TANJORE PAINTINGS

If ever Art has ardently wooed Beauty, nowhere is it more evident than in the paintings of Thanjavur. Every creation is truly a celebration of the beautiful. Rich, full bodied colours vie with exquisite filigree work to overwhelm the eye. The themes are figures of God, Krishna being the most frequently reproduced , but in various poses & depicting various stages of his life. Other Gods are depicted too. Today people are experimenting with birds, animals, building structures, etc.,

Thanjavur, located in the rich delta of the river Cauvery between Tiruchirapalli & Kumbakonam had been the centre of economical & cultural activities under the Nayaks of Vijayanagar dynasty, Sultan of Bijapur & lastly by Maratha rulers. Though Thanjavur was not the birth place of this art, this style of paintings developed here during the 18th century under Maratha rulers. As people & artists migrated to Tanjore from Mysore, Andhra, Bijapur, Maharashtra & Gujarat, the theme & style came to be largely influenced by various schools of arts & religious requirements, also coming under some Western & Chinese influence.

Seasoned wooden planks were joined on which paper or a piece of cloth was fixed by using tamarind seed paste. Locally available stone powder & unboiled lime powder were used to prepare the surface. Outline was drawn by tracing the original hand drawn figures. Semi-precious & precious stones, cut glasses etc., were placed to make the jewels for the figure. Apart from giving artificial gold colouring, gold & silver leaves were used to colour the costumes & jewellery and other decorative areas.

The pigments were prepared using locally available natual materials. The artists favoured bright luminous colours as the paintings were originally meant to be kept in poorly lighted rooms, temple, mutts and homes for worshipping. Tanjore style paintings are also drawn on glass by using different techniques. The characteristics of the Tanjore paintings are its brilliant colour scheme, decorative jewellery with stones and cut-glasses & its chubby larger-than-life figures.

The QEDWiki Project

One of the most sophisticated applications built on Zend Framework to date is the QEDWiki project by IBM. QEDWiki is an "application wiki," which extends the wiki concept significantly. Drag and drop application elements onto wiki pages, connect them through web services, and create composite applications that solve real business needs. The widgets are PHP classes that are executed via AJAX to render themselves. Most of the widgets used in the demos have both a design-time and a run-time rendering. IBM and Zend have an ongoing partnership to foster PHP development, and this is just one example of how they are working together. Much of the code that IBM has developed for QEDWiki is in the process of being given back to the community in the form of contributions to the Zend Framework. Check out this impressive demo by Stewart Nickolas to learn more about QEDWiki. [View Demo]

We Salute You!

Spend 2 minutes in remembering the martyrs Bhagatsingh, Sukhdev, Rajguru...


Today on 23rd Mar in 1931, with 'Inkilab Zindabad' in their mind, these three youngsters, were hanged to death. All for our independence...

WE SALUTE YOU !

Can't get through

Customer: "I've been ringing your call centre on 0700 2300 for two days and can't get through to enquiries, can you help?"

Operator: "Where did you get that number from, sir?"

Customer: "It was on the door to the travel centre."

Operator: "Sir, they are our opening hours."

THE CAUVERI BELT AROUND BANGALORE: MUTHATHI

There are many places close to Bangalore and Mysore along the banks of Cauveri that make perfect spot for a day trip or pleasent picnic. Today I am going to talk about the place called Muthathi.

Muthathi is probably the nearest place from Bangalore on the banks of the river. It is a small village, near which the river runs shallow and wide. Road to Muthathi runs parallel to the river and makes a pleasent drive. While you are there, you can dip into the waters and enjoy the feel of the running water. The good thing about the place is that it does not get very crowded in the weekends and even if it does, there is enough open space that you can always find some nice and empty area near the bank for yourself.

Other than loitering by the river, the approach to the village is a nice drive through dry deciduos forests where you might spot wildlife if you are lucky. One of the specialities of this region is the highly endemic grizzled giant squirrel which are rare and hardly seen.

