So here are a couple of quick hacks:

• Monitoring what you do on a daily basis:
  Productivity geeks will love this! This is a script which can help you know what the active window title is and print it into a file. Just cron this script to run once a minute and you will have a pretty good picture of what you do on a daily basis. Want to know how much time you spend on Facebook? Try this script!

  
printf "`date "+%D %T"`: " >> active-window-log
active=`xprop -root | grep -P "^_NET_ACTIVE_WINDOW" | awk '{print $NF}'`
title=`xwininfo -id $active | grep -P "^xwin"` >> active-window-log


  Try this script for a day and you will be amazed by the insights you get by looking at the output log.

• Monitoring a terminal for changes: How many times has it so happened that you had a terminal which was running a script and you were waiting for it to complete, but then you didn’t know how long it would take before it printed the next line of output? Wouldn’t it be great if you could monitor it?

  So here is the command that you can use to monitor changes to a specific terminal:
  
window_id=`xwininfo | grep "Window id" | sed -e 's/.*Window id: //g' -e 's/ .*//g'`;
xwd -id "$window_id" > /tmp/initial;
while true;
do xwd -id "$window_id" > /tmp/final;
if [ -z "`diff /tmp/initial /tmp/final`" ];
then echo "No diff";
else echo "Windows differ";
rm /tmp/final /tmp/initial;
break;
fi;
sleep 3;
done


  When you run this script, your mouse pointer changes to a cross-hair. Just point and click the terminal that you want to monitor and then allow it to continue with its work. As soon as there are changes, it will print “Windows differ”. Now you can as well make it send you a mail or start playing a song!

  The cool thing about this script is, it shows how flexible Unix tooling is. The way the script works is by taking a ‘screenshot’ of the terminal every 3 seconds and comparing it with the original screenshot. If there is a change, then diff outputs something and hence becomes non-zero.

The scripts have been tested in Ubuntu. If you don’t have any of the commands, Ubuntu should prompt you to apt-get install them. Although not tested, it should work in any X based system.

If you liked this, you may also like

• May 22, 2010 — The power of Ubuntu – showing dynamic messages in your desktop background!
• June 11, 2009 — Associating files with URLs on Ubuntu (Gnome) – a quick hack
• July 11, 2009 — Getting Reliance (Huawei) USB Data Card to work in Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty)
• July 15, 2008 — Getting Rosegarden to work in Ubuntu (Gnome)
• July 12, 2008 — Adventure with Ubuntu, Wubi, yum, libc and the like
• July 25, 2006 — Want a Linux flavor for human beings?

So when I learnt about the Nokia 5230, I was excited. It was neither Android based nor Linux based, but I could atleast keep up with the developments in the mobile space at a cheap price. It didn’t take me long to decide to buy one.

This is the first smartphone I have owned, so needless to say I am excited about the features. All I really care about in a phone (other than the regular call/messaging features) is the browsing and PDA capabilities of the phone. I had earlier decided to go for the Nokia 5233, but it does not have GPS, and the 5230 comes with AGPS for an extra Rs. 1000/- so I decided to go for it.

Having used this phone for more than a month now, I am ready to write a review of the phone. The opinion is biased, since I don’t really care about the camera and audio capabilities – I really don’t see a point in providing these when they are not state of the art.

So here goes:

GPS and navigation

The Nokia 5230 navigation edition comes with builtin OVI maps. When I took it for a test ride in Bangalore, I found the reception to be decent, although the routes are not necessarily the shortest. Further, it is not completely updated, so there were places where I was asked to take a right turn, but there was a divider right on the road. The OVI maps data is only available in huge cities, and is pretty useless even in moderately sized towns.

I also have Google Maps installed and I have found it useful atleast a couple of times. In our last trip to Bharachukki and Gaganachukki, we lost our way and Google Maps helped us identify that we are heading in the wrong direction. However, the route that it suggested to get out of the wrong way was not optimal. All in all, it is a wonderful attempt at providing navigation services in India.

The GPS does not require the mobile signal. Unfortunately, the Google Maps software expects mobile signal. This is one thing that I don’t understand. I know that Google Maps caches the maps sprites, so I would have expected them to atleast show me the route trails if the signal is low or not present. This makes it completely useless in remote trekking places where you cannot expect mobile signal.

One final issue with the GPS is the lack of a mechanism to record trails and then export it as GPX/KML. This is however a software limitation and I am still on the lookout for some application that can help me do this. The closest that I have come across is Sports Tracker which ironically is not specifically meant this purpose.

GPRS/Web Browsing

The next thing that matters to me is the browsing capabilities. This is one thing that I am increasingly getting used to. I started off with the default browser that comes with the phone. But it is slow, and the font sizes are just too small to be comfortable. It does not do any screen optimization, and I really hate to scroll horizontally when I need to read.

I started looking for alternatives and the only alternative that I could find was Opera. There are 2 versions of Opera browsers available for Symbian phones. One is the Opera Mini – this makes use of a proxy server to optimize the pages for mobile browsing. It has a small footprint, and loads pages extremely well. However, it is pretty limited in its Javascript capabilities.

The other is the Opera Mobile – this is a bit heavy in its footprint, but is a full-fledged browser. With the Opera Mobile, I can feel the limitations of the ARM 434 MHz processor that the phone is equipped with. It makes the scrolls feel a bit sluggish. But the browser is awesome! I am increasingly getting used to this way of browsing and have my daily cup of BBC and other news via the phone. In some cases I find it easier to read news on the phone than on my laptop and this is no exaggeration! The screen optimization is amazing, and coming from the web world, I sometimes wonder how well they have done it. Most sites that I visit on a regular basis, work fine on my phone.

The Opera Mobile also has a sync capability (Opera Link) so you can sync your bookmarks and history with the browser on your laptop. I don’t use Opera in my laptop, but I find this a good way to transfer interesting content over to the laptop.

