Modern devices that may serve the ubiquitous computing model include mobile phones, digital audio players, radio-frequency identification tags and interactive whiteboards. Other terms for ubiquitous computing include pervasive computing, calm technology, things that think, everyware, and more recently, pervasive Internet.

Ubiquitous computing encompasses a wide range of research topics, including distributed computing, mobile computing, sensor networks, human-computer interaction, and artificial intelligence.

HISTORY

Pervasive computing is the third wave of computing technologies to emerge since computers first appeared:

• First Wave – Mainframe computing era: one computer shared by many people, via

workstations.

• Second Wave – Personal computing era: one computer used by one person, requiring a

conscious interaction. Users largely bound to desktop.

• Third Wave – Pervasive (initially called ubiquitous) computing era: one person, many

computers. Millions of computers embedded in the environment, allowing technology

to recede into the background.

BACKGROUND

Eight billion embedded microprocessors are produced each year. This number is expected to rise dramatically over the next decade, making electronic devices ever more pervasive. These devices will range from a few millimeters in size (small sensors) to several meters (displays and surfaces). They may be interconnected via wired and wireless technologies into broader, more capable, networks. Pervasive computing systems and services may lead to a greater degree of user knowledge of, or control over, the surrounding environment, whether at home, or in an office or car.There have been calls for more widespread debate on the implications of pervasive computing while it is still at an early stage of development.

PERVASIVE COMPUTING TECHNOLOGIES

Pervasive computing technologies classified in to four converging areas

- Mobile Computing

- Embedded and Applied computing

- RFID and Sensors

- Mobile and sensor networking

Mobile Computing

The widespread use of mobile computing devices has changed the way people compute and vastly expanded research areas in distributed computing and networking. In fact, traditional distributed computing is actually a subset of the broad area of mobile computing. Many topics in “mature” areas like distributed databases, distributed fault tolerance, and resource management now require much additional study, because many traditional assumptions are challenged. Mobile computers operate in more hostile environments, are resource-constrained (limited power, frequent disconnection), and are peripheral-poor.

Mobile computing is changing the way we live and work, as profoundly as the introduction of the automobile did almost a century ago. Key advances in mobile networking, wireless connectivity, mobile information access, content adaptation, data synchronization, technology for notebook and wearable computers, and innovative mobile e-business solutions have come from worldwide research laboratories..

Some of the recent research in mobile computing includes:

WEARABLE DISPLAY OF ATHLETES’ STATISTICS

TeamAwear is a basketball jersey that displays real-time information about its wearer’s statistics such as their fouls, points, and scores and alerts players when the game is nearly over or when time is running out to shoot. Mitchell Page and Andrew Vande Moere at the Centre of Design Computing and Cognition of the University of Sydney developed the system, which consists of numerous colored electroluminescent panels. A small computer attached to the player’s body controls the panels and communicates wirelessly with a server that tracks relevant game statistics. For example, panels on the jersey’s side light up to show how many goals the wearer has scored, with each panel representing 10 goals Although the inventors developed the TeamAwear jersey originally for basketball, they claim that it could also work in other fast-paced sports in which player-specific data changes rapidly, such as soccer, volleyball, cricket, and baseball. It could also support emergency teams working in noisy environments where verbal communication is inefficient.

SKYSCOUT

If you’ve ever looked at the night sky and wondered what stars you were observing, Celestron’s SkyScout might be for you. Especially useful for novice astronomers, this handheld device combines GPS technology with a map of the sky to identify, locate, and provide information about celestial bodies. To identify an object of interest, you simply view it through the SkyScout and press the Identify button. SkyScout’s technology identifies the object and tells you what it is. To locate a celestial body, you select it from a reasonably easy-touse menu of objects and press the Locate button. SkyScout uses red directional arrows around the eyepiece to guide you to the object in the sky. A nice feature is that the menu shows only objects that should be visible. (Unfortunately, Sky- Scout has no way to know which of those objects are blocked by trees). Finally, the device can educate you about many of the more popular celestial bodies. The information is available both through audio and text and includes facts about the object and its history and mythology. SkyScout’s release was delayed in 2006 because of manufacturing problems in one of the components.

NOKIA NSERIES PHONES

Nokia has announced three new mobile phones in its multimedia Nseries, each targeting a different market segment. The N71, N80, and N92 offer a long list of features. The N71, from the Nokia XpressMusic family, offers an FM stereo tuner, a five-band equalizer, and support for audio and video formats including MP3, AAC, eAAC+, WMA, JPEG, and MPEG-4. It offers a 240 _ 320-pixel display and two cameras, one 2-megapixel (1600 _ 1200 pixel) and the other VGA (640 _ 480 pixel). It operates on dual-mode wideband code division multiple access (WCDMA)/GSM and triband GSM. The N80 offers a 352 _ 416-pixel display and a 3-megapixel camera with features including four flash modes, 10 scene modes, manual exposure correction, and four color tones.

Embedded and Applied Computing

Embedded and ubiquitous computing is an exciting new paradigm that provides computing and communication services all the time and everywhere. Its systems are now affecting every aspect of our life to the point that they are hidden inside various appliances. This emergence is a natural outcome of research and technological advances in embedded systems. An Embedded Pervasive Computing Environment is equipped with hardware and software components that autonomously respond to the needs of its occupants. Embedded system is the core part of pervasive computing and it deals with various applications like wearable computer architecture and applications, sensor networks, real-time embedded operating systems, embedded servers, embedded system networking, address-free routing, smart spaces, dynamic service discovery, mobility and case studies. Some of the on-going researches in embedded systems include:

ROLLABLE DISPLAY

Who hasn’t dreamt of a display that rolls up when not in use? Phillips took one step toward this dream on a commercial scale when it formed venture company Polymer Vision in January 2004. Polymer Vision recently reported that it can make a flexible display with a 2 cm bending radius. The display is an organics-based, QVGA (320 240 pixels) active-matrix display, 5 in. on the diagonal and 85 dpi. The display layers a 200-micron thick, reflective Electronic-Ink display from E Ink Corporation (www.eink.com) on top of a 25-micron thick, active-matrix plane.

USING LANDLINES FOR CELLULAR CALLS

Xcelis (www.xcelis.com) has developed an innovative product for coupling cell phones and landline handsets. The Pantheon (see Figure 3) plugs into a landline phone line and, using a Bluetooth connection, routes incoming and outgoing voice calls and data from users’ cell phones to their landline handsets. The Pantheon indicates incoming mobile calls with a distinctive ring. While the mobile call is in progress, it doesn’t tie up the landline, meaning you can still receive landline calls through your other telephones.
You need one device for each landline telephone that you want to multiplex. When making calls from your landline, you can choose whether to use your cell phone or landline account. The Pantheon provides additional features, including conferencing a landline call and a mobile call, accessing a user’s mobile phonebook from a landline phone, and switching mid-call from a landline phone to a mobile phone. The Pantheon is also compatible with voice over IP handsets.

BIONIC ARM

Todd Kuiken at the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago at the Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine has developed a thought-powered bionic arm. The arm is based on a pioneering muscle reinnervation procedure that takes an amputee’s nerves and connects them to a healthy muscle. Doctors take nerves that used to go to the arm and connect them to chest muscles. The nerves grow into the chest muscles and can contract the muscle when the patient thinks, for example, “Close hand.” Electrical signals from the chest muscles drive the arm. Surface electrodes sense these impulses from the pectoral muscle and carry them through to the arm, causing it to move. Jesse Sullivan, a high-power lineman who had both of his arms amputated after being severely electrocuted, is the first patient to be outfitted with bionic arms. The arms have enabled him to do daily activities such as put on socks, shave, eat dinner, take out the garbage, carry groceries, and vacuum. Future generations of the arm will incorporate the sense of touch and feeling.

Mobile and Sensor networking

Sensor mobility allows better coverage in areas where events occur frequently in many sensor networks, considerably more units are available than necessary for simple coverage of the space. Augmenting sensor networks with motion can exploit this surplus to enhance sensing while also improving the network’s lifetime and reliability. When a major incident such as a fire or chemical spill occurs, several sensors can cluster around that incident. This ensures good coverage of the event and provides immediate redundancy in case of failure another use of mobility comes about if the specific area of interest (within a larger area) is unknown during deployment. For example, if a network is deployed to monitor the migration of a herd of animals, the herd’s exact path through an area will be unknown beforehand. But as the herd moves, the sensors could converge on it to get the maximum amount of data. In addition, the sensors could move such that they also maintain complete coverage of their environment while reacting to the events in that environment. In this way, at least one sensor still detects any events that occur in isolation, while several sensors more carefully observe dense clusters of events. On going researches in sensor networking includes:

WORLDWIDE BROADBAND WIRELESS ACCESS

Option is offering a PC data card that can access wireless broadband worldwide. You can use the GlobeTrotter GT Max on the 850, 1900, or 2100 MHz HSDPA/UMTS (High-Speed Downlink Packet Access/Universal Mobile Telecommunications System) networks and the 850, 900, 1800, or 1900 MHz EDGE/ GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) bands. The card can support data speeds up to 1.8 megabits per second on HSDPA networks, 384 kilobits per second on UMTS networks, 247 Kbps on EDGE networks, and 85 Kbps on GPRS networks. It’s a Type II PCMCIA (Personal Computer Memory Card International Association)-compliant 3.3-V PC card and includes a novel “Butterfly” retractable antenna that doesn’t require users to remove the card when it’s not in use. Numerous wireless carriers offer the card, including Cingular, which recently announced that it would offer it under two plans. One plan will cost users $110 per month and includes unlimited data use in the US and 100 Mbytes of downloads in Canada and Mexico. The other plan will cost $140 and will include unlimited use in the US and 100 Mbytes of downloads in 24 countries including Australia, China, France, Italy, and Germany.

THE SELF-CLEANING HOUSE OF THE FUTURE

The house of the future won’t need cleaning. Not by humans, leastways. Every surface will be dirt-repellent and antibacterial; and on the floors the vacuum cleaner is buzzing around – all on its own. The outer walls are all glass which can be screened off entirely and the interior surface used as TV screen. The scenario of the self-cleaning house belongs in the distant future, maybe 20 years from now. With the rapidly increasing development of nanotechnology we have seen for the past few years, it is not easy to predict a specific time span and it will be not only self-cleaning but also self-sufficient, energy wise. Today, the Australians are already experimenting with nanoglass-houses where the glass can be treated with a pigmented coating rendering the entire house non-transparent – the roof included.

WALL SENSORS

The house of the future will be capable of alerting its owner if it’s in need of repair. The building materials will, of course, be susceptible to wear and tear due to wind and weather, and they will therefore have built-in sensors. When these sensors appear, the house computer will receive a message that this particular section needs repair. A variety of conditions are similarly monitored. This way, house owners can cheaply repair worn materials and avoid major, expensive repairs after the damage has been done.

THE INTELLIGENT HOUSE

The intelligent house of the future will alert the fire brigade in case of fire when you’re at work. Or, if you’ve got a leaky water pipe, it will get hold of the plumber. Multifunctional sensors throughout the house will keep an eye on heating, lights, indoor climate etc. The house of the future will comprise two major digital gateways. One gateway will be the media server which comprises the complete collection of the family’s music, films, photos etc. Another feature will be the highly secure homegateway – a server communicating with the many sensors distributed all over the house to monitor heating, indoor climate etc. The two gateways are separate entities, as the security on the homegateway needs to be exceedingly tight. This gateway should not be exposed to hacking, which could have fatal consequences with respect to security. If, for instance, the motion detectors are tampered with, the burglar alarm might be disabled. Likewise, it would be an unpleasant experience to come home to a room temperature of 40 degrees Celcisus, because someone is mad at you and has hacked into your system to change the temperature settings Thus, each room in the house of the future will be equipped with small sensors. – Larger rooms may have several. They will measure the physical conditions in the room and communicate with the homegateway which will then take care of the Internet-based communication out of the house.

RFID and Sensors

Radio frequency identification (RFID) technology uses radiofrequency waves to transfer data between readers and movable tagged objects without line of sight. RFID holds the promise of real-time identifying, locating, tracking and monitoring physical objects, and can be used for a wide range of pervasive computing applications. To achieve these goals, RFID data have to be collected, transformed and expressively modeled as their virtual counterparts in the virtual world. RFID data, however, have their own unique characteristics – including aggregation, location, temporal and history-oriented – which have to be fully considered and integrated into the data model. The diversity of RFID applications pose further challenges to a generalized framework for RFID data modeling. Today, Radio Frequency Identification enjoys an enormous interest as the first widely deployed pervasive technology as not only from the standpoint of research
but also from Corporate practices future. Some of the recent researches in RFID technologies include:

TAGS EVERYWHERE

The Ubiquitous ID Center provides the infrastructure for managing electronic tags embedded in or attached to objects in a ubiquitous environment. The center developed the ucode, a multicode tag that automatically identifies information stored in bar codes, RFID chips, smart cards, and electronic tags embedded in virtual entities such as software and electronic money. Comparable to the ISBN (International Standard Book Numbering) code used in the publishing industry, the UID Center assigns unique numbers to each tag and stores data relating to the object in database servers. The ucode tags use a 128-bit code that can be extended in 128-bit units, creating a virtually limitless string of numbers. To navigate this tagged environment, the UID Center developed the Ubiquitous Communicator, a PDA-like device that reads ucode tags and retrieves the relevant data from the UID Center’s server database. The standard UC has a host of features, including wireless LAN, Voice over Internet Protocol, infrared data communication, and a biometric reader. Apart from the PDA-like version, the UID Center developed a cell phone model and a watch style. At home, it will serve as the remote control for home entertainment systems and appliances. In the office, it will read a printer’s tag and order a replacement cartridge as needed

FROM UPC TO RFID

Smart packaging became a possibility with the introduction of small battery-free microprocessors called RFID (Radio Frequency Identification Device) tags. Though these have been commercially available for a number of years, they have been too clunky and too expensive for use in packaging. This situation is changing rapidly: industry experts predict that the price per tag will fall to under 10 cents each in the course of five years or so. The new generation of RFID tags can take the form of a sticker like the classic bar codes, or they can be directly integrated into the packaging material itself. They consist of a silicon microprocessor and some form of radio antenna—conductive carbon ink is replacing the more expensive metal coil of earlier tag types. This radio antenna functions as both input/output channel and power source. Electricity is generated in the antenna by either a magnetic field or a radio signal; the tag responds by sending out a radio signal in turn. This reply signal contains metadata stored on the chip, typically an ID number .With the help of RFID readers—in our cell phones, in supermarket freezers and check-outs, in our private fridges—we will be able to retrieve information about a particular item based on its ID number. In fact, the first cell phones with built-in readers, based on NFC (Near Field Communication) technology, are already on the market.

NEXT-GENERATION TAGS

The smart tags which will soon begin replacing bar codes in our supermarkets are actually pretty dumb: their only ability is reciting their ID code on command. With the next generation of MEMS tags, the epithet ‘smart’ will be more fitting. MEMS (Micro Electro Mechanical Systems) tags are able to perform measurements and calculations. MEMS tags are especially interesting in connection with extremely perishable goods like milk and meat. Studies have shown that the ‘sell by’ date on such products is dubious at best: milk only stays fresh until the given date as long as it is stored at the right temperature. Storage is the key term here; for example, that the temperature in around one-fifth of the meat and dairy cases in American supermarkets is three or four degrees too high. And what happens when we leave the milk out on the kitchen counter all morning? MEMS tags in smart packages will be able to take the milk’s temperature every fifteen minutes. The measurements are then sent to a small microprocessor which calculates the milk’s estimated freshness.

FOOD SAFETY

The fridge of the future will have a door with a built-in scanner for reading the digital tags on food packages. This way the refrigerator will always keep abreast of what is put into it; and the screen on the door can supply an overview of what’s behind the door. By scanning all foodstuffs, you will always have an updated listing of your current supplies – canned and frozen food included. In other words: the refrigerator comes to play the part of digital administrator of the kitchen. Should you e.g. keep food approaching its expiry date, the fridge will alert you. The product can then be used at once, and you avoid having to throw away food. The screen is connected to the Internet, and each and every chip tagged to the packaging will represent a Web site which can be visited by the fridge as the food products are stowed away. Thus it can check for any warnings issued for this particular product. We all remember instances of contaminated food which, undetected by producers, have ended up in supermarkets and, consequently, household fridge or freezer. In such cases, an alert from the refrigerator could reduce the risks considerably. Since the fridge frequently runs automatic checks on the net, users are no longer dependent on radio and TV alerts.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Since then, every president has paid lip service to the concept of energy independence but have you noticed that it hasn’t gotten any better? In fact, since Nixon’s first, tentative words on the subject, we have increased our dependence on foreign oil. We now import over 60% of our oil each year and pump prices go up far more than they go down. In other words, we have had an “energy crisis” of one sort or another for 35 years and for reasons of diplomacy, environmentalism, real politic, industrial intransigence, consumer inertia and who knows what else, very little has been done to solve the problem.

True, alternative fuels like ethanol seem promising, and we are doing better at harnessing wind and solar power. Hybrid, electrical, fuel cell and biodiesel vehicles are slowly making their way into the marketplace while the President has started an initiative to increase CAFÉ standards by 20 miles per gallon within the next 10 years. We are doing better at recycling and using energy efficient devices. All of that is great but most of these efforts depend on emerging technology and none of it deals with the problem that exists right now: Energy prices are out of control and the most vulnerable sector of the economy, the sector most likely to be harmed by this, is small business.

In 2006, back in the good old days of $76 per barrel oil prices, the Small Business Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives issued a report called Impact of Rising Energy Costs on Small Business. It is an interesting read for any small businessman. The conclusions of that report are as follows:

The impacts from the perceived and actual status of our energy supplies are significant.Last month [July, 2006], the Federal Reserve Chairman projected that higher energy rates will create some inflation in the economy. He cited the cumulative impacts of escalating energy prices as causing consumers and businesses to spend less, and to pass on costs to others. U.S. industries are also showing signs of deflation due to energy problems. Last month, the manufacturing sector growth index was the lowest since the previous August. Industry officials attributed energy costs, along with other inflationary impacts, such as interest rate increases, as impediments to expansion.

Given the impacts from the energy crisis, including inflation and slowed economic growth, these firms – in an attempt to cover rising production costs – have constricted operations while limiting their investment and expansion plans. Facing an increasingly unequal playing field, the extreme volatility of energy prices only creates larger financial burdens and operational disruptions for small firms when compared to their corporate counterparts.

The current energy crisis is just one more in a series of challenges that have recently befallen small businesses. These firms already face rising costs from many aspects of their enterprises, particularly health care, pensions, and regulatory requirements – all which deplete key resources from their operations. On top of these demands, energy affects entrepreneur’s human, capital, and raw materials. If these conditions continue, the economic climate will become increasingly harsh for this country’s small businesses and entrepreneurs. (Impact of Rising Energy Costs on Small Business, House Small Business Committee, U.S. House of Representatives, August 2006)

Does any of this sound familiar to anyone? It should, given the facts that small business is the least able to absorb high energy costs and that it dominates many energy-intensive industries. The energy crisis is squeezing profit margins of small firms from different sources. Consequently, they are at a competitive disadvantage to their large, corporate counterparts who, through economies of scale, can afford equipment and technology to reduce energy use. Firms with larger capital and production resources also maintain a greater capacity to negotiate favorable prices for inputs from suppliers and to control the price of products sold. In other words, large companies can more easily weather this storm than small companies. No surprises there. Sometimes size does matter. Still, it ought to raise some hackles that the pinch that you and your business are feeling today was predicted two years ago! How many small businesses have had to close behind the energy policies (or lack thereof) to which we have been subjected?

That is not so easy to determine since a business closing is usually the result of a number of factors. It is a dead certainty, however, that energy costs figure prominently in a large number of such closings. What is clear is that the current crop of presidential hopefuls doesn’t seem to have any real plans to do anything decisive about this problem.

