Audio Notes using MS Office 2008

Last week I was looking for solution for best Audio Notes. There are many commercial applications available but One Note was my favorite.  Switching to Mac rules out use of One Note, but the solution that I found was perfect and without any additional cost.

If you are using Office 2008 or above this will be available in just 2 steps:

1. Switch to notebook layout: In the ‘View’ ribbon you can switch to ‘Notebook Layout’ which transforms the normal layout to a tab based (vertical). Tabs can be used for different sections, and the page are ruled too (I don’t know what purpose they serve, but it looks good).
2. Switch on the Audio: Tools -> Audio Tools -> Start Recording  will start the audio recording. Best part about this recording is the position of text while audio was recording is also recorded. When you hover over a piece of text, a speaker icon appears next to it. Using that one can playback specific notes pertaining to that text easily. This makes it a brilliant utility specially for class and meeting notes.

Screenshot of Audio Recording. 

Tags: audio notes, Office, OneNote

I am not saying cricket is simple, but everything around it, if you keep simple, it becomes relatively easy

On the eve of becoming the most capped player in Test Cricket, these words perfectly sum the way he thinks and explains how he handles the burden of expectations from millions. I like this statement very much because I believe the same in technology arena.  Technology is not simple, but if separate it out from other things and remove all the jargons, it can be understood easily.

People who do not know Sachin would always wonder how can one person dominate World cricket for more then 20 years and still remain simple, down to earth person who when walks on the filed is hope for billion people and nightmare for opposition. Answer is simple – his simplicity and love for game acts helps him play but he never allows that success to get into his head. He answers it simple -

Time flies. You just need to enjoy it, it’s a circle. You are not always on the top, sometimes there are rough patches, but the simple formula that I have followed is, whenever I have gone through tough phases, I have found a reason to work harder. And try and spend all my energy at something I have been wanting to get better at.

Congratulations on yet another record and lets level this ‘dead’ series.

Tags: Sachin Tendulkar

Formula 1 has been hit once again with the controversy of Team Orders. Team Orders can be defined as team dictating the outcome of it’s two players. Mainly this situation arises when team favors one drive over another. This has been a controversial topic in motor sport for long time and change of regulation has a lot to do with how it can be perceived. In earlier days of F1, a specific leader of team was chosen and even if he can problem with his car, he could use his teammates during the race. But those times are gone and now sporting rules do not allow to dictate the results.

The bigger question then arises is – Formula 1 is a team sport or not? Lets see how the teams are designed. Both drivers have separate car, with moderate modifications done for each driver as per his driving style, physical conditions and other factors. Both drivers have separate team of engineers working on respective cars, that makes it more like individual sport. On other side, funds for a team are handled from one team, almost all of the technology is developed for both drivers and data is completely shared between both, this makes it a team sport.

If we consider F1 as team sport, then team has right to dictate the result. It would be similar to Cycling where complete team tries to win the race for the leader. Here unlike other team sport such as football and cricket, the team leader is considered a winner and not the team. World knows about Lance Armstrong as winner, but very few know about which team helped him win the title.

But the difference is a team leader is selected in the beginning and everyone knows what they are getting into and what are their duties. Unlike in Formula1 where no one driver is selected as leader and that is why I believe F1 should be considered an individual sport. No one should be robbed of the victory one deserves. But this is not the end of story, every team order situation should be considered individually.

For example the Austrian GP 2002 when Schumacher was asked to take lead off Barichello was not a fair move. Point being, Barichello was fast in practice, qualifying and race as well. That time to ask him to give his position away was unfair. But during yesterday’s race where Alonso was allegedly given chance to overtake Massa is totally different. Massa could never match the pace of Alonso is the race and that could have resulted in few situations. One being where Vettel would have come close to Alonso and started pressuring him, that could have resulted in something lesser then Ferrari 1-2 which is not favorable. Second situations is where Alonso and Massa could have collided trying to fend each other and could have resulted in zero points. The same situation arose few weeks back where it resulted in collision between Vettel and Webber. To Ferrari’s defense, they would never want to have a repeat situation of such and asked Massa to back off for the greater good of team (no pun or double meaning intended).

This situation barely justifies the move and it might yield in punishment or not, all depends on WMSC, which is handling this matter.  This time WMSC should not only resolve this matter, but also come up with strict guidelines to protect individual’s rights. They should specifically have scenarios where similar conflicts in team can be resolved.

As a F1 fan, we do not want any more scandals in this sports. Already for last few years we had too much politics, race fixing, espionage etc and this season seems to be shaping up well keeping everything behind. 

