About Me: Irfan Surdar

Occupation

Unemployed User Experience and Front-end Dev Expert in a Tyrannical Country, namely Pakistan.

Childhood, Early Education, and Achievements

Born in the small city of Jhelum, province Punjab, in the year 1977, I spent the first 6 years in Jhelum, then we moved to Chakwal, and after spending a couple of years in Gujranwala, I, along with the whole of the family, returned to Jhelum in the year 1989 or 1990.

I developed a profound interest in sports when I was in 2nd grade starting with hockey, as hockey was the only sport that was popular in the city of Chakwal, province Punjab. Upon moving to Gujranwala, I switched to cricket, and I have remained a cricket devotee since then. I represented Jhelum F.G. School in regional tournament as a fast bowler twice when I was in 9th and 10th grades. I was the strike bowler in 10th grade despite having declined to attend the practice sessions and nets as I had had a slightly heated exchange with the teacher managing the cricketing affairs, and in the process, I had gotten selected for the basketball team. However, as the school did not have another person capable of bowling at my speed, hence, the teacher had to eventually convince me to drop out of the basketball team and represent the school in the regional tournament, which was held in Kharian military cantonment. Despite not having prepared for the tournament, as stated previously, I, along with just another fast bowler, remained the only two bowlers whom the opposing team was not able to negotiate with much success. Despite not getting hit out, I failed to get any wickets, and the other bowlers received such a spectacular level of hitting from the opposing team that our team failed to win the match.

When I was in the 8th grade, serendipitously, a boy, who had left the school to Hifz Quran and participate in a couple of other activities, rejoined our school, and he became my class fellow. We almost immediately became good friends, and he introduced me to the art of calligraphy. He gave me Parker’s Gothic Black calligraphy learning guide. After mastering the technique within mere weeks, I concluded that the design of the letters in that calligraphy set was spectacularly poor. I redesigned most of the characters in the set which Parker pen company is still busy selling with its Parker Vector calligraphy pens. My redesigned calligraphy set proved a phenomenal success in our school, and almost all of my teachers started to assign me design works that included calligraphy and sketch making. Although I had absolutely zero interest in sketching and drawing, nevertheless, all of my drawing, sketching, and chart making projects were deemed much superior than what other children of my age, or pupils, were busy submitting.

Despite being spectacularly good at calligraphy work, the fastest bowler in the school in 8th grade, an excellent shooter, an avid cinephile, and an ardent gardener, I topped the school in the 8th grade; almost all of the teachers were of the opinion that they had an unusually, rather outstandingly, talented kid in their class.

As I was forced to join the computer science degree awarding institution in Lahore under severe pressure from my father, hence, I initially failed to develop any interest in computing. However, when I was at FAST–NUCES, I managed to almost obliterate my classmates in the compulsory English course. A girl with 923 marks who now has a master degree from Cambridge University in the UK, and a boy who has a masters degree from Columbia University, USA, failed to hit 80% point from a teacher who was teaching at the most prestigious institution for women in Lahore, whereas, I was able to get 96.25% points despite my poor record in the 10th grade. I left the teacher absolutely bamboozled with my narrative weaving skills, and my other professors with my oratory skills.

Current Location: Place of Residence

Lahore: I have been a resident of Lahore, Pakistan, since the December of 1996. Regardless of what the successive democratic governments have done and are still busy doing in Pakistan, which mostly amounts to destroying the lives of competent people, I can tell you, the visitor, without any hesitation that Lahore is an extremely likeable city. We definitely need to get rid of certain people, links to posts detailing their horrendous conduct included below, nevertheless, the rest of the city is an extremely likeable place.

• Meet Farah Zia: Loved by Horrendous Individuals
• Meet Omar Mirza, Abid Mirza, and Cohorts: PTI Zindabad
• An Impeccable Game of Strategy: Master Strategist at Work
• Unrivaled Powers of Persuasion: Master Negotiator at Work

Expertise and Interests

User Experience, Programming, Numerics and Statistical Analysis, Logophile (English Lexicon), Reading and writing, Music, Typography, Cars, Photography, Watching Arts, Flowers, and Animal Kingdom on Instagram.

Also, a Lapsed Cinephile. I used to be in love with American movies and British sitcoms. The list of my favorite actors will appear at the end of this page.

Outlook Defining Encounters and People

With my expertise and core interests listed, my introduction would not be complete without the information contained in the following pages. The Acknowledgements Page lists people who have played pivotal roles in my life and left indellible marks on my personality. Some, with their conduct, have helped shape the way I approach life. You can also read my the most favorite axioms that I live and breathe. The other aspects of my life, my interests in sports, favorite books, hobbies, etc. appear after these links.

