Bad experience with Tata photon Plus speed

A few months back, I finally cancelled my Tata Photon Plus / Tata Docomo subscription due to very low speeds that I consistently faced. If you read their advertise on http://www.tataphoton.com, it says :-

Tata Photon Plus is a High Speed Internet Access Service (HSIA) in the form of a USB Modem offered by Tata Teleservices Ltd. The speeds offered are
        Up to 3.1 Mbps (Downlink)
        Up to 1.8 Mbps (Uplink)

Allured by the high speed numbers, I subscribed to their USB Modem Tata Photon Plus postpaid plan and since then my journey onto the internet had been drastically slow. The speeds were so pathetic (0.10 Mbps to 0.25 Mbps Downlink) that opening any page during any time of the day would take 30-90 secs. Watching videos with this speed was a nightmare.

On complaint, one of the Tata Indicom engineers visited my home and checked my network settings, machine configuration and found those to be up to the mark. Then he told that there might be a network issue with Malad West tower and they were getting many complaints regarding the speed/connectivity. Finally I got a call which stated that we could not resolve this issue unless and until we launch a new site (may be a new tower nearby) in the area.

My concern was why was then issued a connection if it was not going to serve at least half of the advertised speed and why should I pay their highly charged postpaid bills. I continuously followed up with the customer care team and was really frustrated with the replies that I received. Here are some of the replies :-

--------------------
We would like to inform you that we have verified your screen shot and found that you are getting average speed of 256kbps and there is no speed issue.
Please be informed that if you are facing slow speed issue which is less than the average speed i.e.256kbps kindly revert us back which will help us for further proceedings.
--------------------
We would like to inform you that Photon Plus connection provides speed up to 3.1 Mbps. However, the actual connection & browsing speed depends on a variety of factor such as,

1. Number of simultaneous Photon Plus users in your area,
2. Time of the day internet is accessed
3. Webpage accessed
4. Speed of processor
5. Virus & Malware presence in the back ground
6. Size of RAM

Thus, in most real-world situations, you can expect average speeds of 256-600 Kbps (Kilo bits per Second)”

FYI - my machine configuration was one of the best - 6 GB RAM,  Intel i5 Dual Core 2.4 GHz, 64-bit OS

--------------------
We request you to bear with us interim and you will be duly intimated about the resolution for newly site plan.
--------------------

I wish I could have posted the entire email chain, but I think the above replies are sufficient to judge their service and advertisement.

So please DO NOT trust their Advertising speeds. You have every right to ask them questions! Verify the actual upload and download speeds with http://speedtest.net/  -> Click 'Begin Test'

A visit to Asmita center for Handicapped

A couple of weeks back, a small team (which organizes some social responsibility activities) from our company visited Asmita Center for Handicapped. I along with my wife also joined the group. 

Asmita is a NGO based in Mumbai. It runs many projects, amongst which, runs a small vocational training center for physically challenged people in Ashokvan, Borivali (West), Mumbai. Their motto ‘Hum bhi kisi se kam nahi’ is not just on paper, but we could see that motto being carved out into the hearts of many students undergoing various kind of trainings at the institute. 

The center mainly targets handicapped people who are confined to their homes due to their disablilties and lack of self confidence. Asmita volunteers go to the society (which targets mainly slums) looking for such students and persuading their parents to send them to the center. Recently they have started involving college social project teams to reach out to physically challenged people in the society. Each batch consists of about 15-20 students who are trained for about 2 years. The main aim is to build self confidence within these students so that they have the confidence to face the society and the required skills to earn a livelihood for themselves. Up till now the trust has helped more than 1000 handicapped people (called as 'AmrutPutra' and 'AmrutKanya' ) in the center.

The activities in the center include sewing, wood/board panel cutting and painting, making greeting cards, making paper plates, stitching (bags, aprons, mats, etc), agarbattis, other handicrafts used by KG schools, teaching computer basics, etc. At the end of their training period, the students are provided with machinery and equipment to enable them to earn a sustainable living.

Sudha Tai Wagh has been running this center for almost 2 decades on a voluntary basis. Hats off to her dedication! We have certainly a lot to learn from such kind of people. When we were talking to her regarding various aspects/challenges about training the handicapped people,  I remembered this ultimate quote by Mark Twain - "Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see". The proof was right in front of us! :-) The rest of the volunteers consist of teachers (most of whom are students who have passed out in earlier batches), retired people, some young students, helpers and a bus driver. The bus, donated to the trust, picks up the students from their homes to the center and drops them back at their homes. The center also employs a physio to provide medical help to the students.

