Moving to blogger

My blog is now at rr0hit.blogspot.com

Wireshark Cookie Dump:

OKCancel

“Thank You and RIP, Dennis Ritchie”

#include <stdio.h>

int main()
{
    printf ("Thank You and RIP, Dennis Ritchie");
    return 0;
}

Why apps like “Tweet Against Corruption” is a bad idea – A geek’s perspective

Maybe I am paranoid. But do read and see if I have a point. I recently came across a twitter application Tweet Against Corruption. I think it would be a bad idea to encourage such an application in the long run. I’ll try to tell you why I feel so. I do not endorse any point of view on the whole fight against corruption conundrum. The post is not just about this application, but any similar application. Most probably the authors of the app mentioned have no ill will at heart.

The app periodically send tweets on user’s behalf. The tweets are not bot generated ones but ones pushed out manually. There is no notification as to what has been tweeted on a real time basis. That means, the user will come to know what has been tweeted only during next login.

My issues 

• Whoever created the application, do they want the 5000 odd people who are using the app to read the tweets or use them to promote the idea they endorse ? If at all the former is a concern, they could have just set up a twitter account, the 5000 people if they really share the same point of view would follow the account and retweet the tweets they like. It would have the same effect it has now.
• The app can generate trends instantaneously which I would see as a really dangerous prospect.
• How many people would remember to discontinue the application once the issue (in this case the anti-corruption movement) is out of limelight or even settled ? Who knows one day the app wont be misused ?

What I would prefer :

• Add a feature where the user has to approve the tweet to be posted.
• Easier, just set up another twitter account and publish your ideas.

I know it is just like any app with authentication to tweet. The concerning aspect is that it is using a trending issue to gain posting access to a large number of accounts. The application has not provided any terms and conditions of usage which could even put them in a vulnerable position, should an inflammatory tweet be published.

This is just a point of view. I do not mean to accuse anyone.

Longest Return Statement

This is a screenshot of a function’s return statement. The longest I have ever written. My screen is not capable of showing it in full even in full screen mode. The function calculates the derivative of radial velocity at sonic point (when calculated in full GTR for inviscid accretion). I used Mathematica to calculate the expression. Converted it into C-code using the function CForm in mathematica and then converted to python. And Why python and not C++ ? I need not worry about limits of floating point numbers. (Yes I did try in C++ and got aweful results. Python code works well ).

A Python Solver for Multiplication Puzzle game in GNU Emacs

Those who are familiar with emacs will know a game called mpuz (Multiplication Puzzle) bundled with emacs. For those who do not know, It looks like this :

All you have to do is to guess the digits corresponding to each letter. I found some time to make a solver today (ofcourse in python ). It uses brute force as of now. But I hope to improve it when I feel more jobless.

Running the solver : For this particular example you can run the solver with :

python solver.py aeb he digb acje aicbb

Wait for a while and you get the result as :

264 96 1584 2376 25344

The code is in github. License : Do What The Fuck You Want To Public License.

A simple python score keeper for “Least-Count” card game

I am in Bangalore for my summer internship. Staying with "new" friends in Platinum City Apartments. In the time after we come back from IISc (where we all do our projects) we play a particular card game called "Least Count".

Rules

1. Each player is dealt 5 cards
2. Face cards have value 10, number cards retain respective values, A has value one.
3. From the remaining cards one is placed face up. Players can either play the same card of a different symbol or play another card and take another from the deck or top of the face up cards.
4. Player who feels he has the least sum yells "Least Count". If he actually does possess least sum, then he receives 0 points and the rest receive points equal to the sum they possess. In case he got it wrong, he receives 50 points and the rest get 0 points.
5. Player who crosses a pre-decided limit is out. The last one alive wins.

The Script

I am new to python and thought "OK..I’ll make a script to automate the scoring process". I uploaded it to github and here is the link. I have released it under Do What The Fuck You Want To Public License.

Update 1

Just added a GTK based GUI version of the score keeper. Here is a screenshot :

Update 2

The commandline version can now save the game state if you exit at any point using keyboard interrupt. The saved state file is to be passed as a commandline arguement to the program. Handy.

Blogilo is very cool !!

I just found out about blogilo, a blogging client that works like magic on Linux. Its a KDE app and this post is from that !!

Posted an article on Comptalks. http://www.comptalks.com/blog-from-your-desktop-using-blogilo/ have a look

My rant at the Nokia-M$ partnership

I am sad that my first post has to be a rant. Nokia has announced a partnership with M$. Nokia smart phones will drag M$ software along with them. I have serious issues with this. I have tried to keep my arguments uninfluenced  by my hatred towards M$. All my arguments are based on my concerns regarding the MeeGo Project and the dangerous trend of software companies wrapping up hardware manufacturers in soapy deals to ship their software by default.

What is MeeGo and What of it ?

MeeGo is a net-book/smart phone platform developed by the open-source community supported by Nokia and Intel. It was announced in early January and has made tremendous progress. See for it yourself from this album or by giving it a test run on your USB drive.   I always thought phones and tablets could take open-source software on a dream ride into the bulk user’s hands. Hence the MeeGo project was something I looked up to so much because Intel thought MeeGo would be THE OS for their Atom processor and it was expected that Nokia would ship Meego (they did so with N900).

Now Nokia want M$ software on their phones. I want to swear at this point (refraining because I do not want to get this blog censored). But, Nokia have assured that MeeGo project will go on and that it will be in their “next generation devices” and blah blah consoling the community. Basically I feel like they have let down the open-source community. They have devoid MeeGo of the opportunity to be shipped by default in a device.

The M$ Plot

M$ controls the market in Desktops and Laptops. How? Basically because they have signed up hardware manufacturers to ship their OS. And a regular user would never even dare to reinstall his Win OS let alone install a Linux based OS. They have played on the ignorance/fear of a normal user and devoid them of the right to choose their OS. They are doing the same in case of hand held devices. This should ring some bells. This needs to STOP. Future MeeGo will go on whether or not Nokia ships it. Hardware manufacturers will hopefully ship MeeGo in future (unless they fall prey to M$ trap). Either ways Win Phone 7 will take for ever to catch up with Android.

So I say : “Nokia, very bad choice : best of luck connecting people with Windows. And M$, well played, but future is at best bleak for you. And users, be ready to pay more for your Nokia phones”