all that's buzzing

Best Skiing locations in India

2017-02-12T15:03:00.002+05:30

India is a cheap location for skiing. You can find a great value for money here. The various ski resorts in India are as follows:

Auli: It is an important ski location in Uttarakhand in North India. GMVNL provides facilities for skiing at this location. One needs a certificate for skiing here. The validity of the certificate ranges from 4 6to 14 days. One can also go for a skiing course here in case the person is an amateur. The first South Asian Winter Games were held here in the year 2011. The average cost of a skiing expedition here would be about Rs 2100 per person.

The nearest airport is at Dehradun which is at a distance of 170 km.

Gulmarg: Gulmarg is an important skiing destination in the state of Jammu and Kashmir in North India. It has been rated as Asia’s seventh best ski location. Anyhow it is not as cheap as other locations in India. A one night stay at an average hotel in Gulmarg would set you back by Rs 5000. Skiing activities are held at a height of 4200 m. The average cost of a skiing expedition here would be about Rs 2400 per person.

The nearest airport is Srinagar at a distance of 52 km.

Kufri: Kufri is located at in the state of Himachal Pradesh in North India. It is situated at a distance of 13 km from Shimla and is situated at NH 22. The average cost of a skiing expedition here would be about Rs 1400 per person.

There are a few potato plantations here. During winter they are cleared to make a path for skiing.

Lachung: Lachung is an important skiing location in the state of Sikkim in Eastern India. This place has been occupied by the Indian Army due to security issues. The government of India has recently opened the town for skiing in order to boost the economy of the region. Please note that a special permit is required to visit the place. The average cost of a skiing expedition here would be about Rs 3600 per person for the complete expedition.

Manali: Manali is an important location for skiing activities in India. This is the most frequented place for skiing. This is due to the tourist importance of Manali, easy transportation facilities and cheaper accommodation. Skiing activities are held in Rohtang during summers and it is closed during winters. The average cost of a skiing expedition here would be about Rs 800 per person.

The nearest airport is located at Bhuntar town at a distance of 52 km from Manali. Anyhow this place can be easily approached by other modes of communication as well.

Narkanda: Narkanda is an important skiing destination in North India. It is situated in the district of Shimla in the state of Himachal Pradesh in Northern India. The place can be well accessed through roadways. Skiing activities take place here in summers only. It is located at an altitude of 2700 km. The average cost of a skiing expedition here would be about Rs 1200 per person.

The nearest airport is Shimla.

Solang Valley: The Solang Valley is an important skiing location in North India. It is located at a distance of 14 km from Manali in the Kullu district. Unlike Manali, skiing activities are held here during winters and are replaced by Zobering in summers. It is considered to be one of the safest places for skiing in India. The average cost of a skiing expedition here would be about Rs 1350 per person.

The nearest airport is located at BhutBhutan

Yumthang Valley: Solang Valley is an important skiing location in North India. This valley is located at an altitude of 5000 m in the Eastern state of Sikkim. This place is not easily accessible. People usually travel from Gangtok to Lachung and rent a room there. Then an expedition is held from Lachung to Yumthang. Skiing events here may take a whole day. AQnyhow this is the toughest location for skiing and thus the most enjoyable one as well. The average cost of a skiing expedition here would be about Rs 3400 per person for the complete expedition.

The nearest airport is located at Gangtok.

Places to do White Water Rafting in India

2017-02-12T14:57:00.001+05:30

Rafting in India

Rafting is one of the most challenging adventure sport. It is navigation of water bodies through an inflatable raft. In India, white water rafting is usually done on fast moving North Indian rivers which derive their source from the High Himalayas. It is quite a fun activity.

Rapids and grades of rapids

Rapids are the sections of a river where the depth of the river bed is low and thus the velocity and turbulence of water increases. White water rafting activities are held in a river which has rapids. These rapids have grades. These grades are:

Grade 1: These rapids usually have flat water or very little current. Very basic paddling skills are required to raft through them.

Grade 2: These rapids have slight currents with small bubbles oozing out from beneath. Very basic paddling skills are required to raft through them.

Grade 3: These rapids have average currents and may have a slight fall as well. There may be small rocks as well. Anyhow they do not pose any danger as such. Experienced paddling skills are required to raft through them.

Grade 4: These rapids have large currents and may have a steep fall as well. There may be big rocks as well. Anyhow they do not pose any danger as such. Whitewater paddling skills are required to raft through them.

Grade 5: These rapids have larger currents and may have a very steep fall as well. There may be huge rocks as well. They do pose some any danger. Advanced whitewater paddling skills are required to raft through them.

Grade 6: These rapids are unnavigable. Most of them have never been experienced on a raft till date. Rafting through them may be life threatening as well.

Rafting in the Ganges River

Rishikesh is the most popular location for rafting in India. It is located near Haridwar in North India and is easily accessible by rail and road. Here, rafting starts from four points: Brahmapuri (9 km), Shivpuri (16 km), Byasi (26 km) and Kaudiyala (40 km) and ends at Rishikesh. Rafting for Brahmapuri is quite tame and is suitable for family trips. Anyhow this is not the case with rafting from Shivpuri and Byasi. This is because many grade 4 rapids like Black Money, Cross Fire, Three Blind Mice, body Surfing , Roller Coaster, Return to Sender, Golf Course, Club House, Return to Sender, Double Trouble, Hilton and Terminator come en route. Only mentally and physically fit young men can go for this adventure. Rafting from Kaudiyala can only be done by experienced people as there is a grade 4+ rapid called 'The Wall' in the way which cannot be tackled that easily.

Rafting in Alaknanda River

If rafting in Rishikesh seemed too tame, don't worry. There is more nearby. Take a 6 hour 165 km drive to Chamoli. You can find many grade 4+ and grade 5 rapids here. This expedition will take about 4 days.

Real Heroes Raft at the Brahmaputra

Unlike the Ganges, the Brahmaputra is really really wild. When the river enters India, it enters an area which receives heavy rainfall. This is where the river gains its vigour from. The river has many strong rapids like the 'Pulsating Pusi' and the 'Toothfairy' en route which are strong enough to give you the most fearful experience of your life. This rafting is a true adrenaline booster. You will first have to reach Arunachal Pradesh to reach here.

Risking life at the Zanskar River, Leh

So you think that the Brahmaputra was still not enough. No problem. There is a better (worse for some) option. Welcome to Zanskar River, Leh. At 11,450 rafting in the Zanskar river in no doubt the highest rafting expedition in the whole world. It's damn cold here. Water is 7-degree celsius and surroundings frozen. The river is situated in Ladakh which is itself quite inaccessible so don't expect any help in case of emergency. No mobile signal, no safety, too cold, toughest rapids, highest falls, roughest terrain. This is what I call fun.

Hobby Rafting at the Kali, Dandeli

So you are just a hobbyist and not an experienced adventurist and have no plans to go to the Alaknanda or the Brahmaputra or the Zanskar. You can raft at the Kali in Dandeli. This rafting is tame enough for first timers. Anyhow its quite expensive and short length.

Time Pass Rafting at Kundalika river, Kolad

Kolad is situated at a distance of 123 km from Mumbai. Rafting at the Kundalika river starts from here. There are a few grade 3 rapids here. Remember to book online in advance as there are no arrangments for the same on reaching Kolad.

Chilling Rafting in the Beas, Kulu

The Beas is a cold river and rafting here is quite pleasing especially because of the surrounding mountains which make a beautiful scenery. Rafting in usually done across two lengths - 7km and 14 km. The best the here is to jump out of the raft and go for body surfing in the chilling water.

Family Rafting at the Cauvery in Bhemeshwari

Okay, so you want to go on a family rafting trip. Go to the Cauvery river in Bhemeshwari. It is fine to rafting there even for little kids.

Rafting at Barapole River in Coorg

This river 'Barapole' has a few number of grade 2 and grade 3 rapids. First timers can also raft here.

Java program to check if a word is a Palindrome with user input from console

2014-04-21T09:51:00.001+05:30

In this program we would be making the user of BufferedReader to get the input from the user and then it would be saved in String 's'. After that we would be comparing the words from first to last to check if the word is a Palindrome. It works for both even and odd number of digits as the in case of odd number of digits the middle digit is ignored. There are some complex methods to shorten the code but if you are starting out then you should try this easy code.

package palindrome;
/**
*
* @author ankit
*/
import java.io.BufferedReader;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.InputStreamReader;

class Comp
{int counter=0; String s;
    Comp()
    {
        System.out.println("Enter the name");
        try{
            BufferedReader bufferRead= new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(System.in));
             s= bufferRead.readLine();
            for(int i=0;i<s.length();i++) {
            if( s.charAt(i) != '$' ) {
        counter=counter+1;
    }
            }
        }
        catch(IOException e)
        {System.out.println(e);}

    }
    int calc()
            {int a=0;
            for (int i=0;i<=(counter-1)/2;i++)
            { if(s.charAt(i)!=s.charAt(counter-i-1))
                a=a+1;
            }
            return a;
            }
}
public class Input {
public static void main(String[] args) {

        Comp in= new Comp();
        int x;
        x=in.calc();
if (x==0)
            System.out.println("It is Palindrome");
        else
            System.out.println("Not a palindrome");
}
}

DTH service providers: Videocon vs Reliance features and services comparison

2014-04-11T18:29:00.002+05:30

I will say that in today's time DTH services are playing a very important role for our entertainment. Now this service have been compulsorily applied to many states of our country. So whether you like it or not, you really have to go for any of the DTH service providers if you want to get the daily entertainment dose in case your cable TV operator has not switched to it. Here I will be discussing about two DTH services and they are Videocon and Reliance. Both of the companies are well known for their services, but now it is the time to check out which one of these will be able to provide you the best services when it comes to media entertainment.

Videocon vs Reliance

First let us see all the possible pros and cons of Videocon and as well as Reliance Big TV:

When it comes to Reliance Big TV you will be able to access all the 250 channels in HD, in other words you can say that the channels will be available in up-scaled HD like quality with video resolution of 1080p at 50 Hz which is really cool. In Reliance Big TV picture and sound quality is awesome. Videocon also delivers good picture and audio quality. In this term both are good.
Reliance is really good in offering you packages of different channels, when compared to all DTH packages and prices you will find that Reliance is really good in that. Same thing you will be able to see in Videocon, with this service provider also all the channels are available at low price, and even the package prices are good. The best thing is that you will be able to order a lot of paid movie channels and Videocon provides you good amount of channels that too in good quality. The pack of packages in both the services are carefully organized to provide you the best return on your money.
Both of the services are using MPEG-4 technology, so in this field both are doing their best job. But the challenging task is to keep up its service when it is raining. When it comes to Reliance then you will surely have less rain fade issue, and even I would say that Videocon also stands in the same line when it is raining heavily.
Reliance somewhere does lack in doing a lot of publicity. In the area of clarity, even the infrastructure of this service is not properly build and may be because of this, Reliance is not that famous. The same is with Videocon, even it have not been able to succeed much in the market like Dish TV and Airtel DTH. So according to me both the services have not be able to properly showcase all their features in a good way.
If you see overall then Reliance Big TV does not have any major disadvantage, but the worst thing is that it has an irritating large logo, which is not even transparent making it quite difficult to ignore it as well. The software also has some problems because of which sometimes hanging problem of STB appears. It does not have a good EPG (Electronic program guide) and may be the reason for all this is Incorrect package activation and bad customer service.
When we talk about disadvantages of Videocon then it has been observed that a lot of customers are reporting about pixelation problem and here also the STB software is not that good and even the range compression level at which it is applied is very low. For those who do not know what is DRC, it is a technique which is applied to equalize sound intensity, for example if you have a very high velocity sound coming with great beats and if high DRC is applied then sound will change to very low intensity with beats flattened thus giving you a poor audio experience.