With his Plan for a Clean Energy Future, Barack Obama is obviously more interested in climate change than energy independence and lower gas prices. A look at his campaign website, BarackObama.com, shows that his platform calls for an 80% reduction in carbon emissions by 2050; a ten-year, $150 billion research and development effort to find “Clean Energy” alternatives including bio-fuels, renewable energy and clean coal technology; support next generation biofuels as well as a low-carbon fuel standard and an increase in renewable fuels by 2030; reduce oil consumption by at least 35% by 2030 with higher fuel economy standards, doubling them within the next 18 years. Finally, he wants to increase energy efficiency by 50% by 2030 and restore the U.S. to a leadership position on the issue of climate change.

While there is not one thing in this plan that one can disagree with, they are all good ideas and should go forward, one has to ask how much of this depends on technology that is currently tried and true and how much of it depends on developing new technology? If a plan depends on something yet to be invented or perfected, then that plan has some serious faults to it. Of course, the primary fault is that it does nothing to address the problems that we face here and now. Perhaps his opponent can do better:

According to her campaign website (HillaryClinton.com), Hillary has a bold and comprehensive plan to address America’s energy and environmental challenges that will establish a green, efficient economy and create as many as five million new jobs. Sounds great! How will she do it? Here is the outline:

* A new cap-and-trade program that auctions 100% of permits alongside investments to move us on the path towards energy independence;
* An aggressive comprehensive energy efficiency agenda to reduce electricity consumption 20% from projected levels by 2020 by changing the way utilities do business, catalyzing a green building industry, enacting strict appliance efficiency standards, and phasing out incandescent light bulbs;
* A $50 billion Strategic Energy Fund, paid for in part by oil companies, to fund investments in alternative energy. The SEF will finance one-third of the $150 billon ten-year investment in a new energy future contained in this plan;
* Doubling of federal investment in basic energy research, including funding for an ARPA-E, a new research agency modeled on the successful Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency;
* Aggressive action to transition our economy toward renewable energy sources, with renewables generating 25% of electricity by 2025 and with 60 billion gallons of home-grown biofuels available for cars and trucks by 2030;
* 10 “Smart Grid City” partnerships to prove the advanced capabilities of smart grid and other advanced demand-reduction technologies, as well as new investment in plug-in hybrid vehicle technologies;
* An increase in fuel efficiency standards to 55 mpg by 2030, and $20 billion of “Green Vehicle Bonds” to help U.S. automakers retool their plants to meet the standards;
* A plan to catalyze a thriving green building industry by investing in green collar jobs and helping to modernize and retrofit 20 million low-income homes to make them more energy efficient;
* A new “Connie Mae” program to make it easier for low and middle-income Americans to buy green homes and invest in green home improvements;
* A requirement that all publicly traded companies report financial risks due to climate change in annual reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission; and
* Creation of a “National Energy Council” within the White House to ensure implementation of the plan across the Executive Branch;
* A requirement that all federal buildings designed after January 20, 2009 will be zero emissions buildings.

OK, more new technology and an emphasis on environment over economics. Again, there is nothing wrong with any of these per se, high mileage standards and renewable resources are great, but does anything on this list address the issues at hand? Do they take advantage of existing technologies to deal with the core issues facing America as its energy bills mount up? Will they lower the exorbitant pump prices that we are all paying today? No, they won’t. Perhaps we need to cross the aisle and see what the other end of the American political spectrum can offer.

John McCain has net yet offered a comprehensive energy plan. However, his speeches, statements and proposals do offer some insight into the Senator’s point of view on energy and the environment. Some of the things he has mentioned include:

* A cap-and-trade system to cut carbon dioxide emissions 30% below 2004 levels by 2050;
* The construction of new nuclear power plants and economic incentives for communities that host nuclear waste repositories;
* Research and development of new energy technologies;
* Work with China to share clean coal technology;
* The development of ways to break down carbon dioxide into useful components;
* New fossil fuel exploration and extraction;
* The development of plug-in and battery-powered electric, hybrid fuel-electric and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles;
* Support for alternative fuels, like ethanol from various crop sources, and biodiesel from wastes;
* Support for government spending on research and development, pilot projects and other initiatives to spur development of energy products that can compete in the free market;
* Support for an increase in fuel efficiency. At one time McCain supported raising the fuel economy of vehicles to 36 mpg by 2016;
* Make permanent a tax credit that businesses can use for research and development;

This sounds good, has long-term prospects as well as shorter-term solutions, but since this is gleaned from a number of speeches, statements and position that McCain has made both as a senator and as a presidential candidate, it is difficult to know how his final energy plan will work out. While it is certain that the cap-and-trade systems would lead to higher costs (the Environmental Protection Agency estimates that McCain’s proposal would add another $0.68 per gallon of gas by 2050), it is also certain that a sizable portion of what we can consider McCain’s proposal works with resources and technologies that we have today. Unlike the other contenders for the Oval Office, McCain sees energy as a security issue as well. A great deal of the money we spend on foreign oil goes to terrorist organizations. In a way, we are funding both sides of the Iraq War! McCain at least understands that this has to stop and it has to stop soon. Taking advantage of domestic oil fields and building nuclear reactors while engaged in research and development is a sensible way to go since it offers a reasonably short-term solution for current problems and it allows us to find truly viable answers to the long-term energy problems that we face.

Will any of these positions make their way into law? Any one of the three would have to convince Congress that their plan is the right one. Partisanship, vested interests, lobbyists and other obstacles will stand in the way for good or ill, but that is the nature of our system of government. We are not yet there, however. We still have candidates to nominate and an election to finish. How these candidates approach the energy issue will have ramifications for years to come. It is as important as taxes, defense, gun control or any of the other hot-button political issues we face this year.

Far be it from this Blog to tell you who to vote for, but before you throw your support behind one candidate or another, consider how their positions will affect your livelihood. As a small business owner you can no longer afford to be a straight-ticket kind of voter. You need to look at who will create the best climate for you to do business. Can you afford more of the same pie-eyed promises of new technology solving all our problems or do you want solutions for problems you are facing today? Think carefully. There is a lot riding on your decision.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Consider the fact, that at that time, there were not computers at all, to say nothing of miniaturization. The first version used 16bite processor, manually made memory and manually wired-in program. Assembly work and debugging took two years. He protected his device with copper screen from possible clutters and hid it in his boots. At first he was very lucky, but then he lost a great deal. It made him give up independent playing. Keith thought of writing a book, but then contracts with professional players came his way. After a few years the market offered more powerful computing devices.

The basis of the other device was Z80 processor. Keith built it in the pocket calculator. This version of “George”, later renamed as “David”, caught Uston’s eye. Keith together with his brother made several such computers for his team. They doubled their capital in a week. Trebled in two weeks. Then they were caught, the money and the computer were confiscated. By the way, Uston’s lawyer in the case was Oscar Goodman – now he is effective mayor of Las Vegas.

In the upshot the project broke down. And a new one emerged with more sophisticated and secret devices but now without Uston. More complicated computers required new processors and larger memory. New investments from the players and “Thor” project made good money for Taft and gamblers. Moreover, this computer remained unnoticed in the casinos. Keith created protection system which in fact repeats the concept of modern “electronic key”.
Then he developed “7-Up” scheme which connected 7 (!!) players at the table into the network. Each had a computer and they were united into the network. Just think – this guy – created computer networks!!!! It was 1982! Before Microsoft these people managed computer severs…

Then video cameras appeared. Keith started applying satellite and radio signals. Then again a failure, arrest and accusation of fraud. Charges were again dismissed. A new hi-tech project followed.

Finally when the usage of computers was deemed illegal in the USA, Keith stopped playing blackjack. Now he is living in his house and is working in his laboratory. I wonder, on what?

Things get easier when done together.
Blackjack boom in 70-80-s, public description of team playing methods lead to creation of the biggest blackjack teams. The most famous, probably was the team of Massachusetts technological Institute or MIT Team. The idea was innovative– instead of hiring people with money, the operators of the team trained the students of playing the game and offered blackjack as summer earnings during their vacation. They almost posted announcements in the lecture rooms saying “Blackjack players wanted!”
At first he team was small, however the management drew great funds from outside investors and project became very large. These young guys and ladies lived a double life – five days a week attending the lectures and eating in the campus canteen and on the weekend flying to Las Vegas, betting on 10 thousand dollars in the box, living in luxury apartments and driving in limousines at the expense of casinos.

This is possibly the most highly qualified team in all history of blackjack. In a few years they have won about 10 million dollars. Then everything went pear shaped. First, the risk on the casino’s side increased. There was spying on the players, soon it was found out that they were students of MIT and then their names were added to the blacklist all over the country. Besides, the casinos were more aware of team game principles and each big player immediately came under observation.

But it is not the most terrible. A prick was in the team. One of the players betrayed for “the thirty pieces of silver” all the members of the team to the casino security service. Moreover, part of the money was simply stolen. It caused the breakdown of the team. Though it revived in different new forms, they were not so successful as before. However, as the rumors circulating, you can come across some interesting announcements in the institute…

Former founders and managers of the team now are very famous people. Semyon Dukach is in sales and purchase of Internet companies, conducts seminars on blackjack and Andy Bloch became a professional poker player.

Team playing, regardless of its pros has a lot of cons of administration nature. It requires great investments into the risky business. That’s why 99% of team playing efforts end up in a financial catastrophe.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Revere invented a new simple counting system and first described the method of reducing the current score to the real one. Stanford Wong amplified and improved Hi-Lo system, and also developed the Halves system. Lance Humble, Brison, Gordon, Harvey Dubner, – all these giants made a great contribution to the development of the methods of the game.

In late 70s the professional gambler Al Francesco, probably created the first blackjack team in history. He hired the enthusiasts, taught them Lawrence Revere’s counting system and sent them to play. He invented and put into practice the principle of “BIG PLAYER” – when the part of the team is humbly playing low and some drunken and wealthy fish makes high bets on the given signals.

Ken Uston also belonged to this team. Uston was the vice president of fund stock exchange at that time. However after meeting Revere he quitted the stock exchange and changed his strict outfit for magnificent bush of hair, golden chains and silk shirts with huge collars in the style of that time.

Uston played for Francesco’s team for quite a long time and with varied success, but his ego did stand it under the pressure of his own ego. He had a very high opinion of himself and wanted to be the first in everything. He left Francesco and wrote several books about his adventures. The books simply exploded the gambling world.

The book “BIG PLAYER” revealed the secrets of team game. The Book “Million Dollar Blackjack” is stuffed with unbelievable stories in intervals explaining the technical aspects also presents different cards counting systems. Uston made people believe that one can beat casino playing blackjack. Win a lot. Millions of dollars. Also everyone found out how casinos react to the professional gamblers – slams, insinuations, blacklists, crooked gambling, false accusations. Uston was in the blacklists all over the world, having won with his several teams about 8 million dollars.

By the way, Al Francesco and many other players are still dissatisfied with Uston’s actions who decided to publish the methods of the game which were then available only to the few. But Uston would not be himself if he had not done it.

The next outburst of his popularity was in early 80s, when Ken won the case against a casino in New Jersey (Resorts International Hotel Inc.). Since then no casino of this state (unlike, for example, Las Vegas in Nevada ) is not eligible to prohibit playing to person who can count cards. On the other hand, this verdict made the rules in Nevada much worse than in Vegas.

The next wave of the struggle between the casino and counters relates to Uston’s era. The casinos understood, that well-financed team of pros can cause great losses. And then the multidecked games, frequent riffle were coming into fashion and several good rules just died away. There appeared special detective agencies who spied on the professional players, collected the necessary information about them and distributed it among the casinos.

Uston created new methods of the game, used makeup, recruited more and more people in his teams and started playing abroad. He also was writing new books, was starring on TV, was writing new articles, was developing new counting systems. By the way Ken, wrote the book on optimal game strategy for Pac-Man (arcade video game). It’s a video game not for money, he was just interested in it.

One of the most scandalous Kenny’s projects was creating the team against the casino with using the computer. They used hidden on the body and in the shoes micro chips that calculated the current situation in the game more precisely than any other “human” strategy and gave the necessary signals to the player. His teams almost broke several casinos, but in a while they were caught, arrested and accused of fraud, the computer was confiscated. However, the experts including FBI experts, proved that there was no fraud and the accusations were withdrawn. In two weeks the Supreme Court of the USA of Nevada State made the usage of computing devices in casinos illegal….

Kenny was a good guy, the heart of the company, first class jazz musician, loved by women and press. He had great plans on making a film, writing new books, arranging one more trial, and surely new projects on blackjack. His life was suddenly interrupted in 1983 and the version that casinos are privy to his death is not cast back yet.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

And if you remember those days of the late ’70’s and early 80’s, you recall that the games relied on graphic improvements and better ways of shooting the enemy. It was more or less a solitary pursuit. With the rise of the Internet and online games however, lots of things changed, including the ability to download games and playing online games, making games a more social activity, with lots of players, or opponents playing each other from different countries. This may be the biggest change – and the latest benefit that games have offered the world.

But what about the early days? How did it all start and what were the video games that defined the era? The Innovators

Many people think that Pong was the home game that started it all, but really it was Magnavox and their “Odyssey” system in 1972. Although it was very simple, it was still the first. It had twelve simple games with graphic overlays. However, there was lots of room for improvement, and that’s where Pong came into play.

Nolan Bushnell created Pong, along with Al Alcorn, the founder of Atari. Rumor has it that when the prototype was tested at a California bar, the machine broke down after two days, because it was so popular. The next logical step was to create a home version. So, one year later, Atari released Pong, complete with built in paddles, and a speaker. Of course, Pong was a huge success and represented a new stage in the evolution of gaming. Over sixty Pong knock-offs would be produced, but Atari dominated the market.

Next was the implementation of the microprocessor, which the entire industry adopted. As a result of this, more complicated systems could be developed. These systems produced groundbreaking and innovative graphical and auditory effects that had never been seen before. Consumers were eating it up. The industry was on fire. In 1981 alone, five billion dollars were spent on video arcade machines and another billion dollars was spent on home video game systems. Atari’s VCS/2600 system remained the dominant player through 1982, when the gaming market experienced a crash.

What were some of the great games? How about Pac Man? Pac Man, the yellow blob that ate up dots and avoided squid-like ghosts, was a worldwide sensation and probably the biggest game of all time.

Space Invaders was another incredibly popular game. In fact, it really marked a turning point for arcade games, bringing them out of bars and into family friendly places like shops and restaurants. The premise of Space Invaders was to stop an alien invasion. This simple formula went on to become the most successful arcade game of all time.

Then there was Super Mario, which was huge as well. It involved an Italian anti-hero who was deliberately designed as a character that everyone could relate to. Soon thereafter came Zelda, Metroid, and other classics. Rise and Fall of Atari

Atari was the hottest thing in the gaming world in the early ’80’s. Today, they are a relic of past glory. So what happened? Atari made some bad decisions, and although it’s a little complicated, it’s helpful to understand the situation. At that time in the computing world, magnetic mediums were implemented in the data storage used in Arcade machines. These mediums allowed for a higher memory capacity than ROM cartridges.

In 1982, Atari had the option to include a disk drive in their systems. The price difference would have been nominal, and the memory capacity would have been significant. Atari, however, thought that magnetic media was too “fragile” for the consumer to adequately handle. Atari’s “concern” for the customer backfired on them. In the previous years, there had been a very fine line separating arcade game quality from home game quality. With arcades utilizing storage capacities ten to forty-five times larger than home systems that fine line became a chasm. Arcade games seemed to be evolving exponentially, while home systems seemed “stuck in a time warp.”

The public quickly became uninterested in video game specific consoles, and sales plummeted.

This would mark the end of Atari’s reign of the video game market. The Rise of the New

In 1984, everything changed. The reason? Two innovations: The reduction in cost of Dynamic RAM (DRAM) chips which allowed more memory, and the production of higher power 8-bit processors, which lowered the prices of the previous chips. Sega, a new player in home gaming systems, entered the console market with their Master System 2. The Sega Master system would sell very well, but its success would be limited.

The other key player was Nintendo of Japan. The genius of Nintendo was their marketing prowess, as they poured millions into advertisements. These advertisements hit consumers at the perfect time, as evidenced in their sales. In fact, Nintendo couldn’t manufacture enough systems to keep up with demand. After all was said and done, the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) would become the highest selling system in history. They would also become the most notorious, as they were involved in the intimidation of retailers, competing companies, and other suppliers and partners.

Over the next five years Sega and Nintendo would battle for dominance, going back and forth. The consumer definitely benefited from this rivalry.

Today, it’s between PlayStation 2, the Xbox and the GameCube. Xbox has taken the step to merge the past and present, where Xbox “Live Arcade” is a console system that has a “download-like” characteristic where you can buy games via the console itself. One thing in the video game industry will always remain: the classic games of yesterday were great games, helped define an era, and will always be fun.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

It is now a part of our collective popular wisdom that computers will change everything, the way we dress, the way we eat, the way in which we have sex.

Computers have been predicted to cause massive unemployment … to create millions of jobs … to help us at birth and to ease our suffering at death.

If there is one singular invention in the history of mankind that can be said to be “the cause of all things” – it would be the digital computer and the revolution it has caused in so many industries and lives.

For 25 years I have been a software programmer/engineer in the banking industry and chemical industry. I created games for the TI 99/4A, The “Home Computer” sold by Bill Cosby. I have worked on Macintosh, Windows and Unix.
Among my colleagues the question has come up over the years of what we were doing when Microsoft began and what life would be like if we had joined Bill Gates on that first day in the office.

The arguments generally end the same way, “No one will ever be in a position like that again in human history. It’s a singularity in business and will never be repeated.”

Well, I’ve thought a lot about that … Microsoft singularity … over the years. I’ve wondered what I could do … what industry I could become involved with that had the same potential as a Microsoft in 1978.

And now, it’s clear to me and it became clear in a flash of insight, that something far more important than computers is occurring all around us as we speak: The pursuit of limitless mechanical power … the global race for renewable energy technologies.

This energy race is an opportunity that dwarfs that of Microsoft in 1978. The potential for wealth from renewable energy is many times greater than the computer industry.

The key word is “Renewable”, once many of these technologies are in place Solar, Wind, Biomass, Geothermal, Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC), Wave-action and Vortex Induced Vibration Aquatic Current Energy (VIVACE) their maintenance costs are very low and the fuel costs, well that’s the point, the fuel costs are low to zero.

It’s clear to me that many, many Bill Gates are waiting to be unleashed in the renewable energy sector and I want my piece of the pie. It’s clear that renewable energy is the global blockbuster industry of the near and far future, but which technology do you bet on.

Of all the research I’ve done, my favorite is Vortex Induced Vibration Aquatic Current Energy (VIVACE). Question: What is the largest solar collector on the earth? Answer: The Oceans!

All the energy from the Sun captured by the oceans is where we should be looking to power our societies and infrastructure. The classic photovoltaic direct energy conversion is clearly gaining momentum, but he efficiency is low and various kinds of infrastructure must be put into place that does not currently exist.

VIVACE is a novel approach to extracting energy from flowing water currents. It is unlike any other ocean energy or low-head hydropower concept. VIVACE is based on the extensively studied phenomenon of Vortex Induced Vibrations (VIV), which was first observed 500 years ago by Leonardo DaVinci in the form of “Aeolian Tones.” For decades, engineers have been trying to prevent VIV from damaging offshore equipment and structures. By maximizing and exploiting VIV rather than spoiling and preventing it, VIVACE takes this ‘problem’ and transforms it into a valuable resource for mankind.

The genius behind this power generation technology, as with all great innovations, is that this is an extensively studied and understood phenomenon … very familiar to engineers of bridges over waterways and engineers of oil platforms in the oceans of the world.

