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Introduction
The BbyB Beacon is an
electronic publication to keep the members of Bit by Bit
informed about the current affairs of the company. It contains
announcements of important events like training programmes,
Management Review Meetings, etc.
Contact
Information
Any contributions to the newsletter
in the form of technical articles, or items of general interest,
are welcome. Please send them to padmabaliga@bbyb.sdc.int or padmabaliga@bbyb.com
Editorial (top)
Different Strokes
for Different Folks
While millions the world over
associate February with love and romance, the IT geek considers
February to be very dear to her / him for its associations
with technology. In 1946 on February
14, the ENIAC or Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer,
the first general-purpose electronic computer, was unveiled
at the University of Pennsylvania. We’ve come a long
way from that bulky machine which was as large as a three bedroom
mansion. Seventy years before this event, another, perhaps
more important, event took place and that was when Alexander
Graham Bell filed a patent for the telephone on February 14,
1876. All of us who walk around with a mobile phone glued to
our ears, wouldn’t have known what to do with ourselves
if that moment had been lost to history. And then, do you remember
the typewriter? It was a machine with keys for every letter
and number which, when pressed, would print the character on
a piece of paper. Before the word processor, every college
student had a typewriter, as did every office, journalist and
author. The inventor of the typewriter and of the QWERTY keyboard
(still used on most computers today), Christopher Sholes, was
born on February 14, 1819.
However to most of us, February
is the month for romance, for exchanging gifts, candies and
sweet nothings. For those of us who wish that this period never
ends, here is some good news. Till a few decades ago, the Catholic
Church formally recognized a total of eleven Valentine's days.
Besides February 14, these included January 7, May 2, July
16, August 31, September 2, October 25, November 1, 11 and
13, and December 16. Shall we bring back the good times?
Four BbyBers, Raghu and Usha,
Chaitanya and Yogita, will be celebrating their wedding anniversaries
this month, a confirmation of their enduring love for each
other. The Beacon wishes them all the best and also wishes
all BbyBers a lot of love and goodwill.
Salaam-e-Ishq!!
Until next time
Padma
From The Management (top)
Dear
All,
We have just gone through
another review process and I would like to thank all of you
for the frankness that has been exhibited by you. I promise
that any comments/criticism that the management has received
will be looked into and we will try our best to rectify this.
We
have made our first release of StaffRoster which is BbyB’s
first completely object oriented .NET based web product.
The demos of this software have got great feedback from prospective
clients and the initial pilot of this product has just started
at Guy's and St. Thomas Hospital, which is one of the UK's
largest hospitals. We have now taken the decision to convert
StaffBank also into a totally object oriented .NET based
web product and slowly all projects will be migrated onto
this platform.
I have now also started working
with other projects (currently pFACT) with the idea of introducing
object oriented techniques into those projects and also develop
common libraries which will 'plug-and-play' into all BbyB products.
Regards,
Raghu
Projects
News
StaffBank (top)
This
month was extremely hectic for the StaffRoster team as they
had to release the StaffRoster on Web version to Guys & Thomas
Trust. Finally the product was released on 20th January,
two days before the scheduled date.
StaffBank team released 2.08.00z
version to BHP with a few change controls. Also version 2.07.02.57
was released to NHSP with some change controls and bug fixes.
The Web version 2.08.06 was released to Whittington with some
change controls.
LinguaBank version 1.06 was
released to BHP with a few bug fixes.
Let's congratulate Prathibha
who has been promoted as Domain Leader, StaffBank.
Vasudev Shenoy
for StaffBank
MESaLS (top)
Dear All,
This
month it’s my turn
and my pleasure to write about the MESaLS in the month of January,
for the newsletter.
The new year started very
nicely. This month there was a dry run for Milton Keynes and
no Go Lives. We had a few external changes and bugs.
This month has been dedicated
to fixing all the Internal/External bugs and a few enhancements.
The testers were busy with testing the fixed issues.
We are expecting a major release
(bug free version) of MESaLS by the end of February second
week.
