My objective is to read all of Robert Ludlum books within a reasonable time!

The list goes like...

1. The Matarese Countown
2. The Apocalypse Watch
3. Trevayne
4. The Matlock Paper
5. The Road to Omaha
6. The Road to Gandolfo
7. The Bourne Ultimatum
8. The Holcroft Covenant
9. The Icarus Agenda
10. The Bourne Supremacy
11. The Aquitaine Progression
12. The Parsifal Mosaic
13. The Bourne Identity
14. The Matarese Circle
15. The Chancellor Manuscript
16. The Rhinemann Exchange
17. The Cry of the Halidon
18. the Osterman Weekend
19. The Scarlatti Inheritance

Yes the list is a big one.
Hopefully I should be able to finish it within a reasonable time.

Few weeks back I finished reading Gemini Contenders by Robert Lublum. The story is nicely plotted. It makes you read on and on till the point where a dramatic twist is witnessed. I would rather don't wanna go into the details of the plots and explain it. Robert Ludlum already has done that. In my personal view, the dramatic twist happens when the hero in dying moments passes his responsibilities into his two twin sons. From here on the story goes haywire and this where I diverted. I don't know why but somehow I was not interested in knowing what would be the end. This is probably because i knew what would happen! The twist is so dramatic that itself implies the end. I was hopping that my intuition and repeated indications by the author comes untrue. But I was not wrong. It was the end that was expected. I thought it could have been better with something more rational. I don't know what that could have been but i felt that it could have been better than the present one. And ultimately the story ends with the new beginning. As most of the time the Hollywood stories part 1 ends with a plot for the part 2. I think this makes for a nice Hollywood movie.

I always had the urge to have multiple desktop like the Linux in windows. Some people would say just migrate to Linux and you will have that by default. I use windows at my work place and have Linux as my primary operating system at home. When I discovered this virtual desktop tool, it made my day with excitement. I quickly installed and changed few settings. It delivered all that was expected of it. I am planning to customize and use it very similar to my Linux box.

What I liked about it was the simplicity and no difference in window switches and its very easy to work with a click. I haven't had time to tweak, but feels to be like at home (Linux). Earlier I had the notion that the graphics cards provide the multiple windows in the windows environment, now that I have got hold of this it seems that i was wrong. It feels good to be wrong at time like this.

Tuesday, 6th of Nov 2007, I was experimenting with the extensibility of windows terminal (cmd prompt). I found an interesting software that did that. You can also checkout from here. Its a nice piece of enhancement which looks very cool. After using it, I wondered why none cared to enhance the default command prompt? Probably micro$oft is not into command mode at all.

The image is a cropped desktop. Transparency setting makes this console awesome looking. You can't really differentiate between your desktop and the console. Most of my work involves console and I was bugged with the plain command prompt of windows as well as cygwin. Cygwin is better to an extent. I never went hacking cygwin so if you could do what console has done, then i would be happy :-)

One thing i liked about console was the configuration tweaks that you can do. I am still playing with it and hence have none to show here. When I do configure to my liking i will post the configuration here. Its actually very easy to do the changes. The configuration reads xml and as you know its a plain text file which can be modified by the text editors. Here is a screen shot of my desktop. This is just to illustrate how it looks!

For certain font selection which can be selected from various configurations, copy is disabled and it seems that it won't be implemented :-( Apart from this, its a nice utility to have.

The following is a story written by one of my friend.

A young second generation Indian in the US was asked by his mother to explain the significance of " Diwali" to his younger brother, this is how he went about it...

"So, like this dude had, like, a big cool kingdom and people liked him. But, like, his step-mom, or something, was kind of a bitch, and she forced her husband to, like, send this cool-dude, he was Ram, to some national forest or something... Since he was going, for like, something like more than 10 years or so.. he decided to get his wife and his bro along... you know... so that they could all chill out together. But dude, the forest was reeeeal scary shit... really man... they had monkeys and devils and shit like that.

But this dude, Ram, kicked him with darts and bows and arrows... so it was fine.

