Aqualounge Test

!2 most Annoying Types of Facebookers

2009-12-29T13:44:00.000-08:00

Facebook, for better or worse, is like being at a big party with all your friends, family, acquaintances and co-workers.

Facebook can be a great tool, and an occasional annoyance. What kind of Facebooker are you?

There are lots of fun, interesting people you're happy to talk to when they stroll up. Then there are the other people, the ones who make you cringe when you see them coming. This article is about those people.

Sure, Facebook can be a great tool for keeping up with folks who are important to you. Take the status update, the 160-character message that users post in response to the question, "What's on your mind?" An artful, witty or newsy status update is a pleasure -- a real-time, tiny window into a friend's life.

But far more posts read like navel-gazing diary entries, or worse, spam. A recent study categorized 40 percent of Twitter tweets as "pointless babble," and it wouldn't be surprising if updates on Facebook, still a fast-growing social network, break down in a similar way.

Here are 12 of the most annoying types of Facebook users:

The Let-Me-Tell-You-Every-Detail-of-My-Day Bore. "I'm waking up." "I had Wheaties for breakfast." "I'm bored at work." "I'm stuck in traffic." You're kidding! How fascinating! No moment is too mundane for some people to broadcast unsolicited to the world. Just because you have 432 Facebook friends doesn't mean we all want to know when you're waiting for the bus.

The Self-Promoter. OK, so we've probably all posted at least once about some achievement. And sure, maybe your friends really do want to read the fascinating article you wrote about beet farming. But when almost EVERY update is a link to your blog, your poetry reading, your 10k results or your art show, you sound like a bragger or a self-centered careerist.

The Friend-Padder. The average Facebook user has 120 friends on the site. Schmoozers and social butterflies -- you know, the ones who make lifelong pals on the subway -- might reasonably have 300 or 400. But 1,000 "friends?" Unless you're George Clooney or just won the lottery, no one has that many. That's just showing off.

The Town Crier. "Michael Jackson is dead!!!" You heard it from me first! Me, and the 213,000 other people who all saw it on TMZ. These Matt Drudge wannabes are the reason many of us learn of breaking news not from TV or news sites but from online social networks. In their rush to trumpet the news, these people also spread rumors, half-truths and innuendo. No, Jeff Goldblum did not plunge to his death from a New Zealand cliff.

The TMIer. "Brad is heading to Walgreens to buy something for these pesky hemorrhoids." Boundaries of privacy and decorum don't seem to exist for these too-much-information updaters, who unabashedly offer up details about their sex lives, marital troubles and bodily functions. Thanks for sharing.

The Bad Grammarian. "So sad about Fara Fauset but Im so gladd its friday yippe". Yes, I know the punctuation rules are different in the digital world. And, no, no one likes a spelling-Nazi schoolmarm. But you sound like a moron.

The Sympathy-Baiter. "Barbara is feeling sad today." "Man, am I glad that's over." "Jim could really use some good news about now." Like anglers hunting for fish, these sad sacks cast out their hooks -- baited with vague tales of woe -- in the hopes of landing concerned responses. Genuine bad news is one thing, but these manipulative posts are just pleas for attention.

The Lurker. The Peeping Toms of Facebook, these voyeurs are too cautious, or maybe too lazy, to update their status or write on your wall. But once in a while, you'll be talking to them and they'll mention something you posted, so you know they're on your page, hiding in the shadows. It's just a little creepy.

The Crank. These curmudgeons, like the trolls who spew hate in blog comments, never met something they couldn't complain about. "Carl isn't really that impressed with idiots who don't realize how idiotic they are." [Actual status update.] Keep spreading the love.

The Paparazzo. Ever visit your Facebook page and discover that someone's posted a photo of you from last weekend's party -- a photo you didn't authorize and haven't even seen? You'd really rather not have to explain to your mom why you were leering like a drunken hyena and French-kissing a bottle of Jagermeister.

The Obscurist. "If not now then when?" "You'll see..." "Grist for the mill." "John is, small world." "Dave thought he was immune, but no. No, he is not." [Actual status updates, all.] Sorry, but you're not being mysterious -- just nonsensical.

The Chronic Inviter. "Support my cause. Sign my petition. Play Mafia Wars with me. Which 'Star Trek' character are you? Here are the 'Top 5 cars I have personally owned.' Here are '25 Things About Me.' Here's a drink. What drink are you? We're related! I took the 'What President Are You?' quiz and found out I'm Millard Fillmore! What president are you?"

You probably mean well, but stop. Just stop. I don't care what president I am -- can't we simply be friends? Now excuse me while I go post the link to this story on my Facebook page.

Managers Special !

2009-08-10T03:03:00.001-07:00

The following I read while I was travelling ... its truly awesome.. so close to our lives

Lesson Number One

A crow was sitting on a tree, doing nothing all day. A small rabbit saw the crow, and asked him, "Can I also sit like you and do nothing all day long?"

The crow answered: "Sure, why not."

So, the rabbit sat on the ground below the crow, and rested. All of a sudden, a fox appeared, jumped on the rabbit and ate it.

Management Lesson: To be sitting and doing nothing, you must be sitting very, very high up.

Lesson Number Two

A turkey was chatting with a bull.

"I would love to be able to get to the top of that tree," sighed the turkey, "but I haven't got the energy. "Well, why don't you nibble on some of my droppings?" replied the bull. "They're packed with nutrients."

The turkey pecked at a lump of dung and found that it actually gave him enough strength to reach the first branch of the tree. The next day, after eating some more dung, he reached the second branch. Finally after a fortnight, there he was proudly perched at the top of the tree. Soon he was promptly spotted by a farmer, who shot the turkey out of the tree.

