3D Design Course and Anaya

I'm taking advantage of the recent surge in traffic to ask about something...

One of the many things that the abundance of time in Pilani offers me is pursuing of a hobby. One of these hobbies is 3D design. I have used Blender 3D for a very long time now and dabbled in daydreams of starting an animation studio, an architectural rendering studio, special effects studio etc. - there is no limit to imagination is there? :-)

And all this with free and open source software.

With passing time, I realise that for a lazy and unmotivated person like me something like this is practically impossible. So instead of spending inordinately long hours in front of the computer fiddling with Blender 3D, I talked to the BITS administration about allowing me to offer a course from next semester on 3D Design.

Its an attempt to pass on what I have gathered through the years and see if you guys can make anything out of it. I also want to demystify Blender 3D which is considered by many to be notoriously difficult to learn - but teaching has always been my one of my strong points. :-)

Here is the tentative handout and summary of the course :

Handout

Summary

Of course, it is not official yet and and has to meet with BITS' screening and approval. I just wanted you to comment if you are interested so that I would get to know if this is feasible or not. But as I said, it is pending approval and is likely to meet with many changes in requirements and format.

Textbooks really won't be required because there are community tutorials splattered all over the internet.

Last but not least, this is not an engineering or physics course - the aim is to channel creativity to a particular medium and have fun while doing it.

On a related note, I was pleasantly surprised stepping out of my office yesterday and finding a signboard in the TBI area with "Anaya : Animation Unlimited" written on it. I dropped in for a couple of minutes and a nice dude answered all my questions very patiently.

I'm extremely happy because this is the first ever attempted start-up I have seen in BITS that has a very solid technical base. They are using CUDA as of now to accelerate physics calculations for a few animation companies - they plan to branch to OpenCL soon.

For those for whom that didn't make any sense, CUDA and OpenCL are standards which allow us to harness the tremendous power of GPU's (your graphics cards, plainly put) to do calculations much faster than the CPU can handle. There are free SDK's that can be downloaded to do the same - but I know nothing about them. Although I could tell you a thing or to about the graphics card architectures. :-)

Of course, these calculations need to be of a particular type only - otherwise the CPU is faster.

But I'm very happy to see some young guys doing cutting edge stuff sitting in this arid Indian hamlet. CUDA and OpenCL are just getting noticed all over the world and maturing as technologies and these guys are already on to it.

Congratulations Anaya, and best wishes.

Epilogue

Whew!

Its been an eventful 24 hours. I, blogger intermittent, received the highest number of hits for any post that I ever made. Som says I underestimated the power of sensationalism. I agree with him, but my heart goes out to those 42 comments made as a response to the original post. Not a single abuse (apart from "assface" of course :-D maan, I can't seem to get over that, controlling laughter now), not a single derogatory statement, but actually constructive criticism! Well meaning, mature people expressing an individual opinion - a rarity nowadays.

Now that my 15 minutes of fame are over, this post is philosophical but not holier-than-thou. A reflection on my own personal mistakes and a reflection on a spirit (both yours and mine) which refuses to die. Philosophy without action would be hypocrisy. Action without philosophy is madness. Philosophy and Action imply knowledge. Right or wrong knowledge.

This is mainly my story, but also a little bit of yours. Read at your own risk - you have been warned. I write to no one in particular.

What was my primary mistake? Underestimating the power of an action. The more I think, the more I feel that Newton's Third Law of kinematics needs to be seriously revised - every action has amplification in the reaction.

The Wise Ones have for long said that even your thoughts create ripples in the fabric of space-time. Actions definitely create waves in that same fabric. Be Aware, I tell myself, be constantly Aware.

And now, the spirit - the one which refuses to die. How is one supposed to react to a situation, a circumstance - especially an unpleasant one? How is one to deal with negativity?

The first thing about negativity is to accept it. And again, full marks to people like GR and G.Su. who have the guts to stand up and accept it. BITS needs that as does any other organisation or individual.

The second thing about negativity is to posess it or fight it - and not be averse to it. There are two images that the word "fight" brings to my mind - one of Chhatrapati Shivaji riding his horse and holding his sword out in defiance. The second is of Mahatma Gandhi, sitting quietly and smiling. Both are iconic Indian symbols. (And also both are Bengalis!)

The third and final thing about negativity is to sublimate it - to give it a new form.

