Nirvana

As I am nearing the end of the book "Fermat's last theorm"  I am starting to feel a li'l enlightened (dunno why :P). I have started reading mathematical puzzles on internet, also started devoting some time thinking about a few Number Theory axioms,rules. So decided to keep everyone else also in loop and share any thoughts on any new mathematical topics,statements i come across. This new post is entirely dedicated to such findings. I will keep on updating the post with new things i learn or find on the web. Most of them should be known to you but it doesnt hurt to go over them yet another time ;). Please post anything you want to add in comments section and I will edit the post :P. Lets start rocking.

[1]  2⁵ + 2⁷ + 2⁹ + 5³ + 5⁴ =  5² + 7² + 9² + 3⁵ + 4⁵

Did you know the above equality?

[2] A very well known puzzle. Most of you must have heard of the puzzle but do you know the solution?

Imagine that you are a contestant on a television game show. You are shown three large doors. Behind one of the doors is a new car, and behind each of the other two is a goat. To win the car, you simply have to choose which door it is behind. When you choose a door, the host of the show opens one of the doors you have not chosen, and shows you that there is a goat behind it. You are then given a choice; you may stick with your original choice, or you may switch to the remaining closed door.

What should you do to maximize your chances of winning the car? 

PS- Special mention of Mr. Suhas Rao who introduced me to the book and helped me realize the world beyond eating  and sleeping :).

FRAGADDICT

For the benefit of the mortals the title represents my name in quake. No No I am not immortal, actually in quake you can get spawn 'n' number of times making you virtually immortal ;). Quake is a first person shooter game where you need to shoot the fist person you meet :P. Sorry, just kiddin, just search of "first person shooter" on wiki or google and you will know.

So a few question that we answered till now.

1. What is quake?

A. A first person shooter game.

2. Who plays it?

A. Everyone. Even "keyser soze" can play it :P.

So is it just about fancy names? Well not really, its about regeneration,humiliation and holy shit. Its about scoring that crucial flag when other team is leading and you hear a "1 minute warning". Its about killing the attacker coming with quad-damage and regeneration. Its about timing opponents armours,shards and health. Its about crying that holy word "Fuck" everytime someone kills you. Its about binding your keys to send the most funkiest of messages.Its about skipping lunch to get a slot to play. Its about pressing "F1" to kick someone. Its about discussing quake all night long. Its about running back after finishing exam,not to study but for quake. Its about those golden days that cannot be forgotten.

Bangalore rocks? Does it? ;)

So from the title of the blog its easy to understand that it is going to be about Bangalore. So i have been in Bangalore now for about more than a year. 

Question: What do i like about Bangalore?

Answer: People :) 

Question: Are Bangalore people really so nice?

Answer: Its nothing to do with niceness. Its just so many of them.:P. Just kiddin actually more than 50% of my college junta is in Bangalore.

Question: What about weekends in Bangalore?

Answer: You go to one of the two malls in Bangalore, Garuda or Forum which are less of malls more of railway station. You can meet everyone staying in Bangalore at these two places on weekend.

Question: What else can you do?

Answer: Watch movies. That sounds good,right. You need to book tickets 3-4 days in advance and also need to shell out 300 Rs for a movie. 300 Rs, you kiddin me? I get a PVR ticket for 100-150 in Delhi. Ya you do but this is Bangalore.

Question: How about food?

Answer: Again you need to book your place in advance. And all of them *hu-ha expensive.

Question: How about transport?

Answer: Please dont ask me this one. It has the worst traffic of all places. You are scared to cross the road.  Metro contruction covers 80% of the roads. Autorickshaw will cost more than your movie ticket.

Question: Do you find anything good about Bangalore?

Answer: I do. You can visit places around Bangalore. Its almost at centre for so many nice places to visit. You can go for "go carting",paintball,wall climbing etc sports but to get to them you will have to cross that traffic :P. Also food however expensive,it is good.

Not the best place to be in, but a nice place to hangout with friends.

*hu-ha--- An exaggerated term used to denote SUPER EXPENSIVE.

Duckworth-Lewis System Revisited.

For the benefit of those who dont know what Duckworth-Lewis system means..It is a method used in the game or cricket to derive approximate score a team needs to score if match is shortened due to some match interruption.

The two main assests that duckworth system looks at are:

• Wickets
• Overs

Fair enough as these two are the most important assets in a cricket match. 

Now look at the scenario Bangladesh has 5 overs left and 3 wickets remaining(doesnt matter whoever it is) against Australian bowling and say if Australia has 5 overs remaining and 3 wickets remaining (Ricky Ponting,Craig White,Brett Lee, Stuart Clarke) against Bangladesh bowling.

Which one would you think more favourable to get to the target?? ;). Current duckworth-lewis system rates them as equally favourable by giving them equal targets. But shouldnt we take care of the fact that may be Australian wickets are valued more than the Bangladeshi wickets.

So you have the problem statement. But whats the solution to it? Okay i am not just a quizmaster here. Lets try to solve this together.

So what are the most important assets in a cricket match.

• Wickets
• Overs

Did I write the same as Mr Duckworth and Mr Lewis? :P.  Okay, lets give these guys credit for guessing the right assets. But these assets are not of equal value for each team. Take this for example:  Is a 2-bhk in Delhi  same as a 2-bhk in New York?? If your answer is no, your answer is same as mine.Okay lets start then.

• Overs are important but we should also take care whether out of the remaining overs we have a powerplay? What say? If first batting team had got 3 powerplays and second team got 2 and match is shortened, it doesnt look fair.
• If batsmen to follow is Rahul Dravid or Yuvraj Singh. I dont mean any disrespect for Dravid, infact i am a great fan of him and his game. I just meant to bring to notice the strike rate and form of batsmen to follow. So we can look at str. rate/ Bat Avg of the batsmen to follow for last 5 innings.
• Opposition bowling. However great a batsmen is, you always have a greater chance of scoring against Sreesanth than Brett Lee or Nathan Bracken or Dale Steyn. So we can incorporate last 5 innings of bowler.
• Or if its difficult to include individual performances...lets take average runs made by the team in last 5 innings and average runs conceeded by bowling team in last 5 overs.

I would just like to conclude by saying that Duckworth-Lewis system is by far the best system we have now for ODI but i think due  to changing environment like inclusion of powerplays and  increasing differences in talent pool of different countries, its time we include these factors in calculating the total. We dont want some day Hongkong beating Australia just because they had wickets left even though those wickets are not worth it.