Funky vehicle hairdo

A Somali truck with a fuckin' HUGE load of corn!
(with a calf sneakily taking one final chew :p)

Call for Help

Customer: I have a problem logging into your system. I forgot my username and password. Can you tell them to me over the phone?
Me : Hang on... it's "your.name" and "password321"
Customer: Thanks. Hang on while I try logging in yea?

[after a moment's wait...]

Customer: Sorry la, our computers here are like Muzium Negara la... slow and all...
Me : (chuckles) haha
Customer: Why? Why are you laughing??
Me : (Hmm? But I thought you just cracked a joke?!) Err... err... so has the page loaded yet?
Customer: Hmm... I get this "file not found error"
Me : What's the URL or the address of the site you're at right now?
Customer: What is a URL?
Me : Erm... it's the address of the website you're in. It usually starts with "http://..."
Customer: Where can I find it?
Me : You usually will see it on the top half of your browser window, near the menu bar. What browser are you running anyway?
Customer: What browser?
Me : Erm... your Internet browser? The software you use to surf the Internet?
Customer: I think I'm running Netscape.
Me : Do you know which version of Netscape you're running?
Customer: I dunno... it says here "Netscape Mail". How do I find out?

Up close and personal with pointy haired boss

Just had this hypothetical conversation the other day...

Boss: Hey, write a proposal to get us an R&D grant to build a flying car so that we can get money to support our company.
Me : Hmm... but why do we need a flying car for?
Boss: Well, it will "future-proof" our existing car prototype so that Proton won't beat us to it. Yea sure, we'll build additional functionality, but more importantly, we'll need the grant so that we can secretly siphon some of the funds off the grant to maintain our own operations since I'm running out of cash to pay you guys.
Me : But isn't the grant solely for R&D? I mean, they'll surely hold us accountable for every deliverable we promise in the proposal.
Boss: Don't worry, just write a high-level description of the deliverables in the proposal, vaguely describe the concepts so they can't hold us too tightly accountable for the deliverables... and I want you to be the project manager.




Me : So what features do you want in the new flying car?
Boss: Well, I heard that Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the next hottest thing. So let's put some intelligence in the car. We'll need AI to help the driver drive.
Me : But how does that add value to the car and the driving experience?
Boss: I don't know, but just do as I say, and we'll get the grant... don't worry, my friends in the grant committee are waiting to throw the money to me since I'm their close friend.
Boss: I want you to write the proposal and have it on my desk in 1 week.
Me : We have no technical expertise on AI at the moment, and it'll take us a few months to look into coming up with a technical proposal for such a huge project (which I may add no one else has done commercially before).
Boss: I'll find a scientist and hypnotise him into writing the technical part for us without getting paid until (or if) the grant money comes in.

... a few days later, I was introduced to the scientist. After our meeting...

Me : The scientist and I have met and decided that we need to carry out a market feasability study n all before we actually know what to write.
Boss: Aiya... that's the problem with you engineers out there that arts people don't have. You guys always need to know the nitty-gritty details in order to write proposals.
Me : But isn't this a "detailed technical proposal" that the grant committee wants to see? Look, it says here that "you're to submit a detailed proposal technically describing all your deliverables". How am I going to write it if I don't even know what is it for and why are we doing it?
Boss: No no, I'll brainwash the scientist to drag his friends into writing the whole research grant for us then. We'll dangle money in front of them because that'll get some people excited, and hopefully them.

New prices for CDs beginning Janurary 2004:

• Local and foreign VCDs - RM14 max.


• Local music CDs RM21


• Foreign music CDs RM29

I wonder if these prices also include specially imported CDs (e.g. what you would normally find with Jazz and New Age music).

Good news for consumers and tourists, who can now buy their favourite music albums here cheaper than anywhere else in the world. It'll be interesting though, to see how new CD prices will rid this country of piracy. Skeptical RIM chairman, Darren Choy thinks that "cost should be calculated as a total business rather than the cost of the product". But if you look closely, this is exactly the reason why we have been ripped off all this while.

Back in the 1980s when CDs were first introduced into the market, they were priced much more than tapes, because manufacturers wanted to position them as premium products (superior sound quality, no degradation, digital sound recording). To clap the other hand, early adopting customers were actually willing to pay for the novelty of this technology, even though it costs a fraction of the price to produce (heck... even cheaper than audio cassettes!).

So why didn't the price go down?

For one, the fact that customers were flocking to music stores to get CDs showed that price didn't really matter much to them (as we were all brainwashed to think "whoa... better sound quality, no degradation = higher price OK"). As dictated by economics, don't bring the price down if customers are willing to pay. So instead, more money was spent on creating new distribution channels, penetrating new markets and aggresive advertising.

