TO ALL THE JUDGES OF AAP GOVERNANCE

My opinion is, don't give them 3-4 months for your judgement, judge them everyday, judge every action, they are answerable to all,
BUT
Listen to their answers, don't listen to media's opinion. A lot of us will be thinking that the Delhi cabinet is on Dharna to demand control of Delhi police. But, as per AK's interview over the weekend (here are the links)
http://www.ndtv.com/video/player/ndtv-special-ndtv-24x7/congress-will-soon-regret-support-to-aap-arvind-kejriwal-tells-ndtv/305854?video-mostpopular
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dd9AQeD9hxQ
they are going to dharna to demand for suspension of the police officers against whom there will be a judicial probe in the midnight raid controversy with Somnath Bharti; and related to two other cases. I am not sure about the law here, but I remember watching in movies that if there is an inquiry against any police office, he/she is suspended till the inquiry is over. That is what AK is demanding, suspension of the officials against whom the inquiry will be done. And yes, here is a little more for the people who think that Somnath Bharti did absolutely wrong that night, and police needs warrant for the raid...
"As Bharti has said, The Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act, 1956 allows a police officer to search premises without a warrant if the officer “has reasonable grounds for believing that an offence punishable under this Act has been or is being committed in respect of a person living in any premises, and that search of the premises with warrant cannot be made without undue delay.” The officer can also “remove from the premises all the persons found therein.” Such a search would require two “respectable inhabitants” of the locality and at least two women police officers to be present."
I have quoted this form the following source - http://preethidumpala.wordpress.com/2014/01/18/how-do-you-think-change-happens/   which infact is another good read. Yes, that blog post has personal opinions, which we may discard, but it has some good facts, which will be useful for us.

Apart from this, they demand control of Delhi Police, but they are not sitting on dharna for that. That is what AK clearly says in his interview, but is not made clear by the news article which we read and pass our judgement that he is not running the government properly.
And frankly, when we say he is not doing his work, we better point out what he is missing in his day's job. Also, most of the judges, you and me, we are like 25-30-35 yr old, have started taking interest in politics probably not more than a year back, have seen some ineffective governance in past, are we really capable to judge? We have only seen how an ineffective government works. We are probably not the best judge. But I believe, we should start judging, but with full information. Not by reading a couple of news articles. Another example, that why we all need to be more responsible is that the media have put photos of AK hugging Kapil Sibal only ( I saw this atleast in TOI), just to make the idea of AAP-Congress nexus stronger. But the truth is, that AK hugged BJP leader also in the same function. It was Eid function. But why should media bother to put the full truth?
My opinion is, if we have to judge, then WE should judge, don't let media judge, don't make your opinion on half news which you get to see. Read/watch the whole story, listen to AAP cabinet before deciding whether they are doing it right or wrong.

Here are some more links which might help you in judging AAP
http://ibnlive.in.com/news/aap-shows-complaints-by-residents-about-sex-drug-racket/446641-37-64.html
https://twitter.com/chirpingchuck/status/425247873228222466/photo/1/large
http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/read-letter-from-ugandan-high-commission-cited-by-aap-473194?curl=1390208163
http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/woman-from-ugandan-mission-thanked-us-arvind-kejriwal-473192?curl=1390208023

Rockstar

My version of the poster :D
The following text is not exactly a movie review. It is not for those who want to watch the movie in the near future as it will contain spoilers. You can refer this for the movie review.
I watched the movie today. Not among the best movies, but I did like cinematography and screenplay a lot. Though still found story a bit weak, as is the case with most of the bollywood movies these days. The movie-makers wants to show a lot of things, but always lack the strength of story which has to carry everything. I did not find the reasons strong enough for the actions.
This movie is about making of a Rockstar. As it is a bollywood movie, the making of rockstar has to involve a girl. Bollywood people should realise, it is not necessary that you always have a love interest for the protagonist in the movie. I would had been rather happy to see the journalist as the lead lady and our guy could have had some other reason and story. Two reasons for this suggestion - it would had been a nice change, and the other reason, which is a bigger reason, that girl Nargis does not know how to act. Yes, she can improve if she tries, but this performance was not acceptable at all. Ranvir Kapoor is surely going to be a big name in future. His performance was brilliant. He has been superb in all the movies in past too.
It was a good attempt, but at least in my view, the team failed to delivery what it (probably) is capable of, particularly the script writer(s).
According to me, the strengths were:
1) Ranvir Kapoor
2) Screen play
3) Cinematography
4) A.R. Rehman's music
And the weakness:
1) Nargis
2) Weak story and script
3) Total runtime
And yes, it reminded me of Delhi :). In almost all the scenes in the first half, I could not restrain myself from telling the person sitting next to me that this is Delhi Universoty, this is CP, this is where I live (Pitampura :)) and this is blah blah blah

