OMG – I am not able to make sweeping statements

I know that everyone makes sweeping statements once in a while (I hope this one is not) and it is kind of acceptable in normal life. Having said it, the real problem with sweeping statements are it being made by the same person on a frequent basis.

I make this statement based on factual information from a highly informed source (my cubicle mate). It’s we two who are the most affected by the issue; we are sandwiched between the world’s best sweeping statement makers.

So what the hell is a sweeping statement you may ask, so I looked into the dictionary and all I got was “A sweeping statement is a statement that makes a wide-ranging and complete comment about something, or more often, everything. Unfortunately, it is very common for people to make these sorts of statements when they, in fact, are talking about minor groups rather than "everybody" (this being a word they could use).”

Well since we now know what the statement is, you may be asking me why the hell I am talking about it now. It’s because of this stupid guy (much worse than Forrest Gump to be precise) keeps making a statement every hour and today he said “In general I think that all Girls have an opinion that ‘ALL GUYS ARE JERKS’.“. I started to wonder if it is true.

Well I cannot comment on this, not to the fact that I am married with children, but I find that perhaps this statement of his for once may be true. Also it bought me to another question “Am I losing my touch to make sweeping statements of late?” I think project management really makes people dumb and numb. [This is certainly not a sweeping statement please]

Let me elaborate it for you to understand, It always disappoints me when I hear people involved in technology and people who I follow just go out and say things like "Women are good drivers" and I think it really just loses the credibility of the person making that statement even further. The problem is these people also tend to have a bit of authority and others just listen to whatever they say. Prime example: My boss at work.

Some of the statements made by my boss are listed here and then you decide

1. “All those who work on this project [Drowning] will be compensated well later in the appraisal cycle”
2. “Maybe he is, maybe he isn’t but the Truth will come out”
3. “Every project must track the traceability matrix to ensure quality from now on”
4. “This Subway franchise is bad, so all of them must be bad.”
5. “All my team members are acting like imbecile and I condescend to that fact.”
6. “Everyone must be made accountable in this project for better management”
7. “There is nothing like a stupid question, so what is stopping you from asking something?”
8. “We must all develop knowledge optimization initiatives to leverage our key learning’s from this project”
9. “The longer you with my project, the more diverse your profile gets.”
10. “If you all work really hard, then eventually we can fix all the problems.”

So now let’s move on to the next group of people who are born sweeping statement makers – well you guessed it right. The women folk have this inherent DNA which gives them the complete control to make sweeping statements at will. You are mostly wondering how I am making such a bold statement; well I look no further from my home – Wife and my Mother --- QED

There has been no end to the subjects that a woman can talk, take from cooking to cornea transplantation, nuclear gas to nanotechnology, cricket to online poker, washing machines to cryogenic engines – they have the capacity to make bold sweeping statements. And for those entire married “Y” chromosome humans who have an inherent capacity to follow will accept these statements and hence all conflicts are resolved.

It’s getting boring and I will come to the topic now (have to somewhere before the end) – recently since I have been given extra work in current role, I feel I do not have the time to make sweeping statements as I did a few years back. Maybe education and my current role is the main reason. Let me also tell you that it was this skill set of providing giant sweeping statements that got me to my current role too. This is why I am a little perturbed now that I am losing my skill set.

So I guess I have to go back to my basics ie. Start listening closely to my wife, and then get back to some real-time training (Facebook/Orkut Chat) to sharpen my skills since the appraisal cycle in my company is nearing and I have to fill huge chunks of forms stating my achievements in the past year. So folks wish me luck and send me some statements for my reserve.

Overused Words and Phrases - In the Corporate World

What should I be doing? Its Deepavali time and I am sitting inside a conference room and listening to the LCD projectors sound while 10 others fight it out for some silly reason. Then it struck me to just note down some of those words/phrases that keeps on repeating and here is the list.

A good one too - kept me awake for the entire 3 hour session. I have listed it in Alphabetical order for your easy readability.

I am not making this up, but I heard all these words in the past 3 hours of useless meeting session. I have included only those words which had been repeated more than 3 times, I have a few which came only once but to cut the list short have eliminated them.

So when I sit for the next meeting after Deepavali will update this page with those which I come across.

For now enjoy ....

[A]
absolutely (when used instead of "yes")
accountability
action items
all-hands meeting
alternative
at the end of the day

[B]
back-end
benchmark(ing)
best practices
big picture
bottom line
buy-in

[C]
client focus(ed)
closure
communications channel
core competencies
cross-platform
customer-focused

[D]
deliverables
drill down

[E]
enable
excellence
exponential(-ly)

[F]
fact of the matter
fast track
flexible
fool-proof

[G}
game plan
gap analysis
go the extra mile
goal-setting

[H]
heads up

[I]
in the loop (to add me)
innovate
issue list

[J]
joint responsibility

[K]
key players

[L]
leadership
low-hanging fruit

[M]
matrix
methodology
multitask(ing)

[N]
Networking

[O]
on the same page
opportunity
out-of-the-box
ownership

[P]

performance-based
prioritize
proactive
process review

[Q]
Quality

[R]
ramp up
reality check
regroup
revisit
robust

[S]
scalable
scenario
skill set
streamline
synergy

[T]
task force
think outside the box
total quality
touch base
24/7

[U]
utilize

[V]
validate
value-add

[W]
world class

[X]

[Y]

[Z]

It's For Your Safety

Whatever you are doing, drop it right now, everything unless it is your baby. Because I have obtained some shocking information regarding our National Security - information that I am going to reveal to you now, despite the chilling fact that, by revealing it, I am placing myself in direct peril of winning a Nobel Prize for Peace or appearing on National TV News shows whichever comes earlier. **: Conditions apply.

This information will be the greatest single security threat to our nation, as measured not only by the magnitude of the vote bank politics, but also by the number of condemned Ravan movie CDs.

That's right: I am referring to our National Security Policy. As you may recall, we are still to have one in place, yet the parliament continue to dream of having one which is running at very high efficiency. Why do I say it, just look at the Naxals, they are better communicated and planned than our security forces. So why am I been so paranoids and finicky about this issue? Well I have been frisked more than the whole population of Guatemala in total.

What has this got to do with me, I am being frisked all the way from my office till I reach my home and for no reason. Look at it this way, I was stopped yesterday night near my office entrance, asked to blow for alcohol traces and then frisked for dangerous weapons and drugs. I am at work just finishing off a bug tracking status call. Imagine what would be my feeling.

It’s not the frisking that bothers me but the way they do it. Let me walk through a sample scenario.

