Prometheus

My Bombay Burns!

2008-11-27T16:36:00.004+05:30

I was born and raised in Bombay (Mumbai) and one part of me has never left the city. I have seen it burning many times before either in the name of religion or of divisive politics played by those we entrust our law and order with.

Today it burns once more at the hands of madmen who claim to be acting in accordance with a religion that fails to value human life and as a result fails to value anything we could love and treasure on this earth. I hope the terrorists that perpetrated this are gunned down like the cowardly bastards that they are.

The day this nation accepts such a devastating loss of life with only a shrug of its shoulders, that day it would have sentenced each of it's citizens to die a gruesome death like those who lost their lives today. Its only then a matter of time.

I'd like to say Jai Hind but I think India now needs to act before it can deserve such a salutation.

Would be Symantec CEO shows little knowledge of economics

2008-11-22T11:24:00.002+05:30

Bloomberg ran this story where it quotes the soon to be CEO of my former employer, Enrique Salem, saying

``The way we're going to get out of this malaise we're in, is by spending money,'' Salem said. ``If we all just hoard our cash, we're not going to get out of this.''

Keynes would have been proud of that statement but it still isn't going to get him around this economic slump. Its actually more of the same philosophy that got us here in the first place. Amity Shales had some good points to make about this on her Bloomberg.com Opinion column.

Symantec has always been a cash-cow but with this change in leadership I wonder about its future.

On Enjoying Work

2008-11-12T16:32:00.003+05:30

From the time I've been working I've noticed a behavioral trait about myself over and over again.

Whenever I have interesting work to accomplish in office I seem to find time to concurrently do other things too. Be it reading books (I'm an avid reader) or reading articles / following happenings on the internet, I always could manage the time. In fact it often seems like I can create the time to do all that even when I'm busy on a particular problem.

On the other hand, when I have boring work to look after in office it almost single-handedly seems to kill my motivation for any other activity. In the recent past this has been pretty apparent as my stash of 'to read' books just keeps getting bigger and bigger.

I could say that I should 'not' let work affect me and continue with 'side' projects but that just does not work for me. I spend about 65% of my 'workable' time in office and if I'm not motivated about that work for an extended period of time it is inevitably going to affect other facets of my life. I can appreciate that fact on a philosophical & practical level.

I also tend to have my best 'ideas' on diverse matters when I'm really knee deep in solving some complex problem. My mind works at altogether a different level at those moments. All that without substance abuse too! Fuck dope just give me a good problem to solve.

// Start of rant

Well onto a rant now & one cause of all these laments! In my experience, the Indian software industry has been a total myth. I used to have this romantic vision of staying awake at night solving complex problems but what I do at work is hardly worth a yawn. Most folks couldn't be troubled with right and wrong in software development. No need to think about consequences of design decisions. No need to debate technical aspects. New solutions or enhancements in a product always take the familiar road, no need to think about accomplishing things in a better way. Who gives a fuck anyway, we aren't the ones using the software right? Some guy in the US is looking to cut costs and we give him just that - software at a cost of quality. Talk about negative ROI.

// End of rant

I can control who I work for but unfortunately cannot control what work they give me. Setting up a business on my own never sounded better, just waiting for the right time & opportunity. That time may be in the considerable future, but its the only thing keeping me sane.

Note to self: Get out while you still enjoy it.

John Allison & the wretched press release

2008-11-10T14:10:00.002+05:30

Over at Rule of Reason Doug posted this with reference to John Allison's take on the bailout.

I posted the following comment:-

At present we cannot know 'why' John Allison made such a statement but that does not mean we cannot judge the statement for what it is and denounce it as an anti-thesis of what one would expect from a vocal advocate of Objectivism & Capitalism. Knowledge truly is contextual and we have to as proponents of Objectivism state for the record that Mr. Allison's press release is contrary to Objectivist principles.

Yes, Mr. Allison has in the past displayed his support of Objectivism and for that I'm grateful but that does not absolve him of the necessity to remain consistent in his following of the same. It does not say much for Objectivism if we have to build escape clauses for people in tight situations.

