Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) - God's Own Architecture

Intended Audience: Anyone and Everyone!

Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), has for long been used by different people in different ways. Some have used this three letter buzzword to sell their products (without actually understanding what it really meant!), while some (a handful) have passionately sold their products by truly implementing SOA. Though there has been a lot of information about SOA in the internet, its always been a tough task to explain this to a layperson (say, a doctor or a fashion designer!)

In this article, we'll try to step aside from the 'serious' and 'geekish' SOA discussion, and get into a lighter way of looking at this three letter buzzword. We all know how complex God's creations have been. From the universe (this is still a black box to mankind!) to the creation of humans, God's creation has always amused mankind. In the IT parlance, God is the supreme architect of all what we see around and inside of us. For the sake of dicussion, in this article, lets consider the Human Body (yes, our very own body!) as a product, and SOA as the architecture. Do you see some similarities? Read on...

Before we jump any further, lets quickly recall the SOA Reference Architecture, as defined by IBM (an undisputed leader in this space!)

Above picture shows the SOA Reference Architecture defined by IBM. A closer look at it shows the different aspects of the SOA. The Enterprise Service Bus is the core integration backbone of the SOA. The rest of them are self-explanatory. Without delving much into this, lets quickly jump back into our mainstream discussion - God's Own Architecture.

Lets extend SOA to the Human Body. As we all understand, the human body is one of the most complex, robust, flexible and agile systems. The below diagram is what I used to explain SOA to a doctor friend of mine.

A closer look at the above diagram will be good enough for you to understand the similarity. The Spinal System is the core of the human body (Its the integration layer!). The human brain takes care of the Process and Interaction Services. The human body is the most complex implementation based on SOA! This is very obvious with the fact that one cannot map a certain part of the body to only one aspect of SOA. For example, the human brain is so complex that one cannot rule out the participation of the human brain in Partner Services or Interaction Services.

In simple terms, apart from making laypeople understand SOA, the attempt here is to convey that Service Oriented Archtiecture (SOA) is God's Own Architecture (or, atleast close to it!). SOA has to be applied to the context of an industry to be able to understand its actual business value. In this article, we took the human body as an example. One might also want to consider the Solar System (with the Sun as the ESB, and so on) when explaining SOA to an astronomer.

So, Remember...SOA as a plain technology or business statement DOES NOT sell (and the world has seen this)! Industry content is the key!

Are you learning to drive a car?

After watching the Singapore F1 (which was quiet different/funny/disappointing in different ways), my cousin sent me this interesting video link, which I think you will enjoy too.

If you are one of those who is learning to drive a car or having a tough time wading your way through crowded streets of India (or any other parts of the world), this video might give you some ideas (refreshing ones!)



Good luck with your personal stunts!

Disclaimer: I'm not responsible if you try any of this with your (or your friend's) car ;-)

10 Reasons Why You Should Use Google Chrome (the Lean Browser!)

Google's latest power-packed offering Chrome, has taken a tangible percentage (2%) of the user market right on day two. With still a quarter to go in 2008, the Industry Standard predicts Google Chrome to reach 5% market share by end of this year.

So, if you are still contemplating over using Google Chrome, here are the Top 10 compelling reasons for which you should consider this Lean Browser*-

1. It's really fast to download this browser from Google's website (can be done effortlessly even from a dial-up connection!)
2. You get to View More of what You Want - Google Chrome has pruned out the unnecessary constituents of a typical browser (that Microsoft defined with its IE)
3. Google Chrome consumes lesser system resources...it's really less! (based on my testing on Windows XP)
4. Search and Address bar is no more two different things - Google Chrome has just a single place which lets the user to search (with suggestions) and type a website URL. This saves a lot of time! Just imagine (in a typical browser) the time taken in opening a new browser window, getting the search engine (of course its Google!) to load, and typing the search phrase...Phew!
   
