Fax services on Vista home premium

All the Windows Vista Home Premium users by now must have figured out that they don’t have the basic Windows Fax and Scan services. Too bad Microsoft decided to remove something that basic from an already crappy operating system. The only solution is to look for an alternate and I seem to have found a good alternate – Classic Phone Tools by Avanquest Software

You can get the full version for free if you follow the right links on the page. So far it seems to work great for me! Let me know if anyone of you knows other better Windows Fax software.

Zinio – Magazines right on your iPad

Of all my experiences with the iPad, the best have been surfing web, reading books, and magazines. The Zinio app has totally redefined the way I get my favorite magazines! Imagine not having to wait weeks to get your PCWorld magazine delivered to your home. Having all your favorite magazines available with you and readable with almost the same or more convenience as the print media has been a dream so far – at least for me. My laptop can’t go everywhere with me but the iPad surely can. My laptop needs a wall socket after 2 hours of use so its not the best for use on airplanes, trains and airports. Its too bulky to handle as well. All of these are not a problem for the iPad.

With Zinio, I got virtually a news stand on my iPad! I can browse and purchase from a HUGE selection of magazines, not just the ones you would otherwise find on stalls. Even the prices appeared relatively cheaper than print media prices. Tell me what kind of Magazine applications are you using? Would love to know!

Hobby Open Source Projects

As I have written on several occasions about me, I love programming. You can find the software I have written on this blog. Just made a link to a program called CopyFat with its installer and source code. I will mention here the projects I have done in the past and will eventually post them with Source Code and Installers.

• LECIDE - Learners/Experts Configurable Integrated Development Environment
  • With LECIDE I intended to make something like Eclipse IDE much before it showed up. Obviously my effort was much juvenile and to be honest, I started by creating a Notepad clone in VB6 and ended up creating a very complex IDE with syntax coloring, instant help tooltips, multiple compiler support, and BLADE - a drag and drop GUI designer for creating C++ dialog resources. Unfortunately, the way the code was written was horrible. If I wanted to do something new with it today, I would rather jump off a building than taking a dive back into its code. This was a really big project and I won multiple competitions for it. Source code coming soon!
• CopyFat 2.0 - File copy program
  • You can read more about it here. It was one of the most useful utilities I ever wrote. It helped me and my friends on several occassions!
• CyberBrowser - Tabbed IE based browser
  • A pretty simple browser with Tabbed browsing capability back in the days when IE was still a single window browser. A good reference for those wanting to learn how to use the WebBrowser control in VB6. Download the source code here.
• Winsock Based FTP client
  • While learning socket programming, I implemented my own FTP client. The important thing to note is, I didn’t use any third party components to derive FTP functionalities. The code actually talks to the FTP server by opening ports and opening parallel channels for file downloads etc. Great stuff if you are learning socket programming in VB6! Get the source code right here.

Trying out the Windows Live Writer

Now I just set up Windows Live Writer which came as a part of the Live Essentials suite. The best part I liked about it is that I can setup multiple blogging accounts in it and write at one place, but post in all the accounts. This is my first post testing out this feature. I have my other blogs at the following locations:

http://neodimension.blogspot.com

http://abhishekchatterjee.spaces.live.com

Introduction to Design Patterns @ InfoBeans/.NET Ramp up

Design Patterns are something that most developers in the Object Oriented world know as dishes given common names so that communication between developers becomes easy. Really, they are just good OOAD practices given a name. This introduction presentation just intends to be a food for thought kind which will direct the developer to be able to study more on it and explore more. Check out the presentation or download it:

 

Introduction to Design Patterns

Technorati Tags: infobeans,presentation,design,patterns,design patterns

View more presentations from Abhishek Chatterjee.

A Journey called InfoBeans ends for me

The journey that began for me on 30th June 2006 has finally ended officially on 4th December 2009. This journey is hard to be summarized in words. I will let a few pictures speak instead of me…

Bon Jovi’s new album “The Circle”

My favorite band has a new album and they ROCK with it! There are amazing songs and it looks like there is nothing stopping these guys…

Here are the top three songs from the Album:

“Work for the working man” is a Livin on a prayer style song and has some excellent guitar riffs and vocals.

