Tuesday, December 25, 2012

Bhagavadgita Verse - Treating Everyone Equally

vidya-vinaya-sampanne
brahmane gavi hastini
suni caiva sva-pake ca
panditah sama-darsinah


The humble sage, by virtue of true knowledge, sees with equal vision a learned and gentle brahmana, a cow, an elephant, a dog and a dog-eater.

- Bhagavadgita 5.18


I am not a sage like in the above verse. But, I treat Gandhi and KCR equally.

You need to have lot of knowledge to understand this post. If you are desperate to know it, please call me to hear discourses on this.

Sunday, December 16, 2012

Wasting Time of A Big Personality

Many people say that, they like one big personality. Whenever they get chance to meet him for a second, they go and visit him, by spending few days in travel. That person is very busy in meeting all the "so called" fans of him. He hardly sleeps 1.5 hours per day. He does not get any off on weekends or holidays. In fact, on holidays, more people come to visit him.

All the "so called" fans of him say that, everyone must visit him regularly. They do not care whether that person is getting some rest or not. How can one say that, they like a person, when they never worry about whether that person is getting enough sleep or not?


Why are you going to Tirupathi?

Friday, December 07, 2012

Public Transport - Developed Country

A developed country is not a place where the poor have cars. It's where the rich use public transport.
- Gustavo Petro, Mayor of Bogota

I am not sure, how many people really understood this quote. In India, whenever somebody talks about equality among the people, most of the time, they mean, bringing down the rich people to the level of the poor, rather than developing poor people to the level of the rich.

In this case, socialists/communist people think this as, banning all the private vehicles and forcing everyone to use public transport. But, that is not the meaning of this.

In a developed country, the public transport is as friendly as private transport. That's why, even rich people would prefer to use public transport, since it saves lot of money and time. If the public transport is pathetic, then even poor people would have to buy their own vehicles for better transport.

Wednesday, November 28, 2012

What is Test Driven Development?

The developer develops the bare minimum functionality for the entire task without any unit testing and delivers it to the Test team.

The Test team tests the functionality and files bugs saying either the functionality is missing or not working for mainline scenarios.

For functionality missing bugs, the developer implements just the mainline scenario, and for the main line scenario not working bugs, he makes it work just for the mainline scenario and delivers the code.

The test team tests the functionality again, and files bugs saying, either the mainline scenarios are not working for the previously missing functionality or other scenarios are not working.

Developer fixes those again, and delivers it.

Then the test team finds few more scenarios and few corner cases and files bugs on those.

This cycle is repeated, till the code satisfies all the requirements.

This is called Test Driven Development.

The advantage in this method is, the developer does not need to give accurate estimates to the manager, in terms of no.of tasks or duration of each task. We can finish the project, whenever the manager wants. [i.e., we say that, we are done with the tasks on the deadline given by the manager.]

The only disadvantage is, the testers will lose interest in software and/or their life.

[If you really don't know what is test driven development, and if you follow this, then the testers' life becomes miserable. In real test driven development, we have to replace test team with automated testcases.]


With sympathy on all the testers who are testing my code.

Monday, November 19, 2012

Restrictions on Politicians Contesting in the Elections

We should not allow someone resigning and contesting again. It is a waste of money.

We should put minimum educational qualification for the candidates.

We should not allow criminals in the elections.

We should have Retirement Age in politics.

We should have right to recall the elected representatives.

The contestant should start as a surpanch/councillor/corporator, and after serving for one full term, they should contest as MLA, and after serving for one full term only, they should contest for MP.


Why are you electing them? Don't vote for those who are not qualified according to your rules.

I do not support any kind of restriction in elections, whether it is by caste, sex, criminal record or anything. People should have complete freedom on whom to elect.

Let's suppose, there are two contestants in the elections. First person has developed the city with Rs.10 crore and did not take even single rupee as bribe. Second person has developed the city with Rs.100 crore, but took Rs.10 crore bribe.

In this case, many people would say that, the second person should not be allowed to contest. But, I want the second person to contest, and I would vote for the second person only, and I will not vote for the first person. If the majority of the people think that, second person is bad, let them not vote for the second person. But, let the people decide. Do not put any restriction on that.

Saturday, November 10, 2012

Movies on Impractical Politics

Few years back, people used to suggest me to watch few movies based on the Hindu scriptures like Mahabharath, Ramayan and Bhagavatham. After watching few movies of that type, I lost interest in watching movies based on the scriptures. The reason was, almost all the directors changed the story for their own reasons. Because of the distortion in the story, I lost interest in watching those movies.

Nowadays, I am getting recommendations to watch movies on politics. After watching those, I am getting the same feeling. I am losing interest in watching movies on politics, because most of the movies are not practical. They want to show something interesting/heroic to the audience, and not the actual way to solve the problem.

Let's take an example of the movie, Leader.

After the hero becomes Chief Minister, he had to release a criminal for him to continue as C.M. The Hero's mother is disappointed that, he released a criminal to keep his C.M.'s post. The events that are followed by this are, Hero's mother dies, Hero arrests the criminal and seizes the black money of all the elected representatives which is around Rs.1,00,000,00,00,000 and he calls for the elections.

If the same thing happens in the real world, the state would NOT be in a better state by what the hero did in this movie.

If a person becomes a C.M. by anyway other than his/her own mass power, then they would definitely get pressure from others in doing some unethical/illegal activities. If he/she does not do that, then very soon he/she would lose his/her post. The scale of unethical/illegal activities that he/she needs to support is indirectly proportional to his/her own mass power.

If the hero loses his post, then he cannot do anything for the society, and a crooked person takes the power and destroys the state/country. If he stays back in the post, he would have to allow few illegal things, but, he can do something to the society at his capacity. More on this at Even Good People Are Becoming Bad After Entering Politics.

Since, it is a movie, he wins and becomes C.M., But, in real world that won't happen. As in the movie, even if the government collects 1 Lakh Crore rupees of black money, still, it would be used by the same politicians, and they know very well on how to get that money into their pockets.

In most of the movies based on politics, they project, collecting black money, or giving freebies to the poor people as good. But, they never stress the point that, making people self-dependent is the first important thing.

Most of the movies stress the point that, the politicians are bad. But, hardly any movie stresses the point that, the people are electing the bad people. So, it is people who have to change, and not the politicians.

There is only one exception to this in Telugu Cinema. There is only one director/writer in Telugu cinema, who can make real political movies to inspire people. He is Posani Krishna Murali, and this post is not applicable to him. He made real political movies like, Raja Vaari Chepala Cheruvu, Operation Duryodhana etc. Unfortunately, normal people cannot accept the truth, if it is told bluntly. That's why, his movies are not so popular.

Thursday, November 01, 2012

How to Get an Appointment with that Big Personality

The following are the general categories of people who ask for appointment of big personalities in the name of helping the big personality (Other than those who really help the big personality).


Mr.X is not doing correctly. I would like to give suggestions to him and would like to tell what he should do and what he should not do. For that, I need an appointment.

Mr.X is handling things only at national level. He is not worried about the things that are happening in a village. I must bring it to the notice of him. For that, I need an appointment.

I need appointment with Mr.X, so that, I can take suggestions from him in proceeding the activities in my village.


Mr.X has been in this field, even before many were born. He has lot of knowledge, and does not need any suggestions from anyone else. It is not worth of his time to spend time on smaller issues by ignoring bigger issues.

If you really want to help the big personality, the best thing that you can do is, not wasting his time.

Friday, October 26, 2012

Country Is Not Land. Country Is People

Country Is Not Land. Country Is People.

This is a famous quote used by many people in many situations.

In the entire world, how many countries follow this?

If a group of people want to migrate to any country, almost no country allows them (Unless they have something which is useful for that country). However, if they offer the land, almost all the countries in this world are ready to take over it.

According to the scriptures, King must take care of everyone who surrenders to him. But, no country does.

Saturday, October 20, 2012

Three Major Changes Required for "Developed India"


People should realize the value of their vote.

Media should stop writing the news from the communists/socialists point of view, and start writing neutrally or from the free market point of view.

Proportionate voting should be brought instead of the first past the post system.


Monday, October 08, 2012

Quote of the Day - Teasing

Teasing is not really teasing, if the other person is going to change any decision, behavior, life style or anything of some significance to someone.

That teasing is called suggestion, request, criticism, abuse or demand etc.

Saturday, September 29, 2012

Not uttering the word salt at night

At many places, there is a custom that, one should not utter the word salt at night. They use words like, that one, the one that is there in that box/packet etc.

The original reason is, one should not use too much of salt. So, the ancestors might have said, never use salt at night time. But, still, people in their house might wanted to use that, and since, they may be fear of the head of the family, if they say salt at night. So, they would have started using words like, that one, the one which is there in that box etc. Gradually, their children and grand children might have continued using those words without knowing the original reason.

Eventhough, the original purpose was to reduce the usage of salt, without reducing that, we have just reduced the uttering the word salt.

