b:include name='[the-includable-name]' data='[the-expression-for-var]'/>

The attributes name and data:

name: (Required) This name will be pointing to the includable which is to be included. There should be a includable with the id as this name.

data: (Optional) Like a parameter is passed to function this data is passed to includable. It is a peice of data to pass on to the includable section. This will become the value of the var attribute in the includable.

We can have any name for includable but it must be unique for that widget. This includable can then be included in one or more places in the widget using the include tag.
Next lets discuss two more tags from the "b" namespace. They are if / else and the loop.

The if / else Tag.

The if/else tag is displayed as shown.


<!-- Only if-->
<b:if cond='[some condn check]'>
 [Then do this]
</b:if>


<!-- both if and else-->
<b:if cond='[some cond check]'>
 <!--  [Then do this]  -->
<b:else/>
 <!--  [else do this]  -->
</b:if>

From the code above the working of if and else would be quite clear. One thing to note is that the else tag is a self closing one. To understand the condition see the following examples.


<!-- to check a boolean variable. -->
<b:if cond='data:useImage'> 
 <!--  [execute if the header for your blog is image instead of text]  -->
</b:if>

<!-- to compare equivalence of two values-->
<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "item"'> 
 <!--  [True if the current page is an item page (post page).]  -->
</b:if>

<!-- to compare non-equivalence -->
<b:if cond='data:displayname != "Fred"'> 
 <!--  [True if this is not Fred's display name.]  -->
</b:if>

<!-- comparing greater than, less than-->
<b:if cond='data:post.numComments > 1'> 
 <!--  [True if the current post has more than one comment.]  -->
</b:if>

They say for any language if you know to control the flow you are done with the basics. So for completing the basics of blogger template we need to learn about if-else and a looping feature. One done One to Go. So lets discuss the loop feature now.

The Loop Tag.

This is also part of "b" namespace. It behaves as any loop should i.e., for every element in some set of elements you can do something. For e.g., In a set of comments display each comment. If you are looking for customizing your comments display you may have to look into this loop. The usage will be more clear once you have a look at the syntax.


<b:loop var='some-identifying-var' values='set-of-something'>
 <!--  [For every var in the values i.e., for every data in the set of data do something here]  -->
</b:loop>

Now we are done with the basics, but one important thing remains - Displaying your data. Obviously you just dont want to have a beautiful page without any data. You need to display some data. For that we will have to learn about the data namespace.

Therefore data namespace contains the most important variables and if I mention it all in here it would be too cluttered. I will write a separate article on that. And as you must know you learn more experimenting then reading. So get your coffees ready and start experimenting with the code.

You are more than welcome to add more help in the comments. Also if you want or have a better explanation add it up in comments. If you have any doubts put them here. I would answer them if I know :).

Prevent Mobile Loss

2009-01-10T18:15:00.010+05:30

Found my love my mobile

As I have mentioned earlier in the post "She broke up with me" my love, my mobile was lost in an auto rickshaw while commuting to office. Thanks to the prayers I & you made I am back again with her :). We did meet again. The breakup didn't last long. Hope it doesn't ever happen again.

The burning question that everybody is asking me now:

How to get lost / stolen mobile back?

When you search the net for lost mobile you will find thousands of links and pages, but very few posts from people who recovered it.

One of the reason I got mobile back is because I was very well prepared that this crisis might occur. Other reasons are chance and luck, which are beyond our control but the following things should be taken care of.

First: When you buy a mobile, keep your bills safe. Don't throw them away. Make sure your Bills are duly stamped and should contain your name, manufacturer name, model name and Product / Serial Number of your mobile. Keep all the manuals warranty etc that come along they are helpful although not for recovery.

Second: Take a note of your IMEI ( International Mobile Equipment Identity ) number. Its usually found printed on the phone under the battery along with the serial number. It is a unique number assigned to each mobile equipment. This number is unique to the device and has no relation to the SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) which stores the IMSI (International Mobile Subscriber Identity) and hence to sevice provider. It was introduced mainly to control mobile thefts. The logic used for tracking is as follows. Whenever a mobile connects to a GSM networks (IMEI is only for GSM networks) along with the SIM number and other information the mobile also transfers the IMEI number to identify itself as a valid device.
Now when a mobile is stolen or is to be tracked as who is using it, a alert can be placed on the IMEI number. The next time the number comes on the network it is identified as a invalid device and the alert is triggered on it with all the details i.e., the phone number / sim number etc, from where the person's address who is using the SIM etc can be found. A point to note here is that although most of the countries follow this standard and have laws implementing IMEI number for mobile devices, some countries although, like Singapore etc don't have such laws and there are devices without IMEI number. There are even techniques to remove/tamper the IMEI number of mobile equipments. But this techniques are against the law in many countries and require high skill and understanding. Its basically like a hack and proficient people can do it. More on IMEI number here.

Third: Although this wont help you find your mobile but will help you mitigate the loss, get an insurance on it. In many countries getting an insurance is a general practice while buying mobile. If your device is costly why not take it.

Fourth: Try and get a backup of all your data i.e., keep synchronising your device with your laptop or whatever. The activesync on windows mobile takes care of backing up your contacts, calendar appointments, E-mail, Tasks, Notes, Favourites, some files and other media. You can use some other Sync softwares which can keep your storage / memory card in sync. Make an habit of connecting your device to laptop (bluetooth sync is hasselfree).

