Debugging is like having sex

I have been working as a software developer for about four years now and have known many people from this industry who have chosen development of software as their career path. As exciting as it looks from outside, the task of development if full of filth, gamble and uncertainty. It is true that after having been around for a while, a person begins developing boredom and less liking towards a job. But I do not write this text in such a mood or state. I choose to remain a developer for a while, just because it often becomes challenging enough to let you enjoy your job.

Software development is an above average paying job in many countries now and so I expect it to remain for at least a couple of years after which the global pay scale will slightly decline and then saturate for some time. Despite of other important respectable positions that can be held in a software development company, the role of a developer is more challenging if you like to be at the root of problems and ignite your own solutions. How can a software developer be recognized? A simple management trick! Take your employees for a walk, say around some paddy fields. Those who jump into the fields and run around, they are useless, throw them out! Those who take out some gadgets, a laptop or a mobile or a camera, and starts pretending to be busy, they have good management skills, but obviously not a developer! If there is a group of people, physically not very active, standing at the edge of the fields, grouped together and talking about various topics ranging from the cellular biology to the Proxima Centauri, each person impersonating a genius when each is a jack than a master, you have chosen the right people! These people babbling nonsense and every other person in the group having a say (but remember, they speak because they have to say something!) are the true developers. Another unique idea - talk to them. If you cannot understand them and they look confused all the time, you have met the right person for the post of a developer.

But however the individuals be, respect the job they do. The most challenging task for a developer is debugging. It is an art of going through the garbage so that the garbage remains in tact and the rat with dirty plague hiding inside and squeaking all the time is dead. (Well, you assume its dead, but its just unconscious!) Ok, I will rephrase it...so the rat is dead at least for a while. The patience and skill needed, the analytical power needed and the monotonous task of re-executing the code to reload the scenario are virtues of a developer. In fact, a developer is already a cyborg. His thoughts are mechanical and social consciousness is artificial. His desires are technically sound but morally absurd, and no matter how many wives he can pride on, his first wife will always remain a lousy 17" desktop with a crap keyboard.

Debugging is like having sex. The pleasure that a developer experiences when a bug is solved, is ecstatic. But since debugging is a human task and the debugger is still a human, the level of discomfort always troubles him. That is why, the speed and accuracy of the solutions provided by developers are directly proportional to the junk food and coffee on his table. There is an old teaching for wives that the best way to reach a man's heart is through his stomach. Since successful companies like Google and Microsoft have already learnt this lesson, all projects managers in this industry must. Cutting short the crap, developers need something to munch while he has something to crunch in mind. What about trainings? They are secondary. Oh sorry, did I get the women rights people behind me? But I could not help assuming that all (well, almost all) debuggers are men, because women are good at developing new solutions, but perhaps being hygienically conscious, they rarely like to overturn the garbage for the rat. You do not agree, well no problem, I didn't say all....I said almost all. Congratulations, you are an exception!

It was a funny thought I had when I was trying to explore why software developers are given the facilities they enjoy at their workplaces (well, in many of the workplaces). It seems like the project managers are aware of the nuptial bond between a developer and his PC. They have to do nothing but lure them to stay together, which requires much less effort, because I have never heard of a developer going for a counseling session because his relationship with his first wife is not working! He pays very less attention to other relationships and that is why software developers find wives (or mates) even though they are fat and lousy. You asked why? Well, the wives do not have to worry about planning for future or any expenses that the dummy developer would incur. All he needs is some gadgets (and the much needed munch is often free at his workplace), and the balance from the salary is a treat! You can also watch your favorite TV shows and visit late night parties because the dumb ass is still unaware of the world beyond his PC!

There is much more I could explain about the creepy looking people of this alien world who call themselves the creators of software and pride on their creation unaware of the riches that pour in through it. But I am already upsetting many and I will, for my safety, let it be for a while. When I find less humidity around, I will get back to it.

An atheist

How do you define an atheist? An atheist is supposed to be a person who does not believe in God. If someone does not believe in God, he still holds a firm belief in non-existence of God. He is still a believer. Now doesn't that sound a bit awkward that an atheist is a believer?

Couple of years back, I met a person who called himself a die-hard atheist. During the conversation, he mentioned that he does not visit a temple nearby although the members of religious society insist him to. He had not visited the temple in last fifteen years since he became an atheist. I smiled and replied, "For me, you turn out to be more religious than the rest. For all these years, you have not visited the temple because you believed that it was a place of God and as an atheist, you should not. That sounds like you firmly believe that the place is the place of God. You have started believing in the existence of God more than us. If you were an atheist as you define it to be, you would have found no difference in the temple and a neighbor's house. I do not see a point in hating to visit the place, then!"