Sunday, September 23, 2012

Clement Atlee's Response on Gandhi's Role in Independence

It was British prime minister Clement Atlee who, when granting independence to India, said that Gandhi’s non-violence movement had next to zero effect on the British. In corroboration, Chief Justice P.B. Chakrabarty of the Kolkata High Court, who had earlier served as acting governor of West Bengal, disclosed the following in a letter addressed to the publisher of Ramesh Chandra Majumdar’s book A History of Bengal:

You have fulfilled a noble task by persuading Dr. Majumdar to write this history of Bengal and publishing it … In the preface of the book Dr. Majumdar has written that he could not accept the thesis that Indian independence was brought about solely, or predominantly by the non-violent civil disobedience movement of Gandhi. When I was the acting Governor, Lord Atlee, who had given us independence by withdrawing the British rule from India, spent two days in the Governor’s palace at Calcutta during his tour of India. At that time I had a prolonged discussion with him regarding the real factors that had led the British to quit India. My direct question to him was that since Gandhi’s “Quit India” movement had tapered off quite some time ago and in 1947 no such new compelling situation had arisen that would necessitate a hasty British departure, why did they have to leave? In his reply Atlee cited several reasons, the principal among them being the erosion of loyalty to the British Crown among the Indian army and navy personnel as a result of the military activities of Netaji [Subhash Chandra Bose]. Toward the end of our discussion I asked Atlee what was the extent of Gandhi’s influence upon the British decision to quit India. Hearing this question, Atlee's lips became twisted in a sarcastic smile as he slowly chewed out the word, “m-i-n-i-m-a-l!”



Source:

Majumdar, Ramesh Chandra, Three Phases of India’s Struggle for Freedom, Bhartiya Vidya Bhavan, Bombay, India, 1967, pp. 58-59.

Ranjan Borra, “Subhas Chandra Bose, The Indian National Army, and The War of India’s Liberation,” Journal of Historical Review, Vol. 20 (2001), No. 1, reference 46.

Hitler, NOT Gandhi, Should Be Given Credit for the Independence of India in 1947

Monday, September 17, 2012

Vijetha and Sikhara Darsanam - Biographies of Chiranjeevi

The books Vijetha and Sikhara Darsanam are biographies of famous telugu hero Chiranjeevi. One line summary of these books is, I am yet to see a more useless biography than these for any famous person.

Compare these books with any biography in cinema field including N.T.Rama Rao, Akkineni Nageswara Rao, S.P.Bala Subrahmanyam, Rajinikanth, Gollapudi Maruthi Rao, Sobhanbabu, Kantha Rao, Savithri, Ghantasala or Ram Gopal Varma etc. No. Simply, you cannot compare.

After reading these books, I realized that, I should not write any book. Because, if I write any, it would be like these.

The author C.Sreekanth Kumar is very active in the Chiranjeevi fans association, Chiranjeevi eye & Blood Banks. He received Santhosham Film Award for the book Vijetha, for the best book based on movies in 2004. If this book has received the award, then what awards should the authors of the other biographies get?

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

If We Are Uncomfortable With Someone

If we are uncomfortable with someone, most of the time, we would like to get rid of them, so that, they won't trouble us again. While doing that, many people wish for bad things to happen to them, and most of the time, they wish for severe bad things than they deserve for the uncomfortableness they caused. Sometimes, the other person may not be wrong at all. But, because of the situation, we may be uncomfortable with them. In that case, we should not wish for any bad thing happen to them.

What should we wish for them?

We should wish for very good things to happen to them, so that they won't trouble us again.

If our colleague is causing trouble, and if he/she gets a very good job with very good pay in his/her favorite company and leaves this company, then our problems would be solved, and also he/she would be happy.

If a girl is uncomfortable because of a guy proposing her, and if she wishes that, he gets a more suitable girl than her, then both would be happy.

If anybody is troubling us because of some problem that he/she has, instead of wishing anything bad happen to that person, if we wish for that person's problem to be solved, that would be good for both.

Sunday, September 09, 2012

There is only one reality. That is Code. Everything Else is Illusion

There is only one reality. That is Code. Everything else (design and documentation etc.) is illusion.

Once I worked in a team, where the managers expected detailed design for everything. When, I say, we will have a single library for validation and data storage etc., they won't accept it. They expect the application to be modularized, and have many components. If somebody proposes multiple libraries, with each library doing one small work, they would be very happy about it.

I am very bad at presenting these things, and coming up with big architecture for very small problems. There was a person in my team, who is very good in these things. He came up with a design, in which, there are multiple libraries. One library for business logic and one for data storage etc.

There will be one business logic library, which does all the validations and processing of the data and the conversions from UI to DB and vice versa. The DB layer handles all the save and retrieval of data, and it is not burdened with any processing of the data or business logic. The entire business logic would be in the business logic library. In future, if the business logic grows, we can split into multiple libraries based on the functionality. Since, it is the first version, we can start with one library and see in the next release whether to split this library.

At the end, most of the methods in the business logic library are like this.
public BIObject GetBIObject(Parameters)
{
    return dbHandler.GetBIObject(Parameters)
}

public BIObject SaveBIObject(Parameters)
{
    return dbHandler.SaveBIObject(Parameters)
}
[For those who did not understand the above, the entire functionality (validation, storage and everything else) was developed in the data library. The business logic is just a wrapper with one line of code for each method.]

Everybody was happy by this method.

The managers were happy, because, the design is good, where there are multiple components, and it is modularized. The other developer was happy, because, the managers were impressed with his design. I was happy, because, the code was exactly the way, I wanted it to be. And, also, I was relieved from the burden of designing (which I never used anyway) and presenting it to the managers.


Related Links:
What does it take to convince a Manager?
Developing Libraries - Give Minimum Privileges

Monday, September 03, 2012

Gandhi - His Attitude on Power

It is very easy to say, "I don't care about money", while having nice dinner at a seven star hotel.

If we go by what is known to the majority of the people, Gandhi is very simple and he did not have any interest on power etc. Except at the very beginning, he did not show any interest in becoming the president of Congress, and after getting the Independence, he did not take any post in the government.

In the later part of Gandhi's life, he had full power. Whatever he asked, it was done. He had Nehru, who has done everything that he asked (till the Independence). So, Gandhi never needed to take the power officially.

In 1939, Subash Chandra Bose contested for the Congress President elections. Gandhi had put Pattabi Seetharamayya as his candidate. Pattabi Seetharamayya lost in the elections, and Subhash Chandra Bose became the president of the Congress.

Gandhi did not like that. He publicly said, that the defeat of Sitaramayya was his own defeat. He asked many people to resign from their posts and have given zero co-operation to Subash Chandra Bose. Gandhi did not even attend the meetings of Congress. Bose got frustrated with the things happened in Congress because of Gandhi, and left Congress.

In 1946, India was on the way to Independence. Congress was supposed to elect the first Prime Minister of India. 16 states supported Sardar Vallabai Patel and only one state supported Nehru. But, Gandhi asked Patel to withdraw, and asked him to give the way to Nehru. Patel accepted it and Nehru became the first Prime Minister of India.

Gandhi never wanted to take power. But, he always wanted people, who listens to him in everything, to take power. Eventhough, Gandhi did not hold any official posts most of the time, he had full powers most of the time. He had people who listened to him for everything. When he was having full power, it is very easy to say that, he does not care about power. The real picture would come out only, when the people who have power do not listen to him.

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Questions I had when I was a Kid

In physics calculations, they use sin(x) = x for small x. Even if x is 1 degree, sin(1) is significantly less than 1. If x is very less than one degree, then it will not be of any significance. For example, for any calculations on a road which has some slope, my lecturer used this formula. If this formula does not hold good even for 1 degree, what is the use of that? The road having slope less than 1 degree is itself of no significance.

In sports, why most of the time, the first and second rankers face only in finals? If both face in the first round itself, that would give opportunity to others to reach finals.

When the father is more intelligent and knowledgable than child, why Grahm Bell's father did not invent the telephone?

In telugu/sanskrit, there is a comparison of a king and poet. It says that, when a king dies, one star fells. When a poet dies, one star appears in the sky. It claims that appearing in the sky has more significance. When a star fells after the death of the king, it signifies the impact that was created by the King. How can that be of less significance?

What I understood later on

x is not in degrees, but, it is in radians. If it is in radians, then it has some significance, and sin(x) = x can be used in practical problems for small x. I never had enough dare to ask my lecturer about this.

Generally the tournaments are conducted in such a way that, the winner is the one who can defeat everyone, and the runner-up is the one who can defeat everyone except the winner. Similarly the second runner-up is the one who can defeat everyone except the first two. If the tournament is not conducted that way, then there is no use of conducting that tournament. Because, except the first place, one can "fix" all other places. I understood this, when I got second prize in one tournament. If they had followed the real tournament rules, I would have been in 17th position out of 32 people.

"Father is intelligent than child" is applicable only for the first few years of the child, and the no.of years varies from child to child. After that, everything would change. Many people stop acquiring knowledge after reaching a certain stage. Depending on when they stop acquiring knowledge, there will be difference in the knowledge of the father and the child.

Eventhough a star falling down seems a major incident, it means, after that day, nobody would be aware of that star. When the star goes on to the sky, it means, from that day onwards, people would know about the star, and it will live eternal. In this case, nobody will remember the King after his death, where as everyone will remember the poet forever.

