Thoughtworks...i loved it.........

Hi
  Here I am, writing again about my experience with THOUGHTWORKS...yes, I heard a lot about this company from my brother and was eager to see what's there in it that people love it so much. So then the date for campus recruitment of this company was announced. I was unaware about the company but I believed in my brother's words that this is the best place to work at. So in-order to know about company I visited its website and was pretty impressed by it. It was totally different from the websites of most of the IT companies.
   Then there was the first line in their recruitment process "WE HIRE ONLY EXCEPTIONAL PEOPLE..." I was really nervous after reading this line as I think I am an ordinary guy like most others but I don't understand why my friends think I am good at studies. I think its only because I've read a few books more than them that I know things and it has nothing to do with intelligence. I really wanted to join this company.
    I've solved some of the sample problems that my friends shared with me.Then came the day and I gave my aptitude test and was among the few who cleared it but was still a bit nervous because now I was in coding round and I am an average coder. Somehow I managed to clear the coding round. I ran my code for the first time when the invigilator said its last 5 mins. I was very happy to know that it ran without any errors and gave me the required output. So finally I was very happy to make it to the final 20 and was asked to come to their office the following day for interview. They also asked all 20 of us to join them for snacks that evening. I was really impressed with this gesture because we were still not placed and were having snacks with HR people of Thoughtworks.
    So I prepared myself for interview and was really nervous because it was THOUGHTWORKS. I left for company office the next morning with lots of hope and with a promise to myself that I will give my best. I have a big issue while speaking with people, I don't know how to talk with people. We reached office in about an hour and here it goes....
    I was personally very impressed with the kind of infrastructure Thoughtworks had. Then there was the HR person with whom we had snacks the other day and he greeted us 'Good Morning' and I was shocked, am I supposed to greet him or should he greet me? was the question that bothered me. We then entered the office and there it was..a huge hall full of big tables, white boards and other office stuffs. There were no cabins or cubicles. The environment there was so energetic that I felt like "Oh God I want to work here at any cost".
    My brother had warned me to be ready for surprises at every moment with Thoughtworks and there it was, we faced a test where we were asked to solve 50 questions in 12mins. The beauty of this test was that it made me realize how difficult basic mathematics can be. The sums in this test were in increasing level of difficulty and I made a strategy that I will leave the sum if I don't get it after reading once. Somehow I managed to solve 32/50 by skipping about 4-5 of them.
Then they made groups of 5 for case study. I knew that I was out the moment they said 'Case Study'. I decided to give it a try just to have at-least an experience of case study. Then there was case study where I realized how important it is to have stage daring and good communication skills. What made me sad was the fact that I was unable to speak anything due to my fears. I tried my best but the way I spoke even I would have not selected myself had I been the selector. So I was sad that I got rejected because I didn't even try it.
   I really enjoyed the way people work at Thoughtworks. I was shocked to see my judge  of case study in 3/4ths :).
   Then there were people chatting as if they were at home, there were some making tea,coffee,cornflakes,Maggi and all and all of them were employees and not canteen staff. There was also a freeze with all kinds of cold drinks, juices etc.
There was a LCD TV in pantry with PS2 and home theater. Then there were people playing table tennis in one corner of the hall where others were working.
    I really enjoyed the place and would like to work with Thoughtworks at-least once in my lifetime. For the first time I was feeling that I lost something in life that I wanted desperately and it took me 3-4 days to come out of it. I kept crying for it every night I went to bed for these 3-4 days...:(

Always Njoy!!!

My Experiences with placements........NVIDIA....