Management Lesson: Bullshit might get you to the top, but it won't keep you there.

Lesson Number Three

When the body was first made, all the parts wanted to be Boss. The brain said, "I should be Boss because I control the whole body's responses and functions."

The feet said, "We should be Boss as we carry the brain about and get him to where he wants to go." The hands said, "We should be the Boss because we do all the work and earn all the money." And so it went on and on with the heart, the lungs and the eyes until finally the asshole spoke up.

All the parts laughed at the idea of the asshole being the Boss. So the asshole went on strike, blocked itself up and refused to work. Within a short time the eyes became crossed, the hands clenched, the feet twitched, the heart and lungs began to panic and the brain fevered. Eventually they all decided that the asshole should be the Boss, so the motion was passed.

All the other parts did all the work while the Boss just sat and passed out the shit!

Management Lesson: You don't need brains to be Boss, any asshole will do!

Lesson Number Four

A little bird was flying south for the winter. It was so cold, the bird froze and fell to the ground in a large field. While it was lying there, a cow came by and dropped some dung on it. As the frozen bird lay there in the pile of cow dung, it began to realize how warm it was. The dung was actually thawing him out!

He lay there all warm and happy, and soon began to sing for joy. A passing cat heard he bird singing and came to investigate. Following the sound, the cat discovered the bird under the pile of cow dung, and promptly dug him out and ate him!

Management Lessons:

1. Not everyone who drops shit on you is your enemy.

2. Not everyone who gets you out of shit is your friend.

3. When you're in deep shit, keep your mouth shut!

Life after a Euro Trip

2009-07-10T23:58:00.000-07:00

I read it some where a few typical traits an Indian does after returning to India from Abroad.

22. Use Nope for No and Yep for Yes.

21. Tries to use credit card in road side hotel.

20. Drinks and carries mineral water and always speaks of health conscious.

19. Sprays deo such so that he doesn't need to take bath.

18. Sneezes and says 'Excuse me'.

17. Says "Hey" instead of "Hi".

Says "Yogurt" instead says "Curds".

Says "Cab" instead of "Taxi".

Says "Candy" instead of "Chocolate".

Says "Cookie" instead of "Biscuit".

Says " Free Way " instead of "Highway".

Says "got to go" instead of "Have to go".

Says "Oh" instead of "Zero", (for 704, says Seven Oh Four Instead of Seven

Zero Four)

16.Doesn't forget to crib about air pollution. Keeps cribbing every time he steps out.

15. Says all the distances in Miles (Not in Kilo Meters), and counts in Millions. (Not in Lakhs)

14. Tries to figure all the prices in Dollars as far as possible (but deep down the heart multiplies by 43 times).

13. Tries to see the % of fat on the cover of a milk pocket.

12. When need to say Z (zed), never says Z (Zed), repeats "Zee" several times, if the other person unable to get, then says X, Y Zee(but never says Zed)

11. Writes date as MM/DD/YYYY, on watching traditional DD/MM/YYYY, says "Oh! British Style!"

10. Makes fun of Indian Standard Time and Indian Road Conditions.

9. Even after 2 months, complaints about "Jet Lag".

8. Avoids eating more chili (hot) stuff.

7. Tries to drink "Diet Coke", instead of Normal Coke.

6.. Tries to complain about any thing in India as if he is experiencing it for the first time.

5. Pronounces "schedule" as "skejule", and "module" as "mojule".

4. Looks suspiciously towards Hotel/Dhaba food.

3. From the luggage bag, does not remove the stickers of Airways by which he traveled back to India, even after 4 months of arrival.

2. Takes the cabin luggage bag to short visits in India, tries to roll the bag on Indian Roads.

Ultimate one:

1. Tries to begin conversation with "In Europe ...." or "When I was in US...", "Man you know one evening in Paris..that girl "....

I hope I will not be that indian I am making fun off :-)

Jobbers Path

2009-06-10T06:08:00.000-07:00

With fall of 2009 , I found that not every one in my college campus was contended enough with the job he had, this inspired me to write the following blog, throwing alternative infact better ways of securing better jobs. Also I would like to take this opportunity to inform the readers that though the campus placement scenario is freakingly bad but still NIT Durgapur managed to keep up to the expectations. More than 80 companies visited the campus this year, with more than 300 students securing a double job(dream we say). Highest package being whoophing 12Lps (Amazon.com).

In India All top colleges especially IITs, NITs and BITs have their own list of favorite companies that employ freshers graduating from their Campus. Every year there is a good number of students who gain employment through such campus recruitment methods. However, if you take a look at the reports available, you will find that only a small minority finds employment through this method.Campus recruitment is neither the only nor the best way for a fresher to get employment. There are many other ways for students to find freshers employment, which are not only more effective, but also easy to act upon. Let us take a look at what the other options/ means to employ freshers are there:

Networking : This is one of the most powerful yet simple way of gaining freshers employment, Simple, because as a student of your college you would have the advantage of a vast number of already well-placed alumni who would be ever-ready to recommend your name in their companies when they know you. The point here is to get them know you. This can be done through group messages boards/ channels of your college, or personal contact with those alumni who are employed with the companies where you want employment. In practical this happens in Cisco, I have seen many of my friends/Seniors getting absorbed after being refereed for the interview by the Alumni. Similarly there a few more companies that do follow this approach very seriously.
Internships : Infact all the colleges have a curriculum pre-requisite for the student to undergo a certain amount of days/ weeks/ months as internship. It is often that the organizations which offer such internships appreciates the students, work and make a freshers employment offer. In order for you to qualify for such an offer, you would need to win them over with your dedication, commitment and hard work. I have seen many of my friends working in a company be it Tata Motors or CGG Veritas to name, being absorbed in there after being able to impress them with your hardwork and dedication.
Apply Independently: As in my case, I had applied independently to Job opening by sending my CV. If your CV matches their requirement, you will be contacted soon. Bingo!! A telephonic interview Twice (1st - Tech, 2nd - Bhaat Baaji). you just got hired !!.
Search Companies : There are many organizations which employ freshers every year. However, they never go for Campus recruitment. You need to find such companies and apply to them through their website, email or in person:
Company's website : most organizations post their requirements on their website much before they would advertise for it in the newspapers or the Web. Go to their websites and look for freshers employment opportunities; apply where such openings are available.
Referrals from your professors/ career coaches: talk to your faculty guide/ career coach and outline what you are looking for. Many times, these people would have some interesting leads for you.