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Law of Karma for Animals

In few philosophies, it says karma is applicable only to humans and not to animals. Since, the animals do not have thinking capacity.

In any place, if there are many dogs, and if a new dog comes to that locality, then all the dogs shout and send the new dog away, as if their government has registered that street to them. If they behave like this, is there any reason why the dogs have to be excluded from the law of Karma? If the dogs are included in the law of Karma, is there any reason why the other animals should be excluded?

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Indian Independence - British Circumstances

During the world war - 2, Britain had spent lot of money. After the world war - 2, it became expensive for them to rule India. So, they gave Independence to India. For the same reason, they gave independence to Jordan in 1946, Palestine in 1947, Sri Lanka and Myanmar in 1948, and Egypt in 1952. For the same reason, France also had to grant independence to Laos in 1949, Cambodia in 1953, and Vietnam in 1954.

If there had been no world war - 2, and if Britain had not lost money, it would not have given independence to India for decades.

Even if Gandhi and other leaders of Congress had not done anything for Independence, still, Britain would have left India, purely because of financial reasons.

Friday, August 10, 2012

Taking Employer's Product Unofficially and Selling Outside

Long back, When I was working in a product based company, which sells products to big organizations mainly in US, I had discussion with my colleague on taking Company's products unofficially and selling outside.

My colleague started talking in such a way that, you cannot take any code outside. I told him that, everything is open here. You can take the code out in so many ways. But, the company trusts us. That's why, they had given full access to everything.

Then, he said something like below,

They don't need to have trust. If you can take our product and sell it to anyone yourself, then our company will appreciate it, and will make you as the official sales partner. They will give you good percentage in the sales by taking all the headache of new feature development, support, maintenance, bug fixing, legal and many other things.

Friday, August 03, 2012

Bhagavadgita and Vishnu Sahasranama in Thikkana Mahabharath

Mahabharath was first translated to Telugu by Nannaya, Thikkana and Errapragada. Thikkana translated from Virata Parvam till the end. Bhagavadgita, the most important part of the Mahabharath, is a part of Bheeshma Parvam, translated by Thikkana. But, in the telugu version, He finished Gita in 1/10th of the verses in Sanskrit. Telugu Bhagavadgita by Thikkana contains less than 70 verses, where as the original Bhagavadgita contains 700 verses. Similarly, he did not touch Vishnu Sahasranama also. Few people give commentary saying that, since, they are not important, he just summarized them.

The following is the explanation on the same, given by Sri Malladi Chandrasekhara Sastry, Asthana Pandit of Tirumala Thirupathi Devasthanam.

The three most important parts of Mahabharath are Bhagavadgita, Vishnu Sahasranama and the stories of Sanatsujatha. Thikkana wanted everyone to read the original version rather than the translated version. That's why, he did not translate them completely. Thikkana had met Veda Vyasa, and Veda Vyasa asked him, what did he do with the most important parts of Mahabharath. Thikkana told him that, he did not touch those. [i.e., he did not translate those.]

If one wants to get any credit of reading Bhagavadgita or Vishnu Sahasranama, they must read with the original sanskrit verse. They cannot read just the translated version and get the credit of that.

Saturday, July 28, 2012

Mistakes Vs Corruption of Officials

In the name of anti-corruption, many times, people and media are doing over enthusiastic things which would halt the development.

Few years back, when a new organization was formed, the government has taken 10% share in that organization. After some time, the organization decided to increase their base fund, and asked all the partners to invest more money. The directors (IAS officers) from the government felt that, there was no point in investing more money in that organization, and did not invest more government money. After few years, the organization started making huge profits. Now, the media started blaming the directors that, they are corrupted, and that's why, they did not try to maintain the share of the government. Had the directors maintained the government share and if the company had made losses, the same media again would have said, they are corrupted, and that's why, they invested more money in the organization which is making losses.

How many people in the world can actually predict the growth of an organization? If they can predict it correctly, they would be one of the richest people of the world. Everyone goes with some assumptions with whatever knowledge they have, and people cannot predict always. If the media or other so-called social workers start blaming the government officials for the things which are not in their control, then no official would try to take any decision, and the entire development would halt.

Monday, July 23, 2012

Corruption - Incentive Vs Bribe

You wanted a birth certificate and went to the concerned office. The officer said, if you give money, you would get it immediately. If you don't give money, you would get it after one month. Is this corruption?

Same scenario. Instead of one month, it takes two months. Is that corruption?


According to the rules of the government, there is a time limit for each application. For most of the applications, including RTI, the time limit is one month. If he is giving you what you wanted within the specified time, then that cannot be considered as corruption. If he is giving an option of getting it sooner, it should be considered as incentive to him.

Let's suppose, if the application has to be processed within a month and the concerned officer is taking two months, and is asking for money to give it sooner, then can we consider it as bribe? Let's suppose, if the office does not have enough staff to process all the applications, and because of that, if they are going to take two months, how can the concerned officer is responsible for the delay, when he does not have any control in recruiting staff.

If according to the government rules, and the staff that the office has, if they are going to do their best and process all the applications on time, then why should they be charged with corruption?

If the employee is going to work after the office hours and process few extra applications, and in turn take some money from the applicants, it cannot be called as bribe. It is just an incentive to the employee.

If you are an employee of any organization, and if somebody (other than your manager or anybody in the hierarchy) asks you to work (under the terms of the company) on a sunday and offers some incentive, would you say NO?

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Ekalavya - Arjuna - Drona - Bheeshma

Eventhough Arjuna and Dronacharya are famous for many things, many people have bad opinion on them for their behavior towards Ekalavya.

Dronacharya promised Arjuna that he would make him as the best archer in the world. Once Ekalavya came to Dronacharya and expressed his interest in learning archery. Drona rejected Ekalavya to teach archery, since he was not a Kshatriya.

Later on, Ekalavya made a deity of Drona, and worshiped him. He practiced archery assuming Drona as his guru and learned many things in archery.

Once Pandavas visited forest. During that time, one dog disturbed Ekalavya a lot by barking repeatedly. Then, Ekalavya used seven arrows in the dog's mouth in such a way that, it does not die and it cannot bark. It went to the Pandava's camp. After seeing this and the way it is used, they wondered who had the capacity of using this. Then, they came to know about Ekalavya. They reported this to Drona, and Drona asked Ekalavya his thumb, so that he cannot practice archery anymore.

This caused many people to have bad opinion on Arjuna and Drona.

Dharma is very complicated, especially in the areas like this. To understand this, one must completely forget our present caste system, and understand the real varnasrama dharma according to the scriptures.

Brahmana, Kshatriya, Vysya and Sudra are according to the nature and the type of the activities performed by one. They are never based on one's birth. If the father is a brahmin, then son won't become a Brahmin automatically. For example, Drona is a Brahmin, but, his son Aswathama is not a Brahmin.

Kshatriyas are supposed to learn warfare to protect people and to rule the kingdom. They are not supposed to use for any other purpose. Whereas, Ekalavya used archery on dogs to show his skill, which was a complete misuse of archery. If he had continued to misuse archery, then, many people would have suffered because of that. To stop the misuse, Drona took his thumb.

Even if he was a proper Kshatriya and learned archery, how can one say that, he is going to beat Arjuna just by showing few skills in archery. The skills that one shows in any show, can be done by any advanced archer. One does not need to be at the level of Arjuna to show those.

Eventhough skill is an important part of the archery, but, in the entire Mahabharath, the weapons that one possessed played major role than the skill. The only reason why Krishna worried about Karna was the powerful weapons that Karna possessed, mainly Shakthi given by Indra and Nagasthram. In both the cases, Krishna directly/indirectly saved Arjuna. Without those weapons, Karna lost even to Bheema many times. Bheema did not kill Karna, because, Arjuna had taken vow to kill Karna.

If Arjuna wanted, he could have used Pasupathastram or any other powerful astras that he had and killed the entire kaurava army in one minute. But, those powerful astras are not supposed to use that way, and he did not use those. [He used Pasupathastram for one specific purpose (to kill Saindhava), and withdrew it immediately after killing him.]

Another thing is, Arjuna is a savyasachi, i.e., he can use both the hands in archery. Even if Arjuna gives his right thumb, still, he can use his left hand and compete with anybody.

Ekalavya does not have any powerful weapons. He knows only sastras and not Astras. In any war, he cannot compete with anyone who has a powerful weapon. Also, Drona had minimum role in the Astras secured by Arjuna. Arjuna got many of his Astras, after he finished his education at Drona.

If one is given boons which they are not qualified to receive, then they may misuse it. Whenever Vishnu kills any demon, first thing that he says to Brahma is, do not give this type of boons to anyone. In the same way, if Ekalavya is left like that, he may create more havoc. So, to stop that, Drona took his thumb.

There is no question of Arjuna feeling jealous about Ekalavya. In fact, Arjuna was never a best archer in the world at that time. Drona could not make him as the greatest archer. Apart from Krishna, Bheeshma is the one who is a better archer than Arjuna. Arjuna could defeat everyone else at some time or other, but, he could never defeat Bheeshma. During the war, Pandavas had to beg him to leave his Bow and Arrows, so that, they could win against him. Except that incident, Bheeshma never lost in any war.

