Inspire is the annual technical extravaganza organized by the Division of Computer Science, CUSAT. The rhapsody involves emphatic participation from a myriad of students within and outside the realms of CUSAT.

With diverse but nevertheless riveting, ingeniously plot and intellectually invigorating events, the participants are presented with an opportunity to earn accolades and benefits in terms of prizes worth over 1.6 Lakh rupees.

Inspire 08 is going to be the biggest ever.

Please find event details on the website http://www.acesinspire.com

Register Online for hassle free participation.

Special feature: Guest Lectures by Manu Zacharia(Ethical Hacking & Information Security), Mani Karthik(Blogging), Linux by LUG Kochi, GIS, and Video blogging event by Digit.

Our Co-Sponsors:

Our Media Partners:

Our Education Media Partner:

If you are going to try, go all the way.
Otherwise don’t even start.
This could mean losing girlfriends, wives,
relatives, jobs and maybe your mind.
It could mean not eating for 3 or 4 days.
It could mean freezing on the park bench.
It could mean jail.
It could mean derision.
It could mean mockery, isolation.
Isolation is the gift.
All the others are a test of your endurance,
of how much you really want to do it.
And you’ll do it.
Despite rejection and worst odds
and it will be better than anything else you can imagine.
If you’re going to try, go all the way.
There is no other feeling like that.
You will be alone with the gods.
And the nights will flame with fire.
You will ride life straight to perfect laughter,
it’s the only good fight there is.

Charles Bukowski, Factotum

I presented a seminar on eka – the fastest supercomputer in asia and 8th fastest in the world. I barely had two days to prepare and somehow pulled it off. Apparently it was pretty good and everyone liked it!

Im uploading my presentation:

and resources I referred for the presentation:

• Eka supercomputer(PPT)
• HP Cluster Platform 3000BL(PDF) ,4000BL & 6000BL(PDF)
• The making of a Supercomputer, Businessworld(PDF)
• CRL India eka Brochure(PDF)
• infiniband_software_and-protocols(PDF)
• Building eka @PuneTech
• Project Manager, CRL Interview

This just has to be the prettiest jewellery I have ever seen!

This is the new Miss Universe 2008 Crown and the 57th pageant will be crowned with this masterpiece which was designed by CAO Fine Jewelry, Vietnam. Vietnam is also this years host for the event.

“The curved design creates a natural rhythm and a stable structure for the crown, symbolizing the spirit of unity. The crown combines the beauty and the character of each nation, accomplishing the goal of the pageant, which is international unity”, explained designers Ms. Kim Lien and Rosalina Lydster.

Valued at $120 thousand dollars, it is made of 18K white and yellow gold. It is comprised of over 1,000 precious stones; including 555 white diamonds (30 carats), 375 cognac diamonds (14 carats), 10 smoky quartz crystals (20 carats) and 19 morganite gemstones (60 carats). The colors of the jewels chosen for the crown have great significance. The yellow luster of the gold represents the prosperous thriving economy in Vietnam. White, light pink and cognac are the main hues in the crown which represent inspiration and feeling.Each piece of the crown was designed to represent an important attribute of the Miss Universe Pageant. The curves of inlaid precious stones represent the strong development and potential of each country. The image of the crane (Lac Bird) symbolizes Vietnamese spirit and culture. The image of the heart represents unified breath, rhythm and vision, which are powerful internal forces that stress faith, hope and unity.

It reminds me of the movie Man cheng jin dai huang jin jia(Curse of the Golden flower)? The design of the crown is distinctly eastern and seems like one of the organic(?) ones worn by Gong Li in the movie. I highly recommend the movie, its amazingly beautiful!

And here comes the real motive behind this blog post. Its a grouse. Why doesn’t the Mr World guy get a crown ?? :/

I think guys should get crowns too … or something. A nice watch? or Koenigsegg CCXR? How about that years Miss World ?

The winners would be declared at a gala event on 13th July, 2008. Bets put Miss Venezuela as favourite by FAR yet again. Miss India also has strong chances. Checkout betting rates!(lower the better)

Evolution of the Crown over the years 1952-2008

I have a sketchy memory of the incident but this is what I remember.

I was finally on my way back home to Jamnagar, Gujarat. On the train, it was not like last time (:D) Only some boring old people. Happily holding on to their newly issues blankets and white sheets and eagerly checking and shouting out if they had a faintest stain. Come Baroda station and at the adjacent local compartment, there was a sight to see. Not less than 40 young gujarati businessmen, trying to get in through the poor door. I wondered how would a lady passenger board that compartment.

