Owner: MGL Unplugged URL:http://mglunplugged.com/ Join Date: Mon, 08 Oct 2007 05:43:33 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: We, at MGL, indulge in blogging for a variety of reasons. Some of us enjoy creative writing as a way of escaping the burden of constantly staring at our computer screens. Others blog since they believe that knowledge sharing is the only that the world wil Site statistics:Click here
As the worm turns 2007-08-16 12:33:15
With the W32.USB worm creeping and crawling to net users worldwide, a variety of technology-based blogs and anti-virus websites are offering solutions to battle it. A colleague of mine has even uploaded two posts on this blog that offer a remedy for the worm.‘Dnt hate Mozilla but use IE or else’We know that you ‘Dnt hate Mozilla’Spyware Guide - a renowned and comprehensive online hub dedicated to covering all aspects of challenges faced by PC users today - have this to say about the dreaded worm.TAGS:dnt hate Mozilla, use IE or else, W32.USB, spyware, blog Read more:turns
Our tube? 2007-08-16 12:31:13
Last Monday, CNN held a political debate that featured Democratic candidates responding to videos from YouTube users. Moderated by CNN's Anderson Cooper, this two-hour show broke cable news records by delivering the highest viewership for a debate among adults in the 18-34 category.Television and web technology. Quite a pair, aren’t they?TAGS:YouTube, CNN, debate
Big Bang 2020 2007-08-16 12:28:38
Will it be the web services bellwether Google or Microsoft, IBM, HP, TCS, Infosys or a new entity we have not heard of as yet that will breach the trillion-dollar market capitalization mark? Will we have to wait till 2020? Microsoft leads to race today as the world’s most valuable software technology firm with a market capitalization close to the $ 300 billion mark. Google has been the notional leader though, with its growth from the garage to $ 170 billion market cap within a decade. So will it be Google then?Google has rushed in to fill a void as a search engine pioneer and quickly grew into being a web services supermarket. It has you and me in its pocket. But does it have the rest of our known world, enterprise applications, infrastructure and the rest of the commercial software world eating out of its hands? Guess not, and but who are the leaders in this space? IBM, HP, Microsoft, TCS, Infosys, Accenture and like-minded ones. Let’s collectively refer to them as the “vendor Read more:Big Bang
From the tube to you 2007-10-16 10:50:37
It’s been quite a hectic week on the YouTube circuit, as Google’s premier video sharing website has been on a roll, collecting both brickbats and accolades. The biggest news of them all being that Google has announced a “long-awaited video piracy blocker” which has been designed to block copyrighted videos. Using “video finger printing” technology, YouTube executives have said that all the videos uploaded would be compared to a unique digital identification before they are available for public viewing. All that remains to be seen is whether the viewing community will work with YouTube to stem the flow of pirated content.In what is likely to rock the world of online videos, police in Philippines have obtained information that Al-Qaida linked extremists under their country’s military siege are receiving “fresh funding through the popular video-sharing website.” Stay tuned for more updates on this issue, but for now – let’s leave it at that!British television
Our nature, our productivity 2007-10-16 09:43:04
Mankind has a history of learning behavioural patterns from Nature, without even realizing that we unconsciously imbibe so many things!! Give it a thought. Nature is the best teacher who teaches the most complicated lessons in the simplest manner possible. Despite the availability of high tech communication devices, the biggest challenge today we face is to increase the speed and responsiveness of our teams. Lets take a closer look at the Nature’s self-managed teams.Take for instance, a creature million of times smaller than humans. Ever seen a single ant with a sugar cube! They work in teams. Next time an ant community passes by you, before you drive them away or burn them under your microscope - observe them for a minute. If an ant spots a predator, it immediately broadcasts the information to the other ants through scent trails. The other team members catch the cue and acts accordingly. There is an order built out of the chaos.A team is like a chain, whose strength is determined Read more:nature
You can keep your MTV, I want my MMORPG 2007-10-09 07:34:58
