going nostalgic with marathi music...

I was surfing net today.. Reading some complex algorithms and trying to make sense and to get my mood out of dizziness caused by anti-allergic medicines...and just to keep my mood and brains alive, few nice songs were the must ! And I just tried to open few songs which marked few years in my teens...English songs are great.. they are nice. Elvis had its own style.. same with Sting as well even new song like " I kiss a girl.. I liked it.. " good songs.. Lively ones.. songs for every mood.. YET! marathi is marathi...thats my mother tongue and will remain close to my heart forever! like many others I am proud of it... Veer-Ras, Prem-Ras, Shrigaar -Ras, Vatsalya Ras made marathi songs specially different when it comes to it period from 1950-1970....

Atleast for me, Songs that needs to be addressed with utmost respect for their lyrics/tunes-composition. Once me being a Tabala player, I am amzed how sweet these tunes are, some songs rush your adrenalin when it takes you to all another level ..different years .. may be 200-400 years ago...These numbers surely made generations dance to the tunes literally...so much so that even new generation has remix versions of the same without modifying the lrycis much, though I dont appreciate that much personally:
१. वेडात मराठे वीर दौडले सातं... : लता मंगेशकर
२. मलमली तारुण्य माझे: आशा भोसले
३. सागरा प्राण : वीर सावरकर
४. जयोस्तुते जयोस्तुते श्री महन्मंगले शिवास्पदे
५. हे देवा तुझ्या दारी आलो: अजय- अतुल
६. चांदणे शिंपीत जाशी : आशा भोसले
७. गगन सदन तेजोमय : लता मंगेशकर
८ . लट पट लत पटलट पट तुझा चालण गा
९. ही चाल तुरुतुरु...
आणि अजून किती तरी...
जाता जाता एक गोष्ट जरूर नमूद कराविशी वाटते...एक चित्रपट अजूनही मनावर त्याचा ठसा ठाम टिकवून आहे ...शिवकल्याण राजा ! लता मंगेशकर याचं काम, गायिका म्हणून ठ्लक आठवावी अशी गाणी आणि त्याहून मोठं असं की ते तेजोमय असे शब्दं ; शिवरायांचं कर्तव्य शब्दशः मूर्तिमंत उभं राहतं॰ " निश्चयाचा महामेरु ... शिवरायांचे ध्यान फिरे अन् उठे मुलुख सारा " असे शब्द जीवाचा ठांव घेतात ... महाराष्ट्राचा इतिहास समोर उभा करण्यास क्षणाचिही गरज लागत नाही ... याचं शिवरायांच्या महाराष्ट्राचे आपण वंशज आहोत हा विचारच रोम रोम उभे करतो !

जय महाराष्ट्र!
मंदार सामंत

Possibilities are limitless....

First thing on Monday morning.. office...start checking mails.. One mail popped up saying, this is insane.. I opened it and saw to my greatest surprise.. Oracle Buys Sun!!!

I googled..and saw one more article..."This surely makes perfect sense" mentioned on the ZDNET blog ( http://blogs.zdnet.com/Gardner/?p=2903 ) ...that's right! Sense in terms of mode of business...Sense in terms of merging or purging product lines.. sense in terms of from strong handshakes as partners in the field; to have one wrist to clinch the deals...!

As an ex-Sun, I see the sunny side of this merger/acquisition... Oracle has an immense respect from all the techies like me...hmmm...almost all :) .. perhaps in my case that's the first RDBMS I started with and got a good leads/mgr who imbibed Oracle in my blood, not just oracle but also the magic tricks with different data structures in the Database...I mean oracle 7 and later! ...So I talked to my some of my ex-Sun pals about the news ... and they said its too obvious news man... I couldn't agree more or should I say it is a high-time to make this happen.

SUN Microsystems, how-much-ever I have respect for the technology paradigms that it has invented, was still going down.. as they said " 3o000+ folks, almost everyone of them had entrepreneur spirit in them, thinking in those many directions" ...good when it is thinking so that you can brainstorm but not necessarily good when it comes to their software product strategy.

