Monday, January 25, 2010
Fault Indicators for Consumer Appliances
A washing machine fail to work. The Lady of the house wonders what went wrong. She turns it on, clothes are in, water tap is connected, but the machine doesnt start. She calls the vendor. The vendors redirects her to the service shop. The service shop guy asks for details and promises to send a service engineer.
The service engineer drops in after two days. Well dressed even a tie the service engineers speaks half in english and half in regional language. He checks the machine and says there seems to nothing wrong except the motor. He says motor is not his area of expertise so he will go back and report. After another two days an other service engineer turns up. He confirms the motor must be the problem. Then comes the shock! He says the machine needs to be brought to the service shop to investigate and fix this.
You cannot take a washing machine in auto or your home car! So the lady brings a small load carrier, costs Rs. 250 for 4km distance. She takes the machine to the service shop. She then expresses frustration to the service manager and tells him that if the motor is gone bad, she doesnt want to fix it rather she will dispose it. The service manager orders the engineers to check throughly.
Then comes the shock they report that the motor too is fine! At last they find that the unit where buttons operate the machine there is a fault. They changed the swtich assembly and it all works fine. At least seems to work fine. The lady just notices that there are so many other people with grim face waiting to quarrel with the service shop folks regarding one or the other washing machine issues.
Now let us assume the above story goes as below:
When the machine failed, the Lady calls the service shop. The receiver asks the make/model/year of manufacture etc. Then he asks the lady to locate a spot in the washing machine where there are LEDs marked E1, E2, E3, E4. And there is a small glass viewpoint. He asks her whether there is a Yellow and Red color flashing alternatively in the glass viewpoint. The lady says No. He responds that means the motor is not running. Then he asks do you see any of the LEDs labelled E1/E2/etc turned ON? She says yes E1 alone is glowing. He responds that means the switch assembly is gone bad. He says "Madam, we will send our service engineer with tools and for worst case a replacement unit of switch assembly with in two days".
Two days later the service engineer comes, checks and finds a replacement of switch assembly is required. In few minutes he fixes everything. Charges for part and service.
I know it will cost little more money. But when things fail, it anyway costs money, frustration, loss of good will, etc.
NOW IF YOU ARE A STUDENT IN FINAL YEAR GRADUATION AND WILLING TO DO SUCH A PROJECT - I CAN CO-SPONSOR and CO-PARTICIPATE
The service engineer drops in after two days. Well dressed even a tie the service engineers speaks half in english and half in regional language. He checks the machine and says there seems to nothing wrong except the motor. He says motor is not his area of expertise so he will go back and report. After another two days an other service engineer turns up. He confirms the motor must be the problem. Then comes the shock! He says the machine needs to be brought to the service shop to investigate and fix this.
You cannot take a washing machine in auto or your home car! So the lady brings a small load carrier, costs Rs. 250 for 4km distance. She takes the machine to the service shop. She then expresses frustration to the service manager and tells him that if the motor is gone bad, she doesnt want to fix it rather she will dispose it. The service manager orders the engineers to check throughly.
Then comes the shock they report that the motor too is fine! At last they find that the unit where buttons operate the machine there is a fault. They changed the swtich assembly and it all works fine. At least seems to work fine. The lady just notices that there are so many other people with grim face waiting to quarrel with the service shop folks regarding one or the other washing machine issues.
Now let us assume the above story goes as below:
When the machine failed, the Lady calls the service shop. The receiver asks the make/model/year of manufacture etc. Then he asks the lady to locate a spot in the washing machine where there are LEDs marked E1, E2, E3, E4. And there is a small glass viewpoint. He asks her whether there is a Yellow and Red color flashing alternatively in the glass viewpoint. The lady says No. He responds that means the motor is not running. Then he asks do you see any of the LEDs labelled E1/E2/etc turned ON? She says yes E1 alone is glowing. He responds that means the switch assembly is gone bad. He says "Madam, we will send our service engineer with tools and for worst case a replacement unit of switch assembly with in two days".
