The recommended weight based on the height of an individual is given in the following sheet:
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
On Tamilnadu, an info presentation
A Zoho show presentation on some very basic facts about Tamilnadu. Will expand this later or add more presentations.
You can visit http://www.zoho.com to try out Zoho Show and other online tools of them.
You can visit http://www.zoho.com to try out Zoho Show and other online tools of them.
Sunday, November 08, 2009
Fake Office ?
One of the Microsoft’s top executives recently mentioned that the competitors (Zoho, Google, Zimbra ......among others) online office application offerings as “fake office”.
The response from Zoho is below :
http://www.fakeoffice.org/
Creative, hilarious and head-on, makes you smile when an underdog fights a Gorilla ….
As one person by the name of M.K.Gandhi mentioned :
First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you and then you win ......
The response from Zoho is below :
http://www.fakeoffice.org/
Creative, hilarious and head-on, makes you smile when an underdog fights a Gorilla ….
As one person by the name of M.K.Gandhi mentioned :
First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you and then you win ......
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
New Wave of Tamil Films
Among the new Tamil films released over the past year or so , the following were the good ones -
While the above movies are mostly with new faces or with small actors - the so called big budget films and the Stars failed miserably at the box-office - except for Suriya's Aiyan, none of the hyped up films stood up to their billing - this include Kuruvi, Villu, Sathyam, Thoranai, Vaaranam Aayiram .....et all ...
- Subramaniapuram
- Vennila Kabbadi Kuzhu
- Kunguma Poovum Konjum Puravum
- Pasanga
- Nadodiagl
While the above movies are mostly with new faces or with small actors - the so called big budget films and the Stars failed miserably at the box-office - except for Suriya's Aiyan, none of the hyped up films stood up to their billing - this include Kuruvi, Villu, Sathyam, Thoranai, Vaaranam Aayiram .....et all ...
Friday, July 31, 2009
Oracle buys Sun
Posted on April 21 elsewhere on the news on proposed Oracle's buyout of Sun.
The big news in the techcircle is the Oracles proposed acquisition of Sun Microsystems. In all probability it will go through.
Its again the signs of consolidation in the big (bad ?!) world of hitech/computing. IBM was the original bidder and as they harangued over few pennies, the ever predatory Larry Ellison snatched the deal. In one sense its good for the market as it can (sun-oracle combination) check the behemoth that IBM is. On the other hand analysts and Industry watchers are worried about the fact that now Java is actually *owned* by Oracle ! And not to mention about the MySQL the open source database that many SMB’s, academics and ISP’s prefer over that of the *commercial* Oracle.
Its a direct conflict of Interest for Oracle. And one will not be surprised if MySQL was given a quite burial, but I hope it will not happen beacuse of the widespread community base of the MySQL users.
And the other issue is Oracle never had experience in HW and with many enterprises using Sun HW they will be watching with crossed fingers on how Oracle’s strategy on this.
Overall, a good buy for Oracle, good competition for IBM, good value for Oracles shareholders, good suitor for Sun …….but for the Industry whether it is good or bad, have to wait and watch ……
Sivakumar
The big news in the techcircle is the Oracles proposed acquisition of Sun Microsystems. In all probability it will go through.
Its again the signs of consolidation in the big (bad ?!) world of hitech/computing. IBM was the original bidder and as they harangued over few pennies, the ever predatory Larry Ellison snatched the deal. In one sense its good for the market as it can (sun-oracle combination) check the behemoth that IBM is. On the other hand analysts and Industry watchers are worried about the fact that now Java is actually *owned* by Oracle ! And not to mention about the MySQL the open source database that many SMB’s, academics and ISP’s prefer over that of the *commercial* Oracle.
Its a direct conflict of Interest for Oracle. And one will not be surprised if MySQL was given a quite burial, but I hope it will not happen beacuse of the widespread community base of the MySQL users.
And the other issue is Oracle never had experience in HW and with many enterprises using Sun HW they will be watching with crossed fingers on how Oracle’s strategy on this.
Overall, a good buy for Oracle, good competition for IBM, good value for Oracles shareholders, good suitor for Sun …….but for the Industry whether it is good or bad, have to wait and watch ……
Sivakumar
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Caste, Politics and Reservation - Part I
Caste based politics is not new to TN, or for that fact for India. The more we say we are casteless, religion neutral secular country, the more we practice casteism. Even in this century, even in this IT age. The popular matrimony sites advertise - database of "x" no of castes, "y" no of communities .....and so on. And we are replete with all kinds of "sangams" (associations) who are supposed to take care of their respective castes and in few cases their respective political parties too.
The story of PMK in TN is too well known to be documented - PMK "graduated" to the most-sought-after political ally (usually for different parties in different elections) from its earlier roots of Vanniyar sangam. They are particularly strong in Northern and part of western districts of TN. Even after some of the most politically opportunistic alliance switching - its political base remained intact and whenever major political parties aligned with it, it got benefited.
Few other caste based parties also tried this route albeit with little success. Most of them remained as "letter pad" parties and used it so called power to bargain with political parties for one or two seats or for nothing (but settled for some cash.)
