California Trip: A Rendezvous

Jamee called me yesterday and told me, he is willing to join us in California trip. Jamee! It was quite a surprise. When we were in college Jamee was the last guy whom we asked for any trip. He was one of our best buddy but he was not very outgoing type. Zafar explains this event as 'amazing stuff.' He actually bought the ticket for Los Angeles yesterday. He is going to join us on 24th December. I hope the number of people is not too much yet.

I still remember Florida trip. One thing I learned in a hard way in Florida trip: if there is no leader chaos is inevitable. Whenever I have some time, I still think of our Florida trip. I believe it was a problem of leadership. If someone step forward and wanted to play the role of a leader we could have much better result. I am not going to let the same thing happen again.

An amazing thing happened in Florida that changed my philosophy forever. I am still very confused about our behavior in Florida trip. What was wrong? Leadership? Commitment? Respect? Trust? Competition? Pride? Florida trip was moment of truth for me, I am still looking for the mystery of Florida trip.

Experiments

Experiment is kind of boring but results are fun. I am running couple of experiments these days. It is kind of boring, I feel like I am doing nothing. I have to monitor the whole thing in every 10 or 20 minutes. I can't concentrate on anything else within this time and at the end of the day I feel like I did nothing.

The only fun part of the experiment is results. Results are really interesting. I guess every result possesses a hidden treasure inside it. It our responsibility to reveal the treasure. Some results might drive you nuts but once it's secret is revealed the treasure worths even more.

Some experiments are truly test of patience. Right now each of my trial run are taking about 20 minutes. These are trial experiments I would definitely automate the whole process once finalize everything and move to the final experiment. Right now what I do is start the experiment and browse phone and Internet for few minutes and look at the results and repeat the whole process again. I think the amount of real time work is no more than 30 min after whole day.

California Trip: Mission Alcatraz

I bought the ticket for Alcatraz today. We are planning to visit Alcatraz on 28th. Alcatraz is in San Francisco Bay. It is an abandon penitentiary. I think several movies were shot in Alcatraz. I think it was in the movie 'the rock.' There is also a prison break movie named 'Escape from Alcatraz.' I have never been in abandoned penitentiary; I hope it should be fun.

We had to buy the ticket online and long before the visit. I have no idea why they have this kind of system. The ticket is $28 each. We are hoping to take the 11:00 AM ferry from San Francisco pier 33. I hope 11:00 AM is fine. We should be able to drive to pier 33 before 11.

We need to finalize the entire plan. And I need to see whether the total plan makes any sense. In our last Florida trip we have several underestimated our travel time. This time I don't want that happen again. There is problem of perfect plan: there is no surprise left for the guy who does the planning. Again I don't want that either.

HTC Sense

Overall, HTC makes good phone. I was curious about why HTC is loosing business. To me, HTC one x looks much better than Samsung s3. But then I have the opportunity to look at Samsung s3 during this weekend. I think Samsung touchwiz is much better than HTC sense. Touchwiz is robust and way more responsive compared to HTC sense.

Now I think I know why HTC is loosing business. Although HTC is making top quality hardware they need to do much better job with software. I wonder why HTC is not releasing phone with stock android. I think stock android is better than HTC sense. I don't see any point to do something that makes a product worse.

My primary complain is about its robustness. Google Chrome crashes every now and then on htc sense. I didn't like stock keyboard. My wi-fi stops working randomly. The menu button is little weird. That's all I think but random wi-fi glitch bothers me lot. My experience is much better with stock android. However htc sense has much better design compared to touchwiz I think. I am eagerly waiting for their new version of htc sense for my HTC one x.

Thanks giving dinner

I love thanks giving. It is the time of too many good food. Shishu uncle is one who makes our thanks giving fun. Otherwise it would have been another boring holiday. Ron used to prepare a good thanks giving dinner. This he did it early, so I couldn't attend. I just came from Shishu uncle's home and I too full.

I had too much good food today. Particularly I am not a big fan of turkey grill but I like the whole package. Shishu uncle's place was fun, not too many people. It was just the right number of people. I like lot of things about this guy.

California Trip: The Blueprint

I never tried travel blogging. This time I decided to do travel blogging. I am planning for a trip to California this winter. I have reserved the lodges today. We have not finalize the details yet, but tentative idea goes as follows.

We will fly to Los Angeles 23rd December and stay there till 26th. We have a plan to visit universal studio, Hollywood, death valley, Santana monia beach and bay area. Probably we will head to San Francisco on 26th. And of course we are going to take highway 1. I have been listening about this drive since I was kid. This is one of my dream ride. Highway 1 goes along the pacific coastline.

We are planning to stay in San Francisco till 28th. We are not sure yet about where to go in San Francisco. The tentative idea is, we will go to Yosemite for one day, Alcatraz and golden gate Bridge for one day and probably we will visit other part of the San Francisco and San Jose on 26th and 29th.

