Sunday, December 12, 2010

December 5th - Yet another red letter day in my life

On 1st November i was informed by our T&P cell that TCS is heading to our college for a pool campus drive on 3rd december.Later we had our semester exams.They were supposed to end on 13th but they ended on 20th November.One of the exams was postponed to 20th November by JNTUK.[Thats because rain god was feeling way too sad to leave visakhapatnam and move on to another place].

After my dismal performance in semester exams i felt sad as i failed to keep up the promise i made to my dad that i would do well in my exams.He didnt feel bad about it,but i did.I just wanted to make him feel happy by doing well in my semester exams,but i couldnt do it.So the only opportunity left in front of me is TCS.I felt that getting placed in a good company like TCS would make my parents feel proud and will give me more positive energy. Working in industry and learning while working has been my career plan right from my 2nd year. Thats when i made up my mind to work in a good company, gain some experience and then do MBA in Human resources from a premier B School.We had hardly 12 days to prepare with India VS New Zealand test series going on in full swing. It was just enough to keep cricket maniacs like me away from books.Meanwhile CIFEL people were giving placement oriented training in our college. I didnt feel like attending them.I thought it would be easy to cover the entire technical syllabus in 2 days. Instead it took me a weeks time to brush up my certification syllabus.So i am left with only 2 more days to complete semester subjects and prepare for written exam.

3rd December 2010 - Written exam

We had some practice papers covering all the possible patterns for written test.Once we are done practicing them written exam would be a cakewalk.From 4/4 IT we had 38 members who are eligible to take the written exam.And when the results were announced later that day,we came to know that all 38 of us cleared the written exam. I must say that this was the most happiest moment in 4-1 for almost every one in class. I had spent rest of the day revising programming language related concepts.I had a sound sleep later that night and took good amount of rest.

4th December 2010.

This is it. It all depends on how we perform on this day.We had three rounds. They are TR,MR and HR rounds.Each student needs to clear all three of them to make it to the big dance. Student volunteers would call our names periodically and all of us were asked to sit in mechanical workshop. Before we went to workshops, our beloved HOD sir addressed all of us. It was a rejuvenating talk. Student volunteers started calling our names at about 11:30 am in the morning and i had to wait until 4:30 pm to attend my technical round.I didnt have my lunch and was busy with books.After a while i throwed my books away and started listening to music.I was called in at around 5 PM in the evening for my technical interview.

The person who interviewed me was in his mid 30's if i am not wrong. He was having cashew pakodas and hot coffee offered to him. He received me well, and initially my concentration was on the plate of mouth watering snacks in front of me[yeah, I am starving]. He didnt notice my starving looks. He was looking at my resume and after a minutes time he broke the ice and asked me to introduce myself. Later he asked me to write programs for some data structures and a c program for avoiding deadlocks using semaphores. I wrote them within 10 mins and explained them well to him.[Thanks to raju sir,without whom my foundations in programming were never concrete]. He was impressed.I could make that out from his eyes.He was listening to me,eating his pakodas and sipping hot coffee[Multitasking].Later he asked me about some latest technologies of Oracle and Microsoft and in the end about my project.I explicated them in detail and i felt really good when i finished.He offered his hand for a shake and told me that i am selected and will not have my MR round. He said that HR people would call me soon and wished me luck.I was happy that i did well in technical round.Later i had my HR round at around 8 30 pm.It went quite well.After i came out i breathed a sigh of relief and left for canteen to have some food. We had to wait until 12 30 for the final results.

We had no rest that day.I was feeling drowsy.A young guy from TCS, with a bright smile on his face started reading out names department wise.They were reading out names in alphabetical order.So i had to wait for a while to hear my name in the list of selected candidates.Finally he called my name out and i felt happy.22 members from my department made it to TCS.When we came out, every one was busy giving high fives and hugs to each other.I called my parents up and told them that i was selected.