Online freshers employment agencies: There are a number of popular online recruiting agencies where you could upload your application so it would be visible to the prospective employers who seek to employ freshers. In order to increase your visibility, you would need to adapt your CV to a web-ready format. Learn about this aspect before you upload your CV.Look at the above choices, and you will realize that campus recruitment represents indeed a tiny fraction of the freshers employment opportunity pie. Your chances to land your dream job depend very much upon how well you could adapt to as many of these avenues.

College Days

2009-06-09T01:10:00.000-07:00

College Days : gone are best days of my life

1) Day 0 : Every New Semester :Came to college, loads of resolutions, full of energy to change the world.

2) After 2 months : Sick of daily routine , Time for a Change :-)

3) After 3 months : Proxy, Jhoops, CC, CCD, NITE Outs

4) Before Viva and Lab Exam s : Who cares , will copy :-P

5) During the Viva : We cry , we beg, but we Pass :-P

6)After Viva: Evening Chillout at CCD or CC

7) Before the Final Exam: No worries Will copy

8)Once the Time Table is out

9) 6 Days to Exam : We sleep as never slept before

10) 5 days to Exam : Listen to Everything you can from Sutta to Bhajan

11) 4 days to exam : Think About All the crushes you ever had

12) 3 days to exam : Get sloshed, Roam accross the college Drunk and Out:-P

13) 2 days to exam : Drink Again - Trying to come over the hang over

14) 1 day to exam : Hang Over Persists

15) One Nite Before Exam : SHOW Your true skills

16) D day Morning - Move to the exam hall Remove all the desks and write everythn that u can

16) D Day - Show the world what you are : A cheater :-P

17 ) After the battle is won

18) Hello world!! I am a gradute now , B.Tech, NITD. Cheers to Life , Cheers to Engg.

Love 2.0 - Move On!

2009-06-08T07:00:00.000-07:00

Ever you wanted to go down on you knees and propose undying love to her over a bottle of Chianti wine and candle lit dinner. Does this scenario sound familiar? Is some corner in you saying been there, done that! Understanding the girl sitting rite infront of your table/sitting next to you in a movie/ besides you in a car/ living next door or sharing your notes for next exam isnt that easy! Ask the men and well, they have given up trying to understand women. They merely shrug their shoulders and their word of advice…”Go with the flow!”

For me, a girl is a complex creatures…an erroneous code which cannot be debugged. Enigma, mystery, secret…all that is a package deal when you think about your dream woman. But, at the end of the day, it’s all about a very basic truth….understanding…attraction! To the truth, my friend is that, if there is no understanding …then, all your attempts to show her heaven on earth is going to backfire!

If she was attracted with your candle lit dinner scenario…it would be reflected in her eyes! But, if that doesn’t do the trick, don’t push the envelope. It’s only going to suffocate her. Roses and chocolates…to a certain extent do their bit of magic! But, it would create magic if there is magic between both of you‘ll and the focus word would be both! It’s not enough that only one of you’ll share the attraction. Relationship is mutual which automatically translates into both of you’ll feeling the pull!

As matter of fact all girls always know how a guy feels for her. She always makes sure you wanted her. She knew it from the beginning. If she finds you worth enough to be in a relationship with her, she passes on numerous tests that a guy is expected to pass.

Always be :-

Patience(Always getting a No when you actually deserve a Yes),

Perspective (Clear Vision of what you want in relationship)

Persistence ( Be persistant enough to keep pushing the envelope, remember its you need her more)

So, am I saying that laying the cards on the table is a no – no? No, after a point, the cat and mouse game ceases to lose its interest. You need to know if she truly is interested in you. But, do not push her. Writing poetry,asking her out, calling her 50 times a day…yes, in your book, it is romantic…but, if she is not interested, then all this would just further abet in pushing her away. Respect her space…do not profess undying love and promise her the stars and the moon. Respect her intelligence. No woman in this day and age is going to fall for a line like that! Being romantic is one thing, being pushy is another! There’s a very thin line between romanticism and pushiness. So test the waters before you jump into the game.

But, to avoid all this, you create the attraction from the beginning.

GRE -- A Genuinely Rhetoric Exam

2009-06-06T11:45:00.000-07:00

Well giving a short break to previous blogs, I think I should write something constructive which I know will help alot of my friends and juniors who often ask me how I prepared for the GRE exam.

G...R...E... Yikes! Those three letters instantly make me anxious!

But before I dive into my paragraphs of advice on preparing for the GRE, you probably want to know what my advice is worth. In other words, you probably want to know how well I did on the GRE before you're going to care about my advice. I took the exam on march 2008 and score 1450, So take this advice in that context, I am writting for the benefit of those who may seek them. In this post I present my views on the GRE and the method I used to prepare for it. I assume a reasonable familiarity with the exam. Also, what follows is my own opinion and by no means a definitive guide to the GRE.

What is GRE?