On our visit, we met with the students, the trainers, the founder member and other volunteers who had decided to spend at least a part of their time supporting the cause – each had a special experience to share and the visit turned out to be a beautiful interaction for all of us there.

We watched videos of the Asmita’s performing team – it’s a team of specially gifted artists who can play musical instruments with their feet, dance on a single leg, sing and entertain like never before! The talent and more importantly the enthusiasm exuberated in these performances is hard to express in words.

They show cased their products and one would never believe that these students could have made them!  Some of us tried our hand at rolling the agarbatti – and none could do it as perfectly as Amol -  Amol could not bend his arms like most of us can, and crawls on his knees.

Each one of us carried back a lot with us - Asmita's people, its humility, its simplicity, its dedication and much more! They definitely need a financial support, but more than that they need volunteers (part time/ full time) to help in their cause. We can definitely try to make a small difference in the lives of  physically challenged people! I am wrong saying this ... It is actually going to change our lives for sure! Let's make them friends forever ...

I would end this post with a very nice quote by Janet Barnes -

"I have not been handicapped by my condition. I am physically challenged and differently able." 

Completely lost in Dhak ...

Another one day bike trek organized by Abhijeet ! This time he planned a trek to Dhak and we joined him to explore the nature trails. Dhak is considered to be one of the most thrilling and challenging treks in Karjat region. We were also very excited for this adventure. It was around 290 Km return journey. (Thane - Lonavala - Kamshet - Kundeshwar and back). We wanted to reach to the narrow ridge between the 'Kalakrai' cliff and the mountain, from where one can climb up to the Bahiri caves. However, we faced very heavy rains and dense fog. We got completely lost .... Since we wanted to come back on same day, we finally decided to return back. It was really difficult to trace the return path in such a dense fog ... but finally we managed it :-) Though we could not complete our trek, we enjoyed the waterfalls, Kundali river, the dense forest as well as fog and the rain bullets ! And needless to say we enjoyed being lost in Nature ! ... Sharing few snaps ...

Beautiful flowers

Sharing some snaps of beautiful flowers (Lotus and Krishnakamal) ... These photos were taken at National Park, Borivali. I am sure you will like it !

 

Trek to Harihar fort

Monsoon has just started in Maharashtra and we could not hold ourselves to experience the green and lively nature in rains. On 7th July, Abhijit and Rajesh planned a one day bike trek to Harihar fort near Nasik. It was around 280 Km of round journey from Mumbai to Harihar and back. The road that we took was Thane -> Kasara -> Khodale -> Nirgudpada.  The base village of Harihar fort is Nirgudpada. It was my first long journey bike experience and I loved it !

Harihar (approx. 3,676 ft) forms a part of the Trimbak range in Nasik region. There are total 117 steps carved beautifully in the rock patch and you really feel like flying on the wings of the wind when there is a very windy and rainy weather while climbing up the steps. We enjoyed the trek very much! Sharing some snaps...

Two states

Should I call this a mere coincidence? A couple of weeks back, my wife and I attended our friend's marriage (Love marriage to be specific). My friend is a Maharashtrian and the bride (who is also my friend) is a Kannadian South Indian. Needless to say the match that the God made is perfect! Both liked each other, fell in love with each other and then finally decided to get married :-) Everyone enjoyed the wedding ceremony.

In the evening, we went to our another friend staying nearby where I located a book - 'Two States - the story of my marriage'  by Chetan Bhagat. I got interested into the book by reading this -

"Love marriages around the world are simple! Boy loves girl. Girl loves boy. They get married.
 
In India, there are a few more steps:-
Boy loves girl. Girl loves boy.
Girl's family has to love boy. Boy's family has to love girl.
Girl's family has to love boy's family. Boy's family has to love girl's family.
Girl and boy still love each other. They get married."

Was this a coincidence that my eyes caught only this book among the other books resting on the bookshelf ? I had just attended a love marriage of my friends who belong to two different states in India. I tried to imagine the conversations/discussions that might have happened between the two families - two communities when my friends had told their decision to them. But I know imagining about a battle is always easy than actually fighting it! So kudos to my friends for winning it ! :-)

I borrowed the book from my friend and was totally engrossed with reading the book after that! A story about two friends - Punjabi and Tamilian, deeply in love and want to get married, not by hurting their parents' feelings, but with a smile on both parents' faces instead! An excellent book which touches your heart ! What I most liked is the approach the couple took to convince their families instead of fighting and rebelling. Chetan has beautifully narrated the story and you won't feel keeping the book down until it is completely finished. Hats off to you Chetan ! I loved the book !

