Desicritics Author: Goyal

Movie Review: Parzania

Goyal — Sun, 4 Feb 2007 12:45:55 EST

It is such a shame that two movies based on the same event, Gujarat killings in this case, at different times, get released together, just because of the ruling party. Parzania, made during the Congress rule got released immediately without censor cuts while Black Friday>, made when a BJP led government ruled the country, will get released after a long delay in a couple of weeks. Anyway, this is not a rant about that. After all, hasn't each government abused its power in such cases to impact the fortunes of the movies.

Parzania is an exceptionally well made movie. Directed by little known Rahul Dholakia, it explores the misfortune of a Gujarati Parsi family during the Gujarat riots. The movie stars Naseeruddin Shah as Cyrus, (the oh-so-beautiful eyes) Sarika as Shernaz, Corin Nemec as Allan, Parzan Dastur as Parzan and Pearl Barsiwala as Dilshad. The movie attempts to chronicle the pain, anguish and post-riot trauma faced by these people and many more.

It is an extremely well paced movie and goes about the job of telling the story in a no-nonsense manner. The character development and build up is excellent. Halfway through the film, you are left ashamed at being part of a country where politicians can manipulate people to kill each other and they still get elected despite everyone knowing the truth. Maybe we guys deserve this. Maybe it is because we do not take active interest in what is happening around us.

When will the world learn that there are no Hindu or Muslim terrorists? They are just terrorists and have no religion.

Naseeruddin Shah has only grown on me, be it Being Cyrus or Parzania. The one person I discovered in the movie is the still so gorgeous, natural and extremely talented Sarika. She plays the part of Shernaz to perfection and with minimum fuss. Her last dialogue in the movie did leave most women in the theatre crying and even me moist eyed. She is very natural as an actress and plays her part with minimum fuss. Another highlight of the movie is how the entire thing is narrated through the character of Corin Nemec. He plays his part to perfection and one feels that he may have been under-utilised in the movie.

The movie gets a rating of 4.5/5.0. Go spend money on it rather than some dumb love stories.

Book Review: CSS - The Definitive Guide

Goyal — Sun, 7 Jan 2007 14:00:13 EST

CSS is the de-facto standard of web styling and is used to enhance the presentation of markup languages. Web designers everywhere use it to improve accessibility and maintain consistency amongst pages.

CSS: The Definitive Guide - Eric A. Meyer is an excellent place to begin learning about CSS. All you require to have is a beginner's knowledge of HTML and you are ready to go. Meyer is a well known web design consultant, author and an expert on CSS.

Meyer starts from the basics of cascade and inheritance and drills into details of not only how but also why of almost all topics. You would find details of how and why even on oft ignored topics as font and colour units used. The reader is not bored with details of obsolete or proprietary CSS properties. Instead, Meyer focuses only on properties (CSS2 and standard CSS2.1) which are supported by most web browsers and are actually in use today.

The related properties are grouped together into separate chapters and they are well organized. For example, the chapter on font properties is followed by one on text properties and one visual formatting by a chapter on padding and borders. This makes it easy for the reader to find what he is looking for.

A couple of interesting chapters on UI styles and non-screen media complete an exhaustive and informative book. This is followed by an appendix of various CSS properties references that you will find yourself going back to again and again.

The book lacks only two things. Colour pages and problem solving. The book tells you about floating and positioning but does not tell how to use it to create a two column layout.

Nevertheless, it is a very informative and useful book. Though not "definitive" it is certainly a great book for anyone, right from experienced users to complete novices.

Disclaimer: I was provided this book for review by O'Reilly Media

Cricket: One Hair Less

Goyal — Tue, 7 Nov 2006 15:58:36 EST

Darrell Hair seems to be the current bad boy of cricket when it comes to being the centre of a controversy. The apparently no nonsense umpire has been removed from the elite panel of umpires and will no longer be officiating in International matches.

While the media from Down Under and Britain are crying foul and terming it as strong arm tactics of the Asian bloc, Mr. Hair is not stranger to courting controversy. Lets take a look at his career which has never remained free from the limelight.

