The first thing I did was to turn off the 3G radio. Since India does not have 3G yet, and not expected for another 6 months on Airtel. It’s best to turn this off to save battery. To do this, just go to Settings->General->Network and turn off ‘Enable 3G’.

Next thing I noticed is that iTunes would take way too long to backup the phone everytime I wanted to sync. So I disabled the automatic backup by doing the following on my mac:

Open Terminal, type: defaults write com.apple.iTunes DeviceBackupsDisabled -bool true
and hit return

Note iTunes should not be running when you do this. Launch iTunes after doing this and it won’t backup the phone every time. I am thinking that I would like to re-enable backup by changing the ‘true’ above to ‘false’ once in a month.

For Windows folks:
1. Locate your iTunesPrefs.xml file. It’s usually located in C:\Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\Apple Computer\iTunes or C:\Documents and Settings\username\Local Settings\Application Data\Apple computer\iTunes.
2. Open it in Notepad and search for a section called User Preferences and paste the following snipped into the User Preferences Section after the first <dict>:

<key>DeviceBackupsDisabled</key>
<data>
dHJ1ZQ==
</data>

3. Save the file and launch iTunes. You may want to take a backup of your existing iTunesPrefs.xml first.

Next: Turn off the Equalizer of the iPod since it eats up battery when it plays songs. Turn off the EQ by going to the Settings > iPod > EQ and change to Off.

I’ll add more as I use my iPhone more

The announcement came during a quarterly conference call with financial analysts in which chief operating officer Tim Cook and chief financial officer Peter Oppenheimer discussed Apple’s results for the fiscal third quarter.

Rumours are that Vodafone will make iPhone 3G available in the Czech Republic, Egypt, Greece, South Africa, Turkey, and most importantly — India. Details of price plans will be made available in the respective countries by individual Vodafone operating companies. Vodafone customers in all of these markets including India can pre-register online and in retail stores in the next few days.

Meanwhile, Airtel customers who wish to receive more information on the Apple iPhone can send an SMS with keyword “iPhone” to 54321 (toll-free number). Airtel will announce details regarding pricing and availability at a later date, the company said.

• logical
• curious nature
• tenacious
• patient
• self-confident
• detail-oriented
• methodical
• polite
• creative
• calm
• analytical
• cooperative
• rational
• ability to see the implications of a decision
• desire to solve problems
• seeks mental challenges
• self-motivating
• ability to focus
• works well alone
• focused 

Lifestyle & Habits

• Are socially inept and “normal” people who expect things like stimulating and thought-providing conversation with them will be disappointed.
• Struggle with a social life because they cannot place appearance above function. Body language, they believe, is too imprecise to be useful for communication.
• Are fascinated with gadgets. Generally speaking, non-technical people believe the adage “if it aint broke, don’t fix it.” IT professionals believe that if it ain’t broke, it doesn’t have enough features yet.
• Make clothing their lowest priority assuming the basic temperature and decency threshold has been satisfied. Anything more is a waste.
• Are excessively honest even in the most awkward situations, except for white lies like “I won’t change anything without clearing it with you.”
• Are exceedingly frugal because when it comes to money every spending situation becomes a problem of resource optimization.
• Delight in sharing their wisdom even in areas in which they have no experience. They believe that their command of logic provides them with inherent insight into any field. Non-technical people, of course believe that knowledge comes through experience.
• Have amazing powers of concentration. Of course this leads to devoting days to devising an elegant solution to a simple problem because they can hear the computer laughing at them.
• Hate risk because managers make such a big deal out of one little mistake. Just look at the Hindenberg, Apollo 13, the Hubble space telescope, and the Space Shuttle Challenger
• Knows that programming is a creative art and is anything but boring
• Takes great pride in his work and gets great satisfaction from it
• Tries to reduce the complexity of both the problem and the solution
• Is in a hurry but is never too busy to help others learn
• Seeks out constructive criticism and provides constructive criticism for others
• Has worked on failed projects but has consciously learned from those failures
• Is a master of his tools
• Never stops learning and gets a thrill from the ‘aha’ moments

Three Great Virtues

1. Laziness
   The quality that makes you go to great effort to reduce your overall energy expenditure. It makes you write robust, modular, well-documented programs so you can reuse the code.
2. Impatience
   The anger you feel when the computer is being lazy, which happens when another programmer is not lazy. It makes you write programs that use minimal code so they’re fast, efficient, and anticipate what needs to be done.
3. Hubris
   The pride that makes you write and maintain programs that you and your peers will admire. If hubris is uncontrolled or undeserved, it can also get you in trouble.

