Happy Diwali

It's that time of the year again. Lots of sweets, lights, fireworks, gifts and also loads of pollution (that's the sad part). But nevertheless, wish you a very happy and bright Diwali.

Incidently, my tenure in Chandigarh is over now and I am moving back to Bangalore end of this month. There is one more related news but I will take some time to divulge.

SO, for now be happy, celebrate Diwali and enjoy to the fullest!!

Nectarine Flash animations

I saw them some time back and again stumbled on today. In case you have not seen'em, go ahead. They are really amazing peice of art!!

Flash Animation for launch of Flash 8

Flash Animation on 10th Anniversary

Good Agile, Bad Agile

Read this beautiful peice of write up from Steve Yegge. He works for Google (am really jealous) and explains how Google uses and perfects the art of Agile working.

My favoutite peice:

"Back in Ye Olden Dayes, most companies approached software development as follows:

- hire a bunch of engineers, then hire more.
- dream up a project.
- set a date for when they want it launched.
- put some engineers on it.
- whip them until they're either dead or it's launched. or both.
- throw a cheap-ass pathetic little party, maybe. This step is optional.
- then start over."

and

"- there are managers, sort of, but most of them code at least half-time, making them more like tech leads.
- developers can switch teams and/or projects any time they want, no questions asked; just say the word and the movers will show up the next day to put you in your new office with your new team.
- Google has a philosophy of not ever telling developers what to work on, and they take it pretty seriously.- developers are strongly encouraged to spend 20% of their time (and I mean their M-F, 8-5 time, not weekends or personal time) working on whatever they want, as long as it's not their main project.
- there aren't very many meetings. I'd say an average developer attends perhaps 3 meetings a week, including their 1:1 with their lead.
- it's quiet. Engineers are quietly focused on their work, as individuals or sometimes in little groups or 2 to 5.
- there aren't Gantt charts or date-task-owner spreadsheets or any other visible project-management artifacts in evidence, not that I've ever seen.
- even during the relatively rare crunch periods, people still go get lunch and dinner, which are (famously) always free and tasty, and they don't work insane hours unless they want to."

All I can say is Sigh!!!!! Read the full article here.

India does a star turn to Adobe

"Adobe India is on a roll. In the past one month, the San Jose-based parent of the Indian unit has commercially released three products, completely "Made in India".
Contribute 4.0, the latest product to have been released in the United States on Friday, was fully engineered in India, as were the other two, Captivate 2 and Premier Elements 3.0. "

Read the full article here.

Google To Acquire YouTube

This is HUGE!! Google has acquired YouTube for a whopping $1.65 Billion in stocks. The market was buzzing with the rumour for some time but $1.65 Billion is a heafty sum even for stock/cash rich Google.

I wonder how Google plans to get the investment out of YouTube!! Anyways, great day for Flash Video.

Read NY Times and Google press release.

Got Mugged :o(

Someone stole stereo from my car when I went for some festival shopping yesterday. It was a rather expensive peice with CD player and other stuff.

More than the stearo what hurt me was all the shopping we had done also went with it; the guy did'nt even spared change money on the car. Man, am I sad or what :o(