Wrap up

We could not find much difference in the quality of the service of both the providers. Except for the issue of the opaque logo in Reliance Big TV, both the services are almost equal in their pricing, quality and customer support.

C++ important interview questions and exam notes

2014-01-03T12:56:00.002+05:30

Important benefits OOPS programming in C++
Encapsulation- Securing data in single unit in form of class.
Data Abstraction- Creating new user defined data types modeling real world entities complete with built in data type properties and allowed operators.
Inheritance- Allows a sub class to inherit the properties of the base class. Help avoid the problem of rewriting the code again and again in a program.
Multiple Inheritance- Type of inheritance where there are multiple base classes each with its own instance variable
Polymorphism- Single name/operator associated with multiple operations depending on the type of data. It is done by operator overloading, function overloading and dynamic binding (virtual functions).
Message Passing- It invokes an operation on an object by passing a message
Genericity- It is declaration of data items without specifying data type. It is done when the data type is not fixed and varies according to the data passed to it. Example is sort() function. It is realized through function templates and class templates.
Delegation- Based on the object view that an object can be a collection of multiple objects and relationships. That is it has a has a relationship or containership relationship. It is quite similar to inheritance in that it passes (delegates) a receiving operating to its delegate.
Persistence- Object outlives the existence of its program execution period and exists during the program execution too. Supported in C++ by use of file streams.
Extensibility- This is what is done by inheritance and abstract classes. They allow the extension of a software or function.
Types of programming paradigm and to which does C++ belong?
Monolithic, Structural, Procedural and Object Oriented
C++ belongs to Object Oriented programming type
Types of Object based programming and differences
Object based languages- Encapsulation + Object identity
Object oriented languages- Object based + Inheritance + Polymorphism
Dynamic binding or late binding refers to the binding of the procedure call to the address code which executes when the procedure is called. This means that the code to be executed is unknown till it is called at run time.
C++ was developed by Bjarne Stroustrup in AT&T Bell laboratories in 1980.
Memory allocation for objects: Static (preallocated by compiler in fixed global memory), automated (allocated on stack) and dynamic (allocated on heap).
It C++ it is possible to access a global variable with the same name as the local variable with the help of scope resolution operator (::)
Reference variables are used a value variable but have the power of pointer variable. Reference variables are called as an alias for the actual variable. Constant values do not have an alias; i.e. int &b=a[100] will give compilation error.
Inline function is used where the function is small to avoid the overhead of jumping to another function. Member functions defined inside a class are considered inline and those outside the class are not treated inline.
In C++, basic data types can easily be converted with implicit type conversion or explicit type conversion routines for which are provided by the compiler itself.
Function templates are programs which possess the functionality of many functions which themselves are different only due to their parameters and local variable data types.
new in C++ is similar to malloc() and calloc() of C and similarly delete operator in C++ is similar to free of C. Important to call delete after new to ensure that the allocated heap space is returned back to the system.
Constructor is a member function having same name as of the class and is executed automatically when the class is instantiated. It is possible to overload a constructor.
Destructor is used (~classname) to reclaim the memory allocated to an object. A class has only 1 destructor.
Access specifiers like private and public are used to set access permissions to a class.

Facebook role playing game Syfy Monster Island review

2013-12-26T19:51:00.000+05:30

Pros and cons of Syfy Monster Island
Pros: Interesting turn based combat game, can use friend's avatars, customizable weapons, varied type of monsters
Cons: Inner interesting (best part) of the game are premium with are quite expensive

Detailed review of the Facebook game Syfy Monster Island

It seems as if nobody is ready to give the monsters a well deserved break! Even when they are alone on an island some enthusiastic people have to fly to the island, experiment on them, fight them with bullets, knock out a few bones and take them as gifts for the tribesmen.

This is how Syfy Monster game developed by Sneaky games starts out, but then such games make for an apparently interesting story line. What could have been a boring flick on the TV turns quickly into interesting action based rescue mission. The game quickly shows it social features when you have to start interacting with your friends for playing the game. Syfy Monster features some amazingly strange monsters to capture but alas the high prices to play this game take away the fame it could have got as an amazingly enjoyable social adventure game.

However, it does not mean that Syfy Monster Island is an original idea. The ideas in the game closely remember to that of Dragon Age Legends, starting from the customizable base of operations to the turn-based combat that makes you remember the Final Fantasy series.

Your customizable character gets the same knife and machine gun in the start but soon after the fourth level you start to get some changes. You start receiving a number of quests which slowly start to reveal the narrative between the blind slaughters that you do. It all feels like a second grade movie stuff taking into account the story line; however, the sound track and the characters that guides us during the gameplay have been designed perfectly keeping in mind the feel of the game and you do seem to get in that flow while playing Syfy Monster Island.

However, as it goes with Dragon Age Legends, there is no other aspect of the game that is as good as the combat part. Fights are interesting to do in the start and occasionally get challenging in the later parts of the game. You will get to fight many different creatures from the Mega Croc to the hybrids like Sharkopus. Syfy Monster Island may be a turn based game but you can enlist the help of up to 3 of your friend's avatars that will fight for your cause complete with the battle gear they have accumulated in their own games. Though this is not a multiplayer game but this approach encourages gift sharing with friends as these gifts will not be only helpful for your friends but later will also help you to progress in the game. If you do not have any of your friends playing the game even then you need not worry as you can fill these empty slots with a couple of NPC companion.

This is only a little part of the game and players willing to go into the deeper reaches of the island might enjoy displaying these captured beasts at their bases. These are harvested for quest items as mentioned in the start of this review. Just be ready to pay with real money if you want to get the best out of the game.

The worst part of this game is nothing else than the premium this game asks for certain items, for example companions can cost you around $5 and there is also a special agent card that costs $17. In short if you are not careful with this game then you could end up spending much more of this fun but light weight game than the fun is worth of. This is especially true because Syfy Monster Island will keep you bombarding with notifications to buy these things.

Anyhow, except for the price issue there are only a few things to bug you. We seem to have to wait for a long time for energy renewal and also a technical bug seems to show your avatar in underwear before it is equipped with its combat gear. Otherwise, Syfy Monster Island is a fun and polished game to spend your time with. Any old monster movies fan and Syfy's own Saturday Original movies fan is going to like this game. Although this is not an original idea but this game still stands out from the rest and adds to the Syfy's list of highly enjoyable social games.

Android multiple choice objective questions

2013-12-25T18:20:00.001+05:30

Android multiple choice questions

To perform inter-communication between activities or services ______ is required:

Binder
Intent
AIDL
Service

How to set a launcher activity?

using application node in AndroidManifest.
using Layout node in main.xml
using string.xml
None of the above

Which Intent ACTION is required to launch GPS Setting activity?

ACTION_CAPTURE
ACTION_GPS_ENABLE
ACTION_VIEW
ACTION_LOCATION_SOURCE_SETTINGS

If user can interact with the activity, then the activity is in ______ state

Foreground
Background
Suspended
Dead

Which method needs to be called to stop an activity

finish()
end()
destroy()
None of the above

How to enable your application to receive a SMS?

using action android.provider.Telephony.SMS_RECEIVED
using action android.provider.Telephony.RECEIVE_SMS
using BroadcastReceiver component
using 1,2 and 3 all together

How to define standard interface for IPC using services?

Using ARI
Using AIDL
Using UUID
Using INTENT

______ is the file extension for a Silverlight-based application package.

ipa
apk
xap
apx

______ includes a list of phone capabilities that the application needs to use, the default main page, the application's icon and background images.

ApplicationManifesh.xml
WMAppManifest.xml
AppManifest.xml
PhoneAppManifest.xml

The tasks which launch a feature and do not return a value are called as:

Launcher
Choosers
Simple Tasks
Complex Tasks

The tasks which launch a feature and do return a value are called as:

Launcher
Choosers
Simple Tasks
Complex Tasks

How to pass integer value to next Activity?

using Intent class method putExtra(String name, int value)
using Intent class method putInt(String name, int value)
using Bundle class method putExtra(String name, int value)
using Bundle class method putIntExtra(String name, int value)

In stopped state an activity can do

Nothing
UI Creation
IPC
Internet Communication

In which year the OHA (Open Handset Alliance) is announced?

2001
2002
2005
2007

_____ class allows to perform background operations and publish results on UI thread without having to manipulate threads or handlers.

Service
AsyncTask
Thread
None of the above

The ____ method is called when bindService is used to start a service

onBind()
onStartCommand()
onServiceBind()
onServiceStartCommand()

What is the use of ADT plugins

to enable Android application debugging with Eclipse
to enable Android application development with Eclipse
to enable Android application packaging with Eclipse
All of the above

Which amongst these is not a native library?

Dalvik
SGL
OpenGL
SQLite

When Android boot finishes _____ broadcast message is sent by System

ACTION_BOOT_COMPLETED
ACTION_BOOT_FINISH
ACTION_BOOT_DONE
BOOT_LOADING_COMPLETE

_____ compiler compiles .class files into .dex files

dx
javac
dexer
None of the above

_____ process is responsible for starting Android Virtual machine

init
zygote
system service
kernel

What is a Nine Patch PNG?

a image that takes less space
a image that cannot be modified again
a image with stretchable areas
a image with collapsible areas

_____ method is used to launch another activity

startActivity()
launchActivity()
showActivity()
displayActivity()

When startActivityForResult() is used which of the following callback method is called

onActivityResult()
onActivityStartup()
onResult()
onStartup()

The unbound service can be started by

startService()
createService()
showService()
None of the above

_____ class needs to be subclasses to create database in Android

SQLiteOpenHelper
SQLiteHelper
SqliteOpenHelper
Sqlite Helper

To register Broadcast Receiver in AndroidManifest.xml file ____ element is used

receiver
broadcast_receiver
broadcastreceiver
None of the above

______ Action is required to make an activity as startup activity

android.intent.action.MAIN
android.intent.action.Main
Android.intent.Action.Main
Android.Intent.Action.Main

Which one of the following tag is used to use permission?

<permission..>
<uses-permission..>
<create-permission..>
<use-permission..>

_____ property indicates what proportion of the free space should go with the widget?

android:layout_width
android:layout_height
android:layout_weight
android:gravity

The weight for widget is _____ by default

0
1
-1
0.5

_____ property tells Android to slide the contents of the widget or container in a particular direction

android:gravity
android:layout_gravity
android:alignment
android:layout_alignment

The file system used till Android 2.3 is

YAFFSV2
ext2
NTFS
FAT

_____ gives activity specific preferences

getSharedPreferences()
getPreferences()
getDefaultSharedPreferences()
None of the above

Implicit intent required to pass _____ to its constructor

Class
Name of the class
Action
Path to the class

The max limit of the message sent using C2DM is ___ while that in GCM is

1kb and 4 kb
2kb and 8 kb
4kb and 4kb
1kb and 10 kb

____ layer in Android is responsible for memory management

Kernel
Libraries
Application Frameworks
Applications

____ are ways of organizing multiple widgets into some sort of structure

Containers
Holders
ViewHolders
ViewFlippers

The first emulator starts on ____ port

5558
5556
5552
5554

____ handles mounting and formatting the volumes and images

volume
vold
systemmanager
keystore

____ action is used in intent to launch phone application with number

ACTION_PHONE
ACTION_DIAL
ACTION_PHONE_NUMBER
ACTION_MAKE_CALL

Accelerometer gives displacement in ____ unit

m/s
m/s²
mm/s
mm/s²

Which of the following class is required to communicate with content provider

ContentResolverManager
ContentProviderResolver
ContentProviderManager
ContentResolver

Which of the following tag is required to register a content provider

<provider>
<contentprovider>
<content_provider>
<content-provider>

Which one of the following utilities is used to sign an Android application

signer
jarsigner
signjar
jarsign

Unverified answers, please use discretion

PC game: Grave Mania- Undead Fever review

2013-12-12T20:35:00.001+05:30

Pros and cons of Grave Mania- Undead Fever
Pros: Cute graphics, upgrades carry over to next level
Cons: Inconsistent game play, short games in between break your quest flow, difficulty level increases suddenly from basic to high.

