Experts Tips

What is difference between a virus, Trojan Horse and Worm

2009-03-05T03:33:00.001-08:00

What is the Difference Between a Virus, Trojan Horse and Worm?

The most common blunder when the topic of a computer virus arises is that people will often refer to a Worm or Trojan Horse as a Virus. While the words Trojan, worm, and virus are used interchangeably, they are not the same. Viruses, worms, and Trojan Horses are all malicious programs that can cause damage to your computer, but there are differences between the three, and knowing those differences can help you to better protect your computer from their often damaging effects.

A computer Virus attaches itself to a program or file so it can spread from one computer to another, leaving infections as it travels. Some viruses cause only mildly annoying effects while others can damage your hardware, software, or files. Almost all viruses are attached to an executable file, which means the virus may exist on your computer but it cannot infect your computer unless you run or open the malicious program. It is important to note that a virus cannot be spread without a human action, (such as running an infected program) to keep it going. People continue the spread of a computer virus, mostly unknowingly, by sharing infecting files or sending e-mails with viruses as attachments in the e-mail.

A Worm is similar to a virus by its design, and is considered to be a sub-class of a virus. Worms spread from computer to computer, but unlike a virus, it has the ability to travel without any help from a person. A worm takes advantage of file or information transport features on your system, which allows it to travel unaided. The biggest danger with a worm is its ability to replicate itself on your system, so rather than your computer sending out a single worm, it could send out hundreds or thousands of copies of itself, creating a huge devastating effect. One example would be for a worm to send a copy of itself to everyone listed in your e-mail address book. Then, the worm replicates and sends itself out to everyone listed in each of the receiver's address book, and the manifest continues on down the line. Due to the copying nature of a worm and its ability to travel across networks the end result in most cases is that the worm consumes too much system memory (or network bandwidth), causing Web servers, network servers, and individual computers to stop responding. In more recent worm attacks such as the much talked about Blaster Worm, the worm has been designed to tunnel into your system and allow malicious users to control your computer remotely.

A Trojan Horse is full of as much trickery as the mythological Trojan Horse it was named after. The Trojan Horse, at first glance will appear to be useful software but will actually do damage once installed or run on your computer. Those on the receiving end of a Trojan Horse are usually tricked into opening them because they appear to be receiving legitimate software or files from a legitimate source. The Trojan horse itself would typically be a Windows executable program file, and thus must have an executable filename extension such as .exe, .com, .scr, .bat, or .pif. Since Windows is sometimes configured by default to hide filename extensions from a user, the Trojan horse is an extension that might be "masked" by giving it a name such as 'Readme.txt. exe'. With file extensions hidden, the user would only see 'Readme.txt' and could mistake it for a harmless text file. When the recipient double-clicks on the attachment, the Trojan horse might superficially do what the user expects it to do (open a text file, for example), so as to keep the victim unaware of its real, concealed, objectives. Meanwhile, it might discreetly modify or delete files, change the configuration of the computer, or even use the computer as a base from which to attack local or other networks - possibly joining many other similarly infected computers as part of a distributed denial-of-service attack. When a Trojan is activated on your computer, the results can vary. Some Trojans are designed to be more annoying than malicious (like changing your desktop, adding silly active desktop icons) or they can cause serious damage by deleting files and destroying information on your system. Trojans are also known to create a backdoor on your computer that gives malicious users access to your system, possibly allowing confidential or personal information to be compromised. Unlike viruses and worms, Trojans do not reproduce by infecting other files nor do they self-replicate.

Added into the mix, what is called a blended threat? A blended threat is a sophisticated attack that bundles some of the worst aspects of viruses, worms, Trojan horses and malicious code into one threat. Blended threats use server and Internet vulnerabilities to initiate, transmit and spread an attack. This combination of method and techniques means blended threats can spread quickly and cause widespread damage. Characteristics of blended threats include: causes harm, propagates by multiple methods, attacks from multiple points and exploits vulnerabilities.

To be considered a blended thread, the attack would normally serve to transport multiple attacks in one payload. For examplem it wouldn't just launch a DoS attack it would also install a backdoor and damage a local system in one shot. Additionally, blended threats are designed to use multiple modes of transport. For example, a worm may travel through e-mail, but a single blended threat could use multiple routes such as e-mail, IRC and file-sharing sharing networks. The actual attack itself is also not limited to a specific act. For example, rather than a specific attack on predetermined .exe files, a blended thread could modify exe files, HTML files and registry keys at the same time basically it can cause damage within several areas of your network at one time.

Blended threats are considered to be the worst risk to security since the inception of viruses, as most blended threats require no human intervention to propagate.

Combating Viruses, Worms and Trojan Horses :

The first steps to protect your computer are to ensure your operating system (OS) is up-to-date. This is essential if you are running a Microsoft Windows OS. Secondly, you should have anti-virus software installed on your system and download updates frequently to ensure your software has the latest fixes for new viruses, worms, and Trojan Horses. Additionally you want to make sure your anti-virus program has the ability to scan e-mail and files as they are downloaded from the Internet. This will help prevent malicious programs from even reaching your computer. If this isn't enough protection, then you may want to consider installing a firewall as well.

A firewall is a system which prevents unauthorized use and access to your computer. A firewall can be either hardware or software. Hardware firewalls provide a strong degree of protection from most forms of attack coming from the outside world and can be purchased as a stand-alone product or in broadband routers. Unfortunately, when battling viruses, worms and Trojans, a hardware firewall may be less effective than a software firewall, as it could possibly ignore embedded worms in out going e-mails and see this as regular network traffic. For individual home users, the most popular firewall choice is a software firewall. A good software firewall will protect your computer from outside attempts to control or gain access your computer, and usually provides additional protection against the most common Trojan programs or e-mail worms. The downside to software firewalls is that they will only protect the computer they are installed on, not a network.

It is important to remember that on its own a firewall is unable to get rid of your computer virus problems, but when used in conjunction with regular operating system updates and a good anti-virus scanning software, it will add some extra security and protection for your computer or network.

Warren Buffet's advice for 2009

2009-02-24T22:49:00.001-08:00

We begin this New Year with dampened enthusiasm and dented optimism. Our
happiness is diluted and our peace is threatened by the financial illness
that has infected our families, organizations and nations. Everyone is
desperate to find a remedy that will cure their financial illness and help
them recover their financial health. They expect the financial experts to
provide them with remedies, forgetting the fact that it is these experts who
created this financial mess.

Every new year, I adopt a couple of old maxims as my beacons to guide my
future. This self-prescribed therapy has ensured that with each passing
year, I grow wiser and not older. This year, I invite you to tap into the
financial wisdom of our elders along with me, and become financially wiser.

Hard work: *All hard work bring a profit, but mere talk leads only to   poverty.

Laziness:* A sleeping lobster is carried away by the water current.

Earnings:* Never depend on a single source of income.. [At least make   your Investments get you second earning]

Spending:* If you buy things you don't need, you'll soon sell things   you need.

Savings:* Don't save what is left after spending; Spend what is left   after saving.

Borrowings:* The borrower becomes the lender's slave..**

Accounting:* It's no use carrying an umbrella, if your shoes are leaking.

Auditing:* Beware of little expenses; A small leak can sink a large   ship.

Risk-taking:* Never test the depth of the river with both feet. [Have an alternate plan ready]

Investment:* Don't put all your eggs in one basket.

I'm certain that those who have already been practicing these principles
remain financially healthy. I'm equally confident that those who resolve to
start practicing these principles will quickly regain their financial
health.

With Best Regards,
Warren Buffet

The World as We Know It: 8 Ways to Feel Good When You Low

2008-02-28T06:37:00.000-08:00

The World as We Know It: 8 Ways to Feel Good When You Low

Prediction for 2008 - Warren Buffet - 3rd Richest Man in the world

2008-02-25T09:35:00.001-08:00

"Eight for '08"
Warren Buffett became one of the wealthiest people in the world by
making predictions and putting money behind those predictions. Every
time he buys a stock or a business or some other investment, he's
forecasting the future.

Judging by the incredible returns of his holding company Berkshire
Hathaway, Buffett and his colleagues are very good at making those
predictions.

Of course, it helps when you can give your predictions plenty of time
to come true. That's one reason Buffett's favorite holding period for
investments in "outstanding businesses with outstanding managements"
is "forever." After all, "We don't get paid for activity, just for
being right. As to how long we'll wait, we'll wait indefinitely."

1. Recessions can't be avoided forever.

In the last few days, Buffett told that if unemployment picks up
significantly, the "dominoes" will fall and the U.S. economy will fall
into recession in 2008. He's not sure, however, that unemployment
will go up next year. In fact, he's surprised that all the weakness
we're seeing in housing hasn't affected the jobs market ... yet.
Here's what he is sure about: "It is the nature of capitalism to
periodically have recessions. People overshoot."

2. We'll survive future recessions just as we've survived past
problems.

As Buffett told in August, "We've got a wonderful economy... There's
never been anything like that in the history of the world. We live
seven times better than the people did a century ago on average...
We've had problems all along. If you look at the last century, we had
that Great Depression and World War Two, we had the Cold War, we had
the atomic bomb, but the country does well."

3. Recessions will create opportunities.

"I made by far the best buys I've ever made in my lifetime in 1974.
And that was a time of great pessimism and the oil shock and
stagflation and all those sort of things. But stocks were cheap."

4. All stocks won't be cheap.

Like Ted Williams waiting for the right pitch, a successful investor
waits for the right stock at the right price, and it doesn't happen
every day. "What's nice about investing is you don't have to swing at
pitches. You can watch pitches come in one inch above or one inch
below your navel, and you don't have to swing. No umpire is going to
call you out." You get in trouble, Buffett says, when you listen to
the crowd chanting "Swing, batter, swing!"

5. The crowd will make mistakes.

Buffett cites this piece of advice from his mentor Benjamin Graham:
"You're neither right nor wrong because other people agree with you.
You're right because your facts are right and your reasoning is right—
and that's the only thing that makes you right. And if your facts and
reasoning are right, you don't have to worry about anybody else."

6. Investors will mistakenly think falling stock prices are bad.

"If they reduce the price of hamburgers at McDonald's today I feel
terrific. Now I don't go back and think, gee, I paid a little more
yesterday. I think I'm going to be buying them cheaper today. Anything
you're going to be buying in the future, you want to have get cheaper.

7. Good times will prompt bad decisions.

In his 2000 Letter to Berkshire shareholders, Buffett compared the
crowd that buys big when prices are high to Cinderella at the ball.
"They know that overstaying the festivities - that is, continuing to
speculate in companies that have gigantic valuations relative to the
cash they are likely to generate in the future - will eventually bring
on pumpkins and mice. But they nevertheless hate to miss a single
minute of what is one helluva party. Therefore, the giddy participants
all plan to leave just seconds before midnight. There's a problem,
though: They are dancing in a room in which the clocks have no hands."

8. There will be more dancing at another wild party followed by
another painful hangover.

Looking back at the Internet bubble, Buffett is quoted as saying,
"The world went mad. What we learn from history is that people don't
learn from history."

__,_._,___

Mostly Harmless: java Exception - Unknown Source

2008-01-23T04:39:00.000-08:00

Many time java engineer is in dilema of exception called Unknown Source and it take
hours and some whole day to track the source of exception by tracking entire code flow

Here is very good tips to tackle from such kind of error, it is basically because of
ant level configuration in build.xml

Please visit Nilesh Bansal blog for more details insight on it

Mostly Harmless: java Exception - Unknown Source

Happy Debugging

Golden Rules to earn money in Stock Market

2008-01-13T22:59:00.001-08:00

1. Keep patience - that's most important rule in stock market.
2. Always follow the market trend.
3. Do fundamental analysis of any stocks before investing in to Stock
Market.
4. Invest equal amount of money in 3-4 scripts & keep your eyes on your
stock holding and market trend to get good returns.
5. Strictly follow stop loss for any stocks.
6. Don't loose your focus.
7. Book Profit on every rise,so always you will get benefited.
8. Keep your profit aside and rotate the principal amount again in stock
market.
9. Don't forget any of above rule & follow *Tips4Trade tips*, you will be
always in profit.