5. Saves your energy and unnecessary mouse movement - Even creating bookmarks is simpler...just at the click of a button!
6. Lets you convert a new browser tab to a new browser window - You just need to click on the browser tab and pull it away from the browser! (helps in doing a lot of housekeeping with unnecessary tabs open)
7. You no more will see a download window coming in between you and the browser (it's so annoying to see this download status window in IE or Firefox!) - When you download something, it gets displayed in the bottom of the browser...how pleasant it is!
8. All tabs get displayed as separate resources in the Windows Task Manager - You can now force end a process that just takes off one tab in your Google Chrome browser!
9. Using a shared computer? Don't want to let others know what you are browsing after you are done? - Google Chrome offer a privacy mode, aka incognito mode. It prevents the pages you browsed from appearing in the web history!
10. Did you always want to use a browser that feels light to both the system and your eyes? - Google Chrome is for You!

Oh yes, we should always remember that Chrome is just a few days old! There are sure to be some hitches in it, and I'm sure Google is already working on them. Remember, Google has mastered the art of Perpetual Beta. This very fact drives the assurance down the users' minds that they always keep innovating....and, Innovation is not a Destination..but a Continuous Process.

*Lean Browser - Google has successfully adopted the lean approach in removing unnecessary (or) non-value adding artifacts (Kaizen) in its Chrome.

Congrats CERN...You guys ROCK!

My hearty congratulations and wishes to folks at CERN who successfully started the Large Hadron Collider. You guys have put in months and years of hard work into this project, and I wish you very good luck in successfully completing this project. The God Particle will soon be known to the world!

God Speed...

CIOs and IT Leaders - Having SAP Nightmares? Read on...

I've seen a lot of buzz around SAP and heard a good number of my customers/partners raise this concern in the past many months. I've also been following the series of articles by Thomas Wailgum at CIO.com on this topic. In this article, we'll try to take a few steps back in time, and understand how it started. We'll also see how it evolved over time. Towards the end, we'll also see, as leaders in the IT space, a way to tackle this. The its and this' refer to the ERP bugaboo.

It all started in the early 2000's, right after the dot com boom, when the senior IT management teams of many companies wanted to manage their wide spread businesses effectively. From a management perspective, they thought that having a single ubiquitous platform would help from both talent acquisition and software management perspectives. This was the time when SAP's ERP suite was launched (mySAP ERP was launched in 2003). This suite offered four individual solutions, each addressing specific functional areas, namely-

1. Human Capital Management
2. Financials
3. Operations
4. Corporate Services

Over the next few years, these customers of SAP were happy with their investment decisions. These companies started to implement these solutions for their enterprises. But slowly, over a period in time, these companies pretty much reached a stage where they completed implementations of these solutions. As their corporate footprint and needs increased, they sought SAP's assistance to deploy these solutions for the newly inducted companies as well.

In the background, there was this monster called complexity that was growing. SAP was continuously adding newer features and releasing newer versions of these solutions. With the new deployments of SAP's solutions, these customers slowly started to realize that they needed to manage these different versions of solutions across their enterprises. This is when SAP introduced their Netweaver integrated technology platform, which was intended to help manage this complexity of different SAP versions. However, they later chose to call this a service-oriented application and integration platform.

Assuming the above fixed the problem of complexity, these companies started to look at the other side of the business - beating the competition and creating a unique business value to their customers. This resulted in the business teams of these companies coming up with some strategic initiatives and strategic business processes. This is when the ball was thrown back to the IT Leaders and CIOs to think of ways to implement these strategic business processes.

Still enchanted by SAP's ERP solutions, these IT Leaders resorted to implementing these strategic business processes in the same SAP platform using the programming languages like ABAP, etc. Now, the monster started to surface again! This time, it came with a greater force and impact. With the existing complexity of managing different versions of the SAP ERP, the companies were now put through a challenge of having to deal with different versions and fixes of these individual custom processes/modules that were deployed to address their strategic initiatives.

Let us now try and remind ourselves that SAP ERP was designed to address the resource management related processes (related to corporate operations, financial processes, human capital managment and the like). These processes are typically found in every enterprise, whatever industry or business they may be. When we talk about strategic business processes, we refer to those unique business processes that help an enterprise/corporate differentiate itself from its competition. The truth is that SAP's ERP was NOT designed to handle this! So, it was a Square Peg in a Round Hole.

IT Leaders looked at managing complexity in the short term, but failed to see the complexity in the longer run. So, is there a way to tame this man-made monster called complexity? Yes, there is. Read on...