A Hilarious Blunder in Google Translation

Please follow the instructions below & enjoy the blunder made by Google.

01. Open http://www.google.co.in
02. Click 'language tools' link.
03. Write "Britney's mom is very nice" in 'Translate text:' textbox.
04. Select "English to Spanish" in the below drop down.
05. Press Translate and wait for translation.
06. Now copy the translated text from the above text and paste it in
the 'Translate text:' textbox.
07. Select "Spanish to English" in the below combo.
08. Press Translate and wait for translation.
09. Enjoy!!!

I could have told you the climax too, but its too irresistable to miss
as a first hand experience!

for those who thought Google never made mistakes...

Is there anything fishy with Google Calendar?

Well although so far so good. We are getting great free services from this company. But in this regard i would like to mention you the demat account case of Jodhpur.

Some photo studio's came up with this very kewl free trial scheme where you could get your free snaps taken and developed. Under this trial scheme, thousands of people exploited the scheme and got their snaps done. No one bothered to think why the shop was giving out free snaps and how it was making profit from it. Then only to realise one day that a scam had been uncovered, and their names and photos were used to register thousands of false demat accounts.

I am not saying google will exploit us that bad, but it can do some interesting stuff with it. It can become the bad medicine that Microsoft has become for us. We don't want to take it, but can't live without it.

After all if I have a business and I want to use a business email, why not buy an email account? Rather than relying on Gmail. You never know when Gmail decides that you have broken policies and shuts your account. Apart from that, you are simply handing over your personal data to gmail, which is surely not the best deed. (Since we have this quite infamous rumour that they don't delete a single mail that you recieve.)

Now we have this new service called Google Calendar, which seems just as dubious as its Gmail service. With being able to let others sync to our calendars, its a really innovative method of letting others know of your schedule so that they can adjust their schedules etc. Despite all the plus points it just moves one step closer to occupying every user's online life. I don't know about others, but I don't know why I would like people to know about my schedules. If they want to sync with me, they can always ask. What if I throw a private party to selected few, and one of those makes a Google calendar entry? I would face 'discrimination charges' from my all other contacts.
Apart from that, it has the wierd strategy of importing calendars. It allows you to import calendars from outlook, evolution etc, but not export back. Well that is fishy enough to discuss further.

I am fine with softwares like Evolution where I can do most of my day to day scheduling jobs. Some how I have been gripped by Gmail. I still can't figure out how to get rid of it. It's far more simpler to have a 3GB easily searcheable mailbox than burning your archived emails onto CD/DVDs (that i used to do earlier). However wonderful, I still find it a real risky business to deal with. I am still trying my best to get back to my previous routine.

In the end I would like the readers to rethink and decide the share of their lives that they would like to place in Google's hand.

HCL's ad shows wrong map of India !!!

Now there is something definitely very wrong with the Map of India shown in the HCL's ad of People Less office.

Kashmir has been cut off from the LoC as it seems. That is not the way an Indian company should be showing India's Map, that too on Indian TV channels. Whoever made this ad should be fined for the act.

It is a humiliation for the Indians, we do not follow the American mapping standards. I don't know how many have noticed this, but something should be done about it.

Now the HCL's animated characters are waiting to be named! Well yeah call them bunty bubbly who cares? Atleast straighten the god damn map of our mother land!

Hexaware Recruitment Process, a low standard demonstration

I write this to enlighten all the students appearing for Hexaware Fresher recruitment via G4 Solutions...

I must tell all of you that G4 is an absolute bullshit. www.g4careermapping.com
They charge you Rs. 450/- for giving their CBT and then take a GD process.

The hilarious part is, those short listed by G4 are by no means the final interview candidates!!! (unlike claimed by them) At the last moment the Hexaware people will walk in and say that we have slight change in plans... and then they will take another written which is hilariously out of common man's bounds. They ask electronics questions to Comp. Sci people and all kinds of awkward questions which you would have definitely not expected. Hence, that round becomes a "Fluke" round.

