KwiKK

It is such a nice pleasure to blog after a long long time! But, getting an appropriate topic from all these time I did not blog is tough.. Just because there were so many awesome things to share.
As I remember, the last thing I blogged was almost a year back. That was about Kumaraparvata. And by now, the river has seen lot of water in these months, there were highs and almost no lows :) I have been a part of the corporate world from last 5 and a half months and before that, it was an awesome college life. Though I found no difference or very less difference from the college life being i corporate world, I miss my college days. But, never want to go back (for weird reasons) ;)

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A bit about the first half

College life, almost at the end. Just few more months and all of us from my batch would be kicked out of the college into some dirty, hectic work-life (at least many thought so). Last semester was just calling us. Unlike most of other autonomous engineering institutions, my college had project+lab+4 subjects in the final semester. Hectic right? But, no other go; had to manage. Just before the college began, we had to begin with our project idea and as usual, team Pi-LDR was together. Submitting our project idea to our HoD Dr.M.K.Parasuram, it was approved and it was really a happy moment to work with him. The project "Energy saving control for auditorium" was the one which caught the attention of many later. Though the project started with a slow pace, the experience of working with the analog circuits and discrete component made us work efficiently. By this time, Deepak had become Debug, Lakku and Pai were knowing every node and its voltage in our circuit. With some small changes after much experimentation, our System was ready to control the auditorium! The project evaluations, vivas went smoothly most of the times as it was a full in-house built and not the Imported ;)
Winning saga

Our system of controlling the auditorium was a hit!(as my friends,juniors say). The project exhibition EXPRO was held in college and we realised the people were very much interested in the projects than ever before. Pai was our representative most of the times during the exhibition. I was a smart operator who had to move fingers through the doors of the auditorium in and out (No naughty thinking huh?). Deepu was a waterboy who got cold water whenever we had to demonstrate that our auditorium's ac and fan are working. Lakku was a heater who used to control the temperature of the auditorium with the soldron. We realized that the number of features in our project was very much and no judge was willing to listen to the full explanation! They were tired seeing the projects we thought. After the judges went, our friends had a guess that the winners will be Pi-LDR only! As they said, we had won! "The team which won in IIT are national level champs. They will win in college level obviously right?" was the common saying and we got tired listening to that. One more thing we realized from our friends was that the crowd was more only near our demo tables and everywhere else, the crowd showed the interest very similar to the previous years! We felt bad for all those who imported the project paying huge cash; we could have done that for them if we had some more time and they had some patience ;)

By then, our farewell was also done! And juniors were so uninterested to send them out that they bunked the farewell function itself! Wow! Only some juniors who loved to send us out and to become the seniors did all the arrangements. Talking in Tulu for the first time on stage was great though there were some exceptions raised by some people for talking tulu on dais. I was awarded with Best outgoing student of the branch! There were many who deserved it better than me though.
The Sasihithlu trip is the one to be cherished. The team Pi-LDR along with HSV(aka Rajesh) did almost a night out in delta over there. The beauty of the nature there can not be explained in words. Played with sand building some houses, writing the wedding invitations with the respective crushes was all fun. An yearly-once trip to Sasihithlu was decided to enjoy the nature beauty there. The delta which we see in Sasihithlu is the other side of the delta in Mulky which is also called Ghajini for no reason! Be there once!

The exams arrived and it was as usual. Last day learning and a lot of help from Vikas in the name of combined study, Actually it was all one way, he teaching me. Our project work was just at the finishing touch, fine tuning. Written exams got over. Only lab and project viva was remaining. Suddenly we got a call from HoD that 2 have to go from the team to University level technical festival where there will be project exhibition event to be held at Reva ITM, Bangalore to be held in just 3 days. That was totally unexpected. Our project evaluation would get shifted to the last day. The next day, HoD said, college would sponsor 3 people! When it is 3, why not 4? The same day me, Lakku and Pai started to Bangalore and Deepu joined us there starting from Mangalore the next day. Again, the judges were impatient to listen to our full explanation and demo, but very impressed by seeing our work with discrete electronic components. The same judges had asked tens of irritating questions but just walked off us by asking just one question -"How many months you took to build all these?"! That was a University level triumph. The same dialogue repeated- "The team which won in IIT are national level champs. They will win in university level obviously right?"
Back to Nitte and back to exam mode. Lab and Project viva smashed!
Into the Corporate world and some unexpected happenings
I, the first one to get placed in EC had to be the first one to join the company. Just the day before I left for Hubli, all the friends including Pai, Lakku, Deepu, Kri, Bale, Vikas and HSV graced the occasion at my home. It was a great time in Kukkundoor. The next day I left for Hubli. The colleagues here in Hubli were great. A start-up, friendly environment, lot to learn, VLSI field; what else do I need? I was with my brother initially for a month. Playing with his kid of age less than a year was all fun. But he changed his room as he had the family. I decided to stay back where he lived. I was alone for almost one month there but loneliness never made me sick for all those things I experienced in college during some circumstances.
Then came a surprise! There was an offcampus drive for Sankalp at Hubli. Immediately when I came to know about this, I fanned out the info to all in my friend-circle who are interested. With less than 10 days to join at Tata Elxsi, Pai and Krithika were in Hubli selected for Sankalp! Pai became my roommate! With office being at walkable distance, life was so good :)

