Anonymous posted 28,000 email and password combinations online claiming that they could be used to access Paypal accounts. However, Paypal said there was no evidence of any tampering or account loss from their site. It ends up that they were taken from ZPanel, a hosting site. Because many people use a single login and password for all the sites they visit, it is possible that some of these combinations could access Paypal and other sites. Facebook, Google, Microsoft and other social media sites then cross referenced these combinations with their own accounts and sent emails to account holders warning them to change their passwords. Twitter went too far.

Image via CrunchBase

IT professionals in midsize companies need to educate their users on the importance of using unique passwords. Using the same information to log into multiple sites may be easier, but not secure.

Network World announced, “Twitter sent notices of an attempted hacking to China-based foreign journalists and analysts just hours before apologizing for resetting the passwords of more users than necessary in a recent break-in of accounts.” No information was given as to who the hackers were, but Chinese Internet users have had problems accessing foreign websites. It is well known that China is one of the top three countries specializing in distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.

The bottom line is it does not matter who the hackers are, but that the accounts were stolen. IT professionals may want to consider business-specific login names, and instructions on email usage and phishing attacks. If a message comes to a user that tells them to click on a link to change their password, they should instead log in to the site and change it there. The link in the email may look like the real thing, but have one letter out of place that leads the user to a phishing site.

Some of the more security-conscious IT professionals may want look at virtualization. A virtual bubble can safeguard the rest of the network from invalid email links, but is up to the user to create unique passwords for their personal lives.

A Siberian Wolf after snowfall

Source: http://www.youwall.com/index.php?ver=MjE4NQ==

A Bengal Tiger Resting

Source: http://www.hdwallpapers.in/tiger_painting-wallpapers.html

Vatican City, Rome

Source: http://topwalls.net/vatican-rome/

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I hope you enjoy having these backgrounds as much as I did, and if you find any fantastic backgrounds for either windows computer desktops, or for Mac’s Mountain Lion – Please post them in the comments section below.

Introduction

Having a broad knowledge of how your company is performing based on strategy is important. In the past simple financial measures were used but today there are several methods that include non-financial measures that are used. These measures are conducted based on several areas of a corporation.

The Idea in a Nutshell

The concept of the primary measures of corporate performance is to analyze and determine if the use of a particular strategy is a success or a failure. One of the earliest books on performance measurement was written by William Harvey Allen. The idea of measuring corporate performance doesn’t just stop at calculating ROI and EPS; it is very in depth and interesting.

The Top 10 Things You Need to Know About the Primary Measures of Corporate Performance

1.    The traditional financial measures of corporate performance include but are not limited to ROI, EPS, ROE, and operating cash flow. It is argued that the best indicator of corporate performance is Return on Investment (ROI). ROE focuses on return to the shareholders of the company. If you are a shareholder, this gives you a quick and easy to understand metric. Many people argue that although ROI is the best indicator of corporate performance it has several advantages as well as limitations.

2.    Some non-financial measures are also used to measure the company’s performance. These measures are the ones that most people are familiar with. Some common examples include customer or employee satisfaction, quality, market share, and the number of new products. These measures are considered to be the leading indicators of future financial performance.

3.    There are several stakeholder measures that are used to determine how a company is performing. These stakeholder measures include both near term measures and long-term measures. Stakeholders in a company include customers, suppliers, employees, Congress etc. Most of these measures are basically numeric values that don’t include doing various formulas.

4.    In 1992, Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton began publicizing the Balanced Scorecard through a series of journal articles. In 1996, they published the book The Balanced Scorecard. The Balanced Scorecard is a performance planning and measurement framework, with similar principles as Management by Objectives. It is a tool to execute and monitor the organizational strategy by using a combination of financial and non financial measures. It is designed to translate vision and strategy into objectives and measures across four balanced perspectives.

5.    Another method of measuring performance is using the Balanced Scorecard Approach.  A balanced scorecard is based on four perspectives: Financial Perspective, Customer Perspective, Internal Business Perspective, and Innovation and Learning Perspective.

6.    These four perspectives are then assigned measures, targets, and initiatives. These measures are thought of as key performance measures. More than 50 percent of large enterprises use some type of a balanced scorecard according to a study by Cranfield University. About 70 percent of organizations had at least partially implemented a balanced scorecard by 2006.

