Day before I saw a Volkswagen Advertisement of the New Beetle. I was fascinated with this car from a very long time and today opened up carwale to check the price of the car. It was a shocker .

21 lakhs ex-showroom price for a 2.0 litre petrol engine Car :O.  Also the power of 116 PS at 5400 RPM is not an impressive number to shell out so much money too. There cannot be anything more absurd than this price. I think you can afford a Volkswagen Passat if you can pay so much. People elsewhere in the world would end up rolling on the floor laughing if we buy the new beetle for such a obscene price . The price is more than that of some signature editions of Beetle which Volkswagen sells for in the USA. Till yesterday I thought Honda Jazz as a highly overpriced car. But now, looking at the Beetle’s price Jazz at 9 lakhs looks to be a very cheap car .

Whoever at Volkswagen got this wonderful idea of importing a fully assembled model from Brazil and selling it in India for 21 lakhs would have been dreaming about any sales… I would say not more than a couple of these cars would be sold in a year.

A huge disappointment from Volkswagen .

Pratap.

Till yesterday I knew about 2D, 3D and even 4D movies but yesterday I got to hear this term 1D movie! Don’t confuse yourselves… I am not talking about a technical discussion around 1D movies but a funny discussion with one of my friends to whom I said I booked tickets for Avatar .

That person immediately asked me “Did you get tickets for the 3D, 2D or 1D version of movie?”

I couldn’t control my laughter… 1D movie with an investment of more than 200 million dollars .

But after that I got this doubt… What is a 1D movie? Can it be made? Any person with a Graphics Background or a Movie background who can answer this question?

Pratap.

I was surprised to see this news article in Mail Today.

The article mainly tries to highlight how the Congress High command will try to handle this problem of Andhra-Telangana divide. The following statements were made in the article:

1. “Congress High command will not bow down to any pressure tactics”

2. “High Command would respond at the appropriate time”

3. “Will wait till the issue fizzle’s out”

4. “Revolt was the first time in the party”

These statements are nothing but a mockery of democracy. Here someone might have started this issue and high command can do its witch hunting about it later… But as on today the first two statements that Congress High command will not bow down to pressure tactics is just a fake statement . Already it had bowed down to 11 days of KCR’s fast and that too to a party which did not hold any ground in the state when it came to the 2009 election results. When these people have already stooped so low… the statements that we don’t bow to anyone is just that Congress High Command is trying to behave like an Ostrich.

Also statements like these at a time like this is just not acceptable. They should listen to public opinion. They have taken a stupid decision by not consulting all parties and have become a laughing stock in the entire nation. Now if they do not heed to the public opinion from other areas and try to peddle their single sided view of the happenings then they will certainly fan a revolt from the areas of Andhra and Rayalaseema.

Sonia Gandhi should leave the false world which her chelas have created around her. She is no Indira Gandhi with popular mass support from around the country. YSR was the face of Congress in AP till 100 days ago and if Congress has to continue to be a strong party in AP it should try to protect a bit of YSR’s legacy instead of trying to behave as if Sonia Gandhi is the supreme leader in India. A similar behavior from Indira Gandhi was the sole reason for the strong emergence of TDP and now Sonia Gandhi with her midnight decisions is leading to a chaos in the state and preparing strong ground for the resurgence of power centers like Jagan Camp and TDP.

Understand the public and then take decisions, do not think of everything that happens in the state from a conspiracy theory point of view. Even when there is a conspiracy you cannot wait for fires to die down a natural death, TDP will fan them till Congress govt goes down in AP.

Also there is a strong negative sentiment about Congress brewing up because of the way High command is treating our Chief Minister Rosaiah and how he is behaving like a postman before the High Command. People are shouting for stronger leadership in the state and not for ’administrators’/post-men. The so called High Command is making people to look towards other parties for stronger leadership at the state level.

Pratap.

I have always maintained my distance on this issue of Telangana-Andhra divide.  Being a person who shares equal amount of affection to all the three areas I will not try to give my opinions on how many regions this state should be split into or whose argument is more valid. What I am trying to provide in this post is my take on the kind of costly political mistakes that Congress made in the last couple of days and how this will effect their prospects going ahead.