 Hi,
    As I wrote in my previous article I am very nervous about interviews, group discussions and all those things.I am a kind of person who don't like meeting too many people or discussing things with them, I like to be with my close friends and have informal chats with them and I never or say I rarely discuss things with people. This is what I think I'm lacking during placements.
       It started on 15th June 2011 when NVIDIA visited our college campus. They announced a whopping package of 8.2 lakh, like most other students even I tried my best to get it. After formal company presentation it all started with an Aptitude test. I was excited and was a bit nervous for it. It had four sections: C & C++, quantitative aptitude, data structures and OS.
      As I said I was nervous, I marked the answers for Quantitative aptitude section into DS part. When I realized this it was half done, I mean 1Hr of the 2Hr test was over.I had no option so I just scratched the answers and marked them again and prayed God that they should consider it. OS section was really very tough. So after all this I thought it was over for me, but its only when you think its over it surprises you as it did to me.Eighteen out of 126 students were shortlisted and I was 12th among them.
      I was happy that I stood 12th among all the students, that is something I thought I will never achieve. But then I was in the state of shock because will have to face interview now. I got ready for it and had a word with my brother who asked me to be confident. I tried but was unable to control my nervousness. I reached college where my friends who had their interviews told me about the questions they were asking.I got even more nervous after hearing it.My interview was scheduled at 3pm and it started at around 5:45 and by that time I was too sleepy (it sounds crazy but yes, I was sleepy before my 1st interview and this is my worst habit that I need to change). Finally it started........
      It was supposed to be a technical interview but the first question he asked me was-
Tell me something about yourself? It was a bouncer for me :) but I think I managed to handle it.
Then he got into every possible details of my projects.He then moved on to DS and asked me 3 puzzles and I was able to answer only one of them.I was so nervous that he offered me water twice during the interview.My interview was about 45 mins. I knew that I won't make it when I left the room but was happy to have such an experience and exposure.
      Finally 3 of my friends were selected and I was happy for them because they deserved it and felt happy that I learned quite a few good things from this interview:

1. Don't under-estimate yourself...you never know when it will happen to you...
2. There is no need to get too nervous for interviews...
3. Be confident for what you say, and don't fake things :)
4. Every interviewer is not as bad as you may think...
5. Give your best...that's it...that's what you can do...

I understood that its difficult to smile after you lose something but then that's what you learn from it...:)

Always Njoy!!! :)

PPP....its Pre-placement pressures for me...

Hi,
     Now that I've completed 3 years of engineering its placement time and I'm getting very nervous for it. As my seniors said the general process involves aptitude test-> group discussion -> technical interview ->HR intervier.....tough job ahead. I'm not getting what should we study and what not. I'm confident about aptitude but too nervous for other three as I don't have good communication skills.
      Another reason for me getting nervous  is about my TCS project. I got selected for BE project in Persistent Systems and TCS only to know that we can apply only for one company through campus. It took almost a week to resolve the matter with my college who threatened to suspend me from placements. Then finally it was 20th June, the day we went to TCS office for our project and I was pretty excited as it was my only company experience. They asked us to choose 3 from 25 projects and we did the same. God knows which algorithm they ran on choices that out of 22 teams 19 got what they opted and 3 were unlucky and I was one of them. What made me even more sad was that we were TEAM 1 from 22 teams and still we didn't get it.
       Finally we chose one of the remaining projects only to know that there was another guy from some other college who would be working with us for which college didn't allow us. Finally we solved this problem but then there was another waiting for us. Though one of our Project Coordinators agreed for our project the others rejected it and here we are still waiting for confirmation from college and company.
      After all this, I'm feeling like I'm the unluckiest person I've ever met (hath toh aaya par muh na laga :( )
I think we should never lose hope in life. So here I am still trying to sortout things. Hope this 'never give up' attitude will help me.The day I will get project and placement will be a great relief for me.Hope I'll be able to handle these pressures.
Things that I learned from these episodes are:

Don't take things for granted.
Things are not as easy as they look as it is said ("saral hamesha saral nahi hota aur kathin hamesha kathin nai hota")
Whatever the situation may be don't giveup its just a matter of time.
All one needs is a strong desire to win.
 
Always Njoy!!!

Life lessons from a glass of water!

