Pavan Gayakwad

When it comes to programming, I noticed most of the super programmers share similar attitude and thought process. I started identifying similarities whenever I took interviews. After meeting 3000+  potential candidates (thanks to all my previous companies choosing me as interviewer), I dared to have a quick points to spot a 'Super Programmer' from the pool of programmers. When I shared these points with my colleagues, they found it useful during their interviews. Please note These points are strictly valid for 'Rock Star Programmers' only. If you apply these observations to a good programmer, you may loose him.  I always don't follow these points very strictly in interviews as there will be many other aspects to consider, However these can just be used as indicative pointers if you feel good.  So here it goes, They may be little nervous in the beginning. When you ask them about their interesting project, their eyes glow and for a moment they...

"Ice Age 3: Dawn of the Dinosaurs" is a neat pack of humor, adventure with be on the mind characters. The fun begins when alone, One-eyed, dino-hunting weasel called 'Buck', who is sophisticated yet not so complicated, agrees to find 'floppy green thing' with his set of rules and killing his life time enemy Rudy (T Rex Dino). After that there are many eye catching events and nice animation work. In the end Buck kill Rudy and says "He is gone! What am I suppose to do now?". In that very moment, I see him losing excitement in life. Not so fascinatingly, he agrees to come to the world of Ice age. All of a sudden when  Rudy roars!! Buck finds reason to go back to his world and fight with Rudy all alone.      Its been many weeks, Buck is still in my thoughts and there is no sign of him stopping his blabbering. His existence has no meaning if there is no Rudy. He only knows living for finding opportunity to defeat Rudy. That's his purpose and he i...

With a history of serving Kuvempu University for question paper generation, Quick Quest is now serving Scholar’s private college in Nigeria and receiving good feedback. The teacher using this software sent his experiences and I am very happy to publish his 'as is' words on main page of Quick Quest section . This is a great encouragement to the development effort of Quick Quest. Thanks to “The Scholar’s Private Collage, Akure, Nigeria” for choosing Quick Quest.

The saxophone playing in lavish and lazy mood on my home theater audio system. Half filled crystal clear mocktail glass is standing still on the table. It served me 12 times. Ice cubes in the container melting slowly. Few small pieces of pizza left out in the take-away box. Ceiling fan is blowing cool air. With aesthetic gratification, I am sleeping in my bed. Not fully slipped in dream world. My senses are still enjoying the atmosphere. My right leg big and second toe shaking unnoticeably. Laptop silently downloading recent updates and also scanning for Conficker warm which recently attracted much of attention all over the world. Television is in mute, “DOA: Dead or Alive” action was on. Washing machine is busy cleaning dirty cloths. My salary credit message is sitting unread in my mobile message inbox. The alarm is down counting to wake me up in next 2 minutes… I felt I needed this lazy day after my busy project work schedule at office. I spent restless week. I am lying in my bed li...

Microsoft’s free web browser Internet Explorer 8 is out for public use and it started appearing on windows update programs list as well. This time IE8 is offering a tight competition to its rivalry browsers by putting up noticeable features like accelerators, web slices, common color tab groups, security filters and better performance in comparison with its previous flavors. It was impressive in the beginning when I started using IE8 with all its new features; on my aggressive usage below points came to notice. Still few web sites are breaking Tabs are not responsive if one of the tabs is struggling Page rendering sometimes takes more processing time and Browser speed is not always faster Let me admit, I got addicted to Firefox though it’s a memory hogging browser. But it just doesn’t toddle when I am doing too many things on it. IE8 is an obtrusive update for IE7/IE6 users. Users like me have slim to none chances to migrate to IE8 yet.

