Click 2 Connect

Easier sharing in Google Docs

2010-06-17T23:13:00.000+05:30

Sharing in Google doc has become more easier with new visibility link...

Full post at below official link...

Official Google Blog: Easier sharing in Google Docs

Free Blogger Template

2010-01-31T18:45:00.000+05:30

If you are looking for new blogger template, check out the following sites

1. btemplates.com
2. Deluxe Template
3. Bloggers Style
4. eBlogTemplates

The above four sites contain the most exhaustive list of free blogger templates.

Enjoy.

Official Gmail Blog: Composing a message? Try the contact chooser

2009-08-26T14:41:00.000+05:30

Finally Gmail is having option to choose contacts from address book while composing mail. This is one of the feature I had been waiting for long.

More hOfficial Gmail Blog: Composing a message? Try the contact chooser

Deleting selective URL from Firefox

2009-03-21T19:58:00.003+05:30

Ever visited some URL, which you would like to clear from auto completion in Firefox? But don't want to clear full history, as that will make you re-type all those URLs again....

well, than you have a way out... you can selectively delete URL from Firefox... there's no messing around with registry, neither a need of installing third party software.

Simply type in the URL, get the focus on the particular URL you want to delete and "shift+delete". You can even goto history and select the particular URL and than press "shift+delete".

That URL is gone now and will not re-appear in your auto completion anymore.

Sitemeter hack

2009-03-21T12:06:00.000+05:30

One of the most used and best free site/blog counter is sitemeter.com

The only problem is, counter is visible to all. If you like to show off the number of hits, well, than it's not a problem. But what if you want to hide the sitemeter counter and yet want to use it for free?

Here's the official way out by which you can hide it..

1) Login to your sitemeter account.
2) Go to 'Manager' from top menu.
3) Go to 'Meter Style' option from left hand menu.
4) Select 2nd last meter style. Counter, which shows simple numbers.
5) Now in “DIGIT COLOR” select 'Transparent', Similarly in “BACKGROUND COLOR” select 'Transparent'.
6) DONE.

Now your counter is hidden.

Chat with 'Live' guys on 'Yahoo'

2009-02-28T22:31:00.002+05:30

When I logged in today to my yahoo mail account was greeted with one very pleasing message... "now you can chat with your windows Live friend"

now that's really cool. Google is already shared with AIM and now Yahoo with Live. Hopefully, it will reduce the number of chat people got to sign in to talk to there friends... :)

Gmail Updates to attachments: multi-select and progress bars

2009-02-28T18:00:00.001+05:30

Finally Gmail came up with multiple attachments and progress bar.

I had been waiting for this profile for quite a long time.

Thanks Google.

Chrome style tab browsing

2009-01-31T10:57:00.002+05:30

Something I really liked about Chrome browser was when I open the new tab, instead of getting blank page, I get thumbnails of all most frequently visited website. But somehow, despite of liking this feature, I was not able to switch out from FireFox for many reasons and now I don't think I need to even. Well, answer is new Google Toolbar for Firefox.

To quote from official google blog...

One of the features I'm really excited about is the new tab page. Now, when you open up a new tab, instead of the blank white page you see by default in Firefox, you will instead see small thumbnails of your favorite sites (up to 9), as well as recently-closed and bookmarked pages based on your browser history. You can edit the thumbnails, and all this data remains locally on your browser, which means none of the information about your most viewed sites or recently closed pages will be sent back to Google.

Indian Railways Train on Google Map

2008-11-08T19:23:00.000+05:30

Found this really cool Google Maps mashup site called IndiaRailInfo.com

It lets you search for "From" and "To" station and gives you available trains for your destination. Lot of sites do that but IndiaRailInfo also gives you an option to look at the train route on Google Map.

But the best part is status check of train. Just type train name or train number and check its exact location on the map and time by which it's running late.

Here's the snaps shot of status check

Here's how my journey to Kolkata via Yeshwantpur Exp looks like on Google Maps. It's long 34hrs and 35 mins journey, travelling 1,972km through 30 different stations in between.

New feature in Blogger

2008-05-14T12:59:00.004+05:30

While editing my 'Configure Blog Post' setting, I saw the setting for 'Show Star Rating', is this the new feature on it's way ??

Though as of now, I am not able to figure out, how to use the same. Anyone aware of it, who can share more insight on it.

Update from Blogger Status

Blogger Status
Wednesday, May 07, 2008

Some users may be seeing star ratings on their posts without having opted in to this new feature. This is an experimental feature that was accidentally enabled on some users' blogs. We're currently working to remove star ratings on all affected blogs. In the future, you'll be able to choose to opt-in to this feature; it won't appear automatically.

Update: The Star Rating feature has been disabled for the moment.

Posted by Siobhan at 18:35 PDT

Banner Image online

2008-02-15T14:43:00.002+05:30

I was just trying to figure out how to place a proper image in the header instead of the standard text. One of the problem is, I am sitting in the cafe, which has got only Paint as photo editing tool. So if you are also in such situation, here's quick way out.

Just search for banner image and download some background image, which you would like to use. Once you have image with you, the only thing you need to do is add stylish text to it. Log onto Online Image Editor. It has got all the styles and options you can think of.

2 minutes and my custom banner image is ready.

Resource: Banner images at Texas State University site.

Removing navbar from blogspot

2007-12-15T14:46:00.001+05:30

If you have been using blogspot for your blogs using your own domain, you might find top navbar bit annoying... here's the way out.

Goto your dashboard and check out the Layout for the Blog you want to remove the navbar. Goto edit HTML and paste the following code just before the closing of style tag b:skin closing tag.

Here's the code

#navbar-iframe {
height:0px;
visibility:hidden;
display:none
}

Here's how it should look once it's changed.

Lastly, if you are wondering, whether it's legal to remove the navbar ? Yes, it is legal to remove the navbar. Check this out on labnol.org.

Hiding in Yahoo Messenger? Caught you !

2007-11-08T00:48:00.000+05:30

So if your friend is hiding under invisible mode in Yahoo Messenger, here is the quick tool for your help.

Check out the site XeeBer.com and VNGrabber.com. Just fill in the Yahoo ID of your fiend and you will know the exact online status.

So if you have been using invisible mode so that you are not disturbed, better sign out. :)

IMAP's here

2007-10-27T12:39:00.001+05:30

Finally long awaited IMAP feature is available in Gmail.

Check out the ammouncement
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Google/?p=780

Power your PowerPoint with Google

2007-09-19T10:43:00.000+05:30

Google Doc is now powered with Presentation tool too. You can upload your existing PPT, PPS slides or just creating new one from scratch. Infact, with time Google's Spreadsheet is getting more powerful too. No doubt, MS is going to face now good competetion on it's Office tool.

Though feature wise its definitely too far behind, but than it's available on any machine from anywhere (free of cost !)

Check out http://docs.google.com

New look of Google Docs & Spreadsheet

2007-07-07T10:55:00.000+05:30

I am really impressed by Google's new site layout and interface for its Docs & Spreadsheet. No doubt there are lot of new features too and is now almost usable for day to day word processing and spreadsheet use.

The thing which I really like is explorer kind of view to check out all the existing files already created.

The way Google is going ahead... I am seriously waiting for the day when they announce the feature that you can directly save your .doc and .xls
file received as email attachment in Gmail and photos in Google Photo.
I think that will really integrate it's all site and will be of good
use to all.

If anyone from Google is reading this... when can we expect this feature ??

Save photos from Gmail to Picasaweb

2007-06-11T10:20:00.001+05:30

One of the feature which I am seriously looking forward from the Google stable is the option to save photo attachments from Gmail directly to Google Photos. I think, the more the people request for the feature, more quickly it gets implemented.... will you like to have that feature ??

Than please go ahead and request here.... or use Gmail Help and than request feature, if this link doesn't work.

mGinger

2007-05-26T14:57:00.000+05:30

Just stumble upon one new site... called mGinger. Idea is simple, making money through advertisement. Just the difference being, take it a step forward from site to email to now your mobile.

I don't know how worth the site might turn out to be... but may not be a bad idea to give a try....

Check up here at mGinger

Google Archive Search

2006-09-03T03:15:00.000+05:30

Yesterday Google signed-up for some new domain names again, as reported by Garret Rogers of Zdnet Blog. Here's what he blogged about it.

The first thing I thought of when I saw domains like google-archivesearch.com (registered Friday) was the WayBackMachine. If my gut instinct is correct, it won't be long before Google launches a similar service that lets us peer into the history of the web.
How much information does Google remember about page changes though? We know they keep at least one cached copy, but is it possible that every time the cache is updated, the old version is filed away somewhere safe?

Here is the list of domains Google registered yesterday:

archivesearchgoogle.com/net
archivesssearchgoogle.com/net
google-archive-search.com/net
google-archive.com/net
google-archives-search.com/net
google-archives.com/net
google-archivesearch.com/net
google-archivessearch.com/net

If I am on the wrong track with the web archive, another possibility for a service named "Google Archive Search" would be one where you could search for historic articles from things like newspapers and magazines. Also don't forget the deal that was made with the Associated Press — it could have something to do with these domains also.
You might know that most public libraries offer free databases that do this very thing — for example, full text articles from the 1800's in the New York Times can be downloaded free of charge using a licensed ProQuest database.
What do you think? Is Google going to provide a "cool" service that lets you see the history of the web, or will it be a service that lets you search through historic publications? Or, if you think it could be something else, let me know.

Free Ringtones on Airtel

2006-09-03T03:02:00.000+05:30

Well, if you are in search of getting free ringtones on your GPRS mobile set without subscribing for GPRS service, here's the way out.

Go to your web setting and add a bookmark http://tagtag.com/silvershadow and try to connect. Well, no doubt initially you will get error like "no access" , "no service reply" or something denying and making you realise that the same is not accessible. But believe me, keep on trying and after number of attempts (well, I had to make about 16 attempts), you will be able to get access.

Once you get access... Bang you go... download as many ringtones as you want from there without needing to pay for single ringtones or for GPRS access.

eWallet

2006-09-02T06:32:00.000+05:30

Got stumble across today at Wallet365.com.

Reason I am posting about the site is because this is the one among those very few Indian site relating to money transfer I came across.

What is wallet365 anyway ?

Online Payment System

Wallet365.com, brought to you by TimesofMoney Ltd., is an online payment system with a vision to provide value, convenience, transparency and security in all online transactions.

Wallet365.com is a revolutionary new online payment service that lets you pay anyone, anywhere. It lets you shop online and even receive money. Wallet365.com is absolutely safe, instant and convenient. All you need is an email ID. It secures you from the dangers of online credit card fraud.

Uses of Wallet365.com
Send money online to anyone
Receive money online from anyone
Make online payment to businesses
Pay for online shopping

Key Features of Wallet365.com's online payment service
Safe and Secure to use
Financial details are protected
Beyond Accepting Credit Card Payments
Use any bank account
Instant online money transfers
Free Sign-Up
Secure internet payment gateway.

Haven't use this site as yet, but surely going to give a try.

Adding HTML Signature to Gmail

2006-08-31T07:41:00.000+05:30

Found this really good article by Digital Inspiration on technique of adding HTML Signature to your Gmail.

Did you notice anything special about this screenshot of GMail message ? Well, it has an embedded animated graphic instead of the plain text signature.

GMail has a wonderful rich text editor to compose emails but there are some desirable things that you cannot accomplish in GMail using standard techniques. For example:

1. GMail allows plain text signatures but there's no way to embed HTML signatures with images like the ones you see in Yahoo, Hotmail or Microsoft Outlook email.