On Mahatma Gandhi - my history teacher told me in Class 8 that she didn't agree with Gandhiji and had he not called off the Non-cooperation movment in 1922 after Chauri Chaura, India would have gained her independence earlier. For very long I held Gandhiji in contempt and Netaji (Bengali!) in regard.

Eventually after my own personal development, the picture of Gandhiji and his ideals grew stronger and stronger till I was convinced that his way was the only way. And, it left little doubt in my mind that had his way not been adopted, India would have never gained her freedom.

Violence will not solve the issue. Give me ONE example in this entire world where violence has solved the issue...

So accept negativity, possess it and transmute it. But violence in thought or in action will have mostly a disastrous consequence. Such is the Law of the Universe. The Greeks conquered by violence, the Romans fought long and hard for their empire, the marauding Mongols fought with violent valour. Where are they now? Where are the great empires? From ashes to ashes, from dust to dust.

Only one great country in this whole wide world has never attacked anyone but in retaliation. Only one great country in this world has been recorded in history before any other country has been recorded. Only one culture exists from that time to today. Only one great country has shown a resilience even to the point of frustration. You and I are that great country, that great culture.

How do you protest against something? In any way, as long as it is non-violent - in thought and in action - that's important. The whole universe will listen to you. India has had her own means of protest from times immemorial. You need to keep that up. Have pride in who you are and not what you want to become.

Sometimes people ask me why I never left India. Because I wanted to be India - I wanted to be able to make a change. Today I am plain uncomfortable outside India. A couple of years back, I went to Singapore for a conference. It was a very enjoyable three days, but on the fourth I was itching for my flight back to Delhi. And when I landed at IGI, the ground seemed my own and the air seemed my own - it just felt different and unfamiliar in Singapore.

I stayed on in BITS for the same reason - because I wanted to be able to make a change. As a student I mostly slept through the days and bunked classes. The reasons were exactly the same as today's - most of my classes were singularly uninspiring. It was a frustrating realisation and I sought solace in the few classes that were. This was acceptance of negativity.

Then was the possession, or the fight. I fought against teachers and purposely missed their vivas, abused everything and everyone from instructors to question papers to text-book publishers. It was terrible and it left me tired and weak and confused about my future and feeling I was fighting with the entire world all alone.

In the winter of 2001, after finishing PS II and before starting my final semester at BITS, I did the Sudarshan Kriya in Calcutta. And one day that winter, as I was sitting deep in meditation in Thakur's room at Dakshineshwar (a favourite jaunt of mine), a voice from inside revealed to me my future. It was clear as crystal, what I had to do - I had to become the very thing I hated the most - the instructor. The possession of negativity!

Very good, divine intervention and all that - but I had 6.5 in my two Physics sems and 5.5 in my two EEE sems; so how to do it? Believe it or not, I had difficulty differentiating between series and parallel resistance connections. On the car ride back from Dakshineshwar, I thought about how I would take my first class. And it all came rushing back, the negativity and the frustration, the bad teaching and some of the good. It was scary being the very thing that you detested.

In my final semester I did my thesis. (Oh, I finally found my guru - but more on him later.) 10 a.m. in the morning to 6 p.m. in the evening I was in Sky on the grass with one text book - no lunch (the mess cook wasn't Bengali), no getting up and lots of chai and cigarettes. In three weeks, I read three pages - I shit you not - but I made sure I understood every word of what I read. In the entire semester, I finished one and a half chapters of that text book and designed a circuit with 5 transistors. Which the brighter students do in a week.

At that point in time I refused a couple of jobs and enrolled for my Master's at BITS much to my parents' chagrin and my friends' titterings and against well-wishers who warned that BITS was a place full of old degenerates. But the voice had said to become instructor. BITS was short of people at that point in time and I guess that is how in spite of my abysmal CG, I made it to TA-ship.

The whole universe had conspired to make me an instructor and I, driven by a mad voice had let it.

They gave me a lecture section - Electrical Sciences I. I had made a C in that course and more notably a zero in the second test as student. There were twelve people in class and most prominently a girl I had had a crush on as a student not so long ago. In a matter of seconds I forgot all the planning I had done from that day on in Dakshineshwar and could not get a single English statement out straight. I ended up reading the handout and letting them go in 15 minutes.

The second load I had was Microelectronic Circuits - a CDC freshly introduced by LKM into EEE that year and I was his direct TA. I had to attend his classes and I was sweating hard in the first class because he was revising stuff and the third and fourth year guys were answering stuff I had no clue to. I swore at the voice and was sure that this possession of negativity wasn't such a great idea.

