Wish list for 2011

Not many but few Wishes for New Year 2011

* Stopover 3 different lovely cities across the Globe.

* Celebrate Birthday on an island.

* Tag on my passion without failing once in a month

* Sponsor an orphon child

* Conduct atleast one face yoga workshop

* Minimun two blog post every month

* Find someone who knocks me off my feet

* Thanks Giving at Golden Temple

* Bake whats called the perfect Chocolate Cake

* More of tech talks and blogging

* Keep up the smile no matter how worst things get

* Stand on the cities tallest building, kiss the sky and sing my favorite song

* A day in a Jungle

* Play an Adventure sport

10 things I can't live without

Apple Milkshake : Almost addicted, can't kickstart my day without it

Internet : As it connects me to my family, friends, colleagues and my blog, twitter followers

Dessert : I don't have a sweet tooth but a sweet teeth

Job : It defines me, enriches my learning and adds to my knowledge

Laughter : The best medicine and gives me the push to go ahead and solve any problem

Blog : My best friend with whom I can share everything and it never complaints

Compliments : It keeps me going and motivating

Pay check : Money, money I don't need it, but we all can't live without it... True fact

Miracles : As I say "I live to witness miracles"

Music : I believe dance is the best form of exercise and stress reliever

Why do most of the Hum Tum Stories end Unexpressed?

Tum and Hum met for the first time like strangers

Hum said something logical and Tum laughed out loud.

Hum kept wondering, while Tum realized that he has lost his most precious thing

Tum dreamt about Hum while Hum kept dreaming about how true love would be like.

Tum looked forward for one glimpse of Hum, while Hum kept running far from reality and hiding face from the world

Tum waited to hear “Hi” and a smile from Hum, while Hum was scared to look into anyone’s eyes.

Tum will dile Hum number, but would cut it before it rings

Tum bought roses but did not gather guts to offer Hum, so scattered its pedals on the steps Hum used to daily walk up at. Wishing that they get blessed by her feats.

Hum looks at the pedals and feels bad, carefully takes her steps so that none of the pedals get stamped by her.

Tum expresses his feeling in a mail, but instead of clicking on Send he saves it as Drafts

Tum will watch Hum from far and adored and respects here Indianess.

Hum carrying a bindi on her forehead wearing a salwar-kameez passes by Tum with eyes down lost in here own fantasy world.

Tum sitting opposite of the table that of Hum.

Hum smiles at all and every time Tum expected exclusively one for himself.

Tum rushes to the library to grab the same book he saw in Hum hands

Tum stood behind Hum when she’s purchasing pastries and buys the same pastry which was adjacent to the one she picked.

Tum bought a lavish car wishing to take one day Hum for a long ride

As Hum was getting wet in the rain, Tum steps out of his car and walks to share the same lucky rain drops with her.

All so silent but not in real….lots happening.

The world around Hum and Tum could witness all this but were speechless.

The day came where Hum and Tum story came to an end.

Tum organized a Farwell for Hum as he was happy to see Hum heading towards her dreams.

Love is not about expression, its all about feeling.

Its not that Hum didn’t felt Tum feelings, she knew it all….just that she could not overcome here fear of being loved.

She will always respect and treasure the Love and adoration she received.

Thank You!

Confession from a so called Android Fan Gal.

Yes I bough the iPad and when I said this I know it hurted most of them. So I am not doing any justification on this here, just expressing and sharing my thoughts about iPad.

It all happened during my visit to London last month.

I was at Planet of Apps Europe Conference and luckily was sitting next to BBC Technology Correspondent who was hosting the event for the day. He had 2 devices & no price for guessing – Apple iPad and Samsung recently launched Galaxy Tablet.

We started the conversation and when I asked him “What are your thoughts on Samsung Tablet” he took both the device next to each other and started comparing.

To summarize my observation:

Browser experience, typing experience & video rendering on iPad was far more better then the Samsung tablet. On that sadly Samsung Tab is overly priced and the touch pad is not very responding.

Then my dear boss handed over his iPad asking me to play around with it….that was actually the beginning.

