Flip Flop!

What is Android? - Android

2008-03-05T04:27:00.000-08:00

What is Android? - Android: "What is Android?

Android is a software stack for mobile devices that includes an operating system, middleware and key applications. This early look at the Android SDK provides the tools and APIs necessary to begin developing applications on the Android platform using the Java programming language."

Anatomy of the Linux kernel - History and architectural decomposition

2007-06-16T21:32:00.000-07:00

Anatomy of the Linux kernel

The Linux® kernel is the core of a large and complex operating system, and while it's huge, it is well organized in terms of subsystems and layers. In this article, you explore the general structure of the Linux kernel and get to know its major subsystems and core interfaces. Where possible, you get links to other IBM articles to help you dig deeper.

Given that the goal of this article is to introduce you to the Linux kernel and explore its architecture and major components, let's start with a short tour of Linux kernel history, then look at the Linux kernel architecture from 30,000 feet, and, finally, examine its major subsystems. The Linux kernel is over six million lines of code, so this introduction is not exhaustive. Use the pointers to more content to dig in further.

SCA: 1.0 and OASIS - Bobby Woolf's dW Blog

2007-04-05T02:10:00.000-07:00

From Bobby Woolf: WebSphere SOA and J2EE in Practice

Monday April 02, 2007

SCA: 1.0 and OASIS

Service component architecture (SCA) has reached some important milestones.

In "SCA V1.0 Publication & OASIS Standardization Intent Announcement," the OSOA announces SCA v1.0, to go with SDO 2.1. The specs have now been submitted to OASIS for ratification as a standard.

I've talked about Service Component Architecture (SCA), the new programming model designed specifically for SOA, and Service Data Objects (SDO), a programming model for portable data. SCA is built into WebSphere Process Server and is being standardized by the Open Service Oriented Architecture (OSOA) organization, a collaboration of a dozen top software vendors including IBM.

You can get more links on my wiki; Open Service-Oriented Architecture is a good place to start.

Oracle Service Registry 10.1.3.1 now available

2007-02-03T09:03:00.000-08:00

Oracle SOA Suite 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.1.0) Downloads: "Oracle Service Registry 10g Runs on all certified platforms (80 MB)"

The Oracle Service Registry 10.1.3.1 has been released and is available for download from OTN. This version of Registry is fully compatible with the 10.1.3.1 (SOA) releases of Oracle Application Server and OC4J standalone.

The product installer, a ReadMe document and the product documentation can be downloaded from the SOA/Web Center download page on OTN

Note that the installer can be used with all supported versions of Windows, Linux and Unix. This is a change from the 10.1.3 release, which had different Windows/Linux and Unix installers.

** WHAT'S NEW IN ORACLE SERVICE REGISTRY 10.1.3.1 **

Key enhancements other than infrastructure changes include:

* Support for the Oracle XML-based lightweight security provider

* Use of Oracle data sources, meaning that RAC support is now provided out-of-the-box

* Support for the following non-Oracle databases:
** Microsoft SQL Server 2005
** IBM DB2 8.0 +
** Sybase ASE 12.5 +

* An embedded Oracle Lite database. This configuration is supported on Windows only and is suitable for demonstration purposes only.

** SUPPORTED ORACLE APPLICATION SERVER VERSIONS **

Oracle Service Registry 10.1.3.1 is supported on the following Oracle versions:

Oracle Application Server 10g R3 (10.1.3.1)
OC4J Standalone 10g R3 (10.1.3.1)
Oracle Application Server 10g R2 (10.1.2.0.2)
OC4J 10g R2 (10.1.2.0.2)

Note that because the new release uses the Oracle JSP (OJSP) engine instead of Apache Jasper, an OJSP patch is required if running on Oracle Application Server/OC4J R2 (10.1.2.0.2). The patch can be downloaded from Metalink:

Patch: 4936151
Release: 10.1.2.0.2
Platform: Generic

Help wanted: qualified SOA architects

2007-01-30T09:16:00.000-08:00

Help wanted: qualified SOA architects: "Help wanted: qualified SOA architects
By Rich Seeley, News Writer
29 Jan 2007 | SearchWebServices.com

The Association of Open Group Enterprise Architects (AOGEA) was founded today in an attempt to fill a competence gap in the face of analyst and vendor fears that unqualified architects might slow or even doom SOA adoption."

Study Finds Open Source Benefits Business

2007-01-24T04:12:00.000-08:00

Study Finds Open Source Benefits Business

By Thomas Claburn

'Free' software makes economic sense.

Floss for economic health. That's the conclusion of a newly released European Commission study Open Source Software (Floss) on the European IT sector. on the impact of Free, Libre, and

The EC study, conducted by UNU-Merit, a research institute of the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands, finds that the use of open source software adds 263 billion Euros to the European economy and "the number of employees among firms contributing code to Floss projects is at least 570,000."

It also says that open source software programmers, nearly half of which are based in Europe, volunteer least 800 million Euros (roughly $1 billion U.S.) worth of labor.