Two days later the service engineer comes, checks and finds a replacement of switch assembly is required. In few minutes he fixes everything. Charges for part and service.
I know it will cost little more money. But when things fail, it anyway costs money, frustration, loss of good will, etc.
NOW IF YOU ARE A STUDENT IN FINAL YEAR GRADUATION AND WILLING TO DO SUCH A PROJECT - I CAN CO-SPONSOR and CO-PARTICIPATE
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Sep 2009 South Karnataka Tour
6 days, five nights
Shimoga, Sringeri, Agumbe -> Jog Falls, Murudeshwara -> Gokarna, Kollur, Udupi -> Karkala, Dharmathsala -> Belur, Halebidu, Shravanabelagola
One museum, two waterfalls, three beaches, four monuments, five national highways, six temples,…
Day One, we drove from Bangalore via Tumkur, Tiptur and Shimoga to Mandagadde. We had booked home stay at Inchara. The stay was very homely and green. Inchara in Kannada means chirping of birds. The name was perfect.
Shimoga, Sringeri, Agumbe -> Jog Falls, Murudeshwara -> Gokarna, Kollur, Udupi -> Karkala, Dharmathsala -> Belur, Halebidu, Shravanabelagola
One museum, two waterfalls, three beaches, four monuments, five national highways, six temples,…
Day One, we drove from Bangalore via Tumkur, Tiptur and Shimoga to Mandagadde. We had booked home stay at Inchara. The stay was very homely and green. Inchara in Kannada means chirping of birds. The name was perfect.
Day Two, we visited the bird sanctuary in Mandagadde. There we only few birds, but it is right on the NH-13. We spotted 3 types of birds. Then we went to Mahishi beach which is clean and there were more pebbles than sand. After that we visited National Poet Kuvempu’s house in Kuppali. The house is converted in to a Museum. Apart from the pictures, articles and other collections the house itself is a masterpiece. We also climbed to the Hillock next to the museum where the Poet use to derive inspiration and was put to rest. It is a Beautiful place. We had tea in the stall outside the museum with Forest Ranger Mr. Jagadish. Then we drove to Sringeri. The parking lot in Sringeri was mess and from outside the place is nothing special. But once you enter inside, the antic temple stands magnificent. The river and the mutt in the background add to the beauty. The temple, verandas and dinner hall are all maintained very clean. After the bliss of serenity from Sringeri we drove to Agumbe. It was extremely cloudy and hence we could not get any view. But the drive to the spot itself was thrilling with visibility only for the next 12 feet or so. We got to definitely make a trip to Agumbe in the right season. We then drove back to Inchara, Mandagadde via Theerthahalli.
Day Three, we drove to Jog Falls. With so much cloud and mist, we were praying for some wind to clear the sky, and to get a glimpse of the water falls. And the prayers were answered. We could see the falls. It was beautiful, but we were told the water we saw was very less. This is an other place that is definitely to be visited again, and again, and my be again! We reached Murudeshwara via Honnavar and stayed in the RNS Residency, fifth floor. Had amazing time with wonderful view, lot of walking in the beach. We visited the temple and had darshan. We had specialty sea food dinner in the Hotel Naveen Beach Resort.
Day Four, we went to Gokarna. Bought lotus flowers, listened to the sthala puranam (history of the temple) and had darshan. We noticed that the Aadi Murti (interpret as Initial Idol or Original Idol) is now almost immersed in water. Pujas and all formalities are happening in a newer building with newer idol. Some native people were still praying the Aadi Murti. Then we moved on to the Om Beach. One of the finest beaches I had visited in my life. We walked almost 75% of the beach and headed back to the hotel to check out. We drove to Kollur. The place and temple was nowhere close to what I remember from my last visit that was roughly 20 years ago. Most of the forest is now seems to be replaced with civilization. After darshan we drove to Udupi and stayed in Hotel Kediyur.