However, between thinking of doing an MBA and learning Java, I taught those classes I was supposed to and within a couple of months, I could get complete English sentences out straight. :-)

Then one hot and sultry afternoon in September as I taught to my class of twelve, there was a magical moment. I was saying something I can't remember what - when in a dizzying flash I forgot to speak. For floating in front of my eyes were electrons and transistors in their primordial glory. Something I had said triggered the vision and like Neo from the Matrix, I stood silent and amazed at the swirling particles.

I remember what I had said after that. I stopped at looked at my (rather worried) twelve and smiled and said, "Does anyone have any questions?". I knew that I could answer anything they had to ask.

The sublimation of negativity had occurred!

Yes, I was the instructor I had always despised and feared. But a much better version. I had kept the good and removed the bad as much as I could. From then till now, it has been polishing stuff so that the students are taken to a point of clarity beyond doubt.

Then I soon realised that BITS had many things I needed changed. That happened finally yesterday. At least the beginning happened. Which is why I was so thrilled of course.

But yes, it is a never-ending journey towards perfection. I am just glad that some of my favourite men are at the helm and I am also glad that some of my non-favourites are not - I have fought long and hard against them.

If you complain about BITS and India, (paraphrasing from President Abdul Kalam - yeah I was really proud of him) know that you are BITS and you are India.

And only YOU can be the change that you want to see.

Questions

From the more technically adept I'd like to know some things:

1) Is it possible to have a password captured to the Blogger account?

2) Can posts be removed by complaints?

I'm just curious. Am a little dazed as well. This is just general information I need...

Quick Updates...

This post has been blocked temporarily pending further resolution.

Blown to BITS

Hmmmm - if you are reading this after around 3 a.m. Sunday (7/3/2010) then this is probably different than what you are looking for. :-)

I've had to remove this post - not because I regret writing it, but because Varun has pointed out something I might have unwittingly spawned, which is as hilarious as it is dangerous. That's as much comment as I am willing to make. :-) If you've beaten me there, then you know already - its a proverbial can of worms.

So if that is traced back, it comes straight here. Dissolution of the fountainhead under the present scenario would be most prudent!

But I don't want to leave anyone with a sense of futility in the exercise. I did manage to read through all the comments and I am happy to see that people are not all dead. I have for some time held the opinion that students were largely blind to the situation and just wanted that "degree" the quickest way possible. I am elated to find among you today - exceptions!

Vimal : You were possibly right about my openness. Possibly not in the way you thought, but I might be giving you lesser credit than you deserve for your foresight.

Rachit, Karan, Radha, Shruti, Anurag, Raghav, Mind Salad : Respeck r'gh' bac'

Pratik, Aseem : Yes, cheers to that.

Sidharth, Chandu, Aseem, Bandan : Thanks!

Goonjan, Chirawa, Vishal, Bandan, Mind Salad, sahilishere : Sorry to disappoint you mates, but I had been myopic in thinking that I would be the only one involved in saying all this out aloud. But you know the rest...

RendzeV : Let's hope so mate, let's hope so...

Ashish, Abhi : Yes you guys! I know he is not a Bengali - I was making fun of myself - of an old Bengali trait actually. While we are on the topic, BITS has this trait as well. Everyone who has ever become anything has been a BITSian at one point in time - its like a Law, man. Last I heard from them, Mahatma Gandhi and Behzad Razavi were strongly suspected to be BITSians...

Ashish : I am thrilled you make the point about faculty improvement and research infrastructure. Sometimes I think you guys don't even notice. Very Happy I am!

Abhi : Good to hear you are tension free - but there are miles to go before we sleep...

Gamma, Radha : ROTFL

Student, Pritish : Shabash! Yes I completely agree with you. Extracurriculars should be done at all cost - but let's keep our primary focus on the curricular. At the risk of invoking everybody's wrath :-D, let me suggest that BITS should start failing people and making attendance compulsory. I would have hated that yes when I was in your place - but it would probably have made me a better engineer than I am today.

Pratik : Don't worry - it'll be gradual. Kumar-da is a successful industrialist remember? ;-)

AVeraGe : Love your nick. Yes! Free expression is my forte! ;-)

Mind Salad : Love your nick too. Is that English for dimaag ka bhartaa? ;-)

Addy : tohfa kabool kiya!

Rover : Nobody's called me assface in a long time. ROTFLMAO at that and the rest of your post contents. Say Hi when you are down in Pilani next...

Mayank, Mehak : Yeah, Kumar-da sure has his head screwed on right.