But then some bad gangsta boys, some jerk called Ravan, picks up his babe (Sita) and lures her away to his hood. And boy, was our man, and also his bro, Laxman, pissed ... And you don't piss this son-of-a-gun cuz, he just kicks them and like... all the gods were with him... So anyways, you don't mess with gods. So, Ram, and his bro get an army of monkeys... Dude, don't ask me how they trained the damn monkeys... just go along with me, ok... So, Ram, Lax and their monkeys whip this gangsta's ass in his own hood. Anyways, by this time, their time's up in the forest... and anyways... it gets kinda boring, you know... no TV or malls or shit like that. So,they decided to hitch a ride back home... and when the people realize that our dude, his bro and the wife are back home... they thought, well, you know, at least they deserve something nice... and they didn't have any bars or clubs in those days... so they couldn't take them out for a drink, so they, like, decided to smoke and shit... and since they also had some lamps, they lit the lamps also... so it was pretty cooool... you know with all those fireworks... Really, they even had some local band play along with the fireworks... and you know, what, dude, that was the very first, no kidding..., that was the very first music-synchronized fireworks... you know, like the 4th of July stuff, but just, more cooler and stuff, you know. And, so dude, that was how, like, this festival started."

-By Veda.

I have been busy all these days doing nothing. Its like you don't have enough motivation. This can't be true but i may need to consider this as a possibility. You never know the first time you experience a thing and say wrongly define it. May be.
I wanted to try many things this weekend. I wanted to erase all the data in my computer and start a new, ofcourse after taking backup. Some how my desktop had different idea. It died on me. SMPS is refusing to power on. I have to do few tests before i can declare it as dead. This will make me procure a new smps. Now i am looking at different aspect all together. I wanted a desktop which can run all the recent games. In short i needed a power pc. hmmm, it could be the right time for me to own one. Let me decide on that after smps resolved.
I am planning to have a stable distribution now. I am looking at running Debian and freeBSD as the only two OSes. I am not at all looking at windows. It's sort of going back to a year when i didn't had windows. The real problem at that time was media players. Now I can have alternate players. And one more issue i think i would have now also is gaming. I need to have windows for gaming. Yes i think i will have windows exclusive for gaming only. I don't understand why there aren't games for Linux. But have read about their availability in the market. I haven't really bothered about it as i had windows. Now that i may not have i need to do an R&D on Linux games. Hope i can have a good list to choose from!

Its been raining in Bangalore for the past few days. It starts to rain in the evening, when we pack up from office heading towards home. Anyhow it never deters me to ride in rain and enjoy the feel of it. From my childhood i used to enjoy rain. I used to stand in front of our bedroom window and used to watch rain water gushing trying to reach its destination. I never used to get bored with it. I always found reasons to drench myself in rain.
The feeling of walking in the rain is one of the most calming effects i can have. When you lookup towards the sky and see the rain drops hitting you with all its mightly bringing the calm effect makes me want to experience it every time.
On the first day of rain, I had missed it as i was early home. I made sure the next day i will fully get drenched. And thats what i did. Rain was so heavy, that I was riding my bike with a constant throttle so that the rain water doesn't enter my exhaust making my bike stop in the middle of the river road.
It was all fun in the rain.

Yesterday, I was looking for a way to send text messages via Internet. I found few sites,

1. http://www.txtdrop.net/- for international messaging,
2. http://gizmosms.com/

These above sites send text messages for free without charging the sender. I am not sure if the they charge for the receiver. I tried sending few text messages to myself and it worked. But for a friend, (who is enjoying his days in Sweden) it didn't work. I tried sending a few text messages and found that he was not able to receive any of it. Probably the telephone carrier doesn't support it. Its strange in that regard. Hope he gets to receive text messages from web so i can spam him.

It seems my Debian is broken. Its been long time since i had a chance to look at the issue closer. I broke it last month. I don't remember the reason why i reinstalled Debian, but thats where the trouble started. Mouse refused to show any movement, now it seems that i haven't been able to install the correct sound driver for my sound card. Its all gone very broke. I think i need to get the latest Debian release and work with that. I loved the way it had worked earlier.

Psychology eludes me every time! May be I need to understand the varying components involved. The passion that drives me is the new hurdles and learning that tend to be by products. Thats very exciting. Today I had been to a beautiful temple which greatly inspired me. Let me explain that a bit here. The entrance is truly spectacular. Entrance is a passage that leads into the main portion. The passage looks to be 4 feet wide. You will have a scare. Being very scared your movements will be limited. I was pushed by a friend to go forward. It all seemed like i was in a world of stone age. And the beauty of it is to be cherished. Once you reach the main portion of the temple, you will be surprised. You can see the God statue placed at a comfortable height. Its spectacular. Around the statue you will find emptiness that draws your attention. Unusual in the aspect that you can have an entire view of the statue. Every thing you can see is made of stone. This is what I wanted to see in every temple. May be this is what i was searching all along. You can find the carvings which try to tell their story. Its really amazing not to have found this myself. I really enjoyed being there for a moment that signifies where you are! This is where i would leave you wondering! I am trying to get snaps of the temple. Hope to publish it one day :-)

Today is our independence day and i am proud to be one among my fellow Indian. This couldn't have come with sugar coat! Every media is talking about it. Our constitution is one of the longest written one. Yes we should thank Dr. Ambedkar. We should all acknowledge his contribution as well as others unsung heros.

