I hate Reports. Reports as in Crystal Reports, Sql Server Reporting Services.

I was pondering over the question, why do I hate reports? this entire day. Do I simple hate them? Did it have something to do with the way I look at them? Is it because, I have always seen it in the wrong way? Was it that I hated it from the first that I am getting an aversion towards it?

My first work with reports was in 2007. I really hated the way Crystal Reports did the formatting. Even though, I had very little space between the columns, it always rendered it with more space, and I would be questioned on why there was more space? How will I know? That would be my answer. Only when I had one column laid literally over the other, did it give a small space. It all started there! And it is still continuing.

I thought only Crystal Reports was like that! Now SSRS (SQL Server Reporting Services) is even more terrible. I understand that Reports are more important requirements in any project. They are the way of letting people see, decide and plan on what has to be done. Any software solution provider will have reporting requirements that need to be done. I tried to even start reading books on Reports, but something is wrong in the way that I understand them. I write SQL, but somehow, I hate it when it comes to reports. It must be the way I perceive it, but really, Reports / Data Analysis is really not my cup of tea! I really can’t get over this feeling. I want to learn it, but simply I can’t.

I hate you Reports! But somehow, I have to do it! Get it done!

Here are the steps to perform a clean un-install of MySQL from your Mac.

Execute the following commands at the Terminal

Uninstalling MySQL

Open /etc/hostconfig file in a text editor and remove the following line

MYSQLCOM=-YES-

That’s all.

I was surprised the day before yesterday to see a FedEx door tag hanging on my apartment door. I had not ordered anything, or I could not think of someone who would spend money to send me a FedEx parcel as gift.

I just left it signed on my door yesterday, so that the FedEx person could leave it at the door. When I came back for lunch, yesterday, I met the FedEx guy who gave me a small parcel.

Viola! it contained a 2 GB iPod Shuffle. It was gifted by Sagitec, my employer as a Christmas gift.

Thank You Sagitec.

I am writing this post using WriteRoom, one super working space on my new laptop Macbook Pro.  I got this one as one major purchase after I landed in US.

I gave up my only companion the PC, to which I have been faithful since my beginning days in computers for a new Mac. Why did I take the decision? I still use Microsoft’s own Visual Studio in office for my development activities. So half of my time, I am on a PC and the remaining time I am on Mac. They both are a different culture. Everything about Mac, at least my first feel of Mac is it is beautiful.

Design – It is Apple’s forte. It has that good finish, wonderful, artistic and everything about it. That is what captured me to it. Being a designer myself, I wanted to own it, and it just happened that I did it in the home of software development.

I have no regrets with Windows or Linux, the two other operating systems I have used fairly so far. The first software that I have licensed, other than the OS is TextMate. It was a worthy buy. So I have bought a license for it. It feels good to own and work on licensed software. I feel as if I own it. I feel that I respect the work that goes into the making of it. I love open source and free softwares. If there is some great work going on, and you can provide your own contributions to it, yes pay them. It is not for the software, but the people behind it.

In India, we use pirated software all the time. Piracy is nothing. Everyone has a copy of Windows, Office running on their machines. The cost of software in Indian currency is much higher compared to the US counterparts. People don’t like to pay for just a CD. We are used to the belief that if you pay more, you get more. For something as big as Rs. 13,000/- a CD doesn’t suffice, we look for something more bigger. We are used to thinking that way, just like grocery and furniture shopping.

Since, everyone is used to using Windows, no one wants to move from the comfort zone offered by it and embrace free software. There has to be paradigm shift, if people should start buying software.

How can that be achieved. It won’t/can’t happen immediately. Schools should start using Linux and open source softwares. Students must be encouraged to read code, tweak existing programs so that they get what they want. They must get that idea, the machine does only what they want it to do, rather than stand amazed at seeing the computer working. After all it is what it is programmed for. Then as they grow up, they will start appreciating software and by the time, they get their own computers, they get to choose what they want. They can buy a Windows or a Mac, or write their own operating systems.

Lets make this happen!

After all, it is necessity that is the mother of all inventions.

Here is a nice incident that happened today at office.

We use Star Team for source code configuration tool. I wanted to move the location where I maintain the project files in my local system, from C:\ to D:\. So I logged into Star Team, and opened the project. Then I clicked on View -> Properties. This opened the Properties dialog. There I selected the “Alternate Path” option and specified the “D:\Directory”.

Instead of showing all the files in the ‘Missing’ status, Star Team just didn’t display any folder excepting the Root folder. For any one who logged in after i made the change, Star Team just was reporting a ‘Not in View’ status, meaning, the file was not in the Star Team. Ah! It turned out that I had deleted all the files from “Source Control”… with a big stress on the word ‘Deleted’.

