Prakash Advani's Blog

OpenLaszlo is an easy way to create rich internet applications, that can be played on any platform with any browser.

The platform is now open source and competes with Macromedia’s Flex platform. With simple scripting you can create very powerful web applications.

Check out the impressive demos.

The world is moving to Wide Screen Laptops, now Samsung has release the World’s First 19” Laptop. The beauty of this laptop is that the screen can be detached and also used as an external monitor. Expect to see more 19″ wonders from other manufacturers too.

Related Posts:

Toshiba Qosmio

Wide Screen Notebooks/Laptops comparison

We often find there are people who always seems to be in a hurry. It may appear that they are hard working since they are trying to squeeze maximium out of time, but in reality they may be inefficient and may be cutting it too close!.

Seth Godin’s blog has an interesting post:

There are two ways to catch a plane. The first, which happens to be the most common, is to leave on time, do your best to park nearby, repeatedly glance at your watch, and then start moving faster and faster. By the time you get to security, you realize that you’re quite late, so you cut the line (“My plane leaves in 10 minutes!” you shout). You walk fast. As you get closer to your gate, you realize that walking fast isn’t going to work, so you start to jog. Three gates away, you break into a run, and if you’re lucky, you barely make the flight.

The second way is to leave for the airport 10 minutes early.

So don’t always be in a hurry, and don’t take the stress! Murphy’s law: If anything can go wrong, it will.

Interesting story that I came across..

This Is Good

An old story is told of a king in Africa who had a close friend with whom he grew up. The friend had a habit of looking at every situation that ever occurred in his life (positive or negative) and remarking, This is good!

One day the king and his friend were out on a hunting expedition. The friend would load and prepare the guns for the king. The friend had apparently done something wrong in preparing one of the guns, for after taking the gun from his friend, the king fired it and his thumb was blown off. Examining the situation the friend remarked as usual, This is good! To which the king
replied, No, this is NOT good! and proceeded to send his friend to jail.

About a year later, the king was hunting in an area that he should have known to stay clear of. Cannibals captured him and took him to their village. They tied his hands, stacked some wood, set up a stake and bound him to the stake.

As they came near to set fire to the wood, they noticed that the king was missing a thumb. Being superstitious, they never ate anyone that was less than whole. So untying the king, they sent him on his way. As he returned home, he was reminded of the event that had taken his thumb and felt remorse for his treatment of his friend. He went immediately to the jail to speak with his friend. You were right, he said, it was good that my thumb was blown off. And he proceeded to tell the friend all that had just happened.

And so I am very sorry for sending you to jail for so long. It was bad for me to do this.

No, his friend replied, This is good!

What do you mean,’This is good’ How could it be good that I sent my friend to jail for a year

If I had NOT been in jail, I would have been with you.

Konica Minolta has a new model DiMAGE Z6. This is a good semi-professional Digital Camera. I like the DiMAGE because it has most of the features found in high end digital cameras at a cheaper price. It also uses standard SD Memory and AA Batteries.

I also liked the earlier model Z5 and that has been on my shopping list. As compared to that Z6 has the following extras:

• 6 Megapixel vs 5
• better battery life

The Z5 support 640X480 movie mode but Z6 only supports 320X240.

So if these don’t matter to you, then you could still go in for the Z5. Z5 prices are expected (if not already) to come down as Z6 is available in the market in September.

Here is a detailed comparison of Konika Minolta DiMAGE Z6 and DiMAGE Z5.

Also read the complete review at DP Review.

del.icio.us is an online bookmarking services. Its easy to use and has a simple interface. It is the best way to have your bookmarks accessible from anywhere. You can also see other’s bookmarks and others can see yours too.

Check out my bookmarks.

Linux is everywhere. You can have a Linux phone, home security system, PVR and now a Car PC.

Looks very interesting, hope I can build one someday.

As per an article:

9.7 million digital cameras were sold in the United States in the first half of 2005.

This showed 20% growth but comparatively, in the year 2004 the growth was 50%.

The reason for the slow down is because people are now buying camera phones so consumers aren’t buying stand alone digital cameras.

Professional photographers would still continue to buy high end digital camera.

Wikipedia is the World’s biggest encyclopedia. Anyone can edit or contribute articles.

Articles are under GNU Free Documentation License.

As of now:

It has over 16,00,000 articles
12,00,000 visitors
It has editions in about 200 different languages
There are 26,000 contributors and most contributors are anonymous

If you are looking at buyging a SD memory card which is a standard memory used by most digital cameras, then SanDisk Ultra II SD Plus is an interesting product. It is a standard SD Card but also has a USB port. So it can be directly connected to the PC to transfer images, without requiring an adaptor.

It can also double up a a USB pen/thumb drive.



See a bigger picture here.

Maruti has recently launched Suzuki Swift in India, I have seen the car, haven’t had a chance to test drive it yet but here are my first impressions of the Car.

After a long time Maruti has had a Model which has a good response. Most of the other models that they launched hasn’t done so well. Versa, Baleno and Grand Vitara hasn’t created any significant dent in the market and didn’t do so well as the Swift. In fact Maruti has already increased the price of the Swift to take advance of the high demand.

Pros:
Looks good: This is of course a personal choice, some people like the new design while others find it odd.
Latest Model: Maruti has launched a latest model in India. The latest models are seldom launched in India by Automobile companies .
The car is selling well and likely to be successful.
The car has a good pickup.
It uses the esteem engine. Even though this an old engine, it is a well tested engine and is revamped.
Service network of Maruti is well established.

Cons:
Boot space is very limited and the inside space isn’t too great either.
Interiors look very simple.
There is long waiting period to get delivery which could take 5-6 months.
Still a new car, may slow down later or face competition. GM, Honda and Toyota have plans to launch cars in the same segment.

Some more inputs:

I was reading a UK based car magazine – Test Drive. They reviewed 12 cars one of which was Swift. The Swift was rated 3rd. 1st was Honda Jass and 2nd was Mitsubushi Colt.

Both Honda & Mitsubushi had a better mileage as per the review. Mitsubushi still isn’t an established player in India, so may not be a strong competition if the Colt was launched in India. But if Honda launches the Jazz then Swift could have some good competition.

Until then you could settle for Swift, provided you are willing to wait for 6 months for the delivery!

Related articles:

Hyundai i10

Tata Nano: 1 Lakh Rupees ($2500) Car

Hyundai Verna – First Look

Maruti Suzuki Swift Vs. Hyundai Getz

Honda Jazz coming to India

Hyundai Santro Vs. Maruti Suzuki Wagon-R

If you need to test if your boadband connection is really broadband then Cnet Bandwidth testing is a good tool to use.

It will ask you for a zip code, if you not in the US, just put any zip code and that should work.

My home connections shows a decent 25 KBps.

Is Microsoft a leader or a follower? They are just doing what Google is doing.

Microsoft got into search to compete with Google.
Google started Gmail with 1 GB email (now 2 GB and still growing!), so Microsoft’s Hotmail also announced that they are also going to offer 1 GB email. Earlier Hotmail users were still struggling with 3 MB email.
Hotmail is also being re-vamped to compete with Gmail’s cool interface.
Recently Google launched Google Earth, Microsoft followed with MSN Virtual Earth. They even copied the Name!

Sometimes leaders also become followers when they are worried about competition. Way to go Google! Our email accounts have gone up by nearly 1000 times! and Gmail interface rocks. Competition always benefits the customers.