Nakul : The news would have reached you sooner or later. From someone else if not me... :-)

Varun : Cheers mate! Been a long time. Thanks for your words. And thanks for the tip-off - I was thinking it was spam or something.

Akshay : Yes, faculty upgradation is a must and a problem BITS needs to deal with as a priority. And yes Nattu's a nice guy.

Amrit Pal : Hey, I'm sorry I made you feel that way, man. I've probably been in BITS way longer than I should have and tend to get acerbic at times. Don't hold that too hard. Anyway, if its of any consolation Raman is considered by BITS to be one its best administrators - and rather grudgingly I might give him that - though I'd rather you didn't take the superlative in an absolute sense. Hope that makes you smile a bit! :-)

Mehak : Does that mean you didn't have much respect for me in the first place? :-)

So all good. Keep your chin up everyone and do your part wherever and whenever you can. I wanted to do my part so badly that I came back to teach here. :-)

Now, I'm outta here. You never saw me.

The Emperor

Michael Jackson died. I am a great fan of his but this entry is not an eulogy to him. It is a lament; and a tribute to someone else.

I adore Jackson. There was a certain energy to his dances and songs that kept the viewer mesmerised. I often watch "The Way You Make Me Feel" even today. And I love it. My cousins had introduced Jackson to me when I was about 6. From Thriller to Billie Jean to plain moonwalking, I loved it all...

There was another musician who I discovered all by myself though. This is about him. Why? Because this great musician died too last week. Because you need to know about him. Because "The Times of India" (which I hope does not reflect really the times of India) had just a three line side column entry on his death (whereas it continues to splash Jacko over 5 pages every day since his death).

His name was Ali Akbar. We call him Ustad Ali Akbar Khan Saheb, or sometimes plain Khansaheb. It is understood that there is only one of his kind. Its difficult to describe his music, so I will tell you just stories I know. (Whether all true or not I don't know.)

Around the time I was 13 years old, I had just started playing the sarod. I was pretty interested in Classical Music at that time and I would listen to everyone and anyone with an LP or cassette recording. I had already found out Zakir Hussain and was looking for more of his kind. Then one day, I heard Medhaavi...

Here is the first of the stories. It dates back many years before I heard Medhaavi. On a particularly bad personal day in his life, Khansaheb as a young musician had run away from home and had decided to end his life by jumping from a cliff. Torn by the internal machinations of his mind, he did not jump that day. He created a raag. He called it Medhaavi...

Medhaavi is an outpouring of his soul. Medhaavi is the expression of that which is impossible to express. Medhaavi encompasses you completely. Medhaavi makes you forget that you ever knew or ever want to hear anything else again in your life.

Oh, I forgot - why was I playing the sarod? Well, another story. When I was about 12, my father (a very good general physican in my part of Calcutta) noticed a commotion outside his extremely small clinic. People were suddenly prostrating in front of an unseen entity and creating a major hullabaloo. My father recalls stepping out and not being able to believe his eyes. For in front of him was Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, flanked on the sides by Aashish and Dhyanesh Khan - his two eldest sons - whom I would eventually have as my gurus. Khansaheb had a concert in Calcutta that evening and was sick and worried that he wouldn't be able to play. Anindya, his disciple and my father's long time patient had brought him over.

Thanks to my father, that night Calcutta heard the maestro enraptured. Khansaheb was not ungrateful. He came back to the clinic the next day and gifted an autographed LP to Baba. He was overwhelmed that he had not just been able to play, but could play extra long. He asked Baba about his sons and when he came to know that I had been playing the tabla for some time, suggested that I start learning the sarod from his son, Dhyanesh.

I did.

But good music takes some time to be understood and although I started learning the sarod and heard the autographed LP at the first opportunity I found it, to be frank, dull for my tastes.

A few months later, I heard Medhaavi. I dug up everything in the house that I could find on Ali Akbar. I must have been deaf or blind or both. For streaming into my ears was the most profound and beautiful music I had ever heard in my entire 13 years of life! I heard the autographed LP again. This time at full volume.

Khansaheb's music was ethereal. It said so much at so many levels that I can't even begin to describe it. I wasn't sure whether I was hallucinating, so I heard these many times over. I went to Guruji (Dhyanesh Khan) and I told him the wonderful things that I was suddenly hearing. He smiled. But didn't say anything. He was (Dhyanesh Khan died a year into my training with him) a great guru. He wanted me to find my own path. He was my guiding light.

