For the past one month, I am getting to meet families of my colleagues, having lunch, tea and dinner with them. Socializing!

This is giving me the break from the monotony of living alone and single in my apartment. Getting to meet people, share thoughts, playing golf, badminton, etc.

With it, my tummy has again started to grow. Nice food, Indian food, South Indian meals, from Vijay’s, Renga’s, Murali’s and Bhavneet’s houses, travelling on my car, getting used to driving in the nights and the rains. These are those nice things that happened in the past month. I have decided to try every nice restaurant in Richmond, eat the specialty dishes.

Started off with omelette’s, hash browns and pan cakes in ‘ihop’… More to come…

Another year has passed, I have added one more step to my life as a software engineer. Four years into the industry, it is long time now. In this year, I have groomed myself up.

I am no more the rough, lesser jumping to conclusions, lesser assuming stuff, improving listening and notes taking. Nowadays, I spend more time attending meetings, take the points, propose design. I have grown, but I don’t have a way to measure.

One more step forward is done. Stepping into the fifth year. All the best to all my friends who did join on the same day as me.

Social Networking is the catch phrase of the hour. Everyone has one or more online presence. Twitter, Buzz, FriendFeed, Facebook, MySpace, Orkut, IM most of us use one or more of these services. I remember signing up for most or all of the services that I have listed above, when they came into existence.

But now, I just had a thought, are we creating a hype! Overusing social networking? Trying to find acceptance in the online world? Just pondering questions.

Why suddenly this concern? When I look up the magazine, ads, everywhere, now it reads, “We are on twitter, Follow Us!”. It is good thing that twitter helps business owners to reach out to people, market the products and help to connect people. But I really hate it when people use it like an IM. Checking for updates every 5 mins! Following people just for the sake that they follow back. I really felt bad when a person caught in fire in bangalore office was trying to send twitter updates instead of trying to save himself. Media was really showing his twitter updates. Crazy!

I remember my roommates telling me, “Next you will update that you went to take a leak!”. Any new invention or service is good. It is not the service that is bad, it is we the people, who have to ‘Use it wisely!’

Teachers: They were the best part in my life. With friends and family, they played a significant part in making me what I am today. So this post is dedicated to them.

Michael Arokiaraj and Uma Mageshwaran

Both of them were my Maths teachers. Michael sir taught me in 10th and Uma taught me in 11 & 12th class. Both of them had different styles. Dedication was one common factor. Michael sir would treat us as a friend. Uma sir would treat us as student and teacher. To just quote one incident from each one of them. It was our revision exam in school in 10th standard. We were some 130 students put together in 2 classes. We completed the exam in afternoon. The next day morning, in our special class, Michael sir was there distributing the papers. We could see that he had not slept well the previous nights. It was not that he was pushing himself. He enjoyed doing it, just to make sure that we learn something from him. And he would always have that smile going in his face. He took his time to come to school on sundays and saturdays to conduct mock exams. No one paid him for it and no one was acknowledging his efforts. But he did it because, he wanted us to be in good position in life. Hats off!

Coming to Uma sir, Wow! He was well versed in his subject. From morning to evening, he would run a marathon of Maths classes. From 7.30 am to 3.00 pm, I have attended his classes. He would never rest, he will go on continuously, writing on the board, making sure that people get to understand everything. He lived on a principle, ‘I am your teacher inside the classroom. I am a stranger to you outside this room’. I simply adore him. He had that ‘something’ in him that attracted respect, and there will be pin-drop silence in his classes. He too would make sure that we get all our papers on time and perfect. Hats off Sir!

O S Sivakumar

If it is computers, there was only one man in Neyveli to teach, that is Mr OS! He had OS in his name! Wonderful, dedicated and cheerful. ‘Enada kanna?’, I still remember that! He allowed us to explore computers. He would allow us to learn, experiment with computers. Myself, Naseen and Arun, we were most of the time inside the lab. If I chose, computers as my field of choice, then all the credit goes to this one man! A real teacher.

Arul Jeganathan, Maria Kulanthai, Kaliamurthi, Arul Anand Raj, Peter Lawrence, Raymond, Christopher, Lakshmi Narayanan… the list goes on.

And if I forget to mention one person, that would be a crime. The man who made all these possible. Rev. Fr. E. Thomas. I respect you sir!

I would cherish each and every moment I studied in my school, St Pauls Matriculation Higher Secondary School, Neyveli, Tamil Nadu, 607801. My alma matter.

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!

Licensed to drive in the US.

I got my driving license now. Got to get a car, and get mobile. I am planning to get a car from my friend Abilash Nair. A chevy. Heading full steam on the life in America, the land of opportunities.

Yeh Jo Desh Hai Tera!

Wish you all a very Happy New Year 2010. Let this year bring prosperity and joy to all.

This is the time to reflect back on what happened the previous year, and plan for the coming year.

What happened in 2009?

• Completed my one year in Sagitec.
• Had been continuously writing on this blog.
• Got my first ever proposal.
• Accepted her as my better half.
• Got my first onsite offer, to work in America.
• Came to USA on a H1B permit and currently working.

Wishes for 2010:

• Get happily settled in life.
• Get a new look for this site.
• Get CowsNBulls game to the next level.
• Learn a new language apart from C#, looking at python and ruby.
• Live happily ever after.

Once again, wish you all a very happy and a prosperous new year.

In India, in most households, parents take care of all the things for the children. Food, clothing and whatever. I am one among those spoilt Indian kids.

We are spoilt totally, that we cannot take care of ourselves. At least, I was never into the kitchen to cook food, till I was in India. I have never washed dishes, rooms, etc. Everything my mother used to take care.

I would help her with talking her to the shop on my bike. But it was she who would do all the shopping. I have never wished to learn how to shop for groceries, vegetables, etc. I think that is the case with any kid who grew up in towns of India. In the villages, kids are to an extent independent. This I can say, as I see a lot of my friends from the villages, know quiet a lot than me.

When I was left alone, that is when I realized, the world is too big. Getting things together, cleaning, washing, cooking, making the bed, everything seemed to be an area of study for itself.

I am turning independent. It has its own thrill.

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 more update on my life in America. It was hard finding an apartment here. Office is in Downtown area. I don’t own a car. So I had to consider that fact too, either, the office must be reachable by Public Transit or walkable.

I found one. A nice and a beautiful apartment (That is how anyone from Chennai will feel about any house here). I am now a resident of Downtown, Richmond, VA. After the apartment hunt, then comes setting aside enough money to furnish your apartment. I had to buy a bed and a few kitchen utensils, the minimum requirements to stay in any apartment. With no car to get to places to shop, I resorted to shopping online.

In India, we just buy a bed (wooden or steel), then we order a mattress or we just leave it off. Here, we have more. First you have to get a bed frame, then a box spring, then the actual mattress. Still, I have not gotten used to not tracking dollar conversion to rupees. I have asked my stupid mind to stop counting it. And there are 4 sizes to choose from, King, Queen, Full and Twin. That is when my college friend, Abhilash (Nair as I call him), came. He was the friend in need. He has been here for sometime now, he dragged me to the omnipresent Walmart. And that ended all the shopping.

We also made it a point to visit the local Indian Restaurant ‘India K Raja’ and the Indian grocery store, ‘Lakshmi Palace’. It was good to do a bit of shopping. Now I have moved to the new apartment. It is just 5 mins walk to my office. Also the SSN application is over. I am getting settled.