1992. Adelaide Test. India vs Australia. Australia won by a narrow margin of 38 runs. Wisden felt that the entire affair was "marred ... by controversy over LBW decisions - eight times Indians were given out, while all but two of their own appeals were rejected".

1994. Adelaide Test. South Africa vs Australia. Peter Kirsten had an animated talk with Mr. Hair after a series of Proteans were declared out LBW. Kirsten was promptly declared out LBW in the next innings, and South Africa lost the game. Many felt that the decision was flimsy at the best.

1995. Melbourne Test. Sri Lanka vs Australia. Mr. Hair infamously no-balled Murali (from the bowlers end) for chucking. Now though the Aussies agree that Mr. Hair is very fair in all his dealings, I am ready to bet that such instances are not very common in the cricketing arena where the leg umpire is generally the one to declare a ball as being "thrown". Lot of water has flown under the bridge since then. ICC has cleared Murali of all charges. Mr. Hair was charged (note, not penalised) for bringing the game into disrepute by calling Murali's action "diabolical" in his autobiography.

2005. Faisalabad Test. Pakistan vs England. Mr. Hair declares Inzamam run out for leaving his crease while taking evasive action. Cricketing gurus feel it is contradictory to cricketing laws that stipulate that batsman cannot be run out if he leaves his ground due to evasive action. [Side note: I was happy as the decision against Tendulkar at Eden Garden is avenged.]

2006. Oval Test. Pakistan vs England. Mr. Hair, in consultation with Mr. Doctrove, declare the ball as being tampered with penalise Pakistan 5 runs and change the ball. Now, we all now that Pakistan has long faced such charges and are often in trouble for tampering with the ball and getting "some" reverse swing. Anyways, Pakistan decide that they had done nothing wrong and decide to not take the field as a mark of protest. Mr. Hair declares the match as forfeited and awards it to England. An enquiry committee then finds the ball being not tampered with and clear Pakistan of ball tampering charges but penalise them for bringing the game into disrepute. This was done after hearing the views of former cricketer Geoff Boycott and TV analyst Simon Hughes.

On the receiving end of Mr. Hair's decisions have been India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and South Africa while on the other end stand Australia and England. Now, only if someone could explain me why the so called Asian bloc (supported by South Africa, West Indies and Zimbabwe) was for, while Australia and England (supported by New Zealand) are against, the suspension of Mr. Hair?

Japanese Grand Prix: Suzuka Spells Doom For Schumi, Victory For Alonso

Goyal — Sun, 8 Oct 2006 13:08:28 EDT

It was the last F1 race in Suzuka for some time to come. It was definitely the last race of Schumacher here. And everyone was out to see the Red Emperor score a big victory.

It was a race he was supposed to win with ease. And, till the 36th lap today, nothing happened to the contrary. Schumacher qualified second on the grid, just behind teammate Massa and 3 places ahead of fifth placed Alonso. He passed Massa on the third lap and after that remained comfortably at the top of the group.

Alonso, however, drove with a lot of passion and quickly overtook Jenson Button and Ralf Schumacher to come up to the third place and drove like there was no tomorrow. At no point of time did he let the two Ferraris out of his sight. He overtook Massa after the first round of pit stops and drove great laps in and out of the pits to exit just ahead of Massa. The difference in their stops being a mere 0.3 seconds.

Michael was the last of the top 3 to pit and that erased all doubts of a lightly fueled Ferrari for qualifying and the rumors about the tyres not being suited well enough for the circuit. He drove in his usual calm and composed manner, and looked all set to win. Disaster struck, however, on the second Degner Curve on the 37th lap and fumes came out of the red machine. The circuit looked on in stunned disbelief as the Ferrari of Schumacher retired for the first time since Spain 2005 without a crash. Schumacher, however, got out his car calmly, waved at the crowds and shook hands with all he passed, to show that he was the true Champion.

Alonso then drove a very calm race to take his Renault home, for a first victory since June. Massa came in second and Fisichella third. Button and Raikkonen completed the top 5.