Warren Buffett Talk / VIdeo on Stock picking and Investing - Part 1

2007-12-20T05:55:00.001-08:00

Warren Buffett Quotes

2007-10-11T06:34:00.001-07:00

Warren Buffett Quotes

A public-opinion poll is no substitute for thought.

Chains of habit are too light to be felt until they are too heavy to be broken.

I always knew I was going to be rich. I don't think I ever doubted it for a minute.

I am quite serious when I say that I do not believe there are, on the whole earth besides, so many intensified bores as in these United States. No man can form an adequate idea of the real meaning of the word, without coming here.

I buy expensive suits. They just look cheap on me.

I don't look to jump over 7-foot bars: I look around for 1-foot bars that I can step over.

I never attempt to make money on the stock market. I buy on the assumption that they could close the market the next day and not reopen it for five years.

If a business does well, the stock eventually follows.

If past history was all there was to the game, the richest people would be librarians.

In the business world, the rearview mirror is always clearer than the windshield.

It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently.

It's better to hang out with people better than you. Pick out associates whose behavior is better than yours and you'll drift in that direction.

It's far better to buy a wonderful company at a fair price than a fair company at a wonderful price.

Let blockheads read what blockheads wrote.

Look at market fluctuations as your friend rather than your enemy; profit from folly rather than participate in it.

Of the billionaires I have known, money just brings out the basic traits in them. If they were jerks before they had money, they are simply jerks with a billion dollars.

Only buy something that you'd be perfectly happy to hold if the market shut down for 10 years.

Only when the tide goes out do you discover who's been swimming naked.

Our favorite holding period is forever.

Our favourite holding period is forever.

Price is what you pay. Value is what you get.

Risk comes from not knowing what you're doing.

Risk is a part of God's game, alike for men and nations.

Rule No.1: Never lose money. Rule No.2: Never forget rule No.1.

Should you find yourself in a chronically leaking boat, energy devoted to changing vessels is likely to be more productive than energy devoted to patching leaks.

The business schools reward difficult complex behavior more than simple behavior, but simple behavior is more effective.

The first rule is not to lose. The second rule is not to forget the first rule.

The investor of today does not profit from yesterday's growth.

The only time to buy these is on a day with no "y" in it.

The smarter the journalists are, the better off society is. For to a degree, people read the press to inform themselves-and the better the teacher, the better the student body.

There seems to be some perverse human characteristic that likes to make easy things difficult.

Time is the friend of the wonderful company, the enemy of the mediocre.

Value is what you get.

We believe that according the name 'investors' to institutions that trade actively is like calling someone who repeatedly engages in one-night stands a 'romantic.'

We enjoy the process far more than the proceeds.

We simply attempt to be fearful when others are greedy and to be greedy only when others are fearful.

When a management team with a reputation for brilliance tackles a business with a reputation for bad economics, it is the reputation of the business that remains intact.

When a management with a reputation for brilliance tackles a business with a reputation for bad economics, it is the reputation of the business that remains intact.

Why not invest your assets in the companies you really like? As Mae West said, "Too much of a good thing can be wonderful".

Wide diversification is only required when investors do not understand what they are doing.

You do things when the opportunities come along. I've had periods in my life when I've had a bundle of ideas come along, and I've had long dry spells. If I get an idea next week, I'll do something. If not, I won't do a damn thing.

You only have to do a very few things right in your life so long as you don't do too many things wrong.

Your premium brand had better be delivering something special, or it's not going to get the business.

10 Essential Health Tips

2007-09-27T06:31:00.001-07:00

1. Move More

Make it a daily challenge to find ways to move your body. Climb stairs if given a choice between that and escalators or elevators. Walk your dog; chase your kids; toss balls with friends, mow the lawn. Anything that moves your limbs is not only a fitness tool, it's a stress buster. Think 'move' in small increments of time. It doesn't have to be an hour in the gym or a 45-minute aerobic dance class or tai chi or kickboxing. But that's great when you're up to it.

2. Cut Fat

Avoid the obvious such as fried foods, burgers and other fatty meats (i.e. pork, bacon, ham, salami, ribs and sausage). Dairy products such as cheese, cottage cheese, milk and cream should be eaten in low fat versions. Nuts and sandwich meats, mayonnaise, margarine, butter and sauces should be eaten in limited amounts. Most are available in lower fat versions such as substitute butter, fat free cheeses and mayonnaise.

3. Quit Smoking

The jury is definitely in on this verdict. Ever since 1960 when the Surgeon General announced that smoking was harmful to your health, Americans have been reducing their use of tobacco products that kill. Just recently, we've seen a surge in smoking in adolescents and teens. Could it be the Hollywood influence? It seems the stars in every movie of late smoke cigarettes. Beware. Warn your children of the false romance or 'tough guy' stance of Hollywood smokers.

4. Reduce Stress

Easier said than done, stress busters come in many forms. Some techniques recommended by experts are to think positive thoughts. Spend 30 minutes a day doing something you like. (i.e.,Soak in a hot tub; walk on the beach or in a park; read a good book; visit a friend; play with your dog; listen to soothing music; watch a funny movie. Get a massage, a facial or a haircut. Meditate. Count to ten before losing your temper or getting aggravated. Avoid difficult people when possible.

5. Protect Yourself from Pollution

If you can't live in a smog-free environment, at least avoid smoke-filled rooms, high traffic areas, breathing in highway fumes and exercising near busy thoroughfares. Exercise outside when the smog rating is low. Exercise indoors in air conditioning when air quality is good. Plant lots of shrubbery in your yard. It's a good pollution and dirt from the street deterrent.

6. Wear Your Seat Belt

Statistics show that seat belts add to longevity and help alleviate potential injuries in car crashes.

7. Floss Your Teeth

Recent studies make a direct connection between longevity and teeth flossing. Nobody knows exactly why. Perhaps it's because people who floss tend to be more health conscious than people who don't?

8. Avoid Excessive Drinking

While recent studies show a glass of wine or one drink a day (two for men) can help protect against heart disease, more than that can cause other health problems such as liver and kidney disease and cancer.

9. Keep a Positive Mental Outlook

There's a definitive connection between living well and healthfully and having a cheerful outlook on life.

10. Choose Your Parents Well

The link between genetics and health is a powerful one. But just because one or both of your parents died young in ill health doesn't mean you cannot counteract the genetic pool handed you.

Warren Buffet's 10 Golden Rules for Investing

2007-09-25T08:24:00.000-07:00

Warren Buffet's 10 Golden Rules for Investing
1 Never invest in a business you can not understand

2 Risk can be reduced by concentrating on few holdings

3 Stop predict direction of the stock market, economy,intrest rate etc
4 Buy companies with strong histories of profitibalities

5Be fearful when others are greedy and greedy only when others are fearful

6 Unless you can watch ur stock holding decline by 50% without becoming panic,you should not be in stock market

7 Do not take yearly results too serious,instead focus on five year average

8 Focus on return on equity ; not on EPS

9 Calcualte " owners earning" to get true of value of the stock

10 AlwaysInvest for a long term.Think about "Does business have favourable long term prospects?"

SEO Tips - External Linking

2007-09-17T00:25:00.001-07:00

SEO Tips - External Linking

Posted: 16 Sep 2007 09:27 AM CDT

SEO Series is back on track and today's topic is about external linking. External linking is another important factor in your SEO optimization. With every external link your blog becomes more and more popular on the web meaning that it gets higher search engine results and more importantly - more traffic.

Even though you can't have an impact on every external link pointing to your blog, you still have a chance of getting some external links to your blog which you CAN control - control the linking (anchor) text, that is.

How to get desired anchor text for your external links:

1. Exchanging links with other bloggers - allows you to ask for desired anchor text
2. Submitting your blog to web directories where you have editorial control and you can specify how your link will look like
3. Getting listed on partner blogs and sites
4. Optimizing your post title - if you use a great title your post can be picked up by someone where you usually get the credit for it + the post title as the anchor text
5. Buying links on other blogs which gives you complete editorial rights and you can specify the desired anchor text.
6. Running a contest on your blog will bring you external links with the anchor text you specify in the contest rules.

After you have done that, your external links depend on the webmasters that post them. The best influence you can have on that is to optimize your post titles in the best possible way.

One last thing, external linking very much depends on your content. With high quality content you will have no problems at all in getting external links.

7 Steps to Becoming a Happier Person

2007-09-14T01:44:00.001-07:00

Choosing To Be Happy

Strategies for Happiness: 7 Steps to Becoming a Happier Person

By Tom Valeo
WebMD Feature

Reviewed by Cynthia Dennison Haines, MD

A popular greeting card attributes this quote to Henry David Thoreau: "Happiness is like a butterfly: the more you chase it, the more it will elude you, but if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder."

With all due respect to the author of Walden, that just isn't so, according to a growing number of psychologists. You can choose to be happy, they say. You can chase down that elusive butterfly and get it to sit on your shoulder. How? In part, by simply making the effort to monitor the workings of your mind.

Research has shown that your talent for happiness is, to a large degree, determined by your genes. Psychology professor David T. Lykken, author of Happiness: Its Nature and Nurture, says that "trying to be happier is like trying to be taller." We each have a "happiness set point," he argues, and move away from it only slightly.

And yet, psychologists who study happiness -- including Lykken -- believe we can pursue happiness. We can do this by thwarting negative emotions such as pessimism, resentment, and anger. And we can foster positive emotions, such as empathy, serenity, and especially gratitude.

Happiness Strategy # 1: Don't Worry, Choose Happy

The first step, however, is to make a conscious choice to boost your happiness. In his book, The Conquest of Happiness, published in 1930, the philosopher Bertrand Russell had this to say: "Happiness is not, except in very rare cases, something that drops into the mouth, like a ripe fruit. … Happiness must be, for most men and women, an achievement rather than a gift of the gods, and in this achievement, effort, both inward and outward, must play a great part."

Today, psychologists who study happiness heartily agree. The intention to be happy is the first of The 9 Choices of Happy People listed by authors Rick Foster and Greg Hicks in their book of the same name.

"Intention is the active desire and commitment to be happy," they write. "It's the decision to consciously choose attitudes and behaviors that lead to happiness over unhappiness."

Tom G. Stevens, PhD, titled his book with the bold assertion, You Can Choose to Be Happy. "Choose to make happiness a top goal," Stevens tells WebMD. "Choose to take advantage of opportunities to learn how to be happy. For example, reprogram your beliefs and values. Learn good self-management skills, good interpersonal skills, and good career-related skills. Choose to be in environments and around people that increase your probability of happiness. The persons who become the happiest and grow the most are those who also make truth and their own personal growth primary values."

In short, we may be born with a happiness "set point," as Lykken calls it, but we are not stuck there. Happiness also depends on how we manage our emotions and our relationships with others.

Jon Haidt, author of The Happiness Hypothesis, teaches positive psychology. He actually assigns his students to make themselves happier during the semester.

"They have to say exactly what technique they will use," says Haidt, a professor at the University of Virginia, in Charlottesville. "They may choose to be more forgiving or more grateful. They may learn to identify negative thoughts so they can challenge them. For example, when someone crosses you, in your mind you build a case against that person, but that's very damaging to relationships. So they may learn to shut up their inner lawyer and stop building these cases against people."