Announcing the "IndianObjectivist" Mailing List

2008-11-02T21:27:00.007+05:30

IndianObjectivists

IndianObjectivists is a private mailing list for Objectivists either based in India or with an interest in Indian society. Its purpose is to facilitate ideas for activism & also for promoting the philosophy of Objectivism in India.

List Membership

Subscribers to IndianObjectivists must meet the following criteria:

They must be Objectivists, meaning that they agree with and live by the principles of Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism as best they understand them. Newcomers to Objectivism are just as welcome as old-timers. Those who consider themselves to be libertarians (or associate with the Libertarian Party), advocate revising Objectivism (like David Kelley's "open system"), or associate with the dishonest pseudo-advocates of Objectivism (most notably David Kelley, Nathaniel Branden, Barbara Branden, and Chris Sciabarra) should not subscribe to the list.

People who do not clearly meet this criteria should not subscribe without first e-mailing the list owner, Dinesh Pillay, at dpillay@gmail.com.

New subscribers are encouraged to post an introduction, including name, blog title and URL, and blogging interests (if any).

List Rules

The list has a few basic rules:

Please be friendly or at least civil in posts to the list. Subscribers who behave like asses, such as by insulting other list members or attacking Objectivist intellectuals, will be removed from the list.

Please respect the purpose of the list. This list is not intended as a forum for the discussion and understanding of Objectivist ideas. People looking for help in such aspects would do well to stop by ObjectivismOnline. Subscribers who prove disruptive to the basic purpose of the list -- such as by attempting to arguing against Objectivist positions or posting on irrelevant topics -- will be unsubscribed or subject to moderation.

Contact

If you have any questions about or problems with the list, please e-mail Dinesh Pillay, the list's owner and administrator, at dpillay@gmail.com.

Multiple faces of deception

2008-11-02T10:03:00.004+05:30

The TOI brings us this disturbing piece of how more and more are drawn to Karl Marx at times like these. Talk about asking for more of the same nonsense albeit in different shades!

Lets file this under the "What NOT to do!" section, shall we?

More madness from the RBI

2008-11-01T16:20:00.005+05:30

In another move, RBI has cut key deposit rates.

If we continue like this banks will just not need customer deposits anymore to lend. Maybe thats the utopia everyone is looking for. We don't need more of the bad economic policies that got us to this state in the first place. We need to abolish foolish regulations and establish a 'sane' monetary policy based on a gold standard.

Gold and a Free Market

2008-10-31T19:11:00.003+05:30

Brian Simpson @ Capitalism Magazine has done an excellent job of summarizing the causes of the economic meltdown over in the US and the measures that need to be taken to solve the crisis. You can read the article here.

In India too the RBI is jumping in on the action and cutting key rates. Interventionism cannot and will not lead to a laissez-faire economy. Hasn't history proven that over & over again? Central banks all over need to perish if the global economy is to be salvaged in the long run.

If you want to learn more about Austrian Economics, please stop by mises.org and browse the literature section. I would highly recommend Economics in One Lesson & Human Action.

[I found the article via my Google Reader feed but I'd like to hat tip Gus Van Horn also.]

And the award for the Lamest Argument ever goes to..

2008-10-31T09:49:00.002+05:30

Is he really that fuckin' stupid? All those billion years of evolution totally wasted to produce garbage like him!

Let them fail!

2008-10-12T13:02:00.002+05:30

Really good video over at Bloomberg pertaining to the global economic meltdown.

How can one lend to folks with zero income and then gasp when the unrealistic fantasy comes crashing down?!

What complaint do they now have to make? That the universe is irrational? Is it?

-- Ayn Rand

Brother, you asked for it!

WordWeb Environmentalism

2008-09-08T14:05:00.005+05:30

I was a regular user of WordWeb till I read their licensing conditions. I immediately uninstalled the application and want nothing to do with it anymore.

