Happy new year!!!

TV serials

How many of you people out there watch serials? And how many of you people run away from serials?

I have watched just one serial seriously in my life and that too i abandoned in the middle after the story became very incomprehensible. The serial was "Shanti". It used to come on DD.

To broadly classify people, there are 3 types of people in the world.

a) those who watch serials.
b) those who despise serials and run away from them.
c) those who make money out of making serials

I am not sure why i am writing this stuff. Maybe out of frustration caused due to the increasing noise pollution caused by the serials.

The basic concept in making these serials is:

• The story should have so many twists and turns that the viewer gets totally confused.


• The story should follow the waterfall model of evolution. So whenever TRP drops, someone is killed and a new character is introduced changing the story to make it even more complex.


• The actors and acresses are allowed to take long vacations - the start of which is marked by the death of the character the actor/actress is playing and the return is marked by the introduction of a double role or a reincarnation of the old character.


• The story is told in the slowest pace possible to make the serial as long as possible. some serials never end.


• Each dialogue should be followed by at least 3 moving closeups of the actor/actress who has said the dialogue.


• There should be constant background music - loud and unpleasant.


• All the serials should look the same. There should not be major variations in the story and characters of the serials. This makes switching between different serials on different channels effortless mentally.


• The story should always circle around marriage and family issues and completely ignore all other aspects of life like finance, education and totally ignore political, rural and legislative issues.

I really dont know why people watch these serials and what do they get out of it. I prefer to watch movies - max 3 hours to get a story straight and no pondering/waiting for the next part. Or play games for entertainment which also sharpen my reflexes.

And now recently there has been awards for these serials as well. Along with ads in movie halls - for some serials running on some channel.

My view of the serials is based on very less experience in watching these serials - since i cant tolerate them. Please feel free to add more regarding these serials.

reliance usb mg880 modem on linux

running reliance usb mg880 modem on linux

1. plugin the usb modem and do "dmesg" to see if it is being detected
output should be somewhat like

<snip>
[ 4089.904000] ISOFS: changing to secondary root
[ 4434.112000] usb 3-1: new full speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 7
[ 4434.232000] usb 3-1: device descriptor read/64, error -71
[ 4434.460000] usb 3-1: device descriptor read/64, error -71
[ 4434.676000] usb 3-1: new full speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 8
[ 4434.796000] usb 3-1: device descriptor read/64, error -71
[ 4435.020000] usb 3-1: device descriptor read/64, error -71
[ 4436.132000] usb 3-1: new full speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 10
[ 4436.352000] usb 3-1: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
<snip>

2. Check out the vendorid and productid of the device

command: lsusb -v

<snip>
Bus 003 Device 010: ID 19d2:fffd
Device Descriptor:
bLength 18
bDescriptorType 1
bcdUSB 1.01
bDeviceClass 0 (Defined at Interface level)
bDeviceSubClass 0
bDeviceProtocol 0
bMaxPacketSize0 16
idVendor 0x19d2
idProduct 0xfffd
bcdDevice 0.00
iManufacturer 1 ZTE, Incorporated
iProduct 2 ZTE CDMA Tech
iSerial 3 Serial Number
bNumConfigurations 1
<snip>

3. run modprobe to create ttyUSB* devices

command: modprobe usbserial vendor=0x19d2 product=0xfffd

4. do a "dmesg" check if usb devices were created.

<snip>
[ 5791.852000] /build/buildd/linux-source-2.6.22-2.6.22/drivers/usb/serial/usb-serial.c: USB Serial support registered for generic
[ 5791.852000] usbserial_generic 3-1:1.0: generic converter detected
[ 5791.856000] usb 3-1: generic converter now attached to ttyUSB0
[ 5791.856000] usbserial_generic 3-1:1.1: generic converter detected
[ 5791.856000] usb 3-1: generic converter now attached to ttyUSB1
[ 5791.856000] usbserial_generic 3-1:1.2: generic converter detected
[ 5791.856000] usb 3-1: generic converter now attached to ttyUSB2
[ 5791.856000] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbserial_generic
[ 5791.856000] /build/buildd/linux-source-2.6.22-2.6.22/drivers/usb/serial/usb-serial.c: USB Serial Driver core
<snip>

5. create the wvdial.conf script

[Dialer Defaults]
Modem = /dev/ttyUSB0
Baud = 115200
SetVolume = 0
Dial-AT-OK ATDT Command =
Init1 = ATZ
Init2 = AT+CRM=1
FlowControl = Hardware (CRTSCTS)
Phone = #777
Username = <phone no>
Password = <phone no>
New PPPD = yes
Carrier Check = no
Stupid Mode = 1

6. Run wvdial as root...

DOHC 4 cylinder car engine simulation

xbox 360 vs sony ps3 vs nintendo wii

Yes, another comparison. But from an end user perspective. I have recently got an Xbox 360.