I am yet to find a good, free office and note taking suite. Considering that the world is moving towards browser based applications, I would expect someone (Google is already almost there) to soon provide full-fledged mobile based editing capabilities. As of this writing, there is limited spreadsheet editing capability from Google, and viewing for Google word documents. Google Notebooks allows you to take notes, but doesn’t allow you to edit an existing note. I have tried Zoho, but didn’t find it good enough.

All said, the official applications for the Nokia phone are not comparable to other smart phones in the market (Android or the iPhone). There is no good official messaging application, there is no application for Twitter, there are no good mail clients. But considering the price at which this phone is available and comparing it to the other touch phones in the market, I feel it is totally worth the price.

Music

Let me be quick on this one. It sucks.

The music quality is not comparable to other phones which are available at a cheaper price than this phone. When I listen to music on my iPod, I feel like learning music and enjoy it every bit. But on this phone, I am ‘trying hard’ to listen to the subtleties of the instruments.

Camera

Not much here either. Having come from the SLR world, I find this to be a toy.

However you might find it good enough to quickly click a snap of something – say a board that you came across, some whiteboard full of writings, a notepad scribbled with text that you don’t want to lose etc. But if you want to capture the beauty of a place that you have visited, don’t even bother.

Battery backup

This would be my biggest complaint. A lot of the applications suck battery. There is some bug in the Opera Mobile, where the battery can be sucked up completely in less than an hour’s time even though you have quit the application. The only solution is to restart the phone.

The Maps application also sucks a lot of battery and if you keep it open during a trip, you will be out of power in less than 5 hours.

Processor

I already mentioned the sluggishness of the processor when you use some application like Opera Mobile. But the biggest issue is this: Suppose you are browsing some site and you have the phone held horizontally and you receive a call, you tilt the phone and answer the call. The processor now has to reset the orientation from horizontal to vertical and change the packet switching so that you can receive the call and do the necessary processing for this. It took me a while to get used to the sluggishness. My old phone didn’t have any smart phone capabilities, and I could receive a call and get talking in less than a second, but this phone requires atleast a couple of seconds (sometimes even more) to receive the call and start speaking. If you hold the phone in some weird angle between horizontal and vertical, there are chances that the phone is completely confused and it tries to shift between horizontal and vertical orientations repeatedly. Opera Mobile crashes when this happens.

Other experiments

I have tried a few other experiments with the phone, right from installing Putty and logging into a remote server, to sending out SMSes by connecting the phone via bluetooth to my Ubuntu system. The lack of the PC suite application for Ubuntu makes it difficult for me to sync my contacts with my laptop, but I managed to find ways to do it. I have also played with video format conversions using mencoder and optimizing it to be viewed on the phone. These are just geeky experiments, and I will perhaps post a few of these sometime.

All in all, I find the Nokia 5230 to be a good entry level smart phone for people who need basic GPS and GPRS capabilities. If you are looking for a sub-10k (Rs) range phone with GPS capabilities you should check this out.

If you liked this, you may also like

• March 6, 2010 — A review of the Sony Digital Reader (PRS 600BC)
• March 28, 2007 — iPod Nano – my new acquisition

The next day, we got up early. Since we were almost out of fuel, we decided to walk the entire distance from the homestay to Mallalli falls – we were told that it would be about 4km. It turned out to be 5.5km one way!

We started early morning at about 7am from the homestay. The path is mostly tarred – it is mostly downhill when you go. The jeep can take you almost the entire distance. There is a toll – where you pay Rs.5/- per person. This place was not even open when we crossed it. Finally as you reach the final spot you are warned about the ferociouness of the falls. A board reads, “Mallalli falls is very deep and dangerous, take care. Crocodiles are there.”

It is difficult to describe the grandeur of this falls. Slowly approaching the tip of the hill, the clean, calm water gushes down the valley for god knows how many meters to make a ferocious fall.

There is dense forest on all sides of the valley. The falls unfolds as you climb down the hill – you can’t see the whole view from any single point. There are cement steps laid out for almost half the distance. The steps are huge – it reminded me of the Chitradurga fort steps (which are actually meant for elephants). Sometimes I feel it is easier to climb in the regular paths than these – it seems to tire me easily. We saw a few frogs and snails on the way.

As we neared the falls, we could feel the droplets of water in the air. There was a cool breeze. The final point where you need to stop is undescribable. The droplets which felt like a drizzle was now very strong – to the point that we were completely wet. But it was not even a bit like getting drenched in a regular rainfall. The droplets from the falls were so fine that they deposited on our brows, arms and hair. It was a very amazing feeling to close our eyes and experience the moment. It is these moments that you cherish and make it worth the journey!

We spent quite some time here. My advice to shutterbugs is to go to this place as early as possible – 6:30 seems like a good time. Unfortunately we didn’t have such advice. I had difficulty getting good snaps – by the time we reached Mallalli falls, there was sunlight on one side of the falls, and a shadow on the other – this is always difficult to click because of differences in lighting. Anyway, I don’t repent it because sometimes trips are worth more than the photographs.

On our way back the toll collection guy had opened shop and asked us if we had stayed at the falls overnight – it seemed like it is uncommon for visitors to visit this falls so early in the morning. He distributed chocolates as it was Independence Day. We wished each other, bought a fruit juice (which was nothing like anything I had before) and then left.

We were back in our homestay by 10. That is 3 hours since we started. I should say that is pretty quick! We got ready, had a hefty breakfast, thanked the homestay owner (Ningappa) and checked out of the place.

We still had the fuel issue – so were not sure whether to go to Somwarpet fill up and then go to Abbimatta falls or to do Abbimatta falls on the way to Somwarpet. Abbimatta falls is a small falls about 5km from Somwarpet. The driver now had some confidence that we can go to Abbimatta falls, and then to Somwarpet – he said we should be able to make it. So based on his confidence, we decided to cover the falls first.