What the hell!!! If Hexaware didnt trust G4 why the hell did it outsource the selection process to it??? Knocks me off. I got eliminated in the "Fluke" round... I tried to convince the so called in charge of Hexaware selection process to consider me for an interview (after all i had cleared all previous rounds and this round wasnt expected) but he was too arrogant to even listen.

I suggest to everyone, that please do not go for the recruitment process if being conducted by G4 Solutions. DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY ON THE WEIRD SELECTION PROCEDURE UNTIL AND UNLESS YOU ARE PREPARED TO THROW OFF 450 bucks.

Mission Udaan Ep1 Compressed.avi (23.75 MB)

Hey everyone,

All those who wanted to know about the Indian Air Force, here is a documentary on the way the Indian Air Force goes. Its an on going series on the National Geographic channel.

You can click on the following link to download:

Mission Udaan Episode 1

The following message was included:

Mission Udaan Episode 1 (First Half). For all those who missed, here is a reduced quality version.

Were the New Delhi Bomb Blasts planned using Google Earth?

Now just two posts down the line I wrote about how much a threat Google Earth could be. How much would it help in planning terror strikes... and just a few days later there are terror strikes in New Delhi with bombs set off at three locations.

I wonder how many speculate the idea of Google Earth being used for these attacks. Well, if Google earth was used, then it was a terrible success for the terrorists aka Jehadis! Well, how would have this software helped in setting up bomb sites? While we all were concerned about the Parliament House and Rashtrapati Bhawan, we forgot the common man, didn't we? Well, why do we keep forgetting that if terrorists were so noble (killing politicians, which i would do eagerly myself!) why would we call them terrorists? These SOB's take innocent lives, they hit those, who have nothing to do with the political bullshit because of which the whole thing happens in the first place.

Anyway, once again trying to look at what exactly the terrorists would look at in Google Earth to plan any of these bomb blasts? Yes, they can locate the Paharganj market easily and also Sarojni nagar market with similar ease. Now since the photographs are two years old, and since there has been severe infrastructure changes, all they could have relied upon was the old shop buildings and the roads. That is, they could have planned their entry and exit from the places (even spotted the narrow lanes which could serve as back ups), they could have judged the most crowded places in the area and hence finalised upon where to place the bomb. That done, all that comes next is to wait for the big explosion, and say 'Mission Accomplished' to their big fellas!

Hmm... but what I still want to analyse is the level of use that this software called Google Earth would have served to these SOB's. Wait till we zero upon a few facts from the police and media and hence be able to carry out some researches on our own.

Serial Bomb Blasts Rock New Delhi

A series of explosions rocked Delhi on Saturday evening, killing at least 65 people and leaving scores injured, some of them critically.As many as 20 people have been killed in an explosion in Sarojini Nagar market and 15 others have reportedly been killed in Paharganj.Most of those injured or killed in the explosions were ordinary people out shopping in the festival season. Suspects detainedAt least ten people have been detained following the three blasts in Delhi. Five of them were picked up from the New Delhi Railway station and others from other railway stations and bus terminals. It is now believed that high explosive devices suspected to be RDX were used in carrying out the blasts. Police have raided several hotels in Paharganj and other places in and around the Capital.Prime Minister Manmohan Singh cut short his visit to the Northeast and returned to Delhi from Kolkata. He described the serial blasts as "dastardly acts of terrorism"."The terrorists wish to spread a sense of fear and suspicion among peace-loving people. These blasts have been timed to create disaffection during the festive season when people of all communities are celebrating our national festivals. "We shall defeat their nefarious designs and will not allow them to succeed. We are resolute in our commitment to fight terror in all forms," the Prime Minister said.

A red alert has been sounded across several places in the country including neighbouring Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Mumbai and Kolkata. Home Minister Shivraj Patil called a high-level emergency meeting at 9 pm (IST) to review the situation and discuss security operations.The Home Minister said it was too early to pinpoint who was responsible for the blasts. "As to who is responsible for the blasts, we will not like to jump to any conclusion. The first priority is to give relief and succour to those affected by the blasts," the Home Minister said. Congress President Sonia Gandhi visited the injured in hospitals. Extending her condolences to the families of those killed in the blasts, she described the incidents as acts of terrorism."Terrorism is a menace that we all have to face and fight together. This is not only a phenomenon here in our country. This is something that the whole world has to face. It is important that we all together fight it together," said Gandhi.

