The Usability factor

Well, I was browsing the CNN Website Education section looking for an article (regarding ASU) of which I had an broken link (which I picked up from a forum)

Now, After the finding the link to be broken after a bit of grumbling I really had 2 options:
1) To give up on the article
2) To find the article myself

Well, I picked option 2 for no certain reason and tried the so-called "search" feature.

Now the problems I faced while using the search feature:
1) By default the search is a web-search and not a CNN.com search. I just don't get this, Why would anybody does this? I won't go to CNN.com to do an Yahoo search(this is what they use). This should be really simple to know, understand and do.
2) No section specific search: So I can't search in education section only
3) By default results are ordered by Date and not Relevance. This was really irritating. I was getting really weird top results due to this as the hits were sorted by date.

Though, I wasn't able to find the article using the search, I thought why not just browse to the date of the article (somewhere in april). I clicked on "more articles" link on the Ed section page and viola I was on a page that looked like had archived content but that was limited till May only. I wasn't able to find a link to older stories :(

A simple example of how Small things when overlooked can cause mayhem to a web site's usability.

Common Sense of Loosing weight

A friend of mine managed to loose humongous amount of weight after he was diagnosed with medical problems. Now, this guy was fat all his life. He used to be live on junk food and called all kinds of names during his school days. But one day when he was diagnosed with several health problems owing to his weight. He resolved to loose weight.

He managed to loose about 50 Kgs. in 10 months. And he is one of fittest persons I know of. He's also working on a book called "Common Sense of loosing weight".

You can read his story [rediff.com].

Check out Rishi's site at: http://www.commonsenseofloosingweight.com/

Women Em"Powerment"

Intresting tid bits of news today on TV and the news paper.

In a incident, one women along with her family and well-wishers ransacked a marriage. Apparently the marriage was of her husband who was marrying under another name.

In a separate incident a "sadhu" was beaten up by a girl and her family members coz he tried to rape the girl earlier in the day. Apparently he ran after she managed to raise a alarm and hid inside the temple. The police has booked the sadhu for attempted rape and the girl for beating and ransacking the place.

What made me noticed the incidents were that they were both reported from semi-urban parts of the country and also the changing face of the Indian woman in these parts. They are actually standing up for themselves and saying if the police/govt. cant protect us we ourselves will. They aren't shy to go after the offenders themselves and give them a taste of justice.

Another thing to notice about the 2 incidents was the role of the media. In both the cases media was present while there was no police to be seen. This sends out a big message about the media and police today. Media has become a powerful force. The police may or may not be able to help you. But once the media is on your side it doesn't matter who is on the other side in Modern India coz soon the whole India would be rallying behind you. Such is the power of media in new age India.

Great pieces of news ;)

Y2k Bug

Hmm, I was in a phone convo with a friend today, who gave a example of the Y2K bug. Basically saying it was a huge dud and only because US said the universe will collapse on year 2000, the world hit the panic button and upgraded their systems.

That sent me into a tizzy, I dont remember thinking it this way, Infact Y2k was such a no incident that i dont even remember thinking about it after year 2000. But now i think or rather I would quote from wikipedia

"Debate continues on Whether the absence of computer failures was the result of the preparation undertaken or whether the significance of the problem had been overstated??"

Hmm.. I dont really recall hearing *any* major incident coz of the Y2K bug, Why is that? I cant really believe we were 100% ready!! Somebody must have missed it!

Hell, In most circustances I would believe that while upgrading some of the code might have been left unfixed (quite easy !)

So was all that expenditure and the hoopla only due to a overhyped unfounded rumour?

Read:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y2K

To read a parody on the Y2K bug hoopla visit:
http://www.jefflindsay.com/my2k.shtml

First Things First

I have just started reading "First Things First" by Stephen Covey. It struck me as pretty insightful as did the 7 habits. However, I think, its quite easy to forget what all I can grab from the book writing a brief of the things in the book.

1. Quadrant - II Living: Devote time to Q-II (the important) activities of life. Dont procastinate and let things turn into crisis. Separate the Urgent from Urgent but not Important activities. Avoid Q-III and Q-IV at all costs

What does it mean to me?
a) Things are imp. which I can start anyday has to be started now: Eating right, Drinking lots of water, Exercising
b)Give more importance to relationships.
c)Stop wasting time in Video games and other stupid stuff.

2. Identify the real "First things" : Not only be just more efficient but be more "effective". Identify activities which really are important. Stop living in the crisis world.

Stop giving importance to every to-do activity. Identify the actually "important" activities and start devoting time to those

3CR

The post is on a funda I call 3CR i.e. confirm, Confirm, CONFIRM, Report. Basically, It says you can easily make a ass out of yourself if you report premature findings with no solid proof quite easily. Hence, double..no..triple check everything before establishing or generalising something. This has happened to me multiple times and hence I push myself to adhere to this principle as much as possible(quite hard at times for me)

Ofcourse the above becomes more important when you are reporting to your boss or client where reporting any findings which may turn out to be wrong could be quite a disaster.

So, before jumping from your seat and yelling Eureka, just run a few more testcases ;)

Interesting thought

I attended a workshop on Coaching today, where I heard this:

"Weaknesses are generally just over-played strengths". Hmm... think about it, It seems plausible to me

Thing I hate about myself

From now on, I will try and list the things I really would like to change about myself and just to remind me of the things, i'll list them here to remind me and to remind you to remind me that i have to loose the "bad habits of Amit Wadhwa" :P

1. Laziness/Procastination : I am epitome of procastination. I dilly dally at every opportunity. From waking up to packing up my bags in office and returning home. I am never able to do it well in time. I get up late and rarely reach office on time. I take off late from office and reach home late. I almost miss all the deadlines for everything.. CAT, MS apps blah blah.. blah Hell, I even put off shaving until it starts itching(okay its not always that bad)

2. I am a mess!!: I am highly disorganized.. Each item I own which can be misplaced is reight now MISPLACED! My first resolution of 2007 was to make myself more organized but I have been tarrying it all along(cf. pt. 1)

Lots More to Come..