2. Gmail Rich text editor has standard text formatting features like font sizes, colors, bullets, hyperlinks, indentation, etc. but there's no way to add other HTML tags like TABLE, DIV, EMBED, etc. So how do you embed Youtube videos, sophisticated table layouts, Flash animation movies, inline podcast players like odeo, etc. in GMail ?

3. You can compose new email in either Plain text or Rich text but how to do you compose a new GMail message in native HTML something like a webpage created in Microsoft Frontpage ?

4. Gmail lets you attach pictures to outgoing email but it shows up as an attachment on the recipients' screen. How do make embed a photograph that appears inline with the actual email message ?

5. You want to embed the Feedburner Headline Animator graphic or the Feedburner Subscriber Counter to your GMail signature which is an animated GIF file.

Now the really good news is that you can do all the above easily with GMail and here's how to do it:

To embed an HTML signature with Images in GMail ?

Create an HTML signature snippet using notepad or WYSIWYG editors like Dreamweaver/Frontpage/Golive or online with Geocities/GooglePages/Tripod Lycos. Your signature can have all kind of HTML tags (including DIV, EMBED, TABLE) but all linked Image files, audio files and video clips must be pointing somewhere the web and not on your desktop.

Once you are satisfied with the layout, select the entire portion of the webpage that you want to appear in the GMail signature and drag it to the GMail compose window. Alternatively you can copy it to the clipboard and then press Ctrl+V in the Gmail window.

I have an illustration here:

Step 1: The HTML signature is created in Google Page Creator. Select the entire signature and press ctrl+c.

Step 2: Open a new Gmail compose message window. Now either drag the signature in this GMail window or press Ctrl+V to paste it.

The same technique can be applied to embed anything in your gmail message. Say you want to embed an image between two sentences, just drag the image to your gmail compose window and drop it there. It's that simple but makes you email more appealing as if it's composed inside Microsoft Word or Outlook.

To embed Feedburner RSS feed animator, open that graphic in your browser window and drag-n-drop it anywhere in your gmail message.

You can even point images to your blog or embed HTML forms so that recipients can subscribe to your blog directly from your gmail message. Or create tables in Microsoft word and place them in your email. Or even send entire webpages as email so readers can view the page in the message itself without having to click the link. The possibilities are endless.

Download full books

2006-08-30T07:30:00.000+05:30

Google has started to allow full book download of out-of-copyrights books. As posted on GoogleBlog

Starting today, you can go to Google Book Search and download full copies of out-of-copyright books to read at your own pace. You're free to choose from a diverse collection of public domain titles -- from well-known classics to obscure gems.

Before the rise of the public library -– a story chronicled in this 1897 edition of The Free Library – access to large collections of books was the privilege of a wealthy minority. Now, with the help of our wonderful library partners, we're able to offer you the ability to download and read PDF versions of out-of-copyright books from some of the world’s greatest collections.

Using Google Book Search, you can find The Free Library and many other extraordinary old books, such as:

* Ferriar's The Bibliomania
* A futurist from 1881's 1931: A Glance at the Twentieth Century
* Aesop's Fables
* Shakespeare's Hamlet
* Abbott's Flatland
* Hugo's Marion De Lorme
* Dunant's Eine Erinnerung an Solferino
* Bolívar's Proclamas
* Dante's Inferno

To find out-of-copyright books that you can download, simply select the "Full view" radio button when you search on books.google.com. (Please note that we do not enable downloading of any book currently under copyright. Unless we have the publisher’s permission to show more, we display only small snippets of text –- at most, two or three sentences surrounding your search term -– to help you determine if you’ve found what you’re looking for.)

Of course, this is just the beginning. As we digitize more of the world's books -- whether rare, common, popular or obscure -- people everywhere will be able to discover them on Google Book Search.

Gmail for Domain gets new name

2006-08-28T10:32:00.001+05:30

It seems, google has been working with long term plan of giving complete office suite for business. Today saw the post on Google Blog announcing the new name for "Gmail for domain" as "Google Apps for Your Domain"

Also, now it's not just Gmail that is being offered... but also incorporated Calendar, Google Talk & Google Page Creator.

With Writely and Spreadsheet under beta and getting mature... no wonder, both might be included within the package of "Apps for your Domain" soon.

So all your office needs completely out sourced ;)

Blogger Update

2006-08-15T21:37:00.000+05:30

Finally one among the most awaited update by people on blogger is arriving. In very Google style...

Now the new blogger is having dynamic updating of changes and post... (just like wordpress), going to have labels (the very google style... instead of going for name categories)... and many more new features... so if you have been relegiously following Google and was just not able to make up your mind whether to sign up with blogger or to go for some else blog publishing software... now you dont have any reason to say no to bogger.

Though Google didn't left his traditional way of distributing new feature.... currently new features are avilable on beta basis to selected users. To try your luck (if signup is on... ) check this page... http://beta.blogger.com , I could not be lucky enough to get hands on the same... but eagerly waiting for it.

To check for the list of new feature... check out the this Blogger Help section.

Update: Related Links

2006-08-08T04:54:00.000+05:30

A new tab for Video has been added in Google's Related Link.

As Google Blog states: Reason for adding the same is

visitors have access to relevant quality video content, and you add more interactivity to your site

What's SSD in Google Account ?

2006-07-11T00:03:00.000+05:30

Just stumble upon something called SSD in my Google Account page on the right hand side under "My Services". The link currently points towards Google HomePage... I wonder what does it stand for ?

Is it a new Service on its way??

digg story

New Gmail feature on its way

2006-07-09T16:47:00.001+05:30

As Posted by Garett Rogers of Zdnet Blog

There are at least two new features that are making their way to Gmail accounts near you. The source code for Gmail confirms both of these features, but for most people the variable enabling them is set to "false".

The first feature is one that lets users delete all their spam with a single click. Previously, to delete all your spam, you had to "select all", "delete", "select all", "delete", etc. until you had gone through all the pages of your spam. Now there will be a "Delete all spam" link that should significantly cut down on the time it would normally take.

d=(g?u("Delete all spam messages now","dal" ,true):"")

The second one that was just discovered today is the ability to create filters and apply them to existing messages. For most people, when you create a filter it only acts on new messages that come in, but leaves old ones untouched. This feature will help current users keep their mail organized, and give new users some time to ease into their account without worrying about creating filters right away. Google Operating System has a list of things you can do with this new feature.

"+("Also apply filter to "+(""+(V[3]+" conversations below")))+"

MSN email for free

2006-07-07T07:49:00.000+05:30

Hated to have @hotmail ID ??? Well, here is the chance you can get yourself @msn.com ID for free.

Click here to get your own @MSN ID for free.

New in Gmail: Delete All Spam

2006-07-03T07:07:00.000+05:30

Gmail is rolling out a new link called "Delete all spam messages now" so you don't have to repeatedly select all messages and delete them. Another new feature: "Empty trash".

read more | digg story

Firefox 2.0 Gets Two NEW Features: Undo Close Tab & Scrolling Tab Bar

2006-07-02T07:06:00.000+05:30

After upgrading to the latest nightly build of Firefox 2.0 I noticed two features that I haven't seen before. One of the features was an Undo Close Tab button when you right-click on the tab-bar or on a tab. The other feature that I don't like very much is a scrolling tab-bar.

read more | digg story

Too many passwords?

2006-07-01T06:58:00.000+05:30

Hashapass automatically generates strong passwords from a master password and a parameter. Given the same master password and parameter, Hashapass will always give you the same result. That's so you don't have to store your generated passwords anywhere: just come back here with your master password and the parameter.

read more | digg story

Adsense tips for Blogger’s

2006-06-22T19:55:00.000+05:30

Here are some tips for Adsense users who publish there ADs on Blogger.

1. Which Ads to be used?

Use multiple format ADs by using power of Condtional Tags, Depending on the kind of page visitor is visiting.

2. Which AD formats are highly paid?

Some high revenue fetching Ads as per my personal experience, as well as of other blogger's are the Big Rectangles and Wide SkyScrapper. Though, according to the AD shown, it may not hold true in all the case.

3 where to place ADs?

Some common places are side bar, at the end of blog page. Right Top site is the general place, where visitor looks first on visiting site. So that may be attractive place to put your ADs.

More so over, placing ADs below the post is more helpful in conversion. If after reading post visitor is desirous of hunting more relevant information and the AD shown right below shows this relevant AD, than chances of visitor clicking it increases.

Use Channels to understand which ADs earn more revenue and keep on trying different AD positions.

4. Use Mix of Text and Image AD

Use both Image and Text ADs. So if no Image AD relevant to your text is found, text AD can be shown.

5. Title of Blog Post

It’s important to bring Traffic. More the traffic means more chance of conversion. Hence, use proper keywords in describing the Title of Post. This in turn improves search rating too.

6. Quality Content

Write quality content. Otherwise, chances of showing relevant ADs reduces

7. AD Colour Scheme

Don't make ADs obvious on your page. Use proper colour scheme to make ADs part of your blog site. This increases chance of click.

8. On Personal Weblogs

If you happen to put your ADs on personal weblog, chances of showing relevant ADs may be little, if content are just ramblings of your life in broken sentences.

In such cases, use Text Link ADs. This shows text box to find ADs when no relevant ADs are found, in contrary to showing blank space.

9. If no ADs are shown

Plan your layout and structure of ADs in such a way, that if, no ADs are shown, the layout don't look bad with empty patches here and there. Use the alternative selection in case no ADs are shown wisely, while creating Adsense Code.

10. Connect with other Blogger’s

Be active blogger, by visiting and commenting on other blogs. This doesn't mean spamming. Make Blogger's friend and link with each other. Use tools like, Blog directory to get you listed, so more people can know about your blog site.

Take advantage of Email Signature to spread your Blog site.

11. Understand Traffic

It’s important to understand Traffic pattern and to know who refers your blog site and what keywords in search engine lead visitor to your site. So as o understand the general pattern of your visitors. You can use tools like Measure Map, Google Analytics , etc to understand traffic pattern.

12. Don't think of Click Frauds

DO NOT click on your own ADs. As it will lead to termination of your Adsense account altogether. Remember, Google is Big Boss and knows very well, how users can do click frauds.

Lastly keep on trying new and innovative way, since there are ample of things which can be tried out.

Multiple Template in Blogger

2006-06-21T15:37:00.000+05:30

Many of newbie Blogger.com user on blogspot feels that they have only one template at there disposal which they can use to display there content. I just want to give an insight on the blogger's template tag with help of which you can have multiple template behaviour.

Firstly, when you see the template code, you will notice some of the following kind of tags:

"< MainPage >
< ArchivePage >
< ItemPage >
< MainOrArchivePage >"

This are nothing but the conditional tags, which gives you freedom to choose the kind of content yo would like to display to the user depending on the page he is visiting.. may be a single post page, archive page, etc.

Let's take for an example you are Adsense user and you would like to display the different size of ADs depending on the page user is visiting.

Say Main Page you want to display wide sky scrapper, since there is enough content that can display ADs, where as when user is on single post page, you would like to display a small banner AD. So what you got to do is, put your wide Adsense code within MainPage tags.

"< MainPage >
Wide sky scrapper AD code here
end MainPage tag"

and put your adsense code for small banner at apprpriate place within ItemPage tags.

"< ItemPage >
Small banner AD code here
end ItemPage tag"

You are done. Now sky scrapper AD will be shown only on Main Page, where as small banner will be shown on single post page only.

Use this conditional tags to display content as you wish and have fun.