Detailed game review of Grave Mania- Undead Fever

Spooky games are always interesting and amusing as the cool graphics and the spooky storyline will always keep you glued. Grave mania- undead fever is one game that sticks to this genre but its high handed difficulty makes it a very tough nut to crack. Let us now have a peek over the insights of the game.

The storyline of Grave Mania-Undead Fever is not as spooky in comparison to other spooky games. It would appear to you as a Halloween centric game as the game is full of zombies but actually is a true time skills testing game. The storyline starts with a city where the people residing there eat a delicious pie which causes a plague all over the city.

Now you are placed in the role of a couple who have to travel the whole country and there by trap and prepare the zombies for their final resting place through a series of beauty saloons. As you move further in the game the number of beauty stations or saloons will increase and these stations may formaldehyde storage bin to a complete dressing room where the zombies will also be asking for new attires. There is a lot of pampering needed before you guide your zombies to the grave. Sometimes the bones in the zombies may not be properly aligned and for serving that purpose you have beauty stations where bone alignment is done.

Sometimes your zombies may request you for some external accessories and make up, and then there are beauty stations serving these purposes. Sometimes in the game, situations do arise when your zombie breaks free of all its restraints. At that point of time, you are required to tap on them so that you hit them on their head. This will make the zombie stable. Then you are required to throw each zombie to its coffin so that it is moved back to the graveyard. As you have seen in the storyline, you are provided with a lot of beauty stations each of them having a unique purpose. So you can see that inside a game, there are a lot of mini games which are provided in the form of beauty stations. In fact, in every beauty station you are required to act in a different way like in the formaldehyde storage bin, you are supposed to tap on the vials so that it fills the formaldehyde in a line but one thing that should be taken care of is that it should not spill over. Now in the beauty station for external accessory and makeup, you are supposed to move your zombie through a series of outfits until your zombie shows its happiness with a smile which shows that you have chosen the right outfit. Now successfully accomplishing these tasks will help you to add stars to the patience of zombies i.e. if you have more stars then your zombie would be more patient. But the real pinch happens when you are supposed to handle 8-9 zombies at a single time and all requiring your attention which increases your difficulty.

On the whole even the game Grave Mania- Undead Fever has unique graphics and storyline which is really believable, the difficulty level makes it a rather a tough nut to crack.

Zombie, Inc. review- time management game

2013-12-12T20:26:00.002+05:30

Storming the streets when the sun goes down, with a motive of fulfilling the basic need of survival, the need to eat... With pale, white skin and blank eyes, these half dead creatures roam around in the search of human flesh... feeding to their very sustenance, bringing about the apocalypse of the world.

Basically, Zombies Inc. is a time management strategy game, about the walking dead coming into business, very frightening thought of two deadly combinations. This game has been introduced by Athos Games.

Athos Games, formerly known as Psyflash Productions, have developed some really cool games like Coin Hunter, Orb Hunter, Telegrave, Visible, Revert to Growth, Thief's Escape.

The basic requirement for the game Zombies, Inc. is to maintain the sustenance of an undead dominated world and along with it to satisfy the needs of running a multinational company.
The goal is to earn good dough of money so as to make it easy to build a legion of the walking dead to conquer the world.

The gamer, here, is the CEO of a multinational incorporation. The mission is to gather enough money to develop an army of the undead, the zombies. To conquer the world is the primary goal of the gamer. The jest to the story is that, the CEO of Zombies, Inc. has to conquer thirteen territories along with unlocking zombies and also upgrading the present zombies. All this is done by selling items to the zombie population and upgrading the status of Zombie Incorporation and governing the world. There are thirty achievements in total to unlock, distributed across three major challenges.

The game is completely mouse controlled. Zombies Inc. has been spread across over four departments.

The first department focuses on "Zombies". This department concentrates on growing and developing the legions of the walking dead. It also deals with the upgradation of the zombies.

The second is the "Attack" screen. Here, the gamer coordinates the various attacks. From the Northern Arctic Circle to the inhabited Circle of Antarctic in the South, the attacks can be designated wherever the user wants it to be. The number territories conquered is directly proportional to the concentration of the zombie population across the world, which is also the primary goal of the game.

Then there is the "Sales" department. Considering that the zombie population serves as main market for the sales of Zombie Inc., the need for empowering more and more territories increases. The sales department basically deals researching and releasing new and quality products for the zombie population.

The last department handles the "Company Upgrades" screen. The gamer here, buys and acquires bonuses to support the whole Zombies Inc.

Each of these departments gives opportunities to unlock and upgrade different zombies at different stages, and also upgrading different products to sell, but by paying an amount to all this.

This combo of deadly business gives the gamer a good bite on the zombie based time strategic games. The interface is addictive as well as humorous.

But there is also a criticism along, the part of earning and fighting seems unnecessarily confusing. The event pop-ups are also very irritating.

Even though having a few cons in sum of its parts, Zombies, Inc. is a pursuing game that's fun to play.

iOS puzzle game: Munch time review

2013-12-12T20:22:00.001+05:30

Sometimes some games can appear seemingly easy but can take your toll to master upon. One such game is the munch time which is simple yet difficult. Munch Time is a iOS based game with really lively graphics which will keep you glued to the game. It is a rather simple game but it takes time to master it. Now let us have a quick peek into the insights of the game.

In the game you have to guide Munch, a chameleon, to his lunch. You are provided with various levels and difficulty which will increase according to the levels. The game is complete physics based puzzle where you have to guide Munch to his destination by tapping a specified location. One thing that should be noted here is that Munch cannot jump or move on the bulges instead you have to move the chameleon to the various colored flowers and tap them so that munch can catch the flowers with it's long lizard tongue.

Now you will be thinking if the game is so simple then why I have called the game as physics based puzzle. Now let us have a peek over the physics aspect of the game. The physics aspect lies in the latching of Munch, the speed, momentum and direction of munch all depends on its position of latch or more specifically the place from where the Munch latches. If you take a situation where Munch chances to catch a flower from above and right, then the Munch will move in high speed in the clockwise direction. Now, the twist in the game is once you have used most of the flowers, you are not supposed to use them again. So one thing that you should take due care is to remember the flowers Munch has munched otherwise you can end up to a used flower and will have no way to proceed. As stalling can affect Munch's momentum, the players have to take due care to move on to flowers with speed and accuracy.

If you look at the technicalities of the game, the characterization of Munch is commendable with its long versatile tongue. In addition to this, the visuals are really amusing which will keep you glued to the game. The deceptively simplicity of the game can make you feel that you can master it easily but once you actually play the game you will lament about your mistake. Games pacing is also really good. Initially you are provided with less number of flowers but gradually it increases. In the end you can also get some fireflies which when munched by munch can change the color of munch. So, on the whole, the iOS game, Munch Time is technically pretty sound.

Now let us have the final look on the game. Munch Time is a really cool game which will make you go gooey with excitement with its amusing visuals, deceptive simplicity and commendable characterization. There are some added interesting notes in the game like the inclusion of permanently rotating flowers and flowers which can blast. Pacing of the game is also really commendable. So, on the whole, it is a package that you should not miss.

iOS game Kingdoms of Camelot: Battle for the North review

2013-12-12T20:16:00.001+05:30

Facebook gamers will be familiar with the game Kingdoms of Camelot: Battle for the North. It is a hardcore action game with slow paced strategy and that's enough to say that it has succeeded in attracting a good following over a number of years. The game is quite similar to Evony and is now available as an upgrade on the iOS with the title Kingdoms of Camelot: Battle for the North. There is no change in the game play and most of the story remains the same except for the fact that it is now available on mobile devices. That said, Kingdoms of Camelot is not a easy game even for new players.

For those unfamiliar with this came let's delve into the details of this game. This is a big multiplayer game where players have to together build up a kingdom from the ground. You are required to build your kingdom by constructing on plots of land and forcing your way through anything that comes in your path, including other players, by the army of thousands you will gather by expanding your kingdom. Till this end of theme there is nothing different in the iOS version except of course the clicks being replaced with taps.

As a new player you start off with building structures and managing resources. The resources include lumber, food, stone, and population and so on. All of these resources are connected and used somewhere. You are given a small piece of land where you use these resources to build structures, increase population to be used in army and in farms, food to feed the population and gold to make purchases. Gold is collected as taxes from the population which makes them unhappy and you are then forced to make structures or purchase buyable items for them to keep their anger in check.

This all might sound a bit confusing, but there is a guide system in place to help you through the new tasks step by step and a quest system which will guide you in the whole game on what should be done next. In fact, new players are given ample resources and monetary benefits in the start.

The best thing about this is that you need not go on managing the resources throughout the game, once you have made the required structures the resources are produced passively. Also, once you have done the basics required for buildings and any associated units that are produced, you get several minutes to hours to do some research roaming in the kingdom because the production takes so much of time. You can use this time constructively by familiarizing yourself with the game, researching new technology which will help you in increasing the effectiveness of your production units and also in upgrading your structures to newer levels on efficiency. This will decrease you time play as the production tasks will start to take less and less time. This might not be to the liking for some of the players but for playing this game on iOS mobile device the shortening in time doesn't sound too bad.

For accelerating the game further you can also opt for the virtual currency which can be bought by using real money. This currency is called "Gems" and can be used for a variety of purposes like accelerating construction speed or buying defense or offence for your army. This is a nice feature in the game as you cannot go too competitive on a mobile device.

As mentioned earlier, this game is massively multiplayer where players can attack any other player. Though the new players are granted a secure time of 7 days but they prove too less when a veteran player bulldozes through your defenses, takes away your earnings and flattens your army. There is no level playing field here and if you want to keep going alone then you will be thrown out soon; the only way to keep up in the game is to form alliances. Aside from this complain the only other con of Kingdoms of Camelot: Battle for the North is that it is not much different its genre predecessor Evony.

At conclusion I will say that if are ready to face the constant attacks in your kingdom then there is nothing bad in this game. The game proceeds slowly due to delay by the production units but as now it is on a mobile device you can always take off a few minutes to manage your kingdom with the aid of the push notifications which will keep you updated on the proceedings. If you were a fan of the Facebook version of Kingdoms of Camelot then you will like to play the game on your Apple device too. It is sad however that you cannot connect the iOS rendition to the Facebook one. For the new players only one suggestion- do not get disappointed by a lot of loses in the start.

House of 1000 doors hands-on review

2013-12-12T20:02:00.000+05:30

Pros: Varied location design, easy navigation, clear objectives, complex puzzle design
Cons: Ghost rescue not an original idea, bonus chapter feels forced on game narration
Price:$13.99

As any successful author and they will tell you that more than failure it is the success that bugs them. House of 1000 Doors: Family Secrets is a rescue missions to save the dead- the haunted souls. It is a hidden object adventure of one player who actually is a writer. There is nothing path breaking in this game but yeah, it is one of the good games with intricately designed interface and gameplay.

The game starts with the game character, author Kate suffering from some writer's block. With nothing coming to her mind and her career as an author on the brink of going down there appears a strange box on her doorsteps. The box contains an invitation to a séance. Though the invitation is unusual but Kate always wanted to attend a séance. Relieved at this opening to take a break from here nowhere proceeding work Kate jumps at this opportunity, takes a cab and reaches the location to find it one a ruse- it is actually only an entry to an inter-dimensional mystery.

