umo

UMO '07 – A Retrospective

December 4, 2007 Design

I had promised to keep you guys posted from Hyderabad but some things did not work out as I had planned. The data card didn’t work and I was left (fuming) without an internet connection. To make my matters worse, my camera stopped working and I could not take pictures from the event.

Back to the story. The conference was being held in the spacious environs of the Indian School of Business (ISB) in the Khemka Auditorium. The scheduled start was 8:30 am but it got delayed and finally kicked-off nearly 2 hours later. When we reached the place early morning, the banners were not yet displayed and we were completely lost. The chief guest for the event was Ravi Pooviah, my long time idol and a professor from IDC-IIT. This year UMO (Usability Matters.org) was exploring the theme of health innovation and therefore the guests from medical to software industry were offered an opportunity to showcase their work in that field. Amongst the presentations Parmeshwar Raju’s lecture on Designing through a grid layout and Anirudha Joshi’s slides on devising User-experience metrics were found to be most interesting. I also enjoyed Shruti Agarwal’s discussion on SMOKEDOTE, which is an interactive game for smokers. The design of her slides was very creative indeed. Shruti’s a senior Visual Communications student at IDC-IIT.

The action for the next 2 days shifted to the Abridge Solutions’ training center where the Track I and II workshops were to be held. I had opted for Track I and Ravi Pooviah’s class on Information Visualization. It was the most fabulous experience for me and we were given in depth information on the basics of design and evolving concepts through the mind mapping exercise. On the sidelines, I had a long discussions with Ravi on the future of design and the education system in India which prevents raw talent to be recognized and instead considers the marks system to be the final judging factor. It’s a topic for another article from me so I will stop here. Overall, the experience of attending this event was good and looking forward to applying the knowledge at my work place soon.

A Night to Forget

November 29, 2007 General

It was a typical office day like any other but it ended in a disaster which I must try hard and forget. My data card – that magic thing which allows you wireless internet access (on a laptop) through a SIM card got me into deep trouble. The antenna that’s used to catch the signal wouldn’t come on and it had to be sent for repairs. After 10 days, the card was going to be delivered to me yesterday. Despite running a high fever sitting in the A/C, I decided to stay on since I was off to Hyderabad to attend the UMO 07 conference. I HAD to get that card to keep me connected and working there.

The card finally arrived late in the evening and I heaved a sigh of relief. My condition was depleting and besides I had to pack my things after reaching home. But it was not to be so. Soon after testing the card I realised that the vendor had forgotten to insert the SIM without which it would be impossible to connect. A crossfire between the local engineer and the vendor ensued with both parties disagreeing on the missing SIM. Each one denied having seen the card while the vendor adamantly defended his position. All this while I sat shivering and starving for a morsel of foodgrain and some antibiotics (*cough).

A solution had to be found since it was certain that the card would not be delivered on time for my trip. An older version was found and one of the engineers tried relentlessly to install it on my notebook but failed on each attempt. The drivers were outdated and clashed with Windows Vista. After 2 hours of battling the issue, I finally put my hands up and decided to walk off. I was in bad shape and was not sure if I could embark on my tour in this condition. Thankfully after consuming some of mum’s delicious food and popping a few pills, I woke up completely fit and healthy this morning. And more good news followed – the data card which I had been missing all along is also on its way and I am flying off in the next few hours. If everything goes well (and the card works as planned), I will keep you updated on the conference activities and stuff through my website on all the 3 days with some pictures as well. So wish me luck and see you soon.