Grizzled Giant Squirrel

Muthathi Information

The best thing about Mutathi is that it is just 90 minute drive once you leave the town. Drive on the Kanakapura road through Kanakapura and Sathanur. Turn left at Satanur and drive for another 30 minutes to reach Muthathi. You drive through the hills and wilderness of Cauvery wildlife sanctuary and get good views of the river. There is no accomodation available in Muthathi village but nearby Bheemeshwari has a resort run by Jungle Lodges and Resorts. Advance booking is necessary. Pack your food before you leave the town since there are no restaurants available. Nearby places that can be visited include the Bheemeshwai Jungle Lodge which is famous for angling activities. It is known as one of the best places to catch Masheer fish. Also close by are Mekedatu, Chunchi falls and Kaveri Sangama where river Arkavati meets Kaveri.

Yahoo! India's World cup Cricket '07 Special

Visit: http://in.sports.yahoo.com/cricket/world-cup-2007.html

The Cricket World Cup in Google

Reto Meier provides you with an interesting rundown of all the places you can track the Cricket World Cup 2007 in Google applications (like Google gadgets, or Google Maps mashups). “The Cricket World Cup is one of the biggest sporting events in Australia, India, Pakistan, The West Indies,” Reto adds.

Largest Wireless Internet Provider

NTT DoCoMo (Japan) is the world's largest wireless internet provider, with 45,687,117 subscribers to their i-mode service.

New Seven Wonders of the World

The race is on to nominate seven new wonders of the world. On 1 January 2006, a panel of experts short-listed nominations that had received the most votes throughout 2005, narrowing a list of 77 sites down to 21 finalists. These 21 finalists, listed below, will be the subject of public vote to decide which seven make the history books.

Millions of people have already have already participated in one of the largest global votes that has ever taken place. The result will be released on 7 July 2007 – 07/07/07 – so there's still time to make your voice heard. Click here to find out more.

Choose from this list of finalists:

1. The Acropolis of Athens (450 - 330 B.C.) Athens, Greece
2. Alhambra (12th century) Granada, Spain
3. Angkor (12th century) Cambodia
4. The Pyramid at Chichén Itzá (before 800 A.D.) Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico
5. Christ Redeemer (1931) Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
6. The Roman Colosseum (70 - 82 A.D.) Rome, Italy (bottom pic)
7. Statues of Easter Island (10th - 16th Century) Easter Island, Chile
8. The Eiffel Tower (1887 - 89) Paris, France
9. The Great Wall of China (220 B.C and 1368 - 1644 A.D.) China
10. The Hagia Sophia (532 - 537 A.D.) Istanbul, Turkey
    
11. Kiyomizu Temple (749 - 1855) Kyoto, Japan
12. The Kremlin and Red Square (1156 - 1850) Moscow, Russia
13. Machu Picchu (1460-1470), Peru
14. Neuschwanstein Castle (1869 -1884) Füssen, Germany
15. Petra (9 B.C. - 40 A.D.), Jordan
16. The Pyramids of Giza (2600 - 2500 B.C), Egypt (middle pic)
17. The Statue of Liberty (1886) New York City, U.S.A.
18. Stonehenge (3000 B.C. - 1600 B.C.) Amesbury, United Kingdom
19. Sydney Opera House (1954 - 73) Sydney, Australia (top pic)
20. The Taj Mahal (1630 A.D.) Agra, India
21. Timbuktu (12th century) Mali

Third Opinion

Three Doctors are dicussing which types of patients they prefer.
Doctor Watson says, ''I prefer librarians. All their organs are alphabetized.''

Doctor Fitzpatrick says, ''I prefer mathematicians. All their organs are numbered.''

Doctor Ahn says, ''I prefer lawyers. They are gutless, heartless, brainless, spineless, and their heads and rear ends are interchangeable.''

IBM OmniFind Yahoo! Edition

Hey you! Need a PHP Search Application?

