Added Live Search plugin for Wordpress from Jagath's plugin page. Interestingly, the plugin author is from the sub-continent. :)

This plugin is an AJAX script that enables 'live' search on the wordpress. I'm yet to take a peak into the code of this one, but it was pretty easy to set up and get it running.

Check out this nice plugin on the right side bar of this blog under "Live Search".

It was a tough decision, but in many ways a good one...
I switched from fedora core 3 to ubuntu recently. As it happened, the other day GNOME suddenly got messed up on fedora when I tried to kill gam_server (gamin - which was eating up 100% CPU, I couldn't figure out why) and I couldn't use xcfe comfortably (though its quite faster than GNOME). I don't like KDE, either. So, instead of installing fedora afresh, I opted to go for ubuntu. I have been hearing a lot about it these days, it was time to check it out myself :)

Came across this comment on /. couldn't resist admiring it... Bravo! ;)

Background:Its an usual thing to see slashdotters calling India a third world country. (Its become an even more sticky label these days, all credits to outsourcing). The link above leads to a comment that does a take on this and clears the misinformation that prevails.

Yahoo launched few days back what seems to be its answer to google's Search history (and more) - the myweb beta.

It has several cool options that aren't available on google's Search History. Google's Search history is just what it means, just a log with a calendar and search interface for that log. Yahoo stands out with a slightly different approach, with features like
* Email a friend - where one can mail the saved search pages to friends.
* IM saved pages or selected pages from the search history to friends (google can't do this ;) )
* Folders - where one can store the saved search.

The history can be cleared at one go on yahoo. 'Saved search' here mean saving them from the 'History'. One can even Import bookmarks to the list from My Yahoo! bookmarks.

There's a small feature called "How I found it" which shows what keyword you used to get to that result. There's also a feature to let you "block" URLs, but I couldn't figure how out how I could block one. The default saved pages are apparently some sponsored links. Mine had most Indian sites like rediff, indiafm and filmfare which I deleted.

The search interface for "myweb beta", is also very nice. It sports the latest news stories and mailbox information (when logged in).
Besides everything I mentioned here, probably the most nice feature on yahoo is the synced sign in. Just one login is enough to browse through all personalised services on yahoo.

But, having said that, yahoo 'my web' seems to be pretty much of a overdose to me, a frequent user of google. Its been cleverly designed to keep the users sticked to yahoo search engine and keep them coming back ;)

/. carried a story today about China getting its internet domains completely in chinese characters. This might sound like locking the 'Net-Citizenry', but it might quite be a revelation!

Chinese government has approved i-DNS.net to give out some chinese names as domains. The domain names can then be typed in chinese to access the websites!
Go to samples page, and there's a tamil counterpart of the solution, as well!

Imagine URLs like सर

ಬೆಳಗಾಗಿ ಪೇಪರ�? ಹಿಡಿದರೆ ದೊಡ�?ಡದಾಗಿ ಹೀಗೆ Headlinesಉ : "ಎಸ�? ಎಸ�? ಎಲ�? ಸಿ ಪರೀಕ�?ಷೆ ಫಲಿತಾಂಶ:‌ಮತ�?ತೊಮ�?ಮೆ ಹ�?ಡ�?ಗಿಯರ ಮೇಲ�?ಗೈ!".
ಅಲ�?ಲ, ಅದ�?ಯಾಕೆ ಹ�?ಡ�?ಗಿಯರೆ ಯಾವಾಗಲೂ ಮೇಲ�?ಗೈ ಸಾಧಿಸೋದ�?? ಹ�?ಡ�?ಗರ�? ಯಾಕೆ ಮ�?ಂದೆ ಬರೋದಿಲ�?ಲ? ಬಹ�?ಶಃ ಹ�?ಡ�?ಗರ�? ಹ�?ಡ�?ಗಿಯರ ಹಿಂದೆ ಪೋಲಿ ತಿರ�?ಗ�?ತಿರ�?ತಾ ಇರ�?ತಾರೇನೋ ;) ಅಥವಾ ಗಟ�?ಟ�? ಹೊಡೆಯೋದರಲ�?ಲಿ ಹ�?ಡ�?ಗಿಯರನ�?ನ�? ಸಡ�?ಡ�? ಹೊಡೆಯೋಕೆ ಆಗೋದಿಲ�?ವೇನೊ. �?ನಕ�?ಕೂ Honest ಹ�?ಡ�?ಗರ�? "ಲೇಡೀಸ�? ಫರ�?ಸ�?ಟ�?" ಅಂತ Prompt ಆಗಿ ದಾರಿ ಮಾಡ�?ಕೊಡ�?ತಾರೆ. :D

Aish is on Oprah's "Woman across the globe" show. Aishwarya rai is one among the few women from around the globe interviewed on the show.

Oprah describes aishwarya as " This Bollywood beauty is a shrewd businesswoman, raking in the American equivalent of about $15 million a film."

One should really agree on that fact ;) not only is she stacking up lots of aishwarya (wealth), she's now becoming a popular face in the west, as well.

Excerpts:

Oprah: Do they (Indian women) say we're rude?

Aishwarya: No, Indian people are very hospitable.

Oprah: Do they say we talk too much?

Aishwarya: Opinionated maybe.

Oprah: Do they say we get a lot of divorces?

Aishwarya: Ah, that could be a discussion.

Oprah: You know what, you could be a diplomat!

(via Sanjay)

UPDATE: This blog post has a link to a torrent using which one can download the episode. (in Quicktime format)