5 blades for Gillette

These are one of the things that litterally change your life ... 5 bladed Gillette razor called fusion, wow its even much better looking than the Mach3 series and the Quatro.

Category: Razor,Gillette,Quatro,life

Claiming my feedster account :P

No Need to Click Here - I'm just claiming my feed at Feedster

Reunion Island Photos

I posted the reunion photos on flickr for you to watch. I think its much more convenient there than posting them directly on blogger .



Here is the link : http://www.flickr.com/photos/56452775@N00/

Points to know about reunion island is that it is really mountainous , nothing like Mauritius. Actually i always thought that it would ressemble a bit like France but thats totally false , flat liveable land is scarce there.



There is also a lot of erosion problems and everywhere you see metallic structures used to stop erosion and stop rocks from stumbling down mountains, hills or cliffs.

Unfortunately sandy beaches are almost absent on the island , as there is not much coral reefs surrounding it which further accentuates the erosion process.


The beauty of Reunion is high up in the mountains , the villages are gorgeous and ressemble a lot to swiss landscape . There is also Piton de la fournaise which is one of the most active volcanoes on the planet. However it was not active when we went to see it.



The voyage to the volcano makes you discover some breathtaking scenery , which looks absolutely moon-like , its really surprising . The roads are curvy and reddish just like a red carpet . Do take breaks when you there as you might easily get stomach and ear problems due to pressure difference as can be seen by this lays packet , which is inflated like a balloon (thats my dad's hand :P).

Shopping is not something i would recommend anyone to do , as everything seems to be expensive . On the roads be prepared to see a lot of french cars , most people there own one but they seem all to buy the same make citroen and renault.



The houses are not so modern there are loads of old creole houses with very bright colours which are really attractive to look at.



Bring warm clothes as it is really cold high up in the mountains and do take biscuits and stuffs to eat although there are a lot of shops and restaurants even 5000km above sea-level.

Category: Reunion,Island,Mauritius,Volcano,Reunion Island

Back to Mauritius

Am back just 3 hours ago , my health is much better now , although thats kind of strange cause i stayed in the cold , drank chilled stuffs and didn't take much medecine. Anyway what counts is that i had real fun on reunion island.

The ship usually takes about 12 hours to get there and i boarded on the Trochatia , which is not very big but the cabins are quiet comfortable. I took a lot of pictures with my mobile , i'll post them tommorrow cause i dont have my mobile cable at home.

Category: Mauritius,Javed Mandary,Reunion,Reunion+Island

Flu i hate U

Woke up yesterday and i had a sore throat , today is no better and tommorrow am supposed to go on cruise to Reunion island (another island very next to Mauritius).

Man am sure am gonna enjoy this trip with my 37 degrees headache and my blocked nose . HOHOHO and a bottle of KoughKiller. Whats annoying with all these medications is that you end up in a really sleepy condition now that can be good when you are at home but when you are in the office and you know that day is going to be long .. i mean very long then there is reason to panic.

Just hope tommorrow i won't end up sea sick along with being influenzied (hmmm dont know if that word exists but if doesnt then am the first to have found it :P ...heheeh... i feel like Columbus now :P )

Category: Flu,Reunion,Mauritius,Health

Start.com

Microsoft's Start.com is a brilliant way to start your day , the draggable tiles allow you to place your blocks the way you want it to be or close blocks which you don't want to use.

It comes with engadget and boingboing rss feeds by default , but you can customize and add your own favorite feeds , not that i would do such a thing . There is also a staff picks section which shows all the best on the web.

The interface itself is easy to navigate and its using AJAX which is mondo cool and trendy.



On top of that you get to see dilbert comics!!!!

Category: Site,Start,Mauritius

Flickr Tag fighter

FlickrTagFighter site allows you to compare the popularity between flickr tags , it also returns you a set of photos related to the tags names your insert.

Usage is simple and you can do loads of fights and get really nice pictures out of it.

Category: Flickr,Tag,Fight,Fun

Urban Dead the free browser based game

You got good internet access , you like playing free online mutiplayer games , try considering Urban Dead. By the way the name is cool .. already 65,352 dead and rising.

You can start as a military man , doctor or zombie corpse , you roam about the city collecting items , points etc.. . The registration is free and its kind of fun if you dont mind having a screen filled with boxes and numbers instead of actual graphics and images.

The creator of the game Kevan Davis has created other such games have a look at his website .

Category: Review,Games,Urban Dead,Zombie

Google vs Katrina

In an effort to help people after hurricane Katrina , google maps has been updated with a new button named Katrina which allows users of google maps to see the extent of the damage caused by the hurricane.

