KRISH

Tesla -- Instant Messaging for Teams

2013-05-27T03:39:00.001-07:00

Getting group-chat to work is hard. Getting group-chat to work easily is immensely hard. That's when a friend told me about his app, www.tesla.im.

Tesla.im is Instant Messaging for Teams/Groups. Where Tesla.im stands out from the rest is its intuitive design. Its very simple and easy to use. No lengthy forms to fill. Just click 'Guest Login' and you are taken into the app. You can register if you like it. Else just logout and forget about it.

It's a 100% free service (ad-free too) and it seems reliable, stable and secure. The engineers at Tesla.im tell me that its built with node.js and can handle many many times the concurrent connections compared to existing technologies like XMPP. (Google just gave up on XMPP just a few days back - Link)

Tesla.im is still an alpha release, with more features like desktop notifications, etc lined up.

Experience it and let me know your thoughts.

Parsing JSON in a Windows Phone Application

2012-10-01T09:14:00.000-07:00

I see questions regarding JSON parsing/deserializing almost everyday in Stackoverflow. Hence decided to write a blog post to show you how to easily parse JSON strings in Windows Phone applications.

***Please read entire blog for a complete overview before implementing in your applications***

I would like to divide this post into 2 categories.

One is, where you will have to parse a similar json data in many places in your application or you will use the parsed data in many instances of your code

Other is, you just parse the data once, get your values and no need of the data else where in your project i.e one time usage.

CASE I:

Step 1: Go to Json2Csharp site and paste either your entire JSON string or URL to the JSON and click on Generate button. This creates all the required classes for your JSON response.

I am taking this sample json data

{"MyBookList": [{"ID":5,"TYPE":"History","TITLE":"XYZbook","PRICE":"200","IMAGE":"Ekannoborti.jpg","DOWNLOADLINK":"http://www.amazon.com/"}],"success":3}

And here are the classes generated

public class MyBookList
{
    public int ID { get; set; }
    public string TYPE { get; set; }
    public string TITLE { get; set; }
    public string PRICE { get; set; }
    public string IMAGE { get; set; }
    public string DOWNLOADLINK { get; set; }
}

public class RootObject
{
    public List<MyBookList> MyBookList { get; set; }
    public int success { get; set; }
}

Now place this classes somewhere in your project, so that they are available in all the locations you require them.

Step 2: ( Here I am assuming that you get your json from a web service)

Make a web request to get the JSON response

WebClient webClient = new WebClient();
webClient.DownloadStringCompleted += new DownloadStringCompletedEventHandler(webClient_DownloadStringCompleted);
webClient.DownloadStringAsync(new Uri("http://somedomain.com/xyz/myjson.aspx"));

And then in the response handler, use the following code to parse the data and convert into classes

void webClient_DownloadStringCompleted(object sender, DownloadStringCompletedEventArgs e)
{
    var rootObject = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<RootObject>(e.Result);

    foreach (var book in rootObject.MyBookList)
    {
         Console.WriteLine(book.TITLE);
    } }

There you go, you can play with the response classes and data bind them with the UI elements :)

CASE II:

Here as your requirement is one time parsing and one time usage, instead of storing them in unnecessary classes, we just wisely parse the data and get the task done.

Consider this sample,

String jsonData = @"{""MyBookList"": [{""ID"":5,""TYPE"":""History"",""TITLE"":""XYZbook"",""PRICE"":""200"",""IMAGE"":""Ekannoborti.jpg"",""DOWNLOADLINK"":""http://www.amazon.com/""}],""success"":3}";

And inorder to get the title of each book here

JObject obj = JObject.Parse(jsonData);
JArray jarr = (JArray)obj["MyBookList"];
string bookTitle = (string)jarr[0]["TITLE"]; //To get the title of First book

foreach(var item in jarr)
     Console.WriteLine(item["TITLE"]); //Gets the title of each book in the list

NOTE : For both the cases, I have used json.net for parsing the json data. You can get it from this Nuget package. And if you dont know how to install and use a Nuget package, Check Here

###*** Source code is available here ***###

Hope it helps. Please dont forget to +1 or leave a comment.

Thank you

Kishor Chandra N (@kishorchandra30)

Upload image to Twitter from a Windows Phone Application

2012-06-26T03:18:00.000-07:00

Here is a blog post for Windows Phone Application developers. In this blog post I will show you how to implement photo upload feature for Twitter from your Windows Phone Application.

If you want to implement basic text sharing functionality for Twitter(No photo or customized sharing), I would suggest to use ShareStatusTask and ShareLinkTask which makes the work much easier for the developers.But if you want to implement some customized sharing like photo upload, you need to put in a little effort. In this blog post, I will demo the photo upload feature with the help of the Hammock library.

Step 1: Install the latest version of Hammock library from Nuget, which helps in the implementation of Oauth process.

Step 2: Refer this blog post on How to implement Oauth authentication process for Twitter using hammock (The post may not be directly compatible with latest version of Hammock, check for any inconsistency).

Step 3: Obtain the required oauth tokens as specified in the above blog post from step 2.

Step 4: Post a sample tweet as specified in this blog post Post a Tweet on a User’s behalf

Step 5: After successfully completing all the above steps, now here is the code to upload a photo along with a tweet..
(Check the Twitter documentaion on Status Update with Media)

private void PostImageButtonClick(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
PhotoChooserTask photoChooserTask = new PhotoChooserTask();
photoChooserTask.Completed += new EventHandler<PhotoResult>(photoChooserTask_Completed);
photoChooserTask.Show();
}

void photoChooserTask_Completed(object sender, PhotoResult e)
{
if (e.TaskResult == TaskResult.OK)
{
uploadPhoto(e.ChosenPhoto, e.OriginalFileName);
}
}

public void uploadPhoto(Stream photoStream, string photoName)
{
var credentials = new OAuthCredentials
{
Type = OAuthType.ProtectedResource,
SignatureMethod = OAuthSignatureMethod.HmacSha1,
ParameterHandling =OAuthParameterHandling.HttpAuthorizationHeader,
ConsumerKey = TwitterSettings.consumerKey,
ConsumerSecret = TwitterSettings.consumerKeySecret,
Token = TwitterSettings.accessToken,
TokenSecret = TwitterSettings.accessTokenSecret,
Version = "1.0a"
};

RestClient restClient = new RestClient
{
Authority = "https://upload.twitter.com",
HasElevatedPermissions = true,
Credentials = credentials,
Method = WebMethod.Post
};

RestRequest restRequest = new RestRequest
{
Path = "1/statuses/update_with_media.json"
};

restRequest.AddParameter("status", textBoxNewTweet.Text);
restRequest.AddFile("media[]", photoName, photoStream, "image/jpg");

restClient.BeginRequest(restRequest, new RestCallback(PostTweetRequestCallback));
}

private void PostTweetRequestCallback(RestRequest request, Hammock.RestResponse response, object obj)
{
if (response.StatusCode == System.Net.HttpStatusCode.OK)
{
//Success code
}
}

and the 4th parameter for .AddFile() should be taken care of(I have not considered other formats while doing this sample, you have to take care in your apps)

Note: If you like this Blog Post, Plz share this and Plz Upvote my answer in StackOverflow

Windows 8 Developer Camp in hyderabad by Microsoft India.

2012-03-17T03:08:00.000-07:00

Windows 8 Developer Camp in hyderabad by Microsoft India.

It was the first ever developer camp on windows 8 and was excited to attend it. As it was an invite based event submitted two app ideas and fortunately got invitation for both.

Venue was The PARK hotel, somajiguda. Had a good time in The Park, well hosted and nice food as well. Registration was simple and directly went to the seminar hall. First session started with the Windows 8 consumer preview demo by Rajashekaran from Microsoft. After that had continuous sessions by other Microsoft techies like Sandeep Alur, Aditee gupte, Harish V etc. All the sessions are nice with useful samples and demos.