There was a second offcampus drive for which Bale and Aruna came to Hubli. Though they dint get selected, it was a Hubli-Darshan day later. Had fun roaming around.

Then came Deepu's bday. With everyone being around Mangalore, we decided to celebrate his bday by giving a surprise midnight bash! His sis knew it and the plan was a superb success with me, Pai and Lakku being there at exact 12 midnight on 2 bikes! Sasihithlu, one more almost night-out, that too unexpected for him, on his birthday, midnight, everything was perfect!
As I was about to complete 5 months in Sankalp, I had to move to Bangalore for an onsite project. That is where I am now. Working at Texas Instruments, Bangalore for the next two months. Pai is alone and missing me ;)

--ನಾವಿಕ

Geeting into VLSI field, I now realize how noisy this world is! even simulators give noise....

This is my article in Electronics mail of April 2011

Life and social networking

Long before internet came into existence, communication media were letters, trunk calls and telegrams. Even if the computers were in use, network was nothing but nodes and hubs! But, once the internet bloomed, emails and websites replaced them and they became the centre of information sharing soon. All the conversations became online. New place for business was the Internet as lot of tech-savvy people started using the Internet very much. Computer occupied every place where human could work. Human effort reduced very much and automation was very much increased.

                By the same time, human wanted to retain his contacts with his friends. Constantly mailing them was difficult. Even though cell phone was very much developed with sms, mms etc., it just served him more as an entertainment gadget with music player, camera, video player and other features. All wanted to keep in touch with their close ones in a very interactive way, but free of cost! With AOL, Yahoo! and Amazon bringing networking, fun and business under the single roof, the era of social; networking began.

Social Networking’s Adolescence: With Classmates.com starting with the purpose to find the classmates or schoolmates, social network’s progress was noticeable. With Friendster followed by LinkedIn, Orkut, Myspace and Facebook, social networking had already a big hit. Information sharing was very easy by the time. The race to get into the top between them was observed. The one with more user-friendly feature became more popular. Initially, it was Orkut’s turn and now it is replaced by Facebook in India.

Facebook’s popularity is not questionable! The site is the most popular among all the Internet users in the world. Users are allowed to post their status updates and share photos, videos etc. They are then followed by comments and like’s. Every celebrity has a fan page and every company has a page describing about themselves. An average user has around 250 friends and he visits at least once a day.

Web sites such as Twitter.com have been quickly increasing in popularity for their microblogging ability. The act of microblogging basically allows a user to post small messages to an online profile which in turn is being monitored by other users of the service. Many celebrities are using Twitter to post "tweets" about their normal daily activities which provides fans with an insight to their life. Most tweets are done with cell phones as a user would text the information to the site which is then posted. People use twitter so extensively that any incidence happened will be tweeted within fraction of a minute! The world comes to know the incidence by twitter!

Similarly other networking sites such as aardvark.com started sharing the information by networking. Now, it is the most popular service to know the answer for any question. The service is as popular as Yahoo! answers which again provides the answers for the question asked by the users. Mediafire, rapidshare and other file sharing sites have made the file sharing much easier than before.

There is one more positive side of the social networking sites like Facebook.com. The revolutions against the government in Tunisia and Egypt began online in the social networking sites. It reached maximum number of people in the respective countries and the revolution was successful in throwing the the rules out of power. The sites like Wikileaks are continuously exposing the hidden faces of the most powerful countries in the world and embarrassing them. Though the secrets are revealed and this might result in a negative ways for any country, the secrets help in knowing the real intensons of those governments.