I'm actually quite shocked to see this. Where will this madness lead us?

Haskell & Type Inference

2008-06-24T14:29:00.004+05:30

I've been dabbling in Haskell for a few days now and I'm totally hooked onto it. Never have I enjoyed learning a new language this much! I'm still learning and given the nature of the language it looks like I will continue in this state (albeit progressing) for quite some time. Learning & unlearning a few things along the way.

Yesterday, I was stuck on a piece of code and it just refused to compile, the code being:-

module Test where

import List(isPrefixOf);

main = do {
         revStr <- getLine;
         reverse_str revStr;
       }

reverse_str [] = [];
reverse_str (x:xs) = reverse_str (xs) ++ [x];

subst _ _ [] = [];
subst [] _ xs = xs;
subst from to xs@(a:as) =
    if from `isPrefixOf` xs
       then
           to ++ subst from to (drop (length from) xs)
       else
           a : subst from to as

My problem here was that I kept getting:

Couldn't match expected type `IO' against inferred type `[]'
   Expected type: IO t
   Inferred type: [Char]

for "main" and the whole time I kept thinking that the type of "reverse_str" was for some reason wrong! Only a few minutes later did I realize that it was "main" itself that was screwed up. It all was fixed by wrapping the "reverse_str" call in a "return" whose type is "(Monad m) => a -> m a".

Baby steps perhaps, but this has gone a long way in teaching me about Haskell's type inference & strictness!

P.S. - Obviously you don't need something like reverse_str as the Prelude already provides a reverse!

A Mathematician’s Lament

2008-06-24T10:58:00.004+05:30

Think you know math? Please read this essay by Paul Lockhart which is exceptionally brilliant.

I have always loved mathematics but I can easily see the truth in his words by relating it to my own learning experience in school & then college. Asking "why?" of a teacher over anything was academic suicide.

Of particular interest to me was his "ladder myth" trap to which I succumb even today. For example, of late I have been interested in lambda calculus and the first thought that shoots in my mind is what all I need to learn prior to tackling it instead of concentrating on the context of the problem and what the conjecture solves.

Another aspect of the essay that really stood out was his emphasis on students critiquing each others work. This has the by-product of making students more resilient to criticism and being able to handle it better. I could link this directly with developer's behavior towards code reviews. I have seen many a developer who does not have the emotional aptitude to take criticism of one's work.

Please read the essay, it may get you charged up for what I consider one of the most beautiful avenues of learning & fun.

Winds of Change

2008-05-23T11:58:00.002+05:30

Today marks my last working day here in Symantec. I eagerly look
forward to joining Tibco (www.tibco.com) from Monday!

The new Cricket

2008-05-02T08:35:00.003+05:30

I've been watching the Indian Premier League (IPL) for quite a few days now and cannot help but think about the future of the game.

I don't like doomsday stories so I'm not going to talk in terms of the ruin of cricket. Everything evolves and so will cricket. Only question in my mind is whether I like what cricket is evolving into. I've seen batsmen swinging blindly at the ball and also seen each nick to the boundary been applauded to the fullest. If batting is going to get reduced to the sheer power of the person & his lack of sense of the line of the ball, I for one have no interest in watching. The finesse of the great players sometimes creeps through but people watching already have associated such class with "traditional" cricket.

So it does look like cricket will get its new brand of Dhoni's & Asondkar's who swing their bat for all their worth. I wonder where the next Mark Waugh will come from & worst even if such an anomaly does arise whether the future coaches of the world will coax him to swing his bat like every other Joe.

I wonder if 20-30 years from now any youngster will truly enjoy watching or playing test cricket. As the game gets shorter & the moolah factor becomes larger, I think most kids will look forward to leagues such as the IPL & who can blame them with parents being eager to push the poor kids onto such things for the money. First it was all about either becoming a doctor or an engineer and now it will be all about cricket camps specializing in teaching T20 cricket.