A chemistry professor decided to teach his students a different lesson one day. Holding a glass of water in his hand, he asked the students, “How much do you think this glass of water weighs?” “500 grams!” came a voice from the back. “600,” said another student. “I don’t really know!” said the professor, holding the glass up to make sure everyone could see it. “And unless we weigh it, we won’t know.” With the glass still in his outstretched hand, the professor continued, “What will happen if I hold it like this for a few minutes?”
“Nothing!” came the reply. “Right, and if I hold it for an hour like this, what might happen?” “Your hand will begin to hurt,” said a student. “Indeed. And what would happen if I held the glass in my hand like this for 24 hours?”
“You would be in tremendous pain,” said one student. “Your hand will probably go numb,” said another. “Your arm will be paralysed and we’ll need to rush you to the hospital!” said a student on the last bench.
“True,” said the professor. “But notice that through all this, the weight of the glass did not change. What then causes the pain?”
The class went quiet. The students seemed puzzled.“What should I do to avoid the pain?” asked the professor. “Put the glass down!” said a student.
“Well said!” exclaimed the professor. “And that’s a lesson I want you to remember. The problems and worries in life are like that glass of water. Think about them for a while and nothing happens. But think about it a bit longer and they begin to hurt. And if you think about them all day long, you will feel paralysed – incapable of doing anything. It’s important to remember to let go of your problems. Remember to put the glass down!”
We may not have been in that classroom that day, but it’s a lesson we would all do well to remember. Put the glass down! Always. It’s not just problems and worries. Sometimes, we feel hurt and betrayed by a friend. And we carry that grudge through our lives. It grows and causes us anguish and pain. Learning to forgive – and forget – is not just good for the other people, it’s great for you. Nelson Mandela spent 27 years in jail and when he was finally freed, you can understand how angry and vengeful he must have felt. But guess what? When he became President, he invited his jailers to be present at the inauguration – in the VIP seats! If he could forgive after 27 years of suffering, surely we can too. It is the same with our fears too. A failure or an incident in early childhood becomes a deeply entrenched fear over time. Fear of public speaking, fear of Maths, fear of rejection. You name it, and chances are, we have it. Someone gave us that glass to hold when we were little kids – ‘you are clumsy, you are no good, you can’t do it’ - and we have faithfully held on to it all our lives. ‘I can’t’ - becomes a thought that stays in our mind and grows – leading us to complete paralysis. Time to put the glass down!
The story goes that there was a hardworking man who lived a contented life with his wife and children. Every evening when he returned from work, he’d follow a ritual. Outside the door to his house were three nails. On the first one, he’d put his hat. On the second he’d hang his coat. And on the third nail, he’d unwrap an imaginary turban from his head and ‘put’ it there. A friend happened to see this and enquired what he was putting on the third nail every day.
“Those are my problems, my worries and my anger,” said the man. “I have lots of that at work, but when I come home, I remember to take it off – and leave them outside. I don’t take them home with me.” Maybe you should learn to do that too. Starting today. Put the glass down. And see the difference!

Always Njoy!!!

Trying to discover myself...

     Sounds foolish? Yes, I think the title I gave to this article seems to be childish and freaky as everyone of us undoubtedly think that we know ourselves. Some day, I don't remember exactly when, I came across an article which asked the readers to try to know themselves. Its only after we know ourselves better than others can we make an attempt to understand things around us....So try to know yourself....give it a thought...ask yourself, who you are? what are your likes and dislikes? what do you wanna achieve in life?
what are your goals? Are you chasing your dreams?
          It was when I gave it a thought and tried to answer these questions that I realized it was the toughest exam I'm facing.So I simply took a pen and paper and tried writing whatever I know about myself or what I think I know about myself. I tried my best to be honest to the extent to which I can. Hope those who know me would agree to what I wrote further because that's what I felt about myself while writing.I request you to try to know yourself,believe me its fun...you'll definitely enjoy it. I request you to help me know something about myself which you might have noticed while being with me or if you have any idea of what kind of a person I am and be frank guys I would love to have your honest thoughts.You can even mail it to me if you find it hard to express in public :)
      Here are the things which I wrote that day and its a cumulative process, so I'll keep updating the list as I get to know things about myself.
First we'll go through my weaknesses..........

