Shell Utility to show you random quotes a day

Attached is a script I wrote to show a random quote every time you run it.

Just change the MYHOME entry in config.sh to the directory on your machine where you keep this file, include it in your .profile file and watch a new quote everyday.

--- attachment coming soon!! ----

Na Swaramoo Nee Swaramoo Sangamamai ...

I just found the lyrics to one of my most favorite songs ever on Television. I loved to hear this and can't seem to get it out of my mind almost 8-10 years after I last heard it.
(Bhimsen Joshi): Mile sur mera tumhara tooooo soooor bane hamaara… sur ki dariya har disha se behke saagar mein mile… baadalon ka roop-a lekar… barse halke halke…. oooooh mile sur mera tumhara tooo soor bane hamara….
(Rajasthan, featuring then-famous bowler Narendra Hirwani sitting on aqueduct) (your) tarang (and) (my) tarang… ek vat baniye (our) tarang!
Tena sur mele mera sur dena milke bane ek nava sur da
(Shabana Azmi right outside the Taj Mahal): Mile sur mera tumhara to sur bane hamaara
(cast of Tamas, supposed to be the Punjab element)
Female chorus: Sur ka dariya behke saagar mein miley
Male chorus: Baadlaan-da roop lehke
Deepa Sahi: Barasana hole hole…. (we move deep south, and musician Balamurlikrishna is on the beach with Cricketer turned umpire Venkataraghavan and some others… including Kamal Hassan who doesn’t sing but just gives a Digjam pose) Isayindaal… nam iruvarin… suramum namadaahum (Veena music, while Kamal shows off his Digjam pose.)
isaimel raagaahum aadisei aarugal mugilai mazhaiaai pozhivadum pol isai! nam isaaaaaaaaiiii!
(woman singing dhik tak dhik ta jhoom… etc etc)
Shift to Karnataka. (man dressed in Coorg attire) Nanna dhwanige ninna dhwaniya (woman) seridante namma dhwaniya (you can also see prakash padukone here)
Shift to Andhra. (man and woman together) naa swaramoo nee swaramoo sangamamai mana swaranga avatarinche
Shift to Kerala. (mallu dude on elephant) ende swaramum ningalude swaramum ottucheru namm-ode swaramai!
(cut from one Communist state to another: Bong boatman slowly rowing boat on the Hooghly)…. Tomar shoor modir shoor… sristi hoouu… hoiko shoor… (repeat thrice)
fourth time: sristi hoouu hoi ko taal (change music to manipuri/nagaland type with people walking past with their arms interlocked around their hips)
(male) Tomar moro shoorono milano (female joins in) shrishti hoo chalo chapano
(music while Goa is shown and they show Mario Miranda’s cartoon styled paintings…)
(Mallika Sarabhai in Gujju) Maley soor jo taro maro, bane aapdo soor niralo..
(Tanuja representing Maharashtra): Majhya tumchya jultya taara madhur suranchya barasti dhaara
(Shrillest voice of ALL, Lata, first singing for Waheeda Rehman) Sur ki nadiya har disha se behke saagar mein mile
(now for Hema Malini) Baadalon ka rooooop leke barse halke halke
(Sharmila Tagore) hooo mile sur mera tumhara
(now they make no pretense and show Lata) Mile sur mera tumhara… toooooo soor bane…. hamaara….
(music increases in volume and speed again and they show the TRIO - Ganga Jamuna and Saraswati, Amitabh, Jeetendra and Mithun, with their arms around each other) Mile sur mera tumhara, to sur bane hamara
(everyone singing together) to sur bane hamara! to sur bane hamara!
(song turns into end of national anthem, Jaya he, jaya he… just the music, while each beat forms the Indian flag and the silhouette of Gandhi)

"We apologize to some of you"

Jobs: 'We apologize for disappointing some of you'

By MarketWatch

posted on the company's Web site on Thursday.

"To all iPhone customers:

I have received hundreds of emails from iPhone customers who are upset about Apple dropping the price of iPhone by $200 two months after it went on sale. After reading every one of these emails, I have some observations and conclusions.

'..even though the technology road is bumpy, we need to do a better job taking care of our early iPhone customers as we aggressively go after new ones.' — Steve Jobs

First, I am sure that we are making the correct decision to lower the price of the 8GB iPhone from $599 to $399, and that now is the right time to do it. iPhone is a breakthrough product, and we have the chance to 'go for it' this holiday season. iPhone is so far ahead of the competition, and now it will be affordable by even more customers. It benefits both Apple and every iPhone user to get as many new customers as possible in the iPhone 'tent.' We strongly believe the $399 price will help us do just that this holiday season.

