In an elusive search of Clouds and the place above them, called Skandagiri.

Posted by posted by Insane at at

Skandagiri is a hill, located off Bellary Road (NH-7 Hyderabad-Bangalore Highway), and is very close to Nandi Hills and Chikkaballapura. The peak is every adventurer’s paradise with beautiful night trek, altitude camping, stunning sunrise, and serene and swimming clouds that sometimes limits visibility to just a few meters. The village is called Kandavara Halli and the hill is called Kandavarahalli Betta (aka Skandagiri and Kalwarahalli Betta). It is in the Chikkaballapura district of Karnataka.

Statistics (for nerds):

Altitude: About 1350m above sea level.
Distance: 78 km from Bangalore.
Nearest Town/Medical Help: Chikkaballapura, 5 km.
Co-ordinates: 13°25′3″N 77°40′58″E

Getting There:

There are two routes to Skandagiri:

1. From NH-7, turn towards Nandi Hills. At the base of Nandi Hills turn right and proceed toKalawara village via Muddenahalli (birth place of Bharath Rathna Sir.M.Visweswaraih).

2. From Chikkaballapura proceed directly to Kalawara village.

Plan with the second route, as it will be easy to catch an early bird on this route to guide us if you get lost in Chikkaballapura town.

Directions:

1. Follow the Bangalore International Airport, better known as Bellary Road. After crossing the BIAL, you will be on Chikkaballapura Road. Follow the same road until you find aVisweswaraih statue on to our Left.

2. Take a left at this place and a right turn at the City Municipal Council a little further down. Later this shall directly lead to Papagni Mutt, which is the basement of Skandagiri.

3. At Kalawara village ask for Omkara Jyoti Ashrama / Papagni Mutt (13°25′26.6″N 77°41′28″E for nerds). There is a Shiva temple near the base of the hill, where vehicles can be parked.

- Nandi to Kalawara to Papagni Mutt is 6 km.
- Chikaballapur to Papagni Mutt is 3 km.

Trekking:

Level of Trekking: Moderate, but Exciting.

- It is common to trek in the dark, and it's a fun on a full moon night. Trekkers usually start the climbing around 2:00 AM and aim to reach the top by around 5:30 AM to catch the sunrise. This timing allows viewing of sunrise against the backdrop of golden clouds.

- This is a tedious trek as the hill is precipitous and high. The trek starts from the Papagni Temple at the foot of the hill. The fortress is in full sight throughout the trek uphill. This steep and fantastic trek through a maze of dense shrub is highly intriguing.

- Skandagiri is a teaser. Just as you reach the fort wall content that you have topped the hill, you see another ring of fort. No sooner do you reach there, than you find another majestic fort wall waiting to be conquered. There are six such series of stonewalls protecting an abandoned temple on the hilltop.

- Recently the Karnataka Forest Department has shown interest in Skandagiri due to the frequent visit of people and has established a parking place for all the vehicles visiting there. An Entry Fee of INR 15 is charged for each person visiting the hill.

- For the beginners, trek guides are available on Weekends only. These guides charge INR 200-1000. The exact charges depends on the weather and obviously your negotiation skills. They speak understandable English & Hindi language.

- Local villagers sometimes camp on the peak and sell Omelette and Tea. We can get Maggi also, if lucky. They even gather wood for you in case you want a campfire. They charge for this from INR 50-250.

Must Carry:

- Personal first-aid medication.
- Water bottles (At least 2 liters per head).
- A Torch with new batteries (At least visibility of 75-100 meters).
- Energy Food (Chocolate bars, Flavored Milk, Electrolyte/ Energy drinks - Glucon-D, Red Bull etc).
- Rain Gear (As per weather.com)
- Winter Gear.
- Camera with batteries.
- Cash, as no cards accepted there.

Please note that, temperature is likely to drop enough to make you shiver at the peak.

Feel free to share your confusion/thought/suggestion/information, if any.

Hoping an Excellent and Safe trekking & nature experience in an elusive search of Clouds and the place above them, called Skandagiri!

Labels: Adventure, Bangalore, Camping, Moon Light Trekking, Skandagiri Vacation, Trekking, Weekend

These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.

What will you do if Google enters your market?

Posted by posted by Insane at at

What's the toughest question a venture capitalist can ask? Answer: "What will you do if Google enters your market?" The web has been buzzing with speculation that senior Microsoft executives are now asking that question. The truth is that they have been asking it for quite a while. In an intriguing interview he gave several years ago, Bill Gates observed that the only company out there that reminded him of Microsoft in its early days was Google. He didn't elaborate, but most of the audience knew what he meant: a company that was smart, agile and hell-bent on world domination.

The reason for the excitement last week was Google's announcement that it was developing an operating system - and dominance of the market for operating systems is the source of Microsoft's power. Until now, Google had studiously ignored this part of the market, which seemed like a smart strategy: after all, only a fool attacks on the enemy's strongest front. Instead Google concentrated on picking off other pieces of Microsoft territory, starting with Hotmail (attacked with Gmail), MSN (Google Talk), Microsoft Office (Google Docs and Apps) and, latterly, Internet Explorer (the Google Chrome browser).

