801 My First experience with a CrossWord Puzzle Generator, and my First Crossword Puzzle No. ybcw1.

YB CROSSWORD PUZZLE NO. 001

Trigger for this blogpost: Crossword Puzzles of Guardian, NewYork Times, and Spectator. Most of these English Crossword Puzzles are published in Indian English Newspapers, both Net and Print Editions. Apart from the global Newspapers, Indian Newspapers like TheHindu have their Daily Crossword Puzzles. DeccanChronicle also publishes Guardian and NewYork Times, English Crossword Puzzles, with key following the next day. After working out a good number of such puzzles, I have developed an irresistible urge to design some CWPs, albeit with the help of Computer Programmes, as is the craze and the State-of-Art of today. The above picture is the blank grid of my first such English Cross Word Puzzle. Some of the words in the grid have been supplied by me. The rest of the words have been auto-filled by a Computer software. The above grid is not interactive (we cannot answer the Crossword on the Computer or the mobile). For that we may need a java applet, or an android mobile app. Right now, though I can write some Java programmes and design some small android apps., it is not sufficient for me to create and implement a truly effective Crossword Puzzle Creator/Generator/Maker in Java or Android.

Clues: Across: 1. degrade, get degraded.(5)
6. Salty.(6)
11. Without anything in hands.(10)
13. Abbreviation for 'link'.(2)
14. A language in Nigeria and NW Africa.(4)
15. Exist, stay.(2)
16. It is I.(2)
17. Opposite of debit (2).
19. Back side (4).
21. Saying yes, approving (7).
24. Having a name (5).
25. Nomini umbra in Latin, man of straw in English (3).
27. A collection of anecdotes and quotes (3).
29. Crush with a piece of a thin wood (5).
31. An Arctic tusked whale (7).
32. Succeeds, triumphs (4).
35. North India(2).
36. Engineer before name(2).
37. Bachelor of Arts. In Telugu language: bottiga annAniki lEni vADu [A person who does not even have anything for survival](2).
38. Bible, murderer who killed his own brother out of jealousy (4).
40. A Bank Probationary Officer in India(2).
41. Assemble (10).
44. Bent, inclined (6).
45. From the valley (5).

DOWN

1. More capable, skilled (5).
2. Prohibition (3).
3. Accounts Receivable (2).
4. A British river (6).
6. Swimming with a diving mask (11).
7. Sum up (3).
8. Open arable land (3).
9. Identity in short (2).
10. Come out, ooze out (6).
11. Master of Arts (2).
18. Help (3).
19. A Biblical baby name (4).
22. A high level computer language used in aircraft navigation (3).
23. Neither morning nor evening (4).
27. Baby girl name of gracefulness (6).
28. Baby name to mean 'king' (3).
29. Some what colloq. "Silence please!" (2).
30. Go ahead, from teens (6).
33. Industrial Relations in short (2).
34. Disdain (5).
38. Fraud (3).
39. Neither 'were', nor 'will be' (3).
40. Pisum Sativum, to eat (3)
41. Fourth note in music. Is it 'ma' in INdian music? (2)
42. Arabic for 'the' (2).
43. Head Master or Home Minister? (2).

Question: You could have googled for some Java jars, available on the Net for downloading.

I use Ubuntu / PepperMint operating system based on Linux. Of course, the Java applications available on Net are platform and os independent. Some of these applications I have downloaded and experimented with. There are about some 10 java applications at SourceForge.Net. Click to have a look at java applications which are platform independent, some of which are useful for creating Crossword puzzles. .

I use a Java JDK8 + JRE, from a USB drive (pen drive), and access it from Linux Command Line.

Some of the Java applications and jar files downloaded by me from Net, and tried to use to generate crossword puzzles, started giving an error message "Main Class not found". An example of one such type of application is Crossword Sage. I am in the process of resolving them.

What will you say about downloading Java applications, from Windows based developers, and download-web pages?

Answer: I am really exasperated to find that many of them contain hidden links to FORCED ADVERTISEMENT CLICKS. We have to spend a lot of time in seggregating real download links, and forced-advertisement links. Some of the real download links, may finally lead to SourceForge.net only. In Indian Banking, we have a maxim "Lendor of Last Resort" which refers to the Central Bank of the country, i.e. the Reserve Bank of India, (a class similar to Federal Reserve in United States, and Bank of England, in England). SourceForge seems to be our truely dependable MAGNANIMOUS donor for downloading UNSTRINGED free software, without forced advertisements.