1. I lack the quality of appreciation, yes, I can't appreciate things. Even if I liked something about others I am unable to express myself. Its not ego, its just that I don't give it importance or I think its not that big to be appreciated.
2. Too scared to fail, I want to achieve success in whatever I do. Don't wanna fail in any exam,nothing, no failure in life. I really get disheartened by failure and I think all of my successes (there aren't many :) still) are just a matter of luck. I've been lucky to achieve whatever I have and think I didn't do anything great to achieve it.
3. I'm really tensed about things like exams, meetings, interview etc. I don't like to meet people or in fact, new people, unless they are really important to me or there is some profit in it for me.... :)
4. I always think of what people think about me. While doing any task I keep thinking am I doing it in a way that others do? Am I doing it normally or is there something unusual about it? Like if I'm eating with a person I keep thinking is he noticing the way I'm eating?
5. I don't have self confidence. I don't think I can achieve what others of my age have done.I don't think I can do things in the way I am supposed to do them and this lack of self-confidence is the biggest hurdle I'm facing in working towards my goal.
6. I lack the quality of expressing myself or I like to express things only to my loved ones. I think there are very less people to whom I really matter or think there are only a few people who will be happy with my success.
7. With time I develop a kind of mindset for people. Like if once I have decided that person A is a fool I think its very difficult for me to change my ideas about him even if he does me a favour.
8. I am really scared of girls, its not that I had some bad experience in past with them but I really don't enjoy there company (except some of my friends),or with a kind of language that am habitual to use with my friends I am a bit uncomfortable to use it in presence of girls. 
9. I don't have ability to convince people to my point. If there is a discussion about something I cant convince people to agree with my views and I tend to giveup rather than convincing others even if I strongly believe in what I say.
10. I don't have strength to say SORRY to people even if I know its my mistake and even if I feel sorry for what I did. I might text them saying sorry but can't say sorry face to face. 
11. I am very shy of girls. Its not that I try to show attitude to them, but I don't know how to behave with them. I don't know what should I do when I meet a girl, say my classmate, so should I smile, or say `hello`, what after that? Due to these reasons I try avoiding them and people tend to think wrong about  me for which I'm helpless.

                Finally, I was asked to find out my strengths...its the most difficult task I ever did...so here are the things which I think are my strengths...

1. I don't fake things. I might pretend to agree with what others say but its only because of my inability to convince them.But internally I do believe and wanna stick to my thoughts.
2. I am friendly with people.Though I am an introvert I strongly believe in altruism and I'm always ready to help others.
3. I am honest at heart. I really don't wanna hurt anyone with what I say or with my actions towards people. Its never my objective to hurt people though I unknowingly hurt them sometimes.
4. I have some kind of faith in things. Though I lack confidence there are somethings which I strongly believe I can do and trust me 99% of things which I feel always happens with me. So for me its about feeling that I can do it rather than having confidence of doing things.
5. I hate lairs and people with overconfidence. I also dislike people who try to malign others and who are jealous of others though, even I am jealous of others sometimes but I'm trying my best to not to be so, and I know that one day I will surely overcome this.What I think is he tried hard for it, he deserved it and thus he got it, its as simple as that.
6. I respect elders and women.Though I might curse them with people around me but I really respect them at heart. I strongly believe that experience is the greatest treasure that elders have and think we should utilize as much of it as possible to our benefit.
7. I am a good follower and supporter. I never leave things only because others say that's wrong. I follow it if I feel its right or at least that its not wrong.
8. I try hard to chase my dreams. Once I've decided to do something or once I dream of something, I try my best to achieve it without bothering whether I would be able to achieve it or not.My attitude towards it is that you have dreamt  it so you ought to get it, just give it a try and keep trying till you achieve it (It took 21 years even for the likes of Sachin Tendulkar to win a world cup so keep trying). If you are honest with your efforts you will get it right someday.
9. I believe in hard-work. I think with hard-work we can achieve anything in life even if we think we don't deserve it........
10. I really wanna grow rich.Yes, I want to earn as much money as possible and as soon as possible.People around me think I am a miser but the fact is I want to do everything with my money rather than depending on my family.It really motivates me.....
11. I have my best friend, Trilok Sadhwani, with whom I discuss every problem and he gives me a solution. Sometimes it happens that I think there is no solution to this problem and discussing it with him gives me a simple and straight solution. I enjoy his company. He has a very positive attitude towards life. He makes me feel easy, makes me laugh. He has a very straight forward approach towards things. He lives life to fullest and I hope living with him one day even I'll learn it. :) (I said he makes me smile..hehe..)

                      These are the few things which I realized after trying hard for it. I'm trying to know myself better and will keep updating the list with time :) Believe me after doing this I have a feeling of some kind of achievement which is hard to express.Finally, I would like to thank you all for having patience and time of going through my article with poor english.I tried constructing my thoughts in the best possible way I can. I'm trying to improve my vocabulary so that I would be able to express myself better.Till then please keep ignoring my english and help me to improve it by correcting my mistakes and please let me know areas where I need improvement...:)  

Always Njoy!!!

Enabling HIBERNATE option in Windows XP

Hi..
      Here I am writing again after a long time.Recently the problem I was facing was that HIBERNATE option from my windows XP system was disabled. I tried enabling it but was unsuccessful in doing so. Even I have enabled it from power settings I was unable to see it in my TURN OFF menu. As you all know there is nothing that you can't get on google. So after searching I got the following steps....

