One good thing about me switching jobs is that I eventually make a post out of it every time. Thus happened with IBM, Samsung and now Cisco. In retrospect, that is kind of expected. A quick jot of the reasons would look like this:

1. I get loads of time to kill. Wait. Loads is an understatement; its more like Mountains.

2. The Internet speed has improved from College to IBM to Samsung to Cisco.

3. More of alone time leads to more philosophy (not essentially better).

4. I kind of miss the old environment (read people I used to work with) and this point should have been clubbed with the previous one.

5. An entirely new set of females in and around the campus has the creative juices flowing. No pun intended here!

6. Every time I switch, I realize that despite the trillions of pages, there is only so much internet that you can browse.

The body of the post is not related to the title in any way, it's just that the title keeps rolling over and over in the back of my mind as I type.

To end, I would like to say that I find the updated blogger interface decent; this being my first time using it.

Finally, I would really really appreciate if anyone is kind enough to drop a comment, just to let me know that people do still visit my blog.

Some days back my manager came up to me and asked me if we could show a particular stock animation on the Interface at some particular event in the hardware. What happened to that is another story saved for some other time, but what happened a week back is interesting.

I was trying to connect my PC to the internet using a nokia phone and nokia PC suite. This was something my mom and dad had tried sometime back at home (without child supervision :-)) and failed.

Whenever that happens, I get a call explaining the problem and expecting a fix. I had never seen that software at the time, so all I could come up with was some 'useless beating around the bush' which, needless to say, failed (My Dad, as usual, thought my engineering degree was a waste of money).

So coming back to previous week, at the climax of the connection activity (while the PC was trying to connect), there was a decent, neat animation showing waves travelling from the PC towards the tower (You must have seen it if you have ever connected to the internet using nokia PC suite). My Dad, who had been watching wordlessly till now, commented -

"As long as no waves come back from the tower, this cannot possibly connect."

Animation brings life to UI's and has enormous potential to confuse simple people.

Once during my first experience of Windows OS, something that I had put for copy hung. The progress bar wouldn't budge a millimeter, but I was happy because I could see bits of paper flying from one folder to the other!

To tell you the truth, I never intended to guide people in becoming entrepreneurs. Far from it. It just happens that three people pinged me on facebook to tell me that they thought my blog was good.

I believe in science. And I believe that science says that when you have the same observation thrice, it's about time for deduction. Which in this case has lead to an attempt to bring my dead blog back to life.

Before you start, to prevent you from getting any false ideas about me, I would like to clarify the following.

• I come from a family where they have never been any entrepreneurs/businessmen. In short, no one I am related to has ever made a "profit".

• My family does not believe in entrepreneurship. In short, everyone I am related to tries to explain why the whole idea of entrepreneurship is not a very smart one.

If you still want to learn from me, I would gladly feel sorry for you. Here goes the list of do's and don'ts.

• Don't start deciding the name first. We spent the first two months doing nothing except working on the name!! And what we finally agreed on (and have stuck to), in our college lingo means 'idiot'.

• If it's an internet/software startup, forget about getting a server. We wasted the next two months thinking about the advantages we would have with a dedicated server. When we finally worked on the disadvantages list, it turned out to be so long that today we host our website on a free webspace.

• If you haven't already, do not watch the movie "The Social Network". Not that it isn't an awesome movie, but they day my partner watched it (I recommended it to him), he started talking about how much each of us own and how we should always inform the other before every decision taken. *wink*

• This one is very important. Never, and I mean never ever announce a product before you have it completely ready. The following things could happen:

- Out of the blue your day job may start demanding hectic hours and you won't get any more time to work on the product.

- You may start getting bored with working on the same thing for a long time.

- You start getting the feeling that the product is useless. This is usually the most common.

• Well this one is a revelation. You have your website up and running which tries to tell people what you intend to do and how you intend to do it. Simple enough. You post the link somewhere (a little bragging never hurt anyone), and next thing you know is you start getting the following type of messages on Facebook -
  
  
  "Awesome work man! Btw what are we supposed to do on the site?"
  
  
  You are not supposed to do anything dumbo! All you are supposed to do is to look at it and tell us if you think it's good/bad.

• If you are a group of one/two/three etc people, you must understand that you can't be one/two/three for the rest of your life. So you need to bring in new people. How? Don't ask me, we are still two.

• This one is a secret. Odd jobs never hurt anyone. I suspect that all entrepreneurs have done some at some point. For example, I sometimes do assignments for grad students in US/Europe to keep my paypal account ticking. *wink*

• You always live in the morbid fear that you are getting accustomed to (and maybe even interested in) your day job. Trust me, it's not true. After spending an uncomfortable more than a year, I finally realized this. "All day jobs suck and have always sucked".

