Forever Dead

A merry face, he smiled and laughed;
He Jumped and hopped, in merriment he pranced and danced.

Crashed, his mother’s china, his father’s pots;
Slashed his arm, bruised his knee and merry thoughts;

“The witch’s curse has shackled my soul!” he blurted out;
The smallest joy was since plagued with doubt;

The lad now knew nothing but to work hard and true,
With a frown as crisp as the forehead furrow grew;

With a deep, thoughtful purse of his lips,
He laboured through life, from his brow as sweat dripped;

Winning every battle, earning accolades and wealth,
He built a family, a home of heart and health;

“The curse has worn off, I shall now drink and dance!” he said,
Crashed his mother’s china, his father’s pots, his soul forever dead.

Turn-Tables

Criticism is the best resource to improve something. Played a bad shot, let the veteran criticize you in the newspapers. Made a bad movie, enter, the film critic. Awful pop number, let Rolling Stone pluck your string.

Being a critic takes a lot of practice and a lot of time with the vocation. Like a literature critic, the author’s customer, a reader. I am not a reader, I hardly read two sentences before taking a break. But I’m definitely a critic. Because I love criticising. And today, I shall be criticing readers and the entire concept of reading and more.

There are many kinds of readers. Some read all the time, some sometimes and me. Some read fast, some read smart, some slow, some intently, and me. There are selective readers, pop readers, connoisseurs of literature, comic book readers, blog followers, people followers, combinations of these, and me. There are also seasoned readers, wannabe readers, genuinely trying readers and me, and some other miscellaneous types of readers (God are there a lot of readers! And me, of course.)

All these readers have opinions about everything they read. The question is, are some of them qualified to have opinions about what they read? Is there a structure to reading? A method? Does every reader follow a protocol that lies underneath the coolness and creativity? What if the protocol asked the reader to keep reading through the boring parts full of prepositions and twisted pronouns to eventually reach the wonderful world of interjections and rhetorics? How important is it to be a good reader to extract the best out of a text? It is as important as the text being good itself. It is important to be a good reader, to extract information out of mediocre text, or extract entertainment out of mediocre narration.

In the same vein, it is important to be a good receiver. At a restaurant for example, if they don’t use Serrano peppers but use Jalapenos instead, and you create a ruckus about it, it is you who’s spoiling the evenings of fifty other people along with yours, while knowing that there’s really no difference between the peppers except their cool names. A stressed out call-center will be more cordial if the callers are polite. Bad movies are always unintentional comedies. Bad pop songs are great for an annoying prank.

Critics generally speak and lead to constructive processes. Being a bitch and complaining about everything will lead to a less happier life for the critic, not the artist. “Open your eyes, look up to the skies and see…” A little broader mind and accomodating consumer will always do cordial business. And the waiter won’t spit in his chilli. All the best.

Real-Time-Ness

Tardiness: Are we really late? According to my teachers, real-time processing imples results are available when they are required. It does not matter if the results are available an hour before or a microsecond before its requirement. But a microsecond on the other side could be disastrous. Alright alright, let’s say it won’t be disastrous, because we’re not that bad, but it will definitely be useless. Or it can be disastrous; if the airbags open through your cracked skull wrapped around your knee.

We still don’t need to be early. Unless someone is going to notice that we are. And he believes that it’s not because we’re vela or desperate. And that it’s more because we’re sincere and understand the importance of being not-late. On the other hand, being right on time might give the impression of professionalism. There is probably no pragmatic human who will not be looking to make the most of the productive part of the day, where reaching early implies waste of time waiting. Who’s better at time management then? The early one or the maximum-time-utilization-er?

Early birds do take the worm, and, early worms get taken by birds. So, one needs to decide what strata of the food chain one belongs to. We don’t want to be helping pretty girls set up food stalls in our Armanis while dignitaries walk past us in theirs.

We will learn most from an assignment if we upload it in the last minute before the online system stops accepting them. Upload it a few days early and we’re sure to miss out on those few days of discussions and dissections. Unless there are grades on speed (when we’re birds who might want to get the worm.)

And there it is, one more thing to think about with no apparent consequence. The amount of trivial ideas a processor generates at just about the wrong time is probably boundless. Real-time-ness. Really!

I Squared Are

There are 3 broad types and an average of 2 sub-types of power dissipation in digital CMOS circuits. The best electronic products run while dissipating around 20% energy at their best. Generally around 40% is just lost in thin air. DC power transmission lines lose around the same amount just allowing the power to reach its destination. AC power is lost as reactive power in leaky capacitors and noisy inductance. So much of energy is put in knowing that it is going to be lost in thin air.

The wonders of Apple’s touch technology is from just 60% of the energy that runs it.  Motors in BMWs are awfully noisy and lossy in the electrical sense. And digital electronic circuits are supposedly the most efficient machines.