'Genial-G', one of the virtual characters in the RAN worldThe thin line that had distinguished my reality from the game world further began to blur when I had got a glimpse of Sony BMG and Aloft Hotel within Second Life (For those who don’t go around collecting stamps or butterflies will truly understand when I say this certainly is a better ‘Life’).Real world brand images along with its Read more:MMORPG
Ford's IT Diversity Festival: A lookback 2007-10-09 06:30:39 Portrait of a Masconite as a Yoga guru! Any corporate entity seeks to create incisive cultures for its employees to drive quality and sustainable business results. There are even certain principles wh Read more:Diversity
, Festival
Tagging your brand 2007-10-19 07:27:30 As one of my biker friends passionately quoted the famous Harley-Davidson tagline “The Legend Rolls On”, I couldn’t help but wonder how a simple tagline so correctly sums up the tone of the product. No doubt Harley-Davidson is indeed the legend on wheels!It got me thinking as to why a tagline is required, what is its significance and how effective it is as a marketing or brand-building tool.Tagline enhances the value of a brand and gives it renewed vigor. Attaching a tagline to a brand is an excellent method of communicating the company’s vision and USP of its products. The tagline should ideally focus on the company’s line of business or the uniqueness of its products, highlighting the reason that makes the company or its product stand apart from that of its competitors.Most importantly, a tagline should be memorable. “The Complete Man” (Raymonds); “Bond with the Best” (Reid and Taylor); “Made For Each Other” (Wills) are some classic examples, which immediately b Read more:Tagging
Chennai's December music season 2007 2007-11-03 12:22:25
MGL will be co-sponsoring '33rd Year Art Festival 2007' organized by Kartik Fine Arts. The one-month long music festival will feature performances by legends who have mastered this art form. Some of the renowned musicians scheduled to perform are P Unnikrishnan, Sudha Raghunathan, Nithya Shree Mahadevan and K J Yesudas.
Download the calender for the 33rd Year Art Festival 2007Stay tuned for more information. Read more:Chennai
, December
Me, you and a phenomenon named YouTube 2007-10-30 09:55:43 YouTube
is huge. It's not a secret anymore. Everybody and their Internet addicted cousin have logged on to YouTube and experienced firsthand the phenomenon of viral videos. Of course, complacency could have kicked in and the phenomenon could have faded out into something less exciting and less appealing. But thankfully, YouTube's growth lies in the minds and keyboards of its users.Having said that, competition always raises the level of quality (as ex-President Hoover Herbert once said, "competition is the incentive to progress"!). YouTube's competitors have come and gone. Sites such as Eefoof, Panjea, Revver. iFilm and Blip TV have all posed a minor threat with their niche web video offerings. But YouTube has always been too "big' for any of them. When other sites tried to do one better than YouTube, these guys introduced new features such as embedded flash players, easy-to-use uploading dashboards, and micro-sites and stayed clear ahead in the race.Even popular viral v Read more:named
Songbird of the South 2007-11-22 14:12:17
Neethya Shree Mahadevan Neethya’s family consisted of legends of Carnatic music. Her grandfather, Palghat Mani Iyer, was first mridangist to win the Padmabhushan award. Her grandmother D.K. Pattammal formed the “female trinity of Carnatic Music” along with M. S. Subbulaks Read more:Songbird
, South
More than a 'Flickr' of popularity 2007-11-21 14:43:52
Developed by Ludicorp, Flickr
initially took off as a “chat room for real-time photo exchange capabilities”. The chat room eventually got dropped as Flickr evolved into a photo sharing website/web services suite/online community platform. Thanks to Yahoo’s acquisition in 2005, it soon became one of the most popular online photograph repositories. A few days ago, Flickr launched a new feature called Places that enabled access to photographs taken around landmarks of the world, which have been matched up either by name or geo-tags. In a nutshell, you now can view specific pages that contain images for each location where Flickr users are clicking heavily!No longer would you have to hope and pray that Google images contain that particular image of that your preferred location. With Flickr’s Places, all you have to do is type in the location name and presto - pictures taken by both professional and local photographers are available for your viewing pleasure! In addition, you
