Kaleidoscope

The dangers of the Web 2.0 fizzle

2008-06-05T14:55:00.004+05:30

"There exists a probability that the Web 2.0 phenomenon may ultimately lead to a mere augmentation of current cultural information exchanges that are bound by existing political and societal strictures." - criticisim about Web 2.0 on Wikipedia

Extending that thought, Web 2.0 hones a culture of not just openness and sharing, but also of open threats. The traditional problem faced by open-source was exactly this - it was also threatened in terms of security due to its 'laid-bare' technology. What could possibly happen in such a collaborative, open and democratic atmosphere is that too many people start playing 'god' , or on the other extreme, many haphazard social, political, economic and cultural threats and malpractices start appearing. The recent incident of kidnapping and murder of an individual whose primary contact point was through a social networking site, is just the tip of the iceberg. A system without controls ceases to be a system! It becomes fluid enough to take up any assuming shape within the bounds of merely time and space. Policies and structures laid out in any system are primarily to inculcate responsibility and actions taken against any violation. Imagine what would happen if the country's judicial system would turn to Web 2.0! Even in perfect democracy there is always some monocracy, else things would simply go haywire.

Web 2.0 is still in its infancy, though tech geeks might think I'm outdated to state that- the possible consequences of such techno-revolution can be fully understood only in course of time..

KnowMore: Ever wondered what a website bounce rate means on your analytics reports? Read on

2008-04-03T12:49:00.002+05:30

Bounce Rate (sometimes confused with Exit Rate)^[1] is a term used in website traffic analysis.

A bounce occurs when a website visitor leaves a page or a site without visiting any other pages before a specified session-timeout occurs. There is no industry-standard minimum or maximum time by which a visitor must leave in order for a bounce to occur. Rather, this is determined by the session timeout of the analytics tracking software. A commonly used^{[citation needed]} session timeout value is 30 minutes. In this case, if a visitor views a page and leaves his browser idle for 31 minutes, they will register as a bounce. If the visitor continue to navigate after this delay, a new session will occur and the last page they view before exiting or timing out again will result in another bounce.

The Bounce Rate for a single page is the number of visitors who enter the site at a page and leave within the specified timeout period without viewing another page, divided by the total number of visitors who entered the site at that page. In contrast, the Bounce Rate for a website is the number of web site visitors who visit only a single page of a website per session divided by the total number of website visits.

Bounce rates can be used to help determine the effectiveness or performance of an entry page. An entry page with a low bounce rate means that the page effectively causes visitors to view more pages and continue on deeper into the website. ^[2]

Google.com analytics specialist Avinash Kaushik has stated, "It is really hard to get a bounce rate under 20%, anything over 35% is cause for concern, 50% (above) is worrying." ^[3]

A visitor can bounce by:

Closing an open window or tab
Typing a new URL
Clicking the "Back" button to leave the website
Session timeout

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bounce_Rate

Simply tick off the clock that tick tocks all the way! - A project time tracker

2008-04-02T12:04:00.005+05:30

Have you ever felt the need for someone to be your timekeeper while you perform mundane chores throughout the day? Ever felt the need for some alarm bell to ring while you spend endless hours being dazed by the internet while you are yet to close your day's work? Ever desired the clock your daily activities to make sure you don't over spend time on just one activity? Ever wanted to understand billing details on every project activity that you did?

Here's a tool that will be your personal time manager, where you can simply log in your project activity and start time on each activity. Its called MyHours. Billing details are also set for each project activity so you know what is the money spent on time. All you need to do is simply start and stop the clock to tick off your project! The reporting tool also downloads automatic reports on your daily, weekly and monthly time spent project wise and activity wise. No more worries on filling in boring time sheets!

Ofiice 2007, Outlook 2003 and the MAPi32.DLL battle

2008-03-28T12:31:00.007+05:30

A week ago i raved about the new Office Ultimate 2007 version in my office. In spite of the organization possessing the license for nearly 1 year, none had it on their machines. I was the proud owner of the first copy of the entire suite of Office 2007 with its latest software tools. I flaunted its features through my works on and off, especially with the new One Note 2007 drawing seamless pictures and tables with clean organization of data and a pleasurable experience to use. I simply ignored the product key pop-ups since our licensed one didn't seem to work, and every time it came up (now a regular visitor on my desktop nearly 5 times a day!), it was a spam on my nerve!
Until yesterday - the spam was no longer an unwelcome intruder - it suddenly morphed into an scary Vader type villain invading my entire Office 2007 suite and locking all the functions of the Office 2007 software. i was helpless! And was more importantly stuck with knowledge i could only see, but not touch, feel or play around with - it was lifeless!!