Day Five, went to Udupi Sri Krishna temple and had darshan. From Udupi we went to Karkala, visited the Gomateshwara on hill top. It is a must to see place. The drive to the hill top and coming down was real fun. We then proceeded to Dharmathsala and had darshan after 3 hours of waiting in the queue. Biggest mistake in this tour was this. There is no good restaurant in this area. We drove to Belur for night stay.
Day Six, we visited Belur monument. I had visited it 20 years ago and hence I only had faded memories. This place is one among the ones that every human being can adore. The innovation, modularity, extensibility in the architecture is just amazing. Also we noticed idols of Lion on top of Elephant. This symbolizes Hinduism overtaking Buddhism around the time when the temple was built. After that we also visited the Halebidu monument. We then drove to Shravanabelagola, climbed hill top to have darshan of Gomateshwara. After that we reached Bangalore to our home.
This is our second long drive in our Scorpio Vlx. Lots of driving in rains, bad roads, real test to the Car. 1646 KMs, 37 hours drive, Average Mileage 12.4 kmpl, Average Speed 45 kmph. Highest speed we could get was in NH
Labels: Beach, Karnataka, Monuments, Travel
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Gardening - Vegetable Addition
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Firstly I am a beginner. The garden space I have is 1'3" x 40' on the south side of my rented house. To make it worse the next house on south side is just 3 feet away and is a duplex house. But optimistically I could grow beans, palak (greens) so far very successfully. Motivated by the results blessed by mother nature I further venture out.
Firstly I tilled the soil and generously added cow manure 3 inches under the surface. Removed every piece of stone I could feel with my fingers (need to buy tools). The soil felt more clay and I wasnt prepared. Things to do next time - Add 2 bags of sand, generous amout of compost.
I sowed six tomatoe, six green chillie, nine ladies finger, three Dolichos bean, five cucumber and two bitter gourd. The idea is to grow vegetables close to the proportion of our consumption. Some of my friends grow things out of proportion and try sharing with others which is ok only when the receiver values it!
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When I removed palak, I had left 3 of them untouched. They have now grown fully and maybe in a months time yeild us seeds. Since my garden is 100% organic, I want to harvest those seeds if possible.
My concern is whether the creepers (Dolicosh Bean, Cucumber) will hinder sunlight to my other plants. They are going to be on tall poles and wires (due to space limitation). Bitter gourd wont be a problem as it is in the east end where I only have a weed garden. I will write about my 'weed garden' concept in a separate blog. On the east end of my so called garden my wife is encouraging me to put a chicken coup to get some home made eggs! Will post on that if at all I could do it
useful links
Dolicosh Beans - http://www.seedsofindia.com/Beans.htm
Remarkable benefits of Bitter Gourd - http://www.juicing-for-health.com/bitter-gourd-benefits.html
Happy Growing
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Learn to suspect
Have you checked out the driving directions between your home and your friend's place in google maps and got stranded?
You tested multiple times the tool you wrote and ended up discovering due to some build rules screw-up the changes are not even compiled?
You tried so hard to fix a relationship but failed and felt guilty it is all your fault?
Take a deep breath, you need to learn to suspect things. This includes great things like Google to simple things like your shoe lace. Don't assume that things will work perfectly the way they are intended to be. While solving a problem, learn to suspect that anything may be the cause of failure...
Failing to suspect things, and assuming the failure is related to your own may burn out more efforts with no progress.
just my 2 cents...
You tested multiple times the tool you wrote and ended up discovering due to some build rules screw-up the changes are not even compiled?
You tried so hard to fix a relationship but failed and felt guilty it is all your fault?
Take a deep breath, you need to learn to suspect things. This includes great things like Google to simple things like your shoe lace. Don't assume that things will work perfectly the way they are intended to be. While solving a problem, learn to suspect that anything may be the cause of failure...