The features that impressed me in Windows 8 Consumer preview are The Metro style home screen and Metro style apps, faster app switching, integration of multiple technologies like C#, VB, C/C++, HTML5, CSS, JS etc into the WinRT metro application development. We were given access to the Visual studio 2011 beta version, which includes some cool new features like integration with Blend, Edit and continue in debugging, improved Team development, deeply integrated testing, Unit testing and I felt the best of all is the support for languages like CPP, HTML5, CSS, JS in VS (as if they are native .NET languages).

After the successful completion of the sessions, actual fun started at 6PM a nonstop 24 hour development and coding session of Windows 8 Metro apps. A big spacious seminar hall with well planned seating arrangement is provided to all the developers. Most of the people worked seriously on their own ideas. Some people worked as a team also. Eventhough its a continuous development session, there was no moment we felt bore. There were continuous efforts from microsoft team to cheer us and to encourage us. They arranged a funny Magic show, a nice music show by a guitarist and a yoga session on how to perform Mudras.

One best thing other than the sessions is the food provided by The PARK, lunch, dinner, breakfast everything is good. We were provided with various kinds of snacks throughout the night. Microsoft also provided nice T-shirts for all the attendees along with a participation certificate.

Finally before the end of the Camp, we were asked to demonstrate our ideas on the stage. I have demoed two simple apps, one shows the public timeline of the twitter and another is a cocktail app, which got a good response from all. Microsoft team felt good with my presention and asked me to give the visual feedback about the event. Overall its a nice Metro journey with all surprises and memories. Btw, met some new friends from different companies.

Papikondalu Tour @ Ravi marriage

2012-03-05T04:51:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone, had a nice 2 days trip to papikondalu and rampa waterfalls near rajamundry.
All my office colleagues planned for a 2 days trip to papikondalu and rajamundry on the occassion of our beloved iphone developer Ravi. Prasad and co planned well and arranged a 40 seater super luxury bus for 31 persons and we started at 9.30 pm on friday (24 feb) and reached Rajamundry by 8 am nextday. Ravi arranged rooms in a lodge near kotipalli bus-stand in Rajamundry. After refreshing we reached the Papikondalu boat by 11.30am (3 hours lately).

Boat journey on Godavari river was an Amazing experience for all of us. I was thrilled with the beauty of the Godavari and its surroundings. We all had fun. We reached Papikondalu by 4pm and had a halt at Perantalapalli . And while returning, in the evening the Godavari became much more beautiful and Sunset was so good. I spent some time sitting alone at the back of the boat by keeping my legs into the river. Wowwwwwwwwwwww its an amazing experience.
Got down from the boat at 7.30 and from there went directly to the marriage reception at Rajamundry. we reached the lodge by 11pm. Slept for 3 hrs and again attended the marriage at 3am. Had some fun at the marriage venue after the marriage.

Sunday morning we started to Rampa chodavaram waterfalls at 7 from Rajamundry and reached by 9.30. Water falls are small but good for enjoyment. Water is pure and very cool. We were almost frozen with the chillness of the water. After spending around 2hrs there, we returned back to Hyderabad via Rajamundry, and reached Hyderabad by 4am on Monday.
And Ravi, we had a great time bcoz of You. We wish you a Happie married Life. :)

How GPS works!!!

2011-10-10T05:52:00.000-07:00

Here is the seminar by Mr. Siddhartha Kongara, Riktam Technologies......... a detailed explanation of the working of GPS system.

How GPS works part-1

How GPS works part-2

How GPS works part-3

PEOPLEDOCK

2011-08-24T04:19:00.000-07:00

Are you bored of Facebook!!!

Not interested in Google+!!!

Want to share with your collegues!!!

Are you ready for the new networking experience!!!!!!

Here it is,

PEOPLEDOCK.COM

Check it out!!! :)

For more details, check Peopledock official blog

TCS campus placements

2011-08-18T07:16:00.000-07:00

Hi Everyone,

I wanted to share my experience in the TCS recruitment on dec' 10 in our college campus during my final semister. It contained 3 rounds, Written test, Technical round and HR interview.
1) Written Test : Completely on aptitude and logical questions. Difficulty level is high for the questions. It was an online test. Be very careful and be aware about the online test rules.
The questions are mostly from TCS previous papers with minor changes. The basic for aptitude questions is from RSAgarval aptitude book. But the standard of qns is high. How fast and how logically you think, is the key for the success in this test. I suggest every one to practice all the previous papers thoroughly.
The following link contains some TCS papers for your reference: click here for TCS old papers.

2) Second round is Technical round: One of the senior HRs or Project Managers of TCS wil conduct face to face technical round. As it is campus placement and as we are all freshers, mostly we faced questions on basics only. So dont worry much about this round. There may be some qns about TCS and its policies etc. So have some basic idea about the company as well. Be very confident when answering the qns. Being frank also helps. Try to take the HRs concentration to the subject which you likes most/which you are more confident about. Highlight the same in your RESUME also.
Dont do night outs on the previous night of interviews. Take a good rest. That improves your concentration. Dont listen to others comments about interviews, and dont be panic infront of interviewer. Be very confident.......Be very confident.......Be very confident.

3) Final round is HR round: Mostly it is a formality round. Your communication skills and confidence levels matters here. General qns about TCS, or about yourself, your study, family background etc will be asked. Again your confidence matters here. Be prepared with a good answer for the question "Tell me About Yourself". And please dont copy others answers. Every one try to think about themselves and write your own answer.

Finally, my suggestion is, Dont worry about the result...just face the interview with confidence. Its still your first interview, so you have nothing to loss, more to gain..either job or experience :) . One thing is sure,

If you are selected you are lucky and if you are not, you are double lucky ( I dnt tell u Y)

All the best guys.

Yours,
Kishor Chandra N,
Software Developer,
Riktam Technologies.

To become a Java web developer

2011-08-11T00:47:00.000-07:00

Java developer !

Java development in general is a vast field, today Java is used in many types of platforms, that includes Personal computers, Main frames, Hand held portable devices, Mobiles, Smart cards, Games and many more thing. But the biggest stream of java development that creates more jobs than any other stream is the JavaEE platform. The JavaEE platform is used to create the enterprise applications (It includes web applications as well).

This article is about java web development or enterprise application development. Most of the time when you read a job classified for skills, “Spring, Spring MVC, Struts, Hibernate, EJB” they are for java web development.

So, now it’s clear that you want to be a Java web developer and looking for a jump start. So here are the skills that will get you going.

Step 1 : First thing first, Know the basics, Learn core Java

The first thing you must learn is Core Java. Having a solid foundation in core java will help you when you jump into the advanced java. No matter what Java technologies you plan to work on, you will need to use the core java every day. So it is absolutely must to have a good understanding of the core concepts. Learn the basic programming concepts like variables, branching and looping, logical conditions, data types etc.

Good understanding of core java library is a must

Learn core java library, especially collection framework, Threads, java.lang, java.io packages. If you are targeting the web development, you may not want to waste time on the swing.
Get yourself a good core java book that covers the latest java edition JDK 1.6. (When I was a beginner, I read “The complete reference java”)

Step 2 : Learn to use an IDE (integrated development environment)

While working as a professional, you won’t use the plain text editors to write the code, you will have to know how to use IDE. IDE A.K.A code editor will greatly improve your productivity, and make your life easier. Code editors are used to write, compile, run and debug code. They provide features like syntax highlighting, auto completion, can identify the problems in code even before compiling. These are some of the most common features, but there are many more than just these. I will recommend you to learn eclipse which is one of the most popular IDE amongst java developer, and its free.

Step 3 : your first step toward web development, HTML, CSS and JavaScript

I will not explain what HTML or CSS is, there are plenty of resources available on the internet. But understand, this is the most important parts of any web application. Second most important thing to learn is JavaScript, let me clarify, the JavaScript is not java, the similarity in name is for historical reasons. Get yourself into the world of web applications with this three skills, learn some tutorials on the internet or get some good book.

