An excellent read on the different ways DBMSs handle sequences and identity columns. While only IBM DB2 supports both, Oracle and SQL Server have their own nooks and crannies which need to be explored in depth. This article does an excellent job at it.

http://www.dbazine.com/db2/db2-disarticles/gulutzan4

If you want to convert an IDENTITY column which is generated by DEFAULT to be generated ALWAYS, you are out of luck. You cant do it using an ALTER statement. The only logical way is to drop and recreate the table as stated here.

How do you retrieve the value of an IDENTITY just inserted into a row? Use the function called IDENTITY_VAL_LOCAL as shown here.

UPDATED the look and feel of this blog. Changed the header. Brought Yahoo Answers upstairs. Removed Google Referrals and added the single row of text advertisements at the top. Link Categories shown now. Post categories shown now. Lots of other minor tweaks….

Thanks to DM for all his support

As usual I was reading more stuff, this time on Palmistry. Its quite amazing how different marks / indications in palms can be correlated with actual events / happenings in the lives of people. Most people dont believe all this. I dont know yet whether I do or not, but at the moment I am just trying to understand it. I believe it needs to be explored completely before banishing it as a hoax.

Orkut seems to be one of the best places I have come across for learning palmistry ( and other occult sciences ) from other learned members. Regardless of how many people curse orkut, I think it provides a great way to learn things you cant learn otherwise. Its a great tutor. Thank you Google.

The very basics of palmistry lie in the Mounts on the hand. Mounts on the palm are like hills on ground. Small areas which sort of surface above the normal level of the palm. Any normal hand would contain 9 mounts. A detailed explanation of all 9 mounts and where exactly they are located on the palm can be found here and here.

Once you know where the mounts are, you can go understand a lot more of what people are talking about. Here are the meanings of a Cross appearing on any of those mounts. They can be read on this thread on orkut, but I just present them in a easier-to-read format below. Remember, a cross can be both a positive and a negative sign on the palm. It depends entirely on where the cross is placed.

All information contained herein is the property of Dr.H.M.Awais. I do not claim any rights to the same. Neither am I responsible for any inaccuracies.

• Cross on Mount of Jupiter
  • Indicates that somebody will love you with full devotion.These people will surely will fall in strong love in their life.
  • A sign of happy married life, if the marriage line is not crossing the heart line.
  • It indicate foreign travell (But the luck line should be good).
  • It indicates some aims in life. Big cross big aims. Minor cross minor aims.
  • It supports you in social positions (gives you fame).
  • Cross on this mount along with good thumb is sure sign of wealth.
  • Two crosses on this mount will indicate a person who have two kinds of nature. Such people may not realize his/her real life.
  • Cross along with Star indicates love marriage with a known person.But it also speaks about loose morals.
  • It helps in education.Mostly such people will get education upto Masters degree(if their thumb is good)
• Cross on the Mount of Saturn
  • It indicate a person with complex nature.
  • That person’s point of view and thinking will always be different from other.
  • It indicates poor old age.
  • Such person cant benefit from his/her children.
  • Such person is expected to have accidental death.
  • In old palmistry people use to say this is a sign of judicial hanging.
• Cross on the Mount of Sun / Apollo
  • In old palmistry it was consider as the sign of bad fame.
  • But according to my point of view cross on this mount indicates good social position(except in old age)
  • It indicate a person who is very creative but he will use his power in negative direction.
  • To some extent it will help in financial position.
• Cross on the Mount of Mercury
  • Poor communication power.
  • Poor business power.
  • Cheaters.
  • Wrong decision power.
• Cross on the Mount of Upper Mars (between index finger and thumb)
  • A person who will be cheated by his family members.
  • Poor childhood.
  • Hidden enemies from family side.
  • Scar (mark) on the face or leg.
• Cross on the Mount of Lower Mars (between Head & Heart line)
  • Open enemies.
  • Hyper.
  • Aggresive.
  • That person will face many enemies in his life.
  • They have to work hard to acheive success in bussiness.
  • This is a negative sign for army people.
• Cross on the Mount of Venus
  • Problem in family life.
  • Broken affair.
  • Attraction toward multiple sexual relations.
  • Poor relation with one of brother or sister.
• Cross on the Mount of Moon
  • Problem in travelling.
  • Road traffic accidents.
  • Delay in travel.
  • Water accidents.
• Cross on the Mount of Neptune (even I dont know where Neptune is :))
  • Loose morals.
  • Hidden truth about the birth.
  • Selfish,Stubborn.

Now that you are an expert in palmistry, tell me what does a fish symbol on the Mount of Apollo on the inactive hand mean?

Reading has been a habit of mine. But if there is something I dont read regularly, its the stuff that scares people. I am not talking about horror books or movies. No, that stuff is passe’ (sometimes comic too). I am talking about (un)expected events of the future. Like the recurrence of Ice Age. Or extinction of the Lion. Or paying for air to breathe. Or the decay of the institution called marriage.

It was a lovely sunny morning here in Bangalore when my eyes fell on this. And they just didnt know where to look thereafter. They kept staring, not able to fully comprehend what the author had just said.

Its not like its not been said before. Its not like I didnt expect it to happen sometime. Its just that I didnt expect it to happen in my lifetime. Born and brought up in a family which still emphasizes very strongly on family values, even the thought of marriages becoming superficial and being based on only economic “needs” is quite scary. Yes, scarier than even death. Because marriages are what shape children and marriages are what made each and every one of us what we are today. And the end of marriage as an institution would mean the end of society as we know it.

The author says, and I quote:

Marriage encourages sloth, allows one person to live off the other and gives a parasite the legal right to live off the host.

He may be right in some sense. After all, traditionally women (and in some cases men too) have been entirely economically dependent on their spouse. And each have had their own responsibilities to take care of. So does that mean economic independence would automatically create situations which would no longer “require” a spouse? There’s got to be more to a marriage than just a “requirement”, right? There must be something additional on which billons of marriages have survived over thousands of years in the history of mankind.

The article made me think and do a bit of research. How is a marriage defined? What are its basic ingredients? And what constitutes a “minimum requirement” for a couple to be called “married”?

Wikipedia told me it has been defined and implemented differently by different societies at different times. But the singular feature which has stayed common over ages and tribes is the creation of affinal ties. And that my dear friends, was the answer I was looking for.

I am happy that the author is an economist and not a psychologist. I am happy that his idea was earlier rejected, and I hope it continues to be rejected. I rejoice because I found something to contradict him with. I am glad that I still believe in marriage just as much as I did earlier. I am glad, because Wikipedia exists.

I was looking for a base 64 encoder which would work online and encode text without having to download any software at all.
This is what I found…and it works pretty darn well.

Online base64 encoding

You might ask why would someone need something like that? Well there are reasons and then some. Ask spammers why they cant send spam any more and that might help!!!

Oracle has updated its suite of datawarehousing products (read competition) and now sports the Release 2 tag for the “Warehouse Builder” line of products designed to integrate with Oracle 10g.
This is where you get to read more about it.

Its not quite the industry standard yet, but its got the potential, and if Oracle manages to support it properly, it might well take the podium position soon.

Take a look at the new features and some screenshots here.

This is a small article which I wrote just before leaving IMT. Its been a while, but I just remembered about it a few minutes back. And thought this blog would be the ideal place to put it up. After all, this blog is about my life.

Click here to access the Word document and engross yourself in a brand new experience.