Start differentiating between your strategic business processes and your ERP processes. Keep the latter in your existing ERP and move the former to a common, enterprise-wide platform that conforms to IT and Industry Standards. It's very important to think about the IT and Industry standards because your enterprise is bound to have disparate lines of businesses and different softwares from different vendors. You will need to have a platform that will seamlessly integrate these different systems and software.

From an IT Standards perspective, Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) has is a proven approach that offers the maximum flexibility and seamless integration capabilities. Though SAP-AG chose to call their Netweaver platform as a service-oriented application and integration platform, it isn't really so. Just because your integration platform allows its applications to be exposed as Web-Services, does not mean that it is SOA compliant! To know more on the difference between SOA and Web-Services, read this article.

To summarize, take a closer look at your ERP usage and try to separate out those non-ERP business processes. Adopt the SOA approach to your enterprise's IT architecture. It helps your business and IT be more flexible, agile and robust.

For further reading:

1. AMR Research article titled SOA will kill ERP
2. Forrester Research on ERP and SOA
   

The Big-Bang Experiment - Whats this all about?

Firstly, the Big-Bang Theory. The Wikipedia definition of this theory goes this way-

The Big Bang is the cosmological model of the universe that is best supported by all lines of scientific evidence and observation. The essential idea is that the universe has expanded from a primordial hot and dense initial condition at some finite time in the past and continues to expand to this day. Georges Lemaître proposed what became known as the Big Bang theory of the origin of the Universe, although he called it his 'hypothesis of the primeval atom'. The framework for the model relies on Albert Einstein's General Relativity as formulated by Alexander Friedmann

So what is this experiment all about?
Well, this experiment is about the recreation of this effect, like how Georges Lemaitre proposed in his original theory. The core of this experiment is a 27 kilometer long tunnel-like machine called the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) machine which is placed under Swizz-French border. Scientists will attempt to smash particle beams together at close to the speed of light inside this machine, that is said to simulate multiple smaller versions of this Big-Bang.

Cosmologists say that that explosion of an object the size of a small coin occurred about 13.7 billion years ago, and this resulted to the creation of mass and hence the creation of life on Earth. (and maybe in many other planets)

One of the key aims of this experiment is to find the Higgs Bosom. Scottish physicist Peter Higgs pointed out in 1964 to such a particle (also called the God Particle) as the force that gave mass to matter and made the universe possible.

So, why is the world looking at this with caution and tension?
This is because there has been some talks (or rumours?) that this experiment will create "black holes" of intensive gravity sucking in CERN, Europe and perhaps the whole planet, or that it will open the way for beings from another universe to invade through a "worm hole" in space-time.

So, is this really safe?
Well, at this point in time, the scientists at CERN have assured that this is highly safe and that the LHC is well sealed and safe. All we can do at this point in time, is to wait till tomorrow.

I wish the scientists at CERN a very good luck and I'm confident this experiment will be listed as one of the most successful scientific experiments conducted by mankind!

Here is a video that walks us through this $16bn particle accelerator-

For more videos on this experiment, go here.

What My Mentor Taught Me

Kim Nash has written very well on this topic at CIO.com. Based on my personal experience with my two mentors, I'd like to add two more points to this list -

1. Be bold in letting the world know what you think: "One of my mentors taught me that if you think something is right, and have the right reasoning behind it, you should let the world know. Critisisms are always bound to be there. But always use your experience and judgement to take the decision you feel is right". I've realized that people love to work with leaders who are bold enough to voice their thoughts, than with leaders who take things as they come by.
2. Select the right set of people and give them smaller chunks of the larger work you are assigned with: "Another mentor of mine gave this piece of advise to me. I used to do everything myself...however big the work was. This piece of advise impacted me in a very big way. Its taught me how to select the right people to assign work. Its taught me to trust people and has hence given me the time to focus on larger challenges.

Think Beyond Cost Cutting - Managing IT during an economic downturn

Many Indian companies which are into the services outsourcing business, have been going though a rough patch with the rampant recession in the United States. Many Indian services companies have a larger share of customers in the United States. Due to the growing recession, many companies in the United States have been looking to reduce their IT (Information Technology) expenditure. As a result, these companies have started to pull out projects that were earlier queued up for outsourcing.