One thing that i would like to mention here is about the ambience back at home. Parents happiness is priceless.I really enjoyed my first interview experience.I am still in search of better opportunities which would offer joining dates soon after i finish my btech.For now my soul is relaxed and this is all i need at the beginning of a challenging main project. I am hoping to do a good project in an area that i had never explored before and learn more things.That should serve as a perfect ending to my engineering life.
And yeah ALL IZZ WELL :)

Sunday, September 26, 2010

The experience, The Idea and The genesis of a Multiple OS terminal simulator:

It was in my second year-second semester that I had written almost all the programs for DBMS lab. The same were followed by everyone in class. My internal exam went good. I still remember that day which haunted me for at least 6 weeks until my results were out. It was my external lab examination. I was extremely confident that my performance in exam and viva voice would be good. But things didn’t really go as expected. I faced a problem with the Oracle client that we used in our lab. It got stuck oftentimes and I was literally pissed off. I changed my system and started typing again. But still I faced the same problem. I felt like screaming aloud until my vocal cords busted out. It was a strange feeling – Mixture of frustration and desperation I should say. But the faculty members who recognized my work earlier in the semester gave me full marks.


After my results were out I never really gave it a second thought and it was one of those faded memories back in my mind. In our 4-1 we are supposed to do an industry oriented mini project. I always wanted to do a project that would help me learn something new and give me ample amount of work satiation. Without giving a second thought on who should I approach regarding the topic, I rushed to my mentor and one of my all time favorite teachers---- none other than my HOD. He gave me nearly 6 -8 ideas explicating each idea in detail. Out of all these one idea sounded pretty much interesting to me.

When the load on the server increases, then it may lead to server crash. So we can develop a load balancer that distributes the load across a cluster of servers. When I came back home and googled about this topic I realized its significance. Later, I came to know that the reason why my Oracle client got stuck up in my second year lab exam was due to the excessive load on the server. It was kind of weird coincidence. And soon after reading about it I made up my mind to take it as the topic for my mini project.

Initially I was a bit skeptical about my ability to complete the project in time. But I must really thank my guide who gave me loads of freedom and soothed my mind whenever I was worried about a certain aspect in the development. Talks with HOD regarding the project always left me with many more ideas for implementation. Finally after 1 month of intense coding and debugging I could come up with a simulator. My project got a unique advantage from the programming language that I had used for its development. Since java is platform independent, by changing the OS on the server side I can simulate the same OS on the client side. This feature turned out to be an add-on to what was already developed. So I called it a Multiple OS simulator. Adding to this it balances the load across a cluster of servers.

During my course of development I could explore Ubuntu which is a flavor of Linux. I worked with Fedora earlier. Ubuntu is not much different. I even loved the Unix platform. Everything can be done by configuring few files in the file system. Whenever I changed a few files in the file system and observed things working, I felt as if I’m some Albert Einstein or some great scientist/computer professional [it was just because of the pleasure I derive while working….I know it’s weird…but it gives me lots of excitement and happiness]. I learned some aspects of networking and could actually implement them in my workstation.

Coming to the hard times during the course of development, I jabbed my sand bag when ever things dint go as expected. [Oh yeah I was so very influenced by Sylvester Stallone in Rocky].Many of my friends developed web applications and I cursed myself few times for not choosing my current topic for main project [since I would get more time] when I observed the progress in their projects. But then with God’s grace things worked quite well just when the screws were tightening up and I completed my work 2 days before the last date for submission.

All the project reviews went well and people appreciated my effort. I should thank my team for having faith in me that I would complete things in time. They are the prime reason why my reviews went smoothly without any discrepancies. They adapted themselves so well according to the situation and did a great job in the viva-voice. I was harsh sometimes at them but still they gave me good moral support and never mistook my intentions. What else can one ask for when he/she has such a team which supports you morally and delivers at peak times.

On 24th September I completed delivering my presentation and told myself ALL IZZ WELL. And yeah “all went well” without any problems. Other friends of mine developed some very good applications as well. I, without sounding cocky can say that my class is the BEST when it comes to web development. Our class breathed a sigh of relief when we are done with our reviews.

