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 2002 Google Programming Contest Winner

So, I couldn't make my program on time and got eliminated from the contest to let Daniel Egnor win the conest with his 'Geographic Search' idea which adds the ability to search for web pages within a particular geographic locale to traditional keyword searching. That's very similar to things we were planning to do, converting street addresses to latitude-longitude based cooredinates through publicly available TIGER and FIPS data sources.
Jen McGrath, a software engineer at Google, said Egnor's entry was chosen not just because he had developed a useful application but also because he had "clean" code and, importantly, because his code showed the possibility of "scaling" to work across the entire Web.
He got $10'000 in cash and a VIP visit to Google's office in Mountain View, CA.
But, who is the real winner of the contest? I would say: Google. They now have tons and tons of fresh ideas and a bunch of pre-written, ready and clean code which they legally can glue to their system (although they have said they're not planning to use it for now) by spending approximately one month salary of one of their Phds. List of Winners
Google's Search for Winner Ends, Farhad Manjoo's article in Wired
Fri May 31, 2002   (09:45 AM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Senegal Beats France

Senegal Beats FranceAnother world cup started yesterday (or apparently earlier this morning), and Senegal surprised everybody with a 1-0 win against France (FIFA world cup holder) through a first-half goal from Papa Bouba Diop.
Holders France's bid to become the first nation for 40 years to win a second straight World Cup were undermined when they lost 1-0 to newcomers Senegal in the World Cup opening match on Friday. Papa Bouba Diop scored the sole goal in the 30th minute to seal the first ever World Cup victory for Senegal.
Captain Marcel Desailly attributed the defeat to Senegal's conservative tactics. "We have been trying to play, but not enough quicker." the 34- year-old veteran said after the match.
Complete Coverage
Fri May 31, 2002   (09:22 AM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Some pictures of Amir's graduation party

Some pictures of Amir's graduation partyI put Some photos of Amir's graduation party in the photo album. Check them out, that was fun. :-)

Let me quickly add, I just realized that Google's database has started it's monthly update. It now contains a lot more pages of www.anvari.org including this log page which is the only page refreshed on a bi-daily basis on their database.
Sun May 26, 2002   (07:51 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Kings Canyon

Kings CanyonSequia and Kings Canyon are two of the most beautiful national parks in California. I was planning to go to my cousin's graduation party on Saturday, but got today off, stopped by at Kings Canyon, visited some friends at Cedar Grove and went hiking with them. The whole area is really gorgeous.
I have taken some pictures of Mist Falls and other beautiful places, will be posted on the site as soon as I get them developed.
Picture: The whole path (including planned return path by MapQuest)
Fri May 24, 2002   (11:36 AM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Craigslist Party

We went to craigslist party last night, that was cool, those people who are all in the computers and stuff all gathered in San Francisco for a fun night. I guess they're gonna put some photos on Craigslist. I posted a message to sell the party's tickets when I was there. :-)
I gotta get back to work now, meetings, back to back...
Thu May 23, 2002   (01:33 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Google's technology playground

Google's technology playgroundSay your search keywords... Okay, searching... your results are ready... *** Say your search keywords... Okay, searching... your results are ready...
This is what you hear after dialing (650)318-0165 to perform a Google search via voice! Yes, the dream has come true: Voice Search.
Google labs is the place google learns from you. They have combined their sophisticated search capabilities with basic technologies to become one of the leaders in the market in the very near future. They don't do magic, they just plug and play.
I had written about the great combination of image processing technology and Google's advanced search engine which led to the birth of Google Catalogs (which is unfortunately still in Beta). The system basically receives your search keywords, looks them up into the scanned catalogs and returns the pages with your phrase highlighted in them.
Now, google works on the advanced voice search which enables any computer illiterate performs a quick search on google and gets the desired results. This system basically receives your keywords through the telephone system, converts them to text through a sophisticated speech recognition technology and sends the result to a web page. A perfect and smart combination of sound processing and their search engine. They say: we do the text processing, give us image/voice processing, we'll glue them together and do the magic.
Their next step towards making the search much easier for the businessmen would be the integration with mobile platforms and sending the search results to the cell phones. Here is the trick which makes them perfect: get your search results when you're camping, gone to a picnic or driving your car.
Google sets is also one of the experimental projects held in Google. It may reveal some of the secrets of google's future projects, it works fine enough to find any related items to your few items and make a set. The system should obviously work for the English phrases, but it also amazingly worked when I entered persian numbers (yek, do, seh) into the system... Google rocks again!
Please refer to http://www.anvari.org/log if you want to point to this article.
Tue May 21, 2002   (08:48 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Dilbert visits google.com