1. Chidambaram makes a statement between 11:00 and 12:00 in the night that a resolution for Telangana issue will be passed in state assembly. CM Rosaiah is in flight from Delhi to Hyderabad at that time and when he gets down at Hyderabad he declares that he doesn’t know about such a press statement released by the Central Government.
   1. A major decision about the state is made without even informing the CM of the state about it. What kind of an impression does the Central Government want to convey to the people of Andhra Pradesh?
      1. That Sonia Gandhi or Chidambaram are the supreme rulers akin to someone like Akbar/Aurangazeb and can dictate terms to the state assembly without even informing the major players like the CM or the leader of the opposition about their thoughts for the state.
2. Chidambaram makes a statement that all the cases against students who broke the law (during the violence on Big Bazar, Hyderabad Central and other establishments) during the agitation in Hyderabad will be withdrawn.
   1. Shows how weak the Central Home minister is with respect to the law and order of the country.
   2. This is the prime reason why people are now taking to violent agitations in the Non-Telangana areas today because there is no fear that police will register cases against them. Incidents such as the attack on HSBC bank in Vizag was a direct fall out of such a no-fear environment.
3. The Telangana sentiment is high, there is no doubt about it. Two of my best friends from the Telangana region become emotional whenever this issue crops up in our discussions. But at the same time there are my other Telangana friends with investments in Hyderabad who are opposed to this issue. The prime reason being the speculation based real estate prices which are slowing down in Hyderabad whenever the issue of carving a separate state crops up. The opinion is divided and to some extent it showed up in polls. TRS won 10 assembly seats and 2 Lok Sabha seats in the 2009 elections and lost its base in Greater Hyderabad with TRS fearing to even contest in the latest GHMC elections.
   1. In a situation like this where Congress already has 51 seats in assembly from Telangana area, 14 MP seats and a majority in the GHMC they have unnecessarily tried to showcase themselves as a weak party before the TRS.
   2. Even the credit of carving Telangana will be shared between TRS and Congress because Mr. KCR with a good display of political shrewdness has rebuilt his bastion to certain extent in these regions.
4. On the other had the opinion about United Andhra in the Rest of Andhra Pradesh is almost unanimous because of the connection with Hyderabad. People from around Andhra share an opinion that Hyderabad was built with the taxes collected from around AP. That the development the capital carried has to be shared across regions than to concentrate it only on Hyderabad.
   1. Congress currenly holds 17 MP positions and 104 MLA positions in the rest of Andhra.
   2. In such a situation this midnight decision has rubbed many people on the wrong side. Tomorrow if TDP suddenly announces that it has changed its mind and wants to stand by United AP, Congress will loose its deposits in most areas in Andhra.
   3. A clear indication on this was sent out by 138 MLAs from these regions by their resignations.
5. From Points 3 and 4 it is clear that with such a hasty decision Congress will be reduced to a mediocre force in Telangana + Andhra Regions if elections are held tomorrow.
6. CM Rosaiah has already proven himself to be a weak leader who dances to the tune of the Central Leadership. He is no YSR. At a state level people look for leaders not for administrators. YSR was a charismatic leader which the state of AP got to see for the last five years. Now in his absence people are sensing that Chandra Babu Naidu is the next best leader for the state.
   1. By not projecting a leader from its party but sticking to the tune of able administrators Congress is weakening itself significantly in the state.
7. The term that Sonia has declared a ‘Birthday Gift’ with this political decision has caused heart burn in many areas in Andhra Pradesh.

By making so many costly political mistakes Congress has definitely weakned itself in AP. It has paved the way for TDP to cash on its mistakes and emerge as a stronger power.  YSR demise has definitely proven to be Congress’s demise in the southern circuit.

Pratap.

I tried using some Avi to Mpeg converters and this was a free useful tool which I found on the web. The person whoever wrote the tool requested users to blog about it if we find it useful… so, thought I could give his link here.

Click Here.

Note:

     I used E-Trust to scan this tool and it showed no viruses… I don’t know for sure if there are any hidden trojans or viruses in this tool. Please scan the tool before you use it.

Pratap.

After a long time we got time . After having stabilized the database for our platform it is going a bit slow (very less bugs coming our way) these days. In a way feeling proud on pushing out a stable database system (or maybe users are just ignoring the bugs ). Took almost an year to develop and stabilize this system so been enjoying some free time these days (which was hard to come by in the last one year).

So, our team decided to play a volleyball match and even after getting a warning from my wife to stay out of the game and concentrate on writing a resume for her, I dared to go and play the game today .

