The Year 2013 – for me

I would like to maintain my style of posting about a recap of events that happened in the last year, as my first post of the year – a sort of autobiography.  So, here it is:

• It’s difficult to start learning something new, especially as basic as a skill like driving, and that too when people less than half your age, already have mastered it. Nevertheless, with a firm mind, I started with a two-wheeler, and within a month, mastered it (simply means, you keep driving in chaotic traffic, and try to find way, even within a very narrow space!). Then came the bigger one – Learning to drive a manual transmission car (with gears!), in real traffic and that too in curvy and slope roads, (ofcourse after getting trained from a professional driving school) 
• Had the experience of being pulled into a project and being pushed out of a project purely for non-technical reasons! – Though I had to admit that, I was wishing for it to happen.  
• Met reasonable success in a project that involved overcoming huge administrative challenges, and happy as it brought a sense of satisfaction after a lot frustration and will be a very important milestone in the history of the organization that I am working with. 
• Yet another project of mine, relating to academic networking saw some reasonable success; However all the above projects require continuous follow up to sustain the success!
• Started to do some serious study on DNS, that I had kept in my wish list for a long time. 
• My mentor and boss, for almost a decade, moved to another location of the organization. This lead to series of changes, but at the end, you learn to accept the changes.
• Had a busy time authoring proposals in areas related to Information Security, the domain that I had been involved with for the past few years  
• Got a feel of Hybrid PC or Convertibles – (Laptop with detachable screen, and screen can act as a tab), but soon realized that these products are immature and not going to suit someone who spends considerable time in front of the PC. 
• Had the experience of learning and working with good number of interns this year
• Had the experience of running around the government offices to apply and collect few essential documents!
• Travel: As usual made trips to New Delhi, Tirumala, Madurai, Mumbai, Chandigarh, Chennai

The Year 2012 – for me

It’s becoming difficult to blog these days! With Work pressure,  Social Networking (Facebook, Twitter), Professional Networking (LinkedIn) eating up your time,  its difficult to blog unless you have a compelling reason to write.  Let me stop here, otherwise this subject matter would be a blog post by itself. 

So, I start this year, as usual by reflecting about myself in the past year – 2012.  It had it own share of satisfactions and disappointments

• The Academic Networking Portal that we were building picked up a good number of users without any promotions and despite our deliberate underplayed stance. We started the year with less than 100 users and by the end of the year, we had more than 1700+ registered users. 

• Faced lot of heat and pressure (and sleepless nights) on the project related to a DR setup. As this was the first of the kind project being executed by me, and the first of its kind to the entire organization, it was really challenging as there were too lengthy processes and execution of it took its own sweet time.   Spent my full time only on this effort in the last few months of the year, pushing myself hard and taking the extra long steps to see things are getting done. 

• Attended a conference on Disaster Management and was impressed by the speakers from all over the world. Had a paper presentation in the same conference and got the ‘Best Paper Award’ but felt bad as the organizers never handed over the promised cash prize!

• Disappointed by the way private schools collect money and wondered what great ideals could be imparted to the children by them!

• Got selected for a Training Program (One among the only 2 participants from India) on Information Security Management System – ISO 27000 organized by Asian Productivity Organization and conducted by Korea Productivity Centre at Seoul, Republic of Korea.  Had a very nice, interesting and useful experience. 

• Got Selected for the Internet Society’s Next Generation Leadership Program – an E-Learning Course on History and Future of Internet and Governance. Very happy and cherished the learning’s and experience I gained through this. Successfully completed the course. 

• Got involved in a project proposal that was very innovative, and will change the digital landscape of   e-governance services – a project related to authentication. However due to prolonging delays and certain other issues, I exited out of it. 

• An Organizational change happened, at an unexpected time, and in a very rapid way, which no one expected it to happen in such  a way. It created lots of doubts, fears etc… though such a change was logical and was bound to happen one day. It shook us. 