PS: Yeah yeah, the main reason behind writing the complete post is the poster :)

Pie

Poor sun does not get its share of pie.. any guesses why??? (No PrIzE for guessing though)

APOGEE 2008 - Inside

A few names which come to my mind when I think of APOGEE 2008: (in psuedo-random order)
Gautam, Jyoti, Sumanth, Reeshav, Dhiraj, Ravindra, Divya, Vinay Soni, Pradeep, Ritesh, Raja, Sagnik, Ali, Rajat, Jeffery, Mohit, Gurukaran, Puri, Ankit Mittal, Shubham, Tarun.
Favourite moment: 11th March 2008 1400 hrs:
Lunch at Sky. Thinking about inaug... almost all the projects were working :). In all it should be 20+.
Scariest moment: 11th March 2008 0600 hrs:
I woke up. F*ck! Oh I am in chota wala lab (2138). Oh fish! Why was I sleeping.. Oh fish! what's the time? Oh fish! just 6 hours left for assoc room inaugration. Oh fish! We need to move all the stuff to the assoc rooms. Oh fish! Where are all the people? Gautam... uth saale... kuch kar... just 6 hours... kya kare.. oh fish! Tu kuch kar yaha... main hostel jaake logo ko utha ke lata hun. (Dub: Gautam... wake up... do something.. just 6 hours.. what to do..oh fish!... You do something here.. I'll go to hostel and get people from there.) Ring Ring... Hello Jyoti!.. tu kaha hai.. MB...abhi tak so rahi hai.. just 6 hours left. Jaldi aa... main hostel jaake logo ko utha ke lata hun (Dub: Ring Ring... Hello Jyoti!.. where are you.. Meera Bhawan...sleeping till now.. just 6 hours left. Come soon..I'll go to hostel and get people from there. )
Funniest moment: 13th March 2008 0930 hrs:
Explaining the projcet to the judge; and I was wearing cargo ( it should be called pyjama actually) and T-shirt which read "I am Kind of a Big Deal" :D. Actually I was supposed to change before the judging seesion, was on the way to hostel to do the same at around 0845 hrs. But then got to know that judges have already arrived, so aborted the plan and went back. (I am not too sure of the date for this one :D)
Five things which make me happy as Co-ord, Instrumentation Forum, APOGEE 2008:
- Assocs collaborated to conduct events
- Over two-thirds of the projects on the display in our assoc were working. ( Generally percentage is pretty low)
- Good participation from all three batches in our assoc (don't expect anything from psenti-semites)
- Our assoc had two rooms full of projects and workshops
- Our Group leader called me after Val-D to congratulate us
Five things which don't make me happy as Co-ord, Instrumentation Forum, APOGEE 2008:
- The events were not handled so well by Instru assoc.
- Wireless Quest (new event, required particiapants to design radio receiver) failed even after the (not-so :P) hard work
- Abstract submission was vague. Only projects which were being done seriously should had been submitted. Inspite of my efforts to do so, finally it dint happen properly.
- Guest lectures were not given due attention
- Publicity was not so effective.

