This is definitely what I want to be doing in the future. Obviously, there are days where everything breaks, but that’s with any job. Currently, I’ve been doing a lot of projects involving security changes, as well as revamping some of our processes to make use of what we have more efficiently.

On my most recent project, which I started a couple of days ago, I’ve been using Microsoft’s System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) for hardware and software inventory. This product’s been around for quite a while – formerly being called SMS. We use it for distributing software, and generating reports on who has what, among other things. I’m trying to customize SCCM to hold our inventory information with a variety of things. It seems like an easy enough concept, but I’ve learnt that applying it is more complicated than trying to design a method.

I urge you to check out a more technical blog that my friends started, which I’ll be contributing to. This is more meant to be a place where we keep our notes for ourselves, either through our experiences or referencing other stuff we’ve found online; but hopefully this helps you. http://nerdy-notes.blogspot.com.

On a more personal note, classes are going to be starting up in another couple of weeks. I’m not sure what this fourth/final year is going to hold for me, but I’m definitely looking forward to my CCIE classes/labs and my Capstone Project. Computer Forensics sounds interesting as well!

For everyone starting classes, whether you’re in Elementary school, High school, Apprenticeship, or College/University; I’d like to wish you the best of luck for the upcoming year.

Ciao!

I got to see a lot of Mumbai this time, most of which I haven’t seen before. In the past, I usually just visited a few places that we usually visit, and that’s it. I always thought of Mumbai as a second home, but at the same time, didn’t like it because a lot, if not all of the very little places I’d seen were noisy, congested, polluted, and dirty. Also, I was sheltered to a lot of things; and always told to be careful of everything and everyone.

This time, however, I learnt a lot and got to see Mumbai and the people that live here in a different light (given, a lot of Mumbai is still noisy, congested, and polluted. It seems a lot cleaner than when I was last here though). For example: even though people on the road seem to be in a rush to go everywhere, and people can’t seem to stay in the lanes while driving; everyone is still very helpful to one another to provide directions, etc. and there are no hard feelings for not giving someone way, etc.

Another moment that I though was quite touching(?) inspirational(?) I’m not sure of the word, but either way it showed true selflessness:

My Dad and his friend, who they call "Lamboo"

We went to see the colony where my dad was brought up, where we saw an old friend of his who used to work at a laundromat opposite to my dad’s old building. Turns out he owns it now. When they saw each other, he recognized my dad immediately, got up greeted him and hugged him. Not once did he ask “what did you bring me?” or anything of that sort; instead he said “materials don’t matter, they’re just going to break or get lost anyways. What’s important is that we’re healthy, and that we’re together. Come on, let me give you some daal and roti, you must be hungry by now”. For some reason, it doesn’t sound as spectacular in English as it did in Hindi. But trust me, when he said it, he said it in a way that would have opened anyones eyes to true friendship. To him, it wasn’t about what my dad could offer him, but what he could offer my dad.

Anyways, other than that sort of stuff, I spent the two weeks mostly exploring Mumbai, and visiting family. I got to see the Gateway of India, Lions Gate (where my Grandfather used to work), Victoria Terminus, the naval dockyard colony (where my dad was brought up), and a whole bunch of other places that I’m too lazy to list right now…

In any case, the trip was awesome, I had a lot of fun, and I got to see a lot of things that I haven’t seen before in Mumbai. My only regret is having stayed only two weeks. I wish I could have stayed longer, to see more, and to enjoy the life there. Mumbai has changed drastically from when I was a kid, and I can’t wait for the next time I go there to see what else has improved.

I just uploaded some pictures to my flickr (they’re really bad quality…most were taken from a moving car..), have a look. I’m not done uploading all the pictures yet.

P.S. I just want to say thanks to my family who put up with us for two weeks. And a special thanks to my cousin Laxmi’s husband Hari and their son, Varun for driving us around Mumbai, and spending a lot of their time showing me around.

Those of you that know me know that I primarily use Google Chrome as my primary web browser, and have been using it for quite a while now. To me, Chrome’s convenience and speed outweigh the resource usage.

I find that Chrome makes me more productive than most other browsers do, as a huge part of my day is spent on the laptop, and usually browsing the web for research, etc.

A lot of people prefer Firefox for the use of it’s plugins (Firefox has a TON of plugins), but Chrome’s extension gallery is growing day by day, and a lot of useful plugins have been ported from Firefox to Chrome.

Here’s some Chrome’s plugins that make my day a little more productive:

• AdThwart - Uses the AdBlock+ engine from Firefox to block annoying popups, and ads. (AdBlock works just as well on Chrome, but not AdBlock+)
• AutoPager Chrome – Automatically loads the next page on a website with multiple pages (i.e. Google) just by scrolling to near the bottom of the page
• Chromed Bird – Twitter client
• Feedly – I was looking for a good RSS reader forever, and I was finally satisfied when I came across this. It uses Google Reader’s API to pull your RSS feeds from Google, and displays it in a really nice, organized, presentable view
• Firebug Lite – A port of Firebug, from Firefox. Not as clean as the original Firebug, but still useful. I use it for checking over my code when I design websites, etc. Usually I leave it disabled until I need it.
• IE Tab – Allows you to run Internet Explorer’s engine within Chrome to be compatible with websites who require Internet Explorer (like sites that use ActiveX). I keep this one disabled as well until I need it
• One Number – checks Google Reader, Gmail, Google Voice, and Google Wave for your inbox updates
• Xmarks Bookmarks Sync – Yes. I’m aware that Chrome is able to sync bookmarks natively, but I like Xmarks for the reason that I can have those same bookmarks on Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari, etc. Chrome’s built-in bookmarks synchronization is really good, but as far as I know, it’s limited only to sync bookmarks within Chrome.

https://chrome.google.com/extensions is a good place to find extensions for Google Chrome.