The above picture shows the louisiana superdome damaged by Katrina.

Lets hope the people of louisine get help in due time and losses are minized at best. No news of our friend Book , hope he managed to get to safety and that he's doing fine.

Category: Katrina,Hurricane,Google,Disaster

Holidays la tortura!

Am currently on holidays and am having great fun watching all the junk serials on Canal + Satellite , mondo cool .. apart from that there isn't much i could do since everyone else is working ..thanks people.

Well a least i was able to roam the island a bit by bus , buy some clothes ,check my mails once or twice and do some sport ...or sort of.

On sunday (yesterday) , i went to the port-louis bazaar , hadn't been there since a while things had changed with new stalls , its cleaner , nicer and a tiny-weenee bit more modern.

My pc on the other hand is giving me a sweat ,there are so many viruses on the old horse that its kind of a pain to surf and that to on a 56kb modem , god knows why am still hanging on to it.

Book has been blogging about katrina , the hurricane , have a look at his blog, hope everything goes well for you brother.

Category: Port-louis,Mauritius,Javed Mandary,Holidays

Blog anniversary

Its already a year since i started this blog and i must admit that i never thought that i would get over 8000 hits nor that people would be interested with all the stuffs that i write about during my free time. Anyways i would like to thank all of you who have come regularly on my little space on the net, thanks a lot guys and gurls.

Category: Blog,Anniversary,Javed Mandary,Mauritius

Animation blogs

There are a number of animation blogs out there as pointed out on blogware.

Just had a look at the blog from pixar studio. You will get to see all the latest animation movies in preparation.

Also other blogs to visit : Cold Hard Flash,Cartoon Brew, Family Guy

Category: Animation,Blog,Pixar

Goowy updates

Enhanced features on Goowy today :

#New RSS widget in goowy (re)
#Higher qaulity text and image rendering
#New skins
#New games

I particularly like the rss feed feed manager , which has a really nice interface. Goowy now looks like a proper application.

Thanks to Alex Bard , CEO Goowy , for the notification ;) .

Caegory: Goowy,Mail,Rss

Google making jabber popular

Jabber has existed as an IM communication protocol for quiet some time now , but it never really got the popularity it deserved. I remembered installing exodus and other Jabber clients to find that non of my friends nor relatives were really keen in using it mostly because it was really painful to use as compared to msn messenger or yahoo messenger.

But overnight the interest for Jabber has suddenly risen because of Google , its really interesting to see how a company can help brush off the dust accumulated over Jabber technology. Points to ponder are do we find a tool or software cool really because the company providing it is trendy? Its just like NIKE shoes , the shoe might have a really dumb design but people still buy it because of the logo , so are we using google products because it has the "Google" sign attached to it?

Google allows you to make free calls , yeah thats cool but you can also make free pc calls using msn messenger , so whats the big deal . On top of that right now i still can't connect to their server which adds to my frustration :P.

Another thing is google is allowing users to connect to their Jabber server using any decent compliant Jabber client , inlcuding home-made google talk, there seems to be a catch here .. I mean whats the point ? Where does google cash the money? There's no advert + more money will have to be spent for administration of their Jabber servers ..

Lastly i believe that there needs to be more innovation for people to swap their msn , yahoo messenger or aim clients for google talk. I personnally can't find myself leaving my msn for google talk , because right now msn still (unfortunately) outclasses most IMs in terms of functionality and aesthetics.

Category: Google Talk,IM,Yahoo,Jabber,Msn,Google,Nike

Authentication error on Google Talk

This is so absolutely annoying i rushed to my pc to download Google talk only to find that am getting a Server cannot be authenticated error message. Imagine my disappointment, maybe its a problem with network on my office LAN so i will have to digg through it or try the IM at home.

Anyways thanks J.Cousin for the Google talk invite :P .

Google talk is spreading like fire in an internet full of chopped dry Instant Messengers...

Category: Google,Google Talk,IM,Mauritius

Google Talk IM available for download

Google talk , google's instant messanger is available for download. I am right now joining a meeting so i can't review for the moment but in the afternoon be sure i will have tested most of the functionalities.



According to google you are allowed to perform free voice conversations using Google Talk so this sure is going to be direct competition to Skype .

Google IM here we come!!!!!!!!!!
Category: Google,IM,Google Talk,Messenger,New

Windows Vista Installation

Windows Vista promises to offer a nicer and simpler GUI for its installation as it can be seen from the pics as reported by this neowin article.



Frankly i always thought that Windows XP had already a really easy interface as far as installation was concerned , could it get any easier :) ?

