The Lonesome Road

Found redemption Lucas has?

Well somewhat. Episode III - Revenge of the Sith is a far better movie than the unmitigated disasters of Episode I and II. It can’t hold a candle to episodes IV, V and VI - but that’s nostalgia and fond memories of a trilogy seen a long, long time back.

Lucas seems to love special effects, and while there’s nothing wrong in doing so, I feel than an excess of effects can take away the feel of a movie - and to a certain extent it’s happened in this case. That being said, the storyline in this movie was a lot tighter and better scripted than the previous two episodes. It moves along at a brisk pace and there’s no real feeling of boredom as the plot advances - even though you know what’s going to happen.

If I have a grouse with the movie - it’s with Anakin Skywalker - as a character in the movie and the actor who plays him. Hayden Christensen does not make a good Anakin. When I went to see the movie, I wanted to see a change in the character - from essentially good hearted padawn to a dark hearted Sith Lords apprentice. Somehow, the conversion was handled very badly. Even the actual stage where Anakin helps kill Mace Windu did not have any of the classic elements of the Dark Side - there was no rage or hate. It was a clinical move by Anakin to cut of Windu’s hand - leaving th actual use of the power of the Dark Side to Palpatine. Immediatly after the killing, Anakin shows regret - and then pledges himslef to the Emperor. Am I the only one who finds this scene taken badly?

Master manupilator he may be, but Palpatine had no real trouble converting Whinakin to the Dark Side. While I agree that loss of family and a seeming loss of prestige are powerful motives, they are not enough to push someone totally into the Dark Side of the Force. But I may be biased. After reading Darth Vader’s Blog, the character in the movie seems to be woefully one dimensional. Also, Hayden Christensen portrayal of Anakin leaves a lot to be desired. For most part he seems extremely wooden and the only expression that he seems to portray effectively is a sulk and a brooding glare. Very disappointing. I expected the chahracter to darken over time. All those who’ve seen Superman 3 will have an idea of what I’m talking about. The dulling opf the costume, the increasing broodiness, et al. Also, personally, I feel that the transformation from Anakin to Darth Vader was not complete till the time Emperor Palpatine told his apprentice that it was his Force Choke that killed Padme. Of course - this is what I read.

If there’s a ray of Light in the whole proceedings, it comes courtesy Obi-Wan Kenobi. The dude really steals the show in this movie and comes across as the true representative of what the Jedi order truly embodies.

The fight sequences have been taken very well - I refer of course to the light saber duels. Somehow, dog-fighting has never appealed to my tastes. It was a pleasure watching Master Yoda taking on Palpatine. Very interesting style of fighting does Yoda have.

The betrayal of the Jedi was a well executed sequence. Somehow, the entire scene was made more poignant with the use of a beautiful background score.

After watching all six episodes, I now feel that the most interesting character in the entire series is that little droid R2-D2. They say that the Force does not affect mechanical beings, but somehow R2 seems to be a Force touched creature. I don’t remember much of Episode I, but he’s responsible for saving Anakin and Padme in Count Dooku’s factory in Episode II, helped Anakin and Obi Wan in Episode III, was Luke and Anakin Skywalkers ship droid. I could just go on. Whenever there’s an important juncture in the Star Wars universe, R2 has been there. Makes you wonder doesn’t it?

Until next time -May the Force be with You

Last week was bad - real bad. It’s been a tradition over my years in engineering that exam times always bring power problems. I don’t know why, but it’s always been the case. It’s happened while I was in the hostel, friends home, my home - didn’t really matter. The power companies always knew. Take the last week for instance. Over the last seven days, the power has been out for an average of six hours in a day. That’s nearly two days of the week. I wouldn’t mind it so much if they cut the power in the morning - but then - that really does not impede my work, does it?

So, they cut power at around 3 in the afternoon. The perfect time to disturb anyone. The heat is on with the sun blazing away - and darkness comes at seven. My brave inverter tries to keep up - but after 4 hours it simply gives up the unequal struggle, whines softly to signal it’s defeat and goes off. Now heres the fun part - the light goes in 4 lanes in our area - the rest of the place has power. Go figure. Thankfully, have plenty of friends in and around, so does not really affect me all that much.

Of course, the situation last week was not helped by the tempo driver who crashed into a light pole, ruining the transformer that was attached to it. Nor was it helped by the gentlemen in the Public Works Department who decided that turning off the power and trimming branches at 12 in the afternoon was their duty.

If all this was not enough, my ISP had major link problems and I had no net access for the last five days. Talk about a bummer week.

Anyway, things seems to be better now. Yesterday the power went for the scheduled 4 hours and as you can see - I seem to be back online . In other good news, I won tickets for the premiere of Star Wars Episode III. Should be a fun evening.

And now I have to get back to my books. It’s such a relief to write again!

Was reading up for my Multimedia Techniques paper when I came across this gem of a sentence. It’s from the chapter on audio in multimedia, sub-chapter phase. For understandable reasons, I will leave the name of the text and the author anonymous. Thankfully I have two better texts to read from and was going through this one ‘cos a friend recommended it. Guess who’s not recommending text books to me anymore?

Anyway, here’s the paragraph (part of it). I’ve made the sentence bold - just to give it a little lift.