Abbimatta falls is not clearly visible because there are trees and a small stream that is deep. We entered the fields, looked for paths to the falls and not finding one, decided to satisfy ourselves with telephoto shots of the falls. For the locals, we seemed to be capturing some breaking news. Nearly a dozen workers in the field stopped their work and started staring at us as we crossed the fields. They stayed motionless for the next 5 minutes. They finally got back to work only when we started speaking to a couple of them enquiring about the falls.

It was 12:30 by the time we checked this place off our list and started heading to Somwarpet. The entire fuel fiasco was just a mythical daemon – there was enough fuel until we reached Somwarpet!

We now had 2 options – either go back to Bangalore directly or see if we can cover Shivanasamudram – which would be an icing on the cake in our ‘Falls trip’ – which was pretty successful so far.

We decided to postpone our decision until we cross Hunsur and then, depending on the time we visit the falls or skip it. When we enquired with the driver, he seemed to be confident of reaching the falls by 4:30, so we decided to go. Unfortunately, we lost our way – on SH7, instead of entering SH79 we continued on to Arkere and had to move back – losing atleast half an hour of precious time. At this point, I made use of the Google Maps on my phone to see if it is worth it and I can tell you it is not good if you are looking for a way out. Google Maps suggests the shortest route to the destination – unfortunately, the shortest route need not be the least time consuming route. The route that Google Maps suggested was via narrow mud roads and it would have taken us far longer time.

We reached Gaganachukki an hour late than the estimated time. Both falls Gaganachukki and Bharachukki look ferocious and wide and I had a lot of expectations. But we were disappointed when we reached this place. It was nothing like the snaps we had seen. There was hardly any water and it seemed like a mystery – is this really the same falls?! It was a bad icing on the cake.

We decided to cover Bharachukki too since our hopes had died out and we just had to tick it off the list (and get the GPS information to the place). It would not be worth it to come to this place specifically and it would be better to cover it since we were already so close. We knew it would be too late by the time we reach the falls, but it was ok as it would not be something that we would miss.

It was 6:45 by the time we reached Bharachukki. I clicked a few snaps with varying exposure time – between 2 to 20 seconds and trying out various color balance levels in vain. The photos were all bluish and not worthy of publishing.

We had dinner in Malavalli – and then headed back to Bangalore via the Kanakapura route. It was a huge circuit but an amazingly well planned trip. Thanks to Manja for the excellent trip planning.

If you liked this, you may also like

• August 19, 2010 — Trip to Devarakolli falls, Devaragundi falls, Matsya Teertha – Thodikana
• August 3, 2010 — Trip to Chelavara Falls, Igguthappa Temple, Iruppu Falls and Nagarhole National Park
• July 19, 2010 — Trip to Dubare, Pollibetta, Talakaveri, Bhagamandala
• August 12, 2010 — Trip to Kalhatti Falls, Kemmangundi, Hebbe Falls and Mullayanagiri – Chikmagalur
• July 6, 2010 — Trip to Mandalpatti, Madikeri, Dubare and Bylakuppe
• March 3, 2010 — Sunset at Sankey Tank
• February 28, 2010 — An evening in Lalbagh
• February 9, 2010 — Trip to Turahalli, Chudahalli, Agara and Begur
• January 30, 2010 — Trip to Horanadu, Kalasa, Kadambi Falls, Kudremukh and Hanumangundi falls
• January 9, 2010 — Trip to Chitradurga, Chandravalli – Ankali Caves and Holalkere

Our trip as usual began early in the morning – this time we made sure the driver knew how serious we were about starting off on time. We were out of Bangalore by 5. By 8, we were hungry, unfortunately most hotels on the way were closed and as we crossed Hunsur we saw a few popular places which were full. We got into a small hotel and had some awful food – the place is not worth mentioning.

From here, we continued on the Madikeri road. Our plan was to cover Devarakolli falls, Devaragundi falls and Kalyala falls on Day 1, then go to Beedahalli and stay at Pushpagiri Homestay for the night and cover Mallalli falls, Abbimatta falls and Shivanasamudram on Day 2.

So we started heading towards Sullia taluk – the farthest point of our journey. The Madikeri-Mangalore road is nothing like the other parts of Coorg (which are filled with Coffee estates) – it is a road mostly downhill – with tall trees. There is a stream that follows the road almost all the way to Sullia taluk. You see quite a few small falls on the way.

This was perhaps the first trip in the last few trips where we never stopped on the way for snaps – the scenes of mist covered hills had become so common that we didn’t feel anything was different!

Devarakolli falls is in the Devarakolli village – it is a small falls on the road side at a turning. We reached this place by 11. We took a few quick snaps and then continued on to Thodikana. We stopped at Devarakolli to take a few snaps of a wonderful stream. Looking at our equipment, a few villagers came over and asked us if we were from the media (we get this a lot ). When we told them we were just photo hobbyists and are looking for interesting places, they asked us to check out the Payaswini river. It was just beside the point where we had stopped. So we decided to check it out. A small walk down a slightly slippery slope and we reached Payaswini river. The water was gushing at an amazing pace – at one point it hit a rock and was sometimes splashing to a height of 4-5 feet! It was powerful.

We then enquired about Kalyala falls and Devaragundi falls – we were told that it might be tough to cover both places on the same day. Further Kalyala falls is leech infested and we were advised to avoid it. The road to Mangalore from Madikeri is bad and it adds a lot to the commute time. We decided to skip Kalyala falls and go to Devaragundi falls directly.

We reached Thodikana Mallikarjuna temple at around 1:20 in the afternoon. The temple was closed. We were very hungry and so we had some food (bun and tea) in a shop closeby. We then enquired about the way to Devaragundi falls. We were told that the jeep can take us to a distance of about 1km and from there you need to walk. We decided to walk the entire distance as we didn’t want to risk the vehicle getting stuck in the muddy path. The total walking distance was about 2.5km.