Once you've decided to be happier, you can choose strategies for achieving happiness. Psychologists who study happiness tend to agree on ones like these.

Happiness Strategy #2: Cultivate Gratitude

In his book, Authentic Happiness, University of Pennsylvania psychologist Martin Seligman encourages readers to perform a daily "gratitude exercise." It involves listing a few things that make them grateful. This shifts people away from bitterness and despair, he says, and promotes happiness.

Happiness Strategy #3: Foster Forgiveness

Holding a grudge and nursing grievances can affect physical as well as mental health, according to a rapidly growing body of research. One way to curtail these kinds of feelings is to foster forgiveness. This reduces the power of bad events to create bitterness and resentment, say Michael McCullough and Robert Emmons, happiness researchers who edited The Psychology of Happiness.

In his book, Five Steps to Forgiveness, clinical psychologist Everett Worthington Jr. offers a 5-step process he calls REACH. First, recall the hurt. Then empathize and try to understand the act from the perpetrator's point of view. Be altruistic by recalling a time in your life when you were forgiven. Commit to putting your forgiveness into words. You can do this either in a letter to the person you're forgiving or in your journal. Finally, try to hold on to the forgiveness. Don't dwell on your anger, hurt, and desire for vengeance.

The alternative to forgiveness is mulling over a transgression. This is a form of chronic stress, says Worthington.

"Rumination is the mental health bad boy," Worthington tells WebMD. "It's associated with almost everything bad in the mental health field -- obsessive-compulsive disorder, depression, anxiety -- probably hives, too."

Happiness Strategy #4: Counteract Negative Thoughts and Feelings

As Jon Haidt puts it, improve your mental hygiene. In The Happiness Hypothesis, Haidt compares the mind to a man riding an elephant. The elephant represents the powerful thoughts and feelings -- mostly unconscious -- that drive your behavior. The man, although much weaker, can exert control over the elephant, just as you can exert control over negative thoughts and feelings.

"The key is a commitment to doing the things necessary to retrain the elephant," Haidt says. "And the evidence suggests there's a lot you can do. It just takes work."

For example, you can practice meditation, rhythmic breathing, yoga, or relaxation techniques to quell anxiety and promote serenity. You can learn to recognize and challenge thoughts you have about being inadequate and helpless.

"If you learn techniques for identifying negative thoughts, then it's easier to challenge them," Haidt said. "Sometimes just reading David Burns' book, Feeling Good, can have a positive effect."

Happiness Strategy #5: Remember, Money Can't Buy Happiness

Research shows that once income climbs above the poverty level, more money brings very little extra happiness. Yet, "we keep assuming that because things aren't bringing us happiness, they're the wrong things, rather than recognizing that the pursuit itself is futile," writes Daniel Gilbert in his book, Stumbling on Happiness. "Regardless of what we achieve in the pursuit of stuff, it's never going to bring about an enduring state of happiness."

Happiness Strategy #6: Foster Friendship

There are few better antidotes to unhappiness than close friendships with people who care about you, says David G. Myers, author of The Pursuit of Happiness. One Australian study found that people over 70 who had the strongest network of friends lived much longer.

"Sadly, our increasingly individualistic society suffers from impoverished social connections, which some psychologists believe is a cause of today's epidemic levels of depression," Myers writes. "The social ties that bind also provide support in difficult times."

Happiness Strategy #7: Engage in Meaningful Activities

People are seldom happier, says psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, than when they're in the "flow." This is a state in which your mind becomes thoroughly absorbed in a meaningful task that challenges your abilities. Yet, he has found that the most common leisure time activity -- watching TV -- produces some of the lowest levels of happiness.

To get more out of life, we need to put more into it, says Csikszentmihalyi. "Active leisure that helps a person grow does not come easily," he writes in Finding Flow. "Each of the flow-producing activities requires an initial investment of attention before it begins to be enjoyable."

So it turns out that happiness can be a matter of choice -- not just luck. Some people are lucky enough to possess genes that foster happiness. However, certain thought patterns and interpersonal skills definitely help people become an "epicure of experience," says David Lykken, whose name, in Norwegian, means "the happiness."

http://www.webmd.com/balance/guide/choosing-to-be-happy?page=1

Balance Work and Life

2007-09-09T23:38:00.001-07:00

I come across very good articles.

on

Work Less, Be Happier
Family First

http://finance.yahoo.com/expert/article/careerist/43903
http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/2006/08/27/your-family-would-be-better-off-with-a-housewife-so-would-mine/
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/11/AR2007071102345.html?hpid=topnews

69 Wisdoms and Axioms for modern life

2007-09-07T04:47:00.001-07:00

69 Wisdoms and Axioms for modern life
1) If at first you don't succeed, destroy all evidence that you tried.

2) A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking.

3) Experience is something that you don't get until just after you need it.

4) For every action, there is an equal and opposite criticism.

5) He who hesitates is probably right.

6) No one is listening until you make a mistake.

7) Success always occurs in private, and failure in full view.

8) To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism; to steal from many is research.

9) Two wrongs are only the beginning.

10) Monday is an awful way to spend one-seventh of your life.

11) The sooner you fall behind, the more time you'll have for catching up.

12) A clear consciense is usually the sign of a bad memory.

13) It is much easier to apologize than to ask permission.

14) There are two rules for ultimate success in life. Never tell everything you know.

15) Never put off until tomorrow what you can avoid doing altogether.

16) The trouble with being in the rat race is that even if you win, you're still a rat.

17) Everyone has a right to be stupid. Some just abuse the privilege.

18) On the keyboard of life, always keep one finger on the escape key.

19) It's frustrating when you know all the answers, but nobody bothers to ask you the questions.

21) If you can remain calm, you just don't have all the facts.

22) Never do card tricks for the group you play poker with.

23) The colder the X-ray table, the more of your body is required on it.

24) The hardness of the butter is proportional to the softness of the bread.

25) The severity of the itch is proportional to the reach.

26) To succeed in politics, it is often necessary to rise above your principles.

27) You never really learn to swear until you learn to drive.

28) The problem with the gene pool is that there is no lifeguard.

29) If you must choose between two evils, pick the one you've never tried before.

30) Change is inevitable except from vending machines.

31) Don't sweat petty things or pet sweaty things.

32) A fool and his money are soon partying.

33) Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

34) Money can't buy love But it CAN rent a very close imitation.

35) Plan to be spontaneous tomorrow.

36) Always try to be modest ... And be damn proud of it!

37) If you think nobody cares about you, try missing a couple of loan repayments.

38) How many of you believe in telekinesis? Raise my hands.

39) Everybody repeat after me "We are all individuals."

40) Chastity is curable, if detected early.

41) Love may be blind, but marriage is a real eye-opener.

42) Hell hath no fury like the lawyer of a woman scorned.

43) Bills travel through the post at twice the speed of cheques.

44) Hard work pays off in the future, Laziness pays off now.

45) Eagles may soar, but weasels aren't sucked into jet engines.

46) Borrow money from pessimists - they don't expect it back.

47) Half the people you know are below average.

48) 99 percent of lawyers give the rest a bad name.

49) 427.23 percent of all statistics are made up on the spot.

50) A conscience is what hurts when all your other parts feel so good.

51) Everyone has a photographic memory. Some don't have film.

52) He who laughs last, thinks slowest.

53) A day without sunshine is like, well, night.

54) On the other hand, you have different fingers.

55) Back up my hard drive? How do I put it in reverse?

56) I just got lost in thought. It was unfamiliar territory.

57) Seen it all, done it all, can't remember most of it.

58) Those who live by the sword get shot by those who don't.

59) I feel like I'm diagonally parked in a parallel universe.

60) He's not dead; he's electroencephalographically challenged.

61) You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say will be misquoted, then used against you.

62) I wonder how much deeper would the ocean be without sponges.

63) Despite the cost of living, have you noticed how it remains so popular?

64) Nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool.

65) Always remember that you are unique, just like everyone else.

66) War doesn't determine who's right, just who's left.

67) Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.

68) I almost had a psychic girlfriend but she left me before we met.

69) Do unto others, then run .............

Found Good Site on Internet Marketing

2007-09-07T04:06:00.001-07:00

Dave Wong - Motivation, NLP, Study Skills, Internet Marketing Coach

www.success-route.com

Description:The route to success is a road hard to thread and not many willing or dare to walk on it. It is filled with countless hardships and challenges. We are here to be your guide towards enroute success, clearing hardships and challenges together with you, making your enroute towards success smoother and easier to thread on. Dave Wong.

Google Optimization - Key Factors

2007-09-07T02:34:00.001-07:00

Google optimization is one of the most crucial factors for your SEO campaign and making money online. Google is, as you probably know by now, the most powerful search engine today and your SEO very much depends on Google Optimization.

Google Optimization is based on three things:

1. Google Page Rank
2. Google Sand Box
3. Inbound Links

You need to focus on those three factors to make the most from your Goo gle Optimization. What Google values the most are those high-quality inbound links . You can get them by writing articles, buying links and link exchanges. Try to get as much as you can of those one-way text links and by getting that alone, your Page Rank should increase by itself.

On the other hand, you should try to avoid getting caught in the Google Sand Box. The effect of the Google Sand Box is on the new domain names by holding them in a filter. Getting out of the Sand Box includes adding relevant content to your blog, linking to your external pages and using competitive keywords.

Goo gle Op timiz ation - Key Fact ors

- make sure your new pages link to your old ones
- add a sitemap to your blog
- use title optimization
- use relevant keywords in your posts
- submit your site to web-directories
- use robot.txt files to prevent non-relevant content being scanned
- submit your site to Google
- write content for your readers - not for search engines

Differences Between GSM & CDM

2007-08-29T00:39:00.000-07:00

Differences between

the GSM and CDMA Wireless Networks

GSM and CDMA have been the two leading commercial wireless technologies that are being used all over the world. This paper presents to the readers the key differences between the two technologies ¹. The various topics in which this paper presents the difference are:

Radio Spectrum Usage
Network architecture differences
Radio channel differences
Call Processing
Evolution to 3G
Network capacity differences
Deployment

Introduction

This section presents the basic wireless network architecture and lays the foundation for the readers to understand the later sections of this paper.

Though this paper concentrates on the differences between these networks, but the basic network architecture for both these networks is same.

The diagram below presents the general architecture of a wireless network.

1: This paper concentrates mostly on the differences in the BSS.

Figure 1: General Architecture of Wireless Networks

The Mobile Station

The Mobile Station (MS) is the user equipment in Wireless Networks.. Production of Mobile Stations is done by many different manufacturers, and there will almost always be a wide range of different Mobile Stations in a mobile network. Therefore the specifications specify the workings of the MS in great detail.

The Base Transceiver Station

The Base Transceiver Station (BTS) is the entity corresponding to one site communicating with the Mobile Stations. Usually, the BTS will have an antenna with several TRXs (radio transceivers) that each communicates on radio frequency. The link-level signaling on the radio-channels is interpreted in the BTS, whereas most of the higher-level signaling is forwarded to the BSC and MSC

The Base Station Controller

Each Base Station Controller (BSC) control the magnitude of several hundred BTSs. The BSC takes care of a number of different procedures regarding call setup, location update and handover for each MS. The handover control procedures will come especially into focus in this thesis. It is the BSC that decides when handover is necessary. This is accomplished by analyzing the measurement results that are sent from the MS during a call and ordering the MS to perform handover if this is necessary. The continuous analyzing of measurements from many MSs requires considerable computational power. This put strong constraints on the design of the BSC.