I was too far from my home by the time I realize that its gonna rain nicely now. Its 7 eve and it’s my routine walk time. Weather turned darker. When I turn around, I saw slight panic in people’s eyes. It started raining. Those who were walking started running, two wheelers stopped near shops or big trees for shelter. People in car were closing windows. Many were kind of worried about getting drenched. It's getting everything wet including me. I am standing looking up at the sky. The rain drops are falling on my face and I shut my eyes. I am feeling cold. My heart is more lively and warm. I am flying free. Thunder and lightning didn’t change what I'm feeling. I kept my walk as usual and as simple as it can. Many were looking at me strangely, some with a question mark on their face and few with confusion. They all had one common question-“Are you mad? It’s raining!!” I just laughed at it! I couldn’t stop walking in the rain and so my thinking. We became so much ‘civilized’ that ...

Carefully and painstakingly crafted movie - The Godfather. Incredibly strong script, cut throat decisions, lasting moments, nerve breaking sequences, chilling twists and extremely sharp dialogues makes me to watch this movie often. I have captured some of the very thoughtful and deep impacting dialogues from the characters of 'The Godfather'. "I am going to make him an offer he can't refuse" "Why did you go to the police? Why didn't you come to me first?" "Never hate your enemies, it affects your judgment." "Fredo you are my older brother and I love you so much, but never take side with anyone against the family ever" "Some day, and that day may never come, I will call upon you to do a service for me. But uh, until that day, accept this justice as a gift on my daughter's wedding day" "Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer." "Never let anyone know what you are thinking." ...

Behind vehicles... Intel Inside, Idiot Outside. (Written on a car) Who said I ride faster? I am just flying... See we met again! Don't drink and drive, drive after drinking Don't Honk, Earn your way! Don't follow me, follow GOD I am not afraid of death, I just don't want to be there when it happens If your wife wants to learn to drive, don't stand in her way! It is not desirable to travel faster than the speed of light, cos my hat keeps blowing off If everything seems under control, you're just not going fast enough On T-Shirts... Girlfriend always comes with an expiry date Education ruined me He Who Laughs Last Thinks Slowest Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder If you want to look young and thin, hang around old life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it Whatever it is -- I didn't do it! Behind every successful man is a woman, behind her is his wife I believe in dragons, fairies, good women and other mythical creatures! Coffee isn...

I have fanatical interest to be acquainted with what made Indian emperors take influential decisions during their reign. Few great kings’ valuable decisions created a remarkable history. When Akbar accepts the marriage proposal of Hindu King (Bharmal of Amer), he wishes to make an attempt to set an example for two culture and religions and convey the message of peace. Later, destiny takes him to the critical path of life having most depraved political and family oriented problems. Being a true great emperor, Akbar learns and conclude challenges by demonstrating his exceptional leadership qualities. With his verdicts, Akbar stands as an incomparable king of all time. “Jodha Akbar” – brings 16th-century incidents to life and shows beginning part of Akbar’s married life which was, in fact, a deal for political gain. This decision slowly unleashes Akbar’s loving life, internal dreadful politics, painfully desirous people around him and betraying family members. Jalaluddin Mohamma...

After many months of development work, Quick Quest is available for download. Quick Quest Limited Edition –is a free version for personal use. Soon I will start working on “Professional” and “University” Editions. Quick Quest home page is revamped. SrushtiSoft blog is now having new look.

Not sure how regularly you visit SrushtiSoft blog , if you had not visited it for several weeks; please take a glance now.

When I wanted to re-create “Quick Quest” (QQ), my struggle to move further sometimes made me feel “I am thinking too much!!”. Recently, When I come across few statistics about execution of software projects in the industry from Grady Booch blog (“Software And Movie Making” posted on Thursday, June 12, 2008. you can also find his blog link from My Favorites section on this page.) I just felt my struggle was realistic to my scale and I am not alone. “Quick Quest” is not a big revenue making software for me now however it taught many things to me. An extract from Grady’s post, “75% of all software projects at Fortune 500 companies fail, 33% are cancelled, and 66% go over budget by more than 200%“ Well, Me and QQ belongs to 66% share which indicates variance of estimated budget by 200%. Where ‘budget’ for me here is my ‘time’, which is impossible to slow down or earn more :)

Recently I noticed, Kannada calendar hanging in my home is indirectly indicating my working moods in percentage. Here is what I found the exact information when I put imaginary lines on weekday letters. Don't you think everything tries to tell something to us and we just need those ‘eyes’ to observe?

