Archive for January, 2008
400 signups! ApnaBill.com is going to rock!
January 28th, 2008
What a sight it was - to see the signup counter at 400!
In just 75 days, we have registered 400 potential users - and this could have not been possible without immense support from our friends and family.
We are working day and night to launch the website into Alpha version…. and trust me, it would totally be worthy of all that wait 
So, just in case - if you havn’t registered - please register at our Beta Signup - and we’ll buzz you as soon as we are ready to rock the prepaid mobile world!
Just before ending, some stats I collected off the registration data…
Signups from different mail services…
Gmail: 210
Yahoo: 97
Hotmail: 28
Others: Rest
With a ton of thanks,
ApnaBill.com Team
Posted in ApnaBill | Comments (0)
Just in…
January 24th, 2008
ISS M Team - From left - Aseem, Rehan, Siddharth, Me, Nitin, Anand & Naresh (missing from the pic are Murtu and Shubra)
The food at Northern Frontiers is damn good!
Munching {something} lol
Posted in Life @ IBM | Comments (2)
Run Nitin, Run!
January 23rd, 2008
We were asking Nitin that when is his birthday from past 2 weeks & his answer always used to be 
(silence) - we had wowed that we’ll not leave him if we get to know his birthday ourselves, using our own means.
Well, that wasn’t tough! Today, our cake shy dude had more cake on his face than what he ate 
Today was his birthday!
Wish you a very Happy Birthday Nitin
But what impressed me today was his sporty spirit! Though he hated all the cake on his face - he still very happily added this picture to his Orkut profile without any second thoughts! - Whats done is done - Keep it up dude
We then all gathered for a group pic…
Boy! I desperately need my hair back 
:(
Posted in Life @ IBM, Life in Pune | Comments (2)
Fixing PNG transparency issues in IE6 and its brothers!
January 23rd, 2008
One thing that was eating my head ever since designing the UI for ApnaBill.com, was the PNG transparency issues with IE6 and its elder siblings (its brothers and sisters born before him). A picture can only best explain this…
Why on earth did IE ever existed?
Thanks a ton to Manuj for reporting that bug - We needed that kick on our backside, we are a bunch of lazy as*es!
As you can see, my PNG image is totally screwed!
A quick google search will lead you to http://komodomedia.com/blog/index.php/2007/11/05/css-png-image-fix-for-ie - the solution is simple and works without changing any code in the HTML. Just a css is required with a conditional include.
Make sure to copy the 1×1 pixel transparent.gif off the author’s website. Without it, you might end up getting small red colored x marks behind your images. This mini transparent image is rendered as the background of your PNG image.
The sticker size is still creating problems when shown on bigger resolution screens - but thats just a tiny fix - Sunday’s task lol
Posted in ApnaBill | Comments (1)
Why are people always like that?
January 19th, 2008
I was back on the joggin track today evening and to my surprise - each and everyone was running/walking again in clockwise direction… why did no one even bothered to switch directions? Time and again I’ve seen this strange habit amongst pupil to just follow - cant anyone think different? It isnt written anwwhere that everyone has to move clockwise lol - And when I started running anti-clockwise, people who were getting onto the track started joining my direction???
On top of that, when I was walking around the track for a warm up, the lights suddenly went out. We though its a power cut again. But then suddenly I saw a fire on the ground, picking up flares on the dry grass. It was a short circuit. What’s weird was that people were least bothered - leave alone the short circuit, the fire even didn’t bothered them. Everyone just continued walking around that area - whats happening to everyone? Not bothered atall?
I managed to get hold of a care-taker, who killed the fire with sand.
Sometimes, the general public attitude is soo strange and ugghh…
Just to end the post on a light thought, a great shot I found in my archives - way back from the good time in Atlanta
The ISS Gang at Norcross Jain Temple.
Posted in Blog, Life | Comments (2)
8 laps!
January 18th, 2008
Yesterday, I ran 6 laps - up from 5 laps the before yesterday. Today’s target was 7 - I completed 8!
God! 8 laps - 4 kilometers - thats a personal record!!!
The day when I’ll complete 10 laps is not far - not by the current standards
Posted in A strong urge to blog... | Comments (3)
6 laps - 3 kilometers!
January 17th, 2008
Yes, that was on my agenda today when I left for Jogger’s park.
