https://sunilgarg.com/ Recent content on Sunil Garg Hugo -- gohugo.io en-US sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) (c) 2018 Sunil Garg. Sun, 31 Dec 2017 00:00:00 +0000 https://sunilgarg.com/2017/12/my-year-in-cities-2017/ Sun, 31 Dec 2017 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2017/12/my-year-in-cities-2017/ After a very exhausting year of travel in 2016, this year was deliberately more relaxed with “only” 60,553 miles flown. Saskatoon, Canada* San Francisco, CA* Pittsburgh, PA* Bothell, WA Agra, India Delhi, India Marshall, CA^ Beaverton, OR* Half Moon Bay, CA^ Monterey, CA^ Carmel Valley, CA Carmel, CA^ New York City, NY Hicksville, NY Glendale, AZ Anchorage, AK Seward, AK Seattle, WA^ Klamath Falls, OR Kirkland, WA* Orlando, FL Sydney, Australia Toronto, Canada^ Amsterdam, Netherlands Berlin, Germany One or more nights spent in each place, with the exception of day trips marked with a ^. https://sunilgarg.com/2016/12/my-year-in-cities-2016/ Sat, 31 Dec 2016 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2016/12/my-year-in-cities-2016/ International jetsetting continued this year, with 141,349 miles flown! This is the first year that my travels extended outside of a single hemisphere, hence the rectangular map. Luquillo, PR San Juan, PR^ San Francisco, CA* Beaverton, OR* Seattle, WA^ Bangalore, India* Gurgaon, India* New Delhi, India^ Mumbai, India Anaheim, CA Walnut, CA^ Yorba Linda, CA^ Newport Beach, CA^ New Orleans, LA Amsterdam, Netherlands Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates^ Kolkata, India* Cupertino, CA^ Saskatoon, SK* Bangkok, Thailand Ko Samui, Thailand Whistler, BC Pemberton, BC^ Vancouver, BC^ Richmond, BC Portland, OR Detroit, MI^ Shelby Charter Township, MI Sterling Heights, MI^ Troy, MI^ Romulus, MI Laguna Hills, CA Los Angeles, CA Jakarta, Indonesia Singapore St. https://sunilgarg.com/2015/12/my-year-in-cities-2015/ Thu, 31 Dec 2015 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2015/12/my-year-in-cities-2015/ With several trips across the North Pole, shuttling between San Francisco and India, I flew 104,028 miles this year. A new record! Cabarete, Dominican Republic San Francisco, CA* Beaverton, OR* Kirkland, WA* Seattle, WA^ Half Moon Bay, CA^ Mill Valley, CA^ South Lake Tahoe, CA^ Stateline, NV El Dorado Hills, CA^ Occidental, CA Guerneville, CA^ Vancouver, Canada Woodburn, OR^ Hyderabad, India Gurgaon, India* Bangalore, India* Saskatoon, Canada San Diego, CA* Laguna Hills, CA^ Mission Viejo, CA^* Chula Vista, CA^* Montreal, Canada* New York, NY Puertos Morelos, Mexico Agra, India Santa Cruz, CA^ Rancho Cucamonga, CA Las Vegas, NV Oakland, CA^* Los Banos, CA^ Los Angeles, CA^ Anaheim, CA Kolkata, India* Kharagpur, India San Juan, PR^ Humacao, PR Luquillo, PR One or more nights spent in each place, with the exception of day trips marked with a ^. https://sunilgarg.com/2014/12/my-year-in-cities-2014/ Wed, 31 Dec 2014 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2014/12/my-year-in-cities-2014/ Earlier this year, in a somewhat unexpected plot twist, I changed jobs and moved from Seattle to San Francisco. Since then, I’ve been exploring the Bay Area and also made frequent trips to visit family and friends in Portland, San Diego, and Seattle. Despite spending most of the year on the West Coast, I managed to fly 55,156 miles this year, which was the most since 2009! I’m finishing off the year on a beach in the Dominican Republic and am looking forward to whatever’s in store for 2015. https://sunilgarg.com/2013/12/my-year-in-cities-2013/ Tue, 31 Dec 2013 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2013/12/my-year-in-cities-2013/ This year’s travel was an enjoyable mix of work and pleasure, with highlights including a cruise to Alaska, two-week vacation in Argentina and Brazil, and lots of short trips shuttling up and down the West Coast. I flew 41,795 miles over the course of the year, which was pretty similar to the last few years. Many destinations kept bringing me back, including 13 trips to Oregon, 10 trips to California, and 5 trips to British Columbia. https://sunilgarg.com/2012/12/my-year-in-cities-2012/ Mon, 31 Dec 2012 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2012/12/my-year-in-cities-2012/ A year ago, I was excited to be leaving for France. That experience took me across Western and Central Europe over the course of four months, and dominates the list of cities I visited this year. I rounded out the year with some travel for work and more fun. By the numbers, I visited 55 cities in 18 countries, rode 65 trains (hooray for Eurail!), and flew 52,976 miles. Beaverton, OR* Luxembourg City, Luxembourg* Metz, France* Paris, France* Strasbourg, France Colmar, France^ Stockholm, Sweden^ Sollentuna, Sweden Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland Venice, Italy Florence, Italy Pisa, Italy^ Rome, Italy Vatican City, Holy See^ Pompeii, Italy^ Heidelberg, Germany Atlanta, GA Alpharetta, GA^ Versailles, France^ Barcelona, Spain Monistrol de Montserrat, Spain^ Nice, France Eze, France^ Monte-Carlo, Monaco^ Cannes, France^ Brussels, Belgium* Amsterdam, Netherlands London, England Budapest, Hungary Vienna, Austria Prague, Czech Republic Berlin, Germany Seattle, WA* George, WA Bothell, WA Eugene, OR Bend, OR North Bend, WA^ Camas, WA^ El Dorado Hills, CA Vancouver, Canada^ Richmond, Canada Troy, NY Cambridge, MA Sunnyvale, CA Cupertino, CA^ San Francisco, CA Pleasanton, CA^ Berkeley, CA^ Chennai, India* Bangalore, India Mumbai, India Agra, India Toronto, Canada^ Pickering, Canada One or more nights spent in each place, with the exception of day trips marked with a ^. https://sunilgarg.com/2011/12/my-year-in-cities-2011/ Sat, 31 Dec 2011 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2011/12/my-year-in-cities-2011/ Another year is ending, so it’s time for another summary of the year in travel. I spent 2011 mainly shuttling between Atlanta and the Pacific Northwest, with the big exception being a short trip to Ghana for research. This year’s travel resulted in 41,287 miles flown, about the same as last year. I’m very much looking forward to spending my final semester of grad school in at Georgia Tech’s campus in Metz, France starting next week. https://sunilgarg.com/2010/12/my-year-in-cities-2010/ Fri, 31 Dec 2010 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2010/12/my-year-in-cities-2010/ This year began with a flurry of travel for job interviews and grad school visits, and then was relatively quiet once I graduated and returned to Portland in the spring. In August, I moved to Atlanta to begin grad school, and finished the year off with some conference travel and tourism. By the numbers, I didn’t fly nearly as many miles as I did last year, with a total of 40,340 miles flown. https://sunilgarg.com/2010/09/how-to-write-a-personal-statement-for-grad-school/ Sat, 25 Sep 2010 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2010/09/how-to-write-a-personal-statement-for-grad-school/ This post is based on an answer I recently contributed to Quora. I’ve been wanting to write a comprehensive guide to computer science grad school admissions (like the ones by Mor Harchol-Balter or Justine Sherry) for a while now – rather than letting such a large task intimidate me any longer, perhaps it’ll actually happen if I post it in pieces. By the time you begin applying to grad school, the single piece of your application that you have full control over is your statement of purpose. https://sunilgarg.com/2010/08/a-lesson-in-brevity/ Sun, 29 Aug 2010 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2010/08/a-lesson-in-brevity/ I recently sent Comcast an inquiry which said “I just signed up for service. What is my account number?” Their response, which follows, is so incredibly verbose that I feel compelled to share it with the world. I must say, though, that my experience with Comcast in Atlanta has been nothing short of stellar. They installed service at my new apartment within a day, gave me a great deal, and I’m getting far more bandwidth than I was promised. https://sunilgarg.com/2009/12/my-year-in-cities-2009/ Wed, 30 Dec 2009 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2009/12/my-year-in-cities-2009/ 2009 is coming to a close, which means that it’s time for a recap of the year’s travels. This was yet another year that brought many surprises. In January, I began working on MultiLearn as a capstone project in CSE 477. Thanks to very generous support from our advisors and sponsors, the project resulted in lots of travel. Combining those trips with a few others, I flew 79,661 miles this year, which falls well beyond my previous record from 2007. https://sunilgarg.com/2009/06/homelessness-in-america/ Tue, 30 Jun 2009 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2009/06/homelessness-in-america/ Earlier this month, I had the incredibly humbling experience of attending a presentation by Mark Horvath, creator of invisiblepeople.tv, who has dedicated himself to sharing the stories of homeless people in America. Like many others, my interaction with homeless people has generally consisted of me walking past them on the streets of supposedly thriving cities like Seattle and Portland. What’s more, most of us have adopted a negative stereotype towards the homeless, having dealt with relentless beggars, witnessed drug addicts, and read stories about people who make thousands by begging at highway onramps. https://sunilgarg.com/2009/05/my-favorite-talks-from-ignite-seattle-6/ Fri, 22 May 2009 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2009/05/my-favorite-talks-from-ignite-seattle-6/ Over the past couple years, I’ve attended a few events hosted by various members of the Seattle tech community. Most of them are focused on running and promoting startup companies, but last month I had the chance to