Question: What did you install for generating the above Crossword Puzzle?

Ans: I am trying a linux based package called 'qxw', which is available in Ubuntu Repositories. It can be installed from Ubuntu Software Centre.

For installing from Ubuntu Command line:

sudo apt-get install qxw .

Installation does not take more than 1 mb.

What is the most important merit of qxw?

Ans: It has a dictionary, from which it will autofill the words in the grid, if we choose autofill. Or, alternatively, we can supply some words, and for the rest we can use autofill.

2. It has a facility to export to png, both the empty grid, and the filled solution grid. It can also export to 'html' which can be uploaded to a website.

Did you experience any problems?

I have so far done only one crossword puzzle. Though it seems capable of giving clues, I am unable to use the facility for creating clues effectively. I have manually created the clues, applying my mind and using my brain + dictionaries.

Question: Why do you waste your time in creating CrossWord Puzzles? English is a foreign language.

Answer: Even a completely and truly Socialist country (the goal and theme of this blog), has to depend for its livelihood-income on production of goods and services. Today, whether anybody or any country likes it or not, English is a language of the World Today. That means, even if one / two / some countries get rid of Capitalism and install a truly Socialist Economy and Society, they cannot avoid production of goods and services for export to the other parts of the world. For promoting and marketing of exports, Business Communications serve as an effective tool. Language skills become important. Not just writing computer codes. Not just producing cement or dredgers and earth-movers. Whatever we produce, we have to market, by canvassing for orders, develop customer relations, make export documentation containing invoices, transport documents, insurance documents, weight lists, numerous other certificates adhering to the conditions laid down by the foreign buyers.

Vocabulary in a language can be compared to bricks and steel rods used in raising a building. Right type of vocabulary cannot be obtained in one day. Vocabulary building requires daily exercise, comparable to physical exercise in Gyms, undertaken by body-builders. Crossword Puzzles serve the purpose of SEMANTIC EXERCISES needed for our brain, while walking, jogging, working in gyms etc. provided us PHYSICAL EXERCISES to body.

Question: Can Crossword Puzzles be used in controlling blood sugar and diabetes?

Ans: Difficult to say yes or no. Crossword Puzzles can be classified under the category of 'exercise to brain and mind', apart from being VOCABULARY BOOSTERS and REFRESHERS. Brain for its consumption seems to use direct sugar from blood, while our muscles in shoulders, limbs, thighs etc. seem to use starch-based sugars produced in liver. Hence, in my personal humble opinion, working continuously with brain is as important as working with muscles. Both are not mutually exclusive.

TRUE AND COMPLETE SOCIALISM SHOULD INVOLVE BOTH PHYSICAL LABOR AND MENTAL LABOR !

For this reason only, in the roadmap for TRUE AND COMPLETE SOCIALISM of YB BRAND, every physically fit person and mentally fit person should be given a daily routine of 20% physical labor, 20% mental labor, 10% leisure, 25% family commitments, hygiene etc, and remaining 25% for sleep.

Thousands of books have been written, thousands of web pages have been created, Governments and NGOs make out adequate publicity about the link between physical exercise and health. But few books, websites, Governments, NGOs highlight the importance of mental labor. Of course working in an Office as some Assistant or as a sales person or as a Software Engineer or somebody else may involve some mental labor. But it may not be adequate, because it does not have a mix of various components.

I shall never support the idea of some Sections in the Society saying that they will not do any physical labor, as they are INTELLECTUALS AND BRAIN WORKERS. If brain workers start sharing physical labor, at least for their own personal and family chores, that will reduce the burden on occupations which are now considered as menial and looked down upon with condescension. It will reduce the present drudgery which is thrust upon some occupations today, which seem to be thrown upon poorer sections of the society.

To continue. सशेष. ఇంకా ఉంది.