Step 4 : The java web components, Servlet API and JSP

Almost every web application running on internet or intranet which is developed in Java has their roots in Servlet API. So next thing to learn is servlets. Servlet API is the only standard API for java web application development. JSP is also based on the servlet API. Almost all the web frameworks, like Spring MVC, Struts, Wicket uses the servlet API under the hood. Get yourself a good book like “head first servlet”. Having the solid understanding of the Servlet API is quite important. Understand the core concepts like, life cycle, request, response, filters, session, config, context etc.

Step 5 : Learn a web container

Web container is a run time environment or server that is used to deploy and run the web applications or more specifically Web components (Eg servlets or JSP)
Web containers does not know how to run struts or Spring MVC, they just understand the servlet API, but still you can run them on a web container, because ultimately they are based on the Servlet API. You can learn the tomcat, that would be sufficient initially.

Step 6 : Learn JDBC

Almost every web application will need to connect to a database for storing and retrieving persistent data. JDBC is the standard API for database connectivity. So it is quite important that you understand the JDBC well.

Step 7 : Learn a web application framework and an ORM framework

A web application framework is actually a set of libraries that makes developing web applications easier. Struts and Spring MVC are good choices. If you are just starting, I would recommend going with Spring MVC.

ORM stands for object to relational mapping, they are based on JDBC and used for storing and querying the database. But unlike JDBC, ORM frameworks operates on objects and provides ways for storing and retrieving objects. (But be clear, they are ultimately using JDBC under the hood). ORM frameworks reduces lots of boilerplate code, improves productivity and makes developers life easier. Hibernate is the best choice. If you are just starting, read and understand JPA (Java persistence API) which is the standard java ORM API. You can use hibernate for running your JPA code.

That's it. If you know everything I mentioned above well, you are all set to get a job as java web developer.

Step 8 : What next!

Once you are familiar with the things mentioned above, The next step would be to learn the JavaEE (Java enterprise edition). Learn EJB (Enterprise java beans), JSF (Java server faces) and other APIs that are part of the JavaEE. Get a good book that covers the latest JavaEE edition 1.6

Resources

Excel Shortcuts

2011-08-03T04:05:00.000-07:00

Excel shortcuts
Alt and Return: Start a new line in the current cell instead of moving to the next one.
F11: Generate a chart from the currently selected data.
Shift/Ctrl and Space: Select the current row/column.
Alt and =: Total the selected cells.
Ctrl and Shift and $: Format selected cells as currency with two decimal places.
Ctrl and ;: Insert current date.
Ctrl and Shift and ': Paste value from the cell above.
Shift and F11: Insert a new worksheet.
Ctrl and PageDown/PageUp: Move between worksheets.
Ctrl and D/R: Fill cell with the contents of the cell either above (D) or to the left (R).

The REAL Hero - Bradley Manning

2011-05-26T03:43:00.000-07:00

May 26 marks the anniversary of Bradley Manning’s arrest. Manning, 22, was a soldier suspected of leaking evidence of war crimes by his government. As a result, he was arrested and imprisoned without charges. For months he was held in solitary confinement and tormented by his captors.

But Manning is not a prisoner of Libya, Iran or North Korea. Manning was born in Crescent, just an hour from OU’s Norman campus, and his captor is the United States government.

In 2010, WikiLeaks, a journalistic organization devoted to “exposing oppressive regimes,” began publishing classified U.S. documents leaked by an unknown source. We learned many interesting things about our government from these documents, such as the fact that U.S. tax dollars have been spent on drugs and child prostitutes in Afghanistan and U.S. diplomats were ordered to steal the credit card numbers of UN officials.

The national media didn’t focus on the crimes documented in the leaks, preferring instead to repeat vague accusations that WikiLeaks endangered innocent lives.

Prominent among the leaked material was a video of a 2007 Baghdad airstrike, in which a U.S. helicopter fires into a crowd of men — some armed, some civilians — quickly decimating the crowd.

Two of the civilians were Reuters journalists.
“Oh yeah! Look at those dead bastards,” one U.S. soldier said. However, Reuters journalist Saeed Chmagh survived. He crawled along the pavement, trying to stand up.

A van arrived with two children in the front seat. Unarmed men got out of the van and attempted to rescue the journalist. The helicopter opened fire, killing Chmagh and others. Fortunately, both children survived their injuries.

The US government did all it could to obscure the true nature of the incident. One military spokesperson claimed “no innocent civilians were killed on our part deliberately. We took great pains to prevent that ... I don’t know how the children were hurt.”

Despite its claimed innocence, the Pentagon refused to release footage of the attack to Reuters, or to return the cameras taken from the bodies of its journalists. What really happened wasn’t apparent to the public until the video was leaked.

The Obama administration scrambled to deflect blame, claiming the video was taken out of context — as if any context could justify deliberately shooting defenseless adults and children. Obama and his cronies spoke repeatedly on the “treasonous” leak and how it supposedly endangered innocent lives.

With Julian Assange, editor of WikiLeaks, out of its grasp, the government focused its rage on Bradley Manning, the young soldier suspected of being the leak’s original source.

Manning was arrested and held for months in solitary confinement in a windowless cell. He slept on a bed without sheets or a pillow, and was made to present himself naked each morning for “inspection.” In a letter to the public, Manning reported further abuse, including having his eyeglasses confiscated, forcing him to live in “essential blindness.”

Obama registered his approval of Manning’s torture in characteristically vague and noncommittal terms: “I’ve actually asked the Pentagon whether or not the procedures … are appropriate. They assured me they are.”

Manning now faces life imprisonment. This is the price of revealing the crimes of the powerful.

Manning, assuming he is guilty, is surely one of the greatest Oklahoman heroes in recent history. He placed justice for murdered Iraqis above his own life. The hypocrisy of the Obama administration stands in contrast to Manning’s integrity and courage.

Windows Phone 7 Announcements & Demo's from MIX 11 with Joe Belfiore

2011-04-21T07:23:00.000-07:00

How HTML5 is influencing Web App Development

2011-04-18T00:03:00.000-07:00

Over the last 12 months, the momentum behind HTML5 has continued to build, with application developers, browser makers and hardware vendors fully embracing and supporting the web of the future. Consumers have started to embrace HTML5 as well, especially as more users understand the benefits and potential that HTML5 can mean for the future.

With Firefox 4, Google Chrome, IE 9, Safari 5 and Opera all offering better, more robust support for HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript, we’re already seeing glimpses of what is possible and what the web of the future may look like.

Let’s look at some of the aspects of HTML5 that are already making their mark on web app development.

Better Typography and Custom Fonts

The Web Open Font Format, or WOFF, might technically be part of the HTML5 specification, but WOFF, SVG and the CSS3 @font-face specification are all commonly used additions to HTML5.

The adoption of web fonts, whether it’s using WOFF, services like Fonts.com, Typekit or the Google Web Font API is increasing at a rapid pace. This development gives content creators, brands and developers a way to better express and control the most important part of an app or website — the text — without having to rely on images or Flash implementations that don’t always work well for translated text or with search engines.

Since first highlighting this trend last year, the number of web apps that support custom fonts using Google, Typekit, Fonts.com or any number of other solutions has only increased. We expect this to continue, especially as adoption of the latest and greatest web browsers continues to grow.

Frameworks, Boilerplates and Toolkits

Last year, Paul Irish and Divya Manian introduced HTML5 Boilerplate to the world.

Over the last seven months, the project has exploded and grown in both scope and support. As we said last year, HTML5 Boilerplate is not a framework. Instead, it’s a template that can be modified by developers for their own use.

HTML5 Boilerplate 1.0 was released on March 21, 2011 with support for optimized build scripts, a custom boilerplate builder, and perhaps most excitingly for app developers — support for lighttpd, Google App Engine and NodeJS, as well as old favorites Apache, Nginx and IIS. The number of websites using HTML5 Boilerplate continues to grow and evolve.