Internet connectivity with 115K!

Yes I am using an internet connection which boosts up to 115Kpbs. I have never seen it go past 80K. Presently I have been degraded to use this connection as I have no ISP’s providing a connection where I leave. And yet I am proud to leave in a high tech city named Bangalore. I don’t know why we can’t have a higher bandwidth. This may be due to poor planning by the municipal authority or the Bangalore Development authority. It’s been 4 months that I have shifted my residence and constant following up with the Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited to provide me a Telephone connection with Internet connectivity is yielding no result. I am getting only assurances. Let me not delve into the details. It’s not that pretty also. For almost 4 months I was not having internet connectivity at home. As a consequence I am now forced to use this connection which makes my life a bit harder. Eventually it may improve or I may adapt to the situation.

I must say it’s always been very interesting to have a connection. I can use chat clients without any considerable degradation of service. Remote connection is one of my requirement which is one of the concern on mine. Remote connection may yield 1k transfer speed. These speeds are literally pushing me into Stone Age. The main disadvantage of living here is that there are no private ISP’s and the only available player is BSNL which is showing a monopoly attitude. Eventually I am planning to go to media which may help me. Anyways I feel like I am held for a ransom! Internet connection!

Hope is the best thing in these situations. I guess I have to do a Munnabhai style protests to get internet connectivity. May be that may follow soon. Never prejudice.

Die Hard...Not that easy in here.

You would love to see a movie with a plot like this. The only catch is if you are a geek! oops...I guess that was hard to digest. Remember you are reading about Die Hard. The movie is centred around the technology and how we are bound to it. In reality it may inspire a few to take lead and make it possible. What am i talking about? Yes the situations and the plot revolves around power. It really comes down to stealing the financial data and making millions in minutes. A diversion is set for the authorities and when it starts to work, they make their move. As always our hero is at the right place at the right time. So the story takes a turn. Now its not the millions that matter, its the revenge! The sole enemy of all. Guess who wins the battle? Kinda end of the story.
After seeing this movie, i found difficult to answer few of the questions. Are we moving towards having a society which can be controlled by a click of button? Is this really possible? At present we are all in the automation era, where everyone needs can be meet with in a clicks away. That's what we claim to be doing. Being in the developing country gives me a bit of comfort zone, but thats for a short period. Is this all boils down to destructive power? We all should be scared as a society. But does the society care? Doesn't looks like it does much. Hmmm lots of question but no answer. Can you give me a answer?

End is just the begining...

JDBC connectorj for MySql Database

Java connects to MySql Database using JDBC driver named Connector/J. I found it a bit interesting in configuring and testing the driver. I previously hadn't connected using Connector/J. In my personal view it's much more easier to connect using php to MySql when you first try your hand. Let me get to the details.

I downloaded Connector/J driver from the ConnectorJ_5.0
You need to download the latest driver. Its around 8 MB which contains both the source and the binary.You are allowed to download either a windows version (Zip) or a Linux version (tar.gz). Anyhow both are compressed form and you need to uncompress for both platform. I used windows hence i will explain the steps involved in windows platform.

First copy the jar file, com and org folders contained in the zip file into one of classpath folders where JVM can find it. I copied mysql-connector-java-5.0.5-bin.jar, com and org folder into a folder named as connectorj in d: drive.

In my case i didn't had the classpath set.
I created a new variable named classpath in the Environmental variable.
Variable name:classpath
Variable value:.;D:\connectorj\mysql-connector-java-5.0.5-bin.jar

For setting classpath and for more information see classpath info in Sun Site or Javapedia

Then i tested the driver using the code,

public class TestCon {
public static void main(String args[]) {
try {
class.forName("com.mysql.jdbc.Driver").newInstance();
System.out.println("JVM is able to find the driver. Test success");
} catch (Exception e) {
System.out.println("Driver error. Cann't find the driver");
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
}

Compiled using javac TestCon.java and executed by java TestCon for which i got the
JVM is able to find the driver. Test success
This demonstrated that i was able to connect to connectorj driver.