The GRE or Graduate Record Exam is required for admission to most U.S., Canadian, and UK graduate schools. Most students attend graduate business school for pursuing an Master degree. In addition, GRE can also be used for admission to PhD program.

What does GRE test?

The GRE general test does not test specific knowledge in any subject. It measures the ability to respond to questions in limited time.The Graduate Record Examination (GRE) is a multiple-choice exam designed to measure verbal, analytical, and quantitative skills. The GRE General Test, required by most graduate schools, many vet schools, and various other allied health professional schools, is considered to be a good predictor of your success in a graduate program. GRE Subject Tests (in 17 specific areas, e.g. Psychology, Biology, Chemistry) are often required for graduate school (Ph.D.) admission, but not generally for health fields.

A Quick Glance of What I PREASSUME GRE is all about:

A few observations to start with:

1. The GRE is, at best, a necessary evil. Different universities give your score different levels of importance. Since one can never know how much importance your dream university gives to your GRE score, it’s a good idea to do well. You just cant afford to under-evalute this exam, since some universities do have their own lower cuttoff, for Instance what ever GOD Profile you have Stanford CS dept will never entertain your application packet if your score is less than 1200.

Provided you are not among the Turing Award Winners.

2. The time required to prepare well varies for each individual. Don’t trust someone else’s estimate. I heard my seniors saying giving GRE is just a matter of few months, I completely disagree with the fact, I would say it depends, but to be safe i would recommend 4 months should be good enough.(if working class extend it to 2 more months)

3. Buy one 14th edition of barrons and do it well. Don’t get distracted by the abundance of study material in internet or you LAN.

4. Studying wordlists is NOT a waste of time. Most of those words, you will come across in the stuff you read. The GRE asks simple words that are in common use, but have different meanings in different contexts. If you waste time learning long, esoteric words of no consequence; you’re to blame, not the GRE. Always make sure you are thorough with the following Wordlist ADSPICEF, since according to me 60 percent of words have these alphabets.

5.Start readinng from your desktop/laptop. Since reading and understanding one page of english essay is far more difficult while using desktop, rather than using a paper. Since GRE is purely computer based test (CBT) you are expected to read from computer screens, understand and respond. So avoid reading from papers.

P.S. make sure you make NYTIMES as your home page if you are serious enough for GRE, reading editorials helps you while reading for Reading Comprehensions ( Pyaar se RC kehte hain ).

6. Preparing for the Analytical Writing section has a very small profit margin. But if you think you’re bad at writing, some practice is surely useful.

7. Please donot ignore quants, I scored 770 in maths else my score would have been 1480 if I could manage 800 in it:-(.

8. Accept the fact that luck can play a significant role in this exam.

I am not finished yet ... Its getting late will digg deeper in my next blog....

All About BOYS

2009-06-05T12:06:00.000-07:00

After being rebuked by my sister, for my previous blogs on girls. I am compelled to write The following blog as my sincere attempt to uplift the social image of boys( especially for girls who have some misconstrued ideas about us). I think its my moral responsibility to enlighten my fellow mates about what a boy is all about. Though its impossible to cover all the aspects of an individual, Still i will try. So Neha, your brother is MCP no more !!

BELOW HOLDS TRUE FOR 90 % BOYS I MET : rest 10% left me in doubt about them :-)

Conventional wisdom suggests that teenage boys have one thing on their minds. And it’s not history class. Statistics that support this theory abound: Teenage boys have testosterone surges multiple times a day. Teenage boys think about sex an average of every 28 seconds. The theories go on.(I read that in a blog of a sex educator from Stanford univ). Leaving the filthy and kinky stuff apart, which i must admit is very difficult as far as boys are concerned , still I will try to keep my blog clean and readable.

BOY when SINGLE:

He is single not because his mother said so, well I assume there can be only two reasons for that either he is already out of a breakup and is actually avoiding it again for some time. Secondly he never had an opportunity to be called as boyfriend. Boys of First category are happiest of their kind, happier than the survivors of Tsunamis. For the other category of guys I have only one suggestion fall in love, and you will never rise :-)

BOY when ATTRACTED:

Whenever a girl meets a boy,first they decide whether he deserves a chance to try to “make them fall in love" and secondly, they always need to collected enough evidence (what he did and what he failed to do) for falling in love with him.

STAGE-1: "Falling in love" for us is instantaneous:like 2 fast n 2furious

Men fall in love at first sight even more frequently than do women. Research shows that within the first fifteen seconds, a woman will have decided (sub-consciously) if she will give a guy a chance to try to “make her fall in love’ or not. In the same amount of time, a man will have decided if he is “turned’ on by how a woman looks or not.( Read in MaXim - don't tellmy MOM!!)

Though unfair to judge a person for their "character rather than for their looks", nature has programmed our brains (more programming on men’s brains) to select out and respond as sexually compelling.

While women use visual, emotional and physical (including financial) cues to assess a man’s desirability, I think everyone of us decides on the basis of visual cues. Some of us, or better say most of us get super glued on so called Physical features and bouncy behavior, showing mere inability to simply take our eyes off her!!

STAGE-2: "Falling in love" for us is FINDING HER SPECIAL: WALK TO REMEMBER

Still be visually attracted to other women and this woman with the “less than perfect" body but there is just “something about her" - and it is driving him nuts. BUZZ!!! INFECTED WITH LOVE32 VIRUS. It can be the way she talk/laugh/think/enthusiasm/passion, or whatever it is she does that makes him delightful to be with. He feels more energized just by being around her which in turn makes him feel good about himself and about life in general. (DUDE you have already been infected!!)