Dilbert visits google.comRemember Dilbert? Scott Adams will add some color to Google's first page logo all the way this week. So, visit google.com everyday this week (which I'm sure you computer nerds do anyways!) to see sketches of cartoon hero Dilbert featured on the first page of the Mountain View search engine.
Complete story from SiliconValley.com
OOpps. it just went live! :-)
Sun May 19, 2002   (11:11 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 WEBDUDE: Nice license plate!

WEBDUDE: Nice license plate!Good morning! Driving down to work a few minutes ago, saw this guy with a cool license plate (WEBDUDE) on Martin Luther King avenue. His website address was also printed on his trunk. Where's the world going to go? Cars with cool license plates and the owner's web site address? Or maybe the license plate format will change to a dot com one?!
Fri May 17, 2002   (10:33 AM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 No More War

Just received an IM containing this link, turn on your speakers and enjoy the flash presentation: No more war.
Thu May 16, 2002   (02:10 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Capital of the states

A teacher asked one of her pupils, "Can you name our nation's capital?"
The reply was, "Washington DC"
When asked what the "DC" stood for, the pupil added, "Dot com "
Thu May 16, 2002   (10:31 AM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Test your IQ

Here's a very cool test from BBC, just follow the instructions and Test your IQ. The results will be sent to your e-mail adress, just make sure you use your real address. You can go back to the above link to analyze how well you did on the test and where you stand. You can also use this conversion table to see if you are considered a genius or not. Good luck!
What is IQ? IQ stands for Intelligence Quotient, the IQ score is a statistically derived number which indicates relative and comparative abilities that can be used to obtain academic skills and knowledge. IQ was used as a means to control immigration in the US in the 1920s.
[I didn't know that allegedly Marilyn Monroe had a higher IQ than Einstein..!]
Wed May 15, 2002   (06:02 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Love of the Game

It's Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final, and a man makes his way to his seat right at center ice. He sits down, noticing that the seat next to him is empty. He leans over and asks his neighbor if someone will be sitting there.
"No," says the neighbor. "The seat is empty."
"This is incredible", said the man. "Who in their right mind would have a seat like this for final game of the Stanley Cup playoffs and not use it?"
The neighbor says "Well, actually, the seat belongs to me. I was supposed to come with my wife, but she passed away. This is the first Stanley Cup we haven't been to together since we got married in 1967."
"Oh .. I'm sorry to hear that. That's terrible. But couldn't you find someone else, a friend or relative, or even a neighbor to take the seat?"

The man shakes his head "No. They're all at the funeral."
From: #!/sub/neural/
[I'm going home to watch Lakers-Spurs game 5 now!!! For the love of the game...]
Tue May 14, 2002   (06:22 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Earthquake, an hour ago...

I was watching TV when a substantial earthquake shook the Bay Area less than an hour ago. The center of the earthquake was 3 miles southwest of Gilory, soutside San Jose (preliminary magnitude of 5.2), however, I could totally feel it here in Berkeley more than 50 miles away from its center. No major injuries has been reported so far.
It was the 2nd strongest earthquake I experienced, the first one was seven point something strong, almost 10 years ago back there when I was in Iran.
Complete story from Associated Press: Earthquake Shakes San Francisco Area
Mon May 13, 2002   (10:49 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Back from LA

I'm back from my four day trip to LA. Saw and learned new stuff, came back more experienced, with fresh ideas and the enthusiasm to read about some new topics.
So, the first thing I checked after the quick Monday morning meeting was tons of deferred e-mails, this one from Yahoo! indicating they have added this page to their directory was a cool one, check Yahoo's directory of Online Journals, they used a weird nickname to describe me which is kinda kewl: compuworm!
BTW, does anyone have any idea what this URL could be? One of Yahoo!'s internal machines?
http://surf.yahoo.com/whatsnew/yahoo/1020510/lisae/complete.html
Mon May 13, 2002   (11:01 AM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Crazy people around the world!