Tags: Alonso, f1, Ferrari, Massa, Team orders

Spoiler Alert

void main(){
   static int totem = 12345;
   int level = 0;
   int task = 45678;
   int returnTotem = dreamSequence(task);

   if (totem == returnTotem)
        printf("you are real");
   else{
       printf("Stuck in limbo");
       while(true);
   }
}

int dreamSequence(unsigned int number) {
     int totem = 12345;
     level++;
     int taskCompleted = 0;

    // Task Processing
   // Time Spent in function = f(t,level)

    if( taskCompleted)
         return totem;
     return dreamSequence(task);
}

Tags: Humor, Programming

Swype is the virtual keyboard device that replaces the original keyboard that comes along with various mobile devices. I have been hearing about Swype from Gina Trapani for long time but always thought, how great can one keyboard be over the existing one. I had to try for myself and in just 2 tries I fell in love with this brilliant piece of software.

Typing on mobile devices has never been my strong point, I would always spend a lot of time figuring out where the keys are and a simple text message reply will take up to 4 minutes. T9 was a great help and I still consider it better then most of the physical qwerty keyboards that come along with mobile devices. iPhones soft keyboard was improvement over all and Android’s keyboard was better but Swype takes the experience to a new level.

Swype is developed by the same person who developed T9. In Swype you do not lift your fingers to type but move them in a pattern such that it joins all the letters of intended word you wanted to type. Swype recognizes the pattern and types in that word for you. One does not have to necessarily spend extra time on the character he wants to input, just swiping over it does the trick. 

By eliminating the time spent on lifting the finger and putting it back, a greater amount of efficiency is achieved. Tracking of the path need not be accurate, Swype uses its extensive database of words to give you a closest match and its substitutes. It has increased my typing speed by more then twice and it promises to take the typing speed up to 40 words per minute. Just try this once and you will fall in love with the new way to type.

This also demonstrates the importance of open platform. Swype started developing for Windows phone first and now has included Android phones to its portfolio. By replacing the normal keyboard, my productivity on N1 has improved drastically. I believe, these kind of revolutionary products will push the Android platform ahead of iOs platform. 

Tags: Android, swype

I have been using Nexus One for over a month now and it seems right time to do a review. I did not want to review it soon, because as a smart phone it has too many functionalities and all those have to be tested thoroughly before giving a verdict. My main purpose was to fill the void between my McBook pro and mobile browser (iPod touch) during business travel. I planned to use this as replacement for a netbook and it seems N1 fits perfectly into it.

To start with hardware, the most striking feature of N1 is its beautiful screen. N1’s AMOLED touchscreen emits such beautiful colors that its a pleasure to watch videos and photographs. Unlike the iPhone screen, it gives much better contrast and blacks come out really well. One would expect phone to be heavy with a 3.7 inch screen but surprisingly HTC did a wonderful job. If one is transitioning from other smart phone they will feel the difference on how lighter phone this is. First thing that I noticed as soon as started my phone for first time was the snappiness, the reaction time between the action and command. It was brilliant and that is the result of 1 Ghz Snapdragon processor, which combined with 512 MB RAM makes phone very responsive.

At the end of screen we have four soft touch buttons, which come very handy for menu access, going back, reaching home screen and most importantly search functionality. These four buttons are tremendous leap for a multitouch screen phone. One might consider they are not needed when everything can be achieved with multitouch, but to experience the impact one has to use N1 and they will feel the difference. I believe Google took this idea from Palm Pre, but this is a brilliant addition to N1. Then at the bottom we have a trackball, which I do not use frequently. I wonder why would we need a trackball for such a device, might be some functionality but I don’t get it. The only use I have for trackball is its notification light.

Moving on to the Android OS, this is where Google shows its true strength. This phone is not as intuitive to use as iPhone, but by taking that away Google has provided such a wide set of functionality that every day one discovers new features. This OS is power packed with tweaks, shortcuts, and multiple ways of doing things that it takes few days to get used to the phone. But once a person is used to phone, its features look much more powerful then what iPhone provides. Android brings multitasking along with it and that adds a lot of complexity to the system, but Google overcame that with a brilliantly designed notification system. The way notification system is designed, my first reaction to it was, why don’t Microsoft and Apple make operating systems like that. Why have windows and all the complexity when things can be done in a much simpler way.

The phone comes up with a set of preloaded applications from Google, most notable are Voice Search, Google Goggles, Navigation, Amazon MP3 Store, Voice dialer, New and weather app and a browser. All of these apps are very well developed and I tested them in various scenarios and found them to be very useful. Navigation system is brilliantly designed and when first times one see Google maps changing to street view when we reach destination is amazing. Google has used its web services very well and combined a of them together to provide N1 users a perfect experience. Browsing apps also have been made very smooth and aesthetic by a roll down approach, rather then a card based approach as seen in most smartphones. Another good part about the N1 is, integration with Google services. One just has to provide his gmail id and everything is setup for him. Picasa albums are directly synced, Gtalk configured, contacts synced and phone is ready to go. Syncing contact has been revolutionized in N1 – Google takes contacts from Gmail, Twitter, Facebook and phone book and collates them together to provide all the information about the person. So lets say if I want to call X and I open the contact, I will not only get details about his phone number, email address but also his latest tweet, photograph etc. This just makes life so easy and one does not have to waste anytime for fixing contacts, removing duplicates etc.