At this stage, like his counterparts in the animal kingdom, he begins to mark his territory. He pays more attention to her needs, try spending more time with her . At this stage, like his counterparts in the animal kingdom, he begins to mark his territory. He pays more attention to your needs, spends more time with you and is over protective when other men try to make a move on “his woman".

STAGE-3: "Falling in love" is "She be the One": Love is Blind

He feels he is with the right woman at the right time and he will have NO problem declaring to her how he really feels. He might not always use the words, "I love you," but he manages to get his point across. Keeping in mind that in this age(23) and time(2009- things were different before we were born) "settle down" does not necessarily mean marriage to all people but it simply means "I AM WITH THE ONE" . And they fall in love and stay together till they break-up or till they marry (which may turn even worst than a breakup) :-)

She be the one
She be the drug
She's gonna take you high, take your love
And never get enough
She be the one
She be the bomb
Watch out here she comes
You know you're gonna get some

All About Girls

2009-06-03T01:13:00.000-07:00

To give a short break to previous postings, I thought to add some spice to my blog. Well the following blog is entirely based on my personal experiences any resemblances to any girl living or forgotten must be considered purely co-incidental but intentional. Also here goes my vote of thanks to all those girls who so ever were there to add up misery to my life.

It is merely impossible to answer one simple question - What actually a girl wants? Assuming she is Straight, most of the times they themseleves are in a state of confusion sending mixed signals to all the recievers(guys in this case) everywhere. For some recievers the signal is noisy, for some damped and for some ultra Clear. A girl wants a man. A wealthy man, a successful men, a famous man, an interesting man, a macho, a talented man, a loving man, a man she loves, a father for her children, a friend, a sex-machine - details may differ, but the main point stays the same. She wants a man ( Assuming she is Straight). Some females want just money or a career, but if she denies her willingness to meet a real man - she lies. Moreover, girl’s demands to what she calls a good man vary as she gets older.

P.S : Holds true for 90% of Girls I ever met.

Approaching 22 : Usually every girl near me said this cliche once or more that she is realistic in life without too many expectations from any one. Buzzz !! Guys Alert !! A girl may claim she’s realistic and doesn’t look on the world through the pink glasses, but she’ll never confess dreaming of an ideal man. He’s got to be handsome, charming, popular. He’s got to be rich - probably not so rich, but always have a wallet full of cash (500/- atleast to incur her CCD or Barista Bills). He’s got to be smart, brilliantly smart, Outstandingly- to some girls it’s even more important than being very handsome, but of course his mind is never more important than his purse. He’s got to have a great sense of humor, stylish( Levis and Lee always score high), romantic and a good listener, tender lover and… well, the list of his qualities can be prolonged on and on. A girl wants a man to adore her and to make her the goddess with flowers, gifts and promises of eternal love laid at her feet. How can I forget Choclates and IceCreams.

Above 26 approaching : College Days are Over so is casual flirts and dating, now its time to be seriously search for a man. The search algorithm is now powered by social security and future relationships. The same girl now has her priorities changed or better manipulated, wants just a good man. She has finally taken off those pink glasses and got rid of romantic fantasies. So her good man mustn’t be a hero - he is good-looking, has good manners, a well-paid job(6 to 8 LPA), a good car (ofcourse maruti or waganor wont do), a good house( 2Bhk atleast), and a good sum of money on a credit card. Also he carries bags from supermarket, likes her home-cooked dinners, laughs at her jokes, remembers the most important dates - like her mom’s birthday, her dogs name, her brothers phone number and able to express tenderness not less than one time per week. Such a nice domestic kind of a good man.

Above 32+ : Girls who are re-considering to restart their love-engines once again,, may be after a breakup from her Ex, or too much career centric so that she never found time for anyone except herself. A girl of 32 wants just a man. That ordinary kind of man is not a movie star, he even has a belly instead of muscles- good if the shirt covers it all; sometimes a head lacking hair, but still isn’t too disgusting. He shaves by the weekends, is still “athletic” enough to do some housework, remembers where to laugh in the jokes, nods to show he’s listening, takes her out once a month, drives her to the supermarket and back, doesn’t set the car in motion until all women’s parts of body are in, and puts the water-closet pan’s seat down.

I hope most of my friends agree to above if not I wish to see the comments :-) My next blog will be all about boys;-)

Sample Email

2009-06-02T05:12:00.000-07:00

People Please donot copy this - too many people already copied this :-) :-P

`From: Anand kishore Raju` `Subject: Prospective Student Interested in Power Aware routing problem`	Make sure your from address and subject lines are useful
`Dear Professor XYZ,`	Greeting: its safest to be a bit formal here.
`I will be finishing a B.Tech degree in Computer Science at the National Institute of Tech, India this year. I am considering applying to Univ of ABC internship/Phd/MS program and would be interested joining your Distributed Computing Research group.`	Briefly introduce yourself in at most two sentences. Don't tell your whole life story. Be direct and clear about applying to grad school.
`I found your paper, "Blah Blah in Blah System for Blah Networks", on your website. I was fascinated by your result, especially as I have spent several summers studying the power awareness in general network problem as an intern at Microshifty Corp in the blah Country. You can find a paper about my work on this at (some XYZ confernce.)`	Explain specifically what you read and where you found it (people sometimes publish several papers with similar names and forget which is which). A touch of flattery never hurts, but don't go overboard. If appropriate, relate it to your background and interests and briefly plug your work.
`I believe your result is even more important than your paper implies, since it can be extended to solve the current problem of power reduction in Internet Devices (Like Big Green Initiative of IBM).`	Concisely describe your insight or why you are interested in the work.
`Do you think it would be worthwhile to pursue this line of research? If you are interested, I can send you a proof sketch along with my detailed resume.Thanking you in Anticipation.`	End with a clear, simple question. Offer a suggestion on how to proceed.
`Regards, Anand`	Closing — make sure to include you name and email address.

