Color Clock - Representing Time As A Hexadecimal Color Value

I came across a post in my Facebook feed today that linked to The Colour Clock by Jack Hughes. It's a pretty neat idea - the current time is translated into a hexadecimal color value and applied to the background of the page. So as the time changes, the background color of the page changes as well.

The only thing is, it's in Flash so if you're on an iOS device, you won't be able to see it. Or if you'd like to pull it up on your web-enabled TV or other device that doesn't have Flash. So I spent my Sunday afternoon porting it over to JavaScript and this is what I have: http://colorclock.nogoodatcoding.com. Can you spot the original?

Will the real Color Clock please stand up?
It's the one on the left.

  

I've tried to stay true to the original but among other things, my colors are just a little off, most likely because I'm calculating them differently. You can find project details on my site.

 Cross-posted from No Good Tips & Tricks

Mini Cooper Countryman Promo Car

Saw this at Tech Square the other day, a Mini Cooper Countryman promo car with an older (classic?) Mini Cooper mounted on top:

Classic Mini Cooper mounted on a Mini Cooper Countryman Promo Car

  

Of GRA Positions And SSN Applications

I've got a job as a Graduate Research Assistant at the GT-RNOC lab which is an awesome place for someone like me - the work involves all sorts of interesting technologies and platforms, ranging from mobile devices to set-top boxes to VoIP - and people there are really smart and fun as well (hey guys!).

As part of the whole "employed and getting paid" thing, I was out early this morning to apply for an SSN. The Social Security Administration office at the Peachtree-Summit Federal Building, 401, W Peachtree Street, Suite 2860, Atlanta is open 0830-1530, Mon-Fri. Here's a tip, if you're looking for the building on Google Maps, don't search by just the street address - marker will turn up at the wrong intersection. You want to also add the building name - Peachtree-Summit Federal Building. The entrance is at the corner of W. Peachtree St NW and Ivan Allen Jr. Blvd/Ralph McGill Blvd NE. And for some reason, this building doesn't show up when you search for 'social security' but I've edited the marker and added the type 'Social Security Office' so it should be part of the search results, whenever the data is updated.

I took the MARTA to the Civic Center Station which is right next to the building and stepped out at 0830 but because Google Maps told me to go the wrong way, I wasted about 10 mins - trotting off in the wrong direction and then coming back. At the entrance, you need to sign in, show some identification and go through an airport style security check with everything through the X-ray machine (didn't need to take off my shoes though). The office is up on the 28^th floor but the elevator was fast! I'm pretty sure I've taken longer to get to the top of a 5-storey building in India!

I'd already filled out the form (Application for a Social Security Card - SS-5) but the one they gave me at the OHR was kinda outdated, so after I took a time-ticket, I filled out a new form. There were just a couple of people before me - I waited for about 20 minutes and the actual process only took about 10 minutes. I was back home by 0930.

I was told to expect the card in about 2 weeks so now I wait!

 UPDATE [1500 11 Feb 2010]: Bummer - after almost 4 weeks of waiting, nothing. I called up the Social Security office and was told that my application showed as processed and that I should've received it. The lady told me to come in to the office in person, with all my documents, again. So now I wait another two weeks, hopefully this time it won't be lost in the mail.

 UPDATE [1300 22 Feb 2010]: Woohoo! It's finally here! Interesting to note, when they said 'card', I expected something like a credit card, made of plastic. Instead, it's made of card stock.

Snow Day In Atlanta

It was really cold here, in Atlanta, these last couple weeks - temperatures dipped to -8 °Celsius and with the wind blowing, it felt even colder. At first there was ice all over and it finally snowed last week on the 7^th of Jan. Georgia Tech was closed on Friday - too bad classes on only started this Monday :D

The night it snowed, we found a bat sitting outside our door - the poor little guy must've been half-frozen in the cold. He stayed there for two nights but was gone the third.

P.S. Yeah, I know, this post is a week late but I've been busy and uploading so many images to Blogger is slow work, so...