Aruj will be leaving BbyB
in February first week and we wish him all the best in all
his future endeavours.
We welcome Ram and Sabin to
MESaLS Development.
Raju for MESaLS
pFACT (top)
Dear All,
For the first two weeks of
January, the pFACT team had a busy schedule as the patch releases
for both the SQL and Oracle versions had to be released. The
released versions are 2.01.c in Oracle and 2.01.a in SQL.
After the release, at least
for four days, the pFACT developers took great pleasure in
surprising their cabmates by leaving the office on time.
But again in the following
weeks, pFACT team's schedule remained quite busy as they were
getting ready for another release.
Manu Gupta and Lakshmanan
are working on classes for pFACT.
Finally, I heartily welcome
the two new members, Phani and Sephali to the pFACT team and
wish them all the best.
Sukanya for pFACT
Sepia (top)
Sepians started the new year
on a positive note. As usual, it has been another busy month
with a lot of releases.
We have released two versions.
Version 3.08.00.h was released to Dorset. Version 3.08.00.i
was released to MK. Version 3.09.00 is finally going to be
released by the end of this week.
Sepia help is also getting
updated to the latest version 3.09.00. Padma is busy updating
the Help documents. The Introductory Guide to systems is ready
and Padma is busy updating the main Help contents.
Devaki for Sepia
Other
News (top)
Farewell to Aruj
Aruj George Ayrookuzhy who
joined us on July 1, 2005 will be leaving BbyB on February
1. Aruj will be returning to his native Kerala, to join Euro
Soft Pvt. Ltd. as Senior Software Engineer. EuroSoft is located
in Techno Park, Trivandrum. Aruj says that what excites him
the most about the move is that he will finally be living near
his home town and he will be getting a chance to study and
implement new things like GPRS, etc.
Aruj confesses that he will
miss BbyB and life in Bangalore. When asked to pin down a favourite
memory, he said that it was difficult to answer as there have
been lots of memorable moments with his BbyB friends gang.
We wish him all the best!!
A Twosome of Trainees
February will see the commencement
of a new batch of trainees. We welcome Pinki Nair and Anoop
Nair who will join us on February 5.
Holidays (top)
March
19th, a Monday, will be a holiday. Hindus everywhere celebrate
Ugadi on that day and observe it as the beginning of a new
year.
Training
and Education (top)
Our
second batch of trainees have comes to the end of their training
period. All of them have been associated with different projects
since January and are busy mastering the intricacies of their
particular project.
Meetings
and Events
We begin the holiday season for the
next year with, what else, but a holiday. January
1, New Year’s Day will be a holiday and so
will January 26 as it is Republic
Day. That’s two long weekends to look
forward to and relish.
Colleagues
Cognizant (top)
Raghu Shenoy
This month, the focus is on
Raghu Shenoy. Raghu is not only our Managing Director, but
is also the founder and the brain behind Bit by Bit. Raghu
is the quintessential achiever. He speaks German and French
other than a host of Indian languages, and also holds a degree
in French. He has been a member of the Saturday Night Quiz
Circle for more than a decade and has hosted plenty of quiz
programmes.
While we all know that Raghu
can be quite a taskmaster, we also know that he is a caring
employer who goes out on a limb for deserving employees.
Read on and get to know Raghu
a lot better.
What
was the inspiration behind starting BbyB?
(grins) Basically I needed a job, I needed to occupy myself.
You
started BbyB with only one employee - yourself...How does
it feel to be Managing Director of a company of 60 odd employees
now?
It’s hard to believe at
times - I never expected it. In a way I preferred it when
I had 15 employees because every extra employee means extra
work percolates to the top.
How
easy or difficult was it in the early days to get your company
started?
It really wasn’t too difficult – of
course my day started at 4 am and ended at times at 11 pm,
but the risks were never huge and so the fears were never
huge either. Of course, working from home also helped as
I had no rents to pay, etc. And then I never expanded unless
I had to.
What
is your vision for BbyB?
Rather than a long term vision,
I’d like to talk about my short term
goals.
I’d
like to get more involved in all the projects; improve the
coding levels and ensure certain standards across all projects.
I am also particularly keen that projects should not become
islands.
We understand
that you spend a lot of time reading up the latest in pure
sciences. Which of the branches encompasses your particular
field of interest? And where do you find the time?
I’m particularly interested
in Astrophysics and Quantum Physics. I read the popular books
on these subjects. While I may not be able to solve Quantum
Physics equations, I am able to understand and appreciate the concepts they
talk about.
Most
of my reading is to do with non-fiction. I don’t read
a lot of novels, maybe one in every 10 books I read is a
novel.
We have also heard that you
are pursuing a course of study in Astrophysics in UK. Can you
tell us something about it?
Yes, I did start a distance learning
course from the University of Manchester and I finished one
semester (with a high score). But I was not particularly enamoured
by distance education. However, some time in the future, I’d
like to continue my studies in Astrophysics.
Almost
all IT companies are facing heavy attrition. How do you think
this can be tackled?
It’s a matter of demand and supply and we should simply accept it as
a fact of life. I think that for BbyB, the best course at present is to take
freshers and train them. This will give us stability. I’d also like .NET
skills to move up the chain. A targeted retention policy might also help.
You
are known for your strong Ethics in work as well as in your
personal life. What makes you stick to those ethics in difficult
times as well?
Actually, it is far easier to
get through difficult times when you stick to ethics. One
can sleep well at night if one’s conscience is clear.
A belief in ethics and values
was inculcated in me by my family. In fact, years ago when
my grandfather was the Headmaster of a Government school in
Madikere, the watchman gave my father (then a little boy) a
jackfruit from a tree in the school compound. When my father
took it home, my grandfather was very annoyed and made him
understand that the jackfruit was school property and was not
to be consumed by the Headmaster or his family. The next day,
the jackfruit was auctioned and my father was asked to deposit
the money in the government treasury.
What
advice would you give to the next generation of entrepreneurs
/ IT professionals?
To entrepreneurs, my advice is
nil, as I don’t consider myself a businessman.
Regarding
IT professionals, I notice that today there is a lack of
a desire or drive to learn. A good computer professional
should always be learning something new. I am still amazed
by something new and excited to learn something more. I’d
like to see more people being all-fired by the drive to learn.
You
do as much coding as any other programmer. What excites you
about programming?
Again, it is just the joy of learning.
How
has life changed for you after your marriage?
It’s been great. Marriage
is the best thing that has happened to me in a long time.
I feel that the long wait for the right person was worth
it. I enjoy the commitment and did not feel I was losing
my freedom.
And
finally, what is the secret of your success?
I guess the secret is to accept
whatever has happened, solve whatever can be solved and learn
to live with what can’t be solved. I believe in always
doing the best I can with my life.
Weekend Jaunts (top)
Kurinajal
About 20 kilometres from Kudremukh
colony and about 10 kilometres from the main road to Kudremukh
colony, there is a beautiful peak, almost the same height as
Kudremukh and called Kurinajal.
Kurinajal is in South Kanara
in Western Karnataka. Take a bus from Bangalore to Kudremukh.
The distance by road is about 300 kilometres. Get off before
you reach the Kudremukh colony, and after the Bhagavati forest
check post. From here, you can traverse a jeepable track. Alternatively,
you can take the route that starts from a village called Mala,
which goes through jungle thickets typical of the Western Ghats.
The view from Kurinajal is
absolutely breathtaking and is rather like the descriptions
of the Welsh Downs that one reads in the James Herriot novels.
There is an old abandoned
UHF receiver station at the top of the Kurinajal peak. If you
are lucky, you may find bison strolling around. Carry drinking
water as the only water source is at a one km distance downhill.
You can stay the night at Kudremukh Colony where good hotels
and restaurants are available.
Vasudev
Shenoy
Birthdays (top)
Glimpses of last month’s celebrations
Sanuj's Birthday Snaps
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