The center of game is a titular "House of 1000 Doors", which is a house continuously travelling through space and time. The house is filled not only with haunted spirits with various gifted mediums you help these spirits move on to the next plane. Reason best known to her, Kate is blessed with psychic powers that make her a prime candidate for the transcendental troupe, which are soon proved true by here encounters with the haunted spirits of the house. The aim of Kate in the game is help the spirits of the house to figure out the stuff and to uncover a murder mystery to restore her dead grandmother's name who was blamed for this murder. It might look quite a bit of work for a single girl Kate (one player) but thanks to the smooth interface and easy play, the game never feels to complex.

Most of the hidden object scenes use the easy way out in designing the interface. You enter a location, realize you need a hidden object and look for the item by way of a hidden object scene nearby. The basic gameplay of House of 1000 Doors: Family Secrets is totally similar but the puzzles, items and the answers to the puzzles are weaved together in the gameplay so intricately that the narrative feels as if it opening up as you go on solving a previous problem. This designing is unlike other hidden object games where the object finding feels like individual scenes, clumsily clubbed together.

The depth of the game is one of its biggest advantages. Except that a mechanic allows you to travel between different dimensions through dimensions. It provides a nice change of scenery and also opens up big scopes for designing of new titles of House of 1000 doors. The map has been cleanly designed which helps you to know your next objective and also teleport to that location easily. The graphics are mostly good except for some characters which looked unnaturally drawn. The audio is not world class but does the job without sounding strange.
Of course like most other games House of 1000 Doors is far from perfect. It has its own sets of problems. The first issue is with originality. A few ideas like helping spirits find their way towards light, evil theatre and toyshop owner are extremely exploited ideas. Add to that that every third hidden object is related to ghosts. Why can't developers of hidden object games find some new idea is out of my imagination? And the second disappointment is a forced abrupt ending. Though all other hidden object games end like this but while playing House of 1000 doors for one second I thought that Alawar developers are doing something ground breaking by offering us a choice of ending the game but it was not so. And finally the games bonus chapter does have a better game play but speaking in terms of game narrative it feels somewhat forced on.

House of 1000 doors is not a ground breaking game but is still a worthwhile and hard to miss hidden object game. Though the theme is copied and not much has been changed with the game play but the intricacy of the game, different location design and clear objectives along with easy navigation makes it a good game to play.

What is the importance of backlink and Page Rank?

2013-12-12T19:41:00.000+05:30

The questions which we will be covering in this Zlob are What is a backlink? What are internal and external links? Why is it important to have quality backlinks? What are quality backlinks? What is page rank? And What is Dofollow and Nofollow?

What is a backlink?

In simple terms backlink is a HTML clickable link from any site to your site or website page.
The link should be the URL or web address on your page.
This simple means that if any other website puts a link from his page to any of your page in your website then it is counted as a backlink. The link can be in any form, it can be a text, picture or a button- the main thing is that by clicking on it the browser should open your page in the same window, another tab or in another window.

What is the difference between internal and external links?

An internal link- points to a page in your own website or blog. For example if you write any Zlob and post a link pointing to a page in Zlobber will be termed as an internal link.

An external link- points to a page in another blog or website. It means that any link not containing zlobber.com as the starting address is an external link. For example if you add a link from your Blogspot blog to Zlobber then it is a external link.

What is the need to create backlinks to your articles?

Backlinks are created for two reasons:

For referred traffic- Whenever people see a link with anchor text (explained below) that interests them then they will visit your page through that link.
Search engine reputation- Search engines give any page some value or let’s call it points. Now if there is a link in that page to another page especially an external link then the points for the page whose link is given increases. So a backlink in simple terms has the power to increase your search engine ranking.

How to create the best backlinks?

Not all backlinks give you the maximum profit. A few things are to be taken care of to make quality backlinks:

Anchor text- The words which are used to create a link are called anchor text. It is important that these words point to the subject matter of the page which is linked. An anchor text with unrelated anchor text will do no good.
Subject of article- Not only the anchor text but the subject of the article also matters when creating a backlink. For example if you create a link from a food recipe article to a Windows related article then such a link is going to do no good. People who have to come to see recipes are rarely going to be interested in Windows related articles. Therefore it is better to link to sites having similar subject matter as you.
Site quality- Opening a Blogspot blog and writing a small article for the sake of a link is not going to do any good to you. Nor you will get any referred visitor but search engines too won’t give you any points for link from such a site. Now for example if you are able to get a link from Microsoft to a Microsoft related article in your site then it is the best you can do.

Are all backlinks good or at least harmless?

No, this is not the case. However most will say that it is not the case and even I don’t have a proof of it but it is suggested to avoid backlinks from:

Spam or adult sites unless your own site is an adult one.
Articles which have no relation to the article you are linking.

However I do not say that it is a total waste of time to get a backlink from a less reputed site even if the article is related. Who knows that site just might become famous one day and in such scenario that backlink is going to be highly profitable to you. And as higher quality links are hard to make you should not entirely avoid making low quality backlinks.

What are the places where I can easily make some backlinks?

There are some easy ways to get backlinks. Here are a few:

Forums- Some sites allow external links in forum footer or otherwise in quality responses or reputed users.
Blogs: Search for blogs having similar type of content by using Google search (“inurl:blog” (your subject) and in the quality blogs leave a valid comment and include backlinks to your site through it.
Answer sites- Sites like Yahoo! Answers or Answerbag. Note that Yahoo! Answers requires you to be at least on level 2 to make links.
Blog directories offering Dofollow links like followlist
Social Bookmarking sites like Digg, Stumbleupon, Twitter, Facebook and redgage

Through guest posts- This is the best method however requires time to create a quality article which most blog owners except and offer Dofollow links in return.

Difference between Dofollow and Nofollow

If you are not even a basic technical person or have just learnt a few HTML tricks then you can stop now. All the important points about Backlinks have been discussed above. However if you can understand a few basic HTMLs and a comfortable will very basic coding then read on to know a little more about backlinks.

Google and other search engines have provided authors some controls to authors to tell the search engine bots how to consider a particular link. By adding some attributes authors tell bots what to do with a link.
Nofollow attribute tells the Google bots not to follow the linked page. This also stops from yur points being donated to the linked page. Therefore Nofollow links do not help in increasing your site reputation in search results.
Dofollow tells web crawlers that it is okay to follow the other page and that we recommend other page. These links improve your search engine reputation.
These tags do not interfere with the working of links for a human user and are only for the Web crawlers or search engine bots.

What are paid backlinks?

Some reputed website owners night ask you some amount to create backlinks to your site. In such a case the backlink can be called a paid one. However I suggest no to pay for backlinks. There is no dearth of reputed sites which will offer backlinks with just some quality write-ups.

Is it possible to create too many backlinks?

No, it is very difficult to get backlink from reputed sites leave aside creating too many backlinks. However there are some black hat methods where some people offers some xyz number of backlinks for a payment. I suggest not going for such offers as these backlinks are created in low quality websites which might be taken up as Google as link spamming and instead of increasing your sites reputation it might end up harming it.

What is Page Rank (PR)?

Page Rank is given by Google which ranges from 0 to 10. All websites start their PR from 0 and the higher a site has its PR higher the placement of their articles in the search engines. A lot of things help in determining the PR of a site. I have seen sites getting PR 3 within a span of 3 months as well as in 6 months. One of the site I am talking about is Thoughtfromgeeks which got its PR 3 in just 3 months and the other site is Googleplustips which got PR 3 in 6 months. As I was personally associated with Googleplustips I know that it got that rank due to the quality content and timely posting of the relevant articles. GPT got its PR 3 with just 60 articles. As for Thoughtfrokgeeks, backlinks and quality content help them get that PR.

Please note that SERP (Search Engine Results Page) is one thing and PR another. SERP is where you rank in search for a particular or set of keywords whereas PR denotes the overall ranking of the site. However, if you have high PR then your SERP will also be high.

Is site’s PR the same as page PR?

Most backlinks will point to the landing page and not the Homepage.
Pages within the site will obviously have more value if the Homepage is ranked higher. However it is not suggested to link the Homepage unless the article at other site is specifically about your site. The rank of the site should be increased by increasing the rank of the internal pages.

Are advertisement links also counted as backlinks like of Adwords?

No, the ads of Google or other advertising firms are Nofollow and hold no value in search engines. There are not even read by the search engines. Moreover as they keep on rotating they wouldn’t hold any value in any case.

Best institutes and subjects for CDAC and placement opportunities

2013-11-09T11:40:00.001+05:30

CDAC (Center for Development of Advance Computing) is a Government established program which is both a research center and a training institute. With its center at Pune and branches across Indian, CDAC has a became a preferred choice for students of Engineering and MCA to get excellent placement opportunities in case they are not able to get them from then Bachelor or Master’s degree program. It is also a good choice for professionals who want to improve their resume by adding a plethora of programming languages in their skill set. Let’s see the best CDAC Intitutes (Those highlighted in red color are placement centers):

Banglore (Knowledge Park)- Pune might be the center of CDAC but due to the presence of more programming related industries in the area and the southern habit of making you work like anything, Banglore has the best placements. Please do note that CDAC was started with the “DAC” course and even now the main focus of CDAC is on DAC only. DAC department is given the best faculty and all efforts of the institute are focused on them, be it placement or teaching. This is the same for all CDAC institutes. Classes are of around 9 hours starting from 9 AM in the morning and you won't get any holiday except of national holidays.
Pune- Pune being the headquarter and present in south, the southern culture makes the students work like anything. You will be having classes from 9 AM in the morning to anywhere till 8-9 PM all 7 days of the week. Holidays will be rare and you should expect them only during national holidays.
Hyderabad- Hyderabad is also a IT hub and will get you excellent placements. Present in south the students are given a heavy toll of work just like in Banglore and Pune.
Banglore- The second branch of CDAC in Banglore also gets the benefit of many IT industries present in south and again the southern culture of studying.
Noida- CDAC Noida is also present in industrial area and is one of the placement centers. However, the placement scenario is not as good as other CDAC centers mentioned above. DAC department February 2013 batch got around 10 placements and other departments excluding the Embedded department had almost negligible placements. Embedded department had around 50% placement track courtesy a number of embedded industries located in Noida and Gurgaon. This center has Saturday and Sunday off with the class timing from 9.30 AM to 5 PM.

Other CDAC centers and affiliated institutes have very less placement track though but if you do want to join one of them I would suggest you preferably go for the southern centers rather than the other ones. Similarly, CDAC centers are to be preferred rather than the affiliated centers.

Subjects to select

If you are just going for placements then DAC is the subject to go for. CDAC doesn't put much efforts in the other branches and that is the reason for poor performance of these branches. If you are really interested in some other subject then you will have to make it amongst the toppers of the class and become efficient in programming to get any chances of placement.
Embedded in another good field to go for. Integrated VLSI and Embedded is a tough field because it covers 2 subjects and it is quite difficult to cover these 2 subjects in 6 months. Effectively, there is only 4.5 or 4 months of study in CDAC with the rest devoted to exams and project time.

Placement opportunities

Placement opportunities have been talked about in the center listing itself. As for the companies, CDAC offers the companies trained professionals which require very less training from the company side to get them started in the job. This is the reason why companies prefer to employ good candidates from CDAC centers. Many famous IT companies like TATA, Infy, etc come to CDAC centers. The main focus of these companies the knowledge of the students in C, C++ and Java. It is important to keep a focus of Aptitude too as most companies have this test as the first shortlisting method. Company list is more center specific and changes with every batch and if you are in the first 4 centers mentioned above, you need not worry about the companies but should just focus on becoming as efficient in programming as possible.