Most of us say we detest caste based politics, but we dont know from where these guys gain strength and confidence. It is particularly depressing to know that even well known Cinema starts (Karthik, Vivek and now Sarathkumar to name a few) tries to use (exploit) the youth of their caste to promote their benefits. (To be fair to him, Vivek is no longer in the forefront of his caste "sangam", Karthik has made a mockery of a Once-a-Nationalist-party into a caste based outfit and Sarathkumar in a none-too-subtle way is wooing his community people with his political outfit, ironically named with "equality")
Representatives of mainstream political parties also play their own caste games especially on micro level which largely gets unnoticed by the mainstream media or at best ignored.
The main demands of these caste based outfits is for more job opportunities and more educational opportunities (read exclusive reservation) for their community. With TN being one of the "advanced and mature" states in "social equality" (whatever it means) not much tinkering can be done in the existing reservation formula (though PMK was able to extract a significant % in the pretext of MBC). As a result most of the caste based political parties doesn't seem to do much actually to the upliftment or welfare of their community people. Instead it remains as a fringe political force and mostly militant in its way in dealing with the other communities, especially with the oppressed classes (in their region). This trend is particularly disturbing as this has caused the affected parties to join or form an outfit of their own (again with their own caste affiliations). The emergence of PB and VCK in the northern districts and PT in the southern districts is an indication for this (PB - Puthiya Bharatham, VCK - Viduthalai chirruthaigal, PT- Puthiya Tamizhagam ).
As though all this is not enough, TN is witnessing the next wave in the heady cocktail of caste and politics - the emergence of a political outfit for Kongu Vellalars, known as Gounders and the FEBAS, the Federation of Brahmin association of South India.
More on this on the next posting ...
The story of PMK in TN is too well known to be documented - PMK "graduated" to the most-sought-after political ally (usually for different parties in different elections) from its earlier roots of Vanniyar sangam. They are particularly strong in Northern and part of western districts of TN. Even after some of the most politically opportunistic alliance switching - its political base remained intact and whenever major political parties aligned with it, it got benefited.
Few other caste based parties also tried this route albeit with little success. Most of them remained as "letter pad" parties and used it so called power to bargain with political parties for one or two seats or for nothing (but settled for some cash.)
Most of us say we detest caste based politics, but we dont know from where these guys gain strength and confidence. It is particularly depressing to know that even well known Cinema starts (Karthik, Vivek and now Sarathkumar to name a few) tries to use (exploit) the youth of their caste to promote their benefits. (To be fair to him, Vivek is no longer in the forefront of his caste "sangam", Karthik has made a mockery of a Once-a-Nationalist-party into a caste based outfit and Sarathkumar in a none-too-subtle way is wooing his community people with his political outfit, ironically named with "equality")
Representatives of mainstream political parties also play their own caste games especially on micro level which largely gets unnoticed by the mainstream media or at best ignored.
The main demands of these caste based outfits is for more job opportunities and more educational opportunities (read exclusive reservation) for their community. With TN being one of the "advanced and mature" states in "social equality" (whatever it means) not much tinkering can be done in the existing reservation formula (though PMK was able to extract a significant % in the pretext of MBC). As a result most of the caste based political parties doesn't seem to do much actually to the upliftment or welfare of their community people. Instead it remains as a fringe political force and mostly militant in its way in dealing with the other communities, especially with the oppressed classes (in their region). This trend is particularly disturbing as this has caused the affected parties to join or form an outfit of their own (again with their own caste affiliations). The emergence of PB and VCK in the northern districts and PT in the southern districts is an indication for this (PB - Puthiya Bharatham, VCK - Viduthalai chirruthaigal, PT- Puthiya Tamizhagam ).
As though all this is not enough, TN is witnessing the next wave in the heady cocktail of caste and politics - the emergence of a political outfit for Kongu Vellalars, known as Gounders and the FEBAS, the Federation of Brahmin association of South India.
More on this on the next posting ...
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Is English necessary for a nations development ?
If I have to answer this in one word its a BIG NO. Since there are lot of ifs & buts and assumptions associated with it - will elaborate a little bit.
First, why NO ? To guage a nations development - language is not a metric or criteria - industrialization, education, standard of living are some of the metrics. With respect to this if you see the G-5, G-7, G-8 or G-20 group of countries - majority of the countries (in each group) are non-English countries. In fact English as a native language is only for a handful of countries - UK, USA, Australia, Canada, New zealand South Africa and few others.
Countries like Germany, Russia, Japan, China, France,Italy, India etc .. are all world's advanced economies and no way they can say the development (or the non-development) is because of English. For Engineering, the benchmark is Germany, for quality the bench mark is Japanese, for cost effective - China, Taiwan, worlds sweetest language - Italian, French, Portuguese, Urdu, Telugu, Tamil - opinions differ, but not English ....So English is not a differentiating factor. No doubt English is established itself as a language of business and to an extent language of technology. But it doesn't mean that English alone can bring prosperity or growth to a nation. It is a good second language. Thats it.