Category: Windows,Vista,Installation,Pic

FARK.com

Fark.com provides you hillarous , strange and fun news 24 hours a day 7 days a week , make sure you dont miss it.

Its an ali baba cave of jokes and funny news , you'll spends hours reading all the stuffs submitted by people all round the globosphere.

Some samples:
- Guy goes for naked swim with girlfriend. Coast Guard alarmed by pile of clothes on beach. Hilarity ensues.

- Tom Hanks stalker builds replica Apollo 13 module and invites star for breakfast.

Category: Fun,Site,Review,Submit

Techcrunch

Guess what my blog was cited in techcrunch , a weblog dedictated to web 2.0 business, product and services.

They have a link to my mail interview with Alex Bard on goowy. Thanks a lot guys!

Category: Goowy,Techcrunch

Donald trump's blog

Guess what donald trump just started blogging here is the link to his blog.

Its really funny how he glorifies himself in his entries :
- "My career is a model of tough, fair dealing and fantastic success--without shortcuts, without breaking the law........"

- "The glamour and grandeur of my buildings and my life are no mere trappings."

Category: Blog,Trump,Celebrity

Running win 95 on a psp

Joystiq.com describes how to run windows 95 on a PSP . This gives you an idea how powerful the PSP can be , really impressive.

However it might not be very practical typing using your PSP joystick :P .

source

Category: PSP,Windows

Praying mantis eating a humming bird

Got this picture from boingboing, it shows a praying mantis eating a humming bird, which is something really really rare.

To bad we dont have neither humming birds nor praying mantis in MRU , however we do have spiders and pink pigeons , wonder when i am gonna see an spider jumping on a pink pigeon :).

full story here
Category: Bird,Insect,Mauritius,Photo,Pic

Echo 2 web framework

Echo 2 is a web framework having support for the cool Ajax technology. I had a look at the mail demo online , it really comes really close a RIA app.

The framework echo users really gives you the potentials of building applications online instead of pages linked together. Personnally i think this concept rocks and its strongly growing in acceptance and popularity.

You can download Echo 2.0 from here its 4.7Mb download in zip format.

Category: Web,Ajax,Echo,Developer,Download

AJAX or the latest craze for web development

If you have a Gmail account or use Google map this is what powers them ..AJAX.

Not only does it have a cool name but it has several advantages too:

1. You don't need to submit your form and wait for your page to refresh , AJAX allows instant field checking and saving , a bit like how a desktop application would work.

2. A single screen interface : consider having one Application page which captures all the display table , forms , etc.. of your application on a single screen.

3. Easy to implement : you use AJAX tag librabries and a servlet and el presto ...google like functionality on the fly.

You can create forms with auto completion , interactive popups , the possibilities are endless.

Midnight coders have implemented their webORB presentation server which actually allows AJAX and FLASH RIA clients to connect to JAVA applications.

Category: JAVA,AJAX,webORB,Google,RIA,Flash,Developer

Interview with CEO of Goowy

Here is a transcript a mail interview I had with CEO of Goowy , Alex Bard, on the now growing in popularity flash mail App:

1. what technology does goowy use for the server side processing is that J2EE and on what server does it run?

We use .Net on the server side.

2. what niche of users are you trying to target?

We are targeting the iPod generation. It is a generation that transcends age and culture and a state of mind. We are targeting people who appreciate form, function, elegance, and embrace new technologies.


3. Where is the goowy head office located?

We are located in San Diego, California.

4. Is goowy planning to stay free for ever?

We will always offer a free version of our service. We truly want to make a difference in how people interact on the web and want to ensure that everyone has access to our services.

We will also offer premuim services in the near future which will provide increased storage, and additional advanced functionality.


5. What are the future functionalities that goowy is planning to add?

We are working a lot of exciting things in our lab that are a combination the amazing suggestions and feedback we have received from our members and our vivid imaginations.


"Its kind of fun to do the impossible" - Walt Disney


6.Hope thats not too much questions :) .

Not at all...your support has been great! Help us spread the word!


Category: Mail,Flash,Goowy,RIA,.Net,Technology,Interview

Pics of Michael Shumacher's F1 car

As promised here are the pics i took at Grand Baie of Michael Shumacher's ferrari.


The ferrari was the attraction of the moment with loads of people trying to take pics of the car.


Category: Michael Shumacher,Ferrari,Photo,Grand Baie,Super U,Car,F1,Mauritius

Finally 24!!

As of 10 am today , am 24 . It seems that I share this date with l'abbe Pierre and the nuclear bomb on Hiroshima..which is a very sad event i must admit.

Still this is how i spent my day , woke up with an sms from my best friend who is studying abroad in Pakistan..followed by a series of birthday sms from friends and relatives in Mauritius.