Now I need to go and have a head to toe bath as I am covered in sand .

Pratap.

Digging out a post from my previous blog. Thought this post should be seen by a global audience to see how some Big Indian Service companies deal with employees or potential-to-be-employees. This incident changed my outlook towards a ‘company’ in general. And after this incident I never kept the same respect towards any other HR policy.

The funniest aspect of the whole story is that, the HR person who was involved in this whole incident (which happened in the 2006-2007 time frame) is still with the same company (infact promoted as a Executive HR :O) and she completed her MBA education from the most renowened management institution (famous for its HR education) in India :O [I want to question the basis for her selection to this institution and the basis for her promotion. A person who does not have courtesy, decency and least of all a sense that she is playing with other's careers is selected to a premier institute and is promoted :O, The world is definitely not fair. I will definitely reveal the name of the company in this blog one day, not right now.]

– The post –

What I write here is about an encounter with the HR/Recruitment team from an Indian IT gaint, which is one of the top Indian Service companies. I am NOT going to give the company’s name here… as I am NOT doing any witch hunting here.

To start with, after my wife resigned from the company (I wrote about this in another post of mine), she started applying for bigger ones and made it to this company. People at home were happy that my wife had the calibre to make it big. All this happened in Nov 2006 and she was asked a question in the interview whether it is ok for her, if they post her wherever the company wants. To that she replied, no my marriage is in Feb 2007 and I cannot, so please consider putting me in Hyderabad. To that the person replied, That’s good, you did a good thing by saying this in the beginning itself. She came back home, but was still inconvienient about the fact that she might be placed elsewhere and wrote a mail to the HR here in Hyderabad, looking after recruitment, to consider putting her in Hyderabad.

Two days later my wife received a mail from the company stating that she was being posted to training at Chennai. To this she wrote mail to the same HR at Hyd stating that, please consider my position and consider putting me at Hyderabad. To that there was a reply from the HR stating that “You can join at Hyd, but you will have to wait till Jan”. Then my wife waited till Feb and seeing no mails from them, wrote a mail to the same person asking her [the HR] what the status is. The reply was given by another person who we assumed to be the junior to the HR (we initially sent mails to). He replied by calling us that you will have to wait for another month for the training to commence.

We waited till March, exactly a month, and wrote a mail to him as well as the first HR asking them when it would start. There was no message from their side and my wife went to meet them at their office in Hyderabad. My wife met that person who called her and asked him why is this getting delayed and he said, please bear with us it will take another month.

Like this the replies like “Next” month kept on going and finally we reached September 2007. When my wife called the first HR in Aug 2007, She [The HR] replied saying that “Everyone has valid reasons, we cannot please everyone. You might be offered a training date at Chennai in Dec 2007. Please Wait.”. We knew that applying to another company and joining that company would take at least one month. And since we already have an offer at hand from a good company, why take pains like that. We asked a person whom we knew in that company to know why this is getting delayed like this and asked him to see if he can recommend to the HR team to see to it that she gets a place at Hyderabad.

The person got back to us with a reply saying, the name of the candidate does not appear in the list of people to be offered a job at our company. The reason stated was she did not join on the first DOJ for which she received a mail in Nov 2006.

We were totally shocked and utterly furious on the HR team for telling us to wait eternally for a long time to just get back a news like this. We wrote a mail to the HR people asking them what the actual status is, as we got a message from our contact in the same company stating something different from what they had been saying all the while. To that the HR team replied in mail stating that “As we have already discussed, the offer stands terminated”. We in reply wrote a mail to the HR team as well as CCing their Hyderabad operations head and the Senior HR management asking them why the HR team of a big company like this is so incompetent, and what we should be telling about this company to other people who ask us about it. That HR team does not respond truthfully in e-mails or they keep you waiting for eternally long time.

We got a call from the HR team asking us to come and meet them on Wednesday [19th September 2007] the next, with the offer letter that they gave her. I was telling my wife not to go first and ask them what the agenda of that meeting would be. To that my father-in-law and my dad said, no probs we will meet and see what the out-come would be. I did not reply and waited for this meeting to end. And this is what happened on that day.

