Nitin Nain

Author: nitinnain

  • Tips to boost performance of a Windows PC

    I recently dived into fixing some of my PC nagging performance issues. Two years of use called for an overhaul! Here are some tips and tricks I used to fix the issues:

    1. Use System Logs to identify the most critical issues that slow down your PC

    a) Open “Event Viewer”
b) Goto ‘Application and Service Logs’ > Microsoft > Windows > Diagnostics Performance

    You will find your PC performance logs here. Look carefully and you might spot few devices that interfere with the Sleep/Resume performance of your PC. I salvaged 6secs of time from one single service “Toshiba Service Station”. It’s funny that a service by the manufacturer that’s not even required during regular runtime is slowing their machine. Saved about 20 secs in total on wake up time.

    2. Stop applications that start automatically at boot time but aren’t used

    1) Press Win Key + R (to open Run dialog box)
2) Type “msconfig” 
3) Stop all the unnecessary programs under the 'startup' tab.

    I do this often. Several programs like gtalk, gdrive, Skype, Web Cam, vlc, etc start with the system boot up and make the boot process painfully slow. It’s really bad that third party apps compromise a user’s overall PC experience just so that they can launch easily later on.

    Here’s a screenshot of msconfig showing programs that I’ve stopped from launch at boot-time:

    Msconfig dialog box - Windows OS

    3.  Stop unnecessary Services that consume resources in background

    1) Press Win Key + R (to open Run dialog box)
2) Type “services.msc” 
3) See what services you can stop.

    For instance, I stopped the notifications from ‘Intel Management and Security Status’ (the service is for networked update & Anti-theft service which I haven’t enabled for 2years and don’t think can really help after a theft.) and changed the “Toshiba Optical Drive” service to manual (The Optical Disc Drive still works. This service is just to protect the DVD at the time of running. Discs are rarely used now.)

    There are plenty of articles on the web listing non-essential services, so I won’t list them all here.

    4. Adjust Visual Effects

    I removed the following Visual effects without any noticeable effect.

    Windows OS visual settings for System Optimization

    5. Spring Clean Applications on your PC

    Use the Uninstall utility from the Control Panel to get rid of unnecessary programs. There are like 20 programs from Toshiba that I never used: Toshiba Bulletin board, Book places etc… More on this later in this post.

    6. Defragment the Hard Disk

    Right Click on drive under My Computer and find the defragment tool there.

    7. Clean up the Windows Registry

    Windows has a “Performance Issues and  Tools” program. It might highlight some sticking points, but won’t fix everything.

    I’m not really sure if this helps improve performance but it takes only a few minutes. You can look up “clean windows registry” on the internet and you’ll find plenty of resources. Be cautious of installing random ‘Registry Cleaners’ though — they could be malware.

    (more…)

  • “Language X for Y developer” tutorials are useless

    The idea of the polyglot/full-stack developer is pushing all the web developers to continually learn new languages and you might come across a few tutorials on the lines of ‘Python for C++ programmers’ or ‘Go for Java developers’.

    I don’t think these tutorials are the best way to pick a new language. The premise of such a tutorial suggests that you’re in a hurry, and want a few quick hacks to get started. Let’s try to unwind the situation. Suppose you are a C++ programmer looking to learn Python. To learn “Hello World” from this tutorial would mean that you read through the “Hello World” code in C++, and then the “Hello World” code in Python… and then spend all your brain power on comparing the diffs. When actually you could have easily learnt your first Python program.

    Now let’s pick a simpler case, let’s say you’re moving from C to C++. You start off comparing basic code in the two languages again, which would be a cake walk since, it could be pretty similar. But wait, you probably don’t understand Classes and Objects yet. Cpp is going to offer you new concepts on data abstraction, OOPS, encapsulation and inheritance. Stuff that a quick guide can’t teach. So there actually isn’t any quick and dirty way at all.

    There are elegant similarities in languages of course. But there are interesting differences as well. The differences are the reason you’re learning a new language to start with. Differences that make a new language useful.

