Sunday, July 26, 2009

Are Matrix and Terminator in the same series?

Both scifi block buster movies, Matrix and Terminator, share a lot of similarities, such as:
  1. Fought against machine and protect human race.
  2. Time travel, or time space travel in terms of Matrix.
  3. Got a salvior who engaged and told about his identity and fate by the time space travelers. Neo was engaged by Trinity and Morpheus, Sarah and John Connor were engaged by Kyle Reese and reprogrammed Terminator.
  4. Salvior was not fully trusted by the people.
  5. Salvior got pursuer. Neo got Agent Smith, John got Terminator.
  6. The battle was won, but not yet over.
Talk about the time frame, Matrix seems like the following future of Terminator.

Sent via BlackBerry from Maxis

Saturday, July 18, 2009

Convert your life of complexity into a check list

I always think that our brains are used to think, rather than remember. Instead of trying to remember all you complicated assignments (work or personal) inside your grey matter, it is better to write them down into a checklist so that you can focus on thinking.

I only use open office word processing to manage my check list. At the top I create a calendar by using table and mark down important events on that month (and include the following month if any important event that need to get ready).

Then I put an UNCOMPLETED TASKS table, which contain 2 columns: task description and ETA (Estimated Time Accomplishment). Then follow by a KIV TASKS table and a COMPLETE TASKS table, which have the same columns as UMCOMPLETED TASKS (Add in any necessary column to suit your need).

Whenever I get an assignment (from email to someone to do a project), I set a ETA for it and add it in UNCOMPLETED TASKS order by ETA. After it is done, I move it to the COMPLETED TASK table. For assignment that is not important and not urgent, put it in KIV TASKS.

So now your assignment is very simple, try to reduce the number of row in UNCOMPLETED TASK table. Below is my checklist format:

Calendar

Uncompleted Tasks

KIV Tasks

Completed Tasks

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Value measurement using time

When we measure the value of a product, we will normally say how much it costs or how expensive is it. Is price equal to value?

Of couase not. Even the price is the same, the value of the product might be vary depend on the buyers. For example buyers with annual income RM10 thousands, and buyers with annual income RM50 thousands.

If we calculate how much the buyer earn money in every hour, we will clearly see the difference. For a normal employee, we usually work around 2000 hour a year (7.5 hours x 5.5 days x 52 weeks). So we divide our annual income by 2000 and we will roughly get our hour income. Buyer with RM10 thousand annual income will get 10000/2000 = RM5, while buyer with RM50 thousand will get 50000/2000 = RM 25.

Now both buyers bought an iPhone costed RM2000. Buyer with RM5/hour actually used up RM2000/RM5 = 400 hours to buy the phone, while buyer with RM25/hour used RM2000/RM25 = 80 hours. Both buyers are able to buy the same product, buy what they paid is actually not the same.

Thursday, July 9, 2009

Make a book holder out of a slingshot

A typical slingshot

Aware of the corner that block the metal to go over the handle

Unscrew the handle

Take apart the handle

Turn the metal the other way and screw the handle back

You can see the corner that block the metal is in the other way

Now the slingshot can serve as a book holder

Saturday, July 4, 2009

Save money by getting rid bad habits

Place a picture of an iphone on your desk, or stick a postal of your dream holiday on the wall. Remind yourself how much time will be delay to buy your new toy or go for a vacation when you contribute to your bad habit.

Then make yourself another good (and cheaper) habit in order to distract yourself from the bad habit. Exercise should be a good choice of distraction.

Get up immediate once your alarm rang

Get up immediate when your alarm clock rang. Once you lay down again and continue sleeping after you turned off your alarm, first you might be late for something (you must have set your alarm clock for some reason), second everything needs to be rush because of the delay, then further more you might be blue for the rest of the day since you have fail to archive the first task of the day.

So start your day with a good wakeup. Place your alarm clock away from your bed, out of the distance where your hand can reach. Then of course sleep on time on the previous night.