Was really nice nothing really special except that i slept almost throught out the day which is the best gift i've had since a while and I saw Michael Sumacher's former F1 car at Super U , Grand Baie. I got the pics on my phone , i'll post them as soon as possible online.

Category: 24,Javed Mandary,Birthday

Goowy (re) or the Return of a cool Flash Mail App

Nice features come with this new version of Goowy code-named Goowy (Re).

Here is a list of them :

1. New bar which allows you to switch between different modes desktop , mail , calendar , today , options , help.

2. Ability to load a less flashy version of goowy for people with slow internet connection speed.

3. Goowy games which seems to be a very innovative concept , play games while reading your mail.

4. A google toolbar.

These are things that really want you to use goowy + you can customize your desktop. And the way the windows open up is way so cool , i love flash.

On the other hand being a flash application what i would have really liked is the ability to move objects on the goowy desktop, RSS feeds and definitively more publicity on Goowy so as it becomes trendy ..(thats why am writing this blog entry ..hhhehhe)
Category: Goowy, Flash, Mail, RIA, Cool

Okkaz.com

New site on mauritian web okkaz.com , is a supposed to be dedicated to "petites annonces", however right how its kind of empty. Most people preferring using servihoo's version of the same system.

If we compare the two, Servihoo outclasses by a mile Okkaz in terms of functionality , clarity and response. Although Okkaz has a nice interface , there are some things which are really not acceptable namely the fact that prices are displayed in euros instead of in Mauritian Rupees . This could be extrapolated to indicate that the guy running the Okazz bought the site from some french software maker or something.

Okkaz should try to put more emphasis on delivering useful content to be able to switch people going to servihoo onto their site.

Category: Okazz,Mauritius,Site

Find the meaning of your name

My dad always told me that the meaning of the name 'javed' meant 'good person', i always thought so but today i learnt that this was not the case . This is what my name really means:

JAVED
Gender: Masculine
Usage: Iranian, Arabic
Derived from Persian jawid meaning "eternal".

If you want to know the meaning of your name just follow this link .

Category: Name,Site,Arabic,Persian

Search through flickr photos

Just went on a tour inside Flickr's new feature called interestingness. The feature allows you to view the most popular pictures submitted by flickr users , i was really surprised to see some very nice pics that could turn out to be excellent wallpapers :) .

There are also other features on flickr such as a year ago today , sets and groups for you to navigate through different perspective of photography.

Category: flickr,Photo,Mauritius,Art,Camera

The website of everything

Yes you are not dreaming there is actually thewebsiteofeverything. However the definition of everything is limited to only mammals .. a website dedicated to providing a wide array of information on mammals of all sort .

This is something i would have liked when i was in primary school .. although there was no internet at that time.

Category: Mammals,Website,Site,Mauritius

MCM virus removal solution

Lately i got a virus called MCM it is detected as an ".exe" with allows the mcm suffix appended to it, you can get it in the form of mcm.exe , mcm[1].exe ,etc...

Although i had Symantec Antivirus and the Microsoft Anti-Spyware installed, both were unable to remove it on my system. After a few searches i came across this page , which explained how to remove the crap out of my pc using hijackthis.

Hijackthis did identify mcm in its log but that too didn't help to remove it , so i had a look at the running processes and there was one "system.mcm" . I first had to terminate the process and then had to go to windows directory where there was a copy of this "system.mcm" file stored. Next step was to delete this "system.mcm" file.

That did it , nothing better than a hand to hand combat with a virus.

Category: MCM,Virus,Removal,Spyware,Malware

Make your own Google logo

Fancy having google logo with your name? Well this is possible with the Google Logo Maker .

You just write what you want to put as "google" logo and presto ! I know it has absolutely no usefulness but still its fun ..

Category: Google,logo,Javed Mandary,Mauritius,Site

Make your own star wars intergalatic spaceship

Watched Star Wars Episode 3 yesterday : Revenge of the Sith . Coooooooooooooool movie with loads of yummy animations.

Just found this forum where fanatics write about how they create their model star wars spaceships , whats surpring is that some of these models can actually fly!

Category: Star Wars,Model,Aircraft,Spaceship

Msn virtual earth beta version out

Just tried to find mauritius using the new virtual earth map service from msn.Well according to the search result , Mauritius does not exist or has not been discovered yet!

Being on a 56kb dial-up line did not help things out , it takes ages for the page tiles to load , I wouldn't recommend any of you to navigate a map if you are not on broadband.