After Bheeshma left this world, probably, one can claim that, Arjuna is the greatest archer in the world after Krishna.

If we include all the warriors and not just archery, then Bheema is no less warrior than Arjuna. He is the one who killed maximum people in the war. He alone killed all the 100 sons of Dhritarashtra. He got multiple chances to kill even Karna. But, he did not kill him, because he wanted Arjuna to kill him.

Thursday, July 12, 2012

Sisupala's Criticisms on Krishna

Is Krishna older than his own father Vasudeva?

Is Krishna a better hero than Bheeshma?

Is Krishna a bigger sage than Veda Vyasa?

Is Krishna a better guru than Dronacharya or Krupacharya?

Is Krishna better than all the Kings here?

Is Krishna a better archer than Karna?

Is Krishna a closer relative to you than your father-in-law, Drupada?

Is Krishna your favorite who has to be pacified at any cost?


For those who do not know the answer for the above, it is resounding YES for all the questions.

Few people try to compare bad people as they were Hiranyakasipa, Ravana, Kumbakarna and Sisupala etc., in their previous birth. This is nothing but praising them like anything. Because, Jaya and Vijaya who were the gatekeepers of Vaikunta, have born as these demons because of a curse. Criticizing someone like Ravana or Kumbakarna etc. is nothing but, praising them as the great devotees of Narayana.

Monday, July 09, 2012

Quote of the Day - Voting for My Caste Leader

How will I get an advantage, if my caste leader gets elected to an important position (MLA/MP/CM/PM/President)? If I really get an advantage, it means, I was at disadvantage till now, and after 5 years, I will be at disadvantage for the whole life.

Friday, July 06, 2012

Discouraging MBA

Whenever anyone says that, he/she is planning to do MBA, the first thing that I do is, to discourage them in all the possible ways. Depending on their interest in terms of higher education/money/management, I suggest M.S./M.Tech, or to join a startup, or to start their own company etc. As much as possible, I try to prove that, they are going to waste two years of their time by doing MBA. But, once, I failed miserably.

She does not like software and wants huge salary.

Saturday, June 30, 2012

Political Parties Policies on Liquor

Whenever I read news about liquor and fightings on liquor by different political parties, I could never understand what are they trying to achieve by that. There are different proposals by different political parties, and there are different things that were tried in the past.

Complete Prohibition

Almost all the social drinkers would be against it saying, people know what is good and what is bad, and government should not control the moral.

Mafia may increase in this case.

People may go for adulterated liquor and damage the health or life.

Establishing Liquor Shops by Auctioning

Maximum revenue to the government, since, the liquor shops are auctioned in open competition. Even in small towns, the revenue per shop is more than Rs.1 crore.

Since, the shops are paying significantly high price for the license fee, they sell liquor more than the MRP.

Because of that, not all poor people can buy. In many villages and small towns, the liquor shops give liquor as a loan, and collect the money on friday/saturday, when the people get their salaries.

Still, for few people, it is too expensive. So, they may go for adulterated liquor and damage their health and life. Some time back, in Andhra Pradesh, few people died due to adulterated liquor, and since then this issue has increased significantly.

Establishing Liquor Shops by Lottery

In this method, government fixes the license fee based on the area. If more than one participant is interested in that, then government gives the license to one applicant by lottery.

Other than the reduction in the revenue to the government and increase of the profit to the licensee, I don't see any difference when compared to auctioning.

Once the shop is established, everybody tries to get maximum income. Nobody would try to get less income, just because, they spent less money as the investment. Let's suppose, when the shop was auctioned, and somebody bought it for Rs.1 crore, and he was getting income of Rs.1.5 crore and profit of Rs.50 Lakh. Now, to the same person, if the shop is sold for Rs.50 lakh, why would he try to get income less than Rs.1.5 crore, and profit less than Rs.1 crore? If he cannot maintain the income, then he is unfit to do any business. I don't think, any liquor shop owner in A.P is unfit to do business.

Other than loss of revenue to the government, I don't think this method would have any other change when compared to auctioning.

Running Liquor Business by the Government

Since, the liquor is sold at cheaper price, many people would buy liquor and they will damage their health.

The revenue would reduce significantly, because, government sells for MRP. (Private shops sell for much higher price than the MRP.)


Selecting a policy for liquor is like, selecting a stone to break your head.

Wednesday, June 27, 2012

Pair Programming

In any big project, the people in that project would be having different skills at different levels. The skill set can be different in design, coding, performance optimization, or the knowledge of the existing functionality, code base, coming up with scenarios etc.

When the developers are working independently, if they don't have all the skills, then the feature may not be complete in all the areas. They may implement the functionality, but, it may not scale, or, they may come up with good design, but, misses many scenarios. In those cases, typically what happens is, two ore more developers would be working on the feature one after another. After the first developer implements with the skills that they have, second developer takes over and fixes the issues. If one developer implements the functionality without any performance, second developer may optimize that for performance. If one implements with good design and provides good framework, another one may add all the scenarios. In most of these cases, the second developer would be re-writing what the first one had written. After re-writing, the first one would review it, to make sure, they did not lose anything in re-writing.

If both the developers sit together and implement the functionality, then it would take less time than both implementing individually, one after another. When they do it together, they would be covering all aspects first time itself, and it would save significant time.

Pair programming does not work well, if one is having very good skills in all areas when compared to the other. In that case, it would become like, one dictating the code and the other typing, or one typing and other just watching. It works very well, when both have skills in different areas or almost equal skills in all areas.

I have seen re-writing of the code by different people many times in the name of review, bug fixes or improving performance. Many times, it could have been avoided, if they had thought about the solution together.

Eventhough, Pair Programming is a good practice in general, it is not followed by many. When two people work together, the immediate question that is asked by many people is, why cannot one person work on that? It is difficult to answer, because, it is very difficult to tell something like, "I don't know ABC's of the existing functionality, and the other developer does not have good design skills". It is almost impossible to tell this to the manager. If the developers are of opposite sex, then they may face different issues.

Pair programming may miserably fail, if the programmers do not have good relationship or their thinking is not in sync. Of course, if the programmers do not have good relationship, not only pair programming, but, even normal development also would be effected. The following is a snippet from an article in yourstory.

If you have two lead architects designing a system, you’re likely to end up with a two-module project. This phenomenon was first observed in the 1970s, when compiler design teams with 4 lead engineers ended up with 4-pass compilers. If your team had only 3 lead engineers, they were likely to design a 3-pass compiler. The design of the interfaces between the modules is also likely to be heavily influenced by the relationship between the lead programmers. If your system has 2 architects that are good friends, you’re likely to end up with a two well defined modules with clean interfaces and detailed contracts. If the two are not very good friends, they’re likely to come up with a design that relies too heavily on standard interfaces (like XML/WebServices) that may ultimately not be flexible enough for the system.

Thursday, June 21, 2012

Lok Satta and Communists Alliance

After Lok Satta Party and Communists party formed alliance, many volunteers and supporters of Lok Satta Party were strongly against the alliance.

If any problem, which is not very popular, is given to all the volunteers and supporters of Lok Satta Party (not to Dr.JP or other senior leaders of the party), most of them would give the same solution that is proposed by the Communists. Still, they are against the alliance.

I am not very much against the alliance with Communists, because, they form with TDP also. Whereas, the policies of Communists and TDP are completely different. Still, this kind of alliances will work, because, negligible no.of people would care about the policies for voting. That's why, it is not a problem, if Lok Satta Party forms alliance with Communists.

By the way, only Lok Satta Party and Communists are supporting proportional based voting. If proportional based voting comes, alliances will not have any meaning, and there will not be any pre-poll alliances.

Monday, June 18, 2012

Changes in Tatkal Ticket Booking

Previously, Tatkal quota used to open one day in advance from the departure time at the station where one wants to board. Now, the quota is opened for the entire route, one day in advance from the departure time of the train at the starting station.

Tamilnadu Express goes from New Delhi to Chennai. If it starts on saturday at New Delhi, then tatkal quota would be opened on friday for New Delhi. It reaches Agra on sunday early morning. Previously, Tatkal quota for Agra used to open on saturday. But, with this change, Tatkal quota would be opened on Friday itself.

The same train reaches Vijayawada, monday early morning. Previously, the taktal quota from Vijayawada to Chennai used to open on sunday. Now, one can book on friday itself.

Thursday, June 14, 2012

Persons With Disabilities - Satyameva Jayathe

In Satyamave Jayathe, there was one program on "Persons With Disabilities". The program mainly concentrated on, not having facilities for persons with disabilities doing anything themselves. For example, there are no ramps at many public offices, and people have to take others' help to reach there. In most of the educational institutes, there are no facilities for people with disabilities to go themselves.

One person suggested that, just with one single signature, this problem can be solved in all educational institutes. If the union education minister passes a bill saying that, if the educational institute does not have facilities for handicapped people, then it's recognition should be cancelled.