The Mobile Switching Center

The Mobile Switching Center is a normal ISDN-switch with extended functionality to handle mobile subscribers. The basic function of the MSC is to switch speech and data connections between BSCs, other MSCs, other Wireless networks and external non-mobile-networks. The MSC also handles a number of functions associated with mobile subscribers, among others registration, location updating and handover. There will normally exist only a few BSCs per MSC, due to the large number of BTSs connected to the BSC. The MSC and BSCs are connected via the highly standardized A-interface. However, due to the lack of standardization on Operation and Management protocols, network providers usually choose BSCs, MSCs and Location Registers from one manufacturer.

The Location Registers

With each MSC, there is associated a Visitors Location Register (VLR). The VLR can be associated with one or several MSCs. The VLR stores data about all customers who are roaming withing the location area of that MSC. This data is updated with the location update procedure initiated from the MS through the MSC, or directly from the subscriber Home Location Register (HLR). The HLR is the home register of the subscriber. Subscription information, allowed services, authentication information and localization of the subscriber are at all times stored in the HLR. This information may be obtained by the VLR/MSC when necessary. When the subscriber roams into the location area of another VLR/MSC, the HLR is updated. At mobile terminated calls, the HLR is interrogated to find which MSC the MS is registered with. Because the HLR is a centralized database that need to be accessed during every call setup and data transmission in the GSM network, this entity need to have a very large data transmission capacity suggests a scheme for distributing the data in the HLR in order to reduce the load.

The communication between MSC, VLR and HLR is done using the MAP (Mobile Application Part) of the Signalling System 7. The MAP is defined in and will be further discussed in

Historical View of GSM and CDMA

GSM

The first step towards GSM was the allocation of a common frequency band in 1978, twice 25 MHz, at around 900 MHz for mobile communication in Europe. In 1990, the GSM specifications for 900 MHz were frozen. In 1990 it was decided that GSM 1800

GSM radio interface GSM Phase 2+

8 channels per carrier Adaptive multirate coder

200 – KHz carrier bandwidth 14.4 Kbp data service

Slow frequency hopping General pocket radio service

Enhanced data rates using optimised modulation (EDGE)

Table 1 shows the time schedule of GSM.

Table 1 – GSM Development Time Schedule

1982	Groupe Special Mobile established within CEPT
1984	Several proposals for GSM multiple access : wideband TDMA, narrowband TDMA, DS- CDMA, hybrid CDMA/FDMA, narrowband FDMA
1986	Eight prototype systems tested in CNET laboratories in France Permanent nucleus is set up
1987	Basic transmission principles selected : 8-slot TDMA, 200-kHz carrier spacing, frequency hopping
1987	MoU signed
1988	GSM becomes an ETSI technical committee
1990	GSM phase 1 specifications frozen (drafted 1987 – 1990) GSM1800 standardisation begins
1991	GSM1800 specifications are frozen
1992	GSM900 commercial operation starts
1992	GSM phase 2+ development starts
1995	GSM submitted as a PCS technology candidate to the United States
1995	PCS1900 standard adopted in the United States
1996	Enhanced full rate (EFR) speech codec standard ready
1996	14.4-Kbps standard ready GSM1900 commercial operation starts
1997	HSCSD standard ready GSM cordless system (home base station) standardisation started EDGE standardisation started
1998	GPRS standard ready WCDMA selected as the third generation air interface

Classification of CDMA

based on the modulation method

CDMA : direct sequence (DS)

CDMA : frequency hopping (FH)

CDMA : time hopping (TH)

Frequency
Direct sequence
Frequency hopping

Time hopping
Time

[1] In DS- CDMA, spectrum is spread by multiplying the information signal with a pseudo-noise sequence, resulting in a wideband signal.

[2] In FH- CDMA. In the frequency hopping spread spectrum, a pseudo-noise sequence defines the instantaneous transmission frequency. The bandwidth at each moment is small, but the total bandwidth over, for example, a symbol period is large. Frequency hopping can either be fast (several hops over one symbol) or slow (several symbols transmitted during one hop).

[3] In TH- CDMA, in the time hopping spread spectrum, a pseudo-noise sequence defines the transmission moment.

CDMA era, as shown in table 2

Table 2 – CDMA Era

Pioneer Era

1949	John Pierce : time hopping spread spectrum
1949	Claude Shannon and Robert Pierce : basic ideas of CDMA
1950	De Rosa-Rogoff : direct sequence spread spectrum
1956	Price and Green : antimultipath "RAKE" patent
1961	Magnuski : near-far problem
1970s	Several developments for military field and navigation systems

Narrowband CDMA Era

1978	Cooper and Nettleton : cellular application of spread spectrum
1980s	Investigation of narrowband CDMA techniques for cellular applications
1986	Formulation of optimum multiuser detection by Verdu
1993	IS-95 standard

Wideband CDMA Era

WCDMA1995 -	Europe : FRAMES FMA2 Japan : Core-A USA : cdma2000 Korea : TTA I, TTA II
2000s	Commercialization of wideband CDMA systems

Table 3 shows the technical parameters of second generation systems. All these systems are frequency division duplex (FDD) systems. They transmit and receive in different frequency bands. Time division duplex (TDD). The actual data rate available in commercial systems is usually much smaller. In 1998 GSM supports 14.4 Kbps, IS-95 9.6 Kbps, IS-136 9.6Kbps and PDC 9.6 Kbps.

Table 3 – Second Generation Digital Systems

	GSM	IS-136	IS-95	PDC
Multiple access	TDMA	TDMA	CDMA	TDMA
Modulation	GMSK^a	ð/4-DQPSK^b Coherent ð/4- DQPSK Coherent 8-PSK	QPSK/0-QPSK^c	ð/4-DQPSK
Carrier spacing	200 kHz	30 kHz	1.25 MHz	25 kHz
Carrier bit rate	270.833 Kbps	48.6 Kbps (ð/4-PSK and ð/4-DQPSK) 72.9 Kbps (8-PSK)	1.2288 Mchip/s^d	42 Kbps
Frame length	4.615 ms	40 ms	20 ms	20 ms
Slots per frame	8/16	6	1	3/6
Frequency band (uplink/ downlink) (MHz)	880-915 / 935-960 1720-1785 / 1805-1880 1930-1990 / 1850-1910	824-849 / 869-894 1930-1990 / 1850-1910	824-849/869-894 1930-1990 / 1850-1910	810-826 / 940-956 1429-1453/ 1477-1501
Speech codec	RPE-LTP^e 13 Kbps Half rate 6.5 Kbps Enhanced full rate (EFR) 12.2 kbps	VSELP^f 8 Kbps IS-641-A: 7.4 Kbps (ACELP)^g US1: 12.2 Kbps (ACELP)	QCELP 8 Kbps CELP 8 Kbps CELP 13 Kbps	VCELP 6.7 Kbps
Maximum possible data rate	HSCSD:115.2 Kbps GPRS : 115.2 – 182.4 Kbps (depending on the coding)	IS-136+: 43.2 Kbps	IS95A:14.4 Kbps IS95B:115.2 Kbps	28.8 Kbps
Frequency hopping	Yes	No	N/A	No
Handover	Hard	Hard	Soft	Hard

^a Gaussian minimum shift keying

^b Differential quadrature phase shift keying

^c Offset QPSK

^d A "chip" is used to denote a spread symbol in DS- CDMA systems

^e Regular pulse excited long term prediction

^f Vector sum excited linear predictive

^g Algebraic code excited linear predictive

Comparison of Technologies

Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA):

The frequency spectrum is divided into number of narrow band channels. These channels are assigned to users. Therefore, users transmit in their assigned frequency range. This is the assigned dynamically. The frequency range can be reassigned once the call is completed. The frequency assigned serves as channel identifier.

Time Division to Multiple Access (TDMA):

As in FDMA, TDMA divides the spectrum into narrow band channels. However, in TDMA, the same channel is assigned to multiple users. The available time is divided into a number of time slots. These slots are assigned to users sharing the same channel. Thus, TDMA provides more spectral efficiency than FDMA. The capacity is increased N times, where N is the number of timeslots within in a channel. Thus, N users can be accommodated in a channel. The frequency assignment, along with the assigned time slot, serves as a channel identifier. This technology is used in GSM .

Code Division Multiple Access ( CDMA):

In CDMA , all users share the wideband spectrum. Each user is spread with a pseudo-random binary sequence. The wide band frequency assignment (common to all users) along with a pseudo-random sequence serves as the channel identifier.

Network Architecture

This section presents the differences between the GSM and CDMA network architectures.

The diagram below shows the GSM network architecture:

The diagram below shows the IS-95 based CDMA network architecture:

Mobile Station:

GSM :

The mobile station (MS) consists of the mobile equipment (the terminal) and a smart card called the Subscriber Identity Module (SIM). The SIM provides personal mobility, so that the user can have access to subscribed services irrespective of a specific terminal. By inserting the SIM card into another GSM terminal, the user is able to receive calls at that terminal, make calls from that terminal, and receive other subscribed services.

The mobile equipment is uniquely identified by the International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI). The SIM card contains the International Mobile Subscriber Identity (IMSI) used to identify the subscriber to the system, a secret key for authentication, and other information. The IMEI and the IMSI are independent, thereby allowing personal mobility. The SIM card may be protected against unauthorized use by a password or personal identity number.

CDMA :

One of the biggest drawbacks of the CDMA mobile stations is the absence of the SIM card. As a result of this, a user's identity is fixed to a handset.

Electronic Serial Number (ESN) uniquely identifies the mobile equipment. ESN is a 32bit number assigned by the mobile station manufacturer.

An IMSI and ESN are linked in the operator database to uniquely identify a subscriber.

Cell Design

In CDMA , the same 1.233 MHz wideband channel may be reused in all the cells. Therefore, adjacent cells may use the same frequency; thus the frequency reuse factor is 1. This greatly simplifies the frequency planning.

On the other hand in GSM, the frequency assignments in one cell cannot be reused in adjacent cells. Hence, frequency assignments in each cell have to be carefully allocated to avoid interference from adjacent cells.

Base Station Sub-System (BSS):

An important component of the BSS, which is considered in the canonical GSM architecture as part of the BTS is TRAU, or the Transcoder/Rate Adapter Unit. The TRAU is the equipment in which the GSM specific speech encoder and decoding is carried out, as well as the rate adaptation in the case of data. Although the GMS specifications consider the TRAU as part of the BTS, it can be sited away from the BTS and in many cases it is actually between the BSC and MSC. Having the TRAU as close to MSC saves a lot on the 64kbps link between the BSC and the MSC.

Where as in CDMA , the TRAU is called the Vocoders and they are considered as part of the BSC.

Another key difference in the BSS is that the CDMA BSS gets the time synchronization between the various Network elements using the GPS, where as in GSM is it controlled by the MSC and BSS interface.

Radio Interface Differences

The radio interface in the wireless systems provides the link between the fixed infrastructure of different operators and the mobile station of various manufacturers.

The radio interface serves two main functions:

To transport user information, both speech and data – bi-directional.
To exchange signaling information between the mobile station and the network.

Uplink and Downlink differences:

The radio link directed from the mobile station to the network is called the uplink. This is also referred to as the reverse link in CDMA networks.

The radio link directed from network to the mobile station is called the downlink. This is referred to as the forward link in the CDMA networks.

Channels are used in pair for full duplex communications. Thus, GSM uses both uplink and downlink bands of a given spectrum.

In other words, a physical channel refers to a pair of frequencies used for a cellular radio talk path. One is used for the cell site to mobile transmission while the other is used for the mobile to the cell site transmission.

GMS signal requires channels spacing of 200kHz.

In CDMA two types of PN codes are used for differentiating the forward and the reverse links.

Short Codes

These PN codes are generated with a register length of 15. The length of the code is 2^15-(32,768) bits. Generated at the rate of 1.2288MHz, these codes repeat every 26.67 msec. Each base station generates a short code with a different offset that identifies the base station.