A true atheist would be the one for whom the existence and non-existence of God does not matter at all. A true atheist would be the one who does not hook up his independence of decision making and realization of self-existence to the mercy of anyone else, be there God or no God. But a human being can never remain a true atheist for ever because however independent one is, he always turns out to a savior during difficult times of life. It is not necessary that the savior be a founder of a religion, it can be your nearest friend or a good person you know. At various moments in life, we tend to surrender our independence in decision-making and the grace of realization of self-existence to someone else, and this is possible only if you put your trust into. Once we start realizing that it is time now when we do not need help from anyone else, the dependence of faith is revoked and one becomes independent in belief again.

Every person is born atheist, but the nature of survival makes a person hook up their faith to a supreme power. And it is necessary to accept a ruler, because fear and luck are two virtues of life that no being can claim itself safe from the grandeur of the nature. It is fear or greed that makes a person religious, but it is the nature of existence that makes a person theist.

The passage of life

Life and to live has always been a mystery for me. Every year, I celebrate my birthday with friends and family, and feel happy about it. But it was on my eighteenth birthday that my consciousness asked me a question that knocked me hard. It asked me to explain my life and the eighteen years. Not in terms of success or studies, or wealth or grief, but in terms of the meaning of life.

Having failed to explain my own life, I struggled to write down the moment as it meant to me. But it took days, more difficult days, and finally one day, I wrapped up the fearful voyage in the dreadful world of emotions. By the time, I had a few lines ready to be shared.

This is the most beautiful poem I ever wrote as yet today, I discover a new self with its help. Seven years have passed by and I crave for it the way I did then. Welcome to the passage of life!

Meandering through, in pastime of the eternal sleep,

By sheer chance of the law, that gave me a creep,

Entrapped within the weird length of the passage,

Was welcomed with love, in a prevailing queerness.

High up, the blue giant, extended its caring arms,

But bewildered, stood I, with a feel of wariness.



On the carpet of roses, I could smell their bloom,

Laid heaped in a corner, my preserved heirloom.

Two steep marble cliffs, proud of their grandeur,

Had engraved on them, with hands blood-stained,

Rewards for the dead and epitaphs on who lived,

Beyond the gossamer veil, so through ages remained.



A primeval gallery, with profound paintings on show,

Limned by some splendid hands, marvels of the graffito.

I gazed upon each, my eyes kindles in excite,

For I could see the priming, of smiles, hopes and tears.

The pros and cons of the art, tossed deep in my mind,

As I witnessed, their own blood, a couple endears.



And a crowd of imposters, each had an edifice of hopes,

Headed petrified to the other end of knowing the ropes.

Pondering over the oddity of their own bizarre paintings,

For I could not see theirs, and neither they mine.

Some lolled for an instant, some kept their pace,

But none accompanied me, through all my lifetime.



Reading the ciphers, I’ve been through two short of twenty,

And as the next comes looming, I can relive a plenty.

Determined to face the muscle, in the murky road ahead,

Rich in verve and the paradise boons bestowed in a ray,

The ablazed crave to see more of the art, I tread ahead,

With hopes that the other end, lies still far far away.

(It took me days to record this vision in appropriate words. There were times, when I would fall short of words just because there was so much to describe. I finally completed it on 5 April, 2001.)

The boulder

It has been years since I wrote this, but it still stands so fresh and so true. The mixed emotion of love and fear still dwells in me and I know not if I can claim anything has changed since.

There rests a boulder, pious and divine,

On the top of a hillock, my house aside,

That stares at the sky – a diamond shine,

Engraved on a ring, so the hillock to be.

I oft be lost, know nay what to detect,

Significant so high, I can’t describe,

Numbers fall short to count its worth,

To me and my love and the beats to beat.

I wander in thoughts when the wind is calm,

And dream of my apt love come true.

My ‘she’ do I praise, unfading charm of ever,

With her I be blessed, troubled never.

I dream of then when we two together,

The day in memo, me and ‘my’ on the rock,

Will sing and cheer and kiss and smile.

If my love turned so, I’ll be drowned in joy.

But to me terror times, I dream the worst,

Sweet dreams hampered and heart pierced.

True do I speak to the purity the most,

Will cast my self from the height unknown,

To end my dreams and the pricking breath,

With agony of pain and tragedy in love.

Then will the future write an epitaph on me,

And the boulder decides, life or else for me.

Uncertain yet, me and my love spellbound,

Life is in speed and in search of life,

But still rests a boulder, pious and divine,

On the top of a hillock, my house aside.

(I don’t exactly know when I wrote this. But I am not really satistfied by the way this was formed. It does not quite reflect what it should have. But then, this is the best way I could put it then. It must have been somewhere around the end of the last millenium.)

Crucifixion, a sacrifice?

"People talk of the sacrifice of Christ as evidence by His crucifixion. But, he was surrounded and bound, and crowned by the crowd who captured Him with a crown of thorns, and later, nailed to the cross by his captors. A person bound and beaten by the police cannot say that he has sacrificed anything, for, he is not a free man."
(Source: http://saigrace.com/christmas.html)