05 Oct 2021
As usual, the first facebook is down intimation comes when you’re on whatsapp and suddenly you can’t send messages anymore. You wonder, is it my internet? Then after realisation that servers are down, you wait for few minutes to pass. Quickly switching to signal/telegram just when whatsapp is down is well, ah.
15 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour, 4 hours?! It’s 1:30 AM IST on 5 October right now. People are going crazy on twitter. I made my twitter account for the first time and hey look what I tweeted.
So what exactly has happened? So many discussions around. This is actually an interesting topic (Update: Cloudfare wrote an article about this, highly recommended).
It seems that facebook’s DNS names have stopped resolving. So, all the routes have disappeared and DNS are all offline. Facebook IP addresses still appear to be routed. But, that’s no use. Websites relying on facbeook have lost their way as well. So, what happens when you can’t connect to your nameserver? Apps fail to repond, and backend users can’t keep calm. They continously send requests, more than they would usually. Even I did that. This in turn increases load on DNS resolvers. I think that’s another problem. It’s funny, one small problem possibly caused this which had a domino effect causing this outage. Then over that, users create problems. Just shows how interconnected we are, in a good way. So many people, so many systems. Of course, the issue is much more complicated, but atleast we can try to understand it on the surface.
With this I remembered that when I was interning at Google, my host had explained how such outage problems cause frenzy in large companies. Facebook engineers, you can do this. The whole internet is feeling the heat of it.
On another note, I heard that facebook recruiters are still conducting interviews over phone at this time. Truly, modern problems require modern solutions.
Also god I’m sleepy.
06 Dec 2020
Functional programming, does the term not seem cool? This led me to explore what research area it came under in the past summer, then came my attempt to learn haskell. Programming languages it was, oh was there not so much.
I randomly came across this article about PLMW co-located with various conferences. This year it was all virtual and the workshop was aimed towards later undergrads and early grads navigating through re-search and the options they had. If accepted to the workshop, we would get a complimentary registration to the OOPSLA, ECOOP and all the conferences co-located with SPLASH 2020 virtually. I had never attended an academic conference (even though due to a lot of them being virtual offering free access; this one didn’t). I wanted to explore! I applied, and somewhere around the start of november I came to know that I had been accepted. Again, maybe it is much easier to accomodate more people virtually than in person?
Whatever it was, I was excited. I went around, attended talks and notes through the conference. I also tried to read few research papers (as much I could understand with my learning since I have to yet to actually take PL or adv PL/compilers course at my college). During the PLMW, I got to interact with a bunch of professors, researchers and PhD students – who had volunteered to be mentors for the workshop. They had these rooms with one mentor each which students could join, interact (with audio/video on) and then hop on to other rooms. I listened to students talking about their research and discussing. Various mentors also encouraged me to find professor at my college and get started with something - because me being a sophomore should not stop me from getting started with research at undergraduate level. A lot of them also named few professors from IIT Delhi when I mentioned I studied there, which made me re-realise that I do actually study CS at one of the best places in the country.
I’m most proud of myself asking questions at the workshop and conferences even though I was afraid due to my practically non-existing background. The mentors were really nice and warm. They understood my novice position. I also had the opportunity to talk to fellow mentee students. Grads students do have a good nerd sense of humour, it was fun. Thanks to the time-zones I was up until 1 am on a day for this workshop. This was such a new experience and it certainly helped instill preliminary interest in me regarding this research area.
I look forward to attending another virtual PLMW (possibly in a different format than this one) at POPL 2021.
20 Jul 2020
23 IITs. 7+ days. 13 sports events. Inter-IIT Sports Meet is the longest running inter-collegiate meet in India since 1961. It is one of the most prestigious events which IITs look forward to.
I represented IIT Delhi as a part of its athletics team in the 54th Inter-IIT Sports Meet held at IIT Kharagpur and IIT Bhubneswar. Our IIT’s overall contingent size was 155 members, which comprised of the best of the institute from first-year UG to PhD students, otherwise totalling a 10k+ population. Inter-IIT lives up to the name it holds, with athletes practicing all round the year to compete in it along with handling their rigorous academic curriculum. Every year, there are new records and better improvements. For most, in the front, there’s honour that comes with participating in the meet and at its back — hundreds of hours of practice and sweat put into perfecting that start, jump, goal or throw. Coaches put in the best to see their teams winning, always encouraging and pointing out mistakes. Before the meet in the holidays, we have several practice sessions throughout the day, special meal arrangements and also a final contingent dinner with the director and deans where they advice and wish us the best.
