Wii, Mii and Lots of fun.

Back in 2006 , I had this little prediction when Wii was just coming out that it will be a huge hit though I was owning an XBOX at that time.I did not buy a Wii for a long time initially because my good friend Jacob and I play on weekends with his son Dennis . Then later on I did not want to spend crazy money on ebay or Amazon to get hold of one. The part where being an MVP you get games at a discount from the MS Store also added to my XBOX affiliation. The starting of the year had some darstic changes prompted by one of my new year resolution to lose some extra pounds. Well not that I have not taken this resolution in the past , but have never been committed to it . But this time there is more than a few pounds of steak but more prides at stake ( my lame attempt to make it rhyming hm..! ) .Most of you who know me , know about my crazy cousins too . This time we have turned it into our own version of the biggest loser with online tracking and statistics . Check it out here .

What does all that got to do with Wii. Well after weighing in for the initial base weight and agreeing on percantage weight loss achieved as our winning criteria . There is a prize for total weight loss too clearly skewed in favour of the big guys, I came back to NY and realized in Jan that I am actually going the other way that is (gulp!) gaining ! . Well now once a game is on , it's on . Probably all that good food at home and the amount of stuff that gets packed for you by family , that you are literally hoping no one opens your bags in airport :-) lest they suspect you are opening a mini indian store
So my game plan came down to this , Cut my gym membership! yeah sounds crazy ! I realized I was not going there as often as I used to and I had many excuses to bunk , Too much work at office, too cold, too chilly , cant clear the snow today morning, will start from next week , my fingers are hurting, Headache , I am really creative here sometime when my wife pushes me to get going. My favorite one I want to play with Adithi our little one , sure to hit home. :-).

Well my strategy was if something has not worked before , find out what is the base reason , In my case I realized what it is , "I plain hate excercise". The very thought of excercising turns me off. There is no intellectual stimulation , neither do I think that is a valuable use of say an hour in your day. The next thing I could do is to play some outdoor games which I really like but being in Corning where you have winter/cold for almost six months does not help . So that boils down to playing an outdoor game indoors or finding a new job. This is exactly where Wii comes in, I have been playing wii for about an hour 2 month now and I have been noticing that I am losing weight and havnig a lot of fun. Binitha also have picked up on wii tennis , she normally does not like video games and Adithi laughs like crazy when she sees both of us making those funny actions and jumping from one part of the room to another swingin and shouting . We are having lots of fun.. I recommend the wii for all you people out there who like games but hate excercise like me . Let me know your wii stories...

The year end approaching

The holidays are here , we are into thanksgiving week and we will soon be into christhmas, As usual we take off the foot of the gas pedal and enjoy the slower pace of life. Here in Corning it snowed yesterday and I had to get my winter coat out. somehow that marks the holiday season for me , the white christhmas .
For me it is also a time for introspection as I take a vacation and travel all the way around the world to meet my loved ones . This year has been special from all perspective , both in the technology world with me being re-awarded as BizTalk MVP for the second consecutive year and personally with the birth of our little daughter Adithi . She has changed our world in more ways than I could imagine.

Well this is probably the last post for the year as I am off to India tomorrow . The blog is also completing 6 years , starting in 2001 when I was in London when blogging was not yet the phenomenal craze as we see it today . It has been a great experience writing these thoughts in the digital life.

Eco Friendly Houses



Now this is one house I would like to stay in ..

Fall Roses

It is that time of the year , Fall , For those of you in upstate , there are lot of Maple leaves lying on the road , Here is a way to make roses from Maple leaves

So this is really FALLing for a Rose :-)

Get The Movie Fonts you like

Ever seen a movie font and then wanted to write something using that font ..
Well now here is a site that lets you download some popular movie fonts

Check out Type Now

Passage of Time

Today I found an old picture on my brothers orkut profile page. I have often mentioned in my posts about the lot of cousins that I have and I have infact posted some recent photos as well
But this one is probably the oldest I think that is there in color and it does bring back sweet and scary memories of childhood. we did some crazy things and if you see more than 3 of us together that usually meant trouble is brewing .. and more than 4 of us quiet means a volcano is exploding ...
Well now all in this picture is working and will never connect who is who ?
Can you guess Who is who ? Maybe you can start by trying to find me ?





If you found out then post a comment

Adithi Wants the Pc too.. Can I try that papa..

