mere funde

Category: Tech

  • Software release names

    When I was upgrading the WordPress installation, I noticed that the particular version was code named “Tyner” after McCoy Tyner, a jazz pianist. WordPress releases are mostly named after Jazz musicians, like Ella Fitzgerald, and saxophonist Stan Getz.

    These codenames have always fascinated me since the good old days of Prithvi and Agni, at the Insti’s IPC – not International Patent Classification but Information Processing Center. Prithvi was the codename for the Linux server, and Agni for Unix. Vi used to be the editor of choice. Pine for email. Cat and Man were commands, rather than species name. Anyways I digress.

    I was always fascinated by the way “Valhalla” used to appear on the terminal (screen) when we tried to log on to the network. And since then I have tried to follow these release names for various softwares. Below is a quick look at the names used by RedHat Linux.

    1. RHL 7.0 – Guinness
    2. RHL 7.1 – Seawolf
    3. RHL 7.3 – Valhalla
    4. RHL 8.0 – Psyche
    5. RHL 9.0 – Shrike

    I think post this RedHad became Fedora, or atleast a part of it did, and they used different names. Maybe I will follow up with some other interesting ones later (Ubuntu follows a cool method).

  • ABN Amro lacks FF support!

    ABN Amro – India, recently made some changes to its website which renders the NetBanking option unusable on Firefox (any version!). I sent an email to their support desk about this, and am reproducing their response below.

    Dear Customer,

    This is with reference to your email dated July 09, 2008. At the outset we would like to thank you for the time taken and effort made by you in sharing your concerns with us.

    We wish to inform you that currently you will not be able to access our Net banking service through Fire fox browser. However to access our Net banking services we recommend Internet explorer browser version to be 5.5 and 6 and we would also request you to kindly check if your Internet Explorer browser is configured for JAVA applet.

    Should you require any other assistance, please feel free to call our 24 Hour Bank by Phone service* in your City and our executives will be glad to assist you.

    Assuring you of our best services.

    Yours Sincerely,
    Service Delivery, Consumer Bank, India

    While I appreciate their quick response to my query, I am thoroughly disappointed with the response. For a company of ABN Amro’s size, simply stating that it does not work is not acceptable.

    Just for the record, ICICI Bank which runs the same software (FINACLE by Infosys), supports all sorts of browsers and their NetBanking is much easier to use.

  • The post about Yahoo!

    So much has been said about Yahoo over the recent past, that it seems like a blessing in disguise for Twitter. The laundry list of senior execs leaving has not gone down well either.

    However, I do not agree with Mike Arrington when he says that Yahoo should have sold out to Microsoft. I have great respect for Mike but I think he is wrong, and big time at that, about this issue. Maybe the decision seemed to make business sense, but personally I feel that the two companies are so different that merging them together would have been the great disaster since Yahoo’s move with Geocities.

    Anyways I would like to agree with a contrarian view put forth by Danny here. And to add to it I have some suggestions. Yahoo currently owns some of the best stuff on the internet.

    1. Yahoo Mail – As much as I dislike the service now, loads of people still use Yahoo mail. Provide free POP access. Remove those obscene ads. And think of a better way to monetize it. STOP THE SPAM. Let me say that again. STOP THAT SPAM. And no, Ymail won’t solve your issues here. Also, the RSS reader (does anyone use it??) is a joke. Do away with it.
    2. del.icio.us – Yeah, the founder is leaving. But you guys are to blame. Release the new version already. You know what people using it are thinking. Use it. Use it with Answers. Use it with Search. Probabaly integrate with Flickr.
    3. Flickr – Again, the founders are leaving. Don’t mess with the product. Its awesome. Think integration with Image search results.
    4. Messenger – Cut those stupid ads. Simplify it. Let it do the job. I dont need bull shit on it. Let me talk and chat.
    5. Answers – Something I know least about, but have heard awesome stuff about it. Let it be.
    6. Finance – Good as is. Let it be.

    Get back into the game by getting back those users who used to swear by Yahoo at a point of time. You can always look at better ways of monetizing. Get rid of non-committed people. Don’t let go off good ones. Get rid of pro email. Perhaps you missed the memo but people have stopped paying for it ages back!! Get rid of competing products. Get rid of stupid execs. Focus on technology, the money will follow. You don’t need to do everything. Get rid of non-core products. Slim down and focus your energies.

    I grew up on the internet with you folks. Don’t throw in the towel just yet. Stop eating peanut butter.

  • Gmail spam filter gone nuts!

    That’s an email from the Google Alerts not spam!!

    Google spam filter is broken

  • STN vs GenomeQuest

    … or why STN is going to fail. DGENE and USGENE recently introduced an option to limit sequence searches (BLAST) by % match. But I think it might just be too little to late for them.

    For too long now STN has enjoyed the benefits of monopoly in the field of patent sequence searching. However, a new entrant in the domain threatens not only to end the monopoly but might also bring an end to STNs business in this field. GenomeQuest has quietly, but steadily has become the tool of choice for patent information searchers. More and more people, including some patent offices, have started accepting it as a standard. So why exactly is this happening??

    Sequence searching on STN is complex, not-user friendly, and extremely expensive. On the other hand GenomeQuest offers a easy and intuitive interface for searching. Also, for searches with more than 50 odd patent results GenomeQuest becomes a more cost effective option, that too if you are searching on one database only through STN.

    However, GenomeQuest is not without its share of problems. Their coverage so far is not comprehensive, and they do not have clear information on what patent-ranges (date or jurisdiction wise) are covered by them. Also, GenomeQuest lacks amount of filtering offered by STN.

    The geek in me loves the STN for the impressive options, and here is what they need to do to get back ahead.

    1. Introduce a simple single combined search on all interfaces with automatic duplicate reduction. I understand this might not be possible in cases where the databases are supplied by different companies, like CAS Registry and DGENE, but you got to do it for business – so figure it out, will you!
    2. Reduce the cost and make the search affordable. Treat sequence searches (structure too if possible) as one search and charge a fixed amount (say USD 200-250) to do the search and display the results. No separate display charges.
    3. Keep up that brilliant customer service 🙂

    So here. No go ahead, make the changes and be the best again STN!

    PS: The views expressed above are mine alone and do not reflect those of my employer. Also, this post is not to defame any service.