The "start" button

A couple of days back, I had the privilage to work with SuSE 10 ( a Linux distro, fully supported by Novell)
(Don't worry, this is not going be as big as the last one ;) )
For quite long now, I was hoping that some Linux distro. would be compatible with my keyboard...
You might say, what are you talking about?Any one can type and see the characters on the screen with any Microsoft Windows compatible keyboard..

Yes, but have you ever noticed the key with the "Windows" image on it, rather, famously known as the "start" button...
What happens when u press the key........... on Linux?



Nothing...........
and I've been a lot frustrated, when, to use a console, I always have to use the mouse :(



until now,

Not any more I'll be frustrated........
'Coz, SuSE 10 changes this!! :) Yes, the "startup menu" equivalent (already available in earlier versions of SuSE) can be accessed by the "start" button!!!
How good of SuSE to have thought about it :)
..................for me ;)

My new year bash - 2007 !

Why should anyone consider Jan 1st as a special day? Why is that not just another day in anybody's life?
Okay enough of philosophy...Jan 1st is the day where most of us take new resolutions..only to find that we make the same resolution for the next year too! ;)
most of my new year celebrations... for abt 15 years..were spent at my home....and probably a very few times that I was awake when the clock stuck 00:00 hrs...but then things changed, I moved away from my home and I started celebrating the new year in a different fashion (though I despised the stuff at that time !)...but things changed and so did I, and started njoying the stuff...
Its been almost 20 months that I moved back to Hyd..and celebrated the last new year wid my family @ my home.........

but, this time, its been a different xperience all2gether for me...
one of my frnds Shashank was on vacation and had come back from the U.S. and we decided to meet...and called up a couple of others Rajesh, Venky, Suresh and Ramu, so that we cud have a new year bash 2gether...
Though we had enough time 2 plan for the bash...but we never ever planned it...
all of suddend on Dec 30th nite, I get a call frm Rajesh ordering me 2 be @ Shashank's house by 9 a.m. the nxt day; I called up Suresh and we were @ Shashank's by 12:00 afternoon and we found our frnd Ramu has come frm B'lore 2 spend time wid us....we spent some time discussing this and that...and thought we wud go out for lunch..we were 6 ppl and we had 3 bikes...but Shashank said we would go by his car...and it turned be none other than the Skoda Laura!...
Skoda Laura was made to seat 5 ppl comfortably (unless one plans to sit in the dicky ;) , we were 6, so had to adjust a bit (which we were not new to, btw )...
we drove to the Prasad's Multiplex....and entered the "Mirror Maze" which was something fun! all mirrors around u and u'd have to find ur way out on the other side...really fun!!
then we walked around..chit chattin and decided to have lunch somewhere....
but then we thought we go to the outskirts some where...we drove to himayatsagar...gandipet.. and watched the notorious "outer ring road" in the making..and we reached gandipet...
when we were sitting for a while @ gandipet...a tarrot card reader with a parrot walked over to us...and wanted to tell "everything" abt us...we talked two of us into getting talked abt them..

a bit abt Skoda Laura..'m not an automobile xpert..but, automatic transmission, but customisable for manual trasmission and sports mode too!

then indicators, rather sensors, that tell u from time to time the amout of fuel and how long (in kms) the fuel will last..the temperature inside...and sensors that watch the car's rear so that it does not hit somebody/thing when in reverse...awesome music players whch can play 6 discs at a time(i did not understand the concept here )..plush leather seats..and awesome pickup..at times when the road was empty..we reached 120kmps!

then we went to a dhaba..had some spicy, gud dinner (donot remember the name of the dhaba)and then started coming back 2 the city...it was a huge traffic jam at Mehdipatnam..'coz the next day it was Eid too!! and about 2 to 3 Thousand goat and sheep were put up for sale all over the place!! It took us abt an hour to get out of the traffic and come back 2 the city...
next we decided to stay back @ Shashank's for the nite and watch "Bommarillu" and Rang de Basanti.....
now the important part is not the movies we watched...but wat tools did we use to watch it...Shashank had brought something like a projector from the U.S. which plays DVDs and also projects them onto a screen!!..So, we picked an empty room and let the show begin...and watched uptil 3 p.m; ofcourse, we greeted each other and friends @ 00:00 hrs...
one thing was surprising...the networks weren't as busy as they were "supposed" to be! every one of us was receiving calls, SMSes and we were also able to make calls and send SMSes...Hmm..the mobile network has definitely improved :)

and that is how my new year celebrations went.....................
how was urs?
btw, the pics are frm Venky's 12x Canon cam . (frm the U.S. ofcourse)