Companies and people made money on the technologies SUN developed but they could not do so in turn. In my opinion, Sun's R & D was working hard but due to Dot comm bubble  boom and burst some of the finest brains in the industry left Sun and joined some of the others folks like AMD. Java was there, and was paving its way in EVERYTHING, as a primary technology paradigm to Sun other than Solaris. Others too noticed the growing potential of Java and minted money with J2EE specs based application servers as a topping. BEA/IBM/JBOSS/PRAMATI/JRUN, late Entrant Oracle everyone except Sun. why ? May be the reason being;  some companies inherently are not good when it comes to acquisitions. Most of the ventures Sun carried themselves worked well in the beginning, all SW frameworks, Solaris in initial days, Storedge product lines, UltraSpark processors in the very initial and recent days and technology paradigms. In my humble-most opinion, as a traditional problems in the computing industry, Sun always stumbled when it acquired any new company... to merge product lines or keep it as is or kill product lines... are the classic questions got never answers  and unfortunately products features suffer and got prolonged or got over engineered.

Anyways, Sun always in a forefront when it comes to sheer technology. Not just the technology, it is the first company on the platform side believed truly in PARTNERS. Starting from inventing File Systems in the initial days to leading in multi-core processors like Niagara for T-2000 based systems to meet PPE challenges and ofcourse to create momentum in developer world with world-class events like SunTech Days, JavaOne and JavaChina and much more...In my short span of career I am fortunate enough to attend many conferences, developers meets/galas and events; sometimes as a speaker & sometimes as participants. But whenever Sun started with a simple event, those events always got eventually converted into technologist pilgrimage. Even the hard-core competition too attended it and participated it on the same podium as Sun and paved the away for partnerships. Java User Groups is one such examples which embarks major success of Java platform as a partnership network between any form of developments strata, be it Enterprise, C/S, Mobile....

Ok So what now; Oracle and SUN together as one company?

Oracle's association with Sun is too old to ignore. Whenever Sun needed a friendly partner's hand; oracle was mostly there...and vice-versa is also true! Sometimes they fought, sometimes the negotiated like crazy over Price-performance topics but nonetheless they were there; together taking on the giants like Microsoft and IBM.

I think for sure that Sun fits well in Oracle's strategy.. Apart from Databases they now own the platform;  on which, in my humblest opinion, Oracle orchestrates the best performance.They have their own middleware and BEA acquisition in their bag; and now with this as well the brains behind the technology paradigms like Java ( I am not sure if they will continue with Java EE offerings from Sun) and their SOA offerings...! What remains a puzzle for me is what kind of Cloud computing solutions/services this combined giant can offer...

Again when oracle acquires Sun...one is with total aggression, sheer guts, dott strategies and other one is with technology focus and invention to the core, I am sure possibilities are limitless! looking forward for a well orchestrated show...:)

Cheers,

Mandar Samant

Resolutions Revisited...

we are in 2009...and already 4 days away from 2008. And its back to the same game of resolutions, I am playing it for almost 20 years and 80% times I have lost them to my laziness, wrong bets, overestimating my strengths...or just time management...So thought of giving a good thought to this entire process, and thought of writing it in a different way... ( See even these lines are stolen from my first post last year..damn this laziness.....)
1. Absolutely dry year 2008. YES. I have followed it to the core mostly. Alcohol intake was reduced to close-to-zero by the end of 2008. 2009 will follow the same trend for me.
2. Stop thinking about others and their benefits, I will be bit more selfish of thinking about my side first..: I was not completely selfish, I helped others for sure but also focused on my goals actively.
3. I will call NOT more than 2 times/per important person/Week : This is absolutely rubbish resolution, may be in next birth I will give a try! so it does not stand or never stood for me for any year...As with other years, this year too will not be an exception.
4. I will visit Dasara festival next year in Parula: Been there for almost all the important festivities. Could not complete it this year also. This is a carry forward for 2009.
5. Cardio needs to be started again: Diet is on roll , 2008 for me was weight gaining year due to my health and yes I agree to the mad craving for American food! But now I am sticking to a good diet and 2009 May goal is to come back to my shape before 8 years. This is a big resolution!
7. Start driving again, and by the end of the yr. 2008 I Will hands on Jag...!: Not Jag but started driving again...have my cutie with me .. Altima 2.5 SL!
8. Visit Himalayas this year...Wildflower hall (http://www.oberoiwildflowerhall.com/index.asp?leftinfo=1&leftitem=1 )sure on the cards this time: Could not and this resolution alters to mountains in North America.

new Resolutions:
1. Start playing tabla again...
2. Start exercising again...20 min-3 times-per week
3. Visit Grand Canyon, Rockies, Bahamas and New Zealand.
4. Trek Raigadh in Maharashtra
5. Read at least 1 book per month

I guess I have kept them very simple this time...Should work.. :)

Cheers,
mandar samant.

An Inconvenient Book: A Good Read...!