They make you walk though a wooden structure that continuously displays a sign “WALK” and makes a beeping sound much similar to buffalo soldiers by Bob Marley. I judiciously walk through it expecting it not to make a beep sound and get the security officers attention.

Security Officer (from now on the stated person shall be known as Singaram): Sir, this way please.
Myself: (raising my hands and kneeling down) Yes sir.

Singaram does an act like a massage par lour assistant except that his hands do not have oil and runs through my vital statistics. The application speed and hand pressure increase with time and he does this routine till the time I shriek my voice in pain. He then says: OK sir, open your bag.

I think Microsoft makes their laptop OS programmed to stop running exactly when needed viz. meetings, airport security inspection etc. Singaram finds my laptop and asks me to open it and show that it’s a working one. I frantically press few keys, then thump random keys hard and finally jump on it and yet it wouldn’t start. He looks upon me up and down as though I resemble a Colombian drug smuggler (I may look like that but for the slim Charlie Chaplin moustache) with my consignment inside this small laptop.

While this is going on, there is a big built guy, whose arms has a total area the size of Gibraltar and is carrying 2 automated machine guns and a .38 pistol, safely riding on a T-90 tank. He is stopped by Singaram and asked “Sir, Do you have anything to declare as unsafe?”
Guy (in a husky voice): Nothing but these. He shows 2 lays potato chips packet and some confidential reports from his bag.

Singaram: OK you can proceed.

All the while the wooden machine was playing the beep tones and when this unruly big guy passes, it stops and is totally noiseless. Soon as this guy whistles pass me, I am back in contention for singaram’s attention. He now passes my laptop through a baking oven followed by a coolant shower and finally through a CT scan. Yes I am exaggerating a little; the coolant shower was not present there. After all this I am pronounced as a SAFE PERSON and asked to leave.

I am still wondering on that night, why are everybody being checked for which Singaram sincerely answers “Sir, Independence Day is coming next week and these are some safety measures taken in your interest”. My thought are exactly as yours – how come frisking some software professionals at the outskirts of the city where no civiliasation exists make the city any safer than before. Well, you can’t reason out with government policies just like the software quality audits.

Somebody has to let Singaram know not to trust that machine and to look around the world to see things as they are. Well, I can’t get my software quality audit teams to do the same. All they see and ask is for reports and audit points not worried about the actual software content. The auditors are equipped to ask for details and not to look into those details when supplied. Then how do I except these local security guards to do a better job.

The one thing that bemuses me more is, even with this pathetic scenario my city looks clam and safe place. Sometime these things cannot be explained but have to be felt, like in Pammal.K.Sambandam “Aaraya Kudathu, Anubhavi kanum”

Client Interaction - 101 Course

In computer service industries, Client means GOD and client is bigger than Sachin Tendulkar. Many a times we find ourselves in positions that we have to face the clients either in their wrath or in desperate situations. Never does a team member face a happy client.

Anyway, there are certain phrases or sentences that a member should not utter during a conversation with the client and am listing them below:

1. We were totally surprised it worked
2. We just thought it was a nice thing to do
3. I am doing this only to stay billable
4. Oops it’s crashed
5. Previous work by XXX is actually very good
6. To be honest, we came up with the solution after the testing
7. The results are just OK
8. Future work … ah ha who are you kidding? We won’t get more funding to do this.
9. It only took us just 20 days to complete this testing, don’t know who did the planning
10. I think we did a good job in spite of being new to this domain
11. How it works and what the document says is not totally in sync.
12. Ohh, we are not supposed to use the production environment for testing?
13. What is the procedure for rolling back the transaction?
14. We never had any back-up plans
15. You mean we had super-user access to these log files
16. I thought we were going to do this in Phase-[XXX] of the project
17. So I should not have overwritten those log files?
18. We still are yet to get an architect in our team
19. Traceability matrix – what does that mean?
20. It is really tough programming in C++ … what, you mean we had to do it in Java?

Talent Show Judges - A Crash Course

I have been watching crap TV programs for a long time in cable (since May 1998) and now I feel like I need to be a part of this event rather than simply watching it. So I tried my hand at cricket. I scored at a very brisk pace, was consistent, could handle the short pitched balls, was trim and fit, bowled spin and never missed a catch. So the Indian team management felt that I was not the best fit for their team, also I did not suffer from IPL fatigue. My head hung and I was disappointed that I could not make it to the TV. Just then did I realise that I had a lot of potentials in the reality TV shows.

Reality television is a genre of programmes that is supposed to present unscripted dramatic or humourous programs but in reality it doesn’t. Confused as to what I am saying here, well reality television programmes started out to be not rehearsed and extempore in nature but then it did not draw much of response from the audiences and hence they turned to a little dramatised and rehearsed reality programs which has created waves in the media market today.

The genre initially covered a wide range of program formats, from game shows, talk shows to quiz shows. The main aim of the show is to portray the participants in a highly modified and influenced form of reality which means acting thereby utilising sensationalism to attract innocent viewers for Target Rating Points (TRP). Participants are selected by testing the acting ability of the person to improvise the situation given in such a way as to display realism as well as acting abilities at the same time.

OK enough about Reality shows and talent hunt shows, let’s get to business. If you need yourself to be equipped with the linguistics of a judge you need to have certain jargons in your vocabulary. You don’t have to go anywhere to search them; I have compiled them here for your benefit. I also will answer some of your more thought provoking questions on talent shows.

Situation: You heard one of the worst renditions of a hit song. How do you give your feedback?
You have to say something in the lines of “What a superb performance, I have never seen one like this before. A good job. God Bless you, all the best. I have a few clarifications to make, the pitching of the song was not to tune, your beats were out of sync, the voice dynamics were not up to the mark, other than that the overall you performance was really excellent … I give you 8 on 10”.

Situation: You heard one of the best renditions of a hit song. How do you give your feedback?
You have to say something in the lines of “What a superb performance, it should be termed a stellar performance. I knew you would deliver just like this … great song selection, good dress, nice body language - your performance was really excellent … I give you 8 on 10”.

Situation: You hear one of the renditions of a hit song which you don’t like. How do you give your feedback?
You have to say something in the lines of “What a superb performance, god bless you, you have a bright career if you continue to practice hard and improve your voice … I give you 8 on 10”.

Situation: You heard one of a decent or average rendition of a hit song. How do you give your feedback?
You have to say something in the lines of “What a scintillating performance, you look like a complete performer. If you can manage to sing like this for another 10 years you could easily make it to the top. Thanks for the song selection, nice body language, good voice dynamics, you sang with conviction - your performance was really excellent … on par with the rest, I give you 8 on 10”.