You first cross a small stream – and then you see a house where you take a U-turn. From this point, you get 3 houses. The 3rd house is where you need to enter their property and then ask them the way to Devaragundi falls. Cross another stream and you see this wonderful, cute falls – completely secluded from habitat. The water was crystal clear, the spot was clean unlike most other popular spots where you see some garbage thrown around. The water is calm until it gushes down and turns milky white instantly. We treated ourselves to a few snaps, spent some time appreciating the beauty of the falls and then headed back to Thodikana.

Just behind the temple on the right side, you see a spot called Matsya Teertha (or Meenugundi). This is a point where you can see large fishes – according to a board put up there, they have seen a fish that is 1.75m in length. We fed the fish puffed rice and took a few snaps of it. Fishing is prohibited in this area – it is considered a sin to kill them.

After this we started our long journey back to Madikeri – we had to go to Madikeri and then to Beedahalli via Somwarpet. It took us 4.5 hours to cover this distance to the homestay. It was 8:30 by the time we reached.

In order to make things a little more interesting, there was a misunderstanding between us and the driver. The driver assumed that our homestay is 5km from Somwarpet – we were almost out of fuel and he thought he will fill up the next day. It was about 20km from Somwarpet when he raised the alarm. He said we might only have enough fuel to last for another 10km. It was already night and we were not sure if we had enough fuel to turn back – the only option for us was to somehow reach the homestay and worry about fuel the next day. The rest of the few km to the homestay was very tense – we were not sure if we could make the distance – what if we don’t, we were not even sure how much distance we had to cover to reach our destination. It was pitch dark, mostly secluded, and there is no power in this area. It is at this point, that you are reminded of stories of the tussle between humans and the wild elephants in Coorg.

Anyway, nothing like that happened – and we reached our homestay without any problems – it was just some thrill added to our journey to make it more interesting.

Pushpagiri homestay is very close to the Kumaraparvata peak. This area has no power – well, it is solar powered – you have a few small CFL bulbs but no fans. But if you are to compare it to staying in the wild, I would say it was amazing. You don’t expect such cosy places and such hospitality in the middle of a jungle. We unloaded our bags and were treated to some amazing food. We were really hungry as we had small quantities of food throughout the day.

Day 2 experiences covering Mallalli falls, Abbimatta falls and Shivanasamudram (Bharachukki and Gaganachukki) here.

If you liked this, you may also like

• August 19, 2010 — Trip to Mallalli falls, Abbimatta falls, Gaganachukki and Bharachukki
• August 3, 2010 — Trip to Chelavara Falls, Igguthappa Temple, Iruppu Falls and Nagarhole National Park
• July 19, 2010 — Trip to Dubare, Pollibetta, Talakaveri, Bhagamandala
• August 12, 2010 — Trip to Kalhatti Falls, Kemmangundi, Hebbe Falls and Mullayanagiri – Chikmagalur
• July 6, 2010 — Trip to Mandalpatti, Madikeri, Dubare and Bylakuppe
• March 3, 2010 — Sunset at Sankey Tank
• February 28, 2010 — An evening in Lalbagh
• February 9, 2010 — Trip to Turahalli, Chudahalli, Agara and Begur
• January 30, 2010 — Trip to Horanadu, Kalasa, Kadambi Falls, Kudremukh and Hanumangundi falls
• January 9, 2010 — Trip to Chitradurga, Chandravalli – Ankali Caves and Holalkere

Then it was a couple of trips to Coorg, the first one being a trip to Mandalpatti, Madikeri, Dubare and Bylakuppe followed by another trip to Coorg covering Dubare, Chelavara falls, Iruppu falls and Nagarhole National Park.

This was the 4th trip in 5 consecutive weekends and the planning seemed straightforward. By this time, our routine of finding places, mapping them out and deciding the route had become fairly standardized. We went on a Qualis this time since there were more people than what an Indica could carry.

We planned to leave early in the morning by 2am from Bangalore – but the driver who seemed to have just returned from some other trip overslept and we left late. It was already 4am by the time we crossed Nelamangala and we were silently cursing the driver for the delay.

Our earlier plan was to go to Chikmagalur by 7 or 8, find a hotel, cover Mullayangiri, Sitalayangiri, Bababudangiri and then head to Kemmangundi and the surrounding places the next day. But we made a last minute change in plans prompted by the driver – we decided to go to Kemmangundi first and then go to the peaks the next day. The driver was of the opinion that it is easy to find a homestay, and we should do that. In hindsight this was a good decision because the places that we wanted to cover near Kemmangundi was packed and we couldn’t have covered them all if it was scheduled for the second day and Bababudangiri was closed, so there wouldn’t be enough places for the first.

We had breakfast on the way and then headed to Ballavara which is in the foot of Kemmangundi.

This was not my first trip to Chikmagalur. I had been on a 3 day trip to Horanadu, Kalasa and Kudremukh in January and it was the same feeling – as soon as you enter Chikmagalur you get this feeling that the air has suddenly become pure, the landscape changes and you can feel the difference.

We were very close to Ballavara when we had our first scene of the day – blue skies, a hill in the remote landscape, with coconut trees and lush green grass fields in the front. We stopped for snaps.

One important change I did in this trip was to not use the UV filter on my wide angle lens – this turned out to be good because the colors were more natural. I had noticed a bluish tinge in my landscape photos from the Coorg trips and was concerned about it. It turned out to be because of the UV filter and removing it worked.

It was 10am by the time we reached Ballavara. We found a homestay but it turned out to be expensive, and then we found another one by the name of Rangers Camp – it was a pretty decent deal – it worked out to roughly Rs. 400/- per person and we went for it. One headache off.

We then went to Kalhatti falls. Kalhatti falls (or Kalahasti falls) is located at a place called Kallattipura. There is a small Veerabhadreshwara (Siva) temple here.

There was slight rain when we reached this place – but that meant low light and excellent for waterfall photography. After satisfying ourselves with a whole set of snaps, we went to Kemmangundi.

The route from Kalhatti falls to Kemmangundi is amazing – the weather was awesome, the air was cold, there was light fog, and there was a hint of Nilgiri scent in the air – a good combination of joy for the senses!