How to Approach

2009-06-02T04:51:00.000-07:00

Its a really bad idea to send spam emails to long lists of professors. These emails will never help you, and some professors will maintain blacklists of applicants who do this to make sure their application is rejected without consideration.

Your goal in sending email is not to contact as many professors as you can, but to identify a few professors who you might want as your research advisor and then to find which of those seem most promising as advisors and convince them that you would be a worthwhile student.

You should only contact professors/Mentors with whom you have a genuine interest in working based on knowing something about them and what they do. You can find out about professors' research by looking at their web pages (professors who don't have web pages about their research are either not interested in recruiting students, not doing any research, or so famous they probably have someone to filter their email for them).

Do Your Homework

Before contacting a potential advisor, do your homework: read the advisor's home page, read their blogs and at least one recent paper.If doing this doesn't give you any interesting ideas, this is probably not someone with whom you want to do research so you shouldn't waste time contacting her or him. If it does, send a short introductory email.You should make an effort to raise an interesting question about the work described in the paper, to suggest extensions or applications of the work, or to relate it directly to something you have done.

It is definitely worth taking time to write clearly and consisely using correct spelling and grammar. As with all emails, the message should be broken into short paragraphs, the sentences should be simple and straightforward, and no line should have more than 80 characters.

Never Do:-

Donot send you personal information like GRE/Gmat Scores GPA, class rank, cholesterol levels, favorite movies, etc. and ask what your chances of admission are. Standardized tests and grades have minimal influence on your chances of admission and reveal very little about your potential as a researcher. No one can or should tell you anything about your chances of admission based on an email (other than that you are more likely to be rejected now since you sent an annoying email).
Don't send a first email longer than one screenful (about 60 lines). You should be able to get across everything you need in a first email concisely and use longer emails if technical depth is required in follow ups.
Don't waste space and time telling me how hard-working, creative and smart you are — demonstrate it with the contents of your message.
Don't make generic statements about being interested in my work or how well it relates to your interests. Most professors have projects in several different areas and can't figure out what you mean unless you describe a specific connection or interest.
Don't attach anything to your email. It may be blocked by the univ server as their spam filters are ultra sensitive.Don't use any fancy formatting in your email (including your message signature)

Follow Up Ur Email:

Since most professors get lots of emails, there is some chance that even if you do everything right, your message will get lost in inbox and you won't get a reply. If you don't get a reply after about a week, send a follow up email that politely asks if the message was received and includes the previous message. If you still don't get a response, that's a pretty good sign that the potential professor you are contacting either has an overly-agressive spam filter, or is not someone you want as your advisor. Just leave him dont bother him anymore :-)

Internships- 4.0 FAQs - KnowHows - Contd

2009-06-02T01:57:00.000-07:00

Q4 What if I have no guidance from a prof?

Well jiska ka koi nahi hota uska upar waala hota hai. Well in this case you may not be aided by any upar waala but http://www.google.com will help you. Please develop the habit of asking questions from internet and develop the knack of getting the right answers in right time. Without this knack, you will be in a deep soup. See you can read science magazines, digit and chip for CS guys and electronics for you for ECE guys. These magazines have truckload of articles on assorted topics. Read those topics and get some info on those topics from http://www.google.com. You can also use wikipedia as a starting reference point on any topic. Once you know which area to work on, download papers from online libraries such as http://www.ieee.org, http://www.springer-link.com, http://www.sciencedirect.com et all. Most institutions have subscription to these libraries. I have the username and passwords of them all but cant post them here as they are under licence to Bilkent university. Once you read these papers, organize them so that you can see what is the latest research in your area? Once you know that, you can do three things

1. Do something entirely new in the area of your choice.

2. Do some extention work, i.e. add on something to what already has been done

3. Conduct intensive literature survey, drawing conclusion and hypothyze something that can be done

See doing point one requires guidance. Without prof you cannot do it. So in case you donot have any guidance, I suggest you concentrate on second and third. Now the third point sometimes proves a very valuable contribution to research community and is highly favored (it sometimes translates into journal publication). However, it has to be truly extensive for it to demand any merit. Extension work well and truly deserves a conference publication. If your extension is just a minor addition like a new graph or some new analytical or mathematical result then it will result into publication in a national conference. However, if you extend your work to something new then you merit a publication in an international conference. Extension work is increasingly finding favour in journals of lower impact parameter(which are those I will not name here to avert controversy) however, an IEEE journal publication means good work and a PRL (Physical Review Letter) publication means high quality of work. A PRL publication guarantees a seat in top 10 US University whatever your acads maybe. Again it is EE Specific example. People from other branches need to check out on this. Below are most of the journals I know of. Search for them using google.

1. IEEE (http://www.ieee.org)

2. SPIE(http://www.spie.org)

3. OSA (http://www.opticsexpress.org)

4. Springer (http://www.springer-link.com)

5. Science Direct

6. PRL Physical Review Letters

Write a good paper and try submitting. Who knows your work may actually get appreciated and get published. See the idea is to work not for publication but for learning. Those who do vice versa can do neither.

Q5 Conferences and Techfest demystified.

Well I have been browsing through various forums for quite some time now. I have seen people posting their profiles and saying one paper in National Level Technical Symposium or Two papers presented at IIT Delhi. Well no disrespect to you guys, but make this thing very clear in your mind before u start your uni shortlisting based on this stellar profile. Friends paper in techfest or prize awarding national symposiums organized by some university department which are not peer reviewed papers hold little merit. Try and get your paper published in an international conference. Now how to find a good international conference? Go to the website http://www.ieee.org, http://www.spie.org, http://www.osa.org (my apologies to mech guys here too much ee centric. However you can look for SAE and ASHRAE webpages). IEEE annually organizes more than 100 conferences in a broad spectrum of specializations encompassing all branches of EE. SPIE and OSA conferences are in the area of Optics, Photonics, Imaging, nanotechnology, datamining (new addition to SPIE stable), biomedical imaging and optics etc. Also periodically perform google search for conferences in India. TCI organizes most of good conferences in India and you can check out their listings for good conferences being organized in India.