7.    Performance evaluations are standard practice for directors in different areas of world. These performance evaluations used by many companies. Performance appraisals help supervisors and employees to identify strengths and weaknesses of employee performance. They offer an opportunity for supervisors and employees to discuss the employee’s goals and how to achieve them.

8.    Management audits are systematic assessments of methods and policies of an organization’s management in the administration. The objectives of the management audits are to establish the current level of effectiveness, suggest improvements, and lay down standards for future performance.

9.    Strategic Audits are also a type of management audit. Strategic audits have several purposes. Some audits assess compliance with laws and regulations. Others measure compliance with the organization’s internal policies and procedures. A strategic audit helps small-business owners assess whether internal processes are helping them toward their strategic goals. Based on audit results, management adjusts operations to maximize progress toward the goals.

10.    Economic Value Added is gaining popularity and may eventually be a replacement for ROI. EVA measures the difference between the pre-strategy and post-strategy for the business. ROI can lose it popularity because the numbers can be easily manipulated cover up any blemishes the company might have.

The Video Lounge

I chose a video about the Balanced Scorecard. This video shows some key facts that companies should know about the Balanced Scorecard before they implement it in their company. I find this video kind of interesting because many people working for companies do not understand the strategy and managers fail to execute their strategies.

My Take

I think knowing about the Primary Measures of Corporate Performance is very important and necessary. It is also important to realize that measuring performance is not only based on mathematical formulas using data obtained from financial statements, it is also measured in a non-mathematical way. When a corporation’s performance is measured it breaks down each area of the corporation and measures it thoroughly.

References

Balanced Scorecard. (n.d.). QuickMBA: Accounting, Business Law, Economics, Entrepreneurship, Finance, Management, Marketing, Operations, Statistics, Strategy. Retrieved November 15, 2012, from http://www.quickmba.com/accounting/mgmt/balanced-scorecard/

Balanced Scorecard . (n.d.). Vector Study. Retrieved November 17, 2012, from http://www.vectorstudy.com/management_theories/balanced_scorecard.htm

Balanced Scorecard Fact Sheet and Statistics. (n.d.). Balanced Scorecard Designer software (BSC Designer) – create KPIs, metrics and indicators offline and online. Retrieved November 16, 2012, from http://www.bscdesigner.com/balanced-scorecard-fact-sheet.htm

Brudan, A. (2010, August 7). History of Performance Measurement . AurelBrudan.com. Retrieved November 15, 2012, from http://www.AurelBrudan.com/tag/history-of-performance-measurement/

III, J. H., Brown, J. S., & Davison, L. (2010, March 4). The Best Way to Measure Company Performance – John Hagel III, John Seely Brown and Lang Davison – John Hagel III and John Seely Brown – Harvard Business Review. HBR Blog Network – Harvard Business Review. Retrieved November 15, 2012, from http://blogs.hbr.org/bigshift/2010/03/the-best-way-to-measure-company.html

Martin, M. (n.d.). How Performance Appraisal is Helpful for Business Improvement | Chron.com. Chron.com. Retrieved November 15, 2012, from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/performance-appraisal-helpful-business-improvement-3073.html

Non-Financial Performance Measures Definition from Financial Times Lexicon. (n.d.). Financial Times Lexicon. Retrieved November 15, 2012, from http://lexicon.ft.com/Term?term=non_financial-performance-measures

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Contact Information

To contact the author of “Management 101: What You Need to Know About The Primary Measures of Corporate Performance,” please email Ashley E. Washington at w0365501@selu.edu or awashington126@gmail.com.

About the Publisher

David C. Wyld (dwyld@selu.edu) is the Robert Maurin Professor of Management at Southeastern Louisiana University in Hammond, Louisiana. He is a management consultant, researcher/writer, and executive educator. His blog, Business News 24/7, can be viewed at http://wyld-business.blogspot.com/. He also serves as the Director of the Reverse Auction Research Center (http://reverseauctionresearch.org), a hub of research and news in the expanding world of competitive bidding.