Why NDA should avoid selecting Narendra Modi as its Prime Ministerial candidate

2013-08-06T12:41:00.000+05:30

Let me make it sufficiently clear in the start itself that I am an ardent supported of any political party. I am just a 22 year old getting his first chance to vote in the Indian election system. And my first voting experience will be directly for the highest power center in our country- the Indian Parliament. I want to support a party, which is led by a leader with a modernistic and logical approach; one whom I can proudly say is the leader of our country. And this, is where my problem starts with the present CM of Gujrat, Shri Narendra Modi being presented as the leader of the party which I was hoping to vote for after the poor performance of Congress. It's not that I was hoping for some landmark changes during the tenure of NDA, it is just that I am tired of the corruption charges that have come for the UPA-2. And yeah, I am not a big fan for dynastic politics either. With most chances being Rahul Gandhi becoming the PM in case UPA wins, I am not at all interested in voting for Congress.

I was all set to vote for BJP this time but now I am hesitant in voting for a party which projects a communal leader as its Prime Minister candidate. I am not at all saying that Mr. Modi is responsible for the Gujrat riots, but then the truth is that he does have made a image for himself which shouts out loud "Hindutva". Many of the developed countries see him as a communal leader who was responsible for Gujrat riots. America is not even ready to host Narendra Modi in their country. Even the people in our country believe him responsible. If the people of our nation select such a person as a leader our country it will completely tarnish the image of India in the international scenario. It will send out the message that India is still not one, but is still divided into communal, religious parts. The truth might be this only that people still give their "Indian" adjective a place second to their religion or even their state, but the other nations are not aware of this and I would prefer to keep it that way because this truth is very shameful for the present youth of India.

Mr. Narendra Modi being a intelligent person should understand this that if he is selected as the PM of our country, we stand to lose all the pride in the international arena. People will rather vote for a financially corrupt government rather than a religiously corrupt government. Getting clean chit from the Indian judiciary in no way clears the name of a person because the common public is totally aware of how most politicians being strong henchmen have enough resources at their disposal to silence the witnesses and erase the proof. People of India are smart enough to see how most political parties have among their ranks a majority of criminally tainted politicians and how they are able to side step the judiciary. How the police force, the CBI and any other legal enforcement is puppet of these politicians is not hidden from anyone. The recent actions on UP IAS officer Durga Shakti Nagpal don't come as a surprise to the Indian people.

Anyhow, returning to the topic, the truth holds that Shri. Narendra Modi might be in truth all clean in reality, but the Indian or non-Indian public will never be able to believe that. For the greater good, it will be a better choice for Mr.Modi to side step voluntary and bring in front leaders like Mrs. Sushma Swaraj, which are a sort of guarantee for BJP to win the elections. This will not only give an image boost for BJP but would bring back JD(U) to its rank bolstering its secular standings. Being led by a female leader would help BJP boost its ranking among the female voters and would give a boasting point to counter the female leaderships of Congress too. Shiv Sena has already shown its support for this choice and BJP-NDA combine have a lot of gain from the selection of a female leadership.

For all those Modi supporters who are ready to launch counter attacks on me quoting the achievements of Modi, I request you all to please take a breath and understand this that I am not at all ignoring his achievements. But you need to understand that Public Relations are not jokes and they hold a very important value in international relations. You might have noticed how China is nowadays trying to present itself as a tolerant nation, a nation which respects human rights and is also allowing free speech up to a certain extent. This should give you an idea how important is to maintain a good face in the international waters because it is not only an image, but impacts a country economically too. Getting labeled as a communal nation is a very big issue and selection of Narendra Modi leads directly there.

Narendra Modi can still act as a powerful figure in the Indian government just like Sonia Gandhi does and implement his great ideas for the development of India as one. If the NDA wins, Shri Modi will have ample time to showcase how he is a not a communal person and cares for the India as a whole and would probably have a clean slate to contest in the next Lok Sabha elections, but for now the better choice for Modiji will be to take a back seat.

Micromax Canvas 4 A210 review, features and cheapest price

2013-07-28T15:20:00.000+05:30

The whole world is getting crazy about smartphones, and to quench the thrust of this crazy addiction, mobile companies are coming up with new features in there smartphones almost every single day. Maybe this is the reason that even Micromax is also set to come up with a great peace of art and has been able to add one more star in their Canvas series. Yes, they have introduced their latest technology in their new Canvas model and that is Micromax Canvas 4. This smartphone has got a lot of new features, so let us first have a look at its specifications.

Specifications

The size of the screen is 5 inch with the resolution of 720p, it has got multi touch which can be used while wearing gloves as well. The primary camera is 13 MP, which is simply awesome and it has also got a front camera of 5 MP which is really not bad at all with flash, auto-focus and video recording facility.

In connectivity options they have got features like bluetooth v4.0, Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi hotspot: 2G as well as 3G network, Micro USB port, GPRS, EDGE, Navigation, A-GPS. It is a dual SIM card with one 3G and 2G option. It has got 16 GB of internal memory with an 1 .5 GHz quad core processor and 2 GB RAM. The memory is expandable up to 32GB with the help of microSD card.

The OS platform is Android 4.2 jelly bean, which is the latest one. It has got a lot of applications and widgets like Audio player, Video player, games from Google play store, G sensor, Proximity sensor and it has got audio jack of 3.5 mm. The capacity of the battery is 2,00 mAh, which seems to be little less when it comes to such a huge e screen size. This smartphone is available in two colours and they are white and black.

Some of the special features of Micromax Canvas 4

1. Now you can unlock you Canvas 4 smartphone screen just by blowing air! Yes, you read it right, taking an inspiration from the feather touch of Galaxy S4, Micromax has introduced a blow feature by which you can unlock your screen as if you are removing a feather from the screen.

2. It has got anti-shake technology which will prevent any shaky photo capture. Plus, you can also apply some cool photo effects quickly on your image and as well as you can share it in your social networks.

3. You can pin any video and then you will be able to work and as well as you can watch the video as well. If you look away from the video then it will automatically pause and once you look at it again then it will resume itself instantly- As the name says, now you can preview the next video without pausing the current video play .

4. You can increase or decrease the volume of your smartphone just by swiping the screen on right and if you want to manipulate with the brightness of the screen then you can swipe the screen on left.

5. The screen can be divided into two halves which means you can do two work at a time. In the both the side you can run two different apps and have twice the fun.

6. You don't have to swipe your Canvas every time to need to make a call or answer a incoming call, you simply have to bring your Canvas to your ear and then you will be able to make a call or answer a call without even touching your phone.

7. If you don't want to attend a call then you simply have to flip your Canvas down and it will get into silent mode.

Price of Micromax Canvas 4 in India

Price of this super gadget of the year is 18, 390 INR in India. The brand is consider to be the cheapest brand and if you are getting so many awesome features of a Smartphone in a mid-range then that won't be a bad deal at all. You can buy it from http://www.fabmart.com/products/micromax-canvas-4

Where and how to check the status of your DMCA application at Google Webmasters-DMCA Dashboard

2013-01-26T23:30:00.001+05:30

If you have been in the field of publishing original content online or in simple terms blogging actively for sometime now and more importantly have attracted the attention of numerous readers by your good quality content and high authority website, then you must have faced situations where people copy your content.

It is no different for me and especially since I work on revenue sharing website as a Manager where I am responsible for checking other people's article for copied content and other Google Webmaster quality guidelines I come across many such instances where I find other people copying the content from our authors. Now, since we have to approve the articles at our sites and we face some practical problems due to which we can't rely on our authors to file the DMCA with Google correctly, we Managers ourselves file the DMCAs as legal representatives of the owner of this website.

Now, the problem I used to face was that sometimes there was no reply mail from Google's side and I would get stuck about the status of my application. I had seen the Dashboard of Google and I knew that I could find the status of my application there but the problem was how to open that Dashboard. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't find the link to the Google DMCA Dashboard anywhere. I need to add here that I did not remember the word "Dashboard" while searching for it and was typing sentences in Google search like "DMCA Google status" "Status of Google DMCA application" "Copy complain Google DMCA status" and a few more search terms like this but was not able to find it. I even searched the Webmaster tools of Google but even that does not contains the link to it.

Anyhow, just out of nowhere I luckily remembers the word "Dashboard" and when I typed "Google DMCA Dashboard", the link to the page came as the first result. So I thought why not to help my fellow bloggers in finding this precious page easily and free them from the struggle of finding this page. So here is the link to the page of Google DMCA Dashboard which if will find useful now or later if you continue to follow you passion of blogging and continue creating original and quality content for your readers.

Buying guide for a mouse pad- Qualities to look to buy a good gaming mouse pad

2012-10-21T22:56:00.000+05:30

If you are a serious gamer then having a high performance computer is not enough, some parts that we take for granted - keyboard, mouse - to perform ideally may not be that perfect and play a very important role in your performance in a game. Similarly another thing which plays a very important role in a perfect gaming experience is your mouse pad.

Think about it, a precise movement of the mouse can make a hell lot of difference in the result of a game. Especially for a serious gamer even a slight advantage can make a huge difference. When it comes to gaming controls you need to perfect your controls and in a gaming environment your only major controls are your keyboard and your mouse. The mouse to say the least is the continuously used tool except for racing games.

For precise gaming action a precise mouse is required and to fine tune this preciseness you will need a gaming mouse pad. For any mouse dependent game a laser mouse is the best choice and for its precise functioning the light needs to bounce off properly from the mouse pad. A good quality mouse pad surface not only gives good feedback and feel to the gamer but also gives the mouse proper feedback to work with. Mouse lag is a known problem for any bad surface of a mouse pad where both unevenness and surface finishing problem will lead to lag and even the slightest lag will become a major disadvantage for a gamer. So here are some qualities that a good potential mouse pad must have:

Size of the mouse pad: The size of a mouse pad must be as large as possible. Just think that in the middle of shooting you run out of mouse realty – you just end up losing with no digestible reason. Of course the size should be such that you can easily keep in on the desk but the bigger the better.
Surface of the mouse pad: Above I mentioned about the working of the red beam of light of a mouse and how its précis feedback is important for perfect movements. This is where the surface of a mouse pad comes into play for proper feedback. In market you will get several mouse pads perfected for gaming experiences and the choice comes down to you according to your preferred feel. While some prefer the plastic touch while other go for the good-old cotton surface.
Underside of the mouse pad: By the underside I mean the side that touches the desk surface. This simply means that the underside should have a good grip on the surface. If your mouse pad slips in between the game that means a major loss of control. Fir best friction rubber works the best however that can sometimes give you a squishy feeling below the side of hand touching the mouse pad. If you do not like that squishy feeling go for not sticky underside rubber mouse pads.

These were the major qualities you should look for while purchasing a good mouse pad however there are many other personal preferences which play a role like color, design, wrist rest and of couse a good reputed brand.

Uses of multiplexer and demultiplexer

2012-09-29T16:41:00.000+05:30

Multiplexer
In communication field, the methods by which many inputs (the inputs may be analog or digital in form) are combined together to give one output is known as multiplexing. Multiplexing is a technique to select one suitable output from the given number of input lines . Another terminology in multiplexers are the section lines. The output is determined with the help of selection lines .

The selection lines are dependent on the type of multiplexer. There are various types of multiplexer namely

2-to-1 multiplexer(having 1 selection line)
4-to-1 multiplexer(having 2 selection lines)
8-to-1 multiplexer(having 3 selection lines)
16-to-1 multiplexer(having 4 selection lines).

In real life we use different types of multiplexing depending on how we want to share the limited transmission medium which is available.
For example: We use frequency division multiplexing for cable television ,voice telephony requirements etc. time division multiplexing or time division multiple access(TDMA) for 2G and 3G systems. Whereas, in prior versions of 2G, known as code division multiple access(CDMA), we were using code division multiplexing.

Uses of Frequency Division Multiplexing (FDM)
When the total bandwidth or frequency available is divided into a set of frequency which should be non-overlapping, this technique is known as frequency division multiplexing (FDM). Each subset is used to carry different signals. This allows the common medium to be shared by many different frequencies. You all must be watching television as a daily part of your life which works with the help of cable wire, it is the most extensive and common example of frequency division multiplexing in real life. The television channels which are nothing but frequencies are carried by one single cable which is the medium.