Yahoo Messenger 8.0 Beta announced

2006-06-21T15:06:00.000+05:30

Yahoo Messenger's new verion 8.0 beta is out now. One of the key change in the new messenger is plugin capability. So now you can make your own plugins to get the content you want and integration with Yahoo 360.

Make it yours with plug-ins

Get the content you want, delivered right to Yahoo! Messenger and share it with friends while you IM. You'll find handy plug-ins for Yahoo! Music, News, Finance, and more. Plus ones for eBay, Amazon.com, and more.

See what friends are up to
Use the Yahoo! 360° plug-in to get alerts on — then see — the latest photos, blog entries, reviews, and more from your friend's Yahoo! 360° pages. Also send blasts and post blogs to your 360° page from the plug-in

Google's Webalbum

2006-06-15T07:55:00.000+05:30

Finally google is out with its web album and probably its first time, google has decided to not to give it completely free. Seems Google coming out with new strategy.

Currently providing easy upload and also download of photos thorugh new version of Picasa, with 250 MB limit size on disc for free users, while 6 gb for payment of $25/year.

One more surprising thing to be noted was.... Google didn't launched Web Album under Beta... rather it states as Test.

First look on WebAlbum was as always with all Google product... cool. More so over, since photo's aren't shrinked too much unlike Yahoo photos.

For me... Google was very much eqal to Free. So am not happy to see Google charging, but I think its because Google has not inserted any ads in Web Album, so that may be a reason for not providing it for free.

Is Google's web album on its way?

2006-06-07T07:17:00.000+05:30

As spotted by Philipp Lenssen of Blog-outer Court, it seems, Picasa is going to be used as medium to deliver the Google's web album. The new link on the top right indicates about Google's web album to be released soon.

Time to think for riya, flickr and yahoo photos. Since, this is the only place where Google didn't had any presence till this point of time.

Google's version of Excel

2006-06-07T07:04:00.000+05:30

Seems, rumour of Google's office suite has started taking shapes more finely now. After Writely, Google Blog announced today the limited test version of Google's version of Spread Sheet.

Though I couldn't be lucky enough to get my hand on the test version as yet.... but with the screen shots provided, it seems very exciting.

Related Links:
Invites: Gmail / Writely/ Orkut

Gmail's probable new feature

2006-05-29T08:58:00.000+05:30

Garret Rogers on Zdnet's Blog writes about his continued investigation of Gmail code, which threw one more probable Gmail feature on its way. To quote him :

In my latest source code inspection, I found more snippets code that foreshadow upcoming features in Gmail. As far as I know, these features aren't available in the current version — I couldn't reproduce them and there is no documentation in the Help area.
As many of you probably know, depending on the content of email recieved through Gmail, special links are displayed above the advertisements on the right. Google currently tracks packages for UPS, gives us maps and lets us add events to our calendars with these links — but it looks like that list is about to get bigger.

In addition to it's current functionality, the code suggests FedEx and USPS (United States Postal Service) tracking numbers will be detected by Gmail to further satisfy your package tracking needs. This might be old news, but I don't recall hearing about it or seeing it in action. I wonder how long it will take for others like DHL and Purolator to be included in this list?

oe["oa"]="Map this";
oe["ou"]="Track UPS package";
oe["osp"]="Track USPS package";
oe["ofd"]="Track FedEx package";

The piece of code that really caught my attention though was the line directly below these that says "Get prices". When Gmail detects a product within an email, I'm guessing it will soon display a link on the right that takes you to a Froogle result page for that item. I was unable to reproduce this behaviour in the current version of Gmail, so it must something they are working on. The icon that will be used for this feature is here.

oe["op"]="Get prices";
This could open up a huge can of worms for Google. For example, if a company sends a legitimate promotional email to a customer about a product, Google now makes it easy for that customer to find cheaper prices from right inside that email. Gmail users won't complain, but it could leave a sour taste in the mouths of some retailers. For features like these, is it possible to not be evil for both users and businesses?

Network Security Tools

2006-05-28T20:01:00.000+05:30

If you happen to be kind of person, who would love to explore things beyond the point normal netizen... you will be keeping on searching on newer and newer tools to satisfy your thurst for knowledge and experiments.

Worst of it... not able to decide what you want to know... simple way out in such situation is to test out some tools and realise what more information you can get....

confusing ?? to simply put... where to find all the network security tools which the geeks use. Than just simply check out this List of top tools used by geeks on Insecure.org , I bet, your hunt for searching all the tools will end here.

Enjoy... without breaking ;)

MS Announces new photo format

2006-05-27T08:49:00.000+05:30

At Windows Hardware Engineering Conference, Microsoft Announced a new image format that targets to kill JPEG, as tracked by Thilak.

According to MS, Windows Media Photo [WMP] will be supported by Vista and XP. WMP also boast its superior compression ratio to that of JPEG and it can offer better images at half the size.

MeasureMap update

2006-05-22T22:14:00.000+05:30

Long since the Blogger aquired MeasureMap.net, something seems to be again happening.

While hitting http://MeasureMap.net, I was led to Google home page. Indication of something to be announced soon.

My best guest... how about integration with Blogger. Let's wait and watch.

Free Storage: Elephant Drive

2006-05-22T09:40:00.000+05:30

Elephant Drive, in association with Amazon is creating a service similar to that of Xdrive.

However, they offer unlimited offsite backup free of charge if you sign up as a beta tester!

Check out for yourself at http://www.elephantdrive.com

Afraid Of Re-installing Windows XP?

2006-05-22T09:39:00.000+05:30

This site has a very useful tutorial if you have an old and slow XP machine with hundreds of programs and you want to re-install. This site will show you how to save your old partition in a virtual machine, and have a nice, new install of Windows.

read more | digg story

Google: Notebook launched

2006-05-16T15:13:00.000+05:30

Google Notebook goes live

Haven't tested it as yet, but the initial browsing definitely suggest that it provides much more than simple book mark. As name suggest, it's notebook. Got cool FireFox download plugin which sits in the Status Bar and quite ease to post URL as well as text on the notebook.

Thing which I found lacking was.... Tagging... humm!! something difficult to do without.

Check Google Notebook

Google Notebook

2006-05-12T07:56:00.000+05:30

One more product from Google which is in pipeline, seems to be direct competetion to del.icio.us

As quoted on ZdNet Blog

Google Notebook isn't quite ready yet, but from what I gather, it's basically a plugin that will follow you around from page to page. It acts as a convenient way to store and share important information from websites. From the webcast, it looked like they are using the same engine that is behind Google Pages in the full screen mode.

Here's some screenshot posted by Erica Joy.

Gmail: Photos & Sounds...

2006-05-12T07:31:00.000+05:30

A picture's worth a thousand words

With contact pictures in Gmail, you can pick ones for yourself, see which ones your friends have chosen, and set certain pictures to show up for specific people in your Gmail account. Best of all, you can even send picture suggestions to your friends.
Learn more

Gmail Chat now has sound!

Never miss out on a chat in Gmail again. Now there’s a "ping" when people send you a chat.
Learn more

Google Trends & Google Co-op

2006-05-11T07:24:00.000+05:30

Google Trends

This one is cool product from Google. Ever wondered, how many people are using the same search key word as of yours to Google out.

Well, now you can find it out Cities, Region and Language wise. Check the Google Trends

Google Co-op

Google Co-op is about sharing expertise. You can contribute your expertise and benefit when others do the same. Help other users find information more easily by creating "subscribed links" for your services and labeling webpages around the topics you know best.

Check Google Co-op

Torrents Explained

2006-05-07T06:48:00.000+05:30

BitTorrent is both the name of a peer-to-peer (P2P) file distribution client application and also the name of the file sharing protocol itself, both of which were created by programmer Bram Cohen.

BitTorrent is designed to widely distribute large amounts of data without incurring the corresponding consumption in costly server and bandwidth resources. The original BitTorrent application was written in Python and its source code has been released under the BitTorrent Open Source License (a modified version of the Jabber Open Source License), as of version 4.0.

The name "BitTorrent" refers to the distribution protocol, the original client application, and the .torrent file type.

How it works?

The BitTorrent protocol breaks the file(s) down into smaller fragments, typically a quarter of a megabyte (256 KB) in size. Peers download missing fragments from each other and upload those that they already have to peers that request them. The protocol is 'smart' enough to choose the peer with the best network connections for the fragments that it's requesting. To increase the overall efficiency of the swarm (the ad-hoc P2P network temporarily created to distribute a particular file), the bittorrent clients request from their peers the fragments that are most rare; in other words, the fragments that are available on the least number of peers, making most fragments available widely across many machines and avoiding bottlenecks. The file fragments are not usually downloaded in sequential order and need to be reassembled by the receiving machine. It is important to note that clients start uploading fragments to their peers before the entire file is downloaded. Sharing by each peer therefore begins when the first complete segment is downloaded and can begin to be uploaded if another peer requests it. This scheme is particularly useful for trading large files such as videos and operating systems. This is different from conventional file serving where high demand can lead to saturation of the host's resources as the consumption of bandwidth to transfer the file to many requesting downloaders surges. With BitTorrent, high demand can actually increase throughput as more bandwidth and additional “seeds” of the file become available to the group.
The BitTorrent protocol operates on top of TCP.

I want to download a file using BitTorrent, how?

You will need two things:

I. a BitTorrent program

Its called "a program" because unlike some peer-to-peer networks, BitTorrent is open source. Open source means programmers may use the source code of the program and modify it, basically it means they can make their own program based on the original program as long as they give credit. And many have done so. Below are some of the programs around atm:
(1) Azureus (uses java, get the latest java client here)
(2) ABC
(3) Bittornado
(4) Burst!
(5) Official Client
(6) Check out this topic and this topic to learn about other clients and to help you decide on a client.

II. a Torrent file

A small file (that ends in .torrent) which contains information about the file you want to download. You can download torrents from a webserver. When you open the .torrent file Your BitTorrent program will start up, read the info and start downloading your file.

Where do I find Torrent files?

On torrent sites. Check out this topic for good torrent sites.
You can also search it here

Advantages in using Torrent Programmes:

* The speed depends on the number of peers downloading/uploading and how fast they can upload/download. The average speed varies a lot but most of the time it is high.
* There are various tools and sites that can help you some more. Just look around, google it...

Disadvantages in using Torrent Programmes:

* Files do not usually remain available as long as on other peer-to-peer networks.
* You cannot search the network for the file that you are looking for unlike other peer-to-peer networks.

Some Common words used

Peer: A peer is another computer on the internet that you connect to and transfer data. Generally a peer does not have the complete file, otherwise it would be called a seed. Some people also refer to peers as leeches, to distinguish them from those generous folks who have completed their download and continue to leave the client running and act as a seed.

Seed: A computer that has a complete copy of a certain torrent. Once your client finishes downloading, it will remain open until you click the Finish button (or otherwise close it.) This is known as being a seed or seeding. You can also start a BT client with a complete file, and once BT has checked the file it will connect and seed the file to others. Generally, it's considered good manners to continue seeding a file after you have finished downloading, to help out others. Also, when a new torrent is posted to a tracker, someone must seed it in order for it to be available to others. Remember, the tracker doesn't know anything of the actual contents of a file, so it's important to follow through and seed a file if you upload the torrent to a tracker.

Reseed: When there are zero seeds for a given torrent (and not enough peers to have a distributed copy), then eventually all the peers will get stuck with an incomplete file, since no one in the swarm has the missing pieces. When this happens, someone with a complete file (a seed) must connect to the swarm so that those missing pieces can be transferred. This is called reseeding. Usually a request for a reseed comes with an implicit promise that the requester will leave his or her client open for some time period after finishing (to add longevity to the torrent) in return for the kind soul reseeding the file.