APOGEE 2008

Well, its time for APOGEE 2010, but alas, I am lagging by two years. Lets not wait further, lets do it this time. APOGEE 2008. Truly, one of the most memorable events of my life and I am sure that it will remain so even at the time of APOGEE 2050. APOGEE i.e. A Professions Oriented Gathering over Educational Experience is the national (rather, its international now) level inter-college technical festival hosted by BITS Pilani.

At the time of APOGEE 2008, it was in my third year, and I was the co-ordinator for Instrumentation Forum ( association of students of Electronics and Instrumentation ). So I was responsible for all the activities of Instru assoc for APOGEE 2008. We were some 70+ students. Together we organized guest lectures; technical events (Parishod, Open hardware, Virtuosity, Garovista, Siddhi, Wireless Quest, Breadstroming, Quintronics) in collaboration with some other assocs; workshops; and we prepared some prize winnig projects :).

Events... lets not discuss it. I accept that we could had done better in organization of the events. But projects and workshops.. they were the highlights.. that is what made the APOGEE 2008 memorable, atleast for me.

Workshops - we conducted two workshops - One on MEMS and another one on Industrial Automation. These were not professional workshops. It was like students (primarily first year, guided by third year students) study and present some (not necessarily :P) new technical topic to the junta during APOGEE. So one group prepared on Micro Electro-Mechanical Systems and the other group prepared on Industrial Automation. Both the groups had some 8-10 furst year students guided by 1-2 third year student(s). The MEMS group studied the various concepts/processes involved in MEMS and explained it with one example (I think it was Cantilever). They were planning to use some software tool called Sugar, but I don't remember if they finally did it or not. The other Industrial Automation Group prepared a working model of Tile Industry. They integrated it with LabVIEW also. The model showed the various staged involved in manufacturing a tile. In reality, manufacturing of tiles invlove very high temperatures for baking and stuff. So this was just a model, and it prepared models of tiles :D. It was working in the sense that there was a conveyor belt, controlled by motor, some other moving parts like a 'heavy' weight which can be moved up and down, and is used to flaten the stuff to form tiles and so on. Both of them got reasonably good response.

Projects - This was the thing. Our show in Project competition was lot better than previous times :). We won first prize in Automation for 'Digital Display'; first in Industrial Processes and Automation for 'Automation of Tile Industry'; first in Signal Processing for 'Speech Controlled Wheel Chair'; and second in Signal Processing for 'Automated Linesman'. Apart from project competition, some projects won prizes in events too - first in Siddhi ( in the module which required a robot to imitate some biological organ/organism ) for 'Octapod'; and first in Open Hardware for 'Speech Controlled Wheel Chair'. Apart from the winners, some other projects were - Surface Colour Plotter, Robotic Arm, Free Space Optics (this was inspired from my and gautam's first APOGEE's project), GRID - Automated Path Tracking Robot, Writing robo, Automated Machine Error Detection System, PoleClimber, Table Ice Hockey, Breaks Unleashed, etc. Most of these project plus may other whose name I dont remember (sorry) were working :). I was really happy and satisfied as we had more than 20 projects in working condition.

I'll upload the photos on some online album and update the link in this post soon.

This all was just data. And obviously I remember something more than just data from this memorable event. If I post it here, it will be too long post, so lets split it. I'll 'blog' and not report in my next post on APOGEE 2008.

DSP yes DSP no

Actually I would had preferred starting with APOGEE 2008 or Speech Controlled Wheel Chair, thoose two are my favoutrite. But they'll need some visual effects, and right now I am in my office and I don't have them.
So lets move on to this one...
DSP yes was till third year, rather till my placements started in the seventh semester. I was really interested in DSP, Communication Systems and related stuff. Actually I still am. But at that point of time, I wanted to make my career in DSP. I feel really bad to admit, but the main reason for DSP yes was that I felt microelectronics is out of my reach. So, at that time, I decided not to step in microelectronics. The second best option was DSP and Communication. Moreover, my profile also suits pretty well for this field. It includes my APOGEE projects - Free Space Optics ,Specch Controlled Wheel Chair; my formal projects - Advanced Experiments in Telecom Networks, Reconfigurable Architecture for Turbo Encoders for Software Defined Radio; and my electives - Mobile Telecommunication Networks, Telecom Switching Systems and Networks, Digital Signal Processing, Digital Communication. With all this, it seems I am deeply interested in DSP and Communications, which is obviously true.
But I still thought of VLSI, particularly Analog. It feels more electrical than DSP/Communication which has signals, statistics, algorithms.
Then came Placements. The best thing they did to me was helped me believe that I can, I can get into VLSI. The first big relief came with nVidia :), no I was not hired, but I was among the six shortlisted for interview. That time I realised that Digital VLSI is definitely not that difficult. The end was even better, Cosmic Circuits Pvt. Ltd. selected me :) It works in Analog VLSI, we'll talk about in detail some other time.
But this was really the turning point, and boy, I am enjoying this DSP no world :)
Rishi Mathur
Design Engineer
Cosmic Circuits Pvt. Ltd.