    And there are more reasons why this might be a bad idea. Bad Habits of one language can affect your style on another. You might observe useful features of a language too late since you were busy hacking the diffs. Python obsesses over consistency of syntax, C++ obsesses over inheritance and optimization.

    So start fresh when learning a programming language. Your learnings from previous languages will map automatically onto the new language that you want to learn.

  • Startup Festival Bangalore

    The Startup Festival held at Bangalore from 7-10 March 2013, was an interesting peek into a lot of the startup companies based at Bangalore. Here’s what I saw.

    The Good

    I wasn’t expecting to see such a big turnout! A shoutout to the organisers (Vlad, Shashidharan, and the volunteers) for the well-organised event. It was a great place for entrepreneurs to meetup and know how the startup scene is shaping up, and possibly collaborate on each others’ skill-set. Met some interesting people. There’s so much effort people are putting, I hope the government starts embracing small private companies and entrepreneurs.

    Though, the best part was that it set my expectations around the idea of starting up in India correctly. It was nice to get a sneak peek into business practicals and to size up the number of people involved.

    The Bad

    It’s sad that the Indian market just doesn’t have the kind of funds that SF, London or Berlin have. Many companies are self funded, which considering the low PPP in India means having to cut down on the basic infrastructure i.e. home offices and no Macs. Bootstrapping might have a potential advantage but I still feel that there has to be more funding to have world class innovations, especially at an early stage, and the government needs to pitch in.

    Also the network effect of the IITs is rather overwhelming. The funding is very unevenly spread within a small set of colleges. 

    It was also a bit overwhelming to see so many people running after the same ideas. Of course, execution differs and matters a lot. It would be cool if people addressed the right market gaps. I was a bit disgruntled by the cockiness of a few founders.

    The Ugh

    There was a stage for presentations: During presentations, Some pitches/presentations were quite lousy. This was an opportunity to highlight your company! At least prepare a good pitch. Oh, and the run down questions “how should I start?” or “what’s the risk in starting a business?”

     

    Here’s a small personal log of the 4 days:

    Day 1: at Indranagar, Bangalore

    Attended talks at Exotel, Red Bus and Collaborative Community and few of the Powerhouse sessions at the main auditorium.

    Day 2: at Jayanagar, Bangalore

    The biggest takeaway of the day was that I figured out Jayanagar and JP Nagar’s roads. Both companies I attended delivered very flat talks.

    Day 3: at Koramangala, Bangalore

    Beard Design’s founder gave a good talk. The 7 person company is located at Goa! The Unreasonable at Sea team was in India, and they came up to Bangalore for the event; it was cool to hear their stories.

    Day 4: at Pebbles, Bangalore

    A nice closing party at Pebbles and Kitsch Mandi.

    It was an interesting peek into the startup community. There’re talented folks out there, hope the scene stays bouyant and more funding flows into the market.

  • Redesigning Windows desktop theme with Rainmeter

    One thing I miss about the Windows OS is the nifty selection of desktop applications developed by some amazing people over the years.

    Macs were too closed and expensive when I started working with computers. While, Windows and Linux gave me an opportunity to dissect my PC and play around with installing different OSes. An invaluable excercise for software developers IMHO.

    The thing I really dislike about Windows is the web development environment — I have to do all my web development work in Linux. And switching OSes is quite a drag. But Win 7 is pretty wonderful if you intend to use it for other purposes.

    Anyway, here’re two screenshots of my desktop from 2010. I created these using a Desktop customization tool called Rainmeter. Not the most user-friendly configuration, but it was fun exploring how much the desktop theme can be bent to your liking.

  • The new Nao is awesome!

    Dec 13, 2011

  • Aero India 2011

    Aero India 2011

    Hot day, a huge crowd, and most people would have gotten back exhausted. The arrangements at AeroIndia could have been better. But props to those who attended. Open-air fields are rough. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger haha. Nevertheless, I did enjoy many things at the show — I had to. I can’t hate aviation.