799 (Part 1/10) of Lenin-Trotsky-MNRoy-Open Source Management and, Management of Truly Socialist Economy and Society

Here is a link to Sourceforge.net/blog/handling the banes of open source management, which depicts the problems associated with Open Source Management. click to go to Sourceforge.
Open Source Management, and Management of True Complete Socialism has some similarities. Managing a truly Communist / Socialist / Marxist economy amidst dozens of Capital countries blinking and glittering around with their goodies of luxury cars, casinos, film festivals, facebooks and twitters, may be more complex and complicated when compared to running repositories and patrons of Open Source Management, in the arena of Computer Operating Systems and Software. Open Source Management, prima facie, is not a lucre-accumulating vocation. Unless persons and institutions are endowed with some supreme commitment to their goals and ideals, there is a risk of their getting fatigued and tired in the midway. Like metal fatigue, fatigue of "providing something free over long term" without expecting cognizible rewards is greater-greater-greater than an acrobatic feat of walking on a thin wire across Niagara falls.

Photo above: M.N. Roy's 1920 encounter with Lenin, the Supreme Boss of Bolshevik Revolution and 1920 Soviet Union, and probably World Communism of the day. In this group photo, Trotsky and Stalin were apparently not present. We cannot read much from their absence, but this is just an observation out of curiosity.

OPEN SOURCE MANAGEMENT

The Open Source Movement, is to a large extent influenced by the problems faced by Computer-users with the incarcerating Operating System Windows of Mr. Bill Gates, and the commercial software churned out by business organisations. While there is nothing wrong with doing genuine, honest and legitimate business by discovering and innovating gadgets and widgets, Windows and their Associate Developers indulging in restrictive methods. Imposing some restrictions on distribution or usage, when software and/or code is provided free, is understandable, making these restrictions eternal, too cumbersome, preventing people from using the software purchased by them after paying through their necks and throats, could not be swallowed by user-society. From it generated, the groups of suffering users, searching for "Open Source". Such was their suffering, they even offered to spend a substantial part of their own time, money, and resources, for the cause of the Open Source Movement.

Like phoenix from ash emerged, the Linux Operating System from the Unix, to challenge the monopolies of Windows, Internet Explorer, and other commercial and proprietory software makers. Gradually, with the help of volunteer developers, Open Source Movement matured into a true challenger to Microsoft, Adobe and their ilk. Debian, Debian forked Ubuntu, Ubuntu forked Linux Mint, Lubuntu, Xubuntu, Porteu, etc. operating Systems have started enjoying good support from users and have become substitutes for Windows.

In promoting the Open Source Movement, development and distribution of Open Source Packages, pioneers and leaders like SourceForge, Launchpad have rendered yeomen services by giving shelter and bandwith to the packages. From my own personal experience, I do not know, how many dollars ( I do not have such dollars and hence I might have been forced to forego, or indulge in use of pirated software) I might have been compelled to shell out elsewhere to download the bulky and bloated Windows packages both from so called genunine and dubious websites. As a person of small means, I can only express my gratitude to Launchpad, SourceForge, and many other Linux developers and donors which made the Open Source Movement a true challenger to some Commercial-Proprietory sharks.

Sameway, Open Office, Abhiword, LibreOffice have become good substitutes for MS Office.

BENEFITS OF USING OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE

1. free of payment. Those who have money can voluntarily donate.

2. Those who are interested, can study the source code also, and improvise upon it for own use, and also distribute the improvised packages under the GNU public license system. Those who make such improvements can also contact the original developers and contribute to the development of the original software.

3. Most linux software, by and large, is virus-free and virus-resistant, unlike windows where if we download and install one package, thousand other things like bootsector viruses, file-proliferators, unsolicited unwanted tool-bars in the web-browsers will appear and make our work a hell as it is difficult to get out of the intrusions.

The SourceForge blog article linked by me above, discusses in length the pros and cons associated with Open Source Management. Apart from those discussed above, there is also the primary problem of finding out monetary resources for day to day work, such as payment of bills of rents, minimum salaries, electricity, computer hardware, bandwidth, etc. etc.

TRUE COMPLETE SOCIALISM

In our previous blogposts, I have already discussed some of the features which I have tried to attribute to the True Complete Socialism of my dreams or fantasies. Before, we can discuss some more of them, it is necessary for us to have a look into recent comments about the pirouetting ambulations and peregrinations of the socialist movement in United Kingdom. Here is a very thought-provoking article by Peter Hitchens in Spectator dated 20th Aug. 2016.

