Learning Sourashtra Script (Ramarai Script)

Thanks: Shri. O.S. Subramanian for taking the class for the benefit of all Sourashtrians, and uploading the video to youtube.

Vowels

Consonants, Vowel-Consonants, special characters

Vocabulary: evanescent

evanescent: vanishing, fading away.

e.g.

The latter two PML formulations have increased ability to absorb evanescent waves

Vocabulary: fissiparous

fissiparous - tending to break up into parts

Delaying and dodging to resolve the ethnic conflict in SriLanka, will lead to fissiparous tendencies to grow in various parts of India.

e.g. source: http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=27452

இன்றைய சொல்: விரைவூ‌க்க அ‌ட்டை

Smart Card - விரைவூ‌க்க அ‌ட்டை

போ‌க்குவர‌த்து‌த் துறை‌யி‌‌ன் சா‌ர்‌பி‌ல் ‌விரைவூ‌க்க அ‌ட்டை (SMART CARD) மூல‌ம் ஓ‌ட்டுந‌ர் உ‌ரிம‌ம் ம‌ற்று‌ம் வாகன‌ப் ப‌திவு‌ச் சா‌ன்‌றித‌ழ் வழ‌ங்கு‌ம் ‌தி‌ட்ட‌த்தை முத‌ல்வ‌ர் கருணா‌நி‌தி இ‌ன்று தொட‌ங்‌கி வை‌த்தா‌ர்.

e.g. source: http://tamil.webdunia.com/newsworld/news/tnnews/0811/10/1081110051_1.htm

Ambani - Audio Book

After finishing Madan's கி.மு.-கி.பி. audio book (excellent writing, I enjoyed everybit of it), I started listening Ambani audio book.  The writing (N Chokkan) was good and also K Charles voice.  In the beginning the pronunciation of Dhirubai Ambani was such that "Thiru Bai Ampaani", but immediately it was corrected after 3rd or 4th instance I guess.   Some time Ambani was pronounced as Ampaani and other times Ambaani.  I think Ambaani is the correct pronunciation and not Ampaani.  In future, Kizhakku editorial can advice the person who is going to voice, the correct pronunciation of important characters/place names in the book (at least for the name often repeated). For e.g. the pronunciation of "Moncada (Barracks)" was different in Fidel Castro book and Che Book though both was narrated (voice) by K Charles.  Visible disturbances (such as தொண்டையை சரி செய்தல்) can be edited in post-processing.  I noticed it only in 1 instance (some where in Ambani book) out of the 6 audio books I listened so far.  I hope Kizhakku is reviewing the audio book at least once after the recording, to see any visible mistakes such as reading the wrong word (I noticed this once not sure in which book, I think Fidel Castro or Che book, the voicer  repeated some other word instead of the word in printing; some time it happens for every one, we have a word in mind, but end up in swapping or repeating some other word, especially when we talk fast or too excited). 

Overall the audio books has made me to read (o.k. to listen) more books (especially when it is in Tamil).  Now started to listen Tipu Sultan (written by Marudhan, voice K.Charles).

Badri's Blog

I am one of the regular reader of Mr.Badri Seshadri's Blog http://thoughtsintamil.blogspot.com from the early days of his blogging.  I always admired his writing skill - he has the skill of telling even a very complicated topic in a simple to understand way.  May be he should have become a teacher in a University.  Whenever I teach Internet to some one in Tamil, I always tell the audience his blog URL as an example of explaining complicated topics in simple way.  My best wishes to Mr.Badri to write more and more articles.

Audio Books from Kizhakku Publisher

The first time I ever listened a Tamil audio book is அக்னிச் சிறகுகள் from Karadi Tales.  Later, I found many Tamil audio book getting released from Kizhakku.  Luckily I found quite a number of them at the public library in Singapore.  The good thing with Kizhakku is they have given the files directly in mp3 format and hence no need to rip if you want to hear from portable mp3 players.  In the last 3 weeks I listened five audio books in Tamil, during my travel time and lunch time break.

1. Simma Soppanam - Fidel Castro (written by Marudhan, voice by K Charles)
2. Che Guevara (written by Marudhan, voice by K Charles)
3. Hezbollah (written by Pa.Raghavan, voice by K Charles)
4. Risk Edu Thalaivaa (written by Sibi K Solomon, voice: forgot the name; I didn't like the voice; some how this voice made me tense throughout the listening of that book; it can be improved since the narrator has the skill of changing his tone for each character. This is just my personal opinion.  Chances are others may like his voice)
   
5. Infosys Narayana Murthy (written by N.Chokkan)
   

K Charles voice is superb.

This week I am listening Madan's கி.மு.-கி.பி. (voice K Charles).

I like the writing style of both Marudhan and Chokkan. 

Vikatan.com == no value for feedback

When Vikatan online service started, it was using the Vikatan_TAM font for Tamil.  Much later when they switched to Unicode, I felt very happy.  In the initial days of the Unicode switch, when I saw some new pages still using the old Vikatan_TAM font, I didn't complaint since it was mentioned somewhere in their website that it will take some time for a full transition.

But even these days this condition prevails.  In fact I would say the occurence of non-Unicode pages has increased.  I pointed this out to the appropriate contact email provided in their "Contact Us" page.  In my mails I took time to point out the URL of the non-Unicode pages and requested them to correct such behaviour in future. But I didn't receive single response to my email. 

Later I send couple of more mails with more URLs of articles with non-Unicode encoding.  Again no response.

The problem with all popular media is their assumption that the end-user will always be using Internet Exploer as their browser.  In contrary there are many non-IE users out there such as Firefox, Opera, Chrome etc.

Pages designed to display properly (with user-defined encoding) for IE most often doesn't work well with other browsers (Note: Other browsers such as Firefox, Opera are more standard complaint than IE).  Thus to see pages with Vikatan_TAM fonts either I have to manually change the encoding to "Windows-1252" each time or use IE. 

I made one last attempt (this time to both webmaster@vikatan.com and av@vikatan.com) and reported this practise of still using non-Unicode fonts, even threatening them that I will not renew my subscription, if I don't see any action to my mail.  Again no response and the practise continue!!

In effect my feedback became செவிடன் காதில் ஊதிய சங்கு!

Congrats Obama!

When the US election rally started I always thought that some how Obama should win this election.  It happened today in a historic win.  My best wishes to him.

I hope that at least under his presidency he will remove the economic blockade against his neighboring country Cuba and put an end to the suffering of the people there due to the blockade for nearly 50 years now.  Cuban people with their enormous hard work deserve much more better living and the removal of the blockade will surely help them to achieve that.

Enforce Display of Door Number at IMM

Several times when I was shopping at IMM Mall (near Jurong East MRT), I often find the door number (i.e. floor-number/unit-number) from the directory and then finding it hard to locate them since many of the outlets there, doesn't display the door number.  The management should make it mandatory to display it for all outlets for the convenience of the customers.