The entire course of mini project development was awesome. It gave me lots of confidence and happiness. I hope I could implement this sooner or later in my department so that my juniors could find this app of mine useful. Some of my faculty suggested putting it up as a paper in some renowned Journals. I should give it a thought again. But for now I’m happy that I completed my work. ALL IZZ WELL 

Saturday, September 25, 2010

Honor Killings --- Whose honor is being killed???

The chronicles in the news papers showcase the pathetic state our country is in today. In this article I’m speaking about “honor killings”. After 64 years of Independence still these practices which were followed extensively in the ancient period prevail in our country.


When I first read about honor killings in the news paper I felt like expressing my views on it. But then it took me a while to get back to blogger space as I found myself preoccupied with other works. These barbaric incidents are prevalent in many regions in our country including Bihar and Haryana.

The perceived dishonor is normally the result of the following behaviors, or the suspicion of such behaviors:

(a) Utilizing dress codes unacceptable to the family/community

(b) Wanting to terminate or prevent an arranged marriage or desiring to marry by own choice

I always categorize a person’s life into two phases: Before and after he/she attains his/her “Mental maturity”. After we get the so called “mental maturity” we know what we want. It is at this particular phase in a person’s life where independence in cerebration should be encouraged. They should be allowed to do things according to their choice. Why should one dictate how the other person should lead his/her life when they are capable of doing things on their own? Giving a piece of advice is always acceptable but making rules for others living is not acceptable.

Everyone should have the freedom to choose their life partners. After all it is us who invented this caste/creed/color based differentiation. I keep on saying this example when people speak about differentiation based on caste/creed/color. The human race has its origin from the early man. From then onwards, over the years we became civilized and to show that we are civilized to the people around us, we started discriminating ourselves from the so called “un-civilized people”. So from the broader perspective we shouldn’t be worried too much about such discrimination.

I don’t really criticize people who do not follow their traditional practices. But I hate people who have no respect for their traditions. Everyone should have some value and respect for their tradition. But they shouldn’t be obsessed about their traditional practices. People do change in due course of time as the world around us is changing. So they should learn to exist in such a rapidly evolving world.

At the end of the day taking a life is never an answer to any problem in this world. But people still believe that death is the ultimate penalization. Any problem can be solved by means of “SENSIBLE” communication. I hope people would realize this someday or the other.

Friday, July 2, 2010

CRPF Personnel Butchered

The recent Maoist attack which took place in Chattisgarh claimed the lives of 27 CRPF Personnel and some people were still not found.This barbaric act by the Maoists is really very annoying.Terrorism is gradually spreading like an infectious virus in each and every nation.The Maoist attacks are becoming very frequent these days and they are causing panic to many other people who live around.Despite government's efforts to curb these barbaric acts, still these misdeeds prevail in our country.

The terrorists are striking at their own will-- they kill people when ever they want.They enforce bandhs making us wonder whose writ runs in naxal infected states.And the reason they do all these things is to draw the attention of the government to their so called issues.Is killing civilians the only way to grab attention of the government? If thats the case,there would be no life left on this planet once the government's attention is brought onto all the social issues in present day life.If the terrorists consider these personnel/civilians as their own people they would never commit such inhuman acts.


Just as Leopard cannot change its spots or a tiger its stripes, the terrorists cannot eschew violence.Doling out compensation to victim's families will not reduce the gravity of these events.The government's idea to have talks with them would turn futile.So the government should stop being a mute spectator and bring the army into action and curb this violence.Another way of checking terrorism would be the issual of unique ids to every one in the country.The person with an invalid/no identity can be prosecuted.But still efficient means should be adopted so that there wouldnt be any duplicate/fake id's given.The intelligence unit should be strengthened and other measures should be taken to check these minacious deeds.

Fear is the most infectious condition.Living life with fear is far more worse than dying,which gives a person eternal peace.Peace is the need of the hour and the government should consider this issue seriously.

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

We love India?? or Success?

