Thursday, July 12, 2007

Federer Vs Sampras

Grand Slam..FastForward...Rounds..Pause..Final..Federer..Play.."Fedex Lifts Grand Slam Title No 11" This has become a routine in Mens Tennis..Why??? Because Federer is playing the Tennis of his life.It started in 2001 when Fedex defeated four-time defending champion and seven-time Wimbledon champion Pete Sampras in the fourth round..I believe this was the turning point of his career and the tennis he started play after this was phenomenal.Tennis in this 21st century could be defined by telling FEDERER.. Fedex (a.k.a) Federer has won 11 Grand Slams so far.He is just 25 and he has achieved something that other stars took 13-14 Grand Slams more...Lets take a look at his opponents ..Nadal, Hewitt, Roddick, .....Hmmm cant remember anyone else !!!!..these are the current class players there are many more starts but the above 3 are his major threats..Are they really???? Just kidding.lets take a look at fedex titles

Wins (11)

Year ↓

Championship ↓

Opponent in Final ↓

Score in Final ↓

2003

Wimbledon (1st)

Flag of AustraliaMark Philippoussis

7-6(5), 6-2, 7-6(3)

2004

Australian Open (1st)

Flag of RussiaMarat Safin

7-6(3), 6-4, 6-2

2004

Wimbledon (2nd)

Flag of United StatesAndy Roddick

4-6, 7-5, 7-6(3), 6-4

2004

U.S. Open (1st)

Flag of AustraliaLleyton Hewitt

6-0, 7-6(3), 6-0

2005

Wimbledon (3rd)

Flag of United StatesAndy Roddick

6-2, 7-6(2), 6-4

2005

U.S. Open (2nd)

Flag of United StatesAndre Agassi

6-3, 2-6, 7-6(1), 6-1

2006

Australian Open (2nd)

Flag of CyprusMarcos Baghdatis

5-7, 7-5, 6-0, 6-2

2006

Wimbledon (4th)

Flag of SpainRafael Nadal

6-0, 7-6(5), 6-7(2), 6-3

2006

U.S. Open (3rd)

Flag of United StatesAndy Roddick

6-2, 4-6, 7-5, 6-1

2007

Australian Open (3rd)

Flag of ChileFernando González

7-6(2), 6-4, 6-4

2007

Wimbledon (5th)

Flag of SpainRafael Nadal

7-6(7), 4-6, 7-6(3), 2-6, 6-2



Lets know take the champion Pete Sampras..He has 14 Grand Slam titles under his belt..and was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame..Below is the list of titles he has won

Year ↓

Championship ↓

Opponent in Final ↓

Score in Final ↓

1990

U.S. Open

Flag of United StatesAndre Agassi

6-4, 6-3, 6-2

1993

Wimbledon

Flag of United StatesJim Courier

7-6, 7-6, 3-6, 6-3

1993

U.S. Open (2)

Flag of FranceCédric Pioline

6-4, 6-4, 6-3

1994

Australian Open

Flag of United StatesTodd Martin

7-6, 6-4, 6-4

1994

Wimbledon (2)

Flag of CroatiaGoran Ivanišević

7-6, 7-6, 6-0

1995

Wimbledon (3)

Flag of GermanyBoris Becker

6-7, 6-2, 6-4, 6-2

1995

U.S. Open (3)

Flag of United StatesAndre Agassi

6-4, 6-3, 4-6, 7-5

1996

U.S. Open (4)

Flag of United StatesMichael Chang

6-1, 6-4, 7-6

1997

Australian Open (2)

Flag of SpainCarlos Moyá

6-2, 6-3, 6-3

1997

Wimbledon (4)

Flag of FranceCédric Pioline

6-4, 6-2, 6-4

1998

Wimbledon (5)

Flag of CroatiaGoran Ivanišević

6-7, 7-6, 6-4, 3-6, 6-2

1999

Wimbledon (6)

Flag of United StatesAndre Agassi

6-3, 6-4, 7-5

2000

Wimbledon (7)

Flag of AustraliaPatrick Rafter

6-7, 7-6, 6-4, 6-2

2002

U.S. Open (5)

Flag of United StatesAndre Agassi

6-3, 6-4, 5-7, 6-4


Looking at the above statistics..Look at the class of players out there..Agassi,Rafter,Moya,Becker,Courier...on and on.. His last Grand Slam title was a beauty where is overcame tough opponents and won..