And no, artists still get a fraction of what you pay for a CD... producers and distributors were the ones reaping all the money. I can understand why artists feel ambivalent about these price reductions. Cutting CD prices will only lead to lower royalty... and it's difficult to see how reducting CD prices can help combat piracy off the Internet.
In my opinion, the largest contender for CD sales isn't the pasar malam guy selling audio CDs for RM10... it's the fact that music can still be download off the net for free. Now who can beat that?

I wasted 20.6% of my day yesterday

7:30pm - Left office
7:45 - Got into car and headed to the LDP towards Sunway bridge. Massive jam ahead. Didn't feel like queuing up for the jam *and* having to pay a RM2.50 toll all the way home. So, I u-turned and headed towards Sprint instead
8:00 - Stuck in massive jam on the LDP leading towards Sprint highway (accident at Damansara Utama)
8:15 - Turned off at LDP SS2 exit headed towards Fed Highway instead
8:30 - Reached Federal Highway, turned off at Jln Pantai, heading towards Bangsar
8:45 - Turned into Dataran Merdeka/Masjid Jamek area since Loke Yew was a crawl
9:00 - Stuck in front of the Pudu Post office
9:15 - I can still see the Pudu Post office in my side mirror! #$*%(%#@
9:30 - Turned into Jalan Cheras. Menara PGRM in the distance
9:50 - Right in front of Menara PGRM. Decided to turn off at Shamelin Perkasa and head towards Ampang.
10:00 - Home

Distance travelled : 30km
Time wasted : 2 hours 30 minutes

1 hour (getting to work) + 2 hours 30 minutes (coming home) = 3:30

Assuming I sleep 7 hours a day, I'm left with 17 hours.

3:30 of 17 hours translates into 20.6% of my waking hours!

If this happens often enough, I'm going to reconsider moving office....
The thought of throwing a fifth of my life away to bad traffic ain't worth it.

Why software development and engineering is fun

FYI, this has no relation to the post before this :p

But here's a few reasons why I think software development is fun:

The sheer fun of finding things out and how they work.
e.g. It's fun to analyse and breakdown complex processes into logical steps all the time. For example, if you're developing an E-learning management system, you'll need to know how users learn, what attracts them to e-learning, how to keep their attention spans going, how do evaluations take place and the whole process of educating a person. Analysing how processes like these work can be very gratifying, especially if in the end of the day, everything falls nicely into place.
Of course, sometimes it's easy to over-analyse things like coming up with algorithms on how traffic lights work (esp. when you're stuck in the jams), or algorithms on jukeboxes, smart cards, ATMs, car ignition systems, fans, fuzzy logic air conds, handphones, Aibo... when these stuff start to happen, get professional help immediately!

Makes you realise how powerful your mind really is
e.g. to pick up a pen, you'll need to:
1. recall the meaning of the word 'pen' and its characteristics from memory
2. move your eyeballs to scan the environment for an object that would match the description of a pen
3. perform pattern matching to identify that an object you're focusing on is a pen
4. with reasonable accuracy, confirm that the object is indeed a pen
5. identify its location in 3D space
6. move hand to pick it up
... all in less than 1 milisecond!

... hmm... maybe I need help :p

You get to learn another "foreign" language.
IMHO, extensive use of TLAs and abbreviations are defining characteristics of geeks:
e.g. In my current project, I'm using PEAR to develop a software in PHP & MySQL. I'm programming in OOP and use a DAL snippet called ADODB to connect to the DB.

You get to define your own language syntax (whoops, i mean grammar) :p
e.g. I have a programmer colleague who speaks in Pseudocode:
Secretary: Do you want to join me for lunch?
Programmer: Hmm...
If (not join you) {
can finish work;
} else {
boss unhappy;
evaluation points = evaluation points - 1;
}
Secretary: wtf?!

You get to stare into blankness/daydream without anyone questioning you
('cos they all think you're busy formulating the programming logic of the next killer application)
You can afford to ignore your boss/incoming calls by going... "Shhh! I'm trying to concentrate on getting this code to work!"

Even chatting on Yahoo! Instant Messenger or blogging can seem like you're hard at work.
i.e. Just gotta fake the "hard at work" and "seriously concentrating" facial expression.

PHP programmer wanted!

In my Inbox today, I got a mail from someone wishing to fill our programmer post:

The attachment: "surat mintak kerja inter.doc"

LOL... How direct can people get?

Sigh... any ideas on where to get good PHP programmers/good places to advertise for programming posts?

Binglish

Foreign journalists seem to love to cari-pasal (find problems) with Malaysia. It isn't enough that they consistently misreport our stand in political issues, they are now starting to threaten us with political blackmail if we refuse to let them interview us.

Well, it's not like we don't try to make ourselves heard clearly for we seem to be making every effort to present a more "international front" to the world, to prevent international journalists misunderstanding/misreporting us. One of the more obvious efforts include the introduction of English words into the Malay language (Bahasa Melayu/BM).