    So, without much ado Here’s a list of the main aircrafts that performed Aerobatics at the event:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HAL_Tejas (my first viewing of this Indian Fighter Aircraft! I love to hate on HAL for their slow pace,. but this one’s aerobatic abilities pleasantly surprise me!)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_F/A-18E/F_Super_Hornet (US)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Dynamics_F-16_Fighting_Falcon (US)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saab_JAS_39_Gripen (Swedish, in the pic below.)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dassault_Rafale (French, Dassault also makes Mirage 2000 which IAF already has)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sukhoi_Su-30 (Russian, demo’ed by IAF)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurofighter_Typhoon (Developed by a consortium of 4 European countries. An Italian flew it at the show. One of the top aircraft on the show)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HAL_Dhruv (HAL’s Dhruv helicopter seems great too!)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HAL_Kiran (flown by the Suryakiran team)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zl%C3%ADn_Z_50 (Red Bull team’s aircraft)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saab_2000
    A jet trainer that I can’t recollect now — probably the BAE Hawk
    (And there were IL76, Mi18, Chetak, C-130J, Avro, and others parked away.)

    And this is from the top of my head! I identified almost all of them in Air, given the PA system was quite a hit-and-miss.)

  • Turn the volume down

    Jan 18, 2010

    Reposting comments from a discussion about earphones on slashdot —

    Re:Turn down the volume (Score:4, Interesting) by Khyber
    No, your ear drums are not a nerve. They’re a tympanic membrane. Where you lose your hearing is from the loss and the degradation of the three inner ear bones caused by intense sound pressure that the tympanic membrane transmits, either as a result of standing next to loud speakers or having a set of earbuds crammed almost up against your ear drum.
    This will also affect your balance, as the cilia in your cochlea break from this, and so do the tiny sodium/calcium deposits in your cochlea that act as balance weights.

    Turn the volume UP (Score:5, Funny) by KingSkippus
    “Turn down the volume.”
    How does that help? If you have hearing loss, the obvious solution is to turn UP the volume, so you can hear the music better, of course.

    Happy listening people… take care!

    Source: http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=08/10/13/1355220

  • Humanoid Robots

    Dec 9, 2009

    I’ve always had a fascination for automation and robotics. The last few years have seen some very interesting developments in Humanoid robots. Honda Asimo, Sony Aibo and Sony Qrio displayed some nifty capabilities early 2000s. Unfortunately Sony stopped the research on the duo in Jan 2006 and Asimo hasn’t seen a new version for some time now. Guess the research cost was trumping the benefits in foreseeable future for these Japanese manufacturers.

    Anyway, there’s interesting work happening still. Aldebaran Robotics’ Nao caught my eye. Priced at €10,000, it’s still a research product and isn’t available to everybody. Here are some of my favourites in action.

    Nao (by Aldebaran Robotics)

    Aldebaran Nao - Movements and Joints

    Qrio (by Sony)

    Dancing – The steps are synchronized down to msecs!

    Toyota’s Humanoid showcasing impressive stability

    Motoman

    (There’re also the AI/Facial-expressions focused robots. I just covered the ‘motor’ ones.)

  • The Art of Engineering

    Ever given a curious thought to what happens when that 220 Volts is plugged into the computer? Here goes:

    A basic circuit converts the 220V AC to a 5V DC and feeds it to the Oscillator on the MotherBoard. A wave of electrical pulses that flips about 109 (1000,000,000) times a second is generated. For the uninitiated, the 0’s and 1’s they show in digital/sci-fi movies (‘The Matrix’ et al.), represent these high (1) and low (0) currents. A simple math with these binary bits lets you play those high-action video games!

    The latest processors house 45nm transistors — about a Hundred million (and growing) would fit in the size of your thumbprint — each flipping meticulously to load this website you read right now. The advances in Chip production technologies blow my mind!

    People are fond of their cool gizmos (iPhones!) and associate them with the “Art” in engineering work. But to me, THIS digital dance is the sexiest aspect of electronics engineering… and I’m a fan of the canvas!