P.S. The above data has been taken from Wikipedia


Lets compare both of them..Both of them have their own class. Sampras Back hand and Fedex Forehand..Fedex and Sampras are great servers but Sampras is better when it comes to Serve and volley..
Sampras and Fedex are Mr.Cool during a match..


The advantage Fedex is now facing is he is dominating amongst these youngsters in the present era..Nothing to take from Fedex but one final question.."Could he have won 11 titles had he faced the same quality of opponents that Sampras faced?? "


Last but not the least...FEDEX is like TENDULKAR and SAMPRAS Is like DON BRADMAN..the Current Master : All time Great

Friday, July 6, 2007

Product or Service Based Company : Where would you like to work???

I had been working in a service based company for the past 21 months. One thing that always kept me thinking was "Am I in the right kind of company doing the right kind of work!!!!!"..

Lets first start of with the major service based companies in INDIA... Service Companies have an attrition rate of atleast 10-15% percent every year..For a company with 70,000 employees an attrition rate of 10% will count for 7000 employees!!!! Its a very huge figure.

Check this article..its very interesting ....

http://infotech.indiatimes.com/articleshow/925121.cms

One of the primary reasons for attrition is the pay scale. A Service based company gives you a pay of 3 Lacs p.a for a fresher and a product based company for the same job profile you could get a pay of around 4.5 - 5
Lacs p.a ..In addition to this difference in pay scale you get a lof of other benefits..bonus,holiday packages..etc all because a Product based company has lesser number of people and are more people oriented..

An Important perception that comes in is "I am doing the Cream of the work"...I felt that the product do give the simple work to the services company and the cream work is done by them...Is it true???? Still thinking...

Money comes in next if your satisfied with the job you do..I am ready to work for a lower package if my job gives me the right kind of exposure and I am able to answer these question "What I am doing? Why I am doing? and the Application of this work that I am doing"..The major difference I see in a product based company is that they are working in the complete application/coding and hence the people around there would be able to help you and give answers for these abstruse questions whereas we in a service based company will be able to answer those questions put to us in pre-application. Lets take an example of a simple SOC a system on chip..we have many modules working with different applications inside of it. We as a Service company look at the work from a verification perspective and not from an application perspective. I do know what each module does inside the SOC but do I know how it works in the actual application???? NO!!!! This is where I find a major difference in between a Service and a Product based company.

The technical challenges and innovation will be similar but a services company does not own the intellectual property and also does not take the responsibility of the success of the idea. This responsibility makes a product company special because it makes long term revenue for the company. I do not know a lot about services industry but have heard they also depend a lot on price competitiveness..

""A product company uses its people to create intellectual property.

A services company rents its people out so others can create intellectual property.

A product company takes a $20/hour Java programmer and uses her skills to create a $20 million product.

A services company takes a $20/hour Java programmer and rents him out for $25/hour.""

Despite the advantages in a product based company..it has some disadvantages also.. The major disadvantage being the ROLE I play in the Product based company is mostly going to be fixed throughout my tenure but in a service based company the ROLE is flexible...You will be exposed to the various technologies around the globe since you are working for different customers..

The other major diasdvantage in a Producy based company is that I design a chip thinking its going to yield a billion dollar business..The service company has done the testing the Product company has finally verified and launched the product..What happens if my chip doesnt sell????? For a service based company it means nothing but a client lost or in trouble and catch a new one but for a product based company you are loosing out a billion dollar revenue and the future looks bleak and you could well end up on the wrong side " Your Fired !!!!"

Well after these arguments what I see is I am in a metastable state not knowing whether my flip flop will yield a 0 or 1 in favor of these companies..

http://www.newdelhitimes.org/archives/2007/05/the_product_com.html

P.S..All these are based on personal opinions

Thursday, May 10, 2007

An uncertain future in this ever changing world !!

When I was in 8th std it all started, I started to know what a computer is, programming stuff ,BASIC, DBASE....the list went on.... We all know that languages get stronger day by day we went from BASIC to what we have today C# and some more.. I live in this ever changing world and had to learn these..

I started of learning DBASE, BASIC... Finally when I reached 10th I knew C, C++ ,UNIX, VB ,VC++....I was interested in Math stuff and did some papers on it, wrote Math Olympiad..qualified twice ....