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Introduction

Activity-Based Costing is an approach for allocating overhead costs. There are benefits and non-benefits associated with allocating costs. ABC is an in depth way to analyze costs within a company by breaking down activities, processes, and transactions associated with the everyday producing of products or services.

The Idea in a Nutshell

Activity – Based Costing is an approach for allocating overhead costs. ABC allocates overhead to multiple activity pools, and then assigns the activity cost pools to products and services by cost drivers. By breaking down ABC you have three main objectives that explain what exactly Activity-Based Costing is. I will begin with the first one, activity, activity is any event, action, transaction, or work sequence that incurs cost when producing a product or providing a service. The second main point is activity cost pool, this is the overhead cost attributed to a distinct type of activity (ex: ordering of materials or setting up machinery). Lastly we have a cost driver; it is any factor or activity that has a direct cause- effect relationship with the resources consumed.

The Top 10 Things You Need to Know About Activity Based-Costing

1.    Activity: Is any event, action, transaction, or work sequence that incurs cost when producing a product or providing a service. Activities can be broken down into four different level activities, unit, batch, product line activities and, facility. Unit-level activities are defined by every time a service is performed or a product is made. The number of units made may not be enough for the demand, there for the unit will be put on back order or the unit may have to stay in warehouse causing more money to be lost by holding.

2.    Batch-level activities are incurred every time a group or a batch of units is produced and services of steps are performed.  This also may include, purchase orders, machine setup, or quality tests. The resources that are used by batch, product, and facility level activities do not vary at the unit level.

3.    Product-line activities are those activities that support an entire product line but not exactly each individual unit. An example could be product design changes, warehousing or storage costs for each product line. Time spent on testing activities increases with the number of products the company produces.

4.    Facility support activities are necessary for development and production to take place. They are costs that are administered and include building the following: depreciation, property taxes, plant security, insurance, accounting, outside landscape, maintenance, plant management, and support staff’s salaries.

5.    Identifying the steps in the development of an activity-based costing system is important for getting accurate results. ABC involves four steps that must be identified. Step one says to identify and classify major activities involved in the manufacture of specific products, while allocating manufacturing overhead costs to the appropriate cost pools. Step two says to identify the cost driver that has the strongest correlation to the costs accumulated in the cost pool. Step three says to compute overhead rates per cost drivers. Step four explains to assign the manufacturing overhead costs for each cost pool to the products or services using the overhead rates.

6.    Know how to identify the activity cost pools used by companies for ABC.

An activity cost pool must be identified, by doing so, a company must perform an analysis of each operation or process. The analysis can be made by documenting and timing every task, action, and transaction that is made.

7.    Know how a company is to identify and use cost drivers in ABC. Cost drivers are identified for assigning activity cost pools. First step is to accurately measure the consumption of the activity by the various products. Also you need to have related data easily accessible.

8.    Understanding the benefits and limitations of ABC features. The features of ABC make it a more accurate product costing system. The benefits are the number of increased cost pools used to assign overhead, enhance control over overhead costs, and better management’s decisions, making it more accurate.

Limitations are to higher analysis and the measurements costs that are used to multiply activity centers and cost drivers.

9.    Value-added and Non-value-added activities. Value-added are necessary to the operations of business and can increase the worth of a product or a service. Non-value-added are not essential activities that can easily add cost to or increase the time spent on a product or service without increasing the market value. Managers are encouraged by these classifications to help reduce or eliminate the time spent on non-value-added activities.

10.    Apply ABC to the service industries to get the best possible outcome.

Service industries are no different than manufacturing industries. Improved costing of services provided for the following: jobs, services, contracts, or customers.

However, the general approach to costing is the same; you analyze operations, identify the activities, and accumulate overhead costs by activity cost pools. Cost drivers are assigned to the cost pools for the services as well.

The Video Lounge

I found this video from Wiley-PLUS, an accounting program site that is required for the accounting courses here at Southeastern – Link:

http://edugen.wileyplus.com/edugen/courses/crs6428/simulations/Managerial_Accounting_Videos/chapter04/Activity_Based_Costing.html

My Take

    Activity-Based Costing is important for companies to use for more accurate results. It is also important for a variety of reasons most have to do with the way a manager can find what is costing the company more money. If the cost drivers and cost pools are accurately calculated it is easy to tell what is costing the company money and is broken down into many detailed areas. The ABC approach is very detail oriented and provides managers with in depth analysis of cost. I like the ABC approach, however it is a timely process. The better the information a company has the more of a competitive edge they have against their competitors. They can work with the information they have and build from it continually progressing towards goals.