Fifth: There are software which can be installed on the devices supporting multimedia i.e., having PC connectivity installed with OS as Windows Mobile, Symbian, Palm OS etc. There are only a few of these software which I am going to tell you about. These software are again a kind of hack and tampering done to track SIM card change. The logic of this software is simple. There is predefined configurable mobile number stored on your device (like in the mobile registry) which will be notified by a SMS, being sent in the background with the information like the new SIM number and mobile number inserted. Some more sophisticated softwares also insert the GPS coordinates of the mobile when sending the SMS, provided your device had GPS installed on it. So you can find out the person yourself who did this to you. You may find some free software look for them. This point may not be applicable to many of you and I admit its a bit geeky.

Sixth: Take Care Period.

Well I took care of most of the above points but I could not install these software on my device because of the performance tweak I did a few days before losing it. When I was talking about the performance tweak in the last post I was talking about this. The tweak basically was that I had formated my Windows mobile 6.0 and installed windows mobile 6.1 and along with that changed my IPL and SPL ( more of it on someother day if interested get started here). It freed a lot of locked memory on my device. So basically after doing it I did not install these software and the next day the mobile was lost.

Its basically like a stitch in time saves nine. So any precaution that you can take is good. With this all done you might not even lose your mobile. And if you lose it chances are that you will be back with your love as I am.

continued in...

So now how to Recover Lost mobile?

Traveler IQ Quiz Game

2008-11-30T21:13:00.010+05:30

So how nicely do you know the world you live in?

OK... Did you ever wish that you live your job or whatever you do and go for a trip around the world. Get into the exquisite hotels around the world. From East to West, From North to South.

Well Fella ! before that lets check how much you about the world. Turn on your imagination and bring the world map in front of you. Then try and imagine these places.

1. Grand Canyon - USA
2. Great Barrier Reaf - Australia
3. Florida - USA
4. The South Island - New Zealand
5. Cape Town - South Africa
6. Golden Temple - India
7. Las Vegas - USA
8. Sydney - Australia
9. New York - USA
10. Taj Mahal - India
11. Canadian Rockies - Canada
12. Uluru - Australia
13. Chichen Itza -Mexico
14. Macchu Pichu - Peru
15. Niagara Falls - Canada/USA
16. Petra - Jordan
17. The Pyramids - Egypt
18. Venice - Italy
19. Maldives - Maldives
20. Great Wall - China
21. Victoria Falls - Zambia/Zimbabwe
22. Hongkong - Hongkong
23. Yosemite National Park - USA
24. Hawaii - USA
25. Auckland - New Zealand
26. Iguassu Falls - Argentina/Brazil
27. Paris - France
28. Alaska - USA
29. Angkor Wat - Cambodia
30. Himalayas - India/Nepal/Tibet
31. Rio de Janerio - Brazil
32. Masai Mara - Kenya
33. Galapagos Island - Ecuador
34. Luxor - Egypt
35. Rome - Italy
36. San Fransisco - USA
37. Barcelona - Spain
38. Dubai - Arab Emirates
39. Singapore - Singapore
40. La Digue - Seychelles

So how many could you picture, How many could you locate? Well, for most of you when you were thinking of a world trip you were imagining of those luxury hotels, historic places, exotic beaches, and what not.

Meaning you must have forgotten the aim of this blog. To test and challenge your IQ. Let me help your imagination and take you to a wonderful Game/Quiz by TravelPod. This will brush up your GK and IQ and get you ready for that trip.

So here is the link for The Traveler IQ Challenge™. This game is also embedded below.

If you face any display problem please play at the link given above.

This Traveler IQ challenge compares your geographical knowledge against the World's Original Travel diary's other 3,372,655 travelers who have taken this challenge as of Sunday, November 30, 2008 at 03:44PM GMT. (TravelPod is a TripAdvisor Media Network member)

Checkout wikipedia for the places you know, you know but can't remember :). So when you have completed the challenge and got your Map IQ high, You can start packing your travel bags. Until then Happy Quizzing.

Display HTML / JavaScript code in Blogger - How to

2008-11-29T13:00:00.001+05:30

In my last post about How to add Digg to Blogger I was struggling with how to display html code on my page. Showing code in those beautiful boxes without disturbing the layout / indenting was easy but tricky. You need to know css / html and that the Blogger does not support unescaped code. Also to maintain consistency among all this boxes, is another issue. So here is what I did.

Lets have a look first at the box I am talking about.

So the question remains, how to get it?

Easy... just follow this steps.

As blogger wont take html code as it is... meaning you will need to convert it into escaped code. For that get the code you need to any text editor. Then replace all the < signs with < and all > signs with >. Now copy this escapped code to your blog. There is another easy way to do it. Go to this site -> Text -> HTML Entities Encoder. There are two boxes, copy your code into first box. The escaped code will be generated in the next one. Easy isn't it.

Now how to add those boxes. There are a lot of ways to do it. I will show you the one that I used. First we will make a css class in our blogger template. Use this for Basics of Blogger template. In the css section add this code.


.postCode{
 background:lightyellow none repeat scroll 0 0;
 border:1px inset orange;
 height:150px;
 margin:10px;
 overflow:auto;
 padding:6px;
 text-align:left;
}

You can change the background/border colors height etc to match your needs. Now, we will use this class with a <PRE> tag to format our code in those boxes. So enclose your escapped code in this manner.


<pre class="postCode">
YOUR CODE
</pre>

Tadaa! You are done.

How to add Digg to Blogger - Explained.

