Today I had an experience that further reinforced the fact that the only thing that you can do alone is in the toilet! ( This is actually a famous quote by the late Reliance Chairman, Dhirubai Ambani)
It was my turn today to present a paper at the reading group. I chose to present a paper on Phylogenetic Tree Construction. After, the paper I presented a couple of ideas that I thought could be converted into something practical. The ideas did seem very good to me. But, as I presented it to the group, different comments started flowing in and I realized that what I was taking up wasnt as easy as it looked. I got a new perspective on the problem and realized that I had to confront a lot of issues
1) I had to make my method hold up against all the existing work, current research in the field had some models to measure algorithms. My method had to measure up to all those modes. The inexperienced grad student that I am, it would be an extremely difficult task.
2) The project would be a reasonably long range project. Though in the end the idea might work out, the risk was pretty high. It would make a lot more sense to work on smaller, easier and well defined problems before moving into a task of this dimension.
These are things that I would have never realized on my own! You tend to get a bit carried away with the fact that you have thought of something interesting and become oblivious to the subtleities that decide if it's going to succeed or fail. I was thankful for the objective criticism that I recieved. I think I am going to provide the same kind of objective evaluation to other's ideas in the meetings!
Moral of the story: Listen to others. For your own good! Tell them what you think. For their own good!
Thursday, March 03, 2005
Sunday, February 20, 2005
Well..I finally update it..
Well here I am back in the US after a great vacation in India. Saarang, Chennai (nee Tata nee Gold Flake) Open and home. Had a great time meeting friends and family.
Well now it's back to work and winter. Coursework and research work plod on. In my spare time I usually play tennis. But now it's too cold to play tennis, so I have taken up other games that use a racquet and ball- squash and racquet ball!
Squash is quite an interesting game. It's not as complicated as tennis but it's a whole lot tiring. You keep shuffling up and down the court for everypoint. It's fast paced and unlike tennis most of the points tend to be pretty long and involved. Well it's can be like that in tennis too, but maybe if you are carlos moya. What is fun about the game is the kind of stuff that is permitted. The ball can richochet of the side walls , back walls wherever. Another thing I like about the game is that the ball cannot go out!! Whatever you do the ball is going to hit that wall and come right back at you. The most important thing about the game ( to me atleast) is that it's indoors. So it's one thing that you can play in winter when it's way too cold to play outside.
Looking forward to spring break in Seattle with a trip to Vancouver.
Life in grad school is pretty different. It's more work focused and everyone is trying to make a career for themselves. Maybe my case is special, but grad school is pretty boring. Apart from your work you really dont have that much of a life. But maybe life does get better as you spend more time in school. But if you think about it it's pretty different from you undergraduate days. Most of your friends you made in the first 2 months of college.
What else. Right now I am busy trying to find an internship for myself. I really do want to do something in Bionformatics but I really dont see myself getting something. I could get into a research lab, but you need to have contacts to do that. You could get into a company, but there should be companies that are looking for people like you. Another option is getting into a government lab, but most of the positions are open only for US Nationals. So , I guess I will mostly have to settle for an intern with a software company. :( The only consolation is that the money is good. With the money I can.....
Well now it's back to work and winter. Coursework and research work plod on. In my spare time I usually play tennis. But now it's too cold to play tennis, so I have taken up other games that use a racquet and ball- squash and racquet ball!
Squash is quite an interesting game. It's not as complicated as tennis but it's a whole lot tiring. You keep shuffling up and down the court for everypoint. It's fast paced and unlike tennis most of the points tend to be pretty long and involved. Well it's can be like that in tennis too, but maybe if you are carlos moya. What is fun about the game is the kind of stuff that is permitted. The ball can richochet of the side walls , back walls wherever. Another thing I like about the game is that the ball cannot go out!! Whatever you do the ball is going to hit that wall and come right back at you. The most important thing about the game ( to me atleast) is that it's indoors. So it's one thing that you can play in winter when it's way too cold to play outside.
Looking forward to spring break in Seattle with a trip to Vancouver.
Life in grad school is pretty different. It's more work focused and everyone is trying to make a career for themselves. Maybe my case is special, but grad school is pretty boring. Apart from your work you really dont have that much of a life. But maybe life does get better as you spend more time in school. But if you think about it it's pretty different from you undergraduate days. Most of your friends you made in the first 2 months of college.
What else. Right now I am busy trying to find an internship for myself. I really do want to do something in Bionformatics but I really dont see myself getting something. I could get into a research lab, but you need to have contacts to do that. You could get into a company, but there should be companies that are looking for people like you. Another option is getting into a government lab, but most of the positions are open only for US Nationals. So , I guess I will mostly have to settle for an intern with a software company. :( The only consolation is that the money is good. With the money I can.....
Monday, December 20, 2004
Travel Advisory
Never ever ever ever travel Greyhound. You are guaranteed to be
1) Cold
2) Very Late
3) All those things that come from being cold and late e.g. irritable, sleep deprived etc etc.
Why am I ranting like this?
I took this greyhound from Champaign Illinois to Rochester, New York with connections at Chicago and Cleveland.
1) The bus to Chicago got delayed. I missed my 8:45PM connection to Cleveland.
2) I got a 2:30 AM connection to Cleveland. This thing breaks down in the middle of the highway in the dead of the might in the middle of a freezing snowstorm.The drive dude HAD to turn off the engine and the heating. Which meant that the occupants were freezing for the better part of the night. Then our man gets it up to a gas station where yours truly had to wait for another 3 hours for a replacement bus.