Personally, I think that he’s got a great idea, so watch the video, and favourite it at http://www.doritosviralocity.ca/Gallery/VideoDetails.aspx?v=6435

Before we begin: These instructions will only work on the most recent phones/OS’s. The latest Blackberry OS (v. 5.0.0.411)was leaked out on the internet, but any of the new phones (Bold 9700, etc. will work as well). More info available at http://crackberry.com/leaked-os-5-0-0-411-blackberry-bold-9000-and-blackberry-curve-8900

So, let’s begin:

Assuming you’ve installed the new O/S already, or you have one of their newer phones (I think most of the new ones with the trackpad instead of the trackball should be fine..haven’t tested any other than the Bold 9700 though.

Start by going to “Manage Connections” and select “Set Up Wi-Fi Network” then choose “Manually Add Network” (you can also scan, does prettymuch the same thing).

If manually adding, the network name would be CAMPUS-AIR

On the next screen, set the different values as follows:

• Security Type: PEAP
• Username: <your student number>
• Password: <your network password>
• CA Certificate: <choose any certificate, you’ll be ignoring it anyways>
• Inner link security EAP-MS-CHAP v2
• Token: <none>
• Disable Server Certificate Validation: CHECKED

Now you can save the connection, or if you don’t want to save, just click connect.

That should be it..

Feel free to comment!

Thanks to Albert and Drew for helping/validating things for me

Here’s something that’ll hopefully stir some things up with the Canadian wireless market. Currently there are 3 major players in the Canadian wireless communications industry: Bell (BCE), Rogers, and Telus. Wind Mobile applied to be the fourth, but got denied by the CRTC on the grounds that the parent company, Globalive doesn’t have enough Canadian control in its company’s structure.

However, on Friday, Industry Minister Tony Clement overthrew that decision, claiming that after going through their case several times over, they have come to the conclusion that Globalive has enough Canadian control to operate in Canada.

Rumor has it that Wind Mobile is ready to mobilize and will be ready to launch before Christmas this year, which would mean that there is a lot of pressure on the Big 3.

What does this mean for us as consumers?

As the saying goes: the more, the merrier!

In other words, having more competition will push the other “Big 3″ to reduce their prices and/or improve their services, if they want to remain competitive.

Pricing

Prices can be found at http://shop.windmobile.ca/ProductCatalog/VoicePlans/ for their voice plans

Apple's Magic Mouse

If you haven’t tried Apple’s Magic Mouse yet, you should. It’s not radically different from an old-school mouse, but it’s really cool. The multi-touch features are pretty cool too..but like I said, it’s still a mouse. For more information on the mouse, go to Apple’s Magic Mouse page. It’s a pretty decent mouse; especially considering its Bluetooth, and multi-touch and only costs $69.00 from the Apple Store.

Here’s the catch. It only works on Mac’s. There’s no drivers for the Magic Mouse on Windows. Until now…(well..it’s still not 100% legit, but hey, if it’s good, then who cares, right?)

But Dan at UNEASYsilence has posted both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the latest Windows drivers for the Magic Mouse, which Apple delivered via an update for Apple’s Bootcamp. You can find his blog post which has the drivers at http://uneasysilence.com/archive/2009/11/14588/.

Thanks =)

Lets start with the basics: How to insert an equation in the document

This is super simple. There’s two ways of doing this:

1. In the “ribbon” go to Insert -> Equation (it has a huge pi symbol above it, you can’t miss it)
2. Use the keyboard shortcut Alt + = (that’s Alt and Equal)

Equation Editor 2007

I’m not going to explain all the things you can do in Equation Editor, but basically you can see the symbols, and the different functions you can put in to the right of the symbols. The interface is really simple to use; I’m sure you can figure it out.

Userful Keyboard Shortcuts

Here’s some useful keyboard shortcuts that Brad/Albert/Myself find useful while in Equation Editor:

Subscripts: _ (underscore) Eg: A_c for A subscript c
Superscript: ^ (carat/hat/whatever you want to call it) Eg: x^2 for x²

Division: / Eg:  1/2 for ½ Note: I can’t really give a good example without including an image but it gives 1 right above 2
Multiplication: \times  gives you the multiplication symbol (×) or \bullet gives you a dot in the middle if you don’t want to use ×

Integral: \int brings up the integral symbol, combine with subscript and superscript to get definite integrals. Eg: \int_-10^10 for a definite integral from -10 to 10.

Greek letters: basically these are just \ then their name. Capitalize the first letter if you want a capital letter. Eg: \pi gives you π but a \Pi would give you an uppercase pi.

Arrows:  ->  <- ….you get the idea..

These are just a few of the commands..there’s a much more in-depth list available in pdf format at: http://bit.ly/1gHRbc. It’s really well done..and explained probably better than I do.

Hope that helps! If you have any questions, leave a comment!