“…..There is some controversial evidence that humans can hear absolute phase. More importantly, phase problems occur in stereo transmission. If two signals are exactly out of phase, they cancel, resulting in the sound of silence. For normal listening this rarely happens. But consider the case when a stereo soundtrack from a movie is mixed to mono for conventional monophonic televisions. It can and does happen that some sound engineer somewhere mixed up the phase on some sound effect or two. There are true stories of the network executive heating up the telephone after the machine gun on his television suddenly spoke silently…”

Now can someone please make sense of the sentence for me? I’m wide awake - not drowsy at all. I’ve quoted verbatim from the book!

In other news, a gentleman from Australia found that water, an iPod and a screwdriver do not make the best combination.

Gotta hit the books - not literally .

Until next time - may your machine gun stay silent!

Looks like the government of Maharashtra finally woke up to the fact that free power is an idea that cannot be sustained. Unfortunately, it took some mob rule to show them that the ordinary, middle class people of that state were fed up with the apathy shown by the state government. In most cases, the middle class in India are a very non-demanding lot - to get them riled up really takes something big.

There were sporadic attacks on the MSEB offices in the last two weeks, in Kolhapur, Nagpur and (sadly)Pune to mention a few places. In all cases, property was destroyed and the offices nearly gutted. This sent the government into a tizzy and they took a break from pointing fingers at each other and decided to placate the masses. Vox populi vox di. I suppose that the displeasure expressed by the Central Government over the free power isssue also tipped the scales in the matter.

So finally, a decision has been taken to shut down the free power and charge farmers at subsidized rates. As far as I’ve read the rate is Rs.1.70 per unit which the government is planning to subsidize to Re.0.50-0.70 per unit. They are also encouraging farmers to install meters so that billing becomes simpler. Though the order has gone through, it will be effective only from the 1st of June. The state has already lost over Rs.1700 crore over “free” power - how much more will it cost us now?

The MSEB is also trying to reduce the transmission losses that it incurs. Presently, it is at 39% - yup that’s the power loss in transport. This coupled with the power theft done by certain companies that lie on the outskirts of MSEBs jusrisdiction burns a big hole in the revenue collection.

In more good news on the power front, the court has ordered that all areas that are supplied by the MSEB to face load shedding. Therefore New Mumbai and Thana will also come under the load shedding plan. Mumbai (Bombay) is not supplied power by MSEB and will continue to have 24 hour power. MSEB announced that the load shedding time will come down from 4 hours to 3 hours a day for 5 days in a week. Unfortunately, the drones in the department seem to have missed this information and have been randomly cutting power over all areas for the last few days - not following the schedule that has been set up. This is way more irritating than a 4 hour power cut that is fixed. I hope they get back on track soon.

In other reading, India has come out with a sub-$200 computer (dubbed a simputer) [www.slashdot.org] which runs Linux and uses a memory stick to provide storage. Photos can be found here [www.news.com]. From what I read, it seems closer to a Palm PC than a complete computer. Let’s see what this does for the computer penetration in India which is currently at a measly 13%.

This is going to be a slow post month. The exams for my final semester in undergrad education are drawing close. Want to get it over and done with now.

That’s all from me. Power to the people!

The flavor this morning seems to be computer rage with a wide variety of articles reporting on the angst and anxiety caused by non performing, wilfully or accidentally destroyed machines.

Technology, it seems, is growing a lot faster than understanding. There are peoplw who exhibit symptoms of depression when confronted by a machine that just refuses to do their bidding. For quite a few people though - computer destruction is just a way to let of steam. There are reports of people who have tried to flush their laptops, taken sledge hammers to machines, and surveys indicate that nearly 10% of all computer/palm/tablet PC owners hit/kick their machines in frustration.

All this is giving a shot in the arm to the troubleshooting industry. They provide a house call service and charge anywhere from USD 60 - 100 an hour. They are also trained to understand the emotional state of the customer and respond accordingly. Most people, once they have managed to take out their frustration on the machine suddenly realize that there was valuable information on it. Duh! This is where the data recovery teams come in - and this can cost upto a whopping USD 2000. Of course, there is no guarantee that the laptop you just drove over will allow you to recover the data that you just lost. Of course, this service also works for those who accidentally managed to damage their machines.

I do a little troubleshooting on the side - not professionally though. Usually just help friends and relatives to keep their systems on track, help them install their operating systems (Linux is still a major headache for most guys - though I don’t know why), help set up and assemble new PCs and general maintenance. I’ve seen that a little prevention goes a long way. Though this has been repeated umpteen times - I’ll say it again.

a) Keep your anti-virus updated
b) Keep your anti-spyware updated
c) Apply patches that the OS vendor (does not matter which OS you use) provides
d) Do not open attachments from people you do not know
e) Keep backups - even if it’s a home PC. God bless DVDs

Till next time - stay chill
PS : And if you do feel like slamming your PC, do it virtually. Try this [http://www.thestylemachine.com/metele/]

Links :
Dell Laptop Execution [www.theregister.co.uk]
Repair Teams and Computer Rage [www.washingtonpost.com]
Smashing computers - spanish style! Ole! [www.theregister.co.uk]
PC killing 101 [news.bbc.uk]