Mr. Aggarwal

A cube measures at 6in x 6in x 6in. It is thinly cut into smaller cubes, each 1in x 1in x 1in that remain in the large cube shape. If I paint the outside of the large cube shape, how many smaller cubes have no paint on any of their sides?

I have found there is a whole lot more “oops” going on in the world than evil. Equip yourself to fight your own “oops” and the “oops” of others. – Ashok Aggarwal

India Nighttime Lights Imagery – Normal:

India Nighttime Lights Imagery – Trended and Colored:

I have seen a bunch of internet postings sharing a “NASA” satellite image of India “on the night of Diwali”. As nice as it looks, and as viral as it has gotten, this isn’t a picture of India on Diwali night like most people claim it is. As I understand it, this imagery represents the population growth in India via the change in nighttime lights…the different colors you see are showing change in population for images taken in different years (1992 is blue, 1998 is green, 2003 is red, and white lights show nighttime lights that existed during all 3 sampling times).

Following is the link to the NOAA page of the original image:

http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/dmsp/interest/india.html

Part of the glory of this image is that neighboring countries appear to be “dark” compared to India, but as you look at more of NOAA’s nighttime images, you notice other countries, even the United States (as shown below), have similar nighttime lighting imagery.

PS: I was torn about exposing this as I find it truly enamoring that Indians, Americans, and everyone around the world seems to be amazed by this. So let me request that, if you wish, continue to be amazed, even feel free to doubt what I have shown here and continue to believe that this nighttime light satellite imagery is unique only to India and only on the night of Diwali. And all the colors in different regions show how different parts of the country lights their communities with specific colors. Really, I do enjoy the innocence of people enjoying this picture at face value. Sometimes I wish I didn’t research it myself.

I put together these slides for some of the kids in my family and thought I would share with others; I think it is important that children understand some basic rules when using email to protect themselves as well as their family and friends. Any constructive input is appreciated.

I just found out about a phone number you can use to test your sound. It is designed for Plantronic headsets, but the idea can be used to just verify what other people hear.

The number is: (866) 210-2157

I then used option 3 to test how I sound and get the playback. I just ignore the Plantronic headset adjustment instructions.

I just bought and installed a new cordless phone system. Our previous system had seen better days — batteries on a few of the phones were not charging anymore and my tripping over the cords for the main base in my office caused it to drop enough times that it had begun to show its scars.

I didn’t shop long, but was generally amazed at how little this technology has advanced. I would have thought that phones would come standard with simple contact synchronization (with Outlook through cords if not with Google or other services over the internet). I also thought a standard feature might be some level of bluetooth integration with my cell phone so I could switch to the handset easily. I dare not expect any sort of rudimentary phone number lookup capabilities with internet services. I don’t even need a map UI — just simple scrolling of the first few numbers it finds — and let me lookup either residential or businesses. But nope, I will expect the exact same features I have had for 15 or more years.

But all those possible capabilities seem way too complicated to even dream of compared to the experience I just encountered while trying to setup the meager number of configurable settings on my phone system (if I can even call it a “system”) tonight. I went through to set up the voicemail access number for my phone provider —– no, I was past wondering why these phones don’t have visual voicemail built-in. After testing the setup, I realized I typo’d one of the numbers. ‘No big deal, I will just change the number,’ I thought to myself. However, though I could initially set the access number through the normal menus, I realized there was simply no way to change it. I had to dig up the manual online and was amused enough by the cryptic steps that I just had to share them (below).

Can someone PLEASE build some interesting land-line phone systems – many of us do still use them for a number of reasons, and I bet many more would if they had any decent functionality (especially with all this research coming out about the possibly negative health implications of cellphone use).

Steps for Changing Your Cordless Phone’s Voicemail Access Number
In order to change your voicemail access number, you must first erase it.
However, there are no textual menus providing any workflow for you to delete the number, let alone change it.
Instead, press {MENU}
Then dial {#}{3}{3}{1} ------ How on earth could I have guessed that???
Then, press and hold {CLEAR} until all digits are erased.
Then select {SAVE}
Then press {OFF}


I would not have been surprised if they next asked me to unplug the device for 20 seconds and plug it back in, followed by spinning around 4 times before attempting to setting the voice mail access code again.

I am thankful for my old gigabit switch getting “louder”. As annoying as the sounds may get, I understand this as one last, loyal yelp to let me know he is about to die…which I appreciate as opposed to him just up-and-dying on me immediately without my having a replacement ready.

