Good chance to avail $ 10k by downloading 50 billionth app from Apple App Store.
Apple’s is celebrating its approach of the 50 billion App Store download milestone with an attractive contest and wanted to say thanks to its users by this way.
May be today or tomorrow 50 billion apps have been downloaded worldwide from App Store. And Apple celebrates this moment with its users. Download the 50 billionth app, and you could win a US$10,000 App Store Gift Card. Or download one of the first 50 apps after that, and you could win a US$500 App Store Gift Card.^* Browse the App Store and download apps by your own choice. So this is a great opportunity to win the gift card worth $10,000. Don’t waste times just go to the site and start downloading apps. Entry form of this promotion is available on this link http://www.apple.com/. This promotion is open only to applicants who are 13 years of age or older at the time of entry.
The Sponsor of this Promotion is Apple Inc., 1 Infinite Loop, Cupertino, CA 95014 (“Sponsor”). All questions regarding this Promotion should be directed by email to appstore50billion@apple.com.

Related Technology News:

• Protect your children from unwanted material of web:
• Health-related Apps:
• Good news for Viber users:
• 5 incredible Android apps of this week:
• Technology has no limits:

1. Click on “Tools”
2. Click on “Internet Options…”
3. Click on “Content” tab
4. In the “Content Advisor” section click on “Enable…”

You are now in the Content Advisor. From here you can set your own settings.

• Ratings tab:
   Set rating levels for: language, nudity, crime, sex and violence.
• Approved Sites tab:
  Name sites that you will permit your kids to view or name sites that you never want your kids to view, regardless of the site’s rating.
• General tab:
  • Permit or prohibit your child to see sites that are not rated.
  • Create a password – this is great for use with older children. You set a password, then if your child goes to a site they want to see, but it is a restricted site, you can allow the site using the password. You will have the option to always allow the site or only allow it for one time.
  • View or adjust the rating system

Blocking Software:
Here is a list of some softwares you can consider for blocking programs from many sites:

• We-Blocker – Free. Create different settings for each child.
• CyberSitter – Rated #1 by PC magazine 2003.
• KidsNet – restrict specific types of emails from getting through. Age specific settings.
• CyberPatrol – Control on instant messages, email and sites.
• NetNanny – Observe, restrict and control your children’s access to Internet.

Child-Friendly Browsers:
Moreover some kids-friendly content filtering web browser is also very helpful in this context like Noah’s Web and  KidRocket etc. This type of browsers helps you to restrict unwanted material of the web.
 

Related Technology News:

• Promotion worth $10,000 from Apple Inc.
• Health-related Apps:
• Good news for Viber users:
• 5 incredible Android apps of this week:
• Technology has no limits:

Blood Pressure (BP) Watch:
This app will help you to get your pressure monitoring. Blood pressure is the force of blood against the walls of arteries. During each heart-beat, blood pressure varies between a peak (systolic) and a minimum (diastolic) pressure. A normal systolic blood pressure is below 120 and a normal diastolic blood pressure is less than 80.
BP Watch keeps tracking your blood pressure in the above familiar setting and records the history of your blood pressure. It also records the posture, position and time of the blood pressure. No doubt it is a beneficial app but with all of its qualities it must not consider as a substitute of proper professional Medical advice.
BP Watch has the following features:
-It is ad-free version
-Recording Blood Pressure
-Tracking Blood Pressure
-Update and Delete Blood Pressure
-Showing Time with BP Graph
-Enhanced History of the user

Related Technology News:

• Promotion worth $10,000 from Apple Inc.
• Protect your children from unwanted material of web:
• Good news for Viber users:
• 5 incredible Android apps of this week:
• Technology has no limits:

Related Technology News:

• Promotion worth $10,000 from Apple Inc.
• Protect your children from unwanted material of web:
• Health-related Apps:
• 5 incredible Android apps of this week:
• Technology has no limits:

Five absolutely free apps of this week for Android smart phones and tablets users.

Dextr Email Beta (Free)Dextr’s aim is to improve our way to read and send our e-mails through our cell phones. Use Dextr to lessen the mess of your inbox and concentrates merely on conversations with your love ones (family, kinfolk, helpers, customers, spouses and class-mates etc.). It facilitates us to concise our mails in an attractive way, and provide us to list up our important messages in a unified way.This is an early beta, so expect frequent updates and improved features. Shoot an email anytime to support@meetdextr.com for your feedback. Dextr currently support only Gmail. Let them know if you’re looking for something else. Push notifications will be enabled in the next release.