2008-11-28T00:15:00.005+05:30

Well last day I was trying to add Digg to blogger. I was experimenting on how to add a Digg button on my blog. The digg button should use the auto-generated link of blogger as the digg_url for digging and submitting it for the first time.

After experimenting with my Blog template I came across this way to do it.

Things you should require/know :-

A Digg Account (optional)
A Blogger Account
Basics of XML/HTML/CSS/Java Script
Ctrl+C / Ctrl+V :)

First login into your blogger account. Go to the Layout tab and click on Edit HTML.

If you want you can make a backup of your existing template by clicking on "Download full template" [ If your confident skip this step ]

Understanding the Blogger Template
The basic structure of template has various sections defined. At top there are some variables defined. Which can be changed to change the color layout etc of the Blog.
After the variables the CSS definitions are given. You can edit the different classes to change the blog to your taste.

Now in the body tag you will find all the sections and div defined. Complete blog lies in the outer-wrapper div. And in it you will have the header-wrapper then content-wrapper and lastly footer-wrapper. The content-wrapper will contain the main and the sidebar wrappers.

In them you will have <b:section> and <b:widget> tags defined. So this basic template tells all the widgets that are placed on your page and their position as per the wrappers.

Example code:


<div id='main-wrapper'>
    <b:section class='main' id='main' showaddelement='no'>
        <b:widget id='Blog1' locked='true' title='Blog Posts' type='Blog'/>
    </b:section>
</div>
<div id='sidebar-wrapper'>
    <b:section class='sidebar' id='sidebar' preferred='yes'>
        <b:widget id='BlogArchive1' locked='false' title='Blog Archive' type='BlogArchive'/>
        <b:widget id='HTML1' locked='false' title='' type='HTML'/>
        <b:widget id='Label1' locked='false' title='Labels' type='Label'/>
    </b:section>
</div>

Now the widget tag... i.e., <b:widgets>
This above basic template just gives you a method for understanding the layout, But to understand how to put the automated url Digg button you will have to understand the code in this widget. So go ahead and click the checkbox marked as "Expand Widget Templates". This will expand the <b:widgets> tags and show you how the widget is implemented in it.

Each widget when expanded will have many includables <b:includable>. Each of this includable will have an id.
Example code:


<b:includable id='flat' var='data'>
  <ul>
    <b:loop values='data:data' var='i'>
      <li class='archivedate'>
        <a expr:href='data:i.url'><data:i.name/></a> (<data:i.post-count/>)
      </li>
    </b:loop>
  </ul>
</b:includable>
<b:includable id='menu' var='data'>
  <select expr:id='data:widget.instanceId + &quot;_ArchiveMenu&quot;'>
    <option value=''><data:title/></option>
    <b:loop values='data:data' var='i'>
      <option expr:value='data:i.url'><data:i.name/> (<data:i.post-count/>)</option>
    </b:loop>
  </select>
</b:includable>

So as seen in this code there are two includables. we are interested in the includables having the id as post i.e.,
<b:includable id='post' var='post'>

So then in this includable we need to add our digg code. This blogger template defines and provides access to its data object. For e.g., <data:post.url/> signifies the url of the Blog post. It is the permalink of each blog entry. The digg widget button provided by Digg needs the post url. So this will generate it automatically for us. Now the code that I have used on to show the digg button is pasted in the includable as shown. You can place it and style it as you like.

Basically you will need to copy from the Digg Box start comment to Dig Box End comment. Copy and paste it in your blog and enjoy the easy Digg Button.


<b:includable id='post' var='post'>
  <div class='post hentry'>
    <a expr:name='data:post.id'/>
    <b:if cond='data:post.title'>
      <h3 class='post-title entry-title'>
     <b:if cond='data:post.link'>
       <a expr:href='data:post.link'><data:post.title/></a>
     <b:else/>
        <b:if cond='data:post.url'>
          <a expr:href='data:post.url'><data:post.title/></a>
        <b:else/>
          <data:post.title/>
        </b:if>
     </b:if>
      </h3>
    </b:if>
    <!--- ==== Digg Box Code by J start ==== -->
    <div class='diggBox' style='margin: 4px; float: right;'>
        <script type='text/javascript'>
        digg_url = &#39;<data:post.url/>&#39;;
        </script>
        <script src='http://digg.com/tools/diggthis.js' type='text/javascript'/>
    </div>
    <!-- == Digg Box code end ===-->
    <div class='post-header-line-1'/>

    <div class='post-body entry-content'>
      <data:post.body/>
      <div style='clear: both;'/> <!-- clear for photos floats -->
    </div>

 </div>
</b:includable>

She broke up with Me !

2008-11-24T21:24:00.004+05:30

So they say, every love comes to an end. Or does it?

I thought otherwise until it happened to me. Or did it?

Is it the end of the relationship? Or is it just a breakup and we will meet again. I hope we do.

We had a year long relationship. One Year and 7 days to be precise. Its the time when I came to this city in south. We had a really good time together for like 3-4 months then I kind of didn't pay that much attention, got busy with other stuff. But for the few weeks I had only my beautiful Elf in mind. The relationship was back strong. I was too happy with her for the few days. It was kind of a performance tweak. And then this huge blow, suddenly without even saying a good bye :(.

What happened? What went wrong?

Some might say that I cheated but thats not the thing. I paid equal attention to both of them, Gharwali and Baharwali. And I am sure they both knew that too. They had a great ActiveSync partnership working between them. I guess losing a baharwali is more difficult.