Would like to end this post by providing a part of the speech(message) from the book that the girl's father gave during the wedding ceremony. We should carve this message on our heart :-

"So why do parents object to cross community/culture marriage? It is not only about another community. It is the fact that your daughter has found a boy for herself. We as parents feel disobeyed, left out and disappointed. We bring our children up from babies to adults, how can they ignore us like this? All our frustration comes out in anger.

But we forget that this has happened because your child had love to give to someone in this world. Is that such a bad thing? Where did the child learn to love? From us, after all, the person they loved first is you.

Actually, the choice is simple. When your child decides to love a new person, you can either see it as a chance to hate some people - the person they choose and their families. Which is what we did for a while. However, you can also see it as a chance to love some more people. And since when did loving more people become a bad thing?

Yes, the Tamilian in me is a little disappointed. But the Indian in me is quite happy. And more than anything, the human being in me is happy. After all, we have decided to use this opportunity to create more loved ones for ourselves!"

Enjoy reading!
  

Tuesdays with Morrie

I finally read the book - Tuesdays with Morrie (by Mitch Albom) which I decided to read after I watched the wonderful drama Wah! Guru last month. The drama is based on this book. The thoughts about life and death created such an interest in my mind that I finished reading the book in a single day. I actually got into it! Good utilization of my Saturday time! :-)

Sharing some beautiful thoughts/aphorisms from this book :-

"The culture we have does not make people feel good about themselves. And you have to be strong enough to say if the culture doesn't work, don't buy it."

"Everyone knows they are going to die, but nobody believes it. If we did,we would do things differently."

"To know you are going to die, and to be prepared for it at any time. That way you can actually be more involved in your life while you are living."

"The truth is once you learn how to die,you learn how to live."

"At seventy eight, he was giving as an adult and taking as a child."

"I embrace aging. As you grow, you learn more. If you stayed at 22, you'd always be as ignorant as you were at 22. Aging is not just decay. It's growth. It's more than the negative that you are going to die, it's also the positive that you understand you are going to die, and that you live a better life because of it."

"If you are trying to show off for people at the top, forget it. They will look down at you anyhow. And if you are trying to show off for people at bottom, forget it. They will only envy you. Status will get you nowhere. Only an open heart will allow you to float equally between everyone."

"When you are in bed,you are dead."

"People are only mean when they are threatened. And that's what our culture does. That's what our economy does. Even people who have jobs in our economy are threatened, because they worry about losing them. And when you get threatened, you start looking out only for yourself.You start making money a god. It is all part of this culture."

"Death ends a life, not a relationship."

And will end this post by this beautiful moral story :-

The story is about a little wave, bobbing along in the ocean, having a grand old time. It's enjoying the wind and the fresh air until it notices the other waves in front of him, crashing against the store.

"My God, this is terrible", the wave says."Look what's going to happen to me!" Then along comes another wave. It sees the first wave, looking grim, and it says to the wave, "Why do you look so sad?"

The first wave says,"You don't understand! We are all going to crash! All of us waves are going to be nothing! Isn't it terrible?"

The second wave says,"No, you don't understand. You are not a wave, you are part of the ocean!"

Enjoy reading !

Some updates about my blogging

I decided to separate out the technical stuff from this blog to another blog. So I have now 3 blogs :-

1) About Nature, Literature, Life :-
http://niranjansarade.blogspot.com

2) Technical Stuff :-
http://niranjansarade.tumblr.com/
Have recently shared the slides for my talk @RubyConfIndia 2012 in the above blog.

3) My poem collection :-
http://dhundamanasi.wordpress.com/

Enjoy reading !

Speaking @RubyConf India 2012

I am going to speak @ RubyConf India 2012. This event is happening in Pune !



The title of my talk is 'What lies beneath the beautiful code?'
So get...set...ready... ! :-)
Please stay tuned for the updates !

Aavarana by S. L. Bhyrappa

Recently I read a Marathi translated version of a novel called 'Aavarana(2007)'. The book has been originally written in Kannada by the bestselling novelist Professor S.L.Bhyrappa and translated in Marathi by Uma Kulkarni. The novel portrays the relationship between Hinduism and Islam - in the past and in the present, with two stories going on a parallel track.