With all the popularity and advantages, there’s always a negative face for everything. As the user base increased, problems such as hacking, spamming and phishing increased. Information theft became a major problem. Security measures had to be taken to prevent such things. The more one uses these networking sites, the more he is into depression (proved scientifically). With an addiction to sites like facebook, most of the times which must have been fruitfully utilized are now wasted in front of some machine. Staring at the screen, commenting some others’ updates, browsing through the applications just wastes the time but nothing else.

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But, the time is such that social networking is a part of life of everyone who uses Internet. The networking sites are trying to get still deeper into user base by introducing new features like integrated email service provision. And making sure that people are not moving away from it. It is sure that nothing can separate this generation from social networking. Life has been much more simpler and complex with networking!

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                 Welcoming 2011, we planned our 5-men trip to be on 4^th and 5^th January. Packing up everything we needed, we thought bag was really heavy. But, our imagination about the trekking was quiet simple. Just climb the hill and you are done! But, real challenge was to be faced there.

                With Krithika escorting us till the platform, our journey started in Subramanya passenger train from Mangalore at 1030 on first day. Reaching Subramanya at around at 1.30, we had our lunch. At the same time, my Bhavaji came there to escort us till the base of Kumara parvata. We cannot forget him for all his help and influences there. We had informed Bhat of Bhat’s house that we five are going to stay ther on 4^th Jan. I had informed via my Bhavaji also. (Bhat’s house only house between base and peak. Even to bring groceries, he has to walk 6km down to Subramanya.)

                Started at 2.30 from the base, we really felt the heat of sun, even though thick forest covered us with its shadow. Every ten minutes, we had to take rest as Pai was always remaining behind us at least by 100m! We used to take rest till he comes. I made him to hold a stick which gave him enough support walk constantly. The forest path had roots, rocks and steepness! It made us to sit many times and to empty water bottles and also glucose. Glucose was like drugs to HSV and Deepak. They were addicted so much to it. Crossing the forest, we had to walk around 1.5km more through bare-hills to reach our day1 destiny. We were so excited to see arecanut trees there in Bhat’s house. We were ahead of schedule by at least half an hour and reached there by 4.45. Now we had to pass the time till night somehow. We had seen the stone-benches very near there and we decided to sit there till 8 there and we carried our torches to support us and chips to fill us (finally, most of the chips was eaten by Pai only.). The view of sunset was superb. Teasing everyone among ourselves, had loads of fun there. Each of us started searching for the places from where we can call. We could get full network, but were not able to call. By 7, we started feeling cold. Reached house back at 8, we had a reasonably good dinner and sound sleep. We were surprised to see no mosquitoes there.

                We had planned to start from house at 6 next morning. But, as it was dark, we started at 7. Now, it was my turn to get exhausted first. It was very cold and our walking speed was very less. We had the bread we had brought from Subramanya somewhere when we sat down. The path was bare-hills but, really challenging as the mountains were really steep. A step missed, then, we were nowhere! Crossing all the small mountains, we rached Kallu Mantapa. Kallu mantapa is really a nice place to stay overnight. There were some traces of campfire too. Now we started getting heavy winds, which was capable of making me, Lakku and Deepak fly! It was so hard that we started taking rest every two minutes and our walking speed reduced as it was opposing our walk. We could see a ‘herd’ of people from B’lore which was trekking back. The group had some 21 people. We got some free advices from them about trekking too. Still some 2km more to reach the peak, we were able to reach the peak at 9.45 itself. Pretty fast! Pai and Rajesh were slower than us three. Reaching the peak, Lakku was completely exhausted. We had a nice photo-session and hogging-session too. Again , the dominant is Pai ;)

                Started to trek back around 10.40, we slowly came down from Kumara parvata. Whatever we had mistaken as fog was not really fog! It was dense smoke from the places near Kallu Mantapa. We guessed that forest officers have put the fire to remove all the grass off. We were scared at once seeing fire in our path. But, taking risk, we decided to walk ahead in the middle of fire escaping from it. We were able to run through the places where there was no fire and we really don’t know how we climbed down the entire Shesha parvata and Kallu mantapa region in just fifteen minutes. Escaping from it, we saw a team of local trekkers, and they said that-‘B’lore people have told forest officer that Nitte people put the fire’. We were worried and started abusing the B’loreans. We also thought that B’lore people smoked etc etc and fire was begun. Moreover, we were not mad to go up putting fire at the base. However, we reached back Bhat’s house by 12.45.