Please note that in order to use Hibernate,  the S4 System State (Hibernation) must be supported by your computer's ACPI implementation, othewise you cannot do anything about it.

Go to Start → Settings → Control Panel. Make sure to open the Classic View, and open Power Options:

When the Power Options Properties dialog appears, check if there is a tab labeled Hibernate. It should be the last one:

If you are not able to see the Hibernate tab, then Hibernation is probably not supported in your computer...

On the other hand, if you have a Hibernate tab, that's good news. Open the Hibernate tab and make sure to check the Enable Hibernation checkbox:

Click the Apply or OK button to make the changes take effect.

Now, the next time you want hibernate, in the Turn Off Computer dialog, press and hold down the Shift Key. The Stand By option will change to Hibernate whilst you hold the Shift Key pressed:

With the Shift Key down click on Hibernate.  

Always Njoy!!!

101 reasons why Linux is better than Windows

Hi
    As we had many assignments on Linux in college we all had to install and use it. I always heard people praising Linux and preferring it over Windows and so I really wanted to know what's there in Linux that makes it so special that people love it.After searching a lot I came across a blog which finally made it crystal clear to me. So if you have the same question as "Why Linux is better than Windows?"....
Here is the answer which I think will surely quench your thirst...

This was the blog by Prakash Advani and it goes as folllows......

Many a times Windows users talk about what Windows can do but Linux can’t. To be fair, they also need to know what Linux can do but Windows can’t.

This isn’t 101 yet,Contributions are most welcome to make that happen.
Note: This is still work in progress, so please bear with me . Would also like to thank everyone who has contributed to this.
Core OS Features:

1. It works Its not a vaporware and is available today.
2. Linux doesn’t have the virus problems: Even Microsoft’s CEO Steve Balmer couldn’t clean Windows Viruses. Still not convinced? Read more on Why Linux isn’t affected by Viruses. Its not that there aren’t any viruses for Linux but Linux is more secure and less virus prone.
3. No Spyware: Not just spyware but none of those funny applications that keep doing things in the background.
4. Linux Doesn’t need defragging: The Linux file systems work very efficiently such that it arranges data in a way that it doesn’t require defragging. to know more, read earlier post.
5. Linux doesn’t crash without any apparent reasons. In Linux the core operating system (kernel) is separate from the GUl (X-Window) from the applications (OpenOffice.org, etc). So even if the application crashes, the core operating system is not affected. In Windows (Microsoft prefers to call this tight integration) if the Browser crashes, it can take down the entire operating system.
6. Linux doesn’t crash if you accidentally pulled out your USB key/pen drive. Try this a 100 times if you don’t believe me but don’t blame me if your pen drive data gets corrupt.
7. Linux doesn’t require frequent re-installation: In Windows if the OS crashes, there is no easy way to recover this. Many IT support staff don’t know what to do and all they can do is re-install Windows. Which means that users applications and preferences are lost, and needs to be installed again. I haven’t seen anyone using Linux, requiring to re-install unless there is a hard drive failure. Most things in Linux can be fixed without requiring re-installation.
8. You can keep your operating system from your data, its designed to actually do that very easily. The benefit of this is all the users preferences can be preserved even if the OS needs to be re-installed. This can be handled by creating a separate partition for the home directory, read more.
9. Linux also doesn’t require rebooting when a new hardware device is added configured.
10. Linux doesn’t require rebooting when you change any setting or re-configure your Network.
11. Linux also doesn’t require rebooting when you install a new application.
12. Linux doesn’t require frequent rebooting. Linux runs extremely stable, even if an application crashes, there is no need to reboot the whole system, just restart that application or service.
13. Most importantly Linux doesn’t reboot on its own! I have had a situation where Windows updated the system and then rebooted on its own, without my knowledge. And worst, this was when I was updating my digital camera firmware.
14. No licensing headaches: Yes Linux is free and you don’t know need to bother about the complexing licensing of per user/per PC/per server/etc. Note: Some Linux distributions charge a yearly subscription to get the updates and patches, however this is still more simpler than the proprietary world.
15. Linux can read over a 100 different types of file systems. Windows is limited to its own two file systems. Well most general users may not care about this but its extremely useful is you are working in a mixed environment or you need to extract some data from a hard drive formatted on another computer.
16. You have access to the source code and the right to modify or fix things if you are a programmer. Many end users think this is not necessary but they will realize how important this is when their application vendor decides to discontinue support on a older version to promote a newer one.
17. Linux can install in logical partition or a second (slave hard drive as well)Windows can only be installed in a primary partition. Read this on some suggestions for partitioning.
18. Linux is scalable right from the PDA/Cellphones to super computers.
19. Linux is running mission critical applications including powering an Aircraft.
20. Linux has less bugs than commercial software, this is one of the main reasons for its stability. Read more.
21. You can also share the software with your friends and its completely legal to do so. Didn’t your teacher tell you in kindergarten that you should share things with your friends? Linux and Open Source actually encourage that while if you do that in Windows its not only considered illegal but they will call you a pirate!
22. Linux costs less, cause not only the OS is free but the applications are also free. Plus since Linux doesn’t have a virus problem, you also save on the recurring cost of Anti-Virus software. Note: You may still have to pay for support/training but the over all running cost is low.
23. Both Linux and Windows has shell environment Windows (know as command prompt). The shell environments in Linux (such as bash) are more powerful and you can write entire programs using the scripting language. This is extremely useful to automate repetitive tasks such as backup.
24. Linux can run from a CD or can be installed on the hard drive. Windows by default doesn’t have any such option. Using live CDs such as Ubuntu/Knoppix, users can try out Linux by booting from the CD, without the need to install the operating system.
25. Linux is also extremely portable, it can also run off usb pen drives/portable hardrives/thumb drives and more.
26. Did you know that in Windows, there is built in back-door entry so US government can see you data as and when they like? Yes the US NSA has the key build into every copy of Windows. In Linux there is no such thing possible as the operating system is open source and can easily be detected and disabled. Read how this was done.
27. Linux has built in virtualization(XEN/KVM/VirtualBox/etc.) so you can run multiple copies of Linux or Windows simultaneously.
28. The Linux kernel comes shipped with large number of hardware drivers. 3000 Printers, 1000 Digital Cameras and 200 webcams were supported by Ubuntu. On Windows, a lot of hardware doesn’t work until you install the driver, this problem is worse with Vista as Microsoft doesn’t allow drivers to be installed which are not supported/certified by Microsoft. On Linux, a huge percentage of today’s common hardware works perfectly out-of-the-box.
29. Vendor independence: With proprietary operating system, you are dependent on the vendor who developed the operating system. With Linux you have a choice of vendors, so even if the vendor fails to give you support, you can always move to another vendor. Choice of vendors also means more competition, which means better value for money for the customer.
