GMail introduces Group Chat and New Emoticons

The new Gmail Seattle team is happy to announce two additions to Gmail's built-in chat capabilities: group chat and enhanced emoticons.

To start a group chat, click "Group chat" from the "Options" menu when chatting. Enter the names of the people you want to add, and, bingo, you're in your very own chat room. All the familiar features such as chat archiving and taking the chat off the record still work as well.

These features only work with the latest version of Gmail, which we are still rolling out to IE6, international and Google Apps users.

I would like to see the same features to be provided to GTalk users too in near future.

Official Link

BSNL - 100 mbps DataOne Broadband in next 2.5 years

WOOOOOOW! Isn't that an amazing news. Yes, there is some fact in this story. The same was conveyed in Economic Times dt. 19-Nov-2007.

“BSNL is also working on a project to offer at least 100 mbps of broadband speed for all. Currently, it is about 2 mbps. This will be done in stages where in the first stage fibre lines to the nodes will be converted to fibre optics. In the second stage, the plan is to offer fibre to premises and this will allow 100 mbps. We hope to achieve this in the next two and half years.”

For complete news, please visit this link.

The question remains same:
1) Is this gonna really happen?
2) What will be the tarrif?
3) Will there be Unlimited Download plan with better speed (other than the current 256kbps)?
4) How frequently will BSNL upgrade their tariff? Its been more than 1 year, since I can see any change in the tariff. After the 2mbps plan, BSNL has still left the Unlimited Downloads plan to 256kbps. Will they atleast consider to increase the speed to 512kbps for Unlimited downloads?
5) The night time unlimited download plan (2am to 8am) still holds good for Night Watchmans. A common man can benefit night time unlimited downloads only by drinking lots of Tea during midnight!!!

Windows XP SP3 is on the way...

Just days after Microsoft Corp. delivered a release candidate preview for Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1), it has quietly issued a similar milestone for Windows XP SP3 to about 15,000 testers, the company said today.
The service pack, the last major update to the six-year-old operating system, is slated for release sometime in the first half of 2008. Microsoft has not been more specific than that six-month stretch, and today even took the time to remind everyone that the half-year window is not a lock. "We are targeting [the first half of] 2008 for the release of XP SP3 RTM [release to manufacturing], though our timing will always be based on customer feedback as a first priority," a company spokeswoman said today.

Windows XP Service Pack 3 is highly anticipated and according to testers from the Devil Mountain Software group, gives a 10% performance boost compared to computers running on Windows XP Service Pack 2. This is using the exact same computer configuration as well.
Windows XP Service Pack 3 is twice as fast as Windows Vista in the OfficeBench benchmark program. 15,000 testers have been given Windows XP SP3 Release Candiate. It will feature over 1,000 hot fixes and patches which have been put out over the past three years and at least four new features.

Windows XP debuted in October 2001 and was last updated as SP2 in August 2004.

Links - Windows Service Pack Road Map

Computer Power Supply - SMPS

On Friday midnight, my computer UPS started beeping. I woke up and noticed that there was no power supply in my home and there was a burning smell coming from the back side of my PC. I realized that I used my PC to max extent (almost running 24hrs) and the SMPS (Computer Power Supply unit) is blown. My computer dealer confirmed that the SMPS needs to be replaced.

The next question was - "whats the best SMPS to be purchased for a heavy PC user like me?". While discussing with the dealer, I learnt that they supply the local made SMPS to all the PC's which usually costs Rs.500 to 700. These are not heavy duty ones and you would need a better one for heavy usage. I was recommended the Cooler Master Extreme Power Duo 600W SMPS which costed about Rs.4000 (including all taxes). This SMPS includes the power supply for SATA Hard disk/DVD drives. Check their SMPS products here.

Antec is another company which provides hi-end SMPS and cabinets. I heard about the model SP-450 through my neighbour.