I am very much disappointed by the interface offered by msn , there is however a new feature called the "locate me" which is useful when you get lost somewhere between africa and alaska. Or if you don't on which continent you currently are due to amnesia or something or better if you are a secret agent and it happened that they shipped you somewhere without telling you where.

Now there are 2 ways to get msn to find you . The first one being to install a software on your pc ...no thank you and the second method is to having msn analyse your ip.. i prefer this option . However msn was unable to find me ....logical since they have not discovered Mauritius yet!

My recommendation use Google Maps instead , its faster and nicer to use from my perspective .


Category: Virtual Earth,Msn,Mauritius,Google Maps,Map

Longhorn out - Vista in

According to the official website of Microsoft the name of the next version of Windows has been changed from Longhorn to Windows Vista.

Here is the video of the announcement of the new Windows Vista. I would have prefered they kept it Longhorn , it was much more mysterious and charming than Vista .. well hasta la vista Lonhorn.

Category: Windows,Vista,Longhorn,Mauritius

Desert Island Downloads

What would you do if you were stranded on a desert island....given that you got broadband connection allowing you to download any software on the net, (lets say its a cyber-desert-island and WIFI-enabled using solar panels to power up your laptop). Which programs would you choose to download?

The C-net staff put to the question have given out some answers. Its funny and at the same time you get to discover new downloads.

full story

Category: Download,Cnet,Story,Funny,Mauritius

Samsung SCH-v740

Isn't this new Samsung mobile , the Samsung SCH-v740, really wicked? .. although it does look like the Motorola Razr.

Actually when you have a very very not so close look ,its almost identical to the Razr!

As a picture is worth a thousand words , here is 3000 words to prove it:






Category: Samsung,Phone,Motorola,Razr

Optimus Wireless Keyboard

Behold the next generation of Keyboards , the russian Optimus wireless Keyboard has buttons that light up to your touch , is open source and comes with an SDK + keyboard studio application . It allows its user to customize its buttons and has a nice ...standard design .. ok thats a minus point...apart from the buttons that light up!

Category: Pc,Keyboard

Tuning Mania

Its finally hitting Mauritian roads , the tuning mania has begun. More and more people are interested in getting their cars revamped Fast and Furious style which is absolutely delightful to watch on the streets.

Just yesterday i came across this site Le Concept Car , kinda of cool and sets you directly into the tuning world.

Its the Concept Car tuning shop's website online (based at Q.Bornes ,Mauritius). I didn't see any prices though on the alloy wheels that would have been interesting. Still its worth the visit.

Category: Mauritius,Tuning

Watching Hurricane Dennis live

Ever wondered how a hurricane looked liked whislt looking out of your window off pensacola in florida USA , well that is possible , even if you are not in Florida! Thanks to the webcams installed on Pensacola people from all over the world can witness this whirpool of wind and rain. The picture above shows the image of

To get the latest images click here .

Category: Dennis,Hurricane,Weather

LongHorn Beta

Beta testing of Microsft LongHorn have started. Only a select few individuals will have access to the beta version of LongHorn, the rest will have to wait until next year.

LongHorn will feature the next version of internet explorer , IE7.



Category: Windows,Longhorn,Beta

All about sega , birds , creole in MRU

Just found a few interesing websites related to Mauritius:

1. Sega music from Mauritius : Songs are proposed along with nice pictures and descriptions of the origins of our good old sega songs.

2. Birds of Mauritius : Have a look at all the native birds of the island , most of which like the kestrel and pink pigeon are in danger of extinction.

3. Kreol : A good "dictionary" to start learning creol which is the most spoken language on the island.

4. Encyclopedia Mauritiana : one of the first Mauritian Online Encylopedias

Category: Mauritius

Antenne Reunion and Navin Ramgoolam

Last week i was watching french news on our sister island's channel Antenne Reunion and i was really surprised to see that these guys which seemed to be providing professional information did not even know how the name of our Mauritian prime minister was spelt.

They kep saying Navin Rangoolam whilst his name is Navin Ramgoolam on top of that it was written as Rangoolam on the headlines .... humm wow such professionalism. Either they really dont care about us or its really a typing mistake.

Category: Mauritius,Antenne Reunion,Tv,Reunion

Scotland yard seeking video footage

According to BBC.co.uk , uk police is seeking footage taken by camera amateurs or mobile phone users on the crime scenes of the london bombing. These can prove to be valuable source of information in their investigations. These footage can be sent to the following address : images@met.police.uk .

Yesterday i was really sad to see that there was one Mauritian who might have dissapeared in the london bombings , we can really can not imagine what her friends , relatives and family must be going through.