And the music starts... 2007-11-19 14:12:01 With MGL’s co-sponsoring Karthik Fine Arts’ music season this December in Chennai, the prevailing mood in our office is vibrant with excitement! The internal Carnatic music contest to be held this Thursday at Guindy is keeping everyone on theirs toes, tapping to imaginary beats!It gives us great pleasure to announce that MGL Unplugged will be posting reviews of the daily concerts throughout the music season. Kicking off the first part of our coverage, we bring to you the profiles of some of the versatile musicians scheduled to turn the heat up during Chennai’s coldest month!Without further ado, presenting… &
Day One: The festivities begin! 2007-12-04 12:02:49 The December music season in Chennai kicked off in style with the 33rd Year Art Festival organized by Karthik Fine Arts, co-sponsored by Mascon Global Limited. The inaugural function was held on Saturday and was initiated by a prayer song. Next up, Mr L Sabaratnam, Chairman of Karthik Fine Arts, gave the welcome address and expressed his honour in being amidst Sri Ganapathy Sachidananda Swami, who was all set to inaugurate the function. Surrounded by loud cheers, Swami said that music can have a soothing effect and be an effective antidote to day-to-day problems faced. “Music is the only thing that gives us pleasure the whole day, we can never get bored with it, he added.Next on the podium was the Chairman of Bank of India, Mr T.S. Narayanasami, followed by Prof E.G. Ramachandran, formerly a renowned professor in IIT Madras. Prof. Ramachandram spoke on behalf of MGL and said that it gave him great pleasure in being part of an event that honours such legends in Carnat Read more:begin
, Day One
Presenting MGL’s Most Wanted 2007-11-30 14:24:52
As part of Chennai’s December music season 2007 (you can download the calender from the left-hand corner of our blog, under 'Sites We Recommend'), MGL’s Communication and Coordination Group, along with the Business Development team organized an internal Carnatic music contest to find out who was MGL’s Most Wanted singer!The show kicked off in style as the crowd response was overwhelming, to say the least. As the audience poured in through the doors, the first participant adjusted the microphone and settled down to hit the right notes with his rendition of the devotional song Tirupavai.Then one by one, each of them enthralled us with their renditions of renowned Carnatic compositions. We even got a chance to listen to Alaipayuthey by Ravi Shankar of the Oracle Aps team amidst loud cheers and applause. Even the judges Mr Saarangan (Committee member, Karthik Fine Arts) and Mrs Usha Narasimhan (Member of Faculty, Brhaddhvani) seemed captivated not only by the participants’
5 tips for the Advanced MS Word users 2007-12-10 06:54:39 Ever had a day without facing Microsoft Office word processor - the all-mighty MS Word? Word matters so much for us in our work that it has even been known to have a psychological impact on our professional lives! The joy of clicking Ctrl+S, just after finishing a tedious document, the utter pain of watching the words “document cannot be found” appear on the screen while accessing an important file, and so on.Anyway, like wise old men say, “keep your friends close and your enemies closer”!! So here’s a brief outline of some Word matters that might be of relevance to you.(Note: The following are applicable for Word 2003)Document MapClick the menu 'View' and then click the menu command 'Document Map'. The left division of your Word window displays valid headings and those that Word recognizes as Headings. Click on these headings to easily navigate through your documents. A Document Map is very handy in easy navigation, identifying minor formatting discrepancies like empty l Read more:users
Day Four: When tradition continued in full form 2007-12-05 15:00:32 Master Balamurali Krishna (Balamurali)– Vocal
Aanayampatti G. Venkatasubramaniyan (Venkat)– Violin
B. Sivaraman (Siva)– Mridangam
K. V. Gopalakrishnan (KVG)– Kanjira
The concert started with a brilliant piece of Kaanada Varnam. Master Balamurali Krishna, though appeared to be very humble, presented the concert in a more traditional way that was enjoyable. His rendering of Ragas proved to be promising and illustrated the nuances of the traditional Carnatic music that was in its purest form in the so-called Golden period of Carnatic Music.The second piece was Inma Praka - a krithi by Anai Ayya in Raga Mayamalawa Gowla and set to Rupaka Thalam. The raga, by itself, is the ste Read more:Day Four
Day Two: While her violin gently wept 2007-12-04 14:30:53
As the concerts officially began at this year’s 33rd Year Art Festival, the crowd poured in at the auditorium. Since it was a Sunday, the audience participation on day two seemed more than promising! With enthralling performances by the Mandolin sisters Srisha & Shri Usha, this truly proved to be an evening drenched in musical harmonies. The standout performance of the day for me was violin