VIVACE turns that extensive research on it’s head and uses these perturbations for any “bluff body” in a viscous fluid into a technique to extract energy … but of even greater interest is that this energy extraction can occur at high efficiencies at low flow rates … as low as 1.5 knots … most ocean currents flow below 3 knots.

Of course many streams and rivers also flow at low speeds and have thus been considered low probability targets for energy generation … save the extremely destructive process of dam building. VIVACE directly refutes this logic. Slow moving streams and rivers can be excellent sources of electrical energy production. Ocean currents can be enormous generators supporting multi-megawatt installations, in theory.

One other advantage to ocean current power generation installations is that they produce power 24/7. Ocean currents never cease. Ever. This one feature sets ocean current power generation apart from wind, solar and geothermal.

The future can be brighter than the past and we can shape that future.

Choose to invent the future, for it cannot be predicted any other way.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Picture this, it’s 12:15pm and you stop at Joe’s Snack shop for a quick bite to eat. While enjoying that great sandwich you’re wondering if you got time to stop by that prospects office before you head back to the office for your weekly staff meeting. Unfortunately you can’t remember if the meeting starts at 1:30 or is it 2:30.

You think to your self, “I’ll open up my laptop and check my calendar”, but you quickly remember it’s out in the car and it’s pouring down rain, you think, “boy there must be a better way”. As you look around Joe’s Snack shop disappointed you didn’t bring your laptop with you, you notice that some young hot-shot has just pulled something out of his shirt pocket that looks like a pocket-size calculator. You gather up the courage to walk over to him and you ask, “What is that thing?” Without looking up from it he says “It’s a Palm, dude, where have you been? I am just checking my schedule for the afternoon.”

A Palm, What’s a Palm? The only palm that you are familiar with are the ones attached to your hands. As you walk back out to your car to use your laptop continue to wonder: What’s a PDA, Palm or whatever? And how do I get my hands on one?

Just as the notebook computer freed the world from the desk and office, new breakthroughs in technology such as the Personal Digital Assistant, so often called a PDA (or Palm or handheld) is revolutionizing the way mobile computing is performed.

What is a PDA?

Official name: Personal digital assistant

Nick Names: Palm Pilot, PDA, Handheld

Defined: A remarkable, tiny, fully functional handheld device, kind of like a computer. Its beauty is that it is only about the size of a calculator, small enough to hold in the palm of one hand. Unlike a paper organizer or planner, a PDA can also hold your downloaded e-mail and play music.

History Of PDA’s
One of the first PDAs to be commercially available was actually designed by Apple Computer during the 1980s. It was named the “Newton Message Pad”. However, the Newton proved to be too big, too complicated and expensive. In addition, its handwriting recognition program was poor. A handful of other companies attempted to make a PDA with little success.

It was not until the 1990s that the idea of making a small hand-held computer for storing addresses and phone numbers, taking notes and keeping track of daily appointments really blossom.

In 1996, the original Palm Pilot was introduced, and it was a big hit with consumers. It was small and light enough to fit in a shirt pocket, ran for weeks on AAA batteries, was easy to use and could store thousands of contacts, appointments and notes. More importantly, it was affordable. Today, you can buy Palm-like devices from major PC hardware manufacturers such as: Palm, Inc.

Though originally intended to be simple digital calendars, PDAs have evolved into capable machines for crunching numbers, playing games or music and downloading information from the Internet. All have one thing in common: They’re designed to complement a desktop or laptop computer, not replace one.

How Do PDA’s Work?

Hardware – Palm Devices

PDAs are classified into two major types: palm-sized computers and hand-held computers. The major differences between the two are size, display and mode of data entry.

Palm-sized computers are smaller and lighter. They have smaller liquid crystal displays (LCD) and rely on stylus (touch-screen) technology and handwriting recognition programs for data entry.

Compared to palm-sized computers, hand-held computers tend to be larger and heavier. They have larger liquid crystal displays (LCD) and use a miniature keyboard, usually in combination with touch-screen technology, for data entry.

Software – Operating System
The operating system contains the pre-programmed instructions that tell the microprocessor what to do. The operating systems used by PDAs are not as complex as those used by PCs. They generally have fewer instructions and take up less memory. For example, the Palm operating system fits in less than 100K of memory, which is less than 1 percent the size of Windows 98 or the Mac OS.

PDAs typically have one of two types of operating systems, Palm OS (3Com) or PocketPC (formerly called Windows CE, Microsoft). At current, Palm OS dominates the market, but the PocketPC is challenging. Palm OS takes up less memory and runs faster, and most users say it is easier to use.

PocketPC easily supports color displays, graphics, miniaturized Windows packages (Word, Excel), and other devices (such as built-in MP3 players or MPEG movie players). The PocketPC takes up more memory and consumes more battery power. Some owners have mentioned that it is more complicated.

Software – Applications
All PDAs come with some kind of personal information management (PIM) software for the following tasks:

* store contact information (names, addresses, phone numbers, e-mail addresses)
* make task or to-do lists
* take notes
* write memos
* keep track of appointments (date book, calendar)
* remind you of appointments (clock, alarm functions)
* plan projects
* do calculations
* keep track of expenses

However, not all of these functions are included in every package, so check this before you buy. Also, make sure that your PC has similar software so that you can easily exchange information between your PDA and PC. Sometimes, PC PIM software is included with the PDA software.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

But do not despair. By the end of this article, you should be able to draw your own conclusions about your preferred choice and maybe, even add to the ever-dividing fanbase of either Gates or Jobs.

Today, the personal computer endearingly called “PC,” is commonly understood to be associated with Microsoft’s Windows operating system. Although common sense says that the Mac is also a personal computer, it has become sacrilegious to refer to it as a “PC.” The Mac uses an operating system known as OS X and its operating systems are often legendary for its prettier interfaces.

When deciding between these two computer titans, it’s important to keep in mind what your needs are before coming to any purchasing decision. If we were to turn back the clock to the 90s, this decision would have been fairly easy. The Mac then was the design and print industry’s choice for all things graphic-orientated. The PC on the other hand, was confined to everyday use in the office and the home. This would have explained the exorbitant pricing discrepancy between both desktops then.

Today, this distinction has been blurred. Although, the Mac still costs more than the average PC, it’s finding itself in more homes and offices than at any other time in Mac history. Therefore, dissecting the pros and cons becomes all the more important before investing any kind of cash for these over-sized gadgets.

So, let’s break it down and get you moving in the right direction. These comparisons do apply to both desktops and laptops.

Hardware and Performance

The PC

Dollar for dollar, the PC offers more hardware specifications than the Mac, which for the budget-conscious, getting a PC requires no further deliberation. Intel-based dual-core CPU allows for blistering pace on the PC even for the most general-purpose PC user with a budget of less than a $1,000. If you drive a hard bargain, head over to Best Buy and you could get a PC for less than $350.

A variety of PC desktop sizes are also available, from the small form factor to the full tower case types. Again, sizes are a direct relation to the needs of the user, so do not mistake an all-in-one like the Sony VAIO to have the same power handling and speed of a mid-tower case like Dell.

Even as a power-user, whether using the PC for gaming or turning it into a mini home-theater system while running business applications on it, the PC is still able to meet all those demands at a very reasonable cost. Bargain basement prices are the main reason why PCs still dominate the desktop and laptop markets. It is economically-driven and caters to all segments of the buying public. Try as you might, you may never get a Mac for anywhere close to $350.

Performance-wise, PCs are still very cost-effective. Upgrading the graphics card, RAM or hard disk space is still much cheaper than having to buy a new PC altogether. This makes it truly easy for anyone to customize their PC without worrying about maxing out their credit cards. Another advantage to this is that businesses running multiple PCs will have a much easier time finding replacement parts or even upgrading components just because it’s so widely available at a very low cost.

As far as the operating system goes, Vista is the very latest introduction from Microsoft, although Windows XP is currently the more stable version. According to Gartner, XP will be installed on more than 77 percent of PCs worldwide by the end of 2007 while Vista might crawl to just about 12 percent. This suggests that if you’re planning to get a PC, buying one with Windows XP installed is still the preferred choice over the latest Vista.

The Mac

If you’re shopping for prestige rather than price, then Apple’s Mac is about as prestigious as it gets. Macs are about status, and status usually comes with a hefty price tag. Unlike the PC, there is no such thing as a truly “stripped-down” Mac. Hence, the PC being better value dollar for dollar. But on the other hand, the Mac was never truly built for the budget-conscious. Rather, it was targeted for those craving an “appliance” with style and innovative design, and Apple rarely fails to deliver on this. You would only have to visit an Apple store for proof.

As far as performance goes, Macs are up there with the best of them. There was a point in history where PCs were leading the pack in terms of how fast they performed. Mac’s G4 processors were never thought to be quite as fast as the PC’s Intel Pentium 4. But, Apple changed all that last year when it announced that their Macs will now carry the Intel processor, just like PCs. Apple’s migration to Intel processors has now made Intel-based Macs two to three times faster than ever before. But, that’s not all.

Apple has a new technology called Boot Camp that allows you to run Microsoft’s Windows on Intel-based Macs. This means you can have the best of Microsoft and the Mac on one elegant-looking computer. Software compatibility issues will soon be a thing of the past, although power-users will still find it difficult to customize and upgrade the Mac’s hardware. The same problem applies to businesses using Macs because Apple maintains a tight grip on its supply chain.

Mac’s current operating system, the OS X is reportedly far superior to Microsoft’s operating systems. Its selling points range from user friendly interfaces with attractive intuitive features, to a more secure, stable and virus-free operating system. These factors are usually enough to get the more security-conscious amongst shoppers, to hop on board the Mac bandwagon.

Software, Applications and Uses

The PC

PCs certainly have a much wider range of software of varying purposes available compared to the Mac, giving consumers a variety of options to choose from. This is why you’ll find most hardcore gamers preferring PCs over Macs due to this availability of gaming software.

Business users will find that Microsoft Office is sufficient to manage their documentation and presentations, hardly requiring extra bells and whistles to meet their business needs. Small businesses rarely need to go beyond what Microsoft Office 2003 and the latest Office 2007 offer, using add-on software only for better productivity. Also, compatibility issues are rarely a point of contention with Microsoft Office because most computers recognize its format. In other words, if you’re running a business and Office applications are all you need, then choosing a PC would be the ideal choice for you.

Other uses for the PC such as web surfing, chatting online and e-mailing usually come as bundled software containing these applications, while additional peripherals are widely available in most electronic stores. PC manufacturers like Dell have made installing additional peripherals extremely easy, so long as your PC has the right ports (USB, FireWire, Ethernet, audio and video ports) available. For instance, if you’re an avid photographer, loading photos onto your PC would require a USB or FireWire port to connect your digital camera to the PC. Most PCs today come with these ports pre-installed, so not to worry.

The Mac

The tradeoff of having a secure, albeit tightly controlled Mac operating system is the lack of choices in software. Mac fanatics argue that this lack of software compatibility means lesser technical issues to deal with. A positive way of looking at things, but Mac users have no real need to complain about software issues. Business users on a Mac can quite easily exchange Microsoft Office files with colleagues or clients on a PC.

But where the Mac really shines in terms of software and applications is in multimedia. In all honesty, the Mac is far superior to the PC when it comes to multimedia applications. If your business revolves around multimedia or multimedia is a serious hobby, then getting a Mac is a must.

The iLife suite that comes with the Mac provides full multimedia capabilities, allowing anyone to create professionally finished products. It is setup in such a way that a complete novice will have no problems churning out quality audio or video products on the fly. Whether it’s buying music from the iTunes store, recording and burning DVDs, setting up a photo studio on your computer, chatting and communicating online, or blogging, the iLife suite has you covered. The Mac has become a necessary solution for the digital lifestyle enthusiast.

Conclusion

Choosing between a PC and a Mac really boils down to what you want to do with your computer and how you’re going to use it. If you want more bang-for-your-buck or more gaming options, then the PC is the way to go. If you’re leaning towards better stability, less system crashes and security breaches, then the Mac is the superior choice.

Weigh the pros and cons against your needs and you should be able to draw your own conclusions about the worthier computer for you. But, for the ultimate experience, why not buy an Intel-based Mac and run Windows on it? That could probably be the closest thing yet, to enjoying the “perfect computing experience.”

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Intel made the first microprocessor in 1971. This little chip was crucial to new development. Integrated circuit technology had opened the door for advanced computing that was only limited by the amount of chips that could put together.

This primordial processor achieved the landmark objective of putting all of a computer’s intelligence on one chip. This small microprocessor contained the full power of the central processing unit while also providing for the computer’s basic memory and the control methods for incoming and outgoing data. This progress was simply amazing when one considers that the company was just a little start up by two engineers.

This chip was a kind of accidental invention. They received one of their first jobs to design twelve different computer chips for Busicom, a small Japanese company. They wanted designs for chips that would provide for keyboard scanning functionality, controlling the display on the monitor and the printer and just about anything else that their brand of calculator hoped to do. There was just one big issue that they had to overcome.

Money was a big concern, but there was another puzzle. They lacked the sheer manpower necessary to actually design twelve chips in the time frame. So, their engineers figured out a way to build one chip that was able to do every single function. Busicom liked the idea and decided to fund the project. Time passed and a new chip that had more power than any of the old computers was developed.

It was a historic move when Intel bought back these chips. The sky was the limit from this point onward. This basic technological idea has been applied time and time again to give us electronics capable of amazing power and ability.

You will trouble believing me, but the fact is that common calculators have more advanced processors today, than the ones used for early space travel. The shrinking of this technological power has worked perfectly alongside the development of many other electronic parts to make everyday life just a little bit easier for everyone. In just the time span of about 40 years, we have advanced to computers that are almost able to mimic true human intelligence.

These advancements in micro processing have improved all of our lives in ways that we may not even realize. The blazing pace of technology is so amazing that we can hold in our palms as much computing power as once required a full building.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

But with the launch of the Apple laptop, Apple was able to finally break free from this restrictive mold. Apple was able to separate itself from the crowd with a visually appealing product that catered to the customer’s needs and wants – a powerful computing machine that was easy to use.

Apple laptops, such as the iBook and PowerBook models, were visually unique also. They stood apart from other laptop designs with their trademark sleek white or shimmering silver color and a curvy design that lacked edges. These laptops appealed to both the upper echelon as well as the common dweller.

The Apple laptop also incorporated accessibility into its design. This Apple product was different in that it could be used with PC and Windows products, which is one of the attributes that helped propel Apple beyond its constrictive refines. Apple users were no longer restricted. Another plus is that the Apple laptop tended to outperform comparable laptop PCs.

The novel design of Apple laptop even included a built in trackball which served to set it even further apart from its competition. No other laptop manufacturers included such a feature that was integrated as well. With the Apple laptop, the trackball was placed in front of the keyboard making it easier to use and much more comfortable will.

Apple even managed to package its laptop into a smaller space than other PC manufacturers. The Apple laptop was less than 2.5 inches thick and only covered an area slightly larger than a letter-size sheet of paper. And in addition to that, it weighed in at only 6.8 pounds, while its PC counterparts averaged well over 8 pounds and lacked many of the features found in even the cheapest desktop system, such as hard drives and mice.

By incorporating features that other laptop PCs did not include, the Apple laptop managed to gain footing in the IT world and propel itself to the top of the ranks. And by remaining on the cutting edge of technology, Apple shows no signs of slipping yet.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

The first telegraph was actually built in 1809, but the technology matured during the mid-nineteenth century with the development of methods whereby actual images could be transmitted electronically (1843). With the laying of the Transatlantic Cable in 1866, communication that once took weeks or months could be accomplished in minutes.

Further advances included the development of wireless communication in the 1890’s, and the combination of this technology with the typewriter to create the teletype machine in the early 20th century.

Thomas Edison was the first to come up with a way to store sound information with the invention of the phonograph in 1877, but it was really the development of audio magnetic recording tape in 1926 by German inventor Fritz Pfleumer that would become a method of storing information electronically.

Magnetic tape was initially used for recording sound. The technology finally arrived in the U.S. after the Second World War, and early computer engineers soon found uses for it. Magnetic audio tape was used to store data by the UNIVAC I computer of 1951.

What is interesting is how the information was stored – which differs little from the basic way information is stored today. If you were to listen to a magnetic tape on which computer data was stored, you would hear a series of beeps of varying lengths – but consisting of only two pitches. These are basically “ones” and “zeros” – the building blocks of all computer data.

Today, we are able to store, process and transmit more information than ever before in history, using nothing more than two symbols! 1 0

Information Technology Since 1980

The development during the 1970’s of integrated circuits and the microprocessor were the advances that began the real revolution in computing. Before the 1970’s, computers were huge, extremely expensive, and relatively slow.

Integrated circuits and microprocessors made possible the development of smaller, faster machines that were priced within the reach of more people. “Personal computers” had actually been around since the early 1950’s (computing pioneer Edmund Berkeley published plans for a PC which he called “Simon” in Radio Electronics magazine in 1950 and ‘51).

However, the Apple II, released in April of 1977 (price: about $1300) was the first modern desktop computer featuring an interactive, graphical interface made widely available and affordable to the general public.1

The other significant development came in the early 1990’s when a system of little-known academic and military networks dating from the late 1960’s and early 1980’s suddenly exploded into popularity. The World Wide Web, or Internet, has changed the way people access information, communicate and even entertainment itself.

Separate devices such as telephones, televisions and cameras are now becoming single devices that encompass all of these functions. Meanwhile, the power and capability of computers continues to go up while the cost of the technology continues to drop. Still, waiting to take advantage of technology will be a mistake.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

When the actual cost of each individual component is available, this is a rather simple procedure. However, when only lump-sum costs are available, cost estimating techniques may be required to “segregate” or “allocate” costs to individual components of property (e.g., land, land improvements, buildings, equipment, furniture and fixtures, etc.). This type of analysis is generally called a “cost segregation study,” “cost segregation analysis,” or “cost allocation study.”
Significant tax benefits may be derived from utilizing shorter recovery periods. The issues for Internal Revenue Service Examiners (Service Examiners) are 1) the rationale used to segregate property into its various components, and 2) the methods used to allocate the total project costs among these components.

The most common situation is the allocation or reallocation of building costs to tangible personal property. A building, termed “section (§) 1250 property”, is generally 39-year property eligible for straight-line depreciation. Equipment, furniture and fixtures, termed “section (§) 1245 property”, are tangible personal property. Tangible personal property has a short recovery period, thus, a faster depreciation write-off (and tax benefit).

Property allocations and reallocations are typically based on criteria established under the Investment Tax Credit (ITC). In a recent landmark decision, the Tax Court ruled that, to the extent tangible personal property is included in an acquisition or in overall costs, it should be treated as such for depreciation purposes. The court also decided that the rules for determining whether property qualifies as tangible personal property for purposes of ITC (under pre-1981 tax law) are also applicable to determining depreciation under current law. [See Hospital Corporation of America, 109 T.C. 21 (1997)] The Service acquiesced to the use of ITC rules for distinguishing § 1245 property from § 1250 property.

OVERVIEW

It is important to review the relevant legal history and the motivations of taxpayers to allocate costs to personal property. The legislative and judicial history of depreciation, depreciation recapture, and Investment Tax Credit (ITC) are closely related.

The Internal Revenue Code (IRC) has historically authorized depreciation as an allowance for the exhaustion, wear and tear, and obsolescence of property used in a trade or business or for the production of income (IRC Sec. 167 and the regulations thereunder.)

BULLETIN F

For example, IRS Publication Number 173 (also known as “Bulletin F”) was published in 1942 and provided a useful life guide for various types of property based on the nature of a taxpayer’s business or industry. Bulletin F identified over 5,000 assets used in 57 different industries and activities and described two procedures for computing depreciation for buildings:
Composite Method: A depreciation chart provided a composite rate for buildings, including all installed building equipment.

Component Method: Taxpayers could elect to depreciate the building equipment separately from the structure itself.