Every day i receive messages wishing me a very good morning...but today it was something different. Iam deeply moved by these messages and felt like explaining few things to everyone. Almost all my friends know that im a Dhoni maniac and after India's dismal performance yesterday they were totally fed up. One of the message's said:


"What a knock by MSD...he made the entire nation *******"

"What is the one word substitute for ******** skipper???

...................its MSD"

And i have seen some friends in FB posting

"Screw Indians..and MSD....They s***"

The same is the case in the last T20 tournament and the penultimate World Cup tournament. We have seen some edited pics of cricketers in newspapers and fans also went on to destroy assets owned by the cricketers.This is basically criticism at its best.Firstly we should ask ourselves one question.

-- Are the men in blue doing this purposefully?

If we start thinking about this,the answer that comes to our mind is "No".They have tried to win and gave their best, but then it was just not their day.

If India is expected to win every tournament it plays,then what is the reason for other teams to take part in the tournament?Are the remaining teams playing for pride?? No...Almost all the teams playing have world class cricketers in their sides and they are "hungry" to win the tournament.So even if we loose,we are not loosing to a second rated/inferior team. We are loosing to a side which is equally good compared to us.One must realize this fact and stop expecting too much from the men in blue. Theres nothing wrong having a hope that the men in blue will win,but one shouldnt be obsessed about the victory.After all,the word victory has got some meaning just because we have a word "defeat".It is inevitable that some defeat will enter even the most victorious life.

The human spirit is never finished when it is defeated...it is finished when it surrenders.

If men in blue pull of an incredible victory then people start praising them.If they lose then they start criticising them. If that is the case "Are we loving India?? or success??". I just felt led to express my opinion here.I do have some problems with the team selection.We definitely missed out some key players who have had a great run in the IPL.

But at the end of the day one must support India even when it looses. That really boosts their confidence and help them win.I will still cheer for our country and i wish them luck for the world cup 2011.

Saturday, May 8, 2010

Caste ^ Census || Census

Few days back i was flipping channels on TV and suddenly i came across a discussion in the parliament. This was regarding "Census".For all of those who are wondering what "Census" means,here is some light on cenus:

"A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population.The term is used mostly in connection with national population "

There was a debate going on between the ruling party and some other politicians whether or not to include caste in census.It had brought out many opinions about the after effects of inclusion of caste in census.
Some of the politicians say that its good to include caste in cenus while others protested againt this[they think that we shouldnt divide the country based on caste/creed].I personally feel the inclusion of caste in census is very beneficial.Our's is a vote-bank driven political system. We cannot completely remove reservations and other amenities provided for the backward classes .Census provides us with value information while we are dealing with reservations for various classes of people in the country.Hence passing these bills using this valuable data as a reference would lead to framing up of more accurate and meaningful policies.

Apparently this might seem to be highly beneficial for decision making process,but still we have some practical problems with it:

--The enumerators for this particular program, who carry out this process by issuing a questionnaire cannot really verify whether the details given by people are valid or not.

--Adding to this we may find various political parties using these details for knowing the composition[which may benefit them during elections] of our country.

There should be some approach by means of which we can fight all these pragmatic issues.The information should be precise and must not go into the wrong hands.I [just like many more indian's] am waiting for the Prime Minister's decision on this issue.

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar---- We Adore You

It was the 2nd ODI between India and south africa and by the time i reached home in the afternoon Tendulkar was in the nervous nineties. I was praying for his ton and soon he raised his bat to the dressing room acknowledging the cheers of lakhs of people around him in the stadium. I can assure that whenever Sachin hits a ton we find a smile on each and every Indian's face. We normally donot have that additional grin on our faces when some other cricketing legend scores a ton[Well thats my opinion].But in a while his batting style after scoring a hundred had changed considerably. He started to go after the bowling and scored boundaries at regular intervals.

When the second batting powerplay was taken Sachin had just crossed the 150 mark. Some how i felt that he would make it to the 200 mark. He kept going and became the highest scorer in ODI's when he surpassed Anwar's record of 194. I was more nervous just like millions of Indian's who were watching him play. Basically im a Dhoni maniac and when Dhoni didnt give sachin strike for a while when the batting maestro was on 199, i cursed Dhoni like never before. It was over no 50 in the match when this magical moment which deserved to be etched in gold in the history of cricket took place. Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar completes his double century and becomes the first man to do it in the history of limited over cricket.