From past some days, I was consistently doing 4 laps (2kms) nonstop. Towards the end, a 50m sprint to the end point would mark the finishing of the last lap. Yesterday, I somehow stretched it to 5 laps. Stopping the adrenaline rush towards the last lap does it all.
So today, I decided to stretch it even further! 6 laps - this is a record of sorts for me. I never used to run 6 laps (3kms) together at a stretch - even when I played Tennis fulltime!
Tomorrow, I am going to crack the 7 laps jinx! Its going to be a personal victory of sorts!
The only problem in this equation is that running around the same track bores me to death! Thats one of the biggest reason to run anticlockwise on the track - while everyone else walks/runs clockwise. lol - watching people as they go past is one good thing that keeps me distracted from the boredom of running on same track again and again (those 6 laps!). - What will happen if I someday decide to run 10 laps!
BTW, this is not all in the fitness schedule - add to it 100 crunches and 500 skipping
–someone wants to get back into shape! lol
Posted in A strong urge to blog..., Life in Pune | Comments (3)
Finally made that little sticker…
January 17th, 2008
After setting up the feed aggregation at ApnaBill.com’s Blog, I now had an uphill task in front of me - to tell people that such a blog exists. Writing about it at my blog was one thing, letting it known to ApnaBill’s users was another. And those small sticker like graphics on the topmost right side of the pages used to fascinate me alot.
But having a left hand - when it comes to graphics designing - was a major problem which I had to overcome! As always, I resorted to OpenOffice Presenter to utilize its drawing tools - though they suffice from a presentation viewpoint, I found out that they were not atall suitable for the task I had in mind. Infact, it was pathetic. I was so depressed - I had high hopes from the Presenter’s drawing tool.
Using Gimp or such stuff was not atall on my mind because I wanted to get this done dirt quick - but should look good at the same time. On top of that, my knowledge of Gimp is very limited - resizing images, cut/copy/paste is all what I know
I was sad! Adding a text link on the front page of ApnaBill.com would have sufficed, but it wasn’t what I wanted…
Just then, I remembered that Sameer had tipped me about the improved drawing tool/imaging in Microsoft Office 2007. Not interested much, but still I decided to give it a shot. And to my surprise, it was actually pretty good and fast. I must say, it has improved by leaps and bounds!
I was able to create this in just 10 minutes!
So this goes into OO wishlist from my side - please add more graphics with better look & feel. I never wanted to boot into Windows yesterday - if I had a choice…
Note - I still am and will be an Open Office user
Update
I just found out about Open Office Draw - am going to give it a shot today…
Posted in ApnaBill, GNU/Linux, Open Source | Comments (4)
Our SVN, Bz and Dev-Blogs are up!
January 16th, 2008
Finally after three and half months, our own SVN and Bugzilla are up. Earlier, we were not using Bugzilla… and we were missing its usage from our day to day work. Letting each others know of the bugs on emails was kinda weird. Having used Bugzilla extensively in my good old days at Red Hat, it was an obvious choice. Down the line, I plan to move feature tracking to Bugzilla as well.
Our developer blogs also went online this week. I initially had plans to set up “PlanetPlanet” to aggregate feeds from mine & Sandy’s blog, but later on I realized that Wordpress has a plugin even for that - nice! In less then 30 minutes, the aggregation of feeds was up & online.
You are most welcome to syndicate our feeds - http://blog.apnabill.com
Posted in ApnaBill | Comments (0)
Getting time in IST
January 14th, 2008
ApnaBill.com’s server is hosted on Rails Playground - which from the “Time.now” output - is not running as per IST…
This was creating problems when generating invoices & other billing related information - because Time.now was returning time which was in UTC - while 99.99% of our users expect it to be in IST.
This is how I managed to get the time in IST - You’ll need “TZInfo” gem installed on your system (gem install tzinfo -y)
>> ENV[’TZ’]=nil
=> nil
>> TZInfo::Timezone.get(”Asia/Calcutta”).utc_to_local(Time.now)
=> Mon Jan 14 07:30:53 UTC 2008
>> ENV[’TZ’]=”IST”
=> “IST”
>> TZInfo::Timezone.get(”Asia/Calcutta”).utc_to_local(Time.now)
=> Mon Jan 14 12:31:08 UTC 2008
This little trick just saved me a ton of worries - Bug fixes would be up shortly!
–Rails Ho!