Ice Skating At The Centennial Olympic Park In Atlanta

Waterfall at the Centennial Olympic Park, Atlanta

Waterfall at the Centennial Olympic Park, Atlanta

Waterfall at the Centennial Olympic Park, Atlanta

We went ice-skating yesterday at the Centennial Olympic Park yesterday and it was a lot of fun! The entry fee is $7 per person for 90 minutes with optional $2 for skate rental and $1 for a locker (for upto 2 hours) but as Georgia Tech students, admission and skate rental was $6 per head so that worked out well for us. As of this post, College Discount Days are Mondays and Tuesdays - valid during the usual operating hours of the rink.

The outside of the ice skating rink at the Centennial Olympic Park, Atlanta

Ice skating rink at the Centennial Olympic Park, Atlanta

It was our first ice-skating and the first few minutes on ice were awkward and scary as our feet kept threatening to slide out from under us - we hugged the wall all the way around! After a while though, I was managing quite well (in my own opinion) and my first and only fall was almost an hour after I stepped onto the rink. The only problem I had was with stopping! My friends had a slightly harder time moving around though - they probably need a little more time. To be fair, I've had some practice on roller-skates, even though that was over 10 years ago.

Ice skating rink at the Centennial Olympic Park, Atlanta

Concession stands at the ice skating rink at the Centennial Olympic Park, Atlanta

The rink wasn't over-crowded - I suspect the sub-zero (in °Celsius) temperature had something to do with it - and there were quite a few other first time skaters so we didn't feel too out of place! I don't know how the rink compares in size to other places but it seemed big enough for a beginner. The only thing that sucked about the evening was that my skates were wet from the inside and my feet were numb by the time we left. So if you go, you might want to make sure you've been given dry ones!

All in all, we had a great time and if you haven't been ice-skating before, this is a great chance to try it out. And if you're studying at GATech, the student discount should be reason enough to go at least once.

UPDATE [1507 06 Jan 2010]: Though there's an ATM on the premises, it might help to keep in mind that the rink accepts payments by cash or check only.

UPDATE [2035 20 Jan 2010]: According to the Inside Access blog on ajc.com, the rink is 64 by 116 feet — and has 350 pairs of skates available.

Venk.in Vonuts

So Venkster finally got a domain name - venk.in. Between the two of us, we came up with this ridiculous parody that makes no sense but which we found hilarious all the same:

VENK.IN VONUTS
AMRIKKA RUNS ON VENK.IN

UPDATE [2353 18 Dec 2010]: You can find this at http://vonuts.venk.in. Personally, venk.in/vonuts would make more sense but he doesn't have hosting space yet...

Space Invaders

Space Invader made with mouse pads

There was a carton of free mouse pads kept in the common area of the College of Computing - someone stuck a bunch of them on a whiteboard and made this space invader!

Death Is A Sanskrit Dictionary?

So I was watching Dead Like Me - Life After Death the other day and the introduction sequence had this comic panel. Well, the jar doesn't actually say Contents: Death. It reads Sanskrit Dictionary! I thought that was hilarious! And kind of sad actually, that the filmmakers figured any 'alien' looking script could pass off as God's writing (that they picked the Devnagri script may just have some hidden cosmic significance though!). They might as well have used Klingon!


And a couple of days later, I was watching Scrubs and I spotted this on one of the computer monitors in the show. Do you recognize what it is on the monitor down in the right hand corner in the screenshot? It's the Windows Media Player setup screen! Looks like one of the nurses didn't have enough to do :)

Natatorium

I'd been looking for a swimming pool where I could become a member for quite a while now. Except, I'm not really the 'go-out-and-look-for-things' kinda person; I prefer checking out stuff online. That didn't really help. So yesterday and I found out about a pool from a friend and went to see if it was a public pool or not. Turns out it was. Yay! But they needed me to fill out a form and then get it signed and stamped by a doctor to ensure that I was not carrying any contagious diseases and was fit to swim. Sigh.

I went home early and then went down to the hospital that's in the same sector where I live. The receptionist wasn't quite sure what to make of the form, he said that any government doctor would sign the form. I didn't really want to go to a government hospital; actually, I didn't really want to go anywhere else now that I was already at a hospital. Finally, he told me to get an OPD form and go see a doctor in the basement.