Flashback... the one I missed

I really feel sorry for the injustice I did to the HITS and MISSES I had in my third and final year. They are numorous, and that is why I didn't get time to post.
Today, I am slightly free, but could not get anything to write on, so now I have decided... next few posts will be the flashback, things which I missed out.
Sneak Preview: APOGEE 2008, Speech Controlled Wheel Chair, DSP yes DSP no, Welcome to VLSI, Tips and tricks for placements, What is instrumentation?,...
The order is not decided, and some other stuff might be there in between.

Bengaluru

So, now with the new status, as happens with all the other engineers, I am too in Bengaluru. This is the place even Mr. Obama is a little afraid off :D

Well well, it has been three weeks here. And I am really liking the place. I guess one reason that strengthens this liking is definitely that I dont actually frequently go to the inner parts of the city. People say that traffic there is total disaster. I am living and working outside the outer ring road, so life's good :)

The best thing about Bengaluru.. definitely its weather. That is the prime reason it is the silicon valley and IT hub of India.
And the other things which I like are : better public transport (as compared to delhi). But till now, I havnt encountered such a situation, even in peak rush hours, that you donot find any place in any of the buses. Yeah, a few of them are really crowded, but you'll atleast have an option to pay more and travel in a volve :).

Anyway, it has only been three weeks, I guess it will take me some more time to experience the real bengaluru.

Here is a list of places I have been to in these past three week:
Bengaluru International Airport
AECS Layout ( in Kundalahalli)
Marathahalli
Cosmos Mall at ITPL road
BTM Layout
Murgesh Palya
Hotel Leela Palace
Koramangla
The Forum Mall
Total Mall
LifeStyle
Garuda Mall
ChurchStreet (Java City and a not so impressive Empire restaurent)
Shopper's Stop near Jayadeva
Barbeque Nation, IndiraNagar

This is primarily east, central and south bengaluru... let see when do I see the other parts. Anyway, I guess this is a pretty good start :D

Status Update

Again, its been a long long time, as always. And yeah, few things did happen in this long long time. I am now an Engineer (provisional :P, not yet received the degree, just the provisionla certificate) Anyway, people do trust that to, so I guess for all the practical purposes, I am a Bachelor of Engineering (honours) in Electronics and Instrumentation.