Indian NetFlix

Looks like online movie rentals are on a roll in India. They emulate the popular netflix style of watching and renting you rmovie at home .
http://www.seventymm.com/Browse/Default.aspx

The difference seems that the company has adapted it to the indian Market by doing free delivery and pickup . The plans look a little steep at 199 and 599 for unlimited movie but every friends you refer brings down your price by 1/6 , effectevily using viral marketing . They have also got a round of venture capital investment . Will be interesting to watch this one . Presently this is offered in delhi , bombay, chennai and bangalore

Adithi


Kids are miracles from heaven . we had our little Miracle on Aprill 11 2007 ;our little daughter Adithi, In a few weeks my life has tottally changed , Unlike many people who say there will be so much stress once you get kids ,strangely i find myself more at peace , That is not to say she is not waking up in the night or anything ,but watching these little ones are truly a different experience . The experience of parenthood is definitely enlightening .

I have her pictures here http://www.abhilash.in/adithi/adithi.htm

Indian MVP's at the summit


Thanks to Abhishek kant our India MVP Lead for getting all of us together for this nice photograph . I guess there were around 35 MVP's from India who were at the summit . It was great to meet these folks who represented various facets of IT and who were working on such diverse stuff . The euphoria and the upbeatness of the professionals is amazing.

I was fortunate to meet so many MVP's from different parts of India working on so many different things

MVP Summit 2007 coming up

The summit is here and I am excited . This will be my first time at the summit and I am excited to meet a lot of my netizens in person . It is a great opportunity to interact with a lot of great minds . I should be posting on my technical blog soon .

The Future of Human Computer Interaction ..

It is marvellous how future human computer interaction will be so immersive where the interface almost completely disappears . As Jeff Han puts it . There is no reason that in this era we should conform to a physical device that .. Check this video on multi touch displays out

India and 49-O NO VOTE

One day morning I get an email forward in my group mailing list . It did take me by surprise . Read the email

Did you know that there is a system in our constitution, as per the 1969 act, in section "49-O" that a person can go to the polling booth, confirm his identity, get his finger marked and convey the presiding election officer that he doesn't want to vote anyone!

Yes such a feature is available, but obviously these seemingly notorious leaders have never disclosed it. This is called "49-O".

Why should you go and say "I VOTE NOBODY"... because, in a ward, if a candidate wins, say by 123 votes, and that particular ward has received "49-O" votes more than 123, then that polling will be cancelled and will have to be re-polled. Not only that, but the Candidature of the contestants will be removed and they cannot contest the re-polling, since people had already expressed their decision on them.

This would bring fear into parties and hence look for genuine candidates for their parties for election. This would change the way, of our whole political system... it is seemingly surprising why the election commission has not revealed such a feature to the public....

Please spread this news to as many as you know... Seems to be a wonderful weapon against corrupt parties in India... show your power, expressing your desire not to vote for anybody, is ven more powerful than voting... so don't miss your chance.

So either vote, or vote not to vote (vote 49-O) and pass this information. ..

"Please forward this to as many as possible, so that we, the people of India , can really use this power to save our nation" use your voting right for a better INDIA .

Well that did shook me up , is that true is there such a provision truly available , knowing some of our politicians I wouldn't put it past them but not all apples are rotten we have some gem of politicians . Also why is Indian press silent the hallmark of democracy free speech take 50 + years to find this . Of course pre - internet era would have taken days to figure out if this is true and a visit to library but thaks to Right to Information Act and Digitalisation of archives . I have some news .The story above is well half true .


First I found the electoral hand book online , I could not find any references here . I noticed that this was a 1998 edition .
I dug up somemore and found the 2006 edition of the Handbook

I found what I was looking for ..

I attach the following section from 47.1



47.1. If an elector, after his electoral roll number has been duly entered in the Register of Voters (Form 17A) and he has put his signature/thumb impression
on that register, decides not to record his vote, he shall not be forced or
compelled to record his vote. A remark to the effect that he has decided not to
record his vote – “Refused to Vote” - shall be made in the remarks column
against the entry relating to him in the Register of Voters by the Presiding
Officer and the signature or thumb impression of the elector shall be obtained
against such remark under rule 49-O. It shall not be necessary to make any
change in the serial number of the elector or of any succeeding elector, in
column 1 of the Register of voters.