Situation: You heard one of the best renditions of a worst song. How do you give your feedback?
You have to say something in the lines of “this performance deserves a standing ovation; it should be termed a stellar performance. You took such a tough song and delivered the exact feelings of the song … your voice throw was good, nice movements, on the whole your performance was really excellent than we expected … I give you 8 on 10”.

Some of the jargons which is needed in your vocabulary
1. You are a complete performer
2. Voice dynamics needs to be up
3. Throw your voice
4. Understand the emotions
5. There is a slight crack in your voice
6. Swallow the song
7. Feel the modulation
8. Vocal chemistry is missing
9. Justice to the song
10. You choose a tough song and rendered it better
11. Superb, no words to say
12. You have matured into a fine artist
13. I never expected this kind of a performance from you – Bravo
14. God Bless You
15. You have a great future (Never mention in what)

Kindly memorize these jargons and style of feedback and then you are completly qualified as a Reality or Talent hunt show judge.

Now for the FAQ

Ques: How do I become a Talent hunt show judge?
Answ: Just record a few feedback analyses in a CD and mail it to the producer of the show

Ques: Is that all I have to do?
Answ: Yes, they will come back with 2 days after reviewing your CD.

Ques: Won’t these viewers know that we are just fooling around?
Answ: SHUT UP – do want to come on TV or not?

Ques: I am not so famous; can I still make it to a judge?
Answ: We have so many channels and too many show, too few judges so you are always in demand.

Ques: I don’t have any experience in anything, what to do?
Answ: Neither does the contestants, so why do you worry. Producer only looks for TRP ratings.

Ques: Do I have to update any other skills?
Answ: Yes, you have to look either too profession or too local. One of them is a must.

Ques: What do you mean by local?
Answ: Enough of questions, get on with your make up, we are going live in 5 minutes.

Ques: What is the program?
Answ: Caretel Super Flusher Jr – Season 2. Search for the best toilet flusher in town

The Open Music begins [Dramatic One too – Water Flushing]

Our Governments Report Card - A Birds Eye View

Statutory Warning: Any name or event appearing in this blog is purely based on fictional new items and television shows. If there are any resemblances it is purely coincidental.

I have been watching the special programs for a long time (since May 1981) and now I feel like I need to be a part of this event rather than simply watching it. I am here alluring to the KPA-II (Kangress Party Alliance) report card. I guess that every television channel network now has a total working creativity capacity of a deranged mutant cabbage.

Reality television is a genre of programmes that is supposed to present unscripted dramatic or humourous programs but in reality it doesn’t. They have started covering the achievements of the government of India in the last one year. I know that you will be rolling out in the ground over but this is not a reality show but an out and out humourous show.

Let us loot – opss sorry for the typo. The moment I say government even the keyboard seems to know that LOOT is what comes to our mind. Anyway back to the topic, let us look at the contestants and see how they have fared.

The Hero – Prime minister: Dr. Madam’s Maid Servant (MMS) who is a very soft and non-politician guy but have the most important attribute to be the head, a perfect puppet.

The Heroin – Party President: Ms.Gonia Shandhi who is an aggressive and dimwitted person with loads of cash and network across the globe. She is the person right enough to pull the strings of our Hero.

The 2nd Heroin – Kayawati: A power centre who always is welcomed with a garland worth Rs.13 lakhs. She wants to have herself pulling the strings of the PM or possibly wants to play the Hero’s role herself.

The Financier: Mr.Mranab Pukerjee: Here is a man capable of running the entire fiscal dealing of the country, the only things is he confuses himself between credit & debit column in his budget. Foreseeing this small mistake, he is THE man to run our economy from WORSE to WORST.

The Security Officer: Mr.C.Phidambaram – A man who has lost a creamy portfolio and landed in a minefield. His soul duty is to make statements on improving our homeland security while a bomb goes off next to his meeting place. The threat to this bomb had been given to him via different mediums such as e-mails, SMS, courier, in-person delivery and official broadcast also.

The Communication Expert: Mr.R.Aaja – the person who has a total brain working capacity of dialing 100 for fire emergencies but was reluctantly put on a job to handle communication policies. He is a very shy person, infact sees his own wife behind the kitchen doors and needs his grandfather’s help in bailing him out of controversies.

The Educationalist – Mr. Sapil Kibil – the person who wants to implement what every kid dreams off – school days without exams. He wants to make sure that none of the student is unhappy and abolish all kinds of unwanted elements from the present schooling system such as exams, grades, teachers, moral science subjects et all.

The High Flier – Mr.Kraful Matel – a person who is apt for a high flying portfolio. There are no worries for him by his portfolio flagship concern making loss after loss every year since he earns his lions share from the lucrative IPL league.

The Trainer – Ms. Bamtha Mannerjee – a hardcore fanatic of something which I have no clue about, but am certain that she is a fanatic of something. Her high pitched shrill voice and absolute non-constructive ideas make her as a joker in the pack of cards. She is pretty much training herself to come back to power in her own state – which is Bengal and is in a pretty bad state too.

The Rightful Owner to the Throne – Mr. Gahul Rhandhi, a young energetic boy who thinks that drinking chai with locals and travelling in second class (Not to be mistaken with cattle class, since this is not tweeter) will earn him more trust as an Aam Adhmi Netha. The point to note is that he always wears Armani, Nike and Rolex but prefers chai in mud tumblers. His dream is to over throw the current hero (the puppet) and take the cake and eat it too all by himself.

The Law maker – Mr. Meerappa Voily – a loyalist to the party president and acts only on her directions. He is very strict that he will only abide by the party presidents word. Not much of powers are entrusted to him. Hence he is still pondering to take a decision to hang a confirmed pickpocket named Vasab.

The Culinary Man – Mr. Pharad Sawar, a man in charge of producing food grains for the entire nation but he doesn’t have time to overlook it since he has to run the ICC as a chairman. He has to see that India wins at least one world cup when he is with ICC while many farmers die due to lack of policies from his portfolio.

The Personnel department – Mr. K.S.Mrishna – who is not much of a person to talk about but has a deputy who has lots to talk on, Mr. Thashi Sharoor. His deputy is always seen in tweeter making comments which are very complimentary to his party’s governance.

The Villains – you cannot have a show that has no villans, we are not making a Disney Cartoon movie for kids. So the villains are in the form of JBP, Left, Right, Yulayam Madav, Sulayam Mingh, Sarjun Aingh, Bamitab Aachan etc. These guys currently have no scope in the story until 2014 when the next general elections are due.

So if you can imagine a reality show with all these contestants what would you have – a ball of a time, much better than Parliamentary Session.