• Received my PhD Degree in Convocation

• Internship Guidance: Guided a good number of students/interns. Learnt a lesson that not all students come with open minds and interests in doing Internship – some of them have their own self-interests and will waste your time and energy – So lesson is to be careful and choose only the right students. 

• Some Moments: Wireless Internet Connection,  Conduction of Internal ISO Audit; 

• Travel: Nagercoil, Tirupathi,  Andaman, Seoul and  Hong Kong. So travel in 2012 was exciting!

2011 – The year that was for me!

I had been pushing myself to write this post, as it had become a kind of ‘ritual’ for me to start an year’s blogging with reflections of my past year. Also, I should admit that, after I started ‘tweeting’, it has become extremely difficult to Blog!  So here, I go…

• My Current project had been driving me – as, I got more passionate about it, as days passed by in 2011, and I believe it will surely be of help to students and the academic community
• My successful completion of PhD in Computer Science – The long awaited final defense examination (viva-voce) happened on a day that’s simply unforgetful! – on 11/11/2011, and ofcourse, had a sigh of relief! after the declaration of PhD award
• Attended WWW2011 Conference for the first time, and was very happy to listen to few great people, including Tim Berners-Lee and even managed to have a small discussion with him on Semantic Web, and ofcourse a photograph with him.  
• A lot of learning happened in a very different project, relating to setup of a DR. Though had to encounter and learn too many things that are far from my profession, I was happily taking on the challenges!, and did not have much regrets even when the bosses fired us on our slow pace of work!
• Continued to lead the ISO activities in the office; and managed to organize a Project Management Training for the staff members.
• Managed to coordinate and organize two National-level Symposiums on PKI and Digital Signatures along with my friend and colleague Mr. Misbahuddin.  Though I was only a team member here, I was happy that this effort came to a good end. 
• Started Tweeting! and found to be really interesting and useful (This is ironic, because when twitter started, and when I saw the way people were using it initially, I thought it may not be of much use for me!) – This gave me a lesson – Any tool can be used effectively, and it all depends on the user and their context!
• Travel: Hamirpur in Himachal Pradesh (and also visited Dalai Lama’s residence), Indore, Kashmir (Beautiful Valley; Visited Srinagar, Gulmarg and Pahalgam), Kanyakumari & ; Nagercoil in Tamil Nadu; and my usual trips to Delhi. A very interesting thing happened was I had to travel from Kanyakumari to Kashmir within a span of a day or two.   

Overall, many things were falling in place, and really got a sense of accomplishment, despite some odd firings from few bosses! 

The year 2010 – for me

Here goes the Personal Highlights of 2010 for me!

• The year started for me, with a much awaited approval to work on a new collaborative project, and even had one review completed successfully in the later part of the year
• Got to work on another interesting but an important proposal, that saw its light at the end of the year
• Registered a domain name, for one of the products that we were working on – a first for me
• Submitted my PhD Thesis Report (I really realized the pain of writing a doctoral thesis!, and how relieving it was, after the submission!)
• Submitted two annual reports at the same time (felt like climbing a mountain!)
• Two members of my team – Dnyanesh Pawar and Vikram Kumar quit, to pursue better careers
• Got interested in writing and deploying an application in Google App Engine
• Got a good number of opportunities to develop my ’emcee’ skills! – an area that was absolutely new to me!
• Learnt more about ISO, as I was nominated as the QMS manager! and managed to get through one surveillance audit! Also faced audit of a different kind – for the first time, in the later part of the year!
• Regained my interests in PKI technology as I had to get closely involved in a related project
• Learned and handled certain new courses
• Had to do lot of works that I was not previously familiar or comfortable with
• Had some disappointments too: Efforts relating to get into a specific activity (which would have been a honor), failed and a product deployment did not materialize
• Named our second daughter as Aishwarya
• Got our first daughter admitted to a nearby school
• Traveled to a number of places, thanks to a project & for other personal commitments: Trivandrum, Calicut, Cochin, Alleypey, Delhi, Mysore (Palace, Chamundi Hills, Brindavan gardens, Ranganathaswamy temple, and Tipu sultan fort), Visakhapatnam (also visited Simhachalam) , Planetarium at Bangalore (seeing for the first time in Bangalore, despite being here for a long time!) are the places that I happened to visit this year!.
• Overall, the year was good & memorable, for the important milestones that I happened to pass through, and for taking up opportunities & works that I was not familiar with!