In 12th std holidays I didnt want to waste time so I decided to do a course on C/C++/JAVA. To my suprise I completed with "A" grade..then a few months of "Vetti Days" came along..

Joined college , U know what .. I learnt "C" Again : ADV stuff and finally learnt some OrCad, TI DSP programming, MATLAB..the list went on. I was never interested in Electronics even though I was an ECE degree goer... Huff I finished my degree..was placed.. I tried for MBA didnt work :(0) ...

Well then the interesting part came, my comp started training me @ college..in what ??? u guessed it correct : JAVA, C, C++, RDBMS, ORACLE, UNIX....some stuff..on and on..

Then i was vetti again waiting for my date of joining.. Ah something struck me .. i m going to be a software coder why dont i learn some more prog...yes i went on to learn JAVA, J2EE , C#...

Finally got my offer letter wonder what i became a HARDWARE ENGG.. all the software i learnt was USELESS to tell in simple terms... I had to learn VHDL, Verilog, ModelSim, LEC, Formality,Design Compiler, Prime Time....Magma (i tried but cudnt understand)...then finally ASM , ARM coding...the list went on. I wondered all the stuff learnt in the past 20 years was it useful.

Had to get back to my passion learnt Math..DI..and finally I m through to reach my final destination in this every changing world..wrote exams for MBA

Today I ll b quitting my job for MBA..again learning new tools..new stuff....
this makes me MR.PERFECT in this ever changing world..dont u think!!!

Monday, February 19, 2007

The Day that changed my career : Mr. IT

"Start perparing , We want to achieve 100% placement this year" - College Prof .
Its 2004.!! Time for Campus Interviews @ College for Final year students. It was time for Companies for pick up the best students from every college.

It all started in June the first company came to our college. They were planning to take 100+ students . This company overcame a stiff challenge from the other companies to be the first to recruit at our college. ( Its funny to see companies fighting it out for being the first to recruit at a college )

I missed out on my first chance. I didnt clear the Aptitude :( ( I had to wait till 8 o'clock to know this )

Two days later, it was time for No 2 to unleash its net in this ocean of students.
This time around, I cleared the aptitude. Yo !! it was a great experience. But couldnt start celebrating. There was TECHNICAL INTERVIEW. I was wondering what did I study these 4 years. How current flows ..electrons..protons..neutrons.. Transistors PNP/NPN,triodes, diodes.... Do I remember these? The answer is a big "NOOOOOOO". But I was confident these stuff wouldnt be asked. My time for interview was @ 9pm but it only took place @ 11pm. I could see all the Csc and IT guys preparing very seriously. Being an ECE student, I was short circuited when I saw this...

My name was called out ..... Oh God I just now realised that I didnt prepare anything for my technical interview. When I went inside the hall, there was a man ready to fire questions at me.. I didnt want to get screwed to a person whom I didnt know, I prefer the college VIVA..where my own Profs toughen me up

Missile no 1: Tell me about yourself? I started telling him..Blah,..blah and then about school and that i was in the same school for 15 years... the reason for telling this was that I wanted to make an impression that I wont shift companies toooooooooooo.. Mr. Dedicated.
But wait....He heard it as .. "I am Working for the past 15 years "... Only God knows why he heard it like that...

Missile no 2: Can you write a C program to find out Odd and Even Numbers? The catch was that he said : "You shud write a code on this paper , which when I execute will run on first shot with no errors/warnings"
Done... he had a look at it and ..........

Missile no 3: Tell me something about the Training you underwent during the summer hols.
I underwent a training at a Telephone operator...
The question that came across..was something totally unexpected..it was "Out of Syllabus"
He asked me "Have you felt the telephone wire on ur tongue".
What!!!!!!!!!!!! I was bowled..I didnt have a answer to this..
He started explaining me why a person shouldnt do the above thing...it has 50V....
I wanted to laugh out aloud..but...

The good news finally came out ur through to the next round..I cleared the Technical round..It was a very tough one..

Next was the HR INTERVIEW.
It was a routine HR interview..ur strengths,weakness...blah blah i was confident i would be get thru..

@ 1.20am Next morning came the Suprise.. i became an IT Guy..Recruited in the company..I got a Job with still a year to go...

It was one of the most memorable days in my life..what followed after this was more memorable..

Watch out for more ....