Player FM (Free)
Fed up while traveling? No time to read? Player FM helps you find out and play talk-shows on hundreds of diverse topics and offline playback too. Actually, it’s a high-quality podcasts app on Android, but not the one you previously used.
The app just downloads latest episodes, you can’t delete episodes manually, they’re auto-deleted. App’s Export feature use to download older episodes through which you can save audio files to file system. A future version will let you download and play older episodes inside the app. You can browse 300+ topics. These aren’t just catalogue items; they’re live channels combining latest episodes from high-quality providers. Mark your favorite topics to keep them in the quick-access menu. Player FM has channels on comedy, latest news, current affairs, TV shows, and so on. In addition, there are many vibrant and academic topics, e.g. information technology, health and science, linguistic learning. This app makes it convenient to stream from online sources just like an internet radio, but also support syncing so you can play offline, anytime.
For more info go to http://player.fm

Loss of the Night (Free)
This app gives you a chance to contribute in a “world-wide citizen science project” that’s measure light pollution and star visibility. This app is the best knack for astronomy lovers. “Just look up to the sky,  It is difficult to find certain stars in the light of street lamps, you can understand that how light pollution confine you to locate certain stars at your location and affects health, society, and the environment. If you successfully locate these stars from your location then inform your observation to the scientists through this app. All measurements and information you are providing are sent anonymously to the Globe at Night (www.GLOBEatNight.org) database, which is accumulating the data and generates worldwide maps of star visibility and light pollution, which scientists can use to analyze correlations between light pollution and many more elements. This app is based on the well-known Google Sky Map; this app is a tool to measure star visibility without expensive equipment.
Using the Loss of the Night app is exciting, informative, encourages citizen science, and having dynamic contribution to protect the environment.

Angry Birds Friends (Free)
If you are a game freaking person then ‘Angry Birds’ is not a new name for you. Angry Birds has previously captured the iPhone platform and now leaped onto the Android operating system in the form of this beta version. This is the new mobile version of ‘Angry Birds’ and now it will give you a chance to become a social refit by participating in weekly tournaments against your FB friends and win the title of vital “Bird Flinger ’and trophies.

AVG Memory & Cache Cleaner (Free)
AVG’s latest ‘Memory & Cache Cleaner app for Android targets to clean up cellular devices, erasing browser, call and text histories, deleting unnecessary cached app data, and checking memory usage to eliminate processes that are slowing down your Smart Phone.
Cache Cleaner App is a speedy tool for clearing application cached files. Single Tap is enough to clean all cached files for getting more vacant space. With the help of this tool you can easily free a lot of storage memory of your cellular phone. Free phone internal memory, Get more internal ROM storage. It is essential to all who has memory management issues.
This app is useful in:

Trivial bug fixing

Fixing a bug of long click menu

Fixing a fc bug caused by Feedback

Fixing widget size problem

System requirement of using this app is Android 2.3.3 – Android 2.3.7 and above.
File size is 2.43MB

Related Technology News:

• Promotion worth $10,000 from Apple Inc.
• Protect your children from unwanted material of web:
• Health-related Apps:
• Good news for Viber users:
• Technology has no limits:

Recently Google has released technical specifications of the Google Glass, a pair of the Internet-connected glasses that the company is publicizing as the next revolution in mobile computing. This new wearable technology will fundamentally contain of a pair of ingenious glasses which contain a display, a camera, a microphone, send messages, give directions, display weather, give flights details, translate and everything necessary to make some science fiction fantasies come true. And surely glass will be compatible with many existing Google applications, such as Google Now, Google Maps, Google+, and Gmail.

The Google wearable Glasses functionality and restrained appearance has been resembled to Steve Mann’s EyeTap, also known as “Glass” or “Digital Eye Glass”, although Google Glass is a “Generation-1 Glass” compared to EyeTap, which is a “Generation-4 Glass”. It has aluminum strip with 2 nose pads and its adjustable nose-pads with durable frame fits on any face. It comes with extra nose-pads in two sizes. It supports a 5 megapixel camera that can capture 720p videos. Its connectivity options include Wifi – 802.11b/g and Bluetooth. The Glass has 16 GB of total flash storing capacity on-baord, of which 12 GB is usable. It is compatible with any Bluetooth-capable phone. The MyGlass companion app entails Android 4.0.3.