He and many other missed the point that, it is not just one single signature. Once that bill is passed, the government has to spend lot of money to provide the facilities in all the educational institutes. It takes lot of money, and it is never just one single signature.

The rules for private educational institutes are so high that, it is not an easy task for any small educational institute to get recognition. If they add this rule also, then there will be only international schools and all other educational institutes would be closed.

In many places, it is economically profitable, if the institute or office employs a person to help physically handicapped people rather than constructing ramps and other things.

I feel, we are asking too many things, when we don't have basic things.

How many people without any disabilities can travel in any city bus comfortably? How many people can catch the first bus that they get in their route?

In Hyderabad, the distance from Hyderabad Railway Station (Nampally) to Gachibowli (the main IT area) is 20 kms. Within this 20 kms, there are only two signals and only there, people can cross the road comfortably. There are no signals/subways/foot over bridges at any other place in that 20 kms main road, and it is very difficult for anybody to cross the road.

If normal people itself cannot travel comfortably, is there any need to talk about people with disabilities travelling by public transport? What would happen, if they bring bills like, all educational institutes should introduce the facilities for physically handicapped people, when even normal people cannot cross the road?

There are many solutions for many problems, which look like they solve the problem. But, before going there, we should check whether even more basic problems solved or not. If we try to solve one specific problem without solving very basic problems, it may have negative impact.

Monday, June 11, 2012

Questions/Suggestions for which I don't have Answer

  • Are you still writing code? Are you not a Project Manager? Not even a Project Lead? Many of our friends are Project Managers now. I thought, you would be in a bigger position than us.
  • Don't fight with your leads and managers. Do whatever they say. Once you become lead, then you can do whatever you want.
  • Don't stay in one company for long. Change companies regularly. Otherwise, you will not grow.
  • Why are you not trying for US?
  • Why did you resign when you don't have job in hand? (Few people in my absence say that, I was fired.)
  • Why don't you apply to big companies like Infosys, TCS and Wipro?
  • Why did you resign, when you had to pay couple of tens of thousand rupees (for giving short notice)?
  • Why did you change job, when you are not getting any hike?

Friday, June 08, 2012

Buying Tickets in Black

I am seeing many people posting the following message.

We are also the reason behind the corruption. If we are buying a movie ticket for Rs.500, which actually costs, Rs.50, then the tax for Rs.450 is not going to the government. Cannot we postpone watching the movie? Please stop watching movie by buying tickets in black and reduce corruption.

Many times, I see people getting energized for everything, and most of the time, they miss the basics.

Government does not allow to increase the price of the ticket. i.e., The cinema theater owner does not have an option to sell it for Rs.500 officially, and pay the tax for Rs.500. He has to sell only for Rs.50, and pay the tax for Rs.50. So, if the theater is full, there will be absolutely no difference in the revenue of the government, irrespective of whether all the tickets are sold in black, or all the tickets are sold at the face value of the ticket.

If one does not buy ticket in black, what are they achieving? They are just saving their money. The country or the government is not going to get anything by that.

If there are hundred people who are ready to pay 10 times to the actual ticket price, why should they sell it for the face value of the ticket? If I have something, which others think that, it is valuable, why should I sell it for less than what the consumer can pay? By any business logic, selling it for less price is ridiculous. If I sell it for higher price, then the government gets more tax on that.

The only way to solve the corruption is, bringing liberalization. Any other solution is useful only to get fame in the minds of ignorant people.

Tuesday, June 05, 2012

Politics - Garbage

If you are facing problems with garbage in your locality, there are only two options.
  Either you clean it, or help/encourage those who clean it.
Nothing else would solve the problem.

If you are facing problems with politicians, there are only two options.
  Either you become a politician and change it, or help/encourage the good politicians by voting for them.
Nothing else would solve the problem.

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Leaves and Leaders

I have heard of few leads/managers who do not accept the leaves of their team so easily, even if they are given sufficient advanced notice.

One reason for this is, the team member is indispensable, and if he/she leaves, the project cannot proceed till he/she comes back. The lead cannot lead till then. So, they reject the leaves. If the team member has to go at any cost, then they may leave, even if the leave is not approved. In those cases, few leads escalate these issues to higher management.

I did not understand for a long time, why these leads unnecessarily escalate these issues to higher management. The time won't come back. Even if they escalate, next time, when the team member has to go on leave in emergency, they won't stop. The lead would be just spoiling the relationship with the employee. Instead, if the lead praises the team member how important he/she is to the team, and how indispensable he/she is, then the team member would get more enthusiasm, and would try to do something, so that, the project won't fail.

Later, I realized that, these things are used by leads/managers to pass the blame on to the team member. If the project fails, then the lead or manager immediately say that, since this team member went on leave without approval, the project failed. The lead says, he/she cannot deliver the project, when he/she does not know when the team members leave without any notice.

In many service based companies, the team members shuffle frequently. So, even if the relationship is broken, the lead/manager do not care about it.

Of course, if these "so called" leaders get opportunity to work with people like me, everything would be set straight. ;)

If the leader is not ready to take 100% responsibility for the failure, then he/she is not worth of being called as a leader.

Thursday, May 24, 2012

I Don't Want to Work on Bug Fixes

Many people think that, fixing bugs is inferior work, and many people try to avoid it.

Many people forget that, the quality or greatness of the work is not in the work itself, but, how the people make out of it.

Recently, I got an interesting bug. The bug is very simple. It is a Null Pointer Exception. If that bug is given to any fresher, who has little programming knowledge, they can fix it in five minutes, and it will pass the testcase. But, I took lot more time.

When I had written the code, I assumed that, it won't return null, and coded accordingly. Now, when I got null, I checked why it is returning null. I found that, the corresponding Dictionary has not been populated. It was not populated, because, DB was not returning it. When I checked, what DB is returning, I found that, when the input has 600 ids, DB is returning only for 200 entities. The issue is, the stored procedure's input parameter can hold only 200 ids. Increasing the size of the input fixed this issue.

But, this is not the final solution. The null exception is coming even for basic scenarios. In basic scenarios, it should not be processing hundreds of entities. When I checked, why it is processing that many entities, I realized that, at one place, where it has to update it's dependents, it is updating all the entities in that component. When I am creating a new entity, it won't have any dependents. But, since, it is taking all the entities in the component, it is trying to update all the entities in the system.

My final fixes were, changing the code to update only it's dependents, and increasing the size in the stored procedure. I did NOT add null check in my code. If I get null again, it means, there is some big issue somewhere else.

If I had just added null check in my code, it is very difficult to find the issue, because, this entity would be updated properly. This failed in an asynchronous job. So, it is very rare that, as part of this testcase, tester tests other entities which are not involved with this entity. While executing the testcase for dependents, if the component does not have 200 entities, then that also would pass.

There is no work that can be done by the less qualified people. It is just that, we do it like the way less qualified people.

By the way, since, that Null Reference exception came in my code, I did more investigation. If it had been in other's code, even I would have finished it in five minutes. ;)

On a different note, my lead told me to put the effort spent for bug fixes in hours and not in minutes. I don't know how he felt, when I said, I am putting effort in hours only.

Friday, May 18, 2012

Why Should I be Kind to Everyone?

One person stands at the entrance in a train, does all kinds of feats and boards/gets down the moving train in every station. If he gets hurt by that, Why should I be kind to that person?

One person drives bike very rash and fast in a busy location without helmet. If he falls and gets injured, why should I be kind to that person?

When the people vote for bad candidates in the elections, and then suffer for their problems, why should I show sympathy to them?

One person cheats another person, and the second person suffers a lot because of that. After some time, if the first person suffers in the same way the second person suffered because of his action, Why should I be kind to that person?

People like Mahathma Gandhi have distorted the Hindu principles a lot. He says, one should show compassion to everyone. He removed the phrase, if they deserve.

Yama, the lord of death and punishment, is a great devotee of Lord Krishna. He is one of the 12 maha bhagavathas (The authorized people to preach about the Lord Krishna). If we go by the definition of Gandhi, then Yama can never be a great person.

Only the very fortunate people gets the punishment for their mistakes in the same life.

Saturday, May 12, 2012

Political Illiterate

The worst illiterate is the political illiterate. He hears nothing, sees nothing, takes no part in political life.

He does not seem to know that the cost of living, the price of beans, of flour, of rent, of medicines, all depend on political decisions.

He even prides himself on his political ignorance, sticks out of his chest and says he hates politics.

He does not know, the imbecile, that from his political non-participation comes the prostitute, the robber and, worst of all, corrupt officials, the lackeys of exploitative multinational corporations.

- Bertolt Brecht

Taken from Occupy Together

Tuesday, May 08, 2012

Design of Web Service Vs Performance of Client

Long back, I was working on a desktop application which handles lots of data. That application connects to a web service to get the data. Once the data is downloaded, the user works on the data offline, and then uploads the updated data.

