Why OpenGyan?

For quite sometime couple of my friends and I are doing little weekend work in the banner of OpenGyan. Check out this and this to know more about it. One thing that puzzles people why are we doing this without getting anything back (the fact is that, till now, we didn't get even the traveling allowance or cost and in some cases we request for accommodation in guest house if it requires overnight stay). And this requires an honest answer.

When i thought, i got the following answer (this is my personal view. Though i believe the founders/friends agree with this, i m writing this on my own to keep me grounded and work on the purpose/mission)

• Getting back need not always be material 
• having conducted 10+ workshops, i would say i got more in terms of experience and i cannot equate anything with this.
• Give back if you are privileged to lead a quality life
• Again it depends on people. With the compensation i get from my daytime job thro' my company, i can lead a quality life and feel i can spend a little on my passion.
• Giving back leads to getting back
• I strongly believe that this is an investment but not a spending.
• Pay your fees for learning life lessons
• I cannot afford to set up a college to teach to people. I see this spending as my fees towards realizing my dream/passion
• Meeting young minds is honor but not a job.
• One cannot underestimate the power of young/curious mind. If not for all the above reasons, this one by itself justify the spending i do.
• Get an experience of how to run the show with minimal resources
• Just three folks with each having day time job & family, it requires a lot of endurance to run the show with minimal resources (most importantly time).
• At the end, i makes me happy
• At the end, it is so cool and it makes me happy. So, i better do the things that makes me happy.

More gyan on why OpenGyan later.

Have a happy week.

First Net Sec Workshop by OpenGyan

This is going to be the first workshop on Network Security by OpenGyan. This workshop is designed by Rajkumar. We have the following things in the agenda (but we are not focused to cover everything, we will just cover things based on how things are on the particular day).

• Why network security?
• Elements of Security
• Threat types - Unstructured, structured, Internal and External
• Attacks - Reconnaissance, Access & DoS
• Access attack
• Detection & Prevention

+ a lot of case studies and live demos

We will be again in PSG Tech this Saturday for this workshop.

After this, we will have two consecutive workshops on JVM Architecture one in Vellore and another one in Villupuram. We are working on another workshop during September/October. Stay tuned for future workshops.

In order to inculcate the habit of questioning, we are planning to have a column in our website - Curious Questions. This section will feature all the questions [intelligent, curious ones] that are asked by students/participants along with their name/college. We are in the process of giving it a structure. Again, stay tuned for an update on this in coming weeks.

Spread this goodness - http://www.facebook.com/opengyan

OpenGyan is a non-profit initiative that imparts experiential learning at schools on computing/computers.

5K Performance (33 mins 06 secs)

Y'day, i did a little faster 5K. Last month, my 5K running was 36+ minutes. During my y'day run, i completed 5K in 33 mins 6 sec and noticeably shaved off 3 minutes in a month. Another instance where i found that setting goals in life really helps. 

What amazed me was that, i was able to run at 11.25 kmph for almost 0.5 km and another 1km at 10.5kmph continuously (1.5 km). It is going to take a lot of training for building up speed but it is certainly doable without hurting myself.

Here is my latest run.

I m glad that i m clocking so much and getting better every day. Though it is not a goal now, i m thinking of running a 5K under 25 minutes (may be, i can do it within next 6 months and which means that i should run @ 12kmph for 25 minutes)