In the shop, I saw a cool cabinet (left pic) of Antec which costs Rs.8000, which is transparent from one end. You can see all the PC internal parts from one side and USB/Multimedia connectors are available on top side.

Change your operator, not your mobile number

In a major bonanza to over 37.5 million mobile customers, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) announced the introduction of “number portability” in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai.

Under this system, subscribers do not have to change their mobile phone number if they shift from one operator to another. This means that if you are unhappy with your service provider but have been unable to shift to another because it would mean changing your phone number, you will now be able to switch while retaining the same number.

The facility will be available to mobile customers by the fourth quarter of 2008.

Market surveys have shown that up to 50% of all mobile users in India are unhappy with their operator, and are willing to switch to another service provider if allowed to retain their number. Number portability has so far been introduced in Australia, Korea, Japan, Canada, the US, the UK, most of Europe and Pakistan, among other countries.

Complete News Links:
- Economic Times
- Times of India 13/Nov/2007

Happy Diwali 2007

Wish you all a Happy Diwali 2007

Google Begins 'Gmail 2.0' Rollout

The new look has been made available to about 1% of all Gmail users and is being rolled out to the rest on an ongoing basis. Google on Tuesday confirmed it is giving Gmail a new look. Two prominent blogs that cover Google -- Google Blogscoped and Google Operating System -- have posted screenshots of a new Gmail interface that has been made available to a limited number of users. They're calling it "Gmail 2.0," even if Google isn't.

-Complete Article

More Links:

- Google Unofficial Blog

Gmail has a new architecture that improves the performance and the usability. Now you can use the back button in your browser and bookmark URLs from different Gmail views because the URLs change when you go to a different section. The messages are prefetched when Gmail loads so you don't have to wait too much until a message is displayed.The new contact manager has inline search, better options to delete contacts or add them to a group, the address is now structured and you can enter usernames for different IM networks. You can also export the contacts in vCard format, export the contacts from a group and print your address book so you can use it offline... More with Pics

The story of a Donkey!

One day a farmer's donkey fell down into a well. The animal cried piteously for hours as the farmer tried to figure out what to do. Finally, he decided the animal was old, and the well needed to be covered up anyway; it just wasn't worth it to retrieve the donkey.

He invited all his neighbors to come over and help him. They all grabbed a shovel and began to shovel dirt into the well. At first, the donkey realized what was happening and cried horribly. Then, to everyone's amazement he quieted down.

A few shovel loads later, the farmer finally looked down the well. He was astonished at what he saw. With each shovel of dirt that hit his back, the donkey was doing something amazing. He would shake it off and take a step up.

As the farmer's neighbors continued to shovel dirt on top of the animal, he would shake it off and take a step up. Pretty soon, everyone was amazed as the donkey stepped up over the edge of the well and happily trotted off!



MORAL :
Life is going to shovel dirt on you, all kinds of dirt. The trick to getting out of the well is to shake it off and take a step up. Each of our troubles is a steppingstone. We can get out of the deepest wells just by not stopping, never giving up! Shake it off and take a step up.




Remember the five simple rules to be happy:
1. Free your heart from hatred - Forgive.
2. Free your mind from worries - Most never happen.
3. Live simply and appreciate what you have.
4. Give more.
5. Expect less

WinAmp 5.5 - 10th Anniversary Edition

Today at 10:00 AM EST, Nullsoft and AOL released the latest version of Winamp. The timing of the 5.5 release was deliberately chosen (10/10, 10:00) to commemorate the software's tenth year as a leading media player.

Packed with new features, the latest edition of Winamp is available now. Download Winamp 5.5: The 10th Anniversary Edition and take the all new leading multimedia player for a ride.Here's a sampling of some of the great Winamp features:

• A completely redesigned interface, including Album Art


• Multiple device support, including Apple iPods


• Access and Share your Music and Videos with Winamp Remote


• Play and Playlist the Best Music on the Web with Media Monitor


• Enjoy Dynamic Song Recommendations


• Experience MP3 Surround Sound Support


• Access to Thousands of Online Radio Stations, Videos and More!