COMPONENT DEPRECIATION

In 1959, the Tax Court recognized the right of taxpayers to calculate depreciation using a component method for newly constructed property [Shainberg vs. Commissioner, 33 T.C. 241 (1959)].
Revenue Procedure 62-21, 1962-2 C.B. 418, superceded Bulletin F and provided safe harbor useful lives based on industry-specific asset classes for taxpayers that met the reserve ratio test (a complex provision).

Revenue Ruling 66-111, 1966-1 C.B. 46 (subsequently modified by Revenue Ruling 73-410, 1973-2 C.B. 53), addressed the use of component depreciation for used real property, in light of the decision in Shainberg. The ruling concluded that “When a used building is acquired for a lump sum consideration, separate components are not bought; a unified structure is purchased… Accordingly, an overall useful life for the building must be determined on the basis of the building as a whole.”
Revenue Ruling 68-4,1968-1 C.B. 77, concluded that the asset guideline classes outlined in Revenue Procedure 62-21 “…may only be used where all the assets of the guideline class (building shell and its components) are included in the same guideline class for which one overall composite life is used for computing depreciation.”

ASSET DEPRECIATION RANGE (ADR)

The elective ADR system, implemented by Revenue Procedure 72-10, 1972-1 C. B. 721, was developed for tangible assets placed in service after 1970. All tangible assets were placed in one of the more than 100 asset guideline classes (which generally corresponded to those set out in Rev. Proc. 62-21). The classes of assets were based on the business and industry of the taxpayer. In addition, each class of assets other than land improvements and buildings was given a range of years (called “asset depreciation range”) that was about 20 percent above and below the class life.

If the taxpayer did not elect the ADR system, Revenue Ruling 73-410, 1973-2 C.B. 53, clarified that a taxpayer may utilize the component method of depreciating used property if a qualified appraiser “…properly allocates the costs between non-depreciable land and depreciable building components as of the date of purchase.”

ACCELERATED COST RECOVERY SYSTEM (ACRS)

Congress enacted IRC Sec. 168 I 1981. The ACRS was intended to provide a less complicated method for computing depreciation (known as “cost recovery” by eliminating salvage value and specifying recovery periods of various classes of assets. In contrast to the elective ADR system, ACRS was mandatory and provided only five (later six) recovery periods. ACRS also allowed for a faster write-off of assets than had been allowed under previous rules.

MODIFIED ACCELERATED COST RECOVERY SYSTEM (MACRS)

Significant modifications, generally less favorable to taxpayers, were made to ACRS by the Tax Reform ACT of 1986 (effective for property placed in service after December 31, 1986). Under the Modified Accelerated Cost Recovery System, the recovery period for buildings and structural components increased dramatically.
Revenue Procedure 87-56, 1987-2 C.B. 674, provides the class lives and recovery periods for most MACRS assets. These determinations are based on the specific industry of a taxpayer and the specific activity for which the assets are used.

EXPENSING PROVISIONS AND BONUS DEPRECIATION

Another incentive for allocating costs to shorter-lived property is the expensing provision of IRC Sec. 179. By maximizing the costs allocable to tangible personal property, the taxpayer can not only get an immediate write-off under § 179, but also qualifies for a shorter recovery period under § 168. Also, the 30-percent additional first year bonus depreciation allowance pursuant to § 168(k), enacted by the Job Creation and Worker Assistance Act of 2002 (Public Law 107-147), provides even further incentive for taxpayers to segregate property into shorter recovery periods. The Jobs and Growth Reconciliation Tax Act of 2003 recently increased the bonus depreciation under § 168(k) to 50 percent for certain qualifying property acquired after May 5, 2003, and placed in service before January 1, 2006. Section 1400L provides special rules for qualifying property used by a business in the New York Liberty Zone.

INVESTMENT TAX CREDIT – IRC § 48

In order to stimulate the economy, Congress enacted Code § 48 in 1962. The ITC was designed to encourage the modernization and expansion of productive facilities through the purchase of certain new or used assets for use in a trade or business. Over the years, many other changes were made to the rules, including reductions in the depreciable basis of property for which ITC was claimed, temporary suspensions, termination, reinstatement, and, ultimately, the general repeal of ITC in 1986.

TANGIBLE PERSONAL PROPERTY

Eligible ITC property is defined in former IRC § 48(a)(1) with reference to IRC § 38 (in fact, eligible property is often referred to as “section 38 property”). It included tangible personal property that was closely integrated into the taxpayer’s trade or business. Land, buildings, structural components contained in or attached to buildings, and other inherently permanent structures, generally were not eligible for ITC.

SECTION 1245 AND SECTION 1250 PROPERTY

The benefits of the ITC were somewhat offset by the provisions of IRC Sec. 1245 and 1250, also enacted in 1962. These Code sections result in the conversion of capital gain to ordinary income on the disposition of a property, to the extent its basis has been reduced by an accelerated depreciation method. The definitions of property for purposes of Sec. 1245 and 1250 are very similar to that for ITC and make reference to the regulations under Sec. 48 and the definitions under Sec. 38 property. These interrelated Code sections and the regulations (38, 48, 1245 and 1250) provide the pertinent authority for determining eligibility for ITC.

The primary issue in cost segregation studies is the proper classification of assets as either § 1245 or § 1250 property. Accordingly, the ITC rules are critical in determining whether a taxpayer has classified property into the appropriate asset class.

INHERENT PERMANENCY TEST AND THE “WHITECO FACTORS”

Revenue Ruling 75-178, 1975-1 C.B.9 outlined several criteria to determine Sec. 1245 property classification. The classic pronouncement addressing inherent permanency was Whiteco Industries, Inc. v. Commissioner, 65 T.C. 664, 672-673 (1975). The Tax Court, based on an analysis of judicial precedent, developed six questions designed to ascertain whether a particular asset qualifies as tangible personal property. The questions were referred to as the “Whiteco Factors.”

It should also be noted, however, that movability is not the only determinative factor in measuring inherent permanency. In L.L. Bean, Inc. v. Comm., T.C. Memo, 1997-175, aff’d, 145 F.3d 53 (1st Cir. 1998), it was determined that, even though the structure could be moved, it was designed to remain permanently in place. Thus, it was determined to be an inherently permanent structure.

REPEAL OF ITC AND COMPONENT DEPRECIATION

Due to the significant tax benefits derived from ITC-eligible property, the use of component depreciation proliferated during the 1970’s and created problems not unlike those faced today by taxpayers, practitioners, and the Service regarding cost segregation studies. The problem became so pronounced during the late 1970’s that Congress disallowed component depreciation as a method of computing depreciation for buildings, simultaneously with the enactment of ACRS in the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981 (ERTA) [see IRC § 168(f)(1)].
In 1986, MACRS reiterated that the use of component depreciation was not allowable.

HOSPITAL CORPORATION OF AMERICA v. COMMISSIONER (”HCA”) (1997)

A landmark decision, Hospital Corporation of America v. Commissioner, 109 T.C. 21 (1997)(”HCA”), provided the legal support to use cost segregation studies for computing depreciation. In effect, this decision has reinstated a form of component depreciation.

In HCA, the Service took the position that certain property items were structural components of a building and that § 168(f)(1) prohibited the use of a component depreciation method for computing depreciation on buildings (including structural components). However, Judge Wells ruled that the property at issue was § 1245 property and rejected the Service’s argument. Accordingly, the court determined that §168(f)(1), prohibiting component depreciation, applied only to §1250 property.
The HCA ruling effectively reinstated a form of component depreciation for certain building support systems, such as the electrical and plumbing systems that directly serve tangible personal property. Therefore, cost segregation methodologies previously used to allocate the cost of a building between structural components and ITC property can now be used for § 1245 and § 1250 property.

CHIEF COUNSEL GUIDANCE (on method of accounting)

Chief Counsel issued further guidance to the field in the form of an advice memorandum dated May 28, 1999. One observation was — a change in depreciation method is a change in method of accounting, requiring the consent of the Secretary or his delegate.

[Note, however, that the recent 5th Circuit opinion in Brookshire Brothers Holding, Inc. & Subsidiaries v. Commissioner, 320 F.3d 507 (5th Cir. 2003), aff’g T.C. Memo. 2001-150, reh’g denied (March 31, 2003), which was adverse to the Service, may impact cases in that circuit. The court affirmed the Tax Court decision that the regulations allow taxpayers to make temporal changes in their depreciation schedules, as well as changes in the classification of property, without the consent of the IRS. However, the 10th Circuit opinion in Kurzet v. Commissioner, 222 F.3d 830 (10th Cir. 2000), was favorable to the government on this issue. Clearly, the issue is unsettled. However, Treas. Reg. § 1.446-1T(e)(2)(ii)(d)(2)(i), effective for taxable years ending on or after December 30, 2003, provides that a change in the depreciation or amortization method, period of recovery, or convention of a depreciable or amortizable asset is a change in method of accounting.

In general, it is the position of the Service that a change in depreciation method, recovery period, or convention for depreciable property resulting from the reclassification of property is a change in accounting method. Such a change requires the consent of the Commissioner (i.e., the taxpayer must generally file Form 3115, Application for Change in Accounting Method) and the adjustment to income is made pursuant to IRC § 481(a). Accordingly, claims for adjustment based on a cost segregation study performed after the original return was filed should not be allowed (i.e., unless a Form 3115 has been filed).

The issue of whether or not changes in depreciation methods, conventions, or recovery periods constitute accounting method changes is unsettled due to conflicting court opinions. However, Treas. Reg. § 1.446-1T(e)(2)(ii)(d)(2)(i) and Example 9 of Treas. Reg. § 1.446-1T(e)(2)(iii), effective for taxable years ending on or after December 30, 2003, provide that they do constitute changes in method of accounting.

Taxpayers may conduct a cost segregation study on used property and then recompute its depreciation deductions for prior years.

Service Position on Method of Accounting

In general, it is the position of the Service that in the year an asset is placed in service, an accounting method is adopted relative to the depreciation method, recovery period, or convention for the depreciable property. In any subsequent year from the placed-in-service year, a change in depreciation method, recovery period, or convention resulting from a reclassification of such property, results in a change in method of accounting. Such a change requires the consent of the Commissioner (i.e., the taxpayer must generally file Form 3115, Application for Change in Accounting Method), and the adjustment to income is made pursuant to IRC § 481(a). If a taxpayer has adopted a method of accounting, the taxpayer may not change the method by amending its prior income tax returns. See Rev. Rul. 90-38, 1990-1 C.B. 57. Accordingly, amended returns or claims for adjustment, based on a cost segregation study performed after the original return was filed (for the placed-in-service year), should generally be disallowed on the basis that the taxpayer is attempting to make a retroactive method change.

LOOK-BACK STUDIES

The correct procedure for a taxpayer to change its accounting method is the timely filing of Form 3115, Request for Change in Accounting Method. Pursuant to Revenue Procedure 2002-9, 2002-3 I.R.B. 327, a taxpayer may request automatic consent for the change.
It is the position of the Service that a change in recovery period is a change in accounting method. Accordingly, a taxpayer is required to obtain the consent of the Commissioner by filing a timely Form 3115.

LACK OF BRIGHT-LINE TESTS FOR DISTINGUISHING § 1245 AND § 1250 PROPERTY

A myriad of court cases has addressed the classification of property for ITC purposes. All of the cases are factually-intensive and quite often the opinions of the courts conflict. In addition, though the Service has issued numerous revenue rulings to address specific fact patterns, no bright-line tests have evolved.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

The foregoing commentary has described key portions of the legal framework for distinguishing Sec. 1245 property from Sec. 1250 property and for determining appropriate recovery periods. It cannot be overemphasized that the classification of assets is a factually intensive determination. Based on HCA, the recent AOD, and the 1999 chief Counsel Advice Memorandum, the use of cost segregation studies is expected to increase.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Modern devices that may serve the ubiquitous computing model include mobile phones, digital audio players, radio-frequency identification tags and interactive whiteboards. Other terms for ubiquitous computing include pervasive computing, calm technology, things that think, everyware, and more recently, pervasive Internet.

Ubiquitous computing encompasses a wide range of research topics, including distributed computing, mobile computing, sensor networks, human-computer interaction, and artificial intelligence.

HISTORY

Pervasive computing is the third wave of computing technologies to emerge since computers first appeared:

• First Wave – Mainframe computing era: one computer shared by many people, via

workstations.

• Second Wave – Personal computing era: one computer used by one person, requiring a

conscious interaction. Users largely bound to desktop.

• Third Wave – Pervasive (initially called ubiquitous) computing era: one person, many

computers. Millions of computers embedded in the environment, allowing technology

to recede into the background.

BACKGROUND

Eight billion embedded microprocessors are produced each year. This number is expected to rise dramatically over the next decade, making electronic devices ever more pervasive. These devices will range from a few millimeters in size (small sensors) to several meters (displays and surfaces). They may be interconnected via wired and wireless technologies into broader, more capable, networks. Pervasive computing systems and services may lead to a greater degree of user knowledge of, or control over, the surrounding environment, whether at home, or in an office or car.There have been calls for more widespread debate on the implications of pervasive computing while it is still at an early stage of development.

PERVASIVE COMPUTING TECHNOLOGIES

Pervasive computing technologies classified in to four converging areas

- Mobile Computing

- Embedded and Applied computing

- RFID and Sensors

- Mobile and sensor networking

Mobile Computing

The widespread use of mobile computing devices has changed the way people compute and vastly expanded research areas in distributed computing and networking. In fact, traditional distributed computing is actually a subset of the broad area of mobile computing. Many topics in “mature” areas like distributed databases, distributed fault tolerance, and resource management now require much additional study, because many traditional assumptions are challenged. Mobile computers operate in more hostile environments, are resource-constrained (limited power, frequent disconnection), and are peripheral-poor.

Mobile computing is changing the way we live and work, as profoundly as the introduction of the automobile did almost a century ago. Key advances in mobile networking, wireless connectivity, mobile information access, content adaptation, data synchronization, technology for notebook and wearable computers, and innovative mobile e-business solutions have come from worldwide research laboratories..

Some of the recent research in mobile computing includes:

WEARABLE DISPLAY OF ATHLETES’ STATISTICS

TeamAwear is a basketball jersey that displays real-time information about its wearer’s statistics such as their fouls, points, and scores and alerts players when the game is nearly over or when time is running out to shoot. Mitchell Page and Andrew Vande Moere at the Centre of Design Computing and Cognition of the University of Sydney developed the system, which consists of numerous colored electroluminescent panels. A small computer attached to the player’s body controls the panels and communicates wirelessly with a server that tracks relevant game statistics. For example, panels on the jersey’s side light up to show how many goals the wearer has scored, with each panel representing 10 goals Although the inventors developed the TeamAwear jersey originally for basketball, they claim that it could also work in other fast-paced sports in which player-specific data changes rapidly, such as soccer, volleyball, cricket, and baseball. It could also support emergency teams working in noisy environments where verbal communication is inefficient.

SKYSCOUT

If you’ve ever looked at the night sky and wondered what stars you were observing, Celestron’s SkyScout might be for you. Especially useful for novice astronomers, this handheld device combines GPS technology with a map of the sky to identify, locate, and provide information about celestial bodies. To identify an object of interest, you simply view it through the SkyScout and press the Identify button. SkyScout’s technology identifies the object and tells you what it is. To locate a celestial body, you select it from a reasonably easy-touse menu of objects and press the Locate button. SkyScout uses red directional arrows around the eyepiece to guide you to the object in the sky. A nice feature is that the menu shows only objects that should be visible. (Unfortunately, Sky- Scout has no way to know which of those objects are blocked by trees). Finally, the device can educate you about many of the more popular celestial bodies. The information is available both through audio and text and includes facts about the object and its history and mythology. SkyScout’s release was delayed in 2006 because of manufacturing problems in one of the components.

NOKIA NSERIES PHONES

Nokia has announced three new mobile phones in its multimedia Nseries, each targeting a different market segment. The N71, N80, and N92 offer a long list of features. The N71, from the Nokia XpressMusic family, offers an FM stereo tuner, a five-band equalizer, and support for audio and video formats including MP3, AAC, eAAC+, WMA, JPEG, and MPEG-4. It offers a 240 _ 320-pixel display and two cameras, one 2-megapixel (1600 _ 1200 pixel) and the other VGA (640 _ 480 pixel). It operates on dual-mode wideband code division multiple access (WCDMA)/GSM and triband GSM. The N80 offers a 352 _ 416-pixel display and a 3-megapixel camera with features including four flash modes, 10 scene modes, manual exposure correction, and four color tones.

Embedded and Applied Computing

Embedded and ubiquitous computing is an exciting new paradigm that provides computing and communication services all the time and everywhere. Its systems are now affecting every aspect of our life to the point that they are hidden inside various appliances. This emergence is a natural outcome of research and technological advances in embedded systems. An Embedded Pervasive Computing Environment is equipped with hardware and software components that autonomously respond to the needs of its occupants. Embedded system is the core part of pervasive computing and it deals with various applications like wearable computer architecture and applications, sensor networks, real-time embedded operating systems, embedded servers, embedded system networking, address-free routing, smart spaces, dynamic service discovery, mobility and case studies. Some of the on-going researches in embedded systems include:

ROLLABLE DISPLAY

Who hasn’t dreamt of a display that rolls up when not in use? Phillips took one step toward this dream on a commercial scale when it formed venture company Polymer Vision in January 2004. Polymer Vision recently reported that it can make a flexible display with a 2 cm bending radius. The display is an organics-based, QVGA (320 240 pixels) active-matrix display, 5 in. on the diagonal and 85 dpi. The display layers a 200-micron thick, reflective Electronic-Ink display from E Ink Corporation (www.eink.com) on top of a 25-micron thick, active-matrix plane.

USING LANDLINES FOR CELLULAR CALLS

Xcelis (www.xcelis.com) has developed an innovative product for coupling cell phones and landline handsets. The Pantheon (see Figure 3) plugs into a landline phone line and, using a Bluetooth connection, routes incoming and outgoing voice calls and data from users’ cell phones to their landline handsets. The Pantheon indicates incoming mobile calls with a distinctive ring. While the mobile call is in progress, it doesn’t tie up the landline, meaning you can still receive landline calls through your other telephones.
You need one device for each landline telephone that you want to multiplex. When making calls from your landline, you can choose whether to use your cell phone or landline account. The Pantheon provides additional features, including conferencing a landline call and a mobile call, accessing a user’s mobile phonebook from a landline phone, and switching mid-call from a landline phone to a mobile phone. The Pantheon is also compatible with voice over IP handsets.

BIONIC ARM

Todd Kuiken at the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago at the Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine has developed a thought-powered bionic arm. The arm is based on a pioneering muscle reinnervation procedure that takes an amputee’s nerves and connects them to a healthy muscle. Doctors take nerves that used to go to the arm and connect them to chest muscles. The nerves grow into the chest muscles and can contract the muscle when the patient thinks, for example, “Close hand.” Electrical signals from the chest muscles drive the arm. Surface electrodes sense these impulses from the pectoral muscle and carry them through to the arm, causing it to move. Jesse Sullivan, a high-power lineman who had both of his arms amputated after being severely electrocuted, is the first patient to be outfitted with bionic arms. The arms have enabled him to do daily activities such as put on socks, shave, eat dinner, take out the garbage, carry groceries, and vacuum. Future generations of the arm will incorporate the sense of touch and feeling.

