Tuesday, June 26, 2007

Applied Micro Circuits Corporation

Applied Micro Circuits Corporation is a fables semiconductor company scheming network and embedded Power Architecture, optical transport and storage solutions. They bought assets, IP and engineers concerning the PowerPC 400 microprocessors from IBM in 2004 for $227 million and they now market the processors under their own name. The deal also included access to IBM's SoC design methodology and advanced CMOS process technology.

3ware is a producer of RAID controllers and storage products. Founded as an self-governing company in 1997, it was acquired by AMCC in April 2004.This division has usually been focused on SATA and PATA RAID devices. They were one of the pioneers in implementing "multi-lane" cabling for RAID systems which greatly reduced cable difficulty in systems with many hard drives.

Saturday, June 23, 2007

Watercraft

A watercraft is a vehicle, vessel or craft designed to move across water for pleasure, recreation, physical exercise, commerce, transport of people and goods, and military missions. It is resulting from the term "craft" which was used as term to describe all types of water going vessels. Most watercraft would be described as either a ship or a boat. However, there are a number of craft which many people would consider neither a ship nor a boat, such as: canoes, kayaks, rafts, barges, catamarans, hydrofoils, windsurfers, surfboards (when used as a paddle board), underwater robots, torpedos and jet skis.

Sunday, June 17, 2007

Exploration

Exploration is the act of searching or traveling for the purpose of discovery, e.g. of unknown regions, including space, for oil, gas, coal, ores, caves, water (Mineral exploration or prospecting), or information.The term can also be used to describe the first incursions of peoples from one culture into the geographical and cultural environment of others. Although exploration has existed as long as human beings, its peak is seen as being during the Age of Discovery when European navigators travelled around the world discovering new worlds and cultures.In scientific research, exploration is one of three purposes of research.Exploration is the attempt to develop an initial, rough understanding of some phenomenon.

Monday, June 11, 2007

Star

A star is an enormous, luminous ball of plasma. Stars cluster together to form galaxies, and they dominate the visible universe. The nearest star to Earth is the Sun, which is the source of most of the energy on Earth, together with daylight. Other stars are visible in the night sky, when they are not outshone by the Sun. A star shines because nuclear fusion in its core releases energy which traverses the stars internal and then radiates into outer space. Almost all elements heavier than hydrogen and helium were produced inside the cores of stars.

Astronomers can establish the mass, age, chemical composition and many other properties of a star by observing its spectrum, luminosity and motion through space. The total mass of a star is the principal determinant in its development and eventual fate. Other individuality of a star that is determined by its evolutionary history includes the diameter, rotation, movement and temperature. A plot of the temperature of many stars against their luminosities, known as a Hertz sprung-Russell diagram (H-R diagram), allows the current age and evolutionary state of a particular star to be determined.

Wednesday, June 06, 2007

Shrimp fishery


A shrimp fishery is a fishery directed toward harvesting either shrimp or prawns. Fisheries do not usually differentiate between the two taxa, and the terms are used interchangeably. This article therefore refers to the catching of either shrimp or prawns.
A number of the larger species, including the Atlantic white shrimp (Penaeus setiferus), are caught commercially and used for food. Recipes utilizing shrimp form part of the cuisine of many cultures: examples include jambalaya, okonomiyaki, poon choi, bagoong, Kerala and scampi.Preparing shrimp for consumption usually involves removing the shell, tail, and "sand vein". As with other seafood, shrimp is high in calcium, protein and low in food energy.Shrimp and prawns are versatile ingredients, and are often used as an accompaniment to fried rice. Common methods of preparation comprise baking, boiling and frying. As stated in the movie Forrest Gump

Sunday, May 27, 2007

History of bullets

The history of bullets parallels the history of firearms. Advances in one either resulted from or precipitated advances in the additional. Originally, bullets are round metallic or stone balls placed in front of a volatile charge of gunpowder at the end of a closed tube. As firearms became more scientifically advanced, from 1500 to 1800, bullets changed very little. They remained simple round lead balls, called rounds, conflicting only in their diameter. The growth of the hand culverin and matchlock harquebus brought about the use of cast lead balls as projectiles. "Bullet" is derived from the French word "boulette" which approximately means "little ball". The original musket bullet was a globular lead ball two sizes smaller than the bore, wrapped in a loosely-fitted paper patch which served to hold the bullet in the barrel firmly upon the powder. The loading of muskets was, therefore, easy with the old smooth-bore Brown Bess and similar military muskets.

Saturday, May 19, 2007

Description of Quick Ring

The basic Quick Ring system consisted of seven serial links, six of them carrying data, and one a 50 MHz clock signal. Two physical media were specified, sets of twisted-pair copper wiring embedded in a thin plastic strip for use inside a computer, or the same signals using frequency-division multiplexing in a single fiber optic cable for longer links between machines.