Well thats how they(my friends) say... my lappy T42 is my Gharwali for enjoying at home, and P3450 my Baharwali for outdoors. Yes, my HTC Touch P3450 codename Elf has left me, or I can say the Big Bastard world came between us.

So let me tell you the story, So that I dont have to tell it over and over again.

It happened today, the cloudy weather outside made a way into my life. I as usual woke up late and started for my office. On the way I found an auto and the guy asking 20 Rs extra on the metered fare. I argued and got it settled to 10 Rs. extra. Well everything was usual daily routine until now. When I got down at office, while taking out my wallet I kept the Elf on my bag beside me. Then there was this problem of change of 100Rs. I came out and asked a colleague who was passing by. He gave me the money I gave it to the Auto driver and took the bag and left. I pulled the bag from the handle without looking so he mobile dropped over there. I went upstairs and realised, started calling the number nobody picked it, then somebody started rejecting the call and then switched it off. Well I and you kinda knew this was going to happen.

Well rest you know what I had to do, called customer care barred outgoing calls. Went to customer care office got a duplicate SIM card. Went to police station with the IMEI number filed the complaint.

Now I seriously hope that the good guys of the Police Dept find her out. Otherwise, I am stuck here with a company provided Nokia 1100, Oh my god !!

Well for those who dont know HTC Touch product code name is ELF. If properly tweaked she runs like hell :). Wish the breakup gets over and we are back together. Hope you add a prayer for me.

Gun Powder

2008-08-21T02:47:00.003+05:30

When I try to sleep
I wish I rather weep.
Wash away with tears,
My sorrows and fears.

Once the heart of Gold
is now so cold.
What glowed like fire.
smells like burnt tire.

With the passing tide
Am I more dead inside?
Is this it?
No, Somewhere in the ashes
Something is lit.

Only the fuse has burnt...
and left is the Gun Powder.

Happy Graduation Day

2008-05-25T18:13:00.003+05:30

Some of you may have remembered and some forgotten.
That today is the fated day when we all graduated out of IITG. It's been one year guys.

Happy Graduation Day, The first anniversary.

So its time to enjoy :) or is it?

Today is the time when you can stand and look back at the year past and think
"kya khoya kya paya maine"

It's hard to believe it's been that long.

Time flies, I guess specially when you are in the real world, the challenges and learning, the life long process goes even faster when you are out of college and facing the real life. So much so that its here and you don't know, and you're amazed you wonder and think about the sweet memories of friends which were your family.

Many things have changed.

Some got promoted,
Some got new jobs,
Some starting ventures,
Some got married,
Some are getting married,
Some are happy and content,
Some are sad and frustrated,
Some climbing the stairs,
Some taking a slide down,
Some winning the game called life,
Some trying to win it,

Although its just one year,
But its a milestone,
And you will reach many milestones in this journey called life.
But always take out some time
-to say
-to wish
-to congratulate
-to share a loving shoulder
with the friends you made and will treasure your whole life.

Remember you are not alone. Friends are always there.
To all my dear friends - I wish to say that - "I Love You" :) . My life would be hell without you.

You may be physically with me or not. But I wish our paths get crossed many times even if we cant be together. I wish to write too much but you would probably thinking "aur kitna lamba hai". So will conclude.

I will conclude with saying that on all fronts, things are going not to well but not too bad too. And the anniversary of my graduation seems like a good moment to stop, and Thank God for everything.

Why I sleep late?

2008-05-04T02:21:00.003+05:30

My usual routines includes sleeping late. Recently, Apart from some reasons which I knew, I found one more cause which would have made me sleep late although subconsciously. The reason is that when I lay on my bed and try to sleep. I leave my mind to relax and that's when it starts wandering in the overcrowded empty space.

It feels like there is some hollow space filled with a lot of dreams and aspirations. Every night either I revisit one of that old aspiration or I create a new one. While lying in the bed just before sleep I think of doing things which I want to do; of things which I have to do; of things that I can't do; and of things that I couldn't do.

Sometimes I plan really big things, sometimes small. But there are mere few which I have brought into action. When I think about the reasons for it I find probably its because I am more of a thinker than a doer. And maybe because as once said by one of my close friend that "My entropy is high". I usually cant stand with one thing for too long (it feels like I am wasting my time and proceeding in the wrong direction so I chose another and finally dissatisfaction). Another reason maybe is I want to do a lot of things and all I have is such a small life with even less time for myself and even lesser time to work on one of them with full devotion and then I shall not forget to mention the wide range of moods that I have. So a match of a mood to a todo action is even lesser. For example right now I am in an introspective mood with a touch of distressing thoughts.

I don't do much physical work in my daily routine and therefore getting tired is unusual. All that feel tired in my body are my eyes and my hands after clicking the mouse and hitting the keyboard all day long. So falling to bed and sleeping in an instant is a privilege which I don't have. So to avoid long session of distressing thoughts and rolling restlessly on the bed and then thinking of writing a blog about it and finally getting frustrated over the whole stupid thing. I sleep late by keeping myself engaged in hitting the keyboard and clicking the mouse.

Don't know how long this is going to last. I think there are many others wondering the same for themselves.

A story worth reading.

2008-05-04T02:17:00.001+05:30

It was a long time ago. I was young and bright, bold and idealistic. I was in the final year of my master's course in computer science at the Indian Institute of Science [IISc] in Bangalore, then known as the Tata Institute. Life was full of fun and joy. I did not know what helplessness or injustice meant.