Each gaming console has its own advantages and disadvantages. Lets go through the tech specs first to see which one is the best technically...

Microsoft Xbox 360 :

Cost - 20,000/- INR for the pro console which contains a 20 GB hdd and various wires for connecting with various devices. 18,000 for the core console (basic without hdd and wires).

Processor - 3.2 GHz PowerPC with 3 dual threaded processor cores

Graphics - ATI based custom processor @ 500 MHz Clock speed.

Video RAM - Up to 512 MB GDDR3 system RAM (700 MHz) plus 10 MB embedded DRAM (eDRAM) frame buffer

Video memory bandwidth - 21.6 GBps to system RAM; 256 GBps to eDRAM

Video resolution - 16:9 widescreen 720p, 1080i, 1080p (will downsample to standard definition). HDTV output supported.

Sound - Dolby Pro-Logic II(analog), 5.1 channel Dolby Digital. Number of voices is software based and limited only by the CPU and memory available.

System memory - 512 MB GDDR3 RAM (700 MHz), shared with GPU. Memory bandwidth of 22.4 GBps.

Drives - Optical 12X dual layered DVD drive and 20 GB removable hard drive.

Memory card ports - 2 Xbox 360 memory units (64 MB or 512 MB).

USB 2.0 ports - 3

Networking - 1 ethernet port 100 MBps. No Wi-Fi. Online gaming via Xbox LIVE. Also download full length movies through xbox live gold.


Sony Playstation 3 (ps3) :

Cost - 30,000/- INR for the console which includes a 60 GB Hard drive and almost everything. A higher model is also available with 80 GB Hard drive.

Processor - 3.2 GHz Cell processor with 7 single-threaded synergistic processing units cores.

Graphics - NVIDIA-based RSX "Reality Synthesizer" @ 550 MHz

Video RAM - 256MB GDDR3 (700MHz)

Video memory bandwidth - 22.4 GBps

Video resolution - 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, 1080p (will downsample to standard definition). HDTV output supported.

Sound - Stereo (Analog sound). 5.1 Channel Dolby digital and 7.1 Channel LPCM. Number of voices is limited to 320 compressed channels if hardware based. For software based voices the number is limited only by the available CPU and memory.

System memory - 256 MB XDR RAM (3.2GHz). Memory bandwidth of 25.6 GBps.

Drives - Optical Blu-Ray and 60 GB or 80 GB replaceable hard drive.

Memory card ports - Flash memory card reader (supports Memory Stick, Compact Flash and SD/MMC).

USB 2.0 ports - 4

Networking - 1 ethernet port 1 GBps. Bluetooth 2.0. Bluetooth controller interface. Wi-Fi. Free PlayStation Network with micropayment system; includes a Web browser. Individual game makers can choose to charge for online services.



Nintendo wii :

Cost - Sorry, did not check the price in india. In USD it is $249. There is only 1 model. It is the cheapest of all consoles.

Processor - 729 MHz IBM Broadway processor with 5 execution units

Graphics - ATI Hollywood processor @ 243 MHz

Video RAM - 24 MB of system RAM (486 MHz) plus 3 MB of embedded DRAM (eDRAM)

Video memory bandwidth - 3.9 GBps

Video resolution - 853 x 480 (480p) in widescreen or 4:3 aspect ratio. HDTV output NOT supported.

Sound - Dolby Pro-Logic II (Analog sound). No digital sound output. Number of voices is limited to Hardware DSP with 64+ channels

System memory - 64 MB GDDR3 RAM. Memory bandwidth of 1.9 GBps.

Drives - Proprietary optical drive. No hard drive. Has 512 MB internal flash memory for storing saved games, downloaded games and other data.

Memory card ports - 1 SD card slot, 2 GameCube memory card ports.

USB 2.0 ports - 2

Networking - No ethernet ports. Integrated Wi-Fi for networking and internet access. Bluetooth 2.0 for controllers. Wii Network online service includes online shopping, Web browsing, messaging, and other features.