So I went to my father's other classical musician patients. I told them that Ustad Ali Akbar Khan was the greatest musician ever - and I asked for their opinion. To my utter surprise (and utter relief as well) they all agreed with me. They took me under their fold as if I had stumbled upon a secret society. They gave me membership willingly and immediately. They would rave and rant about Khansaheb till I got bored. I wanted to listen to more of his music. I wanted to listen to everything he had ever played.

Till then I had not been allowed to Khansaheb's live concerts. They were meant for "grown-ups" only. I was dying to meet him, to see him with my own eyes. I wanted to bring out that faceless music from the speakers into the visual domain. I wanted to meet this god. If his music was so beautiful, how beautiful would he be? I fished out a photo from him from the newspapers and drew a portrait of him and stared at it long and hard.

At that time I was also involved with "The Statesman in School". The Statesman was a widely read newspaper in Calcutta and we were the school volunteers who wrote about stuff we liked in a weekly edition called "The Statesman in School". Arup-da (Amitava Ghosh's son) was in charge and dearly loved by all of us. One day, he gave us a proposition. We could interview the star of our choice.

Ali Akbar, I had screamed out and had promptly been given permission. There were a few d******s in the other members who disliked the choice - because Western Music was the in-thing and also because they had never heard of Ali Akbar. (I suspect they also work for the TOI today. Heh! Heh!). That week Shiva (the rock group) was being interviewed and there was considerable excitement because of that. However, the good Arup-da fought for me and won. Both Shiva's and Ali Akbar's interview would go up in that edition.

Where is Shiva today, I ask you? Most of you probably don't recognise the name anyway...

Well, I had got my chance to meet the great man and that was all that mattered. I needed questions to ask him, but I didn't know what to say. I just wanted to meet him. My mother (I am eternally grateful to her) wrote down a bunch of questions for me and I called up Khansaheb's secretary and arrived there with my brother in tow. The average age of the interview team was 11!

We were asked to wait in the living room. Heart thumping I waited. How tall would he be? Over 6 feet? Was he an angry man? What if he scolded me or asked me to play the sarod for him? I became convinced I had made an error by opting for the interview. I could leave now, but Arup-da would be very disappointed...

My brother and I stood up as Khansaheb walked in. I was astonished. He wasn't more than five feet two I think, very dark and hobbled in with a pack of 20's Classics in his hand. He was going to light up, but stopped when he saw his "interviewers" and was as astonished as I was. My brother, all of 9 years, holding up a portable borrowed tape recorder and me, all of 13 years ready with pad and pencil.

"You are going to interview me?", he asked in a broken and husky voice. Ow, this is the person who created Medhaavi? But I was also afraid for Ustad Ali Akbar Khan was a giant among musicians. Before I could react, he looked half amused and half interested and settled down.

I learnt that the Ustad's legendary father, Baba Allaudin Khan had made him practice for 18 hours a day and would tie him to a tree and hit him with a stick if he didn't. I learnt that his father had finally appreciated his music when Ali Akbar was 50 years old. I listened to all this with wide open eyes.

How do you play the sarod like that, I wanted to ask him.

At the end of the interview, I slipped him the portrait I had drawn and requested for it to be autographed. "You have given me too much hair", he said rubbing his shining bald pate and lovingly signed the sketch.

That day, I met the greatest musician in the world. Apart from his music what made him so great? He lived in the knowledge that he was the Emperor. So he didn't worry about ego. He concentrated on his art and created music which words cannot convey. Indian Classical artistes are as jealous as they are talented and they often have ego hassles. The Emperor had surpassed ego because he knew in a completely egoless way, that he could not ever be surpassed. He had after all stepped out from the shadows of his genius father and made a brand of music which was completely his own. Some of us, know its Ali Akbar by just hearing the tuning of the sarod.

I saw his concerts after that. Live concerts.

How did he play? Did he smile at the audience from time to time? Did he shake his head and have mannerisms? Did he complain about the weather? Did he threaten the sounds guy?

No, to all of the above.

One of the first things you would observe about Ali Akbar on stage was that his hobble was completely gone. He would walk rapidly and purposefully to the dais. He would announce the raag and he would sometimes forget.

And then he would slouch down with sarod in lap. He would lower his head, close his eyes and disappear. In a few seconds you would hear the first strain of the sarod. Each string pluck would be a like a stroke of a brush with a different colour. You would see the picture appearing gradually with the aalaap. What went on behind Khansaheb's closed eyes is beyond anyone's wildest imagination, but his hands gave us ample glimpses of it.