These barbaric acts of terrorism should definitively be put to a stop , its just not permissible to have a bomb exploding every 12 months anywhere in the world. Its really revolting. This is to say that no one will feel safe anymore and this is not something which can be tolerated.

Category: London Bombing, Mauritius,BBC

London Bombing of 7th July 05

Like many Mauritians I was really horrified to learn that there had been a terrorist attack killing 37 and wounding 700 innocent civilians. There are loads of Mauritians in london and our immediate reaction here have been to contact as many as possible to see if they were ok.

Its really depressing to see that every year there is always a bunch of idiots out there who kill innocent individuals just because they want to get themselves heard and whats worst is that as they strike in the dark its always others that get blamed for such actions.

Category: London, Mauritius, London Bombing

Windows through the ages

I have tried loads of OS over the years but the one which i found really easy to use and does meets it purpose as an OS has always been Microsoft Windows , people can always say the Unix/Linux variants are free and just as cool but we have to be realistic there is definitely much more support towards Windows than any other OS on the market.

I have worked with Windows 3.0 , Windows NT/95/98 , Windows 2000 , Windows Millenium , Windows XP and i just can't wait for end 2006 to get my copy of Windows Longhorn.

If you are one of those people who started using your pc after 2000 you probably never saw the versions which came before Windows Millenium and 2000 so here is a site which provides screenshots of those nostalgic years of rapid evolution, where everything was different and harder and dos prevailed.


Category: Windows,History,Longhorn

My Web Beta - Bookmark service from Yahoo

Just tried Yahoo's My Web 1.0 BETA . This service from google yahoo allows you to save your bookmarks online. So far it was able to import my firefox bookmarks successfully.

This feature can be really cool if for example you have important bookmarks at work and you want to get them when switch to another pc at home or elsewhere. You can share your bookmarks with other people and be able to search them easily.

Category: Bookmark , Yahoo , Review

First Zombie dogs already created

According to news.com.au , the first zombies are already amongst us and they not only come from the dead but also bark and wag their tails! Yes .. zombie dogs!



These form part of an experiment to re-animate bodies after removing their blood and injecting saline solutions in them. The purpose of such a procedure is to be able to preserve body tissues and organs of patients in cases where these patients are losing lots of blood and need to be preserved until taken to hospital for example in battlefields.

The first trials are already a success with dogs being put to death and re-animated
a few hours later.

Read full story

Category: Zombie, Dog, Medecine

Alliance Social winner of 2005 elections

So the counting is over and the winner is Alliance Social . Navin Ramgoolam is now our Prime Minister for 5 years.



Am right now at the cybercity , it seems that there is a giant congestion in port-louis and I have absolutely no idea at what time am gonna be back home ..yikes :S .

Election results can be found on the government portal :
http://electoral.gov.mu/elec2005/index.htm

Category: Mauritius, Election, Result

Election results for Mauritian electoral campaign 2005

So today is big day for many fellow Mauritians ,who of the parties will win the elections 2005 is still a mystery. But my guess it will be either MSM/MMM (current ruling party) or Alliance Sociale.

Yesterday was voting day most voting centers recorded between 75 and 85% attendees , which is quiet good although i do wonder what the 20% remaining were doing.. :) .There apparently was not too much trouble , I went voting around 3pm many people like me prefered having lunch first before heading to the voting centres.

It was rather calm there 200 meters off voting center premises there were both MSM/MM and Alliance Sociale activitist sitting in front of each other or rather ignoring each other. Lots of young people in the locality were among them which was quiet surprising to me.

Right now the counting is about to start , results will be obtained by the end of the day.

Category: Election, Mauritius, Vote

Sunday Surfing and thoughts

Having nothing to watch on tv at times can be a bliss. As today was the case I immediately turned towards my pc for my daily surfing exercise.

I thought "Hey why not have a look at what the other blogs are saying" , so after a quick browsing sesssion on del.icio.us, I came on this blog called cool hunting which was showing how to dissapear completely . Its basically about using sheds for hideouts ,well that was the bizarre blog of the day.

Afterwards I came across a site or more precisely a project online called The Gutenberg Project , its kind of a collection of free literrature mostly in Text format , that you can download and read without having to pay for anything , I just downloaded The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci and The Best American Humorous Short Stories both less than a megabyte in Zip format. Its nothing compared to reading a physical book (unless you print it of course) , but still its better than nothing.

Talking about litterature its astonishing to see the amount of people rushing to their book stores to get hold of the Da Vinci Code . The book is already one of the best "best-sellers" of all time. Even here in Mauritius lots of people of both sex keep gossiping about it.