I was falling for iPad as I started :

- Playing games

- Watching youtube videos

- Checking and replying to mails

- Updating my Facebook status

- and tweeting from the iPad twitter app

- Making notes

- Reading an iBook

When I was back to my hotel, I was actually missing something and was hating to work on my laptop, asking myself a question “Have I got used to iPad ?”

I got the answer and early morning I went to the Apple store on Oxford Street and bought my iPad.

The question here is “Did iPad got sold here or its me which got totally sold out for iPad”

As I was back to India….

Mom said- “U were supposed to buy an android phone, has the size of the phone increased these days?”

Sister said- “How could you buy a mac product?”

Dad said- “Why a gadget, why not branded watch, cloths, shoes & diamonds?”

Friends said – “U are an Android betrayer”

But my 6 yrs old niece simply loves playing with iPad and I am happy to see a smile on here face.

I am still passionate about android, but the fact is if a gadget can bring in smile on a face…its any time worth-it.

A good friend Soham Mondal made a productive use of the iPad and here are his thoughts on the iPad (1.0) after a week or two of using the iPad

Pros

1. The web-surfing experience. Apart from the lack of flash, the surfing experience on the iPad is unparalleled to any other device. The zippy touch + screen size experience is much better than that on any desktop or laptop and the galaxy tab doesn't even come close!
2. Videos/Youtube. If you like watching music videos or youtube vlogs/flicks, there is nothing like the iPad, you can now watch videos while you lie down on the bed or while you wait for your cab to reach the office car or anywhere the go, it looks great and feels very convenient to use
3. Apps. Some apps look and feel downright amazing on the iPad, games n newsreaders feel right at home here!
4. Battery life. 7+ hours while watching videos and surfing the net over wifi is no small achievement
5. Form factor, screen size. Apart from the weight, everything feels just right! It is sleek and very portable.
6. You can pair your apple bluetooth keyboard to the iPad to have a mobile workstation on the go, this is a really practical and powerful solution for mobile-workers!

Cons

1. It is a tad too heavy! Yup, you won't notice this when you first hold it, but if you plan to read books or watch videos while you hold it, it really weighs down on you. This is easily the biggest flaw of iPad 1.0 and I'm sure apple will work on a lighter frame for the next version of the iPad!
2. Speakers. One (mono) speaker just doesn't cut it these days. On top of that, the speakers are dry and weak and just do not do justice to the videos played on this device.
3. Apps. Apart from the handful of good free apps, most apps are either outrageously priced(some even free on the iPhone) or just not present. Either way, you can't really complain considering that the iPad has just been around for less than a year.
4. Youtube! Unless you jailbreak the iPad, the youtube player defaults to the highest resolution for videos. In other words for some videos it will default to 720p or 1080p and you have no way to reduce that and u can expect videos to buffer forever for most contemporary channels over 2/4 mbps connections.
5. Lack of camera(s), this doesn't really matter to me but many people might object to the lack of a front facing camera for video conferencing!
6. Lack of a back button. You would be surprised that I would complain about this but after using an android device for the past few months you cannot live without a back button. It is so practical and jumping back to the home screen or using the software back approach is not practical most of the times!

All in all, it is a great device, you wouldn't really think you'd need one until you actually get one. It is great for watching videos and surfing the web and I've actually started using my laptop less after getting this. However, I would definitely want it to be lighter and with a better speaker, if that's the case I would definitely not mind going in for the iPad 2.0 wifi + 3g version!

Final confession: I enjoy all the attention that I get when I carry along with me my iPad.

Good Resources to start with Android development

These are the blogs, websites which helped me and is still helping me in my Android Learning Journey:

Official Google Android Site developer.android.com

Good Android Videos and learning from DroidCon http://skillsmatter.com/event/os-mobile-server/droidcon-london-2009

Android Development Tutorial - Froyo http://www.vogella.de/articles/Android/article.html

Android People http://www.androidpeople.com/

Android Market http://www.android.com/market/

Android Stack Over Flow http://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/android

Android Blogging and hard code programming http://risesoftware.com/

Android World class trainer http://marakana.com/training/android/

Oreilly Trainings http://training.oreilly.com/androidapps-java/
http://training.oreilly.com/androidapps/