News Coverage: As it comes

I have never felt like this before – yes I want to stop watching the news channel. I think I had enough of humour episodes till now. This was not how it was back in the olden days (November 1986). Long before the age of cable television, NEWS in India was controlled by the First Fundamental Rights in the constitution which states that “Thou shall not covet thy neighbour’s wife” … wait that is from another list, anyway the fundamental rights in our constitution really said something about how to furnish NEWS to an avid TV viewer.

Back in the days of Black and White TV sets the news was controlled by the ruling party in the government. Hence the news which was aired daily was of no use to anyone expect 3 people namely the PMO office, the DD broadcaster and the new reader’s husband. No one cared for any news item except for the last 10 minutes which showed sports and entertainment. Even the weather report for sometime was controlled by the government, it was such a monotony during that time. Then the cable television came which broke the monotony with brand new ideas such as commercials within the news programmer and colour news readers who had a total reading capacity of a deranged turnip.

The television channels for a long time had a set stereotyped format for the news program. This format used to be supplied by the ruling party and gave importance to enhance the image of the government. No real news used to come, even if they came, the television viewer would have received the same news via his/her servant or car driver’s network. 9 out of 10 times, this network news was found to be more accurate than the TV relayed news items.

One needs to introspect on whether we need to view news items such as “State Minister for Law opens a new Bank in a rural area and advices the folks to invest properly and follow traffic rules”. Such news coverage led to the eventual fall of the news program from the producer’s wish list. The TRP rating for these came down drastically till a point where it was regarded that NEWS program was aimed at viewers who had an average IQ of 18 and could differentiate between a Cow and a Bull only if there were 3 help lines available [Most of them choose the 50/50].

In the due course of time, the regional political parties found that the TV was the best medium for communicating to the masses and started using them. The parties found that most of the people were hooked on to these soap operas and hence they started to place their party news just before and after these popular shows. Now these political parties found that there were very few shows and hence started a channel for each so that they need not compete for time slots. This led to the forming of a separate news channel for each party. Today we have a set ground rule that to start a party; you need to have criminal cases against you in the Supreme Court and should have a TV channel solely to air good messages about you.

So in today’s world, if you need to know the exact news you may have to see news in 3 different channels. First we see the ruling parties channel, then flip to the opposition parties channel and then to the allies channel to get the actual reality of the news item. While flipping through, you get a good mix of humour, exercise for your fingers, increase the knowledge on your surroundings.

I practice this exercise solely to vent all my frustrations that I face throughout the day in office and traffic, it really makes me feel relaxed before I gain anger when I find my wife switching the channel back to the soap opera where the protagonist is a humble female whose husband is currently enjoying an extra-marital affair with a female who is divorced twice and is being searched by a gang of drug dealers while the protagonist friend is a very straight police officer who is working under a corrupt official who is the ex-husband of the drug pedaling female. I found this just by watching 3 minutes of the show and all my brain cells revolted to work beyond this if I don’t get to watch a comedy show (ie. News at Nine)

For the benefit of those who do not watch the regional TV news, I will answer some of your thought provoking questions.

Q. What is the use of seeing this NEWS program?
A. It is a good tool for time pass and playing pranks of your friends in office.

Q. Where will these channels get this news items?
A. They hire special writers whose only job is to frame news headlines.

Q. Is there a way to get the real news?
A. Yes, Only a pittance – by asking your servants some drilling questions.

Q. How much do I drill?
A. Depends on your wife’s tolerance level.

Q. But isn't that ethically bad?
A. Shut up.

Q. The papers say there are news items are all a fake?
A. Those are only headlines in papers for them to market. Don’t get fooled by that.

Q. OK, So what is good and bad for me in watching news channel?
A. The good news is that you end up getting relaxed by watching the news and the bad news is that your IQ reduces itself every 3 seconds.

Enough about this – “Oh My god, this can’t be true!!! – They are letting Modi off the hook” – that’s the NEWS for today.

College Admission: Courses Available

Summer vacation season is here and so is April, I do not know if this is purely coincidental but let us give the benefit of the doubt. I know how it is for those parents who have their child given their 12th exams. They are all thinking about which college, what course, how much money, is there drugs in those colleges et cetera, while the child is plainly thinking nothing else than college education. (I know this is a pure lie, all the 12th Standard kids think about is free time, movies and girls, Trust me kids, it is what you get in today’s college.)

Back in my college days, just a decade back, it was not so much fun as today. Now-a-days these colleges have fashion shows, coffee pubs, Mexican snacks, European drinks and probably some subjects pertaining to their course. Sailing through this looks very easy compared to olden times where even attendance was compulsory.

College is basically a set of arranged rooms which have desk and chairs where you sit for 5600 hours which is split across 4 years called as classes. There is always a brooding old man known as a Professor who holds and manages these classes. The classes are used mainly for learning things which would be helpful to you.

The type of learning in a college is divided into 2 main categories:
1. Things which will help you later in life: 8 hours
These include how to save money by using SMS to send answers, places where DVDs are cheap, a complete directory of medical college girl students contact number and things like that.

2.Hours of boring data not needed for real life experience: 5592 hours
This includes all the –ilogy, itcs, ics, -istry ending subjects which the student is required to memorize to an extent that he spits all the data into the answer sheet and immediately forget them. All though the memorizing part is pretty tough the forgetting part is easy except that we may not be able to erase all the data. Even today we remember a few that we have been trying to forget for the past 10 years.

It now boils down to the fact that you have to choose a specialization course and my basic 20 cents of wisdom is to choose subjects that do not have 1) known facts, 2)need to be accurate and 3) lot of Greek sounding names and numbers. Subjects like mathematics, physic and chemistry all require the above 3 points. There is no way a student can pass the exam without giving the accurate answer which the professor has in his mind.

Take for example, at any point of time if you walk into a physics course class room you would be able to hear a question like this: “Can you derive an equation for a particle with a cosine constant over a rhomboid surface on the third axis of the quadratic dimension and extrapolate it into 5 different vertices along the binary axis”. For students who are weak in understanding the question (Which is whole of the student community) it is very difficult to come up with the answer that the professor has in mind. Leave the answer alone, it would take around 45 minutes for you to read and comprehend the question and think of how to answer it.

The other problem with these kinds of subjects is that the professors are very particular about the result and also want to exactly know how you arrived at this solution. So even if your friend SMSes the answers to you, you may not be in a position to explain the results if called for.

It is for this problem that I wish to advice students from taking Engineering courses since it requires 1) for you to know facts and figures, 2) furnish correct answers. I know not many are capable of doing this for 4 years in a row. Hence I would like to advice them to take courses which only requires you to manipulate English words and where any answer is a correct answer.

Yes, there are subjects like that which is what I am going to elaborate in the below section.