Over the past decade, many companies (whatever their main business has been), have increasingly got dependent on IT. This has resulted in a greater portion of the investment capital being assigned to IT. It seems like many of the companies have had a stereotyped way of thinking. While they've been thinking of reducing IT costs, they seem to have missed the bigger picture. In many cases, a little bit of extra investment in the right IT initiatives, can help optimize their business and hence save overall costs.

To better understand, let us take a little deeper view into the increased spending by companies in the SAP related initiatives. Many companies have increasingly invested a lot of money into ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) over the past many years. Specifically, many companies have implemented a lot of their ERP processes using SAP. Over time, due to an increased need to have a single IT platform (and other needs like costs, etc), companies have gone ahead customizing SAP to implement a lot of other business processes.

Today, many of these companies have been spending a lot of money to customize SAP to implement some business processes that help them differentiate from their competitors (strategic initiatives). These costs are primarily to manage this customization and the resulting problems/complexity. The truth of the matter is that SAP was designed to manage resource management initiatives/processes and not to strategic initatives/processes. Trying to implement strategic business processes in SAP has resulted in unnecessary expenditure and a resultant growth in complexity.

The above is just one example of how companies catch the tiger by its tail and lose controlove rtheir IT infrastructure. The solution is NOT in cutting these costs, but in investing in the right IT initiatives. Information is the key to any business. By effectively utilizing this information, companies can get deeper and better insights that can add value to their businesses. On the other hand, designing the right and optimal strategic business processes can help businesses reduce costs.

This month's McKinsey Quarterly article titled Managing IT in a downturn: Beyond cost cutting suggests some interesting ways for companies to look beyond cost cutting. It also presents some interesting facts and figures to support the same.

Calories Burned During Exercise

I've started to learn swimming just a few days back. Though I did learn this wonderful sport close to about 15 years ago, I've never felt that I knew it well. I've been going to this lovely big swimming pool in Chennai. It's the Shenoy Nagar Swimming Pool, which is maintained and run by the Sports Development Authority of Tamilnadu (SDAT). The pool is well maintained and also has a pool that can host competitions.
Having been forced out of running for quiet sometime now, I'm looking at swimming to help me with the strengthening of my knee and also to cut the extra flab that started to accumulate ever since I stopped running regularly. While I was searching the internet for details on the calories burnt during running, biking and swimming, I bumped into the following lovely chart at Nurtition Strategy website. Thought it would be helpful to many of us here (including for those who do household work).