One fine day, I got a mail from the web service team that, I was using one web service call which gets the data for all the entities in a given component. They were planning to remove that web service, and asked to me to use two other web service calls. First web service gets me the ids of all the entities in the given component, and the second web service gets me the data for a given entity. So, I need to call the first web service and gets the ids of all the entities, and for each id, I need to call the second web service to get the data. If there are 100 entities in the component, then there would be 101 web service calls. The reason that they gave for this change was, the web service was taking lot of time, and taking lock on SQL Server for a long time, which is blocking other transactions.

As usual, I did not agree with their proposal. My arguments were,
  • There will be too many web service calls from the client to the server. Performance of the client would go down.
  • The performance of the server also would go down. If they have single stored procedure/web service, the server would do much less work than 100 web service calls/stored procedures.
  • If they are worried about SQL Server taking locks, they can have another wrapper web service which does all this work, and send it to the client, so that, client does not need to worry about the changes in the server.
Their arguments were,
  • The stored procedure for the original web service is very expensive, and taking huge time to execute. Till then, it is holding the lock and other transactions are blocked till that time.
  • Eventhough, with the proposed changes, the performance of this operation would go down, but, overall performance would increase, because, other transactions would not be blocked for a long time.
  • All the web service calls map to a stored procedure in the DB. Creating another web service which does not have any corresponding stored procedure does not look good. This would be the only web service call that would be odd, and they do not want to pollute the web service.

Till, I was in that project, I have not done what they had asked. I don't know what happened, after I moved out of that project.

Who is wrong in this case?

[Of course, even if you say that, I am wrong, I may not accept. Because, I still feel that, Webservice should be driven by the requirements of the user rather than the DB design.]

Wednesday, May 02, 2012

Discrimination Based on Sex, Caste and Religion

Two people (one guy and one girl) contact me once in a while, for any help required in their application.

Whenever the girl asks for help, it is done in 5 mins to 5 hours. Only once, it went beyond that.
Whenever the guy asks for help, it is done in 5 days to 5 weeks. Only once, it is done in less than 5 days.
Nobody has criticized me directly on this. But, it is quite possible that, they think, I am discriminating based on sex. 

Whenever the girl sends me an email for any help, she puts the entire information that she has in the email. If the information is huge, she dumps everything in a document and attaches that document.

Whenever the guy sends me an email for help, he puts enough information required for any user of that application. He does not put any redundant information and does not attach any extra documents so easily.

If I have any follow up questions, both would respond within one working hour.

In general, if there is any attachment, generally, I won't open it immediately. I would open it later, whenever I am free. Even by this logic, I should be more responsive to the guy rather than the girl.

Unfortunately, people underestimate/ignore many many small things which can change everything. The small things matter a lot in the real world, and if everybody concentrates only big things, we can never develop.

I am very lazy and busy. I am neither a user nor a developer of that application and I don't know the technology that is used in that application. It is developed by a less qualified person, and I am just maintaining it. If I want to do even small change in that, I have to spend lot of time for that. In such a situation, whoever is asking for help, I would be happy to get as much data as possible. When the guy sends the information, he sends enough information for the user of that application. But, I am not a user. So, I need more details. I had to follow up with that guy multiple times.

How exactly one can go to the screen that he is referring? Once I reach that screen, which user should I chose to test? What all operations can I perform on that application so that, their data is not modified? These are all obvious for any user of that application, but not for me. So, I had to follow up for each of those things one by one, because, I discover the second one only after the first is clarified. I generally work on these things at night or weekend, and he won't be available immediately to answer at that time. So, I get the response next working day. Each follow up would increase the time significantly. The general tendency is, if I had to spend more time and follow up many times, then I would delay it more. For example, if I followed up for four times, for first follow up, I may reply in one day, whereas for the fourth follow up, I may reply only after a week.

Once that task is done, after few days, he asked me to do some other change at some other place. By then, he deleted the test user. So, I had to follow up again to create the test user. After doing that, then he said, the same thing has to be done at other places. If he gives the entire information with detailed steps on everything, and asks me to solve it, then, I can spend least amount of time and get it done.

First time, when the girl sent me a big attachment with so much information, I got bewildered. But, when I started doing that, I never needed anything extra, and in one single sitting, I finished everything that she asked. Even for small things like, application is down, she sends full error message that she gets, eventhough, I could find it myself. That would save me few seconds, and I can directly login/open appropriate application/server to fix the issue.

Whenever she sends any mail to me, she does everything she could do, and spends a lot of time in composing the mail with all the information. She communicates to me in such a way that, my time is very valuable, and she tries to use minimum time of mine. Whereas, it is the exact opposite with that guy.

I respond faster to those who give more value to me and my time. I also expect, if they want to solve their problems, they should have more interest in solving their problems than me. Otherwise, I won't respond that much faster.

In towns and villages, many times, people of different castes talk in different ways with others. Few caste people may talk to others always in singular, and few other caste people talk to others always in plural. If somebody asks me a favor without giving respect, I would show minimum interest in solving his/her problem. But, if they give minimum respect, then I may spend time to solve their problems. If only one particular caste people give me respect, then it would look like, I discriminate based on caste, and help only that particular caste people.

I discriminate based on how much the other person values me and my time. If only particular sex, caste and religion people values me and my time, then one can assume that, I discriminate based on sex, caste and religion.

Monday, April 30, 2012

Over Qualified, Under Employment and Bad Work Do Not Exist

Many years back, at the beginning of my career, I was talking to my colleague, New Melchizedec. He told me that, for him, Salary matters more than the kind of work. I asked him, whether he would do a job which can be done even by a 10th class student. He said, he would definitely do it, but, not like a 10th class student, but like a computer science graduate.

It took me many years to understand what he meant. After understanding it, now, if anyone does not follow this, I won't be happy in taking that person to my team.

Many employees ask their company to provide good work. But, the company hired them to solve it's problems and not to provide good work. It is completely upto the employees to solve the problems either with good work or bad work.

Once, an acquaintance of mine called me for some small help. He wanted to download many files from a website. At that time, he could not find anyone else to do this bad work. So, he called me. He told me this, and went out and returned after few mins. Then, he told me that, he would start downloading the files from the bottom, and asked me to start downloading the files from the top. I told him, I had already written a script, and the files are getting downloaded. And we just did gossip till the download was over. He was very happy for that, because, last time, he and three more people had to spend few hours in downloading it. Now, I did not spend more than few mins.

If he gets another bad work, and if he has opportunity to call either a highly qualified person or less qualified person, I am sure, he would directly call the highly qualified person to do that bad work. The expectation is, the work would be done in very efficient way. If the highly qualified person thinks that, he is under utilized, nobody can help him.

The employer wants the problem to be solved. The employer may also give some method of solving the problem. It is upto the employee, whether to use that method or any random method to solve the problem and criticizing the employer for not giving good work, or using the most efficient method, and let others call that as good work.

Another example

I have seen an application, which is developed in a technology in which I cannot write anything other than "Hello World" program. That has just five pages with some data storage. In general, highly qualified people are not interested in doing the application with just five pages. So, it was given to a normal developer. After developing that application, the developer moved out, and I was given the control of the server which hosts that application to maintain it. That's when, the real problems started.

The application is developed in such a way that, it cannot be taken out and host it on a different server. They hard coded and assumed the OS, Path on the disk, path in the URL and everything else. The only way for me to deploy a new version of that, without touching any code is, buying a new server and installing the same OS and deploying in that. Nobody would sponsor a new server, just to deploy such a small application.

So, there is no backup. So, if there is any issue, I have to directly work on the production server and fix it. Since, it is production server, I cannot debug so easily. Since, it is production server, I cannot give control to others. So, I cannot take help from others, unless they are going to sit next to me and help me in that. There are so many issues like this.

If the same work is given to a highly qualified person, and that person develops the same application like how a highly qualified person develops rather than a less qualified person, then I would not have faced so many problems in maintaining it.

Many highly qualified people forget that, when they are given work of less complexity, the work is supposed to be done the way highly qualified people do rather than the way less qualified people do. Everybody should do the work in such a way that, no less qualified person can get the same quality. Otherwise, there is no use of hiring that person. We can hire a less qualified person with lesser pay.

I feel, the most under employed job is, taking care of children.

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Not Giving Control in the Name of Improving Efficiency

The following is the notice that is sent to all the heads of the business units in a company.

We are changing the process of purchasing the hardware in our company. Till now, all the business unit heads are buying the hardware for the needs of their business units. Going forward, the entire hardware would be bought by the IT department. Business Units Heads will have to raise a request through IT department. IT department analyzes the request, and buys the most efficient hardware which satisfies the business requirements and reduces the cost for us. This is to improve our efficiency and reduce the costs.


Director of one business unit wants to buy a powerful server which costs around $100,000. He has a budget of $10,000,000 to run his business operations. According to the new rule, the hardware purchase has to be approved by the IT department. For that purpose, he meets the Director of the IT department.

Director of Business Unit: I would like to purchase one powerful server that costs around $100,000 for processing of some huge data.

IT Head: Why do you need that much powerful server? Why cannot you use normal computer for the same? If you need more CPU power, then use multiple computers.

DIR: We get huge data every month, and we would like to get the analysis results as soon as possible to take better decisions sooner. The application that we have does not support parallelizing. So, we need powerful server.

IT: Then, ask the application vendor to add support for parallelization.