What's up with these militants taking innocent lives???

Finally the dooms day struck...
What the hell? What do these psycho islamists want by taking innocent lives?
Who can understand their psychology? What do they want? The world doesn't seem to have an answer to that. Whats the cure of this disease?

Most terrorist training camps exist in Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir. The best solution is to wipe the area clean of any armed personal, be it Pakistani soldier or whosoever. I believe the world should unit against the Terrorist organisations in Pakistan.

Someone soon come up with a solution... please for God sake.

The Google Earth Hype

Although I do not understand why the Indian media is giving Google Earth so much hype, and critisizing the detail at which it has exposed various Indian cities. Well matter of factly, only four Indian cities have actually been shown in good detail.

• New Delhi and NCR (Near Capital Region) i.e. Noida, Gurgaon etc
• Mumbai and nearby areas
• Hyderabad
• Banglore

As such there is nothing that serious about these cities being exposed in the said detail. First of all, most photographs are quite old and hence do not hold much threat to the military areas exposed.
In any case, we are not the only ones exposed by Google, many important cities in the world have been clearly shown in Earth.

Who should be concerned the most are people in United States. Common! we have all major US cities in 3D details. Maybe Osama's troops can now actually sit back, relax and estimate the tallest building in New York and then target it for some terrorist attack.
As far as military intelligence is concerned, most Air bases in the US have been exposed. Rather even the Area 51 has been clearly exposed.

Well I don't overlook the danger that our own country faces from such attack plannings. Now the terrorists can probably plan which routes to take to reach Rashtrapati bhawan, and which routes to use for the exit. Even the doors and entrances can be seen. A well equipped group could even decide upon snipping locations and assault positions.

But then what is it? Just another commodity in the belts of the bad guys. Who made a fuss when email was invented, practically one of the best ways for terrorists to communicate? Oh yeah I hear some computer guys groaning... although the email was invented in the US a lot of time before 9/11 and hence during a time when US didn't know what terrorism was. But even today e-mail is the most secure method of communication between any two people. The men in white but with heart of titanium use it for some of the best killing spree's even today.

Even today when we have learnt so much from past experiences, we continue to have cyber cafe's which have no user information logging howsoever. Hence virtually anyone can use the email with encrypted messages for conveying the most disasterous messages to their head quarters.

To conclude this, the media should take things little sensibily and realise that every new invention has two faces, the good and the bad... and may be the ugly too. With every new invention, we invent a new way for a person to die. Lets just try and get the official No-Fly-Zones removed from the maps. That is the best that can be done, and that should be done.

A Debate on the word 'United'

Well, me and my friends had this hour long debate on 'United'.
Can you figure out what this word means?
"Combined into a single entity."
Thats an ordinary definition. Usually we use it in a broader context. Allied nations have united in the war on terrorism. Well, yeah exactly. Here we use the word united against an entity, terrorism.

Most sentences using the word united are bred in the same context. So most sentences having the word united have three entities/groups. Two of them get together and the third one is still divided from the two, or better to say, stands as a platform against whom the first two entities unite.

So what if this third entity didn't exist at all? Say there was no terrorism at all! Would the Allied nations unite then? What would we say? "The Allied Nations have united!" Against what? will be the casual question raised. If two groups are uniting without a third entity, we would prefer to use some other words instead, like e.g. The Allied nations have strengthened their political ties, or improved their business relations etc. If two entities were on war, we would rather say that the two entities now have settled for peace.

So whenever we use the word UNITED, there has to be three entities minimum. Two that unite, and third which serves as the basis of unity.

As a matter of conclusion, the word UNITED is quite ironic. Apart from actually consolidating two entities, it makes sure that their exists a boundary/division with the third one. Hence there can be no unity without division, or better to say, division preludes and succeeds unity.

Irony hence proved... :-)

Welcome to my blog

Hi all,

well i have created this blog not to post utter nonsense, but speak my mind.
Most topics will be centric to Indians, but nearly everyone can enjoy.

anyway buddies... keep checking this site.

neo