Indian journals are a bit suspect so do not waste your good work by getting published here. An IETE tech review or Pramana are no good in front of an IEEE conference. This is because an American/EU prof would not be regularly referring to it.

Also somewhere, I had read that people apply this rule of thumb to select conferences that a 31st conference in something is better than 2nd conference in something. I beg to differ here. See the thing is that research trends are constantly evolving, so a 41st conferences in optics may not be relevant as compared to 2nd conference in nanophotonics. Though the latter has evolved out of the former, future is in latter and more of contemporary work is going on in the area of latter. Optics conference could well be a meeting place of puritan opticians still working on fundamentals. Though more fundamental research is being presented in optics conference, a undergrad student would be more accepted in nanophotonics than optics.

Q6 Websites that i followed?

Good question with not so good answer. Apart from forums like edulix,kaaledge.com and testmagic.com, I would suggest applicants to browse through some of the below mentioned website for accessing the database of various professors and their depts.

1) Google directory -http://www.google.co.in/Top/Computers/Computer_Science/

2) http://univ.cc/

3)http://www.allaboutcollege.com/

4)http://www.braintrack.com/

Q7 where do i get a good research internship from?

Well guys this i had missed out earlier so here goes. If in first or second year look for IISc KVPY,IITs, in third or fourth year look for IISc YEFP, TIFRs VSRP, Then internships at ITC is only for IITians, if you are from Applied science background apply at UCLA IPAM for RIPS program. YOu can also look for PARC internships at the end of your final year. ALso look out for british council BOND program and browse the site http://www.daad.de and look for internships in germany. I am not posting details here as i avoid spoon feeding. please do google on the key words in caps and i will be happy to answer any specific querie on these try these new leads

1. go to http://www.tifaccore.dce.edu and contact Dr. R.K. Sinha. Work will be a good mix of theory and experiment

2. Telnet group at IIT Madras offers good internship opportunities in summer (PAID). Check it out

7. UK SCHOL LINKS

http://www.britishcouncil.org/india-scho...-bond-link

http://www.abs-india.org/Learningnonmem/funding.aspx#q1

http://www.orsas.ac.uk/

http://www.admin.cam.ac.uk/univ/gsprospe...dure6.html

http://www.csfp-online.org/hostcountries...ooklet.pdf

http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/hodgkin

http://www.europa.eu.int/comm/education/...ex_en.html(erasmus mundus)

To conclude, I would like to thank all for coaxing me to write this. Call it a very rough draft I am posting.

Internships- 3.0 FAQs - KnowHows

2009-06-02T01:52:00.000-07:00

In this post I will take a question and answer approach, answering all the pertinent questions one by one.

Q1 Who should do research?

Well there are three answers to that question and that varies from person to person. There is a category of people who are skill less in the ways of world. They are ignorant of the ways of the world and conveniently choose to remain so. For them research is shield against their artlessness. The second is the type who has the ability to think out of the box. They have the ability to decipher the toughest of problems and present the simplest of solutions. They are naturals. The third is the one who are simply passionate about whatever they do.

Q2 Why research (Research Vs MBA)?

Enough has been said on this topic in numerous threads on edulix and some other Gre websites that I follow. I will however very briefly give some conclusive comments on this topic. If you are interested in making a lot of money then please do not go in for PhD. Let me substantiate this with some economic facts. If you are lucky to get a fully funded PhD program in a reputed university in US, you will be getting a complete tution waiver along with a stipend of $18000-30000 tops. After completion of your PhD you will have the option of going to the industry or continue somewhere as a PDF(Post Doctoral Fellow). As a PDF you will get somewhere around $3000-$5000 tops per month. By this time you will turn 30 and earning $60,000 per annum. On the other your good friend who gave his GMAT after working for two years and got into a Kellogg, a Wharton, a Yale or an HBS would get a start of $100,000 per annum at a ripe age of 25-27 while you still will be writing your PhD. By 30 he would have touched $150,000 happily married, great wife and a couple of rugrats. So money wise a career in research and development pales in front of an MBA. However if you take a holistic view of things then you will realize that an MBA pales in front of a PhD. To evolve as a human being, it is important to develop an inquisitive attitude and acquire the ability to perform and understand new things. These capabilities can only be acquired during the course of doctoral studies.
I would like to conclude by saying that in our scriptures, it has been mentioned that the two main objectives of a human life are to assimilate and disseminate knowledge and to contribute to continuation of our race. Chasing Maya(or money) is the karma(action) of Demons.

After reading all this, if you are still interested in research, then research it is for you. Congratulations on your decision. Now read on to know how to go about it. Now there a few more limitations of mine that needs to be understood. I am basically an CSE guy and planning to pursue my masters on Distributed computing Algorithms. So whatever I type here will draw examples and instances from CSE, Computer Networks, opensource and algorithms. People from other branches are free to read for their benefit but information will be more specific and useful for the people from above mentioned branches.

Q3 How do I start?