ist Akkarai Subbhalakshmi who captivated us with her steering compositions.Despite not knowing too much about Carnatic music, Subbhalakshmi’s instrumentation definitely made its mark on my aural senses with a gentle balance between rare charm and her insightful knowledge of Carnatic classicism.Truly inspiring.TAGS:December music season 2007, Carnatic, violinist, Mandolin sisters
Day Three: Cometh the hour, Cometh the Tamil Isai Vendar 2007-12-04 14:29:26
The news of the day was that Tamil
Isai Vendar T.V. Sankaranarayanan had replaced Isai Peroli Sowmya on the performance schedule at Naradagana Sabha Main Hall. Monday blues found its way into the auditorium, as the seats were only half-full. However this did not affect the quality of performances, as Mr. Sankaranarayanan struck a note in our hearts with his excellent voice modulation techniques.Classical instruments dominated day three, as the vocals took a backseat. The ghatam and mridangam performance were competing with each other for taking the spotlight. The ghatam was exceptionally good and honestly I never realised that an earthen pot could give birth to such blissful music!The final performance was a stirring rendition of Kaliyuga Varadan and as the day came to an end, so did the journey that my mind had taken since Mr. Sankaranarayanan graced us with his presence.Stay tuned for tomorrow’s review of the December music season 2007, and stay unplugged.TAGS:December music seaso Read more:Three
December 18th, 2007 2007-12-21 17:58:46 Went to the Guindy office today. As usual when I saw the sign that said the entrance has been shifted to the other side of the building, I called up the ever-reliable Kapil asking him to come out and grant me access if he was in the office. I was shocked when the voice on the other side of the phone told me he passed away in an accident on his way home that very morning. Read more:December
Day 12: An evening with Sudha Raghunathan 2007-12-20 14:25:49 The euphoric audience, the energetic anticipation and a slowly raising curtain were all ecstatic moments for me on Day 12 of Chennai's December music season. As I was looking forward to listening to the captivating voice of Sudha Raghunathan all day to the extent of not being able to focus on other tasks. The thrill reached a pinnacle when she introduced the crew and started her first song. It was all that I imagined her voice to be and more and I also realised that all the rave reviews she has garnered could never do as much justice as the tender acoustics resonating through the auditorium did.Her second song was Yevanipugadutuda, a mystical piece in itself, and accompanied with the crew that timed each tune to marvelous perfection. Quite simply put, it was a great song! The next song that followed was a Tyagaraja Kirthana in the sensational madhura vasantham raga. It was an apt piece to elevate the standards of the previous song and it kept me nodding to the intricate nuances of th Read more:evening
Seeing the world through 3D eyes 2007-12-19 17:28:43 The aggregate of structures situated within or near the orbit that assist, support, or protect the eye is vision!!! Hold on, I know this sounds odd and excruciatingly complex. In simple words, vision is anything and everything you can see. Ever wondered how does this happen?Try doing this small exercise: hold a pen (slanting sideways) in your left hand another pen in your right hand keep them as far as possible and then make both the points meet. It's easy. Now close one eye and do the same. It's difficult because one eye creates a semi 3D image or more of a 2D image, and both eyes together create a 3D image.The beauty of 3D formation is that it's created due to an ERROR. An error of 1.5 to 2 inches. This is the usual distance between our eyes. The image formed by our left eye and the image formed by our right are then sensed and overlapped by brain. This erroneous image is the 3D image, which has been formed.Next generation televisions are also coming in to market, which provide Read more:Seeing
Go back to sleep 2008-03-10 13:28:25 I have had trouble sleeping ever since I
discovered how engaging the human mind and late night
television can be. That was over a decade ago. Fast-forward to now, I came
across a survey
conducted by the Sleep Council (I am
not making this up, it actually exists!). The fine people at Sleep Council have
come to a conclusion that many people are losing sleep thanks to technology
advancements. They even go on to claim that this disrupts
relationships.Granted that only 1,400 people were polled, I really find it
hard to associate too much accuracy to these results. But it did get me
wondering about another pertinent issue. A lot of my fellows IT-ians
complain about not having the time these days to stop and smell the roses.