After the match is over i started to think..."What a man,What a knock,What elegance,What style..."...It is rightly said that in India cricket is a religion and Sachin is GOD. At 37 he scored each and every run in his innings by himself without a runner. This enlightens me that it is never too late to make any accomplishment. If u have the passion,zeal and if you truly work for your dreams they do turn into reality. Sachin has proved the entire world that he is the best player and yet his words in the post match press conference were really very modest.He said that he was happy because this achievement belongs to an Indian cricketer.When a scribe made a statement saying "Records are meant to be broken" and sought his reaction,the batting maestro said that he would be happy if this record was broken by an Indian.The entire nation adores him not only for his pyrotechinics but for his character also.He truly deserves a Bharata Ratna for all his achievements in cricketing field. I have no idea about the amount of sadness that prevails in our cricket crazy country when Tendulkar calls off. For now, iam really happy to see him go out and bat. Lets hope that batting legend would entertain us for many more years and break many more records.....We Love you SACHIN....

Sunday, February 28, 2010

Me-Now as "CR"

After many days of drama eventually on 8th February at 2:30 pm i took charge as the new class representative.I must thank GOD for he has been really good to me in this semester.My best friend Chandrasekhar did a great job for one complete semester after Mourya called it off. Now i was asked to take the charge by my class incharge Srinivas rao garu.
  I always wanted to be the CR and i personally felt that i deserved that position more than any one else in my class[Well thats my personal opinion].But somehow or the other my friend got a chance before me for the last semester.As soon as i took the charge i felt strange. Some of my friends congratulated me in a sarcastic way while some people greeted me with some heart soothing words.My mind was filled with strange feelings.Part of me thinks that i can fit in well and do a good job while the other part thinks that i cant handle my class. I identified three qualities in me which make me unfit for that position. They are mainly my temper,impatience and getting along with every one. Right from my child hood i always prefered staying alone or with a small group of people rather than having a big social network. Like all the Geminians even iam short tempered and have very less patience. I personally feel i inherited this quality from my forefathers. After thinking for one complete hour in bus i thought that i need to make some changes in the way i present myself to the people around me. And iam trying to implement that to the best of my levels.
         Albeit some people think that i donot fit in there,I hope my friends would support me and help me do a good job as the class representative.For now im keeping my fingers crossed and im hoping for the best. ALL IZZ WELL :)

Friday, February 26, 2010

Campus Placements @ MVGR

"Get a job and go freak out with the salary you get"..... a general thought in every engineering student's mind. Yeah, campus placements provide a great opportunity for the students in various engineering colleges to showcase their talent and sell themselves. We had TCS [Tata Consultancy Services] at our campus for which some of us were asked to volunteer. I found this boring as i know the fact that being a volunteer makes you do clerical work in the campus. I had no interest in it and skipped the afternoon session by saying to my professor incharge that i was ill.

Nearly 250 students from our college appeared for the interviews. And after day one, nearly a hundred of them were not selected in the written exam. Day 2 had Technical round,MR round and HR round. These were some of the questions asked to my seniors who attended the technical interview.

1. Write a C program for Drivers

2. Write a C program for connecting to a database in the back end

3. Write a program for quick sort.

The last one seems to be quite familiar for most of the students, but the first two questions were boggling.One of them was asked to do a program on system and come back with the output's. And one student was asked the reason for which he took the Oracle certification. The number of students who cleared the technical round reduced once again and finally there were about 60 people who cleared all the rounds.

27 students were selected finally.And to my surprise we had 14 of them from ece. Infact they took only 11 members from the computer science and Information technology streams.Then i started thinking the reason behind their selection. Its not about your percentage in the engineering stream or your track record that counts.Its all about your way of communicating and yeah a piece of fucking luck.If you arent lucky that day,it may turn out really bad. People think that all those students with sound sapience are absorbed into the companies,[ which is true to a certain extent] but they are more concerned about people with good communication skills or soft skills to be precise.This is true because, no matter how much knowledge you have if you are unable to express your knowledge it goes in vain.So one who can express himself really well can have an extra edge when compared to the remaining people.
 