I have a feeling that despite it having an intriguing and fascinating story, that this book has become more of a trendy object that one would showcase on one's desk or library than anything else. Of course there are many people who do enjoy the book for its content rather than for the trend.

Anyways I haven't read the book nor am I thinking of doing so , I prefer watching a nice documentary on National Geographic channel or BBC . Although reading such books is good , entertaining and greatly improves your imagination and vocabulary , i believe that one gains considerably less than learning about true stories of people , animals , insects , forests ,fish and places ,things that you learn by reading scientific/economics litterature or watching docs.

Coming to think of it even Leonardo Da Vinci had a well developed general knowlege of the world around him.

 

Category: Novel , Mauritius , Book , Blog , DaVinci

Live 8 - help reduce poverty in the World

If you are in Paris , Philadelphia , rome and other places in europe and america , you must have heard about it Live8 concert is to be held on the 6th of July . This is concert which is held at different places in the world simultaneously to help poverty stricken countries to fight this plague. Frankly i find it a very noble gesture and if you get the chance to go then dont hesitate.

Here is a list of artists perfoming at different places around the globe (source About.com):
Berlin - Brandenburg Gate

* A-ha
* Crosby Stills and Nash
* Brian Wilson
* Green Day
* Lauryn Hill
* Bap
* Die Toten Hosen
* Peter Maffay

Johannesburg

* To be determined

London - Hyde Park

* Mariah Carey
* Coldplay
* Dido
* Keane
* Sir Elton John
* Annie Lennox
* Madonna
* Muse
* Pink Floyd
* Razorlight
* Scissor Sisters
* Sir Paul McCartney
* Joss Stone
* Stereophonics
* Sting
* Robbie Williams
* U2
* REM
* Velvet Revolver
* Bob Geldof
* The Killers
* The Cure
* Snow Patrol

Paris - Versailles Palace

* Jamiroquai
* Craig David
* Youssou N'Dour
* Yannick Noah
* Andrea Bocelli
* Calo Gero
* Kyo
* Placebo
* Axelle Red
* Johnny Halliday
* Manu Chao
* Renaud
* James Brown
* Sheryl Crow
* Cure

Philadelphia - Museum Of Art

* Will Smith (host)
* Bon Jovi
* Maroon 5
* P Diddy
* Stevie Wonder
* Jay-Z
* The Dave Matthews Band
* Sarah McLachlan
* Rob Thomas
* Keith Urban
* Kaiser Chiefs
* Destiny's Child
* Linkin Park

Rome - Circus Maximus

* Duran Duran
* Faith Hill
* Irene Grandi
* Jovanotti
* Tim McGraw
* Nek
* Laura Pasini
* Vasco Rossi
* Zucchero

There will also be live transmission on M6 for people like us who never get to go to these types of events ;) .

Category: live8,concert,M6

My move to ebene cybercity

ebene cybercity
Originally uploaded by baadaal.

Today is my first day in the ebene cybercity building dubbed the most intelligent building in Mauritius and in Africa in general.

The weather here at ebene is really very cold and there lots of wind.Its cleaner than in port-louis and its certainly beautiful with lots of flowers , and grass.

There are loads of other buildings under construction right now around the main building it seems that if all goes well this business park may prove to be very interesting.

The Ebene Way is where you would like to be to get hold of a nice lunch or dinner , there are about 5 different restaurants from typical indian food , to chinese noodles , + there is also pizza hut. I just had a chicken cutlet with bread (long one) for rs45 so its not that expensive although i can't see myself eating there everyday.

There are lots of other facilities in Ebene Way including SBM and MCB cash ATMs , a barclays bank outlet , Video/DVD rental stores , Supermarket , shops , even surprisingly an aquarium shop .

Its is not allowed to take pictures inside the building itself for security reasons so dont expect me to be posting any, but mark my word its cool.

Resource:
Ebene cybercity : http://www.e-cybercity.mu/

Cybercity, Mauritius, Ebene

Checkout codes from subversion using Ant 1.6.2

Below is a target that you could add to your ant build.xml file to checkout codes automatically from subversion (svn). I had a lot of trouble finding the svnant.jar file necessary for this target so i thought i could share it online with others.

<target name="checkout" depends="init">

<taskdef name="svn" classname="org.tigris.subversion.svnant.SvnTask"/>

<svn username="javed"

password="pass">

<checkout url="http://10.12.5.19/svn/MyRepository/trunk" destPath="${basedir}"/>

</svn>

</target>

Do add the svnant.jar to your ANT_HOME/lib directory.

Category: Subversion,Ant, Build

Nomad Office offered by NetWork Plus

Mauritian company Network Plus is offering a service called Nomad Office. This service allows you to stay connected to the net even if you dont have a telephone nearby. It uses Wimax technology , allowing wireless connectivity to the web. All that you need is simply a modem and your pc/laptop.