Swarm: The group of machines that are collectively connected for a particular file. For example, if you start a BitTorrent client and it tells you that you're connected to 11 peers and 4 seeds, then the swarm consists of you and those 15 other people.

Tracker: A server on the Internet that acts to coordinate the action of BitTorrent clients. When you open a torrent, your machine contacts the tracker and asks for a list of peers to contact. Periodically throughout the transfer, your machine will check in with the tracker, telling it how much you've downloaded and uploaded, how much you have left before finishing, and the state you're in (starting, finished download, stopping.) If a tracker is down and you try to open a torrent, you will be unable to connect. If a tracker goes down during a torrent (i.e., you have already connected at some point and are already talking to peers), you will be able to continue transferring with those peers, but no new peers will be able to contact you. Often tracker errors are temporary, so the best thing to do is just wait and leave the client open to continue trying.

Share Rating: This is simply the ratio of your amount uploaded divided by your amount downloaded. The amounts used are for the current session only, not over the history of the file. If you achieve a share ratio of 1.0, that would mean you've uploaded as much as you've downloaded. The higher the number, the more you have contributed. If you see a share ratio of "oo", this means infinity, which will happen if you open a BT client with a complete file (i.e., you seed the file.) In this case you download nothing since you have the full file, and so anything you send will cause the ratio to reach infinity. Note: The share rating is just a number that is displayed for your convenience. It does not directly affect any aspect of the client at all. In general, out of courtesy to others you should strive to keep this ratio as high as possible, of course.

Choked: This is a term used in the description of the BitTorrent protocol. It refers to the state of an uploader, i.e. the thread that sends data to another peer. When a connection is choked, it means that the transmitter doesn't currently want to send anything on that link. A BT client signals that it's choked to other clients for a number of reasons, but the most common is that by default a client will only maintain --max_uploads active simultaneous uploads, the rest will be marked choked. A connection can also be choked for other reasons, for example a peer downloading from a seed will mark his connection as choked since the seed is not interested in receiving anything. Note that since each connection is bidirectional and symmetrical, there are two choked flags for each connection, one for each Tx endpoint.

Interested: Another term used in the protocol specification. This is the corollary to the choked flag, in that interested refers to the state of a downloader with respect to a connection. A downloader is marked as interested if the other end of the link has any pieces that the client wants, otherwise the connection is marked as not interested.

Snubbed: If the client has not received anything after a certain period (default: 60 seconds), it marks a connection as snubbed, in that the peer on the other end has chosen not to send in a while. See the definition of choked for reasons why an uploader might mark a connection as choked. The real function of keeping track of this variable is to improve download speeds. Occasionally the client will find itself in a state where even though it is connected to many peers, it is choked by all of them. The client uses the snubbed flag in an attempt to prevent this situation. It notes that a peer with whom it would like to trade pieces with has not sent anything in a while, and rather than leaving it up to the optimistic choking to eventuall select that peer, it instead reserves one of its upload slots for sending to that peer.

Optimistic unchoking: Periodically, the client shakes up the list of uploaders and tries sending on different connections that were previously choked, and choking the connections it was just using.

Where to find guide on Torrents ?

* At Filesharing

Invites : Gmail, Writely, Orkut

2006-05-07T06:24:00.000+05:30

Time for invites.

If you need any of the invites, either for Gmail, Writely or Orkut. Please put your email ID in comments and the invite you need.

Update (21/8/2006): Writely has been made public. So new users don't need invite any more.

We're stressing Indian callers

2006-04-19T18:03:00.000+05:30

Workers in India are having nervous breakdowns after being abused by fed-up Australians – but they aren't getting much sympathy. Quote: "Some companies are regretting outsourcing their business to India because of the damage it does to their products' reputation."

Read more

But will this have any impact on Indian Call Centres ??

Yahoo! Mail Beta Improves Performance, Nearing Launch

2006-04-19T18:01:00.000+05:30

Widespread performance improvements have been made to the Yahoo! Mail Beta. As well, they're nearing full public beta.

Read more

Adding del.icio.us & digg as marklet

2006-04-18T18:37:00.000+05:30

Here's the code for blogger through which you will be able to add the link below your post to digg the post, as well as to bookmark it on del.icio.us

Check the link for code
http://www.writely.com/View.aspx?docid=bbg4njvfdwzqx

Google Calendar & Link Bar

2006-04-16T00:20:00.000+05:30

Finally I saw the Google Calendar. It has been really nicely integrated with Gmail too. No doubt, its superb.

Moreover with it using iCal standard, its very easy to import from many of the Calendar application you might have been using currently. Besides its nice integration with Gmail, feature I really liked was the ease with which its feasible to create an event and also the interface supports dragging the events. Lot many other cool feature too exists. Here's list of some of it's features :

Calendar Sharing: Set up a calendar for your company softball team, and share it with the whole roster. (Your shortstop will never forget about practice again.) Or share with friends and family so you can view each other's schedules side by side. You can also overlay different calendars, or hide them and see events only from one calendar!

Invitations: Create event invitations, send them to friends, and keep track of people's responses and comments, all in one place. Your friends can receive your invitation and post responses even if they don't use Google Calendar themselves. Since this is integrated with Gmail quite heavily, all your invitations, accepts, rejects will be on record!

Quick Add: This feature is the same as 30 Boxes 'One Box' concept, where all you have to do is type out the event in plain english, and the application will break it up into different parts, recognise what is what, and generate an event for you based on it. Its simple!

Gmail Integration: Any events mentioned in your G-mails will have a link, using which you can immediately add it to your Calendar!

Search: How could Google leave this out? You can search for your events using normal Google style search queries.

Mobile Access: You can receive event reminders to your mobile phones. This is only applicable in places where Google offers mobile services (which only remains to the west for the moment).

Event Publishing: Share your organization's events with the world.

and lot many more... overall, it's really cool one.

Thanks Google. I guess, Gmail got its belated birthday gift of 1st April :)

http://calendar.google.com

Here comes the Analytics

2006-04-05T20:40:00.000+05:30

Finally I found surprise in my inbox. At last the long waited Google Analytics invite came.

So finally its time to say Goodbye to SiteMeter with its last recorded count of 2032 hits for this blog.

All "Vijay" here

2006-03-30T22:49:00.000+05:30

Out of some crazy thoughts, I started a community at Orkut of people named Vijay.

Well, it actually worked :) Now we are 100 Vijay here.

If you are also named "Vijay" , come and join in.

Blogger Intergration with Google Account

2006-03-24T01:21:00.000+05:30

While browsing on thegooglist blog, found this URL.

https://www.google.com/accounts/ServiceLogin?service=blogger

So it seems, Blogger is also soon going to come under Google Accounts, like Orkut.

Riya.com

2006-03-22T00:16:00.000+05:30

This is just superb. Got today invite for beta testing.

My first experience itself is cool. I feel, the time has finally come, when I will be able to leave Yahoo Photo's. It has got cool face recognition feature.

Well, its kind of photo search engine, search your own photos to hunt out for any individual photographs. Obviously tagging facility is there too +

No limit to the number of photos you can add to Riya photo search.
No bandwidth limit.
No serving limit (although please do not use as an image service for your own site).
No hosting limit (Riya isn't a hosting service, but it does keep an 800 x 600 version and a thumbnail of your photos for search purposes).

Overall riya rocks ;)

Live Mail Beta

2006-03-22T00:13:00.000+05:30

Finally I got invite of Hotmail's "Live Mail" Beta.

Though there are not many new features, except that you can see the improved speed and 2 gb inbox. No other new features.

Also the huge graphic intensive ADs are still all over the window :(

Feeds delivered to your inbox

2006-03-17T23:50:00.000+05:30

If you have also been feeling uncomfortable using your RSS reader to read and stay updated.... rather you would have apprecited the way through which you can get the updates of the sites immediately to your inbox... well, you have got answer, check out www.rssfwd.com

For instance, to subscribe Google Blog's feed, give URL http://googleblog.blogspot.com/atom.xml and next step your email Id. Once verified, you are done. Get updates in your inbox itself.

So go ahead and enjoy your feeds in your regular inbox.

Blogger and Google

2006-03-14T23:27:00.000+05:30

I wonder, is it that Google has now kept its blogging service with sole intention of letting there blog user sign-up and show ads of Google Adsense?

Reason, which makes me think so.... with so many new products of Google coming out and numerous features being kept on added in other products, why the blogger has been left out?

The very much expected blogging feature of categories and trackback is still missing. The last feature which blogger came out was BackLinks.

Moreover blogger has remained down for quite sometime and quite often.... is it that Google feels blogging is out or is it under complete new make-over ??

Get to know who sent you email

2006-03-14T16:39:00.000+05:30

Paste an email, get Google map visual trace of the route

Those crazy Goocam people did it again: paste in an email and they plot it on google maps.

read more | digg story

Windows Live Messenger Beta Open To The Public

2006-03-14T11:02:00.000+05:30

Microsoft has opened the doors to the general public to test their latest Messenger application and Live service.

The new Windows LiveTM Messenger Beta is the next-generation MSN Messenger and, as always, it is free to download.

read more | digg story

However the sad story is it's not officially supported for India.

Launching your own Satellite

2006-03-14T10:50:00.000+05:30

Satellite
____________________________________________________________

In this Guide you will learn about:

* Who can help you learn how to build your own satellite, and get it launched into orbit.
* How to get taken seriously when you ask for help
* Examples of universities where you can learn how to build your own
* Conferences devoted to small and amateur satellites
* Pirate radio and the legal alternatives
* How to become a radio amateur hero
* How to break into satellites (not!)
____________________________________________________________

For real hackers (as opposed to computer criminals who call themselves hackers), satellite hacking is about building your own, getting them launched, and using them. Furthermore, believe it or not, the world's first communications satellite was built by a group of radio amateurs. They were real hackers in the truest sense of the word.
____________________________________________________________

*** Who Can Help You
____________________________________________________________

If you want to build your own space satellite, get it launched, and use it to do fun things, your best bet is to join the Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation, http://www.amsat.org, a nonprofit worldwide group.

The Amsat people launched their first home-built satellite, OSCAR I, on December 12, 1961. Amazingly enough, it was the first satellite that wasn�t built by the governments of the U.S. or the former Soviet Union (now Russia). Furthermore, it was only four years after the first satellite launch in history (the Soviet Sputnik
I), and long before the first commercial satellites. Amsat managed to get it launched by persuading the U.S. Air Force to carry it piggyback into orbit along with the Discover 36 military satellite. OSCAR I was a simple test satellite that broadcasted a message in Morse Code of "HI-HI" over the VHF 2 meter band (144.983 MHz). Over five hundred amateurs in 28 countries reported receiving its signals before its orbit decayed and it re-entered the atmosphere on January 1, 1962.

OSCAR III was Amsat�s first true communications satellite. On March 9, 1965, the U.S. Air Force gave Amsat a piggyback launch, this time along with seven military satellites. OSCAR III relayed voice contacts in the VHF 2 meter band (146 MHz uplink and 144 MHz downlink). OSCAR III's transponder lasted 18 days. During this time,
over 1000 amateurs in 22 countries used it to talk with each other.
____________________________________________________________

Newbie notes: Hz stands for Hertz, meaning cycles per second. VHF stands for Very High Frequency radio waves. VHF frequencies are also often called short wave radio. Sometimes radio waves are measured by length of the waves, for example 2 meter band instead of by frequency (Hz). Morse Code is a means of communicating by simply sending short and long noises: dots and dashes with the dashes represented by a
noise three times as long as a dot. Most famously, the distress signal SOS is represented in Morse Code by dot dot dot, dash dash dash, dot dot dot. See
http://dict.die.net/morse%20code/ for more details.
____________________________________________________________

OSCAR III was the first communications satellite in history. Yes, real hackers, the people who donated their time and equipment and brain power to build it, surpassed all the giant communications companies.