English: This involves about writing your views on a long and dry essay such as the Moby dick. Everyone who has read Moby Dick will know the story is about a whale but you are not supposed to write what is common sense. I base this rule since the evaluator would be seeing thousands of answer papers with the same whale story, so to catch his attention it would be nice if you could rephrase it so say that Moby dick was a whale who got injured in an oil-slick near the coast of Ireland and was rescued by few Vikings during the 100 year war. The evaluating professor would really be relieved to see someone outside the memorizing unit and will give you an “A” grade. If you can come up with such lunatic ideas 4 times a year around then English is the major suited for you.

Philosophy: This is the best course if you have a brain working capacity of a rotten turnip. All you have to do in this course is to sit inside a dim light class room and go on discussing about what is success or there is no such things as reality, there will be a time when politicians are totally non-corrupt and things which makes no sense to a common man. The weirder you think the better chances for you to graduate with distinction. If you were like drinking and drugs, then it is an added advantage for this course.

Psychology: This course is all about talking of rats and dreams. All psychiatrists are obsessed with dreams and its interpretations. One of the requirements for this course is that you should wear thin rimmed glasses and brow a beard that touches your lower stomach, adds personality to what you blabber.

You may have to spend a whole semester trying to teach a rat to staple booklets and arrange them in chronological order. You may also train your roommate with the same exercise. In the end you will find that the rat does it better than your roommate and your roommate is today a leading heart specialist. If you can live with rats then you have a nice career in psychiatry.

Sociology: This is by far the best course in offer for those who can churn incoherent sentences at will all the time. Sociology classes deals with trying to understand the social behavior of man with constant comparison with an ant or a pig. You may have to read tons of social writing to gain expertise in this area and in not of them would you be able to make any sense of what the author is trying to express.

My guess is that sociologist tries to think themselves as scientists and make up complex sentences while trying to explain basic human emotions. Take for example that you have to explain why a child cries when he is slapped and the sociologist (in minimum) comes up with an observation such as “Methodical and schematic observation of the sociometrical behavior of a pre-adolescent isolate member indicates the cross functional matrix relationship between the moving trajectory of the harder object and the cheeks leads to lacrimatory, or crying in common term.

If you can come up with such rotten sentences then you are the right choice for this course,. If you can continuously come up with such sentences for more than 5 years, you will be inducted into the governments planning commission where you will end up writing committee reports while earning in crores.

My advice to all is, do not attempt to take a course such as medicine or engineering which requires us to reproduce known facts and requires exact answers and end up as a failure while you have other easy and fast earning courses such as the above listed ones.

Why do you think you have to believe me, well I am an engineer and know the exact speed of light in total vacuum. Wait is it in vacuum or in ether … no, it is the speed of light or electron. Well, whatever it is – I am in Software management – period.

Discover Your Dream Summer Vacation

Summer vacation season is here and so is April, May heat, and if you have kids, you know what that means! It's time to put them up for auction in eBay. If you have more than one, then combine them with an offer, buy one and get the remaining free for life.

Before I get lengthy lectures on parenting and love, I am sorry. I mean it's time to plan your family summer vacation. This is your chance to escape “the daily grind” and spend quality time with your children, finding out what's new in their lives, which Wii game is on their minds, whether they've been promoted to the next class, etc. At night, after they fall asleep, you can check them their report cards on your own risk.

But where should you go for your vacation this year? According to the Association of Travel Agents who are currently starving to death, the two most popular vacation destinations for Indians have historically been: 1) domestic, and 2) foreign.

Which may be right for you? While many Indian are worried about traveling abroad, the fact is that, statistically, your chances of surviving a foreign vacation would be over 50 percent, as long as you follow the Central Department's Travel Guidelines for Indian Citizens:
- Avoid risky areas such as Australia, Europe, South America, Africa, US, Canada and Mexico.
- Do not touch anything until the safety belt sign is switched off.
- Do not breathe too much.
- Do not carry cash or master card with you.
- Do not tweet more than once in an hour.

In case you do choose to go abroad, then try to “blend in'' with the native population by the following tips
1) match their skin colour as much as possible; 2) Smoke cigarettes with marijuana; 3) do not tip the servers; 4) do not stand around bewildered at the street maps the size of Wimbledon tennis courts; 5) not asking the tour guide questions like: “Is this the place where they shot DaVinci Code movie?' standing in front of the Louvre museum.

So maybe this would be a good year for you to take your family vacation right here in India. The most popular type of domestic vacation, of course, is the tremendously long train trip to a place that your children will find hideously boring because none of their friends are there with them.

Along the way, the whole family can enjoy the natural beauty and infinite variety of the interstate railway system (''Look, kids! The next track is broken!'', “Ahha!!! I told you, that train would derail before Nagpur”). Daddy and Mommy can share the sleeping chores, as follows: Daddy will start reading a book and then Mommy will take over as soon as Daddy sleeps. Even then, Daddy may not release his grip on the book; it may have to accompany him into his death. Because Daddy is a male and males are very reluctant to relinquish control over the books which they have started to read.

TRUE FACT: In south India, where I live, it's not uncommon among elderly retired couples for the man to continue reading even after his vision has declined to the level of an eggplant. I have personally seen them reading books in train when they could not, from a distance of 20 centimeters, distinguish between a locomotive and Angelina Jolie. These men pretend to read by following instructions from their wives (''OK, Pa, get ready to turn to next page... OK, now turn ... No, the OTHER way ...'' The book is closed).

But getting back to your family vacation: If you don't want to travel by train to your destination, you can take a plane. The bad news is, the airlines are losing money and have been forced to “cut corners'':
--Indian Airlines, in an effort to reduce fuel costs on its Madras-to-Delhi flights, is actually flying passengers only as far as Vizag, which IA points out, is “less than four days from Cochin by taxi.”

--Kingfisher Airlines flight attendants now pass through the aisles during flights requesting “voluntary donations” from passengers “so we can turn the engines back on and you can have a bottle of chilled beer”.

--Go Air has laid off its high paid veteran pilots, although the airline insists that all of the replacement pilots are, to use the airline's term, “humans with valid learners license”.

So, OK, maybe you shouldn't go anywhere for vacation this year. Maybe you should just stay home, you and your kids, “hanging out,” hour after quality hour in front of the TV. It'll be tons of fun! Until they sleep or escape, whichever comes first.

Viruses Of India Today

Every now and then your computer system may behave in a very strange way. This is due to a software program called “VIRUS” which causes the system to behave in an unusual way. There are many available scanners to remove them and software’s to protect the user from viruses entering your system.

Today I am going to list a few of the most famous viruses which have caught the Indian system and have categorised them into being old or new based on the timelines of their existence.