Other companies like Sencha are also working to bring better and more evolved frameworks and toolkits to web app developers. The upcoming Sencha Ext JS 4 is a JavaScript framework optimized to support HTML5 and other web standards.

Examples in the Wild

When Google launched its Chrome Web Store last December, it was one of the best showcases of what HTML5 web apps could offer users.

Over the last few months, more apps have been added to the store and more companies have started to optimize or rewrite their web apps specifically with HTML5.

TweetDeck is one of the most popular Twitter clients on the desktop and is revered by users. Chrome TweetDeck (or ChromeDeck) was one of the big standouts last winter, and it continues to set a high standard for what users can expect from a web application. It’s also the most popular app in the Chrome Web Store.

Earlier this month, TweetDeck announced the limited beta for its TweetDeck Web product. Built using HTML5, TweetDeck Web takes the core of the TweetDeck Chrome app and applies it to other platforms and browsers. The goal is to make the TweetDeck experience browser- and device-agnostic, and it is part of TweetDeck’s broader strategy approaching mobile and desktop apps.

Creative web app company Aviary introduced Feather, its HTML5 Photo Editor, last year. Feather isn’t only a lightweight image editor with lots of cool effects. It can be seamlessly embedded into other web apps to give additional functionality to developers who don’t have time or money to create their own solutions.

In April, Aviary announced its plans to open up its Effects API to web and mobile developers. This will allow developers to easily add effects and filters, auto-correct photos and create thumbnails or quick crops without needing user interaction.

The Future is Bright

I firmly believe that we will continue to see the worlds of web applications and desktop apps converge. It’s already happened with email, chat and social communication — the next step is to make it viable for data processing, multimedia and, ultimately, web development itself.

HTML5 is going to play a big role in enabling web developers do more with pure web apps, without needing to rely on third-party plugins or extensions. As browsers become better attuned and optimized for the evolving HTML standard, the opportunities will only increase.

Sachin and his 12 non productive centuries

2011-04-15T22:31:00.000-07:00

Now the question is did India lose those matches because of Sachin? Well the idea does not seem to have the logic. What more do you ask a batsman than a century in an ODI. So let’s look at Sachin’s performances in these matches. He has an average of 138 runs in the matches that we have lost at strike rateof 95%. Well compared to the whooping averageof 207.7 at a strike rate of 103 in the matches that he hit a century and won a 138 seems to be a little faded out but I would give absolve him of the count that he has played slow or was playing for his hundred.

Player	NO	Runs	H.Score	Ave	B.Faced	SR	100	50
Lost	1	1518	175	138	1606	94.52	12	0

If we look at those matches individually we will be able to conclude further.

Player	NO	Runs	HS	Ave	BF	SR	100
won	13	4154	200*	208	4051	102.5	33

So here are the stats from the matches that Sachin made a century but the team lost the match. There are 12 of these oddities and here is the date from those matches. Of the 12 matches 7 matches were situations where India made scores more than 275, which is a generally considered a winning score in a typical ODI, but India lost the games. Either the opposition played extremely well or our bowlers just did not raise to the level. Interestingly in all the matches that we lost after Sachin made a century, his contribution to the net total of the game is around 45%, it all gives us an insight into how the rest of the batsman played the game.

Match	Sachin Score	Balls Faced	team score	Sachins contribution
1	137	137	271	51%
2	100	111	226	44%
3	110	138	226	49%
4	143	131	250	57%
5	101	140	224	45%
6	146	153	283	52%
7	101	129	279	36%
8	141	135	317	44%
9	123	130	315	39%
10	100	113	328	30%
11	141	148	309	46%
12	175	141	347	50%
Total	1518	1606	3375	45%

1. 137 off 137 balls with 8 fours & 5 sixes.

India v Sri Lanka.
Wills World Cup – 24th match, Group A.
ODI no. 1070 | 1995/96 season.
Played at Feroz Shah Kotla, Delhi.
2 March 1996 (50-over match).
Sri Lanka won by 6 wickets (with 8 balls remaining).

India finished the 50 overs for 271/3. Only other dependable score was from Mohd. Azharuddin(72 off 80 balls). Mr Manoj Prabhakar had brilliant bowling figures of 4-0-47-0. He opened he bowling for India, he also opened batting innings and scored 7 off 36 balls.

Scorecard

2. 100 off 111 balls with 9 fours & 1 six.

India v Pakistan
Singer Cup – 3rd match
ODI no. 1091 | 1995/96 season
Played at The Padang, Singapore (neutral venue)
5 April 1996 (50-over match)
Pakistan won by 8 wickets (with 30 balls remaining) (revised target)

India was all out for 226 in 47.1 overs. Sachin Tendulkar was stumped out at India’s score of 186/4. Five of the Indian batsmen did not cross the single digit score barrier. And only two others managed to score more than 20 runs. Pakistan had a reduced target due to rains.

Scorecard

3. 110 off 138 balls with 5 fours & 1 six.

Sri Lanka v India
Singer World Series – 2nd match
ODI no. 1106 | 1996 season
Played at R Premadasa Stadium, Colombo
28 August 1996 – day/night (50-over match)
Sri Lanka won by 9 wickets (with 34 balls remaining)

Again the Indian score was 226 but for 5 wickets in 50 overs. Out of seven batsmen who came to crease, only Azharuddin managed to get past 20 runs score. Sachin performed with balls too with figures of 6-0-29-1, the second most economical bowler of the innings. Azhar deployed seven bowlers, out of which two had bowled with economy rate of more than 7 per over.

Scorecard

4. 143 off 131 balls with 9 fours & 5 sixes.

Australia v India
Coca-Cola Cup – 6th match
ODI no. 1325 | 1997/98 season
Played at Sharjah Cricket Association Stadium (neutral venue)
22 April 1998 – day/night (50-over match)
Australia won by 26 runs (revised target)

India, chasing under the milky flood lights of Sharjah, had to over past New Zealand’s Net Run Rate to qualify for the finals. The complete world stood still to witness Sachin’s this innings. When Sachin’s innings ended India was 242/5 in 43 overs. Target was 276 to win or 237 to qualify for finals in 46 overs. India with the help of wonderful innings from VVS Laxman & Kanitkar made a massive score 8 runs in the final 3 overs.

Scorecard

5. 101 off 140 balls with 3 fours & 1 six.

India v Sri Lanka
Coca-Cola Champions Trophy – 1st match
ODI no. 1640 | 2000/01 season
Played at Sharjah Cricket Association Stadium (neutral venue)
20 October 2000 – day/night (50-over match)
Sri Lanka won by 5 wickets (with 37 balls remaining)

India scored 224/8 in 50 overs with 4 single digit scorers and 4 scorers with double digits but less than 20 runs. SL got 225/in 43.5, Sachin also bowled 5-0-22-0, better economy rate than 4 other Indian bowlers of the inning.

Scorecard

6. 146 off 153 balls with 15 fours & 2 sixes.

India v Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe in India ODI Series – 3rd ODI
ODI no. 1658 | 2000/01 season
Played at Barkatullah Khan Stadium, Jodhpur
8 December 2000 (50-over match)
Zimbabwe won by 1 wicket (with 1 ball remaining)

India finished with 283/8 in 50 overs. Sachin ended his marathon as the 8th wicket down for India at 235/8 in 46.3 overs. Ajit Agarkar and Zaheer Khan together rocketed innings with 48 runs in last 3.3 overs. If you do some elementary maths, you will figure out that 89 was the total score which rest of the eight great top order batsmen scored against the World class Zimbabwean bowling attack. Second Highest scorer was Zaheer Khan with 32. Sachin also got 6-0-35-1.

Scorecard

7. 101 off 129 balls with 9 fours.