Relating this to a human tendency of expecting just results and rewards, it’s close to preposterous; this expectation and greed. One must always remember that the most efficient machines get only 60% of the input as output. Imagine the efforts that have gone into making of the biggest machines, machinery and organisations of the world! Then spare a thought for our own efforts and the corresponding expectations we have of ourselves. Improving efficiency will reach a dead end soon. There is a need to improve absolute output. There is a need to improve absolute input.

 

P. S.: Please don’t trust the numbers and earn yourself a bad grade.

Eggs and Bread

Can effort be quantified? How desirable is it to spend a little more to avoid a little effort? How much more? Let’s say a little more is spent to avoid a little effort. Is the saved effort used to replenish the little spent? Is it desirable to quantify effort? Rather spend and acquire material happiness (and a little health and discipline probably.) Save 2 dollars in Walmart and take 20 printouts honestly.

Yes, I talk in dollars now. Wide roads have an inherent disadvantage that it is too far to cross without making sure cars in both directions are at the least in the other city. Presence of roads, on the other hand, makes it even difficult to walk on and across them. Cars are needed to go to the grocers, retailers and the other room. And cars need gas. Irony is taking a free bus ride to a nearby expensive store to save effort when cheap store is also a free bus ride away. Nukkads are just poles with traffic lights on them. Pan ki dukaans sell coffee for close to 120 rupees. Wheat bread is expensive and frozen chapatis are platinum. We really do need to save those two dollars.

I have had a large phase shift in my staple diet. I can make around 10 types of egg-containing dishes and have already eaten 4 types of bread. But good ol’ aloo and chawal have not lost their original form factor. Fried rice is probably the best way to discard unwanted left-over and hardened rice in our stomachs. I forgot to buy straws long enough to draw oil to wash down dry rice, bhurji and bread. On the healthier side, chocolate, coffee and tea always find their way into double sized mugs. Brown bread is the new chapati and rice is white. Occasional honey and milk with Bournvita keeps up the Calcium levels if egg wasn’t enough in the day. With this unhealthy exaggeration and healthy consciousness, I sign off to make today’s supper super.

Dit and Dat

This is a typing test. I have become very slow in typing. I have to improve my typing speed. I am making several mistakes and really should improve the co-ordination between both my hands. Typing is supposed to come as second nature. But in reality, it requires too much practice. It is not easy to co-ordinate the two hands and their fingers.

Typing is becoming boring and mundane because of lack of serious matter to be typed. Lecturing online is only making it worse. Too many ideas and a limited typing speed don’t really help the cause. Most words are shortened and some are not even typed.

Sometimes, speed comes at the cost of accuracy. And vice versa. That is why starting slowly until fingers are warmed up is a good idea. However, once a slow rhythm is established, the entire segment goes slow. This is heavily undesirable. One way to avert it is to time the paragraph. Or keep a typing speed widget on the side.

I have been looking at typing videos on YouTube and it is amazing how committed people are towards their keyboards. It is this sort of commitment that is required for success in any field. Mindless chatting and typing in chat windows without attention to accuracy is detrimental to the activity.

The good part about typing is that it can be learnt, forgotten and re-learnt. And it can be done for all kinds of keyboard layouts. It is fun to not only train a part of your body to do a specific task, but also try out multitaking at the very basic level of concentration. The process of thinking and typing is rather fun. It is difficult to match the speed of thinking and typing. Also, since thinkng and typing both require a certain amount of thinking, the time sharing done by the brain is quite marvellous. With enough continuous practice, it is possible to not think about typing. This helps a lot because once mentally disconnected from typing, more brain time is given to thinking. At the same time, since thinking increases, it is difficult to keep up the typing speed with the thinking throughput. It is a conundrum most pipelined processors face. Another factor is, once typing becomes only a physical activity, the brain may now think of two independent things. Multitasking increases while keeping throughput of both processes lower. This is a more efficient means of processing.

The speed of typing comes down to the speed of moving fingers. Believe it or not, heavier fingers mean stronger fingers which mean faster typing. It is the same for playing guitar. Stronger the fingers, faster the playing. Also, since every key stroke is sure and hard, there is a more efficient output. No letters are missed out, even if they are, it is because of the thinking-typing speed clashes. Learning the keyboard layout is the first step. There is always a set speed at which you can start typing. You can use the standardised finger positions or you can invent your own. As long as the layout and the finger positions don’t change, the speed is not affected much. Accuracy might be owing to lack of concentration or unresponsive brain signals. Otherwise it really is constant.

It is not necessary to be objective or re-productive whilst typing. Creativity can also be expressed in typing. There are ASCII artists and then there are programmers whose life depends on typing and being creative. As said before, typing should be second nature in this computer driven world. Typing faster than writing is like ‘lol’ing harder than laughing. It is required to stay connected and in the loop while being human with normal social contact.