Take this most recent addition as an example:
(Old BM word) -> (New BM word) [English]

Belanjawan -> Bajet [Budget]
Zon/Daerah -> Presint [Precinct]

While this should come as no surprise to native speakers (as we have come to accept the limitations of the language), it is nevertheless worrying to note the "invasion of English" into the Malay language. I mean, don't tell me the Malay language has run out of suku-katas (the building blocks of BM words) to form new words? Politicians, in a lame effort to impress their listeners, have been the main culprit behind this, converting English words to BM to make their speeches/concepts seem larger than life (e.g. the idea of dividing Putrajaya into Presint instead of using Daerah or Taman or Zon). If BM purists don't say anything about this trend soon, I dare say they've been putting up a false front all this while... fighting against the teaching of Science and Maths school subjects in English while allowing English words to slowly creep into the language.

Possible future additions/conversions which I forsee:
Careta [Car] (after AFTA maybe? Proton will need to impress new buyers :p)
Rekrutsi [Recruitment]

Kept unchecked, I wouldn't be surprised if BM becomes pseudo-English a few decades from now.

e.g. A newspaper job advert from Proton in 2008:
"Kami sedang merekrut agen jualan untuk mengeksport careta Proton ke pasaran global. Sila hantar borang applikasi anda ke HQ kami di Shah Alam!"

Why Flash Mobs are so cool...

Flash mobs, spur of the moment mass gatherings intended to foster foolishness. The mob events, now happening around the world, are an e-mail driven experiment in organizing groups of people (via forwarded e-mails) who suddenly materialize in public places, perform some silly scripted activity, and then disperse as suddenly as they appeared.

One of the earliest flash mobs was started in New York by a guy known publicly as "Bill". The mob that gathered in Manhattan on Tuesday night was looking for something they referred to (without explanation) as a "Love Rug." Or at least that's what the couple of hundred people who gathered in Macy's department store told a bemused salesman, who may or may not have believed he was dealing with a commune of carpet-craving eccentrics.

Every since then, flash mobs have taken the world by storm. Here an except from a London Flash Mob at the Hungerford footbridge over the Thames next to Charing Cross Railway Station in the heart of London's West End:

I received my instructions aboard the Tattershall Castle, formerly a Steam Paddle Ferry and now a floating pub moored on the Thames just up river of the bridge. We were to make our way to the downstream footbridge and arrive at exactly 18:30, (6.30 pm to landlubbers but tonight had a 'naughtycal' theme) where we were to proceed to wave at passing trains as they came out of Charing Cross Station and shout 'Ahoy' to passing river craft that approached the bridge. Tonight's letter theme was 'Y' and everytime we heard it we were to click our fingers.

...By far the best responses came from the passengers on the many boats that swept underneath. Many were out on a night's jolly and were already imbibing cool drafts when they suddenly heard a crowd of about 500 shouting 'Ahoy' from above. Everyone on each boat waved back and we had several bows from the delighted waterbourne revellers. To top that several of the rivercraft sounded their horns in appreciation.


The London flash Mob 2 had a crowd of about 500 shouting 'Ahoy' to passing watercraft from a bridge

It is shouldn't be surprising to note that the participants of the mob have been youths and working adults... the most tech-savvy group of the population. But I feel, there are deeper reasons behind the runaway success of flash-mobs. These days there are just so many rules governing our society, the urge to break free is quite imminent. The "rules" which I refer to, aren't just the ones dictated by law, but also ones which has been dictated by culture and lifestyle.

Corporate life in this new millenium can reduce almost any "happy-go-lucky" person to "robotic-worker-drone" no matter how he/she tries not to succumb. Routine is obviously an inevitable part of the modern lifestyle, as we have grown to accept... which is why it can be mentally healthy to break away occasionally.

However, in some societies like ours, living "freely" can be more stressful with all the recent hoo-ha about "couples getting fined for holding hands or hugging in public". In fact, right in our own country, things are so restrictive in states like Kelantan/Terengganu that cinema ambient lights are left on throughout movies, and males are separated from females in all queues from supermarkets to grocery shops! In some shops when females have no choice but to man the checkout counter, they'll don full gloves and make every effort not to touch your hand.

Not intending to be anti-establishment or anything, it is fun to create such mass gatherings
(i.e. flash mobs) and see how authorities squirm to handle such situations. To the authorities, it would be a real dillema to handle these situations since no rules are broken, yet these gatherings look too organised and wierd to just let go.

I wonder if there'll ever be a flash mob in Malaysia. Any ideas on what would be a cool flash mob to start? >:)

Where is the love?

Why is this probably the best song ever (IMHO, of course :p) on the radio? If you haven't heard it, :O *where have you been?!* :p hehehe... just lookup 'Black Eyed Peas - Where is the love?' on Launchcast


Where is the love?

