Its not blocked anymore!

For a few years now, blogs have been blocked at my office. And a casual try today revealed that it no longer is.

And so my first entry after quite sometime.

There has been so much happening in the past 2 years, I cant stop to even recollect. Its been a whirlwind time.

So slowly when the context is set, I shall post whats been happening. Right now, I am in the transition phase of a project we delivered for International Sourcing (TESCO), and I have been asked to take up the Tesco Bank project from where it was left (the lead just left the organization).

Between this, the demands of personal life have increased as well. More news along the way.

Got my hands and feet full at the moment.

PS: Twitter is still blocked. And typing on a touch phone is not my cup of tea I figured. I need a new phone, but pretty sure that isnt allowed for a while now. Too many unused electronics at home.

Tough Day

What do you do after a tough day at office? Really cant figure out a balming activity. However, indulging due to a bit of self pity doesnt hurt!

Forgetting..

a lot of birthdays and stuff.

And these days, the craving for a PDA phone is starting to take giant proportions. Another year and I may get it officially. But nothing like your own.

I've had a whirlwind weekend, a sleepless 24 hours, which involved a lot of travel and a LOT of questioning. Ended up MAJORLY disappointed at standards at the interviews.

Relished free food at Taj Krishna, and flicked a couple of pens. Had a relaaaxxxedddd evening at a nearby lounge (Fusion 9/ Grill Home) and then flew back to Bangalore and reached home in the wee hours on Sunday.

Another trip to Hosur, and another early morning drive back to office on Monday. I need a break. Soon.

This week's quite a ride so far. Mrs is back on Thursday.

My friend coined a good word for me. Bachelore - Thats where I am when wife's traveling! Quite ingenial!

One more week...

of wife not being in India. She's off to Dallas for a week.

I'm spending most of the evenings learning JSP, ASP and the likes. Have taken up something nice, and will be wonderful if it works out.

On other news, I may be at Hyd this weekend for taking interviews. Santosh, who interviewed me for Tesco, spoke to me today and was telling me how life comes full circles many times. I will be on the other side of the table, probably at the same venue. And am visiting Hyd after a long loooong time.

Looking to catch up with you guys at Hyd. Look out for me.

The Pressures of IT Life

Were at the fullest today.

I dont even want to recount the day at office, since its only going to increase my BP.

Anyway, as I am writing this post, I am relaxed and the whole bay is calm, what with probably 6 or 7 people at office right now. I will be the last one to leave today also.

Last night, was the night of great coincidence. I had booked a cab for 1 AM and then advanced it to 11 PM. And who is the cabbie who comes? The same I had blogged about recently. Fantastic coincidence actually.

But something weird happened, he gave me his cell number so that I can call whenever I wanted a cab. And I entered it in my cell and when I tried to save it, my cell just went crazy. Restarted itself, something it has never done before. I took it as a sign and didnt bother to save the number later though I said I did. We reached Hatfield by around 11.35 PM and he wanted to give me something, anything. His hands reached an unopened Diet Coke and he wanted me to have it. I politely declined saying I am not going to drink it at that hour anyway.

Woke up at around 8 this morning and skipped breakfast and hit the gym at 8.20. I have begun to like the lonely time at the gym, the TV at full volume playing either a good show or some good music. So gymmed till 9.35 and got ready by 10.30. A lady drove the cab which was supposed to pick me up. And we took a different route, a wrong decision eventually on her part. She was so apologetic for the insane traffic, and was getting very tense, asking me if I was missing any appointments. I said I'd rather have traffic as an excuse and miss whatever appointments I had today. She calmed down a bit and the drive was really pleasant.

Planned to leave by 5 PM today, but as luck would have it under the circumstances, decided to stay till 9.30 PM - for now. Its around 7.30 now and I hope everything is fine by 9.30.

Okay, will get back to the wonderful world of coding.

Going Live

Our project is going live this week. And the processes have started.
Strangely though, I am not feeling any extra enthusiasm though I have been involved sufficient enough to feel proud and happy and all that.

But looking at all others around me buzzing, it is rubbing off on me. Some sort of eagerness as well as anxiety.