Long Code

There is only one long code, it is defined in the standard, and it is used by all IS-95 and cdma 2000 systems. The long PN code is generated with a register length of 42. Generated at the rate of 1.2288MHz, this code repeats in approximately in 41 days. In the reverse direction, the long code is used for spreading (mobile to the base station) and to uniquely identify each channel. When the mobile needs to uniquely identify itself or a channel using the long code, it applies a long code mask to the long code, which results in a time shifted version of the long code. The receiver applies the same mask to recover the data.

Logical Channel differences

Both GSM and the CDMA networks have a lot of similarities in the way the logical channels are defined.

In brief both these networks have a

Channel, which is used by the mobile to acquire the system. This is called the Pilot channel in CDMA whereas it is called the FCCH in GSM .
A channel used by the mobile to synchronize to the network. This is called Synch channel in CDMA and in GSM it is called SCH.
Channel to transmit the system wide information and also page the mobile for the termination calls. This in GSM is achieved by two channels called BCCH and PCH, where as in CDMA a single Paging channel does this.
Traffic channels.

The diagrams below shows the logical channel structures of both CDMA and GSM networks.

The major difference between the GSM and the CDMA logical channels is how they are identified. In GSM each logical channel is pre-assigned to a particular time slot and in CDMA they are identified by a pre-assigned Walsh code.

And also in the traffic channel, during the call setup in a GMS the mobile is assigned to a time slot whereas in CDMA a particular Walsh code is assigned.

Call Processing

Both GSM and CDMA networks have similar call setup flows for the origination and the termination of calls and location management.

But the major difference is in the CDMA networks, which has both hard handoff and soft handoff whereas GSM networks have only hard handoffs.

Another major difference is how both these networks handle the Near-Far effect.

In GSM , during traffic a time slot is allocated for the mobile, when the mobile moves far away from the base station its round trip delay increases and the mobile tends to drift to another user time slot. To avoid this, time advance feature is used in GSM networks.

Similarly in CDMA networks, within a cell, mobiles are different radial distances from the base station. If all the mobiles transmit at equal power, the level received at the base station differs from one mobile to another. Mobiles that are nearer are received at significantly high power than the mobiles that are farther away. Because the transmission loss is higher for mobiles farther from the base station, mobiles near to the base station can cause more interference to the mobiles. Introducing power control during the call in the CDMA networks solves this problem.

Evolution to 3G

The diagram below shows the 3G evolution paths taken by each network.

Here is a brief summary changes for the evolution of each network.

GSM to GPRS:

New additions: Packet core network nodes – SGSN and GGSN.

Modifications: BSC hardware and software

No Changes: Circuit core network (MSC, HLR, AuC), Air Interface (MS-BTS) and A-Interface (BSC-MSC)

The diagram below shows a 2.5 G GSM – GPRS network.

GSM /GPRS to UMTS:

New additions: WCDMA Air Interface (UE-Node B), RAN Interfaces, Iub (Node B – RNC), IuR (RNC- RNC), CN Interface Iu (MSC- RNC & SGSN – RNC)

Modifications: MSC and SGSN for Iu Interface.

No Changes: Circuit core network (HLR, AuC), Packet Core Network (GGSN)

The diagram below shows the UMTS network.

IS 95 to CDMA 2000:

New additions: Packet core network (PDSN, AAA, HA/FA), New Interface R-P (PDSN – BSS)

Modifications: Air Interface (MS-BSS), Network Interface (BSC- MSC)

No Changes: Circuit core network (HLR, AC)

The diagram below shows the CDMA2000 network.

Conclusion:

This paper tried to capture the technical differences between the world's two biggest wireless networks – GSM and CDMA. From the practical deployment point of view GMS captured Europe, Asia and Africa where as CDMA has been deployed in the Americas and some parts of Asia like Japan and Korea.

Reference:

http://www.arcx.com/sites/index.htm
GSM Wireless Networks – Nortel Networks Training Division
IS –95 Overview – Award Solutions
www.gmsworld.com
The GSM systems for Mobile Communications – Michel Mouly
Introduction to 3G Mobile Communications – Juha

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN CDMA VS TDMA

Last Updated: 15-Apr-2004

NOTE: During this discussion I will use the generic term "CDMA" to refer to the IS-95B standard. Technically speaking, CDMA is only a means to transmit bits of information, while IS-95B is a transmission protocol that employs CDMA. You may also hear the term "TDMA" used to refer generically to the IS-136 standard. Once again, TDMA is only a method of transmitting bits, while IS-136 is a protocol that happens to employ TDMA.

I spend quite a bit of time reading the messages that flow through the various PCS newsgroups and forums on the Internet, and if one thing is abundantly clear, it is that people don't seem to know the true differences between CDMA and TDMA. And who could blame them? There is so much hype surrounding these two competing technologies that it is difficult for a regular PCS subscriber to know who is telling the truth.

I personally am NOT an RF engineer, nor do I work for any of the cellular or PCS companies. It is however my hobby to keep up with the latest developments in mobile communication (as this web site amply demonstrates). I would like to clear the air by interjecting my own spin on this debate. I hope that by the time you finish reading this editorial you will have a better understanding of the true strengths and weaknesses of both technologies.

The Basics

Let's begin by learning what these two acronyms stand for. TDMA stands for "Time Division Multiple Access", while CDMA stands for "Code Division Multiple Access". Three of the four words in each acronym are identical, since each technology essentially achieves the same goal, but by using different methods. Each strives to better utilize the radio spectrum by allowing multiple users to share the same physical channel. You heard that right. More than one person can carry on a conversation on the same frequency without causing interference. This is the magic of digital technology.

Where the two competing technologies differ is in the manner in which users share the common resource. TDMA does it by chopping up the channel into sequential time slices. Each user of the channel takes turns transmitting and receiving in a round-robin fashion. In reality, only one person is actually using the channel at any given moment, but he or she only uses it for short bursts. He then gives up the channel momentarily to allow the other users to have their turn. This is very similar to how a computer with just one processor can seem to run multiple applications simultaneously.

CDMA on the hand really does let everyone transmit at the same time. Conventional wisdom would lead you to believe that this is simply not possible. Using conventional modulation techniques, it most certainly is impossible. What makes CDMA work is a special type of digital modulation called "Spread Spectrum". This form of modulation takes the user's stream of bits and splatters them across a very wide channel in a pseudo-random fashion. The "pseudo" part is very important here, since the receiver must be able to undo the randomization in order to collect the bits together in a coherent order.

If you are still having trouble understanding the differences though, perhaps this analogy will help you. This my own version of an excellent analogy provided by Qualcomm:

Imagine a room full of people, all trying to carry on one-on-one conversations. In TDMA each couple takes turns talking. They keep their turns short by saying only one sentence at a time. As there is never more than one person speaking in the room at any given moment, no one has to worry about being heard over the background din. In CDMA each couple talks at the same time, but they all use a different language. Because none of the listeners understand any language other than that of the individual to whom they are listening, the background din doesn't cause any real problem.

Voice Encoding

At this point many people confuse two distinctly different issues involved in the transmission of digital audio. The first is the WAY in which the stream of bits is delivered from one end to the other. This part of the "air interface" is what makes one technology different from another. The second is the compression algorithm used to squeeze the audio into as small a stream of bits as possible.

This latter component is known at the "Voice Coder", or Vocoder for short. Another term commonly used is CODEC, which is a similar word to modem. It combines the terms "COder" and "DECoder". Although each technology has chosen their own unique CODECs, there is no rule saying that one transmission method needs to use a specific CODEC. People often lump a technology's transmission method with its CODEC as though they were single entities. We will discuss CODECs in greater detail later on in this article.

Voice encoding schemes differ slightly in their approach to the problem. Because of this, certain types of human voice work better with some CODECs than they do with others. The point to remember is that all PCS CODECs are compromises of some sort. Since human voices have such a fantastic range of pitch and tonal depth, one cannot expect any single compromise to handle each one equally well. This inability to cope with all types of voice at the same level does lead some people to choose one technology over another.

All of the PCS technologies try to minimize battery consumption during calls by keeping the transmission of unnecessary data to a minimum. The phone decides whether or not you are presently speaking, or if the sound it hears is just background noise. If the phone determines that there is no intelligent data to transmit it blanks the audio and it reduces the transmitter duty cycle (in the case of TDMA) or the number of transmitted bits (in the case of CDMA). When the audio is blanked your caller would suddenly find themselves listening to "dead air", and this may cause them to think the call has dropped.

To avoid this psychological problem many service providers insert what is known as "Comfort Noise" during the blanked periods. Comfort Noise is synthesized white noise that tries to mimic the volume and structure of the real background noise. This fake background noise assures the caller that the connection is alive and well.

However, in newer CODECs such as EVRC (used exclusively on CDMA systems) the background noise is generally suppressed even while the user is talking. This piece of magic makes it sound as though the cell phone user is not in a noisy environment at all. Under these conditions, Comfort Noise is neither necessary, nor desirable. You can read my article on EVRC by clicking here.

CDMA

Now that we have a rudimentary understanding of the two technologies, let's try and examine what advantages they provide. We'll begin with CDMA, since this newer technology has created the greatest "buzz" in the mobile communications industry.

One of the terms you'll hear in conjunction with CDMA is "Soft Handoff". A handoff occurs in any cellular system when your call switches from one cell site to another as you travel. In all other technologies this handoff occurs when the network informs your phone of the new channel to which it must switch. The phone then stops receiving and transmitting on the old channel, and it commences transmitting and receiving on the new channel. It goes without saying that this is known as a "Hard Handoff".

In CDMA however, every site are on the SAME frequency. In order to begin listening to a new site the phone only needs to change the pseudo-random sequence it uses to decode the desired data from the jumble of bits sent for everyone else. While a call is in progress the network chooses two or more alternate sites that it feels are handoff candidates. It simultaneously broadcasts a copy of your call on each of these sites. Your phone can then pick and choose between the different sources for your call, and move between them whenever it feels like it. It can even combine the data received from two or more different sites to ease the transition from one to the other.

This arrangement therefore puts the phone in almost complete control of the handoff process. Such an arrangement should ensure that there is always a new site primed and ready to take over the call at a moment's notice. In theory, this should put an end to dropped calls and audio interruptions during the handoff process. In practice it works quite well, but dropped calls are still a fact of life in a mobile environment. However, CDMA rarely drops a call due to a failed handoff.

A big problem facing CDMA systems is channel pollution. This occurs when signals from too many base stations are present at the subscriber's phone, but none are dominant. When this situation occurs the audio quality degrades rapidly, even when the signal seem otherwise very strong. Pollution occurs frequently in densely populated urban environments where service providers must build many sites in close proximity. Channel pollution can also result from massive multipath problems caused by many tall buildings. Taming pollution is a tuning and system design issue. It is up to the service provider to reduce this phenomenon as much as possible.

In defense of CDMA however, I should point out that the new EVRC CODEC is far more robust than either of the earlier CODECs. Because of its increased robustness it provides much more consistent audio in the face of high frame error rates. EVRC is an 8 kilobit CODEC that provides audio quality that is almost as good to the older 13 kilobit CODEC. Since CDMA consumes only as much of the "ether" as a user talks, switching everyone to an 8 kilobit CODEC was an inevitable move.

Don't confuse EVRC with the old (and unlamented) 8 kilobit CODEC implemented in the early days of CDMA deployment. That CODEC was simply awful, and very few good things could be said about it. EVRC is a far more advanced compression algorithm that cleans up many of the stability problems inherent in the two older CODECs. The sound reproduction is slightly muddier than the 13 kilobit CODEC, but the improvement in stability makes up for this.