• Try not to tell everyone you know that you are the proud owner of a company without a product. I understand that at it's really difficult, but atleast try.

Well, I suppose that almost sums up my knowledge of becoming an entrepreneur. If you are a lonely reader who happened to wander to this dead blog, post a comment if you feel like.

Does this happen to you too?

I was eating loads of street food, when someone commented that on the hygenic aspect of street food. In response I told everyone how I had a pretty robust digestive system ( Which I still maintain that I do), so that I could loads of everything and anything that I wanted. The next morning, everyone else is fine, while I keep shuttling between the room and the loo.

I tell someone how I efficiently wrap up my work on time, so much so that I never need to stay back late or go to work on weekends. All through that week, I do 11+ hours and also work from home over the weekend.

I tell my folks how popular I am in college (again I still maintain that I am still a recognized face in my campus, even though I am out of it now), and the next day they meet someone who has never heard of me before. The day I had told someone that I was good with mechanics, the graphics lab prof told me that teaching me graphics had been a complete waste of his and my time.

It's not a crime to brag once in a while, is it??

When the chips are down and the stakes are high,
When the match is tied and you bowl a bye.

When the bills are high and the cash is low,
When the Man-Hole was open and down you go.

When you get a dud after expecting a beauty,
When you see that idiot flaunting a cutie.

When a bird shits on you when you pass under a tree,
When you gotta go to office and the loo ain't free.

When you work on weekends while your friends go booze,
When you brush your teeth and you want to snooze.

When you sweat in office while your Manager has fun,
When you write a code and it does not run.

When the appraisals are out and your ratings are down,
When everyone seems smiling while you wear a frown.

When the Day is Valentine, and you haven't got a date,
When she rejected your proposal but the chocolates she ate.

When your present is boring and your future looks bleak,
When you are avoided coz you complain like a freak.

When the shoes are worn and the road is rough,
When you feel so squashed but the going feels tough.

When everyone you know would kick your bum,
Just hang on Buddy, for your time will come!! :-))

Ahemmm, ahemm, I'm blogging after...... lemme see.......3 months!!

Well, today's one of those rare lucky days, when I have nothing to do (that goes only for the next few minutes, touchwood) and I am still not worrying how I am supposed to show in my ILC(timesheet) what I was doing during this time.

For updates, the pretty gal who sits in front of me hasn't reported to work today(before you think I am that lucky, also consider that there are two wooden partitions in between, which incidentally are completely opaque ;)).
My Functional Manager is in Spain along with one Team Lead, the rest of the Team Leads are in a meeting, and one Lead who has just been back from Spain, has been offering Spanish chocolates to everyone around 30 seconds ago. Tell you what, there's nothing special about Spanish chocolates.

Well, so much for the Mr. X story. If you haven't read that, you might consider doing so here.

Well I am Mr. X now, except the beautiful Mrs X part, which I am sure you have already figured out. Being Mr. X, I wanted to add a little to the story.

• Mr. X never lets a single chance to trash his juniors pass by.

• Mr. X's manager and seniors; similarly never allow a single chance to trash Mr. X pass by.

• As far as the current Mr. X in question (read I) is concerned, I got no juniors

• Mr. X sometimes attends office parties where he feels like screaming his head off, let alone having fun.

• Mr. X meets no clients and delivers no presentations. Instead he tests codes that other people have written (usually) and occasionally gets to write a few lines of code and modify a few lines of pre-written code. Incidentally Mr. X has discovered that the codes he deals with require absolutely zero imagination and no creativity.

The rest of the updates will follow as and when Mr. X finds time and finds updates *wink*. For now, Mr. X has to test the next piece of code. :-).

I do not expect many people to read this post, partly because I have been on an extended leave from the blogosphere and mostly because I never had many readers to start with. So, if you did read this post, you might consider offering Mr. X your sympathies.

Yes I am.

I am stuck in a company. More specifically, I am stuck in a training room. The trainer fumbles while executing a simple C++ program and wonders whether "Using namespace std" ends in a semicolon. He has no idea that C++ codes can be compiled using "g++". What are we doing?? We are learning Object Oriented Programming Concepts (OOPS) in two whole days!!

This is an absolute mockery of my B.E degree. All the time, I sit around chatting and surfing the Internet while the trainer drones on about how confusing Inheritance is. Worse, the guys in the class, leave alone the ones not from Computer Science backgrounds, are even more pathetic. This is a batch where more than 80% of the class cannot complete a factorial program in C in 15 minutes! I am not enjoying being the smart guy in the batch, not anymore.

But the worst part is that I am not feeling like running away as I should. I am yet to receive my first paycheck, but the mere thought is tempting. In a long time, I am very concerned about what future has in store for me.