Activity (1 hour)	130lbs	155lbs	190lbs
Aerobics, general Aerobics, high impact Aerobics, low impact Archery (non-hunting) Automobile repair Backpacking, general Badminton, competitive Badminton, social, general Basketball, game Basketball, nongame, general Basketball, officiating Basketball, shooting baskets Basketball, wheelchair Bicycling, <10mph, leisure Bicycling, >20mph, racing Bicycling, 10-11.9mph, light effort Bicycling, 12-13.9mph, moderate effort Bicycling, 14-15.9mph, vigorous effort Bicycling, 16-19mph, very fast, racing Bicycling, BMX or mountain Bicycling, stationary, general Bicycling, stationary, light effort Bicycling, stationary, moderate effort Bicycling, stationary, very light effort Bicycling, stationary, very vigorous effort Bicycling, stationary, vigorous effort Billiards Bowling Boxing, in ring, general Boxing, punching bag Boxing, sparring Broomball Calisthenics (pushups, sit-ups), vigorous effort Calisthenics, home, light/moderate effort Canoeing, on camping trip Canoeing, rowing, >6 mph, vigorous effort Canoeing, rowing, crewing, competition Canoeing, rowing, light effort Canoeing, rowing, moderate effort Carpentry, general Carrying heavy loads, such as bricks Child care: sitting/kneeling-dressing, feeding Child care: standing-dressing, feeding Circuit training, general Cleaning, heavy, vigorous effort Cleaning, house, general Cleaning, light, moderate effort Coaching: football, soccer, basketball, etc. Construction, outside, remodeling Cooking or food preparation Cricket (batting, bowling) Croquet Curling Dancing, aerobic, ballet or modern, twist Dancing, ballroom, fast Dancing, ballroom, slow Dancing, general Darts, wall or lawn Diving, springboard or platform Electrical work, plumbing Farming, baling hay, cleaning barn Farming, milking by hand Farming, shoveling grain Fencing Fishing from boat, sitting Fishing from river bank, standing Fishing in stream, in waders Fishing, general Fishing, ice, sitting Football or baseball, playing catch Football, competitive Football, touch, flag, general Frisbee playing, general Frisbee, ultimate Gardening, general Golf, carrying clubs Golf, general Golf, miniature or driving range Golf, pulling clubs Golf, using power cart Gymnastics, general Hacky sack Handball, general Handball, team Health club exercise, general Hiking, cross country Hockey, field Hockey, ice Horse grooming Horse racing, galloping Horseback riding, general Horseback riding, trotting Horseback riding, walking Hunting, general Jai alai Jogging, general Judo, karate, kick boxing, tae kwan do Kayaking Kickball Lacrosse Marching band, playing instrument(walking) Marching, rapidly, military Moto-cross Moving furniture, household Moving household items, boxes, upstairs Moving household items, carrying boxes Mowing lawn, general Mowing lawn, riding mower Music playing, cello, flute, horn, woodwind Music playing, drums Music playing, guitar, classical, folk(sitting) Music playing, guitar, rock/roll band(standing) Music playing, piano, organ, violin, trumpet Paddleboat Painting, papering, plastering, scraping Polo Pushing or pulling stroller with child Race walking Racquetball, casual, general Racquetball, competitive Raking lawn Rock climbing, ascending rock Rock climbing, rapelling Rope jumping, fast Rope jumping, moderate, general Rope jumping, slow Rowing, stationary, light effort Rowing, stationary, moderate effort Rowing, stationary, very vigorous effort Rowing, stationary, vigorous effort Rugby Running, 10 mph (6 min mile) Running, 10.9 mph (5.5 min mile) Running, 5 mph (12 min mile) Running, 5.2 mph (11.5 min mile) Running, 6 mph (10 min mile) Running, 6.7 mph (9 min mile) Running, 7 mph (8.5 min mile) Running, 7.5mph (8 min mile) Running, 8 mph (7.5 min mile) Running, 8.6 mph (7 min mile) Running, 9 mph (6.5 min mile) Running, cross country Running, general Running, in place Running, on a track, team practice Running, stairs, up Running, training, pushing wheelchair Running, wheeling, general Sailing, boat/board, windsurfing, general Sailing, in competition Scrubbing floors, on hands and knees Shoveling snow, by hand Shuffleboard, lawn bowling Sitting-playing with child(ren)-light Skateboarding Skating, ice, 9 mph or less Skating, ice, general Skating, ice, rapidly, > 9 mph Skating, ice, speed, competitive Skating, roller Ski jumping (climb up carrying skis) Ski machine, general Skiing, cross-country, >8.0 mph, racing Skiing, cross-country, moderate effort