Uses of Time Division Multiplexing (TDM)
When the message to be sent is differentiated with a very short time lag or when the packets to be sent takes turn on the channel such as one packet is transmitted during the time slot 1 , the second is transmitted at slot 2 and so on. This technique of transmitting and receiving of the data while taking turns on the time is known as Time Division Multiplexing.

This type of multiplexing is mainly used in telephone networks like in circuit switch networks namely public switch telephone network (also known as landline) in which there are multiple subscribers, and if all the lines are full at a particular time then we are not able to make the call. But if we try after some time our call gets connected!! This is mainly because during the time one or more subscriber hangs the phone creating the vacancy of the medium at that time.

Uses of Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA)
This is a technique in which several users are successfully able to transmit and receive the data simultaneously that is at the same time over the same frequency. So in contrast to FDM and TDMA which divides access by frequency (wavelength) or time respectively, code division multiple access is spread spectrum signaling.

For example: Many people speaking in a room can hear and understand your particular language and all other languages are considered as noise. In the same way in CDMA, each user is given a code, in a single channel there are many codes but the users who are connected to the similar code only can communicate.
This code is used in the GPS systems and signaling for mobile networks.

Demultiplexer
In electronics, a demultiplexer is a device which takes the output from a single line and directs it to several output lines. It is used when we need to send the same output to several lines or to several devices. Mainly demultiplexer is required to break the single data stream to the original data streams.
Also, the main aim of a demultiplexer is to combine the data and to transmit it over the medium by taking in single input and making the information to exit through multiple outputs.

Note: We are in process of finding more uses for Demultiplexer, if you happen to know more than please add the info in the comments and help your co-students!

Why I would love to travel to Melbourne and the major attractions in Melbourne for me

2012-09-05T17:58:00.000+05:30

When we are looking out of a destination for a long vacations Melbourne is an option which can cross your mind once for multiple reasons as it is not only perfect place to emigrate to. Melbourne is the capital of Victoria and is second most populous city of Australia. It is also one of the vivacious cities in the world with combination of high standard of living, social and relaxing activities. The climate is moderate oceanic climate and hence the weather is also very unpredictable.

There are many reasons why one should visit Melbourne at least once in life time and here I would describe a few reasons why it's your time to visit Melbourne NOW!.

· The Australian Open in Melbourne

In every month of January, the whole world watches Melbourne, as the first Grand Slam event of tennis year is held in Australia. With four majors on the calendar for men’s women’s tennis, the tournament marks the start of sport year. This event is watched everywhere in Australia with lot of pomp and show and excitement. The event is watched on huge television screens in Federation Square and banners everywhere. The ground of Melbourne Park is alive with the spectators and many players.

· The Great Ocean Road in Melbourne

Melbourne is the starting point for the world legendary Great Ocean Road drive. The road winds its way along some of the most dazzling and spectacular coastline in Australia. If you start travelling a bit earlier in the day you can have a look at eucalyptus forests with koalas, rain forests with a wide variety of flora and fauna and implausible natural rock formation in Port Campbell National Park before returning to the city and watching it come energetic after dark.

· Shopping in Melbourne

A great place for shopaholics where you get confused as what to buy and what to leave out. Melbourne’s pulsating retail scene is active with tempting labels, products and shopping experiences. There is a saying in Melbourne “Shop until you drop”. You get everything like from classics to cutting edge and variety of boutiques in Melbourne. A wide diversity of shopping malls can be visited. A very well known place Fashion Triangle is worth paying visit where fashion boutiques, shops and stores, comprising of the QV, Melbourne’s GPO and Melbourne Central.

· Neighbourhoods in Melbourne:

There are lots of diverse cultures residing in Melbourne. The difference becomes quite visible through the buildings, shopping and especially the food. A walk towards Chinatown, Greek Corner, Vietnamese Section, little Italy, Spanish Corner and Little Saigon will explain the whole story. One day try skipping whole day meals and enjoy sampling from various sites to get a taste of ethnic meal.

· Caribbean Gardens in Melbourne:

The Gardens cover approximately an area of 100 acres surrounding the stunning Lake Caribbean. Throughout the picnic grounds are BBQ’s and bountiful of picnic tables under the shade of beautiful elm, gum and pine trees. You can also find rides operating on Sundays from 11:00 AM to 4:00 PM and subject to weather conditions and during school holidays rides are available on Wednesday and Fridays as well. Chairlift ride, Train ride or jungle cruise rides are also there to enjoy and have fun as children also get pleasure from these rides and these are quite affordable as well.

· Hawthorn Craft Market in Melbourne:

It is one of the best markets of Melbourne which was established in 1979 and is the longest running maker’s market. You can find all hand made products here the best quality assured. Visitors to this market will find a variety of innovative fashion and designs, original paintings photography and artwork, toys, woodcraft, jewellery, plants you name it and get it.

· Museums and other attractions in Melbourne:

The city is blessed with a lot of museums and other various attractions like Australian Centre for the moving image, Royal Botanic Gardens and National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne Aquarium, which has also won many awards for its exploration of ocean life. Melbourne Zoo which has an approximately some 300 species on hand, out of which many are native to Australia.

· The Yara Valley in Melbourne:

This valley is situated right when you enter Melbourne. This valley can be experienced in a wide variety of methods. You can fly over it at dawn in a hot air balloon or can be travelled through oldest steam train in Australia. Yara Valley makes Melbourne all the more exceptional as you can move from city to rural serenity of vineyards in less than an hour’s time.

· The Hotels in Melbourne:

Accommodation is not to worry on in Melbourne. Hotels here in Melbourne provide a wonderful amenities and good hospitality as well. You find all sorts of hotels budgeted to luxurious. Accommodation is one of the headaches when you are planning your holidays, so while coming to Melbourne take a deep breath and come as you can find different budget hotels to relieve your stress.

In the nutshell, Melbourne is a place to rejuvenate and refurbish your mind.

Different types of synchronous counters, ciruit diagram and working

2012-08-26T14:56:00.000+05:30

There are 6 types of Synchronous counters:

Binary counters

Binary counters are most basic type of synchronous counters. Depending on the value of N, a synchronous counter counts from 0 to (2N - 1) and back to 0 again.

Up/down counters

A counter can be used to count in more than one direction. That is, you can use counter to count not only up but down too. The diagram shows below is of an up-down counter. Depending on how the user decides to count an event as up and other as down, the counter can be used to count the events based on his requirements. This is done by either making either the “up” or "down" inputs as high.

Loadable counters

Loadable counters can be used to count from a predefined count. That is, instead of counting from a 0, the counter will count from a initial count given by the user. This type of counter is called a loadable counter.

BCD counters

A BCD counter is a binary digit based counter which users 0 and 1 for counting. The counting is done in binary-coded decimal from 0000 to 1001 and back to 0000. As the counter resets after 1001, i.e. it starts from 0 and after a count of 9 it comes back to 0. Therefore, this counter does not have a straight binary count and has limited functionality.

Ring counters

In a ring counter, the registers are activated one by one in a circular manner. The flip-flops are set one by one; when a particular flip-flop is set, the others are cleared. A single high signal is circulated from one flip-flop to another to produce to produce the sequence of timing signals.

Johnson counters

The Johnson counter is a hybrid form of ring counter. It is also called the twisted ring counter. In this counter the inverse of the most significant bit output at the flip-flop is passed on to lest significant but at the flip-flop. The working can be understood by the truth table shown below. The sequence starts with all the bits of the counter being 0. At the next pulse, the 0 at the final counter will cause the 1’s to be shifted into register from left hand side. Similarly, when the 1’s reach the most significant flip-flop, 0’s will be inserted in the left most registers. This cross coupling between the between the inputs and the outputs of the registers is the base of working of the Johnson counter.

Application of Gray, Excess-3 and ASCII codes

2012-08-23T00:59:00.000+05:30

The ASII code:

The ASCII code represents the text in computers or digital equipments. The ASCII(American Standard Code for Information Interchange) includes definition for 128 characters that explains the processing of text and space.

Excess-3 code:

The excess 3 code is an important BCD code. It is mainly used for arithmetic operations. It can add two decimal numbers even if their sum exceeds nine. It simplifies operations of arithmetic. It’s a way to represent decimal digits, and each value equals the decimal digit value plus 3.

Gray code:

The encoding of numbers such that the adjacent number differs by only 1 by the preceding number.

Application of Gray Code

Because of many shortcomings in addition of the BCD code, excess 3 code is used and grey code is used in the shaft position of the airplanes.

These codes are precisely used in electro optical switches and electrochemical signals.

The Grey code arises in many real life situations. In the beginning, the main use of the code was related to what we now call as the conversion from analog to digital format. The basic aim was to convert a voltage value which was previously in analog to the corresponding series of pulse which will represent the same value in digital form. This technique was to convert voltage by displacing vertically an electron beam that sweeps horizontally across the screen of the cathode ray tube. The screen having a masked imprint on it only allows a passage of beam in certain places, and a current was generated till the beam was passing through the mask. The passage of the beam gives rise to a series of ‘on’ and ‘off’ conditions corresponding to the pattern of the holes through which it passes.

The most common use of this code is locating for rotational position of the shafts I which a pattern which represents the grey code is printed on a disk, or on the shaft, and the pattern is sensed by an electrical or optical detector.

Application of Excess-3

Because of many shortcomings in addition of the BCD code, excess 3 code is used and grey code is used in the shaft position of the airplanes.

These codes are precisely used in electro optical switches and electrochemical signals.

The Gray code arises in many real life situations. In the beginning, the main use of the code was related to what we now call as the conversion from analog to digital format. The basic aim was to convert a voltage value which was previously in analog to the corresponding series of pulse which will represent the same value in digital form. This technique was to convert voltage by displacing vertically an electron beam that sweeps horizontally across the screen of the cathode ray tube. The screen having a masked imprint on it only allows a passage of beam in certain places, and a current was generated till the beam was passing through the mask. The passage of the beam gives rise to a series of ‘on’ and ‘off’ conditions corresponding to the pattern of the holes through which it passes.

The most common use of Gray code is locating for rotational position of the shafts I which a pattern which represents the grey code is printed on a disk, or on the shaft, and the pattern is sensed by an electrical or optical detector.

Gray Code was used in some old computers that relied on a pre-specified number N as a biasing value.

The excess 3 code is a technique to represent numbers with a balance of positive and negative numbers. When the sum of two of these excess 3 numbers exceed 9, the carry bit of adder will set to high. When you add two excess 3 numbers, the resultant would not be an excess 3 number, example : add 1 to 3 , the answer would seem to be 7 but the actual answer should be 4, so a remedy of this problem is to subtract 3 (binary 011) if the resultant is less than decimal 10 and add 3 if the number is equal to or greater than 10.

This needs to be done due to the fact that whenever we add two numbers, an excess value of six results in the sum. But we now that the values 0 to 15 are four bit integer and any excess to that means the sum will overflow.

Application of ASCII

They are used widely in modern computers for representing text and in other devices too that use text in man machine interface. ASCII codes work sequentially and are self complimenting. Its first application was as a seven-bit teleprinter. It is non-weighted code derived from 8421 BCD code.

Microprocessor characterization, language, instruction set and working

2012-08-08T20:37:00.000+05:30

What is microprocessor?