Amsat continues to launch amateur-built satellites. For example, OSCAR-51(Amsat-Echo) was launched on June 29, 2004 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on a Russian Dnepr LV. This launch vehicle is a slightly modified SS-18, the InterContinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) that in the bad old days was designed to lob nuclear bombs.

Amsat-Echo carries an FM repeater that can make 144MHz and 1.2GHz uplinks; and 435MHz and 2.4GHz downlinks. It also carries an AX.25 digital PACSAT BBS (bulletin board system) and a PSK31 uplink on 28MHz. The satellite is available to radio amateurs around the world for voice and data communications.

Amsat-Echo also runs Experimenter's Wednesday. Each Wednesday the satellite is commanded to a new mode of operation so that allows amateur radio operators may test their new equipment.

Amsat is able to afford these launches by building small, lightweight satellites, taking advantage of the goodwill they have won to get piggyback launches, and by working together to raise whatever money is needed to cover the costs.

For more information on Amsat satellites, see http://www.amsat.org/amsat-new/satellites/history.php

____________________________________________________________

*** How to Get Taken Seriously
____________________________________________________________

You can't just talk the Amsat people into launching a satellite for you. You can't even join a design team unless you can show you are worthy of respect.

First of all, you need to become a hard-core amateur radio operator. A good start is to get the knowledge you need to pass the licensing tests, and aim for the highest level license available in your country. A good resource for learning how to get your licenses is available at http://www.arrl.org/hamradio.html

Beyond that, to become really hard core, you need a degree in engineering, ideally electrical engineering (EE) or aerospace engineering. To learn more about becoming an EE, see the international organization to which most EEs belong, the IEEE (http://www.ieee.org). They have student chapters and local groups in almost every nation and major city. If you feel stranded in your EE college program, if you are afraid you might not make it, you probably will be able to get help from a mentor in a local IEEE chapter. Also, local chapters are a great way to make friends.

It might seem more logical to get a degree in aerospace engineering instead. However, an EE degree will fit better with an interest in computers and communication technologies. Best of all: get an EE degree in an institution that also gives aerospace engineering and/or planetary science degrees. This will make it easier to learn many things about the special challenges of spacecraft design, things like temperature control and the problems of cosmic rays, solar storms and the radiation belts of near-earth space. For example, how do you ground a circuit without -- ground? The crucial point is to be certain that the college or university you are considering actually builds satellites or components of satellites.

Some people are afraid to go for an engineering degree because they think they aren't intelligent enough. True, engineering is a more difficult subject than, say, basket weaving. You have to master calculus, differential equations and physics to get an EE
degree, and everybody I have heard of who got an EE degree had to work at understanding these topics. That, really, is the good news, because this means you don't need to be a genius.

Also, because everybody finds the course work to be difficult, engineering students get together in study groups. This makes it easier to study and to make friends.
____________________________________________________________

*** Universities Where You Can Learn How to Build Your Own Satellites
____________________________________________________________

You can get an idea of which colleges and universities would be best for you by asking Amsat members for recommendations. For example, in the United Kingdom, Amsat members hold their annual meetings at the University of Surrey (http://www.surrey.ac.uk/), where students have built some of the world's most innovative amateur satellites.

Important note for women: some engineering schools are hostile (perhaps unwittingly) to women. If the other students exclude you from study groups, and if the professors are unfriendly, you will find the going to be much harder. Before choosing your school, be sure to talk with some of the professors and any women engineering majors. If there aren't any women in the department, watch out, because there is a reason for this. On the other hand, if you decide to be their only (or first) woman student, you can become a heroine by helping the professors and other students see that women, just like men, can do serious intellectual work.

The University of Arizona (http://www.arizona.edu) has a Planetary Science department that has built instruments for many satellites; its Optical Sciences department has built optical systems for surveillance satellites; and it has departments of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering. That's
where I got my master's degree in industrial engineering (which is cross disciplinary with all engineering fields). The opportunities were awesome and the professors did much to encourage women.

Carnegie Mellon (http://www.cmu.edu/) is one of the best universities for women who want engineering degrees, but it lacks satellite design expertise.

One of the most awesome places to get an engineering degree with emphasis on space satellites is the Utah State University, http://www.usu.edu/ . Its Space Dynamics Laboratory http://www.sdl.usu.edu/ builds research satellites and components for
other ultra-high technology satellites, for example the upcoming giant James Webb space telescope. They hire students! However, you may need a security clearance to work on some of their hardware or software. Also, the culture there is overwhelmingly Mormon, a religion that encourages women to stay home and raise lots and lots of children. Groan.

One final note. Most engineering professors like it when students come to their offices to talk about fun engineering projects instead of complaining about tests and homework. I got lots of free extra education by taking advantage of chat with professors, and reading the books and papers they recommended to me. If you make
friends with professors this way, they can help you get an awesome job when you graduate.
____________________________________________________________

*** Conferences Devoted to Small and Amateur Satellites
____________________________________________________________

You can meet people who share your enthusiasms and learn about the leading edge of technology by going to satellite conferences. Amsat holds meetings and conferences around the world; see its website, http://www.amsat.org, or the websites of the various national chapters, all linked from http://www.amsat-france.org/famsat-inter.htm
. Another great one is Utah State University's annual Small Satellite Conference, see http://www.smallsat.org/ .
____________________________________________________________

*** Pirate Radio and the Legal Alternatives
____________________________________________________________

The movie "Pump up the Volume" features a high school boy who alters his short wave radio equipment to broadcast on commercial wavelengths. As the movie ends, he gets soooo busted! You may have encountered some of these radio pirates yourself. They drive around in pickup trucks, park in obscure locations, broadcast briefly, then move on, hoping to keep one jump ahead of the police.

Pirate radio can appear tempting, like hacking on steroids. However, almost all radio amateurs detest and disrespect radio pirates. They know that it doesn't take genius to steal the airwaves. If you want your friends to hear your broadcasts, tell them
to buy radios designed to also receive shortwave transmissions, for these include the frequencies that you, as an amateur, can use for your broadcasts. These radios are cheap and open up a planet's-worth of fun. The wonderful thing about the wavelengths available to amateurs is that they tend to bounce off the ionosphere (the upper,
ionized layer of the atmosphere). So when conditions are right, and if your receiver and transmitter are good enough, you can send and receive radio communications worldwide without even relaying through an OSCAR satellite.

Even more fun, show your friends how to get the no-brainer version of the amateur licenses and then you can enjoy radio chat groups together. In the U.S., the no-brainer license is called "Technician Class." All they have to do to get the license is answer 35 multiple choice questions. See http://www.arrl.org/hamradio.html
for details.
____________________________________________________________

*** How to Become a Hero with Amateur Radio
____________________________________________________________

In New Mexico, if you are a licensed radio amateur, you have the right to disregard zoning laws and protesting neighbors and erect gigantic radio transmission towers at your home. You may have seen some of these towers where you live, typically you�ll see a modest little home and out behind is a tall skinny metal tower with guy wires and funny trusses and shapes sticking out from it. Or you might have noticed someone on a motorcycle with outrageous antennas swaying in the wind as he or she whizzes by: a mobile amateur radio broadcasting station!

The reason the authorities generally love licensed radio amateurs is because they save lives. When disaster strikes, radio amateurs fire up their electrical generators and provide emergency communications for local rescue teams. They also have ground-based repeaters that enable them to patch their radio transmissions into the
Internet and phone system at distant locations outside of the zone of destruction.
____________________________________________________________

*** How to Break into Satellites: Not!
____________________________________________________________

Unless you have millions of dollars and a crack team of engineers, you can't take over commercial or governmental satellites. You may have encountered boasts from hackers that they move satellites around and toy with their transmissions. If so, they were lying. In reality, communications satellites are too well guarded. They receive their commands through dedicated radio transmission systems, and the
antennas these transmissions require are huge and expensive. This is because it is important to focus the satellite control beam tightly, and it takes large antennas to do this.

So unless you build a sufficiently similar system,overpower their satellite control channel link, figure out how to spoof their transmissions, and determine what their proprietary commands must be -- well, it just isn't going to happen. If someone did put together the power to try such a stunt, they would be more likely to damage a satellite than take it over. Dan Veeneman, speaking at Def Con IV, illustrated the danger by citing a case in which the legitimate operator of the AMSC-1 communications satellite accidentally damaged it "soon after launch by inadvertently overloading one of the on-board amplifiers."

Clearly, if a hacker were to damage a satellite by beaming break-in attempts at it, he or she would wind up with a loooong stay behind bars. And, yes, anyone trying such a stunt would be easy to catch. The power required to attempt a satellite takeover would be easy to detect. (Think NSA radio frequency snooping satellites!)
____________________________________________________________

*** Conclusion
____________________________________________________________

If you want to design, build and control space satellites, it is far easier and more fun to build your own than to try to break into other peoples� satellites. That's what I say! OK, OK, maybe some of you readers are wondering why you should pay
attention to me. Answer: I went though the hard work of getting an engineering degree, and afterward had the immense fun of working on satellite designs as a contractor to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (http://www.darpa.mil) and NASA (http://www.nasa.gov).

You can get a quick idea of what some of these fun projects were by checking out my resume at http://techbroker.com .

I'm not telling you this to brag, but rather to encourage you. I'm not a genius, so if I could do it, you can too, even if you aren't a genius, either. It's just a matter of hard work. Besides, if you burn with ambition, all that hard work will turn out to be irresistible fun. Hacking on steroids.
___________________________________________________________
Copyright 2006, Carolyn Meinel. I give permission for you to copy, email, or post this Guide to your website as long as you leave this notice at the end.

Where are those back issues of GTMHHs? Check out the official Happy Hacker Web page at http://www.happyhacker.org .

What if Gmail data gets lost

2006-03-10T14:40:00.000+05:30

I have been following the post by Bob. Who has lost his all email data.... rather to say, has lost his Gmail account altogether.

I don't know, what the exact truth behind.... but yes, one thing is for sure... I do need to have my email data backed up.

If you are also using gmail... may be you also should think of backing up your emails through its POP feature or Forwarding.

In case, you have any more better solution, than please post your comment.

Some shakes for IE

2006-03-07T15:29:00.000+05:30

Check out this code below. Copy and paste it in address bar of your
browser (I have tried it on IE only) and hit enter.

Experience the shakes ;)

<!-- Copy from here

javascript:function flood(n) {if (self.moveBy) {for (i = 35; i > 0;
i--) {for (j = n; j > 0; j--) {
self.moveBy(1,i);self.moveBy(i,0);self.moveBy(0,-i);self.moveBy(-i,0);
} } }} flood(6) ;

Till here -->

Possibly the fastest way to publish information online

2006-03-06T22:23:00.000+05:30

This AJAX based site lets you post any text and then creates a short url for you...without even logging in.

Quick and neat.

read more | digg story

Young Jains of India

2006-03-05T00:21:00.000+05:30

YJI stand for Young Jains of India.

Like in USA and UK Young Jains are promoting Jainism by the name of YJA and YJUK, so they thought to start the same thing in India and YJI evolved in India. The main motive of this Organization to bring all Young Jains of India (YJI) on common platform so that they can help each other and do something productive for the Jain Community.