Its introductory price will be round $1,500 USD
This project of Google has drawn media attention as well as a big threat for the other competitive companies like Microsoft etc.

Related Technology News:

• Promotion worth $10,000 from Apple Inc.
• Protect your children from unwanted material of web:
• Health-related Apps:
• Good news for Viber users:
• 5 incredible Android apps of this week:

2.0 Definitions

COTS:

“A commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) product is a software system that can be adapted to the needs of different customers without changing the source code of the system.”

3.0 Introduction

Software reuse based on COTS has become increasingly common. The vast majority of new business information processing systems are now built using COTS rather than using an object-oriented approach. Although there are often problems with this approach to system development (Tracz, 2001), success stories (Baker, 2002; Balk and Kedia, 2000; Brownsword and Morris, 2003; Pfarr and Reis, 2002) show that COTS-based reuse reduces effort and the time to deploy the system.

There are two types of COTS product reuse, namely COTS-solution systems and COTS-integrated systems.

COTS-solution systems consist of a generic application from a single vendor that is configured to customer requirements.

COTS-integrated systems involve integrating two or more COTS systems.

COTS can be either software or hardware

Software:

Operating Systems (UNIX, Windows/NT, OS2)

Databases (Oracle, Sybase)

Graphics Packages (Motif, ??)

Hardware:

Busses (VME, PCI, cPCI)

Processors (Motorola, HP, Sun, Intel)

Disk Drives (Western Digital, Red Rock)

Peripherals (Printers, Monitors, Keyboards, etc.)

There are many areas where COTS successfully replaced traditional custom software examples are

–        Space Shuttle (non-mission-critical systems)

–        Missile Guidance systems

–        Military ground based and shipboard sensors (radar, sonar)

–        Industrial control and monitoring systems

–        telecommunications

–        Air traffic control

Benefits

This approach to software reuse has been very widely adopted by large companies over the last 15 or so years, as it offers significant benefits over customized software development:

1. As with other types of reuse, more rapid deployment of a reliable system may be possible.

2. It is possible to see what functionality is provided by the applications and so it is easier to judge whether or not they are likely to be suitable. Other companies may already use the applications so experience of the systems is available.

3. Some development risks are avoided by using existing software. However, this approach has its own risks, as I discuss below.

4. Businesses can focus on their core activity without having to devote a lot of resources to IT systems development.

5. As operating platforms evolve, technology updates may be simplified as these are the responsibility of the COTS product vendor rather than the customer.

Problems

Of course, this approach to software engineering has its own problems:

1. Requirements usually have to be adapted to reflect the functionality and mode of operation of the COTS product. This can lead to disruptive changes to existing business processes.

2. The COTS product may be based on assumptions that are practically impossible to change. The customer must therefore adapt their business to reflect these assumptions.

3. Choosing the right COTS system for an enterprise can be a difficult process, especially as many COTS products are not well documented. Making the wrong choice could be disastrous as it may be impossible to make the new system work as required.

4. There may be a lack of local expertise to support systems development.

Consequently, the customer has to rely on the vendor and external consultants for development advice. This advice may be biased and geared to selling products and services, rather than meeting the real needs of the customer.

5. The COTS product vendor controls system support and evolution. They may go out of business, be taken over, or may make change that cause difficulties for customers.

3.1 History

In 1994, then Secretary of Defense William Perry well recognized the potential for commercial products in the Directorate of Defense and authored what has come to be known as the “Perry Memo.” Entitled Acquisition Reform – Mandate for Change, Perry asserted that business policies that once made sense were no longer applicable to current technologies. Commercial-off-the-shelf, or COTS would become an integral part of DoD procurement.

With a COTS item – already built – the government cannot monitor the build process, nor should it. For example, Dell computer hardware is widely used in the DoD. Think of what a waste of time, money, and really how downright silly it would be for DoD program managers to monitor operations at a Dell facility. And so, milspecs cannot apply; they simply do not make sense (Carter & Perry, 1999). Rather, the government puts forth performance-based requirements, and then the program manager finds a COTS product that meets those needs.