Second, being in technology for 30-plus years, I can attest to the fact that the technology road is bumpy. There is always change and improvement, and there is always someone who bought a product before a particular cutoff date and misses the new price or the new operating system or the new whatever. This is life in the technology lane. If you always wait for the next price cut or to buy the new improved model, you'll never buy any technology product because there is always something better and less expensive on the horizon. The good news is that if you buy products from companies that support them well, like Apple tries to do, you will receive years of useful and satisfying service from them even as newer models are introduced.

Third, even though we are making the right decision to lower the price of iPhone, and even though the technology road is bumpy, we need to do a better job taking care of our early iPhone customers as we aggressively go after new ones with a lower price. Our early customers trusted us, and we must live up to that trust with our actions in moments like these.

Therefore, we have decided to offer every iPhone customer who purchased an iPhone from either Apple or AT&T, and who is not receiving a rebate or any other consideration, a $100 store credit towards the purchase of any product at an Apple Retail Store or the Apple Online Store. Details are still being worked out and will be posted on Apple's website next week. Stay tuned.

We want to do the right thing for our valued iPhone customers. We apologize for disappointing some of you, and we are doing our best to live up to your high expectations of Apple."

Steve Jobs
Apple CEO

Thanks Mr. Jobs!

BBC NEWS | Business | Zimbabwe launches $200,000 note

BBC NEWS | Business | Zimbabwe launches $200,000 note

"Zimbabwe is to start circulating a new 200,000 Zimbabwe dollar note, in a bid to tackle the country's inflation, the highest in the world.

The new note, issued by the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe from Wednesday, can buy 1kg (2.2lb) of sugar.

Food and fuel shortages have become common as the government relies more heavily on imports, pushing prices to new heights."

$200,000 to buy 1kg of sugar? Wow!!!! I'm sure there's a 70-year old out there in Harare saying "Humhaare zamaane mein beta ... (in my times, my son ...)!!"

First Woman Pressi for India

To be honest, and very seldom am I honest, I don't care if its a woman or a man at Rashtrapati Bhavan (although I'm not quite sure if they are gonna name it Rashtrapatni Bhavan hereon), 'coz there are probably few people less powerful in Indian politics than its President. What really made me write this blog was Sonia Gandhi's post-election comments -
"I am grateful to the people of India and the men and women of India and this is a victory for the principles which our Indian people uphold,"
Oh well, so the Indian people are not exactly men or women anymore and have to be categorized separately! Well thats exactly what the Indian politicians think anyways!

iPhone or iCandy!

Ok, so I was planning to wait at-least 3 months before I bought the iPhone, but I yielded to the temptation! Its more down to Khawaja, who displayed his new iPhone like a proud father shows off his newly born baby. Roughly within an hour of that demo, I was down at the Apple store with Venkat to pick up our new iPhones. Well, pick up isn't quite the word for a phone which costs at-least $500 and with a 2 year plan, comes up to almost $1500, assuming we are living in an ideal, tax-free world!

I've been using, or should I say my iPhone is being used, during the last week for music, movies, weather, youtube, browsing, stocks, photos ... and lest I forget to mention, yes, to make and receive calls and view and filter visual voice mail.
So what exactly does make the iPhone so special?

• The fantastic multi-touch interface. Face it, there are a few other touch screen phones available, but the iPhone knocks them all into the dust! The photo flipping (photos horizontally or vertically aligning with the phone) is something which amazes almost everyone I've seen using the phone. It does have its glitch after-all, but thats for a later section to discuss!
• The fact that you could keep in touch with the weather, stocks, traffic information, your email, music and movies on the go is something which helped me decide buy this phone. To tell the truth, I've started using my laptop far less at home than I used to. We all know for a fact that once you login to check your email, you know you gotta check out the news and then catch up with your IM, and before you know it you are there browsing and chatting the rest of the night!
• The browsing experience on the iPhone is phenomenal. Also the fact that you could align your browser across when you slide the phone horizontally gives you a far wider view than when you hold it vertically. Now you are not restricted to a small portion of the web page and there isn't a need to remember or keep tapping the keypad to scroll down or across. Just use the thumb and the index finger and enjoy the unique browsing experience!
• You could view, add, delete or customize cities when you view the weather or clock and also customize the stocks you want to keep track of.
• Music and movies sound just as amazing, whereas movies now have a much wider viewing experience compared to a 5Gen iPod, so you probably would sell your existing ipod if you decide to buy an iPhone! Or would you?!
• Shuffling through album artwork to look for your favorite collection is something I've loved and which comes as close to flipping through your actual music collection!
  