Long line at the OPD counter, mostly people paying bills. Healthcare is expensive! I got a sheet with my details on it and had to pay them 200 bucks for it! This was after a 20% discount because of where I work. I went in to see the doctor, not a very impressive guy - Grey's Anatomy this wasn't! Told him I needed to get checked up so he asks me, "Do you have any problems? Any troubles?". Um, if I did, I wouldn't be paying you 200 bucks to get a 'DENIED' stamped across my swimming pool membership form. Luckily for me ( and the other people who come to swim ), I'm fine and I told him that. So he checked my blood pressure, had me breathe deeply a few times and then signed the papers. As simple as that.

Next day, 1600 hours. I turned up at the pool to get my card. You're supposed to pick a 1 hour slot when you'll be coming there. Kinda inconvenient but I guess it's so that there isn't overcrowding. The slots in the morning were full but that didn't bother me since I wanted something in the afternoon so that I could sneak away sometime after lunch. No, it's a good thing, I'd be dozing off in any case so this is good utilization of my time :D I picked 1600-1700, paid them 1200 bucks ( monthly, 800 more if you need coaching ), got my card and went in.

The pool is pretty decent, a small thing, 7 feet at the deep end but it's a 5 minute walk from office and it's clean, so it's not bad. It felt good to get into the water after so many years. Swam around a bit, I think I overdid it though, I'm now beginning to feel aches and I'm sure I'm going to be stiff all over tomorrow! There was one guy teaching the newbies, about 7-8 of them. Not very sure about how effective he'd be. Most people there weren't really that good, more about thrashing about in the water than actually swimming. Kinda sad, that so many people don't have access to proper facilities and training.

After about 45 minutes in the water, our time was up ( actually swimming time is only 50 minutes ). We all trooped out and showered and got dressed. I came back feeling quite good. I'd also packed everything I needed, including moisturizer ( Yes, I needed it after all that chlorine ). However, I didn't anticipate feeling peckish! That required a trip down to the cafeteria for an egg sandwich and a banana shake. Not such a good idea, maybe, because my eyes were glazing over once I got back to my seat.

Well, that's it. That was the big thing of the day for me. How'd you do?

Nuclear Arms

You can't hug your children with nuclear arms

Alright, so this was spoken by Amy, Death's crush, from Family Guy, Season 3, Episode 6. And it's sardonic. But it still sounds cool :D

Birthdays

I'm not big on birthdays. For me, it's just another day with the same old things to do. Maybe I'll use it as an excuse to pig out, but otherwise, I kinda even dislike the disruption of my routine. I know, I know, I'll age into a bitter old man. But that's just the way I am. It's not like I don't enjoy life or give thanks for what I've got; I just don't pick my birthday as a special day for it. I take joy in the smaller things...which I shall not list for fear of being labelled a geek! I just don't think birthdays are a big deal.

But my friends and family think otherwise and in spite of my reluctance, they do their best to make it special for me ( which I appreciate but only after a while; after I give up my attitude better suited to a hermit )

So here's some links to what some nice folks had to say to me on this day:

• Mona's put up a post just for me!


• Charles wished me, not once, but twice!


• And so did krystyna, on Mona's post and on mine!


• There's now more people adding to the comments! Don't you just love bloggers? The way perfect strangers can get together and share important parts of their lives, without ever even meeting. Makes you feel a little better about the world and the people in it. :)

There were others too, friends from school and college, who called and scrapped me on Orkut. Thanks guys.

And last, but not least, a big thanks and a hug to that special person for sending me a scrumptious chocolate cake ( even though I was less than gracious while accepting it; I'm sorry, I was a jerk ).

...Bienvenue 5300

A few days before my Nokia 3120 gave up, I'd been looking into phones because my family had been pestering me to get a 'better' phone, considering the condition the 3120 was in. So when it did die, I wasn't completely unprepared to buy.