It was probably the April of 1974. Bangalore was getting warm and red gulmohars were blooming at the IISc campus. I was the only girl in my postgraduate department and was staying at the ladies hostel. Other girls were pursuing research in different departments of science. I was looking forward to going abroad to complete a doctorate in computer science. I had been offered scholarships from universities in US. I had not thought of taking up a job in India.

One day, while on the way to my hostel from our lecture-hall complex, I saw an advertisement on the notice board. It was a standard job-requirement notice from the famous automobile company Telco [now Tata Motors]. It stated that the company required young, bright engineers, hardworking and with an excellent academic background, etc.

At the bottom was a small line: "Lady candidates need not apply." I read it and was very upset. For the first time in my life I was up against gender discrimination.

Though I was not keen on taking up a job, I saw this as a challenge. I had done extremely well in academics, better than most of my male peers. Little did I know then that in real life academic excellence is not enough to be successful.

After reading the notice I went fuming to my room. I decided to inform the topmost person in Telco's management about the injustice the company was perpetrating. I got a postcard and started to write, but there was a problem: I did not know who headed Telco. I thought it must be one of the Tatas. I knew JRD Tata was the head of the Tata Group; I had seen his pictures in newspapers (actually, Sumant Moolgaokar was the company's chairman then).

I took the card, addressed it to JRD and started writing. To this day I remember clearly what I wrote. "The great Tatas have always been pioneers. They are the people who started the basic infrastructure industries in India, such as iron and steel, chemicals, textiles and locomotives. They have cared for higher education in India since 1900 and they were responsible for the establishment of the Indian Institute of Science. Fortunately, I study there. But I am surprised how a company such as Telco is discriminating on the basis of gender."

I posted the letter and forgot about it. Less than 10 days later, I received a telegram stating that I had to appear for an interview at Telco's Pune facility at the company's expense.

I was taken aback by the telegram. My hostel mates told me I should use the opportunity to go to Pune free of cost — and buy them the famous Pune saris for cheap! I collected Rs 30 each from everyone who wanted a sari. When I look back, I feel like laughing at the reasons for my going, but back then they seemed good enough to make the trip.

It was my first visit to Pune and I immediately fell in love with the city. To this day it remains dear to me. I feel as much at home in Pune as I do in Hubli, my hometown. The place changed my life in so many ways.

As directed, I went to Telco's Pimpri office for the interview. There were six people on the panel and I realised then that this was serious business. "This is the girl who wrote to JRD," I heard somebody whisper as soon as I entered the room. By then I knew for sure that I would not get the job. That realisation abolished all fears from my mind, so I was rather cool while the interview was being conducted.

Even before the interview started, I reckoned the panel was biased, so I told them, rather impolitely, "I hope this is only a technical interview." They were taken aback by my rudeness, and even today I am ashamed about my attitude.

The panel asked me technical questions and I answered all of them. Then an elderly gentleman with an affectionate voice told me, "Do you know why we said lady candidates need not apply? The reason is that we have never employed any ladies on the shop floor. This is not a co-ed college; this is a factory. When it comes to academics, you are a first ranker throughout. We appreciate that, but people like you should work in research laboratories."

I was a young girl from small-town Hubli. My world had been a limited place. I did not know the ways of large corporate houses and their difficulties, so I answered, "But you must start somewhere, otherwise no woman will ever be able to work in your factories."

Finally, after a long interview, I was told I had been successful. So this was what the future had in store for me. Never had I thought I would take up a job in Pune. That city changed my life in many ways. I met a shy young man from Karnataka there, we became good friends and we got married.

It was only after joining Telco that I realised who JRD was: the uncrowned king of Indian industry. Now I was scared, but I did not get to meet him till I was transferred to Bombay. One day I had to show some reports to Mr Moolgaokar, our chairman, who we all knew as SM. I was in his office on the first floor of Bombay House [the Tata headquarters] when, suddenly, JRD walked in. That was the first time I saw 'appro JRD'. Appro means 'our' in Gujarati. That was the affectionate term by which people at Bombay House called him.

I was feeling very nervous, remembering my postcard episode. SM introduced me nicely, "Jeh (that's what his close associates called him), this young woman is an engineer and that too a postgraduate. She is the first woman to work on the Telco shop floor." JRD looked at me. I was praying he would not ask me any questions about my interview (or the postcard that preceded it). Thankfully, he didn't. Instead he remarked. "It is nice that girls are getting into engineering in our country. By the way, what is your name?" "When I joined Telco I was Sudha Kulkarni, Sir," I replied. "Now I am Sudha Murty." He smiled that kindly smile and started a discussion with SM. As for me, I almost ran out of the room.

After that I used to see JRD on and off. He was the Tata Group chairman and I was merely an engineer. There was nothing that we had in common. I was in awe of him.

One day I was waiting for Murthy, my husband, to pick me up after office hours. To my surprise I saw JRD standing next to me. I did not know how to react. Yet again I started worrying about that postcard. Looking back, I realise JRD had forgotten about it. It must have been a small incident for him, but not so for me.

"Young lady, why are you here?" he asked. "Office time is over." I said, "Sir, I'm waiting for my husband to come and pick me up." JRD said, "It is getting dark and there's no one in the corridor. I'll wait with you till your husband comes." I was quite used to waiting for Murthy, but having JRD waiting alongside made me extremely uncomfortable.

