Wednesday, March 28, 2007

CNSI Employee Recognition Night

Today my company honored and celebrated the Employee Recognition Night after a hiatus of 1 year. Its no longer called the Winter Gala and more appropriately called Employee Recognition Night but I could not comprehend the difference between them. Nonethless, a great endeavor on part of the CNSI owners and shows their committment to the employees. So here are the Key Highlights

a) Cal Ripken Jr. was the Chief Guest. For people who did not know that, all they needed to do was stroll to the hotel bar where they served decent scotch and you could meet the Hall of Famer.

b) Vik Mehta was hilarious and his ususal self and made some funny and yes sometimes offensive remarks. Always a great show but I am disappointed as he reads his jokes and one liners! And Vik some of your jokes are repetitive for people like me who have attended this event for some years now

c) Nagu, (for people who don't know him he is Oracle DBA for the Washington project) was in every frame clicked by the photographer that night. We could use him as background on our CNSI logo

d) Our President, was precise and thankful but tad bit slow but it was much concise than the previous ones

e) Vivek Gore was standing up and cheering on on every employee that was recognized. Either he did not have a seat on his table or was just naturally excited about the recognition. I could not since I was getting ready to dance!

f) Yes we danced to all tunes Indian, Punjabi, English, Arabic and Finally TAMIL :)

g) Aggh..the nice thing there were four lucky winners who get the BMW. Yes they are mortgaged for 3 years ..you know what i mean...:)

But overall a good event ,people had a nice time and it was a good break and a workout for me personally... Your comments..

Tuesday, March 27, 2007

Gmail Server is down!!!


This is not the first time that Google mail has been down. Earlier it used to be the case that is a beta version of the mail but now after being almost 2 years into full operations these errors are a pointer to that Google is not immune to software glitches. We blame Microsoft but we cherish Apple and then apple becomes a self serving entity.The fact is that as the companies grow they are unable to maintain the same verve, enthusiasm and drive that made them reach their glory days. Look at the error message..."Oops the system is unable to perform your operation" If we are to implement such messages in our customer applications it is only considered lame but since it is Google people would recognize the coolness and the openeness of the developer to express their ideas. Apart from the growing clout of Google two things are crystal clear a) they cannot maintain the same velocity of change and innovation and b) they are still not a software services company since such downtime issues warrant more maturity in delivery and handling. What do you think ?

Saturday, March 24, 2007

Persistence is Wow!! We can all use some of it!

John Calvin Coolidge, Jr the 30th President of US had to say this on Persistence

“Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan “press on” has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.”

I think this is so remarkably true in my personal and professional life experiences. Just keep on plugging in and we shall work through all the issues surrounding us. After all it is all about Karma!!

Wednesday, March 21, 2007

American Idol: Sanjay Malakar!!!!

I have never watched American Idol till yesterday. The reason for me to watch was because of Sanjay Malakar, an American born Indian from Federal Way, Washington. Yes, I watched it more out of curiosity of seeing him. Yes, I have to admit, I am just a music listener and by no stretch a discerning music buff. I have yet to vote for him and maybe I never participate in this process since there is already a perception that he is getting votes because of his nationality. Well if open nationwide voting are the rules of the game then everyone should accept it. I guess he might be getting a lot of support from the Indian community but I guess that is pretty much the case for every participant. No doubt, it is different case with the Indian population ( well it helps you in some cases). Again, I am not music guy to say whether he is deserving or not but he stands out of the crowd. As I saw the results today, I could see the clear isolation of Sanjay. Every participant who made it to the next round atleast shared a hug with the fellow participants but poor Sanjay was left to enjoy and savor his relief and joy into the next round with a lonely smile all by himself. Yes, by no stretch of imagination he is going to be theAmerican Idol but he is definitely a star. Why do I say so? The nation watched a young american girl (Ashley) cried crazy. Cried out of joy and disbelief after meeting with her star in Sanjay Malakar. Good Luck Sanjay!!!!

Monday, March 19, 2007

Bob Woolmer: Cricketing Pressure Leads to Death

I am deeply saddened by the untimely death of Pakistan Cricket Coach Bob Woolmer. Today's sport have such high expectations and pressure that it is beyond words. Pakistan unexpected departure from the World Cup after getting defeated at the hands of rookies Ireland caused a lot of eyebrows and shouts for firing of the captain, coach and lot of other players on the team. But that pressure resulting in death just leaves me dumbfounded. My sincere condolences to the family of the coach!! I just wish people relaxed a bit and stop these money spinners ( bookies, advertisement companies, sponsors) creating bigger than life sized personalities and teams that the pressure is so onerous that we see such an unforntunate incident. The World Cup spirits are marred! Sportsmanship, the ethos of sports is getting lost in the ultra competitvness of the nations and players. My disappointment with the India team being outplayed by Bangladesh is just blown away! The Gentleman's game is on its lowest ebb!!!