Failing to suspect things, and assuming the failure is related to your own may burn out more efforts with no progress.
just my 2 cents...
Labels: problem solving
Monday, June 1, 2009
A Sunday Morning, 15 kms away from Bangalore
I wanted some time out in nature, green among some flies and birds... Sunday 31st May I got up at 5:30Am and headed towards rural outskirts of Bangalore. Around 12 Kms from Channasandra (near ITPL) towards Chiktirupathi, I went to interior village roads and parked the car.
This is my first such attempt, took some time to figure out. I picked my camera and walked around. The morning time out is such a wonderful experience. Two hours went like 15 minutes. I did clicked some pictures. I think I have a lot of scope for improvement.
I have a Minolta Htsi Plus SLR Film Camera with 28mm-80mm Lens. I havent done justice to the camera yet! The other one is Canon IXUS 800IS 4x Zoom (with digital zoom it can get to 16x - you should forgive me for poor closeup shots :( )
I am amateur in early stages. Your comments, feedback and criticism is of great value. Kindly make time to comment/criticize. For more pictures please click here
Saturday, May 23, 2009
May 2009 Kerala Trip
The trip was to take a break from hectic work life and totally relax. We chose Kerala and it did not let us down in spite of being May summer! Kerala is a beauty. The route we took was
Bangalore - Erode - Coimbatore - Malampuzha - Palakkad - Guruvayoor - Thrissur - Adirapally - Cochin - Munnar - Erode - Bangalore
Visiting Marudamalai and Bharathiar University campus was soothing... All of us who went were from Bharathiar University. And yes we did spot a Peacock in the campus. When we went the boys hostel was empty. Lot of new buildings but the forest feeling is still there (thank god).
I had seen Palakkad fort before but did not recognize it. So worth the visit. The fort had some amazing huge very old mango trees. It is great to realize how old the trees around that fort are standing time. Malampuzha dam was not that pleasing as it was I visited it before. May be due to summer. The dam staff sounded as rude as the ones in Bangalore Lalbagh.
Guruvayoor was crowded. I did not have patience to go through the queue so just prayed from outside. Thrissur was on the way. Somehow we did not plan well to make it to the Vadakkunnathan temple. We saw it just from outside.
Adirapally falls was amazing. When my Dad took us to Kerala tour, this is something we had to give up in our agenda. So I insisted on this in this tour. Going down to the foot of the falls and climbing back was a mini trekking.
We headed to Cochin, stayed there for 3 nights. We booked KTDC tour package to see the backwaters, village life, etc. We had wonderfull Kerala food. The ayurvedic massage was just ok. The ELA restaurant on Marine Drive was good food for reasonable price. Very decent service.
The back waters of Cochin was the key part of our tour. The green, waters, birds and fishes were pleasing to our eyes. I did not concentrate much on my photography. In fact I did not even use my SLR or Tripod. Rather I was just adoring the beauty. But I must do better photography in upcoming tours. It is so good to see the pictures time and again and share with friends.
When we went to Munnar we just realized getting accomodation without reservation is tough. We just changed our mind, roamed a bit seeing the views and headed back to Erode. While crossing Kerala/TN border, the TN check post was collecting Rs 20 from every car. We could not understand what it was for so left without paying it.
Both onward and return we stayed whole day in Erode to spend time with family. Of course we had some good food and shopping in Erode. From Erode we returned to Bangalore.
This is first long trip for my Scorpio. It did excellent. The drive was 1750 KMs. Average mileage was 14.3 Kmpl. Next time I will try to capture average speed between destinations. Kerala roads were really good. The road sense i.e., lane discipline, proper honking, responding to honk was something I should mention. May be it is due to being a highly literate state. But they drive really fast even on narrow roads.
