Archive for August, 2009

Lalbagh

Indian Water Shortage

Drought conditions are looming large in India now. There is much more worrying news that is coming now which does not seem to have caught the attention of many. The Grace mission (Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment) has found out  that in India’s north-west – including Delhi, the water table is falling by about 4cm (1.6 inches) per year. It has also come to the conclusion that climate conditions like rainfall are not the reason for this. This is mainly because of usage of ground water resources for irrigation purposes.  The farmers to irrigate the field are mining more underground water resources. Also it is stated that  irrigation rather than rain fed fields increases the yield of crops like Paddy. This once again underlines the need for a systematic implementation of rain water harvesting.

BBC article

Kadai Cauliflower

Ingredients:
     
1 med. cauliflower, separated into big florets
1 small capsicum, chopped in slivers
1 med. onion grated
1 med. tomato peeled and chopped fine
2 tsp. coriander leaves finely chopped
1/2 tsp. ginger crushed or grated
1/2 tsp. garlic crushed
1/2 tsp. cumin seeds
2 tbsp. oil
Salt and sugar to taste

Mix into paste in 1/2 cup water:
1/2 tsp. red chilli powder
1/2 tsp. dhania powder
1/2 tsp. garam masala
1/5 tsp. turmeric powder
2 tbsp. curds beaten
2 pinches asafoetida

Method:

Steam cauliflower florets with a pinch of salt until just soft.
Heat oil in kadai, add cumin seeds, allow to splutter.
Add ginger, garlic and capsicum and stir for a minute.
Add onion, tomatoes and stir fry for 2 minutes.
Add the prepared masala paste, salt and sugar and fry till oil separates.
Add the steamed cauliflower florets and mix gently.
When oil separates, remove from fire and garnish with coriander leaves.

Cutlets


Ingredients
:
2 large potatoes, boiled, peeled & mashed or grated
1 medium carrot, boiled & grated
1 large beetroot, peeled, boiled & grated
100g frozen green peas boiled soft
3 medium onions, chopped fine
4 green chilies, chopped
60ml Bengal gram, dry roasted
1 cardamom
1 clove
A piece of cinnamon
A handful of mint leaves
1 tsp ginger garlic paste
Little Corn flour and bread crumbs
salt to taste
Oil

Method:
Powder roasted gram dal along with cardamom, cinnamon and clove and keep aside. Mix the mashed potato, carrot, beetroot and peas with salt to taste and a pinch of turmeric powder. Heat oil in a pan and fry the onions, ginger garlic paste and green chillies for about 10 minutes. Add mint leaves, vegetable mixture and the ground powder. Mix well and fry for 5 to 7 minutes. Remove from fire and allow to cool. Make small balls of the mixture and shape into cutlets of desired shape.

Make a thick batter of corn flour and water. Dip the cutlets in this batter and then roll in the bread crumbs and shallow fry on the pan in hot oil until golden brown in colour.

Cherrapunji Root Bridges

This tribe builds bridges by growing tree roots – Cool pics and video

Naaka Mooka – Cool Video

Cocoa Core Data

Read in this order:

  1. Developing with Core Data
  2. Introduction to Core Data Programming Guide: Core Data Basics
  3. Introduction to Core Data Programming Guide: Managed Object Models
  4. Introduction to Core Data Utility Tutorial
  5. Creating a Managed Object Model with Xcode
  6. Xcode Entity Modeling Tools for Core Data
  7. Non-Standard Persistent Attribute
  8. The remainder of Intro to Core Data Programming Guide

From the iPhone Reference Library

  1. Core Data Tutorial for the iPhone OS
  2. Core Data Programming Guide

Cocoa Dev Central Articles:

  1. Core Data Class Overview
  2. Build a Core Data App

iPhone SDK Cookbook

Excellent set of code examples but seems to contain no text or explanations. Associated videos are HERE.

झंपः

Jump in Sanskrit is (no kidding) झंपः.

“The Student’s Sanskrit English Dictionary”, Vaman Shivram Apte
Page 225

झंपः, झंपा A spring, jump, leap;

OpenCL

AMD webpage with an interesting links – History of GPGPU and a very brief intro to OpenCL HERE.

OpenCL Specification (Khronos)

A direct link to the API Spec page.