It was close to 12 by the time we reached Kemmangundi. We decided to lunch there and then continue onto Z-point and Shanthi falls – which is just 3km from Kemmangundi.

Lunch was not ready, so we treated ourselves to some macro photography – looking for droplets on leaves and flowers and anything that is worth remembering.

Post lunch, off we went to Shanthi falls. By the time we reached Shanthi falls, we made a leech check and lo, I had 2 of them on my leg. I pulled them off and found atleast 3 more in my jeans!

Rains here are unpredictable especially in this season – it was not raining when we reached Shanthi falls – we clicked a few snaps and then it started raining heavily. We had our expensive cameras with us, the paths were very slippery, there were quite a few visible leeches in the path, and we were not sure if we could get a good view at Z-point considering the fog. So we decided to go back.

We then reached a point from where we had to take a jeep to Hebbe falls. The driver demanded 800/- and we agreed and so another leech bite later, we were on our way to Hebbe falls.

This journey to Hebbe is something I am not going to forget for quite some time to come. This single journey to Hebbe and back was worth more than the entire trip put together. The road to Hebbe is bad – I mean really bad – believe me, I have had my share of bad roads and Mandalpatti comes close – but I wouldn’t call these roads motorable even by Indian standards. I had newfound respect for the Commander after this drive and the driver – well you can see the photo below and decide for yourself.

The road was hardly visible, it was raining, there was fog, the roads were bad but he didn’t seem to care. It seemed like he could do these routes blindfolded.

There were streams across the road, there were places where we could only see rocks and it was hard to believe that any vehicle can go on these roads. At some places, the roads were dug up to make way for the water to pass across. But the Commander moved on… and, by the way, it was not a 4-wheel vehicle. We also had a few places where the roads were extremely narrow and the vehicles had to scrape each other to pass!

It was only at about 2km from our final destination when the Commander gave up – we had a flat tyre. The driver didn’t have the necessary equipment to replace it – and so he told us we need to wait until another vehicle passes by and then he will be able to replace it. This was our chance to walk through the serene estate – and we told him that we will do the rest of the distance by walk and if he happens to fix the tyre, he can pick us up.

It rained slightly when we reached the point where the jeeps stop. We waited for a moment and then decided to continue – lest we miss the falls as it was getting dark. You need to trek a little distance, crossing 3 streams on the way.

The falls is not visible until the last moment – we could hardly hear it either because of a stream that flows by and here it was – flowing so calmly. I didn’t have any expectations from the falls. I just wanted to go there, feel it and return – but Hebbe falls turned out to be the best falls I have seen till date. The magnificence, the calmness with which it falls, the weather all made it seem like a dream. It felt like the water was falling in slow motion and I could easily picture a scene from Planet Earth. There were no people when we reached and this added to the wonder – as it gave this feeling of a magnificent discovery somewhere in the middle of a dense forest when you least expect it.

I was more keen on feeling the moment than clicking pictures. The droplets from the falls was settling very quickly on the lens, and long exposure almost seemed impossible. We had to wipe the lens clean, keep it covered with a cloth and open it only for a short moment to get a good droplet free snap.

Post this, we headed back to Rangers Camp. We were tired with the day’s activities, but were pretty happy and content. I had a few more leech bites – taking the count for the day to 7; I emerged the unanimous winner!

I will post the day 2 experiences soon.

If you liked this, you may also like

• August 3, 2010 — Trip to Chelavara Falls, Igguthappa Temple, Iruppu Falls and Nagarhole National Park
• January 30, 2010 — Trip to Horanadu, Kalasa, Kadambi Falls, Kudremukh and Hanumangundi falls
• January 9, 2010 — Trip to Chitradurga, Chandravalli – Ankali Caves and Holalkere
• June 30, 2009 — Trip to Gopalaswamy betta and BR hills
• May 23, 2009 — Trips to Ranganathittu, Varthur lake and Sankey Tank
• August 12, 2007 — A very productive weekend
• August 19, 2010 — Trip to Mallalli falls, Abbimatta falls, Gaganachukki and Bharachukki
• August 19, 2010 — Trip to Devarakolli falls, Devaragundi falls, Matsya Teertha – Thodikana
• July 19, 2010 — Trip to Dubare, Pollibetta, Talakaveri, Bhagamandala
• July 6, 2010 — Trip to Mandalpatti, Madikeri, Dubare and Bylakuppe

The next day we started at around 8:30am after a good sleep for more than 10 hours.

We had already booked the jeep the previous day to go to 3 places: Igguthappa Temple, Nalknad Palace and Chelavara Falls. The jeep guy appeared right on time and we had a quick breakfast and were on our way.

The previous night we had taken the same route but we didn’t know what we had missed. The landscape was really amazing – the hills were green and the weather was awesome.

We first went to Igguthappa temple close to Kakkabe. Igguthappa temple is very sacred among the Coorgis. The temple priest actually told us the story of this temple. Padi Igguthappa temple is dedicated to Lord Subrahmanya. It is supposed to be more than a 1000 years old. The consciousness of God among the people was less in this area and so Subrahmanya swamy came in the form of Siva and imparted the knowledge of cultivation to the locals.

The farmers worship this God for rainfall. “Iggu” means food and “thappa” is “to give”. God asked the locals to worship him and follow the rituals and said he will safeguard all the generations to come. The annual Coorg festival is celebrated here and every year people bring their children and contribute food in various forms (sugar, rice, coconuts etc) to the temple. The temple offers food to people everyday.

After offering our prayers, we headed to Nalknad palace. This temple is more than 200 years old and was built by Chikka Veerarajendra in 1792 – the last kind of Coorg.

This palace has lost a lot of its original paintings due to people’s negligence. Miscreants have spoilt the place with their “graffiti”. Then it was the shooting of a Kannada film – where they painted over the original paintings to suit their needs! Now this is a protected monument, they have a guard there and the place is closed after 7pm.