DIR: They may ask $500,000 to support parallelization.

IT: That is your assumption. It should not be that expensive. If they write code in a clean way, then it should be straightforward to support parallelization. Raise a Request for Proposal (RFP) and ask them, how much they are going to quote for this. Or just do it yourself.

DIR: They write very clean code. That is not the issue. Since, they are product based, their cost is very high, and we are not allowed to change their code. If we raise RFP, that also would cost us minimum $25,000.

IT: Nobody asks money for RFP.

DIR: They don't ask money explicitly. But, they would add this expense in other items that we buy from them. Even if we get the parallelizing capacity, we will have to spend more time on our side to make sure that, the application is running in all the services, and restart it, if there is any failure. It requires me to allocate few people explicitly for this.

IT: Then, automate it. You don't need to go to that expensive company for automation. There are many other companies out there, which can automate these for very less cost.

DIR: Can you take care of the automation?

IT: No. We are too busy. We don't have enough bandwidth to do those. You will easily find plenty of companies which can do it for very less cost.

DIR: One of my team members assured me that, if I provide him this hardware and one day per month, he would provide me all the data that I need, in the least amount of time, without asking me anything else. If I have to go by your approach, then myself and my team members will have to spend lot of time in getting these things done.

IT: Initially yes. But, we would be saving lot of time in the long run.

Later, that director gave a contract to the original vendor, which developed the application. By that contract, the vendor would run the data analysis and give the analyzed results to this company. For this, the vendor would get $100,000 per quarter.

Inspired by a real story. There are many companies, which are surviving only because of these policies in big companies.

Sunday, April 22, 2012

Quote of the Day - Decision Power to Multiple People

The most easiest way to destroy a company/project is, instead of giving decision power and responsibility to a single person, ask them to take decisions by consensus and have collective responsibility.

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Stress in Corporate World

One surprising thing that I came to know some time back was, in one of the biggest software companies of India, every year one or two people commit suicide because of the stress. That company makes sure that, the suicide news does not come out.

Having high stress in software job is not an uncommon thing. Many software engineers are stressed out because of various reasons like pressure from manager, too much work etc. I personally know few people who met counsellors to solve their problems due to stress. Of course, not everyone goes to a counsellor or psychiatrist.

Those whoever suicided, they thought if they lose that job, there will be nothing left for them, since it is difficult to get another job due to various reasons.

One small story that I read long back,

Once a king called for a big meeting and he has shown a pond which was full of crocodiles. He announced that, if anyone can swim across the pond and come out safely, he would give either 1 crore gold coins or his daughter or half of his kingdom, depending on the interest of the person.

Suddenly one person jumps in the pond and swims across the pond at very fast speed and comes out from the other side.

The King congratulates him and asks what does he want, whether he want 1 crore gold coins or his daughter or half of his kingdom. He says, he would like to see the person who has thrown him into the pond.


Many people do not know the talent that they have. For many people, the talent would come out, only when they are in deep trouble.

Since many people are just blindly following the software and other high paid jobs, almost everyone is under-estimating other jobs. There are very good opportunities in many other areas apart from software, where one can earn more than the software field. But, the downside is, one may have to work for very less income for some time in those, and nobody is ready to take that risk.

There are many people in the software field who are very good in other areas, but, they stuck to software field for better pay. If all of them get fired from their jobs, and if they take up their interest areas, then very soon, they would reach a good position in those areas.

For those who never want to move out of the software field, and do not want to have any stress, then atleast follow two rules.

  • Have enough cash to sustain for 6 months without any job.
  • Live in such a way that, even if your salary is reduced by 15%, still, you can sustain.

Sunday, April 15, 2012

We Want to be Better Than the Others

We want to be better than the others. We are ready to suffer with others, provided we suffer less than them. But, we never accept others to be better than us, even if it means, our situation is going to be better than the present.

If a poor person comes to a middle class person and proposes a business proposal, by which the middle class person becomes upper middle class, and the poor person becomes super rich, most of the time, the middle class person won't accept the proposal.

Whenever any industrialist wants to start a new business at a new place, many people try to stop it saying, the industrialist is going to exploit their land, people and many other things to become super rich. But, they forget that, they get the employment. Even if they are employed in the same company, everyday, they think that, the industrialist is exploiting them by paying peanuts.

Y.S.Rajasekhara Reddy introduced fee reimbursement scheme for all the poor students. Eventhough, it was not implemented in correct manner, it was beneficial to all the poor students across all the castes and religions. Before that, the poor students had problems in studying courses like engineering.

Recently, one caste people started saying, YSR was against their caste. He did not do anything to their caste. Recently one M.P. of their caste started saying that, YSR has not done anything extra to their caste. The schemes like fee reimbursement are given to all the castes and not to their caste specifically. If YSR really worried about their caste, he should have given something "extra" to their caste.

I feel like, these people deserve to suffer. When YSR gave a lot which they were not getting before, still, they are not satisfied. They would be satisfied, only if they get something extra which others are not getting. Next time, if Chandrababu Naidu becomes CM, he would cancel all the fee reimbursement schemes, and gives 10% of the fee to this caste alone. Then, they would be very much satisfied. First one year, there would be shouting from everyone. After that, it becomes normal. This caste people think that, they are getting "extra", and would be very much satisfied. They deserve to be like that.

Saturday, April 14, 2012

Sharukh Khan - US Immigration

Sharukh Khan, S.M.Krishna and many others were upset because, U.S. Immigration and Customs Department detained Sharukh Khan for more than 2 hours. They were disappointed because, they are not giving enough respect to the celebrity.

Azhar Mahmood, who is a British Citizen, who was a Pakistan Citizen, was selected for IPL 2012. But, Indian Government granted Visa to visit only Delhi and Chandigarh. Why they are not allowing him to visit other cities is unknown. None of the Pakistan Citizens are allowed to play in IPL.

Is there any difference between US treatment to Indian Muslims and Indian treatment to Pakistanis? I feel, India is more harsher than US.

Pakistan Cricketers are not terrorists. They are not coming here to do just one small activity at a random place. They are coming here to play Cricket, which is going to be watched by crores of Indians. Still, Indian Government does not allow them. This is not the first time for troubling Pakistan Cricket Players. Previously also, many times, Indian Government did not give Visas on time to Pakistan Cricket Players. They gave only after many escalations.

For Pakistan, their cricket players are more important to them, than what Sharukh Khan is for Indians.

We don't respect others. But, we expect respect from others.

Sunday, April 08, 2012

Education - Stress - Suicides

The movies 3 Idiots and Hope have done their best to show the stress on students in the academics. I heard that, in one of the premier educational institutes of India, till 3 years back, atleast 2 students suicide every year.

Every institute is supposed to have an incharge for the student affairs, and they are supposed to solve the students problems. I don't know how many institutes have incharge for the student affairs and how many are solving the problems of students.

I would like to give one real example of one institute.

There was one main problem for many post graduate students in that institute. In one particular batch, out of the 45 students, 15 students were stressed out for a single reason. The institute has a rule that, if any student does not maintain 6 CPI in any semester, then that student would be terminated from the program. If they want to study, they have to again write the entrance test, get rank, and join the institute and restart the program from the beginning. Almost one third of the students were stressed because of that reason.

The institute needed to do just one change. If they don't terminate the students and allow students to spend more time to finish the program, that itself would reduce the stress for most of the students. But, it has not done that, but has done many useless things.

That institute has one dean for the student affairs, and it is very difficult to find a bigger moron than him. He gets out of box ideas for all the problems.

Once one student committed suicide in that institute. The dean came to know that, the student used to spend lot of time with computer and maintained a server which is used by many students for many purposes. The dean immediately banned internet at night time in hostels, saying because of using excessive internet, the students got stressed out. It is common in that institute, where the students have to work late nights to finish the assignments or projects. With that change, the students were forced to work in the department and return to hostel at late night. Only that dean knows the link between internet at night and stress.

In that institute, few followers of ISKCON used to organize sessions on spirituality and their main theme was reducing stress. Tens of people used to attend those programs. The programs are conducted in such a way that, there is absolutely no disturbance to any student who is not participating in that session. This dean came to know about these. One day suddenly, he appeared at the place where this session was happening. He took everyone to the main office, and took separate classes to the students of different years. He warned all the student organizers, and if they repeat this activity again, he would take serious action. He took written letter from the outsiders (who were alumni of the same institute) that, they will not enter the institute again without written permission from them. He also banned all the religious activities inside the campus. However, that dean never bothered about the bad habits of the students inside hostel. The students can drink, smoke and do all sorts of things and nobody objects to that. But, if anyone follows ISKCON, then it is a big problem, and they may face trouble.

Instead of solving the root problems, if the institute spends their time and effort on useless things, then the problems will never be solved.

I strongly feel that, if anyone suicides in any educational institute and if it is not because of personal reasons, then the head of that institute is responsible for that suicide.

Monday, April 02, 2012

Lok Satta Party Alliance Conditions

In 2009 elections, Lok Satta Party said, it is ready to form alliance with any party which does not distribute liquor or money. Only united BC Front party promised that, it won't distribute Liquor or money, and it formed alliance with Lok Satta Party.