I washed my face and then suddenly a young lady dashed into the compartment. In the yellow light of the bulb her face was shining from perspiration and she was violently gasping for breath. A fear gripped me, was I concerned? Is she all right? Is she putting up an act? I was caught for a second. And in that one second I captured(and assumed) her several details with such efficiency that id have made an instructor at CIA proud. She was wearing those faded orange tshirt and traveling pants like those foreign tourists wear. Her golden complexion and thin brownish hair. I walked back into the compartment but my thoughts left behind. Her huge brownish eyes looked so terrified. Is she all right?

Barely 2 minutes had passed. I had to go back. But I just came from there … humm … TOILET! … so I went back. She was still there, talking to someone on phone. Entered the bathroom, took off my glasses (nice greenish brown eyes dude, i winked) splashed water on my face. Came out, she was still talking … OOPS! … in not leaving. She kept staring at me while talking on her phone for some 5 minutes (or was it a second). Abruptly she hung up, and I asked her immediately…

AO: “Are you Okay?”

Gal: “Yes i …”

AO: “You really looked breathless, so i thought of asking if you were okay”

Gal: “Im fine, was just trying to get into the general compartment, but it was so crowded. I have this problem of heavy breathing when I get tensed”

AO: “Is your ticket on wait list? you can pay these Ticket guys and get a seat in Sleeper class or AC. They will consider your case cos ur not too well” (i thot she was from abroad, with a waitlisted ticket)

Gal: “hum middleclass ke log hain, nahi afford kar sakte“

She said this in a way that I have not been able to figure out to this day.

Should i speak in english? hindi … what does she …

AO: “Are you in college? cos usually (me smiley) college people get into trouble like this, last minute reservations and stuff” (she smiled back)

Gal: “No”

AO: “Ah, I thought you were, so wanted to offer you help or advice” (oh was I indeed!?)

A middle aged guy wearing glasses, standing right beside her all this time, who from his looks was undoubtedly was a gentleman who spoke only when required, interrupted our one sided conversation.

“She is not going far, will get down at Rajkot”

AO: “(me blushing) Oh okay! Take care then!”

I was still red. Dont know why. Did the AC guys turn down the cooler.

Rajkot passed 11:00pm. Its 11:30. She is still on the train, sitting inside the compartment now.

I felt so excited, yet I dont exactly know for what reason.

I came across a video tribute to Hayao Miyazaki “Memories Dance“, the Japanese animation legend, by his studio Ghibli. The video featured a song by Loreena McKennitt “The Mummer’s Dance”. I loved the video and the song. It transported me to a land far away of mountains, trees and of virgin streams. I checked out other songs from Loreena’s album The Book of Secrets. A song particularly caught my eye. it was titled “The Highwayman”

A quick search led me to the original poem The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes,1906 on WikiSource.

“The Highwayman” is a narrative poem by Alfred Noyes, published in 1906. The poem was written when Noyes was a young man, and brought him immediate and long-lasting success. It tells the story of a nameless highwayman who is in love with an innkeeper’s beautiful daughter named Bess. Tim, the insanely jealous hostler (stableman) betrays the highwayman to the authorities; an action which paves the way for the brutal death of the lovers.

I listened to the audio narration of the poem. It was spellbinding. Absolutely fantastic. I highly recommend the narration by David Shaw Parker and the female voice on WikiSource page. My favourite stanzas of the poem

The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees,
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,
And the highwayman came riding—
Riding—riding—
The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn-door.

Tlot-tlot, in the frosty silence! Tlot-tlot, in the echoing night!
Nearer he came and nearer! Her face was like a light!
Her eyes grew wide for a moment; she drew one last deep breath,
Then her finger moved in the moonlight,
Her musket shattered the moonlight,
Shattered her breast in the moonlight and warned him— with her death.

Check out this animation on the poems imagery! I really liked it

• Here is a version narrated by David Shaw Parker. I liked his narration best.
• Here is the version of The Highwayman beautifully sung by Loreena McKennitt.
• Check out these wonderful illustrations of the poem from the book Volume Two, Storytelling and other Poems with clips of the song by Loreena!
• Here is a video adaptation of the imagery of the poem by Fleetwood Mac in their video Everywhere. It does not quite convey the mood and the song doesn’t help either.(included below ^_^)

Its so much fun to find connections! Am i wasting time :p ?

If you liked this post, drop in a comment !

This has been ripped off from Kenney’s Blog

When Gods Own Country is hosting a BlogCamp, then its has to be very special. The Event will happen on a huge house boat. This is going to be the first unconference to happen on boat. The Event is hosted by Kerala Tourism.