The relevant section 49-O is taken from THE CONDUCT OF ELECTIONS RULES, 1961


49-O. Elector deciding not to vote.-If an elector, after his
electoral roll number has been duly entered in the register of voters
in Form-17A and has put his signature or thumb impression thereon as
required under sub-rule (1) of rule 49L, decided not to record his
vote, a remark to this effect shall be made against the said entry in
Form 17A by the presiding officer and the signature or thumb
impression of the elector shall be obtained against such remark.


This part is indeed true . Now the rest of the piece where the election is declared invalid and The candidates rejected has no basis and I cant seem to find such a reference anywhere

This also seems a bit illogical consider a polling constituency with Votebase of 20,000

Let us say the results are like this

Candidate A- 7000
Candidate B – 6999
Candidate C - 2000
NO VOTE ( unders section 49-O) – 2
People who did not come to vote – 3999

Total = 20,000

In this case as per Rule above the election should be invalid ,By just 2 people deciding to excericse the said option.The whole election is declared invalid and candiates A , B , C are rejected is nonsense . On what basis is A , B and C rejected .
Now the idea might arouse some legitamacy in a situation where the polling percentage is high for NO VOTE situation say a scenario where

Candidate A- 100
Candidate B – 99
Candidate C - 51
NO VOTE ( unders section 49-O) – 15000
People who did not come to vote – 4750
Total = 20,000



Interestingly Also As per rule let us say A and B had 7000 votes each leading to a tie as per rule the inner is decided by a lot .There is still a winner and clearly a result

See 32


32. EQUALITY OF VOTES

If two or more candidates contesting for any seat happen to secure the
highest number of votes and their votes are equal in number, the result will
be decided by lot.


I now assume this was a well concieved hoax at best ,but albiet a thought provoking one . I hope this was informative . Comments are higly welcome

Winning the Fantasy Football

This was my first Fantasy football year . When I decided to play fantasy football I did not think much except to learn American football. I was a little clueless to the whole game. I started out reading about the whole rules in wikipedia. Love wiki for this kind of stuff.

We had two divisions in our league which was run by Dave savage. The Alpha and Omega division.
The first hurdle was draft . With not too much knowledge on players I put the picking up on Autodraft. Sometimes I trust the statistics too much and infinite computing power or AI . Ever read Kasparov vs Deep Blue . I knew I was not going to get the best pick knowing statistics are not always up to date but I would get a decent pick. I came away from the draft with a couple of decent player but some of them were prone to injuries as I later discovered.

My initial 2 weeks went without much ado and I won them . From week 2 I saw injuries to Trent Green . Thereon I started managing my roster a little replacing players on bye with players from the bench .

Week 3 had me playing with an eventual division winner from the Alpha division .I was on omega division. The guy had L Tomilson who I guess is going to be the Most valuable player in the NFL this year with career numbers . I lost week 3 .

I had a 4 week winning streak after that . By this time I have started actively managing my players due to loss of key players like Trent Green . Clinton Portis , Daunte Culpebber , Lamont Jordan. But I had Donavan Mcnabb and Ravens Defense earning me my bulk of my points . Then a low phase followed, In the following weeks I had lost 4 of my 6 games and I lost Mcnabb to add to my growing troubles . But this low phase really helped me research and pick out future stars. I won the division with an 8-5 which got me a first round bye.

Week 2 into playoff I played Thomas ( The Edge guy) and that was a tough match up .He had key players but most of my new picks were now peaking into form this included Ladell Betts and Jeff Garcia whom I picked from Free agency when they were starters. That week going into sunday night game I was up by 5 points with one kicker scores yet to come in for both of us . The game saw Thomas kicker score 12 points and lead me by 7 points. So I needed my kicker to get me 8 points to win the knock out game on Monday night . That was an exciting monday night game. In the game where Cincinati struggled against the colts my kicker came up with 10 points.
So won that that by the neck with 3 points.

I was in the final and interestingly the division leader from other division
. I had lost to Ray before in week 3 and I knew with him having LT and Frank Gore and a star studded line up it was going to be tough . I made some radical adjustments to my roster by playing lower ranked players but potentially peaking players . The move paid off I won the final 139-119 . LT did not have a great game that week which contributed to the margin.
So I got awarded the FFL champion of the league.. :-)





All said and done you need to manage your roster go with some of your gut feel and above all need a little luck to go your way . Wishes to everyone who played

XBOX 360 vs Wii vs PS3
=======================

2 years before when I started hearing about the PS3 and the XBOX 360 and ninetendo's intlligent motion control . I must say I was pretty excited. I presently own an plain normal XBOX . I have played with video games a lot . PLayed and perfected games liek PCMan , Frogger , Teris, Prince of Persia , Carman Sandy , LS Larry,Wolfenstein , Jazz Jack rabbit, Doom , Myst ,warcraft m Shadow warrior Age of Empire, Mythology, Commando .So I feel I am well qualified to write this review or my take on the consoles.

