SDK vs IDE

What's SDK? A software development kit (SDK) is typically a set of development tools that allows a software engineer to create applications for a certain software package, software framework, hardware platform, computer system, video game console, operating system, or similar platform. And in many cases includes the IDE for the development What's an IDE? An integrated development environment (IDE) also known as integrated design environment or integrated debugging environment is a software application that provides comprehensive facilities to computer programmers for software development. An IDE normally consists of a: 1. Source code editor 2. Compiler and/or interpreter 3. Build automation tools 4. Debugger An IDE is actually used to write and test programs. Eg.: Microsoft Visual Studio, Turbo C++ professional An SDK adds functionality, lets you include the sample code, documentation. Eg.: Eclipse SDK(it comes with the IDE)   Therefore, SDK > IDE! Hmmm...whatever...

Bumptop - Physics on your desktop

I got a taste for Bumptop after my friend Vijay recommended Ted. TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is an invitation-only event where the world's leading thinkers and doers gather to find inspiration. But, videos of all the presentations at the event are available for free viewing. And the content on Ted is quite remarkably polished and innovations presented at TED are nothing short of praiseworthy.  Bumptop is the dream child of Anand Agarawala and was created at the University of Toronto. Currently the project is in private beta and is available for download only on an invite basis and I was lucky enough to get an invite. Here is the video from TED. The Beta version does almost most of what is shown in the video and is quite smooth and polished for beta version. You get a 3d room interface where you put your desktop icons and then you can just grow and shrink those icons using shortcut keys. The shortcuts are very easy learn and the interface is quite intuitive. But, I really think that touch interfaces would be the right arena to utilise bumptop to their fullest potential. The project makes complete use of the mouse and allows you to organize files on your desktop in best possible manner. Bumptop is actually a boon for people who tend to have a lot of files on their desktop and need to organize (or disorganize) them. The ability to stack documents, form grids/groups, view images by shuffling through them and allowing you hang priority docs on the walls, combined with the real life physics engine makes Bumptop a shining example of what true Innovation we can bring about even with the current technology. The collision detection system is really great and you would appreciate the way icons/others dangle when you hang them on the wall. Bumptop shows that innovation need not always be about new technology, it can be about using existing technology to do new things in newer ways. However, I did find that it ran faster on my slow XP machine with just 1GB of RAM than on my Vista machine with loads and loads of RAM + a Graphics card (Yeah, maybe I should turn anti aliasing off) Many of my friends asked me to give them an invite to Bumptop, but its not possible for a user to invite others and the only way to get Bumptop is to sign up for their invite at their site.  While I was waiting for the invite to come by, I did realize the existence of certain clones of Bumptop. One of them was Real Desktop. Real Desktop is quite a good product but the free version is extremely limited in what it offers and once you get an invite to Bumptop, you'll not go back to Real Desktop (even if you had paid for it). And before I forget! Here is what my desktop looks like now   [caption id="attachment_232" align="alignnone" width="150" caption="My bumptop interface"]

Ultimate Wishlist for Google Chrome

11 Items that Google Chrome really needs to give us.

1. Support for addons: Addons enable you to customize and personalize your browser, and make it suit your needs.
2. Enhanced compatibility with websites: Google chrome already does a good job at presenting most websites, still this is definitely an area for improvement
3. The ability to recognise RSS feeds and beam them straight into my brain: Honestly, I do not know why Google left out such a feature in the first place.
4. A Search box: True, the address bar is as good as a search bar, but what if I want to just search for something on Wikipedia, or ebay maybe?
5. Mouse Gestures? or maybe the ability to scroll pages with your mind.....
6. Multiple profile support: I really need this one, I love the Firefox profile manager...
7. mobile version of the browser: I would love to have one, and I guess millions of others would agree.
8. A Twitter Addon
9. Rendering holographic projections of websites, which you can view to complete your VR experience...
10. Support for stumbleupon: Stumbleupon is the remote control for the web and I really long to see the SU toolbar on Chrome
11. Maybe a menu bar, just an option for those who still like it....

Multiple instances of Google talk and Firefox

Firefox and Google talk are two apps which I cannot really manage without...but then what do you do if you share your PC with someone else? Maybe someone else at home. Each of us have our own collection of bookmarks, addons and of course logins. So you would need to get Firefox and Gtalk to run multiple instances. The secret to running them is to use Firefox's in built profile manager. We need to invoke the profile manager by changing the shortcut path on your desktop. Ideally, the target looks like this "C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe" Change it to

"C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe" -profilemanager.

"C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe"  -no-remote -profilemanager

"C:\Program Files\Google\Google Talk\googletalk.exe" /nomutex