Moving on to less used features. I rarely use the camera that comes with N1, its a very good 5 Megapixel camera but I have a bias. I do not like any other camera then a DSLR, I just want to have much more control over my settings. Browser – I do not know what browser it is, but I have not used it much. All the services/information I need are provided by apps from market place and direct search.  One more complain I have from N1 is low ringtone. That is caused by the placement of the speaker on back side, if the phone is in cover, its very hard to hear the ringtone. One has to replace in built ringtones with a louder one.

Battery life, which is the main issue with all the smartphones is an issue with N1 too. But one can improve the battery life of phone easily. N1 provides a task manager where one can see how much battery an app is consuming and with that information one can kill the applications which are battery exhaustive. By following simple things, I have increased battery life from 1 day to almost 2 days.

Overall, I would give it very high rating. Its a smartphone with very progressive approach and frequent OS updates helps improve its performance. An open market place gives N1 tremendous strength. I get most of my updates/hacks about N1 from few people I listen to regularly. For hacks and increasing productivity on N1 I follow Gina Trapani and Leo Laporte, they give so many tips on This Week in Google that every times I listen to show I end up improving my phone. For applications I rely on Jolie O’Dell and her updates on Mashable.

Tags: Android, Google, Nexus One

I have been hearing about how good Photoshop CS5’s Content Aware Fill is, so I tried to give it a chance. I took 7 different shots at Round Bald on NC/Tennessee border during spring break, using those I created a panorama. I used Photomerge in CS5 to stitch all the images, so it did not took me much effort. Here is the outcome –

As you can see, lack of tripod will always result in these unfilled spots in a panorama. Usually when I have situations like these, I get the best possible crop of it and utilize it. This time I tried to use Content Aware Fill. The result is shown below. You will notice it has filled almost all the spots. The procedure I followed was to use lasso took to select dark areas and delete that portion. When deleting I get an option to use Content Aware Fill and I said Ok. This did not happen in one go, when I selected a large area, I got the error message that my computer does not have enough memory (RAM), even though I have 3GB RAM on my system. I used bits and pieces to fill the image and took me less than 10 minutes. I deleted 7 different selection to get this result.

As you can notice, there are some improper edges and some fills are not smooth. But these can be smoothened easily by putting some more effort.

I do not like to use Photoshop for my images, not because its not good tool but I like to use my photography skills more then to use photograph as my canvas. This certainly is a step too far into that direction and I do not like it. I agree their are times when we need to have good image, but personally, I like to show what real world looks like. Good bye Content Aware Fill.

Tags: Content Aware Fill, Photoshop

This weekend I finished two books from Daniel Suarez – Daemon and it’s sequel Freedom. These are the first novels written by Daniel Suarez but at the same time best techno-thriller I have read. It was a 27+ hour listen (= read) from Audible but not for a single minute one looses interest in story. Page after page it was an exciting thriller that maintain the grip.

This is story about a computer daemon that is triggered after death of a genius game designer, Mathew Sobol. This book is the journey of the daemon; people who are trying to fight it and how our perception changes when new facts come in light. Sobel tries to take over the world by utilizing the game engine he has developed and which has matured over years. The book is fairly technical in terms of how things take place but author does an excellent job simplifying things. Sometimes there are complex things like API, Encryption algorithms, Buffer overflow, Dictionary hack etc but the book never goes beyond a level where common person cannot understand, but at the same time it uses all of the technologies perfectly.

These books not only cover technology but blends in the current scenarios, world politics, and financial situation very well. Daemon is trying to resolve the entire crisis and on other end there is a set of people who are trying to save themselves from this deamon. The best part about book is Daniel Suarez makes everything believable. He is always using commercially available technologies in a creative way, which makes us think that its not far when we see some of the things he is talking about in book.

As one of the reviewers wrote, these books are Dan Brown’s books done right and I fully agree with that viewpoint. I would rate it 5/5 and highly recommend to all fiction (not only sci-fi) readers.

As always Hollywood has jumped over this story and planning to make a movie, I am glad Walter Parkes of Wargames fame is involved in the project.

I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.

                                        – Douglas Adams

It’s been twenty months since I landed in US and just over a month left before I leave. Planning to come here has been going on for much longer, the main goal was to understand the American perspective of business, to experience the land of opportunities and figure out what makes this place most innovative in the world. MBA here was part of the plan, but not the only thing in mind, interacting with people and learning as much as possible was primary aim. I am not disappointed that I could not get a major in entrepreneurship, but I compensated for it by taking three concentrations.