(Taken from various sources, including works by Larry Wall, Scott Adams, Richard Bandler & John Bentley)

“In addition to loading web pages 1.9 times faster than Internet Explorer 7 and 1.7 times faster than FireFox 2, Safari 3.1 runs JavaScript up to six times faster than other browsers”  - Apple.com

Generally, the browser feels more stable and polished then before, definitely worth keeping and using. 

Of course, there are a host of new features like HTML5 support and Google Gears type caching. 

     Among all members of L, which is the “best” and thus, which should I learn and use?

A variant of M, let’s call it M’, is:

     Is L(x) “better” than L(y)?

Let P be the purpose for which you wish to learn a “best” language.

Let A be the answer to M or M’ with condition P as a constraint.  A is thus the following set:
 

1) P = “I am interested in the design of languages and/or language theory.”

Learn as many members of L as time permits.  Do not pollute L with your own ideas until you really understand what you are doing and what has already been done.  Then do so only if you are convinced  you can materially add to the state-of-the-art with original and useful work.  The world does not need another language just so you can prove that you understand LR(1) grammars.  Implement a subset of at least one existing language yourself to see just how hard this is to do well.
 

2) P = “My current language is too slow/big in its appointed task.”

Most of the time, these problems have a lot more to do with poor programming and algorithm/data structure design than they do the language.  Really get under the covers of your programming style and design approach before you abandon the language you currently know best.  Read Bentley’s “Programming Pearls.”  Learn to use a profiler.  Consider optimizations which merely replace the slow/big portions of the code with something written in a naturally faster/smaller language.
 

3) P = “I have a specialty problem domain which is not well addressed by a general purpose programming language.”

Research what has already been done.  You can often find close enough matches to your problem within other problem domains to get something useful done.  If there really is nothing useful out there, strongly consider using one of the extant scripting languages to build a “little language” of your own which addresses your problem area.  If all else fails, ignore 1) above, and invent your own language, but keep it as small and simple as possible, or you’ll spend less time on your chosen problem area and most of your time maintaining your new language.
 

4) P = “I need to become/stay employable.”

Survey common practice in your profession of choice and determine the most common operating systems, GUIs, and languages already in use and the probable evolution of these items in the next several  ears.  Based on this information, you should select one procedural language, one object language, one scripting language, and, possibly, one assembly language which will comprise your core skill set.  In selecting these, also consider the availability of supporting tools like standard libraries, debuggers, language-sensitive editors, profilers, and so on.  If you have some choice of languages, always prefer those that share a common link format and have compatible inter-language calling APIs.  If it comes down to a tie, pick the older language because it will almost always have fewer bugs.
 

5) P = “I want to write ‘portable’ code.”

Warning: Computer Science Heresey follows.  I’ve already been burned at the stake in this matter, so put your matches away.

Code ‘portability’ is overrated.  Way more important is the portability of your programming skills.  Languages come and go (well, they never really go, do they), but a good programmer expresses themselves well in pretty much any language.  This comes with time, experience, reading other people’s very good code and doing it wrong over and over again.  The most portable language in the world can’t help you if you don’t understand algorithms, data structures, object decomposition, and how to trade off between them.  Writing truly ‘portable’ code has as much to do with your understanding of the underlying operating environments (hardware, OS, network, I/O, and GUI) as it does with the language in question.

There are, of course, cases where portability is very important.  For example, if you are writing commercial software which must run on lots of different platforms for your company to succeed.  In that case, first see if you can find cross-platform library support so you don’t have to do it all yourself.
 

6) P = “I want to make lots of money.”

Quit programming.  Become a rock star, actor, or corrupt politician.  The odds of getting rich in these fields, however slight, are probably better than in programming.
 

7) P = “I’ve heard that OO is the way to do things, so I want the best OO language.”

OO is one way to crack a problem.  It is not the only way.  More importantly,  it is often not a good way.  A solid OO language should be in your bag of tricks, but it’s not the only thing you will need.
 

8)  P = “I’ve heard that AI is the way to do things, so I want the best AI language.”
See 7) above.
 

9)  P = “I want to produce code faster.”
 

Type faster.  It doesn’t matter what you type because if speed is your goal you’ll just become expert at writing buggy code, so why bother with syntax and semantics at all?  Correct code is always produced by people who are thoughtful and deliberate about what they are doing.  Oh, and in the long run, they’re almost always faster getting things done too.
 

10) P = “I want the <gender/species> of choice to like me and be impressed enough to go out with me.”
 

See 6) above.
 

11) P = “The system I must use prescribes a vendor-defined language and tool set.  I want other choices.”
 

See if there are Open Source or alternative vendor choices for that platform.  If not, master the languages/tools on that plaform then broaden your horizons as a matter of professional pride and employability.  See 4) above.
 