Wife is going back to India this weekend. I have another month atleast to kill here.
But I've already had enough of staying here I guess. It is getting beyond boring here. I dont know what it is about this country: it is lovely, it is nice, people are friendly, but at the end of the day, the place where I grew up has grown on me so much, that it is not even possible to think about settling anywhere else.

At work, responsibility is growing, but not the workload. I am beginning to see what it is to be managing a few people. Right now, just leading people as a technical expert - no intentions to insult the word "expert" but it is just the name of the role I am playing. I've got a well-knit bunch of people in my track, and hence am beginning to enjoy the role. I am missing the uncomplicated days though, of someone handing over a module to me and I would just sit and concentrate on that alone.

Meetings after meetings now to check where we are in the going-live process. Another one in 3 minutes. Its fun to see people around me getting nervous. And its a bit discomforting that I am being so indifferent, but what the heck.

Time's up. Will be back soon.

Easily Difficult

Warren Buffet says:
'There seems to be some perverse human characteristic that likes to make easy things difficult.'

How correct is that!

Many times now, I have been noticing that when someone finishes something in 5 or 10 minutes, which usually takes more than 30 mins, nobody is bothered and act as though it is expected.

But at the same time, when someone huffs and puffs to complete something that takes 5 minutes, in 30 minutes and then makes a big deal of it, people actually sit up and notice and cry out how great this person is!

It is universal truth and people like to think everything is difficult; and the more you struggle to do something, the more you are appreciated! Well, most of the times!

I have worked with people who silently do the toughest things and you'll never know it, and I "am" working with people who do housekeeping of instances and go on about it for a week - and get all the attention!

I am somewhere in the middle I guess.

Talking Nonsense

Everyone talks nonsense at some point or the other.

But what do you do if you have a person you have to constantly interact with, and of the total conversation he is having with you, only 2% is relevant information.

It seriously pisses me off to approach him on any topic, simply because of the 15 or 20 minutes I spend with him, only 1 minute is useful and this happens all the time, everytime.

"Anand, that report is running so slowly. It takes 20 minutes. If it takes so much time, thats all. What will the stakeholders do, waiting for this report to complete. If you ask me, you can have couple of coffee breaks simply waiting for the report. Imagine someone sitting and staring at the system, just waiting for the report to finish. They spend so much money on the development of these things and then someone comes with such a slow code. Again waste of money while these people sit no. We have to look into it and improve the performance"

Of this, the only useful relevant information for me was that "20 minutes" detail. Ah God! I mean, even I have made useless statements like these on numerous occassions, so its not like I am proclaiming that I am a no-nonsense man. But EVERYTIME? Drives me crazy.

Everytime I go through such conversations with anybody, I always remember a small conversation that happened in my college:
There was this friend of mine, B, a topper from the computer science department. He is always used to answering all the questions and scoring top marks all the time. And after a particular exam, we all met at the canteen, and along with us was a topper from the Electronics & Communication Dept, lets call him S. B was terribly depressed that for the first time in many years, he didnt answer all questions. When S asked B what the matter was, B said "Dont even ask! I did not write the answers for the last 2 questions in the 16 marks section. I did not have the time to finish and I had to hand over the paper without finishing my answers which I knew by heart" etc etc and went on and on to complain. S listened to it all and at the end of it said "If you had said you couldnt complete the paper, that would have been enough for me as an answer for my question to you. Maybe you answered your other questions in the exam the same way you answered mine now!"

The look on B's face was priceless.

The Missing Link

What is the missing link between a developer and a tester - after a hard time thinking about it, I conclude its Professionalism.

And is exactly what was missing between me and a tester today. On both sides ofcourse. Thats because we took it "personally".

Face it, a developer never takes issues well. And a tester never takes "no" for an answer when he says its an issue. So the basic path they both travel to meet each other is screwed.

But today was a whole new ball game. I was driven to such a bad corner, that I would have blasted out like Neo (Neo yaar! that Matrix guy! oh c'mon!).

The tester, lets name him Jelly (oh I just read about the JellyBean issue with Zaheer Khan). So Jelly calls me to tell me that my code doesnt work.

Aha I say! You JellyBelly, you better get a degree in interpersonal skills.
My code NEVER has issues.