Android UI http://mobiforge.com/designing/story/understanding-user-interface-android-part-1-layouts

Good Friends Good Android learning site http://www.androidcompetencycenter.com/

Android Open Source Projects http://sites.google.com/a/android.com/opensource/projects/

Code Android Singapore http://sg.codeandroid.org/

Android Development Community http://anddev.org

Useful site with information on getting started http://code.google.com/android/index.html -

Developers blog androiddevelopment.org/

Android community with articles, forums, blogs, etc… androidcommunity.com/

Android Walking City http://awalkingcity.com/blog/

Tricks on Android http://www.jsharkey.org/blog/

Android Code & Apps http://www.tomgibara.com/android/

My life with Android http://mylifewithandroid.blogspot.com/

Android official blog http://android-developers.blogspot.com/

Android Developer Tutorials http://developerlife.com/tutorials/

Android OS News, downloads & Tutorials http://www.helloandroid.com/tutorials

Warrior Point http://www.warriorpoint.com/blog/

Android Blogger http://androidblogger.blogspot.com/

Android Linux kernel posts http://android.noisepages.com/

Android News http://www.talkandroid.com

SQLLite DB in Android: http://www.reigndesign.com/blog/using-your-own-sqlite-database-in-android-applications/

I am forced to blog this….joys of getting mails & tweets asking them to guide them through their android learning.

Hope you’ll find it useful… have fun with Android learning.

Talk on Dual Display for Android

It was a privilege to be a speaker at MODS – Mobile Developer Summit 2010 and BAUG – Bangalore Android User Group.

MODS:

Mobile Developer Summit hosted on Wed, Nov 10, 2010 at NIMHANS Convention Center, Bangalore. It featured a convergence of thousands of developers, technologists and industry players from the mobile and web developer communities. Startups, investors, mobile carriers and device manufacturers benefited from better understanding the latest technologies that will define the mobile market of tomorrow.

BAUG:

Bangalore Android Meetup group is targeted especially towards Google Android Developers and people who are linked to Android in some or the other way. Aim of the group is to share Android specific knowledge and networking among the Android enthusiasts. They have monthly meetups to discuss & share anything related to Android.

My talk focused on addressing the following questions:

- What is Dual Display?

- Why Dual Drift is the next Generation?

- How android renders on Screen?

- Various solutions / design approaches for Dual Display

- What are the Technical challenges faced?

- What’s the role of Surface flinger, Window Manger?

- How best a dual display can be used in Application Development?

What got the delegates excited was when we shared the Full Dual display solution implemented in MWC 2010 by Teleca with collaboration with Texas Instruments.

Check out the Presentation:

Dual Display on Android

View more presentations from Bhavya Siddappa.

When taken a pool from the audience 70% of them said they will not like dual display on smartphone, but will like it in Dashboard, TV & eBook reader

Questions received from Delegates:

- When will google support Dual Display

- Which is the best design approach

- Has teleca contributed Dual Display solution towards open source

- When can we expect dual display ebook readers in the market

Feedback received from Delegates:

- Dual Display looks good for TV, Dashboard but a big no to Smart phones

- Smart phones with dual display will have issues in running existing android applications

- Today where we talk of reducing cost of android phone, dual display will actually work in reverse to the pricing structure.

- There are more challenges in the Dual Display, however the scope for innovation from application development is great.

Compliments received from Delegates:

“Very energetic talk”

“Eye opener for me, as I being an application developer never though of it”.

“I came all the way from Gujarat, to listen to your talk…indeed worth it”.

“We wish you to do some android technical writing for our Magazine”.

‘I didn’t get an opportunity to blink my eyes for a while”.

Hall at MODS for my talk was houseful; I appreciate few delegates sitting on the steps and few standing throughout the talk. The best memorable part was when a gentleman close to my dad’s age come up to me saying

‘Hi, Thanks for the energetic talk, I am looking of getting into Android, would you bet on it for the coming few years”.

I said “Yes, you should totally and it’s a right time”.

I did my Job as an Evangelist, but why is that when I try telling my dad about my passion for Android, its just another platform for him or say its his enemy as android takes up lot of his daughter time :)