The 54th Inter-IIT Sports Meet was held from 14th to 22nd December, 2019. We landed in Kolkata in the noon hours of 12th December. It took us a 3 hour journey through bus to reach IIT Kharagpur. IIT Kharagpur, as it was known, was very isolated from the main city. Like the defending champions we had been, we were all determined to be the best this year as well. The living arrangements were very well taken care of. Spacious rooms with 3 students in one with new mattresses, pillows, blankets and a small bag of toiletries. Within a few hours of reaching the institute and settling we were back to the athletics track. A newly built beautiful synthetic track, named the Jnan Gosh Stadium. During that time, there were full teams of few IITs present, practicing. The best teams stay and practice together, a conclusion drawn from the results every year. We warmed up and had a feel of the track that day. We had to come to that track for the next 10 days everyday.
The next day was an exploration day. As our routine through the practice days, we were up early and on track to practice. This time there were more teams present, everyone engrossed in their practice. Like many in my team, it was my first meet and I was in awe seeing so many athletes practicing at once in their respective IIT’s tracksuits or jerseys. It felt so good, realizing that every one of them was going to compete for their IIT in the coming days. As every meet, there were talks. Talks of previous year winners, star players, predictions and expectations. The events were going to start the next day. Those with events had rest from practice the day before their event day. When practices came to end and it was cooldown time, music could be heard from various teams’ stretching areas. This then became a norm for all evening practices. Later that day, we were given our identity cards which had to be scanned for all the meals and other events. We were still getting used to our surroundings. Some liked the food, some didn’t; but everyone liked the environment.
The evening of 14th had the opening ceremony with speeches, march past and torch-lighting. There were athletes of all 23 IITs, in their tracksuits with their respective flags in front. As every contingent passed the stage, the hosts spoke about their respective IITs. Except as funny as it gets, they forgot to do that for us, as we were the first one to go being past year winners. The enthusiasm for what was to come was in the air.
And hence, the meet started. While a lot of events were held on 14th, athletics events were going to start on 15th. Athletics, basketball, cricket, hockey, football and more. When we were free, we slipped off to other sports events to watch them. Cheer for our team, or if not ours then for the teams playing. In Athletics, we cheered in every slot every day because we had players in all events. From heats to finals; running, jumping and throwing all mornings and evenings. We cheered and anticipated good results. Everyone did that for their institutes. There were mini celebrations everyday. Our track and field team was one of the best and what I learnt from my team was the integrity everyone showcased despite the results. It was the support and encouragement that everyone gave to each other which made our team what it was. Along with that, everyone had their fair share of enjoyment and fun when it wasn’t practice or event time. When it was helping time, we filled up glucose bottles, had snacks and took care of all the needs the participants from our team would require. Everyone whose event wasn’t on that day fell in the helping team. Being one of the only two freshers on the athletics team, I didn’t feel excluded even if I hadn’t known my team for long. While the respective teams were handled by their captains, the contingent was led by different heads who acted as bridge between different sports and were responsible to coordinate and give news of wins & losses. My event was high jump, and while I didn’t do good enough in the spur of the moment, my teammates and friends didn’t let me go down. Somewhere in between when we got time, we explored the campus, roamed around and discovered new things.
I’m rightmost column middle
Apart from the main events going on, there were other programmes too. We had two pronites featuring Jubin Nautiyal and Julia Bliss. I didn’t attend either but heard from others that they were quite fun. There were also other small activities in the days for entertainment. On the second last day, we had the Gala dinner night. The Gala dinner night is a tradition of the meet which is open to all participants. This time it had entry with our ID cards. There was dance, music and a lot of delicious food. While we were supposed to dress up all nice for this night, several of us ended up in our tracks because we had directly come after cheering and watching our basketball team win at the basketball court. It’s typical athlete behaviour to go everywhere in sportswear and many are proud of it.
