SIDE EFFECTS OF ALCOHOL

Side effects of alcohol

1.) Symptom: Cold and humid feet.

Cause: Glass is being held at incorrect angle (You are pouring the drink
on ur feet).
Cure: Maneuver glass until open end is facing upward

2.) Symptom: The wall facing you is full of lights.

Cause: You're lying on the floor.
Cure: Position your body at a 90-degree angle to the floor.

3.) Symptom: The floor looks blurry.

Cause: You're looking through an empty glass.
Cure: Quickly refill with your favorite beverage.

4.) Symptom: The floor is moving.

Cause: You're being dragged away.
Cure: At least ask where they're taking you.

5.) Symptom: You hear echoes every time someone speaks.

Cause: You have your glass on your ear.
Cure: Stop making a fool of yourself! .

6.) Symptom: The room is shaking a lot, everyone is dressed in white and
the music is very repetitive.

Cause: You're in an ambulance.
Cure: Don't move. Let the professionals do their job.

7.) Symptom: Your dad and all your brothers are looking at you funny.

Cause: You're in the wrong house.
Cure: Ask if they can point you to your house.

8.) Symptom: A huge light is blinding you.

Cause: You woke up in someone's lawn.
Cure: Coffee and a long nap

iTunes

iTunes is a digital media player application, introduced by Apple Inc. on January 9, 2001 at the Macworld Expo in San Francisco, for playing and organizing digital music and video files. The program is also an interface to manage the contents on Apple's popular iPod digital media players as well as the iPhone. Additionally, iTunes can connect to the iTunes Store via the internet to purchase and download digital music, music videos, television shows, iPod games, audiobooks, various podcasts, feature length films (available only in the USA and Canada), Movie Rentals and Ringtones.

iTunes is available as a free download for Mac OS X, Windows Vista, and Windows XP from Apple's website. It is also bundled with all Macs, and some HP and Dell computers. Older versions are available for Mac OS 9, OS X 10.0-10.2, and Windows 2000. Although Apple does not produce iTunes for other operating systems, it can be run on Linux through Wine.

iTunes users may choose to view their music and video libraries in one of three ways: as a list, as a list with accompanying album artwork, or as a side-scrolling catalog of album artwork, which bears the marketing name Cover Flow.

The standard list view displays library files with many optional detail fields, including name, artist, album, genre, user rating, play count, and so forth. Item backgrounds alternate between white and a light blue-gray for readability.

The list with accompanying album artwork is much the same, only the list is broken up by albums, with the artwork as a header to the list. Although this allows users to browse content more visually, sorting the list view by name will accordingly break up the library into redundant instances of each album. Accordingly, as with Cover Flow view, the second view mode is most appropriate for users who sort their libraries by album.

iTunes 7 can currently read, write, and convert between MP3, AIFF, WAV, MPEG-4, AAC, and Apple Lossless.

iTunes can also play any audio files that QuickTime can play (as well as some video formats), including Protected AAC files from the iTunes Store and Audible.com audio books. There is limited support for Ogg and FLAC enclosed in an Ogg container (FLAC files are not playable) or Speex codecs with the Xiph QuickTime Components - because tag editing and album art is done within iTunes and not Quicktime, these features will not work with these quicktime components. iTunes currently will not play back HE-AAC/aacPlus audio streams correctly. HE-AAC/aacPlus format files will play back as 22 kHz AAC files (effectively having no high end over 11 kHz). HE-AAC streaming audio (which a number of Internet Radio stations use) will not play back at all. The latest version of iTunes (Win/Mac) supports importing audio CDs, when referring to iTunes standard file format AAC, users can choose to import their CDs in either 128 kbit/s, which used to be the standard importing option or 256 kbit/s. Of course, the 256 kbit/s feature only applies to AAC format.

LOVE

"If you love something, set it free...
If it comes back, it's yours,
If it doesn't, it never was yours.... "


The MBA Version:
If you love somebody set her free...instantaneously...
and look for others simultaneously.

The Finance Expert's Version:
If you love somebody set her free...
If she comes back, its time to look for fresh loans.
If she doesn't, write her off as an asset gone bad.

The Marketing Version:
If you love somebody set her free...
If she comes back, she has brand loyalty
If she doesn't, reposition the brand in new markets


The Statistician's Version:
If you love somebody, set her free...
If she loves you, the probability of her coming back is high If
she doesn't, your relationship was improbable anyway.


C++ Programmer's Version:
If(you-love(m_she)) m_she.free()
if(m_she == NULL)
m_she= new CShe;

The Psychologist's Version:
If you love somebody set her free...
If she comes back, her super ego is dominant
If she doesn't come, back her id is supreme (If she doesn't go,
she must be crazy.)

The Pessimistic Version:
If you love somebody, set her free ...
If she ever comes back, she's yours,
If she doesn't, well, as expected, she never was.

The Optimistic Version:
If you love somebody, set her free ...
Don't worry, she will come back.

The Suspicious Version:
If you love somebody, set her free ...
If she ever comes back, ask her why.

The Detective's Version:
If you love somebody, set her free ...
Then get someone to follow her.

The Impatient Version:
If you love somebody, set her free ...
If she doesn't come back within some time limit, forget her.

Schwarzenegger's fans Version:
If you love someone, set her free,
SHE'LL BE BACK!

The Patient Version:
If you love somebody, set her free ...
If she doesn't come back, continue to wait until she comes back
...

The Playful Version:
If you love somebody, set her free ...
* If she comes back, and if you love her still, set her free
again, repeat *

The Lawyer's Version:
If you love somebody, set her free...
Clause 1a of Paragraph 13a-1 in the second amendment of the
Matrimonial Freedom Act clearly states that...

The Bill Gates Version:
If you love somebody, set her free...
If she comes back, I think we can charge her for re-installation
fees and tell her that she's also going to get an upgrade.


The Somnambulist's Version:
If you love someone, set her free
If she comes back it's a nightmare
If she doesn't, you must be dreaming

The Possessive Version:
If you love somebody don't ever set her free


The Zoologist's Version:
If you love someone tag her a radio transmitter and set her free
You can trace her whenever you want !

BRAND NAMES

There are many companies/brands/products whose names were derived from strange circumstances.

Mercedes

This was actually the financier's daughter's name.

Adobe

This came from name of the river Adobe Creek that ran behind the house of founder John Warnock.

Apple Computers

It was the favorite fruit of founder Steve Jobs. He was three months late in filing a name for the business, and he threatened to call his company Apple Computers if the other colleagues didn't suggest a better name by 5 O'clock.

CISCO

It is not an acronym as popularly believed. It is short for San Francisco.

Compaq

This name was formed by using COMp, for computer, and PAQ to denote a small integral object.

Corel

The name was derived from the founder's name Dr. Michael Cowpland. It stands for COwpland REsearch Laboratory.

Google

The name started as a joke boasting about the amount of information the
search-engine would be able to search. It was originally named 'Googol', a word for the number represented by 1 followed by 100 zeros. After founders - Stanford graduate students Sergey Brin and Larry Page presented their project to an angel investor, they received a cheque made out to 'Google'

Hotmail

Founder Jack Smith got the idea of accessing e-mail via the web from a
computer anywhere in the world. When Sabeer Bhatia (Indian) came up with the business plan for the mail service, he tried all kinds of names ending in 'mail' and finally settled for hotmail as it included the letters
"html" - the programming language used to write web pages. It was
initially referred to as HoTMaiL with selective uppercasing.

Hewlett Packard

Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard tossed a coin to decide whether the company they founded would be called Hewlett-Packard or Packard-Hewlett.

Intel

Bob Noyce and Gordon Moore wanted to name their new company 'Moore Noyce' but that was already trademarked by a hotel chain so they had to settle for an acronym of INTegrated ELectronics.

Lotus (Notes)

Mitch Kapor got the name for his company from 'The Lotus Position' or
'Padmasana'. Kapor used to be a teacher of Transcendental Meditation of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.

Microsoft

Coined by Bill Gates to represent the company that was devoted to
MICROcomputer SOFTware. Originally christened Micro-Soft, the '-' was
removed later on.

Motorola

Founder Paul Galvin came up with this name when his company started
manufacturing radios for cars. The popular radio company at the time was called Victrola.

ORACLE

Larry Ellison and Bob Oats were working on a consulting project for the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency). The code name for the project was called Oracle (the CIA saw this as the system to give answers to all questions or something such). The project was designed to help use the newly written SQL code by IBM. The project eventually was terminated but Larrymin and Bob decided to finish what they started and bring
it to the world. They kept the name Oracle and created the RDBMS engine. Later they kept the same name for the company.

Sony

It originated from the Latin word 'sonus' meaning sound, and 'sonny' a slang used by Americans to refer to a bright youngster.

SUN

Founded by 4 Stanford University buddies, SUN is the acronym for Stanford University Network. Andreas Bechtolsheim built a microcomputer; Vinod Khosla recruited him and Scott McNealy to manufacture computers based on it, and Bill Joy to develop a UNIX-based OS for the computer.

Yahoo!

The word was invented by Jonathan Swift and used in his book 'Gulliver's Travels'. It represents a person who is repulsive in appearance and action and is barely human. Yahoo! Founders Jerry Yang and David Filo selected the name because they considered themselves yahoos.

