Video calling on fring

Finally it's here. Video calling on fring, the mobile application for yahoo, msn, skype and many more. Tested on nokia 5800 on 512kbps slt adsl line. works fine, but voice quality is a bit lower than regular skype voice call.

Top 10 annoying driving habits of Sri Lankans

I've been driving in Sri Lanka since I was tall enough to reach for the clutch and see the road at the same time. Throughout the years I've seen various driving habits being added to our driving system. It's disappointing that none of them were good driving practices. Most of them were innovated by the three-wheel driver and later passed on to the motorists. In this article I will refer to these ill-mannered drivers as simply 'idiots'.

Today the situation is pretty bad. So here goes the top 10 things I hate about driving in Sri Lanka.

10. Pedestrians.

This is not really a bad driving habit but indeed a reason which makes driving in Sri Lanka frustrating. It's blazing hot in Sri Lanka these days. So its natural of pedestrians to somehow minimize the time standing on the street during daytime even though the traffic lights tell them to. Yes, even when the traffic lights to pedestrians have turned red they don't seem to pay attention. What most people (specially people who don't drive much) doesn't realize is that motorists don't pay much attention to their surrounding when they see the green light! It's not really the motorists fault if a person gets hit, but the consequences... I think it could make up for a whole new post. :)

9. Traffic light cut through.


This is mostly practiced by motorcyclists. It's okay if these people stay parallel with the vehicles that were originally in front, but instead they pass and stops right in front of you. Even that is okay if they move away as soon as the lights turn green, but they don't. Instead they make odd turns and does various dances. The three-wheeler favourite of this flaw is taking a sharp turn in front of the person that was originally in front. Very annoying.






8. Right of way.

Person who enters the roundabout should leave without being disturbed. This is the concept of a roundabout. It is achieved by simply giving way to the person coming from your right. In Sri Lanka idiots don't give a sh*t about this. They come at you roaring even from your left. In some countries drivers don't even look at their left. If you do that in Sri Lanka, you'll surely end up either in heaven or hell.

7. No signal lights

You are about to enter the main road. A car is coming fast on the main road so you wait till it passes. To see, without passing you it turns to your road! What a waste of time and energy! If that idiot used the signal lights things would have been much 'efficient'. It's a simple thing isn't it? :)

6. Track changing.

There are some idiots who tries to change the lane as soon as they see its moving faster. After driving in Colombo city for several months one should realize that this strategy is not the most effective way to travel fast. It doesn't do good for yourself or to others. People should really start to use their brains.






5. Face to face.

Idiots don't think whats ahead. They just want to fill in whats left of the road. When their side is jammed they use the other side of the road to cut through to the front putting the people on the correct side of the road in danger and frustration. If the red car in this picture is a lorry, you pray to god that it doesn't end up in a head-on collision.








4. Two-wheelers nonstop right turn.

Very common for motorcyclists because this way you don't need to stop and keep your foot on the ground. This could be highly dangerous if the blue car needs to move to his left to make room for an oncoming vehicle. Besides its very annoying to lose the small space of road you already have. You will either have to slow down or drive really carefully so that you won't hit this idiot.

3. No-standing area??? Whats that?

Some Sri Lankans do not know what this sign means. These yellow boxes can be seen at most junctions. The rule is you cant enter a yellow box if you can't exit. This will avoid the junction from being blocked. These are placed at other appropriate places to avoid traffic from being conjested carelessly.





This is the second runner-up of best idiotic drivers competition. The good guy stays away from the yellow box because the car in front is not moving either due to traffic lights or any other matter. The idiot behind loses patience and cuts blood supply to his brain and jumps in the middle. Now the whole meaning of the yellow box has gone to waste. Sometimes the idiot doesn't even realize his mistake.

2. I go first, you go next.

The second most irritating thing I experience almost every morning when entering the main road is this scenario. It is common courtesy that you don't disturb the main road when entering it. So you wait until someone gives you way or you get room. Then an idiot comes along on the wrong side terrorizing the whole junction and crosses over disturbing the smooth flow bringing numerous vehicles to a standstill. Spine chilling irritating.

1. Wrong side for a right turn.

And the number one thing that makes me wanna get down from the car and make the idiot crap his pants is this. This one was brought on very recently.

Inventor: Motorcycle riders.
Beta testing: Three-wheelers.
Now in practice by most motorists.

How many times did you hit brakes hard when people came right at your face and then quickly made a right turn? This is a very dominating technique of driving because there's nowhere on road you can go. You will have to slow down or stop till that person victoriously takes his right turn.

So here you go guys. My top 10 list. I hope you have realized something that you didn't pay much attention before. If you are reading this and thinking to yourself "is this guy crazy? We don't drive like this in Sri Lanka", kindly check the published date mate. Several years must have passed. :)

GPS on nokia 5800 in Sri Lanka

I've been waiting for a long time to show you guys how to make use of GPS on your mobile phone. Still I didn't have the chance of being driven around with the video camera in hand. Phone camera's find it hard to focus on another mobile phone screens.

Here are some of the attempts I made to get it on tape.

Fixed the video camera on the tripod, kept the phone on the seat and shot this.


These two were shot with a Samsung SGH-780i mobile phone. (Not very good video quality isn't it?)

