Encyclopedias are informative, and take great pains to try and cover as much of everything technical that they can, and give you a whole load of facts, which is great for geek junkies.Wikipedia is perhaps the largest Encyclopedia there is, and is a fantastic for knowledge, but it contains too many words or lines that you could spend the rest of your life reading every entry and not get even quarter.
With this Geek Encyclopedia, I’m trying to sift through the millions (billions?) of tech terms and notable people out there to come up with a must know list – discarding what we think you already know, or don't
need to know.
Aakash
Aakash is a series of Android based tablets produced by British company Datawind in association with the Indian Government, IIT Bombay and an India-based manufacturer QUAD. Aakash is presently the most economical tablet in the world. Commercially named Ubislate 7+ it’s available for $60 in the market with a 50% discount for students. Aakash is a 7-inch touch screen with ARM 11 processor and 256MB RAM, running Android 2.2 OS. Aakash 1 was developed with an aim to reach 25,000 colleges and 400 universities across India and provide all students at least one computing device, as part of the “One Laptop per Child (OLPC)” scheme. Aakash 2 (UbiSlate 7 Ci) was released on November 11th, 2012 with a supposedly better processor. It was developed in association with IIT Rajasthan.
Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP)
The AGP port was designed by Intel in August 1997 for video cards and 3D card accelerators. AGP is the brainchild of Ajay Bhatt, Intel's Chief I/O architect, who was also behind the invention of USB ports (Remember that Intel advert with an Indian walking around like a rockstar?!). AGP was a milestone in the area of video cards and GPUs. AGP introduced a dedicated point-to-point channel due to which the graphic controller can directly access the system memory. AGP allows 3D textures to be stored in the main memory rather than the video memory – a significant development over the PCI bus. This increases bandwidth and supports more powerful graphics. A much advanced AGP Pro was developed later; it provided more power to video cards. Earlier, not all operating systems and motherboards supported AGP due to limited or no driver support. By 2010, however, many motherboards were produced with the AGP slots.
ActionScript is an object-oriented scripting language based on the ECMAScript (European Computer Manufacturers Association) and is used majorly in applications such as Flash. The language is strikingly similar to JavaScript. With the help of ActionScript, you can control the actions of Flash objects. It’s also used for game programming, basic Flash animations and in the construction of multimedia websites, e-commerce websites and community portals. With online gaming gaining popularity since the early 90s, ActionScript has become one of the most widely used programming languages. The numbers of APIs developed for ActionScript were sky-high. Many physics engines such as Box 2D were developed to merge with ActionScript and Flash, helping speed up the game development process. But since Apple stopped supporting Flash on iOS devices, ActionScript and Flash witnessed a major downfall. Adobe came up with an extension of Adobe AIR that could port the Flash game onto iOS. Let’s see how this changes the use of ActionScript.
ActiveX is a framework developed by Microsoft for defining reusable software components, like an API. This is a programming language independent framework and hence can be used in a wide range of applications. It was developed to simplify the complex processes of Object Linking and Embedding (technology that allows linking to documents and objects) and Component Object Modeling (used for inter-process communication). Many of Microsoft’s applications such as Internet Explorer, Office, Visual Studio and Media Player use ActiveX controls. ActiveX helps make web browsers more interactive. Functionalities like opening PDF files within the browser can be included with the help of ActiveX controls. ActiveX controls dynamically vary depending upon the website that’s accessing them. These controls are basically like browser add-ons and hence each has different functions such as enhancing security or enhancing video content. Since ActiveX automatically downloads itself and installs during browsing, Microsoft had to work on plenty of security issues to secure the browsing session. It recently made ActiveX an Open Source technology to encourage developers to join in.
Ad-hoc is a Local Area Network that is built spontaneously and doesn’t depend on pre-existing infrastructure such as routers, etc. Hence, all devices in an ad-hoc network have equal status on a network and participate in routing and data-forwarding. Data packets are dynamically forwarded to and from each other. It’s useful in areas where central nodes don’t exist or can’t be depend upon. This is widely used in emergency situations and military conflicts. Ad-hoc networks can be easily and quickly open which increases its application domain. Two types of ad-hoc networks are possible depending upon the devices that are connected: Heterogeneous, where each machine has different capabilities and hence performs different actions and Homogeneous, where all machines/nodes have the same capabilities and hence the same responsibility.