RHCE

The Red Hat Certification Program is Red Hat's professional certification program for Red Hat and general Linux related skills such as system administration on Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

The tests are hands-on and involve troubleshooting, installation, and system administration. There are no multiple-choice questions, and everything is done on a live system. Often there is more than one way to configure a service or troubleshoot a problem, and the exam focuses on the end results, not the process that was taken to achieve that result.

The most common and well-known Red Hat certification is the Red Hat Certified Engineer.


Certifications

Red Hat Certified Technician
The entry-level Red Hat Certified Technician (RHCT) certification focuses on single-system administration.

Red Hat Certified Engineer
The Red Hat Certified Engineer (RHCE) program expands the RHCT with a focus on services and security.

Red Hat Certified Security Specialist
The Red Hat Certified Security Specialist (RHCSS). This certification includes two endorsement exams from the RHCA plus an SELinux exam. It has been offered since 2005-10-13.

Red Hat Certified Datacenter Specialist
The Red Hat Certified Datacenter Specialist (RHCDS) has three of the five RHCA endorsements and specializes in system deployment, virtualization, and clustering and includes a class on the Red Hat Directory Server.

Red Hat Certified Architect
The Red Hat Certified Architect (RHCA) requires an additional five endorsements to the RHCE that adds an enterprise-level focus. From clustering to deploying systems, these five exams ensure the student can deploy systems at the Enterprise level. Red Hat offers a four-day class for each course that can include the exam on the fifth day.

MCSE

Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) refers to the broad certification program for Microsoft, although in previous generations it also referred to an individual candidate who had completed any one exam within the program (subject to some exclusions).

The MCP program offers multiple certifications, based on different areas of technical expertise. To attain these certifications, a candidate must pass a series of exams within the program. The current certifications are Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS), Microsoft Certified Professional Developer (MCPD), Microsoft Certified IT Professional (MCITP) and the Microsoft Certified Architect (MCA).

Popular previous generation certifications include Microsoft Certified System Engineer (MCSE), Microsoft Certified Solution Developer (MCSD) and Microsoft Certified Database Administrator (MCDBA).

Some employers require or prefer certain MCP certifications for specific jobs that involve Microsoft products and technologies. Other vendors have their own certification programs such as the Sun Certified Professional program, the Red Hat Certification Program, the Oracle Certification Program, the Cisco Career Certifications program, the Ubuntu Certified Professional program and the Apple Certification Program.

In the developed world, each exam costs approximately US$125. Exams usually take between 2 and 3 hours to complete and consist of between 45 and 90 multiple choice, drag and drop, solution building questions and simulated content within exams where students are required to perform certain common administrative tasks appropriate for the topic at hand.

DELL XPS 1525

The old days of bulky, overweight Dell notebooks may be coming to a close in 2008. Today Dell announced their latest addition to the Inspiron family of notebooks, the 15.4-inch Inspiron 1525. We are happy to have a pre-production unit to review, and this sleek successor to the Inspiron 1520 might just surprise you.

FEATURES

# 15.4-inch WXGA (1280 x 800) CCFL TrueLife (glossy) screen
# 2.0GHz Core 2 Duo T7250 processor
# 2GB DDR2-667 SDRAM (up to 4GB DDR2 SDRAM available)
# 120GB 5400 RPM SATA HDD
# 8x Dual-layer DVD±RW drive
# Video: Intel Integrated Graphics Media Accelerator X3100
# Wireless: Dell Wireless 1390 802.11g Mini Card
# Mobile Broadband: Dell Wireless integrated mobile broadband mini-cards

SCJP

Sun Certified Java Programmer (SCJP)

The Sun Certified Java Programmer (SCJP) exam is the entry level Java exam and is a prerequisite to a number of the other Java-related certifications. SCJP 6, designated CX-310-065 by Sun, was released in December 2007.

It is designed to have a fairly detailed test of basic knowledge of the essentials of the Java programming language. It tests looping constructs and variables, and does not cover specific technologies such as GUI creation, Web or network programming.

It is assessed through an automatically administered multiple-choice test system and consists of 72 questions which the candidate has 210 minutes to answer. At least 47 questions are needed to be correct to pass (around 65%). The exam is taken at a Prometric test center, and to take the test a candidate must buy a voucher from Sun (approximately US$200 in the US, but £150 (excluding VAT) in the UK) and book the test at least a week in advance. The test consists of multiple choice and drag-and-drop questions, the latter comprising 20-25% of the questions.

The SCJP 5 exam tests a candidate on knowledge of declarations, access control, object orientation, assignments, operators, flow control, assertions, string handling, I/O, parsing, formatting, generics, collections, inner classes, threads and the JDK tools[1]. The test is available in English, Japanese, Chinese, German, Korean, Portuguese and Spanish.

Previous versions

There have been a number of previous versions of the SCJP. The current version, SCJP 6.0, is aimed at the JDK 6.0 release of Java. It introduces new topics covering Console, NavigableSet, and NavigableMap.

SCJP 5.0 (designated CX-310-055) was based on JDK 5. It introduced variable arguments, autoboxing, and generic types, and dropped the bit shifting topics from previous exams.

SCJP 1.4 (designated CX-310-035) was based on JDK 1.4. Compared to the previous version of the exam, SCJP 1.2, it dropped questions on GUI topics and shifted the emphasis towards core language features[3]. SCJP 1.4 features 61 questions to be answered within 120 minutes. 32 questions or more (52%) need to be answered correctly in order to pass.

SCJP 1.2 (designated CX-310-025) was based on JDK 1.2, and was first live on 15 June 2000. The exam had 59 questions (both multiple choice and short answer) to be answered within two hours. The pass mark was 61 percent. However, exam 310-025 has been withdrawn from the market; certified professionals can retain their certification and use the title, but this version is no longer being offered.

CCNA

The Cisco CCNA network associate certification validates the ability to install, configure, operate, and troubleshoot medium-size routed and switched networks, including implementation and verification of connections to remote sites in a WAN. This new curriculum includes basic mitigation of security threats, introduction to wireless networking concepts and terminology, and performance-based skills. This new curriculum also includes (but is not limited to) the use of these protocols: IP, Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (EIGRP), Serial Line Interface Protocol Frame Relay, Routing Information Protocol Version 2 (RIPv2),VLANs, Ethernet, access control lists (ACLs)

Candidates have the option of gaining the certification by passing two tests (ICND1 640-822 and ICND2 640-816), or one single test (CCNA 640-802); the two-test option has the advantage of allowing the candidate to focus on certain subjects.

The certification is valid for three years; at that time a CCNA holder must either

* re-take the CCNA or ICND exam, or
* take and pass an exam for one of the Professional (e.g., CCNP) or Specialist level certifications (excluding the sales specialist exams), or pass the CCIE written exam.

These exams are known by their corresponding numbers. When the curriculum of the exam changes the exam number also changes. The current exam number for CCNA is 640-802 (from 15 Aug 2007). New ICND Part1 (640-822 ICND1) and ICND Part2 (640-816 ICND2) available from 15 Aug 2007. Part 1 by itself will give you a CCENT.

These exams are conducted by authorized test centers at a cost of $125 USD each for the ICND1 or ICND2 exams and $150 USD for the full CCNA exam.

There is also the Cisco Networking Academy, which brings the CCNA and CCNP curricula into traditional educational institutions in over 150 countries. Students enrolled in Cisco Networking Academy can request exam vouchers that allow them to take the retired exam for an extended period of time.

FREEWARE

Freeware is computer software that is available for use at no cost or for an optional fee. Freeware thus refers to its licensing terms (or lack thereof, in the case of the public domain) rather than a functional software category. Freeware is an effective middle ground between commercial software and open source software, allowing authors to contribute something for the benefit of the community, while at the same time allowing them to retain control of the source code and preserve its business potential.

Freeware is different from shareware, where the user is obligated to pay (e.g. after some trial period or for additional functionality).

The only criterion for being classified as "freeware" is that the software must be fully functional for an unlimited time with no monetary cost. The software license may impose one or more other restrictions on the type of use including personal use, individual use, non-profit use, non-commercial use, academic use, commercial use or any combination of these. For instance, the license may be "free for personal, non-commercial use." Everything created with the freeware programs can be distributed at no cost (for example graphic, documents, or sounds made by user).

SONY TYPE G LAPTOP

Sony is refreshing its lightweight Vaio Type-G laptop and has begun offering a solid-state flash drive as an option.

That makes the Type G the first laptop from Sony to be available with the new type of drive, which is the same size as a hard disk drive but uses flash memory to store data instead of writing it onto a magnetic disk. Flash drives several benefits over hard disk drives, including faster data read and write times, greater shock resistance and lower power consumption.

But they are also more expensive. Customers will see the price of a Type G jump by ¥65,000 ($545) when they choose a 32GB flash drive over a 40GB hard disk drive, said Shoko Yanagisawa, a Sony spokeswoman in Tokyo.

A machine based on an Intel Celeron M 443 (1.20GHz) processor with the flash drive will cost ¥229,800. The computers will be available exclusively through Sony's build-to-order sales channel in Japan. Sony doesn't have any current plans to offer them in other countries, said Yanagisawa.