All the consoles are to be frank in different league . Apart from the things liKe HD and the BluRay and the Xbox live features the one thing I am really really excited about is the Wii for one single reason . It gets you out of the couch .

XBOX 360

Having the early mover advantage is with XB360 , It has the widest array of games available on the platform . I frankly like th exbox because of its host of online features and the online gmaing experience . Microsoft has got that community play right with xbox live whihc will be hard to match so fast. It has also built a subsciber revenue model early. Did I mention I already have an XB

PS3

Playstation 3 is a bit of enigma.. It might be a big success or a washout. Although the processer ( cell) is the most powerful . None of the games out there except Resistance the fall of man has taken full advantage of Cell . If Blu Ray comes out to be the defacto player standard buying a PS3 makes sense . atleast just for the player whihc costs over a 1000 $ + but that is if Blu Ray becomes the next standard.
There are not many gmaes in PS3 which are exclusinve to PS3 platform like the edge with PS2 enjoyed . So I am skeptical .

Wii

The controller itself is amazing . I have been trying to get control of a wii box for quite sometime now but no such luck . Yesterday I saw a couple with thier kid but a Wii game which comes out in February with a wii Remote. I guess I am not the only one.

I plan to cancel my health club membership for a new wii..( I have sold my wife on the idea , though she is not convinced I think ). The intitiveness of the control cannot be argued with.. I have heard reports about the strap breaking and hittting expensive TV's . Wii has recalled the straps and giving free replacement straps which are thicker. So far I have heard only nice things about the wii. Wii has unlocked a whole new segment of population into the gaming mode for good. Playing games helps keep the youth in you alive.

I am sure Wii will be a winner

BizTalk talk for CNUG- DAM

I had recently taken a talk on my favorite topic Biztalk .
The talk was on "Common Enterprise Integration problems , Design Patterns and Solutions using Biztalk " Read the session details


Some photos from the talk .

Indian Bloggers Outraged

The Indian governement has asked Internet service providers in the state to Ban certain blogs and websites which were spreading communal inharmony and racial intolerance. The ISP's in the haste to comply to the order blocked all blogsites liek blogspot , type pad . This has caused the wrath of the bloggers community in the country. There were cases filed under Right to Information Act. This also started a big lash out against the governemet. The govt in a knee jerk reaction has came out strongly and said it did not ask ISP's to block the entrire sites just the subdomains .
The undesired effect in this whole scenario is that mainstream media carried the names of theses sites and everyone I knew were visting these websites to check out the literature having quite the opposite effect that the government wanted. I dont believe the govt should start censoring the net. There will always be such websites and bad apples. The Indian democracy should have faith in the people to know what is right and wrong

Anyway the acess restriction have been removed now and the blogs are once again accesible now.

Summer Camping in Allegany

We went camping last month in Allegany, It was a much awaited camping trip, and we had begun preparations a month earlier. Manish had put together a beautiful list based on his prior camping experiences and we were prepared with stuff from mosquito cream to combat West Nile virus to Stomach upset medicines. We were seven. That is me (Abhi ), Bini , Manish , Rashi , Sanjeev , Pooja , Aryan


We started from Corning in the evening and reached Allegany with light still up thanks to the long summer day and the daylight savings. We started with beer as all good things should be started and we were soon putting up the tent . We put Sanjeev's tent first and it was a little tricky and we spend quite some time to put it up . Then we put mine and it took less time as we knew the ropes and then Manish's tent was to be put. By this point now we were self declared experts and tried to improvise the procedure and ended up taking more time . So we came to the conclusion Always follow instructions to the dot.


Once we set up tents we set up the dinner table .It was Raasi's birthday. So we cut cake and we smeared her with cake . The cake was lovely.