I have always thought of cricket as a this private duel between the skill of a top class bowler against the might of a elegant batsmen. The rest is irrelevant. Greatness now has been reduced to that which can get the best crowds, be it cheerleaders or stars doing the hoopla on field.

Its true I think, whats popular is not always whats best. As for the IPL, I will continue watching it looking for the sparks of light that meet my standards of good cricket and the rest being forgotten like a bad dream.

What an exciting time we live in!!

2007-11-21T17:51:00.001+05:30

Check this out -
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/fundamentals/dn12891-is-mathematical-pattern-the-theory-of-everything.html

- Dinesh.

Lost for Words

2007-10-02T11:19:00.000+05:30

Over the past few years I have silently followed Cox & Forkum, enjoying every picture drawn, every word said and today it is with great sadness that I see them taking a final bow.

I wish it were possible to undo this as their cartoons will be sorely missed by me and many other Objectivist's out there. But for all the times I didn't say it, John & Allen, your work has meant a lot to me and you will be dearly missed.

I hope all your future endeavors are lighted with the special brand of fire that you have ignited in our hearts.

- Dinesh.

Tasting one's own Medicine?

2007-05-17T16:11:00.001+05:30

From all parts of the globe you hear instances of moral policing. Instances of the mob knowing whats "good" for you and consequently whats bad. Given such a standard, should the Bible be then given an exception? These residents of Hong Kong have truly hit the nail on the head!

Please read the article, its amazingly hilarious.

Bluetooth Dongle & GPRS Setup on Ubuntu

2007-04-24T23:43:00.000+05:30

Having heard that Ubuntu has released Feisty Fawn 7.04, I was rearing to try out bluetooth connectivity with a bluetooth dongle & my Sony Ericsson M600i phone. It turned out to be pretty easy actually and now I have completely switched over to Ubuntu.

Here's how I accomplished the connections after installing Ubuntu:-

Run "sudo -s" to get into root

Edit "/etc/bluetooth/hcid.conf" and set "security" as "auto" & if you want change the passkey to something you can remember.

Edit "/etc/bluetooth/rfcomm.conf" and make a rfcomm0 with setings such as shown below:-

rfcomm0 {
bind yes;
device _your_device_id_here_;
channel 7;
comment "M600i";
}

Kill the current hcid process and restart it using "/usr/sbin/hcid -x -s"

Restart the bluetooth service using "/etc/init.d/bluetooth restart"

Run pppconfig and make a new connection with following settings:-

Choose a name for the connection (say "gprs")

Choose Chat

Leave the default for the chat login & password

Enter your username & password (if applicable)

Enter the number you need to dial into for GPRS

For the device, manually enter "/dev/rfcomm0"

Save the settings

Edit /etc/chatscripts/gprs and comment out the lines "ogin:" & "assword:"

Edit /etc/ppp/peers/gprs and add the line "lcp-echo-interval 0"

Run "pon gprs" & you should see your phone connecting to the internet! :D

Run "poff gprs" to close the connection.

I spent around 2 hours trying to do this, so I hope others are spared the effort :) Enjoy!

Ayn Rand Novels

2007-04-07T17:12:00.000+05:30

A new site dedicated to Ayn Rand's ideas and her novels has been launched. Site contains some good introductory writings on Objectivism and also information pertaining to novels authored by her. In particular, some of the faq's provided are excellent!

Have a look and change your life!!

To Hell with Property Rights..

2007-02-16T13:49:00.000+05:30

.. or so the Indian Government says when its orders Nimbus to share its live feed with Doordarshan.

This is a clear and direct violation of Nimbus's property rights. If users cannot pay to watch Nimbus's coverage, so be it. There is no "right" to watch a cricket match. Many in this country will be applauding the efforts of our courts, but I wonder who'll have the last laugh when they see such an act of violation being perpetrated against them.

I will then be heartless enough to say, "Brother, you asked for it!".