So from all these following things are clear

-> Wii is underpowered as compared to the three.
-> Xbox 360 is ok, but ps3 has the best configuration.
-> In terms of networking and interconnectivity between devices, xbox is the best. Which when connected with a windows media centric pc can be used to record and play live media. In addition, media can be downloaded and played.
-> PS3 seems more like a pc than a gaming machine.
-> In terms of games the Xbox 360 has numerous options to choose from. Though Xbox 360 does not support most of the legacy Xbox games, but still it has a wide range of titles to choose from. Where as PS3 does not have that many titles to choose from. But since PS2 and PS1 games can also be played on PS3, the number of titles for PS3 also goes high. And Wii supports almost all original gamecube titles. Which means that if you have a PS2 or a game-cube, it would make more sense to upgrade to PS3 or Wii respectively. Since then you would be able to play your older games on the new machine.
-> The best things about PS3 are its video graphics which is said to be awesome. In addition to the next gen Blu-Ray drive and Wi-Fi. A Wi-Fi on Xbox 360 would have made it look irresistible.
-> And the thing about Wii is its wireless remote which uses accelerometers to sense how players swing, point, and tilt the controller, encouraging game titles to incorporate activity. So to swing a golf club in Wii Sports, which is bundled with the console, you literally swing the remote controller as if it were a golf club. That is something which is unavailable with xbox 360 or PS3.
-> If you are looking at power consumption factor then both Xbox 360 and PS3 are power hogs. Wii is very efficient (uses only 18 Watts of power). Xbox 360 is still a bit better than PS3 in terms of power consumption.

If you are looking at a complete entertainer with lots of games to choose from and easy connectivity between various "windows" based devices that you have, then Xbox 360 is recommended.

But before going out and purchasing just an Xbox 360, please be aware that it is a microsoft product and is made to crash. The "Ring of 3 red lights of death". That's what is supposed to happen with the Xbox. The problem, as i have found out after some googleing is that the Xbox 360 unit is not properly cooled. So if you decide to buy an Xbox-360 be prepared to have a fan (preferably an A/c) on top of it cooling it down. Though microsoft has been prompt in replacing defective Xbox-360s with new ones. So in case your Xbox-360 dies, you can call up microsoft and ask for replacement. PS3 and Wii have never had any issue of this type till now. They seem to be more properly tested.

There is also this funda or modding an Xbox-360. You can go to specific places where they place chips in your Xbox-360 for around 2000/- after which you can play most of the pirated games which come for 200-300 rs. The original Xbox-360 games cost around 2000-2500/- too much to spend for a normal person.

The thing i liked about xbox was its support - not from microsoft, but from the local community. It is difficult to hear about PS3 or Wii, but you can hear about Xbox-360 a lot cause there are lots of people using it. And once you go live on Xbox-360(it requires a minimum of 512 KBps internet connection), you have the whole world to play against.

Wii also has tonnes of games, but it is more appealing to small kids. Xbox has games both for serious players and kids. Whereas PS3 has some games which are mostly for serious players.

Source:

http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/xbox360_ps3_wii.asp
http://www.hardcoreware.net/reviews/review-356-1.htm
http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/xbox360_how_to_choose.asp
And some other sites...

Piracy

In ancient ages, piracy referred to robbery at sea. Pirates used to mark down ships and boats and capture people and rob them.

In recent times, piracy refers to unauthorized reproduction and distribution of materials covered by copyright law.

So if you buy an mp3 cd with the latest songs for 50 rupees, you are supporting piracy.

But there is no stopping piracy. Looking it from the consumer point of view, an original DVD would cost around 800-1000 rs while a priated DVD would cost around 100 rs. The difference is huge. Why should a consumer - an end user pay 800/- for something that he can get for 100/- only. Because the end user is interested in the media or software and is not concerned with the source.

And then you keep on seeing those ads which try to make you go against pirated stuff.

But would you?

Recently i got an Xbox 360, and when i went out looking for games for xbox 360, i was shocked to see games priced around 2000. I was shocked. Paying 2000 for a game is too much. Earlier i used to get game cds for 100 rs (ofcourse pirated). But after some research, i came to know that games are locked using region codes. So games made for US cannot be played in a Xbox sold in india. That is something that only microsoft could think of. I have always worked with open-source stuff. Have always got the source and compiled it as i liked it and used it. And microsoft ofcourse would not support open-source.

Every businessman works to make money. And so does microsoft.

some more research led me believe that if i get my console modified, i could play region free games and also play pirated games which i can obtain for 100-200 rs. I would have gone ahead and modified the console, but then i thought, why spend so much time and money after modifying the console. I am not going to be a hard-core gamer. I would be using xbox for occassional gaming only. So i would be getting new games once in 3 months.

Maybe i would be able to find friends and share/exchange games.

Modifying software is ok - it should not cause any issue - since it is a low cost stuff and can be easily replaced. But modifying hardware is a costly issue. If anything goes wrong you could lose your hardware. And there is no easy replacement.

Maybe after an year of use, i find that i have become a very avid gamer, then i would get my xbox modded and play tons of games.

compiz fusion - linux rocks

Disk space on windows Vista

Recently i got a new lappy with windows vista. And within 2 weeks my disk usage went up from 25 GB to 34 GB. Though all i had installed was a few small softwares.

Ever imagine where the disk space goes when you are using windows vista?