30. It won’t die or get killed like what happened with other fantastic but proprietary operating system such as OS/2, BeOS. Reason being, its open source and someone will maintain it and today there are many big companies behind and have bet huge money on Linux.
31. Unlike Windows, Linux doesn’t use registry. Most of the configuration is stored in plain text files, which are easy to manage/backup and transfer between systems. Registry is a pain to manage, very complex and your system configuration is stored in a proprietary format which needs special tools to open. The biggest pain with registry is when it gets corrupted, this problem is eliminated in Linux because it doesn’t use registry.
32. Linux is the most documented operating systems and most of these documentations are available for free. These documents are well written and explain computing concepts too.
33. Linux has more wider support from online forums, articles and most importantly the community. There are Linux Users groups is almost every country, city and small towns as well.
34. Linux community is cool they provide unconditional support and help you get started. Once you get involved into it, its like one huge family.
35. Linux runs on older hardware too, you don’t need to the latest and the greatest hardware. Even if you can’t run all the latest applications on your old hardware, using Linux, you can always put it to some good use.
36. No more hardware upgrades: Linux runs happily on older hardware and the hardware requirements don’t increase with every new version.  If you have really old computers like Pentium I/III, you can still convert them to thin clients using LTSP and still use them. If you compare the hardware requirements between Ubuntu and Windows, you would notice that Ubuntu’s hardware requirements hasn’t changed for many versions.
37. Completely localized: As there is a strong community and the source code is available, Linux is localized into almost every language in the world. You can further customize it for your needs, you can easily do that.
38. Excellent package management: Linux has excellent package management tools which makes it easy to install and upgrade applications.
39. Easy upgrade: Most Linux distributions makes it very easy to upgrade from one version to another.
40. Excellent Development platform: If you are a developer, you will like Linux. Linux has all the development tools, libraries and compilers built in. If you are Java developer or a Web developer using PHP/Perl/Rub or doing C,C++ development, you will feel at home.
41. Linux gives you the Freedom: Linux follows the Free Software philosophy and hence gives its users the Freedom to modify, copy and share Linux.
42. One cick upgrade: Most distributions can easily be upgraded from one version to another in just a few clicks. And most importantly you don’t need to spend a fortune to buy the upgrade.
43. No Hidden APIs. Windows many hidden or undocumented APIs which is used for unfair advantage to Microsoft. In Linux all APIs are completely open and documented. For example Microsoft specifies that everyone writing Internet application should use the Winsock API while Microsoft Internet Explorer doesn’t use the Winsock API, it uses an undocumented API allowing Internet Explorer to run faster than other browsers.
44. Faster patches: Linux is more secure because its patches in hours not days. Microsoft took 200 days to provide a critical patch.
45. No Execute by default: By default if you download any file, it doesn’t have the execute permission, making your system more secure. The app cannot execute unless you go and change the permissions.
46. No write access to applications: By default users cannot install applications unless they change their permission or login as a supervisor. This ensures that any virus or malicious code cannot go and write to your application folder.
47. No open ports: By default most Linux distributions have all their incoming ports blocked, thereby making their Operating more secure from network attacks.
48. Centralised repository of applications ensures that you are downloading your applications/patches only from a known source only. The repository is digitally signed which ensures that only the right application and code can be downloaded and installed on your computer.
49. Centralised patching of all applications: Since your applications are installed from a centralised source, they are also patched from a single application, so each application doesn’t patch on its own. This ensures that your system is always up to date.
50. Faster release cycle: Many Linux distributions have a fixed release cycle of 6 months which makes it easy for them to incorporate all the latest applications, bug fixes, improvement and support for newer hardware. Windows release cycle is not predictable. takes a few years and is often delayed.
Desktop Features:
51. You are in total control. You don’t have applications that suddenly and start updating without your permission!
52. While both Linux and Windows have a GUI, Windows has only one default GUI. Linux is all about choice and has a option to use different type of GUIs or Window Managers as they are know as in Linux. Users can choose from something that looks like their favorite Operating System or they can choose something that’s simple and fast. Popular ones are Gnome and KDE.
53. Most Linux distributions come bundled with whole lot of applications such as Office Suite, Photo Editing, etc. You not only get the OS for free but you also don’t have to pay for the applications. Yes many of these open source applications such as OpenOffice.org also run on Windows but you need to find, download and install them where as there are available in most Linux distros by default.
54. Expanding on the previous point, many Linux distributions bundle thousands of applications (Upto 22,000 depending on which one you choose) where as Windows doesn’t bundle basic applications such a decent text editor, oh yeah there is Notepad if you consider that decent . Point is on Windows spend the time in finding them, downloading them, installing them and then trying them out  or just get them along with your Linux CD/DVD.
55. Appstore included: Ubuntu today has a built in App store where you can download 1000′s of applications with a single click.
56. Linux bundles OpenOffice.org as the office suite which has built in capabilities to write documents as PDFs and Presentations as Flash. Windows requires purchasing/downloading additional software.