Mobile and Sensor networking

Sensor mobility allows better coverage in areas where events occur frequently in many sensor networks, considerably more units are available than necessary for simple coverage of the space. Augmenting sensor networks with motion can exploit this surplus to enhance sensing while also improving the network’s lifetime and reliability. When a major incident such as a fire or chemical spill occurs, several sensors can cluster around that incident. This ensures good coverage of the event and provides immediate redundancy in case of failure another use of mobility comes about if the specific area of interest (within a larger area) is unknown during deployment. For example, if a network is deployed to monitor the migration of a herd of animals, the herd’s exact path through an area will be unknown beforehand. But as the herd moves, the sensors could converge on it to get the maximum amount of data. In addition, the sensors could move such that they also maintain complete coverage of their environment while reacting to the events in that environment. In this way, at least one sensor still detects any events that occur in isolation, while several sensors more carefully observe dense clusters of events. On going researches in sensor networking includes:

WORLDWIDE BROADBAND WIRELESS ACCESS

Option is offering a PC data card that can access wireless broadband worldwide. You can use the GlobeTrotter GT Max on the 850, 1900, or 2100 MHz HSDPA/UMTS (High-Speed Downlink Packet Access/Universal Mobile Telecommunications System) networks and the 850, 900, 1800, or 1900 MHz EDGE/ GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) bands. The card can support data speeds up to 1.8 megabits per second on HSDPA networks, 384 kilobits per second on UMTS networks, 247 Kbps on EDGE networks, and 85 Kbps on GPRS networks. It’s a Type II PCMCIA (Personal Computer Memory Card International Association)-compliant 3.3-V PC card and includes a novel “Butterfly” retractable antenna that doesn’t require users to remove the card when it’s not in use. Numerous wireless carriers offer the card, including Cingular, which recently announced that it would offer it under two plans. One plan will cost users $110 per month and includes unlimited data use in the US and 100 Mbytes of downloads in Canada and Mexico. The other plan will cost $140 and will include unlimited use in the US and 100 Mbytes of downloads in 24 countries including Australia, China, France, Italy, and Germany.

THE SELF-CLEANING HOUSE OF THE FUTURE

The house of the future won’t need cleaning. Not by humans, leastways. Every surface will be dirt-repellent and antibacterial; and on the floors the vacuum cleaner is buzzing around – all on its own. The outer walls are all glass which can be screened off entirely and the interior surface used as TV screen. The scenario of the self-cleaning house belongs in the distant future, maybe 20 years from now. With the rapidly increasing development of nanotechnology we have seen for the past few years, it is not easy to predict a specific time span and it will be not only self-cleaning but also self-sufficient, energy wise. Today, the Australians are already experimenting with nanoglass-houses where the glass can be treated with a pigmented coating rendering the entire house non-transparent – the roof included.

WALL SENSORS

The house of the future will be capable of alerting its owner if it’s in need of repair. The building materials will, of course, be susceptible to wear and tear due to wind and weather, and they will therefore have built-in sensors. When these sensors appear, the house computer will receive a message that this particular section needs repair. A variety of conditions are similarly monitored. This way, house owners can cheaply repair worn materials and avoid major, expensive repairs after the damage has been done.

THE INTELLIGENT HOUSE

The intelligent house of the future will alert the fire brigade in case of fire when you’re at work. Or, if you’ve got a leaky water pipe, it will get hold of the plumber. Multifunctional sensors throughout the house will keep an eye on heating, lights, indoor climate etc. The house of the future will comprise two major digital gateways. One gateway will be the media server which comprises the complete collection of the family’s music, films, photos etc. Another feature will be the highly secure homegateway – a server communicating with the many sensors distributed all over the house to monitor heating, indoor climate etc. The two gateways are separate entities, as the security on the homegateway needs to be exceedingly tight. This gateway should not be exposed to hacking, which could have fatal consequences with respect to security. If, for instance, the motion detectors are tampered with, the burglar alarm might be disabled. Likewise, it would be an unpleasant experience to come home to a room temperature of 40 degrees Celcisus, because someone is mad at you and has hacked into your system to change the temperature settings Thus, each room in the house of the future will be equipped with small sensors. – Larger rooms may have several. They will measure the physical conditions in the room and communicate with the homegateway which will then take care of the Internet-based communication out of the house.

RFID and Sensors

Radio frequency identification (RFID) technology uses radiofrequency waves to transfer data between readers and movable tagged objects without line of sight. RFID holds the promise of real-time identifying, locating, tracking and monitoring physical objects, and can be used for a wide range of pervasive computing applications. To achieve these goals, RFID data have to be collected, transformed and expressively modeled as their virtual counterparts in the virtual world. RFID data, however, have their own unique characteristics – including aggregation, location, temporal and history-oriented – which have to be fully considered and integrated into the data model. The diversity of RFID applications pose further challenges to a generalized framework for RFID data modeling. Today, Radio Frequency Identification enjoys an enormous interest as the first widely deployed pervasive technology as not only from the standpoint of research
but also from Corporate practices future. Some of the recent researches in RFID technologies include:

TAGS EVERYWHERE

The Ubiquitous ID Center provides the infrastructure for managing electronic tags embedded in or attached to objects in a ubiquitous environment. The center developed the ucode, a multicode tag that automatically identifies information stored in bar codes, RFID chips, smart cards, and electronic tags embedded in virtual entities such as software and electronic money. Comparable to the ISBN (International Standard Book Numbering) code used in the publishing industry, the UID Center assigns unique numbers to each tag and stores data relating to the object in database servers. The ucode tags use a 128-bit code that can be extended in 128-bit units, creating a virtually limitless string of numbers. To navigate this tagged environment, the UID Center developed the Ubiquitous Communicator, a PDA-like device that reads ucode tags and retrieves the relevant data from the UID Center’s server database. The standard UC has a host of features, including wireless LAN, Voice over Internet Protocol, infrared data communication, and a biometric reader. Apart from the PDA-like version, the UID Center developed a cell phone model and a watch style. At home, it will serve as the remote control for home entertainment systems and appliances. In the office, it will read a printer’s tag and order a replacement cartridge as needed

FROM UPC TO RFID

Smart packaging became a possibility with the introduction of small battery-free microprocessors called RFID (Radio Frequency Identification Device) tags. Though these have been commercially available for a number of years, they have been too clunky and too expensive for use in packaging. This situation is changing rapidly: industry experts predict that the price per tag will fall to under 10 cents each in the course of five years or so. The new generation of RFID tags can take the form of a sticker like the classic bar codes, or they can be directly integrated into the packaging material itself. They consist of a silicon microprocessor and some form of radio antenna—conductive carbon ink is replacing the more expensive metal coil of earlier tag types. This radio antenna functions as both input/output channel and power source. Electricity is generated in the antenna by either a magnetic field or a radio signal; the tag responds by sending out a radio signal in turn. This reply signal contains metadata stored on the chip, typically an ID number .With the help of RFID readers—in our cell phones, in supermarket freezers and check-outs, in our private fridges—we will be able to retrieve information about a particular item based on its ID number. In fact, the first cell phones with built-in readers, based on NFC (Near Field Communication) technology, are already on the market.

NEXT-GENERATION TAGS

The smart tags which will soon begin replacing bar codes in our supermarkets are actually pretty dumb: their only ability is reciting their ID code on command. With the next generation of MEMS tags, the epithet ‘smart’ will be more fitting. MEMS (Micro Electro Mechanical Systems) tags are able to perform measurements and calculations. MEMS tags are especially interesting in connection with extremely perishable goods like milk and meat. Studies have shown that the ‘sell by’ date on such products is dubious at best: milk only stays fresh until the given date as long as it is stored at the right temperature. Storage is the key term here; for example, that the temperature in around one-fifth of the meat and dairy cases in American supermarkets is three or four degrees too high. And what happens when we leave the milk out on the kitchen counter all morning? MEMS tags in smart packages will be able to take the milk’s temperature every fifteen minutes. The measurements are then sent to a small microprocessor which calculates the milk’s estimated freshness.

FOOD SAFETY

The fridge of the future will have a door with a built-in scanner for reading the digital tags on food packages. This way the refrigerator will always keep abreast of what is put into it; and the screen on the door can supply an overview of what’s behind the door. By scanning all foodstuffs, you will always have an updated listing of your current supplies – canned and frozen food included. In other words: the refrigerator comes to play the part of digital administrator of the kitchen. Should you e.g. keep food approaching its expiry date, the fridge will alert you. The product can then be used at once, and you avoid having to throw away food. The screen is connected to the Internet, and each and every chip tagged to the packaging will represent a Web site which can be visited by the fridge as the food products are stowed away. Thus it can check for any warnings issued for this particular product. We all remember instances of contaminated food which, undetected by producers, have ended up in supermarkets and, consequently, household fridge or freezer. In such cases, an alert from the refrigerator could reduce the risks considerably. Since the fridge frequently runs automatic checks on the net, users are no longer dependent on radio and TV alerts.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Other components of the computer system, such as disks, also generated heat and had to be considered. Tape drives were particularly large producers of heat. It was common, on large scale systems, for the tapes and disks to be installed in a separate room, or partitioned off from the mainframe, so that air conditioning requirements could be better controlled. (Printers were also partitioned, but mainly for noise, dust, and publishing requirements.

For instance disks are sensitive to rapid changes in humidity, as condensation forming on the disk surface can cause head crashes, due to the small height the head flies at. Tapes produce a lot of heat due to the powerful motors they use, but are more tolerant of temperature changes.

Integrated circuits, or chips, introduced at the end of the 1960s, produced a similar escalation in heat generation and tolerance. As they became more sophisticated, and LSI (large scale integration) was common the escalation continued. This problem is still with us today – have you tried using a laptop on your lap lately? Apart from ever more sophisticated fan design, coupled with heat sinks and air flow funnels or plenums, another approach has been used from time to time. This is the system we mentioned above, water cooling.

The computer user already provides a close tolerance power supply, sometimes at different frequencies, such as 400Hz instead of 50 or 60. He must also supply air conditioning with temperature and humidity gradients specified within tight limits. Now he is required to supply chilled water, also to tight tolerances.

The computer logic circuits were assembled on multilayer PCBs ( or PCAs – Printed Circuit Boards or Arrays) which were ‘plugged in’ to the backplane. The Backplane was a large multilayer printed circuit panel, of varying size, depending on the system, but normally around one metre or 3ft square. Approximately 60-100 PCBs would be plugged in to this panel via a multipin connector, with several hundred pins, on the board.

The multilayer pcb or backplane had been necessary since the early 1970s, due to the incorporation of many more circuits on the board. A single two-dimensional plane could not hold all the interconnections required for this multitude of circuits. The multilayer board incorporates circuits on each layer, with links through the layers, to accomplish the required connections.

For water cooling, the PCB consisted of a large heat sink, around which the circuit components were assembled, through which the chilled water flowed. When the pcb was plugged into the backplane, it also connected via special leak proof connectors to the chilled water supply flowing in the backplane. In turn, the backplane was connected with larger leak proof connectors to the customer supply.

Today’s systems are usually physically smaller for the same computing power, and are designed to have a larger tolerance of air conditioning requirements, some in a so-called ‘office environment’. They are designed with a wind tunnel approach, and require all doors to be closed.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Richard Stallman – founder of GNU – the Open Source software foundation, speaking to the Guardian about cloud computing states: “It’s a trap… It’s worse than stupidity, it’s a marketing-hype campaign.”

Get Off My Cloud
Returning to the issue of how these services are going to be paid for. Stallman remains convinced that charges will start small and then be hiked. As corporations (Google and IBM are the two most vociferous proponents), their financial return will no doubt be in the long term, paying less heed to short term revenues and far more interest to global market share. Google’s unofficial motto “don’t be evil”, is surely being tested by employing such a strategy. Perhaps it’s time to consign the phrase to a back room for storage. It’s reminiscent of the IBM of old, when the World would only ever need around a dozen computers (or clouds in this case) – all of them owned by Google (with IBM’s help). Upset these proprietary gorillas and it might affect the future of your business. These ‘cloud-masters’ may find themselves in a position to cherry pick businesses who will do well, and those who will fade into obscurity. Which sounds feudal and undemocratic to me. And possibly evil.

Privacy
There are of course further issues, particularly those associated with user privacy. I know who’s looking on my PC – it’s whoever I give permission to and even then, it’s probably just a login. With your information in a cloud, who knows who might be digging through your private information? Won’t the physical location of the cloud, dictate the laws governing who can access the information? You don’t and probably won’t know, where it is, or who has access to it.

The argument for, is like emptying your household and keeping everything in a large aircraft hangar up the street. When you want something, they send a car round and you can get what you want. Only trouble is – I’m sure someone’s using my stuff when I’m not there and on my way home, last visit, I saw a notice which said: due to costs associated with maintaining this service, it will be necessary to impose a small fee from next week and in really small writing at the bottom – a much larger fee at peak times (weekends – when everyone actually wants to use the service). That’s probably how they’ll fund it.

Old Hat
This is an old strategy – the lightweight, network computer was a buzz-term 15 years ago. It offered a cheap price-point with low functionality (just like IBM ‘dumb’ terminals of the 1970s). You got a very simple PC with nothing stored locally and paid for software use on a remote server, as you used it. That way you could get a PC for $300. It fizzled out and died as a concept – despite backing by all the major players. It’s interesting to note that the $300 price-point was met by fully functioning PCs and Laptops anyway. It’s a warning from history that even if you ignore corporations’ advice, you might still get what they’re promising anyway.

I’ll keep my laptop and programs locally, and publish information to the Internet as and when I want to. I understand the argument that in business you must continually expand or risk being superseded, but the corporations who embrace this ‘take over the world’ philosophy always end up resembling hackneyed, Bond villains. Look on the bright side Google – when cloud computing fails to ignite long term user interest. You can dust down and start unofficially using that ‘don’t be evil’ slogan again.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Various codes have been used in computing, EBCDIC, Fieldata etc., with various bit combination’s, and total bits between 5 and 8. This often depended on which proprietary computer system you were using, and what type of device you were using. Punched cards had a different code again. A standard code, ASCII, was eventually introduced. The American Standard Code for Information Interchange has 8 bits, and is used interchangeably on almost all systems today.

PAPER TAPE CODES

Paper tape was upgraded to 8 bits across, plus the sprocket, and used to boot computers, and to transfer data from one machine to another. For instance a NC, or Numerical Control, could use paper tape to relay instructions to a machine for cutting steel sheet shapes.

PUNCH CARD CODES

Punch cards had been used since the 19th century, and a couple of different formats had emerged, round holes, rectangular holes, 80 per card, 90 per card, different codes, etc. Once again it depended on whose computer you were using IBM, Univac, Control Data etc. However, the basic principle was the same. The ’standard’ came to be the 80-column card, with 12 rows for each character. The 1 to 9 rows were numbers 1-9, with the 0, 11 and 12 rows being used for various special characters, shifts etc.

MAGNETIC TAPE CODES

Magnetic tape, initially on 10 inch reels of half inch wide tape, 2400 ft long, used variations of the computer codes. Initially 6 bits plus parity (7) were written across the tape. With the introduction of bytes this increased to 9 bits to incorporate the 8-bit byte plus parity.

Most variations here have been in the recording system, that is how the data is written to and read from the tape. These include NRZ (Non Return to Zero), PE (Phase Enabled) and, latterly GCR (Group Controlled Recording). The density possible has increased, so that the capacity of the tapes even in the present day small cassettes has greatly increased.

Transport methods, initially ‘Stop-Start’, to record each character, now more commonly ‘Streaming’, have developed in parallel. The tape has normally been written in blocks of various lengths with codes being required to control these, such as ‘Start of Block’, ‘Start of Data’ etc. Other codes are used to verify the data. The DAT (Digital Audio Tape) tapes used today use a different form of digital coding, but data codes are much the same.

As well as the parity bit in each character, there can be a parity bit, for example, for all the ‘3′ bits in a block. This is known as ‘longitudinal parity’, or parity along the tape, a bit for each ‘row’ of bits in the block. You can also have a CRC or, cyclic redundancy check, which considers all the bits in the block, in a complicated formula.

All these check codes are necessary because magnetic tape is an inherently unreliable medium, as you probably know from listening to your old cassettes! This has caused ECC or error correction codes to be developed, similar to those used in memory. In fact there are so many extra codes on the tape you wonder if there is enough room for data.

In part 3 we look at data transmission, disk, and printer codes.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Sometimes the problem goes away when I reboot my machine. At times it’s a bug from a software I’m trying. Once it was a virus which left my PC blank even after I rebooted it. Often it’s because I
tinker too much with my computer. I’m not a techie. Many would probably refer to me as a luddite. I call myself a fiddler…because
I fiddle a lot with my computer. I like to know how bits, bytes and chips all fall into place.

That is perhaps because I’m a writer. I struggle to make thoughts, words and paper form
themselves into something readable. Or maybe it’s because of my first experience with a computer, a worn-out, neglected Apple. The friend who gave it to me didn’t teach me how to use it. He instead taught me how to open it and press a few chips into place if it didn’t boot. I was intrigued forever!

I have a more updated PC now but that doesn’t stop me from opening it and risking life with
electrocution, or intelligence with surrendering to my shop’s techie. At the very least I was
able to install more RAM, a LAN card and a CD-RW (see, I can even talk tech-speak).

It’s not only the hardware, however, that I try to learn. I also try to see how software tick.
I’ve installed and uninstalled so much freeware and shareware that twice I had to format my hard
drive to clear out the “garbage.” Now I’m trying to learn Perl, which is the scripting used in
Website maintenance. In case you haven’t seen one, a particular string of Perl script looks like
it was a result of a two-year old kid left alone on the keyboard.

So here I am, a writer used to weaving words together, now trying to unscramble them. Good thing my Website host is patient with me. So is my computer shop.

Better that I’m patient with myself. There are times when my PC doesn’t even turn on or my
scripts do nothing. It isn’t easy to determine what went wrong and oftentimes I have to start
from the beginning. But when that happens I always consider it as an adventure in education.

Because of this, my book shelves are no longer exclusive enclaves of novels and books on history.
Now found are a sprinkling of computer books from learning to build a PC to publishing on the
World Wide Web. I’m comfortable with reading Chris Pirillo’s computer newsletter, ‘Lockergnome,’
as well as Paul Meyer’s business column, ‘TalkBiz News,’ both of which are electronic
publications.

One thing I truly appreciate about owning a computer is that it has taken away my fear to learn
new things, most especially about myself. After all, what I do has to have a direct correlation
with who I am and what I still want to be. Thus, while I’m not an expert on computer technology,
I have a gut feel about software and what they can do to enhance our work.

A computer crash! What crawled in? A bug, a virus, a worm, a trojan? A bit or a byte that went
haywire? Or was it just me? Whatever. Somehow, something will always turn out right. Ultimately, I’ll always be the better person for it.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

The Dot-com Shake-out

You might be surprised to hear me moan about the dot-com mania of 1999-2000. After all, for many of us it was an exciting time. However, for the early search engines, it was essentially a death-knell! The new money entering the market was huge but investors wanted to see returns. Search Engines were clearly part of the future, but where was their revenue stream? How could one make money from free results – especially free results powered by very expensive computer infrastructures? This impatience grew following the dot-com crash of March 2000.

Yahoo! seemed to be the only company with any kind of sustainable “pure internet play” (from banner advertising which was at that time well funded by the dot-com dollar). At the same time, AOL were pursuing a moderately successful “walled garden” approach to traffic (i.e. where 70% of searches on the site led to content within AOL properties). The argument at the time was that making it easy for people to “exit” to other sites (the essential purpose of the modern search engine) meant losing the opportunity to sell them anything from your own site and content partners.

Altavista, acquired with DEC by Compaq in 1999, was relaunched at huge cost as a portal competitor to Yahoo! Similarly, Excite (now owned by broadband provider @home) tried to become an AOL clone. Lycos, already the largest “pure portal” in the Spring of 1999, merged with the largest Spanish language ISP, Terra Networks (and then ran itself into the ground).

Disney/ABC and NBC had already invested heavily in Infoseek and Snap respectively but quickly began to realize that the revenue they could derive from the increasingly portal-like services was never going to deliver the short term payback which shareholders typically seek. Steve Bornstein, chairman of Walt Disney Internet Group, said in his press release “the Internet environment has continued to shift and change, and therefore our strategies must also change”. 400 employees at Go Network were layed off and a buyer sought for the Infoseek engine.