After much trying, pleading and battling with Office 2007, i gave up. To its predecessor. Office 2003. Microsoft assures you that there is no backward compatibility of OneNote 2007 files in OneNote 2003. Then came another problem once Office 2003 was installed. While opening Outlook 2003, this error occurred: mapi32.dll file is corrupt or it's the wrong version. My team mate from systems struggled for nearly an hour uninstalling and installing Outlook 2003 version, but to no avail. A 5 min search for the solution on Google yielded this:-

OL2000: ErrMsg: MAPI32.DLL is Corrupt or the Wrong Version

and the resolution for this is:-

1.	Quit Outlook.
2.	Click Start, point to Find, and then click Files or Folders.
3.	Type Mapi32.dll in the Named box.
4.	In Look In, click to select My Computer, and click Find Now.
5.	Right-click to select Mapi32.dll in the search results list.
6.	Click Rename, type Mapi32.old, and press ENTER to accept the name change. If there are multiple copies of Mapi32.dll in the list, rename each.
7.	Close the Find Files window and start Outlook.

there's one more step, however, which my systems' person performed, which is the critical factor. He renamed another file names MSAPI.dll to .old, and then Outlook 2003 started working.

time spent earlier: 1 hr
time spent to resolve after searching: 5 mins

what more to say? Search before you research!!

KnowMore: Rants

2008-03-06T15:56:00.001+05:30

A rant or harangue is a speech or text that does not present a well-researched and calm argument; rather, it is typically an attack on an idea, a person or an institution, and very often lacks proven claims. Such attacks are usually personal attacks. Compare with a dialectic.

In some cases, rants are based on facts and concrete information, but the key ideas expressed are what the individual personally feels.

However, some rants are used not to attack something, but to defend an individual, idea or organization. Rants of this type generally occur after the subject has been attacked by another individual or group.

To rave" about someone or something was to be extremely enthusiastic. (This usage differed from an earlier meaning of the word that meant to rant.)

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rant

KnowMore: Turnkey

2008-03-06T15:52:00.002+05:30

Turnkey

This term may be used to advertise the sale of an established business, including all the equipment necessary to run it, or by a business-to-business supplier providing complete packages for business start-up. A turnkey operation is one where fragments of a company's business venture or project is outsourced to third parties or vendors. It is often given to the best bidder in a procurement process.

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turnkey

The Elasticity between Marketing techniques

2008-03-04T10:58:00.000+05:30

All the while I had interpreted ‘PUSH’ and ‘PULL’ quite differently. In the internal marketing context ‘Push’ meant to thrust processes and services down to the employees and ‘Pull’ meant to woo the employees’ confidence and pampering them, thereby winning their approvals. Yesterday I had learnt a new dimension of these two words. ‘Push’ meant that a company floated certain core offerings into the market. The uncertainty here is this: who is the market or what defines the market? A ‘pull’ meant that the market had to be studied to search for needs, immediate and latent, and the uncertainty revolved around the question: what will my business be?

Simply put, The ‘Push’ strategy of marketing has ‘business imperative’ as the focus, and like a rushing waterfall, the products/ services are ‘opened out’ to a selective market. Think of the ‘Pull’ strategy of marketing as a water pump where ‘customer needs/wants’ draw businesses to create products/services based on their needs. ‘Push’ is tilted towards the business offerings and ‘pull’ is tilted towards customer needs.

Again there is an elasticity even between these seemingly opposing thoughts. Sometimes businesses push their offerings, but if they find that the selected market isn’t receptive about certain portions of the offering, they ‘tweak’ the offering to suit their needs, thereby making possible an intrinsic ‘Pull’ within the ‘Push’ strategy. Some other times, the market needs are vast and varied and though products/service offerings are based on market demand, a generic variant of the service is offered to minimize costs and thus ‘pushed’ into the market. This is then an intrinsic ‘push’ within a ‘pull’ strategy.
Thus these two methods are similar to like-poles in a compressed magnetic field. Even when businesses begin, they witness the universality of such an elasticity not knowing what to begin with – what is wanted by whom or who wants what. Well, after all, we are still living with the chicken and egg problem, aren’t we?
The Elasticity between Marketing techniques

Talking about God...