References

John Wiley & Sons, I. (2011). Activity-based costing activities. Retrieved from http://www.CliffsNotes.com/study_guide/Activity-Based-Costing-Activities.topicArticleId-21248,articleId-21225.html

Johnson, R. (2011). Chron.com. Retrieved from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/traditional-costing-vs-activitybased-costing-33724.html

Blocher, J. (2008). Cost management a strategic emphasis. Retrieved from http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/dl/free/0073128155/394466/blo28155_ch05.pdf

de Blij, H. J., & Muller, P. O. (2010). Geography : Realms, regions and concepts. Wiley. Retrieved from https://www.wileyplus.com/WileyCDA/

Jerry, W., Paul, K., & Donald, K. (2012). Managerial accounting: Tools for business decision making. (6 ed.). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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Contact Information

To contact the author of “Management 101: What You Need to Know About Activity-Based Costing ,” please email Francesca Borra at Francesca.Borra@selu.edu or at Franchieb200@yahoo.com.

About the Publisher

David C. Wyld (dwyld@selu.edu) is the Robert Maurin Professor of Management at Southeastern Louisiana University in Hammond, Louisiana. He is a management consultant, researcher/writer, and executive educator. His blog, Business News 24/7, can be viewed at http://wyld-business.blogspot.com/. He also serves as the Director of the Reverse Auction Research Center (http://reverseauctionresearch.org), a hub of research and news in the expanding world of competitive bidding.

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Introduction

What is staffing and what does it have to do with business companies? In this article you will find out the true concept and meaning to the term “staffing” for companies in today’s fast paced business world. You will learn certain issues that involves with the concept of staffing. Also you with find out the “Top 10 Things You Need to Know about Staffing”, and the process it involves. Staffing has helped many companies throughout time pick the right employees for the right jobs and now this article will tell you how.

The Idea in a Nutshell

Staffing is how companies select and use their employees so that every employee fits in his or her right spot in the company, to ensure the company’s success and continue to maximize profits. It involves certain issues such as hiring, firing, promoting, and also training new and/or current employees. Carefully selecting and maintaining the staff of your company is key importance to maintaining a successful growth and profit of the company.

The Top 10 Things You Need to Know About Staffing

1.    Hiring new employees to a company is one of the many important issues involved with staffing. Hiring new employees to the work force can be considered a wonderful addition to a company. The new employees can possess new skills and ideas to help keep the company moving forward. Although the demands of new potential employees are rising, it is very important to take the time to evaluate each person and not just simply hire anyone to fill the empty spots.  You need to ask many questions to find out their work background and make sure that you are selecting the right person for the job in confidence.

2.    With hiring new employee’s means you have to use another staffing issue called firing, so you won’t be over staffed. Firing an employee is when you permanently dismissed an employee from working for the company anymore for some particular reason. Whether the reason may be because they don’t ever show up for work on time, they are not performing to maximum capabilities as need be, or any other non-ethical reasoning.

3.    Although hiring and firing are probably the important and common parts of staffing, according to www.managementstudyguide.com- Staffing Process- “Steps involved in Staffing” there are 8 simple steps to the staffing process. The steps to the process are manpower requirements, recruitment, selection, orientation and placement, training and development, remuneration, performance evaluation, and promotion and transfer. The first step is manpower requirements, in this step business owners try to plan and determine the future manpower needs of the company so that it can run successfully.

Employee of the Month Reserved Parking Sign (Photo credits: myparkingsign.com)

4.    The second step of the staffing process is recruitment; this is when the company accepts applications from potential new employees. The companies use advertising and marketing to get the word out that they are hiring new employees to their staff. Once the applications have been submitted, upper level management of companies will receive them for the selection part of the process.