1. Acknowledgements
2. Truly Memorable People

   People that I either adore or quite like. Behavior of each one of them has not only left an indelible mark, they have in one way or anther made me a better person, as well.

3. Axioms That I Live By

   Axioms that perfectly capture my code of conduct as a professional.

Favorite Sports

The following list is in the descending order of preference.

• Cricket

  Represented my school at regional level tournaments twice as a fast bowler; leading fast bowler in 10th grade.

• Tennis

  Absolutely loved the game when Pete Sampras was still playing.

• Shooting

  I was one of the 6 best shooters out of a group of approximately 200 boys in 12th grade. I used to shoot down match sticks for fun in my mid teens. Everything else had become spectacularly easy for target practice.

• Boxing — Only watching and reading about the sport.
• Karate — Only movies and not events.
• Basketball — Only a passing interest.
• Sprinting — 100m, 200m, 400m (Only a passing interest.)
• Football

  I have only been able to enjoy the game when footballers of the caliber of Zinedine Zidane and Ronaldinho (Ronaldo de Assis Moreira) are playing the sport. Les Brits, as the French like to call them, just do not know how to play the game.

Hobbies

• Poetry Writing — “They” would not let me do it.
• Gardening

  “They” Would not let me do it now. I was an ardent gardner in my mid-to-late teens and had a large collection of approximately 45–50 plants.

• Shooting — “They” would not let me do it now.
• Calligraphy

  “They” would not let me finish my works. Used to love creating letters and working with calligraphy pens. I was rated the best calligrapher in my school by at least a few different teachers.

• Photography

  An extremely casual photographer. I know very little about modern cameras, nevertheless, I quite like my Nikon D7200; circumstances permitting, I would love to purchase the Nikon D850. I sincerely hope that they would incorporte NFC for file transfer and remove the need to repeatedly reconnect the camera with the computing device, whether a laptop or desktop, just to tranfer files.

• Music

  Started listening to American and British singers in my mid teens. Still love listening to excellently written songs. Gordon Matthew Sumner, commonly known as Sting, has been a favorite for over 20 years.

Books

Fiction

• Origin, by Dan Brown

Non-Fiction

• Website Optimization by Andrew B King

  A truly marvelous, outstanding work on Web Site Optimization and long tail query optimization by Andrew B King. I absolutely adore this book.

• Inside the C++ Object Model by Stanley B Lippman

  A phenomenally well-written book discussing the internals of C++ compiler development. I absolutely revelled in reading the nuances of compiler design discussed in this book, a verily delightful experience reading this book. Esteemed engineer Mr. Stanley Lippman excels at not only developing complicated and demanding software systems exceptionally well but also at how to provide as much detail as an intelligent person would find necessary without feeling that the author loves to digress. Bereft of digressions, sensationally well-written work that left me feeling elated.

  As compiler development and the underlying systems on which they run have progressed significantly since the appearance of the aforementioned version, spectacular engineer Mr. Stanley Lippman should definitely consider publishing a second edition discussing all of the latest developments in the world of compiler design and development from his point of view since the publication of this book. I would love to read the next version, if one were to become available soon. The minimum price for this work and any as yet unpublished works should be at least $75. I would gladly pay $150 to read a book written by Stanley Lippman on compiler design.

• High Performance Websites by Steve Souders
• Even Faster Websites by Steve Souders
• Programming: Principles and Practice Using C++ — 2nd Edition
  by Bjarne Stroustrup

  It has some glaring issues; nevertheless, it’s an outstanding introduction. Barring a few unnecessary chapters, Bjarne Stroustrup’s presentation of the programming principles resoundingly outcompetes all of the available introductory works. I had never read such a spectacularly well-written introduction to the various aspects of abstract data type design, also called ADTs, anywhere. Remarkably well presented and discussed introduction to Abstract Data Type design using C++ as the language of choice.

• HTML5 & CSS3 for the Real World: 2nd Edition by Louis Lazaris

  Truly outstanding work; As much detail as you need and not a word more; a book uttery devoid of any verbosity. Although the subject matter is extremely easy, nevertheless, I still loved reading this book because of the way it has been written. They have truly excelled in editing it perfectly. I have read a few articles written by Louis Lazaris, as well, and he discussed his chosen topics in each of those articles splendidly well, too.