Crazy people around the world!You have probably heard the news, the Police arrested this 21-year-old college student by tracking his cell phone, after a high-speed car chasing outside Reno. He was planting pipe bombs across the states as you may remember the story.
Guess what he said today?! He was aiming to make a very huge 'smiley face' across the country!! The first 16 bombs were arranged in two circles, one in Illinois and Iowa and the other in Nebraska. On a map, the circles could resemble the eyes of the 1970s happiness symbol. The final two bombs, found in Colorado and Texas, form an arc that could be the beginning of a smile.
Story from Reuters
Thu May 9, 2002   (08:20 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Stock Market: What a performance!

Did anyone see the performance of stock market today? It was very good, in other words, it was one of the best days I had ever seen. Dow up more than 300 and Nasdaq up more than 120 which is a huge move upwards. Cisco, I believe, was the market's leader up from 13 to 16 something dollars (around 24%) which is quite impressive after they reported higher than expected 3rd quarter profits late yesterday. Microsoft also jumped 5%.
It's very unlikely that the market keeps going up since the investors would probably show less enthusiasm to put their money on the table after this huge rally.
Wed May 8, 2002   (10:35 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Powered by HP?

Powered by HP?Before going to meeting, let me write quickly, have you notieced Yahoo! Mail is not powered by COMPAQ anymore? They changed the little icon at the top to 'Powered by HP'. I just noticed!
Ooops! Call for meeting, gotta run! :-)
Tue May 7, 2002   (10:27 AM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Tennis day

Today, I finally found a free time to play some Tennis with Alidad, my friend from Sharif University. It was fun after a long time, and we joined a bunch of UC Berkeley people and played some basketball with those guys and kicked their a$$es. :-)
The bad news, LA Lakers just lost to San Antonio Spurs some minutes ago, the series is tied 1-1 now..
Mon May 6, 2002   (10:54 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Picture of the day at benel.com

benel.com has a section for picture of the day in their powershot digital camera section. They sent an e-mail to me a week ago:

Ahmad Anvari,

 

Just to let you know one of your images has been selected for 

Picture of the Day on PowerShot User. Your picture will be 

featured on 6th May 2002, and you can vote for your picture 

on this day to help it's chances in the monthly star photo

competition.

 

Have you visited our new forums yet at http://www.benel.com/psforum

 

 Best regards,

 

PowerShot User

http://www.benel.com/powershot/pic-of-the-day.php

So, my photo (a view of San Francisco and Berkeley) is featured today at here. Check that out and vote for it! ;)
Permanent link to the photo
Mon May 6, 2002   (10:28 AM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Al Qaeda Recuruiting Video

A funny flash Cartoon sent to me by someone. They're now hiring! [Turn on your speakers for maximum enjoyment]
Sat May 4, 2002   (02:24 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

 Yao Ming: Where to go?!

Yao Ming: Where to go?!Yao Ming, the 7-5 star center of the Shanghai Sharks of the China Basketball Association whose height, agility and shooting touch make him the most intriguing player in the world outside of the NBA, has come to America. He grabbed everybody's attention in Chicago, where they showcased his mistique in an hourlong workout yesterday. According the NBA.com TV, 26 of the representatives of NBA teams were there to check this fabulous player out!
There are still concerns about his ability to play big, he's just a BIIIG basketball player! (Photo from Reuters)
Thu May 2, 2002   (09:49 PM) | Permalink | Keep Reading

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