With respect to Indian situation vis-a-vis English - ONE BIG MYTH that is created and being circulated - English is the reason for our (recent) growth and success. Nothing can be far from truth. In fact this (misguided) over-dependence on English is actually holding us back on the development. People will argue that the IT, ITS, ITES ($) revenues are all because of English. My personal opinion on this is it is nothing but a glorified clerical service and bodyshopping. What we earn on this is peanuts when compared to what we could have. The problem is we dont have any IP/Patent/Invention. We dont invest/develop worldclass products. Germany built SAP. Japs created SONY. We dont have a world class BRAND (yet). To build that you dont need English. You need native intelligence. Which we have. But which is blurred because of dependence on English.
The limiting factor is - our higher education not being in ones mother tongue. Even - to understand the concepts - one has to be proficient in a foreign language (English) and then master the subject - this is pretty difficult for somebody who is switching to English Medium at the college level. The creative ability of one diminishes if he/she is forced to think in another language.
Also, on the English/British education system - its again a forced one on us (by British and Christian missionaries). My personal opinion on this is - it creates very good clerks and followers (and restricts creative thinking). It is to the credit of our native intelligence (common sense?) that we were able to overcome most of its limitations and be able to grow.
Before the English/British style education we had the Gurukul style of schooling. It will be another topic/debate on the merits and demerits of it. The one good thing I could think of the present (English/British) education system is it helped to eradicate few social barriers. But at what cost ? At the cost of our Mother Tongue(s).....which I feel is very costly .....
It is a pity that our medium of instruction has to be in English (a foreign language) instead of our Mother tongue. This in spite of being one of the advanced civilizations in the world - be it architectural wonders (Tanjore temples), engineering feats (Kallanai dam) or in medicine, literature etc. For almost two to three generations and more as a nation/state we have to endure this ignominy and the worst thing is we take pride in it. The slow death of our Mother tongues is an unpardonable sin we are doing to our forefathers, culture and civilization.
We are going to have one generation of people (are already we have ?) who is neither proficient in English (but they think they are good at it) nor good at their own mother tongue (for which they are proud of (!)) and have little or no knowledge of their nations main language.
First, why NO ? To guage a nations development - language is not a metric or criteria - industrialization, education, standard of living are some of the metrics. With respect to this if you see the G-5, G-7, G-8 or G-20 group of countries - majority of the countries (in each group) are non-English countries. In fact English as a native language is only for a handful of countries - UK, USA, Australia, Canada, New zealand South Africa and few others.
Countries like Germany, Russia, Japan, China, France,Italy, India etc .. are all world's advanced economies and no way they can say the development (or the non-development) is because of English. For Engineering, the benchmark is Germany, for quality the bench mark is Japanese, for cost effective - China, Taiwan, worlds sweetest language - Italian, French, Portuguese, Urdu, Telugu, Tamil - opinions differ, but not English ....So English is not a differentiating factor. No doubt English is established itself as a language of business and to an extent language of technology. But it doesn't mean that English alone can bring prosperity or growth to a nation. It is a good second language. Thats it.
With respect to Indian situation vis-a-vis English - ONE BIG MYTH that is created and being circulated - English is the reason for our (recent) growth and success. Nothing can be far from truth. In fact this (misguided) over-dependence on English is actually holding us back on the development. People will argue that the IT, ITS, ITES ($) revenues are all because of English. My personal opinion on this is it is nothing but a glorified clerical service and bodyshopping. What we earn on this is peanuts when compared to what we could have. The problem is we dont have any IP/Patent/Invention. We dont invest/develop worldclass products. Germany built SAP. Japs created SONY. We dont have a world class BRAND (yet). To build that you dont need English. You need native intelligence. Which we have. But which is blurred because of dependence on English.
The limiting factor is - our higher education not being in ones mother tongue. Even - to understand the concepts - one has to be proficient in a foreign language (English) and then master the subject - this is pretty difficult for somebody who is switching to English Medium at the college level. The creative ability of one diminishes if he/she is forced to think in another language.
Also, on the English/British education system - its again a forced one on us (by British and Christian missionaries). My personal opinion on this is - it creates very good clerks and followers (and restricts creative thinking). It is to the credit of our native intelligence (common sense?) that we were able to overcome most of its limitations and be able to grow.
Before the English/British style education we had the Gurukul style of schooling. It will be another topic/debate on the merits and demerits of it. The one good thing I could think of the present (English/British) education system is it helped to eradicate few social barriers. But at what cost ? At the cost of our Mother Tongue(s).....which I feel is very costly .....
It is a pity that our medium of instruction has to be in English (a foreign language) instead of our Mother tongue. This in spite of being one of the advanced civilizations in the world - be it architectural wonders (Tanjore temples), engineering feats (Kallanai dam) or in medicine, literature etc. For almost two to three generations and more as a nation/state we have to endure this ignominy and the worst thing is we take pride in it. The slow death of our Mother tongues is an unpardonable sin we are doing to our forefathers, culture and civilization.
We are going to have one generation of people (are already we have ?) who is neither proficient in English (but they think they are good at it) nor good at their own mother tongue (for which they are proud of (!)) and have little or no knowledge of their nations main language.
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