Currently the Nomad Service is available from Grand Baie to Vacoas. The rest of the island still needs to be covered , so you just can't be that nomad after all :) .

Two types of connections are offered 128kb and 512kb. Whats good is that Network Plus allows you to temporarily shift to 512kb if you are on 128kb if you need , you just pay extra for the number of hours you increase your bandwidth.

Its the price which unfortunately leaves a salty taste in the mouth,you need to do a rs2000 deposit , rs 300 monthly for

rental and rs 1710/monthly for the 128kb connection whilst the 512kb is at rs 3240/monthly + 15% TVA (VAT). At this price , i

find servihoo's packages really better given the fact that mobility is really not and issue for most individuals.

The service is supposed to target offices , but i dont think that offices would require such a service in Mauritius. We all know how dangerous wireless connections can be . I personnally think its safer to use a wireless LAN in the office with

connection to the external environment via optic cables / telephone lines than relying solely on wireless Wimax connections.

Category: Mauritius, Technology,
Review

The e-Electoral Campaign on Dodo island

As you are aware of it the general elections are due soon and political websites have started to spring up on the web. Its a pity that there is no blog however , would have been a pioneer step by our politicians.

Here are some sites which i found whilst reading l'express:

1. http://www.msmmmm18.com - MSM/MMM ward 18 website.
2. http://www.bizinchanger.net/mlp - l'Alliance sociale (OOps not working!)

By the way right now there are all kinds of ribbons around lamp posts and buildings in Mauritius , its really looking like a big party is taking place. Political discussions are in the minds and heart of many . Just this morning i heard that
poitical activists from opposing camps had started a fight last night and gun shots were heard.

Category: Mauritius, Elections

Back Again

I know , i know i was away for a while from my blog , but thats what you get when you work in the private sector in Mauritius ...very little freetime. So i'll try to forgive myself with some articles on what is happening in the country.

Its getting colder here and my fingers are starting to freeze . Days are shorter and the sun is most of the time playing hide and seek behind the clouds , ideal time to go to the beach if you dont like being roasted and tanned.

Category: Mauritius , Blog

Tech News , mauritian blog

Since the month of May 2005 , the mauritian blogosphere has a new node , Tech News.The latter treats Mauritian actualilty related to the tech world, although do expect political-governmental news along with it.As the name implies its just news , so far i haven't seen anyone putting a personal touch, review or open discussion in the articles posted on the blog.

I dont know who runs the site as there is no information as to the administrators.Still its a nice intiative and hope that others will catch the blogging virus.

Category: Mauritius,Blog,Review

ICL tracker new service in Mauritius

mazda mx
Originally uploaded by baadaal.

Since this month a company called ICL is offering an emergency tracking service for cars.

It works like this, you install the ICL tracker kit in your car.The kit comprises of a GPS and a phone. If you get any kind of problem you just click a button , this sends a priority sms to the ICL tracking department , which in turn is able to localise your car and get in contact with you for assistance.

I think that this is a cool initiative to minimize road crimes which have been very frequent these days in Mauritius particularly amongst taxi drivers.

However i am not very certain whether having ICL responding to emergency calls is a good idea , would they have the necessary skills to perform in critical situations? Well i haven't personnaly tried the service so its difficult to know.

One other question that bugs me is the use of an sms to be sent to ICL tracking service , then having ICL coming to the rescue by calling the police or whatever , doesn't that just adds to the overhead of getting help? Wouldn't it be nicer if we just called the police ,asking them to come to the rescue through a GPS tracking id for example which they could get from ICL or having a GPS console shared commonly with the police and ICL department to track vehicules.

The alarm is really not enough these days , i was thinking if they did send sms , why not install a system that could take photos of the interior of your car at regular intervals and having it sent via mms to a security service of something along with having your alarm ringing in case of danger, that would be cool too.

Well lets just wait and see still its better than nothing.The ICL kit comes at Rs20,000 and a montly fee of Rs400.

Category: Mauritius,Car,Security,Alarm,GPS

Google personalized homepage

google personalized
Originally uploaded by baadaal.

Google strikes yet again with its new homepage personalization service .

What it does is simple , clicking on the personalize homepage link , brings you on a page where you can select which contents you want to be displayed on your google homepage.

You can choose between haing your gmail contents , bbc news , slashdot , weather reports , and other news sources being displayed on your homepage.

The drag and drop functionality allows you to place your blocks the way you want it which is kind of neat.

Category: Google,Review,Site,News