We start with the new or latest viruses that are found in India currently:

L.K. Advani Virus:

This virus pops up every now and then with messages praising yesteryear Pakistani leaders, and the only way you can continue working is by typing Jai Shri Ram 108 times. A complete removal is possible by performing a full rath yathra using flash.

K.P.S. Gill Virus:

Only ladies need to worry about this virus.Every now and then the users get a whack, you know where.

Deve Gowda Virus:

Mostly this virus is found to be sleeping and does no harm. It does no harm to applications that have the keywords farmer or dalits, to the remaining it created havoc by scheduling them at in appropriate times.

Kumaraswamy Virus:
The main characteristic of this virus is that it tries to take control of the machine by making an arrangement with the other process such that it uses 50% of the time slot and give the remaining to the others. Once the virus has used its 50% of share, the virus backs out of the agreement.

Jayalalitha Virus:

This actually is a family of viruses. Each member of this virus family grab as much of hard disk space as possible, while the main virus is totally unaware of it. When everything stops working, this virus blames the user for the whole chaos. It also sends random emails praising the viruses and its achievements.

Laloo Yadav virus:

A dangerous virus, gulps all the resources as well as it corrupts the data. If you try to use scanner when the system is hibernating, it will rename its signature with another deadly virus of the same family (AKA Rabdri Virus). This virus takes help from other viruses to avoid scanning at any time.

Mulayam Virus:

Whatever way, it will try to grab resources of the system; its only task is to abort the BJP processes. This virus hangs the system by sending conflicting signals to different hardware units.

Sonia Gandhi Virus:

Once a part of most deadly virus family of the world. No scanner can detect now, how much damage it can cause to the system, but people used the Bofors scanner for temporary protection. The cleaner for this virus would be available only during the next general elections, until then it has the complete control of the network.

Manmohan Singh Virus:
This virus always plays a second fiddle to the Sonai virus. It has no powers on its own, but will be executing harmful things that Sonia virus wants to. Also the level of execution of this virus is very low is often called a “Week Virus” by the opposition viruses. The main strength of this virus used to be finance but know has been reduced to an administrative virus to front-end the Sonai virus.

Left Virus:
The main aim of this virus is to stop any resource from accessing data from the US or western world. It tries to block the Internet Explorer from loading western data. In case if the system tries to load, it halts the complete execution of the machine. The preferred colour of this virus is RED and turns the screen into a RED one upon taking control.

Varun Ghandhi Virus:
This virus is a very fire-brand one which sometimes makes remarks which are very powerful and against the system. Often it gets itself caught by scanners such as NSA and is put into a virus vault for weeks before letting it free again. This virus comes only once in 5 years or whenever there are elections in UP.

Maya Virus:

It's also called the Dalit virus, it destabilizes the co-ordination amongst different resources, It controls & steps the low priority resources from functioning. Other viruses are thriving by splitting this virus. Lot of scanners available now to kill this virus using the principle of garlanding Maya with Rs.1000 notes or building a memorial park.

Sania Virus:

It's also called the Second round exit virus, it destabilizes the input and output peripherals such that the system comes to a crashing halt at the second level of execution. It does not go beyond the second instruction that the user furnishes. The user interface of this virus is stunning but its working style is very mediocre.

Shashi Tharoor Virus:
This is a very complicated virus to understand since its communication model uses twits. Often it sends out misinterpreted data from the user’s mailbox. For instance: if the user is asking his concern to book a ticket in first class, it would send a message as “Book a ticket for me in cattle class” and gets the user into trouble. The way to avoid this virus is to keep the system without options for twitter, FaceBook etc.

Harbajan Virus:
This virus claims to have a deadly attack but fails to impress when actually attacked. It basically tries to slap the user or tries to call the user as “M***ey” or “D***ey”. This virus performs exceedingly well if the user is an Australian. The only way to clean this virus is to shutdown the system for 2 days so that the virus cannot to access the system data.

Aishswarya Bachan Virus:
This virus falls under the genre of Bachan viruses. The main aim of this virus is to keep the system’s graphical display with the same emotion (like a log) when there is a critical error, a fault, a successful transaction. However, based on the amount of money exchanged in a transaction this virus changes its emotions. The only way to erase this virus is to communicate the age of the virus to itself and it will self-destruct.

Vijayakanth Virus:
This is known as the captain of all viruses. It usually takes complete control of the system and then generates a report of how many processes are Trojans, how many were captured, how many are still under scanning, what percentage of Trojans are dangerous. The virus uses electric signals from the computer power supply to eliminate the Trojans from the hard drive. This virus is not a serious one, but tries to kill the user with unwanted reports.

Older Viruses:

P.V. Narasimha Rao Virus:

First of all, this virus reduces the CPU speed to 66Hz. Before executing any instruction, it deliberates over it a number of times and finally does nothing.

V.P. Singh Virus:

This virus reserves a quota for each instruction, and executes them only according to the quota. Needless to say, the least used instructions have a higher quota than the more used instructions. This virus is favored the Mandal Commision report as a working style which lead to its own demise.

Sukh Ram Virus:

This virus first swallows 10% of the bits in each instruction and then executes them.

Maneka Gandhi Virus:

This is a green virus. It allows executing programmes that were written either by vegetarians or animal lovers.

Phoolan Devi Virus:

This virus hijacks all high priority processes and generates page faults for them. At times, this virus may also celebrate the CPU*s birthday.

I.K.Gujral Virus:

Before executing any instruction, this virus tries to get the approval of 18 other viruses and most of the time, one of the viruses blocks the voting. So the Gujral virus does not execute anything. While it is not doing anything, as it is always, this virus connects to the Internet and keeps sending data to all major/minor countries in the World except India w/o receiving the replies.

Veerappan virus:

This virus plays hide and seek. It captures some famous or celebrity resources and releases them after a quarantine time of 100 days. It sometimes seems to be eradicated but suddenly reappears. Only a few scanners like “Natkiran” or “LTTE” have access to this virus database.

Beware Telemarketers, I am coming

I have never felt like this before – yes I want to work in my office. No, frankly I am feeling like crushing my cell phone and throwing it on the next person who wants to call me. I wish I could go back to the olden days of sending messages via dove. I have an inherent hatred towards cell phones ever since it was invented. This is because it created a subject in my engineering and then has created a vertical in my office in which more than 400 dumb engineers work and has created millions of nincompoops who want to talk even when they are in ICU and couple of minutes from death.