Supporters often cite capacity as one CDMA's biggest assets. Virtually no one disagrees that CDMA has a very high "spectral efficiency". It can accommodate more users per MHz of bandwidth than any other technology. What experts do not agree upon is by how much. Unlike other technologies, in which the capacity is fixed and easily computed, CDMA has what is known as "Soft Capacity". You can always add just one more caller to a CDMA channel, but once you get past a certain point you begin to pollute the channel such that it becomes difficult to retrieve an error-free data stream for any of the participants.

The ultimate capacity of a system is therefore dependent upon where you draw the line. How much degradation is a carrier willing to subject their subscribers to before they admit that they have run out of useable capacity? Even if someone does set a standard error rate at which these calculations are made, it does not mean that you personally will find the service particularly acceptable at that error rate.

TDMA

Let's move away from CDMA now and have a look at TDMA. Before we can go any further though, I should note that there are actually three different flavors of TDMA in the PCS market. Each of these technologies implements TDMA in a slightly different way. The most complex implementation is, without a doubt, GSM. It overlays the basic TDMA principles with many innovations that reduce the potential problems inherent in the system.

To reduce the effects of co-channel interference, multipath, and fading, the GSM network can use something known as Frequency Hopping. This means that your call literally jumps from one channel to another at fairly short intervals. By doing this the likelihood of a given RF problem is randomized, and the effects are far less noticeable to the end user. Frequency Hopping is always available, but not mandated. This means that your GSM provider may or may not use it.

iDEN is a proprietary Motorola technology that no other company seems to participate in. Only Motorola makes iDEN phones, and only Motorola makes iDEN infrastructure equipment. Perhaps the company guards its technology on purpose. iDEN was initially deployed as an alternative to standard packet radio systems commonly used by public safety and business users. However, it also provided phone interconnect services that are extinguishable from phone services offered by the other PCS systems, as well as packet data services for web browsing and hooking up your laptop to the Internet.

Finally there is the old IS-136 technology, but this is now an officially dead technology. All of the North American providers who used it (Rogers, Cingular, and AT&T) are abandoning it in favor of GSM. The same is happening in other parts of the world where IS-136 was used. I therefore will not spend much time talking about this variation of TDMA.

Each of these TDMA technologies uses a different CODEC. GSM sports a CODEC called EFR (short for Enhanced Full Rate). This CODEC is arguable the best sounding one available in the PCS world. IS-136 used to sound horrible, but in the fall of 1997 they replaced their old CODEC with a new one. This new CODEC sounds much better than the old, but it doesn't quite match the GSM and CDMA entries.

TDMA systems still rely on the switch to determine when to perform a handoff. Unlike the old analog system however, the switch does not do this in a vacuum. The TDMA handset constantly monitors the signals coming from other sites, and it reports this information to the switch without the caller being aware of it. The switch then uses this information to make better handoff choices at more appropriate times.

Perhaps the most annoying aspect of TDMA system to some people is the obviousness of handoffs. Some people don't tend to hear them, and I can only envy those individuals. Those of us who are sensitive to the slight interruptions caused by handoffs will probably find GSM the most frustrating. It's handoffs are by far the most messy. When handoffs occur infrequently (such as when we are stationary or in areas with few sites), they really don't present a problem at all. However, when they occur very frequently (while travelling in an area with a huge number of sites) they can become annoying.

Spectral Efficiency

Channel capacity in a TDMA system is fixed and indisputable. Each channel carries a finite number of "slots", and you can never accommodate a new caller once each of those slots is filled. Spectral efficiency varies from one technology to another, but computing a precise number is still a contentious issue. For example, GSM provides 8 slots in a channel 200 kHz wide, while iDEN provides 3 slots in a channel only 25 kHz wide. GSM therefore consumes 25 kHz per user, while IS-136 consumes only 8.333 kHz per user. When Direct Connect is used on iDEN, 6 users can be stuffed into a single channel, thus only 4.166 kHz is consumer per user. There is also a new 6:1 interconnect CODEC coming for iDEN which will allow 6 phone users per channel.

One would be sorely tempted to proclaim that iDEN has 3 to 6 times the capacity of GSM. In a one-cell system this is certainly true, but once we start deploying multiple cells and channel reuse the situation becomes more complex. Due to GSM's better error management and frequency hopping the interference of a co-channel site is greatly reduced. This allows frequencies to be reused more frequently without a degradation in the overall quality of the service.

Capacity is measured in "calls per cell per MHz". An GSM system using N=4 reuse (this means you have 4 different sets of frequencies to spread out around town) the figure is 5.0 We get an efficiency value of 6.6 fo

Viruses: frequently asked questions (Basic)

2007-08-29T00:33:00.001-07:00

Here are answers to some common questions about viruses, worms, and
Trojan horses.

What is a virus?
A virus is a program that replicates itself. It spreads by making
copies of itself on a computer or by inserting computer code into
program or operating system files. Viruses don't always damage files or
computers, but they usually affect a computer's performance and
stability. For a virus to infect a computer or to spread, you usually
have to do something, such as open an infected e-mail attachment.

Are all viruses harmful?
Yes, to varying degrees. Virus damage can range from slowing computer
performance to a loss of information and programs. In the worst case,
viruses delete or modify information and programs on your computer.
Some e-mail viruses send confidential information in messages when
spreading. Even when a virus is not directly damaging information, the
process of replication can slow your computer and Internet connection.

What is a worm?
A worm is computer code that spreads without user interaction. Most
worms begin as e-mail attachments that infect a computer when they're
opened. The worm scans the infected computer for files, such as address
books, or temporary webpages, that contain e-mail addresses. The worm
uses the addresses to send infected e-mail, and often mimics (or
spoofs) the "From" addresses in subsequent e-mail messages so that
those infected messages appear to be from someone you know. Worms then
spread automatically through e-mail, networks, or operating system
vulnerabilities, often overwhelming those systems before the cause is
known. Worms aren't always destructive to computers, but they usually
cause computer and network performance and stability problems.

What is a Trojan horse?
A Trojan horse is a malicious software program that hides inside other
programs. It enters a computer hidden inside a legitimate program, such
as a screen saver. It then puts code into the operating system, which
enables a hacker to access the infected computer. Trojan horses do not
usually spread by themselves; they are spread by viruses, worms, or
downloaded software.

What is a blended threat?
A blended threat is a combination of some or all of the malicious
programs discussed in the sections above. Blended threats often begin
when someone interacts with a virus (such as opening an unsafe e-mail
attachment). The virus automatically propagates using worm behavior,
and then installs a Trojan horse on the infected computer.

How do I prevent viruses?
Install an antivirus program. To be most effective, an antivirus
program should always be turned on, should scan incoming e-mail, and
should scan file access.

How do I know if my computer has a virus?
There is no single indicator of a virus infection, but some of the
more common effects include poor computer performance, pop-up ads
displaying (even when you have turned on a pop-up blocker or
disconnected from the Internet).

How do I check for and remove viruses?
To check for viruses and remove them from your computer, you need to
run antivirus software.

How to help prevent computer viruses

Nothing can guarantee the security of your computer 100 percent.

You can continue to improve your computer's security and decrease the
possibility of infection by using a firewall, keeping your system
up-to-date, maintaining a current antivirus software subscription, and
following a few best practices.

Tip: Because no security method is guaranteed, it's important to back
up critical files on a regular basis before you encounter a virus or
other problems.

Steps to help avoid viruses:
1.
Use an Internet firewall (Note: Windows XP with SP2 has a firewall
already built-in and turned on by default).

2.
Visit Microsoft Update and turn on Automatic Updates.

3.
Subscribe to industry standard antivirus software, such as Windows
Live OneCare and keep it current.

4.
Never open an e-mail attachment from someone you don't know.

5.
Avoid opening an e-mail attachment from someone you know, unless you
know exactly what the attachment is. The sender may be unaware that it
contains a virus.

What about spyware?
Although spyware programs are different from viruses, some can behave
like viruses and pose similar and other risks. Visit our spyware page
to learn more and to install Windows Defender at no charge.

Worm__elbasuer__WormA self-replicating program, similar to a virus. A
worm can make it possible for a malicious user to take over your
computer or can send out enough copies of itself to cause your computer
or a web or network server to stop responding. Virus__elbasuer__VirusA
program that attempts to spread from computer to computer and either
cause damage (by erasing or corrupting data) or annoy users (by
printing messages or altering what is displayed on the screen).

How can I tell if my computer has a virus?

If you can answer "yes" to any of the following questions, your
computer might have a virus.

Is your computer running very slowly? A common symptom of a virus is
much slower than normal computer performance. However, there can be
other reasons for slow performance, including a hard disk that needs
defragmenting, a computer that needs more memory (RAM), or the
existence of spyware or adware. For more information about spyware, see
How to tell if your computer is infected with spyware.

Are you getting unexpected messages, or are programs starting
automatically? Some viruses can cause damage to Windows or some of your
programs. The results of this damage might include messages appearing
unexpectedly, programs starting or closing automatically, or Windows
shutting down suddenly.

Is your modem or hard disk working overtime? An e-mail virus works by
sending many copies of itself by e-mail. One indicator of this is
that the activity light on your broadband or external modem is
constantly lit; another is the sound of your computer's hard disk
continually working. These are not always symptoms of a computer virus,
but when combined with other problems, can indicate a virus infection.

To check for viruses, scan your computer with an antivirus program. New
viruses appear every day, so keeping your antivirus program updated is
important. For more information about computer security, go to the
Security at Home page on the Microsoft website.

Signs of viruses: Are you infected?

After you open and run an infected program or attachment on your
computer, you might not realize that you've introduced a virus until
you notice something isn't quite right.

Here are a few primary indicators that your computer might be infected:

· Your computer runs more slowly than normal

· Your computer stops responding or locks up often

· Your computer crashes and restarts every few minutes

· Your computer restarts on its own and then fails to run normally

· Applications on your computer don't work correctly

· Disks or disk drives are inaccessible

· You can't print correctly

· You see unusual error messages

· You see distorted menus and dialog boxes

These are common signs of infection-but they might also indicate
hardware or software problems that have nothing to do with a virus.
Unless you run the Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool and
install industry-standard, up-to-date antivirus software on your
computer, there is no way to be certain if your computer is infected
with a virus or not. If you don't have current antivirus software
installed or if you're interested in installing a different brand, you
can try Windows Live OneCare free for 90 days or visit our Security
software downloads page for software from other companies.

Tip: Beware of messages warning you that you sent e-mail that contained
a virus. This can indicate that the virus has listed your e-mail
address as the sender of tainted e-mail. This does not necessarily mean
you have a virus. Some viruses have the ability to forge e-mail
addresses.

Articles taken from Microsoft.com

Some cool tips you can use to improve your communication skills

2007-08-27T22:31:00.001-07:00

Some cool tips you can use to improve your communication skills

1 . Awareness of your own interaction with other people is the first step in improving your communication skills.

Learn to identify which types of situations make you uncomfortable and then modify your behavior to achieve positive results is a critical step in improving your communication skills.

You can learn to become aware of behaviors in other people that prompt you to respond in negative ways and modify your own behavior to turn the situation into a positive experience.

2 . You must accept responsibility for your own behavior and do not fear apologizing for errors in judgment or insensitive actions.

Asking others for honest feedback about the way you interact with others can be very helpful. Accept the negative feedback along with the positive and make changes accordingly.

3 . Your non-verbal communication is equally as important as the things that you say. Positive body language is extremely important in your interactions with other people.

If your words and your actions do not match, you will have a difficult time succeeding in social situations.

4 . In order to learn how to improve your communication skills, you must become a great listener. You must fight the urge to respond immediately and really listen to what the other person is trying to communicate.