The year 2009 – for me

As it had been my convention, let me start this year’s blogging by writing about some notable events for me in 2009.

• A long-awaited project in the domain of Web Intelligence materialized in December. More about it later.
• Did spend a good amount of time on research, the result being my research papers accepted for publication in reputed and popular conferences. (Ofcourse faced rejection too, from a most conference)
• Technically feeling and creating the AJAX magic, in web development and mainly involved in improving the Usability of systems.
• Significant progress made towards my PhD; Also decided on the final title of my work;
• A project that I worked passionately for the last few years, got extended for another 3 years, but with riders and change of direction (towards product mode targeting different kind of users).
• Had to put my head into ISO processes, as one of the internal auditors and as a process owner for some time.
• Involved with the process of coordinating a mega module (topic wise), covering Databases and Web in 6 weeks and allocating work to 20+ members! who wanted to participate in the training activity.
• Setting up of VASP (a software for Molecular Simulations) in clusters, for the second time.
• Moved to an apartment with better amenities; started understanding the apartment culture, and was getting the feel and importance of amenities.
• The birth of my second angel/queen
• Took the ‘active’ decision of giving up the official transport and using the Public transport for commuting to office
• Observing Financial markets from a distance, and wondering whether I could ever understand and explain its behavior.
• Travelled to Tirupathi, Kalahasti, Erode, Kodaikanal, Chennai, Mahabhilipuram, Vellore (Golden Temple), Mangalore, Mumbai, Delhi, Pondicherry.
• Overall, the year was satisfying.

The year 2008 – for me

As usual, I start blogging in this year, by reminiscing about the main events of my (both work and personal) life in 2008:

• Privilege to listen and interact with some really great and wonderful people
• Assisting my professor (guide) to setup a HPC Cluster for his new area of research on Computational Nanotechnology
• Publication of research papers in National Conference, International Workshop, and in a Journal
• Invited Talks at a couple of National Symposiums/Conferences and Faculty-Development Programs
• Introduced Multi-Agent Systems in the Advanced Web Module of our courses.
• Being part of an awareness project – to spread awareness about PKI and Digital Signatures
• Building a Unified Interface for a suite of Network Security products
• Understanding ISO and incorporating various Processes – as our organization is moving towards certification
• Project Guidance to MCA Students
• Handling Network and Web Application classes for students of a reputed Management Institute
• Travel – Hyderabad (for the 3rd Meeting of Internet Governance Forum) , Delhi, and Kerala (Trivandrum, Alleppey)
• Learning about: Complexities in Contextual IR, Agent-based Automation systems, Latest technologies in Web Applications, Cryptography and Information Security, E-Markets, Financial Markets and so on …
• Personally, putting my daughter in a play school, and watching as she grows and learns …
• Overall the year was full of learning.

The year 2007 – for me

As usual, let me start the year, with the significant events that happened to me in last year.

• Part of the team that organized the ISED conference (International Conference on ICT Solutions for Socio-economic Development) event and my first role as an editor for the proceedings of ISED Conference.
• Promotion as a Senior Staff Scientist, at my place of work.
• Some progress in my PhD – Found out, the skills required to do a PhD! – now have to master them.
• My friend Neela moving to Denmark for doing his PhD
• Wrote a couple of proposals, to various funding agencies; – In the process gathered some experience!.
• Travel trips to Delhi
• Had good breaks, from work, at home, owing to chickenpox and Madras eye (Conjuctivitis), and utilized them to rejuvenate myself with new ways of thinking, and looking at things!.
• Overall the year allowed me to reflect back, from absolutely eventful previous years
• Opportunity to learn about Financial Markets and Investments

The year 2006 – for me

A New Year – 2007. Another year passed by.