5.    Selection is the third part of the staffing process. This is where the upper level management has to look thru all the applications they received. After management looks thru all the applications they need to decide which candidates are right for the job. They do this by screening, which is when the company screens thru each and every application to see each candidate’s past job experiences and their level of schooling to make sure they pick the best for the job.

6.    After the company screens thru each application the candidates that have been selected to work at the company, they will have to go thru some type of an orientation so that they become familiar with their job title (or placement) and task they will be required to regularly perform.  This step is called orientation and placement. This step is also mostly likely where the new employees will get to meet the other new employees they will be working with for the first time.

7.    Once all the new employees meet one another and learn their job position they enter the next step to the staffing process, the training and development step. During the step the new employees have to go thru a training time period which shows them how to do their job they way the company wants it done. It teaches them step by step ways to properly to their assignments or project that will being doing every day. It also shows the management if the person they picked was truly qualified for the certain job or not, so that they can cut them loses or keeps them for the company.

8.    When the new employees are done going thru the training and development step they will approach the next step in the staffing process called Remuneration. During this step is when the newly trained employees will find out how much money they will be earning in exchange from their services to the company, whether its hourly pay or salary. The amount of pay can be determined by the nature of job and if the employee is skilled or unskilled, has physical or mental health factors, etc.

9.    The second to last step is the performance evaluation step. This is where the employer regularly evaluates and supervises the different parts of the company. The reason for this is to keep track of all the employees’ behavior, attitudes, and their opinions as well.

10.    The last and final step is definitely consider to be one of the most rewarding steps in the whole staffing process, the promotion and transfer step. When an employee has done really well in their particular job they can get promoted to a higher job demanding with more responsibilities and even higher salary. Transferring of an employee is when they send them to work at a different branch or department in the same company.

The Video Lounge

This video clip is about Steve Jobs, former founder/CEO of Apple, and how he talks about the way Apple manages and maintained the people in their company. Apple has no committees as Steve Jobs stats in this video that “We are organized like startups”, meaning each part of the company has only one person in charge of it. They are a very team oriented company that meets for three hours once a week to discuss about everything that Apple is doing for the company at the particular time period. The reason Steve Jobs does this is because he wants everyone in the company to provide their input to help move the Apple company forward, no matter big or small you are in the company. He does this so he can find and see everyone’s views and opinions to help the company keep successes into the future.

My Take

Staffing is most definitely still very relevant in today’s business world. It’s just a little faster paced to try and keep up with today’s business world. Staffing means a lot for managers and employees right now because the process helps the management and of the company know and record how everyone in the organization is doing to make sure that everything runs smoothly and accord to plan. I think what it means to employees today is that it is a strait well thought out process that every new employees and current employees must follow in order to be a part of that particular company.

References

Staffing Process – Steps Involved in Staffing. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.managementstudyguide.com/staffing-process.htm

Lynn, D. (2012). Four Strategic Staffing Processes. Retrieved from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/four-strategic-staffing-processes-14297.html

What is Staffing? Definition and meaning. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/staffing.html

How the staffing process works. (2012). Retrieved from http://www.civ.forces.gc.ca/working-travailler/hspw-qmsd-eng.asp

Turner, R. (2009, February 20). The Staffing Process. Retrieved from http://ezinearticles.com/?The-Staffing-Process&id=2016663

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Contact Information

To contact the author of “Management 101: What You Need to Know About Staffing,” please email Donald Guastella at Donald.Guastella@selu.edu.

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About the Publisher

David C. Wyld (dwyld@selu.edu) is the Robert Maurin Professor of Management at Southeastern Louisiana University in Hammond, Louisiana. He is a management consultant, researcher/writer, and executive educator. His blog, Business News 24/7, can be viewed at http://wyld-business.blogspot.com/. He also serves as the Director of the Reverse Auction Research Center (http://reverseauctionresearch.org), a hub of research and news in the expanding world of competitive bidding.

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Since the launch of Apple IOS 6, many mobile device users have debated within and among themselves if this Apple development is worth spending for.  Different mobile users have different needs and preferences when it comes to mobile gadgets.  Let us take a closer look at what the IOS 6 has to offer.

image credit

Upgraded Siri

On the iPad 3, the iPhone 5, and the iPod touch fifth generation, the Siri voice-controlled personal assistant has the ability to launch apps, post to Facebook and Twitter, and provide information on local places and events including movie listings and sports info.  For now, it remains to serve US localities only.

