(Share) "The empty soap box"

One of the most memorable case studies on Japanese management was the  case  of the  empty  soap  box,  which  happened  in  one  of  Japan's  biggest  cosmetics companies. 

The  company  received  a complaint that a consumer had bought a soap box that was empty.

Immediately the authorities isolated the problem to the assembly line, which  transported all  the  packaged  boxes  of  soap  to  the  delivery department.  

For  some  reason,  one soap  box  went  through  the assembly line empty.

Management  asked  its  engineers  to  solve  the  problem.  

Post-haste, the  engineers worked  hard  to  devise  an  X-ray  machine  with  high- resolution  monitors  manned  by two  people  to  watch  all  the  soap boxes that passed through the line to make sure they were not empty.

No  doubt,  they  worked  hard  and  they  worked  fast  but  they  spent whoopee amount to do so. 

But when a workman was posed with the same problem, did not get into complications  of  X-rays,  etc  but  instead came  out  with  another solution.He  bought  a  strong  industrial  electric  fan  and  pointed  it  at  the assembly line. He switched the fan on, and as each soap box passed the fan, it simply blew the empty boxes out of the line.                                
                           



Moral of the story: Always look for simple solutions. Devise the simplest possible solution that solves the problem.

Maths applied

One more simple yet practical show of Maths as in the chapter of TIME and WORK.

While solving the below example , i realized how important it is to have a work-ex to understand and apply things.

Problem : A can complete a project in 20 days and B can complete the same in 30 days.If A and B start working on the project together and A quits before 10 days when the project is completed,in what no of days will the project be completed ?

Yea you can solve it later on after this post ;)

While solving this i remembered a situation at Sibridge Technologies.While developing an I2C VIP,we first prepare a MPP(Microsoft project plan) file which has a whole lot of info about your work for entire project life.Now after 5 months of developing,one of the core member of my I2C VIP group left the job.

At that time I realized that this is the SAME TIME and WORK but in EXTRPOLATED form.

Moral of the story : Its all very very important even in school.Its expolated application will make you excel amongst others :)

Hardy–Ramanujan number

We all have read the story of Sir Srinivasa Ramanujan in our school time.
This is refreshing revision to it :

Srinivasa Ramanujan (22 December 1887 – 26 April 1920) was a renowned Indian Mathematician. Inspite of having no formal training in pure mathematics, Ramanujan made substantial contributions in the areas of mathematical analysis, number theory, infinite series and continued fractions. He independently compiled nearly 3500 results during his short life time.

1729 came to be known as Ramanujan number, after an interesting incident that took place between Ramanujan & his mentor, G. H. Hardy.

Hardy was paying a visit to Ramanujan, who was ill and undergoing treatment at Putney (London). Hardy mentioned to him that he rode a taxi cab, whose number was 1729. "...the number seemed to me rather a dull one", he added.
It is said about Ramanujan that the numbers 1 - 10000 were his "personal friends". He could effortlessly tell you their factors, divisors, how the number can be split & the each part of the number can be squared/cubed, etc. to produce interesting numbers, and much more.
Interestingly enough, Ramanujan replied to Hardy's comment, saying that 1729 is not a dull number at all. It is the smallest number that can be written as sum of 2 cubes, in 2 different ways.

This is what Ramanujan meant.

After Hardy related this incident to his colleagues, this number became well known and was called as Ramanujan Number.
Later on, numbers having similar property were all called as Ramanujan Numbers & the problem of finding such numbers came to be known as TaxiCab(2) problem. That is, solution to TaxiCab(2) yielded numbers of the kind

a^3 + b^3 = c^3 + d^3

Here are a few numbers of this kind :

Numbers of the kind a^3 + b^3 = m^3 + n^3 = x^3 + y^3 are now known as Ramanujan Triples. The corresponding problem is known as TaxiCab(3).
Numbers of the kind a^3 + b^3 = c^3 + d^4 = w^3 + x^3 = y^3 + z^3 are known as Ramanujan Quadruples or corresponding problem is known as TaxiCab(4), and so on.

              
Moral of the story :
Infinite RESPECT is actually defined in the world !

"Stats-washed"

Three statisticians went hunting in the woods.

Before long, one of them pointed to a plump pigeon in a tree, and the three of them stopped and took aim.

The first fired, missing the bird by a couple of inches to the left. Immediately afterwards the second fired, but also missed, a couple of inches to the right.

The third put down his gun exclaiming, "Great shooting lads, on average I reckon we got it."

Moral : Don't work too much.You mind becomes mono-directional.Take breaks in life and enjoy it.

          

Maths

It was during my 4th semester that i had a monotonous routine which goes like:
Wake up at 9.30am,brush up and run 2.5km to college for lectures.
12-12.40pm lunch time.
Again 2.30 hours of lectures.
15 minutes short break.
Again 2.30 hour of crushing lab work.
Return back to hostel,
(I am just building the scenario for the talk).
have a shower and sleep orelse surf.
Dine at 7.30pm and then go to shopping center(which actually is a food court for hostellites).
Eat something which gives a feeling that yes my stomach is now full.

Now comes the core part.I daily used to talk with one of my besties bhavi at night.
So i used to buy and keep vodafone coupons of 20 and 50 rupees with me,those scratchwala coupons.

Once it so happened that i scratched it real hard that 3 numbers were partly destroyed.It was 3rd,4th and 6th number.
I tried randomly 3-4 times but it was always the error message on my nokia 6300 at that time.

Frustrated,i sat on the bed and said "bc zindagi haav jhaath jevi che"!

Hardik (rommie) - Su thyu ?
Manoj (rommie) - Laughing !
Me - Described the problem.

While describing there was a sudden click.
Since it were 3 numbers,the total possiblity of trial and error would be 10*10*10= 1000 possiblities and that was too huge to deal with.

We all observed that the 3rd number has a curve on the downside,so it could only be 0,6,8(no 9 or 3 coz the visible curve was going west to south).
For the 4th number,it was a pointed shape like structure on the top.So this could definately be 1,4,7 (even 7 was doubtful but whats the harm!)
We could not identify the 6th number.
Hence now the total possiblity was
3*3*10 (worst case) = 90.

Still it was tough to deal with.While we were thinking on the solution,i was desperately trying with possiblities and to utter luck i got that correct in just the 3rd try itself and there was the message "RECHARGE SUCCESSFUL".

And it felt so bloody good.
Cheers Maths.
Respect.