A microprocessor can be defined as followed:
"A multipurpose , programmable logic device which is capable of reading binary instructions from a storage device referred to as memory, accepts data as input and process it according to those instructions and provides result as output"
A microprocessor can be considered to be electronic integrated chip or a set of chip that implements a central processor of a computer system. Microprocessor in a microcomputer resembles a brain in human body which does the functioning of controlling all the peripherals of the body. The main parts of a microprocessor are:
1) Arithmetic and logic unit
2) Central processing unit

The properties by which a microprocessor can be characterized are:
• Speed
• Word length
• Architecture
• Instruction set

When talking about the digital computers they can be classified into different groups on the basis of:
• Size
• Processing power
• Cost and
• Complexity

In this way depending upon these factors three main classes of digital computers are:
1. Micro computers
2. Mini computers
3. Main frames

Mini computers and main frames are more complex and power full than micro computers which uses only a single IC processor unlike the other two. Here minicomputer has word word length ranges from 16 bits to 32 bits and it generally uses 2 or more CPUs.

What is microcomputer?

This category of computers is characterized by it low speed and lesser restorability of data. It uses only one CPU and which is just a single chip. It has low processing power and it is generally used in personal computing and control applications.
Any device which is programmable can be represented by three fundamental components as in the figure:
• Microprocessor
• Memory
• Input/output devices

When these three parts works and interacts together to perform a given particular task it is called a system and the physical components i.e. electronic circuits for input output devices, memory unit and microprocessor chips itself are called Hardware where as the set of instructions written to perform the given task is called a program and further a set of programmes is referred to as a software which performs some pre-specified tasks. Microprocessor receives the encoded instructions then decodes and executes them. Word length of a microprocessor depends upon the width of data bus but it is independent of the length of instruction and operands which are handled by the microprocessor. The microprocessor can handle arithmetic, logic Boolean alphanumeric data. The time taken to execute the basic instructions decides the speed of the concerned microprocessor.
Also, as the microprocessor is a synchronous sequential electronic circuit some clock signals are required for execution of its each instruction so the speed of a microprocessor will also depend upon the clock frequency of the crystal used in the system. For each pulse generated by the crystal one basis instruction is executed.
Representation and organization of the data in the memory will be described in the next portion.

How memory is organized in microcomputers?

Just as the data is written on the pages of a notebook in the same the data storage in electronic memory chip cam be resembled with writing the binary digits on the semiconductor material pages upon which these binary digits are stored such that spaces occurs there after a fixed number of the binary digits and a fixed number of the lines occurs in each pages.

Generally each line in the memory is called register i.e. a collection of 8 bits given a name one byte. Such byte or the registers are arranged in sequential manner in the memory such registers occurs in groups in power of 2 for example for a memory of 1k byte, 2 to the power 10 registers or byte are grouped together. The set of instructions written by the programmer makes the microcomputer to retrieve the data from some external storage device process them and store them in memory or to give it to some external device to display it like LCD display, 8 segment display, computer monitor, speaker in case of sound signal elc.

What is a memory module?

In our further discussion over memory organization we will be using the term memory module which refers to device which stores the data. A memory module contains a fixed number of memory locations where each location contains a fixed number of bits and the number of bits in each location in called word length. To understand the memory organization let us take an example of a memory module of size (nXm) bits then its word length will be m and memory locations will vary from 0 to n-1. It is clear from this far discussion that number of data line in it will depend upon its word length i.e. larger is the word length less will be data line in it because total number of bits in it is to be fixed which is (nXm).

Microprocessor processes the data taken from outside and returns the result it again to external peripheral the devices for connecting the microprocessor to the outside is done with help of a system of hardware called input output devices I/O modules. It will be discussed in further discussion as

What is input output module/device?

As the name suggests it comprises two parts i.e. input module/devices and output module/devices.

Input devices
Provide the data to microprocessor in binary form performing the function of senses of the system to connect it with outer world. These includes keyboard, teletype and analogue to digital converter.

Output devices
Performs the function of reproducing the result obtained from processing section and decodes the binary result and produces it a form understandable to outer world. These devices includes monitor, loudspeaker, printers, LCD display etc.

Any system requires some important and basis parts for making I/O devices usable for it. That can be listed as:
1. Output port
2. Interfacing circuitry

Output port provides the points in the systems through which it may have physical connection with I/O devices for bidirectional flow of data between system and outer world. The system may have more than one input output port but only one is accessed at time whose selection is done by microprocessor itself while the direction of data flow is determined by control signal generated by the microprocessor i.e. the instruction set decides that whether data is to be transferred from system to outer devices or it is to received by a particular port.

Data which deals with microprocessor has to be in binary form to allow any processing to be carried out upon it in the similar way the data obtained from microprocessor also occurs in binary form but it is not generally understandable by outer world. Here interface circuitry converts outer signal into binary form and binary result produced by microprocessor to some other form understandable to outer devices. In this way interface circuitry connects system to outer devices. Some of the output devices are LEOS, Cathode ray tube, printer etc.

What is instruction set and language in microprocessor?

Any microprocessor understands only machine language i.e. 0 &1. But each one differs in its instruction sets. Every microprocessor has its own words, their meanings and the language that they understand. These words are formed by different combinations of basic binary digits (0 &1) called bits. In this way we can define a word as:

"The number of bits the microprocessor recognizes and processes at a time is termed as a word"

World length of a microprocessor may varies from 4 bits to 64 bits where 4 bit words are used in small microcomputers and large words having up to 64 bits are used in high speed large computers generally word is termed as byte i.e. a group of 8 bits so a 32 bit microprocessor has can be said to have a word length of 4 bytes.

For sake of convenience a group of 4 bits is termed a nibble and thus a byte is made with 2 nibbles, a lower nibble and upper nibble.

How a microprocessor works?

A microprocessor can be made to perform a specified task by the programmer with help of a set of instruction set understandable by it. The instructions are to be in binary form i.e. 0 &1 but it is difficult for the programmer to learn the instructions in binary form they are given some English like word to make easier to learn them. In this way the collection of these English like world equivalent to particular instructions constructs a language which is used by the programmer to communicate with microprocessor. This language is referred to as assembly language and programs written in this language are called assembly programs. These assembly programs are written for a specific microprocessor and as each microprocessor understands its own unique instruction set that is why the program written for machine may and may not be transferable to another one. This is a big limitation of assembly language to overcome this limitation many general purpose languages have been developed which provides the facility of transferability of the program written in these languages as they are machine independent. some of those are:
• BASIC
• FORTRAN
• PASCAL
• C And C++

These languages are closer to human understandable languages like English and are termed as high-level languages.

Different languages and their working

Machine language
At the time formation of the microprocessors designers sets some specific combination of bits and gives them certain meaning based upon their function with the help of electronic logic circuitry these are called basic instructions of the concerned microprocessor. Set of such instructions which are designed in machine are called its machine language constructed with only 0s & 1s. Likewise taking an example of microprocessor 8085 whose word length is 8 bit and has it instruction set which is nothing but a different combination of these 8 bits. it may have 256 different bit patterns which can construct 74 different instructions to perform some specific operations.

Assembly language

Although the instructions in machine language may be written in hexadecimal form but it is still a difficult task to memorize these codes for making microprocessor to perform different functions while the alpha-numerical codes are relatively easier to memorize that is why these hexadecimal codes are given some English like alphanumerical code in place of hex or binary codes. In this way language comes out to assembly language it works in the same way that machine language does and the equivalent alphanumeric codes instructions are called mnemonics

Low level languages

Both the machine language and assembly falls in this category of programming languages which are un-transferable to any other microprocessor i.e. these programs are microprocessor specific and are written for a specific chip. The programs written in low level language are to first converted into equivalent binary form to be read by the microprocessor this function of conversion is done either manually or with the help of a program, referred to as assembler that reads each and every mnemonics instruction converts it into equivalent binary form and then moves on to read the next instruction and so on till the end of the program. Thus obtained program can be fed to the microprocessor for its execution.

High-level languages

These languages are more close to the spoken languages and are more understandable to the programmer. Here more than one instruction may be used for execution of a single machine level instruction. Like low level languages it also has to be, first, converted into an equivalent binary code for its execution by the microprocessor which is done by programs just like the assembler does in case of low level language. There are two types of such conversion programs:
1. Interpreter
2. Compiler

The program written in high-level language is called source code while its equivalent conversion into machine language is called object code which is finally executed. Both interpreter and compiler convert source code into object code.
Interpreter reads, converts and executes each instruction of source code before heading to the next one i.e. it first reads one instruction converts into binary form, executes it and then moves on towards the next one.
Compiler first reads and converts the whole soured code into object code and then executes this object code at ounces, as a whole.

Memory allocation and addressing

In any system all the peripherals are identified by an address location which occurs in binary form. The number of lines in address bus of a chip determines maximum possible memory locations that can be accessed by the chip (microprocessor). Taking an example of microprocessor 8085 it has 16 address lines i.e. each address will have 16 bits so maximum possible address locations are 2 to the power 16= 65,536. It means 64k byte of memory can be handled by it.
Now in order to retrieve a data stored at a memory location A2001H the microprocessor first put the address A2001H on the address bus which is sent to the memory module. In memory data is stored like in a notebook i.e. the first two digits (A2) of location address tells the address of a particular page number while remaining two digits (01) refers to line number at that page. Microprocessor sends an RD signal to memory modules which puts the data stored at that location in data but which is received by the microprocessor and data is retrieved in it.

History of microprocessors

Intel 4004 was the first microprocessor that was introduced in 1971, it was a 4 bit PMOS microprocessor used for small applications. 4004 and its improved 4 bit versions i.e. 4040 were used for following applications:
• Industrial control application
• Calculation instrumentation
• Commercial applications
• Videogames
• Toys etc.

The first 8 bit microprocessor was introduced in 1972 by Intel it was also based on PMOS technology. But it had some disadvantages like slow speed and incompatibility with TTL logic due to PMOS technology used in it. These limitations leaded introduction of a new more powerful and faster microprocessor Intel 8080 but it also had a drawback that it was operated upon three power supplies to eliminate it an another chip was introduced i.e. 8085 in 1975 which was operated upon only a single power supply of 5V and it used NMOS technology. 8080 is still used in some places like laboratories for the purpose of teaching the functioning of a basic microprocessor. Some other 8 bit microprocessors developed by other companies are:
Zilog's
• Z800
• Z80
Motorola's
• MC 6800
• MC 6809

These 8 bit microprocessors were very useful in industrial and other control applications some of them are:
• Instrumentation industry applications
• Small general purpose computers

These have memory addressing capability of 64K and clock frequency in range of 1-6 MHz using LSI technology. Now many 16 bit and 32 bit microprocessors are also preset there in the market from many deferent new companies which are capable of addressing a large memory and can work at higher clock frequencies.

What is a site with “WW38” instead of “WWW” and how to register

2012-08-03T19:25:00.000+05:30

Can you imagine a website without the common hypertext www? “ww38.abc.com” instead of “www.abc.com”, Is it possible? Pretty stunned, right? What you heard right now is one hundred percent true. It is possible to have ‘ww38’ as a hypertext before the domain address of a website, instead of ‘www’. Today I am here to share you all the information that I have about this topic. Come along with me and we will have a deep research into the hypertext ‘ww38’ which can even break down the common rule of using hypertext.

Why we use www as prefix to every domain address?

As we all know about the hypertext ‘www’ which we use before every website. You may know the reason for providing this particular hypertext before every website and you might also even familiar with the full form of ‘www’. But for those who are unfamiliar with the term ‘www’, let me brief it before you: www is an abbreviation of ‘World Wide Web’, it is also known as ‘the Web’ in common. www is a hypertext used for interlinking hypertext documents and to access it through the internet. This method of hyperlinking documents of useful information to access via internet, was earlier proposed by Robert Cailliau in 1990. Today almost all the domain names use www as a prefix to their domain address. This act by the domains is due to the naming practice of internet hosts that these sites have been following for a long time. But we rarely type www as prefix to the sites, when we type the name of the website in the address bar, this is because today almost all the browser will capture the given address by adding the prefix ‘www’ automatically.

Sites with ‘ww38’ instead of ‘www’.