                Paying Bhat for his courtesy for food and accommodation, we left from there by 2. We took all the shortcuts possible to reach the base. Me and Lakku leading the way now, we reached base by 3.20. Deepak followed us and Pai and rajesh were late by 15 minutes. With the help of Bhavaji, we got an auto there at the base. Getting the bus to Mangalore at 4, we reached M’lore at 7.30. Caught another bus to Karkala, reached Karkala by 8.45. Catching the last bus for home had made me exhausted already.

                We all had our calf muscles aching for atleast two more days! In total, it was the most challenging trip of my life and the most exciting and enjoying trip. Now, I’m longing to trek again.. When’s the next trek and where!?

2010 is now a history. And 2011 is here… Any resolutions to be made?

Well, I dint think of anything as such. Because I know I fail in everything if I decide to do anything. It must happen within a blink of eye and then it will work out :) Just going through the incidents of last one year, there were personal and professional highs and lows. There are times I felt happy and there are the times I was really down and was not even in a position to convince myself. But, overall, 2010 was a year to cherish. Let me write the main events happened here.

January 2010 started with high twitter and blogging fever (at least for me and Narendra and my senior grey matter frens).  Two blogs were started by me and I almost regularly updated them. Though academically, 5^th sem results were out and it was not upto our expectation. It dint matter to me though, I had forgotten to worry about marks within the first four semesters only!

February went with preparations for OUR own fest “Impulse-2010”. That was the time I got really busy and my busy schedule continued till August (which is my personal low time. Will come to it later). And yeah, I have to remember February for one more thing! It was the time when our team ‘π-LDR’ took birth, I can say :) Our team planned to organize two technical events which was appreciated by all later. Of course, we can’t forget the help by our great seniors Siddharth, Rohit, Suhan and frens from my batch. I miss my seniors now:( I also learnt website design using Joomla and wordpress! Was able to maintain fest website too! Thanks to Raison, Kenneth and Karthik Kastury. February was also the time I participated in Incident in kannada related events with Deepashree and Ghanashyam. Though we cdint win, treasure hunt in Kannada was good. I also participated in another event with Bhadresh and It was in fact, great with we winning 3^rd. We still dint get the certificate yet!

There began March with Impulse on 8^th and 9^th. I really can’t forget 7^th,8^th and 9^th of March for all the awesome time I had! Events went great. Fest was a hit. All credit goes to SNP sir and my superb seniors! Vice-Principal even praised the quality of the events-‘Impulse can be an alternative to college fest’, by this statement, ‘many others’ got jealous (basically they were those who hated EC for any and every reason). Ofcourse, even Impulse saw controversies! It was online war also! Whatever, fest was awesome time we had. It’s sad to even think that individual branch fests are no more :(

April and May went in a blink of eye. Now here comes June, July and August; the most hectic times of mine. Thought of doing a project, completed half of it. But, my time was really bad and had so much of work pressure over myself. Though I could manage my professional /academic works, it was the time for my personal lows. Then a techfest row. Though was a part initially, I was out for some unavoidable reasons and my own personal problems. But, I’m happy that I stood by my moral. Thanks for all the support of Narendra and Kastury. It was the time my blog got popular and many started asking me if I would post something more. But, by that time, I had lost interest in blogging. And my blog was inactive.

Our team was still in hangover of last year’s Shaastra. And we decided to achieve our dream this time atleast. Started working on it pretty late in August, we sent our report that got selected for the finals also:) We started working on our circuit and left for Chennai in last week of September with a huge team of 24 and It was Nitte’s success story there. Our team ‘Watraasi’ wrote the history! We won SCDC! Thanks to juniors, especially Gireesh for his help. Chennai experiences were really sweet with many bitter times. I dint write a post on Chennai’s experiences for the same reason.

Returning from Chennai, we had Sankalp semiconductor coming to our college to recruit us on 8^th October. There were only 3 days left for us for any preparations to make. With zero preparations, I got selected for the HR interview along with Akash. In the interview held at Hubli on 11^th, my future was written and I was into Sankalp. Felt really bad that they selected me alone from our college. But, was able to make good frens there like Darshak Gandhi from Gujarat. Glad that he’ll be my colleague :)

Though it was my high time in professional/academic/extra-curricular activities, I was really feeling down and lonely. Thanks to all my frens who lifted me from my bad mood… But, then it was my mind’s call not to involve in any work. Heavy work in the past had made me to lose many precious events and moments.

November saw some really good events. Techfest went really good by the efforts of the efficient organizers! Though Karthik’s blog saw some ’Anonymous’ comments, I did not bother answering. I need not prove myself to anyone! Should I?