South Africa v India
Standard Bank Triangular Tournament – 1st match
ODI no. 1752 | 2001/02 season
Played at New Wanderers Stadium, Johannesburg
5 October 2001 – day/night (50-over match)
South Africa won by 6 wickets (with 10 balls remaining)

India managed 279/5 in 50 overs with Saurav Ganguly’s 127 off 126 balls and Sachin Tendulkar’s efforts. No other Indian batsmen crossed 20 runs mark, highlighting 1 run knocks from Rahul Dravid. Extras conceded by the South African team were the third highest contributor in Indian score.

8. 141 off 135 balls with 17 fours & 1 six.

Pakistan v India
India in Pakistan ODI Series – 2nd ODI
ODI no. 2114 | 2003/04 season
Played at Rawalpindi Cricket Stadium
16 March 2004 – day/night (50-over match)
Pakistan won by 12 runs

While on the chase of 329 runs, India was 317 all out in 48.4 overs. Except Sachin, Indian innings starred 2 ducks, 2 single digit scores and 4 double-digit but less than 20 scores. Second highest contributor to Indian score was the Extras by Pakistani team.

Scorecard

9. 123 off 130 with 12 fours & 2 sixes.

India v Pakistan
Pakistan in India ODI Series – 4th ODI
ODI no. 2238 | 2004/05 season
Played at Sardar Patel Stadium, Motera, Ahmedabad
12 April 2005 (50-over match)
Pakistan won by 3 wickets (with 0 balls remaining)

India finished at 315/6 in 48 overs. Except Dhoni(47 off 64 balls) no other significant score. Extras were again the third highest contributor. Top 3 Indian bowlers, Balaji, Nehra & Zahir, together facilitated 188 runs in their spell of 26 overs. Sachin bowled 6-0-36-1.

Scorecard

10. 100 off 113 with 10 fours & 1 six.

Pakistan v India
India in Pakistan ODI Series – 1st ODI
ODI no. 2324 | 2005/06 season
Played at Arbab Niaz Stadium, Peshawar
6 February 2006 (50-over match)
Pakistan won by 7 runs (D/L method)

Indian innings completed at 328 all out in 49.4 overs. Irfan Pathan & MS Dhoni scored 65 & 68 runs respectively. Sachin was LBWed at 305/5 in 45 overs. India managed only 23 runs in last 5 overs costing 5 more wickets. Sreesanth conceded 75 runs from his 10 overs. Pakistan won by D/L method.

Scorecard

11. 141 not out off 148 with 13 fours & 5 sixes.

India v West Indies
DLF Cup – 2nd match
ODI no. 2414 | 2006/07 season
Played at Kinrara Academy Oval, Kuala Lumpur (neutral venue)
14 September 2006 – day/night (50-over match)
West Indies won by 29 runs (D/L method)

India amassed 309/5 in 50 overs. Sachin Tendulkar was not out and Pathan was the only other batsman to score more than 50.

Scorecard

12. 175 off 141 balls with 19 fours & 4 sixes.

India v Australia
Australia in India ODI Series – 5th ODI
ODI no. 2923 | 2009/10 season
Played at Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium, Uppal, Hyderabad
5 November 2009 – day/night (50-over match)
Australia won by 3 runs

India was chasing a huge target of 351 in 50 overs which was set by Australia. Indian pace attack conceded 220 runs in just 28 overs while bowling first. India began the chase in style with Sachin & Sehwag. And in the end India fall short of just 3 runs getting all out on 347 in 49.4 overs. Except Sachin Tendulkar, it was just Suresh Raina who scored past 50. Seven of the Indian batsmen returned to pavilion with single digit score.

Scorecard

With those individual match statistics I more than convinced that there is no co-relation between Sachin centuries and India losses. But it brings out the irrefutable fact of any team sport; one man cannot save a game if the rest of the team fails. End of it cricket is a team sport a game played by 11 to win a game and one man cannot influence the result of the game. He might be able to single-handedly save some games but not all the games.

By the way I did not know that Sachin averages a 207 in the games that he made a century and India has won….i don’t think anyone has that average in the history of the game. That is another record that will take a long time to break…..

Why use Android??

2011-03-07T22:51:00.000-08:00

Here are the top10 reasons why Android is an ideal choice for every one:

(1)Native Google Support : It means you get your Emails,Google & Orkut Contacts, Gtalk, Google Maps,Google calender all in one place; Synchronized with your phone. Yes they are synchronized with your phone & everything can get updated on the web & in the phone at one go.

(2)A phone for every budget, Unlike iphone , Android phones are available from a variety of manufacturers, It doesn’t matter if your budget is Rs.6000 or Rs.30,000/-, You will get a phone that fits your budget, The only thing that varies is hardware inside the phone. ( But be rest assured, These are all better than what you get from traditional Nokia phones. …:-) )

(3)Facebook app imports all the facebook contacts to android & you get to see the pictures of your facebook contacts when they call up. Same goes for twitter. The facebook app views photos in a super cool way, It shows high definition full screen slideshow on the phone, It really feels as if the photos were lying on the phone memory. The photo descriptions appear right inside the slideshow thats good too.

(4)Whether its the remaining battery or new chat or a new email, Everything comes with SMS style notification (Yes you can customize them).

(5)Google’s voice search is in, Want to dial a number or find a contact? Speak it, Your android is smart & can listen to what you say, literally !

(6)Doesn’t require specialized data plans like blackberry, Android works on normal WAP, GPRS , Edge & 3G, No matter what internet is available from your operator , Your phone will manage everything Chat, Email , Maps. Wifi can be configured in just 2 taps.

(7)Portable Wi-fi Hotspot is now in your pockets, With Android 2.2 & newer versions you can convert your phone into a portable wi-fi hotspot. (Yes your laptop can connect to the internet & use the maximum speed supported by your mobile operator. Which means if you have 3G activated on your Sim card, You will enjoy super fast internet on your laptop at no extra cost).

(8)Do you know, Android market has an app that converts your phone in to a metal detector? well, you should check it atleast once, It works like charm….(As it was in iphone & many more applications like iphone in your budget)

(9)Android makes communication almost free with just one unlimited data plan from your service provider;
How? well the YAHOO messenger app has an option to make voice calls to others who use yahoo messenger for free. It works using Wi-fi, GPRS, Edge & 3G. So if you have a friend who has android with yahoo messenger installed, Even your international outgoing calls to him will be free.

(10)Last but not the least, Android has official adobe apps to read PDF files & to view Adobe Flash on internet. Android has full html browsers with pinch zoom like iphone.”

Interview Skills – Tell Me About Yourself

2011-03-07T22:32:00.000-08:00

Do you know why Tell me about yourself question is asked so often in most job interviews? This question is actually an ice-breaker. Asking this question starts the conversation. So you should better be ready with an answer. This question gives the interviewer a chance to know about the interviewee. Once you start talking about yourself, interviewer starts preparing his/her next question. So there are high chances that the next question that would be fired on you will be based on the answer of this question. As the answer for this will be based on you, you think and prepare it before the interview.

While preparing for the answer consider including following points.

1. You:

Tell them your name and which place you are from. Suppose you are “Sri Charan”, then do not start with “Myself Sri Charan”; start with “I am Sri Charan”. This is a very common mistake. Not acceptable in interviews especially in call center jobs.

You may talk about your family (cover up in short); you may talk about your how you came to the city, etc.

2. Your education:

Tell them about your education i.e. graduation/post-graduation. If you are a fresher then tell them the grades you got. If you have done something different than others then tell them. It surely adds a value!

3. Your experience:

Talk about your whole experience. Start from early years and gradually come to recent years. If you have a long experience then you must not be doing same thing all years. Then exactly what you were doing? This is what your interviewer wants to listen. If you are a fresher then talk about your projects and emphasize your role you played in it.

4. Your experience regarding to the post you has applied for:

Fresh candidates who do not have any kind of experience, you should show some positive attitude and exhibit willingness to learn and do new things. Be ready to do new things. Don’t worry that you will make mistakes. Fresher candidates are expected to do mistakes and your employers are well aware of it so you don’t have any reason to be afraid. Believe me no one will give you more work than you can handle.