I could not stop laughing when one of my buddies manipulated my photo like this and showed me with the caption, "Find out which one is a fake poster!! Yes you are right!! The one in the Right side is 'faked' ;)" My deep excuses to Scarface Movie Team and Al Pacino :) Little bit about Scarface, He was a United States gangster who terrorized Chicago during prohibition until arrested for tax evasion (1899-1947). One thing my buddy understood very well in this was, If I get chance to act in movies, I will sure opt for a villein role like scarface, who will be the strongest, richest and most terrible person to the world atleast for 2 to 3 hours :))

I was one of the members in popular online social networking web place from past one year. I found many profiles expressing interest in “Business networking”. Whenever I initiated communication, most responses were very unprofessional. I reached many people from diverse profession. Our interaction started with lot of enthusiasm. Later people just didn’t like to have serious talk. As far as keeping in touch with my buddies, I would prefer to drop a personal email. Along with the message I typed, it also carry the emotion of 'you are special to me my buddy, how are you?' So, I am in a wrong place. May be, I am either not so social person or not understanding the online social networking  etiquette . Anyways :)

When I was doing my graduation, I never imagined that I could get a best in industry job and career growth opportunities. How can a below average student can dare to expect such things? Everybody (my college mates and their parents) used to press more on getting high marks to become a successful engineer. I never took those opinions seriously, may be I was ready to take life as it comes. Though I had dreams, I was little dubious. Now feeling amazed sitting in a luxurious suite of high class hotel in Minneapolis, USA and typing this post for my blog. As I talked about in my previous post ( In This World - 8 ), my life did not gave me what I wished but it pushed me to the journey which I never guessed. Though I found and lost many great things, I am still living with joy and surprises. Sometimes I feel life is easy, but it is not as straight as it seems. With little pleasure and slight startle, I am going to bed. Good night Minneapolis.

As you might have noticed I started working on plunking allied images to all my posts, one of the proven best practices of making piece of writing little more attractive. I take a crack at my best; If not my words at least colors should make you feel glad.

31 December, 2007 midnight 12 is a closing edge of 2007 and instigation of 2008. As I remember, in the 2006-2007 edge, I was scratching my head to find out new name for my personal web site, (“WindsonSquare”) and was trying hard to register the domain with my dial-up internet connection at home in my native (Davangere). After many attempts, I wasn’t able to register it successfully due to very slow internet speed and frequent disconnection. At last when I looked at the wall clock it was scoring night 1 AM. I slip to bed. That’s it! This time (2007-2008), during the edge, many were celebrating New Year (as they do it every year I feel) with their friends, at night clubs, at hotels, parting, dancing, screaming, boozing, taking fast bike ride of calm night streets, my neighbor was doing pooja… ...what the hell I was doing? I caught cold so most of the time was busy cleaning my nose and sneezing, turning pages of my new washing machine user guide (delivered on that day evening). A...

Diwaali - one of the richest celebrations in India. A festival of lights, wealth, victory and wisdom. This very day, Hindu mythology has many remarkable events. Goddess Lakshmi’s Birthday. Vishnu rescued Goddess Lakshmi from the prison of king Bali. On this day Rama, Seeta and Lakshman returned to Ayodhya after defeating Raavana and conquering Lankaa. The return of the Pandavaas from their 12 years of “Agnaat Vaas”. On the day preceding Diwali, Krishna killed the demon king Narakaasura and rescued 16,000 women from his detention. On this glorious day, we crack fireworks and symbolically we worship human positive instincts. We pray for the best and light up new dimension towards our life. No matter how far we succeed; as long as we have vigor and undying dreams, covering the way of light will never be a challenge in itself. Wishing you happy festival of enlightenments.

I felt every one of us (Software Professionals) should read, think and act on this http://www.ibnlive.com/blogs/yogeshkumar/1118/2217/life-beyond-work.html . Let’s break-up the culture which has grown very largely and badly. Anyways I started this in my office, what about you guys? Any thoughts?