Outside you see a small ‘mantap’ built for the king’s sister’s marriage. The guard acted as our guide and took us through the palace. The original painting is made by using a combination of herbs and flowers. Only the roof paintings in the Raja’s ‘darbar’ is original.

On one side is the queen’s room. There is a bathroom and a secret passage to a secret dark room which would be used to go in hiding in case of enemy attack. The secret room is dark at any time of the day.

From here, we headed to Chelavara falls. It is a short trek to the falls from the point where you park the jeep. The road to Chelavara falls is not good, but the falls looks good both from a distance as well as from closeby. We can go to the bottom as well as top of the falls.

It was afternoon by the time we went back to our hotel. Our earlier plan was to head back to Bangalore via the route we came, but our driver suggested we take the route via Nagarhole National Park and also cover Iruppu falls on the way. So we checked out and then headed towards Iruppu falls on the way back.

Iruppu falls is where Lakshmanatirtha river flows down and then joins Ramatirtha – which then joins the Cauvery river. The Malabar Banded Peacock (a butterfly) is a common sight here and this is supposed to be only limited to the Western ghats. This place was crowded and they have sort of commercialized this place.

On our way back we came via Nagarhole National Park. This route of over 40km through the jungle was amazing – it was like a free jungle safari through the green, dense forest – we saw a peacock, lots of deers and a few elephants. The first elephant went into the bushes by the time we could pull our cameras out. The second group had also gone into the bushes but one of them was alarmed when it saw our car halt and it came out of the bushes and started chasing us and trumpeted loudly! The third group of elephants was drinking water from a pond very close to the exit gate.

The only major rainfall we encountered during this entire trip until this point was in Bhagamandala and we were happy that our trip was a success. But as we headed back to Bangalore, we reached Srirangapattana and it started raining heavily. This rain was to follow us all the way back to Bangalore – and it was a mess.

Overall it was an amazing trip and we covered more places than we had expected thanks to the surprise introduction of Nagarhole route by the driver.

If you liked this, you may also like

• August 19, 2010 — Trip to Mallalli falls, Abbimatta falls, Gaganachukki and Bharachukki
• August 19, 2010 — Trip to Devarakolli falls, Devaragundi falls, Matsya Teertha – Thodikana
• August 12, 2010 — Trip to Kalhatti Falls, Kemmangundi, Hebbe Falls and Mullayanagiri – Chikmagalur
• July 19, 2010 — Trip to Dubare, Pollibetta, Talakaveri, Bhagamandala
• January 9, 2010 — Trip to Chitradurga, Chandravalli – Ankali Caves and Holalkere
• June 30, 2009 — Trip to Gopalaswamy betta and BR hills
• May 23, 2009 — Trips to Ranganathittu, Varthur lake and Sankey Tank
• August 12, 2007 — A very productive weekend
• July 6, 2010 — Trip to Mandalpatti, Madikeri, Dubare and Bylakuppe
• March 3, 2010 — Sunset at Sankey Tank

After considering several options, we finally narrowed down to a 2 day trip, covering the following places: Dubare, Pollibetta, Talakaveri, Bhagamandala, Igguthappa temple, Nalknad palace and Chelavara falls.

We left at 6am in the morning and stopped for Thatte Idly near Bidadi (Bangalore Mysore road).

We then headed towards Dubare via the Ranganathittu->Hunsur->Kushalnagar road. We reached Dubare at around 11am. In my last trip, I couldn’t see the elephants, as we had reached this place at 12:30. We were met with disappointment this time too. We were told that one of the elephants was sick and they had let all the elephants back to the jungle. (I recently read in the news that seven elephants were killed – most of them in Dubare due to lack of vets). For people visiting to see the elephants – make sure you are there by 9.

Once at Siddapura, we had lunch in a small Udupi hotel near the bus-stand and headed to Pollibetta. There is a Tata estate on top of Pollibetta and with some luck you get to go around – unfortunately we were not lucky and met with our second disappointment for the day. The trip seemed to be a flop with 2 disappointments early on.

We headed to Virajpet via Ammathi. We checked into a small lodge over there. We had not made prior bookings in the hope of finding something – so we didn’t want to wait until the night. We also enquired about Chelavara Falls. We had to book a 4-wheel jeep since these places are tough to go on our Indica. Luckily, we got a person who was ready to take us there the next day for Rs.1200/-. He said he will cover Igguthappa temple, Nalknad palace and Chelavara falls by noon.

Off we went to Talakaveri. This is the birth place of river Cauvery (Kaveri). We reached there just in time. The temple and the place is closed at 6:00pm and we were there at 5:30. We prayed and then climbed to the hilltop. It was foggy – and the landscape was changing every few minutes as the clouds passed by us. It was drizzling slightly – adding excitement to the pleasant weather.

After satisfying ourselves with snaps, we came down to Bhagamandala – this was one part of the trip where we met with really heavy rain. We went to the temple, prayed and then headed back to our car. Bhagamandala is just 8km down the hill from Talakaveri.

The road that we took from Virajpet to Talakaveri, went via Napoklu – and there were certain places where the road was extremely narrow. So we didn’t want to take chances on the way back as it was getting dark. Our driver enquired and found out another route back and we decided to take that.

We reached a small village close to Virajpet on the way back. It was already past 8pm and we saw that most shops and hotels were closed. We bought a few biscuits and headed back to Virajpet – hoping that someone would have some sympathy on us and serve us hot food. Luckily there was one hotel open! There was no power when we reached, but the hotel had a generator. We had ghee rice and paratha and then went back to our lodge and hit the sack.

The complete photoset of the trip to Coorg can be seen here.

Day 2 of the trip is covered in this post: Trip to Chelavara Falls, Iruppu Falls and Nagarhole National Park.