I had doubts on why it is forming alliance based on not distributing money and liquor instead of the manifesto. Others had doubts on why it formed alliance with a caste based party.

It took me a long time to clear my doubts, and many people are still unaware of Lok Satta Party's stand on politics.

Almost nobody understood, when Dr.JP said, winning is not the goal. The one and only goal is to make people realize that, their future is only in their hands, and no one else's. Once people realize that, their vote is the only thing that is going to change their life, then they would automatically vote for the best candidate among the available candidates. Once, the contestants realize that, they have to do good to win in the elections, they would do good to the society.

Let's suppose, Lok Satta Party decides to distribute liquor and money. First question would be, who is going to invest in this party? If anyone invests the money, then obviously they would expect returns. For that, one has to do unfair practices and do corruption.

Let's suppose, there are few kind hearted people who are ready to donate money without expecting anything. Let's assume that, Lok Satta Party comes to the power with that money, and does good to the society. What happens in the next elections? Are they going to invest money again? How long would they invest? Once the investment stops, they would again lose.

People may say that, by showing the development, one can come back to the power, and we don't need to invest money in the next elections. If one does real development, many times, it takes a generation time for people to understand it. Till five years back, almost nobody knew the greatness of P.V.Narasimha Rao. Only, now, people are realizing. To realize the greatness of people like Vajpayee and Chandrababu etc., it may take another decade or so. Unfortunately, in India, the real development never fetched any votes, only pseudo development fetches the votes.

If we are going to win based on distributing money and Liquor, once we stop that, we would lose. After that, if a corrupted party comes to the power, the people again would suffer.

Even if Lok Satta Party is continuously winning in every election, but after some time, if corrupted leaders take in-charge and gets power, then also people would suffer.

People should have awareness that, they should not vote for the corrupted leaders. All the political parties are aligned towards what the voter wants. Right now, the voter is asking for few hundred rupees per vote. What Lok Satta Party is aiming is, making them realize that, their life is in that vote. Once the voters have that realization, all the political parties would be forced to change accordingly.

We should not give anything for free to anyone. We should only give an opportunity to them to get that. We should not give anything which they do not deserve to receive. Otherwise, it would be misused.

Saturday, March 31, 2012

International Trading in BRICS Countries Without Dollar

BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) have decided to trade among these countries in Local currency and not by Dollar.

This is a major milestone in the international trading. If you want to understand the impact of this, or the problems with dollar, read Global Imbalance - An Imminent Dollar Crisis

Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Difference Between Incentive and Bribe

Incentive

You offering Rs.1 crore to Sachin, if he makes a century.

Bribe

Sachin offering Rs.1 crore to the bowler, if he makes a century.


Courtesy: dkarthik on Twitter

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Telangana - Why Nobody Introduces Private Bill?

Many leaders (MLA/MPs) of Telangana are saying that, the government should form separate Telangana state. They are saying, they are trying their best to get separate state as soon as possible. Few leaders go to the extent of saying, they are doing everything democratically. They also ask to put the bill in the house.

I would consider a person is sincere in his/her efforts, only if he/she is going to do everything possible within their powers and then go and ask others to support their cause. If someone is not doing their duty, and ask others to do it, it means, they are not sincere and they are doing everything for the publicity sake.

The people who say, "democracy", should understand that, to form Telangana state, the parliament has to pass the bill for separate state. As a protocol, the parliament expects the bill to be passed in the parent state before partitioning the state.

Even a single MLA/MP can give notice to the speaker to introduce any bill. But, it may not be honored. But, if 10% of the MLA/MPs give notice to the speaker, the bill has to be introduced in the house. Then, the members of the house will have to take the decision on the bill.

Why cannot the supporters of Telangana introduce a private bill? Are they not getting even 10% of the supporters of the bill? In A.P. Assembly, 10% of the members is 30 MLAs. In Telangana, there are 119 MLAs. Even if exclude Hyderabad, it has 95 MLAs. Out of those 95 MLAs, even if 30 MLAs are not ready to sign on a private bill, how can they bring Telangana state, which requires support of 147 MLAs?

To introduce a private bill, there are no restrictions. Any MLA can introduce without losing their seat. But, if the bill is introduced, and the party issues a whip, then they have to vote according to the whip. Otherwise, they will lose their MLA seat. When the MLAs are not signing on a bill, by which they do not lose their MLA seat, would they take risk of losing MLA seat by not following the whip?

If they do not even have support of 30 MLAs, which is close to 1/4th of Telangana MLAs, then they do not have any right to talk about Democracy.

Lagadapati Rajagopal is in 5th place in the present Lok Sabha in introducing maximum no.of private bills.

KCR is in the 2nd place and Vijaya Santhi is in 4th place in the MPs who have least attendance in the Parliament. Unfortunately, A.Raja has been in jail for a long time and has taken the first position in this. Otherwise, KCR would have beaten him very easily. KCR had to attend parliament once in a while, because, if he is absent for a long, then he would lose his MP seat.

If anyone suicides in the name of Telangana, except few top leaders of the Telangana movement, nobody gains anything. It is not going to change anything by anyway. It is only loss to them and their family.

Monday, March 26, 2012

I did not do anything

I did not do anything. But, it is working/done.

There are few people who say like this regularly. Many managers feel like, "They spent 5 days to write 10 lines of code." or "They just reused the code. That's why, it took less time".

The efficient solution always take some significant time. When it is implemented, it looks like, it should have been done in 5 mins and not in 5 days.

In most of the good implementations, the time one spends for design/study/discussions/thinking etc., is much more than the time they spend for coding. Thinking of an efficient solution for 2 days and implementing it in 2 hours is common for very good developers.

Reusing is not as simple as one thinks. It would take some significant effort to understand the existing system, and how it can be used for our needs. That study takes more time. Once that is done, it looks like the developer has not done anything, whereas it was not the case.

I am always happy to work with people, who regularly say, "I have not done anything. But, it is working". Whenever say this, I understand it as, they are providing the efficient solution.

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Taxation on Investments in Companies

Government has changed policies on investments in companies. If anyone is going to invest in a company, and if they pay more price than the fair market price for the shares, then the excess amount is taxed at 30%.

A person starts a company with Rs.1 crore (With 10 lakh shares, with face value of Rs.10 per each share). After one year, when the company has not yet made any significant progress, he sells 1 lakh of his shares for Rs.10 crore. Overnight, his wealth increases by Rs.9 crore. By the existing rules, the company does not pay any tax on that. Government is planning to impose the tax on the excess amount to the fair market price.

But, why would anyone pay more than the fair market price? Why would anybody buy for Rs.10 crore, when it's actual worth is only Rs.10 lakh?

They would buy, if that person's father is a Chief Minister, and they can get enough favors for that. This is the exact same charge on Y.S.Jagan Mohan Reddy, S/O Y.S.Raja Sekhara Reddy, Ex-C.M. of Andhra Pradesh.

Pranab Mukherjee and other politicians may say, it is a very good policy to reduce black money. But, this is a worst policy for Indian business.

For public companies, the fair market price is same as the stock price for the company. For private companies?

The assessing officer of the government decides the fair market price in this case, and there is no need to explain the problems and the corruption that happens because of that. For land in any developed city/town in India, there is a huge variation between the government price and market price. When there is huge difference in the value calculation even in the physical assets, what about the value calculation of an idea, prototype, software product, patent, or any other intellectual property?

To stop handful people like Y.S.Jagan, Indian government is destroying the entire entrepreneurship.

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Why is Dr.Jayaprakash Narayan Not Using Twitter Effectively?

Many people are asking, why is Dr.Jayaprakash Narayan not using twitter effectively?

Whenever Dr.JP would like to say anything, he tells everything in detail with all the possible solutions. He won't give just one line statement. Whatever he says, it is posted in loksatta.org and news.loksatta.org in English and Telugu. Most of his speeches are available at www.loksattavideos.com. One can subscribe to those by email or feed. One can get alerts on Twitter @Loksatta_Party, on Facebook (loksattanews), and on Google Plus. If they want more detailed description on different issues, one can read the publications in loksatta.org and fdrindia.org.

Whenever somebody raises any problem, Dr.JP gives detailed analysis, and the best solution with reasoning. Even in the assembly, when the speaker asks him to conclude, still he takes 10 more mins. How can such a person tell his opinion in 140 characters? If he just tells his decision in one sentence, then there will be many follow up questions in 140 characters like why, how, what etc. For those questions, it may not be possible to answer in 140 characters.

For each and every problem, when he is giving full explanation and is making it available by many different ways, what are they expecting in twitter? Are they expecting copy and paste his writing on twitter by splitting the speech into sets of 140 characters? By the way most of his sentences have more than 140 characters.

Many people are taking the example of celebrities like Kiran Bedi etc. For their information, if they want information on Lokpal or Corruption, Dr.JP can readily provide 140 pages. But, if you ask in 140 characters, it is difficult for him.

Media is expert in taking sentences out of context and making it a controversial issue. If Dr.JP uses twitter and types one sentence in each tweet, it is like, giving a coconut to a monkey.