Its basically for creating awareness about Jain values like N on-violence, Non-absolutism and Non-possessiveness , which has proven time and time again to be the underpinning principals for peace and prosperity and happiness in the world. And of course promoting Vegetarianism

YJI says people should know us by JAIN and not by sects. There should be Unity among Jains. YJI wants that every Jain Youth should know about JAIN VALUES like Anekaantwad, Aparigraha, Ahisma and of course to promote Vegetarianism. YJI wants that Youth should start implementing JAIN Values in their daily life. Live life as Jain Way of Life (JWOL).

YJI conducts annual conferences. The objectives of the conference are:

* To gather Jain youths to begin dialogue about Jain Way of Life
* To develop future leaders who have Jain values instilled in their careers and life
* To begin a movement among Jains youths to express their religion in a diverse world

For all the group discussion and photos of convention and people invloved in the team, check out the Website and Group. We also have Orkut community.

Risk in using Google Page Creator

2006-03-01T15:33:00.000+05:30

Though I just couldn't resist from publishing and testing it... but the thing which come to my mind is... how come Google made such a mistake?

Mistake of making pages published at gmailUserName.googlepages.com , isn't it easy for spammers just to run through the site at googlepages.com and add @ gmail.com to all and send email ??

Well, you can argue with yahoo too on this part.. since they also had the same funda of giving geocities.com/yahooID, but than what the difference will remain between two... but somehow, I have faith in Google and I feel, they must have some backup plan for this too.

Howevere, I have finally unpublished the site, knowing the risk of revealing my personal mail Id and inviting SPAM. I will rather love to wait, till Google allows to publish the googlePages at URL using different name, other than Gmail ID.

A calendar for you and the world

2006-02-28T12:43:00.000+05:30

Just discovered on the zdnet blog. Two new features from Google's Gmail are on there way. The most talked about Google Calendar and also Google Links.

I finally got the Google Page Creator invite. Though they have again shut down the registration. So if you have not received it as yet... well, wait for a while, they will open the sign-up again soon.

Google and Invites

2006-02-24T09:25:00.000+05:30

The first time I encountered the sign-up by invite only funda when Gmail arrived. Though I was preety lucky to get an invite from my brother, but I still see in public groups people asking for Invites.

The process of sign-up by Invite only was great and I was all out praising this way, since it means that people uses it only if they are interested.

But now a days, Google seems to have make this as a way to introduce all new product. However, this funda of invite has also been changed now. Now its Google, who decides whom to invite. :(( Everytime, the message being beamed is, Google has experienced tremendous response and henceforth sign-up has been closed and have been made by invite only. Is this marketing strategy ? Don't Google know, how much demand will be there and open new service registration accordingly ?

I feel, geniune users, who are not extreme techy loose interest after waiting for few months and start opting for some other alternates.

Preety sad for me, I am still waiting for invite for Google Analytics, Measure Map and now one more added... Google Page Creator. Even till date, some of the most popular programmes are still kept on invite only basis.. like Gmail and Orkut.

Alas! what all Google fan can do... wait, wait and wait till there invite arrives. I feel, this is what all users feel, who have not received invite for long time :((

10 things to build a blog readership

2006-02-24T00:07:00.000+05:30

A new blog is created every second, so it's hard for bloggers to create a readership and keep them coming back. This article lists 10 things you need if you want to build a loyal audience.

read more | digg story

Google Experienced Digg Effect!

2006-02-23T23:47:00.000+05:30

The giant had to shut off registration today due to too many people signing up for their new Google Page Creator software!

"...Google Page Creator has experienced extremely strong demand, and, as a result, we have temporarily limited the number of new sign-ups as we increase capacity..." :P

So one more service of google which will be distributed through invitation only. I am still waiting for Analytics, MeasureMap and now PageCreator. :(( Sob! sob!

Try your luck at http://pages.google.com

read more | digg story

New GMail Feature: Smart Replying

2006-02-23T23:45:00.000+05:30

When you reply to a message that was sent to an email address other than your gmail.com one, it is now smart enough to use that address as the "from" when replying.

read more | digg story

Questions asked by IAS Interviewer

2006-02-19T23:38:00.000+05:30

Here are some of the question asked in Indian Administrative Service interview, which I got in forwarded email, together with the answer given by candidate. In brackets specified is his rank and stream selected. Enjoy.

Q. How can you drop a raw egg onto a concrete floor without cracking it?
A. Concrete floors are very hard to crack! (UPSC Topper)

Q. If it took eight men ten hours to build a wall, how long would it take four men to build it?
A. No time at all it is already built. (UPSC 23 Rank Opted for IFS)

Q. If you had three apples and four oranges in one hand and four apples and three oranges in the other hand, what would you have?
A. Very large hands.(Good one) (UPSC 11 Rank Opted for IPS)

Q. How can you lift an elephant with one hand?
A. It is not a problem, since you will never find an elephant with one hand.
(UPSC Rank 14 Opted for IES)

Q. How can a man go eight days without sleep?
A. No Probs, He sleeps at night. (UPSC IAS Rank 98)

Q. If you throw a red stone into the blue sea what it will become?
A. It will Wet or Sink as simple as that. (UPSC IAS Rank 2)

Q. What looks like half apple?
A: The other half. (UPSC - IAS Topper)

Q. What can you never eat for breakfast?
A: Dinner.

Q. What happened when wheel was invented?
A: It caused a revolution.

Q. Bay of Bengal is in which state?
A: Liquid (UPSC 33Rank)

Q: what is the opposite of Nag panchmi?
A: Nag did not punch me

Mailglobal - No more free

2006-02-19T00:24:00.000+05:30

Just got the email from MailGlobal.net team.
They are shutting off the free service. Though not fully. But many features are taken off from full free version.

Check out the Mailglobal site for current free features available now.

Blogger Template based on Andreas08

2006-02-17T13:08:00.000+05:30

In hunt for some good template, I found Andreas08, an open source template Design by Andreas Viklund.

The template was very neat and impressive giving a good professional taste. So I have attempted it to port it in for Blogger Main format.

Here's the snapshot

How to Change Template?

In order to change your Blog Template, please login to your blogger.com account. Once you have logged in and arrive at Dashboard, click on the Setting of the Blog for which you would like to change the Template.

Now Click on Template, paste the above code by replacing the existing code of your template. (Tip: Do keep a backup of the existing template, which will be handy in case, you would like to switch back to your existing template).

Now Click on Save and than Republish. You are Done.

Known Bug:
1. Small white line remains on the top below nav-bar of blogger.

Download

Gmail Skins

2006-02-16T23:26:00.000+05:30

Philipp writes about Gmail Skins, a Firefox extension which lets you customize the look of Gmail. You get to choose from a wide range of color schemes, move around the navigation sidebar, see icons for attachments, hide your email address (perfect for screenshotting), get rid of some useless interface elements, and use "zebra stripes" (so every inbox line is an alternating color). Modding can break your Gmail, but if you have good results with it, it sounds like fun.

Google Acquires Measure Map Blog Analytics

2006-02-16T20:10:00.000+05:30

Google has announced the acquisition of Measure Map, an analytics tool aimed at bloggers looking to better understand their audience.

So now, you can have your own traffic monitoring tool instead of relying on third party tools... I mean, tools provided by other than Google :-)

Speed-Reading Techniques

2006-02-06T23:30:00.000+05:30

Reading Myths

1. Reading is linear. I had always figured reading was a linear process; you know, start up front and grind through to the very end in the exact order it was printed in. Reading is no more linear than thinking is, (or I eventually discovered, than writing; few writers start at the beginning -- indeed, they usually "write the first part last."

2. True reading is word-for-word. I started as a kid looking at individual letters. They didn't help much. Next I started sounding out syllables. Finally, I could read whole words. Why stop with words? Well, I know one reason… I had a college professor who made us swear we had "Read every single word" of our collateral reading. Why? He didn't make us swear we'd "read every single letter." The answer is simple: that professor (like me) had never moved from letters, syllables, and words, to reading phrases, sentences and paragraphs. He assumed the only way to read thoroughly was by the laborious method of reading one word at a time.

3. Reading is a laborious task which takes a long time. Not at all! Reading can be both fun and fast. Indeed, speed reading is like auto racing -- it is far more exciting.

4. All parts of a book are of equal value. This myth persists until you actually write your own book. Then, all at once you realize there is "filler" material , illustrations, and even sometimes whole chapters jammed into a book just because the publisher insisted. Take messages for instance. Ever hear a message and wish you could put it on fast forward over that long story illustrating a point you already understand? Well, in reading you can fast forward.

5. Reading faster will reduce retention. Sorry. It should be that way, shouldn't it? Those who groan slowly through a book painstakingly sounding out every single word, maybe even moving their lips, should get a greater reward shouldn't they? Sorry. In fact, speed reading techniques will increase one's comprehension and retention.

Getting Ready to Read

So, we're ready to read. But don't read the book yet. There are a few steps to take first.

FIRST: ELIMINATE ALL DISTRACTIONS: Get rid of ANYthing your mind could think about besides the reading material. Is there conversation? Activity? TV? An uncomfortable seat? Music in the background? (OK OK, I know many of my readers are college students who claim they "study better" with music in the background. Go ahead and claim it -- but you are wrong. You might "like it" better, but you do not study better. ANYthing which might occupy your mind waters down your concentration -- even occupying your "mind-in-background." Fool yourself if you wish -- but if you really are serious about reading faster, eliminate distractions.

SECOND: Ask: What is my purpose? Why are you reading this? And what kind of literature is it? Is it a classic or fiction work you are reading for fun? Then, why hurry through it at all? Like a leisurely meal, sit back and taste each bite -- turn over the delicious phrases in your mind. Or is collateral reading for a course where you are must be familiar with the central notions? Then finding the notions is why you are reading, right? Or maybe you are reading collateral where you will be tested on the content? Or maybe collateral reading where you will be required to say, "I read every single word?" Or is this a book where you will be tested on the terms and dates therein? Or, maybe you are just reading the book searching for some new ideas for your own situation. Or you have to write a review. Or maybe you plan to teach it to others. See how different your purpose might be for each? Before you open the book, take a minute to state your purpose to yourself. It will largely determine how you read the book from then on.

THIRD: Do a 10 minute PRE-READ. Take ten minutes or less and pre-read the entire book. Go ahead and try this if you've never done it before. Treat a book like a jigsaw puzzle. Dump it out, then organize all the pieces first before putting it together. Read the dust cover and any cover reviews. Then look through the author blurb. Move to the Table of Contents and see if you can figure out the whole book from this page. Page through the entire book, page by page and glance through all summaries, tables, pull-out quotes, diagrams(especially), and scan through all the section titles and you go.

Chances are you'll find the KEY CHAPTER while you are doing this. Some publishers say (off the record, of course) "A book is simply one great chapter with a dozen other filler chapters." If this is so, find that chapter.

FOURTH: Read the KEY CHAPTER. Start using the rapid reading techniques mentioned later to read this KEY CHAPTER through. You are not obligated to wait until you have read all the chapters before this one, as if you must eat your green beans before the ice cream. The book is yours -- go ahead and get the central idea before you start!

Once you've read the key chapter you are ready to read the rest. In order from the front to the back, or in some other order which better suits your purpose. Now for some actual reading tips tips.