I wish to know what is it that people want to communicate so urgently via a mobile phone. For me a mobile phone is a device which will be misplaced by me in 2 minutes after I receive a call. Then I have to loan my colleagues phone and hunt my device using the ringtone which I faintly remember. Mostly I will be able to locate the device either in the toilet or at the dustbin near my cubicle. Just to avoid this exercise I fail to carry one until my boss wanted me to. He wanted to locate me at any point of time since I, at majority of the time, will never be in my seat. The cell phone is actually an invention to spoil all the fun at work place.

Today’s smart phones have ability to do everything that you can. (Expect: Pricking your nose during the status meeting… pretty soon there will be an application in Apple iStore for it). The devices of today have many capabilities such as reading emails, power point file, excel work sheets, facebook, online gaming, surface to air missile launcher, helicopter maneuvering capabilities and much more. I am impressed by them all except that it doesn’t have what I am looking for – auto forwarding of unwanted calls such as wife, telemarketers etc.

This brings me back to the topic; my cell phone has only capabilities of receiving calls from either my wife or telemarketers. I can never receive any other calls. My hunch is that the service provider has leaked my number to the telemarketers. You are asking me why? They are trying to help me. They have found that I receive only calls from my wife and these calls always tend to be a monologue (Don’t laugh – I know it is the same there for you too) and so to keep my phone relatively busy so that I escape from my wife.

This is fine but these telemarketers are much more a pain that I feel its far better to be listening to my wife than these folks. Initially it will be great to listen to various sweet sounding female voices and nice information such as personal loans, exchange offer for cars, TV, company secrets, extra marital affair stories etc. During the course of time they tend to be monotonous and killing.

In the golden age of marketing which is roughly sometime in May 1984, the way they worked was that a well dressed guy with a laptop bag will come to your house knocking the door exactly when you are about to enter the bathroom with a fully loaded abdomen. You (being a moron) would want to display your hospitality will welcome him. Then he will utter 403 words per minute trying to explain that your house is extremely dirty and is not livable and that you need a vacuum cleaner and he has it ready and in an affordable price.

At this moment, the only capability of your brain is to evaluate the surface tension of your bladder and how long can you hold fort before the disaster. This leaves you with an option of out rightly reject whatever the salesperson wishes offer and get back to the bathroom as quickly as possible. Many seasoned marketing professional would be able to judge the situation based on your body movements and your facial reactions and move on to the next door.

Tragically, because of some of people like you “bad rotten apple'' the marketing firm has lost faith in the earlier model. So in an effort to restore their market numbers, today they have taken preventive care and are calling you rather than making an in-person visit. This is the actual birth of telemarketing, With so many technical advancements like SMS, LBMS (little bigger message service), spam mails, virus, Trojans, tracking cookies etc, the marketing firm have developed a method to track hold of you customers and nail them down.

In order to protect you, I have found from my own experiences certain ways of tackling them. For the benefit of all I am listing a few of them here:

1. If they are after some kind of a loan, tell them that you have filed for bankruptcy and the money they are lending will be of use in clearing existing liabilities.
2. Answer the phone, as soon as you realize that it’s a telemarketer keep the receiver down and shout “Oh My god, you had the guts to ask me this!!!” and bang the phone down.
3. If the person says he is XYZ calling from ABC limited, ask him to be very slow and spell his name first, then his company name, address, his age, his wife’s name, his relationship with his neighbours wife till the other party hangs up
4. Ask them to repeat everything around 4-5 times each, what you do understand?
5. Insist that the caller is your friend and you have found that he is trying to pull your legs.
6. Tell then to talk slowly so that you can write down every word of their plan and benefits.
7. Tell the telemarketer that you are on “House arrest” and they he brings you a bottle of beer + Chips along with the product.
8. Tell them that this is the commissionaire’s residence and that he is just stepped out for a walk.
9. Listen patiently and finally let the caller know that you are currently with his wife.
10. Say “YES” to all their questions and hang up fast.

I know you may have some doubts over these methods so I am answering a few even before you ask me.

Q. What is the use of telemarketing?
A. It is a good tool for time pass and playing pranks on your friends.

Q. Where will these companies get this money?
A. From the purchases that fools like you make from them.

Q. Is there a way to get the money back?
A. Yes, Only a pittance.

Q. How much?
A. The last call metered on your phone.

Q. But isn't that ethically bad?
A. Shut up, you are only entitled to restricted questions.

Q. The papers say there are sites to register to stop them from calling?
A. Those are only headlines in papers, in reality this is where they collect your numbers.

Q. OK, So what is good and bad for me in this prank?
A. The good news is that the you end up buying from insane product and the bad news is that the shipment never comes.

Enough about this – I am receiving a call from a Bank, no wait it’s for a Car loan, No, No, No, it’s a new number - it’s from my Bosses wife – “Oh My god, this can’t be true!!!”

What is this about Tax, Budget

Why should you trust me, well the answers is simple … You are an idiot and I proclaim that you are one. Let’s become serious and try to analyze the question that the nation is facing today. Is “My Name is Khan” a sloppier movie than “Love Aaj Kal”?. No we have more serious question at our hands, it’s February and is it Budget time.

We are all worried, here in the salaried job class as to will we get some salary this month post all our deductions. So I would like to revolve around the tax policies in brief.

First of all, what is this Tax in the first place? After much research I found that it was a way of plucking innocent salaried employees into parting their money for the benefit of a few government personnel. If a government employee was to make a choice between catching a skier on the last ball of a T20 match and taking kick-backs for a fly-over construction tender, he will choose without hesitation the construction tender is because it’s easier than the other (Source: Last two series of IPL tournament).

I have a hunch that these tax policies were invented by people who had lots of free time and a working brain capacity of a turnip. Why does the government need such policies, it is because they need money to run their departments. When I scan through the list of departments that the present cabinet has, I find a lot of them look to be made-up ones. Take for example a few names, the department of marine ecology, department of urban collapsible housing, the department of social injustice to innocent bystanders, department for welfare of endangered squirrels etc.

I have no hard feelings for those people who actually work in this department. I know they too are very regular in their work timings which are from 11AM to 4PM of 4 days per week with a lunch break from 12 to 2 and two snack breaks of 30 minutes each. It is a very tiring schedule and I hope you get my drift.

To run a department we need money and to run these kind of departments with the organizational structure which includes a cabinet minister, 2 deputy cabinet ministers, 1 minster of state, 1 minister of panchayat, 1 president for the department, 2 vice-presidents, 4 deputy vice-presidents, 16 Assistant deputy vice-presidents, 28 legal advisors, 46 senior administrators, 98 administrators, 27 office boys/clerks and no workers. To pay salaries for them, the government needs money and how do they get it? It’s from the innocent taxpayers like you and me. Each year this number of departments increases and so does their salary. Hence there is an increase in TAX for you.