The Passbook Virtual Wallet

The Passbook is Apple’s version of the virtual wallet. This app stores your coupon codes, discount cards, booked tickets, and other other files created using the Passbook file-type all in one place for easy viewing and retrieval. Once done, these files can be virtually shredded away as you watch.

Apple Maps

Thie Apple Maps is IOS’s replacement for Google Maps.  This Tom-Tom assisted map app features 3D buildings and a Google-Earth-ish Flyover mode.  It also offers live traffic information and a listing of 100 million businesses.  The turn-by-turn street navigation it offers is Siri controlled.  However, Google Maps users may not be convinced enough to shift just yet.

Facebook Integration

The Facebook integration of IOS6 provides and easy way for users to keep their friends’ contact details such as phone numbers, birthdays, and other event synced and will appear conveniently in the Calendar. 

Through Siri, IOS6 users can also post status updates by voice. Now, that’s something fancy and convenient, too.

Eyes Free Mode and Car Integration

Apple made it possible for car drivers to use the phone without having to actually hold it by integrating a hardware button into steering wheels to activate Siri. Many car manufacturers such as BMW, Mercedes, and Honda are now ready for this development. 

These and some other enhancements can be found in Apple’s IOS6 gadgets. Also worth looking into are iCloud tabs, Do Not Disturb Option, Face Time calls, and its Panoramic mode photo capture.

I am very selective with my online presence and how much of my personal finances and information is online. I have a Paypal account because it’s a necessity to get paid for online work, but, beyond that, I don’t pay bills online, buy anything online, or such. However, many do these things with the ease and convenience it offers. If you have online financial accounts, pay bills online, having buying accounts online, or such then you need to make sure you’re as protected as possible, right?

The number of online accounts being hacked continues to rise each year, with hackers getting more and more innovative with their attacks and tools of the trade. Yet, people continue to be lax with how they use the internet, their online accounts, and even their passwords.

According to SplashData, a Ca company providing password apps, “password” was the most popular password in 2011 and remains to be the number one password used this year. Really~?  

Rounding out the SplashData top ten most popular online passwords –

2. “123456”

3. “12345678”

4. “abc123”

5. “qwerty”

6. “monkey”

7. “letmein”

8. “dragon”

9. “111111”

10. “baseball”

While these passwords may be easy to remember, they’re equally as easy to let hackers into your accounts. Highly personal passwords, such as a maiden name, birthday, or child’s name are likely to leave you almost as vulnerable.

Security experts recommend adding a numeral, special character, and mix of upper and lowercase letters to your chosen password. Remember, you can still pick a password based on something you’ll remember. Just make sure that it wouldn’t  be on your online profiles, such as a child’s or pet’s  name or birthday would. You could, for example, use the brand of the recliner you sit in and how much you paid for it –“ LazyBoy@$300.” Certainly, that password would be less likely to be cracked than “123456.”

The communication between the client and the server using the request-response paradigm uses Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) and appears first in the web address. The response of the server need not be restricted to HTML documents alone: they could be images, media files, etc., and the protocol need not be only HTTP: it could be File Transfer Protocol (FTP), wais, https, etc. The www.triond.com is the domain name, a user friendly name for an Internet Protocol or IP address formed by 3-digited four-number strings separated by dots. For example, the range of numbers between 64.233.160.0 – 64.233.191.255 represent www.google.com. The browser that the client uses to view – be it Firefox, Safari or Internet Explorer – interprets the tags in the web pages to decide how to display the information in them.

Two Tier Client-Server Architecture

The design used in the above scenario is referred to as Client Server architecture.

Client/Server is a logical 2-tier model that divides workload into a ‘client’ tier and a ’server’ tier: the two tiers may exist on the same machine or be separated over a great distance on different machines. Often this model refers to powerful centralized ‘host’ servers waiting for incoming requests from a network of clients. The clients have the user interface to invoke the requests through function calls, and the database servers send the results after running the functions and stored procedures that implement the business logic of the application, and the information is displayed on the client machines.

