?nkarthiks's blog?

The Call

2008-04-20T01:00:00.000-07:00

It was another hot afternoon in college and I was happily browsing at the department lab.
I got a call on my mobile. It was from some arbitrary landline number from Chennai. The first thing that came to my mind was some call center calling up every poor Airtel customer to publicise some credit card or bank loan offer. It is the usual case when a sweet lady voice says "Good Afternoon sir. Would you be interested in a bank loan from ICICI bank?". I generally cut the call abruptly after I hear that common sentence!
This call had the same lady voice, but it started off with "Am I talking to Mr. Karthik?". Now this was different, as none of the usual call centres refer to Names (possibly because they do not have access to that piece of information).

Me: Ya
X: We are calling from Alphatech (or some name that sounded similar).
Me: Hmmm
X: Would you like to consider working in a multi-national call center firm? (!!)

I was flabbergasted at what i heard! Are they offering a job to a random person that they were calling? And that too in the second sentence of a conversation - a Job offer. I was aware that there were so many new call centres opening up everywhere and that they were always in search of people who can work. But this was pretty much an extreme way of offering jobs!
I was about to reply saying that "I already have a great job offer with me, and would probably consider your offer if your job profile or the pay package interests me much more. :)" (obviously in a greedy sarcastic tone). A call center would not probably find a reply to that question!
Me: No thank you, but I am not interested.
No more words came out of my mouth in that sleepy mood and I am now wishing I could have had more fun in that conversation.

The rate of growth of the IT industry impresses me. No wonder they find the required man power here in India, with so many unemployed graduates who would be satisfied with the salary that a call centre would pay on an average.
(Maybe they got the job through such calls! Who knows?)

Beginner Linux comedies!

2007-12-23T23:14:00.000-08:00

This was left on a terminal by my sister trying to do something :)

[home@localhost ~]$ mount root in big ways
mount: only root can do that
[home@localhost ~]$ mount yourself
mount: can't find yourself in /etc/fstab or /etc/mtab
[home@localhost ~]$ mount ok whatever
mount: only root can do that
[home@localhost ~]$

You don't need to be a linux geek to understand this!

Another break!

2007-12-04T18:40:00.000-08:00

It seems to be quite a long time since I have been shown some mercy and given a few days of break completely (I think about an year now!). Well, as usual I am feeling that I am really jobless and tend to keep watching something on the TV or the computer all the time!
Some amusements that I have turned to this time have been the Serials! After so much criticism of the Tamil Mega Serial community, I see everyone (almost) around me watching some serial (English) claiming this to be something different! Well, Everybody Lies :P.
That must give a clue to one of the serials that I am watching. Others in the line are Heroes (frantically waiting for the latest episode to download completely) and Gossip Girl. The genres are all different giving an overall feeling of not wasted time (I have managed to find the elixir of life!)
Another important part of my life this time is the Unlimited Internet connection that I got @ home. Man, I love it! Watching so many people coming online all day with similar states as mine feels good.

Till the next blog,
xoxo
Karthik

A light moment

2007-12-02T23:32:00.000-08:00

I was reading The Metro Plus in the usual morning. I haven't noticed this column before but this joke really made me enjoy it :-) Here it goes....

In Alaska's National Forests, a tourist guide was giving a talk to a group of tourists about hiking in grizzly bear territory: "Most bear encounters occur when hikers, being extra quiet on the trails in hopes of viewing wildlife, accidentally stumble into bears. The resulting surprise can be catastrophic." To avoid this, he suggested that each hiker wear tiny bells on their clothing to warn the bears of their presence. "Also," he said further, "be especially when you see signs of bear in the area, especially when you see bear droppings."
One tourist asked, "How do you identify bear droppings?"
"Oh that's easy," the guide explained, "it's the ones with all the tiny bells in them!"

Can a C code give different outputs on different runs??

2007-07-10T20:50:00.000-07:00

At first glance on the topic, your answer immediately would be "NO!!"

Let me clarify my situation to explain the topic better. I am talking about a C code that used network sockets provided by the OS. Many such clones of the program are running simultaneously and these interact among themselves using the BSD sockets.
I really got expected execution sometimes by just repeating the whole process of execution just one more time for confirmation... And what happens, it executes properly!!
With all these experiences of mine, I thought about jotting down some common factors that may affect socket programming..
Pointers for socket programming:

Never give up with just one wrong execution of the program. Try at least 2 times.
Carefully choose your buffer sizes. No error is flagged and this is a very easy way of losing data while transmitting or receiving.
DON'T flood the network with packets continuously with packets from different sources to different destinations. It just does not work!! Give some breathing time for it to transmit the packets successfully.