The term 'Aavarana' is used in Vedantic literature to denote that aspect of nescience (Avidya) that obscures all things. It is the 'Avidya' that hides the real truth behind its covers. Prof. SL Bhyrappa chose the same name to his novel because he wanted to highlight the current so called Secular and Social faces in India who are trying to hide the real truth with the help of political support.

The book is very informative as the author has actually referred to many books himself before writing this novel. This list can be found at the end of the book nicely included as a part of the story. The incidents that he has narrated by means of a story are based on these references. The author has made very clear that the relationships between communities should be based on a strong foundation of truth rather than systemic misinformation. To be frank, today's education about the Indian history lacks the truth.

One should definitely read this book and have an introspection about what we have been taught since childhood and what is the actual truth. Certainly, no one should feel against Islam or any other religion, that is not the book's intent as clearly stated by the author. The intent is to understand that no relationship can stand successful if it is not based on a strong foundation of truth. Because truth will never die!

Wah! Guru

Last Sunday, I watched an excellent Marathi drama called 'Wah! Guru'. My favorite actor Dilip Prabhawalkar performed excellent in casting the character of Professor Sapre. The drama is based on Mitch Albom's best-selling novel 'Tuesdays with Morrie - an old man, a young man, and life's greatest lesson'.

It is a story of courage and optimism of Professor Sapre who is diagnosed with the terminal illness of Motor Neuron Disease (MND), a very rare disease due to which the patient loses his muscular control and finally succumbs to it. But Prof. Sapre asks himself - Do I wither up, or do I make the best of my time left?

He makes Death as his final project. Since everyone is going to die, his death can be taught in personal class, that's what he thinks. He starts teaching the bridge between life and death to one of his students by narrating small inspirational stories. And the student actually benefits from his teachings, his positive attitude.

I liked this dialog - 'When you're in bed, you're dead!'
And also this conversation between the student and the professor:-

Student : "Why should we care or think about death now as it approaches towards end of our life ?"
Professor : "My thinking is opposite. The life ends when death approaches us. And hence we need to think of Death every day."

The ebook is available @TuesdaysWithMorrie

So, please watch this wonderful drama or read the book if you haven't already ! Needless to say that my next plan is to read this book ! :-)

Making Gedit look like Textmate for Ubuntu

Textmate is the most popular editor tool available exclusively only for Mac OS. Developers love it due to its simplicity, lightweightness and excellent feature set availability. While working on Ubuntu (11.10 64-bit), we have the default gedit editor available which is also very good. However, if we want to have some Textmate like features with gedit, we can follow these simple steps to make gedit look like Textmate:-

(1) Installing extra gedit plugins :-

$ sudo apt-get install gedit-plugins

(2) Installing Textmate 'Monaco' font

Download from http://www.gringod.com/wp-upload/software/Fonts/Monaco_Linux.ttf and execute below commands:



(3) Installing syntax color scheme darkmate.xml

Download the darkmate.xml file from http://grigio.org/files/darkmate.xml

From gedit, go to Edit -> Preferences -> Font & Colors. Then click Add button and locate the download file(darkmate.xml). Also select the Monaco font.



(4) Activating installed plugins from gedit -> Edit -> Preferences -> Plugins



From this pane,we can enable following plugins as per our requirements :-
-Bracket Completion
-Code Comment
-File Browser Panel
-Snippets
-Word Completion, etc.

With these settings, your gedit now looks like Textmate :-




If you want to avoid the above steps, then we have also another option called Gmate. GMate is a collection of plugins, themes/styles and other improvements to get TextMate-like features in Gedit. The package will add some themes and plugins you can enable/disable from the Gedit preferences. To install GMate in Ubuntu, use the following commands:



In the upcoming posts, we will also try some other text editors available for Linux Ubuntu.

Recording tests with JMeter

We had a requirement of load/performance testing in one of my earlier projects. Instead of using commercial and expensive Silk performer, we gave a try to open source Apache JMeter and it worked really well for the purpose that we were looking for.

The Apache JMeter is an open source software, a 100% pure Java application designed to load test functional behavior and measure performance.

There is an excellent step by step guide available @JMeter proxy Step-by-step for how to record tests with JMeter. The guide explains the steps for creating a test plan with JMeter's proxy. The proxy records the requests sent to the server.