III. Rapid Reading Techniques

1. Raise your speed- comfort level. How comfortable are you speeding in a car? How fast do you have to go before you feel you are "on the edge?" 70 MPH? 90? 120? How about 210 MPH, the speed the Indy car drivers can average? Get the point? Some people have learned to drive faster; their comfort level has been raised. You can do the same thing for reading. Face it, speed-reading isn't mostly about technique; it is about mind set. Indeed this may be the reason you can play a CD while reading -- you are merely driving along at 25MPH. Can you imagine an Indy car driver playing music in the background? No. The driver focuses all his or her skills on the track. If you are out for a Sunday afternoon stroll in your book, then ignore this. But if you are serious about becoming a speed-reader, then start expecting more of yourself.

2. See the book as a mine full of ORE not GOLD. Books offer wonderful gold to the prospector. But the reader must sort through tons of ore to find and refine the gold. The speed reader changes mindsets: quits fooling around with the ore and searches for the gold. What is a book anyway? What are words? They are "carriers" of truth, thoughts, ideas, a thesis, information, terms, concepts, notions. One reads a book to get the message, not to obsess on the words. (I'm tempted here to talk about Bible study, but we shall let it pass this time.) Switch your mindset to looking for the gold.

3. Quit Subvocalizing. Most of us learned to read by sounding out the words. The trouble is, most of us never stopped. Sure, maybe we no longer audibly sound them out, or even move our lips, but in our heads we are "reading to ourselves." We have learned to read by Mouth-and-Ear. To become a speed reader one must discard this habit (or at least reduce it) and adopt the eye-and-mind method. It is mostly a matter of mind set. Instead of acting like the ear (even in one inside your head) is the route to the mind, begin believing that the eye is the gate to the mind. Start drinking in books through your eyes. Let the books pass into the mind directly from the eye, skipping the mouth and ears. Go ahead and start trying it.

4. Use your finger. For most beginning speed-readers this is a shock. They remember reading in grade school with their finger and assume it slows one down. Actually the finger is your pace car. It leads you forward at a speedy pace, and keeps you on focus and avoiding back-skipping. There are several ways to use your finger (or hand) but just try it out for starters. As you improve, buy one of the books on speed-reading and settle on the pattern which works best for you.

5. Break the Back-skip habit. Most of us read along a line of type like this one to get the interpretation of the meaning, but as we read our eyes jump back to dwell on a word we just passed. We do this without knowing it. In fact, probably the only way to discover how many times you back skip is to have someone watch you read and count the eye-darts back. But, unless you have someone you feel pretty comfortable staring you in the face while you read, just trust me -- you probably back-skip. How to stop? First confess you do it. Then start recognizing when you do it. Finally when tempted to back-skip, treat the book like a movie -- that is, even if you miss something in a movie, you don't stop the video and replay it. You just let it flow on through, hoping you'll make it up later.

6. Use your peripheral vision. Just like you must develop a muscle in the gym, so your mind can be trained to use the eye-gate to take in a broader amount of data. For instance, instead of reading left to right across the lines, pretend there is a line right down the middle of this page and you are following the line. Let your eye take in through peripheral vision the phrases to the right or left. Can you do it? With practice you can train your mind to read on "both sides of the road" even though your eyes are on the center line. To practice this skill most speed readers actually draw lines down pages of a book until they have mastered the skill with an invisible line. Let your mind drink in the information on the page without looking directly at it -- just like you "see" the sides of the road when driving an automobile.

7. Learn to read KEY WORDS. 40-60% of the words on a page are neither critical nor important. Indeed, if someone took white-out and hid them from your sight, you could still figure out what the paragraph was communicating. So, it stands to reason that if you could figure out which are these KEY WORDS you could scan past the other words and let your mind fill in the blank. Train your mind to find these key words and you'll add even more speed to your reading.

8. Eliminate "Bus Stops" (Eye rests). As your eyes read down this line they stop periodically and "rest" on a word. Children's eyes often rest on every single word as they learn to read. Then as you grow your eyes move smoothly down the line like a lawn mower, then you stop a split second on a word, then start back up again. Most reader never get over this habit, but like a bus stopping at every corner, it slows down your progress. Try to reduce your eye rests to 3-4 per line, maybe even less as you get better… keep the eye moving smoothly line after line, letting your mind drink in the knowledge on the line.

9. Take breaks. The research is clear. Steady reading hour after hour is less efficient than taking a five minute break every hour or less. Sit down to read 100 pages in the next hour. Set an alarm even. Then reward yourself with a cookie or sandwich when you've reached your goal in 60 minutes.

10. Set a time goal. Have a 300 page book to read? Decide how fast you'll read it. If you are not a speedy reader, maybe you'll only set the US average reading speed as your goal: one page a minute (250 words/min.). Or if you are already an above average reader, set 100 pages an hour and plunge in. If you picked 100 pages an hour, that's 50 in a half hour, 17 per 10 minutes or 1.7 pages per minute. Keep on track… pretend like you are in an auto race… push yourself, concentrate, get yourself out there on the "racer's edge" -- the line just short of out-of-control, yet still in command. Do it; it will be exciting!

IV Retention Techniques

1. Underline, circle, make margin notes. Not highlighting the whole page like some students do! Usually you will not mark more than two or three items per page, and many pages will have no markings. Marking pages increases recall -- do you have a marked-up Bible? If you do, you can almost "see" the page in your head when recalling it. Marking helps. (Highlighting may help -- your own markings, however, are probably superior).

2. Dog-ear important pages. In a 250 page book there will probably be 25 pages worth dog-earing. Turn down the page to return later. The bigger the dog-ear the more important the page. Most books have only four or five half-page-dog ears.

3. Transfer key notes to front of book. Got a great point here? The central message? The quote which essentially represents the whole book? Write it down in the front of the book. Why? Generally speaking when it comes to new information you either "Use it or lose it in 20 minutes." When you discover it, flip the book open to the front and scribble it down; it will cement the notion into your mind. Better yet, link it to something you already know and write that down too. Linked information can be recalled far better than isolated information.

4. When finished, re-read dog-eared pages. Just run back through and re-read the gold. Here is the essence of the book (if you made judgements right going through).

5. Now write an "abstract" in the back or front. You are finished! Go for a pizza… but not just yet. Take a few more minutes and write an "abstract" up front in your own words. When the writer submitted the proposal for this book, he or she probably actually had a single paragraph or page, outlining what this book was all about. To summarize the book, simply "reverse engineer" the book back to the author’s abstract or thesis.

6. Consider drawing a "MindMap" of the contents. If you are going to be tested on this book, get someone to teach you how to use Tony Buzan's "Mind Map" to remember the entire book on a single page. Remember, the mind mostly recalls ideas and pictures, not words. A Mind Map will enable you to "picture" the whole book and you'll look like you posses a "photographic" (which you really don't need, if you simply follow the advice in this article).

7. But if you borrowed the book, and can't mark it, dog-ear it, or otherwise "use" this took -- then use 3M stickers instead of dog-ears, and write your comments on half-sheets of paper as you go.

Poems by my friend Rajlakshmi

2006-01-27T16:03:00.000+05:30

Broken

through thick and thin by my side
you stood there beside me all the time
rigth or wrong ,truth or lies
you have always been ther rigth by my side
endless hours we shared our thougths
those are memories which i cant part with
i dont know if i can feel this way again
as what i felt was from my heart
no give and take for me
as i only wanted you as a person to love me

but that was not ment to be
as faith had a different course for me
another of lifes lessons tougth
lies and hate hurt me most
breaking my trust hurts me even more
but i am the one to blame
as i was the one who loved
never forced but through i came
out from this lesson i gained a valuable lesson
love is menat to be given without any expectation
even if you are dcieved
you will always hold to your the purity of my love
my selfless devotion
i dont care if you have loved me ever or not
you have taken me on a grand ride
but it is not your fault
a gullable creature fell as pray
even if you didnt intend it t ogo this way
you cosincs that is if you have one will eat you alive
for the deed you have done
sinner ,lier what not
i never cared about what you did
but the truth had to surface sooner or later
the dream them ended with no rosey rhyme
this is a rhyme by a girl with a broken heart

Bitter sweet

now the time has come to part
with love and remorse in my heart
matters of the heart are grave
as though they are engraved
deep in my heart and in my mind
i thougth iwould never mind
But as the feeling grew more intense
my mind and my heart grew apart
one said think the other said dont
the greatest battle man has ever fougth
graver than truth and lies
as matters of the herat remain
a Questain even today
so the choice is yours to take
as matters of the heart are grave

a line between love and hate
separates trust and faithfullness
is love just a game is the questain that i ask
what is love ?
everyone knows
or is it what the pressume?
is loving a person really great?
when that person decieves you through and through?

which is better now love or hate?
a blend of both is what we are
but what is it that makes us love ?
just blind trust and broken promises?
maybe not but the power to care
can miss lead you
as you never know if its what you r searching to

so with this thougth in mind
parting with a smile is better than a tear
and i hope i have made myself clear
joy and sorrow we have been together
always remember these daya will be a bitter-sweet memory
well now the time has come to part
as you never had any love in your heart

Blogger: Implementation Of A Calendar

2006-01-26T15:03:00.000+05:30

I was looking around for a calendar which I think nearly every other blogging platform has from the get-go. I was beginning to think it didn't actually exist. But a quick look around Fresh Blog gave the answer.

It seems that having a calendar is actually possible. Ecmanaut, guy's a genius and that's where you want to be headed if you're interested. The hack uses this DHTML/Javascript calendar and the post detailing how to set the calendar is here. Plus he also details how to make your calender pop up as well. Check it out.

Source

Increasing Blog Traffic

2006-01-24T11:06:00.000+05:30

Here’s are some links, where you can subscirbe in order to improve your blog traffic.

You’ll have to surf a bit to get visits, but it’s worth it. Here are some:

www.blogexplosion.com
www.blogclicker.com
www.blogazoo.com
www.blogexchange.net
www.blogcrowd.com

Get paid to Blog

2006-01-24T11:03:00.000+05:30

BlogCharm.com offers free or upgraded blog & journal hosting services which include an extemely powerful online publishing / blogging system that is easy, user-friendly and at your full control with many great features. Features include custom templates, search engine friendly URLs, post categories, RSS syndication, configurable commenting system with spam controls, friends list, user profile with avatar and much more…

Further it proclaims to start payment for blogging based not only on clicks on the Ads shown on the top bar but also on the view. However, till writing of this post, the same is being said to start from March '06.

User Features - Admin Features

1. Instant publishing
2. Over 100 default templates
3. WYSIWYG entry composer
4. Subdirectory URLs
5. Immediate login after signup
6. Commenting
7. “Friends only” entries
8. RSS feeds
9. Mailing lists
10. Avatars
11. Preview comments/entries
12. Customizable templates
13. Permanent links
14. Customizable entry date/time
15. Timezone support
16. Draft entries
17. Support contact form
18. Variables & templates guide
19. Interests keywords
20. File uploads

I still prefer Blogger more than this blogcharm.

Complete List of Web 2.0 Applications | Rian's blog

2006-01-20T10:39:00.000+05:30

Here's nice compilation of Web 2.0 application. If you wondering which web application to use ? Check out this link.

Virtual Karma: Complete List of Web 2.0 Applications | Rian's blog

MailGlobal - 1 Terrabyte space for free

2006-01-03T08:39:00.000+05:30

One more email service worth to check. Its by mailglobal.net , which offers staggering 1 terrabyte of space together with pop/imap, forwarding, encryption facility, provision for digital signature and interface to choose from like classic/outlook 2000/outlook 2003/new hotmail look etc etc and what's more important is... there are no advertisement. Also no need of invitation, just go and sign up.

overall feature wise its really rich and worth to take a look.

Update: Mailglobal have changed it's Free plan. So now only few features are available for free and also some other changes.