• 50 Free MP3 Music downloads compliments of eMusic's 2-week Trial


• Auto-Tagger provides automatic updates to file information


• Control Winamp from your browser with a the Winamp Toolbar

WinAmp is one of the most popular and freely available MP3 player. I have been using WinAmp since the day I started listening to MP3 music since 1999. The MP3 file format has almost replaced the existing Audio Tapes/CD's. All the home audio-video gadgets now come with MP3 support. The Winamp music player was once a simple, compact application. Now it has grown into a full-featured media player with more features, configuration options and music acquisition methods than those offered by iTunes or Windows Media Player.

Sonu Nigam's mimicry - Too Good

One of the best Sonu Nigam's mimicry, where he imitated all other singers:

Show: Johny Aaala Re on Zee TV

Happy Birthday to The Father of Nation

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (October 2, 1869 – January 30, 1948) was a major political and spiritual leader of India and the Indian independence movement. He was the pioneer of Satyagraha—the resistance of tyranny through mass civil disobedience, firmly founded upon ahimsa or total non-violence—which led India to independence and inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world. Gandhi is commonly known in India and across the world as Mahatma Gandhi and as Bapu. In India, he is officially accorded the honour of Father of the Nation and October 2nd, his birthday, is commemorated each year as Gandhi Jayanti, a national holiday. A picture of Gandhi'ji on the Indian Currency (1000 Rupees):

Gandhi's principles of life:

• Truth
• Nonviolence
• Vegetarianism
• Brahmacharya
• Simplicity Faith

I salute this leader and we all miss him.

More Info at Wiki

Google's 9th Birthday

Google turns 9th on 27-Sep-2007. Google opened its doors in September 1998. The exact date when we celebrate our birthday has moved around over the years, depending on when people feel like having cake.

Its strange that Google has not provided any official news link on its Birthday. The 9th birthday image put on Google.com also does not contain any links. Usually, the logo contains link to query for the event on web.

Links:

Google Official Web Search Help

Using GTalk as FM Radio

You can listen FM is on your GTalk now ( Teen Taal 110... only hindi songs). For this you need to follow these steps:
1) add this id in ur GTalk: service@gtalk2voip.com
2) then add: 110@radio.gtalk2voip.com

After completion of these 2 steps, make a GTalk call to 110@radio.gtalk2voip.com, then you will be directly connected to teen taal FM radio station.

Emoticon (Smiley) turns 25

Today signifies the birthdays of many celebrities, Jimmy Fallon, Joan Lunden, and Adam West to name a few, but today each of these stars will share the limelight of 19 September with :-) for its Silver Anniversary.

On this day, 25 years ago, a Carnegie Mellon Univesity computer science professor named Scott E. Fahlman posted a smiley face on an electronic message board, with the accompanying note: "I propose the following character sequence for joke markers."

Unknowingly, with a few simple keystrokes, Fahlman opened up a can of worms in the way we communicate. In 1982, when the posting was made, there was no such thing as e-mail or text messaging, now the primary forms of communication for many people.

A colon for the eyes, a hyphen for the nose and a right parenthesis for the smile; from these grinning beginnings, the emoticon has smiled its way into everyday communication.

Not just content to remain a frozen smirk, it has learned to wink ;-) and stick out its tongue :-p. Sometimes it gets sad :-( or confused :-S, and sometimes it's scared =:-0 but most of the time it's cheerful :-D.

As it grew older, it had its first kiss :-* and smoked its first cigarette :-Q and even grew its hair out &:-). It's shown its fashion sense, too, sporting sunglasses B-) and baseball caps d:-) and even the occasional bow tie :-)8. The emoticon has changed over the years; it's common to see an equal sign replace the semi-colon for the eyes, and much of the time we're too lazy to even give it a nose :).