Click to go to Specator.co.uk. This article is also available at DeccanChronicle.com. Hard copy can be found in the print addition of DC dated 24th Aug. 2016 immediately after the Editorial page.

Honestly, I do not KNOW much about Trotsky. When I was reading about Late Manavendra Nath Roy (popularly called M.N. Roy) who was one of the pioneers of Indian Communism, some years back, I came across the name of Trotsky. I have some sympathies for Trotsky, because he lost his life in the hands of the power-mongering dictator Joseph Stalin.

Earlier, I had great respect towards Lenin, as a leader who has given a "practical effect" and "implementation" to the theories of Late Lenin. But a part of that was blunted and dented, when I learnt through history that Lenin did not hesitate to enter into treaties with the Adolph Hitler of his early rule. I am unable to write anything about it right now, because my own knowledge of Lenin is limited. But, after learning about Lenin's entering into pacts with Hitler, one question frequently lingered in my mind: "Had Lenin lived to the end of the World War II", would Lenin have acted / reacted to Hitler's manoeuvres and massacres, in the same manner as Joseph Stalin?". I could not reconcile to a possibility that Lenin too would have reacted in the same manner as Stalin. Personally, the horizon of my knowledge is limited, I view that Lenin and Stalin seem to have similar behavioral patterns. I seem NOT HAVE much adoration for Trotsky or M.N. Roy, probably because, I have started considering every writing about living powerful persons / or deceased celebrities/halo bearers as hagiographic exaggerations, thus requiring much search and research to accept them as facts.

Here is one quote from Click to go to http://www.sacw.net/article11101.html . This is said to be a narration by one of the pioneers of INdian Communism- Late Mr. M.N. Roy, about his first encounter with Lenin, the Supreme boss and founder of USSR after the Bolshevik Revolution.

"... Danton and Lenin are the two greatest revolutionaries of modern times, and Danton was also a romanticist. The soul of the Great French Revolution was killed when jealousy of the hypocritical High-Priest of Reason sent Danton to the guillotine. Like his great predecessor, Lenin also had the audacity to call for moderation before the cup was drained to the dregs, before it was too late. He had no rival, though Trotsky might pretend to imitate Robespierre’s fanaticism after Lenin’s death, if he had the chance. Therefore, had not the cruel hand of a natural death removed him prematurely Lenin might have turned the course of the revolution to a more fruitful direction. The New Economic Policy was the signal. Its unfoldment might have headed off the subsequent relapse into terrorism and coercion, which destroyed the utopian ideal of Communism. But Trotsky’s Left opposition compelled Stalin to kill the Dantonist spirit of Lenin. The two contenders for the succession to Lenin together did for the Russian Revolution what Robespierre had done for the French. ..."

ybrao-a-donkey's humble observation

We have seen the fiasco of Communism in Vietnam, which went through ghastly battles in rivers and swamps, and massacres in the hands of French Colonialists and the American air and chemical warfare. What did Vietnam learn after going through the hell? Nothing. Today, Vietnam is hand in glove with U.S.A. inviting American Multi Nationals into its land. Of course, Vietnam can always have an excuse of defending themselves from the military and territorial ambitions of China. Like a calf of a kangaroo which hides in the belly-pouch of its mother, Vietnam seems to find security in the guard of U.S., forgetting the past injuries. If this is the retrogression level of a country like Vietnam which had earned much reputation and sympathy from the World, what can we or what should we expect from the Socialist Parties of U.K., France, or the Socialist Facades of Mr. Bernie Sanders.

TAIL PIECE धूमकेतु తోకచుక్క

In India, priests and discoursers, whenever they cannot defend or explain a philosophy or phenonmenon effectively, they take shelter by calling it "VISHNU MAYA" (Glorious and Illusive Ways of Lord Vishnu). For the time being we shall also, self-amusingly SAY, that Communist Parties and Socialist Parties turning dictatorial, and bourgeoisie parties occasionally behaving like Socialist Parties as a part of their Vote Bank politics, also have some strains of Vishnu Maya or ISvar lIlA.

To continue. सशेष. ఇంకా ఉంది.