What i did was i logged into linux and did a du -Sh and found that there was a hidden folder "System Volume Information" which was around 10 GBs and the folder was invisible in windows explorer. And then there was this hyberfile.sys and pagefile.sys taking up 2 GB each.

So windows is chewing up 14 GB of disk space for its processing in addition to the installation size of 6 GB.

System Volume Information is used by windows to store restore points for the system. The larger the volume, the more restore points it can store and the more restore points it can offer in case of a crash.

In my earlier lappy, i had windows xp and i had reduced the size of restore volume to 500 MB using some slider available somewhere. Though i never had to use the restore option in my 2 years of usage. I had a crash and had to reinstall windows again.

But in windows vista, i was unable to find such slider. And so i googled for "System Volume Information Disk usage windows vista" and found some cool links explaining the complete funda.

One of the most interesting links was this which explains in detail the use of restore points.

Well to make a long story short open up the command prompt (right click and do "run as administrator").

Then run vssadmin list shadowstorage, it will give a list of available shadow storage points ("System Volume Information"s' in the system - there is one on each drive). How much space is allocated and how much is used.

C:\Windows\system32>vssadmin list shadowstorage

vssadmin 1.1 - Volume Shadow Copy Service administrative command-line tool

(C) Copyright 2001-2005 Microsoft Corp.

For volume: (C:)\\?\Volume{3ce0cbe2-57c2-11db-a712-806e6f6e6963}\ Shadow Copy Storage volume: (C:)\\?\Volume{3ce0cbe2-57c2-11db-a712-806e6f6e6963}\

Used Shadow Copy Storage space: 9.335 GB

Allocated Shadow Copy Storage space: 9.539 GB

Maximum Shadow Copy Storage space: 10.395 GB


Now list down all the shadow storage points using vssadmin list shadows. And check out the number of restore points. Remember, your storage space should be large enough to have atleast 1 storage point. But i generally dont care for windows, cause, even if it crashes, all you could do is reinstall. I doubt "restore" would work...

And finally reduce the shadow storage size

C:\Windows\system32>vssadmin resize shadowstorage /on=C: /For=C: /MaxSize=3GB

Rerun the vssadmin list shadowstorage command and check the amount of disk space used now

C:\Windows\system32>vssadmin list shadowstorage

vssadmin 1.1 - Volume Shadow Copy Service administrative command-line tool

(C) Copyright 2001-2005 Microsoft Corp.

For volume: (C:)\\?\Volume{3ce0cbe2-57c2-11db-a712-806e6f6e6963}\ Shadow Copy Storage volume: (C:)\\?\Volume{3ce0cbe2-57c2-11db-a712-806e6f6e6963}\

Used Shadow Copy Storage space: 1.347 GB

Allocated Shadow Copy Storage space: 1.389 GB

Maximum Shadow Copy Storage space: 3 GB


Bingo and now you have around 7 GB freed up.

Fasting, the gen-next way

In India, there are numerous occasions when people who worship gods, tend to observe fast. Fast, it seems to them would make the Gods happy and give them their blessings.

Though i truly fail to understand as to why would God be happy, if human beings stay on empty stomach - or eat this or that.

There are customs according to which people who prefer to eat non-vegetarian food, observe a "fast" and eat only vegetarian food on tuesdays and thursdays. I have never been able to figure out why? And why only tuesdays and thrusdays and why not mondays and wednesdays?

And then there is this huge festival called karwa-chauth where married women "fast" for their hubbies. They are not supposed to drink water or eat anything. But some women in my office say that though water is not allowed, you can have cold-drinks and tea/coffee. Strange... Well, if you look at it in this manner, even beer should be allowed... Just kidding...

And the latest trend in fasting is to "fast" for 9 days straight. The navratras. Shop keepers have special "navratra thalis". In fact, this fast seems to me more like a gen-next trend than to do anything with the Gods. All girls and most of the boys "Fast". There are rules about what you can eat and what you cannot eat. So though salt is not supposed to be allowed, but there is special "salt" available which can be had. And then since you are not allowed to eat normal rotis and rice, but there is a distinct variety of flour (not wheat flour) which could be used to make puris and whatever. And ofcourse there is another variety of rice - which you can have. And you can have potatos and lots of "special" papads, and "special" laddoos(sweets). And today itself i came to know that you can also have some green veggies like bottle-gourd and "arbi" (dont know the proper name).

Hence, i fail to understand the purpose of the fast, when eventually you tend to eat everything.

And i fail to understand why under-nourish yourself on the pretension of "fasting".

The fast that i remember is that of a college friend who decided that on every saturday - he would have food only once in the whole day - the main purpose being to lose weight. And he did good. Within 6 months, he had shaped his body pretty well.

Finally, to those people who are actually fasting, i would ask them to have mercy on their close ones who take tension since you would be going without food. The same tension that you would have, if they go without food for a day.

Sql Injections...