The Type G was first launched last year and is notable because it's the lightest 12.1-inch screen-class laptop on the market at 898 grams. Replacing the hard disk drive with a flash drive will lighten the machine by 39 grams.

The computer isn't Sony's first with a flash drive. That distinction goes to the Vaio UX90, a handheld ultra portable that was launched last July with a 16GB flash drive.

The 32GB drive Sony is offering with the Type G is the highest capacity model available from the major drive and memory product makers. Several companies including Samsung Electronics and SanDisk make the drives. Last month Samsung said it would launch a 64GB flash drive in the second quarter of this year.
Hard Disk will be thing of the past. Once the disk storage reaches 100-200 GB range even mediums like DVD, B-Ray will meet is end of the tunnel sooner than later. Hard Disk will be an external backup storage mechanism detached from work stations.

Technology is moving away from deskstop centric storage mechanisms.

With Cloud computing and centralized storages will ensure technologies like Yahoo/MSN Spaces/Google starget to gain momentum with people sharing their High-end processing power, with super charged server processors under clustured environments supported by Cashing replication mechanisms. People would simply carry a powerful processor which would simply take the information and process it from the server only for consumption but NOT for storing.

ebay

eBay Inc. is an American Internet company that manages eBay.com, an online auction and shopping website in which people and businesses buy and sell goods and services worldwide. In addition to its original U.S. website, eBay has established localized websites in thirty other countries. eBay Inc also owns PayPal, Skype, and other businesses.

Items and services

Millions of collectibles, appliances, computers, furniture, equipment, vehicles, and other miscellaneous items are listed, bought, and sold daily. In 2005, eBay launched its Business & Industrial category, breaking into the industrial surplus business. Some items are rare and valuable, while many others are dusty gizmos that would have been discarded if not for the thousands of eager bidders worldwide. Anything can be sold as long as it is not illegal or does not violate the eBay Prohibited and Restricted Items policy.Services and intangibles can be sold, too. Large international companies, such as IBM, sell their newest products and offer services on eBay using competitive auctions and fixed-priced storefronts. Regional searches of the database make shipping slightly faster and cheaper. Separate eBay sites such as eBay US and eBay UK allow the users to trade using the local currency as an additional option to PayPal. Software developers can create applications that integrate with eBay through the eBay API by joining the eBay Developers Program.As of June 2005, there were over 15,000 members in the eBay Developers Program, comprising a broad range of companies creating software applications to support eBay buyers and sellers as well as eBay Affiliates.

Controversy has arisen over certain items put up for bid. For instance, in late 1999 a man offered one of his kidneys for auction on eBay, attempting to profit from the potentially lucrative (and, in the United States, illegal) market for transplantable human organs. On other occasions, people and even entire towns have been listed, often as a joke or to garner free publicity. In general, the company removes auctions that violate its terms of service agreement within a short time after hearing of the auction from an outsider; the company's policy is to not pre-approve transactions. eBay is also an easy place for unscrupulous sellers to market counterfeit merchandise, which can be difficult for novice buyers to distinguish without careful studying of the auction description.

INFOSYS

Infosys Technologies Limited is a multinational information technology services company headquartered in Bangalore, India. It is one of India's largest IT companies, with nine development centers in India and over 30 offices worldwide. Infosys employs over 88,601 professionals (as of December 31, 2007). Its annual revenues for the fiscal year 2006-2007 exceeded US$3.1 billion with a market capitalization of over US$30 billion.

Infosys Technologies Limited was founded on July 2, 1981 in Pune by N. R. Narayana Murthy and six others: Nandan Nilekani, N. S. Raghavan, Kris Gopalakrishnan, S. D. Shibulal, K. Dinesh and Ashok Arora, with Raghavan officially being the first employee of the company.

Infosys serves various industries through its Industrial Business Units(IBU), such as:

* Banking & Capital Markets (BCM)
* Communications Media and Entertainment (CME)
* Energy, Utilities and Services (EUS)
* Insurance, Healthcare and Life Sciences (IHL)
* Manufacturing (MFG)
* Retail, Consumer Product Goods and Logistics (RETL)
* New Growth Engines (NGE)
* India Business Unit ( IND)

In addition to these, there are Horizontal Business Units (HBUs)

* Consulting
* Enterprise Solutions (ES)
* Infrastructure Management Services (IMS)
* Product Engineering and Validation Services (PEVS)
* Systems Integration (SI)

TCS

Tata Consultancy Services Limited (TCS Limited company) is one of the world’s largest providers of information technology, consulting, services and business-process outsourcing which commenced operations in 1968. As of 2007, it is Asia's largest and has the largest number of employees among the Indian IT companies with strength of over 110,000 IT consultants in 47 countries. The company generated consolidated revenues of US $4.3 billion for fiscal year ended 31 March 2007 and is listed on the National Stock Exchange and Bombay Stock Exchange in India.

TCS is part of one of Asia's largest conglomerates the Tata Group, which has interests in areas such as energy, telecommunications, financial services, manufacturing, chemicals, engineering and materials. TCS is the first company to be rated at Level 5 maturity for both the CMMI and PCMM framework. It is also the first Indian company to be certified AS 9100: Rev B for design of airframe structures.

VoIP

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) is a protocol optimized for the transmission of voice through the Internet or other packet switched networks. VoIP is often used abstractly to refer to the actual transmission of voice (rather than the protocol implementing it). VoIP is also known as IP Telephony, Internet telephony, Broadband telephony, Broadband Phone and Voice over Broadband.

Voice over IP protocols carry telephony signals as digital audio, typically reduced in data rate using speech data compression techniques, encapsulated in a data packet stream over IP.



VoIP is a revolutionary technology that has the potential to completely rework the world's phone systems. VoIP providers like Vonage have already been around for a while and are growing steadily. Major carriers like AT&T are already setting up VoIP calling plans in several markets around the United States, and the FCC is looking seriously at the potential ramifications of VoIP service.

Advantages of Using VoIP

VoIP technology uses the Internet's packet-switching capabilities to provide phone service. VoIP has several advantages over circuit switching.

For example, packet switching allows several telephone calls to occupy the amount of space occupied by only one in a circuit-switched network. Using PSTN, that 10-minute phone call we talked about earlier consumed 10 full minutes of transmission time at a cost of 128 Kbps. With VoIP, that same call may have occupied only 3.5 minutes of transmission time at a cost of 64 Kbps, leaving another 64 Kbps free for that 3.5 minutes, plus an additional 128 Kbps for the remaining 6.5 minutes. Based on this simple estimate, another three or four calls could easily fit into the space used by a single call under the conventional system. And this example doesn't even factor in the use of data compression, which further reduces the size of each call.

Some broadband connections may have less than desirable quality. Where IP packets are lost or delayed at any point in the network between VoIP users, there will be a momentary drop-out of voice. This is more noticeable in highly congested networks and/or where there are long distances and/or interworking between end points. Technology has improved the reliability and voice quality over time and will continue to improve VoIP performance as time goes on.

MESOTHELIOMA

Mesothelioma is a form of cancer that is almost always caused by previous exposure to asbestos. In this disease, malignant cells develop in the mesothelium, a protective lining that covers most of the body's internal organs. Its most common site is the pleura (outer lining of the lungs and chest cavity), but it may also occur in the peritoneum (the lining of the abdominal cavity) or the pericardium (a sac that surrounds the heart).

Most people who develop mesothelioma have worked on jobs where they inhaled asbestos particles, or have been exposed to asbestos dust and fibre in other ways, such as by washing the clothes of a family member who worked with asbestos, or by home renovation using asbestos cement products. Unlike lung cancer, there is no association between mesothelioma and smoking.

Signs and Symptoms of Mesothelioma

Symptoms of mesothelioma include:

# Shortness of breath
# Chest or abdominal pain
# Cough
# Difficulty swallowing
# Hoarseness
# Blood in sputum coughed up from the lungs
# Significant weight loss.

Treatment for Mesothelioma

There is no cure for mesothelioma. Supportive treatments to help thin or remove lung secretions, postural drainage, oxygen and painkillers can only relieve distressing symptoms for a short time.

Prognosis and Mesothelioma

75% of people who develop malignant mesothelioma die within 1 year. A few survive for 18 months.

Preliminary mesothelioma detection can be achieved through a chest imagery scan (CT scan, x-ray); however, mesothelioma is often misdiagnosed as viral pneumonia at this stage because of certain symptomatic similarities between the two. The only way to definitively verify a suspected case of malignant mesothelioma is through a biopsy.

A biopsy is a relatively minor procedure (dependent on the location of the tumor) during which a small section of suspect tissue is removed. The removed section is examined by a histopathologist, an expert in the study of diseased tissue. Histopathological examination can confirm a case of malignant mesothelioma while also typing and staging it. Understanding the type and stage can help doctors suggest the best of treatment.

TECHNICAL INTERVIEW QUESTIONS ON UNIX/LINUX

1. How do you list the files in an UNIX directory while also showing hidden files? ls -ltra

2. How do you execute a UNIX command in the background? Use the “&”. for eg : cp file1 file2 &

3. What UNIX command will control the default file permissions when files are created? umask

4. Explain the read, write, and execute permissions on a UNIX directory. Read allows you to see and list the directory contents. Write allows you to create, edit and delete files and subdirectories in the directory. Execute gives you the permissions to run programs or shells from the directory.