What's wrong with the world, mama
People livin' like they ain't got no mamas
I think the whole world addicted to the drama
Only attracted to things that'll bring you trauma
Overseas, yeah, we try to stop terrorism
But we still got terrorists here livin'
In the USA, the big CIA
The Bloods and The Crips and the KKK
But if you only have love for your own race
Then you only leave space to discriminate
And to discriminate only generates hate
And when you hate then you're bound to get irate, yeah
Badness is what you demonstrate
And that's exactly how a n**** works and operates
N**, you gotta have love just to set it straight
Take control of your mind and meditate
Let your soul gravitate to the love, y'all, y'all

People killin', people dyin'
Children hurt and you hear them cryin'
Can you practice what you preach
And would you turn the other cheek

Father, Father, Father help us
Send us some guidance from above
'Cause people got me, got me questionin'
Where is the love (Love)

Where is the love (The love)
Where is the love (The love)
Where is the love
The love, the love

It just ain't the same, always unchanged
New days are strange, is the world insane
If love and peace is so strong
Why are there pieces of love that don't belong
Nations droppin' bombs
Chemical gasses fillin' lungs of little ones
With the ongoin' sufferin' as the youth die young
So ask yourself is the lovin' really gone
So I could ask myself really what is goin' wrong
In this world that we livin' in people keep on givin'
in
Makin' wrong decisions, only visions of them dividends
Not respectin' each other, deny thy brother
A war is goin' on but the reason's undercover
The truth is kept secret, it's swept under the rug
If you never know truth then you never know love
Where's the love, y'all, come on (I don't know)
Where's the truth, y'all, come on (I don't know)
Where's the love, y'all

People killin', people dyin'
Children hurt and you hear them cryin'
Can you practice what you preach
And would you turn the other cheek

Father, Father, Father help us
Send us some guidance from above
'Cause people got me, got me questionin'
Where is the love (Love)

Where is the love (The love)
Where is the love (The love)
Where is the love
The love, the love

I feel the weight of the world on my shoulder
As I'm gettin' older, y'all, people gets colder
Most of us only care about money makin'
Selfishness got us followin' our own direction
Wrong information always shown by the media
Negative images is the main criteria
Infecting the young minds faster than bacteria
Kids act like what they see in the cinema
Yo', whatever happened to the values of humanity
Whatever happened to the fairness in equality
Instead in spreading love we spreading animosity
Lack of understanding, leading lives away from unity
That's the reason why sometimes I'm feelin' under
That's the reason why sometimes I'm feelin' down
There's no wonder why sometimes I'm feelin' under
Gotta keep my faith alive till love is found

People killin', people dyin'
Children hurt and you hear them cryin'
Can you practice what you preach
And would you turn the other cheek

Father, Father, Father help us
Send us some guidance from above
'Cause people got me, got me questionin'
Where is the love (Love)

A very accurate picture of the world today, no?

Sars re-Attacks?

Has SARS re-emerged in Singapore?

and life goes on...

Haven't been blogging a while as I've been a little occupied trying to keep up with all the recent events in my life.

Life is so full of contrasts, both bitter and sweet...

• My grandfather, suffering from his third stroke, is half-paralysed and bed-ridden. He helplessly awaits death to take him away while his wife commutes from home 2 hours daily to hold his hand, accompany, love and care for him.


• A good friend of mine, just got engaged and will marry in a few months.


• Another friend is in the hospital recovering from an accident that nearly took her life. Bones broken and all, she's thankful to be alive, but am now stuck with a few casts and protruding metal rods (not to mention having to spend the remaining 6 months in bed surrounded by 4 walls).


• My colleague, suffering from some form of thyroidal disease, just resigned to recuperate for a few months at home.


• My friend whom I met in the UK, has just recovered from a dengue fever which nearly took her life. She now plans to heck her savings and work to enjoy life with her hard-earned money. She is now lecturing part-time, and is saving for a backpacking trip to New Zealand.


• My cousin's house just got robbed two days ago. Lotsa cash and jewellery missing... plus their spare house key.


• Fed up with corporate life, my cousin's friend has just quit her job at a multi-national company to open her dream cafe.

... and here I am, spending an evening, ranting about life in front of a computer.

Isn't life cruel sometimes? Cruel that at each passing moment, an event as bitter as death can coincide with the celebration of the birth of a baby? Or to think that an accident/crime can share its moment with a marriage proposal?

What's worse is that time doesn't pause... not for a moment. It won't stop to give a dying man a chance to say goodbye to all that mattered to him... nor does it stop to savour the birth of a new soul.

It goes on... ruthlessly charging ahead... not waiting for no one... permanently changing and shaping our future... whether we want it or not.

Heck... time's ticking... I *want* to do something meaningful in my life.