We will return from San Francisco to Los Angeles on 29th. This the day when we have a plan to see night life in LA. Probably we have to do some socializing in LA as well. I am not sure yet. Finally we will take our return flight on 30th December. We are not sure yet, if we can manage some time, we will probably visit San Diego as well.

Btw, we are four: me, Lipa, Parisa and Zafar.

Unknown question

Well I had interview last week. The interviewer was asking which language I know best and which I know least? Guess what, I was never prepared for that question, and even worse. I said java is my best and c is my least. Obviously I didn't consider python or other languages like that. Even more confusing, I said c++ and c# in the middle. I think the interviewer got confused and I don't think he never heard this kind of answer yet. And from my side that was very stupid, I know c very well, how well? Probably better than many people who consider themselves expert in c. I just could say python or something like that. When I realize the goof it was late and I decided to go with that.

You what he asked me then? How OR, AND, NOT, XOR works, funny. Then he asked name of couple of data structures. When he was asking these questions, I got the idea that it is not gonna fly. But the take away was the unknown question. I think I should be more careful about answering unknown questions. You know what he was even saying "so you saying you know c++ better than c?" I think he was really shocked and thought I know none of them at all. Anyway I am pretty confident he is going to send me the rejection but I think I played really dumb this time.

Life goes on!

My throat was hurting real bad last night. It was bleeding and I hardly could sleep. I think I should not talk at all. The interesting part of the story is it hurts really bad when I drink but not much when I eat. That's funny because drinking was suppose to be easier.

I have enough free time because of throat infection. I am lying on my bed for whole day, watching movies and blogging. Interesting! I practically have enough time for myself. Blogging is interesting; sometimes when I see I have been blogging since 2006, I become amazed. Still I don't feel bore. I pour all my pain into my blog. And my blog has enormous ability of soaking my pain.

Whenever I think of my blog, one comment always hunt me down "you have no self respect" don't I? I never argued with this comment, not because I think it is true but because whoever wrote the comment don't understand self respect. Anyway my blog started its seventh year this November. I think I started blogging sometime is November 2006. Most probably some time in the middle of November. In that sense its birthday should be somewhere nearby. Wow I have been doing this for seven years! Life is amazing.

Two most amazing things I have seen is 'life' and 'computer science' and fortunately I have both.

Whistle of a night train

I am drifting apart. I get bored of a thing pretty quick but one thing I could never learn is give up. So I constantly in the pain of sticking with things I consider boring. But one thing I never bored of is life. Life is so amazing. It is full of surprise, somehow life always finds me for its surprise. No matter where I am, life can surprise me even if I am in the dullest place on earth. I am drifting apart, I am drifting apart from everything.

I am little sick today. I got a bad infection in my throat. First I thought it is rabies, I wish it would but it turns out it is not. But it hurts pretty badly. It even hurts if I drink. I never imagined water could be so distasteful. I have spent my entire day on bed, I am not sure what good 'lying on bed' can bring to my throat infection. But I had to do it. Life is so strange. Life is full of surprise.

When I was a kid I had pertussis once. It was bad, I was suffering for almost six months. At that time I used say my stomach gonna come out with my cough. But I survived. Until now I hate cough. This throat infection for some reason remind me those days. I used to be lying on my bed for whole day, nobody used to come to my room except my mom. Well, I am lying on my bed today far from my mom. But still why do I feel like I am having those days again.

In my school we used to memories phrases, one of them was 'man proposes and God disposes.' I never understand what that suppose to mean. I still don't. But I understand how little we know and predict about our future. Life is a relentless surprise for us. I love being alive, I enjoy every moment of it. I feel privileged when I see can appreciate this amazingly beautiful life.

Android 4.2

Android 4.2 lock screen widget is pretty interesting. It has a serious flaw. It allows me add Gmail widget to the lock screen and anybody can read my email without unlocking my tablet. Well that's not a problem if that's what I want. It is even worse, it allows me to add Gmail widget to the lock screen without any authentication at all.

That's pretty interesting. Let's say I do not have my Gmail widget on the lock screen, and now if I lost tablet any body can add Gmail widget to the lock screen and read my emails. He or she does not have to go through any authentication at all. This is very interesting. How come they miss such a big security flaw. I don't mind if they show my email on the lock screen if that's what I want. But allowing anybody to add Gmail widget is a real stupid things to do. I thing some widget should pass authentication before they are added to the lock screen.

Swiftkey

If you are in android and you write a lot using your phone then you must have SwiftKey. SwiftKey is perfect for fast typing, all you have to do is trust SwiftKey. Sure plenty of your keystrokes would be wrong but at the end you will get right word. I know this is very problematic if you try to write other language words with English alphabet. But for English it is simply great.

The factory keyboard with my HTC one x simply sucks. And hence I had to go to third party keyboard. I am happy I choose SwiftKey. I have not bought the paid version yet, but I surely would. I think my phone without SwiftKey is really incomplete.