Please leave your comments and let me know what you think
Bangalore - Erode - Coimbatore - Malampuzha - Palakkad - Guruvayoor - Thrissur - Adirapally - Cochin - Munnar - Erode - Bangalore
Visiting Marudamalai and Bharathiar University campus was soothing... All of us who went were from Bharathiar University. And yes we did spot a Peacock in the campus. When we went the boys hostel was empty. Lot of new buildings but the forest feeling is still there (thank god).
I had seen Palakkad fort before but did not recognize it. So worth the visit. The fort had some amazing huge very old mango trees. It is great to realize how old the trees around that fort are standing time. Malampuzha dam was not that pleasing as it was I visited it before. May be due to summer. The dam staff sounded as rude as the ones in Bangalore Lalbagh.
Guruvayoor was crowded. I did not have patience to go through the queue so just prayed from outside. Thrissur was on the way. Somehow we did not plan well to make it to the Vadakkunnathan temple. We saw it just from outside.
Adirapally falls was amazing. When my Dad took us to Kerala tour, this is something we had to give up in our agenda. So I insisted on this in this tour. Going down to the foot of the falls and climbing back was a mini trekking.
We headed to Cochin, stayed there for 3 nights. We booked KTDC tour package to see the backwaters, village life, etc. We had wonderfull Kerala food. The ayurvedic massage was just ok. The ELA restaurant on Marine Drive was good food for reasonable price. Very decent service.
The back waters of Cochin was the key part of our tour. The green, waters, birds and fishes were pleasing to our eyes. I did not concentrate much on my photography. In fact I did not even use my SLR or Tripod. Rather I was just adoring the beauty. But I must do better photography in upcoming tours. It is so good to see the pictures time and again and share with friends.
When we went to Munnar we just realized getting accomodation without reservation is tough. We just changed our mind, roamed a bit seeing the views and headed back to Erode. While crossing Kerala/TN border, the TN check post was collecting Rs 20 from every car. We could not understand what it was for so left without paying it.
Both onward and return we stayed whole day in Erode to spend time with family. Of course we had some good food and shopping in Erode. From Erode we returned to Bangalore.
This is first long trip for my Scorpio. It did excellent. The drive was 1750 KMs. Average mileage was 14.3 Kmpl. Next time I will try to capture average speed between destinations. Kerala roads were really good. The road sense i.e., lane discipline, proper honking, responding to honk was something I should mention. May be it is due to being a highly literate state. But they drive really fast even on narrow roads.
Please leave your comments and let me know what you think
Labels: Kerala, Roadtrip, Travel
Friday, May 22, 2009
Veluppillai Prabhakaran
Veluppillai Prabhakaran is shown as dead on news channels. Triggers many questions in my mind.
Who had won?
Who had lost?
From the almost 35 year old civil war...
What are the learnings for members of Minority Communities?
What are the learnings for members of Majority Communities?
What are the learnings for Terrorists?
What are the learnings for Governments?
What are the learnings for Migrants?
In almost all such conflicts in the world today, the one who raises a force usually is the one who is forced to put it to an end!
History is extremely important as it repeats itself
Earlier I felt I am free to live anywhere in the world as long as I obey rules of the land and respect sentiments of the people. But I had grown deeply consious about where I belong, where I can establish and where I can afford to carry my identities openly.
(Note: I had had trip to Sri Nagar too, and had heart felt conversations with kashmiris' too)
Who had won?
Who had lost?
From the almost 35 year old civil war...
What are the learnings for members of Minority Communities?
What are the learnings for members of Majority Communities?
What are the learnings for Terrorists?
What are the learnings for Governments?
What are the learnings for Migrants?
In almost all such conflicts in the world today, the one who raises a force usually is the one who is forced to put it to an end!
History is extremely important as it repeats itself
Earlier I felt I am free to live anywhere in the world as long as I obey rules of the land and respect sentiments of the people. But I had grown deeply consious about where I belong, where I can establish and where I can afford to carry my identities openly.
(Note: I had had trip to Sri Nagar too, and had heart felt conversations with kashmiris' too)
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