But tonight, as it reaches the quarter century mark, it simply puts on a birthday hat <:-).

Performance Testing Guidance for Web Applications

The Microsoft Patterns & Practices has recently released a PDF on "Performance Testing Guidance for Web Applications". This guide shows you an end-to-end approach for implementing performance testing. Whether you are new to performance testing, or looking for ways to improve your current performance testing approach, you will find insights that you can tailor for your specific scenarios.

Parts of this Guide includes:

Part 1, Introduction to Performance Testing

Part II, Exemplar Performance Testing Approaches

Part III, Identify the Test Environment

Part IV, Identify Performance Acceptance Criteria

Part V, Plan and Design Tests

Part VI, Execute Tests

Part VII, Analyze Results and Report

Part VIII, Performance Testing Techniques

Download the Guide from this link.

Orkut - now in Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Tamil and Telugu!

Recently Orkut changed its User Interface and introduced Indian language support. Viewing the orkut site in Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Tamil or Telugu (or any one of our other 12 languages) is easy.

• Click the settings button under your profile photo (or click the blue settings link at the top of any page).


• On the general tab, choose your preferred display language from the drop-down menu at the top of the page.


• Click save changes.

Some of the translations are really funny... :-)


Click here for the Official News Link

ICICI Bank - Phishing Mail (BEWARE!!!)

Today, I received a live phishing mail from an anonymous ICICI Bank sender into my Yahoo Mail Box. Here's the summary of its contents:

From: ICICI BANK" customercare@icicibank.com

Subject: Alert!!! Verify Your Internet Banking Account Immediately Otherwise Your Account Get Blocked!!!

The contents of the mail had information on "Security Updates on Online users", along with the phishing URL's seperate for Individual and Corporate Account holders. These URL's are replica of the actual ICICI online website. Below, is the screenshot of the mail.

And here's the website, when I visited using Internet Explorer 6.0:

This issue was well caught by Internet Explorer 7.0 - refer the screenshot of IE7.

IE7 helps in discovering such phishing, I would like to recommend you to upgrade to IE7 immediately.

Yahoo! Photos is closing in 30 days

If you are using Yahoo! Photos service, then you better move/backup your photo collection before 20-Sep-2007, because Yahoo Photo service is closing soon. You will be given choice to move the photos to other free online services like flickr/photobucket or download them. Here's what the official website says:

http://photos.yahoo.com/

Relief for Tata Sky Customers :-)

Tata Sky customers didn't get Sun TV Channels so far. The case was being heard before the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT). Tata Sky had taken Sun TV network to TDSAT for not providing access to its popular regional channels, though these were being provided to rival DTH company Dish TV. According to the DTH guidelines, broadcasters have to make their channels available to all DTH service providers without any discrimination.

After nearly a year of litigation in the Supreme Court and Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT), Direct-to-Home (DTH) operator TataSky and broadcaster Sun TV have settled their dispute on channel sharing and pricing.

Some of the major channels which will now be available on TataSky’s platform are Sun Tv, K Tv Sun Music, Sun News, Gemini, Teja, Gemini Music, Gemini News, Udaya Tv, Udaya News and Chutti TV.

Consumers (including me) are now waiting for Tata Sky to package the channel (not sure if it will be charged extra) and make them available on thier TV Sets.

60 Years of Independence to India

Wishing all the readers of my blog - A Happy Independence Day 2007.

India's Independence Day (Hindi: स्वतंत्रता दिवस) is celebrated on August 15 to commemorate its independence from British rule and its birth as a sovereign nation on that day in 1947. The day is a national holiday in India. It is celebrated all over the country through flag-hoisting ceremony and distribution of sweets. The main celebration takes place in New Delhi, where the Prime Minister raises the national flag at the Red Fort and delivers a nationally televised speech from its ramparts. In his speech, he highlights the achievements of the government during the past year, raises important issues and gives a call for further development. The prime minister also pays tribute to leaders of the freedom struggle. More on Wiki.