Adobe
Adobe Systems Inc., headquartered at San Jose California, is an American multinational company which focused on multimedia and creativity software products until recently extending into Internet Application Software Development. Adobe was founded by two ex Xerox employees in 1982, and ironically its first project was a licensing of “PostScript” that Apple gave them to use in their LaserWriter printers. Over the years, Adobe has developed some remarkable products such as Photoshop, Flash, AIR, After Effects, Premier and PDF Reader, which they provide individually and also as a package (Creative Suite). Flash was one of the major development platforms for online games and websites until Apple decided not to support Flash on its iOS devices, which raised quite a few eyebrows. Adobe locked horns with Apple by filing a lawsuit (mukadma) for anti-competitive actions. Recently though, Adobe developed a plug-in with the help of Adobe AIR, by which developers can port their flash games into iOS devices also. Adobe also recently developed “Creative Cloud” aimed at students and faculty, giving them 24/7 access to all the Adobe tools.
ADSL
DSL or Digital Subscriber line is the technology that allows us to use the internet by transmitting digital data over a local telephone network. ADSL or Asymmetric DSL is an advanced technology which enables even faster communication over copper telephone lines. This is done using frequencies that are not used by a telephone call. It’s been observed that ADSL can be used only over short distances from a telephone exchange (up to 4 kms). To allow both, ADSL and regular voice services to be transmitted simultaneously, a special filter named “Splitter” is used. On being installed on old telephone services, ADSL creates a lot of
Adware is a software application running inside another software and has advertisements embedded in it. Adware generally runs in the background of a freeware program and intermittently(at irregular interval) shows the user advertisements. An additional code is included to display pop-up ads. The main aim of adware is to recover development cost which is forfeited(gave up) to reduce cost for the user. For example, Amazon uses this technique to display ads in Kindle and sell them at a lower-cost than the ad-free versions of Kindle. Many iOS/Android apps also employ this application. The main criticism of adware is that some of them track the user’s actions and create a user profile and generate ads accordingly or sell this information to third parties. Hence, where this information is going is unknown and raises potential threats. Add to the fact that some adware affect the way computers perform. There’s a whole large number of malicious adware even on Facebook; some of them cover your timeline with their ads!
Advanced Encryption Standard is a type of encryption that is widely used in U.S. government agencies and many other private commercial transactions. It was established by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in the year 2001 and was originally called Rijndael. AES is more advanced than DES, which was a widely used encryption standard till the 90s. It was less secure and reliable, which is where AES shone. In 1997, a process was initiated by NIST to find a replacement for DES which is based on a symmetric-key algorithm (same key used for encryption and decryption) and could support 128, 192 and 256 bits at a minimum.
Ajax is a collection of inter-related web development techniques which can be used to create a web application that communicates with the server in the background independent of the present stage of the page. It is a client-side used application and directly communicates with the server. It is an acronym for Asynchronous JavaScript and XML and as the name suggests, it uses JavaScript functions to call methods from a web service. Using Ajax reduces the traffic levels between client and the server and the response time is also pretty fast. It is compatible with JSON also and hence
Alan Turing, born in 1954, is considered to be the father of computer science and artificial intelligence. He was a British mathematician, logician, cryptanalyst and computer scientist with an Indian connection. His father, Julius Mathison Turing worked for the Indian Civil Service (the ICS). At the age of 16, he encountered the work of Albert Einstein and found it quite interesting. He extended Einstein’s work over Newton’s laws of motion and even crisply(sharply) explained it. He created the Turing machine which
Alexander Graham Bell was the genius who invented the Telephone which laid the foundation for all the advanced modern communication systems of the 21st century. Born in Scotland in 1847, he moved to Boston in 1872 to open a school for teaching speech to the deaf. He started experimenting on the ways to improve and use telegraphy. His constant involvement with the school helped his research on hearing and speech which further led him to experiment with hearing devices which eventually end in Bell being awarded the first US patent for the telephone in 1876. Bell was also credited for his invention of metal detectors in 1881. Bell was granted 18 patents on his name alone and 12 with his collaborators, and his inventions were spread across the fields of Photophone, Phonograph, HydroPlanes, Audio meter, Alternative Fuels. His deep interest in medical research, especially in techniques for teaching speech to the deaf led to the invention of the Tape Recorder, Hard Disk and Floppy Disk. Due to a complication arising from his diabetes, he died in 1922.