But anyway, Jelly continues to explain how this is an issue. You see, he did something that is not ideal in a production environment and that screwed up what my program does. So I said, "Jelly, but this is not how the production system works"
Jelly says "Yeah I know that"

Me: "Oh well. Then I assume the meeting ends here"

Jelly: "Oh No! But your code doesnt work"

Me:(you gotto be kidding me) "Precisely. It wont because it is not supposed to"

Jelly: "This is a negative test case I put in. And your code failed"

Me: (so is there a positive test case? oh I thought if you test positive, thats bad news! oh what a sense of humour...pat pat for me) "Well...I dont know what you are trying to tell me"

Jelly: "I know people wont do this in production. But nevertheless your code shouldnt go crazy"

Me: "FYI, thats not 'going crazy'. Thats not meeting something outside requirement, and logically what you are doing is incorrect" (You dont buy code and get some lines free you see)

Jelly: "Hmmm. Alright"

And the next thing I see, is a mail from him asking me for clarification with stakeholders in CC! Ooh Jelly! You hit the wrong note. Face the noise now.

So I sent a "reply all", with contents effectively declaring him a loser.
It gives me a chill when I realize I enjoyed it. It felt good to be bad, is that good or bad?

So as this battle was progressing (I feel so small now at the thought that I was involved in it) I ventured into the deep philosophical research of why this happens all the time.

And there! Like a bolt of lightening tearing through me, I was comprehensively enlightened.

I share the valuable knowledge here with the world:
"Screw it and get back to kicking a$$"

Meeeeetings

Most of the meetings I attend, turn out to be time I think I wasted. Or it is the general theory behind meetings to provide a break in the otherwise ultra-busy super-productive time at work one has?

Atleast in my case, the second part is true!

And today is the mother of all meeting schedules I have had here on site.
4 continuous meetings, 30 mins, 30 mins, 1 hour, 30 mins, during the last part of the day. And thats what sucks even more about it. And no break inbetween, but then I remember, meetings are themselves breaks.

And the worse news is, in all meetings, the max number of participants is 4. And so they can easily catch me napping.

Aaaargggh!!! It is just one of those days!!!

Its a Picnic at Office

Today is a very eventful day!
Btw, it is 20th July by UK time, so you dont get confused by "today".

Ah, the joys and travails of traveling. And keeping your mind always ready for the fact that there are different time zones.

Anyway, in our office yesterday, someone deleted a domain profile and nobody is able to login into the domain. Whereas I am logging into the Indian domain from UK and hence I dont have a problem... And its not resolved even today. Thats going to mean one of two things: 1. Everyone in my team is going to dump work to me or 2. We all pack up and leave early. Fingers crossed for option 2.

User Acceptance Testing for my project is on, and that is now leading to a bit of panic what with all systems down. But we are ever resourceful arent we.

The whole office is like one big picnic today, with everyone roaming about and discussing their good fortune for friday! ;)

And well, now that I've done enough browsing, I'm joining them! Tadaah!

The Sweet Sound of the Fire Alarm!

As I write this blog, my office is engulfed in the sound of the fire alarm here!

There are two around 4 fire escapes in the office, and opening it triggers an alarm (well, you would say we should open it in case of an alarm, but then this makes a bit of sense too)

Someone opened one of the doors accidentally, and the alarm has gone off. For a couple of minutes, everybody was up and about, and a crowd gathered near the door, shook their heads and everyone is back at the desk coz no one could do anything about it. It is still ringing, but everyone is calm and working.

Makes me think, if it were to happen back in India at my office, everyone would have whined and complained and gotten irritated and gone out. Here, people are just waiting for the right person to do the job and they've gotten back to theirs. Small things that you learn, placing work as a priority when at office and when there is no threat to life.

And to be fair, the alarm isnt very irritating.

UPDATE: Someone banged the door and the alarm stopped!

UPDATE: It started again!!!

UPDATE: It stopped...Phew! I dont know who did it, but it stopped and thats what matters now :)

Custom pll

I know not many understand the heading. It is something regarding my work. And my domain.

The first time I had to do a change to custom.pll, which is a custom library, it took be a day and a half to understand its structure, way back in 2003.

Today there was a simple change to be done, and I took exactly 11 minutes to code, test and deploy.

I was just sitting back and wondering, how much I've come across in my professional life and in my domain, and where I stand right now. As of now, I am pretty pleased :)