Super Human - Homo Sapiens 2.0

The following thoughts come to my mind due to 'Pharyngytes' ( must be misspelled here, from which I am suffering now. A throat infection. And because of that, I had fever and bodyache also. And now a days, as one of my friends is doing MBBS, each time a health issue comes up, I discuss it with my friend and try to understand it better. But yeah, this practice, I have started lately only, so, don't have much knowledge yet. And yes, this is the perfect time, as I don't have perfect knowledge, so I can put in my curiosity in my blog :) I had read this some years back, in Gen B ( read general biology, my course in first semester in bits) that these like fever, swelling etc, are body's reaction to some foreign activities. By this, our body tries to kill the intruders ( or maybe its just an alarm in some cases). And yes, we take them as symptoms of some abnormality and try to cure by killing the intruders, generally by correct medicines. Now, what I am wondering is, biological creatures do evolve.. and there are a few diseases which almost all the human suffer atleast once in their lives (in general), say throat infection, or common cold ( or is it just a symptom :O), viral fever (infection). And our body does react to it (fever, body-ache etc). So our body knows that such bad boys ( viruses, bacteria do exists). I reacts in a general way to them all, say increasing the body temperature, or swelling of throat, or so on. Now, after repeated attacks, our body should be able to identify the intruders and also the perfect way to destroy them ( this may require some iterations ( intelligent or plain hit and trials, as per the adaptation theoery says)). So, then, our DNA must be reprogrammed ( read evolution/adaptation) to handle these viruses more efficiently. And the ultimate state will be when as soon as the body is attacked, quickly (maybe within hours), or body is able to destroy them completely and we are back to normal. So this way, these common ailments should just vanish. And hey, it is definitely possible, we all know ( i hope so), that there was a time that mosquitoes were killed using DDT, but after repeated use, they became resistant to it. So, I guess we human should also become resistant to these repeated attacks of viruses. Fine, maybe the DDT used each time was excatly same, and the viruses causing common cold vary a little in different attacks. So, maybe we take more time to adapt... but how much.. maybe a few hundred generations, that might mean some ten thousand years, or maybe some hundred thousand or a million year... But with my limited knowledge, I do believe that we will evolve to super humans, and the next version, Homo Sapiens 2.0 wil be free of these bugs..err... biological ailments.. :P (yeah I am an engineering guy :P) So, hey people in the development team, just improve the DNA code a little bit more, and we are surely going to be better. PS : Well, it might take some time to settle down some bigger bugs , but I guess they can also be handled.

And again.. long time.. no see.. Anyway, some random pics from E:\My Pictures\Kinda technical\Instru forum\motors

Some from E:\My Pictures\Kinda technical\Instru forum

These are random pics, and no details willl be provided.

Foggy pilani

So, here's a real post.. :P
Well yeah, this one's also a shortcut as such.. :D
Anyways... you'll enjoy...:)

CLACK... i mean.. CLOCK TOWER

That's the Art n Dee structure for Oasis 2008

And a not-so-random tree in C-lawns

Krishna Marg. By the way, all these pictures were clicked by yours truely, on 10th of December 2008, between 0720hrs and 0740 hrs.

The road opposite clock tower, between C lawns and D lawns.

And it is gone...

Another shot, same place.

And this is Bhagirath Marg

Brave girl, and a brave lady...

Happy New Year

Oh, finally.. my post :) I sue 2008 for emotional distress, mental trauma, and character assassination; and above that all, for freezing my fingers every time I typed something in this text box under New post. Yeah, I am not joking, this really happened. And I was threatened that if I let this secret out, something really really weird will happen to fourth finger of my left foot. But finally the jinx IS OVER. :) And, yes my sweet lord, now I'll be writing many more posts :) My new year gift to me :)

I am still here

I know its been a loooooooooooooooooooong looooooooooooooon time since I have blogged. Past one and a half year was a bit heavy. Anyways, few more days. Yesterday I sat for first exam of the last examinations before I graduate. A few more days, around 10-12, and I'll be bit more relaxed. Then will continue this blog, definitely.

#define QUESTION (bb)||(!bb)

Its the first weekend this academic year. First week, fine, had one tut quiz already :(.
Right now, I do have time, but feeling a bit lazy to write something.
So, maybe, This will do...

Top Ten Reasons To Date an Engineer
1. The world does revolve around us... We pick the coordinate system.
2. Find out what those other buttons on your calculator do.
3. We know how to handle stress and strain in our relationships.
4. Parents will approve.
5. Help with your math homework.
6. Can calculate head pressure.
7. Looks good on a resume.
8. Free body diagrams.
9. High starting salary.
10.Extremely good looking


Top Ten Reasons NOT to Date an Engineer
1. T-shirt and jeans are their formal dress. Hot dog and a six-pack is their seven-course meal.
2. The only social life known of is to post and talk on the net.
3. Flames like a monster and speaks like a pussycat.
4. Works from 6:30am to 7:30pm daily. No morning kisses and no evening walks.
5. No matter how hard you cry and how loud you yell, he just sits there calmly discussing your emotion in terms of mathematical logic.
6. Only listens to classic rock. Hates everything from Bach to Prince.
7. Touches his car more often than you.
8. Talks in acronyms.
9. Can't leave that damn pencil off his ear for a minute.
10.Will file a divorce if you call him in the middle of debugging.