Flight from Cedar Rapids to San Jose is always time consuming due to the lay overs and delays. .this time it was special.. it was vacation time.. snow storm time and flights were getting delayed by more than 6-8 hours. So as you know it gets very boring at the airports, I decided to visit the book shop...Many books on the history, self help ( ?), and Economic Downturn, One book just took my attention, not because of the Top seller mark ( it already has it ) but because of the Author Glenn Beck. Glen ( called by Kennedy Jr. as the advocate of Fascism on CNN crew) is one of the straightforward , most sarcastic ( sometimes than Bill Oreilly) and conservative talk show host on Radio as well as on CNN. There are many show hosts starting from Anderson Cooper, Larry king, Bill Oreilly, Geraldo, Hannity and many more.. Some are serious, some are smart and serious, and some are just diverse when it comes to the topics that they cover. Striking thing about Glenn is his blunt and very much common sense based observations. So here is the book I liked it after long time... book which surely made a 4 hr 26 minutes journey from SJC to Chicago interesting for sure...!

Firstly book is very pictorial...apart from the content in the book.. sometimes ranging from intelligent, aggressive, stupid or sarcastic comments/statements, pictures speak hell lot of information. Notes and pictures are cleverly used make serious topics less serious, complex topics less complex and every topics more humorous.

Glenn's easy talkative style on the talk shows also reflects in serious of topics. His flawless thinking makes you think on the serious topics like Global Warming where he presents a very talked about  as well a complex phenomenon. he parents seamlessly altogether a negative perspective and sometimes even goes on convincing you with the facts and figures. Now this is the first chapter and from there on interest in this book does goes up.

Not all the topics are complex, to make serious discussions more serious, this book purposely entwines some light weight topics like Blind Dating, Movie rentals which would just allow you to keep you brain aside and read it and enjoy the sarcastic dry humor that Beck possess.

Want know my most favorite topics in this book : Global Warming; Marriage -Porn-Adultery-Divorce; Radical Islam; The Income Gap; Sleepytime - Movie Rental; Education Through Indoctrination; The UN; Media Bias; Illegal Immigration...!

So if you want some short essays/paragraphs/notes to tease your brain with some solid convincing comments this is the book to embrace...!

Cheers,

Mandar Samant

Iowaaaaah.... :)

Sitting just inside….Its red light inside and white outside…Its just white .. Snowing for last 3 days continuously…
Some say its boring, some say it messy... some say let’s sit inside…hmmm…I feel its sheer gorgeous!!!
Every snowflake has it its story…That way every rain drop has it s own world..but they are different…World apart...
As a part of western ghats myself, Rains bring much joy to my mind.. Continuous dripping over the windows…”tak”..”tak”..”trip..trip” every now and then.. just like someone is playing “Tirkit” on the tabla continuously.. .Nature has this much power of making you so helpless to change..Introspect your moods-thoughts with these continuous drips…drops! Some feel it makes them feel fresh…some feel sad…in my case…it forces to introspect, soothes me with these tunes and helps me to build myself again…Just like a mentor, just like a guide.
But Snow is different…It just enters surrounding softly... it builds thru’out day-night heaps of brightness in the atmosphere, into minds of the folks experiencing it…Just like a beautiful dream or a beautiful …you are right to guess…!
I am blessed for last 3 years to be in the snowy cities/countries.. believe me; nothing soothing like cold weather and nothing more pristine than white light snow flakes. It just feels my mind with fresh energy…hopes…!
Canada was a different experience of all... Snow storms.. And we crazy friends, used to meet for Friday evening get-togethers as it there is no tomorrow.. Refrigerators for the drinks used to the snow outside in the balcony/patio…With the Hindi-English pop & dance numbers sizzling, with the friends all around, I never used to know how week’s stress used to go away within those 7/8 hours and we used to get ready to embrace next week easily.
Iowa is different… Snow here is different …people are different…traffic is different J… work is different and to lighten up you r mood same friends are not around…But with this glorious nature here…mind is inclined to hope for better in life...optimistic about not just next day /next moment challenges but for the decades to come...perhaps it’s the outlook which has changed in last 10 months or just White Snow here is throwing black shadows out of mind…
Whatever it is… last 72 hours… 6-10 inches of snow…-18 C temperature…Skidding cars…Wind-chills taking already low temperature low, sending shivers thru’ your spines if you are outside…Dropping temperatures making you freeze in less that a second…Kids building snowman.. Embracing Christmas celebrations around ...smiley kids throwing snow balls at each other.. There is lot of optimism in the environment, lot of energy that makes this place a special one for me for sure.

Cheers,
Mandar Shankar Samant.