5. Do not describe your salary or pay scale at this point of time (unless explicitly asked).

6. Avoid giving unnecessary details. Value your interviewer’s time.

7. The idle answer should not last more than 1 minute.

Good luck.

IntelliJ IDE To Provide Full Java 7 Support

2011-02-27T21:16:00.001-08:00

JetBrains, the Prague-based creator of code-centric Java IDE IntelliJ IDEA, this week took the wraps off the upcoming version of its flagship development environment. According to the company, the major focus of IntelliJ 10.5 will be Java 7 support.

"All of the new language features will be fully supported across the product, with code completion, code inspections, quick fixes and so on," the company said on its "Tips & Tricks" blog. "Of course, we're also working on bug fixes, usability and performance improvements. In particular, in this release we've focused on improving startup performance, so you can expect the new version of IntelliJ IDEA to open and load your projects faster."

The IntelliJ IDEA is one of the relatively few such tools to survive the advent of the Eclipse juggernaut that rolled over the Java IDE market a few years ago. In 2009, the company open sourced the IntelliJ Platform, which provides the underlying APIs for all JetBrains IDEs, including IntelliJ IDEA, RubyMine, Web IDE, and MPS. With version 9.0 of the IDE, the company began offering two editions: Community and Ultimate. The Community Edition is free and available under the Apache 2.0 license; the Ultimate Edition is the commercial version.

Among the stand-out features of this IDE is smart type-aware code completion: The environment "knows" when a coder wants to cast to a type and is aware of run-time type checks, which makes it possible to perform cast and method invocation in a single action.

Among other improvements, version 10 of the IDE added a feature that automatically invokes code completion as the coder types. Version 10.5 comes with improvements to the console for Spring Roo, the Java EE RIA dev tool; integration of the Jetty Java-based HTTP server and servlet container; support for version 2 of XSLT ((Extensible Stylesheet Language Transformations); new refactorings for the Java-based Groovy programming language; and support for the Google Chrome web browser in the JavaScript debugger.

The company unveiled the IntelliJ IDEA 10.05 during a celebration of new offices in Munich, Germany. (Snapshots and status updates are available on the company's Facebook page.)

The new version is scheduled for a general availability release this Spring, but the Early Access Preview program starts in a few weeks. The company is inviting anyone interested to download the source code for the IntelliJ IDEA Community Edition from the JetBrains download page here.

Build mobile web applications with Sencha Touch.( An HTML5 mobile JavaScript framework for WebKit browsers)

2011-02-24T22:17:00.000-08:00

Overview

In the software development world, two important trends are increasingly important: mobile application development and standards-based HTML5 web development. The learning curve for either type of development can be steep. Developing a native mobile application often requires knowledge of specific platforms and skills, such as Objective-C for iPhone and Java™ for Android (and these are only two platforms). HTML5 development has gained traction lately because it is standards-based. While vendors are working rapidly to incorporate and comply with these early specifications, HTML5 is still rather immature.

The recent release of Sencha Touch 1.0 fuses the cutting-edge worlds of mobile application development with HTML5 web development to form a simple, accessible framework for building mobile web applications. In this article, learn everything you'll need to know to start working with the Sencha Touch framework.

Sencha Touch

Learning to build mobile applications—especially from the perspective of a web developer—can be troublesome. A variety of platforms to choose from and technologies to learn are available. HTML5 support, though gaining momentum quickly, is still not quite ready to be used for complex web applications, particularly line-of-business applications.

Frequently used abbreviations

Ajax: Asynchronous JavaScript + XML
API: application programming interface
CSS: Cascading Style Sheets
HTML: Hypertext Markup Language
JSON: JavaScript Object Notation
SDK: software development kit
UI: user interface

Sencha Touch combines the rich platforms of HTML5 and mobile web application development into a happy medium. The framework is developer-friendly and similar to using the Ext JS JavaScript framework. If you have moderate to advanced JavaScript experience, then Sencha Touch is approachable. If you already have skills as a JavaScript and CSS developer, Sencha Touch can immediately turn you into a mobile application developer, too.

Sencha is a company with a core commercial product offering, but it also supports open source software. Sencha Touch 1.0 is free for both personal and commercial use.

Platform support

Sencha Touch is currently supported on WebKit browsers, including the popular Apple iOS and Google Android platforms. Some might contend that this support isn't enough—that all platforms must be supported for Sencha Touch to be taken seriously. When adopting a framework in the mobile web development realm, it's wise to look for two things: platform richness and feature richness. A framework that abstracts the most from HTML5/CSS3 in a form that’s developer-friendly, and with a wide reach, is desirable. In this aspect, Sencha is astute in supporting the two most popular platforms and using their resources to provide rich, easy-to-use features for developers.

What you need to know

To start using Sencha Touch, all you need is working knowledge of the JavaScript language and CSS. As mentioned, the framework abstracts many of the features and styles you'd normally be assembling from scratch.

If you want to explore further, and perhaps build your own custom components or modify styles for your own brand, you need more in-depth skills in HTML5 and CSS3. For more information, see the Resources section.

Getting started

To get started with Sencha Touch:

Download the framework from Sencha. (See Resources.)
Extract the contents to the root of your development website.
Consider renaming the extracted folder to a generic name, such as sencha-touch, so that you can use this same folder name for future framework versions without updating other files that reference it.
Using a WebKit browser, such as Google Chrome, open the examples page at http://localhost/sencha-touch/examples/. Though your environment might look slightly different, you should see a screen similar to Figure 1.

Figure 1. Sencha Touch Examples

Explore some of the framework features by building a Sencha Touch application.

Create a new HTML file named index.html in the root of your site with the source code from Listing 1.

Listing 1. Sample HTML5 document
<!DOCTYPE HTML> <html> <head> <title>Touch Test</title> </head> <body> </body> </html>
Once you create that single file, you are officially an HTML5 developer. The <!DOCTYPE HTML> doctype at the top is the key; it ensures the document is interpreted as HTML5.

Modify the code from Listing 1 as shown in Listing 2.

Listing 2. Installing Sencha Touch scripts and styles

<!DOCTYPE HTML>
<html>
<head>
<title>Touch Test</title>

<!-- sencha touch css -->
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"
           href="sencha-touch/resources/css/sencha-touch-debug.css" />

<!-- sencha touch javascript -->
<script type="text/javascript" src="sencha-touch/sencha-touch-debug.js"></script>

</head>

<body>
</body>
</html>

The above code adds the CSS and JavaScript files for the Sencha Touch framework. You hooked in the debug versions of these files, which is recommended for development purposes since they yield better error messages. To deploy, simply swap out the debug versions for the minified versions. You can also add your own custom CSS file and a JavaScript file for building your application.

To keep the example simple, include some embedded JavaScript code. Start by modifying your code to resembleListing 3.

Listing 3. The simplest Sencha Touch application

<!DOCTYPE HTML>
<html>
<head>
<title>Touch Test</title>

<!-- sencha touch css -->
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"
           href="sencha-touch/resources/css/sencha-touch-debug.css" />

<!-- sencha touch javascript -->
<script type="text/javascript" src="sencha-touch/sencha-touch-debug.js"></script>

<!-- application script -->
<script type="text/javascript">
    Ext.setup( {
        onReady: function() {
            // create the root panel
            new Ext.Panel({
                fullscreen: true,
                html: "Sencha Touch is ready!"
            });
        }
    });
</script>

</head>

<body>
</body>
</html>

Run the page in Google Chrome, and you should see something similar to Figure 2.

Figure 2. The simplest Sencha Touch application

Ext.setup

Several other useful configuration options for theExt.setup function are available; see the API documents, found in the docs folder of your Sencha Touch installation, for details.