For through his sarod, God used to speak...

Hariprasad Chaurasia doesn't play with Zakir Hussain - apparently because the latter hogs the limelight. Ravi Shankar stopped his first wife (incidentally Ali Akbar Khan's sister, Annapurna Devi) from publicly performing the surbahaar (larger cousin of the sitar) out of jealousy and fear. Kishori Amonkar routinely yelled at the poor sounds technicians. Vilayat Khansaheb wouldn't play at a concert because he himself had dropped tea on his own sherwani. Amjad Ali Khan tries tricking Bickram Ghosh by rehearsing a taal in the green room and then changing it on stage.

But Ustad Ali Akbar Khan - he just played the sarod. He played like there was no tomorrow. He played like that every time. He gave to you a gift no one else could. Each concert you would hold in yourself for the rest of your life. He used to say that each raag was a manifestation a divine soul in Heaven; and he tried to bring these souls down to Earth for his audience.

He is on record for having said that having practiced for 10 years, one could please oneself; after 20 years one could please the audience; after 30 even the guru. But you will need many many years more to please The Divine.

Khansaheb not only pleased The Divine I am sure, he also merged with It. Legend has it that even when he was sleeping his left thumb used to be upright and twitching slightly. (That's how the sarod is held.)

Once at the Dover Lane music conference, the organisers reminded him to announce the raag and taal before the concert. It was hilarious. With all earnestness, Khansaheb announced Bageshree Kannada would be the raag. And the taal would be....? He gets stuck, looks befuddled at Swapan Choudhuri (his brilliant and long time accompanist and a great musician in his own right) and both start giggling like teenagers.

"Well, I don't know", Khansaheb finally mischeivously admits - "Actually I haven't thought about it." The evening rolls on. Calcutta is seduced by the sarod and forgets all about the taal. Till Khansaheb starts the gat in jhaptaal, pauses briefly and to keep true to the organisers' wishes announces, "OK, now I know, it is jhaptaal". He smiles and sinks back to his closed-eyes-world in a mere couple of seconds...

And I have to tell you this. Once I heard Khansaheb with Zakir Hussain. Zakir was then half his age and I knew that his professional debut had been when he had accompanied the Emperor at the age of 11. But I had never heard them together live.

Two wizards on stage. A complete magic show with sur and taal. At the end of the concert most of the audience has been moved to tears by the concluding Bhairavi. Zakir flung himself at the Emperor's feet. The Emperor acknowledgesd Zakir, waved at the audience and smiled. We clapped our hands black and blue and cheered ourselves hoarse...

People of all generations need to listen to his music. For Khansaheb created music beyond music. He was himself solidified music in human form. India is grateful to have had him as her son.

Michael Jackson's dance videos will always be the same to me. I have them memorised. Ustad Ali Akbar Khan's cassettes and CD's are different each time I hear them. Ever new and ever changing even as he has now passed on. That is true greatness.

Seeing India's present musical awareness, I think that in a way, it is better that he died. For he is now with the gods. And they are his fitting audience.

I will not miss you Khansaheb - you are in my heart.

I'm an Indian (Mac Hack)

I'm very thrilled today. I finally had the time and energy to do something that I had been wanting to for a long time but putting off. But I suppose its no use for you reading any further unless you own a Mac. Or a Hackintosh.

What I had wanted to do was change the flag in the menubar input source icon to the Tricolour. It was depressing have to stare at the Stars and Stripes or the Union Jack. The Tricolour isn't available in the International Sysytem Preferences.

This is what it looks like now.

Here's a short tutorial in case you have ever wanted to do the same - or want to do it now.

Download Ukelele from http://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.php?site_id=nrsi&id=Ukelele. Ukelele is a Keyboard Layout Editor for Mac OS X.

Make a folder called Ukelele in the Applications folder and move all the files and directories from the mounted dmg to here.

Start Ukelele and select "Copy of other layout". Select Applications -> Ukelele -> System Keyboards -> Roman -> U.S..keylayout

Then do Save As and name it Indian.keylayout and save to ~/Library/Keyboard Layouts/. You have a brand new keyboard layout. But you still have to associate a flag icon with this.

Download this and copy to ~/Library/Keyboard Layouts/. Don't change the name. Or if you do, remember that the .keylayout and .icns file need to have the same primary name.

(If you need the flag of another country then download the flag in a graphic format and use Img2icns to do the conversion.)

Log out. Log in. You're good to go.