5. What is the difference between a soft link and a hard link? A symbolic (soft) linked file and the targeted file can be located on the same or different file system while for a hard link they must be located on the same file system.

6. Give the command to display space usage on the UNIX file system. df -lk

7. Explain iostat, vmstat and netstat. iostat reports on terminal, disk and tape I/O activity. vmstat reports on virtual memory statistics for processes, disk, tape and CPU activity. netstat reports on the contents of network data structures.

8. How would you change all occurrences of a value using VI? %s/(old value)/(new value)/g

9. Give two UNIX kernel parameters that effect an Oracle install. SHMMAX & SHMMNI

10. Briefly, how do you install Oracle software on UNIX? Basically, set up disks, kernel parameters, and run orainst.

11. Q: What is the way to view a unix network share on a Windows computer, within explorer ?
NFS, The Unix computer can be running a NFS Server Daemon.

12 . In Unix OS, what is the file server?
The file server is a machine that shares its disk storage and files with other machines on the network.

13. What is LILO?
LILO stands for Linux boot loader. It will load the MBR, master boot record, into the memory, and tell the system which partition and hard drive to boot from.

14. What is NFS? What is its job?
NFS stands for Network File System. NFS enables filesystems physically residing on one computer system to be used by other computers in the network, appearing to users on the remote host as just another local disk.

15. What is HTTP Tunneling ?
HTTP Tunneling is a security method that encryptes packets traveling throught the internet. Only the intended reciepent should be able to decrypt the packets. Can be used to Create Virtual Private Networks. (VPN)

ORACLE 9i : TECHNICAL INTERVIEW QUESTIONS

1. What is DDL, DML ? How are they different?
2. What are different types of joins in SQL?
3. How do you select unique rows using SQL?
4. What is the difference between DELETE and TRUNCATE ?
5. What is the difference between a "where" clause and a "having" clause?
6. What is the difference between "procedure" and "function"?
7. What is the difference between "translate" and "replace" ?
8. How to remove duplicate records from a table?
9. What is a "trigger"?
10.What is the difference between "translate" and "replace"?
11.What is a VIEW?
12.What is the difference among "dropping a table", "truncating a table"
and "deleting all records" from a table
13.Explain new feature of 9i Database ? Explain new feature of 10g Database ?
14.How to use DECODE function?
15.What is “Group by” clause?
16.What are cursors and what are the situations you will use them?
17.What default packages are provided by Oracle?
18.How do you debug a oracle procedure /function?
19.How many triggers are available?
20.How are procedures executed?
21.Which date function is used to find the difference between two dates?
22.What is the advantage of specifying WITH GRANT OPTION in the GRANT command?
23.What is the use of CASCADE CONSTRAINTS?
24.Which function is used to find the largest integer less than or equal to a specific value?
25.What is the parameter substitution symbol used with INSERT INTO command?
26.Which command displays the SQL command in the SQL buffer, and then executes it?
27.What are the wildcards used for pattern matching?
28.What are the privileges that can be granted on a table by a user to others?
29.What command is used to get back the privileges offered by the GRANT command?
30.Which system tables contain information on privileges granted and privileges obtained?
31.Which system table contains information on constraints on all the tables created?
32.What is the difference between TRUNCATE and DELETE commands?
34.What command is used to create a table by copying the structure of another table?
35.What is the use of the DROP option in the ALTER TABLE command?
36.What is the difference between Single row sub-Query and Scalar sub-Query?
37.Difference between Store Procedure and Trigger?
38.Explain normalization with examples?
39.How to find out the database name from SQL*PLUS command prompt?
40.Whats the back end processes when we type "Select * from Table"?
41.What is the difference between SQL and SQL Server?
42.What is table space?
43.What is difference between Co-related sub query and nested sub query?
44.What is reference cursor?
45.What is difference between Oracle and MS Access? What are disadvantages in Oracle and MS Access? What are features&advantages in Oracle and MS Access?
46.Difference between a equijoin and a union?
47.Difference between VARCHAR and VARCHAR2?
48.How write a SQL statement to query the result set and display row as columns and columns as row?
49.What is cluster.cluster index and non cluster index?
50.What is difference between DBMS and RDBMS?
51.How to test the complex view using manually testing?
52.When using a count(distinct) is it better to use a self-join or temp table to find redundant data ?
53.What is the advantage to use trigger in your PL?
54.What the difference between UNION and UNIONALL?
55.What do you mean by TCL ? Give examples .

TECHNICAL INTERVIEW QUESTIONS ON NETWORKING

1. Describe the OSI model.
2. What is the difference between a repeater, bridge, router? Relate this to the OSI model.
3. Describe an Ethernet switch and where it fits into the OSI model.
4. What is a VLAN? What is an ELAN? What is the difference?
5. Relate FDDI/ATM/SONET to the OSI model.
6. Explain how to configure a host network interface (e.g. IP address, netmask, broadcast address)?
7. Describe Ethernet packet contents: min/max size, header.
8. Describe TCP/IP and its protocols.
9. Describe ATM and what are its current advantages and disadvantages.
10. Describe SONET.
11. What are the maximum distances for CAT5 cabling?
12. Describe UDP and TCP and the differences between the two.
13. What is your current IP address? Hoiw do you find that out on different OSs?
14. Describe what a broadcast storm is.?
15. Describe what a runt, a giant, and a late collision are and what causes each of them.
16. How do you distinguish a DNS problem from a network problem?
17. Describe the Bandwidth Delay problem.
18. Describe the principle of multi-layer switching.
19. Describe the purpose and basic functionality of things like HSRP, VRRP etc.
20.What is the difference between MAC address and IP address ?
21.What is binding order?
22.Explain how traceroute, ping, and tcpdump work and what they are used for?
23.Explain the contents of a routing table (default route, next hop, etc.)
24.Mention some routing protocols that you have configued .
25. Describe what a VPN is and how it works.
26. Describe how VoIP works.
27.Describe methods of QoS.
28.What does Wi-Fi stand for?
29.What does the command “IP name-server 255.255.255.255″ accomplish?
30.How does Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) work?
31.What is a router?
32. What is a gateway?
33.What is LDAP used for?
34.What is the significance of the IP address 255.255.255.255?
35.What is NSLOOKUP ? What options are available in NSLOOKUP ?

C TECHNICAL INTERVIEW QUESTIONS

1.What does a static variable mean?
2.What is a pointer?
3.What is a structure?
4.What are the differences between structures and arrays?
5.What is a static identifier?
6.Where are the auto variables stored?
7.What is recursion?
8.In header files whether functions are declared or defined?
9.What are the differences between malloc() and calloc()?
10.What are macros? What are the advantages and disadvantages?
11.Difference between pass by reference and pass by value?
12.Where are the auto variables stored?
13.Where does global, static, local, register variables, free memory and C Program instructions get stored?
14.Difference between arrays and linked list?
15.What are enumerations?
16.Differentiate between a for loop and a while loop? What are it uses?
17.What are the different storage classes in C?
18.What is difference between Structure and Unions?
19.What the advantages of using Unions?
20.What are the advantages of using pointers in a program?
21.What is the difference between Strings and Arrays?
22.What is a far pointer? where do we use it?
23.How can a called function determine the number of arguments that have been passed
to it?
24.Which one is equivalent to multiplying by 2?
Left shifting a number by 1
Left shifting an unsigned int or char by 1?
25.What is the use of typedef?
26.What are register variables? What are the advantage of using register variables?
27.Out of fgets() and gets() which function is safe to use and why?
28.How would you obtain segment and offset addresses from a far address of a memory
location?
29.Are the expressions arr and *arr same for an array of integers?
30.What do the ‘c’ and ‘v’ in argc and argv stand for?
31.What is the similarity between a Structure, Union and enumeration?
32.Can a Structure contain a Pointer to itself?
33.How can we check whether the contents of two structure variables are same or not?
34.What is the difference between an enumeration and a set of pre-processor #
defines?
35.What are bit fields? What is the use of bit fields in a Structure declaration?
36.Which bit wise operator is suitable for checking whether a particular bit is on or
off?
37.Which bit wise operator is suitable for turning off a particular bit in a number?
38.Which bit wise operator is suitable for putting on a particular bit in a number?
39.Which bit wise operator is suitable for checking whether a particular bit is on or
off?
40.How would you dynamically allocate a one-dimensional and two-dimensional array of
integers ?
41.How can you increase the size of a dynamically allocated array?
42.How can you increase the size of a statically allocated array?
43.What is object file? How can you access object file?
44.How much maximum can you allocate in a single call to malloc()?
45.Write a function similar to printf()?

PROGRAMS:

*Write a program to compare two strings without using the strcmp() function.
*Write a program to concatenate two strings.
*Write a program to interchange 2 variables without using the third one.
*Write programs for String Reversal. The same for Palindrome check.
*Write a program to find the Factorial of a number.
*Write a program to generate the Fibonacci Series?
*Write a program which employs Recursion?
*Write a program which uses command line arguments.
*Write a program which uses functions like strcmp(), strcpy(), etc.

INDIA CHALLENGE AUSTRALIA'S SUPREMACY

India created history by notching up their first-ever cricket tri-series title on Australian soil by pipping the world champions by nine runs in a nail-biting second finals which saw fortune fluctuating from one team to the other till the very end. The series win came after a long hiatus of 23 years after a hard fought series that made headlines on the ground as well as off it.