Final Result: 12 hours late, Cold, Tired and Ranting
1) Cold
2) Very Late
3) All those things that come from being cold and late e.g. irritable, sleep deprived etc etc.
Why am I ranting like this?
I took this greyhound from Champaign Illinois to Rochester, New York with connections at Chicago and Cleveland.
1) The bus to Chicago got delayed. I missed my 8:45PM connection to Cleveland.
2) I got a 2:30 AM connection to Cleveland. This thing breaks down in the middle of the highway in the dead of the might in the middle of a freezing snowstorm.The drive dude HAD to turn off the engine and the heating. Which meant that the occupants were freezing for the better part of the night. Then our man gets it up to a gas station where yours truly had to wait for another 3 hours for a replacement bus.
Final Result: 12 hours late, Cold, Tired and Ranting
Wednesday, December 08, 2004
Memories...
Today I got an email from my tennis team partner in IIT telling me about inter-IIT. It's next week in IIT-Madras. It's coming here after 4 years. It was here the year before I joined IIT and it is back the year after I leave!
All of a sudden I am getting back all kinds of memories- this is the first time in a long time that I am not playing in inter-IIT. Memories of endless practice session in the sun, getting up bleary eyed on my Kinetic and running to the insti-courts,coming back dead and having those naps you can have only when you are dead, traveling in the train to the host IIT, staying in the hostel, cheering the other teams, having strat sessions, sitting back after the game and lazing around with friends...endless list of things..some of the happiest moments of my time in IIT. Arrgghh..you know what..if someone gave me an offer to chuck all this crap and rewind time and get back to IIT. I will take it!
All of a sudden I am getting back all kinds of memories- this is the first time in a long time that I am not playing in inter-IIT. Memories of endless practice session in the sun, getting up bleary eyed on my Kinetic and running to the insti-courts,coming back dead and having those naps you can have only when you are dead, traveling in the train to the host IIT, staying in the hostel, cheering the other teams, having strat sessions, sitting back after the game and lazing around with friends...endless list of things..some of the happiest moments of my time in IIT. Arrgghh..you know what..if someone gave me an offer to chuck all this crap and rewind time and get back to IIT. I will take it!
Friday, December 03, 2004
Minnessota Trip and More
I spent thanksgiving week in Minn. with KP. Jigar had also come along. We had a great time- went to a basketball game, went to a riverdance show, watched Veer Zara the new SRK movie and more. It was good to get away from all the work and come back refreshed. I also saw a good amount of snow. The first since I came to the US. Well, now its back to work.I cant wait for the 18th. Thats when the semester end. I plan to go to NY to spend a week with Arrvindh. We plan to make a 'university tour' of NY. Rent out a car and drive around basically. Then,I leave for India on the 25th. It's going to be good to be back home- no worries, no work, no cooking, no taking care of myself, friends, family of course..I can go on forever!
The IBM T42-One Amazing Laptop
The IBM T42 is the best laptop I have ever come across. I bought a 15" version with1.8 Ghz, 80GB , 512 MB RAM . It has a fingerprint reader which replaces any kind of log on screen. The reader works pretty well too! The screen is good. It has a 64MB ATI Radeon Graphics Card. It's light, about 5.7 lbs. That's way lighter than other models with the same config. Sony's starts at 7lbs! It's fast. The HDD runs at 7200 RPM which makes large programs load quickly. The frame seems sturdy and capable of putting up with hard use.
The only downside is that it's expensive. Costed about 2800$. It didnt matter for me because I was buying it for my dad and his company would be paying for it. It would be possible to get a toned down version for about 1800$. Maybe less. But it would still be a couple of hundred dollars more expensive than comparable configs from other vendors. But, I feel its worth it.
The only downside is that it's expensive. Costed about 2800$. It didnt matter for me because I was buying it for my dad and his company would be paying for it. It would be possible to get a toned down version for about 1800$. Maybe less. But it would still be a couple of hundred dollars more expensive than comparable configs from other vendors. But, I feel its worth it.
Friday, November 19, 2004
Emotional Skills 110
Getting angry/sarcastic/bitter is pointless.
a) It helps in no way to make the situation better.
b) You cause a lot of damage to yourself and to those around you.
c) It makes you feel good. So, you might say why not lose your temper. But, you are getting cheated here. You stop thinking about the damage you cause after your high. Now you need to repair the original situation and the damage you did when you lost it. More work.
=>Either solve the situation or accept it.
a) It helps in no way to make the situation better.
b) You cause a lot of damage to yourself and to those around you.
c) It makes you feel good. So, you might say why not lose your temper. But, you are getting cheated here. You stop thinking about the damage you cause after your high. Now you need to repair the original situation and the damage you did when you lost it. More work.
=>Either solve the situation or accept it.
Tuesday, November 09, 2004
'Life In General'
'Life in General' has now become a little depressing. Mainly because I dont seem to be doing anything apart from sitting in the lab and sitting at home. I really should be going out and doing stuff. But it's get dark at 5! And, yes it's also cold and wet!
Can't wait to take my Thanksgiving break! Get out of the system for a week. When I return, it's just going to be a couple of weeks before I take a flight back home! Don't need to - cook, worry about food, worry about money, worry about anything actually!
Can't wait to take my Thanksgiving break! Get out of the system for a week. When I return, it's just going to be a couple of weeks before I take a flight back home! Don't need to - cook, worry about food, worry about money, worry about anything actually!
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