CDAC: My Second Home (Part Three)

Four months passed in the blink of the eye. And now "Winter is Coming".

December: Sandhaan (Search for Excellence)

The winters of Kharghar are not as cold as those of Virar. It was difficult to get up at 6am but I used to convince myself somehow. This is hostel and you need to do things within the given time. The SNET (Systems and Networking) module started off. Paritosh Sir used to take our lectures. Hats off to the level of patience he had while making the idiotic crowd of 44 understand the concepts of Operating System. The portion was vast, from the smallest thread to the big Producer-Consumer problems. Mid-Dec, the Networking section started with the ISO-OSI model and a deep understanding of all the seven layers. I wished it was as easy as the seven colours of rainbow. Never mind, one thing I noticed was those who were least interested in coding and maths, they were very proactive during SNET module and vice versa (includes me). For the practical, we had to submit one project implementing any concept of OS and we loved Scheduling so much that three groups (includes my group) ended up doing the implementation of Scheduling Algorithms. My group consisted of: I, Litty, Sharvari, Laxmi, Madhur and Ashley Kamalasan. Ashley was a unique character of our batch (Batch mates; remember news of those excessive downloads at 2am using Ashley's id!!!). 

Bhavya and Nitin took the lead in organizing the New Year Celebration Function (held every year in CDAC on 31st Dec). A lot of brainstorming was done on the title of the event. Finally, we came up with the word "SANDHAAN" proposed by Kunal Kesri. It means search for excellence. The inauguration ceremony was held on 17th Dec. Then we had a series of activities from 19th Dec till 29th Dec, including the semi-finals and finals. The outdoor activities included Cricket, Badminton, Running race and Volley ball while the indoor included Chess, Carrom and Table Tennis. We also had some one-minute activities like blowing the balloon and also Tattoo Making, Mehndi, Blind drawing, Antakshari, etc.

Shadab and Nitin and the tattoos

Sharvari was the Chess Queen of CDAC, such quick and clever moves on the board. Neha practiced a lot and became Badminton ace. Namrata was very good at TT. I was good at Carrom. Music and Dance rehearsals were in full swing. The Treasure Hunt contest really made all the staffs run like "Mad Hatters" from the canteen to the lab; in and out of CDAC building, finding the way forward from the clues. Hats off to Piyush (The Question Bank of our batch) for the creation of Treasure Hunt. For the photography lovers, we had Best Picture Clicked Contest. I had no camera then. So I captured the images from the lens of my eyes and penned those on paper.

31st Dec:

Preparations were in full swing since morning. The stage was set and decorations were done. The guests were welcomed with the beautiful Rangolis made by staff and students (including mine). The function started in the evening. Many people performed, I remember a few performances. Shivnath Sir and group performed a spoof dance on old Hindi movies songs. Nitin performed on 'Sadda Haq' from Rockstar, almost rolling on the dance floor. Atul and Tushar Meshram (Rocco and Hunter of our batch) performed on 'Desi Boyz'. Music was in the air, due credit to our pianist Mithil. Then we had the prize distributions followed by a lavish dinner and Mad Dance Party. At 00:00:00 hours, firecrackers were lit and we welcomed 'Year 2012'. The only thing which caught my eyes that night, were the CDAC topper trophies given to Vivek Singh and Ankit Kumar (2010-11 batch). That very moment I made a strong determination to bag the trophy on 31.12.2012 and I did it. Thanks to Ranjith and Niket for receiving the trophy on my behalf and keeping it safe for four and a half months and finally I got it on 12.05.2013

Now That's Me!!!

"Winter is coming":

A phrase used to warn that hard times are coming, usually after a period when it seems as though everything is going well. This month started on a similar note for me. I should say I got a taste of Hostel life. You really need to be careful of what you speak, about whom, when, where, etc. There are some things you do on purpose. There are some things you happen to do unintentionally. Knowing that you have gone wrong and taking measures not to commit those mistakes again is what counts. It makes you improve yourself. Staying eight hours in company of friends and staying twenty-four hours in company of those same friends gives a different experience. You start identifying people, which is really required when you go out in the real world. You learn how to deal with people according to the situation. I was lucky though to have Litty and Laxmi by my side to go through this phase, their advice really helped me to be strong.

To summarize, you start building yourself as better individual to face the good and the bad awaiting for you in the outside world. "If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?"

January: SNET continues………

Everyone was dead tired on Day One of the year. The Mid Term Quiz was scheduled on 2nd Jan, so we had to get back to study. The lectures on Information Security, Cryptography, Socket Programming and Shell Programming were interesting. But the Computer Organization and Architecture was too vast to be completed in a day. Again, for the practical, we had to submit one project implementing any concept of Networking. This time Paritosh Sir had already decided on the topics and we had to select from that list on FCFS (First Come First Serve) basis. My team selected 'Routing Algorithms'. The SNET module was completed by the third week. The WiMC course was completed and their placement interviews were on. Altamesh got placed in CDAC, Bengaluru and Suhas got placed in CDAC, Juhu.

Computer lab:

I mentioned of the dedicated PCs in Part One. We made those dedicated PCs during SNET module. All the boys played Counterstrike in the evenings. And when the Security Guard comes on a round, these guys used to talk in code language, hinting each other to change the screens. Another peculiar thing was, 'I will use this PC in the lab sessions, that PC at night, that PC for playing games (Pool was famous) and so on'. Starting from the right corner of the lab; it was called Niket's corner because his PC was in the corner. Adjacent PC belonged to Abhijeet Kumar (famous for the e-language). On the opposite side, the PCs belonged to Shiv Shanker Pathak (Pathak Ji), Gaurav Singh and Piyush. Now moving to the left corner; my PC was the first, adjacent to the library. The PCs adjacent to mine belonged to Sharvari, next was Laxmi, then Litty and the corner PC was Bhavya's. On the opposite side, the PCs were used by Neha, Pratham Devgania and Karan Chandra. Moving towards the next section, one part was taken by Sudhanshoo and group (Gaurav Bhansali, Bhupendra, etc) and another part by Ranjith and group (Tijo Thomas, Dheeraj Agrawal, Sunita, Namrata, Yogesh Sahu, Pratik, Shadab, Mithil). Further section was reserved for the WiMC batch. The last line of PCs belonged to Naveen, Anshu, Nirgun, etc. 

Computer Lab

We used to have so much of fun cracking jokes, doing mimicry, gossips, teasing and fighting. I remember one such competitive fight between me and Ranjith. Niket was then called the Knowledge Resource. I (Process P) and Niket (Resourse N) were discussing about his Networking project and Ranjith (Process R) interrupted. 

Process R: You are holding the resource which I want. In Round Robin, when time slot is over, you have to release the resource for other processes. So now go to Waiting Queue.

Process P: Who told you that Round Robin is implemented? This is Priority Scheduling and let me specify it’s Non-preemptive. So you do not interrupt, stay in Waiting Queue.

Process R: I will use the technique of aging then.

Process P: You know the difference between Preemptive and Non-preemptive!! I am not getting up till my discussion is over.

And someone urgently called Ranjith, he had to leave. Otherwise I do not know how many more keywords were going to be used in our fight. Call this the after effects of SNET module.The next module 'Soft Skills' was to start on 23rd Jan and continue for two weeks. We had to be strictly in formals for the sessions. 

We completed half of the journey; the next half is still to walk...

Read next : CDAC: My Second Home (Part Four)