If you liked this, you may also like

• August 19, 2010 — Trip to Mallalli falls, Abbimatta falls, Gaganachukki and Bharachukki
• August 19, 2010 — Trip to Devarakolli falls, Devaragundi falls, Matsya Teertha – Thodikana
• August 3, 2010 — Trip to Chelavara Falls, Igguthappa Temple, Iruppu Falls and Nagarhole National Park
• July 6, 2010 — Trip to Mandalpatti, Madikeri, Dubare and Bylakuppe
• August 12, 2010 — Trip to Kalhatti Falls, Kemmangundi, Hebbe Falls and Mullayanagiri – Chikmagalur
• March 3, 2010 — Sunset at Sankey Tank
• February 28, 2010 — An evening in Lalbagh
• February 9, 2010 — Trip to Turahalli, Chudahalli, Agara and Begur
• January 30, 2010 — Trip to Horanadu, Kalasa, Kadambi Falls, Kudremukh and Hanumangundi falls
• January 9, 2010 — Trip to Chitradurga, Chandravalli – Ankali Caves and Holalkere

We started at about 6 in the morning and went to Madikeri. We stopped a few times on the way to click snaps.

We left to Mandalpatti post lunch. Mandalpatti is known for its scenic beauty and is close to Abbey Falls.

Unfortunately this is not a good time to visit unless what you are looking for is an adventure. We were not prepared for what we were about to encounter. There are 2 routes to Mandalpatti – one which shares its route with Abbey Falls, the other which goes via Makkandur. The route via Makkandur is a bit longer but I would easily advise it over the other. The first route is extremely treacherous and there were quite a few places where the road was slushy causing the car to skid and scrape over moderately huge stones. The roads are very narrow and there were small water streams across the road. We had to stop several times to avoid brake-shoe or engine overheating.

It took us almost a quarter tank of fuel to reach the top – since we had to drive mostly on the first gear. We hardly got out of our car except when we had to direct the vehicle to allow other passing vehicles or when we stopped to give the car a rest, but inspite of the short time, 2 of us managed to get leech bites. It was a very tense drive. As you approach the top, the huge trees disappear and you see vast open grasslands. This basically means there is nothing stopping the winds and it made it all the more difficult to steer the car. The visibility was extremely poor and we could hardly see beyond 10-20 feet. We stopped the car on top and got out and were welcomed by a gush of heavy wind and rain – it was no use having an umbrella. We could not get any snaps on top. We could hardly see anything because of the fog. We couldn’t stay for long as it was getting late and the weather was really bad and we had to return.

We returned via the Makkandur route. This route is extremely scenic and the roads are way better than the other route. All in all, it was a good experience because of the scenic routes. I would definitely want to visit this place again – but it is better to take a four-wheel jeep or go in the summers.

We went back to our hotel, had dinner and called it a day.

The next morning we got up early and went to Raja’s seat which was right next to the hotel. The fog was playing hide and seek and we got a few snaps of the landscape. We also got a few macro shots of flowers, plants and sparrows.

We met a very enthusiastic person named Shiva. Shiva has been doing photography for a very long time and has traveled around. He noticed us clicking the snap of the droplet and gave us some good advice. He described some of his own experiences as a photographer. The most important takeaway: “Feel the place first, then you will know what to click”.

We then headed to Dubare Elephant Camp. It was a bit late by the time we reached – the elephants are left into the jungle at 12:30 and it was already 12:30. So we decided to go white water rafting. Dubare is not known for the white water rafting, so I didn’t have high hopes. But it turned out to be better than I had expected. We saw a tusker on the way. Our guide made the whole experience worthwhile. There were 3 rafts – and there was some competition between the rafts – we splashed water at each other, bumped into each others’ rafts, and raced in the river. We were made to hit hard at trees, hitting rocks, going below very low tree branches etc. We also jumped into the river and swam. There was a huge chameleon in the water and our guide took it and wore it on top of his helmet reminding me of Madagascar. There it lay motionless until our guide took it and dropped it on some tree branch. There were 4 rapids and I would now say it is worth the experience – not for the rapids but generally for the fun ride. Unfortunately, I don’t have any snaps as we couldn’t carry a camera during rafting.

We had lunch in Dubare, and then headed to Chiklihole Reservoir. The route was extremely scenic and it reminded me of the route to B. R. Hills. It is about 6km from Dubare Elephant Camp – on the way back, at about 3km from Dubare you will see a diversion to the left and its about 3km from there.

There was slight drizzle and the weather was awesome. The light was low, so the scenic landscape was only for the eyes – and extremely tough to capture.

Our final stop before we came back to Bangalore was Bylakuppe – Golden Temple. I had already been to Golden Temple last year, so I thought I will try something different this time with photography – I decided to click macros and portraits. We stopped on the way to experience the scenery. It was wonderful.

It was 1:30 by the time I reached home. We were exhausted.

The full Coorg Trip photo set is over here.

If you liked this, you may also like

• July 19, 2010 — Trip to Dubare, Pollibetta, Talakaveri, Bhagamandala
• August 19, 2010 — Trip to Mallalli falls, Abbimatta falls, Gaganachukki and Bharachukki
• August 19, 2010 — Trip to Devarakolli falls, Devaragundi falls, Matsya Teertha – Thodikana
• August 12, 2010 — Trip to Kalhatti Falls, Kemmangundi, Hebbe Falls and Mullayanagiri – Chikmagalur
• August 3, 2010 — Trip to Chelavara Falls, Igguthappa Temple, Iruppu Falls and Nagarhole National Park
• March 3, 2010 — Sunset at Sankey Tank
• February 28, 2010 — An evening in Lalbagh
• February 9, 2010 — Trip to Turahalli, Chudahalli, Agara and Begur
• January 30, 2010 — Trip to Horanadu, Kalasa, Kadambi Falls, Kudremukh and Hanumangundi falls
• January 9, 2010 — Trip to Chitradurga, Chandravalli – Ankali Caves and Holalkere

Here are the steps:

1. We first start by creating an SVG template file called wall-tmpl.svg with the following contents and saving it in the Wallpapers directory (let’s say it is ~/Theme/Wallpapers):
   <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE svg PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD SVG 1.0//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/2001/REC-SVG-20010904/DTD/svg10.dtd" [
<!ENTITY ns_imrep "http://ns.adobe.com/ImageReplacement/1.0/">
<!ENTITY ns_svg "http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">
<!ENTITY ns_xlink "http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">
]>
<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" width="1280" height="1024" viewBox="0 0 1280 1024" overflow="visible" enable-backgroun
d="new 0 0 132.72 127.219" xml:space="preserve">
<image xlink:href="~/Theme/Wallpapers/-your-favorite-wall-paper-" x="0" y="0" width="1280" height="1024"/>
<text x="100" y="200" fill="white" font-family="Nimbus Mono L" font-size="14" kerning="2">%text</text>
</svg>

2. Next we create a script to fetch the most recent Twitter message and then embedding it in the image. The script is called change-wallpaper and is placed in the bin directory. It has the following:
   text=`python -c "import urllib;print eval(urllib.urlopen('http://search.twitter.com/search.json?q=ubuntu&lang=en').read().replace('false', 'False').replace('true', 'True
').replace('null', 'None'))['results'][0]['text'].replace('\!','').replace('/','\/')"`
cat ~/Theme/Wallpapers/wall-tmpl.svg | sed "s/%text/$text/g" > ~/Theme/Wallpapers/wall.svg

3. We then add the following entry to crontab to fetch Twitter messages every minute:
   # m h dom mon dow command
* * * * * ~/bin/change-wallpaper

4. Run the script once, it will create a file called wall.svg in your Wallpapers directory. Set this as your desktop background and watch the background change every minute!

You could get very creative with this. You could have your calendar reminders embedded directly into your desktop background or you could have dynamically fetched background images with your own random fortune quote. The possibilities are enormous!

If you liked this, you may also like

• June 11, 2009 — Associating files with URLs on Ubuntu (Gnome) – a quick hack
• September 4, 2010 — Fun with X – hacks in Ubuntu
• June 21, 2009 — My weekend hack – Twitter Trending Topics
• July 11, 2009 — Getting Reliance (Huawei) USB Data Card to work in Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty)
• July 15, 2008 — Getting Rosegarden to work in Ubuntu (Gnome)
• July 12, 2008 — Adventure with Ubuntu, Wubi, yum, libc and the like
• May 3, 2008 — The Afterthoughts – Gmail forwarding and service interoperability – an interesting observation
• April 23, 2008 — Privacy disasters with aggregation services
• March 16, 2008 — Downloading your data using Greasemonkey
• November 13, 2007 — Microblogging experiences

The first thing that I wanted to try was to revive my old application. The application has been inactive because it has surpassed the total stored data quota and I never managed to find time to revive it.

One of the biggest issues that I mentioned last time, was the ability to not be able to delete data from the application easily. There is an upper limit of 1GB on the total stored data. Considering that the data is schema-less (which means that you need more space to store the same data when compared to Relational Databases), this upper limit is severely restrictive when compared to the other quota limits that are imposed. There were about 800,000 entries of a single kind (equivalent of tables) that I had to delete!

So I started looking for ways to delete all the data available and came across this post. I decided to go with the approach mentioned here. The approach still seems to be to delete data in chunks and there is no simple way out. The maximum number of entries allowed in a fetch call is 500, which means I require 1600 calls to delete all the data.

Anyway, so I wrote a simple script as mentioned in the post above and executed it. I experimented with various chunk values and saw that 300 was the size that worked optimally; anything more either seemed to take a lot of time or actually timed out.

Here is the code that I executed:


from google.appengine.ext import db
from <store> import <kind>


def delete_all():
   i = 0
   while True:
      db.delete(<kind>.all().fetch(300))
   i = i + 1
   print i


saved this file as purger.py and executed it as:

$ python appengine_console.py twitter-trending-topics
App Engine interactive console for twitter-trending-topics
>>> import purger
>>> purger.delete_all()


A seemingly simple script, but after about a couple of hours of execution (after having deleted roughly 200,000 entries), I started seeing a 503 Service Unavailable exception. I thought this was to do with some network issues, but realized soon that this was not the case. I had run out of my CPU time quota!

To delete 200,000 entries the engine had taken up 6.5 CPU hours and this it managed to do in less than 2 hours! It had, according to the graphs, assigned 4 CPU cores to the task and executed my task in the 2 hours. At this rate, it will take me 4 days to just delete the data from my application. The Datastore CPU time quota is 62.11 hours but there is an upper cap of 6.5 hours on Total CPU time quota – the Datastore CPU Time quota is not considered separate. I am not sure how this works!

As seen in the screenshot above, the script executed for about 2 hours before running out of CPU. There was no other appreciable CPU usage in the last 24 hours. Considering that there was no other task taking up CPU, the 6.42 hours of Datastore CPU time seems to be included in the 6.5 hours of Total CPU time. So how am I supposed to utilize the rest of the 55 hours of Datastore CPU time?

I am not sure if I am doing something wrong but considering that there are no better ways of doing things here are my observations:

• It is easy to get data into the system
• It is not easy to query the data (there is an upper limit of 500 and considering that joins are done in code, this is severely restrictive).
• There is a total storage limit of 1GB for the free account
• It is not easy to purge entities – the simplest way to delete data is to delete them in chunks
• Deleting data is highly CPU intensive – and you can run out of CPU quota fairly quickly.

So what kind of applications can we build that is neither IO intensive nor CPU intensive? What is Google’s strategy here? Am I missing something? Is anything wrong with my analysis?

If you liked this, you may also like

• June 22, 2009 — What I dislike about Google AppEngine
• June 21, 2009 — My weekend hack – Twitter Trending Topics
• January 6, 2009 — Why it is the way it is – an analysis of the proposal by TimBL of the WWW
• July 21, 2007 — Have I stopped blogging?