Blog It Forward – Vinod Kumar
This blog is part of Blog It Forward Community Challenge initiated by xMoshe Naveh (Old Acct)
I was tagged by Kumud Singh in her Blog It Forward post. This is my first blog in SCN and what an interesting topic to start with !!!
About me
I am Vinod Kumar , working as a lead ABAP consultant with NIIT Technologies, India & moderator in SCN ABAP Development space. I was born and brought up in Kerala , a tiny state of India which is referred to “God’s own country“ by the state government as a slogan to promote tourism. I’m currently staying in Mumbai with my wife and 4 year old son. I completed my graduation in Mathematics, PG Diploma in Computer Science and Masters in Computer Applications. I am into programming since last 14 years, worked in COBOL, FoxPro, Visual FoxPro, Visual Basic & Oracle D2K before moving to ABAP around 6 years back. 🙂 🙂 .
My entry into ABAP development was not preplanned, but (in fact) unexpected. We (around a team of 35 Oracle programmers) were working on a legacy support project during client’s switch over from Oracle applications to SAP. Our organization was handling both SAP implementation as well as legacy support during the clients change over period. Post SAP go-live, for internal resourcing of SAP/JAVA projects, we were offered 3 week class room training on either JAVA or ABAP. We few opted for ABAP, and after 6 years I am happy for my selection.
My journey with SCN started in early 2010, mostly with ABAP development forums & wiki space. Exactly after one year, it was a big surprise when I received a mail from xMoshe Naveh (Old Acct) intimating my selection as a moderator in ABAP development space. I felt privileged to be part moderators team of Thomas Zloch , Rob Burbank, Matthew Billingham .
My wife Dhanya & son Aarav during our vacation in Manali, Himachal Pradesh
Snow filled mountains of Manali.
Three Questions
1) Latest books you have read and would suggest community members to read as well?
I am not an avid reader, so its better to stay away from recommending a book to community members 😉 . My recent read is “It happened in India” – a success story of biggest retain chain in India (also my first SAP Project client).
2) Had you not been into software at all, where would you have been?
Most probably a teacher. IT career was not in my mind till I completed graduation. Post-graduation in Mathematics was the goal, so started my pre-graduation & graduation with Mathematics as a main subject. But eventually, could not get admission to Post graduation (less seats, many with more marks than me 😛 ). So next option was to wait for one year & try for B.Ed – Bachelor of education (Mandatory for teacher’s job in Kerala). But my dad suggested, why only B.Ed ? why don’t you try for Computer science & here I am now… 🙂
3) Biggest challenge as a Mentor / Moderator?
I became moderator of ABAP development space in April’2011. As beginner in moderators team, the biggest challenge was to guide users to follow “Rules of Engagement” of forum (No link farming, No copy & paste answers) and moving the forum posts with basic questions to apprentice/beginner’s forum ( We are still awaiting for that functionality in new SCN 🙁 ) . But with experienced moderators – Thomas, Matt, Rob & Julius it was fun and exciting. Another challenge is communication with the author /poster. A simple sign of aggression is considered as mis-utilization of moderator power. I feel, choosing the right words in communication/comments is one of the essential quality a moderator should have. In ABAP development space, we follow certain standard comments while moderating the discussions (thanks to Thomas Zloch for his guidance).
With New SCN, moderation is not only restricted to discussions. Biggest challenge in new SCN, is to stop the users from posting the discussions as documents/blogs. In such cases, I recommend the author/poster to read Jeanne Carboni‘s blog – Be Careful How You Post .
Blogging It Forward
I would like to Blog It Forward to Kesavadas Thekkillath, Suhas Saha and Ravi Sankar Venna and would be happy to see their answers for
1) Recommend resources of information that helped you in your work
2) If you could be a super hero (or are in your spare time) who would you be?
3) What do you most enjoy on SCN?
I wanted to “Blog It forward” Thomas Zloch too , but now I noticed Jelena Perfiljeva had already tagged him. Looking forward to see his BIF post.
Thanks for reading my blog, looking forward to see more “Blog it Forward”s from the community members. If you missed out any blog in BIF series, have a look at Blog It Forward Chain.
Hi Vinod,
Wow, what a great post! I completely agree with your biggest challenge, regarding selection of write words for communication. BTW, your son is very cute 🙂 .
Regards,
Kumud
Hi Kumud Singh ,
Thanks for the feedback. I was reluctant to write blogs, hope this would be a start which I needed 😉 . Thanks for tagging me in your BIF.
Regards, Vinod
Nice blog Vinod. Keep up the good work.
Hope I can answer your questions to be best of my ability. 😉
1) Recommend resources of information that helped you in your work
http://help.sap.com
https://service.sap.com
www.sdn.sap.com
Plus I have around 50 SAP Press books in my personal library 🙂 but lazy to read them on daily basis 😉
2) If you could be a super hero (or are in your spare time) who would you be?
Michael Phelps - When I was in residential college days, I used to swim like a fish, at least 15 hours on Sundays. I wish I would be another fish like Michael Phelps and go back to those old golden days. 🙂
3) What do you most enjoy on SCN?
Forums - Unfortunately, the quality of the forums are getting down now a days 😥
Blogs - Recently started blogging few months back and still enjoy the same 🙂
Articles - Difficult to find time to write articles (may be I am little bit lazy 😛 ), wish I should write articles also on SCN.