           This filled up my mind with strange thoughts.I asked my self whether i would make it the next year and whether my resume is sound enough to impress the interviewer. Part of me thinks that i will clear the interviews with ease but the other part thinks that im going to mess things up. My past academic record was not that sound and i had my best time academically in my engineering life and gained good respect for my skills among my class,juniors,faculty members and other friends.
             For now i felt its better if i stop thinking more about this and concentrate on my current semester subjects. And yeah ALL IZZ WELL....

Saturday, January 9, 2010

3 IDIOTS - A Must Watch

Finally after many weeks of long wait, i watched 3 idiots the day after our results are out.I should thank my best buddy vikas for taking the tickets and inviting me for the movie.I almost rushed from home when he said that he had 2 tickets with him.And yeah, eventually i came to know the
reason why the tag line "ALL IZZ WELL" had become so popular. No doubt the movie was amazing. This enlightens me the reason why Aamir takes time while he chooses the script for his
movies.
        There is one point which is worth mentioning in the movie. The movie is all about a sound principle which is followed by Rancho alias Aamir "Try to excel in that field for which you have a passion,and one day u will succeed." I liked the "DEMO" strategy Rancho used to help people understand things.Chatur's character was hilarious.He is known for by hearting the lessons.Where as Rancho was known for his conceptual understanding.He was awesome and looked so young.All i can say is this is one movie which is a must watch for all the young engineers.Go along the path where your dreams take you.Another movie which is worth mentioning when you speak about following your dreams is Wake up sid. It had a similar theme casted in a differnt way.

      You will feel good once you come out. You will feel great if you just flunked your exams. For now
ALL IZZZ WELL

Friday, January 8, 2010

My first failure in Engineering..

Every time when my semester results are out, i was one among all those distinction holders. I named it the D club where D stands for distinction.Recently i had written my 3-1 exams and yeah i worked like i never did before for these exams. Before 3-1, my preparation methodology was entirely different. I used to study each and every day , but the day before the exam im glued to my TV watching cricket matches.


However i took an oath not to watch cricket before exams and started reading well. It was the same priciple applied to perfection while i was taking my 3-1 exams.Everything went on well.For the first time when i finished my exams i was very confident and felt good about myself. I didnt feel like praying to GOD any more because i took it for granted that my result would be fair enough.

I was very cool and acted as if i screwed my exams and the same was displayed as a caption in various social networking sites and as a news feed on FB and Twitter.

Finally on 7th January,results were out and im shocked that i missed distinction by 4 marks,while one of my friends made it there.So there goes my percentage -- 69.5. How do u feel when u get so close and miss hitting the target? Unfortunately many of my class mates who were known for their academic excellence couldnt make it there as well. So i said to my self a very famous line "AALL IZZ WELL" and there goes my caption.

Important thing is that my marks were sound in all the subjects where my performance was not to the best of my abilities. But two subject score's were dissappointing. Yeah man this is what happens with JNTU.I finally felt that i should go for revaluation kind of thing. And i told the same to all my friends.

But when i downloaded a pdf from the net about the revaluation details,i felt that the following details were worth noting. Here they go:

Item Fee per subject Applicable to

Recounting - Rs.100/- All courses

Revaluation - Rs.500/- All UG courses except B.Tech.

Challenge valuation- Rs.10,000/- Only for B.Tech.

10000 bucks for challenge valuation?? I dont know whos proposal this is, but i felt this is really ridiculous.Definitely it brings a lot of profit for the university.All my dreams were shattered after looking at this. 10000 bucks for a paper is really insane. So i finally decided to go for recounting which seemed to be economical for me(lol).At the end of the day i felt like making a statement saying -- JNTU and its script valuation SUCKS big time.