There are two times one should not speculate...once when he can afford to and the other when he cannot! -Mark Twain
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Books


The rating scale for these books is from 1 to 5 stars. My ratings are loosely based on how much satisfaction I got about having read the book, and an indicator of my recommendation to other readers. Of course, all books are recommended, just that I liked some more than others. Happy reading.
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Rating Title Short Review Comments
***** Moneywise Must read for an Indian investor. One of the best books on investing I have read. Click here for detailed review.
***** फिजिक्स् विशयी बोलू काही - भाग १ आमच्य वेळी अस नव्हतं! पण असयला हवं होतं. वाचाच. लेखक महाशय, पुधचा भाग कधी येतोय?
***** व्यक्ती आणी वल्ली - पु. ल. देशपान्डे मनुश्य स्वभावाचे इतके सूक्षम निरीक्षण, व तेही पोट धरून हसवणारे
***** स्वयम्भू - प वि वर्तक महाभारताचा नायक भीम कसा, ते समजावून घया
***** वास्तव रमायण - प वि वर्तक या पुस्तकाच्या नवातच सर्व काही आहे
***** मानससरोवर - प्रेमचन्द इन्सान का मन मुन्शीजीने जाना और हमारै लिये कथारूप मे सवारा है
***** देवगन्धर्व भास्करबुवा बखले - शैला दातार कलाकारान्नी वाचावेच. Click here for detailed review.
***** The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Wackiest stuff Ive read. Fourth part onwards, the unpredictability became predictable for me and so I kind-of lost interest. But highly recommended.
***** Towards the Silver Crest of Himalayas Encapsulates Bharatiya Philosophy in a novella
***** The Higher Self Audiobook. Very Reassuring
***** You Can Win Mr. Shiv Khera is marvellous. This book continues to help me
***** Animal Farm Sometimes I still cant decide whether I want to be Snowball or Napolean though mostly I tend to Snowball.
***** Brave New World Wow, I think we are almost there, in the Brave New World. How exciting!
***** Thinking in Java If you read only one book on Java programming ever, let it be this book please. Old is gold.
***** Learning Python Resonated very well with me
***** The Professional Must read for a professional. Click here for detailed review.
***** Simple And Usable Must read for a designer. Click here for detailed review.
**** मरुत्युन्जय - शिवाजी सावन्त सुन्दर कल्पनाविलास
**** Employees First, Customers Second: Turning Conventional Management Upside Down Read only if you really want to change your organization. Click here for detailed review.
**** A Random Walk Down Wall Street A must read for any value investor
**** The Goal Great reading, both this and the next two. Mr. Goldratt tells it very well.
**** It's Not Luck
**** Necessary But Not Sufficient
**** Shared Data Clusters Excellent tome. Additionally, it helped me rediscover the fundamentals. Dileep is a past co-worker and it was a privilege!
*** The Lazy Project Manager Simply must read for project managers. Click here for detailed review.
*** Being Geek: The Software Developer's Career Handbook Simply must read for software developers. Click here for detailed review.
*** Design Patterns You may need multiple readings to understand the patterns, but once understood, they can really sharpen your design skills. They worked for me.
*** Applying UML and Patterns
*** Debugging the Development Process
*** Advanced Programming in the UNIX Environment
*** The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People The 7 Habits ... : Nice reading. American way of doing 'sanskaras' I suppose. I dont think I have effected many of the habits into my ways though.
*** Living With Honour Rare Reading. For a Rare kind of life.
*** The Checklist Manifesto My tweets:
  • Under conditions of true complexity, efforts to dictate every step from the center will fail. Atul Gawande #quote
  • Good checklists are precise, efficient, easy to use in most difficult situations, and practical. Atul Gawande #quote
  • We rarely investigate our failures. If we do, incorporating resultant changes takes years. Atul Gawande #quote
  • Heroes are daring, they improvise, not have protocols, checklists. This idea needs updation. Atul Gawande #quote
  • Selflessness, skill, trustworthy is expected of professionals. Discipline, we have to work at. Atul Gawande #quote
*** स्वरान्क आणि ओम्काराधिष्ठित स्वरसाधना - डौ गोविन्द केतकर सन्गीत रसिकान्साठी, अभ्यासकान्साठी, अत्यन्त उपयुक्त
** The Alchemist Good flow. Nice story. Although at the end I felt like I felt when I saw Matrix III. Which was - huh ?
** Code Complete
** Writing Solid Code
** शल्यकौशल्य - पद्मभूषण डौ. भा ना पुरन्दरे अत्यन्त स्फूर्तीदायक
** Offshore My tweets:
  • According to Gov India accounting, IT-BPO services exports actually fall under 'Invisibles' not 'Merchandise Exports' #gyan #book Offshore
  • Reading for the first time: MK Gandhi referred to as Saint Gandhi, in the #book Offshore
  • What would happen to the rising aspirations, expectations and showy consumerism that the IT/BPO industry has engendered ? #book Offshore
  • The TI office in Bangalore 1st #Offshore center as bonded warehouse with satellite link, tax breaks! Scheme adopted later for STPI. #book
  • Per Ramayan, Hanuman grew in size x times to match Surasa's huge challenge and then thumbsized in a jiffy to outwit her. #book Offshore
  • Indian IT/BPO cos have shown the ability to grow in headcount per market demand. Turning thumbsize remains a challenge. #book Offshore.
  • 1 proposal, 1 relationship, 1 project delivery at a time. Is how cos built their account relationships. No fancy selling. #book Offshore.
  • Infosys reported that in 2011, around 97.6% of their revenues came from repeat clients. #book Offshore.
  • Engineers who love technology and the act of creating something thrive in the software industry. #book Offshore. Wow! Does *that* resonate!
  • Humility has never been a strong point with the (IT Services) industry! #quote #book Offshore
* Games Indians Play My tweets:
  • Fascinating parallels between iterative prisoners dilemma + tit for tat strategy from game theory and Krishna's advice from Geeta (1of6)
  • Krishnas selflessness puts means above the end. If your means or actions are just and honourable, the end takes care of itself. (2of6)
  • If end alone tempts you, it leads to defect-defect decision, manifests worst case game result, not the end you are trying to achive (3of6)
  • One should opt a 'co-operate - co-operate' strategy w/ equanimity i.e. w/o attachment and also retaliate in kind (not forgive!) when (4of6)
  • provoked by a 'defect' of an adharmi, follow it up by compassion in the next round of the game. Perhaps the seminal chapter in #book. (5of6)
  • Precious reading #book Games Indians Play by V Raghunathan. Insight into Indian behavior that will make full sense to Indian reader. (6of6)
* The Mythical Man-Month The Mythical Man Month : I read this because it was recommended to me by a senior colleague at my workplace. The basic principles are good. It does sound a bit out of date though, simply because it was written long ago.
Quoting from another reviewers comments : Read this as one of your primers to software engineering, and then follow up your reading with other texts. This book is quoted so often in other books and technical journals that it deserves an initial reading.
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