Monthly Archives: January 2011

Survey on Employee Attrition – Please help this PhD student

Featured, Miscellaneous, ,

Deepshikha Satija writes:

This is a request to help me to progress towards the completion of my Doctoral Research. I am at the Data Collection stage of my PhD and your help is sought to fill up a questionnaire pertaining to my study.

Purpose of the study: My endeavour is to find the reasons and strategies for Employee Attrition in IT & ITES sector in Pune.

Confidentiality: I assure you that the information provided by you will be truly used for study purpose.

Thank you for your kind co-operation and contribution. If you wish to know the outcome of this study, please mention your email address (optional) in the questionnaire. You will receive a copy of the final analysis. Giving your email address is optional – I will not use the email addresses for any purpose other than sending out results of the study.

Link: https://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dHNILVV5ekNVU2ZXNDc5QVNIQ2J1SFE6MQ

Wikipedia 10th Anniversary Celebrations in Pune – 3 Events

Events, , ,

15th January 2011 is the 10th Anniversary of the launch of Wikipedia. To celebrate, the wikipedians in the city have organized three events: two events this weekend, and then the “main” event on 15th January. The events are as follows:

Marathi Wikipedia meetup

8th January, 1830 – 2000 hrs, SICSR,
Atur Centre, Model Colony. Room No 704. 7th floor
Basic idea is to discuss contributions to the Marathi Wikipedia. Mandar Kulkarni is coordinating.

Pune photothon – Pune loves Wikimedia Commons

09 Jan 2011, 9 AM at Shaniwar Wada gate.
All interested photographers meet there.
The basic idea is to take photographs which will be uploaded to Wikipedia (technically, they will be uploaded to the Wikimedia Commons.) Sudhanwa Jogalekar is coordinating.

Wikipedia 10th Anniversary Celebrations Main Event

This event will on 15 Jan, 6:30pm, in room 707, 7th Floor, SICSR, Model Colony.

The schedule is as follows:

  • Presentation on Wikipedia (ten minutes)
  • Short talk on Marathi Wikipedia (ten minutes).
  • Short talk on 7th Ornithology Course’s contribution to Wikipedia with Uploading of the three improved articles on Indian Birds (ten minutes).
  • Talk on contribution to Wikimedia Commons with symbolic upload of two photographs, one each of two TFs – Wikimedia Commons loves Pune, and
    Hill-forts of Maharashtra (ten minutes).
  • Talk on contribution made by TEDxPUNE’s event for college students on 15 Jan 2011 (ten minutes).
  • Hallmark address by Mr Barry Newstead from Wikimedia Foundation.
  • Vote of thanks.
  • Refreshments.

All the above events are free for all to attend. No registration is required.

Pune IT Milan Seminar – An introduction to IT for college (FY/SY) students

Events, ,

Every year, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh organizes the Pune IT Milan Seminar, a two day program for college students (first and second year students of any degree course – not necessarily Computer Science or Info Tech courses). Many of the talks are in Marathi or Hindi, so that students who are not yet completely comfortable in English can also benefit. There are competitions, overview talks, and discussions on how to go about learning any topic or skill in today’s connected world, and on specific areas like web development, mobile development, sysadmin and networking.

See the full schedule for more details.

The event is on Saturday, 8th January, 2pm-6pm, and continues on Sunday, 9th January, from 8am to 1:30pm. It will be at “Motibag”, Shaniwar Peth. There’s an entry fee of Rs. 50 (which includes a snack and lunch). Register here if you’re interested in attending.

Innovations 2011 Contest: What product/services can the tech community build for Pune

Events, Pune City, , ,
Update: The contest is over. Winners and Judges comments are:

  • Satish Tilokchandani: “Good News Reporter”. Comments: A simple idea that could really catch on if done well. And can spread beyond Pune too.
  • Hemanshu Narsana: “Transportation Options Calculator”. Comments: Would be really useful if it included estimated rickshaw fares, and 6-seater routes.
  • Dhanashree Srivastava: “RFID tags for kids”. Utility is limited to only certain contexts, but an interesting project for students/techies to work on.

On Saturday, 8th January, Pune will again play host to a number of innovative inventors from across the country, as part of Innovations 2011, an event organized by the IIT-Bombay Alumni Association, Pune Chapter. This event showcases the best science and technology innovations in India (whether they are from startups, large companies, or elsewhere) that have been implemented in practice. The innovations are from varied fields such as medicine, agriculture, mechanical/electronic/chemical technology, IT products, etc. Here are some example innovations from previous years:

  • a simple mechanical device that prevents toilets in Indian trains from discharging waste products at a station (i.e. when a train is stationary), but opens up when the train is moving over 40mph
  • a health alert emergency system for senior citizens, to be worn on the body, and which can automatically detect if they’ve fallen, and can alert emergence response systems
  • a solar powered pivot irrigation by a lone inventor
  • an integrated system for ethanol production from sorghum, by Pune’s Praj Industries,
  • wi-fi security by AirTight networks,
  • stem cell therapy for pre-eclampsia

This year, again the event promises to be great. The keynote address is being given by Chetan Maini, CTO of Reva Electric Vehicles (which is now a Mahindra & Mahindra company). For more details of the event schedule see here.

Register here if you wish to attend. There is an entry price – Rs. 750 (with dinner), or Rs. 500 (without dinner).

Every year, Innovations holds a contest where PuneTech readers have a chance to win free passes for Innovations.

The contest this year is this:

Briefly describe a product or service that the tech community can design, develop and deploy for the benefit of the citizens of Pune.

The basic idea is this: there are lots of enthusiastic techies in the tech community in Pune, and we could easily harness their energies to build some great products that can benefit Pune. It could be some simple Question and Answer website like ForPune.com, or something more complicated. It need not necessarily be a InfoTech idea; could be anything else.

The entries will be judged on the basis of these factors:

  • Usefulness: How much does it benefit the citizens of Pune? How much does it benefit society?
  • Ease of implementation: How much effort will it take to implement. The easier it is to implement, the more the chances of winning. For example, any idea that requires the “co-operation” of PMC, or some other government body, has a low chance of being implemented successful, and hence a low chance of winning. (On the other hand, an idea that requires the co-operation of Pune Traffic Police will get higher marks because PTP has been pretty fabulous last year at implementing innovative IT based ideas)
  • Uniqueness: The more “innovation” your idea has, the more different/unique it is from anything else we’ve seen before, the higher marks it gets.

Please describe your idea in brief in the comments section below. The last date for submitting ideas is Thursday, 6th January, 12 noon. Winners will be announced by Friday, 7th Jan. If you’ve already bought a ticket for Innovations, and you win the contest, your ticket price will be refunded. If you don’t actually want the ticket, or if you’re happy to pay the price (which is rather reasonable), you can still enter the contest – simply indicate at the end of your entry that you’re not interested in the ticket. Please ensure that you give correct email address with your comment – so we can contact you if you’ve won.

There will be 3 winners.