The data lines were clocked at seven times the clock signal, so each clock "tick" moved 42 bits of data over the bus for a raw data rate of 2.1 Gbit/s. Ten bits of the 42 were used for signaling and control, leaving the other 32 for data, resulting in a net data transfer rate of 1.6 Gbit/s, or 200 MBytes/s.

Each Quick Ring interface enclosed two of these 200 MB/s links, one for "upstream" and one for "downstream" connections in a point-to-point ring. Since the system was not a bus, machines could talk up and downstream at the same time without interfering with other users. The drawback was that each hop over an intervening point added a latency of up to 1.3 µs.

Since Quick Ring was built in a ring topology there was no need for a dedicated switch, or router, making the system lower cost. It used a circuit switching system, in which the message path is set up before the data is sent, and once set up the connection is very lightweight. This is as opposed to packet switching, in which every message contains all of the data needed to reach the destination, this is more flexible, but adds overhead. Of the 10 bits of control data, four were used to specify a circuit number, allowing for a total of 16 devices per ring.

Monday, May 14, 2007

Protein


Proteins are large organic compounds made of amino acids arranged in a linear chain and joined together by peptide bonds between the carboxyl and amino groups of adjacent amino acid residues. The sequence of amino acids in a protein is defined by a gene and encoded in the genetic code. Although this genetic code specifies 20 "standard" amino acids, the residues in a protein are often chemically altered in post-translational modification: either before the protein can function in the cell, or as part of control mechanisms. Proteins can also work together to achieve a particular function, and they often associate to form stable complexes.

Like other biological macromolecules such as polysaccharides and nucleic acids, proteins are essential parts of all living organisms and participate in every process within cells. Many proteins are enzymes that catalyze biochemical reactions, and are vital to metabolism. Other proteins have structural or mechanical functions, such as the proteins in the cytoskeleton, which forms a system of scaffolding that maintains cell shape. Proteins are also important in cell signaling, immune responses, cell adhesion, and the cell cycle. Protein is also a necessary component in our diet, since animals cannot synthesise all the amino acids and must obtain essential amino acids from food. Through the process of digestion, animals break down ingested protein into free amino acids that can be used for protein synthesis.

Wednesday, May 09, 2007

Shoe

A shoe is a thing of footwear worn on the foot or feet of a human, dog, cat, horse, or doll. Shoes may vary from a simple flip-flop to a multifaceted boot. Shoes may have high or low heels, although in western cultures, high heels are considered a woman's style. Shoe materials include leather or image. Athletic shoe soles may be made of rubber.
Dress and casual shoes
Casual shoes, made of leather Dress shoes are categorized by smooth and supple leather uppers, leather soles, and narrow sleek shape. Casual shoes are characterized by sturdy leather uppers, non-leather outsoles, and wide profile. Some designs of dress shoes can be worn by either gender. The majority of dress shoes have an upper covering, commonly made of leather, enclosing most of the lower foot, but not covering the ankles. This upper part of the shoe is often made without apertures or openings, but may also be made with openings or even itself consist of a series of straps, e.g. an open toe featured in women's shoes. Shoes with uppers made high to cover the ankles are also available; a shoe with the upper rising above the ankle is usually considered a boot but certain styles may be referred to as high-topped shoes or high-tops. Usually, a high-topped shoe is secured by laces or zippers; although some styles have elastic inserts to ease slipping the shoe on.

Wednesday, May 02, 2007

Friday, April 27, 2007

Tourism


Tourism is travel for predominantly leisure or relaxation purposes, and also refers to the prerequisite of services in support of this act. Tourists are people who ,travel to and stay in places outside their common environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes not related to work out of an activity remunerated from within the place visited.

Tourism has become an enormously popular, global activity. As a service industry, tourism has frequent tangible and intangible elements. Major tangible elements include transportation, accommodation, and other apparatus of a hospitality industry. Major intangible elements relate to the purpose or inspiration for becoming a tourist, such as rest, relaxation, the opportunity to meet new people and experience other cultures, or simply to do something different and have an adventure.

Tourism is crucial for many countries, due to the income generated by the expenditure of goods and services by tourists, the taxes levied on businesses in the tourism industry, and the prospect for employment and economic advancement by working in the industry.

Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Artificial intelligence (Collective and non-human intelligence)


Some thinkers have explored the idea of combined intelligence, arising from the harmonization of many people. A battleship, for instance, cannot be operated by a single person's knowledge, actions and intelligence; it takes a equivalent and interacting crew. Similarly, the interesting behaviors of a bee colony are not exhibited in the aptitude and actions of any single bee, but rather manifest in the performance of the hive. These ideas are explored as a basis for human thought, with applications for artificial intelligence, by MIT AI pioneers Norbert Wiener and Marvin Musky. Artificial intelligence has emerged from Computer science as a area of expertise which seeks to make computers act in gradually more intelligent ways, and provides insights into human thought processes.