In December of 2000 a surprising report from StatMarket.com found that only 6.86% of all the referring traffic to websites originated from search engines (compared to 47.01% from direct navigation or bookmarks and 46.13% from internet links). The quality of this research has since been questioned, as it was based not on server logs but on the global Hitwise stat counter data (the code for which was only placed by many webmasters on the homepage of their site). However, this data came at a time when there was a collective loss of confidence in search and portal technologies. The dot-com crash of March 2000 had left investors with a major hangover.

Is it any surprise, then, that so many search properties disappeared altogether (or closed their internal crawl capability down) in 2001? With the closure of Northern Light (to the public at least) in January 2002, the Dot-Com shakeout had essentially closed or fatally wounded WebCrawler, Magellan, Excite, Infoseek, Go Network, Snap and Lycos. It also critically wounded Altavista, who were to struggle on without any real investment in their search capability until their acquisition by Yahoo! in 2003.

The Emergence of Paid Search

If the rush to convert all search engines to portals was (at the time at least) flawed strategic thinking, bad timing also played a part in the demise of so many early contenders.

Quietly and almost unnoticed during the mania was a relatively minor search player called go-to.com, renamed Overture in 2001. Whilst paid listings had been tried before, Overture (with a 2.76% market share in January 1999) were the first company was make a success of it, with some advertisers paying up to a dollar a click by 1998/9. Go-to.com, in fact, only carried paid results! Personally, I never really liked or used the site myself for that exact reason. However, they persevered with their strategy, determined to find a sustainable revenue model and confident that the research-oriented search engines of the time had little to offer a growing army of web users looking to shop ’til they dropped!

History has proved that Overture were right (to persevere with paid ads) although initially there was limited evidence of this. Perhaps if the dot-com investors had only waited a little longer (or started a little later) the value of sponsored results would have become clear. Either way, the big boys hared off into portal oblivion, whilst the Overture tortoise (and the model it spawned) ultimately won the race.

All the best businesses start in Garages

It really is true. The 12×18 foot garage, in which David Packard and William Hewlett launched Hewlett-Packard in 1939, is considered by many to be the birthplace of Silicon Valley. A short drive away is the Los Altos garage of Steve Jobs’ parents, where Apple Computer Inc. was born. Google Inc, similarly traced its early days to a garage – this one in Menlo Park, California – where the newly formed Google Inc spent its first five months as a proper business in late 1998.

However, the real story of Google began more than two years earlier, as the research project (nicknamed “BackRub”) of two Stanford Ph.D. students: Michigan-born Larry Page and Russian Sergey Brin. The simple obsession which preoccupied both was the links between sites on the exponentially growing web. In his original thesis research, Page hypothesised that any link from one site to another was akin to an academic citation and the description (or anchor text) attached to that link like an annotation. If one could identify the sites most cited for any given annotated subject, one could establish a pecking order of significance for any given subject area.

What particularly fascinated Page was what he saw as a fundamental weakness in Tim Berners-Lee’s original design for the web; namely that it was possible to see easily what any site was linking to but very hard (if not impossible) to see the sites linking back. Backrub sought to catalogue all the links on the web and, through doing so, establish which sites had the most “authority” overall and in any given topic. Page insists that it was never his intention at this point to create a search engine. However, intellectual curiosity drove him forward into the creation of a new kind of crawler, based on a link ranking system (now called PageRank after it’s inventor) which was the first of it’s kind.

It was at this point that Sergey Brin was drawn into the project. At this time. Page estimated the size of the web to be approximately 10 million documents and the number of links to be perhaps 100 million. Altavista had impressed everyone by managing to index all those documents on a single large computer. However, indexing both the documents and the links was, to say the least, a big hairy problem; precisely the sort of challenge that appealed to Brin.

In fact, the problem was much tougher than either probably realized at the time. At this point, the web was growing at an exponential rate and the computing resources required for the task were in fact well beyond the humble resources of a student project. This brings me to the part played by lady luck in the formation of Google.

In late 1996, the BackRub crawler was consuming nearly half of all Stanford’s network bandwidth and, on occasions bringing down Stanford’s internet connection. Page and Brin had to beg and borrow storage capacity and were continually running out of space and lines of credit. Whilst both were hardly mucking about, they were not completely sure about a career in business. As Page puts it now, he was either going to be a professor or run a company that made a difference. Nothing in between would do.

So, believe it or not, in the period from 1996-7, all three of the then market leaders were approached by two students with an idea for licensing a new kind of search engine. In August 2004, at the Search Memories session at SES San Jose, the panel included Doug Cutting (formerly Senior Architect, Excite), Steve Kirsch (formerly founder of Infoseek) and Louis Monier, (formerly CTO at AltaVista). Together they reminisced about the early years of search engines and all admitted, one by one, that they had sent the founders of Google packing. Steve Kirsh was the most colorful; “Go pound sand I told them”. Doug Cutting said “I wasn’t impressed with their demo at all” and Louis Mornier shrugged “I didn’t have the authority to sign a check anyway”.

What if Larry Page and Sergey Brin had been just a little bit better at PowerPoint? What if Louis had had his check book with him? This book might have been called “How to get to the top of Altavista” and Digital might still have been in business, continuing the make the machines that power the internet. Lady luck certainly played her part in the proceedings!

However, despite their efforts to dodge destiny, the Stanford graduates did not find a suitable established partner. Some are born great, others achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them. Perhaps Larry and Sergey fall into that rare latter category. By the end of 1998, the Backrub service (renamed Google in September 1997) was growing fast and serving more than 10,000 daily queries. The guys were introduced through a shared contact to Andy Bechtolsheim, an active early-stage investor. After a short demo, Andy literally thrust a check for $100,000 into their hands. Google inc. was born and Brin and Page famously celebrated with a trip to Burger King.

The guys literally lacked a bank account or a legal entity called Google to deposit the check into. So, once the burgers write digested, the two set up Google Inc and rented a garage from a friend. Five months later, the initial investment roll totaled just under $1 million and, by June 1999, a further round (of venture capital funding) exceeded $25 million. If it were fiction, you would say it was a fairy tale… but sometimes truth is stranger than fiction (particularly in the strange world of technology).

From backroom to boardroom in just 5 years

So what does Google mean anyway? Brin and Page close the name, from a brainstorm with fellow students, as a play on the word Googol, meaning the number one followed by 100 zeros. Google’s use of the term reflects the company’s mission; “to organize the immense, seemingly infinite amount of information available on the web”. As an interesting footnote, the word Googol itself is traceable to the work of American mathematician Edward Kasner in the 1940s. His descendants briefly considered suing Google in 2004 for using the name without royalty. Only in America!

Unlike their competitors, Google had a clear vision, perfect timing and all the luck going. Whilst the big boys fiddled with their content-rich portals, Google ruthlessly focused on building the biggest index in the world, ranking sites organically by their authority and serving paid listings alongside, in emulation of Overture’s successful model. As the web grew into a giant haystack, Google helped you find the needle. These factors, above all, laid the foundation for Google’s later dominance.

The company was also pretty thrifty and managed to make it’s initial venture funding go a very long way (at a time when other dotcom millionaires were spending money like it was going out of fashion). In those early days, licensing the search results to other internet sites and portals was the key source of revenue. Key moments included the use of Google by Yahoo! in 2000 to power their search results and the later decision by AOL to do the same. Suddenly, there was only one serious player in town!

Following the important business wins of 2000 (and the launch in that same year of Google Adwords and the Google Toolbar) the search engine was handling more than 100 million searches a year. By the fourth quarter of 2001, the company was turning a profit – an incredible achievement when one considers that Amazon (founded five years before Google in 1994) only turned its first quarterly profit at the same time.

Between July 2002 and June 2003, global referrals from search engines almost doubled (from 7.18% to 13.46%) and have continued to increase quickly since. Most small business sites now obtain more than 85% of their new visitors from search engines, with Google typically sending about 70% of them. In the UK, search engines have overtaken adult sites (in October 2006) as the most heavily trafficked category on the web.

It was perhaps inevitable that Google would eventually come to market and it’s initial public offering took place in August 2004, creating a company worth $23 billion. More importantly, the flotation raised some $1.67 billion, which Google could use to develop new products and make acquisitions. It also made instant paper millionaires of many of Google’s employees.

Perhaps the biggest irony of search history is that AltaVista and the rest were not necessarily wrong in their obsession with portals. They were simply right at the wrong time! The preoccupation of today is not dissimilar to that of 1999, with Google and others all seeking to built “stickability” into their proposition. Suffice to say for now that those IPO billions in the bank were helpful in the acquisitions of YouTube and DoubleClick in 2006-7. This concludes my three part series.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Taking into account that the modern definition of ‘computer’ refers to something that is programmable, the first primitive design of a programmable machine cold be The Jacquard Loom, invented in 1801. The design incorporated punched paper cards that would determine how the loom would weave.

In 1837, Englishman Charles Babbage became the first person to invent a programmable mechanical computer, The Analytic Engine. Although it was never built, he re-modified it’s designs until his death in 1871, whilst Ada Lovelace, a mathematician whom is now considered the first computer programmer, even created a program for Babbage’s machine.

The Z3, designed by German engineer Konrad Kuse was the first programmable automatic computer. Using a design that wasn’t too far from that of The Jacquard Loom, the Z3 used a punched film stock to program it.

In 1946, designers John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert announced the arrival of the “Giant Brain”, the Electronic Numerical Integrator And Computer. This prime example of the second generation of computers was the first general purpose electronic computer. The machine took weeks to programme by a team of six women. It was huge and weighed 2 tonnes.

The first minicomputer design to achieve any commercial success was the PDP-8 designed by W.A. Clark and C.E. Molnar and released in 1965. It had 4k of memory. But by 1971 Intel released the first microprocessor, the 4004 CPU. This design leap heralded the introduction of the first personal computer, a title that is shared between two machines, the Kenbak-1 and the Datapoint 2200.

Throughout the remainder of the 70s and the beginning of the 80s, names such as Apple, Atari and Commodore gradually began to become household names with the latter names utilizing the typical design the primary component of a keyboard, to be connected to a TV screen and the additional tape-deck or cartridge slot.

In 1985 Microsoft launched the Windows 1.0 operating system, but it wasn’t until the release of version 3.0 in 1990 until this new interface became commercially popular. This coincided with an increase in home computing and the introduction of the CDROM, as well as growing popularity of the laser or ink cartridge computer printers for word processing and desktop publishing.

By the late 90s the notion of plug and play technology by way of digital cameras, scanners and flash drives was introduced by the increasingly incorporated USB ports. More expensive PCs began to utilize DVD into the new millennium, whilst LCD monitors have made PCs more integral to home entertainment and WiFi has allowed users to create their own networks and pushed computing even further.

For a range of goods from lingerie to garden products, or if you are looking for a laptop or a special ink cartridge and even a four poster bed, uk.shopping.com and dealtime.co.uk are a great way to find products online, and include product reviews.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

The pioneering Web Search Engines

Really, the point at which modern search engines first begin to appear is after the development and popularisation of the MOSAIC browser in 1993. In 1994, Internet Magazine was launched, together with a review of the top 100 websites billed as the ‘most extensive’ list ever to appear in a magazine. A 28.8Kbps modem was priced at $399 and brought the internet within the reach of the masses (albeit slowly)!

At this point and for the next 4-5 years, it was just about possible to produce printed and web-based directories of the best sites and for this to be useful information for consumers. However, the rapid growth in the number of www sites (from 130 in 1993 to over 600,000 in 1996) began to make this endeavour seem as futile as producing a printed yellow pages of all the businesses, media and libraries in the world!

Whilst WAIS was not a lasting success, it did highlight the value of being able to search – and click through to – the full text of documents on multiple internet hosts. The nascent internet magazines and web directories further highlighted the challenge of being able to keep up with an internet which was growing faster than the ability of any human being to catalogue it.

In June 1993, Matthew Gray at MIT developed the PERL-based web crawler, WWW Wanderer. Initially, this was simply devised as a tool to measure the growth of the world wide web by “collecting sites”. Later, however, Gray (who now works for Google) used the crawled results to build an index called “Wandex” and added a search front-end. In this way, Gray developed the world’s first web search engine and the first autonomous web crawler (an essential feature of all modern search engines).

Whilst Wanderer was the first to send a robot to crawl web sites, it did not index the full text of documents (as had WAIS). The first search engine to combine these two essential ingredients was WebCrawler, developed in 1994 by Brian Pinkerton at the University of Washington. WebCrawler was the search engine on which many of us early pioneers first scoured the web and will be remembered with affection for its (at the time) attractive graphical interface and the incredible speed with which it returned results. 1994 also saw the launch of Infoseek and Lycos.

However, the scale of growth of the web was beginning to put indexing beyond the reach of the average University IT department. The next big step required capital investment. Enter, stage right, the (then huge) Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) and it’s super-fast Alpha 8400 TurboLaser processor. DEC was an early adopter of web technologies and the first Fortune 500 Company to establish a web site. Its search engine, AltaVista, was launched in 1995.

Founded in 1957, DEC had during the 1970s and 1980s led the mini-computer market. In fact, most of the machines on which the earliest ARPANET hosts ran were DEC-PDP-10s and PDP-11s. However, by the early 1990s, DEC was a business in trouble. In 1977, their then CEO, Ken Olsen, famously said that “there is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home”. Whilst somewhat taken out of context at the time, this quote was in part symptomatic of DEC’s slow response to the emergence of personal computing and the client-server revolution of the 1980s.

By the time Altavista was being developed, the company was besieged on all sides by HP, Compaq, Dell, SUN and IBM and was losing money like it was going out of fashion. Louis Monier and his research team at DEC were “discovered” internally as the ultimate PR coup; the entire web captured – and searchable – on a single computer. What better way to showcase the company as an innovator and demonstrate the lightning fast speed and 64-bit storage of their new baby?

During 1995, Monier unleashed a thousand web crawlers onto the young web (at that time an unprecedented achievement). By December (site launch) Altavista had indexed more than 16 million documents comprising several billion words. In essence, Altavista was the first commercial-strength, web-based search engine system. AltaVista enjoyed nearly 300,000 visits on its first day alone and, within nine months, was serving 19 million requests a day.

Altavista was, indeed, well ahead of it’s time technically. The search engine pioneered many technologies that Google and others later took years to catch up with. The site carried natural search queries, Boolean operators, automatic translation services (babelfish) and image, video and audio search. It was also lightning fast (at least in the beginning) and (unlike other engines) coped well with indexing legacy internet resources (and particularly the then still popular UseNet newsgroups).

After Altavista, Magellan and Excite (all launched in 1995), a multitude of other search engine companies made their debut, including Inktomi & Ask Jeeves (1996) and Northern Light & Snap (1997). Google itself launched in 1998.

Of these early engines, each enjoyed its own enthusiastic following and a share of the then nascent search market. Each also had its own relative strengths and weaknesses. Northern Light, for example, organized its search results in specific folders labeled by subject (something arguably still to be bettered today) and acquired a small – but enthusiastic following as a result. Snap pioneered search results ranked, in part, by what people clicked on (something Yahoo! and Google are only toying with now!)

In January 1999 (at the beginning of the dotcom boom), the biggest sites (in terms of market share) were Yahoo!, Excite, Altavista and Disney, with 88% of all search engine referrals. Market share was not closely related to the number of pages indexed (where Northern Light, Altavista and a then relatively unknown Google led the pack):

Search Engine Share of search referrals (Dec 99)

Yahoo! – 55.81%

Excite Properties (Excite, Magellan & WebCrawler) – 11.81%

Altavista – 11.18%

Disney Search Properties (Infoseek & Go Network) – 8.91%

Lycos – 5.05%

Go To (now Overture) – 2.76%

Snap / NBCi – 1.58%

MSN – 1.25%

Northern Light <1% (but most pages indexed)

Google <1%

What these statistics do not convey is the underlying position of the relevant search engines and who was powered by whom. From 1996 to 1998, Altavista powered the Yahoo! search solution and - as such - was the clear market leader. However, by 1999 Inktomi was powering Yahoo! along with Hotbot, MSN, Snap and more.

Inktomi Corporation was founded by Berkeley professor Eric Brewer and graduate student Paul Gauthier, based on the search engine they developed at university. Unlike Alatavista, Inktomi used a distributed computing model (rather than running everything on a single machine). This, arguably, made the solution more scalable and thus easier to sell to internet service providers with an eye to the future.

Despite losing Yahoo! to Inktomi, Altavista thrived as a standalone search solution, growing its market share during the rest of 1999 to over 17%. One might well ask why Altavista is not the name on everyone's lips today (instead of Google). After all, they were well capitalised and had a winning model. Alternatively, they might wonder why Disney didn't work its magic on search (with those deep pockets to fund brand awareness and a decent market share). Why couldn't Northern Light capitalise on such a huge search index and what happened to Inktomi's leading position in 1999?

The answer is, in fact, remarkably simple. It was, as is often the case in business, a combination of flawed strategic thinking, poor timing and bad luck. We will explore how Google trounced them all in the next and final installment of our history; how Google came to dominate (accessible from my blog).

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Sometimes the blog network will “remove” the blog without notice for what it deems to be “risky content” and yet, in doing so the word gets out that the social network cannot be trusted and those who continue are blogging in fear of secret rules or worse arbitrary decisions based on all sorts of things including political persuasion of moderators or political correctness.

Interestingly enough when blog networks get started they enjoy a little bit of chaos, originality and spontaneous controversy, but suddenly change trying to mold themselves to the masses or the mob. Essentially they are going for the largest percentage and throwing away those outside the norm.

This has a dangerous effect on their network, and takes out much of the interesting sound and fury that helps build interest, intrigue and fun. The blogging network will then say, we are trying to prevent bullying or comments that might make users feel insecure, but in reality they are curtailing free speech and destroying expression.

No one should be so naïve to think that the same thing will not happen with off-site storage of your information. No one should be so fooled to believe that all their work will not vanish one day if they disagree with a group, religion, government, or nation.

What cloud computing is, well it’s simple, it is trap to control you, your voice and your information. We know that governments are fond of snooping, and scanning your information, corporate club card data, airline reservations, phone calls and data, do you think for one second your data will be safe?

Don’t be ridiculous, cloud computing is a trap and a way to further control your behavior, mind, information and make you an obedient slave. If you put your trust in it, fine, but it now owns you, your work and your mind from then on. I’ve not heard one argument that would lead me to believe otherwise. Trust no one, not even the clouds above, or that cloud will rain on your parade.

Now please understand, this article writer is the most prolific writer in the history of the Internet, so unless someone spends the time to explain to me the safe guards to the user of cloud computing, he will write 100 articles per year on this topic and they will be scattered across the Internet.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

I’ve had reason to think about this, having been involved in the early software business and having recently published a book about my experiences selling software in the late 1970s. The book is called Priming the Pump: How TRS-80 Enthusiasts Helped Spark the PC Revolution. In the book, co-authored with my husband David, we talk about how Steve Leininger, a newly-hired engineer and computer hobbyist, and Don French, a company insider, created this ground-breaking product for Tandy Corporation for under $150,000 in development costs. Tandy, parent of the nationwide chain of Radio Shack stores (3500 at the time) sold the TRS-80 for $599.95. It was the most expensive product Radio Shack had ever sold, and it was a phenomenal success, so successful that Radio Shack was overwhelmed with orders it couldn’t fill. People had to go on waiting lists to get one.