HR team was utterly adamant and they told my wife, “We have already sent you a mail regarding your NEW joining date and you did not respond, and hence the offer was terminated.”. My wife said, “I did not receive any”… and “Please show me any mails that you would have sent me.”. The lady [HR] was furious and replied “We have sent them, and we need not justify ourselves to anyone. We have them with ourselves”. To this my wife argued for some time and said “You have made me wait for ten months and now you are still being very unjust to me. Please tell me what I should be telling in any interview as to why I wasted ten months”… and to that the lady[HR] said “Who asked you to wait? You should have INFERRED from our statements about ‘next’ month that you don’t have a place here” and to this my wife got frustrated and said “You are lying to me, by saying that you have sent a mail regarding the new joining date. How can you be like this?”. To that the lady[HR] replied, “How can you blame us like this? This suggests that your attitude is improper and we don’t want such people at our company.“.

My wife got totally vexed with the HRs and got out saying that, till now I had a good impression about your company, Now I have lost all that. My dad accompanied my wife that day to the company and when she came out and told him what happened inside. My dad approached the HRs and said, “See, We understand that some communication gap has occured somewhere and we know mistakes happen everywhere. We are not questioning that, but you should understand that you have spoilt ten months of a candidate, please rethink about this and do justice here for whatever mistakes have happened.”.

My dad was told by the HR team, “We don’t talk to relatives of a candidate. Whatever we had to tell we have told the candidate. We don’t want to discuss anything more.”. To that my dad said, “Look, we are people who have seen bigger companies, so please don’t tell us as if we haven’t seen how to deal with such things.”. To that the reply from HR team was, “We don’t want to compare ourselves with others… We have our own policies and we work according to them… So what do you want finally? ‘An apology mail for whatever has happened till now?’“. My dad said, “Ok please lead me to your Senior HR manager and I will talk to him.“… and the reply from the HR team was… “Sorry, you cannot meet him, he is very busy.“.

My dad is as such a very busy man, and these HR people wasted half a day of his and they give such reckless and immature answers. After coming home my wife felt very sad for how they attacked her for the mistakes that they [HRs] made. My dad was telling us how immature the HRs were.

Initially we contemplated a legal move against the company for damaging my wife’s career for ten months. But, my wife was against it, as she felt it would make her look bad, as it might give a wrong impression to other companies that she creates problems everywhere. So, finally my dad has decided to write a mail to their senior management about how great their Team is and has decided to give them a piece of his mind.

Pratap

My old blog on Yahoo360 used to register at least 20 hits a week . Considering the random stuff I used to blog about it is difficult to say who used to read my posts. But after moving to WordPress my hit count was around 0 to 1 hits per month on average for the last one year. Now it has at least picked up a bit and is showing some 1 to 2 hits per week :O… Some improvement at least. But would like to get it back to my original hit count of at least 20 counts a week. I am very serious on hitting that number again and will try to blog more often this time . Will concentrate mostly on Technical stuff as I believe it will generate more hits (interest ) compared to writing random stuff, i.e. about movies I saw and my other comments.

Pratap.

PS: Waiting for some comments from people telling me whether this ‘vision’ for generating more hits is a correct one or not .

This document took me a long time to write :).  Actually had written it for my team and shared it with them some six months ago. Thought it might be a good idea to share it with everyone. Most of the stuff I have written in this document came with experience. All the other stuff required some painful browsing and learning . There might be a few spelling and grammatical errors in the document, but I assume they will not hamper the readability of the document (a bit lazy to correct the doc )

So, if you like the pdf pls drop a comment. If you think anything is incorrect in the document then please feel free to point it out and ‘suggest‘ your correction (this is a very important feedback you can give ).

SQL Coding Guidelines (Pdf) – The Link

Pratap.

PS: Will follow it up with a document on design guidelines. Think it needs some cleaning before I can upload it .

BTW. Sorry for disappointing you Girish … Another post on SQL Server… Will try to write something non-technical in my next post.

I was going through the design of one of our OLAP databases and in that database I found certain fact tables with columns which seemed to be fitting the description of a dimension rather than that of a fact/measure. I had long arguments with the designer who designed this database and still couldn’t get a convincing answer. He seemed to have started designing the database assuming this to be a fact whereas now he was confused between terming that field as a fact or a dimension. So, I did some reading on this aspect and found this article describing something called as ‘Degenerate Dimensions’. It explained in detail why some columns are more like dimensions and how they need to be modeled.

As such this discussion happened between us some months ago… but I started loosing track of the URL… hence I thought it might be a good idea to track it as part of a blog post . Also, it might be of some use to people who are designing OLAP applications.

Pratap.