FIND OF THE DAY : You can't spell Geek without EE

Courtesy : http://www.gdargaud.net/Humor/Engineer.html

PS: In case you didnt get the title, try to think of a famous english author.. of medieval times.. his famous words...

Such a small world

Yesterday, I went with my mom and dad to visit some old neighbours of ours, "the Sharma's". It was nice, meeting them after about three years or so. Before that, we were neighbours for some five+ years.
Though I didnot had that much fun, which I thought I could. Almost throughout, it was like mom busy with aunt, dad with uncle, and me, and their two kids, just watching them, and smiling in between.
When we were about to leave, some of their relative dropped in. The troop wasn't a big one, consisted just of uncle's sister, and her daughter-in-law. Then, again a little general discussion started.
The daughter-in-law was newly wed, maybe a few months or so. So, then a little discussion about where did she is from. They moved in Delhi just about two years ago. 'Where in Delhi??', 'Mayur Vihar', came the answer. Apparently, we were also in Mayur Vihar, some two years back. So, next so obvious question from my mom, "Which phase???", "Phase-II" was the reply. "OOOooo.... even we were in phase-II"; "Which pocket??", "Pocket-B"; "Oh oh..even we were in pocket-B, there was this Bal Bhavan School, my son was there only /* referring to me.. :D */, and there was this 'Neelam mata ka mandir' ". "Yeah.." said she. Now, the next question was flat number. She said "161-A". I was relived a bit, I thought she lived in same house as ours.. :P. But hey, this wasn't far from ours', we were in 167-B. /* A for ground floor, B for first floor, and not blocks or something, so it was pretty close */. I was thinkin it was close enough. But I was proven wrong in a little while.
There was a little discussion between her and my mom, about there that person lived and blah blah blah. And in that discussion only, she said "We were in 166-B for a little while". Now, that house was just next to us, and that you say 'close enough'. They moved into that 166-B just a few days before we left our 167-B. And guess what, my mom and she have had some conversation at that time also. And now they remembered every bit of it. And even I did, I saw that young girl once or twice in her balcony, though she looked pretty different than at present. At that time only, she once enquired, through my mom, for she was trying to get a job in Bal Bhavan, my school. I told her, its not a nice place; it actually is not, specially not for teachers. Anyways, we are not discussion my school.
But the thing is, wow, I have never been in such a co-incidence. It was close.
Really, such a small world.


FIND OF THE DAY : I am extraordinarily patient, provided I get my own way in the end.

My new fan

Yesterday, got up at around 1000 hrs. Thanks, my PS is over :).

Around 1300 hrs, I was sitting in front of this stupid machine, called computer, as usual; when my mother called me, and asked me to get a little stuff from the mother dairy. /* In case you are not a delhite, by mother dairy I am referring to government run shops which sell milk products and vegetables */. I had to comlpete the job before 1400 hrs, when the shop gets closed, so, after lazing around for a while, I went there, and this is where I met my new fan :).

