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Writing & Me
I was fascinated with writing right from my childhood. In schools, from 6th to 12th standard, you are expected to write 100-word paragraphs on assigned topics. Whenever I used to write a paragraph, I used to relate it with reality and celebrities. Therefore, my paragraphs were always different from what you find in good essay writing books. Therefore, my English teacher used to appreciate my paragraphs. However, I was not among the class toppers in English during my school days.
When I was doing Bachelor's in IT (BIT), my university started publishing a newsletter. The university started inviting contributions from BIT students. I actively contributed articles on topics such as system analysis and design, networking, and resume writing. I also contributed a JavaScript quiz.
2002 was the year when the IT industry took a nosedive . Therefore, after passing out of BIT in 2002, I could not find any job in software development. Therefore, I decided to try my hands in writing. I felt that I could carve out a highly successful career in writing because I was creative. Now that I have been writing for more than seven years, I do not regret my decision.
I think that you must be creative if you want to enjoy life. Writing allows me to express my feelings and emotions. Now it is difficult for me to imagine a career without writing.
Random Musings
Never Forget A Thing
Hey, how many times you open Google.com during a day? Your answer is not going to be less than 10, right?
Search engine, such as Google.com, is like a prompt waiter who accepts your order for searching any information available online and serves the results on your desktop. The beauty of Google is that we get the results instantly. We do not have to call up any person and listen to their rants for bothering them. In fact, with Google, we need not remember any other URL. Google is intelligent; it keeps on updating its index and always serves the fresh information. Google ensures that we never lose any information available online.
Now how many times you forget an item that you kept somewhere at home? Let's say you always keep all your important documents inside a file in your locker. Now, one fine evening, you return to your house after making a follow up visit to the doctor. You are holding the prescription in your hand while your partner is making scary faces. She is angry because you are late for the weekend outing. So, instead of spending time on opening your trusted locker, you hurriedly slide the prescription inside a large book on your study table. You firmly believe that you are going to remember that folly. Days pass and you keep on forgetting. Two weeks later, after dressing up for the next follow up visit, you open the file in your locker to take out the prescription. However, the locker is there; the file is there; all other important documents are there; but the prescription is nowhere. You scratch your head. Where's that damn prescription? You keep searching for days while your family members taunt you for being careless.
You are not alone. Billions of people in this world face the same situation day and night.
What then is a solution to say bye to such woes?
It is sad that most researchers are not thinking about solving this problem.
Radio Tagging: One solution that I propose is radio tags. To start with, you need to draw a detailed digital map of your home. You can start from scratch or convert the old architectural blueprint to its digital equivalent. Be sure that you do not leave even an inch. Then attach a clip size radio tag to every item in your home. The radio tag, in addition, in addition to the item name, short description, detailed description, date, size, and weight etc., stores the exact map coordinates. Use these coordinates to zero in the exact location of the item you forgot. Next, install miniature size radio antennas in every room. You already have a computer at home, yes!
The radio tags continuously reflect the radio waves transmitted by antennas. So, whenever you move the item, say a prescription, the radio tags reflect the new coordinates. This information moves to your computer, and you have the updated location. Please note that this process does not require any intervention on your part. It is different from creating an xls file or other spreadsheet and then manually adding or updating the data. This gives you the luxury of a search engine for keeping track of every household item. Of course, radio tagging is expensive. Apart from equipment, you need technical experts for installation and servicing.
I hope that our researchers will bring some innovation to bring down the price of this extremely user-friendly technology.
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SMS Gone, AC On
Summers take a heavy toll on your body leaving you with headache, fatigue, tired legs, dripping sweat, and what not. So when you return home, you expect your air conditioner (AC) to start cooling the home instantly. However, the regular AC takes more than 10 minutes to create cooling effect. You have no other option but to keep ceiling fans on standby.
A leading manufacturer of electrical and electronic appliances in India is changing with a new range of ACs. You can now command your AC to turn on in advance by sending AC*ON as an SMS. You may send this SMS 15 minutes before reaching your home. This means you land up in an already cooled home. No need to turn on the ceiling fans that you have been doing for long.
What is the technical aspect of this marvelous functionality?
The answer lies in the same mobile phone that you use everyday to make and receive calls. The extra thing that comes with this AC is a precool device. This precool device looks like a mobile phone and has a SIM chip. You can use any mobile phone, any brand or service provider, to send AC*ON. Upon receipt of the SMS, the intelligent precool device turns on the AC.
A value addition is that you can also detach the precool device from the AC unit and use it like any other multimedia phone. Reattaching it is easy. Right now, the manufacturer is using it in split ACs. It can be easily extended to cover window ACs too.
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One Time Password (OTP)
If you are either new to teleshopping or have not used it for long, this article is for you. Few months back, it was very easy to purchase goods and services and pay for them through a debit or credit card over the phone. Paying through a card saved time and trouble of going to store. In addition, you could make purchases any time of the day.
It worked like this:
- You call up the merchant IVR.
- From the IVR shopping options, you select the things that you want to buy
- The IVR system computes the total amount taking into consideration discounts, service tax, sales tax, and VAT.
- On being satisfied with the total,
you opt to pay by card.
- You enter your card issuing bank details, cardholder's name, card number, CVV number and date of expiry or tell these details verbally if the call goes to an agent.
- The IVR system debits the amount from the card.
- The transaction is complete, and you receive your goods instantly or within few days.
The above approach had one inherent security gap. The card details are permanent and do not change with time. Once you provide the details, any intelligent but dubious man in the middle could conduct any number of telephonic purchases by entering your details. You never came to know about this fraud until you receive your monthly card statement. No one could compensate you for this fraud because you yourself disclosed the card details. This security gap led to large number of fraudulent transactions causing loss to big percentage of customers.
OTP is a way to close the above security gap by introducing a stringent security mechanism. Once you enter it, it becomes defunct. No one in this world can then use OTP for conducting fraudulent transactions using your card details.
It works like this:
- You register your card and the mobile number for teleshopping with the card issuing bank.
- Before making a transaction, you SMS you card number to the bank's specified number. The bank's automated system sends the OTP as an SMS to your registered mobile number.
OTP is a 6-digit number and is vaild for few minutes only.
- You immediately call up the merchant or its IVR.
- From the IVR shopping options, you select the things you want to buy
- The IVR system computes the total amount taking into consideration discounts, service tax, sales tax, and VAT.
- On being satisfied with the total,
you opt to pay by card.
- You enter your card issuing bank details, cardholder's name, card number, CVV number and date of expiry or tell these details verbally.
- You then enter the OTP.
- If the OTP is valid and correct, the IVR system debits the amount from the card.
- The transaction is complete, and you receive your goods instantly or within few days.
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