Truth about Global Warming

2007-02-06T14:56:00.000+05:30

Timothy Ball, a Canadian Climatologist, rightly questions the intellectual honesty of the so-called 'environmentalists' and muses over the fact that, if what men want is not the truth, what we get is a science-by-consensus.

Math Mutilation!

2007-02-02T14:26:00.001+05:30

The reason why American kids are getting progressively worse at mathematics..

The future of American mathematics looks very bleak if this system persists.

Higher Learning!

2006-12-19T11:54:00.000+05:30

Vice Chancellor R P Singh, has my gratitude and respect for what he is endeavoring to accomplish in the Lucknow University. Our country needs more such voices of reason.

We cannot surrender this country to hooligans, be it in our Universities or in our Parliament. One can only hope to see such a trend in mainstream politics.

Read more here.

Thank you Mr. Singh!

EDIT: I had posted a comment on the article at rediff similar to what I have written above. For some reason, that comment has not shown up. Censorship perhaps?

Penn & Teller on Recyling

2006-11-29T10:22:00.000+05:30

I think this is worth checking out - Penn & Tyler

Recycling is bullshit!

Mukesh Ambani on MSNBC.com

2006-11-21T12:16:00.000+05:30

Way to go Mr. Ambani!

"In a sign of confidence, he has urged the government to remain true to its free-market reforms by not trying to block the real Wal-Mart from entering India. Ambani thinks he can beat the American giant on his home turf based in part on superior local knowledge."

Check out the interview @ msnbc.com

Flying Spaghetti Monster!

2006-10-12T12:55:00.000+05:30

Read this - www.vengaza.org

I haven't read something this funny in quite a while! :)

George Reisman - Environmentalism's Toxicity

2006-10-11T13:22:00.000+05:30

An amazing article on Environmentalism's Toxicity by George Reisman

I'm also currently reading his book on Capitalism, which is freely
available in pdf form on www.capitalism.net

Kudos to you Mr. Reisman!

Brother, Where art thou?

2006-10-03T08:24:00.000+05:30

Its been quite sometime since I have even taken the effort to look at my blog. Shameful, isn't it? Well hopefully this will change in the coming months. I plan to write here regularly but first, got to think of things I do want to blog about. I think my trip to Hong Kong should be the first on the list.

More soon.

Compilers - Here we come!

2006-01-19T16:37:00.000+05:30

Compiler writers probably turned in their graves today when a friend Nishant and I agreed upon starting work on a C++ Compiler! I know nothing about compilers as of now and so I know this is going to take a long time coming! But that's the fun part I guess ;o) If Nishant has his way, its going to be called "The Evil C++ Compiler" !! I don't think so buddy!

To the love of C++ ;o)

My Acer Laptop !!

2006-01-18T17:47:00.000+05:30

I recently bought an Acer Aspire 5002 with an AMD Turion 64bit Processor and 1GB of DRAM :) The machine is truly awesome, cause I use it mostly as a desktop replacement. Most people crib about its heat generation or the battery life, but I'm plagued by neither cause I use it from my room!

Its performance is really good! And for its price range, its a stunner!!

Happy Coding ;o)

Book Reviews

2006-01-18T17:35:00.000+05:30

Trying to gauge how good a book before you buy it can be a pretty hard task! Money doesn't exactly grow on trees ;o) One site I have found useful and insanely accurate in terms of their book reviews is www.accu.org. This is primarily a C++ site but they also give reviews for C# and Java.

Before buying any book, I usually run a search through there to see how its rated.

Dinesh.

Modern C++ Design

2006-01-18T15:29:00.000+05:30

I would really recommend you to try out "Modern C++ Design by Andrei
Alexandrescu". It is a fantastic book delving deep into C++ Template
Techniques. Its not something a novice can read, but yet if you are
comfortable with C++ templates, then you should definitely give it a
shot!

He opens your eyes to a lot of interesting techniques and in the process
also unravels "Loki", the library (written by him) which implements all
of the techniques!