Then we planned to start a campfire. After a few minutes we had a nice campfire going . We roasted marshmallows in the fire . It was fun even Aryan tried a hand in roasting marshmallows . We were quite exhausted by now and we sent to sleep . The night sleeping out was very interesting , There were lot of foxes making sounds and later we realized that it was Manish and then Sanjeev and some other campers joined :)

The next day morning we found out that there has been some breach in security . We had accidentally left some buns outside and it was eaten by some animal . We had been warned about bears . Anyway we did not know what animal it was . But it was strong enough to make a hole in the basket and take the bun out of the cover. Anyway luckily we had some bread so we had bread instead of bun along with scrambled eggs and hot tea for breakfast.





Making breakfast at the campsite is really a wonderful experience . And we had a good filling breakfast with orange juice and stuff. All the time the topic was about the bear who came to eat our buns.




Some shade time. Lying down in the open air is so relaxing . No cases for Sanjeev

After some hour of cycling we were exhausted and then we thought of catching little fish from the stream . We had lot of fun . We even caught a small lobster but we let it go after some time.


After breakfast we lied down and relaxed for a while . No laptops , No cell phone no Instant messenger and NO TV is actually a lot of fun . Then we headed down and rented a cycle and Benita went cycling for some time and then we both went cycling together .


Next on the agenda was slow cycle contest . We all had loads of fun in that . We timed each person's lap and decided winners


We made lunch next and we sat down in the stream which had a very little flow. Our camping chairs were really nice as you could put them anywhere. Next we went boating in the lake . There were some water cycles. But since there were lots of weeds we could not rent the water cycles. We rented rowboats instead .


We came back and then started out charcoal fire again and started grilling . We had Onion, bell peeper , Sukini and chicken and some veg burgers all toasted to perfection . Now we had a new guest a giant raccoon . Now we knew it was this guy who ate our bread yesterday night . After a few minutes he left



We had a couple of rounds of beer and vodka and I guess we did have a little too much as I apparently was walking all around in circles when I thought I was walking straight . The next day morning was not the fun part in camping where you need to pick up your trash and clean the place. The hangover of the previous night was there . Well we picked trash and checked out of the camp by 11 and drove back. The 2 days close to nature had taken a toll on everyone . I guess we should never have mixed alcohols as it had quite unpredictable results. But then there will always be some thing that you need to set right the next time . But it was definitely a wonderful experience. Hopefully we will have another one before the summer is over.

The World cups and the Korean Connection


It comes once in 4 years . The World cup's . The football world cup and The Cricket world cup . And I go crazy .
My whole schedule goes for a toss at these times . I have to plan my life around the television . No other time of the year do television time command so much time and priority in my life. Luckinly for I have South American fan in my spouse who is an ardent fan of Brazil and Argentina , she has a final prediction of them I still got my vote out for Brazil ..

I have the whole prediction running with my tons of cousins , 26 to be exact..( Anything over 25 qualifies as a ton , at least when you are counting first cousins and this is just one parents side of the family ) . There is a cool ipod to be won .

So the game is hotly contested . See who is winning now

Another interesting thing that happened to me and Bini during world cup is that we started supporting Korea and lot

and have even sported ambitions of learning Korean . Now you might genuinely ask wy this sudden interest in South

Korea . Well two reasons we have a soft corner to Asian teams and Koreans like Brazillians have a cult like attitude

towards football suddenly.. The second reason and whihc is the main reason is I have a Dish at home and I believed I get ESPN , ESPN2 and ABC . Come match day and I realize I dont have ABC in my package but ABC Family which is not telecasting matches. Now suddenly that realization on match day is not a very joyful one as most of the weekend games are on ABC . As I hunt through the spectra of channels that I normally dont watch I stumble upon a channel called KBS ( a Korean Channel ) is showing all world cup matches and hurray . I am hooked on to KBS for the ABC telecast games.

So now you know why my sudden love for Korean .

pohl-gah-yo korea , cho-ah-yo .

Want to learn a little Korean Yourself , Check out

Robot has shipped your Christhmas gift

Microsoft Robotics Group annnounces the Microsoft Robotics Studio

As stunning as it may seem it is true. Ther is indeed a Microsoft Robotics group and they have come out with a Microsoft Robotics SDK . Well soon you will be ordering something from amazon and Robots will be packing your order . You never know ... I am a crazy Asimov fan and I have read his Robots Series and the foundation series . So I might be a little over enthusiastic

If you are into robotics as well Read the press Release here