ALGOL, short form for Algorithmic Language is an imperative programming language developed in the 50s. It led to the invention of many languages such as C, Pascal and BCPL. ALGOL is the standard method for description of algorithms in textbooks and academic work, by ACM till date. ALGOL was designed by a committee of European and American computer scientists taking into consideration the problems that would arise through FORTRAN (A programming language developed by IBM and extensively used till then as standard). It was the first programming language to include code blocks which had “begin” and “end” pairs and had nested function implementations along with a lexical scope.
Algorithm is one of the most commonly used words in Computer Science. An algorithm is a step-by-step procedure of solving a problem. The problem can be anything, such as “Find the shortest path between 2 points” or “Find what path birds follow in the sky” or “Search for a letter in a sentence”. The word is derived from the name of the mathematician, Mohammed ibn-Musa al-Khwarizmi, who was part of the royal court in Baghdad. The title of an important mathematical treatise by the 19th century Arabic is the source of the term “algebra”. An algorithm can be represented in any way − in either a specific programming language or a pseudo code or a flow chart or even control tables. Each algorithm has a time-complexity, which shows the amount of time it would take to complete when compared to the input size. The lesser the time-complexity of the algorithm, the more efficient it is. There may be more than one algorithm for a single problem; for example “sorting”. There are numerous sorting algorithms such as “merge sort”, “bucket sort” and “bubble sort”.
With this Geek Encyclopedia, I’m trying to sift through the millions (billions?) of tech terms and notable people out there to come up with a must know list – discarding what we think you already know, or don't
need to know.
Aakash
Aakash is a series of Android based tablets produced by British company Datawind in association with the Indian Government, IIT Bombay and an India-based manufacturer QUAD. Aakash is presently the most economical tablet in the world. Commercially named Ubislate 7+ it’s available for $60 in the market with a 50% discount for students. Aakash is a 7-inch touch screen with ARM 11 processor and 256MB RAM, running Android 2.2 OS. Aakash 1 was developed with an aim to reach 25,000 colleges and 400 universities across India and provide all students at least one computing device, as part of the “One Laptop per Child (OLPC)” scheme. Aakash 2 (UbiSlate 7 Ci) was released on November 11th, 2012 with a supposedly better processor. It was developed in association with IIT Rajasthan.
Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP)
The AGP port was designed by Intel in August 1997 for video cards and 3D card accelerators. AGP is the brainchild of Ajay Bhatt, Intel's Chief I/O architect, who was also behind the invention of USB ports (Remember that Intel advert with an Indian walking around like a rockstar?!). AGP was a milestone in the area of video cards and GPUs. AGP introduced a dedicated point-to-point channel due to which the graphic controller can directly access the system memory. AGP allows 3D textures to be stored in the main memory rather than the video memory – a significant development over the PCI bus. This increases bandwidth and supports more powerful graphics. A much advanced AGP Pro was developed later; it provided more power to video cards. Earlier, not all operating systems and motherboards supported AGP due to limited or no driver support. By 2010, however, many motherboards were produced with the AGP slots.
ActionScript
ActionScript is an object-oriented scripting language based on the ECMAScript (European Computer Manufacturers Association) and is used majorly in applications such as Flash. The language is strikingly similar to JavaScript. With the help of ActionScript, you can control the actions of Flash objects. It’s also used for game programming, basic Flash animations and in the construction of multimedia websites, e-commerce websites and community portals. With online gaming gaining popularity since the early 90s, ActionScript has become one of the most widely used programming languages. The numbers of APIs developed for ActionScript were sky-high. Many physics engines such as Box 2D were developed to merge with ActionScript and Flash, helping speed up the game development process. But since Apple stopped supporting Flash on iOS devices, ActionScript and Flash witnessed a major downfall. Adobe came up with an extension of Adobe AIR that could port the Flash game onto iOS. Let’s see how this changes the use of ActionScript.