My phone has GPS, so???

continuation from my last article "Use technology"

GPS stands for Global Positioning System. It is used to know your exact location on the face of earth. I'm sure you have seen this technology being used in Hollywood movies. From a hand held GPS device one can see where he exactly his on a pre-loaded map. And in movies everyone has a GPS device and the whole army knows where their comrades are! To some this seems like high end technology, but it's not. By the end of this article you will know how to assemble your own army with hand held GPS devices without spending a dime.

Lot of Sri Lankans think that GPS is not available in Sri Lanka. Another common belief among Sri Lankans are that GPS is a service that you have to pay monthly to obtain. Let me enlighten you by starting out with the history of GPS.
GPS technology developed and first used by the American military. They launched satellites that orbit above earth which sends necessary signals to calculate positioning information so precise one could measure centimeters with their GPS device. These signals were encoded and only the US military could use it. Now they have let civilians use the technology but with much lower accuracy. That is what people all around the world use as GPS.

The theory is very simple. US military owned satellites emit certain signals every pre-defined interval continuously. GPS devices capture these signals. These signals are encoded with information needed for the GPS device to calculate distance from that particular satellite. After recieving such signals from 3 satellites (distances from 3 known points) the position of the GPS device can be calculated easily by the GPS device. (Intersection of 3 spheres are two points, one point is not on the face of the earth! So other point is where the GPS device is... pretty simple) more...

US satellites provie this service free of charge for civillians because it is not much of a security threat and bases GPS navigation technology which is essential mostly for ships and boats.

Sri Lankans who don't believe in GPS,

Most of the high end mobile phones have GPS devices built in. If your phone has that feature that means you can find your exact location on earth. (Even in Sri Lanka ;)) So find that option on your phone. It will say "searching for satellites", "calculating GPS data" or something equivalent to that. Go out to a place where your phone can see the sky. Wait for about 5 minutes. Then it will show you the latitude and longitude of your current position. This doesn't cost you anything.

And now let me tell you about Google Maps Mobile. I'm sure you all know about google earth. This is the mobile version of that. Since you have your current location from the in-built GPS device now you can see where on earth you are with this software installed on your mobile phone. Google recently introduced a feature called Google Latitude where you can see the position of your friends as well. Make your friends who has GPS enabled mobile phones your comrades and you've got a "high tech" army. ;)

GPS devices on mobile phones are far less accurate than regular GPS devices. To use a regular GPS device in Sri Lanka one needs a permission from the authorities due to security reasons.

In Sri Lanka there's no highly detailed map as yet. So options like routing and voice navigation doesn't work. When you are seriously lost in Colombo and need to find a way out, you will praise Google Maps Mobile for atleast showing you where you are!

Use technology

Now a day mobile phones are just a fashion. People don’t use half of the options available in their mobile phone. One of my friends recently bought a Nokia N95 from its first owner. It was an American edition and because of that the 3G frequency it can operate was different from the networks we have here in Sri Lanka. So now it’s just a phone with a very low speed data connection. The first owner never knew this. He hadn’t bought this while his stay in America; he has never even been to America. All he wanted was a Nokia N95 because it was the trendiest phone of that time. From all the options the phone had, he only used it to make and receive phone calls and text. He never knew that it could make video calls. He never knew it could send and receive e mail through wifi. He never knew he could find his exact place on earth with the built in GPS. He only knew that he had the “Nokia N95”. I don’t know why people waste so much money on technologies they don’t use. For some people fashion comes ahead of everything else in life, it’s all about how you look on the outside.

Await next post on a technology you think is not available in Sri Lanka.

Missin' the beat.

I have only one grandparent; my maternal grandfather. He has been living with us for the past so many years. Many changes were done around the house since he moved in. If I say we had to baby proof the 1^st storey it would describe a lot. It is said when people are old they step into their second childhood. I am telling you, that is exactly what has happened. He has nothing to do during the whole day and whole night. Just to keep himself occupied he taps the arm rest, or the table he is sitting at making a beat of a song he knows.

Finally the renovation work at our house started which has been put off for ages due to prioritization. It was decided and agreed that my grandpa should live with my aunt till the renovation work is over. He was dropped off today.
I was moving around some furniture to make way for the workers. After rearranging downstairs I sat down on the couch for a short rest and I started tapping on the armrest! I smiled to myself. As soon as my mother came back from my aunts place she told she miss him already. I never said anything.

Sometimes his stay made my life hard. I couldn’t go out when only I was at home because I was not to leave him alone all by himself for more than few minutes. When my mother was out I had to prepare and give him tea. (I don’t even make myself a cup of tea) I can’t leave anything unattended downstairs because he messes around with it. He is just like a 3 year old child.

Every time I come home from the university he’s there sitting on ‘his’ chair in the living room. He receives me with a very innocent smile every time I walk in. I ask him how he’s doing and for a 90 year old he replies he’s doing just great. (When asked he says he is either 94 or 95)

My mother surely misses him and she admits it. Don’t I? I really don’t know. When I’m at home I hear my grandpa’s ‘beat’ all day long, non-stop. Today I didn’t. It’s sort of weird. I’m missin’ the beat…

Stepping into blogging

It hit me yesterday when I was traveling with my best buds to the movie theatre to see Night at the Museum 2. They were so enthusiastically talking about someone's blog that they found very entertaining. I was looking out into the road to see whats new on the road since I've last been there because I couldn't tune myself no where near the frequency which those to were transmitting about. So I thought why not give this a try. And now, here I am speaking to the www...