Best Regards,
Ravi
Oh No! Ravi, a blog was expected from you with some background information! and titled Blog It Forward - Ravi Sankar Venna. So your answer to the blog is still not complete 😉
Moreover, you could forward you blog to many other taking the chain further! 🙂
Regards,
Kumud
Thank you Kumud.
Complicated but a nice concept. That means a lot of work is left out on my side. I am not sure where I should learn my photography tricks 😉
Hope I should find some time soon.
Regards,
Ravi
Hi Ravi,
I am eagerly waiting to read your BIF post. Even though we know about your excellent blogging skills ( Eg : SAP certification blog series - one of my all-time favorite), everyone would be interested to read more about you.
Kumud Singh, thanks for clarifying the 'Blog-It-Forward' concept.
Regards, Vinod
Thank you Vinod for your encouraging words.
Everything looks fine about the concept. I am not sure where I will pick up the good photos, I am a bad photographer 😥 . I should ask lend some photos from my son 😉
Hopefully, I should come up with BIF soon.
Thank you once again for tagged me in BIF and thanks to Kumud for letting me know the concept of BIF 🙂
Best Regards,
Ravi
Hi Vinod,
Somehow, I managed to complete the blog. Not sure how I have written, but, I tried to give my best attempt. Looking forward for your comments. 😉
Again, special thanks to Kumud Singh for briefing the BIF concept.
Best Regards,
Ravi
Hi Ravi,
Good Day!
Two Thumbs Up! Terrific reply! I always like your way of reply and motivation.
You are going to reach the destination now in SCN! Keep up the good work!
Regards,
Hari Suseelan
Hi Vinod, it's a pleasure to have you on the team. Just one year before you, I was new in the moderator role, and received guidance by the other gents you are mentioning, Julius, Rob and Matt, and also by our global moderators. Soon, you will be the one who is guiding 😉
Interesting to read about your background. Regarding the cute pictures, I had some insider information via Facebook already 😉
Keep up the great work!
Thomas
Thomas Zloch & Ravi Sankar Venna - You need to BIF & not post comments 🙂
Cheers,
Suhas
Hi Thomas,
Thanks for your feedback.
Regards, Vinod
Oh..Vinod 🙂
You have trapped me in 😉 .... I was not a blogger till now , but let me take this as a start...need some time though..
Anyways, it was a nice read 🙂
Kesav
Better be late than never 🙂
Hi Vinod!
So nice to meet you - and you moderators get all my respect. It's yeoman's duty ('Yeoman's duty or yeoman's service means the performance of a great, excellent service to others.')
Thanks so much for letting us get to know you!
Sue
Hi Susan,
Thanks for your kind words. I am an ardent follower of your expert comments in workflow related discussions.
Your contribution to business workflow space is an inspiration to many of us.
Regards, Vinod
I think i missed this blog and it is not too late to comment on it 🙂 .
Hi Vinod,
Though I am not a technical guy to understand what you write or post, but I can say it is really challenging task to understand user requirements and reply with the answers.
I appreciate your contribution, time and effort.
I think I am missing many blogs like this on daily basis. I have no idea where we see the blogs list.
But I should request all you to share the blogs in all the areas irrespective of the module and content, so that the SCN users will get to know your time and effort to achieve this stage.
When I read these kind of blogs / articles, I use to think that, I also need to prove myself and help others 🙂 .
My First inspiration to come into this forum was, Ravi Sankar Venna, Murali Babu Nallamothu and Ajay Maheswari. I am really thankful to these experts.
Have a great day guys
Thanks for valuable time
Narasimhulu
I use this link to get a "blog roll", somewhat similar to the blog list on the old web site. Not sure why there is no link to all blogs on the main page. Nowadays the blogs are split into "spaces" and I suspect you are not the only one who are missing on some quality content.
Thanks for sharing, Vinod. Wow, I haven't even realized there are places with so much snow in India. Well, we learn new things on SCN all the time and not just about SAP! 🙂
Thanks Vinod for sharing so much of yourself in this, your first blog. A great and auspicious start! I love the way you have engaged others who might be new to blogging. That's the beauty of this bif concept.
About your present location, my middle daughter and her husband are presently visiting in Mumbai before going to do some volunteer work in Nepal. I've only been there briefly myself because of the kindness of Pratik Talwar but it seems a very dynamic city. I wonder if you miss your native Kerala. I love my visits in the south and find each state very unique. Is there a particular city you are connected with there?
Hi Marilyn,
Thanks a lot for your kind words. BIF has really pushed many of us to area of blogging (even for me this happened because of a friendly push from Kumud Singh 😉 ). Kudos to xMoshe Naveh (Old Acct) for this great initiative.
I belong to Palakkad in Kerala, a border city of two states with mixed culture of different states. Palakkad is famous of one of the most ancient national parks in india - Silent Valley National Park
Mumbai is indeed a dynamic city, the best place to achieve career ambitions. Right now I am at client location away from Mumbai & my family 🙁 (only thing I hate about implementation projects 😉 ). Please let me know when you visit Mumbai/India next time.
Regards,Vinod
Hi Vinod,
Am really enjoyed reading ur blog 🙂 . Vry cute son too..!! 😉
Thanks & Regards
Jana.
Hi Vinod,
Nicely written, I liked the way you have presented your skills and knowledge.
Keep up good work. Thanks for sharing this wonderful blog. Keep sharing and motivate others.
All the best! Once again thank you so much for sharing this blog. 😆
Regards,
Hari Suseelan