English: This is a Client-Server Model (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The advantage of Client-Server model is that it is independent of hardware or operating system platforms. You can deploy clients and servers running on different hardware using different operating systems. The model also provides scalability, though limited. You can add more or faster server machines to share resources such as content, CPU cycles, storage and bandwidth and enhance performance.

Three Tier Client-Server Applications

The Two-tier model required the clients not only to carry the user interface but also bear the burden of processing too in order to reduce network traffic. The more complex the application, the fatter the client became and the more powerful the client hardware required to support it.

In the Three-tier model, the business logic is removed from the client layer as well as the back-end, and managed independently as a Business Layer on what is logically called an Application Server  containing the business logic (functions and procedures – the reusable code). This allows you to use thin clients such as a cell phone.

Thus, in addition to the User Interface layer, we now have a Business layer and Data layer. The 3-tier architecture comprises of a database tier at the bottom, the application tier in the middle and the client tier on top. To understand layers, remember that every layer sends requests and uses the services of underlying layers.

The middle tier brings together the other layers of the 3 tier. It processes the inputs it receives from the clients and interacts with the database.

The Bottom layer or the database layer consists of the Database Management System or the DBMS and the database itself. This database management layer manages the storage, retrieval of data as well as allows simultaneous access, provides security, data integrity and support applications.

Why 3-tier? The scalability of the back end in a two-tier Client-Server is limited. Further separation of data from the procedures that operate on the data enhances the scalability of the model further. When this is done,the servers or the back-end can reuse the same code – functions and procedures; thus, processes can be managed and deployed separately from the user interface and the database, and data from multiple sources can be integrated.

Together, these various tiers of a 3 tier architecture are the framework of most web applications deployed on the Internet.

Reference

W3C

Say what ?!

Yep, there is the odd occassion when writing that a writer finds that a question mark isn’t quite enough and a exclamation mark isn’t quite enough. So they do both – sometimes multiple times. You may have seen it, or used it, before like;

Say what?!
Say what!?
Say what?!?!
Say what!?!?
Say what!!!!

Doing such a thing at the end of a sentence to express both a surprise and a question falls firmly in the category of ‘informal’ writing, yet the need to do so arises more often than one imagines. All the more strange though is that there is an actual punctuation mark that would do away with having to use both a question mark and an exclamation mark – the Interrobang.

It really is as simple as that. The Interrobang is nothing more than a single punctuation mark that combines the question mark and exclamation mark in to one thing. How simple and obvious a thing to do when you think about it. Yet the history of the Interrobang is relatively recent and it has never quite taken off.

The Interrobang was first created in the early 1960’s by Martin Speckter, who was an American who was the head of an Advertising Agency. His theory was simple, when an advertisement wanted to convey a surprised rhetorical question it would be ‘neater’ to do so with a single punctuation mark. His theory was sound in principle and over the next ten years the Interrobang threatened to take hold.

Despite making a lot of appearances in magazines and advertisements throughout the 1960’s and in to the 1970’s, despite it becoming a key on some typewriters, despite the word Interrobang even being featured in some dictionaries the single punctuation mark known as the Interrobang soon feel out of favour and almost became forgotten.

Where can you find the Interrobang on your computer keyboard?

If you have Microsoft Word, change the font to Wingdings 2, then shift+6 will give you the Interrobang, just like this ^

Another way to do it on Microsoft Word is to hold down the Alt key and type 8253 on the Numeric Keypad. 

If you are wanting to do write the Interrobang on a webpage you will need to type & # 8 2 5 3 (without the spaces) which will give you “‽”

Is it worth using the Interrobang?  

At the end of the day the Interrobang deserves more recognition and more use than it currently has, simply for the reason that it serves a purpose and keeps it simple. Sure typing a question mark and then an exclamation mark may well take about the same time as putting in the code for the Interrobang, but one punctuation mark always looks neater than two.

When I was browsing the Internet, I found something very funny. The funny thing is related to the design of the iphone. Many people say that the difference on each type of iphone is only on the length of the phone. whether this is true? dunno, but here are the photos of funny iphone design in the future. LOL

So, what do you think guys about all design above??? can’t get into your shirt pocket or pants??

Please write down your comment about those funny design..
Thank you very much