Finally it was December and I stopped blogging. I lost my precious memory card. I lost many more things including my modem! I had no internet for two weeks almost. But, it was for the good of me as it was my exam time. Exams were good…

I hate December for one more reason. My pet cat who had not completed even one year (he was born in February) expired as he got a weird fever and he started sitting in water and died on 21^st. It was really bad to see him on the death bed. I myself made him take the tablets and drink milk. But, he dint want to survive I think. He left us. I loved him so much. I miss him.

Now, 2010 is past and I lost so many lovable. Now I need to shut the door for those bad memories and I want to refresh myself. Hope 2011 will be a new high for everyone. Let the dull times vanish.

Wishing all a very happy new year.

Semiconductors turning conductors? Hmmm.. If it is temporary, It is normal isn’t it? What if they become conductors permanently? The flow of electrons becomes uncontrollable! The energy flow will be continuous and the usage of it will be zero! Forget about semiconductors becoming conductors. What if they become perfect insulators? Again it is unimaginable…

Let us assume that some scientist predicts that the doom’s day of earth is very near and in another couple of years, none on this earth will be living anymore. That is just the prediction! But, the people on earth are worried as if they will be surely dying in few seconds. A single solar flare erupted can make the whole world silent! And no one can predict the time when it erupts! When life itself is uncertain, what can be certain?

In the same way, any material on this earth can change its property in seconds. The change may be permanent or temporary, but it is bound to make a difference in this world. On this global village, electronics is basically what binds each human being. Electronics works only if semiconductors work. Can anybody imagine their mobile phone not working in future? Human has become so dependent on the electronic gadget such that he’s now not willing to stay away from it even for a single minute. Now assume that semiconductors lose their property and now, the world stops! Starting from the clock which runs on a tiny battery, to the power plants which are feeding the greedy human; starting from radio to satellite; starting from US to the poor countries like Congo; everything stop. We’ll be again in a state to think of something new as an alternative to the semiconductors. Even to realize that silicon has lost its property, we need some other voltage or current measuring device. But, when every device on the earth has stopped working, there is no chance of realizing what has gone wrong. By the time we realize, we will be again in the civilization era! History repeats, isn’t it?

Now the confusion in the imagination is whether the semiconductors lean towards conductors or insulators? In the world, every electronic gadget has semiconductors. Now, by the advancement in mechatronics, mechanical machines are electronic adopted! Semiconductor is a must. Semiconductors are used to control the flow of energy. If they don’t offer any obstruction in the path of flow of electrons, the electrons start flowing like flow of water from hill to ocean. All the produced energy will be wasted. The flow of excess current may make the machines and instruments to malfunction and it may lead to accidents.. the world may turn to ashes without getting heat from any sources including sun.

If the semiconductors turn insulators? This is another extreme. If semiconductors become insulators, the energy flow from one place to another have to be just by means of conductors where the energy flow cannot be controlled which again leads to destruction. Even if conductors are used, only the transfer of energy can be achieved. But what about information? Remote places will be almost out of the world. If all come to know the dangers in using conductors to transfer energy, they would rather prefer to stay out of the world and become isolated!

If semiconductor stop behaving as themselves, the world stops being itself. Who knows when the property of the semiconductor changes! Can anyone predict it? Electronic components have no guarantee. Buildings can survive 1000 years. But electronic gadgets may die the day you purchase it (especially Chinese). If property of semiconductor permanently changes, any solution? No, when we can’t even imagine what may be the outcome, how can we suggest ideas to overcome? What if it happens? Nothing much, we’ll have to go back to civilization era and practice living like how the people in the history were! Being engineers, can we think of some alternatives? Think over it…

Alas! What is this! Some people seem more curious about my blog than about me! Now I realize why pen and words are mightier than sword... I just messaged one friend asking about the recent academic activities, he’s questioning me whether I require that to post it in my blog! May be that is the effect of my previous posts. They may be still expecting some more similar shots. Though I can give some more punches similar to those, I’m no more interested in doing so… The reasons are many, cant explain it here ;)  I have got so many other works rather than bothering about things which might not change if I alone think. Always single hand cant clap and produce sound. Now, it is the time to represent my college in some event outside Karnataka. I have got to prepare for yet another Shaastra which is going to be held at IIT-M from 29^th September to 3^rd October 2010. So, busy preparing the circuit for the event SCDC. C yo folks.

I'll be back with some experiences and also freshness! You can expect something different from next month. I promise. Take care till then.