Saturday, March 17, 2007

Cricket World Cup Begins: India vs. Bangladesh

Well the world Cup Cricket has begun few days back and had a share of interesting results like the tie between Ireland and Zimbave but for the 1 billion Indians, the world cup starts today as India takes on Bangladesh. yes, some would say, for us the Pakistan loss to WestIndies was a good omen but the saga starts today.....
We are in trouble,...lost Sehwag in 2nd over and his heir apparent Robin Uthappa was back after not scoring much. Tendulkar, he is still playing was back after a painful stint of 7 runs. all of a sudden Bangladesh looked like Australia. Mr. Dependable Rahul Dravid is no longer dependable apart from a dependable friend (his persistence with Sehwag shows his dependability as a friend). Well lets see how far Ganguly and Yuvraj takes us...
Aagh..before all the Pakistani and the Indian community go wild about the lack of performance by the Indian team ....lets see how the match rolls on

Friday, March 16, 2007

Catch Me If You Can

Do you remember Frank Abagnale Jr. , the subject of the 2002 Steven Spielberg movie "Catch Me If You Can" - one of the most notorious con men of the 20th century recently addressed as a featured speaker at a cutting-edge, computer-ruled event like the Wharton Technology Conference 2007. Well that is a significant role reversal from one who stole close to $3 million (mostly by writing bad checks), impersonated not only a pilot but also a pediatrician, and passed the Louisiana bar exam to today where he runs a highly successful security consulting firm out of Tulsa, Okla. -- works hard to keep up with today's computerized and Internet-based fraud. Well lets see if his 20th century con mind can catch the 21st century wiz kids since most of the fraud is going to happen over the Internet. Well there is no doubt that in USA, people tend to forget the past rather quickly. Take another instance of Michael Milken known for selling junkbonds, triggered the collapse of 1989, sentenced for 10 years! Today, he is termed as philanthropist, a financial innovator. Go figure....!!!

Sunday, March 11, 2007

SOA Testing and MITA

I am finally giving in! After all my blog title is Just Express. I am currently trying to facilitate some MITA testing and performance discussions under the private sector technology group. Its tough to engage industry stalwarts in meaningful and detailed converstations since they are from organizations which compete on a day to day basis. But examples of IBM and Oracle working together are out there in the software world. I sincerely think that by sharing common points of pain and frustration, these converations, dialogs and collaboration will lead to more matured and evolved thinking and benefit the MMIS industry as a whole. Anwyay, I recently penned my thoughts on test aspect on their WIKI site. Here is the URL for it . http://www.mitahealth.org/wiki/index.php?title=Testing_Approach_to_SOA
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Sunday, March 04, 2007

Trick or Treat: Political Buffonery of Day light Savings Time Shift

As we approach the new day light savings time deadline, a look back shows yet another political decision costing the United States not only dollars but plenty of chaos and anxiety. As political Representative Fred Upton, a Michigan Republican, predicted that children would rejoice at the prospect of an extra hour of daylight trick-or-treating on Halloween. Well the country has been tricked into spending millions of dollars on a Y2K like problem and unforeseen dollars in lost productivity. Well that is definitely a costly treat for the kids at Halloween. Yes there would be savings for the less fossil fuel that would be burned but I would be pleasantly surprised if this would outweigh the costs and the anxious moments that are being spent on the IT fixes. Yes it means good quarterly revenue numbers for IT services firms and consulting organizations but I just wish politicians had a better set of advisors in the future otherwise we would be tricked into yet another political sucide.

The Million Dollar Baby: Are you parenting one?

In this Wall Street Journal (WSJ) there was a report on how much money is being spend on raising kids from age 0-17. Well though the Government numbers were respectable at $16,000 per year, WSJ identified the numbers in the range of 800K to 1.6 million dollars for the period of 17 years. And to top it all, these numbers do not include college education. Initially I was just 'WOW' but then things started to settle in. The example of $800 stroller ( my wife and I discussed buying one, good we just discussed), a $1000 birthday party with a mermaid theme ( attended one that very weekend where the birthday for a 4 year old had a princess theme with a dressed up princess, customized 30 goodie bags and a clown too), $ 3000 annual family vacation trips, $4000 braces treatment and the numbers start to make sense. These kids are surely pampered and I am indeed jealous. The reason this article grabbed my attention was that I have been blessed with an angel girl recently and just reading these articles and numbers blew me away. But on the positive side I said, if I can not be a millionaire, at least I will have the satisfaction of raising one :).