ActiveX
ActiveX is a framework developed by Microsoft for defining reusable software components, like an API. This is a programming language independent framework and hence can be used in a wide range of applications. It was developed to simplify the complex processes of Object Linking and Embedding (technology that allows linking to documents and objects) and Component Object Modeling (used for inter-process communication). Many of Microsoft’s applications such as Internet Explorer, Office, Visual Studio and Media Player use ActiveX controls. ActiveX helps make web browsers more interactive. Functionalities like opening PDF files within the browser can be included with the help of ActiveX controls. ActiveX controls dynamically vary depending upon the website that’s accessing them. These controls are basically like browser add-ons and hence each has different functions such as enhancing security or enhancing video content. Since ActiveX automatically downloads itself and installs during browsing, Microsoft had to work on plenty of security issues to secure the browsing session. It recently made ActiveX an Open Source technology to encourage developers to join in.
Ad-hoc network
Ad-hoc is a Local Area Network that is built spontaneously and doesn’t depend on pre-existing infrastructure such as routers, etc. Hence, all devices in an ad-hoc network have equal status on a network and participate in routing and data-forwarding. Data packets are dynamically forwarded to and from each other. It’s useful in areas where central nodes don’t exist or can’t be depend upon. This is widely used in emergency situations and military conflicts. Ad-hoc networks can be easily and quickly open which increases its application domain. Two types of ad-hoc networks are possible depending upon the devices that are connected: Heterogeneous, where each machine has different capabilities and hence performs different actions and Homogeneous, where all machines/nodes have the same capabilities and hence the same responsibility.
Three types of ad-hoc networks exist on the basis of its application:
1. Mobile Ad-Hoc networks: A network of mobile devices.
2. Wireless Mesh networks: A network of radio nodes in a
mesh topology(arrangement of nodes in communication network).
3. Wireless Sensor networks: A network of distributed autonomous sensors to monitor physical or environmental conditions.
Adobe Systems Inc., headquartered at San Jose California, is an American multinational company which focused on multimedia and creativity software products until recently extending into Internet Application Software Development. Adobe was founded by two ex Xerox employees in 1982, and ironically its first project was a licensing of “PostScript” that Apple gave them to use in their LaserWriter printers. Over the years, Adobe has developed some remarkable products such as Photoshop, Flash, AIR, After Effects, Premier and PDF Reader, which they provide individually and also as a package (Creative Suite). Flash was one of the major development platforms for online games and websites until Apple decided not to support Flash on its iOS devices, which raised quite a few eyebrows. Adobe locked horns with Apple by filing a lawsuit (mukadma) for anti-competitive actions. Recently though, Adobe developed a plug-in with the help of Adobe AIR, by which developers can port their flash games into iOS devices also. Adobe also recently developed “Creative Cloud” aimed at students and faculty, giving them 24/7 access to all the Adobe tools.
DSL or Digital Subscriber line is the technology that allows us to use the internet by transmitting digital data over a local telephone network. ADSL or Asymmetric DSL is an advanced technology which enables even faster communication over copper telephone lines. This is done using frequencies that are not used by a telephone call. It’s been observed that ADSL can be used only over short distances from a telephone exchange (up to 4 kms). To allow both, ADSL and regular voice services to be transmitted simultaneously, a special filter named “Splitter” is used. On being installed on old telephone services, ADSL creates a lot of
interference and hence can be installed on only specific lines. In 1998, ADSL technology was very primitive and supported an upload rate of up to only 1.0 Mbit/s and a download rate of 8.0 Mbit/s. In 2012, these values have more than tripled!
Adware
Adware is a software application running inside another software and has advertisements embedded in it. Adware generally runs in the background of a freeware program and intermittently(at irregular interval) shows the user advertisements. An additional code is included to display pop-up ads. The main aim of adware is to recover development cost which is forfeited(gave up) to reduce cost for the user. For example, Amazon uses this technique to display ads in Kindle and sell them at a lower-cost than the ad-free versions of Kindle. Many iOS/Android apps also employ this application. The main criticism of adware is that some of them track the user’s actions and create a user profile and generate ads accordingly or sell this information to third parties. Hence, where this information is going is unknown and raises potential threats. Add to the fact that some adware affect the way computers perform. There’s a whole large number of malicious adware even on Facebook; some of them cover your timeline with their ads!