So... Go on and give your best network code in C :)

Intern Life

2007-07-10T10:47:00.000-07:00

Its almost been the tail end of the topic concerned when I am writing this.. But this is when I actually made this blogspot working with its new features and all that it claims...
Coming to the point, I got through into Summer Fellowship Programme through a selection process and was then allotted a professor to work under. And it happened to be Computer Networks under which I was supposed to work. It is such a new and growing topic with people around the world finding things that will in the future make your networks work faster and more secure! The curriculum part of the area showed no hint to the vastness of the topic.(boooooh :( )
Well it went on and I was supposed to write C code to simulate some protocol.
I am feeling too sleepy to continue now... Maybe I will try to finish with some more posts within this week....
Keep reading.... :)

Project - Started at last

2006-05-25T03:04:00.000-07:00

The IIT-M project that i was very much expecting has finally come off to a start..
The results were announced a day before we were supposed to report in iit.
The main day came- we were all so tensed and eager to get to the processor in hand.
We had to cover almost 2kms inside the campus to get to the computer science and engineering dept which was clearly hidden off from view by other buildings and ofcourse trees and lots of it.....
The professor then told us that he was too busy that he could not start it today and told us to return on monday- NICE START!!!
Hope the project starts off without much delay like the results soon.............

Project!!!

2006-05-14T11:30:00.000-07:00

Its over with second year and each of my friends keep talking about some project or ipt that they are doing.
Then i learnt that this was important if u go for higher studies or even jobs as it keeps you occupied and also gain some experience in the subject.
Then the work for searching for projects came as a challenge.
Many emails were sent to numerous faculties around the nation in respectable institutions for projects.
Just then did my department(the great comp sci.) come up with this idea of sending their students for a hardware(indegeneous x86 processor development) project in IITM. As the name had its say, i wanted to get this project for sure and also the location in my hometown was an added advantage.
Then came the selection test for the project. Questions were like the IIT-JEE, maybe the name itself carries its standards. You either know the full solution or u know nothing. Ok got over with the test - then what??

The results part
Due to some unavoidable reasons as the departments puts it to us, our results have not yet been declared for 3 weeks from the test. Our holidays have started and many of my friends have started their projects. Well me, iam just sitting plain dumb at home not knowing what to do....
Thank God that at the last moment, i got some feeling and got another project from another of my faculty so that i can spend my time atleast knowing about something.
This is the story of 1 of around 20 students who took the test. God knows what the others will say when asked about it!!!
God save my department and our Excellent HOD!!!!!

2 years in college

2006-05-14T11:19:00.000-07:00

Two years have passed since i joined this prestegious intstitution NITT and i have changed a lot from my earlier form.
I did not feel the time passing by in college as we enjoyed it to our most...
Now i am at the half way point..
Till now, college was a change from school but now i have got used to it.
From now on, i have things to concentrate upon in college like higher studies preparation GRE...

Happy Blogging....

Myself

2005-07-15T19:43:00.000-07:00

To start off my occupation of Blogging, I feel right to tell more about MYSELF.
Firstly, I am N. Karthik Swaminathan
I came into being into this world at the time of around 1830 hrs on 12th May 1987 in a Modern Village known as Chennai(Madras), somewhere in India.
By this time u would have calculated my age using your extremely mathematical brains at being 18(as in 2005).
I did my school in Trichy and then in Chennai under a So-Called prestigious school - P. S. Senior Secondary School.

After completing my schooling in Chennai, God decided to take me back to the place where I started my schooling to start my college-ing in 2004.

I got admitted into the famous department of Computer Science and Engineering in National Institute Of Technology (NIT) formerly known as Regional Engineering College (REC) in Trichy for doing my Bachelor Of Technology Degree.

I took Computer Science because I totally feel that it will fulfill my wishes in the field.

I am now (2005) doing my 2^nd Year of college.

I have been somewhat proficient in this field since Higher Secondary school and I hope to increase this knowledge in this subject with the help of this degree.

Coming to the Next part – About my family.

Our family includes my Father, Mother, my Little Sister and of course ME!

My father is in the Accounts field while my mother is a Homemaker. My sister is still out doing her schooling.

My college being in Trichy, bit near to Chennai often keeps me away from spending the weekends in hostel. I come to Chennai and spend my weekend going around Chennai with my friends, family for movies, etc.

The 350km gap between these places does feel very small after so much shuttling between.

During my free time, I read novels, do some stamp collecting, though I don’t have so much knowledge about it. I watch TV a lot for movies, comedy scenes and other programmes in English and Tamil. My favourite movies recently are The Batman Begins, Anniyan, Constantine, etc. I also like programming in computer languages a lot that when I start on a new program, I never feel the time running around me! I also do some crafts sometimes, those that come in a magazine called Chutti – they are really cool. Apart from this, I listen to music when I am free. I mostly listen to my favourite English and Tamil songs again and again. My favourite English albums are Eminem, Back Street Boys and Michael Jackson. My favourite Tamil songs are Anniyan, Kandukonden Kandukonden, Laysa Laysa and Minnale.

I like driving the car on the highways at comfortable speeds listening to music.