I think the goal is achieved, learning is a continuous process but at one point one has to decide that its time to implement and learn from experience. That time has come, my two long term goals – to start my own company and to locate very close to home, seem to be close to realization. Next month after graduation, I am heading to Ahmedabad to start a ‘Knowledge Solutions’ venture with two of my friends. This venture brings both  fields that I love – Computer Science and Learning, together. We plan to build simulators for learning and teach different aspects of businesses to various sets of managers.

Business plan is made, ideas brainstormed and we are ready for the challenges. Lets see where it goes from here!

Since I came to US one dream was to visit NYC. For people outside United State NYC is the reflection of US. The first image that comes to mind when someone mentions is Statue of Liberty or those high risers from where Spider Man keeps jumping around.  Finally this dream came true last Saturday. When my friend asked what all places you want to see and the only thing I came up with were Statue of Liberty and Times Square. If I had time I had a list of places to visit but time has been the constraint for some time now.

If anyone asks me what is the best way to see the city I always say, use public transport. We started from Bedford in the train bound to Grand Central Station, the journey takes around 90 minutes. On the way, I was told how NYC is structured in Streets and Avenues and the best ways to navigate the city. Grand Central Station suits the name grand perfectly. It is a lovely train station spanning multiple levels. This station looks very impressive from outside and inside, even though with all modern facilities it has maintained its historical touch. 

From there we took the subway to go to Wall Street. We were in search for the Wall Street Bull, but could not see in directly. In our search we saw other landmarks such as Trinity Church, New York Stock Exchange, and many famous buildings that we keep hearing about. One surprise was the presence of hawkers on the street, I have not seen them any where else in US. Finally we found the bull, took some pictures and took a cab.

Cab was to the 83 Pier, where we were supposed to go take a city cruise. Inside the cab was a typical scene portrayed by television. Only difference was presence of a television that play local news and one could browse maps on it. On the way we passed Ground  Zero. I was told, that the memorial has been shifted into a building nearby and at that location construction for One World Trade Center was in progress. We could see that first 2o floors were completed and work was in full flow.

We then took a 3 hour boat tour of New York from Circle Line Sightseeing. This was an excellent choice, not just because we could cover a lot of landmarks in three hours but  because of tour guide. The guide on boat has excellent knowledge of the city, he went on to explain everything we saw in depth. And NYC is a place where we see a lot of things. He has knowledge of all the buildings that we saw, he could tell which famous celebrity  lives where, what is the rent in specific area, which celebrity went to which school, what is significance of a particular building, when/why were they constructed, history and other relevant information of bridges and obviously about Statue of Liberty.  

It was a very cold windy day, so we were shifting between inside of the boat and deck based on importance of landmark. It was great to see the most recognized landmark of US, Statue of Liberty. I was a bit surprised that it does not look as big as it looks in photographs. Passing under the bridges was another good view, we could see the underside of bridges and listen to the historic significance. NYC has both elevator bridges and swing bridges. There was a place where one bridge has to change its position to let us go.

By the time this tour was over, it was evening, so best idea was to go directly to Times Square. We followed the crowd and walked to Time Square. We had dinner at a Mexican Place and were surprised to find out calorie count of the food. NY states has law to mark all the calories and the high value of calories came as surprise to us. I believe the law succeeded in what it was meant for.

We were at broadway at this point. We could see the number of shows going on (which are always the same) and building of New York Times. Moving ahead we went to Hard Rock Cafe, the main one where the chain started. It has a lot of original equipments from Beatles and other famous bands. Times Square is the biggest advertisement area I have seen in my life. Of course there were shops of higher grade but the amount of  light/neon on billboards was breathtaking. No amount of photographs or videos can capture what one sees in real. Other stores we visited were Toys R Us, M&M and few more. It was astounding to see the amount of effort and money put into those places. Everything was bigger and better then the normal shops we see all around world. Even McDonalds was so shiny, bright and filled with neon that it was hard to believe that it is owned by same chain.

It was pretty late by this time but how could one come to NY and not see Empire State building. We walked to Empire State Building, one architecture marvel from the 20s that was highest standing free structure for almost 40 years. We then walked on to Park Avenue, we could see the Chrysler Building, which New Yorkers take pride in. It looks wonderful at night, the radiator grill styling on top looks beautiful in lights. We reached back Grand Central Station, it looked completely different at night. Lights have added to the beauty. It was time to take the train back, we were tired but a day well spent.

Thank you friend for showing me such beautiful city! One thing that has been common in my visits all across east coast is the cold weather, wherever I go, whenever I go, it does not leave me alone. I wish next time wherever I go, I will find a better climate.

Tags: New York City