The code in Listing 3 introduces a block of JavaScript code you'll reuse throughout this article to explore framework features. If you've used Ext JS, this code might look familiar. The Ext.setup function is the starting point for your Sencha Touch applications. It accepts an object with a number of configuration options. The example uses the onReady option, which takes a function to evaluate when the document is ready. The onReady function creates the root panel of the application. The root panel takes up all available space and contains a simple string by using the fullscreen and html options, respectively.

Running applications in an Android emulator

So far you've used the Google Chrome browser to work through development. It's a good approach, especially when trying to deal with JavaScript and CSS bugs. Use a device emulator to start application testing. This section shows how to install an Android emulator.

Download the most recent Android SDK for your operating system platform and extract it to disk.
The SDK includes all the utilities required for getting an emulator up and running, but a few more steps are necessary.
Android emulators require that you create an Android Virtual Device (AVD), which is basically configuration options that model an actual Android-powered device. To create an AVD, run the android utility in the tools folder of the Android SDK.
The Android SDK and AVD Manager should open and look similar to Figure 3.

Figure 3. Android SDK and AVD Manager

At this point, if you try to create a new virtual device using the New… button, notice an important field labeled Target, which is disabled. Before you can create a new virtual device, download an add-on to the SDK.

Select Available Packages from the left menu.
Expand the site labeled https://dl-ssl.google.com/android/repository/repository.xml to reveal the list of available packages to install.
Select the most recent SDK platform, as shown in Figure 4, and then click Install Selected.

Figure 4. Available packages for Android SDK
Accept the installation by clicking the Install button in the next window.
When the download and installation finish, click Close.

You just installed a potential target for any AVDs you want to create. This target is an Android device running version 2.2. The next step is to create the AVD.

Select Virtual Devices from the left menu in the AVD Manager, and click New….
Enter sencha-avd for the Name and select the Android 2.2 target you just installed as the Target. Leave all other defaults.
Click Create AVD.
Click OK at the confirmation window, then close the AVD Manager.

Everything you need to run an emulator is now in your local development environment. To run the emulator: open a terminal window, change directories to the root of your Android SDK installation, and enter the command in Listing 4.

Listing 4. Invoking the Android emulator

tools/emulator -avd sencha-avd

You can use the web browser in the Android emulator to browse to your test application at http://localhost/, but you'll get a big404. This is because referencing localhost, or 127.0.0.1, in the emulator is actually within the context of the emulator itself. To reference your local development environment, use the address 10.0.2.2, which yields the screen shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5. Example running in the Android emulator

A tour of Sencha Touch UI components

Now that you have the basics, this section provides a tour through some of the Sencha Touch UI components.

Buttons

You can create a number of button styles by using just a few configuration options. The code in Listing 5 creates a vertically stacked collection of all available buttons. The example application is expanded to include an array of items to be added to the root panel—in this case, a single panel with a vertically stacked collection of buttons.

The buttons are styled based on the ui configuration option. Supported button types are normal, back, round, action, andforward.

Listing 5. Buttons

<script type="text/javascript">
  Ext.setup( {
    onReady: function() {
      // create the root panel
      new Ext.Panel({
        fullscreen: true,
        items: [
          // add a panel to the root panel
          // this will contain a vertical layout of buttons
          { 
            xtype: "panel",
            layout: "vbox",
            items: [
              {
                xtype: "button",
                ui: "normal",
                text: "Normal"  
              },
              {
                xtype: "button",
                ui: "back",
                text: "Back"  
              },
              {
                xtype: "button",
                ui: "round",
                text: "Round"  
              },
              {
                xtype: "button",
                ui: "action",
                text: "Action"  
              },
              {
                xtype: "button",
                ui: "forward",
                text: "Forward"  
              }
            ]  
          }
        ]
      });
    }
  });
</script>

Figure 6 shows the result.

Figure 6. Available button styles in Sencha Touch

Forms

The forms suite contains all the usual suspects and more. It is apparent that HTML5-specific functions are being handled and incorporated. Support is available for field types (such as e-mail, web addresses, and date pickers) and attributes (such as placeholder text) in HTML5; Sencha Touch just makes it easier to use. Listing 6 shows some of the features.

Listing 6. Sampling of form controls

<script type="text/javascript">
  Ext.setup( {
    onReady: function() {
      // create the root panel
      new Ext.Panel({
        fullscreen: true,
        items: [
          // add a panel to the root panel
          { 
            xtype: "form",
            items: [
              {
                xtype: "textfield",
                name: "name",
                label: "Name",
                placeHolder: "your name here"  
              },
              {
                xtype: "emailfield",
                name: "email",
                label: "Email",
                placeHolder: "you@example.com"  
              },
              {
                xtype: "urlfield",
                name: "url",
                label: "Url",
                placeHolder: "http://www.example.com"  
              },
              {
                xtype: "datepickerfield",
                name: "date",
                label: "Date",
                picker: { yearFrom: 2010 }  
              }
            ]  
          }
        ]
      });
    }
  });
</script>

Running the code in Listing 6 should yield a screen similar to Figure 7. The Date field is focused, revealing the date picker control docked at the bottom.

Figure 7. Sampling of available form fields

Lists

When developing mobile web applications, you're working with limited real estate. Support for list-based UI components becomes important. Sencha Touch is equipped with support for various types of lists, including simple, grouped, and nested.Figure 8, which is taken from the Kitchen Sink demo in the framework download, demonstrates a grouped list. The vertical stack of letters at the right of the list exposes a useful method for jumping to specific portions of the list.

Figure 8. A grouped list from the Kitchen Sink demo

Icons and toolbars

Sencha Touch ships with an impressive repository of icons built in and ready to use. All you need to do is specify a string representing a CSS class for the icon you want. Listing 7 shows how to build two toolbars: one docked to the top of the root panel, and one docked to the bottom. Each toolbar is configured with a small sample of the icons available out of the box.

Many more icons are available. Check out the API docs and examples for more information.

Listing 7. Icons in toolbars

<script type="text/javascript">
  Ext.setup( {
    onReady: function() {
      // create the root panel
      new Ext.Panel({
        fullscreen: true,
        dockedItems: [
          {
            xtype: "toolbar",
            dock: "top",
            items: [
              {
                iconMask: true,
                ui: "plain",
                iconCls: "add"
              },
              {
                iconMask: true,
                ui: "plain",
                iconCls: "delete"
              },
              {
                iconMask: true,
                ui: "plain",
                iconCls: "star"
              },
              {
                iconMask: true,
                ui: "plain",
                iconCls: "home"
              }
            ]
          },
          {
            xtype: "toolbar",
            dock: "bottom",
            items: [
              {
                iconMask: true,
                iconCls: "download"
              },
              {
                iconMask: true,
                iconCls: "favorites"
              },
              {
                iconMask: true,
                iconCls: "search"
              },
              {
                iconMask: true,
                iconCls: "user"
              }
            ]  
          }
        ]
      });
    }
  });
</script>

After running the code from Listing 7, you should see a screen similar to Figure 9.

Figure 9. Sampling of icons and styles

Carousels and tabs

Carousels and tabs are easy to implement using coding patterns you've already explored. Listing 8 shows a tabbed interface and a carousel.

Listing 8. Constructing carousels and tabs

<script type="text/javascript">
  Ext.setup( {
    onReady: function() {
      // create the root panel
      new Ext.TabPanel({
        fullscreen: true,
        items: [
          {
            title: "Tab 1",
            html: "First tab"  
          },
          {
            title: "Tab 2",
            html: "Second tab"  
          },
          {
            title: "Tab 3",
            html: "Third tab"  
          }
        ]
      });
    }
  });
</script>

<script type="text/javascript">
  Ext.setup( {
    onReady: function() {
      // create the root panel
      new Ext.Carousel({
        fullscreen: true,
        items: [
          {
            html: "First item"  
          },
          {
            html: "Second item"  
          },
          {
            html: "Third item"  
          }
        ]
      });
    }
  });
</script>

Carousels and tabs are similar in code and function. The carousel moves between cards by either performing a sliding gesture from side to side, or by clicking one of the circular icons docked at the bottom. By default, both controls transition between cards using a slide animation.