There were injuries along with the wins and losses. In athletics, meet records were broken too. When all the athletics events ended, there were fireworks around the track, handshakes, dance and music. We emerged as winners in girls and runner up in boys. IIT Kharagpur vice-versa. The second runner’s up were IIT Kanpur. These were the full teams practicing on the very first evening. Overall in all sports, we emerged as runner’s up and IIT Kharagpur as winners. The last day marked the closing ceremony. Trophies and medals were given out and a lot of photos were taken. We ran on the track for the last time, and had informal races and jumps. Graduating seniors gave pep talks and motivation for the next meet. And even if the hosts were accused of bias towards their teams, IIT Kharagpur had been a good host and we thanked them for it. We left the campus that night to fly back, and thus this wonderful experience came to an end.
28 May 2020
I’m a rising sophomore. Our college semester is on hold, so I’m technically still a freshman. Our institution had instructed the entire student body to vacate the hostels in the middle of March. It’s been a quarantined summer vacation ever since.
Initially, I rejoiced the reprieve from the hectic college schedule at such short time notice. However, even if I do miss college once in a while, being at home this long has affected me for good. It has enabled me to try new activities which I previously wouldn’t have the time or mental bandwidth to attempt under my busy schedule.
Freshman summer, the summer of exploration.
One thing which I’ve come to do is writing. Writing here, writing for myself and about anything. Not only would it help me to refer back in future but it also helps me to articulate my thoughts well in the present. Reading goes hand in hand with writing. I read a lot on these holidays. Books, articles and papers; academic or non-academic. Some days I just binge on them. I do that often with other activities as well. I have had days when I was excessively absorbed with reading, completing online courses or just lazing around with Netflix. I also sometimes spend my time cooking or doing origami.
I was involved in various extra-currics back in college. Several clubs and societies shifted to activities online. The idea is to keep improving and have fun. I was involved in sports and music, so I by default work out and do vocal exercises. Various other clubs organise open-to-all sessions. I join occasionally, but I’m not particularly much interested. I also help manage an educational social initiative particularly for lockdown period which is handled by me and few of my friends.
I’m trying to learn. An idea which panned out well for me was the planning of summer beforehand so I wasn’t required to make decisions of what to do immediately. I’d already talked to a couple of professors at my college while being in campus to work on projects under them with my partner. Other than learning what’s required to do them, I read and work on anything that interests me. I read a few academic papers for the first time this summer and that has certainly been a nice new experience.
Recently, I developed more interest in music due to my involvement in my college’s music club as a vocalist. I’m beginning to learn music theory and learning to play violin. I always wanted to learn to play a violin.
I also have my motivation down several times. To do anything. I then end up doing nothing for a continuous string of days. Having a good and intelligent friends circle helps immensely. Not only on this front, but good talks and discussions go a long way as well.
I’d conclude that being content during this time is highly mood and phase dependent. The aim is to be more than just sane and reflect on self for good.
Quoting strange planet, “I don’t know how to use my life.”
20 May 2020
I don’t know how many drafts I have written over time which never were put anywhere. Some a lot better than the published ones, left under the keys of the keyboard. Hidden. Even these stories, they remain, not to be read by anyone. My mood varies. I mostly write here in the evening. I like evenings. I don’t even know when I should head to new paragraphs. Now?
Oh, does this look better? How do I hop such easily from thoughts to thoughts? But, it’s to be least cared about since this is a thoughts blog. I don’t even put it through grammarly. Funny. Proof reading seems effort taking. I just let it flow, what comes to my mind, I write. Sometimes I start thinking a lot. I start thinking how writing something would gratify any reader reading. But, with no recognition I come more and more to terms with how I write for myself. For posts I put up on platforms like Quora, I read it again and again even after it’s posted. I find a lot of mistakes there. I often don’t correct them because I don’t like to update once posted. I’m not good with words. I repeat terms and phrases. I don’t diversify my vocabulary. I read a lot but not with such focus to improve deliberatly on my writing style. My tenses. Present, past and future, I mess up with them in stories so bad. I break not-so-common grammar rules because sometimes it’s just the way it is. Yes, it should be good to read but I also want it to be better with respect to the language I’m writing in. Everything is also a part of self satisfaction, significantly that. A lot of people write, try writing. People write, publicise their writing. I don’t know how much of it is for themselves. I don’t like much of normally written poetry. Sorry, how did I get there.
I think I should start writing better, get my vocabulary fixed and learn phrases. Improve, because I like this. On anther side, I’m taking a music theory course and learning violin. My creative juices are certainly flowing this summer.
Let’s see where I get.