Rahul's Blog

Random thoughts

Category: General (page 1 of 2)

Firefox 3

June 17, 2008 / / 0 Comments

Firefox 3 is finally here. While I’m waiting to connect to the Mozilla servers, which seem to be down due to the huge demand, I thought I’ll blog about why you should go download Firefox 3 too.

Firefox 3 has got a ton of new features and is awesomely fast. Especially sites that use a lot of Javascript (like gmail) are much faster than FF2 or IE. I’ve been using the Firefox 3 release candidates for some time now and its great. Here are some links that go into detail about the new features:

And if you’re already using Firefox 3 here’s a Power User’s Guide to Firefox 3.

Now if only we could get our hands on the download and help Mozilla set a world record!

Edit: 0020 hrs IST – Its downloading!

The new Hyderabad Airport

February 17, 2008 / / 5 Comments

The new Hyderabad Airport at Shamshabad (Rajiv Gandhi International Airport) is all set to open on March 16. Apollo is setting up a Medical Center at the airport to cater to the medical needs there. Recently there was a disaster drill (which unfortunately had to be aborted) and a visit by Apollo’s senior doctors and management. I’ve got some nice pics of both the visits on my flickr page. Check them out here:

Airport Disaster Drill
Visit to the New Hyderabad International Airport

The new airport is one huge thing and unlike anything you would have ever seen in India. The current structure is supposed to be designed to handle 12 million passengers a year (current Hyderabad traffic is around 7 million passengers). When the whole airport is completely built it would be able to handle 40 million passengers a year, but that’s still quite a few years away. They’ve built loads of check in counters and huge baggage claim areas, so I guess long queues should be a thing of the past.

The only problem is the distance of the airport from the city. Currently it’ll take about 1 to 1.5 hours from Banjara Hills to reach the airport. The expressway is going to take ages to be ready. So if you’re planning day-trips to Hyderabad, think twice!!

Update: Right after the inauguration they announced that the new Airport’s launch will be delayed. It seems that the airlines are not ready to tie up with the new ground handling agencies since they are charging a bomb! Well whatever the reason, atleast I’m happy that Begumpet airport is open for a little while longer 🙂

Some photos:

Apollo’s Airport Medical Team:
Apollo's Airport Medical Team

The airport:
Hyderabad International Airport

The departure area:
The departure area

Off to Delhi for the weekend…

November 16, 2007 / / 0 Comments

We’ll be in Delhi this weekend for a short break (long overdue though!). If you’re free gimme a buzz and we’ll meet up.

My P1i

November 11, 2007 / / 2 Comments

As I had written earlier I recently bought a new Sony Ericsson P1i. Its a cool phone (though it burnt a hole in my pocket.) The Symbian UIQ OS is good, I haven’t had any problems with it freezing or anything.

I like its software – the calendar, email app, etc. However, I do wish the alarm would have a longer snooze function! The current 5 mins is a little too short for my liking. I’ve been playing around with Wi-Fi and GPRS both. I like Gmail’s little app which I have downloaded. I’ve also got quite used to the keyboard and can tap out a short email/SMS pretty quickly.

The camera’s decent too, but after having used my Nikon dSLR for so long it feels really slow…

I’ve been looking around for some cool little apps for the phone but haven’t found anything interesting yet. Any suggestions?

Marketing Google style – new Gmail, OpenSocial and OHA

November 5, 2007 / / 0 Comments

I’ve seen or heard of very little Google marketing (the only thing that comes to mind is a hoarding they put up for job seekers…)

But if we see today Google seems to have one of the best known brands on the Internet. And I think there are some really clever marketing ppl behind this. I’m really coming around to the view that Google’s slow roll-outs of Gmail and its newer versions and invitation-only betas to new products are all smart marketing tactics to create buzz around these things. Further, I refuse to believe that Google has no hand to play in all the speculation that happens around their upcoming launches.

Take for example the two most recent releases – OpenSocial and the Android/OHA mobile phone OS. I must have read hundreds of blog posts (on what else but Google Reader 🙂 ) about these 2 over the last couple of months. Should I really believe that this is all speculation and is not being fuelled by Google? I find it a little too hard to believe that.

Gmail was the first “big” launch that I remember from Google. I can still remember searching all across the Net for an invite to Gmail till I finally got one. The amount of buzz that was generated then was awesome and I think Google has successfully re-created that around OpenSocial and Android/OHA.

But whatever you say I like the things these guys are building. And if you missed the update that is being rolled out across Gmail accounts now, look out for my next post. My wife’s Gmail has been updated to the new version and as a result I spend more time in her mailbox than mine 😉

Older posts

Recent comments

Meta

© 2025 Rahul's Blog

Theme by Anders Noren — Up ↑