Date :- 16th August 2008

Venue :- Alappuzha

15th is a holiday and 17th is a sunday. So 16th is the perfect date to be on a boat in Kerala with blogging friends. This is a limited entry event. So if you are planning to enjoy a blogcamp on the backwaters of Kerala add your details to the following form.

Url : http://www.blogcampkerala.com/ (brand new website!)
Shared Key : godsowncountry

You will be contacted to confirm your attendance.

Also Visit

http://www.contactvirus.com/blogcampkerala

http://barcamp.org/blogcampkerala

http://groups.google.com/group/blogcampkerala

Join the wiki!

Here is the list of the bloggers that I know personally:

Kenney Jacob – Disruptive Technologies

Im relatively new to blogging and would love to interact with the blogging community of Kerala. 2nd Barcamp of Kerala and the venue was sponsored by the Association of Computer Science Engineering Students (ACES) of School of Engineering CUSAT. It was a great success! Thanks to Kenney Jacob, an avid blogger, an entrepreneur, a technology evangelist, I got to meet and learn from many techies and entrepreneurs. The event was like homecomming! I cant wait for the BlogCamp and hope the event will be a resounding success in the tech circles of Kerala.

So do create a post like this and link up the bloggers you know.

Other bloggers who are talking about it:

BlogCamp Kerala – Kenney’s Blog
BlogCamp Kerala - technoparklive.blogspot.com
Kerala Blog Camp – TheAnand’s Ripples
BlogCamp Kerala - DailySEOblog.com
BlogCamp Kerala August, 2008 - andback.wordpress.com

More photos from the venue:

Excerpts from the article by CATHERINE RAMPELL on How It Does It: The RIAA Explains How It Catches Alleged Music Pirates

To catch college students trading copyrighted songs online, the Recording Industry Association of America uses the same file-sharing software that online pirates love, an RIAA representative told The Chronicle at the organization’s offices during a private demonstration of how it catches alleged music pirates. He also said the group does not single out specific colleges in its investigations.

The official explained that one way the RIAA identifies pirates is by using LimeWire, a popular peer-to-peer file-sharing program that is free online and used by many college students (there is also a more-robust version of the program sold for a small fee).

Here’s how the process works:

1. The RIAA maintains a list of songs whose distribution rights are owned by the RIAA’s member organizations. It has given that list to Media Sentry, a company it hired to search for online pirates.
2. That company runs copies of the LimeWire program and performs searches for those copyrighted song titles, one by one, to see if any are being offered by people whose computers are connected to the LimeWire network. For popular songs, the search can turn up dozens, if not hundreds, of hits. A search on Madonna’s latest release, “4 Minutes,” turned up more than a hundred users trading various copies of the song.
3. The LimeWire software allows users who right-click on any song entry and choose “browse host” to see all of the songs that a given file sharer is offering to others for download. The software also lists the IP address of active file sharers. (An IP address is a unique number, assigned by Internet-service providers, that identifies every connection to the Internet.)
4. While the names of the people associated with particular IP addresses are not public, it is easy to find out which IP addresses are registered to each Internet-service provider. Using public, online databases (such as those at arin.net or samspade.org), Media Sentry locates the name of the Internet-service provider and determines which traders are located at colleges or universities.

Swift Detection

The process mimics how pirates themselves locate files but with a significant difference: speed. Media Sentry has automated the process by using scripting software that types in the songs, grabs the IP addresses, checks them, and forwards the information to the RIAA.

The RIAA’s first step against campus pirates is usually to send a Digital Millennium Copyright Act takedown notice, which asks the college to remove infringing content from its network.

In collecting evidence for those takedown notices, Media Sentry investigators do not usually download suspect music files. Instead, the company uses special software to check the “hash,” a sort of unique digital fingerprint, of each offered file to verify that it is identical to a copyrighted song file in the RIAA’s database. In the rare cases in which the hashes don’t match, the investigators download the song and use a software program sold by Audible Magic to compare the sound waves of the offered audio file against those of the song it may be infringing upon. If the Audible Magic software still doesn’t turn up a match, then a live person will listen to the song.

Based on that information, the RIAA will send a letter to the college asking for the song to be removed. The letter lists the name of the file and the date and time when Media Sentry investigators saw it available online.

On listservs and in interviews, some university administrators have recently questioned the validity of some of these takedown notices because they say they do not have any record of a download at the named IP address at the specified time.

Seeking Settlements

In more serious cases of piracy, the RIAA sometimes decides to send out “prelitigation settlement letters,” which asks alleged infringers to cough up several thousand dollars in lieu of going to court and potentially facing a much more expensive punishment.