I was nervous. Out of the corner of my eye I looked at him. He wore a simple white pant and shirt. He was old, yet his face was glowing. There wasn't any air of superiority about him. I was thinking, "Look at this person. He is a chairman, a well-respected man in our country and he is waiting for the sake of an ordinary employee."

Then I saw Murthy and I rushed out. JRD called and said, "Young lady, tell your husband never to make his wife wait again."

In 1982 I had to resign from my job at Telco. I was reluctant to go, but I really did not have a choice. I was coming down the steps of Bombay House after wrapping up my final settlement when I saw JRD coming up. He was absorbed in thought. I wanted to say goodbye to him so I stopped. He saw me and paused.

Gently, he said, "So what are you doing, Mrs Kulkarni? (That was the way he always addressed me.) "Sir, I am leaving Telco." "Where are you going?" he asked. "Pune, sir. My husband is starting a company called Infosys and I'm shifting to Pune." "Oh! And what you will do when you are successful?" "Sir, I don't know whether we will be successful." "Never start with diffidence," he advised me. "Always start with confidence. When you are successful you must give back to society. Society gives us so much; we must reciprocate. I wish you all the best."

Then JRD continued walking up the stairs. I stood there for what seemed like a millennium. That was the last time I saw him alive.

Many years later I met Ratan Tata in the same Bombay office, occupying the chair JRD once did. I told him of my many sweet memories of working with Telco. Later, he wrote to me, "It was nice listening about Jeh from you. The sad part is that he's not alive to see you today."

I consider JRD a great man because, despite being an extremely busy person, he valued one postcard written by a young girl seeking justice. He must have received thousands of letters every day. He could have thrown mine away, but he didn't do that. He respected the intentions of that unknown girl, who had neither influence nor money, and gave her an opportunity in his company. He did not merely give her a job; he changed her life and mindset forever.

Close to 50 per cent of the students in today's engineering colleges are girls. And there are women on the shop floor in many industry segments. I see these changes and I think of JRD. If at all time stops and asks me what I want from life, I would say I wish JRD were alive today to see how the company we started has grown. He would have enjoyed it wholeheartedly.

My love and respect for the House of Tatas remains undiminished by the passage of time. I always looked up to JRD. I saw him as a role model - for his simplicity, his generosity, his kindness and the care he took of his employees. Those blue eyes always reminded me of the sky; they had the same vastness and munificence.

*Sudha Murty is the chairperson of the Infosys Foundation. She is involved in a number of social development initiatives and is also a widely published writer.

The Tale of a Date

2008-04-01T20:22:00.000+05:30

She is my first and the only love till this point. Her name is Nivedita, a software engineer by profession. She is turning twenty-four shortly and she is undoubtedly the most beautiful girl on earth. I made it a point to share my feelings today with her, hoping this letter would do it all. I have not written any letters in my life till now, and this is perhaps the first time I pen down my thoughts and expectations for the person I love the most on earth.

It's been four years since we met each other and a strong bond has grown between us through these years. I was unaware of her love for a long time. In fact, I hadn't spoken a word with her till about a year I had seen her for the first time. It was in one long journey in train, I understood her love for me. It happened a year ago.

It was a trip from Kanyakumari to Chennai in Kanyakumari Express. We had passed Vizhupuram and it was 3 am in the morning. I thought I was the only one who was awake in the whole compartment in that early hour. But to my surprise, she was also awake.

I didn't know then that it was for me she had got up that early. Hardly had she seemed to move her sight away from me. She smiled at me very often and every time I encountered that cute smile, I started eagerly awaiting the next battle with her smile and shining eyes. Her smile had everything in it, the story of unbelievable affection, care and what not.

From that moment, till now, I too have loved her to a great extent. We have never exchanged words about the love we have towards each other, but words are too less to reflect the amount of affection and love we share. I have always thought that the love would remain throughout our life and it happened to be the same till three months back.

Vivek had come into my life three months back. In fact I myself had waited his arrival for quite a long time, but from the moment he arrived, he has been the worst enemy in my life. Nivedita and he had grown close over times, and the fraction of time she spent with me got lowered to a great extent. Even the latest Sensex fall would be less compared to the fall in her affection for me.

I have wondered how it could suddenly happen, after near to four long years of understanding and love amidst us. At times, I have felt like killing that guy Vivek, but I have not had that much strength or braveness to do that. Still, what can he do? He did no mistake to his part, except for being born charming, cute and fair.

Two days before when I saw her, she was feeding food for him and I was hurt to the core on seeing the incident. My anger had boiled down to tears, and I broke. It took almost close to three hours for me stop crying, I felt I had cried more than how much I would have cried when I was born.

I have been trying to understand where it all went wrong, but to my fortune, till now, I haven't been able spot it out. Once for all, I decided to tell all my feelings to her, no matter how she is going to deal with it. I have heard my dad saying a lot of times 'Something is better than nothing!' and I made up my mind to do 'something'.

I fixed today to be the 'DATE' for throwing open in front of her the 'TALE' of my pure love for her. I don't know whether I will get a positive response from her, but I pray God that only the best happens.

Trrrrriinnnnnnggggg…

My school bell has rung. The lunch break is over. My 'UKG' classmates would be ready to welcome me with the same cute smile as ever.

I hope my 'MOTHER' Nivedita will be alright, understands me and shares some time with me also, apart from that she spends with my three months old rascal 'BROTHER' Vivek.

See you after a break!!!

With Love,

Deepak UKG-B

P.S. you know what

...source internet...

Google Again

2008-04-01T14:33:00.003+05:30

Google has done it again,
they have started yet another service.