Call me a geek but I did install a gadget on my Windows 7 that measures typing speed. There is no accuracy meter though. Will get around to making one which will include backspace strokes too. There will certainly be a sequel to this when certain opinions and ideas gain ground or change. Also, this indeed was a typing test. Its verbosity is because I needed a typing test.

No title? No problem.

When in doubt, ape the mirror. Sit. And reflect. See everything. Stay still. Give back exactly what you get. Nothing more. A little less in case of surface irregularities. But not for long. Just when in doubt. Sit. Reflect.

Go ahead, make a list. Make a chart. A diagram. Be your pupil and teach yourself. Metaphorize. Visualize. Be a mirror. In front of a mirror. Be a good student of yourself. Listen to yourself. Clear your thoughts. Categorize problems. Arbitrate solutions. Re-wire. De-wire.

Redundancy is important. Single-point failures are detrimental to any system. Especially if it is a fragile point. Do not duplicate points of failure, diversify them. Make them mutually exclusive if possible. Avoid ambition. Have goals and dreams. Ambition lacks redundancies.

If your mind is not very orderly, it is okay. Ape the mirror. Re-wire and restart. Brains have that facility. Relax. It is all going to be just fine.

Incredible Credibility

Will you believe me if I said businesses are mathematical models just like everything else? Would you let go of the belief that there is more to business than mathematics and analysis? Will my graphs and curves and tables on a ‘business template’ powerpoint presentation convince you that the behaviour of the parameters represented on the three axes of a pseudo-holographic representation of the characteristics of product sales v/s market penetration v/s production costs is actually an all-encompassing, time-invariant model of a business? You probably will believe it if a senior project manager at McKinsey & Co. showed it to you.

According to Jobs uncle, in a very low-profile talk, “utter bullcrap” is a state of mind. He says that when person hears a thing about something he gives a little attention to, he will choose to believe and accept it or not believe and not accept it. His choice depends on who is telling him about it. He claims that if he says the (past tense of) iRun sports a quantum-nuclear processor that will eliminate (the use of) fossil power sources, it will. Even if it is a generic silicon-nitride based chip that requires lesser energy than half a wall clock to run for a year. “Let’s face it,” he said, “I don’t know what either is. But if my lesser famous engineer’s fiance’s gardner said what I just did, it will be dismissed as “utter bullcrap”. ” Now isn’t that true!

What makes a good reference? A popular book may be. Or a paper on cutting edge technology perhaps. An instruction manual? How good a reference is a theory that is all abstract? How much are we willing to buy a person’s theory? People who did buy such ideas did profit in a few cases. But then, credibility doesn’t come with tenacity and labour alone. What contributes to credibility is the way a person builds on a gamble, or if at all there was a gamble. There are several other things that I do not know that contribute. It is difficult to guage or ‘model’ credibility. People will not buy ideas because the ideas are good alone; they will probably buy them because the person with the ideas has a track record of good ideas. There are always better ideas given the population. It is probably the credibility that matters more then.

By the way, Jobs uncle hardly gives low-profile talks.

Poets and Plays

It is cloudy today; as the curtains are drawn on the stage in a way;
The Audience will be kept at bay, kept away from the play.

Tired and soiled, a few marred, a few spoiled, the actors seek to cleanse;
They look at the drawn curtains, queered, almost shedding the pretense.

The playwrights, the critics, the directors cut loose from the mundane;
Losing themselves in thought, hoping and praying for the rain.

A drizzle, a shower, a blizzard will flush the stage today;
The acting stops, the scripts turn real; it is life, no more a play.

-

It is cloudy, poets scamper in this change of weather;
Trying to hold the pour, until they find their quill feather.

Words and phrases, metaphors and puns dance about in their heads;
Overcome with joy, is it true? Is it a dream? They roll in their beds.

With their scrolls, the papyrus and pens, they sit and they unwind;
For the downpour may dissolve the papyrus, but leave a poem behind.

The poets seemingly ordain the gentle, cleansing, hallowing rain;
With the vile masked by the cascade, the world is poetic again.

————————————————————————————————-

It was cloudy today. There are no references to people. *The disclaimer*. Enjoy.

The Generalist

How important is it to be at least good at everything? It is essential to have a person with superficial knowledge of everything. How else will that person identify a problem before solving it? Knowing that there is a problem in a domain is half the work done towards solving it. A specialist can’t identify problems not pertaining to his own field. A generic problem-identifier is cheaper than a specialist problem-identifier for each domain.

Don’t general problems vastly outnumber specific problems? It takes one person to drive away birds, keep an eye out for parasites and graze cattle away from the field. It will take one person each to study the pH balance of soil, predict humidity and intensity of sunlight; things that hardly pose a problem to the average farmer.

How useless is a specialist outside his domain? He will just be a passenger, a spectator. You don’t require to be a brain surgeon to bandage an abrasion. The local car mechanic isn’t really a rocket scientist. An electronics engineer can’t (still) fix a malfunctioning fan.