So was the TRS-80 the first truly personal computer? We do make the claim that it was the first mass produced (all made in factories in the US) off-the-shelf microcomputer. But in 1977, exactly thirty years ago, the TRS-80 was only one of three microcomputers introduced. There was also the PET from Commodore and the Apple I and II, designed by the guru of geekdom, Steve Wozniak. These three microcomputers hit the market that year, and for the TRS-80, it was the beginning of a series of upgrades and add-ons that eager users snapped up over the next seven or eight years. For Apple, their Apple II computer, which had color from the beginning and was a superb game machine, had an even longer run and sold in huge numbers. In fact, Steve Wozniak, in her new book, iWoz, claims that he “invented the personal computer” (iWoz: How I invented the personal computer, co-founded Apple, and had fun doing it, by Steve Wozniak and Gina Smith, Norton & Company, 2006). But did anyone really “invent” the personal computer?

Before there were personal computers, there were big corporate computers. In the 1960s, computers were large and expensive and did not have a screen. The input/output device was likely to be a teletype machine, itself a large, clunky and expensive machine. Or it may have been connected to a “terminal,” another expensive machine that did have a TV-like screen and a keyboard. You might think that this type of computer somehow evolved into the smaller ones we use today, but that is not so.

Small computers, known initially as microcomputers, arose in the 1970s as a result of developments in electronics, specifically the microprocessor, which let many components that used to be individually mounted on a board be part of one integrated device. This was a technology that moved fast once the principles were in place. Intel founder Gordon Moore observed the fast pace and declared a proposition: Moore’s Law stated that processing power would double every 18 months, and he’s proved right in this observation. But it was more than technical advances that brought about personal computing. It was also a pent-up desire on the part of many people to own their own computer. This is what drove Ted Nelson to write his self-published book, Computer Lib, in 1974 and later write that he sought “the freedom of people to do their own thing with computers.” It is what drove Ed Roberts to build the Altair, the first microcomputer, which appeared on the cover of Popular Electronics in January 1975. Roberts was once quoted as saying that he “lusted” after a computer of his own and that “to have a computer was better than sex.”

When the Intel 4004 chip came out, it was a beginning, but only a concept, as this first microprocessor did not do enough to power a computer. Then came the 8008 and finally the 8080, the one that became the brains of the Altair and the IMSAI, kit computers that found an eager following. These chips were expensive but soon there were other microprocessors, like the 6502 from MOS Technologies and the Z80 from Zilog. Among the fruit trees of northern California soon to be known as Silicon Valley, a young Steve Wozniak had obtained two 6502 microprocessors at a computer show for the incredibly cheap price of $20 each. The man selling them was Chuck Peddle, who had designed them. I recently heard Chuck give a talk (via internet) to the Vintage Computer Festival in New Jersey in which he stated that his company, MOS Technologies, had experienced many quality control problems and a lot of the chips did not work. He wanted to conceal the problems and make it look like he had produced the chips in abundance, so he filled a barrel with them, but only the ones on top actually worked! Good thing Woz got two that worked, because with those he built the first Apple.

Chuck Peddle sold out to Commodore, which began work on a microcomputer project. Wozniak says in his book that Peddle came to see the prototype Apple II in Steve Jobs’ garage and was considering buying the rights to it, but Commodore decided to do their own design. The Commodore PET, released in 1977, had a keyboard for input and a tape cassette for storage; it was a complete system.

In 1976, another Steve – Steve Leininger – was working at National Semiconductor and moonlighting at Paul Terrell’s Byte Shop, where Wozniak’s Apple I models were for sale. Terrell launched Jobs and Wozniak into a real business with a $50,000 order for the hand-built computer, which had no keyboard or monitor; it was really just a board that hobbyists could make into a real computer with add-ons. Leininger found himself talking one day to some buyers from Tandy Corporation, parent of Radio Shack. He later received an offer of employment and was flown to Fort Worth Texas to meet with John Roach, company CEO, and the man who would be his partner in designing the TRS-80, Don French.

The TRS-80 Model I, introduced in August 1977, had some features that the others lacked. Unlike the annoying “chiclet” keyboard of the PET, the TRS-80 had a full size keyboard. The PET came with a monitor, but the TRS-80 had a larger one. Most importantly, the PET was an all-in-one case model, with no expandability, but the TRS-80 was designed for expansion; the tape cassette recorder (the storage device) and the monitor were separate and could be replaced with something else. Eventually, Radio Shack released an “expansion interface” that let users connect a disk drive and add more memory. The TRS-80, with the BASIC language built-in, could accomplish many useful tasks, and its popularity went well beyond the enthusiastic hobbyist market. Small business owners were among the most eager buyers.

The initial events that made the personal computer possible were about technical advances – better, faster microprocessors – and hardware innovations, such as the five-inch disk drive. But the next wave of innovation that made computers essential to modern life was software, all kinds of software that helped people do common tasks more efficiently. Word Processing. Accounting. Mail lists. Database. And the first “killer app” – spreadsheets, beginning with VisiCalc. At the same time, microcomputers were a new form of entertainment. Games were tremendously popular; some mimicked the arcade games of the day and others were analogies to board games like chess. Some broke new ground for gaming, like Scott Adams’ Adventure games, and the popular Oregon Trail. Without all the programmers out there creating useful applications, the computer would never be personal. In our case, David created a word processor called Lazy Writer. It received rave reviews in the many computer magazines that reviewed popular software. We sold copies all over the US and the world, with many buyers in Australia (who used a TRS-80 clone machine called the Dick Smith System 80). We never got rich selling software, but we felt the excitement of being part of something that really was a revolution.

So who invented personal computing? Was it Steve Wozniak, with his amazing designs, or was it Ed Roberts, who believed people lusted after a kit that let them build a computer called Altair, was it Chuck Peddle who gave the world a cheap microprocessor, or was it Leininger and French who built the TRS-80, a machine that had so many fans? Notice that I have not even mentioned Bill Gates or the IBM PC. Gates was there from the beginning, and he too has a claim on inventing personal computing. It was Gates who created the version of the BASIC language that was in the Altair and who later supplied the operating system for the IBM PC, the machine that first gave us the term, “Personal Computer.” But it seems clear to me that the vision of a personal computer was out there long before IBM got into the act. In fact, it seems unlikely that we can ever name one person who deserves the credit for “inventing” personal computing. A computer as a personal tool – an idea that was in the ether, as they say, and that had many inventors, both through breakthroughs in hardware and creativity in software.

The tremendous strides we’ve made in how we use our computers is exemplified for me in two remarks from family members. The first was something my daughter, born in 1985, said to me some years back. She said that when she first heard that computers were once huge machines that filled a room, she pictured in her mind a giant modern computer, with a gigantic screen filling a whole wall and a huge keyboard, with a person jumping from one enormous key to another. She couldn’t see how else a computer could fill a room. The other remark was just recently made by my sister, who is relatively new to computer ownership. She had finished reading my book, which she said she enjoyed despite her lack of computer savvy, and I was pleased because we did not intend our book just for geeks. Then she said, “I always thought early computers would be kind of like modern ones only maybe slower, but now I see that they were completely different.” My first reaction to this was wanting to say “No they weren’t,” but I didn’t say that because I wanted to think about why she would make this remark. I realized that the way a user interacts with a PC today really is completely different from looking at a screen displaying a blinking cursor and the word “Ready.” That’s what we used to see on our TRS-80 when we turned it on. It was ready for us to give it a command and until we did, it would do nothing. And it could only do one thing at a time. Just look at the graphics, sound and interactivity of modern personal computers and, even though they are the descendants of the blank screen with a blinking cursor, the way we use computers and take their amazing abilities for granted is completely different from the era of microcomputers that dazzled us thirty years ago.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

The research centered on proteins that were been determined to be a possible target for cancer therapy. Through a process called “virtual screening”, special analysis software identified molecules that interacted with these proteins, and determined which of the molecular candidates had a high likelihood of being developed into a drug. The process is similar to finding the right key to open a special lock — by looking at millions upon millions of molecular keys.

Participants in the Cancer Research Project were sent a ligand library over the Internet. Their PC analyzed the molecules using a docking software called LigandFit by Accelrys. The LigandFit software analyzed the molecular data by using a three-dimensional model to attempt to interact with a protein binding site. When a ligand docked successfully with a protein, the resulting interaction was scored and the interactions that generated the highest scores were recorded and filed for further evaluation.

We need a better answer. Over five decades of cancer research effort in drug discovery and development have yielded more than 40 drugs for the treatment of cancers. These anti-cancer drugs are extending the lives of many people with cancer, but often at great cost. The side effects commonly associated with cancer therapy often may seem as bad as the disease itself. Side effects can be so severe that they limit the dosages patients can receive. And half of all cancer patients fail to respond to the therapies currently available.

Despite these shortcomings, these therapies are still quite costly — a considerable amount of money is spent on treating cancer. Treatment of cancers account for over 6% of all health care costs. The National Institutes of Health estimate cancer is responsible for $37 billion for direct medical costs, and $11 billion in lost productivity due to illness. The discovery of new drugs represents the best hope to fight both the rising medical costs and the suffering associated with current cancer therapies.

There could hardly be a scourge more worth fighting — the high mortality rate, the suffering experienced by patients, and the high costs of treatment make fighting this disease a research priority.

Even with extensive pre-screening, the whittled-down number of molecules to review for this project is estimated at over two hundred million for each protein — a daunting number. Analyzing this quantity of anything requires an enormous amount of computational power. And when the numbers are this big, even supercomputing is limited. A super computer has a peak capacity. That is, if a workload is three times the capacity of the computer, the jobs must be “queued up” and attacked consecutively. A project like this one might take so much time that a researcher wouldn’t even embark on it — he or she wouldn’t see the end result in their lifetime. However, with distributed computing, thousands or even millions of individual computers can each work on different molecules simultaneously, and the time to results can be significantly lessened.

Diana Campbell’s Letter

I have had Stage IV Breast Cancer (metastases to the bones) since Sept. 2000, and was first diagnosed as Stage IIIB in January, 1992. The past decade has been a roller coaster ride and if you, a family member or friend has cancer, then you know what I’m talking about.

I began researching Stage IV Breast Cancer in the summer of 1999 when an X-ray during a checkup showed a suspicious sliver on a back rib. Many months later, this sliver was a huge tumor, but it had previously biopsied negative. I had a feeling something was not right so I began researching. I found there was not as much info on Stage IV as there was on Breast Cancer prevention and awareness as well as early stage, primary diagnosis and treatment.

So I created this website and the associated Survivor webring, email lists, research project and stores. My goal was to provide the information here that we all want to know at this Stage — mostly associated with what we can do to prolong our lives. I am in the process of updating and adding but I hope this site will be of some help to you. Please join the UD grid too as this project will help speed cancer research and possibly help me and others too very shortly as we cope with stage IV breast cancer.

Diana Campbell

Diana passed away on February 19, 2003

Within a month of joining Diana’s team in December 2000 I found that cancer had vested itself in my frailer human body too.

The initial team which Diana formed began to dwindle as cancer took its ugly toll. Wishing always remember my dear friend and make a contribution, my resources were transferred to the AS! team-CureNow. AS! is now exploring forming another team with broader appeal beyond the very small awards community and will be making a decision in the very near future. I will certainly join and a new team graphic with a link will be updated in this space.

To keep the memory of Diana alive there are now various Internet-based grid computing schemas available, thanks to the pioneering work of Oxford University and United Devices.

The World Community Grid software uses the idle time of Internet-connected computers and applies this computing power toward the advancement of humanity.

The agent works like a screen saver, only using a computer’s resources when it would otherwise be idle and relinquishing the resources back to the users when they start using the computers again. The agent can also be run like an application, always running in the background unless specifically disabled/paused.

While many public computing grids such as SETI@home or Folding@home have been devoted to a single project, the World Community Grid offers multiple humanitarian projects under a single umbrella. Projects are approved by an advisory board, with members from most of the major research institutions and universities, as well as the UN and WHO.

Within the grid, users may join teams that have been created by organizations, groups, or individuals. Teams allow for a heightened sense of community identity and attempts to inspire competitiveness.

World Community Grid also differs from other grid projects by offering support for more than one grid infrastructure. The open source BOINC client is available for Linux, Windows, and Mac; the proprietary Grid MP from United Devices Inc. is only available for Windows.

History

The United Devices Smallpox Research Grid Project was sponsored by IBM and other Research Participants to accelerate the discovery of a smallpox cure. The Smallpox study employed computational chemistry on a massive distributed computing grid to analyze candidates for a medical therapy to fight the smallpox virus.

The project allowed scientists to screen 35 million potential drug molecules against several smallpox proteins to identify good candidates for developing into smallpox treatments. In the first 72 hours, 100,000 results were returned and 44 strong treatment candidates were identified at the completion of the project.

Based on the success of the Smallpox study, IBM announced on November 16, 2004 the creation of World Community Grid with the goal of creating a technical environment where other humanitarian research could be processed.

World Community Grid initially only supported Windows, using the proprietary grid technology from United Devices which powers grid.org projects. Strong demand for Linux support led to the open source BOINC grid technology which powers the Seti@home and Climateprediction (among others) being added. Mac OS X support is now also included.

As of March 24, 2007, the World Community Grid had nearly 272,000 members with over 550,000 registered work stations. It had a total process run time equivalent to about 82,000 years and about 80 million results have been sent. The World Community Grid updates these statistics several times a day, making the information available through a dedicated statistics page.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

CHARLES BABBAGE

Before this time various mechanical devices, such as the ‘Analytical Engine’, proposed by Charles Babbage, an English mathematician, in the early 19th century, could be seen as computers. The machine was never built, due to size, complexity and funding, although funding was provided.

In fact Babbage’s design was built according to his plans around 1990, using 19th century tolerances, and worked perfectly. Babbage had designed the machine as a calculator remarkably similar to a modern computer, in that it was to be operated by a program coded onto a punch card. It also had features like loops and branching similar to present day programs.

An earlier design, of the ‘Difference Engine’ was intended to calculate various mathematical tables, such as Logarithmic tables, well known to students before the calculator came along. The idea was to perform reliable calculations, as the people currently handling the task, (known as computers) made many errors.

ALAN TURING

Alan Turing, another English mathematician, born some 120 years after Babbage, advanced the field of the computing. Turing has been called the ‘Father of Computer Science’ He devised the Turing Machine in the 1930s, this was essentially a model of a computer, needing only the electronics to make one.

During WW2 he worked as a cryptanalyst at Bletchley Park, and devised a method to break the Enigma Code machine used by the German navy. His device the Bombe was used to decipher the coded messages sent by German Naval Command.

Also in use at Bletchley Park was the Colossus computer. This was designed by Tommy Flowers to aid in decrypting the Lorenz machine, used by German High Command to encrypt teleprinter messages.

As advances have been made in computing, the question has often been asked, Is Artificial Intelligence possible? In 1950 Turing asked ‘can a machine think?’ He answered yes, but then asked ‘If it could think, how could we tell?

THE TURING TEST

Turing proposed a test to be used to determine if Artificial Intelligence has been achieved in a computer, suggesting it should have been achieved by the year 2000. This is known as the ‘Turing Test’, it requires a computer to convince a human that it is a human, too.

The test is based on a popular game of the time, in which the player is required to determine which of two persons in another room is a man, and which a woman. Communication is by written question and answer, ideally by teletype, and the player must ask questions of the two to arrive at a conclusion.

In the Turing Test, the determination is between a computer, and a human. It should not be possible to say that the computer is definitely a computer! The computer must therefore be thinking, and learning.

AIMING FOR THE TURING TEST

As an encouragement to computer designers, an annual prize, the Loebner, is awarded to the best computer advancing the development of artificial intelligence, defined as the most human-like computer, for that year. A major prize is available for the first computer which passes the Turing test.

There is also a Turing Award, this is an annual award for technical contributions to the computing field, It has been awarded annually since 1966. Most winners have been computer scientists.

THE FUTURE

It still seems probable that a computer will be produced which can emulate a human, and not just in written communication. Video and audio communication should also be possible. Current estimates of a date for this to happen are around the year 2020.

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

The history of computer dates back a lot longer than the 1900s, in fact computers have been around for over 5000 years.

In ancient time a “computer”, (or “computor”) was a person who performed numerical calculations under the direction of a mathematician.

Some of the better known devices used are the Abacus or the Antikythera mechanism.

Around 1725 Basile Bouchon used perforated paper in a loom to establish the pattern to be reproduced on cloth. This ensured that the pattern was always the same and hardly had any human errors.

Later, in 1801, Joseph Jacquard (1752 – 1834), used the punch card idea to automate more devices with great success.

The First computers?

Charles Babbage’s. (1792-1871), was ahead of his time, and using the punch card idea he developed the first computing devices that would be used for scientific purposes. He invented the Charles Babbage’s Difference Engine, which he begun in 1823 but never completed. Later he started work on the Analytical Engine, it was designed in 1842.

Babbage was also credited with inventing computing concepts such as conditional branches, iterative loops and index variables.

Ada Lovelace (1815-1852), was a colleague of Babbage and founder of scientific computing.

Many people improved on the Babbage inventions, George Scheutz along with his son, Edvard Scheutz, began work on a smaller version and by 1853 they had constructed a machine that could process 15-digit numbers and calculate fourth-order differences.

On of the first notable commercial use, (and success), of computers was the US Census Bureau, which used punch-card equipment designed by Herman Hollerith to tabulate data for the 1890 census.

To compensate for the cyclical nature of the Census Bureau’s demand for his machines, Hollerith founded the Tabulating Machine Company (1896), which was one of three companies that merged to form IBM in 1911.

Later, Claude Shannon (1916- 2001) first suggested the use of digital electronics in computers and in 1937 and J.V.Atanasoff built the first electronic computer that could solve 29 simultaneous equations with 29 unknowns. But this device was not programmable

During those trouble times, computers evolved at a rapid rate. But because of restrictions many projects remained secret until much later and notable example is the British military “Colossus” developed in 1943 by Alan Turing and his team.

In the late 1940 the US army commissioned John V. Mauchly to develop a device to compute ballistics during World War II. As it turned out the machine was only ready in 1945, but the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer, or ENIAC, proved to be a turning point in computer history.

ENIAC proved to be a very efficient machine but not a very easy one to operate. Any changes would sometime require the device itself to be re-programmed. The engineers were all too aware of this obvious problem and they developed “stored program architecture”.

John von Neumann, (a consultant to the ENIAC), Mauchly and his team developed EDVAC, this new project used stored program.

Eckert and Mauchly later developed what was arguably the first commercially successful computer, the UNIVAC.

Software technology during this period was very primitive. The first programs were written out in machine code. By the 1950s programmers were using a symbolic notation, known as assembly language, then hand-translating the symbolic notation into machine code. Later programs known as assemblers performed the translation task.

The Transistor era, the end of the inventor.

Late 1950 saw the end of valve driven computers. Transistor based computers were used because they were smaller, cheaper, faster and a lot more reliable.

Corporations, rather than inventors, were now producing the new computers.

Some of the better known ones are:

* TRADIC at Bell Laboratories in 1954,
* TX-0 at MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory
* IBM 704 and its successors, the 709 and 7094. The latter introduced I/O processors for better throughput between I/O devices and main memory
* First supper computers, The Livermore Atomic Research Computer (LARC) and the IBM 7030 (aka Stretch)
* The Texas Instrument Advanced Scientific Computer (TI-ASC)

Now the basis of computers was in place, with transistors the computers were faster and with Stored program architecture you could use the computer for almost anything.

New high level programs soon arrived, FORTRAN (1956), ALGOL (1958), and COBOL (1959), Cambridge and the University of London cooperated in the development of CPL (Combined Programming Language, 1963). Martin Richards of Cambridge developed a subset of CPL called BCPL (Basic Computer Programming Language, 1967).

In 1969, the CDC 7600 was released, it could perform 10 million floating point operations per second (10 Mflops).

The network years.

From 1985 onward the race was on to put as many transistors as possible on one computer. Each one of them could do a simple operation. But apart from been faster and been able to perform more operations the computer has not evolved much.

The concept of parallel processing is more widely used from the 1990s.