AES
Advanced Encryption Standard is a type of encryption that is widely used in U.S. government agencies and many other private commercial transactions. It was established by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in the year 2001 and was originally called Rijndael. AES is more advanced than DES, which was a widely used encryption standard till the 90s. It was less secure and reliable, which is where AES shone. In 1997, a process was initiated by NIST to find a replacement for DES which is based on a symmetric-key algorithm (same key used for encryption and decryption) and could support 128, 192 and 256 bits at a minimum.
Another criteria mentioned in the proposal was that the implementation of that algorithm should be easy and shouldn’t have software and hardware compatibility issues. Of all the entries that NIST got − even from big players such as IBM − Rijndael suited the requirements best; it was an entry from two Belgian cryptographers named Joan Daemen and Vincent Rijmen. In 2001, the Secretary of Commerce agreed to it and announced that Rijndael would be called AES and would be used for all sensitive, unclassified documents.
Ajax
Ajax is a collection of inter-related web development techniques which can be used to create a web application that communicates with the server in the background independent of the present stage of the page. It is a client-side used application and directly communicates with the server. It is an acronym for Asynchronous JavaScript and XML and as the name suggests, it uses JavaScript functions to call methods from a web service. Using Ajax reduces the traffic levels between client and the server and the response time is also pretty fast. It is compatible with JSON also and hence
can be used with CouchDB. As Java Script is open-source, a lot of libraries are available which makes it user friendly. In 2004, Google made a wide deployment of Ajax with Gmail and Google Maps. But, it has a few drawbacks too: Pages which used Ajax didn’t register themselves in the browser history and search engines like Google couldn’t index Ajax pages. There are even some notable security issues.
Alan Turing
Alan Turing, born in 1954, is considered to be the father of computer science and artificial intelligence. He was a British mathematician, logician, cryptanalyst and computer scientist with an Indian connection. His father, Julius Mathison Turing worked for the Indian Civil Service (the ICS). At the age of 16, he encountered the work of Albert Einstein and found it quite interesting. He extended Einstein’s work over Newton’s laws of motion and even crisply(sharply) explained it. He created the Turing machine which
could simulate(copy) almost any algorithm − a major breakthrough in the field of computing and AI(artificial intelligence). He also helped the British Army in breaking the German ciphers during World War II. Inspite of all his contributions, he was ill-treated by the British Government due to his homosexuality. As it was illegal at that time in the UK, he was imprisoned in 1952. Recently, in 2009, British PM Gordon Brown issued a public apology on behalf of the British Government for his "appalling" treatment.
Alexander Graham Bell
Alexander Graham Bell was the genius who invented the Telephone which laid the foundation for all the advanced modern communication systems of the 21st century. Born in Scotland in 1847, he moved to Boston in 1872 to open a school for teaching speech to the deaf. He started experimenting on the ways to improve and use telegraphy. His constant involvement with the school helped his research on hearing and speech which further led him to experiment with hearing devices which eventually end in Bell being awarded the first US patent for the telephone in 1876. Bell was also credited for his invention of metal detectors in 1881. Bell was granted 18 patents on his name alone and 12 with his collaborators, and his inventions were spread across the fields of Photophone, Phonograph, HydroPlanes, Audio meter, Alternative Fuels. His deep interest in medical research, especially in techniques for teaching speech to the deaf led to the invention of the Tape Recorder, Hard Disk and Floppy Disk. Due to a complication arising from his diabetes, he died in 1922.
ALGOL
ALGOL, short form for Algorithmic Language is an imperative programming language developed in the 50s. It led to the invention of many languages such as C, Pascal and BCPL. ALGOL is the standard method for description of algorithms in textbooks and academic work, by ACM till date. ALGOL was designed by a committee of European and American computer scientists taking into consideration the problems that would arise through FORTRAN (A programming language developed by IBM and extensively used till then as standard). It was the first programming language to include code blocks which had “begin” and “end” pairs and had nested function implementations along with a lexical scope.
It received some negative feedback at the outset. People thought it was too “wordy” and it faced technical issues which were corrected in the later versions - ALGOL 58, 60 and 68. ALGOL 68 implemented expression-based syntax, user-declared types and structures/tagged-unions.