India survived a valiant fightback from Australia to win the second Commonwealth Bank final by nine runs and claim the series 2-0.

Defending a target of 259 after Sachin Tendulkar's classy 91, India made a fine start as Praveen Kumar (four for 46) removed Adam Gilchrist - playing his final international innings - Ricky Ponting and Michael Clarke.

Matthew Hayden (55) and Andrew Symonds (42) put on 89 and James Hopes (63) threatened to see Australia home until Irfan Pathan struck twice in the final over.

These moments come hard in a cricketer's career. Going to Australia and winning a tournament must have began as a distant dream for Dhoni's men, but it turned out to be a reality. India clinched the humdinger of a second final against Australia and with it, won a one-day tournament for the first time in 23 years.

Indian captain MS Dhoni Tuesday said the Commonwealth Bank tri-series win was "important because this is the building stage of my team".

Speaking at the post-match presentation, Dhoni said he was proud of the way his team had performed in "the toughest conditions and against the toughest team in the world".

This will challenge Australia's dominance in world cricket and India's impressive show during the Australian Summer proved that the Oz are not invincible .

HOW TO DELETE THE RECYCLE BIN ICON FROM DESKTOP IN WINDOWS XP / 2003

--> Open Registry Editor.

--> In Registry Editor, navigate to the following registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Desktop\NameSpace



--> Find the following key:

{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E}

Delete the above key.
Note: As always, before making changes to your registry you should always make sure you have a valid backup. In cases where you're supposed to delete or modify keys or values from the registry it is possible to first export that key or value(s) to a .REG file before performing the changes.

--> Close Registry Editor.
There is no need to reboot. Just wait a few seconds and see how the icon disappears from the desktop.

--> In order to restore the Recycle Bin icon to the desktop just re-create the missing key (or import it back to the registry in case you've exported it earlier).

In Registry Editor, navigate to the following registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Desktop\NameSpace

Create the following key:

{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E}

(just copy & paste, including the brackets)

JOB ACCOMPLISHED !!!

GPRS

GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) is the world's most ubiquitous wireless data service, available now with almost every GSM network. GPRS is a connectivity solution based on Internet Protocols that supports a wide range of enterprise and consumer applications. With throughput rates of up to 40 kbit/s, users have a similar access speed to a dial-up modem, but with the convenience of being able to connect from anywhere. GPRS customers enjoy advanced, feature-rich data services such as colour Internet browsing, e-mail on the move, powerful visual communications such as video streaming, multimedia messages and location-based services.

For operators, the adoption of GPRS is a fast and cost-effective strategy that not only supports the real first wave of mobile Internet services, but also represents a big step towards 3GSM (or wideband-CDMA) networks and services.

The class of the device determines the speed at which GPRS can be used.

For example, the majority of GPRS terminals will be able to download data at speeds of up to 24Kbps (kilobytes per second). At the higher end, speeds are theoretically possible up to 171.2 kbit/sec when 8 slots are assigned at the same time to a single user. In reality 40-50Kbps.

PC cards capable of GPRS will send data up to speeds of 48Kbps.


The class indicates the mobile phone capabilities.

Class A
Class A mobile phones can be connected to both GPRS and GSM services simultaneously.


Class B
Class B mobile phones can be attached to both GPRS and GSM services, using one service at a time. Class B enables making or receiving a voice call, or sending/receiving an SMS during a GPRS connection. During voice calls or SMS, GPRS services are suspended and then resumed automatically after the call or SMS session has ended.


Class C
Class C mobile phones are attached to either GPRS or GSM voice service. You need to switch manually between services.

HOW TO BRAND WINDOWS WITH YOUR NAME

open notepad dump the following lines into it and save it with the name OEMINFO.INI in the c:\windows\system32 directory:

[General]
Manufacturer=Your Name Here
Model=Your Model Here
[Support Information]
Line1=Your Name Here
Line2=Your Address Here
Line3=Your Email Address Here


Save the file, then make a right click on my computer select properties, in the general tab a button will be highlighted (support information) make a click on it, you will be able to see the changes.
Now if you want to display some more information then simply increase the line in the file.
ex: Line4=Your Working Hours Here

OPTIMISING MOZILLA FIREFOX

Everybody’s favorite open-source browser, Firefox, is great right out of the box. And by adding some of the awesome extensions available out there, the browser just gets better and better.

But look under the hood, and there are a bunch of hidden (and some not-so-secret) tips and tricks available that will crank Firefox up and pimp your browser. Make it faster, cooler, more efficient.

1) More screen space. Make your icons small. Go to View - Toolbars - Customize and check the “Use small icons” box.

2) Smart keywords. If there’s a search you use a lot (let’s say IMDB.com’s people search), this is an awesome tool that not many people use. Right-click on the search box, select “Add a Keyword for this search”, give the keyword a name and an easy-to-type and easy-to-remember shortcut name (let’s say “actor”) and save it. Now, when you want to do an actor search, go to Firefox’s address bar, type “actor” and the name of the actor and press return. Instant search! You can do this with any search box.

3) Keyboard shortcuts. This is where you become a real Jedi. It just takes a little while to learn these, but once you do, your browsing will be super fast. Here are some of the most common (and my personal favs):

* Spacebar (page down)
* Shift-Spacebar (page up)
* Ctrl+F (find)
* Alt-N (find next)
* Ctrl+D (bookmark page)
* Ctrl+T (new tab)
* Ctrl+K (go to search box)
* Ctrl+L (go to address bar)
* Ctrl+= (increase text size)
* Ctrl+- (decrease text size)
* Ctrl-W (close tab)
* F5 (reload)
* Alt-Home (go to home page)

4) Auto-complete. This is another keyboard shortcut, but it’s not commonly known and very useful. Go to the address bar (Control-L) and type the name of the site without the “www” or the “.com”. Let’s say “google”. Then press Control-Enter, and it will automatically fill in the “www” and the “.com” and take you there - like magic! For .net addresses, press Shift-Enter, and for .org addresses, press Control-Shift-Enter.

5) Tab navigation. Instead of using the mouse to select different tabs that you have open, use the keyboard. Here are the shortcuts:

* Ctrl+Tab (rotate forward among tabs)
* Ctrl+Shft+Tab (rotate to the previous tab)
* Ctrl+1-9 (choose a number to jump to a specific tab)

6) Mouse shortcuts. Sometimes you’re already using your mouse and it’s easier to use a mouse shortcut than to go back to the keyboard. Master these cool ones:

* Middle click on link (opens in new tab)
* Shift-scroll down (previous page)
* Shift-scroll up (next page)
* Ctrl-scroll up (decrease text size)
* Ctrl-scroll down (increase text size)
* Middle click on a tab (closes tab)

7) Delete items from address bar history. Firefox’s ability to automatically show previous URLs you’ve visited, as you type, in the address bar’s drop-down history menu is very cool. But sometimes you just don’t want those URLs to show up (I won’t ask why). Go to the address bar (Ctrl-L), start typing an address, and the drop-down menu will appear with the URLs of pages you’ve visited with those letters in them. Use the down-arrow to go down to an address you want to delete, and press the Delete key to make it disappear.

8) User chrome. If you really want to trick out your Firefox, you’ll want to create a UserChrome.css file and customize your browser. It’s a bit complicated to get into here, but check out this tutorial.

9) Create a user.js file. Another way to customize Firefox, creating a user.js file can really speed up your browsing. You’ll need to create a text file named user.js in your profile folder (see this to find out where the profile folder is).

10) about:config. The true power user’s tool, about.config isn’t something to mess with if you don’t know what a setting does. You can get to the main configuration screen by putting about:config in the browser’s address bar. See Mozillazine’s about:config tips and screenshots.

11) Add a keyword for a bookmark. Go to your bookmarks much faster by giving them keywords. Right-click the bookmark and then select Properties. Put a short keyword in the keyword field, save it, and now you can type that keyword in the address bar and it will go to that bookmark.

12) Speed up Firefox. If you have a broadband connection (and most of us do), you can use pipelining to speed up your page loads. This allows Firefox to load multiple things on a page at once, instead of one at a time (by default, it’s optimized for dialup connections). Here’s how:

* Type “about:config” into the address bar and hit return. Type “network.http” in the filter field, and change the following settings (double-click on them to change them):
* Set “network.http.pipelining” to “true”
* Set “network.http.proxy.pipelining” to “true”
* Set “network.http.pipelining.maxrequests” to a number like 30. This will allow it to make 30 requests at once.
* Also, right-click anywhere and select New-> Integer. Name it “nglayout.initialpaint.delay” and set its value to “0″. This value is the amount of time the browser waits before it acts on information it receives.

13) Limit RAM usage. If Firefox takes up too much memory on your computer, you can limit the amount of RAM it is allowed to us. Again, go to about:config, filter “browser.cache” and select “browser.cache.disk.capacity”. It’s set to 50000, but you can lower it, depending on how much memory you have. Try 15000 if you have between 512MB and 1GB ram.

14) Reduce RAM usage further for when Firefox is minimized. This setting will move Firefox to your hard drive when you minimize it, taking up much less memory. And there is no noticeable difference in speed when you restore Firefox, so it’s definitely worth a go. Again, go to about:config, right-click anywhere and select New-> Boolean. Name it “config.trim_on_minimize” and set it to TRUE. You have to restart Firefox for these settings to take effect.

15) Move or remove the close tab button. Do you accidentally click on the close button of Firefox’s tabs? You can move them or remove them, again through about:config. Edit the preference for “browser.tabs.closeButtons”. Here are the meanings of each value:

* 0: Display a close button on the active tab only
* 1Default) Display close buttons on all tabs
* 2on’t display any close buttons
* 3isplay a single close button at the end of the tab bar (Firefox 1.x behavior)

TEST YOUR ANTI-VIRUS

DO YOU WANT TO TEST IF YOUR ANTI-VIRUS IS POWERFUL & EFFICIENT ENOUGH ???

THE FOLLOWING STEPS WILL CREATE A FAKE MALWARE SIGNATURE AND MAKE YOUR ANTI-VIRUS TEST IT.

Dont worry as this is a fake malware and it won't affect your computer.

STEPS :

1.Create a notepad document in your desktop.

2.Copy the following text into the notepad document ( excluding quotes )
“X5O!P%@AP[4\PZX54(P^)7CC)7}$EICAR-STANDARD-ANTIVIRUS-TEST-FILE!$H+H*”

3.Close the notepad document and save it with any file name.

4.Scan it with your ANTI-VIRUS software.

Your Anti-Virus should now Alert you about a Malware called EICAR Test-Not Virus.
It shows that your software is alert enough.

NB:Note just delete the notepad or follow your Anti-Virus Instructions.

IPL

Cricket in India has yet again attracted top dollar, this time for the Indian Premier League (IPL). In the process, BCCI has ensured that Mukesh Ambani will lock horns with Vijay Mallya while Shah Rukh Khan will face off against Preity Zinta as their teams take to the field.

The Reliance Industries chairman has acquired the Mumbai franchise in IPL for $111.9 million over a 10-year period while the flamboyant chairman of UB Group has won the Bengaluru franchise for $111.6 million. Both Mr Ambani and Mr Mallya had bid more than twice the floor price of $50 million per franchise set by the board. SRK’s Red Chillies Entertainment won the Kolkata franchise for $75 million.

The biggest surprise was the Chandigarh franchise, which went to Preity Zinta and Ness Wadia, together with Apeejay Surrendra’s Karan Paul and Dabur scion Mohit Burman for $75 million.

IPL is yet another show of strength for cricket. Originally conceived as a riposte to Subhash Chandra’s rebel Indian Cricket League, IPL is set to become the biggest money-spinner in cricket today. The league has been modelled on other professional sports leagues like the English Premier League (EPL) and National Basketball Association (NBA).


IPL is also further proof that, in spite of a few blips, cricket still rules the roost for marketers, who want visibility for their brands. Just over two years ago, BCCI had raised a total of $945 million in media, kit and team sponsorship over four years from Nimbus, Nike and Sahara, respectively. This amount has already been eclipsed by the revenues that IPL will generate for BCCI over 10 years (but much lesser cricket time). In all, the board has raked in nearly $724 million from the franchise bids alone, and adding income from media, IPL has fetched it nearly $1.75 billion (approx. Rs 7,000 crore).

India's charismatic one-day captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni emerged as the hottest property in world cricket after being sold out for a staggering USD 1.5 million dollars (approx Rs 6 crore) in a landmark auction which marked the beginning of a lucrative new era in cricket.

The 26-year-old Dhoni set the tempo for the first ever auction of world's top cricketers when he was acquired by the Chennai franchisee for a three-year period, adding another mind-boggling chapter of monetary gains in the BCCI's multi-million dollar Indian Premier League scheduled to begin in mid-April.

Australian all-rounder Andrew Symonds, who recently made headlines for being at the centre of a racial row involving Harbhajan Singh, proved that the controversy had not dented his brand value as he attracted the second highest price of USD 1.35 million (appro Rs 5.4 crore) with the Hyderabad team securing his services.

Flamboyant Sri Lankan opener Sanath Jayasuriya, despite being aged 38, was sold out to Ambani-owned Mumbai team for a whopping Rs 3.9 crore, while Australian speedster Brett Lee (Rs 3.6 crore), South African all-rounder Jacques Kallis (Rs 3.6 crore), Harbhajan Singh (Rs 3.4 crore), West Indian opener Chris Gayle (Rs 3.2 crore) and retiring Australian wicketkeeper Adam Gilchrist (Rs 2.8 crore) were some of the other big draws.

THE BIG GUNS :

MS Dhoni, Chennai $ 1.5 million
Shane Warne, Jaipur $ 450 000
Adam Gilchrist, Hyderabad $ 700,000
Mahela Jayawardena, Mohali $ 475 000
Mutiah Muralitharan, Chennai $ 600,000
Shoaib Akhtar, Kolkata $ 425,000
Anil Kumble Bangalore $ 500,000
Harbhajan Singh, Mumbai, $ 850,000
Sanath Jayasuriya, Mumbai, $ 975,000
Kumar Sangakkara, Mohali, $ 700,000.
Ricky Ponting, Kolkata, $ 400,000
Brett Lee, Mohali, $ 900,000
Daniel Vettori, Delhi, $ 625,000
Matthew Hayden, Chennai, $ 375,000
Brendan McCullum, Kolkata, $ 700,000
Jacob Oram, Chennai, $675,000.
Stephen Fleming, Chennai, $ 350,000.
Graeme Smith, Jaipur, $ 475,000.
Herschelle Gibbs, Hyderabad, $ 575,000.
Chris Gayle, Kolkata, $ 800,000.
Shoaib Malik, Delhi, $ 500,000.
Shahid Afridi, Hyderabad, $ 675,000.
Younis Khan, Jaipur, $ 225,000.
Mohammad Asif, Delhi, $ 650,000.
Jacques Kallis, Bangalore, $ 900,000
Zaheer Khan, Bangalore, $ 450,000.
S Sreesanth, Mohali, $ 625,000.
Dinesh Kaarthick, Delhi, $ 525,000.
A B de Villiers, Delhi, $ 300,000.
Mark Boucher, Bangalore, $ 450,000.
Parthiv Patel, Chennai, $ 325,000.
Kamran Akmal, Jaipur, $ 150,000.
Albie Morkel, Chennai, $ 675,000
Ajit Agarkar, Kolkata, $ 350,000
Shaun Pollock, Mumbai, $ 550,000
Irfan Pathan, Mohali, $ 925,000
Scott Styris, Hyderabad, $ 175,000
Farveez Mahroof, Delhi, $ 225,000
Tillakaratne Dilshan, Delhi, $ 250,000
Cameron White, Bangalore, $ 500,000
Yusuf Pathan, Jaipur, $ 475,000
Joginder Sharma, Chennai, $ 225,000
Gautam Gambhir, Delhi, $ 725,000
Robin Uthappa, Mumbai, $ 800,000
V V S Laxman, Hyderabad, $ 375,000
Wasim Jaffer, Bangalore, $ 150,000
Rohit Sharma, Hyderabad, $ 750,000
Mohd Kaif, Jaipur, $ 675,000
Suresh Raina, Chennai, $ 650,000
Manoj Tiwary, Delhi, $ 675,000
Chamara Silva, Hyderabad, $ 100,000
David Hussey, Kolkata, $ 625,000
Nathan Bracken, Bangalore, $ 325,000
Rudra Pratap Singh, Hyderabad, $ 875,000
Murali Kartik, Kolkata, $ 425,000
Makhaya Ntini, Chennai, $ 200,000
Lasith Malinga, Mumbai, $ 350,000
Chaminda Vaas, Hyderabad, $ 200,000
Ramesh Powar, Mohali, $ 170,000
Umar Gul, Kolkata, $ 150,000
Dale Steyn, Bangalore, $ 325,000
Dilhara Fernando, Mumbai, $ 150,000
Ishant Sharma, Kolkata, $ 950,000
Piyush Chawla, Mohali, $ 400,000
Munaf Patel, Jaipur, $ 275,000
Nuwan Zoysa, Hyderabad, $ 110,000

APPLE MACBOOK

The MacBook is a Macintosh notebook computer by Apple Inc that replaced the iBook G4 series and the 12" PowerBook G4. It is a part of the MacBook family.

The original MacBook was released on May 16, 2006 and utilised the Intel Core Duo processor and 945GM chipset, with Intel's GMA950 integrated graphics on a 667 MHz front-side bus. Later revisions of the MacBook moved to the Core 2 Duo processor.



The latest update to the MacBook line occurred on November 1, 2007. It uses the Intel GM965 chipset, with Intel's X3100 integrated graphics on an 800 MHz system bus.

Starting at just $1099, MacBook has everything you need with Intel Core 2 Duo processors, 1GB of memory, and large hard drives in all models. There’s also a slew of innovative features, including a built-in iSight camera for video chatting on the go, iLife ’08, Front Row, a glossy 13-inch widescreen display, and even dual-display support.



The most advanced and affordable Mac notebook ever gives you a blazingly fast mobile architecture in a beautiful design that costs less than slower, clunkier models. It’s like getting a sports car for the price of a scooter. Talk about performance — MacBook is powered by an Intel Core 2 Duo processor with speeds revving up to 2.2GHz. And all models pack a performance-enhancing 4MB of shared L2 cache.


Apple Inc unveiled MacBook Air, the world's thinnest notebook, in India on February 13. MacBook Air is only 0.16 inches at its thinnest point, while its maximum height of 0.76 inches is less than the thinnest point on competing notebooks.

MacBook Air, at a suggested retail price of Rs 96,100 -- has the following features:

* a 13.3-inch LED-backlit widescreen display
* a full-size and backlit keyboard
* a built-in iSightr video camera for video conferencing
* a spacious trackpad with multi-touch gesture support
* Intel Core 2 Duo processors running at 1.6 GHz and 2GB of memory.

A company statement claims that MacBook Air delivers up to five hours of battery life for wireless productivity and includes AirPort Extremer 802.11n Wi-Fi networking, which delivers up to five times the performance.

The MacBook Air laptop is less than two centimetres thick, features a backlit 13-inch (33 cm) screen, a full-size keyboard and a pad responsive to Apple's multi-touch control gestures. It weighs in at less than 1.5 kg

HAWK-EYE

Hawk-Eye is a computer system used in cricket, tennis and other sports to track the path of the ball. It was developed by engineers at Roke Manor Research Limited in 2001; the patent being held by Paul Hawkins and David Sherry. Later, the technology was spun off into a separate company, Hawk-Eye Innovations Ltd., as a joint venture with television production company Sunset + Vine.

One of the most difficult, and sometimes controversial, decisions that an umpire has to take on the cricket field is for LBW (leg-before wicket). To take the final call on a batsman, the umpire has to juggle with many variables ; whether the ball pitched outside the leg stump, hit the batsman in line with the stumps or whether it would have hit the stumps, and most importantly whether the player was making a genuine effort to play the shot.

Hawk Eye aims to aid the umpire by giving inputs on the physics of the ball by tracking and predicting its motion. It uses a special image-processing system from Roke Manor Research (a Siemens R&D company) and commercial off-the-shelf hardware along with six specially placed cameras. Hawk Eye incorporates both image analysis and radar technology. The six fixed JAI monochrome cameras, with a 120 MHz frame rate, are placed around the playing field (see picture). They track the ball's entire trajectory, right from the point where it is released from the bowler's hand to the point the ball is considered dead.

This is updated 100 times every second. The cameras are used in two sets, and a multi-channel frame grabber handles each set. The images captured are then processed by software to produce a 3-D image. The future path is predicted using a parametric model. The system is able to locate the ball in 3-D and can predict the motion with a claimed accuracy of 5 mm.

Some of the esoteric statistics that can be generated by this system are: the areas where a particular bowler pitched and how much swing or spin a particular bowler generated. In some cases where the system's accuracy is questionable, it just gives a "cant help message " to ensure its accuracy never goes below acceptable limits.

Besides aiding the umpire in taking a decision, the Hawk Eye is also used to give a more enhanced feed to TV viewers.

The application of Hawk Eye goes much beyond cricket. The company, Roke Manor, is also developing similar technologies for tennis, football, baseball and snooker.

EXTREME GIZMO : MICROSOFT SURFACE

Microsoft has officially debuted "Surface," a new umbrella brand for computers that can recognize physical objects (via barcode scanning) and react to human touch. Eschewing mice and keyboards, the first Surface platform uses a 30" table-like screen that is meant for simultaneous multi-user input. "From digital finger painting to a virtual concierge, Surface brings natural interaction to the digital world in a new and exciting way," said Microsoft.



It may look like an old barroom Pac-Man machine, but Microsoft's Surface is the company's first product to make use of a new interface technology the firm calls "surface computing."

Microsoft Surface is the first in a new category of surface computing products from Microsoft, turning an ordinary tabletop into a dynamic surface that provides interaction with all forms of digital content through natural gestures, touch and physical objects.




Microsoft says this new technologuy can create new situations, such as ordering a beverage during a meal with just the tap of a finger or quickly browsing through music and dragging favorite songs onto a personal playlist by moving a finger across the screen.

The first Surface units are geared primarily for the service industry, offering diners and bar-goers the ability to order items and control in-table entertainment via the touchscreen. For instance, using barcode recognition, a customer could place a bottle of wine of the table and instantly be appropriately charged for it. Or, taking a page from Apple's iPhone playbook, Microsoft says "Imagine quickly browsing through music and dragging favorite songs onto a personal playlist by moving a finger across the screen. "



The intuitive user interface works without a traditional mouse or keyboard, allowing people to interact with content and information on their own or collaboratively with their friends and families, just like in the real world. Surface is a 30-inch display in a table-like form factor that small groups can use at the same time. From digital finger painting to a virtual concierge, Surface brings natural interaction to the digital world in a new and exciting way.

From the end of this year, consumers will be able to interact with Surface in hotels, retail establishments, restaurants and public entertainment venues.

THE END OF AN ERA : ADAM GILCHRIST

Full name : Adam Craig Gilchrist

Born : November 14, 1971, Bellingen, New South Wales


Major teams : Australia, ICC World XI, New South Wales, Western Australia

Nickname : Gilly, Churchy

Playing role : Wicketkeeper batsman

Batting style : Left-hand bat

Bowling style : Right-arm offbreak

Fielding position : Wicketkeeper

Height : 1.86 m


Going in first or seventh, wearing whites or coloureds, Adam Gilchrist has been the symbolic heart of Australia's steamrolling agenda and the most exhilarating cricketer of the modern age.



Australia vice-captain Adam Gilchrist stunned the cricketing world on Saturday,26th of Jan when he announced he was retiring from all forms of the game.

Gilchrist said he was quitting Test cricket after the current match against India ends at Adelaide Oval on Monday and One-day internationals at the end of the forthcoming triangular series against India and Sri Lanka.

"It is with great pride and happiness that I make the decision to retire from Test and One-day cricket," Gilchrist said in a statement. "I have come to this decision after much thought and discussion with those important to me."

"My family and I have been fortunate to have had an amazing journey full of rich experiences throughout my career and are sincerely grateful to all who have helped make this stage of our lives so fulfilling."

Gilchrist's shock announcement came just one day after he broke the world record for the most Test dismissals by a wicketkeeper and declared he had no plans of retiring.

"I am now ready and excited to move into the next phase of my life," he said.



A dashing lefthander, Gilchrist is currently playing his 96th test match. He has scored 5,556 runs at an average of 47.89, with 17 hundreds and has a highest score of 204 not out.

He has also taken 414 test dismissals and set a host of batting records, including the most sixes, and the second fastest century in test history.

The 36-year-old from Western Australia has captained Australia both in tests and one-day cricket and his record in the abbreviated form of the game is equally as imposing.

He has made 9,297 runs and taken 454 dismissals from 277 appearances and played in three consecutive World Cup winning teams.

It is evident that he could have played in the Australian team simply on the merits of his batting skills alone.

Hats off to the dashing cricketer who changed the face of modern day cricket.

BATTLE OF THE IT GIANTS

It’s like a battle for supremacy between two countries. Or you may liken it to a cat and mouse game. Both sides look at each other with suspicion.

They acquire armoury which they don’t possess, and build stealth web weaponry to outdo the other. It’s the battle of Facebook versus Orkut, Android and WinMobile and now possibly the Picasa and Flickr. It’s the battle of Google versus Microsoft.

With a proposed buyout of Yahoo! by Microsoft, Google may lose ground on most things through which it threatened to outdo Microsoft on the newage battlefield, the Internet. And understandably, Google’s shares plummeted on the bourses after Microsoft made public its intent to acquire Yahoo! and the search giant declared its third quarter results.

Both tech majors have stocked their armoury with latest in web weapons. Those web weapons which they don’t have, or the rivals possses, they buy. Never mind the cost.

In April, 2007, Marratech, a video conferencing software company was acquired by Google to match up to Microsoft’s Unified Communications. Next month (May 2007), Microsoft bought ScreenTonic SA, Paris, France, a mobile advertising solutions to match Google’s ad solutions. Then Google bought YouTube for $1.65 billion. The same year, Microsoft introduced Soapbox as an answer to YouTube but which failed to impress.

Going back, in May 2005, Microsoft bought MessageCast Inc, an automated alerting and messaging services while Google bought Android (mobile phone platform) Software for handheld devices.

Google infact was taking up the Yahoo challenge as well which will increase manifold now with a huge Microsoft warchest backing it. In July 2004, Google announced Picasa buyout, a photo management software. In March 2005, Yahoo! acquired Ludicorp and Flickr, which has become the buzzword in photo sharing. Back in October 2004 Google acquired Where2 Mapping software but Yahoo! still remains the leader in mapping technology with Yahoo Maps.

While Google’s proposed $3.1 billion DoubleClick acquisition is pending, Microsoft may take a lead by acquiring Yahoo!. Last year, Yahoo launched its new online ad search solution Panama which allows advertsisers to bid for search terms based on their popularity. The Yahoo! acquisition, may give Google big competition in online ad search space from Microsoft.




While Microsoft is a leader in operating system, software, publishing, and video games, Google is the king of internet with its all powerful search expanding to areas such as mobile and PDAs. And the web giant, Google, has been threatening Microsoft’s hotmail and MSN messenger supremacy in most countries through Gmail and Gtalk.

While Google has already captured the social networker’s heart through Orkut and YouTube, Microsoft’s Facebook has proved to be a worthy competitor. Also, Orkut recently matched up to the Facebook challenge by allowing videos to be posted on its sharing site, like Facebook.

Microsoft, the world’s biggest software maker, made an unsolicited $44.6-billion offer for Yahoo to challenge Google’s dominance in internet search services and advertising.


Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer is attempting the biggest-ever technology takeover after failing to compete with Google in a market that may almost double to $80 billion by 2010. Google has grown faster than Microsoft in every quarter since Google’s 2004 initial public offering as its search engine won more users.

A combined Microsoft and Yahoo could pose a real challenge to Google overseas and in hot new ad markets such as mobile Internet, but only if Microsoft ignores its basic instincts.

Microsoft Corp's unsolicited offer of some $44.6 billion for Yahoo Inc would create a larger second player to Google Inc's dominance of Web search and put nearly 600 million unique monthly visitors from around the world under one roof.

But the success of a merger would depend on letting some of Yahoo's brands survive and even acknowledging that a few of its products are superior to Microsoft's.

If consummated, the deal would instantly redraw the competitive landscape on the Internet. And it would escalate the battle between Microsoft and Google, already the most intense high-stakes battle in the technology world, over who will dominate the booming online advertising business.

HOW TO LOCK A FOLDER BY USING NOTEPAD

1) Suppose you want to lock a folder named debasish in your f:\, whose path is f:\debasish

2) Now open the Notepad and type the following

ren debasish debasish.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30 309D}

3) Where debasish is your folder name. Save the text file as loc.bat in the same drive.

4) Open another new notepad text file and type the following

ren debasish.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30 309D} caclub

5) Save the text file as unloc.bat in the same drive.
---------
Usage:
---------
6) To lock the debasish folder, simply click the loc.bat and it will transform into control panel icon which is inaccessible.

7) To unlock the folder click the unloc.bat file. Thus the folder will be unlocked and the contents are accessible.

HOW TO SPEED UP YOUR HARD DISK

HOW TO SPEED UP YOUR HARD DISK

Speed up Your Hard disk

To speed up your hard disk speed we need to configure a special buffering the computer's memory in order to enable it to better deal with interrupts made from the disk.

This tip is only recommended if you have 256MB RAM or higher.
Follow these steps:

Run SYSEDIT.EXE from the Run command.

Expand the system.ini file window.

Scroll down almost to the end of the file till you find a line called [386enh].

Press Enter to make one blank line, and in that line type

Irq14=4096

Note: This line IS CASE SENSITIVE!!!

Click on the File menu, then choose Save.

Close SYSEDIT and reboot your computer.

Done >> Speed improvement will be noticed after the computer reboots.

HOW TO PREVENT DEADLOCK IN SQL SERVER

A deadlock occurs when two system server process IDs (SPIDs) are waiting for a resource and neither process can advance because the other process is preventing it from getting the resource.

The lock manager’s thread checks for deadlocks. When a lock manager’s deadlock detection algorithm detects a deadlock, the lock manager chooses one of the SPIDs as a victim. The lock manager initiates a 1205 error message that is sent to the client, and the lock manager kills the SPID. Killing the SPID frees the resources and allows the other SPID to continue. Killing the SPID that is the deadlock victim is what causes the broken connection that the Visual Basic front-end application experiences.

In a well designed application, the front-end application should trap for the 1205 error, reconnect to SQL Server, and then re-submit the transaction.

Although deadlocks can be minimized, they cannot be completely avoided. That is why the front-end application should be designed to handle deadlocks.

So what can cause deadlocks?

1.Locks

2.Worker threads

3.Memory

4.Parallel query execution-related resources

5.Multiple Active Result Sets (MARS) resources.


Here are some tips on how to avoid deadlocking on your SQL Server:

*Ensure the database design is properly normalized.

*Have the application access server objects in the same order each time.

*During transactions, don't allow any user input. Collect it before the transaction begins.

*Avoid cursors.

*Keep transactions as short as possible. One way to help accomplish this is to reduce the number of round trips between your application and SQL Server by using stored procedures or keeping transactions with a single batch. Another way of reducing the time a transaction takes to complete is to make sure you are not performing the same reads over and over again. If your application does need to read the same data more than once, cache it by storing it in a variable or an array, and then re-reading it from there, not from SQL Server.

*Reduce lock time. Try to develop your application so that it grabs locks at the latest possible time, and then releases them at the very earliest time.

*If appropriate, reduce lock escalation by using the ROWLOCK or PAGLOCK.

*Consider using the NOLOCK hint to prevent locking if the data being locked is not modified often.

*If appropriate, use as low of an isolation level as possible for the user connection running the transaction.

*Consider using bound connections.

How to debug deadlocks

Turn on deadlock trace
DBCC TRACEON(1204,1222)

This will enable deadlock tracing for all existing connetions and new. Trace flag 1204 reports deadlock information formatted by each node involved in the deadlock. Trace flag 1222 formats deadlock information, first by processes and then by resources.

Use SQL Profiler to trace deadlock events and get the resource ID of the table or index under contention. The steps to do this are:
Start SQL profiler
On the Trace Properties dialog box, on the General tab, check Save to file and specify a path to save the trace
Click the Events tab, only add Locks\Lock:deadlock and Locks\Lock:deadlock chain
Click the Data columns tab, add DatabaseID, IndexID, ObjectID

This trace will record all deadlocks on this SQL Server instance, along with the ID of the source table of contention. To translate the database id and object id into names (although DatabaseName and ObjectName are selectable columns, the data is not always presented in the trace), you can do
SELECT database_name(DatabaseID)
SELECT object_name(ObjectID)

Use SQL Profiler to trace batch statements or RPC statements, to trace which statement causes the deadlock. The restriction of this is that if the repro is far between and you have a busy system, the trace file will grow too large to be useful.

You can also run following query to check which process is being blocked.
SELECT * FROM sys.sysprocesses WHERE blocked <> 0

Get the SPID from blocked column

DBCC inputbuffer (SPID)

sp_who2

sp_lock2

You can also use SP_LOCK2 to receive detailed locking view.

DNS

The Domain Name system (DNS) associates various sorts of information with so-called domain names; most importantly, it serves as the "phone book" for the Internet by translating human-readable computer hostnames, e.g. www.example.com, into the IP addresses, e.g. 208.77.150.31, that networking equipment needs to deliver information. It also stores other information such as the list of mail exchange servers that accept email for a given domain. In providing a worldwide keyword-based redirection service, the Domain Name System is an essential component of contemporary Internet use.

The most basic task of DNS is to translate hostnames to IP addresses. In very simple terms, it can be compared to a phone book. DNS also has other important uses.

Preeminently, DNS makes it possible to assign Internet names to organizations (or concerns they represent), independently of the physical routing hierarchy represented by the numerical IP address. Because of this, hyperlinks and Internet contact information can remain the same, whatever the current IP routing arrangements may be, and can take a human-readable form (such as "www.abcxyz.com") which is rather easier to remember than the IP address 208.77.150.31. People take advantage of this when they recite meaningful URLs and e-mail addresses without caring how the machine will actually locate them.



The Domain Name system distributes the responsibility for assigning domain names and mapping them to IP networks by allowing an authoritative server for each domain to keep track of its own changes, avoiding the need for a central registrar to be continually consulted and updated.

DNS servers

The Domain Name System consists of a hierarchical set of DNS servers. Each domain or subdomain has one or more authoritative DNS servers that publish information about that domain and the name servers of any domains "beneath" it. The hierarchy of authoritative DNS servers matches the hierarchy of domains. At the top of the hierarchy stand the root nameservers: the servers to query when looking up (resolving) a top-level domain name (TLD).


PROTOCOL DETAILS

DNS primarily uses UDP on port 53 to serve requests. Almost all DNS queries consist of a single UDP request from the client followed by a single UDP reply from the server. TCP comes into play only when the response data size exceeds 512 bytes, or for such tasks as zone transfer. Some operating systems such as HP-UX are known to have resolver implementations that use TCP for all queries, even when UDP would suffice.

EXTENSIONS TO DNS

EDNS is an extension of the DNS protocol which enhances the transport of DNS data in UDP packages, and adds support for expanding the space of request and response codes.



THE INTERNET DOMAIN STRUCTURE

The Internet domain name space is divided into several organizational and geographical top-level domains. Top-level non-geographic domains include:

COM
commercial organizations

EDU
educational organizations

GOV
government organizations

INT
international organizations

MIL
military departments

NET
networking organizations

ORG
miscellaneous organizations
The top-level domains are shown here in upper case. In fact, domain names are case-insensitive. That is, the COM domain is equivalent to the com domain and is usually written in lower case.

Although the three-letter top-level domains are primarily intended for use by companies and organizations in the United States, domain names in COM, EDU, INT, NET, and ORG are often allocated to companies and organizations in other countries.

Geographical top-level domains generally follow the ISO 3166 standard, which contains abbreviations for each country (for example, ca for Canada, ch for Switzerland, and it for Italy). An exception is the domain uk (United Kingdom) which is used for Great Britain rather than the value gb defined by the standard.