When bearing in mind animal intelligence, a more general definition of intelligence might be applied: the "ability to adapt efficiently to the environment, either by making a change in oneself or by changing the surroundings or finding a new one". Many people have also speculated about the possibility of outer space intelligence.

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Multitrack recording

Multitrack recording is a method of sound recording that allows for the recording of multiple sound sources, whether at the same time or at different times. This is probably the most common technique of recording popular music: Musicians or singers can be recorded independently, then these performances can be edited together to create a cohesive result. It is also called 'multitracking' or just 'tracking' for short.Multitrack recording devices are available with varying capacities. When recording a segment of audio, which is also known as a track, audio engineers and musicians may select which track or tracks on the device will be used.

Monday, April 09, 2007

Willamette River

100 The Willamette River is a tributary of the Columbia River, approximately 240 mi long, in northwestern Oregon in the United States. Flowing northward between the Coastal Range and Cascade Range, the river and its tributaries form a basin called the Willamette Valley containing the largest inhabitants centers of Oregon, including Portland, which sits along both sides of the river near its mouth on the Columbia. Its lush valley is fed by prolific precipitation on the western side of the Cascades, forming one of the most productive agricultural regions of North America that was the destination for many if not most of the emigrants along the Oregon Trail. The river was an important transportation route throughout much of the early history of the state, furnishing a means of conveying the vast timber and agricultural resources of the state to the outside world.

Description

The Willamette rises in three separate forks in the mountains south and southeast of Eugene, at the southern end of the Willamette Valley. The Middle Fork and North Fork raise on the western side of the Cascades between Three Sisters south to Diamond Peak, with the Middle Fork in receipt of the North Fork northwest of Oakridge and flowing northwest from side to side the mountains to the southern end of the Willamette Valley. The Coast Fork rises in the lower mountains south of Cottage Grove, flowing north to join the Middle Fork 2 mi southeast of Eugene.

From Eugene, the joint river flows NNW across the plain of the southern Willamette Valley to Corvallis, and then follows a zigzag course past Albany and around the isolated hills in the central valley, passing west of downtown Salem. From Salem it flows north in a roundabout course across the northwest plain of the valley, reaching the hills at Newberg, where it turns sharply ENE along the hills, passing through an opening in the hills at Oregon City, the position of the Falls of the Willamette and the head of navigation. From Oregon City it flows northwest, past Lake Oswego and Milwaukie on the south edge of Portland, then passing between east and west Portland, where it is spanned by a series of urban bridges. Downstream of downtown Portland it flows northwest through the industrial port area of Portland Harbor, then splitting into two channels around Sauvie Island, both of which hook around to enter the Columbia from the west, with the main channel entering on the north edge of Portland and the smaller Multnomah Channel entering just about 15 mi NNW at St.Helens.

Tuesday, April 03, 2007

Traffic light

A traffic light or traffic signal is a signaling machine positioned at a road meeting point or walker crossing to indicate when it is secure to drive, ride or walk, using a worldwide color code.

History

In the 1920s, after continued obliteration of a normal traffic light in its Tipperary Hill Irish neighborhood, the City of Syracuse in the United States gave up and installed a traffic light with green on the top. The Irish had objected to the fact that "British" red was placed above "Irish" green.On 10 December 1868, the first traffic lights were installed outside the Houses of Parliament in London. They resembled railway signals of the time, with semaphore arms and red and green gas lamps for night use.

The modern electric traffic light is an American formation. As early as 1912, Salt Lake City policeman Lester Wire set up the first red-green electric traffic lights. On 5 August 1914, the American Traffic Signal Company installed a traffic signal system on the corner of 105th Street and Euclid Avenue in Cleveland, Ohio. Based on the design of James Hoge, it had two colors, red and green, and a signal to give a warning for color changes. The first three-color traffic lights were introduced in New York and Detroit in 1920.

The first interrelated traffic signal system could be seen in Salt Lake City, Utah in 1917, with six linked intersections restricted at the same time from a manual switch. Automatic control of interrelated traffic lights was introduced March 1922 in Houston, Texas

The first automatic tentative traffic lights in England were deployed in Wolverhampton in 1927.

Garrett Morgan is sometimes incorrectly credited as the inventor of the traffic light. See

Ampelmännchen traffic lights have come to be seen as a nostalgic sign for the former German Democratic Republic.

Thursday, March 29, 2007

Beaver Coins

100 Beaver Coins, also known in Pioneer days as Beaver Money, were gold coins for a short time minted by the Provisional Government of the Oregon Territory in the not on time 1840's. The coins were obtainable in $5 and $10 dollar denominations. Their name comes from the important Beaver depicted on the face of the coins. Today these coins are quite rare and precious.