Now this is a question many people ask from me. I believe this is not the right question to ask. Research is not a cranked up train or a heated up engine for which there are procedures to start (Mechanical guys would know about it!!!!!). Research is something in which either you have natural interest or you acquire interest over a period of time while reading into the subject.
Now in the first year of engineering, it is belief that a student should concentrate on his academics and hone their skills in physics and mathematics. The reason I am saying this is because these are the the foundation stones on which stellar research careers are built. Once you understand your Newton laws, Fermats Principle, Snells Law, Huygens theory, integration and differentiation and their applications you will be greatly aided in any advanced study that you conduct.
In the second year of engineering you should start looking the area in which you want to do research. Typically, it is determined by the area in which your HOD or a renowned Prof of your college is working. In my case the best Prof in NITDGP was Working on nothing.So I started my self doing something very interesting on Opensource (some server configurations etc). See the point is that in second year you have an impressionist mind. Whatever is taught to you, you try to grasp it firmly. So as early as second year you can work on basically anything or sometimes nothing. It is when you go into the end phase of your second year, you develop some likes or dislikes and get so decided on your major

Internships- 2.0 Research For UnderGrads

2009-06-02T01:40:00.000-07:00

Though I aint an expert but I am only making the narrative a little impersonal. I hope you guys will empathize with me. Now research is something that is not generally associated with undergrads in India. There are many reasons to it. I will point wise dwell into them :

1. The present generation is perceived to be more interested in a stop gap engineering followed by another stop gap MBA leading to a job with a start of 30 thousand per month. When it touches 40 grand you get married, have kids and live happily ever after. Someone getting into an IIT, NIT or DCE stands a better chance at IIMs FMS et all gets a start of 1 lakh, if lucky gets 10 lakhs worth foreign placement and when it touches 2/15 lakh per month, you get married, have kids and live really happy ever after.

2. Lack of experimental facilities and good laboratories means that undergrads here are devoid of training on basic scientific instruments like Oscilloscope, signal generator, Labview and other stuff. They are left with option of study based research and theoretical simulations. Most of our fulltime PhDs do the same is a different thing altogether.

3. Parental and peer pressure: Believe me, most of the parents do not want their children to do a PhD. An MS maybe but never a PhD. They rather see you a happily married MBA than a doctorate scrapping his living like a Lab rat. Your girlfriend would also want same out of you (unless she herself wants to do a PhD which makes you the luckiest bastard alive on this planet, Yess I am one of them !!).

I will also briefly dwell here on whether this scenario will change in India before getting down to the real stuff. Well guys to this there is both good and bad news. You all must have read about supply and demand. Good faculty for any engineering college is very short in supply these days even in places such as IIT and NIT. The reason being mass exodus towards MBA and little towards interdisciplinary research incorporating Engineering and Applied sciences, the kind of thing that holds promise for the future. This crunch however means by the principle stated above that demand will rise. According to me it will take another 20 years for our babus to realize that for their grand children to be good engineers, they need good teachers. Thats when governments emphasis will shift to experimental R&D at university level and indigenous product development.
Every year government is taking steps in this direction but they are too few and too far between. Thats why I foresee a period of 20 years before they all accrue up to something meaningful. But more recently the word Recession had made people more inclined towards Phd/MS(Further Studies), may be its propelled by vast unemployment or suddenly people are getting more interested for doing research.

Internships- 1.0 Importance

2009-06-02T01:38:00.000-07:00

Many students want to give a impetus to their applications for MS or PhD in the US by working with a professor at a good research lab - for example in India there are the IITs and IISc and in places like China there is the Tsinghua University and in the US - there are so many good schools. Many people also apply for internships at EPFL,ENST,ETH Switzerland and INRIA, France and so on. Here are a few tips when trying to approach professors at such places. In general, these tips hold true for emailing university professors in general.

1. Try to show why you are interested in the work going on in a particular lab

2. Try to do a lot of background survey on what kinda of work happens in that lab

3. Try to find matches between what kind of projects you have done and the kind of projects going in the lab currently

4. See the students of the professor in question and see what they are upto - they should have web pages available for this

5. Try to send them a link to your resume rather than a doc copy - it helps to save your email from getting blocked by spam filters

6. If you cant send a link (which is sad coz u can easily get a webpage from google pages) - then send in a pdf copy - not doc

7. Keep resume shorter rather than longer…profs dont usually have a lot of time

8. In the email you send - include 3-4 major points off of your resume - so that they know what you have in you and can go seek out more about

you in the resume…keep the email short…and sweet…

I hope this helps

NameSake

2009-06-02T00:49:00.000-07:00

Well, I dont know about Juliet and Shakespeare's lyrical tale of "star-cross'd" lovers, but for me my name matters alot. My name is my identity, my pride, its inherited. The first thing that you learn about a person is his name. It's also something that you usually remember.
Would Oprah have become a famous talk show host if her name had been Mabel? Would Elvis be the King of Rock and Roll if his name had been Bob? Our names are the cornerstone of our personality. From creative spellings to family tributes, our names say a lot about us, and they help us become who we are. So what about you-what does your name mean, and what does it say about you?
Juliet:What's in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet."

Who Am I

2009-06-02T00:35:00.000-07:00

Nice of you to drop by! I am Anand Kishore Raju, will be working as Development Engineer for next few months at Telecom ParisTech (a.k.a ENST),France.

So if you have more time to waste, then feel free to browse the rest of the blog to know more about me. In case you feel you dont have much time right now, you are wrong, I mean how hard can it be to squeeze out 5 minutes from your busy schedule Mister BusyMan! or Miss BusyWoman! Stick around, who knows we could have more in common than you think!

Well, somehow I managed to finish my Bachelors in Computer Science and Engineering at National Institute of Technology, Durgapur. As far as my personal life is concerned I have a bunch of friends which includes my girlfriend, a number of girls in my crushlist and most importantly a number of people who hate me most.

Will get into details of above mentioned in my future posts. Till then Xo-Xo