Figure 10 shows the tab interface.

Figure 10. Sample tab interface

Figure 11 shows the carousel interface.

Figure 11. Sample carousel interface

Overlays

You can use several overlay controls. Your options include standard alert, confirm, and prompt controls, as well as plain modal controls.

Maps

In mobile web development, one of the more popular components is maps. Sencha Touch makes it very simple to include a map in your application using the Ext.Map component. Listing 9 shows how to include a map in the sample application. Remember to include the JavaScript file for the Google Maps API for this example to work.

Listing 9. Using maps

<!DOCTYPE HTML>
<html>
<head>
<title>Touch Test</title>

<!-- sencha touch css -->
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"
         href="sencha-touch/resources/css/sencha-touch-debug.css" />

<!-- Google Maps API -->
<script type="text/javascript"
              src="http://maps.google.com/maps/api/js?sensor=true"></script>

<!-- sencha touch javascript -->
<script type="text/javascript" src="sencha-touch/sencha-touch-debug.js"></script>

<!-- application script -->
<script type="text/javascript">
  Ext.setup( {
    onReady: function() {
      // create the root panel
      new Ext.Panel({
        fullscreen: true,
        items: [
          {
            xtype: "map"  
          }
        ]
      });
    }
  });
</script>

</head>

<body>
</body>
</html>

The resulting map window is shown in Figure 12.

Figure 12. Example map control

Events and data access

Sencha Touch has support for several key events you might expect in a mobile application, such as touch start/end, scroll start/end, tap, double tap, swipe, and pinch. Data access will look familiar if you've done Ext JS work in the past.

The Sencha Touch framework supports JSON with padding (JSONP), Yahoo! query language (YQL), and Ajax requests. Combined with the Sencha Touch data package, they provide a flexible mechanism for binding data to your UI components.

Style and design

Creating your own theme can be a rather difficult undertaking. The Sencha Touch framework has key features that make it much easier to modify the default styles and design.

The framework uses Syntactically Awesome Stylesheets (Sass), which is an extension of CSS3 that, among other things, lets you use variables and selector inheritance to add more power to theme development. Changing a single variable can impact the entire theme—and it's that easy.

Creating a new theme is outside the scope of this article. Resources has several links to help you get started.

Conclusion

This article provided an introduction to Sencha Touch, which is a mobile web application framework built using HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript. You learned how to create a simple Sencha Touch application, and how to test it with a device emulator. You also explored some of the UI components.

This article is merely an introduction to the Sencha Touch framework. Now that you know the basics, consider diving deeper into the concepts using the Resources below.

Resources

Learn

Learn all about Sencha: read API docs, check out the blog, explore the forums, download demos, and more.
Read "Dive into HTML5," by Mark Pilgrim, to get a jumpstart on HTML5 development.
Learn more about Android. The Android Dev Guide has reference information and step-by-step instructions for common tasks.
The developerWorks Web development zone specializes in articles covering various web-based solutions.

Get products and technologies

Download Sencha Touch.
Download the latest version of the Google Chrome browser.
Get the latest Android SDK.
Download and learn more about Sass.
Evaluate IBM products in the way that suits you best: Download a product trial, try a product online, use a product in a cloud environment, or spend a few hours in the SOA Sandbox learning how to implement Service Oriented Architecture efficiently.

Discuss

Create your My developerWorks profile today and set up a watch list on mobile application development. Get connected and stay connected with developerWorks community.
Find other developerWorks members interested in web development.
Share what you know: Join one of our developerWorks groups focused on web topics.
Roland Barcia talks about Web 2.0 and middleware in his blog.
Follow developerWorks' members' shared bookmarks on web topics.
Get answers quickly: Visit the Web 2.0 Apps forum.
Get answers quickly: Visit the Ajax forum.

I LOST MYSELF.........IN 'U'

2011-02-17T04:19:00.000-08:00

I hold my breath as this life starts to take its toll
I hide behind a smile as this perfect plan unfolds
But oh, God, I feel I've been lied to
Lost all faith in the things I have achieved
And I

I've woken now to find myself
In the shadows of all I have created
I'm longing to be lost in you
away from this place I have made
Won't you take me away from me

Crawling through this world as disease flows through my veins
I look into myself, but my own heart has been changed
I can't go on like this
I loathe all I've become

Lost in a dying world I reach for something more
I have grown so weary of this lie I live

I've woken now to find myself
In the shadows of all I have created
I'm longing to be lost in you

Away from me.........

2011-02-08T05:23:00.000-08:00

Hope is a good thing..may be the best of the things..Hope never dies.

So never loose Hope..

Scam bigger than 2G

2011-02-07T01:15:00.000-08:00

The Comptroller and Auditor General suspects a scandal bigger than 2G in the allocation of S-band spectrum.

The loss purportedly runs into Rs 2 lakh crore, while the 2G spectrum scandal, which cost A Raja his job as telecom minister, is believed to have cost the nation a little less, at Rs 1.7 lakh crore.

The Department of Space and ISRO are under the scanner because the CAG has found that the deal was awarded without competitive bids being invited.

The Hindu reports: "Hard on the heels of its explosive investigations of the 2G spectrum allotments made in 2008 by the Department of Telecommunications, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has started inquiries into a 2005 agreement between the Indian Space Research Organisation's commercial arm Antrix Corporation Ltd. and Devas Multimedia Private Ltd."

The company that allegedly benefited from the deal, Devas Multimedia, is headed by Dr M G Chandrashekhar, who was earlier scientific secretary at ISRO.

2010-12-15T00:52:00.000-08:00

Visit the GRIETMCA08 group for the updates........
click here

AMD unveils first of its kind chip

2010-12-10T19:39:00.001-08:00

Leading provider of graphics, processors and media solutions Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) on Friday announced the launch of Ontario, a first of its kind processor that is set to be three times more powerful and economical than the existing products.

Ontario combines the power of central processing unit and graphic processing unit in one chip, the accelerated processing unit (APU) and AMD claims its new product to be the world's first fusion product. Designed and developed from the drawing board to the motherboard in India, Ontario will power notebooks/tablets, small form factor desktops and devices.

Zacate, another version of Ontario, has been designed to energise the ultrathin mainstream and value notebooks, desktops and all-in-one. Ontario will be the lower power notebook variant of the basic core with Zacate being the higher performance version of the APU.

Announcing the launch on Friday, AMD India Managing Director Dasaratha R. Gude and Chief Engineer Michael Goddard said an 86-member team worked for two years for making the ‘epoch-making' chip and the original equipment manufacturers would roll out their products powered by Ontario from January next. Ontario was set to open new frontiers and set new benchmarks for VLSI teams in the industry and AMD was hopeful that it would power a record number of platforms once it was embedded.

The company was already in negotiations with leading laptop maker, Acer, for the new product, considered most powerful in its class. The total estimated market for products like Ontario was expected to be around 100 million units a year.

India sweeps series with thumping win

2010-12-10T19:09:00.000-08:00

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED: India secured a series whitewash against New Zealand with an eight-wicket victory in Chennai on Friday

Sarkozy calls for permanent Security Council seat for India

2010-12-10T19:00:00.000-08:00

It was “unthinkable” that a country of a billion people should have no representation in the Security Council, he said in his address at the Indian Space Research Organisation where he arrived with his wife Carla Bruni and a large contingent of French ministers and executives.

India's recent election to the Security Council for two years “must serve as the prelude to a permanent Indian presence within the UNSC,” Mr. Sarkozy said.

The UNSC must be expanded to include new permanent members — India, Brazil, Germany and Japan — and must have representation from Africa and the Middle-East, he said, adding India should join the Security Council as a permanent member so that it can assume its full role in the G20.