Offering suggestions or criticism before you are certain of the other person's intent can only lead to frustration for both parties.

5 . Improving your communication skills is a process and cannot be accomplished overnight . Trying to improve or change too many things at once will be counter-productive.

You will become discouraged and overwhelmed if you attempt to change your entire personality all at once. Choose one or two traits at a time and work on those over a period of time. Learn to take advantage of your personal strengths and make a positive i

SEO Series Batch 7 - Top 5 Google Ranking Factors

2007-08-27T22:28:00.001-07:00

SEO Series continues and the linky love is getting bigger every time. Today I will show you the most important search engine factors that Google's algorithm known as "Googlebot" values the most. . SEOMoz released a document about the Google's algorithm and how it works and here are top 5 positive and top 5 negative factors from that document.

Top 5 Positive Factors:

1. Keyword Use In Title Tag - In my opinion the most important factor for getting great search engine rankings! Explained here: Google Top 10 - Post Title Optimization
2. Global Link Popularity Of The Site
3. Anchor Text Of Incoming Links
4. Link Popularity Within The Site
5. Age Of The Site

Top 5 Negative Factors:
1. Server Is Often Inaccessible To Googlebot
2. Content Which Is Very Similar Or Duplicate to Existing Content On The Web
3. External Links To Low Quality Sites
4. Participation In Link Schemes or Actively Selling Links
5. Duplicate Meta Tags On More Pages

Use this factors as your "bible" for SEO optimization!
What ever you do regarding SEO, think of this post and read it again and again.

100 keyboard shortcuts to pace up your work

2007-08-27T03:43:00.001-07:00

100 keyboard shortcuts to pace up your work

CTRL+C (Copy)
CTRL+X (Cut)
CTRL+V (Paste)
CTRL+Z (Undo)
DELETE (Delete)
SHIFT+DELETE (Delete the selected item permanently without placing the item in the Recycle Bin)
CTRL while dragging an item (Copy the selected item)
CTRL+SHIFT while dragging an item (Create a shortcut to the selected item)
F2 key (Rename the selected item)
CTRL+RIGHT ARROW (Move the insertion point to the beginning of the next word)
CTRL+LEFT ARROW (Move the insertion point to the beginning of the previous word)
CTRL+ ;DOWN ARROW (Move the insertion point to the beginning of the next paragraph)
CTRL+UP ARROW (Move the insertion point to the beginning of the previous paragraph)
CTRL+SHIFT with any of the arrow keys (Highlight a block of text)
SHIFT with any of the arrow keys (Select more than one item in a window or on the desktop, or select text in a document)
CTRL+A (Select all)
F3 key (Search for a file or a folder)
ALT+ENTER (View the properties for the selected item)
ALT+F4 (Close the active item, or quit the active program)
ALT+ENTER (Display the properties of the selected object)
ALT+SPACEBAR (Open the shortcut menu for the active window)
CTRL+F4 (Close the active document in programs that enable you to have multiple documents open simultaneously)
ALT+TAB (Switch between the open items)
ALT+ESC (Cycle through items in the order that they had been opened)
F6 key (Cycle through the screen elements in a window or on the desktop)
F4 key (Display the Address bar list in My Computer or Windows Explorer)
SHIFT+F10 (Display the shortcut menu for the selected item)
ALT+SPACEBAR (Display the System menu for the active window)
CTRL+ESC (Display the Start menu)
ALT+Underlined letter in a menu name (Display the corresponding menu)
Underlined letter in a command name on an open menu (Perform the corresponding command)
F10 key (Activate the menu bar in the active program)
RIGHT ARROW (Open the next menu to the right, or open a submenu)
LEFT ARROW (Open the next menu to the left, or close a submenu)
F5 key (Update the active window)
BACKSPACE (View the folder one level up in My Computer or Windows Explorer)
ESC (Cancel the current task)
SHIFT when you insert a CD-ROM into the CD-ROM drive (Prevent the CD-ROM from automatically playing)

Dialog Box Keyboard Shortcuts

CTRL+TAB (Move forward through the tabs)
CTRL+SHIFT+TAB (Move backward through the tabs)
TAB (Move forward through the options)
SHIFT+TAB (Move backward through the options)
ALT+Underlined letter (Perform the corresponding command or select the corresponding option)
ENTER (Perform the command for the active option or button)
SPACEBAR (Select or clear the check box if the active option is a check box)
Arrow keys (Select a button if the active option is a group of option buttons)
F1 key (Display Help)
F4 key (Disp lay the items in the active list)
BACKSPACE (Open a folder one level up if a folder is selected in the Save As or Open dialog box)

Microsoft Natural Keyboard Shortcuts

Windows Logo (Display or hide the Start menu)
Windows Logo+BREAK (Display the System Properties dialog box)
Windows Logo+D (Display the desktop)
Windows Logo+M (Minimize all of the windows)
Windows Logo+SHIFT+M (Restore the minimized windows)
Windows Logo+E (Open My Computer)
Windows Logo+F (Search for a file or a folder)
CTRL+Windows Logo+F (Search for computers)
Windows Logo+F1 (Display Windows Help)
Windows Logo+ L (Lock the keyboard)
Windows Logo+R (Open the Run dialog box)
Wi ndows Logo+U (Open Utility Manager)

Accessibility Keyboard Shortcuts

Right SHIFT for eight seconds (Switch FilterKeys either on or off)
Left ALT+left SHIFT+PRINT SCREEN (Switch High Contrast either on or off)
Left ALT+left SHIFT+NUM LOCK (Switch the MouseKeys either on or off)
SHIFT five times (Switch the StickyKeys either on or off)
NUM LOCK for five seconds (Switch the ToggleKeys either on or off)
Windows Logo +U (Open Utility Manager)

Windows Explorer Keyboard Shortcuts

END (Display the bottom of the active window)
HOME (Display the top of the active window)
NUM LOCK+Asterisk sign (*) (Display all of the subfolders that are under the selected folder)
NUM LOCK+Plus sign (+) (Display the contents of the selected folder)
NUM LOCK+Minus sign (-) (Collapse the selected folder)
LEFT ARROW (Collapse the current selection if it is expanded, or select the parent folder)
RIGHT ARROW (Display the current selection if it is collapsed, or select the first subfolder)

Shortcut Keys for Character Map

After you double-click a character on the grid of characters, you can move through the grid by using the keyboard shortcuts:
RIGHT ARROW (Move to the right or to the beginning of the next line)
LEFT ARROW (Move to the left or to the end of the previous line)
UP ARROW (Move up one row)
DOWN ARROW (Move down one row)
PAGE UP (Move up one screen at a time)
PAGE DOWN (Move down one screen at a time)
HOME (Move to the beginning of the line)
END (Move to the end of the line)
CTRL+HOME (Move to the first character)
CTRL+END (M ove to the last character)
SPACEBAR (Switch between Enlarged and Normal mode when a character is selected)

Microsoft Management Console (MMC) Main Window Keyboard Shortcuts

CTRL+O (Open a saved console)
CTRL+N (Open a new console)
CTRL+S (Save the open console)
CTRL+M (Add or remove a console item)
CTRL+W (Open a new window)
F5 key (Update the content of all console windows)
ALT+SPACEBAR (Display the MMC window menu)
ALT+F4 (Close the console)
ALT+A (Display the Action menu)
ALT+V (Display the View menu)
ALT+F (Display the File menu)
ALT+O (Display the Favorites menu)
MMC Console Window Keyboard Shortcuts
CTRL+P (Print the current page or active pane)
ALT+Minus sign (-) (Display the window menu for the active console window)
SHIFT+F10 (Display the Action shortcut menu for the selected item)
F1 key (Open the Help topic, if any, for the selected item)
F5 key (Update the content of all console windows)
CTRL+F10 (Maximize the active console window)
CTRL+F5 (Restore the active console window)
ALT+ENTER (Display the Properties dialog box, if any, for the selected item)
F2 key (Rename the selected item)
CTRL+F4 (Close the active console window. When a console has only one console window, this shortcut closes the console)

Remote Desktop Connection Navigation

CTRL+ALT+END (Open the m*cro$oft Windows NT Security dialog box)
ALT+PAGE UP (Switch between programs from left to right)
ALT+PAGE DOWN (Switch between programs from right to left)
ALT+INSERT (Cycle through the programs in most recently used order)
ALT+HOME (Display the Start menu)
CTRL+ALT+BREAK (Switch the client computer between a window and a full screen)
ALT+DELETE (Display the Windows menu)
CTRL+ALT+Minus sign (-) (Place a snapshot of the active window in the client on the Terminal server c lipboard and provide the same functionality as pressing PRINT SCREEN on a local computer.)
CTRL+ALT+Plus sign (+) (Place a snapshot of the entire client window area on the Terminal server clipboard and provide the same functionality as pressing ALT+PRINT SCREEN on a local computer.)

Microsoft Internet Explorer Navigation

CTRL+B (Open the Organize Favorites dialog box)
CTRL+E (Open the Search bar)
CTRL+F (Start the Find utility)
CTRL+H (Open the History bar)
CTRL+I (Open the Favorites bar)
CTRL+L (Open the Open dialog box)
CTRL+N (Start another instance of the browser with the same Web address)
CTRL+O (Open the Open dialog box, the same as CTRL+L)
CTRL+P (Open the Print dialog box)
CTRL+R (Update the current Web page)
CTRL+W (Close the current window)

Apache2 Installation on Windows

2007-08-24T00:09:00.001-07:00

Apache2 Installation on Windows

2007-08-23T06:57:00.000-07:00

August 16, 2007

A Quick Implementation Guide for Web Services using Axis

Table of Contents

1.Introduction 3

2.What are Web Services? 3

3.The Web Services Architecture 4

4.The Basic Web Services Stack 4

5.Introduction to Axis 6

6.Software Requirements 6

7.A Quick implementation of Web Services using Axis 6

8.Conclusion 14

9.References 14

Introduction

This document provides basic overview on Web Services and explains how quick web services can be implemented using Apache Axis.

What are Web Services?

Web services are distributed applications that expose an XML Interface defined in XML

Loosely Coupled
Platform and implementation neutral
Coarse Grained
Ability to be synchronous and asynchronous
Supports Remote Procedure Calls (RPCs)
Support for Document Exchange

XML Based

By using XML as data representation layer for all web services protocols and technologies that are created, these technologies are interoperable at a core level

Loosely Coupled

The concept of an interface to be thoroughly applied.
The web services offered or the implementation may change but the interfaces must strive to remain the same.

Coarse Grained

Businesses must strive that the interfaces they expose are coarse grained.
Web services offer a natural way to define coarse grained services that access the right amount of business logic.

Ability to be synchronous and asynchronous

To say the least both semantics are absolutely vital.

Supports Remote Procedure Calls(RPCs)

Web services allow clients to invoke procedures, functions, and methods on remote objects using XML-based RPC.
Remote procedures expose input and output parameters that web services must support.
It is also vital to translate XML based calls to native platform calls.(EJBs , RMI, .NET)

Support for Document Exchange

One of the key advantages of XML is its generic way of representing not only data but also complex documents.

The Web Services Architecture

There can be tremendous benefits to web services. We have heard of interoperability between platforms, ability to invoke a web service over a ubiquitous network technology, and so on.

So what is it?? Let’s take a look at a conceptual model.

Web Services are self-contained, modular applications that can be described, published, located, and invoked over a network, generally, the World Wide Web.

The Web Services architecture describes three roles: Service provider, Service requester and Service broker; and three basic operations: publish, find and bind. A network component can play any or all of these roles.

A Web Services architecture implementation should allow for incremental security and quality of service models facilitated by configuring a set of environmental prerequisites (for example, authentication mechanism, billing, and so on) to control and manages the interactions.