The influx of settlers into the Oregon Country produced a deficiency of circulating currency. The inhabitants at the time resorted to using gold specks or minting their own gold coins for use in trading. Many settlers began lobbying the territory's new government to correct this condition.

The Provisional Territorial Legislature at Champoeg then gave the appreciation for the Oregon Exchange Company to mint currency. Although the Oregon Exchange Company was more often than not a personal organization, the territorial government set the coin's values, authorized a mint, and chosen the officers to the mint. The mint was situated in Oregon City, Oregon.

After Oregon's administrator U.S. territory rank, the Oregon Exchange Company became an completely personal enterprise ongoing its operations until Governor Joseph Lane ruled the operation illegal.

Sunday, March 25, 2007

Clock

A clock is an instrument for measuring time.Those used for technical purposes, of extremely high accuracy, are sometimes called chronometers. A portable clock is called a watch. The clock in its most common modern form displays the hours, minutes, and sometimes seconds that pass over a twelve or twenty-four-hour period.
The world's first self-striking clock was said to be invented by Chang Yeong-Sil, a chief enginner of Korea, in Korea during the Joseon Dynasty. It was called Chagyongru, which means "self-striking clock" in Korean
The development of electronics in the twentieth century led to clocks with no clockwork parts at all. Time in these cases is measured in several ways, such as by the behaviour of quartz crystals, or the decay of radioactive elements. Even mechanical clocks contain since come to be largely powered by batteries, removing the need for winding.

Tuesday, March 20, 2007

Peach

The peach (Prunus persica) is a tree that bears a juicy fruit of the same name. It has a single large seed enclosed in hard wood (called the "pit" or "stone"), yellow or whitish flesh, a delicate aroma, and a velvety skin. Peaches, along with cherries, plums and apricots, are stone fruits (drupes). Cultivated peaches are separated into freestone and clingstone varieties, depending on whether the flesh sticks to the pit; both kinds can be any color. Peaches with white flesh characteristically are very sweet with little acid flavor, while yellow-fleshed peaches classically have an acidic tang coupled with sweetness. Both colors often have some red on their skin. Low-acid white-fleshed peaches are the most popular kinds in China, Japan, and neighboring Asian countries, while Europeans and North Americans have historically favored the acidic, yellow-fleshed kinds.

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

Kashmir

Kashmir is known as heaven on the earth. In the seventeenth century the Mughal emperor Jahangir set his eyes on the valley of Kashmir. He said that if paradise is anywhere on the earth, it is here, while living in a house boat on the mesmerizing Dal Lake. The pleasure of the Mughal gardens makes every minute one spends in Kashmir a joy to the soul. In Jammu and Kashmir the most significant tourist places are Kashmir, Srinagar, Mughal gardens, Gulmarg, Pahalgam-the valley of shepherds, Jammu, Ladakh.
Because of the quite tolerable climate on the higher planes of Jammu and Kashmir, and also because of its scenic beauty and bodies of water, Jammu and Kashmir are a tourist attraction. Until a few decades ago, "Going to Kashmir" was synonymous in India with going on a honeymoon, or for a tour to a cold place during hot summers.
Some areas need a special permit for non-indians to visit.

Friday, March 09, 2007

Rameswaram

Rameswaram (Chennai to Rameswaram 572 km) is a small island in the Gulf of Mannar, is a major pilgrim centre. It is linked to the mainland by road and railway bridges. Rameswaram is a holy place because Sri Rama, on his return from Sri Lanka, offered his thanks to Lord Shiva and performed pooja to wash away his sin in killing the Demon King, Ravana.
Rameswaram is known for its 22 theerthas or wells in and around the main temple. This place is evenly sacred to both Vaishnavites and Shaivites. According to Hindu Mythology, if one visits Rameswaram and prays to Lord Shiva one will be relieved of one’s sins. It is 197 metres long.
The Ramanathaswamy temple is famous for its magnificent corridors and massive sculptured pillars. The third corridor of Ramanathaswamy temple is the longest one in the world.
Besides pilgrimage, Rameswaram Island has some places, which are ideal picnic spots. There are beautiful beaches at Olaikuda, Dhanushkodi and Pamban. The Olaikuda beach is 1 km from the main temple and s engulfed by coral reefs, which makes bathing in the sea safe and enjoyable. With diving glasses and respiration tubes, scuba diving is safe and possible. Flamingos, sea gulls and a variety of birds travel to the Rameswaram Island during winter.
Rameswaram is a main fishing centre of Tamil Nadu. Variety of fishes with export quality fish like prawns, sea cucumber, and lobster are available here. Rameswaram is also famous for its dry fish.