In the area of computer networking, both wide area network (WAN) and local area network (LAN) technology developed at a rapid pace

“This article is brought to you by Gus Woltmann”.

Unlike most devices, the computer is one of the few inventions that does not have one specific inventor. Throughout the development of the computer, many people have added their creations to the list required to make a computer work. Some of the inventions have been different types of computers, and some of them were parts required to allow computers to be developed further.

The Beginning

Perhaps the most significant date in the history of computers is the year 1936. It was in this year that the first “computer” was developed. It was created by Konrad Zuse and dubbed the Z1 Computer. This computer stands as the first as it was the first system to be fully programmable. There were devices prior to this, but none had the computing power that sets it apart from other electronics.

It wasn’t until 1942 that any business saw profit and opportunity in computers. This first company was called ABC computers, owned and operated by John Atanasoff and Clifford Berry. Two years later, the Harvard Mark I computer was developed, furthering the science of computing.

Over the course of the next few years, inventors all over the world began to search more into the study of computers, and how to improve upon them. Those next ten years say the introduction of the transistor, which would become a vital part of the inner workings of the computer, the ENIAC 1 computer, as well as many other types of systems. The ENIAC 1 is perhaps one of the most interesting, as it required 20,000 vacuum tubes to operate. It was a massive machine, and started the revolution to build smaller and faster computers.

The age of computers was forever altered by the introduction of International Business Machines, or IBM, into the computing industry in 1953. This company, over the course of computer history, has been a major player in the development of new systems and servers for public and private use. This introduction brought about the first real signs of competition within computing history, which helped to spur faster and better development of computers. Their first contribution was the IBM 701 EDPM Computer.

A Programming Language Evolves

A year later, the first successful high level programming language was created. This was a programming language not written in ‘assembly’ or binary, which are considered very low level languages. FORTRAN was written so that more people could begin to program computers easily.

The year 1955, the Bank of America, coupled with Stanford Research Institute and General Electric, saw the creation of the first computers for use in banks. The MICR, or Magnetic Ink Character Recognition, coupled with the actual computer, the ERMA, was a breakthrough for the banking industry. It wasn’t until 1959 that the pair of systems were put into use in actual banks.

During 1958, one of the most important breakthroughs in computer history occurred, the creation of the integrated circuit. This device, also known as the chip, is one of the base requirements for modern computer systems. On every motherboard and card within a computer system, are many chips that contain information on what the boards and cards do. Without these chips, the systems as we know them today cannot function.

Gaming, Mice, & the Internet

For many computer users now, games are a vital part of the computing experience. 1962 saw the creation of the first computer game, which was created by Steve Russel and MIT, which was dubbed Spacewar.

The mouse, one of the most basic components of modern computers, was created in 1964 by Douglass Engelbart. It obtained its name from the “tail” leading out of the device.

One of the most important aspects of computers today was invented in 1969. ARPA net was the original Internet, which provided the foundation for the Internet that we know today. This development would result in the evolution of knowledge and business across the entire planet.

It wasn’t until 1970 that Intel entered the scene with the first dynamic RAM chip, which resulted in an explosion of computer science innovation.

On the heels of the RAM chip was the first microprocessor, which was also designed by Intel. These two components, in addition to the chip developed in 1958, would number among the core components of modern computers.

A year later, the floppy disk was created, gaining its name from the flexibility of the storage unit. This was the first step in allowing most people to transfer bits of data between unconnected computers.

The first networking card was created in 1973, allowing data transfer between connected computers. This is similar to the Internet, but allows for the computers to connect without use of the Internet.

Household PC’s Emerge

The next three years were very important for computers. This is when companies began to develop systems for the average consumer. The Scelbi, Mark-8 Altair, IBM 5100, Apple I and II, TRS-80, and the Commodore Pet computers were the forerunners in this area. While expensive, these machines started the trend for computers within common households.

One of the most major breathroughs in computer software occurred in 1978 with the release of the VisiCalc Spreadsheet program. All development costs were paid for within a two week period of time, which makes this one of the most successful programs in computer history.

1979 was perhaps one of the most important years for the home computer user. This is the year that WordStar, the first word processing program, was released to the public for sale. This drastically altered the usefulness of computers for the everyday user.

The IBM Home computer quickly helped revolutionize the consumer market in 1981, as it was affordable for home owners and standard consumers. 1981 also saw the the mega-giant Microsoft enter the scene with the MS-DOS operating system. This operating system utterly changed computing forever, as it was easy enough for everyone to learn.

The Competition Begins : Apple vs. Microsoft

Computers saw yet another vital change during the year of 1983. The Apple Lisa computer was the first with a graphical user interface, or a GUI. Most modern programs contain a GUI, which allows them to be easy to use and pleasing for the eyes. This marked the beginning of the out dating of most text based only programs.

Beyond this point in computer history, many changes and alterations have occurred, from the Apple-Microsoft wars, to the developing of microcomputers and a variety of computer breakthroughs that have become an accepted part of our daily lives. Without the initial first steps of computer history, none of this would have been possible.

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It is applicable to a wide variety of academic disciplines, from the physical and social sciences to the humanities.
Statistics are also used for making informed decisions. Statistical methods can be used to summarize or describe a collection of data; this is called descriptive statistics.
In addition, patterns in the data may be modeled in a way that accounts for randomness and uncertainty in the observations, and then used to draw inferences about the process or population being studied; this is called inferential statistics.
Both descriptive and inferential statistics comprise applied statistics.
There is also a discipline called mathematical statistics, which is concerned with the theoretical basis of the subject. A common goal for a statistical research project is to investigate causality, and in particular to draw a conclusion on the effect of changes in the values of predictors or independent variables on response or dependent variables.
There are two major types of causal statistical studies, experimental studies and observational studies.
In both types of studies, the effect of differences of an independent variable (or variables) on the behavior of the dependent variable are observed.
The difference between the two types is in how the study is actually conducted.
Each can be very effective..
Data mining
Data mining, also known as knowledge-discovery in databases (KDD), is the practice of automatically searching large stores of data for patterns.
To do this, data mining uses computational techniques from statistics, machine learning and pattern recognition..

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Every parallelogram is a polygon, and more specifically a quadrilateral.
Special cases of a parallelogram are the rhombus, in which all four sides are of equal length, the rectangle, in which the two sets of opposing, parallel sides are perpendicular to each other, and the square, in which all four sides are of equal length and the two sets of opposing, parallel sides are perpendicular to each other.
In any parallelogram, the diagonals bisect each other, i.e, they cut each other in half..

It uses controlled, scientifically-designed experiments to test economic theories under laboratory conditions.
Typical empirical research is limited by the fact that only a subset of the set of all possible influences affect (or can be observed to be affecting) economic decision making; therefore, the ability to control for certain influences is limited or non-existent.
With experiments, economists can fix some inputs and measure the effects of other inputs in a way that allows ceteris-paribus comparisons..
Computational genomics
Computational genomics is the study of deciphering biology from genome sequences using computational analysis, including both DNA and RNA.
Computational genomics includes: bio-sequence analysis, gene expression data analysis, phylogenetic analysis, and more specifically pattern recognition and analysis problems such as gene finding, motif finding, gene function prediction, fusion of sequence and expression information, and evolutionary models..

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Other terms for ubiquitous computing include pervasive computing, calm technology, things that think and everyware.
Promoters of this idea hope that embedding computation into the environment and everyday objects would enable people to interact with information-processing devices more naturally and casually than they currently do, and in whatever location or circumstance they find themselves.
Ubiquitous computing encompasses wide range of research topics, including distributed computing, mobile computing, sensor networks, human-computer interaction, and artificial intelligence..
Security engineering
Security engineering is the field of engineering dealing with the security and integrity of real-world systems.
It is similar to systems engineering in that its motivation is to make a system meet requirements, but with the added dimension of enforcing a security policy.
It has existed as an informal field for centuries, in the fields of locksmithing and security printing. Technological advances, principally in the field of computers, have now allowed the creation of far more complex systems, with new and complex security problems.
Because modern systems cut across many areas of human endeavor, security engineers not only need consider the mathematical and physical properties of systems; they also need to consider attacks on the people who use and form parts of those systems using social engineering attacks.
Secure systems have to resist not only technical attacks, but also coercion, fraud, and deception by confidence tricksters. For this reason it involves aspects of social science, psychology and economics, as well as physics, chemistry and mathematics.
Some of the techniques used, such as fault tree analysis, are derived from safety engineering..

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The goal of this area is usually to improve understanding of the data being presented.
For example, scientists interpret potentially huge quantities of laboratory or simulation data or the results from sensors out in the field to aid reasoning, hypothesis building and cognition.
The field of data mining offers many abstract visualizations related to these visualization types.
They are active research areas, drawing on theory in information graphics, computer graphics, human-computer interaction and cognitive science.
Desktop programs capable of presenting interactive models of molecules and microbiological entities are becoming relatively common (Molecular graphics).
The field of Bioinformatics and the field of Cheminformatics make a heavy use of these visualization engines for interpreting lab data and for training purposes.
Medical imaging is a huge application domain for scientific visualization with an emphasis on enhancing imaging results graphically, e.g.
using pseudo-coloring or overlaying of plots.
Real-time visualization can serve to simultaneously image analysis results within or beside an analyzed (e.g.
segmented) scan..

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The defining feature of modern computers which distinguishes them from all other machines is that they can be programmed. That is to say that a list of instructions (the program) can be given to the computer and it will store them and carry them out at some time in the future.

In most cases, computer instructions are simple: add one number to another, move some data from one location to another, send a message to some external device, etc. These instructions are read from the computer’s memory and are generally carried out (executed) in the order they were given. However, there are usually specialized instructions to tell the computer to jump ahead or backwards to some other place in the program and to carry on executing from there. These are called “jump” instructions (or branches). Furthermore, jump instructions may be made to happen conditionally so that different sequences of instructions may be used depending on the result of some previous calculation or some external event. Many computers directly support subroutines by providing a type of jump that “remembers” the location it jumped from and another instruction to return to the instruction following that jump instruction.

Program execution might be likened to reading a book. While a person will normally read each word and line in sequence, they may at times jump back to an earlier place in the text or skip sections that are not of interest. Similarly, a computer may sometimes go back and repeat the instructions in some section of the program over and over again until some internal condition is met. This is called the flow of control within the program and it is what allows the computer to perform tasks repeatedly without human intervention.

Comparatively, a person using a pocket calculator can perform a basic arithmetic operation such as adding two numbers with just a few button presses. But to add together all of the numbers from 1 to 1,000 would take thousands of button presses and a lot of time—with a near certainty of making a mistake. On the other hand, a computer may be programmed to do this with just a few simple instructions. For example:

mov #0,sum ; set sum to 0
mov #1,num ; set num to 1
loop: add num,sum ; add num to sum
add #1,num ; add 1 to num
cmp num,#1000 ; compare num to 1000
ble loop ; if num <= 1000, go back to 'loop'
halt ; end of program. stop running

Once told to run this program, the computer will perform the repetitive addition task without further human intervention. It will almost never make a mistake and a modern PC can complete the task in about a millionth of a second.^[14]

However, computers cannot “think” for themselves in the sense that they only solve problems in exactly the way they are programmed to. An intelligent human faced with the above addition task might soon realize that instead of actually adding up all the numbers one can simply use the equation

and arrive at the correct answer (500,500) with little work.^[15] In other words, a computer programmed to add up the numbers one by one as in the example above would do exactly that without regard to efficiency or alternative solutions.

The Jacquard loom, on display at the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester, England, was one of the first programmable devices.The first use of the word “computer” was recorded in 1613, referring to a person who carried out calculations, or computations, and the word continued to be used in that sense until the middle of the 20th century. From the end of the 19th century onwards though, the word began to take on its more familiar meaning, describing a machine that carries out computations.

The history of the modern computer begins with two separate technologies—automated calculation and programmability—but no single device can be identified as the earliest computer, partly because of the inconsistent application of that term. Examples of early mechanical calculating devices include the abacus, the slide rule and arguably the astrolabe and the Antikythera mechanism (which dates from about 150–100 BC). Hero of Alexandria (c. 10–70 AD) built a mechanical theater which performed a play lasting 10 minutes and was operated by a complex system of ropes and drums that might be considered to be a means of deciding which parts of the mechanism performed which actions and when.[4] This is the essence of programmability.

The “castle clock”, an astronomical clock invented by Al-Jazari in 1206, is considered to be the earliest programmable analog computer.[5] It displayed the zodiac, the solar and lunar orbits, a crescent moon-shaped pointer travelling across a gateway causing automatic doors to open every hour,[6][7] and five robotic musicians who played music when struck by levers operated by a camshaft attached to a water wheel. The length of day and night could be re-programmed to compensate for the changing lengths of day and night throughout the year.[5]

The Renaissance saw a re-invigoration of European mathematics and engineering. Wilhelm Schickard’s 1623 device was the first of a number of mechanical calculators constructed by European engineers, but none fit the modern definition of a computer, because they could not be programmed.

In 1801, Joseph Marie Jacquard made an improvement to the textile loom by introducing a series of punched paper cards as a template which allowed his loom to weave intricate patterns automatically. The resulting Jacquard loom was an important step in the development of computers because the use of punched cards to define woven patterns can be viewed as an early, albeit limited, form of programmability.

It was the fusion of automatic calculation with programmability that produced the first recognizable computers. In 1837, Charles Babbage was the first to conceptualize and design a fully programmable mechanical computer, his analytical engine.[8] Limited finances and Babbage’s inability to resist tinkering with the design meant that the device was never completed.

In the late 1880s, Herman Hollerith invented the recording of data on a machine readable medium. Prior uses of machine readable media, above, had been for control, not data. “After some initial trials with paper tape, he settled on punched cards …”[9] To process these punched cards he invented the tabulator, and the keypunch machines. These three inventions were the foundation of the modern information processing industry. Large-scale automated data processing of punched cards was performed for the 1890 United States Census by Hollerith’s company, which later became the core of IBM. By the end of the 19th century a number of technologies that would later prove useful in the realization of practical computers had begun to appear: the punched card, Boolean algebra, the vacuum tube (thermionic valve) and the teleprinter.

During the first half of the 20th century, many scientific computing needs were met by increasingly sophisticated analog computers, which used a direct mechanical or electrical model of the problem as a basis for computation. However, these were not programmable and generally lacked the versatility and accuracy of modern digital computers.

Alan Turing is widely regarded to be the father of modern computer science. In 1936 Turing provided an influential formalisation of the concept of the algorithm and computation with the Turing machine. Of his role in the modern computer, Time Magazine in naming Turing one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century, states: “The fact remains that everyone who taps at a keyboard, opening a spreadsheet or a word-processing program, is working on an incarnation of a Turing machine.” [10]

George Stibitz is internationally recognized as a father of the modern digital computer. While working at Bell Labs in November 1937, Stibitz invented and built a relay-based calculator he dubbed the “Model K” (for “kitchen table”, on which he had assembled it), which was the first to use binary circuits to perform an arithmetic operation. Later models added greater sophistication including complex arithmetic and programmability.[11]

Defining characteristics of some early digital computers of the 1940s (In the history of computing hardware)
Name First operational Numeral system Computing mechanism Programming Turing complete
Zuse Z3 (Germany) May-41 Binary Electro-mechanical Program-controlled by punched film stock (but no conditional branch) Yes (1998)
Atanasoff–Berry Computer (US) 1942 Binary Electronic Not programmable—single purpose No
Colossus Mark 1 (UK) Feb-44 Binary Electronic Program-controlled by patch cables and switches No
Harvard Mark I – IBM ASCC (US) May-44 Decimal Electro-mechanical Program-controlled by 24-channel punched paper tape (but no conditional branch) No
Colossus Mark 2 (UK) Jun-44 Binary Electronic Program-controlled by patch cables and switches No
ENIAC (US) Jul-46 Decimal Electronic Program-controlled by patch cables and switches Yes
Manchester Small-Scale Experimental Machine (UK) Jun-48 Binary Electronic Stored-program in Williams cathode ray tube memory Yes
Modified ENIAC (US) Sep-48 Decimal Electronic Program-controlled by patch cables and switches plus a primitive read-only stored programming mechanism using the Function Tables as program ROM Yes
EDSAC (UK) May-49 Binary Electronic Stored-program in mercury delay line memory Yes
Manchester Mark 1 (UK) Oct-49 Binary Electronic Stored-program in Williams cathode ray tube memory and magnetic drum memory Yes
CSIRAC (Australia) Nov-49 Binary Electronic Stored-program in mercury delay line memory Yes

A succession of steadily more powerful and flexible computing devices were constructed in the 1930s and 1940s, gradually adding the key features that are seen in modern computers. The use of digital electronics (largely invented by Claude Shannon in 1937) and more flexible programmability were vitally important steps, but defining one point along this road as “the first digital electronic computer” is difficult.Shannon 1940 Notable achievements include:

EDSAC was one of the first computers to implement the stored program (von Neumann) architecture.
Die of an Intel 80486DX2 microprocessor (actual size: 12×6.75 mm) in its packaging.Konrad Zuse’s electromechanical “Z machines”. The Z3 (1941) was the first working machine featuring binary arithmetic, including floating point arithmetic and a measure of programmability. In 1998 the Z3 was proved to be Turing complete, therefore being the world’s first operational computer.[citation needed]
The non-programmable Atanasoff–Berry Computer (1941) which used vacuum tube based computation, binary numbers, and regenerative capacitor memory. The use of regenerative memory allowed it to be much more compact then its peers (being approximately the size of a large desk or workbench), since intermediate results could be stored and then fed back into the same set of computation elements.
The secret British Colossus computers (1943),[12] which had limited programmability but demonstrated that a device using thousands of tubes could be reasonably reliable and electronically reprogrammable. It was used for breaking German wartime codes.
The Harvard Mark I (1944), a large-scale electromechanical computer with limited programmability.
The U.S. Army’s Ballistic Research Laboratory ENIAC (1946), which used decimal arithmetic and is sometimes called the first general purpose electronic computer (since Konrad Zuse’s Z3 of 1941 used electromagnets instead of electronics). Initially, however, ENIAC had an inflexible architecture which essentially required rewiring to change its programming.
Several developers of ENIAC, recognizing its flaws, came up with a far more flexible and elegant design, which came to be known as the “stored program architecture” or von Neumann architecture. This design was first formally described by John von Neumann in the paper First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC, distributed in 1945. A number of projects to develop computers based on the stored-program architecture commenced around this time, the first of these being completed in Great Britain. The first to be demonstrated working was the Manchester Small-Scale Experimental Machine (SSEM or “Baby”), while the EDSAC, completed a year after SSEM, was the first practical implementation of the stored program design. Shortly thereafter, the machine originally described by von Neumann’s paper—EDVAC—was completed but did not see full-time use for an additional two years.

Nearly all modern computers implement some form of the stored-program architecture, making it the single trait by which the word “computer” is now defined. While the technologies used in computers have changed dramatically since the first electronic, general-purpose computers of the 1940s, most still use the von Neumann architecture.

Computers using vacuum tubes as their electronic elements were in use throughout the 1950s, but by the 1960s had been largely replaced by transistor-based machines, which were smaller, faster, cheaper to produce, required less power, and were more reliable. The first transistorised computer was demonstrated at the University of Manchester in 1953.[13] In the 1970s, integrated circuit technology and the subsequent creation of microprocessors, such as the Intel 4004, further decreased size and cost and further increased speed and reliability of computers. By the late 1970s, many products such as video recorders contained dedicated computers called microcontrollers, and they started to appear as a replacement to mechanical controls in domestic appliances such as washing machines. The 1980s witnessed home computers and the now ubiquitous personal computer. With the evolution of the Internet, personal computers are becoming as common as the television and the telephone in the household.

Modern smartphones are fully-programmable computers in their own right, and as of 2009 may well be the most common form of such computers in existence.
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