With the 20/20 vision of hindsight, this can seem like a purposeful route-march towards the ultimate goal - replacement of Microsoft as the dominant company in the computing universe. In that sense the announcement of an upcoming Google OS can indeed be seen as the opening salvo in the final battle.

But there's another way of looking at it. The intriguing thing about the Google announcement is not that it is developing an OS, but that it is switching tack. For nearly two years the company has been developing a Linux-based OS for mobile phones under the Android label. Most of us who have used Android assumed it was only a matter of time before a version tailored for Netbooks was released.

But that is not what Google announced. There wasn't much technical detail in the company's blog post, but the one thing that is clear is that the new OS will be - in its words - "a natural extension of Google Chrome". It is, they go on to say, "our attempt to rethink what operating systems should be".

If true, we have reached a significant milestone because what the Google guys propose amounts to turning the world upside down. Up to now, the operating system was at the heart of every computing device, transforming the machine from an expensive paperweight into something that could do useful things - running programs, managing displays, handling keyboard and mouse, etc. And because the OS had to be able to do all of this, it was the largest, most complex and most important piece of software of all.

In the old paradigm, the web browser was just another program the OS had to support. When the PC was the platform, that made perfect sense, but that paradigm has been steadily eroding. As broadband penetration increased, more and more people began to get their "computing" services not from their PC but from server farms over the net. Imperceptibly, we have been moving into a world in which, to repeat an old mantra, "the network is the computer".

If the network is indeed the computer, then the browser - our window on to the network - becomes the key piece of software. For many people today, the browser is the only program they really need. So it was only to be expected that somebody would eventually ask why we needed vast, clunky, expensive operating systems (such as Windows Vista, say) when really all that is required is a life-support system for a browser. That's what the Google engineers have asked. Their answer is that only a minimalist OS is now needed, and that is what they are developing - and what millions will be running in the latter part of 2010.

We have been here before. In 1995 the founders of a firm called Netscape had the same idea. If the web was going to be the key application, they reasoned, surely the browser could effectively become the operating system. They were unwise enough to say this in the hearing of Bill Gates, who realised instantly it posed a serious threat to Microsoft's core product. At that moment, Netscape's fate was sealed: careless talk costs companies.

But that was then and this is now. And whatever else it may be, Google ain't Netscape. Ask Mr Gates.

Labels: Buisiness, Chome, Chromium, Google, Google's Announcement, Market, Microsoft, Operating, shishir

These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.

Google throws a challenge to Microsoft

Posted by posted by Insane at at

Windows world The first version of Microsoft’s Windows was launched in 1985. Today, it runs on over 90 per cent of the world’s billion-plus computers Penguin flop The open source Linux operating system, developed in the early 1990s, has failed to challenge Windows and has a meagre 2 per cent market share SEARCH giant Google on Wednesday unveiled a browser-based computer operating system, making by far its most audacious assault on Microsoft’s decades-long Windows monopoly
The Chrome Operating System, based on the eponymous browser launched nine months ago, is Google’s “attempt to re-think what operating systems should be,” Sundar Pichai, VP, product management, who also headed the development of the Chrome browser, wrote announcing the launch on the Google blog
The idea of a browser as the operating system was initially touted as early as 1994 when Marc Andreessen’s Netscape browser hit the market and eventually led to its famous browser war with Microsoft’s Internet Explorer in the late 1990’s. The dizzying rise of Google early this century renewed the possibility that the Web-based company would use the browser, rather than any other piece of software, to take a stab at the world’s biggest technology company, Microsoft
Still, Google’s announcement has caught the tech world by surprise. Most expected its Android operating system — designed initially for mobile phones and now being used on so-called Netbooks (cheaper and smaller laptops which use flash RAM instead of hard drives) — to be its base for an assault on the PC market in which Microsoft holds a market share of over 90 percent
Even though the Chrome OS can run “computers ranging from small Netbooks to full-size desktop systems,” as Pichai said, Google is initially targeting the skyrocketing Netbooks market. Last year, about 14 million Netbooks were sold globally and despite the global slump analysts expect it to rise to 30-35 million
The Chrome OS will bring a number of advantages to users, not least its cost. Google is likely to give it away free or at a nominal charge as Chrome OS is developed from a free and open source kernel, and the larger goal surely would be to shut Microsoft out of the Netbooks market
Qualitatively, too, Chrome will provide a number of benefits, especially for users who tend to do almost everything on the Net. It will run computers faster than Windows-based PCs and run almost all Web applications, eventually perhaps precluding the need for desktop software.

Source: Indian Express, ENS Chennai

Labels: Chome, Chromium, Computers, Google, Indian Express, irresistible, Operating, system, Technology

These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.

Shishir Speaks

In an elusive search of Clouds and the place above them, called Skandagiri.

What will you do if Google enters your market?

Google throws a challenge to Microsoft

About Shishir Speaks

Visitors' Comments

Previous Posts

Archives