• SVG Essentials by David J Eisenberg

  A remarkable introduction to the basic and intermediate level concepts required to create shapes and various graphical elements using SVG. Spectacular work.

• The Curious Case of the Misplaced Modifier by Bonnie Trenga

  As a person who grew up in Pakistan studying the English curriculum deemed fit by our educational board, before stumbling upon this little gem, I had never heard of dangling modifiers. In just one extremely concise book, Bonnie Trenga managed to introduce me to topics that I had seen neither getting discussed nor being written about anywhere here in Pakistan before. I found Bonnie’s way of introducing her readers to these topics verily delightful. If you are a person from the Subcontinent or somebody who was not paying much attention in his or her middle school and high school classes, then I highly recommend this book.

• Handbook for Writers (Simon & Schuster) by Lynn Quitman Troyka

  As a high school student who was always busy in multiple extra curricular activities, I failed to learn the mechanics of the language well during my time in the school. After leaving university, when I eventually decided that I would like to take up writing as a pastime of choice, I accidently stumbled upon Lynn Quitman’s work for aspiring authors. Although I read the abridged version, however, I found even that abridged version a true gem. In just a couple of hundred pages or so — I have forgotten the precise page count — it armed me with all of the essential knowledge to construct proper sentences and look for redundancies. A must read for any aspiring author who was either not fully attentive in school or has not read a guideline for authors in a long while.

Favorite Tools

• Visual Studio Code

  Life would have been miserable on OS X without VS Code. I absolutely love working in Visual Studio Code, a phenomenally well engineered application. I adore Microsoft’s engineering standards.

• Brave Web Browser

  An outstanding alternative to Chrome and Firefox. As a computing professional and UX expert, I would have found life extremely miserable without Brendan Eich.

• GIMP

  Although a bit buggy and ever so mildly annoying, however, it’s replete with features and phenomenally useful for users on a budget or those who have yet to enter the workforce.

Favorite Web Services

• Pixlr — A Freemium Photo Editor

  It’s a spectacularly well crafted web services for those interested in editing their images without leaving the web browser. Although it has a few issues, nevertheless, when compared all of other freely available services, I can only rate at as a five star service with just a few minor niggles.

• Freeconvert — Image and Video optimization
• Instagram — A destination to get some therapy and find merriment.
• Blogger

  A very good place for those interested in presenting their writing and work well without spending too much money. Extremely grateful and elated to have such a service. Thank you, Google, for keeping it available for people on spectacularly limited budgets.

• Facebook

  Horrible interface, nevertheless, an extremely nice place to keep an eye on what likeable people are sharing and enjoying.

• Outlook Email

  A spectacularly well-crafted email service for people on a budget.

• PicWish Image Enhancer, Unblurring, and Sharpening Service

  Truly Fantastic Results And Phenomenally To Use. Perfect 10 rated service for unblurring pixelated images.

• Grammarly
• Yandex Image Translate — Absolutely sensational, Outstanding, Terrific.
• Google Translate
• Google Reverse Image search
• ImgOps
• Watermark Remover
• Lyrics.com
• Aha Music: Music Identification Service
• Xodo: PDF to HTML Coversion Service

Favorite Actors and Actresses

• Clint Eastwood — Childhood Favorite
• Sean Connery — Sensational Onscreen Presence; loved every minute of The Hunt of Red October
• Anthony Hopkins — Sensational Screen Presence
• Morgan Freeman — Spectacular performances in The Shawshank Redemption and Bruce Almighty
• Hugh Jackman — A Prolific liar, nevertheless, a stellar actor
• Lee Van Cliff
• Michael Fassbender
• Robert De Niro — Spectacular Actor
• Wesley Snipes
• Denzel Washington — Spectacular On Screen Presence
• Jean Reno
• Robin Williams
• Scott Adkins
• Michael J White
• Taye Diggs
• Christian Bale
• Jason Statham
• Kevin Costner
• Julia Roberts

  Erin Brockovich, Pretty Woman, Runaway Bride, Nottinghill (The Readers of Horse and Hounds Would be Elated to Hear That; Are there any horses in the movie? It takes place in a submarine.

• Michelle Pfeiffer
• Meryl Streep
• Zooey Deschanel
• Helen Hunt
• Rene Russo
• Natascha McElhone

The following page lists some of my favorite products. All of them come with a 5-star rating from me.

• My Favorite Products

  Not at all a mandatory reading, nevertheless, if you would like to know my favorite products, then I have compiled a short list.