Only a miracle can now see Schumacher win the championship. What is needed is a victory in Sao Paulo and Alonso finishing out of points. Will that happen? Well, with the fortunes changing as it has this season, I would definitely not bet against it but I agree that it is only a slim chance.

On another note, I have always been a critic of Alonso, not because of his driving skills, but because he does not have enough grace. That came to light again last week when a frustrated Alonso blamed his own crew and mate Fisichella of letting him down in the last race at Shanghai and even said that there were people in the Renault pits that did not want him to win. I hope Alonso has watched how Schumacher behaved after his blown engine in this race and has picked up a tip or two.

"The drivers’ championship is over because I don’t want to go to Brazil hoping someone else retires" - Michael Schumacher"

Beauty, in Slow-Mo: A tribute to Riquelme

Goyal — Fri, 22 Sep 2006 13:51:29 EDT

It seems to be a season of retirement for my favourite players. First Agassi, then Schumacher, and now Riquelme. Anyway, here is a small tribute to the greatest midfielder of our times.

I must confess right at the start that I have an extremely soft spot for Argentine players. Right from Maradona and Batistuta to Messi and Crespo, I have been a huge Argentinean fan and I was heartbroken after their exit from the 2006 FIFA World Cup.

Some people play the game like they have just 45 minutes rather than 90. Riquelme, however, plays as if there are 180 instead. As Ars�ne Wenger said, "He's always able to slow the game down, and wait for a weak moment to kill you." He is so different from his contemporaries that football once again seems like the beautiful game when he plays.

His speed of thought, ball possession and his creative vision is what sets him apart from the pack. A master at juggling the ball, he outfoxes the defense with such ease that it induces a sense of serenity in his game. When the Argentine is at work, a certain degree of romanticism fills the game, and you are transported back to an era when the game was played for pleasure than winning alone. I always hear people say that Sachin is a great player since he makes the game look so easy. I now believe that the same is true for all sports. Riquelme, with his supreme control of the ball and a vision that sees all, does exactly that.

Born in a poor family of 10, he was spotted early by Boca Juniors (same as that of legendary Maradona and Batistuta) in 1995 and stayed there till 2001. In 2002 he shifted to Barcelona and could not adapt himself to the European style of play. His performance and confidence took and nosedive. In 2003 he was loaned to Villareal. Back in midst of Latin American players (like captain Sorin) he blossomed again. The playmaker was back and helped improve Villareal's fortune in both the La Liga and the UEFA Champions League through the 2004-05 and 2005-06 seasons.

He announced his retirement from international football on September 13, 2006, at a young age of 28, a decision that shocked many who expected him to take over from Sorin. I hope he reconsiders his decision. I hope he does not retire. I hope that the game is not robbed of some of it's beauty. I hope to see Riquelme play again for Argentina.

As Argentine legend Jorge Valdano describes Riquelme: “If we have to travel from point A to point B most of us would take the six-lane highway and get there as quickly as possible. Riquelme would choose the winding mountain road, the beautiful scenic route which takes him six hours instead of two.”

Peer Review of Patents

Goyal — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 16:22:06 EDT

Only recently the USPTO suggested a peer review mechanism to ensure that bad patents are minimized. Wikipatents, launched on August 28th, aims to contribute to "the US patent system by commenting on issued patents and, soon, pending patent applications." This comes on the heels of the IBM, Red Hat, Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard backed Community Patent Review plan of the New York Law School scheduled for a debut early next year.

A Web 2.0 website, complete with AJAX and Digg options, Wikipatents, provides you with entire patent data in HTML/PDF format and allows a registered user to write a title and abstract in a layman's language. It also allows users to vote on cited references, add comments to existing ones and add new references. A new concept here is the market review which allows a user to estimate parameters like marketing and licensing potential of a patent.

While I am supportive of the entire exercise, I have my doubts about the efficacy of the system. First of all patents hardly ever directly impact the public and it is mostly big companies (holders of huge IP portfolio themselves) who are nowadays being sued left, right and center by the so-called patent trolls that are more worried about bad patents. I mean IBM and Microsoft themselves hold patent portfolios greater than many countries. I find no reason for people to sympathize with them.