The great thing about a REST API like IBM OmniFind Yahoo! Edition's is that it is both development language and platform neutral. The bad thing about a REST API like OmniFind Yahoo! Edition's is that it is development language and platform neutral. Using a REST API is not like using an API that is "native" to a particular language. Someone will surely develop a language that uses REST as the native method calls (or maybe it's been done, leave me a comment if you know), but until that time we all use things like JSPs, PHP, Python or Ruby on Rails for web development.

We know that many of you are using PHP to build your search applications, and it's not as easy as it would be with a "PHP native API". An ad-hoc team of OmniFind developers, Bruce Tannenbaum and Louis Gates, and Visual Designer Robert Lee have come together to provide some relief in the form of a sample application and a set of PHP functions that should make developing PHP search applications much simpler.

Besides being a useful head start for PHP development, some users wanting to provide web site search (as opposed to intranet search) have struggled with how to have their web server in the firewall DMZ but their OmniFind Yahoo! Edition server behind the firewall. This requires having a search application that uses the REST API for remotely invoking OmniFind Yahoo! Edition. This sample application is probably the fastest way to get going with a REST API-based remote search application.

You can get the sample and detailed usage instructions from the entry in the forum. You can leave a comment here or in the forum with how it works for you. Enjoy!

Fake Google Logos

Largest fake Google logo collection on the planet, UPDATED WEEKLY!
Most big brand owners protect their brands in very traditional ways. Google is no different. As a very fundamental promotion differentiation though Google would allow and practice themselves rather creative approaches to their existing brand.

click this link and checkout...
Fake Google Logos, Google Logo Images, Google Logo Pictures by Google Fans, Google Logo Design Awards

Johnny Big Head

Johnny comes back from school crying and says, "Mommy all the kids in the school say I have a big head."

His mother replies, "No you don't Johnny. You have a hideously deformed head. The other children are merely hiding the truth to protect your feelings."

Hide PHP and Apache versions

If you would like to prevent Apache from exposing the version information in every request to the server, all you have to do is to put in the following lines into your apache configuration file:

ServerTokens ProductOnly
ServerSignature Off

Now that we’re not exposing the Apache version, let’s hide the PHP version also. To do this, head over to your php.ini file and set expose_php to off. This setting is on by default and when ever a php file is accessed, an X-Powered-By header is sent back through Apache.

expose_php = Off

Hands Free Mouse

Ultimate Wrist Relief

Hands Free Mouse - ergonomic relief

Natural Cursor Control
Move your head and so does the cursor

True Ergonomic Relief
The SmartNAV EG package ends wrist strain, by eliminating the need for a mouse. With the built in switch input it's the best solution available for Carpel Tunnel Syndrome, Tendonitis, Repetitive Strain Injury, and other wrist strain related problems.

Use Your Head, Spare Your Hands
The main cause of carpal tunnel syndrome and tendonitis is the repeated stressful motion of moving your hand from your keyboard to your mouse. Smart-Nav doesn’t require any hand motion, offering you the highest level of relief possible.

How it works

WHAT DO I WEAR?
Put a paper thin tiny reflective dot on the part of your body you'd like to control the cursor with. Placing the dot on a hat or mic boom are the current favorites.

WHERE DO I PUT THE SMARTNAV?
The SmartNAV usually sits on top of your monitor, facing you. But you can clip it to laptops or place it behind you. It can be placed anywhere as long as it can see whichever reflective accessory you've chosen to wear.

HOW MUCH DO I MOVE?
Less than an inch of head movement is more than enough to move the cursor across your entire screen. This is also adjustable in our software's "speed" settings. SmartNAV has a 30 degree Field Of View (FOV), and usuall sits about 2 feet away from your head. Thus you have at least a foot and a half of free "head space" in which to move that simple inch.

HOW DO I CLICK?
You can click with (redefinable) hotkeys on your keyboard, or you can plug a switch into the SmartNAV device. We sell simple Click Switches, which can be joined, via our Y-Breakout Cable, to fully simulate a mouse. We also sell a footswitch, which has two buttons built in.

For further information, click on this link