One interesting problem I had with SwiftKey was trust. Like I said lots of keystrokes would be wrong and if you stuck in correcting them then you are doomed and no point of using SwiftKey. Even if you point one or two mistakes in your keystrokes you need to move on and then you will realize the beauty of SwiftKey.

I am trying to adopt mobile blogging with my new phone and SwiftKey. I heard that SwiftKey has the ability of learning, and meaning even if you I write other language with it can learn and adopt to my writing style, but I didn't try that yet.

California Trip: The Beginning

Today I book the ticket for California trip. I have been thinking of this California trip for long time. We are planning to go to California this winter.

We are taking 23rd December flight to Los Angeles. We will be back on 30th December.
Air ticket is always a waste to me. I never enjoy air travel. I don't know why but somehow I hate it. Anyway since everybody else preferred air, I had no choice. Rental car is little expensive at airport location, so we are thinking of getting the rental car from neighborhood location. May be we have to take a bus to the neighborhood location but it saves almost 20$ per day.

We have not planed the details yet but roughly we will touch Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, Riverside. This time I have a plan to go to universal studio if money permits. I have very tight budget for the trip, I am not sure how everything gonna work out, I am hoping it would.

Blogger app

Blogger app looks much better now. I think it is still far from tumblr, tumblr app is much better for mobile bogging. Interestingly I didn't see much development for blogspot in last few years. I think Google has forgotten blogspot. SwiftKey is also pretty good for mobile blogging. It would be nice if Blogger also have a micro blogging. I think now Tumblr is really cool for personal/mobile blogging.

I am gonna try a new thing for next couple of days, I am am thinking of doing real time blogging for few days. Let's see how it goes.

Would I Still Have You

When I was young I had a dream

That I would meet someone like you

And we would have a happy home

If the world would leave us alone

So it came to pass it all came true

You needed me like I needed you

But the world kept moving on

And our life was changed by a song

Sometimes I wonder and I worry too

If I did not know how to sing

Would I still have you?

That's the time I wished

I'd never bought that first guitar

I'd be out somewhere in Oklahoma

Fixing cars

But maybe after my hard working

Day was through

I'd still have you

It's hard to have loving on your mind

With people lining up for it all the time

And the world I loved went floating by

How did I miss the hurt in your eyes

[Roland Kent LaVoie]

Diversity!

This time I have witness the battle between between Android and iOS; I have heard a lot about the battle between Windows and Mac during 80's. I didn't even witness the reminiscence of the battle. My introduction to the computer was actually way after the battle, in fact way after the battle when all the mess were cleaned up. My first introduction to the computer was windows 3.1. After that when I first saw Windows 95, it was huge blow! Windows 95 was a super cool an super easy. I have grown up listening the story that the tiny piece of thing next my computer is actually invented by some other company and then Windows copied it. I don't know the truth, but I know for one thing for sure, if there was no windows, there would be no computer at my home and there would be no Chronicle of Mundane Life today.  

I don't know what Mac did at that time, but Windows did it so right that it reached every corner of this world. As I grew older I learned there is another kind of computer with linux, they are even cooler but they are hard to work with. They are for what call experts. I have played smart for quite some time in early days :P Then I learned there is another kind of computer even cooler and different from what I have seen so far. It was the revival of Mac. When I was first introduced to Mac, I was thinking it is quite similar to Linux. But they are not intended for so called experts! They are for regular people. I had the idea about how difficult it is to change the hardware in Linux system in early days. Wow! that problem does not exist for Mac at all! Superb! why because they don't support very many hardwares, they are designed for fixed set of things! Ooops! That's interesting! The whole idea of Mac is software can be hardware agnostic! Ouch! That's okay, there are still people in this world who believes Autocracy is the right government; we also see genetically coded animals roaming in this world.

But then in late 2000's the battle between smartphone OS had began. Well lot of people in early days predicted that it is gonna be another 80's war, and surely it is. But many people went far enough to declare the winner. Now in post Jobs era we see they were right, but this time it took less than five years. Interesting! I was thinking exactly what made Android so popular leaving iOS far behind? It is really hard to tell, then I was watching Malcolm Gladwell's TED lecture the other day and it struck into my head, may be there is no right thing for everyone. Why? that is big question; I guess partly because human brain develops beyond the womb and very little part of it actually comes with genetic coded! And that's why there is such a huge diversity among people in the same species. Other than human being two different samples of same species from two different parts of the world would almost behave same. But human is the only exception.

That makes me thinking if Apple makes product for anything else other than human they might actually see great success, because the design of the other animals follows the same philosophy as Apple does. They simply don't understand the beauty of diversity. I don't get it why? There is no wonder America is the greatest country in the world, it the most country in the world as. Every American brought a small piece of their own culture and ideas and together they are more robust than anything else. Diversity does not make something weak, it makes the thing robust. I feel pity when Apple claims something robust; I don't think they know what robust mean.