Actually, we are living in a connected world. So it happened that, our Star Team administrator had removed the ‘Grant’ privilege on all of us as he was doing some testing and he didn’t want us to make change to the Star Team. What he failed to do was not intimating us of the grant change.

So once, the grant was provided to all, we were all able to see all the files. That ended the case of the missing files!!!

Here is the learning: To change Grant options: On the Folder Tree Menu, choose Advanced and then Select Child Folders. Then choose the users who need Access and Grant them the access to the folder. If nothing is specified, all are granted privilege to the folders.

Following are the steps to get Apache, MySQL and PHP installed on a Ubuntu system.

Installing Apache:

In the terminal window issue the following command

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sudo apt-get install apache2

To test if Apache has installed successfully, open a browser and browse to http://localhost. A message “It works” will be displayed.

Installing PHP

In the terminal window issue the following command

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sudo apt-get install php5 libapache2-mod-php5

Once the installation is complete, to get php working, restart apache server by issuing the following command

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sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

To test that PHP has been successfully installed, quickly create a test PHP script

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sudo gedit /var/www/test.php

In the gedit window, type a script and save the file

Open up a browser window and open the test.php file created. The PHP application environment information will be displayed.

Installing MySQL

In the terminal, run the following command

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sudo apt-get install mysql-server

That should get mysql installed. You will be prompted for a ‘root’ db user password. Enter it.
To test mysql, in the terminal issue,

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mysql -u root -p

Enter the root user password for mysql server. You will be launched into the mysql prompt.

Installing phpMyAdmin

To install phpMyAdmin, issue the following command at the terminal

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sudo apt-get install libapache2-mod-auth-mysql php5-mysql phpmyadmin

To test phpmyadmin, open a browser and navigate to http://localhost/phpmyadmin.
Thats it!

Cows and Bulls is a small word building game, implemented in C# as a Windows Application. Feel free to download and play around with it. CowsNBulls is in its version 0.0.0.1 and in beta testing.

The game began in the last bench of my college, MIT where we used to play this game. It was Barath Kumar, my friend who introduced this game to us. Thought of computerizing it and so here it is. 

Download the game and do let me know your comments.

Edit: For a web only version of the game, visit: www.raasukutty.net

The web only version is developed using HTML, Javascript and jQuery. For all the developers out there, check out the source using view source.  All suggestions are welcome.

Happy gaming!

After a unsuccessful installation of rails that took nearly 5 hours, I decided to get rid of Ruby. But the geek inside me, wanted me to go for the kill. That started the quest of successfully installing and deploying rails on WAMP server. Here are the steps.

Requirements:

WAMP Server
Ruby Installer for Windows.
Ruby Gems.
Download the latest .gem file for Rake.
Download the latest .gem file for Active Record.
Download the latest .gem file for Active Support.
Download the latest .gem file for Action Mailer.
Download the latest .gem file for Action Pack.
Download the latest .gem file for Rails.

Installation Instructions:

Install WAMP and Ruby on the machine.

Extract the Ruby Gems Zip file to any location and open a command prompt window.

Run setup.rb from the command prompt in the location where the zip was extracted.

Open command prompt and navigate to the folder where the downloaded gems are located.

Install Rake using the following command.

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gem install rake-x.x.x --local

Here x.x.x stands for the version number, for example, to install rake-2.3.2.gem run it as ‘gem install rake-2.3.2 –local’.

Install Active Support, Active Record, Action Pack, Action Mailer and Rails using the command as below

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gem install gem-x.x.x --local

Replacing the gem- to the current gem to be installed.

This will get Rails installed on the machine. The total install time should be close to 10 minutes.

Installing Rails needs a lot of patience. The command is simple “gem install rails”. But it is a resource hungry and a time consuming installation.

I started the installation at 00:00:00 HRS and it is 03:22:23 HRS now and the installation is still going on.

And look at the memory footprint of the ruby program that is installing rails.

Mem footprint

And here is the Performance Statistics:

Why is an installation taking such a long time?

I got a new SAMSUNG SyncMaster 2033sw, monitor, as my 10 yr old Philips has been running into issues for quite some time now. My PC in Neyveli (hometown) runs on AMD Athlon 64 on a ASUS A8V-VM series motherboard.
The display adapter is an on board solution provided by VIA/S3G.

When I connected the new monitor, the screen resolution was 1024 x 768 and the maximum supported by VIA/S3G Deltachrome IGP is 1280 x 768. This new one has a optimal resolution of 1440 x 900 (32 bpp). Searching on internet on various forums made me feel bad on choosing a wide screen monitor. Everyone said that a BIOS flash was required, which I least preferred.

But a simple driver update left to Windows Hardware Update utility did the trick. All is needed is just a Update Driver using the Add/Remove Hardware Wizard.

So Just update the driver if you are running into issues on the resolution. If that too doesn’t help, then resort to flashing the BIOS.

Edit: Download driver for Windows XP.