Though, I had a couple of things in my mind to blog, I could not find the time to do it. And the new year has come and almost one month over!.

So, this post is to recollect the events in 2006.

• Birth of my daughter
• Giving my daughter a name, by us
• Got registered for my PhD, after doing good amount of work over the years, and after a long wait!
• Invested in Mutual funds for the first time!
• Two of my colleagues – Kailash and Ponraj – who were working with me, quit in April and December respectively – ofcourse in search of better positions! Another friend and colleague – Mayank also quit.
• Lost my Nokia mobile phone (that my wife gifted!) in a crowded bus – to a thief!
• Purchased Sony Ericsson Mobile Handset, and had a terribly bad experience with it for a couple of months (I already had a bad experience with Sony Ericsson Mobile earlier; but foolishly I trusted the brand again! – Probably ‘Fate’ played!)
• Trips to Hyderabad & Delhi – for Project work & Conferences; Personal Trips to Madurai, a couple of times
• Got my home PC upgraded to an additional 256 MB RAM and a new 80 GB Hard disk
• Coordinated and lead the Corporate Training Programme in Computer Networking
• Opened an account in Orkut – after ignoring it for some time!
• Handled many sessions for the students of the courses conducted here
• Worked on Project Proposals, Papers and lot of Presentations
• Learned a lot as usual – but more from a Techno – Research perspective (thanks to my PhD, Paper, and Proposal efforts)
• Overall it was another eventful year

The year 2005 – for me

Another year passed by. A new year has started. Nothing is special except that another fresh day has started and the earth has completed one more revolution around the sun. But still the grouping of days into weeks, months, years, decades, milleniums … mean something significant to most of us.

At a personal front, a few significant things have happened for me in 2005.

• My marriage in February
• Obtaining the PMP certification in September
• Travelling abroad for the first time, to Australia for a paper presentation at the IEEE conference in November.
• Guiding a project in ontology based inferences
• Incorporated new sessions like Usability, Essence of Problem Solving, Ontology etc… as part of our courses
• Starting to ‘Blog’
• Learnt so many new concepts, dwelled upon some and mastered a few.
• Travelled to Chandigarh, Chennai, Melur, Mumbai, Mysore, Shimla, Suttur and Tanjore within the country, and to Bangkok and Melbourne outside the country.

• Declining an offer to go to Grenada (part of west indies) as an IT expert (sponsored by the government of India) for designing solutions for the hurricane hit country.
• Shifting my house to a location that is 30 kms far off from my office and approximately takes 120-150 minutes of travel, owing to the interests of the family.
• My friend and colleague getting himself a transfer.
• Tried to come with a proper open source license for our software system, but still nothing has been decided
• Started to guide a group of people on generating useful inferences, using the concepts of event coorelation, as they requested me for some innovative project work, but later disappeared without notice.
• Our software localized in Punjabi, and successfully included in the package of Punjabi tools slated for release by the Prime Minister. Unfortunately the launch was postponed twice, and still yet to be released.

Though the last few points look like reflecting the negative aspects, I believe that everything happens for the good. I would like to dwell upon a few of my decisions in the rest of the paragraphs.

Declining the offer to go to grenada was one of the toughest decision for me in the last year. It was made within a short time. At one end, it is a job that will give me a sense of pride, apart from money. At the other end, the project that I was involved for nearly the past two years, seemed to be at a stage of bearing fruit; and I did not want to quit that and go. We have been in the mission of building ICT applications usable by rural people, and we have done a lot of field work too, apart from our technological activities, and I have been in the forefront of these activities right from the day, the project was started. I wanted to experiment, explore and learn further, and ofcourse reach the logical end of our work, before I jump to another. That made me to decline the offer.

On the positive side, the decision to appear for the PMP examination, decision to submit a paper for IEEE conference, decision to guide projects were some major decisions that has paid dividends. Thus 2005 in short was an year of opportunities/challenges, changes, and learning for me.For the reader, here’s my philosphical note. There’s no place for ‘if … then’ in any history. Overall the year was eventful and satisfying.