Now the PM talks about cost cutting and curbing all perks in the respective departments, I am in the view that if you dismantle a few redundant departments, it would make a great impact for the common man.

Let us assume that we dismantle a few departments, let’s see what the effect on the aam adhmi is:
Home ministry: Lot easier for us to get information on when terrorists are going to attack.
Finance: We may never have to file the Form-16 for the rest of our lives, No Tax Deducted @ Source.
Defense: No more headlines which reads “Another MIG 29 crashes during trial exercise drill during take-off”
Sports: We maybe in a position to get medals in major world events plus good sports infrastructure.
HRD: Students will be in a good position to answer if they have the board exam for the 10th this year.

So I would like to propose a new solution in this budget to get rid of many of these officials in some of the department and get some actual workers and start delivering results. This reduces the governments need for more money.

Tragically, because of some of these “bad rotten apple'' the public is losing faith in the entire government. So in an effort to restore their reputation, today I want to tackle, “head-on” some of the hard questions that you are asking about this financial meltdown:

Q. What is an Economic Stimulus Payment?
A. It is money that the central government will send to innocent taxpayers.

Q. Where will the government get this money?
A. From last year tax collection.

Q. So the government is giving me back my own money?
A. Only a pittance.

Q. What is the purpose of this payment?
A. The plan is that you will use the money to purchase a high-definition TV set and watch IPL, thus stimulating the economy.

Q. But isn't that stimulating the economy of China?
A. Shut up, you are only entitled for asking restricted questions.

Q. The papers say banks are reducing interest rates but my EMI still going higher?
A. Those are only headlines in papers, not for fools who are on housing loans.

Q. OK, So what is good and bad for me in this stimulus package?
A. The good news is that the government is thinking of returning some money back to you in the form of tax SOPs. (Never try to pull the teeth of a gifted cow), the bad news is that the returned money will be borrowed by the government and every paisa is added to the budget deficit and will be recovered from you via indirect taxes such as service tax, advanced service tax, don’t know why but you MUST pay tax, just to keep you unhappy tax etc.

Enough about tax for now – I have to go and collect my Form-16 for this year.

This is funny, trust me

Why should you trust me, well the answers here. I am a software engineer and you have lots of free time (logic: Since you are reading this crappy blog) and whatever I do results funny. So here I go …

We are worried, here in the software business (motto: ''What, YOUR code never makes misstakes?''). We're hearing that many of our clients have lost your faith in us. Polls show (SMS poll in my website) that the software engineers now rank lower than used-car salespeople, kidnappers and airline flight announcements. (We are still slightly ahead of criminal lawyers.)

Of course, these poll results were reported by media, so they could be wrong. In fact, there might not actually have been any polls; it's possible that the media made up the whole "media credibility'' story up. But I don't think so. I think the public is genuinely unhappy with software engineers. Lately, when I tell people I work for an MNC, I've detected the subtle signs of disapproval-the dirty looks, the snide remarks, twitch of the left eye.

How did we get into this situation? Without pointing the finger of blame at any one institution, I would say it is entirely the fault of the Indian IT service industry.

For many years, IT service companies were considered a great place to work, capable -- as no other company was -- of executing a project within tight budget, timelines. But then a smart employee was caught sleeping while at work. When questioned, he claimed to have written a piece of code which was supposed to stop unauthorized person from downloading you-tube videos at work

This turned out to be incorrect, and the code actually granted permission to all (including the janitors) to browse the internet without any restrictions.

So it was too late: The doors of trust had been left open and breached, leaving behind the doots of reader doubt.

Tragically, because of this one “bad rotten apple'' the public is losing faith in ALL software engineers. So in an effort to restore my profession's reputation, today I want to tackle, "head-on,'' some of the hard questions that you are asking about my job:

Q: Where do projects come from?
A: We don't know. Every morning we find a batch of unsigned but firmly held tasks lying on our tables marked CONFIDENTIAL. We work them in the hope that somebody will appreciate this work via pay hikes.

Q: Who gets to attend the Client Dinner meetings then?
A: Our Account Head.

Q: What is his primary job?
A: Client dinners, picking his nose inside the cabin, appraisal reviews.

Q: How often do you get a pay hike?
A: WHAT… SLAP!!! Our last pay hike was during Indra Gandhi’s tenure.

Q: What is your daily work routine?
A: Sign-in the attendance, Yahoo mail, Facebook chat, Meeting, Lunch, Meeting, YouTube videos, Google mail, email status reports, Twitter, Sign-out attendance, Catch the early shuttle to home.

Q: Don’t get bored of this routine?
A: When bored, prepare the Resume’ for the next jump.

Q: Who does the actual work?
A: My guess is it’s the junior contractors.

Q: What about the full time employees?
A: They are all busy filling up claim forms and online chat.

Q: How to do you know this?
A: via the CDN (Cab Drivers Network).

Q: How come when I use a product I'm familiar with, it always contains errors?
A: This requires a complex team effort, the development team, the testing team, the project managers and the cab driver too. For simplicity let me put the important players in CAPS: First, the PROJECT MANAGER (henceforth called DAMAGER) gathers information by interviewing CLIENTS and trying to write down what they say, getting approximately 35 percent of it is a boon for US. The DAMAGER then builds a USE CASE, which goes to an ACCOUNT MANAGER, who bitterly resents the DAMAGER because the DAMAGER gets to go to outside dinners sometimes, whereas the ACCOUNT MANAGER (henceforth called YANKEE) is stuck in the building eating our CAFETERIA “FOOD” that was originally developed by construction-industry researchers as a substitute for PLYWOOD.

The YANKEE, following project management tradition, decides that the DAMAGER has put the real point of the project in the 14th paragraph, which the YANKEE then attempts to move using the cut ‘n’ paste command, which results in the project disappearing into ANOTHER DIMENSION, partly because the YANKEE, like most managers, has the mechanical aptitude of a RACOON, but also because the NEW COMPUTER SYSTEM has a few “bugs” as a result of being installed by a low-bid VENDOR whose previous experience consisted of washing DISHES @ RESTAURANTS.

So the DAMAGER and the YANKEE, who now hate each other even more than they already did, hastily slap a project requirement together from their memory, then turn it over to a DESIGN PERSON who cannot actually read but is a wizard on the WINDOWS ARCHITECTURE, and who will cut any remaining accurate sentences out of the project document to make room on the page for a colorful, “reader-friendly” CHART, which was actually supposed to illustrate a different USE CASE for an entirely different PROJECT TEAM.

Yes, it's a lot of work, but we do it night after night, with use case after use case, all so that when you, the END USER, go out to your terminal to work, it's wont.

Check your RAM, OK?

Enough about my industry for now – wait till the next recession for more !!!