An invitation for adventure.

This is the need of hour, not just an adventure. The earth that we live upon has been manned all around. All places that are inhabitable are occupied, and those which aren't are made habitable. So to grow further we will need to move out. Move out of mother earth. This is going to be facilitated by Google.

The Project, Virgle.

Starting in 2014, Virgin founder Richard Branson and Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin will be leading hundreds of users on one of the grandest adventures in human history: Project Virgle, the first permanent human colony on Mars.

Ever yearned to journey to the stars?

So here it is Virgle http://www.google.com/virgle/index.html

So apply for the trip. Best of Luck.

P.S. Happy April Fool

AlterTunes

2008-03-31T15:26:00.002+05:30

My friend Abhinav (apna jhantu) has been working on a part time self employed work(though no money till now). :)

He is developing a website which has been reached a beta release stage. I invite you all readers to have a look at this site.

It's called AlterTunes

Altertheater is a unique music search and recommendation system developed by Altertunes, keeping in mind the interest of music lovers over internet.

Altertheater makes music search easy and efficient.

Access to over a 1000 Artists and about 50,000 Songs from 150 different genres.
Make new friends having similar taste in music, listen to their playlists and share your playlists.
Get relevant Videos, Images, Lyrics and Guitar Tabs for all songs with a single click.

Happy Diwali

2007-11-08T18:20:00.000+05:30

Well my diwali was not as bad as i expected. Although I was alone most part of the day. As i mentioned earlier couldn't go home and all friends went apart from a few, and to add up to it those here had offices today. Well its bad for them but for me too.

So alone... but it helped me. Sitting in my room away from everything made me introspect, retrospect and many other spects ;) It was then that i thought about things which we never think about. The significance of friends and family, significance of festivals. What are festivals? What is their purpose? Do the origins of these festivals really matter today? What makes as happy during this periods? Why is it time to celebrate? Why its not fun celebrating alone? and so on...

Thought a lot... But who cares about that?
You would be probably bored reading this already. Its fresh in my mind but i too will soon forget. But what will remain will be the conclusions and the learnings from them.

Anyways Enough gibberish for today
Just Enjoy the festival

After all this Diwali and the thought process brought me memories, Sweet and Lovely memories. They were enough to make me happy this time.

Happy Diwali

Lonely

2007-11-03T12:43:00.000+05:30

Lonely,So lonely
So lonely, (so lonely),
Mr. Lonely,
So lonely So lonely, so lonely, (so lonely), Mr. Lonely
Lonely I'm Mr Lonely,
I have nobody,
For my own
I'm so lonely, I'm Mr. Lonely
I have nobody, For my own
I'm so lonely

It seems this Diwali I am going to sing this song all alone and so lonely...

Won't be able to go home...
Everyone's going and I will be stuck here...

and will be singing So lonely...

I will be lonely amidst the crowd...

So lonely...

Going to miss my family & friends...

Interesting Conversation

2007-10-22T15:10:00.000+05:30

Conversation between Friends:

fr1---hello
fr2---hi

fr1---hey h r u???
fr2---m fine!!! Wht abt u???

fr1---m fine too
fr2---cool

fr1---so howz life???
fr2--gud

fr1--hmmmm

fr1--aur batao? ( passing the ball to the other side)
fr2--hmmm everything as usual

fr2--so wht else???
fr1--nothing much

fr2--ok
fr2--aur batao? ( passing the ball to the other side)

And it goes on like this untill they give up

Are u also having such conversation with ur frnds, then u r
also
suffering from "aur batao syndrome" It means ur life is all screwed up
following the usual monotonous routine.

Probably u need a change in ur life something which is
exciting,something which is adventurous, something which really makes u
feel gud

Correct????

yeh sab to thik hai ab

AUR BATAO

...source internet...

Happy Birthday Google

2007-09-27T17:50:00.000+05:30

its about google again... Why? B'coz its a special day.

My Favorite Search Engine has his Birthday today...

Google has been a life savior during exams...
Google has been a fun bringer when I was bored...
Google has been a lovely search engine for my never-ending curiosity...

Happy Birthday Google
9th Birthday8th Birthday7th Birthday6th Birthday
5th Birthday
4th Birthday

Jelly Battle

2007-09-12T12:50:00.000+05:30

A single player/multi player game.

Loved playing it...
My time pass when there is no work...

Try your hands on it.
There is also some logitech product discount after winning this game, for all the discount seekers.

http://www.jellybattle.com/

Find more Free Games

Will bring you more games soon...

Sigmund Freud's Priorities

2007-09-05T17:28:00.000+05:30

Another interesting one...

Five things are happening in your house at the same time. In which
sequence would you solve them?

The telephone is ringing!
The baby is crying!
Someone's knocking or calling you from the front door!
You hung the clothes out to dry and it is beginning to rain!
You left the tap on in the kitchen and the water is overflowing!

In which sequence would you solve these problems? Write the sequence
and check below how your decisions were made.

BUT BE HONEST, THE FINDINGS ARE EXCITING.

First write YOUR sequence from 1 to 5 then scroll below and read
after!

Answer:

Every individual point represents something in your life.
On the list you can see which meaning every point has:
Telephone represents Work
Baby represents Family
Door represents Friends
Clothes represent Money
Tap represents Sex

Your chosen sequence determines the priorities in your life.

Now....did you turn off the tap first ?

The Lion

2007-04-30T20:40:00.000+05:30

Q. How to catch a lion

Following are the new methods generated after intensive research. Some are useful some very useful.