12) P = “I’m very nerdy.  All I like to do is code on as many different platforms with as many different languages as I can.  My Resume’ is 14 pages long. I have not been out of the house since 1982.  Please help.”
 

Get a life.  Read some poetry, or better still, write some (without using curly braces or semicolons).  Learn a musical instrument that does not require electricity in any form.  Get a low-tech hobby like gardening or sewing.  You are an Addict - I feel your pain.  As a recovery strategy, consider volunteering your skills to a cause that’s worth your time and effort and which requires you to interact with people who have absolutely no clue how a computer works.  Try not to be a jerk when the local minister does not grasp the elegance of your finely tuned LaTeX macro for generating the Sunday Bulletin.  Do something good for your body and your spirit.  I strongly recommend at least one high-activity sport (channel surfing does not qualify) and shooting semi-automatic handguns (at paper targets in a legal manner) as excellent mind-clearing tools.  Collect something other than computer manuals.
 

13) P = “I want to be famous.”

Rob a bank and get caught.  OR  Write a ton of really useful code and then give it away.
 

14) P = “I’m bored, I need a new challenge.”

If you already know more than 5 languages, consider joining the Navy SEALs - they are very busy at the moment and are always looking for an Adventurer just like you.   If you are over 19 and this is therefore impractical, get married and raise children.  You will never be bored.

(Originally posted on comp.lang.python, 1 May, 2002)

I’m writing in reference to the new7wonders.com initiative, the monument is a marvel of engineering and architecture, but our attitude towards it and the people coming to see it is hardly a ‘wonder’.

I’d rather choose ‘Christ Redeemer’ in Rio, anyone landing into Rio can see it - it’s a fantastic symbol of welcoming everyone with open arms.

I’ve not voted yet, I probably won’t.

It’s quite stable and most sites I visited looked good, so not much of javascript/flash/etc issues as of now. I’ve heard it’s got problems and has crashed on a few guys - but hey it’s a beta - final version is not expected till September 2007!

Suddenly, he smelled a marvelous aroma. “Wow! I’ve never smelled anything that good,” he
thought. He followed the aroma, and it led him to a little shop he hadn’t noticed before.
The sign over the shop read, The Best Cookies in the World. “If they taste anything like
they smell,” he thought, “they will indeed be the best cookies in the world.”

He went into the shop. “Do you have any chocolate chip cookies?” he asked the woman behind
the counter.

“Of course we do,” she replied, “and they are the biggest and the best chocolate chip cookies
in the nation. As you and I both know, everything in Texas is bigger and better than anywhere
else.”

“Great,” the fellow said, “I’d like half a dozen, please.”

She boxed them, and he picked up his briefcase and newspaper and walked towards the terminal.
When he arrived the terminal was crowded, and he looked all over to see if there was one seat
that would let him be by himself. He saw one seat with a table next to it, then a grandmother
seated on the far side with her two grandchildren. He walked quickly over to that seat, put
his things down, took out his newspaper, and began to read it. It wasn’t long before he could
smell those cookies again, and he wondered whether they really did taste as good as they
smelled. “I wouldn’t want to take something home that didn’t taste good,” he thought.

“Maybe I should try one.” He reached over, took a cookie from the box on the table, and began
to eat it. It was excellent. He was savoring the flavor when he saw out of the corner of his
eye the grandmother reaching toward his box of cookies. He watched as she took one and began
to eat it. He couldn’t believe his eyes. The nerve of that woman to take one of his cookies!
But he couldn’t face embarrassing her publicly, so he turned back to his newspaper in disbelief.

A short while later, he thought, “If I eat one more cookie, I can take the last three to my
wife and she’ll never know the difference.” As he reached over to take another cookie, he
was stunned to see the grandmother taking not just one cookie, but two. She gave them to her
grandchildren, who began happily munching them.

“This is outrageous! Unbelievable! How can she do that!” he thought. However, he was still
unwilling to face her. Again he returned to his paper, but he was very angry inside. “She
won’t get my last cookie,” he thought, so he reached over to take it. But the woman reached
over at the same time, and their hands paused above the last cookie. He glanced at her. She
smiled at him. He returned to his newspaper. She took the cookie, broke it, and gave half
to him while she ate the other half.

That was the last straw! In anger, he hurriedly ate the half cookie she had given him,
grabbed his briefcase and newspaper, and stomped over to the other side of the terminal.
He waited there seething with anger until his flight boarded. He charged onto the plane,
flung himself down in his seat, jerked down the tray table in front of him, slammed his
briefcase down on it, opened the briefcase… and there was his box of cookies!

Four things you can never recover:

The Stone… after it’s thrown
The Word… after it’s said
The Occasion… after it’s over.
The time… after it’s gone.