Web Services can be dynamically composed into applications stemming from capabilities-based look-up at runtime, instead of the traditional static binding. The dynamic nature of the collaborations allow the implementations to be platform- and programming language-neutral, and communications mechanism-independent, while creating innovative products, processes, and value chains.

The Basic Web Services Stack

Now let’s understand Web Services Stack. Basic Web Services Stack contains:

Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP).
Web Services Definition Language (WSDL).
Universal Description, Discovery, and Integration (UDDI).

SOAP
- Provides a standard packaging structure for transporting XML documents over a variety of standard Internet Technologies.
- Also defines encoding and binding standards for encoding non-XML RPC invocation in XML for transport.
- Heterogeneous platforms become interoperable
- The Basic SOAP Structure

WSDL

Another XML grammar that describes the interface of the Web Service. You may want to compare it only in concept to the “Remote Interface” of Java RMI or the “Interface Definition Language File (IDL)” for RPC. More specifically it standardizes how a web service represents the input and output parameters of an invocation externally. I.e. The function structure, the nature of invocation (in, in/out, etc), and the service protocol binding. And since it is XML grammar, don’t need to say it is interoperable to anyone who understands the grammar.

WSDL in the Eco System

UDDI
- UDDI provides a world wide registry of web services for advertisements, discovery, and integration purposes.
- UDDI could be dynamic or static and a Business Analysts and technologists could use UDDI to search for available web services.
- The UDDI Business Registry provides a place for a company to programmatically describe their services and business processes and their preferred methods for conducting business.

Introduction to Axis

The Apache extensible Interaction System (Axis) is basically a SOAP engine. It represents a framework for constructing SOAP processors such as clients, servers, or gateways. Axis is an Apache open-source project and is written in Java.

Besides being a SOAP engine, Axis also includes the following features:

A server that plugs into servlet engines such as Web Sphere Application Server or Apache Tomcat
Extensive support for the Web service description language (WSDL)
Tools that generate Java classes from WSDL and vice versa (WSDL2Java and Java2WSDL).
A tool for monitoring TCP/IP packets

TCP/IP monitoring is a very efficient tool for Web services’ debugging and troubleshooting.

Software Requirements

Web server: Apache Jakarta Tomcat v4.1
JDK: Sun J2SE v1.4.2
Platform: Microsoft Windows XP

Implementation on Web logic Server can refer following link.

http://ws.apache.org/axis/java/install.html#WebLogic8.1

A Quick implementation of Web Services using Axis

(8 Steps procedure):

Apache Axis alleviates the development of Web Services. This implementation is explained using Tomcat Server.

Download Apache axis from the following URL.

http://archive.apache.org/dist/ws/axis/1_1/axis-1_1.zip

This URL downloads Apache Axis v1.1 zip file for Windows.

Unzip the file at your convenient folder and you would see following folder structure after unzipping.

Now we will have to deploy axis as Web Application in Tomcat Web Server. Copy axis folder under webapps folder to your Tomcat webapps folder.

Set the Environment Variables

AXIS_HOME = C:Tomcatwebappsaxis

AXIS_LIB = %AXIS_HOME%WEB-INFlib

AXISCLASSPATH = %AXIS_LIB%axis.jar;%AXIS_LIB%axis-ant.jar;%AXIS_LIB%commons-discovery.jar; %AXIS_LIB%commons-logging.jar; %AXIS_LIB%jaxrpc.jar; %AXIS_LIB%saaj.jar; %AXIS_LIB%log4j-1.2.8.jar; %AXIS_LIB%wsdl4j.jar

Add %AXISCLASSPATH% to system CLASSPATH and environment variables entries look like the snap shot below.

Now the Axis setup and installation is ready to launch any web service.

To confirm that everything set correct,

Start Tomcat Server
Run this JSP.

http://localhost:8080/axis/happyaxis.jsp

This jsp confirms that all required axis Jars are in CLASSPATH and if there are any mandatory jars missing it would warn.

Above screen shot shows that installation and setup are successful.

Let’s create a Service now, copy and save below code as TemperatureConverter.jws in %TOMCAT_HOME%/axis folder.

public class TemperatureConverter {

public float celsiusToFahrenheit (float celsius) {

float fahrenheit = (celsius *9/5)+32;

return fahrenheit;

}

public float fahrenheitToCelsius(float farenheit) {

float celsius = ((farenheit-32)*5/9);

return celsius;

}

Now lets Check whether Service has been deployed or not and lets generate the WSDL for our Web Service.

Check for Service

http://localhost:8080/axis/TemperatureConverter.jws

Generate WSDL for our TemparatureConverter Web Service.

http://localhost:8080/axis/TemperatureConverter.jws?wsdl

Axis has generated WSDL for TemperatureConverter Web Service that we have deployed.

Now everything set correct and web service is ready.

Start TCP Monitor (tcpmon) to view SOAP Messages that are exchanged between Server and Web Service Client.

Run following command at prompt.

C:> java org.apache.axis.utils.tcpmon

You would see the following screen

We should select a local port which tcpmon will monitor for incoming connections, a target host where it will forward such connections, and the port number on the target machine which should be "tunneled" to. Then click "add".

You should then notice another tab appearing in the window for your new tunneled connection. Looking at that panel, you'll see something like this.

Now each time a SOAP connection is made to the local port, you will see the request appear in the "Request" panel, and the response from the server in the "Response" panel. Tcpmon keeps a log of all request/response pairs, and allows you to view any particular pair by selecting an entry in the top panel. You may also remove selected entries, or all of them, or choose to save to a file for later viewing.

Now, Our Web Services Client should connect to port 8010, which is redirected to 8080 port by TCP Monitor.
If you don’t want to use TCP Monitor skip Step 7.

Let’s write a Web Services Client to connect server.

import java.net.MalformedURLException;

import java.rmi.RemoteException;

import javax.xml.rpc.ParameterMode;

import javax.xml.rpc.ServiceException;

import org.apache.axis.client.Call;

import org.apache.axis.client.Service;

import org.apache.axis.encoding.XMLType;

/**

* @author V.V.Nagesh Akula

public class TempConverterClient {

public static void main(String[] args) {

Float ret=null;

try {

String method = null;

method = "celsiusToFahrenheit";

Float f1 = new Float("30");

Service service = new Service();

Call call = (Call) service.createCall();

// Use port 8010, if you use TCP Monitor

// Use Port 8080, if you don’t use TCP Monitor

call.setTargetEndpointAddress(new java.net.URL(

"http://localhost:8010/axis/TemperatureConverter.jws"));

call.addParameter( "op1", XMLType.XSD_FLOAT, ParameterMode.IN );

call.setOperationName(method);

call.setReturnType(XMLType.XSD_FLOAT);

ret = (Float) call.invoke(new Object[] {f1});

} catch (MalformedURLException e) {

e.printStackTrace();

} catch (RemoteException e) {

e.printStackTrace();

} catch (ServiceException e) {

e.printStackTrace();

}

System.out.println("Got result : " + ret);

}

Console output that you would get after running Web Service Client.

You would see SOAP messages that are exchanged, in TCP Monitor.

Conclusion

This document gives a basic understanding of Web Services and a quick implementation of Web Services using Apache Axis Framework.

References

http://ws.apache.org/axis/

Page 14 of 14

25 ways to eliminate Stress and stressful living!

2007-08-23T02:11:00.001-07:00

Cut Stress in your Life

DRINK WATER ON EMPTY STOMACH - Water Therapy

2007-08-20T04:32:00.001-07:00

D RINK WATER ON EMPTY STOMACH
It is popular in Japan today to drink water immediately after waking up every morning. Furthermore, scientific tests have proven a its value. We publish below a description of use of water for our readers. For old and serious diseases as well as modern illnesses the water treatment had been found successful by a Japanese medical society as a 100% cure for the following diseases:
Headache, body ache, heart system, arthritis, fast heart beat, epilepsy, excess fatness, bronchitis asthma, TB, meningitis, kidney and urine diseases, vomiting, gastritis, diarrhea, piles, diabetes, constipation, all eye diseases, womb, cancer and menstrual disorders, ear nose and throat diseases.

METHOD OF TREATMENT
1. As you wake up in the morning before brushing teeth, drink 4 x 160ml glasses of water
2. Brush and clean the mouth but do not eat or drink anything for 45 minute
3. After 45 minutes you may eat and drink as normal.
4. After 15 minutes of breakfast, lunch and dinner do not eat or drink anything for 2 hours
5. Those who are old or sick and are unable to drink 4 glasses of water at the beginning may commence by taking little water and gradually increase it to 4 glasses per day.
6. The above method of treatment will cure diseases of the sick and others can enjoy a healthy life.
The following list gives the number of days of treatment required to cure/control/reduce main diseases:
1. High Blood Pressure - 30 days
2. Gastric - 10 days
3. Diabetes - 30 days
4. Constipation - 10 days
5. Cancer - 180 days
6. TB - 90 days
7. Arthritis patients should follow the above treatment only for 3 days in the 1st week, and from 2nd week onwards - daily.
This treatment method has no side effects, however at the commencement of treatment you may have to urinate a few times.
It is better if we continue this and make this procedure as a routine work in our life.
Drink Water and Stay healthy and Active.
This makes sense .. The Chinese and Japanese drink hot tea with their meals ..not cold water. Maybe it is time we adopt their drinking habit while eating!!! Nothing to lose, everything to gain...
For those who like to drink cold water, this article is applicable to you.
It is nice to have a cup of cold drink after a meal. However, the cold water will solidify the oily stuff that you have just consumed. It will slow down the digestion.
Once this "sludge" reacts with the acid, it will break down and be absorbed by the intestine faster than the solid food. It will line the intestine. Very soon, this will turn into fats and lead to cancer. It is best to drink hot soup or warm water after a meal.
A serious note about heart attacks: Women should know that not every heart attack symptom is going to be the left arm hurting.
Be aware of intense pain in the jaw line.
You may never have the first chest pain during the course of a heart attack.
Nausea and intense sweating are also common symptoms.
60% of people who have a heart attack while they are asleep do not wake up.
Pain in the jaw can wake you from a sound sleep. Let's be careful and be aware. The more we know, the better chance we could survive...

**Please be a true friend and send this article to all your friends you care about.

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Differences Between GSM & CDM

GSM and CDMA have been the two leading commercial wireless technologies that are being used all over the world. This paper presents to the readers the key differences between the two technologies 1. The various topics in which this paper presents the difference are:

Introduction

This section presents the basic wireless network architecture and lays the foundation for the readers to understand the later sections of this paper.

The Mobile Station

The Base Transceiver Station

The Base Station Controller

The Mobile Switching Center

The Location Registers

Historical View of GSM and CDMA

GSM

Classification of CDMA

Narrowband CDMA Era

Korea : TTA I, TTA II

Comparison of Technologies

Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA):

Time Division to Multiple Access (TDMA):

Code Division Multiple Access ( CDMA):

Network Architecture

Mobile Station:

Cell Design

Base Station Sub-System (BSS):

Radio Interface Differences

Uplink and Downlink differences:

Logical Channel differences

Call Processing

Evolution to 3G

Conclusion:

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Apache2 Installation on Windows

Apache2 Installation on Windows

Introduction

What are Web Services?

The Web Services Architecture

The Basic Web Services Stack

Introduction to Axis

Software Requirements

A Quick implementation of Web Services using Axis

Conclusion

References

25 ways to eliminate Stress and stressful living!

DRINK WATER ON EMPTY STOMACH - Water Therapy

GSM and CDMA have been the two leading commercial wireless technologies that are being used all over the world. This paper presents to the readers the key differences between the two technologies ¹. The various topics in which this paper presents the difference are: