Punch the keys

In recent times the browser usage has increased considerably. For me, most of my time is on the browser. Some small things are really irritating. Like the placement of the below actions. On every browser, the back button is on the left and next on the right. It is very irritating to find the reverse behavior on the blogger page. My mouse pointer automatically moves to the left when I think "past" and only then realize that on blogger it is the reverse. I guess my behavior has been tuned because of the repeated use. But it would definitely be great if the similar behavior is maintained.

Today I came across this article about,  Apple’s Magic Trackpad Signals The End Of The Mouse Era . The author has rightly pointed out the switch in direction in interaction patterns with the computer. The author has also followed it up with another article, The Mouse Is Dead. I Just Killed It. Now Can We Move On? , because of the huge response in comments in the first article. Some of the comments are downright hilarious. Didn't know people were so passionate about the mouse! I think the end of the mouse has started some time back with other alternatives in interaction pattern being explored. A project that I have been very impressed with is Sixth Sense . And Pranav, who is the lead of the sixth sense project, has come up with mouseless . Looking forward to the success of these projects.

The "first-ever web browser for India, the world's only antivirus browser" read the banner on the site  http://www.epicbrowser.com/ . Since it was based on mozilla, I quickly tried it on to see what the browser was about. The first impression was good. The layout, although a dark setting, was impressive. The shortcuts to various settings at the left side, the short-cuts to sites on the new tab page and also the resize anchors at the four corners were different from the other browsers. Overall the content of the browser, as the claim goes, is centered around India. Right from the logo, which is tri-colored to the font support for various Indian languages, there are a lot of skins also pre-loaded to chose to customize the look. The first claim of a "browser for India" is definitely right on. Will be trying out the browser more in the coming days to see how it goes. Update: Here is a news link to the release on The Hindu

Today the cabinet of India made up its mind on the symbol that would represent the Rupee. Detailed information on this can be found at the site link  India picks symbol to rival the €£¥$ . So many associated stuff would be needed to be done with regard to this.. Wow! the enormity of it is super. Right from getting this print on the notes and coins, to getting a new key on the keyboard. Operating systems and other softwares would need to support the new character and hardwares where the printer is dependent on this too would need to be adjusted. It is sure to take time to be absorbed into mainstream usage. Maybe I can start of by practicing to write (or is it draw?) the symbol properly. A new character is introduced! Picture courtesy: from http://blogs.ft.com/beyond-brics/2010/07/15/62286/

Whats the plan on the way back? That was the thought on my mind during our 5 hour transit halt in Suvarnabhumi International Airport at Bangkok. And that too it was a 10 hour wait. So I decided that I would go out of the airport and see as much as possible during the return journey. The Thai flight reached Bangkok at 11:00 am in the morning and I looked up the place to get a transit visa. The visa is free for Indian Passport holders(free till 31 Mar 2011 as of now). The Visa is valid for 15 days, single entry and is non-extendable. Unfortunately, I had only 10 hours to spare to go sightseeing. I filled up the form at the counter, stuck the passport size photo(you can also get your photo taken at the counter) and took my place at the end of a long line. After about 10 mins and the line not moving an inch, I saw that there was an empty express counter adjecent to the normal one. Apparently there is a 200 Baht fee to get it processed there. Having limited time, I quickly got out of th