Eugene has an interesting discussion on what students should concentrate on for a career in Computer Science.

Yesterday, our department hosted a “preview day” for high school seniors who are considering majoring in computer science here at UNI. During the question-and-answer portion of one session, a student asked, “What courses should we take in our senior year to best prepare to study CS?” That’s a good question, and one that resulted in a discussion among the CS faculty present.

For most computer science faculty, the almost reflexive answer to this question is math and science. Mathematics courses encourage abstract thinking, attention to detail, and precision. Science courses help think like an empiricist: formulating hypotheses, designing experiments, making and recording observations, and drawing inferences. A computer science student will use all of these skills throughout her career.

I began my answer with math and science, but the other faculty in the room reacted in a way that let me know they had something to say, too. So I let them take the reins. All three downplayed the popular notion that math, at least advanced math, is an essential element of the CS student’s background.

We ended up closing our answer to the group by saying that studying whatever interests you deeply — and really learning that discipline — will help you prepare to study computer science more than following any blanket prescription to study a particular discipline.

Podcasts.Yahoo.com went live today.

It’ll help you find and listen to podcasts as well as create your own podcasts.

Many of my friends in Bangalore are part of the team that created this. Kudos to them for converting a concept to a product launch in an amazing short period!

Update : Interestingly, Yahoo! announced this via a podcast. Very appropriate.

Eric Rougier has a wonderful 3D pic of the Louvre museum in Paris (Quicktime required). You might have read about the Louvre in The Da Vinci Code.

Eric has a mind-blowing Panorama section that I check out from time to time.

Paris is truly the City of Lights.

Lisa’s post on ‘Commit to a Breakthrough’ reminded me of Parkinson’s Law:

Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.

Gaurav Sabnis has got a legal threat from IIPM for blogging negatively about the IIPM institute. Details at DesiPundit.

I really wonder about the credibility of this institute. How can they teach management to students when they themselves don’t know how to manage criticism?

Similarly, Mediaah was shut down 7 months ago, because of a threat by the Times of India.

This is truly sad. These organizations would rather silence the people who are giving constructive criticisms rather than respond in a constructive manner.

Anyway, I’ve finally convinced my Dad to switch from Times of India to Deccan Herald. Hopefully, I’ll be soon reading real news rather than just captions accompanying photos of celebrities.

Update : According to Technorati, IIPM is right now the most popular searched phrase. Looks like IIPM is getting a lot of backlash from the Indian blogosphere and subsequently, the bigger blogospheres.

Update 2 : Patrix is working furiously to keep everyone updated on this issue.

The A R Rahman New Dimensional Tour came to Bangalore yesterday.

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It rained heavily causing the show to start late by 2 hours. Sivamani played a small display of his amazing drums capabilities that kept the crowd satisfied till Rahman entered the stage. When the show did start, Rahman started off with the song from Yuva. After that, there were various songs sung by Hariharan, Shankar Mahadevan, Alka Yagnik, Sadhna Sargam, Sukhwinder Singh, Chitra, Blaaze, … with Rahman playing the piano for most of the songs. Rahman did sing 3-4 songs himself.

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Although I was disappointed with the selection of songs as well as the speakers system, there were a few good songs that were worth it. Listening to Hariharan sing ‘Roja Janeman’ live was alone worth it. There was also the Kannada version of ‘Kehna Hi Kya’ sung by Chitra, ‘Telephone Dhun’ by Hariharan, ‘Chaiyya Chaiyya’ by Sukhwinder Singh, and of course, ‘Chale Chalo’ from Lagaan by Rahman himself.

It’s been 5 days since I saw the movie, but the title song of Amrithadhare is still playing on and on in my head. As far as I’m concerned, it’s going to be one of those classic songs.

Nee amrithadhare KoTi janma jothe gaathi Nee amrithadhare Ihaku paraku sangathi Nee illavaadare naa hege baaLali? …

About the movie… as usual, some scenes are outrageous, but overall, it’s a good movie to watch with a good message in the end. One of the high points is how Amitabh Bachchan figures in the story.

My team is looking for web developers who can work on a contract basis for 3-6 months.

Knowledge of PHP, Perl, Apache, FreeBSD(or Linux) is required.

If anybody you know is interested, please ask them to send their resume to me ASAP.

• Rands in Repose has written a thoughtful article “Signs of Art” where he asks “Is software art”?

I think I’ll answer “Hell yeah”.

• Jason says:

The most important thing in software development is motivation. Motivation is local — if you aren’t motivated by what you are working on right now then chances are it’s not going to be anywhere near as good as it could be. In fact, it’s probably going to suck.

Food for thought, eh?

• Jason’s talk about the lessons learnt while building Basecamp is a must-hear, especially the part about the four main tenets – reducing mass, embracing constraints, getting real in the process of development and managing debt.

Happy Birthday to Yahoo! Bangalore!