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Showing posts from February, 2015

Privacy in Internet - Avoid flash cookies

Due to some of the recent developments in the area, the browsers have a Do Not Track functionality which does not let the sites to identify a browser and ultimately you and your browsing habits. But the Ad providers are using Flash cookies which need to be blocked separately. The method here is to block all flash content in FireFox and let the user choose which flash content to run. This has another advantage that unnecessary flash Ads will also not be played and thus saving bandwidth. An 'Activate Adobe Flash' message will be shown over blocked content. So, if you want to play a flash, click on the link and view it. Open FireFox and press ctrl + shift + A to open Add-ons Manager. Find Shockwave flash in the list. Change the button to the right end to 'Ask to Activate'. Now if a site try to save flash cookie, you will see a notification below the address bar. You can now see how many of the sites you regularly visit are tracking you. NOTE: This method is also

Best way to get portable WiFi Internet in India for light or medium users

I think this post will benefit users who are thinking to get Internet in their mobile devices. If you are a light internet user and have multiple devices, one way you can choose is to tether your connection with your devices. This will drain battery on your device. Otherwise you will need to buy Internet packs on all the devices which will not be a cost-effective method. My plan is to have a single connection that can be shared with all the devices so that you need only one data plan and the devices will be connected with WiFi means less battery drain. The initial investment is a bit high though ;-) The devices you need are: GSM WiFi dongle that usually supports 5 - 10 devices to be connected at once. ( Sample ) USB power-bank. ( Sample ) BSNL GSM connection with Internet. I chose BSNL as this is the cheapest with Rs.155 for 1GB data as of now and will support both 3G and 2G on this pack. Setup is simple, slide in the SIM to the WiFi dongle and connect to a computer. You c

Pictures of Kanyakumari, Madurai and Aattukal temple from some books printed around 30-40 years back.

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Here are some pictures I found from the archives that are more than 30-40 years old. Kanyakumari (Cape comorin as it was known at that time) Cover page of the book Photo of Sunrise at Bay of Bengal Photo of Kanyakumari Devi Temple Madurai Cover page of the book Meenakshi amman Main entrance of Meenakshi Temple, Madurai The South Tower of Meenakshi Temple, Madurai The Music pillars of Meenakshi temple, Madurai Back cover of book. See the price. :-) Aattukal Temple, Thiruvananthapuram Front view of Rajagopuram, Attukal Temple Ambala Vinayakar, Attukal Temple These books have many other photos. If you like to see them, let me know.

Optimal settings for an iPhone to save battery (my experience)

There are lot of articles telling you to turn off many features in an iPhone to save battery and this is not one of those. I have been changing settings and get a best battery life for my iPhone 5c and with the following settings I am easily getting a 30 hour usage on a single charge. You can also try this. UPDATE : I have written another post on how to setup cheap portable wifi. Check here. Switch off the battery percentage indicator (Settings -> General -> Usage -> Battery Percentage) and do not check the phone constantly to see if you got a notification. Use a louder ring tone (Settings -> Sounds) so that you are notified and use vibration. Use Auto-Brightness (Settings -> Display & Brightness) and set the level to the minimum that is comfortable to you. Use smaller text Text Size (Settings -> Display & Brightness) suitable for you. This will help you to read faster. Group the less-commonly used icons in folders so that you can access the product

How is the price of some of products are kept constant for few years?

There is a joke about a person who is not concerned about the price of petrol. When asked he said "I don't care whether the price of petrol increase or decrease, I will only fill for Rs.100/-". Do you know most of us have done this for years, may not be petrol, but for most FMCG goods? Yes, if you notice the weight of the toothpaste that you have been using for years, you can see that it has been reduced while the price was maintained the same. As we are only checking the price usually, we do not notice a small difference in the weight. These are happening for lot of products. Try to keep a watch on the price and weight from now on and see the changes.