Did you now got the reason why we use www as a hypertext and prefix to many of the domain address? Now let us move into the new concept of ww38, shall we?

Very recently I found out that there can be domain names or addresses with ‘ww38’ as their prefixes. Few days back I was surfing my browser as regular, but in between my process, I was accidently I was redirected to a site with ww38 as its prefix. The site was ww38.kates-part.com, I was very much confused and even scared, as it would be any virus or any other type of malwares or even some sort of scam. I shutdown my browser as soon as I saw that hypertext and I was surprised to know it was not at a malware or any type of virus and it is really an internet site with prefix ‘ww38’. I was looking all over the internet for the info about this kind of prefix, and finally I came to know that there are many websites over the internet which accept ww38 as prefix.

What does ww38 means?

Providing ‘ww38’ as prefix to many of the sites over the internet means that, you can access or you are accessing ‘ww38’ named machine(server) from the main domain. ww38 or any similar other prefixes are only used to notify the server name or server number of the main website, that is being added after this prefix. As ‘www’ is the standard and commonly provided prefix, which is being followed for a long era of time, there is no rules to strictly follow on it.

While a web address is considered, the prefix can be anything which the developer of the website wishes, but the end part(eg: .co, .in, .com etc) should follow either of the valid format.

Now you might have understood the difference between ‘www’ and ‘ww38’, check yourself by providing ‘ww38’ instead of ‘www’ on your search field and it will surely accept it.

Engineering instruments for analysis of signals or waves

2012-07-28T15:45:00.000+05:30

Overview of signal analyser

In various electrical and electronic instruments it is required to analyse the signal produced by them, there are numerous devices serving the purpose depending upon the signal they deal with. Some of them can be listed as:

• Signal analyser
• Distortion analysers
• Spectrum analyser
• Audio analyser
• Modulation analyse

These all analysing instruments may use different technique but do the same basic functioning of measuring the basic frequency of the signal the virtue of their analysis. For example in case of an spectrum analyser the signal frequency band is swept and the output is displaces by it in form of a graph between amplitude and frequency and it is capable of working in a frequency range of 0.002Hz to 250 GHz which is a very wide frequency range. On the other hand when we talk about an wave analyser is can be considered to be a voltmeter with the capability of taking measurement of the voltage of only a particular frequency in a collection of signals of different frequencies i.e. from a frequency band it measures the amplitude of one frequency and discards all other with the help of band pass filter circuits. It working frequency range is 10 Hz to 40 MHz we can take distortion analyser as another example of signal analyser which is used for measurement of the strength energy of the signal ling outside of a given frequency band. It is basically tells how much energy is present there in the signal which is not being taken under used that is why it's given the name distortion analyser. The working range of standard distortion analyser is from 5 Hz to 1MHz. An audio analyser can be studied as an extension of distortion analyser because is performs in the same way as a distortion analyser with an added quality of measuring the noise present in the original signal.

In order to study a more sophisticated and advanced analyser se can take modulation analyser which performs the function of recovering the whole envelope by tuning to a required signal. Here the modulation may:
• Amplitude modulation
• Frequency modulation
• Phase modulation

Each of the above analysers can have different form and type according to the complexity of their working and designing. So in order to have a insight of these device we need to explain each one of them separately.

Wave analysers

Here first thing, very important to understand, is that

What is wave form analysis?
The analysis of a waveform consists of measurement/determination of the basic parameters regarding an electrical harmonic signal which are:
1. Amplitude
2. Frequency
3. Phase angle

Here, it is well known that any periodic waveform can be thought to be a combination of two distinct parts that construct the whole waveform as their summation.
• A DC component and
• Series of sinusoidal harmonics

Analysis of these parameters can be carried out with the help of graphical of mathematical means (i.e. manually) but this all stuff becomes very tedious and also reduces the accuracy of the output, so in order to make it practically feasible we take electrical means under use. The most important section is band pass filter which actually filters out different components and leaves them for their individual analysis i.e. a very narrow band of frequencies is obtained from the output of the filter while all the other are attenuated to such a extent that only a requires portion remains remarkable.

Usually there is collection of signals in which each one is required to be measured separately that requires selection of required one from the cluster. According to this statement we can have a proper definition of a wave analyser as

"An instrument that as a frequency selective voltmeter tuned to the frequency of one desired signal and rejecting all other frequencies".

In actual practice the instrument comes with a dial fixed upon it which can be at any position to select a particular frequency this dial is generally referred to as frequency calibrated dial and thus produces signal can be displayed with help of a suitable display device such as voltmeter or CRO.

The frequency to be dealt with decides the type of wave analyser i.e. depending upon the frequency there are two types of wave analysers
1. Frequency selective
2. Heterodyne wave analyser

Frequency selective wave analyser

When it is requires dealing with the frequency in audio range, the analyser, in this case, is referred to as frequency selective wave analyser.
Here analysis is performed in several different steps such that the output of one stage is fed to the input of next one. In this way in order to study functioning and interconnection of each stage we will be discussing them separately.

1. Attenuator: Firstly, the input signal is fed to the input attenuator in order to bring the signal strength within measurable range, in case it's caring larger energy than required. The attenuator is set by the range switch mounted upon the front panel of the instruments which provides the external control to the input signal strength.

2. Driver amplifier: Thus attenuated signal may or may not be of a specific required strength and form so. To meet the requirement this attenuated signal also has to be amplified that is performed by the driver amplifier.

3. High Q-active filter: This section is employed with the purpose of selection of the desired frequency from the complex waveform. It comprises of a cascaded arrangement of RC resonant sections and filter amplifiers. The capacitor used in RC band pass filters is generally of polystyrene capacitor type. And for tuning of the signal at a desired frequency, precision potentiometer is brought in use that proves to be very precise for frequency selection.

4. Final stage amplifier: The selected frequency signal is, now, supplied two stages i.e.
• Meter circuit
• Un-tuned buffer amplifier

Meter circuit involves amplifier that amplifies selected signal to s desired level so as to display it with the help of some display device and also calibrates it. While buffer amplifier involves a recorder or an electronic counter

It is also very important to emphasise that frequency selective analyser has a narrow band width which has typical value of about 1 % of selected frequency

Heterodyne wave analyser

This category of wave analysers works upon the signals in range of megahertz in which , again the input signal is applied to the device through an attenuator for the same purpose as in frequency selective wave analysers i.e. to bring the signal strength under control.

It also employs some certain steps while attenuation, amplification and filtration. After attenuation the signal is then passed to a amplifier stage that feeds the attenuated signal to the first mixture stage, also called local oscillator whose frequency is in order of the band pass filter of i.f. amplifier that is the next section of the system which gets the output from mixture ,furthermore frequency of local oscillator is adjustable . i.f. amplifier than feeds to the next mixture that mixes the signal to a crystal controlled oscillator such its frequency is so adjusted to produce an output of frequency centered at zero frequency.

A controllable band width active filter is employed in the next section that allows a selected frequency component to pass to the meter circuit.

Here it is to be noticed that the whole system works upon mixing of the original signal which other frequencies having frequency in range of megahertz. The accuracy of the whole system can be improved by introduction of devices capable of producing the frequency accurately. Frequency synchronizers and automatic frequency control having higher resolution and good accuracy, serves the purpose well. Where automatic frequency control (AFC) makes the system to get attached with the signal frequency and avoids the possibility of drifting between them.

Applications of wave analyzer

Wave analyser being capable of performing analysis upon gives complex waveform it proves to be applicable in a number of measurement systems like:
• Electrical measurement
• Sound measurement
• Vibration measurement

Industrially machines like motor rotors and cutters generate a large amount of noise due to vibrations produced in them, which is obviously an undesired output from them. In order to minimize them it is, first, needed to analyse their pattern with the help of suitable wave analyser.

Discrete frequency pattern and resonance related to the motion of the machine can be analysed swith the help of the wave analyser. After recognition of source of vibration and the way it is being produced an appropriate way can be obtained to eliminate that.

Harmonic distortion analyser

A sinusoidal waveform should be generated when a sinusoidal signal is applied to some electronic processing devices like an amplifier. But in most of the cases it is not seen to be with so perfection, the output does not comes out to be the exact copy of the one fed to its input i.e. some distortions always remains there at the output of the device. The components used in the electronic circuit may come out to exhibit non linear characteristics that become a reason of distortion in the output signal. Here, non linear characteristic refers to the behaviour of the component when it responds to the different external conditions differently e.g. a transistor has different gain factor at different frequencies that, definitely, leads to asymmetry when the input signal has a wide band width.

Harmonics are generated in the output signal due to this non-linearity of the components used, and thus, the distortion produced is called harmonic distortion.

Categories of distortions

Different devices and the components, used in it, become a source of distortion produced at the output waveform. But here, we will be discussing only those distortions that are generated by the amplifiers as amplifier are the most important part of any device and behaves in a different way with different frequencies. Some of the distortions produced by the amplifier circuits are as under:

Frequency distortion
As is discussed earlier, amplifier attains a different amplification factor for different frequencies. This non-linearity of the amplifier circuit results into frequency distortion.

Phase distortion
Some components like capacitors and inductors stores energy in form of electric field and magnetic fields respectively while their operation in circuit. These energy components leads to the shifting the output waveform by a specific angle with respect the input signal, this results into phase dissimilarity in output and input waveforms are generates phase distortion in the signal. It is to be emphasised that if phase shift is same in the entire signal i.e. if each components of the input waveforms is shifted by the same angle the resulting shift will not be remarkable. But generally it is seen that the shift does not come out to be same throughout the signal different frequency components have gains different phase shift leading to a noticeable distortion.

Amplitude distortion
Due to formation of the harmonics of the supplied signal by the amplifier of the device it leads to generation of the harmonic distortion in it. Harmonic in the signal always results into an amplitude distortion of the input signal. The best example to illustrate amplitude distortion is that when the amplifier is overdriven it leads to overshooting the operating point that results into clipping off a portion of the original waveform which is a type of amplitude distortion.

Intermediate distortion
The waveform, generally taken under analysis, occurs to be a complex waveform containing signals of more than one frequency thus coexistence of different frequencies leads to their interaction. As a result at the output some new signals are generated with frequency equal to sum and difference of the parental frequencies.

Cross-over distortion
This type of distortion is generally seen in push-pull amplifiers because of incorrect boas levels.

Total Harmonic distortion

For the purpose of studding total harmonic distortion of a given system we initially take the input to be in sine waveform. The input sine wave attains harmonics at the output due to non-linearity of the system such harmonics occurs with frequencies equal to a multiple of input signal. The total harmonic content of the wave comprises Total Harmonic Distortion (THD). Mathematically it is given by the square root of the sum of square of all the harmonics divided by the actual or fundamental signal.

Inter-modulation distortion

When two signals of different frequencies, one of high frequency while other one having low frequency, are mixed together it gives rise to only two frequencies at the output, in case of linear circuit. But the scenario changes when these frequencies are fed to an non-linear circuit as in this case four frequencies occurs at the output are
• Original high frequency
• Original low frequency
• Sum of original frequencies
• Difference of original frequencies
Many harmonics also occurs there along with their sum and difference.

Working of inter-modulation distortion analyzer

The system requires two different input frequencies which are made to fix. According to SMPTE (Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers) these are taken as
f1= 7 kHz and
f2= 60 kHz
While there is standardization, DIN 45403, which set its own standard of frequencies as
f1=8 kHz and
f2=250 kHz

In both of cases the amplitude of frequencies is kept in ratio of 1:4 i.e. the signal of lesser frequency is made to have greater amplitude than that of higher frequency in order to expect a lower degree of non linearity. The mixture of these to frequencies is further fed to high pass filter whose outcome comprises of high frequency carrier and a low frequency modulation. The output thus obtain can be seen with help of an SRC.