Rebooting India - A Book Review.

ebooting India by Nandan Nilekani and Viral Shah is an excellent discussion of how, and under what circumstances, Aadhaar got conceived and its meaningful extensions to improve the manner in which the Indian Government can enrich the life of its citizens.

The book is a bold attempt to infuse technology as a foundation for governmental and societal efficacy, by rooting out opportunities for fraud, bribery, leakage, etc. (I'm poignantly familiar with the strikes against computerization labor unions held in the early 1970s that technology was to be eschewed: Why? It'd rob the unionists of 'meaningful' employment, of course, ...)

US Independence Day Celebration, 2015, Personal Style.

ndependence Days of individual countries are celebrated with differing themes all the world over. Today, July 4, is US Independence Day.

Certain institutions take this opportunity to celebrate the day in their own unique way ...

Customization of Web Streaming for Classical Indian Music - An Unscientific Observation.

usic Genome Project®, we learn from Pandora's web site, is what powers the music service. In this post, I want to share my observations in customizing the web site for Indian Classical Music.

The only mechanism for customization of Pandora Radio is the Thumbs-Up/Thumbs-Down pair. (In How Pandora Radio Works, author Julia Layton describes in good detail how you can use the Pandora software to customize the music you'd want to listen to).

Healthcare and Boeing?

ealthcare and Boeing, the aerospace giant?

Yes.

Not exactly the kind of healthcare schemes that employers are interested in, regarding their employees. But, a system for ensuring that patients get wholesome care by their doctors.

My First Uber Trip.

ver since I learnt about the infusion of capital of Uber at an unusually high valuation, and definitely after I came to know about an UberCHOPPER service in Bangalore, I had been awaiting for an opportunity to experience the Uber service myself, complete with the use of the iPhone App, starting from requesting the service ¹.

How Corporations Help Society.

A good example of how corporations help society can be found in this blog post: Second innings with Google’s gCareer program. Since the blog authors are generally of Indian origin, cricket metaphor has been used talk about 2nd careers.

Another example is how Microsoft has influenced the Redmond area in Washington state.

It seems that it is a lot more effective to have corporation-sponsored activities than government-sponsored ones.

Minimalist Approach has Advantages.

hen you move to a different town, as we did recently by moving to the Seattle area, an important realization hits you: You are indeed able to live in a minimalist manner, out of suitcases, so to speak. And, life is a lot simpler!

14 March 2014: Doodle for Google

Minimalist approach has other advantages.

Take the Google front page, for example. This simple front page has been the gateway for many people for their searches and for the diurnal goodies that Google itself leads you to: Today, it is about Doodle for Google, a scheme which invites young artists — Grades K-12 — to submit their doodles ...

(An Almost) Perfect Parking Experience in Oakland, California.

The smart way to park.

crambling for change before driving to a different location where you have to allow for parking has been a painful phenomenon. Until recently, that is.

I'm not talking about using a credit card to pay for the parking at a curb; this method, while definitely better than scrambling for change, doesn't come close in convenience. What if you need to extend the parking duration? Do you have to call the toll free number, and get into voice-mail jail? Pain.

Enter Parkmobile.

Chromecast, an Example of a Well-Productized Device.

The Chromecast Device.

Within minutes of unpacking the Chromecast device, you can see it working beautifully on your HDMI-equipped TV, getting controlled by your iPhone or iPad¹! No reading manuals, nothing.

Thanks, Google!

You notice that any TV with an HDMI input, the Chromecast, and your iPhone or iPad work seamlessly.

A Journalistic Faux Pas, Internet style.

Journalists make every effort to report news and information correctly. However, once in a while, mistakes happen.

An example is today's on CNN.com.

The front page provides the title "Apple downgrades Tim Cook". You wonder why Apple downgraded Tim Cook. When you click on the link, however, you are taken to another web page where the title is "Apple employees downgrade Tim Cook".

Big difference.

Apple as a corporate entity is different from its constituent employees although, in many cases, the employees have a say in what Apple, the corporate entity, does or says.

Who won in the 2013 US Presidential Election?

Of course, we all know that President Obama was reelected to the 2013 White house with a 303-206 majority in electoral votes last week. But, the real win is for two important constituencies:

1. Education
2. Economy (Middle class)

Education. The advent of China and India as potential economic forces in the world economy needs to be taken note of. The 21st century belongs to a properly educated workforce. Not merely in overall education emphasizing liberal arts, etc., but one that provides proper grounding in technology too. President Obama's passion towards this cause is unmistakable. Did you see such passion in the GOP camp?

Economy (The middle class). The backbone of any economy is a vibrant middle class. Particularly when the entire world is getting adjusted to a different 'economic center of gravity' than just the 'West', with both the US and the Western Europe in economic struggle, it takes some proactive

A Simplistic Model of Performing Earned Value Management (EVM) in a Project.

Most discussions on Earned Value Management (EVM) will tell us to compute planned values, PV(t), at the time of planning the project, and assess Earned Values, EV(t), as we make progress over time. This is a very easy and effective way of assessing how the project is performing with respect to time, i.e., schedule.

The problem, in many cases, is that Planned Value (PV) cannot realistically be computed at all. In a project that is expected to take about 18 months to complete, with an average of 25 engineers on the project throughout, and the number of engineers changing over time, we can only begin to compute the planned value as time progresses.