Google Adsense - Best earning tool

2005-12-28T18:21:00.000+05:30

I really found Google Adsense as best source to make some money without any extra effort. Infact I have been using it from last 4 months or so, but never bothered much. Its just a day before I saw one of my friends cheque and really got excited and finally thought to make some effort.

By now read lot many articles on Google adsense, how-to etc. received over emails and net. Found some real good content. Infact, I had to delete my earlier post about top 25 tips for Google Adsense , I didn't realised I was using someone else work... lolzz. Original article is available here http://labnol.blogspot.com

Out of all the analysis and reading I could conclude

1. You definitely need good template which can show the Ad's at appropriate place and where user after reading article may click for further related material.

2. A real good content is must. So have decided to stop posting all forwards, which I used to. Rather to write some good content.

3. Make sure, you dont click your own Ads, else you will be kicked out by Google. At the end, google is more smarter.

4. Don't try to use Proxy and be smart to hide IP. Google catches it too.

5. Use both Text and Image Ads. Otherwise you may loose some advertisers in which your visitors might be interested.

Overall, what I found is, Google Adsense is best programme which I have came across on net, where I dont have to read some stupid emails or fill up some survery forms or for that sake, do anything. Just keep blogging nicely and you get proper Ads and proper visitors too. Which increases the probability of user clicking the Ads.

So let's see, how much do I make in year 2006.

How to Thank Someone

2005-12-26T23:15:00.000+05:30

Thanking somebody is more than a customary gesture...It will earn respect and a feeling of true appreciation from the recipient of your gratitude. They will know they made the right choice, and you will feel less indebted, but equally as grateful.
Steps

Swallow your pride. You may be less inclined to thank somebody if you feel like you deserved whatever they did for you. On the other hand, do you remember being thanked for something that you considered routine? It creates satisfaction for the giver of an item or reaction that you are openly admitting that you appreciate their efforts and time.
Don't overdo it. Telling somebody thank you for every little thing will lessen the impact of a genuine show of appreciation. Just like, "I love you," use it sparingly, intensely, and not passively or cordially. Getting a person's eye contact is a small gesture to ensure appreciation and truth in giving your thanks.
Don't forget. Put yourself in the position of the person who has done the thing worth receiving thanks for. Several times per day, somebody is doing something for you, if it's their job or duty, or just a gift of time and attention, it's something for you. Always remember that. For example, finish your emails with "Thank you for your time and attention" because you genuinely appreciate the fact that somebody has taken the time to read your email and perhaps honor a request or acknowledge some information.
Put it in writing. If someone has given you a gift or invited you into their home, take the time out afterward to write a simple thank-you note and send it by old-fashioned snail mail.
Change your wording. Try phrases such as, "I appreciate that," "That was nice of you/kind of you," and "I owe you one," preceding "Thank you" or "Thanks."
Be specific. Tell the person how what they did or what they gave you will make your life more fulfilling. For example, if someone gave you a digital camera, in addition to saying "thank you," say: "This will be perfect for taking pictures of our new baby. I've been dying to send pictures to our friends by e-mail, and now I finally can."

Tips

Don't use "thank you." Be thankful.
Ask a close friend or family member to tell you the last time somebody thanked them for something, and remember what that means the next time you're out of the house.
Even when you miss an opportunity to thank someone, feel the respect for what that person or those people did for you. Get into the habit of appreciating other people doing things for you.
For anyone who has read Carnegie's' How to Win Friends and Influence People, thanking somebody should seem a relatively easy and routine task. But it isn't. Remember, before anything else, that if you don't thank somebody, they may not mind, but they will remember it.

Positive Remark

2005-12-10T22:55:00.000+05:30

The wife stands in front of a mirror."you know, dear," she says, "I look in the mirror & I see an old woman, face wrinkled, fat legs & flabby arms"

She turns to her husband & says, "Tell me something positive to make me feel better about myself."

He says in a soft voice, "your eye sight is perfect"

Definition of kiss

2005-11-19T23:35:00.000+05:30

Prof .of Economics
Kiss is that thing for which the demand is aways higher than the supply.

Prof. of Accountancy
Kiss is a credit because it is profitable when returned.

Prof. of Algebra
Kiss is infinity because two divided by nothing.

Prof. of Geometry
Kiss is the shortest distance between two lips.

Prof. of Physics
Kiss is the contraction of mouth due to the expansion of the heart.

Prof. of Chemistry
Kiss is the reaction of the interaction between two hearts.

Prof. of Zoology
Kiss is the interchange of salivary bacteria.

Prof. of Physiology
Kiss is the juxtaposition of two orbicularisoris muscles in the state of contraction.

Prof. of Dentistry
Kiss is infectious and antiseptic.

Prof. of Philosophy
Kiss is the persecution for the child, ecstasy for the youth and homage for the old.

Prof. of English
Kiss is a noun that is used as a conjunction, it is more common than proper, it is spoken in the plural and it is applicable to all.

Prof. of Architecture
Kiss is a process which builds a solid bond between the two dynamic objects

Prof. of Comp.Science
What is a kiss? It seems to be an undefined variable

If you love someone

2005-11-19T12:24:00.000+05:30

Pessimist:
If you love someone, Set her free ... if she ever comes back, she's
yours, If she doesn't, as expected, she never was

Optimist:
If you love someone, Set her free ... Don't worry, she will come back.

Suspicious:
If you love someone, Set her free ... If she ever comes back, ask her why.

Impatient:
If you love someone, Set her free ... If she doesn't comes back soon
forget her.

Patient:
If you love someone, Set her free ... If she doesn't come back,
continue to wait until she comes back ...

Playful:
If you love someone, Set her free ... If she comes back, and if you
love her still, set her free again, repeat

Animal-Rights Activist:
If you love someone, Set her free, In fact, all living creatures
deserve to be free!!

Lawyers:
If you love someone, Set her free, Clause 1a of Paragraph 13a-1 in the
second amendment of the Matrimonial Freedom Act clearly states that...

Bill Gates:
If you love someone, Set her free, If she comes back, I think we can
charge her for re-installation fees and but tell her that she's also
going to get an upgrade.

Biologist:
If you love someone, Set her free, She'll evolve.

Statisticians:
If you love someone, Set her free, If she loves you, the probability
of her coming back is high If she doesn't, your relation was
improbable anyway.

Schwarzenegger's fans:
If you love someone, Set her free, SHE'LL BE BACK!

Over possessive person:
If you love someone don't set her free.

HR specialist:
If you love someone set her free by Offering her VRS and other
benefits Then outsource her.

MBA:
If you love someone set her free instantaneously and look for others
simultaneously

Psychologist:
If you love someone set her free If she comes back her super ego is
dominant If she doesn't come back her id is supreme If she doesn't go,
she must be crazy.

ERP functional expert:
If you love someone set her free If she comes back, map her into your
system If she doesn't, carry out a gap-fit analysis

Finance expert:
If you love someone set her free If she comes back its time to look
fresh loans If she doesn't, write her off as an asset gone bad.

Marketing Expert:
If you love someone set her free If she comes back that's brand loyalty.

27 Things you didn't know about

2005-11-13T22:52:00.000+05:30

27. The cigarette lighter was invented before the match.

26. The average chocolate bar has 8 insect legs in it.

25. Right-handed people live, on average, nine years longer than left-handed people do.

http://www.science-frontiers.com/sf058/sf058b07.htm

24. Its impossible to smoke oneself to death with weed. You won't be able to retain enough motor control and consciousness to do so after such a large amount. (Common Sense)

23. Uncle Phil, from Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, did the voice of Shredder in the TMNT cartoon.

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0043041/

22. Every drop of seawater contains approximately 1 billion gold atoms.

http://www.webelements.com/webelements/elements/text/Au/geol.html

21. The US national anthem actually has three verses, but everyone just knows the first one.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Star-Spangled_Banner

20. During World War II, IBM built the computers the Nazis used to manage their death/concentration camps.

http://www.ibmandtheholocaust.com/articles/auschwitz.html

19. The total combined weight of the worlds ant population is heavier than the weight of the human population.

http://www.perceptions.couk.com/superants.html

18. The deadliest war in history excluding World War II was a civil war in China in the 1850s in which the rebels were led by a man who thought he was the brother of Jesus Christ.

http://www.asiawind.com/pub/forum/fhakka/mhonarc/msg00451.html

17. Just about 3 people are born every second, and about 1.3333 people die every second. The result is about a 2 and 2/3 net increase of people every second. Almost 10 people more live on this Earth now, than before you finished reading this.

http://yahooligans.yahoo.com/content/ask_earl/page?d=20000714

16. Happy Birthday (the song) is copyrighted.

http://www.snopes.com/music/songs/birthday.asp

15. The number of people alive on earth right now is higher than the number of all the people that have died. Ever.

14. The average American consumes 1.2 pounds of spider eggs a year and eat 2.5 pounds of insect parts a year.

http://www.corsinet.com/trivia/average.html

13. The Kamp Krusty episode of the Simpson's was originally meant to be made as the Simpsons movie.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamp_Krusty

12. Men can breastfeed babies

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Male_lactation

11. There is a rare condition called Exploding Head Syndrome which you've probably never heard of.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploding_head_syndrome

10. Scientists have determined that fungi are more closely related to human beings and animals than to other plants.

http://www.factmonster.com/spot/fungus1.html

9. In some (maybe all) Asian countries, the family name is written first and the individual name written second (opposite of the America method). That\'s why Asian athletes like Yao Ming and Ichiro Suzuki have Yao and Ichiro written on their jerseys. Those are their family names and in America their names are written Ming Yao and Suzuki Ichiro.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_name

8. Abe Lincoln bought 50 cents worth of cocaine in 1860

http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/jala/19.1/hall.html

7. A German World War II submarine was sunk due to malfunction of the toilet.

http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=9684&start=0

6. Washington State has the longest single beach in the United States. Long Beach, WA.

5. The largest living thing on the face of the Earth is a mushroom underground in Oregon, it measures three and a half miles in diameter.

http://www.infoplease.com/spot/fungus1.html

4. The town of Los Angeles, California, was originally named El Pueblo la Nuestra Senora de Reina de los Angeles de la Porciuncula.

http://www.usc.edu/isd/archives/la/historic/la_settlement.html

3. 9 out of 10 people believe Thomas Edison invented the light bulb. This isn't true; Joseph Swan did.

http://chem.ch.huji.ac.il/~eugeniik/history/swan.html

2. Honey is the only food that does not spoil. Honey found in the tombs of Egyptian pharaohs has been tasted by archaeologists and found edible.

http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/gen01/gen01338.htm

1. The Population of the world can live within the state boundaries of Texas.

http://www.improb.com/teach/lessons2002/people-in-texas.html

Create expandable post summaries

2005-11-01T18:49:00.000+05:30

With this trick, you can choose to display an arbitrary amount of text from the beginning of each post, as a teaser for the whole thing. Then users who want to read the rest of the post can click a link to see the full text. This is handy if you have lots of long articles all on one page. Note that you'll need to have post pages enabled in order to make this feature work.

There are three ingredients that go into this feature: conditional CSS, a "read more" link for each post, and a modification for the posts that use this feature. So let's go through it step by step.

Conditional CSS

We're going to use conditional tags to change how posts display on different pages. Add the following code to your style sheet:

span.fullpost {display:none;}

span.fullpost {display:inline;}

Your style sheet is usually near the top of your template, between the tags. If you have your style sheet in a separate file, you'll still need to add these lines in your template, so the conditional tags will work. Just make sure you add in the