I was supposed to get some tomatoes and potatoes, /* gen sabji bhaji */. I 'selected' them, put them into a basket, and was waiting for my turn. There was a girl, getting some onions and tomatoes. And there on the other side, was my new fan, the salesperson. While weighing her stuff, he weighed the onions, and then tomatoes. Though such activities are generally not much interesting to observe, but it was interesting to see that one single tomato weighed 300 gms. Both the salesman, and that girl were a bit amazed, but anyways, out of all those tomotoes which she selected for herself, she took only one, weighing 300 gms. I guess she had to get 250 gms of them.
I also had collected a few, intending to take home around 500 gms of those. I also had a packet of potatoes. I weighed my potatoes, on the other machine, it read 1.250 kgs. Anyways, the girl was over with her stuff, and cash transaction followed. She was still managing the change, when I put my potatoes on the machine which the salesman had. It read 1.500 kgs. Now, this was ambiguous. I immediately prompted, and then the salesman realised, he did not set the zero properly. And this solved the mystery of that single tomato weighing 300 gms. After my potatoes, the girl's stuff was weighed again. The salesman was smiling at me, ' sir, aapne bataya na hota to aaj to aise hi jaata'. I smiled back. The girl, she also must had been smiling, but damn, that salesperson was talking to me, and I couldn't look at her :(.
Now, the girl was again packing her stuff, about to leave. I put my tomatoes forward, and instructed the salesman, 'bhaiya, aadha kilo kar dena'. He put all those tomatoes on the machine, and the digital display read "0.500 kgs". And this was more than enough to make him my fan. 'aapke haathon mein to jaddo hai'. I again smiled back to him. And yeah, even I was thinking, 'kamaal hai, eggjactly half kg :P'. The girl, she was at some distance now, else I could had expected a 'girl fan' also... :D


FIND OF THE DAY : People have the right to be stupid. Some people abuse that privilege

I am dead sure.. no one is gonna read my previous post.. such a long one... that happens when you are too lazy, and stop posting regularly. ANyways, who cares, mayb I'll read that, five years down the line... :P

50% engineer?? Definitely!!!