• The speaker volume is independent of the headphone volume. If you don't know what that means, try blasting your iPhone speakers at full volume and then plugging in the headphones.
  
• A feature I totally loved within the Maps is the one where you could search for a business and then call them up. For example, you are driving and need to locate the nearest Chinese restaurant. Just type in and enter "Chinese restaurant" into the Map Search and click any of the little bubbles (or are they balloons??) on screen. If you see an associated tel number, you could just tap it and the iPhone dials it for you! Equally amazing is the integration of the phone with your email. Just tap the number and your call is dialed.
• The Wi-fi and bluetooth capabilities were probably absolute necessities! However I had countless problems discovering the iPhone from my HP Vista PC. Surprisingly, the PC guy did find my Nokia 6201i and one other Nokia in the neighborhood!
• Assigning photos to contacts is another interesting feature, but I'm sure you could do this with a dozen other phones today. You could also attach special ringtones to special people, which means you could now ignore that "important" call from your boss!
• Assigning a password to the phone is good to have as people could otherwise easily access your email or important notes.
• Finally, looks wise the iPhone beats almost any other phone of its kind today. It is sleek, has an intuitive interface and will probably be the Mustang or BMW of cellphones for sometime to come!

Ok, not that I've hyped it so much, lets get down to the cons and suggested improvements for this little gadget.

• I've observed, probably about once in 5 times, that the photos do not flip or align when you rotate the phone. It probably takes a few seconds before the iPhone decides to wake up to the reality of gravity!
• Its expensive! Do I need to say that again?! I'm sure the sales would've been three times more if the phone cost three times less, and probably would've swept the cell phone market if it came in free with the plan! Oh yeah, wishful thinking!
• The screen shuts off after about 15-20 seconds of usage. While this could be effective to save power, it could also get onto your nerves when you are probably typing an email and are not directly taken to that screen. To the credit of the phone, it does not actually cancel or forget the email you were working with! Sames goes for when you are listening to music and need to go back to the controls on screen. If you need to pause or skip a song or two, you'll need to unlock the phone before doing so. I still can't believe they didn't think of that.
• If you have a huge music collection or contact list (although thats debatable given the amount of memory you have on the device) its not possible to scroll directly to the bottom of the list. I so wish that I could also sort my contact list.
• Coughing up more than $500, one surely expects more than the 4Gb of memory. I do hope Apple comes up at-least with more storage for its phone in a future upgrade, although thats something which might not be possible as it could almost completely eat into its Video iPod sales.
• Lack of applications, games - although I'm pretty positive these would be part of the iphone very soon!
• One needs to unlock the phone before making or receiving calls. This could be pretty cumbersome, especially if you are driving.
• Something I'm really peeved about is that music cannot be synced up manually anymore. If you do not wanna sync the entire iTunes Library, you'll need to create a folder and assign it for syncing. The same goes with Movies and Podcasts. I haven't tried it yet, but I sure hope the iPhone does not delete the existing songs when I connect it to a new iTunes Library!
  
• Watch a movie on the iPhone and I'm sure three times out of five, you'll probably bury the speakers beneath your fingers. The fact that movies or videos on the iPhone always have to be watched widescreen and with the "more powerful" speaker located at the bottom right corner, where you normally hold the device, will probably create an impression that the speaker volume hasn't been turned up enough!
• Although I'm sure people are now complaining, not having an integrated chat application is actually good for the battery life of the phone!
  
• I'm not quite sure I could point out problems with the call quality of the iPhone just now, so I'll probably save it for a later review. As of now, the quality is pretty good and it has synced up very well with the bluetooth on my Toyota Camry.

All in all, an amazing phone, and if you are waiting a few months to buy it, I'd advice you to forget the months and go get yourself this remarkable phone before it lands into your grandmother's hands! The iPhone is here to stay!

Mohit's Bday!

Mohit's bday was truly memorable!