2008-02-09T03:20:00.000+05:30

This one is an interesting conversation between an atheistic teacher and a believing student. Author unknown, but worth a read.
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"Let me explain the problem science has with God." The atheist professor of philosophy pauses before his class and then asks one of his new students to stand.

"You're a God believer, aren't you, son?"

"Yes sir," the student says.

"So you believe in God?"

"Absolutely."

"Is God good?"

"Sure! God's good."

"Is God all-powerful? Can God do anything?"

"Yes."

"Are you good or evil?"

"The teachings says I'm evil."

The professor grins knowingly. He considers for a moment.

"Here's one for you. Let's say there's a sick person over here and you can cure him. You can do it. Would you help them? Would you try?"

"Yes sir, I would."

"So you're good...!"

"I wouldn't say that."

"But why not say that? You'd help a sick and maimed person if you could. Most of us would if we could. But God doesn't."

The student does not answer, so the professor continues. "He doesn't, does he? My brother was a God believer who died of cancer, even though he prayed to Jesus to heal him. How is this God good? Hmmm? Can you answer that one?"

The student remains silent.

"No, you can't, can you?" the professor says. He takes a sip of water from a glass on his desk to give the student time to relax.

"Let's start again, young fella. Is God good?"

"Er... Yes," the student says.

"Is Satan good?"

The student doesn't hesitate on this one. "No."

"Then where does Satan come from?"

The student falters. "From... God..."

"That's right. God made Satan, didn't he? Tell me, son. Is there evil in this world?"

"Yes, sir."

"Evil's everywhere, isn't it? And God did make everything, correct? "

"Yes."

"So who created evil?"

Again, the student has no answer.

"Is there sickness? Immorality? Hatred? Ugliness. All these terrible things, do they exist in this world?"

The student squirms on his feet. "Yes."

"So who created them?"

The student does not answer again, so the professor repeats his question.

"Who created them? "

There is still no answer. Suddenly the lecturer breaks away to pace in front of the classroom. The class is mesmerized.

"Tell me," he continues. "Do you believe in God, son?"

The student's voice betrays him and cracks. "Yes, professor. I do."

The old man stops pacing. "Science says you have five senses you use to identify and observe the world around you. Have you ever seen God?"

"No sir. I've never seen Him."

"Then tell us if you've ever heard your God?"

"No, sir. I have not."

"Have you ever felt your God, tasted your God or smelt your God? Have you ever had any sensory perception of God?"

"No, sir, I'm afraid I haven't."

"Yet you still believe in him?" thundered the professor.

"Yes."

"According to the rules of empirical, testable,demonstrable protocol, science says your God doesn't exist. What do you say to that, son?"

"Nothing," the student replies. "I only have my faith."

"Yes, faith," the professor repeats. "And that is the problem science has with God. There is no evidence, only faith."

The student stands quietly for a moment, before asking a question of his own.

"Professor, is there such thing as heat?"

"Yes," the professor replies. "There's heat."

"And is there such a thing as cold?"

"Yes, son, there's cold too."

"No sir, there isn't."

The professor turns to face the student, obviously interested. The room suddenly becomes very quiet. The student begins to explain.

"You can have lots of heat, even more heat, super-heat, mega-heat, white heat, a little heat or no heat, but we don't have anything called 'cold'. We can hit 458 degrees below zero, which is no heat,but we can't go any further after that. There is no such thing as cold; otherwise we would be able to go colder than -458 degrees. You see, sir, cold is only a word we use to describe the absence of heat. We cannot measure cold. Heat we can measure in thermal units because heat is energy. Cold is not the opposite of heat, sir, just the absence of it." Silence across the room! A pen drops somewhere in the classroom, sounding like a hammer.

"What about darkness, professor. Is there such a thing as darkness?"

"Yes," the professor replies without hesitation. "What is night if it isn't darkness?"

"You're wrong again, sir. Darkness is not something; it is the absence of something. You can have low light, normal light, bright light, flashing light. But if you have no light constantly you have nothing and it's called darkness, isn't it? That's the meaning we use to define the word. In reality, Darkness isn't. If it were, you would be able to make darkness darker, wouldn't you?"

The professor begins to smile at the student in front of him. This will be a good semester.

"So what point are you making, young man?"

"Yes, professor. My point is, your philosophical premise is flawed to start with and so your conclusion must also be flawed."