Newton's Method:
Let, the lion catch you. For every action there is equal and opposite reaction. Implies you caught lion

Einstein Method:
Run in the direction opposite to that of the lion.Due to higher relative velocity,the lion will also run faster and will get tired soon. Now you can trap it easily.

Schrodinger Method:
At any given moment, there is a positive probability that lion to be in the cage. So set the trap, sit down and wait.

Inverse Transformation Method:
We place a spherical cage in the forest and enter it. Perform an inverse transformation with respect to lion. Lion is in and we are out.

Thermodynamic Procedure:
We construct a semi-permeable membrane which allows everything to pass it except lions. Then sweep the entire forest with it.

Integration Differential Method:
Integrate the forest over the entire area. The lion is some where in the result. So differentiate the result PARTIALLY w.r.t lion to trace out the lion

Software Engineer Method:
Catch a cat and claim that your testing has proven that its a Lion. If anyone comes back with issues tell that you will upgrade it to Lion.

Indian Police Method:
Catch any animal and interrogate it to accept that its a Lion.

Frustrated !! Yes/No ??

O.K. Now let’s kill the lion...

Rajnikanth Method:
Keep warning the lion that u may come and attack anytime. The lion will live in fear and die soon in fear itself.

Ramarajan Method:
Remove the make-up and put it over lion. The lion will die notwithstanding that heavy weight.

Jayalalitha Method:
Send Police commissioner Muthukaruppan around 2AM and kill it, while it's sleeping!

Manirathnam Method (director):
Make sure the lion does not get sun light and put the lion in a dark room with a single candle lighted. Keep murmuring something in its ears. The lion will be highly irritated and commit suicide.

Karan Johar Method (director):
Send a lioness into the forest. Our lion and lioness fall in love with each other. Send another lioness in to t he forest, followed by another lion. First lion loves the first lioness and the second lion loves the 2nd lioness. But 2nd lioness loves both lions. Now send another
lioness (third) into the forest. You don't understand right... ok....read it after 15 yrs, then also u wont!

Yash Chopra method (director):
Take the lion to Australia or US... and kill it in a good scenic location.

Govinda method:
Continuously dance before the lion for 5 or 6 days.

Rahul Dravid method:
Ask the lion to bowl at u.U bat for 200 balls and score 1 run.

Maneka Gandhi method:
Save the lion from a danger and feed him with some vegetables continuously.

George Bush method:
Link the lion with OSAMA BIN LADEN and shoot him

Google Latest Techonlogies

2007-04-01T19:55:00.000+05:30

Google has come up with some of what u say very intresting and unbelievable solutions as always. Hats off to Google. Have a look at what i am Blogging about.

Google TiSP (BETA)
Looking for a hi-fi wi-fi connection then here it is. It has a long way to reach other countries specially like India. This service is for Developed countries. But i know you would like to have a peek around. Google TiSP (BETA) is a fully functional, end-to-end system that provides in-home wireless access. Google says "Want Wi-fi around? Just flush it down". Google offers professional and enterprise editions too.

Google Romance™
All out there searching for your destined one. Stop searching at wrong places and turn to Google.
As always google has come up with a intresting solution for all. Soulmate Search™ is the technology that i am talking about. So stop fooling yourself and turn to google for a chance to fool around ;). In words of google "When you think about it, love is just another search problem. And we’ve thought about it. A lot. Google Romance™ is our solution."

Google Gulp (BETA)™ with Auto-Drink™ (LIMITED RELEASE)
A revolutionary new drink which gives you the cutting edge technology that google uses to organise information it's search engine comes across to. This same technology can be used by you all u have to do is Gulp the Google Gulp. Google Gulp is designed to maximize your surfing efficiency by making you more intelligent, and less thirsty.

Google Technology
what is Google Technology of ranking pages that makes you love the search results. Have a quick overview of the technology and increase the level of trust u show in Google Search. The people at Google call it PigeonRank™.

Google's MentalPlex^TM
This cool tool understands what u are looking for and searches that. All u have to do is look at the rotating disc. Google mentalplex helps u find what u are looking for very efficiently.

Google Job Opportunities
Google has already created a big spot for itself in the history of this planet. Do u think u lost the chance of being in it. Do not look sad Google will give u chance to create history on Moon.
All u have to do is Apply for the Job.

This April Fool i made a fool of some of my friends, so did Google. In its attempt to make a fool of its users this year they had a new idea.

Happy Holi

2007-03-03T16:20:00.000+05:30

Holi is approaching...
with nothing to do
Thoght of writing a poem...
wrote one in 5 min
then thought of putting it here :) ;)

Dekho fir se holi aayi hai
Sunahari satrangi chata chayi hai

Aap ki jindagi bhi bhari rahe in rango se
Dil ki ghahrayion se ek hi aawaj aayi hai

Gubbare aur pichkari nahi chalate hum
Kichad aur ando se nikala dum
Kyunki chahe kuch bhi karo
Bhawanaye wahi hai
Ichhaye wahi hai
Pyar wahi hai
Deewane wahi hai
Bas peeli Bhang mili thodi si thandayi hai
Dekho fir se holi aayi hai

Happy Holi

Monkey Kick

2007-02-07T02:52:00.000+05:30

I came across a kicking game
Be the monkey to kick the ball as far as possible :D

Its all about the timing and angle.
To know when to hit the ball is based on intution.

Can you kick as far as I can see my kick and then try yourself