Second, patent laws are so unclear and confusing that not many people know about them. Outside the patent attorneys I think hardly anyone would know their priority dates from filing dates.

Third, it is very difficult to gather relevant prior art without a very good understanding of the technology domain and access to proper patent and non-patent databases.

And lastly, relevant prior art is not easily available and finding it requires a lot of man hours and huge effort, else the patent examiners would have found them. Further, patent valuation is a largely inexact science at the best and requires huge amount of experience and prior research to arrive at any value for a patent.

So while it would be nice to get a community review of a patent, I for one would take any information provided with a pinch of salt, or combinations thereof.

Michael Schumacher's Magic at Monza

Goyal — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 15:09:53 EDT

The F1 race at Monza today was of special interest today for more reasons that one. It is Ferrari's home turf. Amid speculations that Schumacher would announce his retirement here, it was also of further interest because Schumacher had qualified much ahead of Alonso, with Massa in between the both, and Raikkonen at the pole it would be interesting to see how much of the 12 point lead would Schumacher be able to slice off. The stands were filled with the tifosi and you could sense that they were anticipating a fairy tale run for Ferrari here. Guess what? Today was their lucky day.

The race started with a surprise that Alonso would be staring from the 10th position on the grid instead of 5th, a penalty of 5 positions for obstructing Massa's qualifying session. Naturally, Renault team boss Flavio Briatore was very pretty pissed at this and felt that the race had been fixed and that the FIA wants Michael to win. Now, while I agree that F1 Marshall's may not be very fair, I don't remember Mr. Briatore making any such statement when Michael was penalised for a similar offense at Monte Carlo. That proves just one thing to me, that the Renault team is a bunch of sore losers. Alonso has received a lot of flak for not being sporting enough. I hope that he can improve his performance on this front, for humility is the hallmark of a true champion.

Anyways, the race began with Raikkonen (possibly the next Ferrari driver) holding off Schumacher till the first round of pit stops, after which Schumacher returned to head the pack. Everything was smooth after this except a minor blip during the 33rd lap in which Michael made an unusual error, braking too late at the first turn, and almost banged into Scott Speed. After that Schumacher shifted into the glide mode in which he just paces himself to the chequered flag without pushing the car too much. I have always believed tha the greatest strengths of Schumacher are not brilliant overtaking maneuvers but driving a very precisely planned race, those drives in and out of the pits, and those fast laps when needed.

The real twist in the entire story came in the 43rd lap when Alonso (now up to 3rd position) retired from the race with a blown engine. This was probably a mixed event for Ferrari as this would mean no points for Alonso and with Schumacher now heading towards a clear and comfortable victory it meant that the championship was wide open. However, Massa, blinded from the smoke emanating from Alonso's Renault drove on to the dirt and damaged his right front tyre and had to stop to get it changed and joined the race in 9th position out of points.

In the end Schumacher won quite comfortably followed by Raikkonen and Robert Kubica (it was only his third race). The face of Jean Todt when Schumacher crossed the chequered flag (the 90th of his illustrious career) confirmed the fact that Schumacher would indeed announce his retirement. It was time for official announcement of the news that had been anticipated through out the week now. During the post race conference a visibly emotional Schumacher announced that the next three races would be the last of his career and thanked his family, his team and his fans for their support.

While Schumacher may not get the title of the greatest ever (that being reserved for the late Senna) he surely has been the most prolific. He probably has every possible F1 record to his name. From the most podiums to the most poles. From the most titles to the most victories at a single venue. He has been there and done that. The sport will be that much less exciting without him. But these words can, for the moment, be saved for 3 more races.

The F1 championship is now poised for a lip smacking last three races as Ferrari leads the constructors championship by 2 points and Schumacher trails the title also by 2. Will Schumacher be able to mark the end of his career with another title? Will Ferrai win the constructors title? Well, I do not want to hazard a guess. So fasten your seat belts and gear up for some action.

PS: Did you know that the Lancias, Ferraris and Maseratis of the 1950s also sported a V8 engine?