Skiing, cross-country, slow or light effort Skiing, cross-country, uphill, maximum effort Skiing, cross-country, vigorous effort Skiing, downhill, light effort Skiing, downhill, moderate effort Skiing, downhill, vigorous effort, racing Skiing, snow, general Skiing, water Ski-mobiling, water Skin diving, scuba diving, general Sledding, tobogganing, bobsledding, luge Snorkeling Snow shoeing Snowmobiling Soccer, casual, general Soccer, competitive Softball or baseball, fast or slow pitch Softball, officiating Squash Stair-treadmill ergometer, general Standing-packing/unpacking boxes Stretching, hatha yoga Surfing, body or board Sweeping garage, sidewalk Swimming laps, freestyle, fast, vigorous effort Swimming laps, freestyle, light/moderate effort Swimming, backstroke, general Swimming, breaststroke, general Swimming, butterfly, general Swimming, leisurely, general Swimming, sidestroke, general Swimming, sychronized Swimming, treading water, fast/vigorous Swimming, treading water, moderate effort Table tennis, ping pong Tai chi Teaching aerobics class Tennis, doubles Tennis, general Tennis, singles Unicycling Volleyball, beach Volleyball, competitive, in gymnasium Volleyball, noncompetitive; 6-9 member team Walk/run-playing with child(ren)-moderate Walk/run-playing with child(ren)-vigorous Walking, 2.0 mph, slow pace Walking, 3.0 mph, mod. pace, walking dog Walking, 3.5 mph, uphill Walking, 4.0 mph, very brisk pace Walking, carrying infant or 15-lb load Walking, grass track Walking, upstairs Walking, using crutches Wallyball, general Water aerobics, water calisthenics Water polo Water volleyball Weight lifting or body building, vigorous effort Weight lifting, light or moderate effort Whitewater rafting, kayaking, or canoeing	354 413 295 207 177 413 413 266 472 354 413 266 384 236 944 354 472 590 708 502 295 325 413 177 738 620 148 177 708 354 531 413 472 266 236 708 708 177 413 207 472 177 207 472 266 207 148 236 325 148 295 148 236 354 325 177 266 148 177 207 472 177 325 354 148 207 354 236 118 148 531 472 177 207 295 325 236 177 295 207 236 236 708 472 325 354 472 472 354 472 236 384 148 295 708 413 590 295 413 472 236 384 236 354 531 413 325 148 118 236 118 177 148 236 266 472 148 384 413 590 236 649 472 708 590 472 413 502 708 561 590 944 1062 472 531 590 649 679 738 797 826 885 531 472 472 590 885 472 177 177 295 325 354 177 148 295 325 413 531 885 413 413 561 826 472 413 974 531 295 354 472 413 354 413 413 413 295 472 207 413 590 295 354 708 354 207 236 177 236 590 472 472 590 649 354 472 472 590 236 236 236 354 354 413 472 295 472 236 177 236 295 148 207 354 236 207 295 472 236 413 236 590 177 354 177 295	422 493 352 246 211 493 493 317 563 422 493 317 457 281 1126 422 563 704 844 598 352 387 493 211 880 739 176 211 844 422 633 493 563 317 281 844 844 211 493 246 563 211 246 563 317 246 176 281 387 176 352 176 281 422 387 211 317 176 211 246 563 211 387 422 176 246 422 281 141 176 633 563 211 246 352 387 281 211 352 246 281 281 844 563 387 422 563 563 422 563 281 457 176 352 844 493 704 352 493 563 281 457 281 422 633 493 387 176 141 281 141 211 176 281 317 563 176 457 493 704 281 774 563 844 704 563 493 598 844 669 704 1126 1267 563 633 704 774 809 880 950 985 1056 633 563 563 704 1056 563 211 211 352 387 422 211 176 352 387 493 633 1056 493 493 669 985 563 493 1161 633 352 422 563 493 422 493 493 493 352 563 246 493 704 352 422 844 422 246 281 211 281 704 563 563 704 774 422 563 563 704 281 281 281 422 422 493 563 352 563 281 211 281 352 176 246 422 281 246 352 563 281 493 281 704 211 422 211 352	518 604 431 302 259 604 604 388 690 518 604 388 561 345 1380 518 690 863 1035 733 431 474 604 259 1078 906 216 259 1035 518 776 604 690 388 345 1035 1035 259 604 302 690 259 302 690 388 302 216 345 474 216 431 216 345 518 474 259 388 216 259 302 690 259 474 518 216 302 518 345 173 216 776 690 259 302 431 474 345 259 431 302 345 345 1035 690 474 518 690 690 518 690 345 561 216 431 1035 604 863 431 604 690 345 561 345 518 776 604 474 216 173 345 173 259 216 345 388 690 216 561 604 863 345 949 690 1035 863 690 604 733 1035 819 863 1380 1553 690 776 863 949 992 1078 1165 1208 1294 776 690 690 863 1294 690 259 259 431 474 518 259 216 431 474 604 776 1294 604 604 819 1208 690 604 1423 776 431 518 690 604 518 604 604 604 431 690 302 604 863 431 518 1035 518 302 345 259 345 863 690 690 863 949 518 690 690 863 345 345 345 518 518 604 690 431 690 345 259 345 431 216 302 518 345 302 431 690 345 604 345 863 259 518 259 431