attend one that was purely centered around encouraging creative expression: Ignite Seattle. If you aren’t familiar with Ignite, it’s a series of talks which are 5 minutes presentations, each with 20 auto-advancing slides. https://sunilgarg.com/2009/03/the-case-for-shared-computing/ Thu, 26 Mar 2009 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2009/03/the-case-for-shared-computing/ My elementary school’s computer lab probably had 50 computers, where we frequently played Oregon Trail and made flashy presentations in HyperStudio. My middle school had a lab of iMacs and rolling carts full of brand new iBooks. My high school had hundreds of PCs available for use in computer labs, classrooms, and even in the hallways. Needless to say, as I grew up, I always had individual access to computers and never needed to share. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/12/my-year-in-cities-2008/ Wed, 31 Dec 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/12/my-year-in-cities-2008/ This year brought another study abroad trip and a road trip in Canada. With a total of 22,366 miles flown, a bit less than 2007, here are the cities where I spent my time this year. Beaverton, OR* Seattle, WA* Vancouver, Canada New Delhi, India Satoli, Uttarakhand, India* Corbett National Park, India Binsar, Uttarakhand, India Jageshwar, Uttarakhand, India Noida, India Agra, India Pickering, Canada* Montreal, Canada Quebec City, Canada One or more nights spent in each place. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/12/blame-it-on-dreamhost./ Mon, 15 Dec 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/12/blame-it-on-dreamhost./ Wondering what happened to this website and many others? Here’s an excerpt from an email that Dreamhost just sent me: Unfortunately, because of the file server problems, in order to get your sites back up, you will now need to REUPLOAD all your content. We are still trying to recover the data from peeler, but at this point it looks like that process may take a few days, if it is even possible at all. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/12/painting-india-on-the-silver-screen/ Thu, 04 Dec 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/12/painting-india-on-the-silver-screen/ First, a lesson in how to make a movie sound cheesy and boring: The story of how impoverished Indian teen Jamal Malik became a contestant on the Hindi version of “Who Wants to be A Millionaire?” – an endeavor made without prize money in mind, rather, an effort to prove his love for his friend Latika, who is an ardent fan of the show. [imdb] While that sentence does not misrepresent the movie, Slumdog Millionaire is far more than a romantic game show appearance. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/11/this-is-our-moment./ Tue, 04 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/11/this-is-our-moment./ America, we have come so far. We have seen so much. But there is so much more to do. So tonight, let us ask ourselves - if our children should live to see the next century; if my daughters should be so lucky to live as long as Ann Nixon Cooper, what change will they see? What progress will we have made? This is our chance to answer that call. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/10/in-the-netherlands-i-fight-stains/ Wed, 22 Oct 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/10/in-the-netherlands-i-fight-stains/ While I was in Amsterdam last year, I came across Sunil brand laundry detergent at the grocery store, which was pretty cool. I just found some of their ads on YouTube, which I feel compelled to post here, if for no other reason than that they contain my name. Here’s an old black and white ad: In this one, I fight stains with martial arts: I have no idea what they’re saying. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/08/board-game-blasphemy/ Tue, 19 Aug 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/08/board-game-blasphemy/ New replaces old. From MSNBC: Toy maker Hasbro Inc. has updated its classic Clue game for today’s tabloid culture to include younger characters, more weapons, and new rooms, including a spa and guest house. The six characters’ last names remain the same, but their first names and bios have been updated. For example, Miss Scarlet is now Kasandra Scarlet, a famous actress often featured in tabloids. And Mr. Green is now Jacob Green, an African-American “with all the ins. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/08/whrrl-plus-twitter-is-here./ Tue, 19 Aug 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/08/whrrl-plus-twitter-is-here./ Look what I made: I just wrote a post on the Whrrl blog announcing a feature I recently built as part of my summer internship at Pelago, which lets you share the places you go with your followers on Twitter. Check it out! You can also follow me and Whrrl on Twitter, if you’d like. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/07/deceptive-packaging/ Thu, 24 Jul 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/07/deceptive-packaging/ For the record, I disagree with Minute Maid’s decision to devote less than 0.3% of this carton’s area towards indicating that its contents are from concentrate. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/07/why-whrrl-is-so-awesome/ Sun, 20 Jul 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/07/why-whrrl-is-so-awesome/ If I’ve talked to you since I started working at Pelago last month, chances are that I’ve told you to go join Whrrl. Apart from not having an “i” in its name, Whrrl has many traits, which usually get condensed into the one-liner description of “location-based social network”. Unsurprisingly, that isn’t immediately interesting to most people, given the number of existing options, so I thought I’d use this space to showcase some of what makes Whrrl so unique and powerful. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/07/how-to-analyze-public-speakers/ Tue, 15 Jul 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/07/how-to-analyze-public-speakers/ During my senior year of high school, I attended a weekly seminar on Media, Politics, and Public Speaking. Every week, we would have a politician from the Portland area, such as Brad Avakian or David Wu, speak to us for the first half of class. Not only did these interactions serve as great exposure to local politics, but our instructors used the time to help us become more media savvy by asking us to reflect upon and analyze what we heard after the speaker had left. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/07/everyday-india/ Thu, 10 Jul 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/07/everyday-india/ Before and during my recent trip to India, many of my friends encouraged me to blog because they wanted to hear about what I was up to. It turns out that I didn’t do the best job of writing frequently and ended up with a grand total of three posts. For those of you who are still curious, however, I found something much better! Yesterday morning, Boing Boing linked to a profile of Nehru Place on Our Delhi Struggle, an awesome blog written by two New Yorkers currently who are living and working in Delhi. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/07/waste-management-in-an-age-of-disposable-goods/ Tue, 08 Jul 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/07/waste-management-in-an-age-of-disposable-goods/ Last month, I visited Goonj, a Delhi-based NGO which began in 1998 with a focus on the reuse of clothing. Now a decade old, the organization distributes over 20,000 kilograms of material ranging from clothes to school supplies to computers throughout South Asia every month. Though I was primarily there to evaluate the possibilities of partnering Ujaala’s efforts in the Pacific Northwest with Goonj, the feature of my visit was a tour of their sorting facilities, which turned out to be quite an impressive operation. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/05/wild-elephants-and-tigers-oh-my/ Tue, 20 May 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/05/wild-elephants-and-tigers-oh-my/ In mid-April, our group decided to take a trip to Corbett National Park, which is a large and famous tiger reserve in southern Uttarakhand. Our visit was an incredible learning experience, as it not only provided an opportunity to view rare wildlife but also to consider some important issues regarding park management and ecotourism. While in the park, I noticed many tenuous issues, especially with regards to the park’s heavy regulation of tourist activity and its relationship with the surrounding community. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/04/blogging-from-the-himalayas/ Tue, 08 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/04/blogging-from-the-himalayas/ This quarter, I’m studying abroad with the UW South Asia Center in India’s mountainous northern province of Uttarakhand. Along with 11 other students from Seattle, I will be studying forest ecology, sustainable development, and culture of the Kumaon region, over a span of ten weeks. In addition, we will be working closely with Chirag, a well-established non-governmental organization in Uttarakhand which works to promote development in the area. Every time I travel to India, I begin to convince myself that I’ve become accustomed to the 20+ hour journey. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/02/note-to-self/ Thu, 28 Feb 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/02/note-to-self/ Don’t generalize results after testing web applications in a pre-release browser, even if the browser is an incredible improvement over its predecessor and doesn’t seem to have any major bugs in “normal” use. https://sunilgarg.com/2008/01/so-you-think-you-can-start-a-non-profit/ Thu, 31 Jan 2008 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2008/01/so-you-think-you-can-start-a-non-profit/ Over the past few years, I’ve worked with many non-profit organizations as a volunteer or board member. Most recently, I joined with some friends to found Ujaala, an organization that aims to support other organizations in India through projects that are locally actionable by volunteers in the US. (We didn’t want to focus our efforts on simply sending money overseas. Instead, we want to engage the local community in order to build awareness of the needs and issues affecting people in India. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/12/my-year-in-cities-2007/ Mon, 31 Dec 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/12/my-year-in-cities-2007/ Over the past year, I studied in Europe, visited 3 countries and 5 cities for the first time, went on my first business trip, traveling by land, air, and sea. I flew 29,066 miles – that’s all the way around the equator and a bit more! I couldn’t have predicted any of this in December 2006, so let’s just wait and see what 2008 brings. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/12/word-of-the-year/ Tue, 11 Dec 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/12/word-of-the-year/ Merriam-Webster has named “W00t” the Word of the Year for 2007. Merriam-Webster’s president, John Morse, said “w00t” was an ideal choice because it blends whimsy and new technology. S3ri0usly? Purists of “l33t speak” often substitute a “7” for the final “t,” expressing a “w007” of victory — an “in your face” of sorts — when they defeat an online gaming opponent. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/11/a-weeklong-experiment-with-facebook-flyers-pro/ Mon, 05 Nov 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/11/a-weeklong-experiment-with-facebook-flyers-pro/ Last Monday, in an attempt to promote our Facebook application while experimenting with Facebook’s advertising platform, I signed up for Flyers Pro, a low-cost CPC-based service that allows users to purchase targeted advertisements on Facebook. Over the course of one week, my flyer received 2,108 impressions and zero clicks. Starting with almost 1000 on the first day, daily impressions steadily declined as the week progressed, probably because Facebook’s algorithm saw that they weren’t making any money on this flyer. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/10/introducing-my-college-apps/ Tue, 23 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/10/introducing-my-college-apps/ Over the past month or so, Clint, Erik, and I have been working on a Facebook application that allows people to track, share, and discuss their college applications with friends on Facebook. After learning a great deal about the Facebook API and Ruby on Rails, we launched yesterday, and are gaining users with every passing hour. Check it out! https://sunilgarg.com/2007/10/enable-two-finger-scrolling-in-ubuntu/ Sun, 07 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/10/enable-two-finger-scrolling-in-ubuntu/ Here’s a small hack I stumbled across in the Ubuntu Forums: you can enable support for two-finger scrolling on your Synaptics touchpad with a couple lines added to the “synaptics” section of your /etc/xorg.conf. Option "VertTwoFingerScroll" "1" Option "HorizTwoFingerScroll" "1" Here’s what the entire section looks like for me: Section "InputDevice" Identifier "Synaptics Touchpad" Driver "synaptics" Option "SendCoreEvents" "true" Option "Device" "/dev/psaux" Option "Protocol" "auto-dev" Option "HorizScrollDelta" "0" Option "VertTwoFingerScroll" "1" Option "HorizTwoFingerScroll" "1" EndSection There are a lot more options described in the forum thread linked above, like assigning a different mouse click to each corner of the touchpad. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/08/net-neutrality-for-web-browsers/ Wed, 29 Aug 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/08/net-neutrality-for-web-browsers/ Now that planning for Firefox 3 is well underway, Asa Dotzler, Mozilla Corporation’s Director of Community Development, has restarted the public discussion about what features should remain, go, or be added in future releases of Firefox. Among other questionable ideas, such as removing the “View Page Source” feature and “Character Encoding” menus from Firefox’s default build, he suggests that a version of AdBlock be included. While I respect the idea that people should view content as they want to, such a decision by Mozilla could take us down a slippery path towards moderated content for two reasons: https://sunilgarg.com/2007/08/amsterdam-a-refreshing-look-at-transportation/ Mon, 20 Aug 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/08/amsterdam-a-refreshing-look-at-transportation/ Having grown up watching the Portland area adapt to its rapidly growing population through road and freeway expansions, numerous MAX lines, a Streetcar, an aerial tram, and commuter rail, all in combination with lots of new construction, I’ve always been interested how cities are designed in advance to support their future inhabitants. Dutch transportation infrastructure is designed in a unique way which supports access to members of every strata of society. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/08/long-time-no-post/ Tue, 07 Aug 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/08/long-time-no-post/ According to Technorati, it’s been a full 75 days since my last post on this blog. That’s quite a long time. Since then: I finished my freshman year of college. I interned with a pretty cool group at Intel and attended Research@Intel Day in Santa Clara. I got on a plane and flew to Amsterdam, where I’m posting from now. When I was originally thinking about starting a “serious” blog, Rajat’s first response was that I needed to define what I would write about. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/05/a-practice-interview/ Wed, 23 May 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/05/a-practice-interview/ I have always been a little apprehensive about conducting interviews, since I’ve never been in a position where I think the time I’m asking of someone else would be worth giving up for them. In this case, however, it was a good experience. We were assigned to conduct an interview to practice for ones we might be conducting while researching in Amsterdam, using Dr. Philip N. Howard’s in-depth research format. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/05/reflections-on-murder-in-amsterdam/ Wed, 23 May 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/05/reflections-on-murder-in-amsterdam/ At some point in each of its seasons, 24 has done a excellent job in showing what the US might look like as its population retaliates against a certain segment of people, which usually turns out to be the American Muslim community. Questions regarding Fox’s accuracy and biases aside, Ian Buruma seems to have done the same, except that in this case, the scenario is real. Buruma effectively illustrates the shocked response to the murder of Theo van Gogh as a juxtaposition against Amsterdam’s philosophy of pragmatic tolerance. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/05/blogs-control-financial-markets/ Thu, 17 May 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/05/blogs-control-financial-markets/ Yesterday afternoon, Engadget published a (false) rumor that Apple was going to significantly delay the release of iPhone and Leopard. Apple’s market cap fell by $4 billion within 6 minutes. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/05/ethnographic-research-more-questions/ Mon, 14 May 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/05/ethnographic-research-more-questions/ The questions never stop. We began by identifying areas of interest, then created research groups, tried to come up with a research question, and are now trying to design a research method. Today’s post brings about three questions: What is our study group? In order to make the most of our month in Amsterdam, we will need to find a convenient group that is easily accessible, and large enough to draw reasonable conclusions from. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/05/defining-and-implementing-e-research-techniques/ Wed, 02 May 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/05/defining-and-implementing-e-research-techniques/ research, _n._1 1. The act of searching (closely or carefully) for or after a specified thing or person. [oed] If E-Research is simply the use of the Internet in research methods, it could be any of the following: using an online card catalog to find relevant books using Google to find relevant web content using any number of other webapps for experiment execution or analysis Unless the object of study is actually the Internet, or some phenomena occurring on it, it doesn’t seem like these tools actually change research methods more than they aid them, by providing unparalleled access to information and analysis of just about anything, whether it be the last hour’s news or an eighteenth-century scientific survey. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/does-tolerance-require-ironic-consequences/ Mon, 30 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/does-tolerance-require-ironic-consequences/ As has been made evident by numerous incidents in our world’s history, it can be difficult for members of society to peacefully tolerate viewpoints that are extremely different or at odds with their own, regardless of the provisions that society has made for free speech and thought. In Murder in Amsterdam, Ian Buruma suggests that second generation immigrants become isolated and thus make extreme alliances because of an alienation from both Dutch culture and that of their parents. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/a-self-portrait/ Wed, 25 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/a-self-portrait/ Perhaps this is a new blog meme. How someone might see me: Subject: Student Sex: Male Age: 18-20, partially based on the expected age of an undergraduate student. Race: Indian Religion: Not apparent, though a string around the right wrist might suggest something. Clothes: Subject wore pants, shirt, and a jacket. The clothes fit fairly well. The pants were a pair of blue denim jeans, fairly standard for an American college student his age; they were not torn or distressed. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/the-informational-city/ Wed, 18 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/the-informational-city/ In Understanding Amsterdam, Manuel Castells discusses the change of urban structure in response to the advancement information technology, claiming that “the coming of a technological revolution centered on information technologies, the formation of a global economy, the transition to a new society, that […] replaces the industrial society as the framework of social institutions.” Seattle is probably a good example of a city currently undergoing that shift. As a city that began with the goal of becoming a great trading port, and rose to that status through an economy focused on lumber and shipbuilding, it has become a place where people “come for the jobs at cutting-edge companies such as Microsoft and Amgen” and thus the best-educated city in the United States. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/the-olympic-sculpture-park/ Mon, 16 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/the-olympic-sculpture-park/ Get out now. Not just outside, but beyond the rap of the programmed electronic age so gently closing around so many people at the end of our century. Go outside, move deliberately, then relax, slow down, and look around. Do not jog. Do not run…Walk. Stroll. Saunter…Explore. Heeding the words of John Stilgoe in Outside Lies Magic, a few of us went to the Seattle Art Museum’s relatively new Olympic Sculpture Park yesterday morning to make observations regarding wayfinding in urban spaces, in order to help us develop a question for research in Amsterdam. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/colleges-pushing-credit-cards/ Wed, 11 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/colleges-pushing-credit-cards/ CNN reports that most public college campuses have signed deals with lenders to gain a portion of the revenue from credit cards offered on campus. (via Consumerist) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/few-spammers-out-there/ Wed, 11 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/few-spammers-out-there/ Richard Clayton from the University of Cambridge suggests that there are only a few large gangs responsible for most of the spam on the Internet. Tracking them down could be a much easier task than finding the supposed thousands of small spammers. (via Schneier) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/wayfinding-online/ Wed, 11 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/wayfinding-online/ In looking at how people interact and “move” in the online world, there are infinitely many places to look for examples to evaluate. First off, a user’s browsing patterns are clearly and intimately visible on the page of any active del.icio.us account. Not only is a viewer given a clear idea of the user’s personal interests, one can infer how a user moves between noteworthy sites through both time and cyberspace. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/creating-a-research-group/ Mon, 09 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/creating-a-research-group/ As is rather apparent at this point, I’m quite interested in utilizing the resources of the Virtual Knowledge Studio to conduct research related to the flow of information online and the social implications which follow. Of course, this range of interest is extremely broad, and I am definitely open to a topic that is outside of the range I outlined in my previous post. In particular, the discussion of virtual wayfinding techniques and the question as to how national identities are presented online have piqued my interest. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/google-411/ Fri, 06 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/google-411/ Google has launched its own free 411 service, in direct competition with Tellme and 1-800-Free-411. They’ll even connect your call to the business you’re looking for. “Just dial 1-800-GOOG-411 (1-800-466-4411) from any phone.” (via TechCrunch) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/finding-fake-photos/ Thu, 05 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/finding-fake-photos/ Science News describes how Dartmouth computer scientist Hany Farid can detect manipulated photographs by using software to find anomalies in a forged image. (via BoingBoing) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/the-coop/ Thu, 05 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/the-coop/ Following in the footsteps of Flock, Mozilla is developing The Coop to add social networking functionality to Firefox. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/wep-is-insecure/ Thu, 05 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/wep-is-insecure/ WEP encryption can be cracked in under two minutes. It’s not really “wired equivalent privacy,” as the name would have you think. Make sure your access points are set to WPA or WPA2! https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/more-dst-brings-no-energy-savings/ Tue, 03 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/more-dst-brings-no-energy-savings/ While it required great efforts to write and apply patches for our timekeeping devices, the change in Daylight Savings Time has not had “any measurable impact” on energy consumption. (via Kottke) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/questioning-the-internets-social-implications/ Mon, 02 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/questioning-the-internets-social-implications/ A large component of the trip to Amsterdam consists of social research in the region. We will be working with the Virtual Knowledge Studio, which is a relatively new Dutch think tank concerned with the evolving use of technology in research. I’m particularly interested in how technology usage patterns differ in various regions of the world. For instance, the use of mobile phones differs greatly between most continents. These differences are especially evident when looking at their use in various regions of the developing world. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/the-itunes-store-now-without-drm/ Mon, 02 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/the-itunes-store-now-without-drm/ Apple has announced that EMI’s entire catalog will be available without DRM on the iTunes Music Store, at a 30-cent premium over the currently available copy-protected music files. Is this the beginning of a new future for online music sales? (via BoingBoing) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/google-tisp/ Sun, 01 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/04/google-tisp/ Google TiSP (BETA) is a fully functional, end-to-end system that provides in-home wireless access by connecting your commode-based TiSP wireless router to one of thousands of TiSP Access Nodes via fiber-optic cable strung through your local municipal sewage lines. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/03/tolerance-and-submission/ Wed, 28 Mar 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/03/tolerance-and-submission/ In preparation for my study abroad journey to Amsterdam this summer, I will be posting on topics relevant to the trip, specifically looking at Dutch culture and pragmatic tolerance. This marks the first post in a series of what I hope to be many. A viewing of Submission, a short film written by Ayaan Hirsi Ali and directed by Theo van Gogh, evokes many responses. The film, while not very artistically stimulating, details the story of a young Muslim woman who was married by her parents through arranged marriage to a man she felt no attachment to. https://sunilgarg.com/2007/03/sunils-got-a-blog/ Tue, 27 Mar 2007 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/2007/03/sunils-got-a-blog/ In the past few years, the blogosphere has gone from zero to sixty million. My goal for this blog is not to simply add more noise to the deafening crowd, but to publish something relevant to a significant portion of the general public. As Lawrence Lessig writes in Free Culture, an internet created and moderated by users like ourselves carries the potential to revolutionize the way we seek and value information: https://sunilgarg.com/about/ Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/about/ Hi, I’m Sunil Garg. I’m a software engineer at Uber in Seattle. I’ve also worked at Amazon.com, Intel, Pelago, and Vernier Software. I studied computer science at the University of Washington and at Georgia Tech. I grew up in Beaverton, Oregon, where I graduated from Southridge High School in 2006. I started this blog in 2007 to publish my thoughts about the things I’m interested in, and try to do so on a semi-regular basis. https://sunilgarg.com/research/ Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000 sunil@sunilgarg.com (Sunil Garg) https://sunilgarg.com/research/ I was a graduate student at Georgia Tech, where I worked in the Technology and International Development Lab and was advised by Michael Best. My research interests lie at the intersection of human-computer interaction (HCI) and technology for developing regions (ICTD). As an undergraduate student at the University of Washington, I was an active member of the Change group and worked on MultiLearn under the direction of Richard Anderson and Joyojeet Pal.