Algorithm
Algorithm is one of the most commonly used words in Computer Science. An algorithm is a step-by-step procedure of solving a problem. The problem can be anything, such as “Find the shortest path between 2 points” or “Find what path birds follow in the sky” or “Search for a letter in a sentence”. The word is derived from the name of the mathematician, Mohammed ibn-Musa al-Khwarizmi, who was part of the royal court in Baghdad. The title of an important mathematical treatise by the 19th century Arabic is the source of the term “algebra”. An algorithm can be represented in any way − in either a specific programming language or a pseudo code or a flow chart or even control tables. Each algorithm has a time-complexity, which shows the amount of time it would take to complete when compared to the input size. The lesser the time-complexity of the algorithm, the more efficient it is. There may be more than one algorithm for a single problem; for example “sorting”. There are numerous sorting algorithms such as “merge sort”, “bucket sort” and “bubble sort”.
ALSA
Advanced Linux Sound Architecture (ALSA) is a free and open-source Linux kernel component that provides device drivers for sound cards. It replaced its predecessor Open Sound System (OSS). ALSA was started with a goal to automatically configure sound card hardware and handle multiple sound devices in a system. During the development process, more features such as hardware-based MIDI synthesis (resource of music) were implemented, which were not previously present when the project started. Apart from functionalities like hardware mixing of multiple channels and full duplex operation, ALSA bundles user space library for application
developers. This would help developers use the driver features with a higher level API than direct kernel interaction. Its main drawback is its complexity in comparison to OSS, so the development
of an application using ALSA is difficult. ALSA supports up to
eight cards, where each card is a physical or logical kernel device capable of input, output or control of the sound card.
Alternating current
Alternating Current (AC) is current that occurs when chargers in a carrier or semi-conductor periodically reverse their direction of movement. The best example is the common household current; this is AC with an approximate frequency of 60 Hz. The other form of current is the Direct Current (DC), where electric charge has a unidirectional flow. Guillaume Duchenne, in 1855, saw the practical application of AC and proved that it was better than the Direct Current for electro-therapeutic triggering of muscle contractions. The AC waveform could be sinusoidal, square or saw tooth-shaped, which depends upon the agent producing it. For example, some types of electronic oscillators have a saw tooth shaped AC. Electric power is delivered to businesses and residences in the form of alternating current. AC power transmission is done in the form of sine waves. The production of alternating current was first done by a dynamo electric generator based on Michael Faraday's principles. Efficient transmission of power transmission is done at high voltage. AC voltage may be altered using a transformer. It can either be a Step-Up transformer (to increase voltage) or a Step-Down one (to decrease voltage).
Amazon
Amazon.com is the world’s largest e-commerce company and is based in Seattle, United States. Initially, it only sold books through its online web portal but later diversified to include software,games, electronic goods, MP3 downloads, apparel, furniture and jewelry. It introduced a range of e-book readers called Kindle, which even runs games. Recently Amazon ventured into games and also launched its cloud-based storage services in the Asia region.
Amazon attracts approximately 65 million customers to its U.S. website per month, so the company has also invested heavily on a massive amount of server capacity for its website mainly to handle the excessive traffic during the Christmas holiday season.
Amazon is famous for its Black Friday deals, on the next day of Thanksgiving. The company has had its fair share of controversies. Wal-Mart filed a suit against it on October 16, 1998, alleging that Amazon had stolen trade secrets by hiring former Wal-Mart executives. This was settled out of court which caused Amazon to implement internal restrictions and reassignment
of former Wal-Mart executives.Jeff Bezos incorporated the company (as Cadabra) in July 1994 and the site went online as Amazon.com in 1995.The company was renamed after the Amazon River, one of the largest rivers in the world, which in turn was named after the Amazons, the legendary nation of female warriors in Greek mythology.