4.0 References

1-       Software Engineering 9^th Edition by Sommervillie Page 440-445

2-      http://www.ippa.ws/IPPC2/PROCEEDINGS/Article_5_Baron.pdf

Related Technology News:

• Alternate mark inversion (AMI)
• Encoding Schemes
• Differential Manchester encoding
• What is Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC)
• Component Based Software Engineering (CBSE)

Alternate mark inversion (AMI) is a digital transmission technique in which binary values are sent by three voltage states.

1. ’0′ bits by a voltage of 0 volts.
2. ’1′ bits by a voltage of +V volts or -V volts alternatively

In AMI, zeros are represented by 01 during each bit cell

Ones are represented by 11 or 00, alternately, during each bit cell

A logical “0″ is represented by 0 volts; A logical 0 is represented by no symbol

A logical 1 by pulses of alternating polarity.

• The alternating coding prevents the build-up of a D.C. voltage level down the cable.
• A logical “1″ is represented by either a positive voltage or a negative voltage so that each alternate “1″ is represented by a voltage level that is the opposite of that which represented the previous “1″.

The result is a digital waveform that has zero DC voltage on the line.

AMI (Alternate Mark Inversion) is a synchronous clock encoding technique which uses bipolar pulses to represent logical 1 value.

AMI Data Encoding

• Line-code type used on T1 and E1 circuits.
• AMI requires that the sending device maintain ones density. Ones density is not maintained independent of the data stream. Sometimes called binary coded alternate mark inversion
• Typically implemented as a RZ code
• Little or no DC content in signal
• Lacks transparency particularly during long sequences of binary ‘0’

Related Technology News:

• What is Commercial off the Shelf (COTS)?
• Encoding Schemes
• Differential Manchester encoding
• What is Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC)
• Component Based Software Engineering (CBSE)

Code Name :   NRZ-L

Binary Code : 11001011

Code Definition:

Non-Return-to-Zero Level

• “One” is represented by one level
• “Zero” is represented by another level lower the one but not zero.

Code Name :   NRZ-I

Binary Code : 11001011

Code Definition:

Non-Return-to-Zero Inverse

• “One” is represented by no change in level
• “Zero” is represented by change in level.

Signal

Code Name :   RZ

Binary Code : 11001011

Code Definition:

Return-to-Zero

• “One” is represented by positive to zero
• “Zero” is represented by negative to zero

Code Name :   Manchester

Binary Code : 11001011

Code Definition:

Manchester encoding uses an inversion at the middle of each bit interval for both synchronization and bit representation.

A negative to positive transition represent binary 1 and a positive to negative transition represent binary 0.

The rising edge in the centre of the data bit indicates either a logic ’1′ or alternatively a logic ’0′.

Code Name :   AMI

Binary Code : 11001011

Code Definition:

Alternate mark inversion (AMI) is a digital transmission technique in which binary values are sent by three voltage states.

1. ’0′ bits by a voltage of 0 volts.
2. ’1′ bits by a voltage of +V volts or -V volts alternatively

Code Name :   Differential Manchester

Binary Code : 11001011

Code Definition:

• A 1 bit is indicated by the absence of a transition at the start of the interval.
• A 0 bit is indicated by the presence of a transition.
•  No transition during the interval indicates no signals are present.

Related Technology News:

• What is Commercial off the Shelf (COTS)?
• Alternate mark inversion (AMI)
• Differential Manchester encoding
• What is Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC)
• Component Based Software Engineering (CBSE)

Encoding in which

(a)   data and clock signals are combined to form a single self-synchronizing data stream,

(b)    one of the two bits, i.e., “0″ or “1″, is represented by no transition at the beginning of a pulse period and a transition in either direction at the midpoint of a pulse period, and

(c)     The other is represented by a transition at the beginning of a pulse period and a transition at the midpoint of the pulse period.

In differential Manchester encoding, if a “1″ is represented by one transition, a “0″ is represented by two transitions, and vice versa.

In differential Manchester encoding, the transition at the middle of the bit is used only for synchronization. The bit representation is defined by the inversion or no inversion at the beginning of the bit.

• Mid-bit transition is ONLY for clocking.
• 1 =   absence of transition at the beginning of the bit interval
• 0 =   presence of transition at the beginning of the bit interval
• Differential Manchester is both differential and bi-phase.
•  The coding is the opposite convention from NRZI.

Used in 802.5 (token ring) with twisted pair.

Related Technology News:

• What is Commercial off the Shelf (COTS)?
• Alternate mark inversion (AMI)
• Encoding Schemes
• What is Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC)
• Component Based Software Engineering (CBSE)