kinshuk sunilit aint no, dessert if therez no caek

Afterlife is a science fiction novel I am working on. Currently in talk with some publishers (do recommend me to some if you find it worth it). This is an old copy of the initial 3 chapters as old as 2006. Will soon update with more details. Matrix and Harry Potter are acknowledged inspirations :)

Afterlife tells the story of Rahul Sharma, a prodigious software engineer from India, working for the best Virtual Reality company in the world. During his researches and his work, he designs a powerful neuro-electric simulation program, which is soon licensed as a successful MMO. The company, though, in their greed overlook common development wisdom and rush through the development cycle. The long and winding road soon brings Rahul on the crossroads where the interest of his family will conflict with the benefit of the world. he has to choose his own path, forge his own destiny. He is no hero.

On june 25th, my blog was hacked by one Mr. Rat and the Black Hacker. Genuinely and very humbly they thanked ‘the administrator for vulnerable scripts‘. Bleh! I learned some lessons then. My Plugins and Themes folders within wp-content were set to +777 which is not a very advisable setting. Now, I am wise. What followed was a series of precautions. I, now, use varied passwords for my profiles now. Simply put, I use a system of a base password + a unique site identifier – useful enough to make a unique password for all sites. And no more +777s. you can learn from my example.

Right here, in this post I will just post an update of what all has happened since.

This blog has undergone a lot of changes since then. I changed the theme – feedbacks for the previous theme were that it looked a lot more like a magazine than a personal blog. This theme fares better on that count. But I lost a lot of readers due to the hack. My subscriber count fell from 108 to 20, which is very sad. In the meanwhile, I have, also, been working on a number of new initatives:

There is Digimantra with Sachin Khosla. Digimantra is a technology blog for everyone from the newbies to the pro. I am currently looking after the Open Source and Gaming Sections of Digimantra. we also recently launched some cool services at Digimantra. Do Have a Look!

Then there is InGDIn or the Indie Game Developes India community – which I intend to make into a platform for all indie gaming action in India. Loads to do there yet. If you are interested in indie gaming, do have a look at the community.

I have also started working on The Boon Prophecy and actively looking for collaborators. The Boon Prophecy is a third person action adventure being developed by me and Yadu in the Ogre3D engine. The game tells the story of a Kargil veteran of the Indian army who faces a supernatural evil in his hometown of Sikri. Part 1 of a trilogy, it is still in the planning stage.

Not to forget, Chronosign.com is also making fast headways as a development garage of a couple of my friends. We are working on some fun Apps concepts which would be nice to use. At least we think so. More updates on this later.

Right now, I am also working on some major changes on the OSScamp community site. So keep your fingers crossed, a lot is about to come.

A lot of stuff is going on. There are good news on the front of Afterlife – the novel I was writing. I will soon share a reading draft of the same on my blog. While, i am also making some useful efforts for my career in the Music Industry.

All in all, It has been a very hectic week and I am sure there are many more hectic weeks coming. Will keep you posted.

Ciao

I am looking for a decent collabware that supports intuitive task management, project management, document management and knowledge-base management plus some aspects of social networking for internal employees, specifically for a small business or a startup. So, I have done a brief preliminary research and highlighted the following products for a quick peek, and then will make an informed choice. The list includes:

(more…)

Recently a friend of mine introduced me to Kindo – a web service that helps you make your family trees. After trying the service for a few days, I will introduce you all to Kindo ;)

With a simple user interface Kindo makes it really easy for you to add details into your family tree. All you have to do is enter a relation which are divided into: Dad, Mum, Brother, Sister, Partner, Daughter and Son. Then you specify the Birth Date, Anniversary date, Date of Death, and for living people you can also invite them to your tree by providing their email address (You can do the same for dead people too, but I don’t know what that would achieve). These invited people can now help you in designing the family tree. All people on the tree will have their own profile which can be constructed by the people on the tree and based on the provided information, Kindo prepares a calendar which will keep reminding you of all coming birthdays, anniversaries and such events.

Now, your family trees are not public. Only the person who started them (you) and the people you invited on your family trees will be able to view the tree. No one else. This is a nice security feature as I wont want my family details to be easily accessible on the Internet. And I assume I am not alone in wanting so.

However, what I am not sure of is the viability of Kindo in India. It is a service not launched specifically in India but available to anyone in the world and given the reach of Internet in the Developed Nations, Kindo is a great tool for families to connect and communicate, but in developing/underdeveloped nations such as India where the Internet is as not as rampant, we will have to wait and see the utility of Kindo.

Another challenge that Kindo faces from Indian users is – Even nuclear families in India have a huge united family in the background. A big unified family lives through a number of nuclear families. Now, when creating a tree with Kindo, you might be able to add all of these individuals on the tree and have a calendar of their birthdays, etc. But Kindo does not offer you anything more (not that I could se in these three days of my ‘extensive’ usages).

For example: As of now, my family tree constitutes of 62 individuals, out of which only 7 have regular Internet access and can contribute to my tree. Now Kindo does not give me any tools to communicate with these 62 people or even those 7 people. So, after a while of novelty – the adventure of building your family tree, it fails to keep you engaged.

All in all, I would want all of you to visit Kindo once and see what it can do for you.

God Bless. Peace.

Little Red Diary,

How I miss you,
and the conversations I had with you.

The way you allowed me to scribble,
my gibberish,
in the insides of you,
and the way,
you let me doodle,
all over you.

I was a lonesome boy,
a recluse,
dear diary,
and you made me your friend.

And you became my best friend.

You concealed in your pages,
my identity,
like a faithful friend,
and my sodden past.

Do you remember,
the day I proposed to that girl,
and the silly latin poem I wrote?
Ah yes, we had such a good laugh.

Where are you, my diary?

And Oh diary!
Do you remember how she used to scribble,
within you,
when she wanted my attention.

You helped us bond better,
dear diary.

And do you remember,
the day I was badly drunk,
and I drew thorny words,
ineligible,
within you.
It must have pained,
I am sorry.
But you held on to me,
just like a faithful friend.

All those cryptic messages,
I hid within you,
are lost with you my diary.

How I repent my forgetfulness.

What wouldn’t I do,
to have you back my diary.

To have a piece of me,
back again.

***

On June 1 2007, I forgot my bag in an auto-rickshaw near Ansal Plaza, South Delhi. Inside the bag were: some CDs, my father’s tie, some forms and promotional material for Reliance Money, a crossed cheque, and my little red diary.

Of all things I lost, I rue it the most. It had bits of me within its pages for the past three years. During my highs and my lows, I would seek its aid: reading everything I had scribbled in it, everything that some of my friends had scribbled in it, all doodles I had drawn, many of my brilliant ideas, my discussions about my self and the world around me, my classroom notes, and two chapters of a novel I am writing. A lot of stuff.

During my graduation, in the year 2004, I got that diary and I started maintaining it as my class notes register. Within a few days I got bored of making notes (imho that is a task best left for girls) and soon it started recording all sorts of discussions I had with my friends. One of these friends was a girl who used to disturb me and seek my attention by scribbling in the diary. Though we have walked away on our separate ways in life, she continued to be a part of my life through her entries into that diary.

Similarly, things went on and soon I joined post graduation. There was this new girl and well, she also became a large part of that diary. I even had some designs/sketches made by her on bits of paper, napkins, etc. within that diary. Now, that was precious too.

And many of my poems, my game designs, software specifications, algorithms, my couplets, my doodles, my stories, my novels, so many things.

In Riddle Terms, this was at least 4 times more special to me than Riddle’s Diary to Riddle… See, how close I am to being a mortal again.

All is lost now. And I will never depend on something that can be lost for the little comforts of life.