AMD
AMD (Advanced Micro Devices) is an American computer processor manufacturer and is a famous rival to the world's leading microprocessor manufacturer, Intel. AMD processors are used in HP and Toshiba laptops and desktops. It is presently the second largest manufacturer of computer processors in the world and Intel’s only significant rival(Be equal to in quality or ability) in the CPU market for x86-based PCs. AMD’s product line includes microprocessors, motherboards, chipsets, embedded processors, graphics processors for servers, personal computers and embedded systems applications. Post acquisition of ATI, AMD took a leap into graphical processing units (GPUs) by starting an initiative named
“Fusion” which implies the merging of CPU and GPU on its mainstream chips. AMD and NVidia together have the whole 100% market share of GPU market space. Some notable AMD GPUs include Radeon, Eye Speed, and FirePro. AMD achieved a Guinness World Record for the "Highest frequency of a computer processor" at 8.429 GHz. AMD’s latest technology, BullDozer had a lot of hopes riding on it due to its 8 cores, but it wasn't all that great.
American MegaTrends (AMI)
AMI is the biggest manufacturer of BIOS firmware for major
motherboard manufacturers. Founded by two Indians who were serial entrepreneurs, AMI started off to be a manufacturer of complete motherboards, but couldn't survive the competition from the original Taiwan-based manufacturers; and so, made BIOS firmware their niche market. AMIBIOS, one of the company’s
products is the most used BIOS firmware in motherboards. Initially, the firmware had a weird problem; it would play the Happy Birthday tune each time a PC booted up. This was solved with a Trojan-free firmware upgrade. In 1994, AMI released an update for AMIBIOS called AMI WinBIOS. It had a graphical user interface setup screen that resembled Windows 3.1; it received mixed response from its users due to the novelty of the concept. AMI developed AMIDiag, a PC diagnostic utility sold only to original
equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to help them spot problems while booting. AMI later diversified into the domains of mobile applications, online data storage (through “StorTrends”) and remote management (“MegaRac”), but BIOS firmware remains its primary product range.
Analog computer
Analog Computers were pretty famous in the 40s. In fact, they were even used in major wars such as World War II, the Vietnam war and the Korean war, but are now technically extinct. An analog computer accepts inputs/physical quantities that vary according to time such as electrical potential, fluid pressure or mechanical motion and applies these to compute the operations of addition
and subtraction. Setting up an analog computer requires plenty of effort; it’s usually set with initial conditions/values which can later be changed. The earliest analog computer was built in 1893 by Lord Kelvin. Some major milestones in its development process were:
Inclusion of the Harmonic Analyzer in 1898; it had 80 components and was capable of generating sinusoidal motion. Invention of the Differential Analyzer in 1930; it used mechanical integrators to solve differential equations and was a major breakthrough for the technology. Analog systems were mainly used in simulating dynamic environments such as aircrafts and nuclear processes. But, the Analog Computer lacked the ability to store large quantities of data unlike their modern day digital counterparts. Also, performing accurate arithmetic and integral operations in analog computers required costly hardware, which was infeasible.
Android
Linux-based Android is the most widely used touchscreen-based operating system designed especially for mobiles and tablets. Android Inc. was acquired by Google Inc. in 2005 and since then has been developing and promoting the OS along with Open Handset Alliance. The first publicly available smartphone running Android, the HTC Dream, was released on October 22, 2008.
It released Android as open-source under the Apache license. Android is based on Java language and apps can be developed using the Android Development Tools (ADT) plug-in. Android can also be used on other devices such as laptops, netbooks, smartbooks and smart TVs (Google TV). Android has a huge-community of developers who develop apps that get published on Google Play and the Amazon App Store. Boom of Android development made Java the most used programming language in the world. In 2011, there are more than 500 million active devices that have Android OS, which constitutes to 75% of the mobile and tablet market share. As of Sep 2012, there are more than 675,000 apps available
for Android and more than 25 billion downloads have been made from Play Store of Google Play. Android has been criticized for aping the design of iOS exactly. But, who doesn’t Apple blame for copying its designs?
Angry Birds
Angry Birds is one of the most popular video game franchises, whose popularity can be compared to evergreen games like Mario and Pong. It was designed and developed by a Finland based Game Studio called Rovio, and the first version was published by Chillingo, a subsidiary of Electronics Art. Initially, the game wasn’t an instant success since Rovio couldn’t advertise much. So it approached Chillingo, and with the backing of EA boosted promotional efforts. It gained popularity within 3 months of its release in 2009. Since then, Angry Birds has been downloaded more than 1 billion times across all platforms. Rovio followed up with more versions of the game namely Angry Birds Seasons, Angry Birds Rio, Angry Birds Space and recently Angry Birds Star-Wars and all of them were top-grossing apps not only on the App Store but also on Google Play, Amazon Kindle and on Facebook.