Hope you would also have the same result.

Yeah its been a long time that i have blogged. Seems like ages. To be frank, I had ample time to blog but was somehow not inclined. Probably i needed a break from this. Anyhow now that i am back again, it shouldn't matter.
I remember reading about Rock genre music. It was kinda informative. It was a research done in comparison with other genres like pop etc. It demonstrated that rock genre had positive effect of your mind. It said that the people had a smoothen effect when they listened to rock genre. It also showed that the heat generated by your body would come down in comparison to other genre. It was remarkable, i thought. Since my dad feels that its a sort of scream. I do appreciate his view but tend to disagree. Its his view and we are a democratic country. Now all the music are played with reduced volume and thats democracy in action! I am rebel on the run six gun lover... We all are rebel at teenage. I always wanted more freedom, more liberty to do things. It's my life. I guess we all grow old and history repeats.

Catch you later....

Water.
Yes i had been to the movie. Nicely directed movie. It was much awaited in my book of must see. I was curious as to why the movie was banned. Probably i haven't seen the uncensored version. I am trying to get hold of the same. We being a democratic country, being a free nation doesn't make sense to ban a movie. I totally agree with the fact that it would stir emotions of the society and may lead to unrest. This can only be possible in the event of support from a large group. You know what i mean :-) Let me not get into that aspect.
As far as the movie is considered, it reflects the Indian Society in the mid 20th century. I really liked the way the movie is directed and the choreography is excellent. I don't understand how it lost in Oscar? I would like each one of you to watch the movie once. Its a master piece from the director. I really appreciate the each and every aspect of the movie. Nice one to watch. And also if you get a DVD it's awesome :-)

Week ends...

I am too lazy to do anything on weekends. I will be in bed till i get bored with the sleep. You can imagine how long i would sleep ;-) I would be struggling to wake up from the bed. That's how lazy i would get in weekends. I guess its the only day i can get to sleep that long and also I am not constrained for time.
I don't know how long I will have this kinda liberty. Anyhow i think weekends are a bore to me. I would be sitting there in front of the Television doing channel surfing. This tends to be very demanding on the eyes since they have to adjust to the changing light every few seconds. Channel surfing is a hobby for me. My Mom and Dad would get irritated seeing me do channel surfing. I usually watch movie channels and will always have a preference. I do switch between M TV, channel V, etc on a priority basis.
But last week was a different weekend altogether. I think the next weekend would be different. Formula1 season is starting and I don't wanna miss the excitement. Its the first race, the season beginner and also the first race without schumi. I don't remember the last time i missed schumi on the race track. He was always the man to beat. This first race would decide who will have the upper advantage and also will sort out who's in who's team. Its all confusing for me right now. Have to catch up with the details. I think it would be exciting to start the season even though we will miss schumi. Its not that i am making too much of schumi, but its the fact. You will be missing the greatest driver of his era. I do expect his younger brother Ralf to replace him, but i feel his team will not be good enough to carry him there. And also he lacks aggression which is pivotal in getting him to the top. When you see the difference between schumi and his brother, i think it's not that close. In my opinion no one has ever matched schumi at his skills. I think its a tough job to accomplish. Time will tell. However, I have a season to look back and also a season ahead to write about. I think I am a bit scratchy with all this writing, but i am trying to make it a bit more interesting and exciting.

Astalavista....

I never wanted myself looking at the mercy of being ripped off emotionally. I was standing there staring at a close friend who seem to ignore my presence. I knew it would happen but still i was there to experience that. It looked like she knew what i was up to. I never imagined nor wanted to end my relationship like that. I was chatting with another friend pretending to be ignoring her. 5 mins since I started the conversation and it looked like a decade to me. I was pretending to be ignoring her and she was doing the same. I was just standing there waiting for her to acknowledge my presence. Wish I was never there. But it never materialized. So it hit me in the middle of the conversation. This has to end soon and i thought it should end now. Thats where i realised the pain i would go through. But it was all over. There was nothing to say. I moved away from my friend and walked towards her. She was there sitting. She didn't even cared to look at me. Gosh I should have hurt her bad. She couldn't even look at me! I guess it was not so easy for me either. I said: "Hi". It sounded like i was striking a conversation with a stranger. She responded in a negative fashion. I choose to ignore that and went ahead to say something. But when she looked at me, it was all over. I knew I was talking to a stranger. It turned out to be a normal conversation and she was not forth coming to even continuing the talk. I said bye to her and left.

Let me start the beginning....a new beginning.