Policy class, local classes, typelists - the list just goes on, its all
there!! He shows what you can do with even the most simple template
classes viz :-

template<bool>
struct CompileTimeChecker
{
CompileTimeChecker(...) {}
};

template<> struct CompileTimeChecker<false> {};

This relatively simple struct can achieve compile time assertions for
you!

Read it! Its worth it!

Dinesh.

Income tax Advertisement!! (OMG)

2005-10-28T11:10:00.000+05:30

Today on the way to work I heard one of the most sickening advertisements (if you can call it that - more like a threat!) on radio! It starts as "Bachke rehna re baba, bachke rehna re!!" (which means in a gist "better beware") and then goes on to advise you to pay your property tax on time so as avoid tax penalty!!! This was voiced on behalf of the Income Tax Division!

It was truly disgusting. This was of the more "in your face" incidents where the government reveals itself as a machine dedicated to looting by force!!

Meet the Parents

2005-10-27T17:39:00.000+05:30

Well the festival of lights, Diwali, is around the corner and I'm going to be spending my short vacation with Neha and her family in Hyderabad! :o) Looking forward to it and crossing my fingers that I don't blunder like the guy in the movie ;o)

Happy Diwali everyone!!

1984 by George Orwell

2005-10-27T17:37:00.000+05:30

Reading this book kinda makes me think about "The Matrix". Might as well replace the "Thought Police" by "Agent Smith"! And also other analogies that I often thought about while reading it!

This was truly an awesome read!! When I initially picked up the book the other day I had no idea what I was in for, cause I hadn't heard much about George Orwell or his works! But this turned out to be a great buy!!

I'd recommend others to try it too! :o)

"Statistics cannot replace reality even if you in a minority of one." - George Orwell.

Its Been a While

2005-10-27T17:31:00.000+05:30

Yeah yeah I'm lying ;o) Its been much more than a while! But I hope all those non-blogging days are past. From now on I'll be trying to blog as much as I can and I'm going to do it consciously. Lots of things have happened and life's just been great ;o)

Updates soon to come!

Centre for Development of Advanced Computing

2005-02-15T22:45:00.000+05:30

I entered C-DAC, Bangalore back in August not knowing exactly what to expect. I wasn't sure as to how good this course would be. Now standing at the juncture of leaving it for a new job, I just thought I'd look back to see what this place has taught me.

One of the greatest aspects of C-DAC is their emphasis on writing code. I'm not from a Computer Science Engineering background but yet I had a bit of coding experience, hence I was able to cope with the course very easily. Once thing I notice with CSE graduates is that though their theory is pretty brilliant, they just don't know to code. Quite a bit revolves around the Indian Education System. Back in engineering no one really cares about code, you are expected to learn that on your own, if you are interested. C-DAC makes you code whether you like it or not and if you don't like to code, chances are that you will not do well here.

All this turned out pretty well for me, cause I love code. I look at it live something living, something that I can shape. My brain-child, my mind at it's absolute best, not bowing to anything but reason and not settling at anything but that which is good.

The projects done here were also really good, especially the File System Simulation (my favourite) and the DBMS project (Airline Reservation System) in which we had designed a really good DataBase.

The one qualm I have with C-DAC is that though they have such a big emphasis on code, they don't have a big emphasis on good code. You can hack away all you won't but then again I guess they presume the onus is on you to write good code or not.

This place has been great for me, lots of life changes and some quality code. I leave it with some exquisitely fond memories and always look back at it as some of the best months of my life.

Change

2005-02-15T22:42:00.000+05:30

A new change in my career also has brought about a change in my blogging home. My old http://prometheus.rationalmind.net is no more going to be updated. I change primarily for the ease of emailing blog entries into my new blog.

The career change comes in the form of a job at Sapient. Over are now my studying days. Out into the real world where competition and success are to be sought.

My time at the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing, Bangalore has been great. Never has life brought so many changes and such great ones in such a short phase. Most of this happiness can be attributed to my love, Neha. Life really is beautiful now.

Here's to our future together. A future of laughter, happiness, pride and success.