57. Mozilla Firefox browser bundled with Linux has excellent features such as blocking of unwanted ads/pop up and supports tab browsing which makes it easy to open another browser windows. Read the 101 things that the Mozilla browser can do that IE cannot.
58. Faster Browsing: Browsing is not only better but faster too! The networking on Linux is faster and the browser has an option to block all the unwanted ads/pop up, there by saving on bandwidth considerably. Read this to block all the ads.
59. Linux saves bandwidth cost. The volume of Updates that Windows, Antivirus and similar applications do, is much more as compared the updated in Linux. So if you are paying for every MB that you download, its a big consideration.
60. No automatic updates: Windows Vista it setup to automatically update your system by default. In Linux it will alert you for an update but you have to choice to click and apply the update. You can setup to automatic update if you like. So you can update when you like and not when your operating system decides to update.
61. Linux has games too! there are some really nice games which many of the Linux distributions bundle. You may not have all the games in the world but you definitely have a huge collection of free games. Here is a list of top 100 games.
62. Empathy/Kopete popular IM clients on Linux are single clients that can connect to all the protocols – Facbook Chat, Google Talk,  Yahoo, MSN, Jabber, ICQ, AOL and more.
63. Twitter/Facebook broadcast from the desktop. With Gwibber client, you can view your social network status right from your desktop or update your status to all your accounts without logging onto each of them separately.
64. Cut and paste is simpler, just select and middle click on the target window and your data gets pasted. Its far quicker and easier than the way Windows does Cut and Paste. Of-course the Windows CTRL-C/CTRL-V still works on Linux for people who are new to Linux.
65. Multiple cut and pastes: Klipper application (default under KDE) maintains a history of your clipboard and you can use it to paste text/etc which you had cut/copied earlier. Gnome users can use Glipper.
66. Easy to setup a Media Center like PC. You don’t need to purchase additional software or re-install a different operating system. Read this on how to convert your existing Linux into a Media Center like PC.
67. Linux already has a usable 3D Desktop – Compiz. This makes it easy to switch and view multiple desktops simultaneously. It also add a nice eye candy to Linux. If you still believe Linux is only for geeks, this feature will definitely change your mind.  This doesn’t require you to purchase expensive graphic cards, it very comfortably works with on board graphic card.
68. Graphic view of how much space your data is using.  In Konqueror File Manager tool bar, there is an option to get file size view which gives you a graphical view of how much space your directories and the files within are consuming. Or in gnome you can use Disk Usage Analyzer Baobab.  This is an excellent way to know where all your disk space has disappeared and makes cleanup easy.
69. No annoying messages like Vista keeps telling you that xyz application is trying to access your system. Vista confuses the user,  Either the user will always click allow or don’t know what to do.
70. Easy to dual boot: Linux makes it easy for it to exist with any other operating system. If you install Linux on a system which already has Windows, Linux will not mess your Windows. Windows on the other hand messes up your Linux partition, if it finds one.
71. Linux Works fine if you  multiple partitions, operating systems and devices. Windows gets confused with ‘extraneous’ partitions used by other operating systems and allocate drive letters to them which cannot be freed. If you have, say, 8 partitions in your hard drive, Windows will associate 8 drive letters to these partitions, reducing the number of drive letter you can use. This also limits the number of drive letters you can have to 26. In Linux you don’t have a concept of drive letters, each drive is mounted as /home, /windows.. etc.. thereby not having any limitations.
72. Customise your shortcut: On Linux you can associate applications to whatever shortcut you choose. On Windows, you cannot associate your beloved Firefox to key combination Win+F, for instance, because it is already associated to ‘Find’ functionality provided by Windows Explorer which you can’t change.
73. Linux is more accessible: Most distributions such as Ubuntu include Orca, which is a screen reader. This can be enabled before installation. With this a visually challenged person can install Linux and also use Linux on his own. In Windows, the accessibility support is limited and not available during installation. It has to be purchased and installed separately costing over US$1000 and the visually challenged person requires an assistant to install Windows and the software before he/she can use.
74. Cool integration between Calendar application and Desktop calendar. For example if you add an appointment into Evolution, it will show up in your Desktop Calendar in Gnome as well when you click on time.
75. You can have multiple workspaces, its like having multiple desktops. Instead of having all your applications on one desktop, you can have them sorted on multiple desktop workspaces and easily switch between them. For example you can make one workspace for work, one for music, one for emails, one for browsing and so on. This can be in a grid or linearly organised.
Server Side features:
76. Linux has bundled Databases such as MySQL and PostgreSQL which are extremely powerful and used in production environments. Customer doesn’t need to purchase expensive databases.
77. Linux is been used for super computing clusters, most of top super computers in the World use Linux. Windows just can’t scale to that level.
78. File system scalability: while NTFS file system can scale upto 16TB, XFS on Linux can scale upto 18 million TB! yes that bigger than what you would ever need.
79. Processor scalability: Linux can scale to Unlimited processors. It is already running on a single system with 2048 CPUs. Windows can’t even claim to come anywhere near that number.
80. You have commands to check the systems Serial Number and other hardware information. to get serial number type:
    dmidecode | grep “Serial Number” | head -n1 | sed -e ‘s/tSerial Number: //g’
    or type dmidecode for all hardware info Read More. You can easily use this feature to extract data quickly and even write some scripts to do that.

Always Njoy!!!