The professor's face cannot hide his surprise this time. "Flawed? Can you explain how?"

"You are working on the premise of duality," the student explains. "You argue that there is life and then there's death; a good God and a bad God. You are viewing the concept of God as something finite, something we can measure. Sir, science can't even explain a thought. It uses electricity and magnetism, but has never seen, much less fully understood either one. To view death as the opposite of life is to be ignorant of the fact that death cannot exist as a substantive thing. Death is not the opposite of life, just the absence of it. Now tell me, professor. Do you teach your students that they evolved from a monkey?"

"If you are referring to the natural evolutionary process, young man,yes,of course I do."

"Have you ever observed evolution with your own eyes, sir?"

The professor begins to shake his head, still smiling, as he realizes where the argument is going. A very good semester indeed!

"Since no one has ever observed the process of evolution at work and cannot even prove that this process is an on-going endeavour, are you not teaching your opinion, sir? Are you now not a scientist, but a preacher?"

The class is in uproar. The student remains silent until the commotion has subsided.

"To continue the point you were making earlier to the other students, let me give you an example of what I mean."

The student looks around the room. "Is there anyone in the class who has ever seen the professor's brain?" The class breaks out into laughter.

"Is there anyone here who has ever heard the professor's brain,felt the professor's brain, touched or smelt the professor's brain? No one appears to have done so. So, according to the established rules of empirical, testable, demonstrable protocol,science says that you have no brain, with all due respect, sir. So if science says you have no brain, how can we trust your lectures, sir?"

Now the room is silent. The professor just stares at the student, his face unreadable!

Finally, after what seems an eternity, the old man answers.

"I guess you'll have to take them on faith." The class breaks into a deadening applause.

"Continuing further, Sir, when GOD created the universe he made a set of rules which governs every living organisms, categorized in his own way. For some, life is a predestined, well programmed journey of life. For others, like humans, the rules of life are a direct results of their own actions, words, thoughts or/and conducts. So, Sir, happiness, sadness, good, bad, sickness, good health, poverty and abundance, is man's own doing unto himself. The wrong and bad happenings in man's life, is nothing but the lack of righteousness in his way of life."

We two, ours but one!

2008-02-08T13:55:00.000+05:30

Beijing is already buzzing with activity and all set for the upcoming Olympics. India's closest competitor for foreign investments and trade looks to this year - the 'RAT's year, for their good luck. All seem going great guns from the third person Indian spectator's perspective who has keenly been sifting through the global prospects of the Asian brother. While at home, i happened to skim through a 'not-so-popular' colour blended magazine and stripped a sheet off it's sheen, intrigued by an article that highlighted the 'one-child' norm of China. While China is desperately trying to winnow the weeds and relax this policy, there still seems to be a problem with the 'one-child' norm in some interior parts of the country. Women not so ready for this pressure, seem to be undergoing their fourth or fifth months of maternity, only to be later forced to abort the little life they yearned to see. Some others see the baby killed right before their eyes. Some, perhaps like Moses's mother , were happier to secretly send away their new-borns hoping they'd get a better life somewhere. The issue really is not about the 'one-child' norm - understandably China's population density would soon warrant not even a one sq. foot's space to one person on an average. The issue is the pressure brought about by the communist regime in the country. One side of the communist argument is right - country's capital is equally divided. But with money swinging the hypnotic pendulum, scarcely is anything equally divided in this world. Rich become richer leaving the poor poorer. The only thing that remains of a communist regime is autocracy morphed. The rich get away from the government and the poor are scape goats. Worse still, because of lack of democracy , right to freedom is little spoken about.

This article is not meant to end here. But its meant to begin something elsewhere. I've just scratched the surface a bit. If you find more articles on this, do post as a comment.

Read and Reflect!

The Kaleidoscope

2008-02-02T22:05:00.000+05:30

Greetings Reader!

Blogs could well remain a record of personal writings - but i would not like to limit its purpose to merely 'venting out' or 'scribbling in' for the sake of wanting to neither waste words nor paper. I believe this should be worth the read, as i value your time as much as mine! I've been part of a team that has engineered, branded and sold a corporate intra-blogging space, but never wrote a single blog on it, since policy restrictions did not permit me to debate and discuss politically or socially sensitive issues. The Kaleidoscope is a rather virgin venture for me, through which i hope to share fresh thoughts, ideas and perspectives. Hope you enjoy reading those that follow!

Read and Reflect!