There are different kind of Listeners available for viewing load test results like Aggregate Report, Aggregate Graph, Summary Report, View Results Tree, Monitor Results, etc. Sharing one sample output of Aggregate Report :-



While setting up the load tests, we also need to take care of some config elements for more accurate results like HTTP Cookie Manager, HTTP Authorization Manager,HTTP Cache Manager, HTTP Request Defaults,HTTP Header Manager, etc.

I could not go through all the elements of test plan in depth due to time constraint, but one can go through these documentation links for stepping into more technical details :-

- JMeter User Manual
- Elements of a Test Plan
- Component Reference

Installing VM(with Ubuntu + RVM + Ruby + Rails) on my Windows 7 system

I wanted to give a try on my Windows 7 system to create and run Virtual Machine with Ubuntu OS. As my colleague Manohar rightly pointed out the reason @Ruby on Rails Development Platform in Enterprise behind this, I followed the instructions to install VMWare and Ubuntu on my Windows 7 laptop.

A. Download and Install VMWare Player which is free for personal non-commercial use.

B. Download 64-bit ISO of Ubuntu.

C. Create a New Virtual Machine for Ubuntu 64-bit using VMware Player. The steps are simple. It takes default 512 MB of RAM but I allocated 2 GB of RAM. It took me around 1 and half hour to install all the necessary files for ubuntu. So have a patience!

My host system configuration :-
Processor: Intel Core Dual i5 CPU, RAM: 6GB, 64-bit Operating System, Windows 7 Home Premium

Some issues that I faced and the corresponding resolution :-

(1) With Ubuntu 32-bit(recommended) ISO file download, the VMWare could not identify the 64-bit Ubuntu OS. So I downloaded 64-bit ISO file for Ubuntu 11.10 verison. With this file, the VMWare was able to detect 64-bit Ubuntu OS correctly.

(2) When I went ahead with the installation, I got 2 warnings/errors :-





To run virtualization software and virtual machines, hardware virtualization technology should be enabled. I enabled Virtualization Technology (VT) in motherboard BIOS settings which is disabled by default and then restarted my machine. This resolved my issue and Ubuntu(64-bit) was then successfully installed on my VM.

I followed the steps mentioned @Ubuntu, Ruby, RVM, Rails, and You to install RVM, Ruby 1.9.3, Rails 3.1.3 and mysql2. The steps are self explanatory and straight forward to follow. Thanks to Ryan Bigg for this !

Now I am ready to try out some ruby/rails development on Ubuntu @ my home pc :-)

Snaps from Sudhagad fort

My wife and I recently visited Sudhagad fort near Pali. Sharing few snaps captured from Sudhagad fort. (Sunset view is my favorite! :-)

Tailbaila view from top :-




Sunset view :-








Enjoy the nature beauty ! :-)

Security Check Fever

Terrorist attack is not new to Mumbai, rather I should say to India. After the Mumbai terrorist attack in year 2008 in which around 200 people were openly killed by Pakistani terrorists, the security measure concern was again raised as usual as it has been for every such terrorist attack in past. Security was again made tight in every government as well as private organizations, public places, etc.

However, this Security check Fever unfortunately did not last for long. We Mumbaikars tend to forget things fast as we are so called very busy people tied to the running clock. Thousands of candles were lighted protesting the so called Coward Terrorist Act and our security chain started to become weak once again.

The organization that I work in is India's one of the largest business process outsourcing service organizations. My organization was no exception to this temporary security fever. Initially, the security was made very tight. But since past couple of years, what I have observed is :-

1) Security guards most of the times only pat on the bag/sack to check whether a person is carrying any weighted thing.
2) They just ask people whether you are carrying any laptops/media or not.
3) In one of the office buildings there is no metal detector entrance gate or even no metal detector equipments.
4) The bag is usually not opened properly and checked.
5) The I-card at the very entrance is usually not verified with the person's face carrying the I-card.
6) The decklids of cars are only opened and checked. Security guards don't realize that the things can be carried away or brought inside from inside the car as well. From the bags inside the car or from under the seats for example.
7) Under Car Inspection mirrors are rarely used.
8) Person's shirt/trousers pockets are never checked at all.

I do not want to add more items to this list. The issue is when are we going to learn from History ? After all, the attacker has no different face to identify.
I would not be surprised if any terrorist attack strikes again in any part of Mumbai. And the only responsible people for letting this attack successful would be we, ourselves. So please be cautious and tighten our security measures !
Vande Mataram !

Kashmir photos

I along with my family went to Kashmir tour in the last week of December 2011. The nature beauty truly mesmerized our minds. Sharing some snaps of the paradise on the earth.