I didn't want to spend too much on a device I'd primarily use to make calls. But if I was going to spend and get a phone, I'd want at least some features. The principal features I was looking for were connectivity via Bluetooth and USB and a music player. Secondary were camera, radio and connectivity via IR and whatever else would come as part of the package. And I didn't need any of these to be top of the line. I was happy with a 1 megapixel camera rather than shell out for a 3 megapixel one that I wouldn't really use.

Now, I'm partial to Nokia phones. I think they've the best, most intuitive interfaces around. And most of them are very well built and the standard features are well thought out. Plus, I've been using Nokia PC Suite for years now and I think it has all basic features I'd need or want to put stuff on my phone. It's bulky but it works. Also, I wanted to be able to access my SMSs and contacts on the phone and save them on my computer. As far as I know, most other phones don't let you into the phone memory even if you can connect them to your machine.

So I finally settled on the Nokia 5300. It's price was short of the upper limit on my budget and it had a music player, FM radio, 1.3 megapixel camera and a mini USB port, Bluetooth and IR! Everything I wanted.

It's a little flimsy, the body is plastic. It's a far cry from the solid feel of my 3120. And the screen's supposed to be problematic. And the battery doesn't last very long. And the camera's image quality is not great. But so what? I'll be careful with it. And I'll carry my charger with me. And I've got a Sony digital camera anyway, so I won't be using this much. ( Who am I trying to convince again? )

All in all, it's great for me; just what I need, in the price range I can afford, with features and looks that I like. Let's see how this one works out.

Adieu 3120...

I'd got my first mobile phone in 2003; a cousin of mine was getting rid of it. When I got it, it had a cracked screen and a loose cover. But it was reason for me to get a number and those surface imperfections were easily fixed.

The phone was the Nokia 3120, apparently no longer in production. A Series 40 phone with CLDC 1.0 and MIDP 1.0 support, it was just what I needed. It had GPRS and support for MIDI files as ringtones and JPEG and GIF image support as well. I later got a DKU-5 data cable and used it a lot, putting wallpapers and ringtones on the phone and more recently, for upgrading my Java skills to include the basics of J2ME.

It was one solid piece of engineering; I must've dropped it a hundred times and it never gave. Light and durable, it gave me over five and a half years of service. But lately, it'd been acting up a bit; it wouldn't charge properly and there were problems accessing it via Nokia PC Suite. It appears the firmware was corrupted to some extent.

Last Friday, the keypad inexplicably stopped working. And it wasn't mechanical failure, because when I restarted the device, the keys would work again but stop after a while. All except for '5'. And then even that stopped. So I knew, as much as I'd been avoiding it, it was time to get a new phone.

Google Labs India

On 15th August, India’s Independence Day, Google had hinted it had something up it’s sleeves. Today Google’s announced Google Labs India, developing features and tools to provide a platform to work with Indian and South Asian languages for searching for content. Pretty neat.

Also, the Hindi transliteration feature on Blogger has now gone a step further and is now a completely independent tool and iGoogle gadget.

Awesome stuff coming from Google and loads more expected!

Background Music

Maybe it's because I've been watching too many movies, but I keep expecting and wising for some sort of background score to accompany my doings throughout the day.

Wouldn't it be great though? Imagine striding into a boardroom meeting to the Imperial March! That would certainly make people more accepting of your ideas!

Or consider the possibility of being aware of your boss lurking around because you can hear the 'dum-dum dum-dum' from Jaws!

The music would also be a great way for people to know how you're feeling at the moment; happy, sad, filled with great expectations. This does have actual possibilities though. Maybe with time, we'd have progressed far enough with AI algorithms for music to have personal devices that can be set to randomly generate music based on a particular mood, soundtrack-style.

Of course, the problem with brilliant ideas, like this one, is that they're short-sighted and never factor in all the other people. With everyone playing out their own theme, it'd just lead to cacophony.

Enveloped

It poured like crazy on Sunday. The day started off sunny ( ugh! ) and sultry but clouds started collecting by mid-morning and after lunch, there was that wonderful, surreal light that precedes a really satisfying thunderstorm.