Before sending out the prelitigation settlement letters, Media Sentry investigators always download music files believed to be infringing on licensed songs. Live human beings then listen to those songs to verify that the files are infringing. A letter goes out to the college with the date and time when investigators saw that the song was available for sharing.

While the process for generating both takedown notices and settlement letters is largely automated, the RIAA said that before each warning is sent out, a full-time RIAA employee reviews each case to make sure the claim is legitimate and that the alleged pirate is in the United States. Thanks to the speed and ease of the automated process, though, the RIAA is “able to identify hundreds of instances of infringement on a daily basis,” according to RIAA spokeswoman Cara Duckworth. She also acknowledged that the RIAA can tell only when a song is being offered for users to illegally download; investigators have no way of knowing when someone else is actually downloading the song.

“The automated takedown notice program we have right now is solely university-focused,” said the anonymous RIAA representative. “We’re trying to make universities aware that they have an issue with peer-to-peer file sharing on their network, and so we don’t send automated notices to commercial ISP’s, I think because they are generally aware that there’s a problem.”

The RIAA said it does not single out particular academic institutions to be “made examples of.”

“We have no capability of targeting any school at all,” said the RIAA representative, who argued that there is a large “misperception” among university administrators that individual colleges are being picked on. “Technically we can’t do it. We find what we find with this process, and that’s what we send to schools.”

So thats that. On the other hand you have Trent Reznor from Nine Inch Nails saying at Sydney Hordern Pavilion on September 16, 2007:

“Last time I was here, I was doing a lot of complaining about the ridiculous prices of CDs down here. And that story got picked up and got carried all around the world and now my record label all around the world hates me, because I yelled at them, I called them out for being greedy fucking assholes. I didn’t get a chance to check, has the price come down at all? I see a no, a no, a no… Has anyone seen the price come down? Okay, well, you know what that means – STEAL IT. Steal away. Steal and steal and steal some more and give it to all your friends and keep on stealin’. Because one way or another these motherfuckers will get it through their head that they’re ripping people off and that that’s not right.”

And hes making headlines for not just that!

Tren Reznor is not only breaking the old distribution model, he’s even breaking the newest, like Radiohead’s pay-what-you-want: Nine Inch Nails‘ latest album—The Slip—is 100% free, no payment required in any case, not even when you download the whooping 1.2GB version—which includes high definition WAVE 24/96 files (better-than-CD-quality 24bit 96kHz audio.) You can also choose from high-quality MP3s, FLAC lossless and M4A lossless. Note to record labels: drop dead.

Now how cool is that. I remember months back they are prolly the first group to release their album in Multitrack format! This allows anyone at all with access to the proper software to create their own remixes of these Nine Inch Nails songs. Recently, a new section has been added to the official Nine Inch Nails website to host remixes created by both fans and professionals alike; point your web browser to remix.nin.com to check it out! NIN is not just hot air as some pro-RIAA people might say, He is at the cutting-edge of music.

Cultural references to RIAA(source Wikipedia)

• “Weird Al” Yankovic’s single “Don’t Download This Song” satirizes the RIAA’s lawsuits against copyright infringers.
• The March 4, 2007 FoxTrot strip also satirized the RIAA’s lawsuits, where Jason tried to teach his iguana Quincy to download music, because “it’s one thing for them to go after single moms, widows, grandmothers, dead people and children… but sue an iguana?! That’d be insane!”
• MC Lars’s single “Download This Song” criticized the RIAA and the music industry in general, mentioning the RIAA’s lawsuits against “little kids downloading hit songs.”
• Billy Joel said in an interview that his first album Cold Spring Harbor wasn’t worth the money to buy, and urges people to steal it if they can manage it.
• After being asked to compose a Christmas Song safe for download Jonathan Coulton released ‘Podsafe Christmas Song’ which contained the lyrics “Don’t think us rude, we don’t want to get sued/ by the thugs at the RIAA”
• After the release of the album Year Zero, Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails told fans in Australia during tour to “STEAL IT. Steal away. Steal and steal and steal some more and give it to all your friends and keep on stealin’. Because one way or another, these motherfuckers will get it through their head that they’re ripping people off and that’s not right.” Renzor has openly opposed the RIAA, and later left Interscope, his record company at the time.

Just when was the last time you heard the word strategically in a song ? No really, why dont you try singing this line Your hat strategically dipped below one eye. See what i mean?

Nice song though, came across it while snooping in a friends scrapbook on orkut