Winners of Slideshare Presentation Contest

Here are the top three winners of Slideshare's World's Best Presentation Contest. I'm simply amazed by the way each of the presenters have taken time and effort to create each of those beautiful pictures. As we see, the key of a good presentation is to hit the right-brain and trigger thoughts from color and creativity.

First Prize:

THIRST

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: design crisis)

Second Prize:

Foot Notes

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: design inspirational)

Third Prize:

Zimbabwe in Crisis

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: refugee hyperinflation)

For the rest of the winners go here.

Google successfully Goes the Disruptive Way

Its finally taken a Google to break the Microsoft trend! I just downloaded the new Chrome, and it took me a few minutes before I could come to believe that this was a web browser. Yes, it feels lighter than feather. I'm not exaggerating!

Microsoft created the design of having the notion of a Menu. The terms File, Edit, View which get featured prominantly in every Windows application was something that Microsoft came up with. There were many players who have tried to break this monotony. Apple did try to change this with its Mac OS styles. Mozilla did try to improve on the browser capabilities with its Firefox. But it is Google that brought in this disruptive innovation into the world of web browsers.

More than sheer removal of flab from the versions of web browsers provided by Microsoft and Mozilla, Google has increased the usable area for users. Here is a comparison of how much of the screen area the three browsers' (Microsoft's Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome) top part (title, menu and others) occupy-

View a larger version of the above image here.

Google Chrome has also done away with the traditional status bar that we find in the bottom of Microsoft's Internet Explorer and Mozilla's Firefox browsers. From a mouse-click perspective, Google Chrome also seems to effectively reduce the need for a right-click. Even to open a new tab, Google has a small plus-sign that you can click.

While lean principles have been the secret behind Toyota's success in the manufacturing space, Google has successfully adopted the lean approach in removing unnecessary (or) non-value adding artifacts (Kaizen) in its products.

Chrome - Another 'Google Brick' in the Internet Wall

As time has gone by, we've slowly seen Google take over more of the internet than any other company in this space. While this has been really interesting to many of us, its getting a bit mundane in my view. Will we be able to see the Clash of Titans anymore? Is there a company or individual which can create a Blue Ocean?

Well, till such a time, do check out these 'cool gadgets' that Google come up with. I just downloaded Chrome. I'm looking forward to playing with it a bit. Known for its knack to make user experience simpler and quicker, I'm sure Google has a bunch of cool features in its Chrome. Check out its 10 key features in this video below -

Wanted - Writers, Creative minds and Management Trainees

I'm looking for people to build a brand value around something. People with good writing skills, creative thinking and good networking skills can contact me. Even management school trainees looking for real branding experience can write to me.

Will keep the world posted as this unfolds...

The Network of Knowledge - A Secret of Success

The success of many key people has always been a sight to watch. The way they get to face and address the most challenging of problems (so to say) is always worth a 'replay'. We all have this curious open question in the top of our minds "How are successful people successful?"

As mere mortals, its next to impossible to know everything beneath (and above) the sky - Let's accept this fact. Often people get caught in this Catch-22 situation when they vehemently pursue a dream of Success by trying to know everything. In Tamil, there is a famous Thirukkural that goes this way -

கற்றது கை மண் அழவு, கல்லாதது உலகழவு
The meaning of this amazing verse is - What one has learnt is just about a fistful of sand, what one has yet to learn is as vast as the universe

Even successful people have these mortal limitations. How do they overcome this? Here is the answer - They surround themselves with a very intense and valuable network of people. In the IT (Information Technology) parlance, this is similar to the internet - You have access to all the information as long as you stay connected to the internet. You are not bound by the limitations of your hard disk (brain) or your system performance (the human ability).

So, how are human networks formed? In the simplest form, there are two ways -

1. the information seeker gets a information source(s) (viz., a Mentor(s))
2. the information source voluntarily reaches out to an information seeker(s)

How can you be successful in the pursuit to seeking and creating a good network? Here are some tips -

• Firstly, keep your inhibition factor and the ego factor at its lowest - Don't feel shy to seek help. Neither should you let pride take control over your actions
• Stay on the lookout for a good Mentor. Mentors can be people who you might treat as a role-model or a person, who you think, can help you think the right way
• Believe in your network
• Don't get contented with the size of your network! More people you know, the more information you have access to
• Utilize your network - There is no point owning a Mercedez and not using it!
• Join networking groups - in any form
• Ask questions (however dumb it may sound) - It's not a sin!

Remember, Rome was not built in a day. So is a good network. It's a evolving thing.

A good network is like a Golden Banyan Tree. As years go by, the value keeps increasing as much as its foundation gets stronger. The number of points of connection to the earth (the world of information) just keeps increasing. The tree just gets stronger!

Stay Networked, Stay Inspired!