Saturday, August 29, 2015

September Dedications

Book Month Incoming.....

This September dedications goes to TB after watching "Thilaka ha Thilakaa" (තිලක හා තිලකා) for the second time. 2015 is a good year to watch it for the second time to get a better understanding of its politics. The movie is created from mix of the TB's three books "විලම්බීත", "තිලක", "තිලක හා තිලකා" ("Vilambeetha", "Thilaka", "Thilaka ha Thilakaa"). And story of "Thilaka ha Thilakaa" depict the real life story of TB(Tikiri Bandara) and his wife, Thamara. As "Apu" trilogy came from the Bengal culture, "Thilaka" trilogy is the brand for Sri Lanka.

There were lot of popular books from great authors in the past with the flavor of the cultural, social and political situation at that time. Such as in Gunadasa Amarasekara stories. Wonder if such a thing like now.

කරුණාරත්න හඟවත්ත සහ වජිරා නිර්මලී, තිලක සහ  තිලකා ලෙසින් (Karnarathne Hangawatte [aka Prof. Karu Hangawatte] and Vajira Nirmali as Thilaka and Thilakaa)

Hope to grab some second hand books of T. B Ilangaratne (ටී බී ඉලංගරත්න) as Yamu.lk said for this September rather than new books. Because it will give the real flavor in olden smell of bygone stories.

Sunday, August 9, 2015

Open the pod bay doors, Hal!


Watched the boring(according to the current standard) science fiction film 2001:A Space Odyssey which was co-written by Arthur C Clarke in 1968. And I just found this funny part in the wiki, how Arthur was involved for the writing in the film.


Searching for a collaborator in the science fiction community, Kubrick(director) was advised by a mutual acquaintance, Columbia Pictures staffer Roger Caras, to talk to writer Arthur C. Clarke. Although convinced that Clarke was "a recluse, a nut who lives in a tree", Kubrick allowed Caras to cable the film proposal to Clarke, who lived in Ceylon.



Seriously wonder, why he chooses Ceylon...!

HAL 9000, the machine intelligence, which was highlighted by the film, describes about its ability to lip-reading with visual speech recognition. And that's where this quote comes from, which was so much popular "Open the pod bay doors, Hal!"






Anyway, what we're interested in here is not the villain Hal or the genius Clarke. We're interested in here is about a song "Daisy Bell" which was sung by the Hal, our machine intelligence that lead me into watching the film even it make me sleepy.


Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer do
I'm half crazy all for the love of you
It won't be a stylish marriage
I can't afford a carriage
But you'll look sweet upon the seat
Of a bicycle built for two."

Originally it was not sung by Hal. It was actually sung by a real machine of IBM in 1961 to demonstrate speech synthesis and was a quite inspiration to Arthur as he witnessed its singing. So let's here its singing.




And more..., search how Samsung uses this Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 science fiction film as evidence against Apple’s intellectual property infringement lawsuit. Anyway Samsung has lost I believe.




Sunday, August 2, 2015

Beer & Diapers for Data Mining


Beer & Diapers story is a well known example to explain the concepts of Data Mining Frequent Itemset Association Rule in the international context.




This unexpected association rule of Beer & Diapers anecdote is everywhere to be heard when learning data mining, even at the places where there is no beer culture.

Does this means there is no proper analysis going on for the local context, that can be taken as anecdote?