A few sentimental ones have even disclosed to me that they no longer smi
HD DVD vs Blu Ray: Winners, losers and whatnot 2008-03-04 04:08:36 “The next generation DVD format war is over. Blu-ray wins.”I stumbled across this bit of news during my daily battle to combat self-ignorance (it’s amazing how well informed you feel when you read Google News…or maybe it’s just me). I felt a little outdated since I had no clue that a technology war not involving Microsoft or Yahoo was going on. I decided to bit more research.In one corner, we have the HD DVD format. HD stands for High Definition and this high-density optical disc was widely touted to be successor to the normal DVD format. In the other corner, we have Blu-Ray disc. It uses a blue-violet laser to read and write data.I’d rather not bore you technical details regarding the size of their respective surface layers and apertures. I am going to assume that you don’ w Read more:Winners
The games women play...or do they? 2008-03-03 08:02:14 Considering all the socializing that I have done, I have met only three people of the fairer sex who love videogames as much as I do (two of them from Korea and another in Chennai). The scores and scores and scores, did I forget to mention, the scores and scores of guys that I game with, associate the recurring phenomenon of women not willing to jump on the gaming bandwagon to their driving skills. It’s about the lack of hand and eye coordination, apparently (Note: It’s the opinion of the guys I game with, and not mine. I have been beaten, trashed and laughed at by a gamer girl, not something I am proud of but, the fact still remains).Further, quoting the words of some of my fairer colleagues, in a very animated discussion over lunch today:“We are just not interested""It would rather
Jungle Raja presents...Cold Callers' Anthem 2008-02-08 11:33:49 Cold calling is all about getting hot profits. Going beyond the frustration and difficulties that a sales person has to go through in making calls to people who were not expecting such an interaction, when done properly - it can be a efficient process in approaching prospective customers or clients.
Ever heard the expression - it's a tough job but somebody has to do it? Well, cold calling is the epitome of this! Don't believe us? Just take a listen to MGL's very own Jungle
Raja as he sweats blood, bullets and nerves to rap out the Cold Caller Anthem.He puts the hip in the hop and comes out on top and with your support, he ain't never gonna stop.Here's JUNGLE RAJA! &n
Going abroad? Mind your language! 2008-02-08 05:10:19 I have provided these two passages just to give you guys a glimpse of the language
barriers that the Indian traveler normally faces while visiting USA or UK. You could find at least 15 words in about 5 sentences, which are different between these 2 passages. Hence I opined that before our fellow professionals reach abroad, they should be exposed to such of those commonly used words, which are different from our existing conventions.AMERICAN WAYIn the early morning during the fall season, being a legal holiday, I packed up our items in the trunk of our automobile and set out to catch the flight to enjoy the vacation. Since the check-in line was lengthy, I bought chips & cookies for a tenner bill and spent time in munching them. I was quite comfortable in my pants, Read more:Going
Scroll down lunch menu…press ‘Shift & Delete’ 2008-01-29 04:58:56 Here we go again…another battle to fight for getting my thoughts posted on MGL Unplugged. I have promised the Webmaster that I wouldn’t sound too anarchistic…oh well I can safely say that I tried!It is one 'o' clock in the afternoon, and one can hear loads of grumbling noises in and around office pantries (lunchrooms) in Indian IT organizations. Eager stomachs battling hunger are in direct conflict with employees’ minds as their sad faces make that "oh no not again" expression.Of course, every now and then, the lunch providers at our desi corporate canteens decide to surprise us and change the menu. And this could only mean that the good people at the canteen have decided that they should no longer serves us tasteless curry…instead they start serving tasteless pepper water (yeah Read more:Scroll
, Shift
Does your website suck? 2008-01-21 07:34:54 With nothing but boring soap opera re-runs, repetitive humour and comical music with loads of eye candy, the television has been rapidly losing its charm. Every time I search for the remote to switch the mode from AV2 to TV (cough cough…I am addicted to the Sony Play Station 2), there is nothing on there that alters my opinion. The TV is definitely on the decline. I am sure that this is a common opinion as numbers on the Internet show me that more and more people are reducing the time spent with the tube and are spending more time online.These numbers stimulated the more recent thoughts – What is on the Internet today!! Having made a living so far in the IT field, I am pretty sure that on the corporate level, it is quite simple: companies just spin the website
s and then wait for consum
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