Wonderful and satisfying if you're safe and protected from the elements that is. I find it very comforting to be safely indoors, watching the rains lashing outside; warm and cosy and out of reach of the storm. It makes me feel invulnerable and all-powerful.

It's the same when I'm outside but protected by a water-proof windcheater and I can feel the raindrops whipping at me with the wind but to no effect. With a full-length jacket, I feel absolutely untouchable. In fact, contradictory to appearances, it's rather liberating, being able to walk where you want and stay out for as long as you want without, defying the weather.

Of course, after a while, the cold starts to get to you and the parts of you that are exposed, beg to return to the warmth of home. After a tempest, hot coffee is wonderful and satisfying in an entirely different way.

Tweeter!

Recently, I discovered Twitter; it's yet another social networking site. But this one is pretty different. For one, it doesn't expect any commitment from you! You don't have to be a part of a community or group. All you do, is post what you're doing at the moment, in 140 characters or less, from your cellphone, IM or on the Web and that becomes your current status. Your friends will see your status along with how long ago you posted it along with others in their friends list.

Why do I like it? Well, it has the potential for saving you the trouble of having to explain what you've been doing for the past week/ month/ year when you meet someone who you haven't been in constant touch with. It's easier to follow what your friends are doing in their lives that have inexorably diverged from yours as time passes. You get this wireframe of an idea of how they're spending their time. It would make it so much easier to catch up when you do meet up.

Of course, you and your friends would need to be on the site and doing this regularly. Unfortunately for me, none of my friends seem to find this appealing enough to sign up. They claim to have enough accounts as it is and don't want to try it out. Sad.

Well, I spent the last two weeks making Tweeter!, a Java client for Twitter because I hated having to leave my browser open to be able to post. Initially, I tried out Twitteroo, a pretty popular app, but it didn't work for me. At work, I connect through a proxy and Twitteroo does not support using proxies as of this writing. At home, I don't have enough space to install the latest Microsoft .Net framework and I can't be bothered to clean out my hard disk right now. Once I discovered the excellent jTwitter API from ThinkTank, I decided to build my own; both for use later as well as a hobby app to teach myself Swing.

It's been done for a couple of days and it seems to have turned out fine. You can download it here. If you do use it, consider letting me know what you think at no.good.at.codingATgmail.com; I'd love to hear from you. If you don't like it, you can always try out other Twitter apps like Twitteroo ( Windows only ) or Twitterrific ( Mac only ). You can follow me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/nogoodatcoding.

You Said It!

What is the difference between the American and Indian democracies?

In America, you can kiss in public but not pee; in India you can pee in public but not kiss.

-Anonymous

From Contrapunto, The Times Of India Delhi issue dated 16 May 2007.

Mininova

I'm really into downloading stuff using torrents and Mininova is where I get most of my torrents from. It's a pretty well maintained site with a simple clean interface.

Originally, when I was told to visit Mininova for torrents, I went to Mininova.com. Except that was a scam site. Some guy was asking people for $100 to use Mininova.org, the actual site!

Anyway, a few days ago, they were able to win a court case ( you can read more about it here ) and acquired the Mininova.com domain name as well. So now if you visit http://www.mininova.com/, you'll be redirected to http://www.mininova.org/. Do visit it, it's good.

And if you don't find what you're looking for there, try Torrentz.com. It's not a site for torrents but rather, a search engine. It searches quite a few sites, including Mininova, Meganova, TorrentSpy, Snarf-It to name a few.

Happy downloading!

Picasa Web Albums

I downloaded Google's Picasa the other day, and although I did have some initial misgivings about yet another photo-organizer, I have to admit, it is pretty slick! Very nice interface, cool GUI effects and pretty decent image manipulation features. Some pretty snazzy effects too. I don't think I'll be using it too often, I prefer to manage these things manually in Windows Explorer, but I did spend some time fooling around with it.

I signed up for a Picasa Web Albums account and then spent a day fiddling around with Picasa and Adobe Photoshop to get some pretty decent finals of some random photos I had lying around. Take a look at my public gallery and let me know what you think.