You’ve been good to me ol’ pal. Let’s ride this thing out with some hardcore, chatter-heavy database transactions. Maybe we’ll throw in some video streaming as well — maybe a nice Netflix movie in commemoration.

Anyone have an apropos movie suggestion(s)?

Point your mobile device to this with a QR reader and enjoy!

I don’t judge the nature of the problem or solution as much as I do the depth of their respective complexity and simplicity. – Ashok Aggarwal

This quote isn’t as much an epiphany as it is just trying to find a way of describing what I really like to do…every day. This notion of finding simple solutions to complex problems also describes the kind of people I enjoy working with. Are you with me on this?

I have summarized the 10 dimensions as described by the video and interpreted by me below:

1. Length – a line
2. Length + Width – an impossibly flat object
3. Length + Width + Height – every object we can perceive; our world — an example is a human
4. Introduction of Time – imagine a single perceivable object in the 4th dimension is of indeterminate size and shows your entire life span
5. Introduction of Possibility – we introduce all the possible life spans you could have led in the 5th dimensional object
6. Our universe’s Infinity – all possibilities from the beginning to end of our entire universe accessed at an instance without travel; as an example, even in the 4th or 5th dimension, you would have to “travel” an indeterminate “distance” (though there is no such notion distance as we know it in dimensions that encompass time) in order to access a place in one of your possible life spans — in the 6th dimension, they would all exist at once
7. Introduction of other universes – imagine other universes with different laws of physics and altogether different foundational beginnings
8+9. Ability to travel “instantly” between different possible universes (similar to 5+6)
10. As our universe’s infinity became a point in the 7th dimension that allowed us to branch to other universe’s infinities, so all the infinities of all universes became a point in the 10th dimension. However, it is unclear what that could possibly branch to. So, in my mind, the 10th dimension is not well defined.

You may want to watch, think about this for a few days, and then come back to watch it again. It is just one way of describing 10 dimensions in layman terms, but I believe it will help formulate a thought process you can engage your mind with. I think you will find that you have already postulated some of these concepts during your own personal contemplation.

This happened to me recently. I needed to download my iPhone photos and videos like I normally do periodically, but I was not seeing the device in Windows Explorer like I used to.

The solution was simple. I just need to:

1. Unplug the phone from the USB charger
2. Enter my passcode
3. Plug it back in

Why? When the phone is locked, Windows cannot detect the device properly. I hope this helps someone.

These are all branded names of web browsers. I have been using FireFox and Chrome for a few years now. I only use IE7/8 for enterprise application development that requires compatibility with those browsers. After seeing such productivity gains myself by switching to the fastest browser available, I am starting to look into introducing FireFox into enterprises. It has certainly occurred to me that a quick description of a web browser is in order.

Notes:

1. A program on your computer, just like Microsoft Word
2. For Windows, Internet Explorer (also called its acronym, “IE”) is the default browser. If you don’t know which browser you are running, you are likely running IE.
3. At its basis, a Web Browser takes a web addresses (also called a “URL”) like http://www.mraggarwal.com as its input, and outputs the result on the screen, which is typically a web page.
4. There are four main Web Browsers on the market:
- IE (Closed Source by Microsoft)
- FireFox (Open Source)
- Google Chrome (Open Source by Google)
- Safari (Closed Source by Apple)

I found the following video to further help exemplify and provide another learning medium. I hope you enjoy it:

As you go higher, the wind gets stronger. – Ashok Aggarwal

I had a font package with afm, pfb, and inf files. When I tried to copy/paste them into c:\windows\fonts on Windows Vista, they would not install. Nor would they install using the “Install Fonts…” options.

These worked fine with XP — I realized that Vista requires a pfm file. And it is not difficult to convert these, though third party software is required. I download the free AfmToPfm software to complete my conversion:

http://www.proximasoftware.com/afmtopfm/

I hope this helps someone in the same situation.

Excerpt from Alon’s blog:

Download the patched version: termsrv_sp3_patch.rar

Installation instructions
0. Go to C:\Windows\system32\dllcache and rename the termsrv.dll to termsrv.dll.bak
1. Go to \Windows\System32 folder and rename termsrv.dll to termsrv.dll.bak
2. Copy the new SP3 patched termsrv.dll to \Windows\System32 folder
3. Run the included registry patch “ts_concurrent_session_patch.reg” (by double clicking it), it will update the relevant registry values which are relevant to the concurrent sessions support.
3. Restart windows.

NOTE:
if you are currently using Terminal Services, you will need to start windows in safe mode before you can overwrite the existing termsrv.dll files.