Its been pretty long time since I wrote something by myself on the blog. Well, was a lil' busy with PS thing.
Yeah, I am gonna describe it in brief.
PS a.k.a. Practice School.
Its one of its kind programme at BITS, Pilani. I am not too sure, but I guess in India atleast, no other institute offers such a nice way of industrial training to its students. We have PS-I, after second years, during the summer break, for around 55 days. There is PS-II, six month long, in the final year.
So, it was PS-I for me this summer. Somewhere around in march, we were told about the various centres all over the country where PS-I will be conducted. All 800 students from my batch were to fill in the preference order, and were alloted one of those 'practice stations'; as per merit and the preferences.
I got Centre for Railway Information Systems, Delhi /* to be referred as CRIS, here onwards */. It was my first preference. Reason number one, it was in Delhi /* :) */, and I expected there must be some interesting thing to learn there. /* damn, I lie big time, the secondary reason was its location in delhi, south delhi, the posh area... close to DU south campus.. :P */.
Anyways, I had one of my ex-wingie also at this centre... that's cool.
So, this PS-I thing was to start on 24th may'07. Now, as I told you, this unique thing in our insti, they had a few more arrangements for us. Each centre had one instructor /* read : faculty member */ and one student co-instructor /* a third yearite */. By the rule book, these two persons were to look after our training, they had to come regularly to the centre(s) assigned to them. And if they go by the rule book, its sure is not a good news for the students, like me.. :P. And it pretty much wasn't in my case. And apart from that, in this period of 54 odd days, we had two quizes /* written tests */, two group discussions, report submission and seminar, in the midterm, and at the end also. These were the arrangements made by our insti for us. This all sounds a bit wierd, but that's the way it is, for us.
We had to strictly follow the timings, 0930 hrs to 1730 hrs, five days a week. I took just one leave. A bit hard for a BITSian... :P. But, yeah, it helped in see the professional one. Though CRIS was a government organisation, it would had been different scenario had it been a private organization, still, it was all professional. On the second day of our PS, we eight people were alloted various departments, as per our interests. In a nutshell, CRIS takes care of all the IT related work for Indian Railways. So, it had much of software engineers in there. But, yours truely, being a eletronics student, is not much interested in that. So, I went to the telecom department. And it wasn't that a bad place. Though it mainly was about networking only, still, I loved the name 'telecom', which
sounds more of electronics, than computers :P.
It was for the first time that BITS had a training centre in CRIS. So, there were no such special arrangements there. Anyhow, we started our training. For a first few days, just saw the networking facilities there... saw the network devices, routers, switched, and the web servers hosting indian railways websites like irctc, trainenquiry, were also there. There were database servers also in the complex, bhramha and vishnu. It was pretty nice to see them. Now, we were to be alloted some project to work over for next 50 odd days. This department didnt had any special project or something going, where we 50% engineers could had contributed. So, it was almost decided that we'll be doing some study based project only. Later on, they asked us to make a little software to help them generate reports for network maintenance. So, it was like, we were three people in telecom departments, yours truely, Piyush, and Neha /* the latter names from BITS Pilani goa campus */. And we had two projects, one that software thing, and one analytic one, analysis of the next STARS network implemented by CRIS in Andaman and Nicobar. I am not going in any detail of them, not because its a state secret or something, but I dont want to. Yours truely and Piyush were on the analytic one, while Neha was handling the software thing, in which I also contributed unofficially. I would like to share my experience in that software development also, maybe sometime later.
Anyways... we showed our engineering skills pretty well all through the training. The two quizes, light, the two GD's, light. But yeah, that seminar and report thing, it did require some amount of energy to be spent.
The midterm report... it wasn't much trouble some for me, I prepared it one telecommunication basics, the thing I am pretty much interested in. Enjoyed preparing that report. And seminar, it didnt had much to worry about the presentation, but I had to prepare the slides also. But it was bit easy with the report already prepared. I started to work on the presentation at around 2200 hrs the previous night, and completed it by 1330 hrs. It went pretty well, but the audience was not from this field, it could had been better.
And the final presentation, the senior most person from telecom department was going to be there. It was bit scary also... that guy... I mean sir, I am pretty much impressed with his knowledge, and his attitude toward us also. And we were pretty scared for he definitely was going to cross question. We divided the presentation among two of us. The presentation, was not that bad, but boring for other trainees, who were from other departments. Though at that time I thought, not my fault, its never gonna interest them. But later on I realised, I should had made it interesting for those people also. Anyway, our fear, he did cross questioned both of us. A few we were able to answer back, in some, he shared his 'gyaan' with us. But at the end, he said he was pretty much impressed by the way we organised the stuff, and the way we presented, it was really good for students of our level, still wondering if that was just to flatter us. Anyway, the final presentation was over. Just that crappy report left. That day, we went to play pool, eight people, one table, half hour, it was much of fun there.
2-3 days more, now this report didnt interest me much, as I was sure that no one is going to give a shit for it. Completed it, got it printed, got a few things wrong, our prof almost threw the report at my face, not literally, the pages were not binded, and he realised it on time, thank god, else I would had been collecting them from the floor. Anyways, thanks to the co-instructor, a student like us :), she helped correcting it. Soon came the last day, we submitted the report, completed the formalities.. and yeah.. PS was over...and now its history
our second year was over...

50% engg??
I don't judge it by the grades, but by the way we ahdnled things at PS. All the work started at deadline, completed at extended deadline... :)
I sure am showing signs of a good engineer.. :)


FIND OF THE DAY : History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon.

Some more engineering humour.. :P

What is said...
What it means

A number of different approaches are being tried...
We don't know where we're going, but we're moving.

An extensive report is being prepared on a fresh approach to the problem...
We just hired three guys.. We'll let them kick it around for a while.

Developed after years of intensive research...
It was discovered by accident.

Modifications are underway to correct certain minor difficulties...
We threw the whole thing out and are starting from scratch.

Preliminary operational tests were inconclusive...
The darn thing blew up when we threw the switch.

Test results were extremely gratifying...
It works, and boy are we surprised !

The design will be finalized in the next reporting period...
We haven't started this job yet, but we've got to say something.

The entire concept is unworkable...
The only guy who understood the thing just quit.

We need close project coordination...
We should have asked someone else.
Alternate: Let's spread the responsibility for this.


Reference
[1] gdargaud

I know, its been quite sometime since I wrote something by myself. But seems good days are over. A few engineering experiences of my own will soon follow. Not good for you, huh!!! But good for me... :D

FIND OF THE DAY : I am really really lazy... seems engineer inside me is coming to full power.. :D