Posted in ApnaBill, Rails | Comments (4)
ApnaBill.com’s Toolbox!
January 13th, 2008
Today, I had a chance to describe the toolbox we use daily for ApnaBill.com & by god, I didn’t expected that we were using so many projects collectively…
We at ApnaBill.com would like to thank all those thousands of individuals who have been working in Open Source Community - day & night - to make possible such great tools & resources.
Posted in ApnaBill | Comments (0)
A Coding Marathon : 10+8 hours straight!
January 7th, 2008
This weekend was like a dream - 2 days, 2 movies, 2 major features implemented for ApnaBill, many bugs solved, slept for more than 12 hours at a stretch, played tennis & what not…
ApnaBill.com’s SVN repository is buzzing with code commits. In last two days, I have checked in code which I was expected to write in the coming week - working almost 18 hours over the two day weekend. With just a few more changes, we’ll have a full blown invoicing system - using which, a user can save or email his invoice PDF anytime for any of the coupons bought through ApnaBill.com - all registered users will enjoy this feature.
Sandy is also picking up pace & is almost about to finish his modules. With his code saftely into SVN, we would be just a few modules short of the feature complete stage. The coming two weeks would be dead hectic for me!
ApnaBill.com touched 300 beta signups this weekend. So, if you havn’t - please signup now on ApnaBill.com - our Beta Signups are going on. I can bet, it wont take more that 10 seconds!
Posted in ApnaBill, Life in Pune, Rails, Startups | Comments (6)
हजारों ख्वाहिशें ऎसी की हर ख्वाइश पे दम निकले…
January 1st, 2008
2007 proved to be one of the most important year for my aspirations. The single most important thing that I had envisioned when I was still in college (maybe even before that) - changed state from just being an idea to a business plan and then into a real entity. Yes, my own startup. The legal entity was formed and registered on 20th December ‘07 - I still remember when my Mom called up to give me the good news! It all started with just an idea - when I saw my roomy (Subu) unhappy about the fact that he has to walk a neat 1km to get his mobile phone recharged. The idea struck me like a lightening blow and I instantly called up Sammer & Sandy to get their views. The idea changed forms many times - from being a mobile app to finally being a web app. The team happily settled with the web app plan
Whatever be the idea - I totally enjoyed the churn! Bringing together the best of minds and taking them along to start something profitable gives me an immense kick - something that a job can never offer. Nurturing something from the very start & see it grow is almost like being a parent of a child. Best programming practices is almost comparable to telling your kids what’s good & bad for them. And if your venture is profitable - its almost like experiencing Nirvana - you own your own destiny!
We are still to launch our first product - ApnaBill.com - eventually that will happen! And with my new year resolutions, I plan to make it happen no later than Jan end
Another interesting thing that happened this year was me joining IBM and then travelling to Atlanta. Going to USofA was a unique experience - it just reinforced my decision to stay in India. The opportunities here are immense - specially because we are still a developing nation. US is good if you need quick money - but nothing beats India! Nothing!
Talking of IBM, I cannot leave out Ruby on Rails from this post. RoR has opened a gateway to commercial web applications for me. Ever since I graduated from college, I hated PHP, never liked the way it was used to write web apps (no offence to hundred’s thousands of PHP developers & the PHP community - just a personal dislike) - but getting introduced to RoR changed it all -”in a snap”! Today, I am proud being a RoR developer. Even the startup is spun around Rails.
Oh yeah, how can I miss my dance performance at Foot Loose - IBM - I broke a 3 year long jinx that I cannot dance. I still remember how my friends used to laugh at me. We practiced hard for a full week before getting onto the stage - messed up our music CD in the first run - fought the judges, got another chance & performed again at our best! We never got past the judges - but I am happy! We all were! And above all that, now nobody can say that I cannot dance
Ok, so cutting the chase - Here are the resolutions for dear ‘08
- Launch ApnaBill.com on or before 31st January
- Be back with family
- Pizza holiday in January (more months to be decided laters)
- Dedicate 1 hour, 5 days a week to fitness - jogging (gym maybe)
- Play Tennis once a week atleast - keep bugging Ratish/Kapil/etc
हजारों ख्वाहिशें ऎसी की हर ख्वाइश पे दम निकले
Posted in A strong urge to blog..., ApnaBill, Life, Startups | Comments (3)