Rovio began selling all possible merchandise related to the characters in the game – plush-toys, key chains, cup cakes, soft toys, soft drink cans, etc.
Animation
Animation is the process of playing a series of pictures/frames in sequence to create a simulation of movement. This is generally presented as a motion picture or a video program. Animation is used in movies, cartoons, games and even in software and advertisements. India has one of the biggest animation industries in terms of revenue in the world. Much of the animation for movies such as Thor is outsourced to India. Animation was traditionally done using a projector and a camera. The images were individually captured by the camera and then scanned to make them digital. This was very tiring and costly. Software like Flash came along and made it easier. Seamless animations could be made in frames in Flash and the animation could be played at the desired frame-rate.
With advancement of technology, the concept of 3D animation was
inevitable. Here redrawing was not needed, but proper bone-rigging of bodies had to be done to animate 3D objects with the help of software such as Maya and 3DS Max.
Anonymous
Anonymous is the name of a “hacktivist” group which is famous for hacking into major organisations such as Sony's PlayStation Network. The members of this group are unknown, and they don’t have a leader, hierarchy system or even location. It’s known to be a group “which is impossible to join”. This group took roots on imageboards such as 4chan and was started with the intention of collaborating as a unit with a hidden identity and a self-agreed upon goal − initially only targeting entertainment but eventually taking on governments worldwide. In a series of statements, the hactivists made it clear that their goal is to do what the common man in society can’t. Anonymous is active on occasions of unethical behavior or attempts to curb free speech. When the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) was planned to be implemented, Anonymous hacked and attacked the websites of the Department of Justice and FBI, and they remained down for many days. Supporters of the Anonymous protested in front of the Capitol Building wearing the Guy Fawkes mask. In 2012, a bunch of UK-based government
websites were attacked in protest against government surveillance policies. Anonymous also attacked and hacked the Sony PSN to protest against a lawsuit by Sony on a public poster of ways to hack PS3. This rung up losses amounting to $171 million for Sony and affected almost 77 million registered accounts. A self-proclaimed leader of Anonymous was arrested in Texas, but his identity is in doubt.
Anti-virus
Anti-virus is a software application that helps protect computers from viruses, adware, backdoors, hijackers and trojans. Computer virus attacks began occurring in the early 80s, but were pretty basic and could never crash computers and hack private information. But by the 90s, more programmers were interested in exploring their skills to make a profit out of stolen data such as account details.
The first anti-virus was created in 1987 for Atari St Platform. Once PCs hit the market, viruses were spread through floppy disks and through applications like Microsoft Word. As the Internet gained popularity so did the number of viral attacks. Even e-mail services like Outlook were vulnerable. There was no single algorithm to discover the virus, which was the main challenge. Signature-based algorithm for detection was applied in the late 70s. By this method, the anti-virus software compares the file to a repository of virus programs it already has. But this method has the threat of attack by new viruses. More sophisticated anti-virus software use heuristic based detection techniques in such cases. The most famous anti-virus software are Norton, McAfee, Avast and Kaspersky. Apache CouchDB CouchDB is a widely used open-source database created by Apache. It is commonly termed as the “database that completely embraces the web” or he “NoSQL Database”. CouchDB is based on traditional SQL-based queries and database tables. Hence no data is stored in relationships and there are no complex SQL queries generally needed for maintaining databases. Here, each database is stored in documents called JSON, which has its own schema. JSON documents can change dynamically to accommodate evolving needs. It is often complimented for its peer-based distributed database systems. All the CouchDB hosts (online and offline) have independent copies of the same online database. Once back online, database changes happen bi-directionally. To avoid conflicts, it used Multi-Version Concurrency Control (MVCC). This avoided the need to lock the database files when written. CouchDB was a project started by an ex-IBM employee in April 2005, and
later in 2008 was incubated by Apache. Presently, a large number of enterprises such as Ubuntu and BBC use CouchDb to manage their databases.