The report calls for "correcting current policies and practices that implicitly or explicitly favor proprietary software" by offering fairer R&D incentives, supporting standardization, avoiding vendor lock-in in education settings, equitable tax treatment for open source contributors, and encouraging partnerships between businesses and the open source community.

The report estimates that the Floss-related share of the economy could reach 4% of European GDP by 2010.

"By providing a skills development environment valued by employers and retaining a greater share of value addition locally, Floss can encourage the creation of [businesses] and jobs," the report says.

That's a perspective shared by Richard Gorman, a venture partner at Silicon Valley VC firm Bay Partners, which invests in open source companies. "Open source is clearly a major trend and is clearly an economic stimulus for the economy today," he said. "The reason we like the open source business model is that it's a way of entering markets and solving customer problems in a very effective way, both from a control and an economic perspective."

Some of the report's findings and recommendations may rankle leading proprietary software makers such as Apple and Microsoft.

One policy recommendation seems particularly applicable to Apple and the ties between the iPod and iTunes Music Store: "Explore how unbundling between hardware and software can lead to a more competitive market and ease forms of innovation that are not favored by vertical integration."

And one of the report's findings is that users of Microsoft Office are no more productive than users of OpenOffice. "We also investigated the productivity of the employees in using Microsoft Office and OpenOffice.org," the report says. "Office suites are widely used and are a good test bed and representative for a comparison on issues like effort and time spent in the daily routine of work. Delays in the task deliveries may have a bigger impact than costs on the organization's management. Our findings report no particular delays or lost of time in the daily work due to the use of OpenOffice.org."

The report, however, stops short of recommending businesses switch to free applications such as OpenOffice because "employees may perceive that their work is under-valued using 'cheap' OSS products." It says organizations should consider that migrating away from proprietary software might have implications beyond cost.

Microsoft maintains that the total cost of ownership for Windows software is less than Linux and continues to host dozens of case studies, white papers, and customer testimonials to that effect on its Get the Facts Web site.

But Gorman insists the open source software makes economic sense. "It's a very good business model for entering large, existing markets and taking significant share, and creating significant customer and investor value," he said. "If you're an incumbent competing with a new company that's an open source company, it's very difficult to adjust or change your business model to be competitive. Usually by the time they end up adjusting, it's too late."

ThomasClaburn tclaburn@cmp.com

Penrose at my college

2006-11-06T00:11:00.000-08:00

News Story: "Mathematician who challenges established ideas --Antara Das

Even quantum mechanics is a provisional theory: Roger Penrose

# He was delivering the NIT convocation address
# Says the Big Bang, in a certain sense, is not the beginning

PHOTO SUSHANTA PATRONOBISH

Mathematician Sir Roger Penrose and BARC director S. Banerjee at the second convocation of the National Institute of Technology in Durgapur on Saturday.

DURGAPUR: For renowned mathematician and physicist Sir Roger Penrose, it is a depressing thought that we may be close to the Theory of Everything that will explain all the mysteries associated with the universe, down to the minutest detail.

'A final theory, if it comes, must have beauty and simplicity — something that I have not yet come across,' he said, while delivering the convocation address at the second convocation of the National Institute of Technology (NIT) here on Saturday.

Hailing from a distinguished family of scientists and mathematicians, Sir Roger had been playing with geometrical objects from the age of 10, said Bikash Sinha, Chairman of the Board of Governors, NIT, while introducing the former.

Controversial views

Known for his controversial views on the relation between physics and consciousness,

Sir Roger came across as one who did not venerate established ideas. 'Even quantum mechanics is a provisional theory, which has to be replaced by a great theory,' he said.

'This is not just my own contention. It has also been stated by Einstein, Schrodinger and Dirac.'

While asking the graduating students to challenge the conceptual basis of established theories and advance alternate world views, he said his own ideas about the Big Bang, the singularity supposed to mark the beginning of time, had considerably changed.

'The Big Bang, in a certain sense, is not the beginning,' he said, adding 'the big final stage may also be the initial stage — when there is only radiation left and the universe loses track of its scale.' It has to be mathematically proved though.

Explaining through fun

Sir Roger, famous for the Penrose tiling, said there was no clear demarcation between scientific work and fun.

He often found that it was often easier to explain with simple diagrams what could not be explained by complex calculations.

© Copyright 2000 - 2006 The Hindu"

yell

2006-11-02T12:18:00.000-08:00

Dwai's Search - Custom Search Engine

2006-10-25T11:05:00.000-07:00

Dwai's Search - Custom Search Engine:

searches 149 sites, including: http://www.stumbleupon.com/tag/, http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Electrical-Engineering-and-Computer-Science, http://del.icio.us, http://dbanerj.google.com

Also embedded in Dain Bramage

SOA Suite 10.1.3.1.0 - Live on OTN

2006-10-24T04:40:00.000-07:00

SOA Suite 10.1.3.1.0 release is now live on OTN . Supporting bits still showing up over the next few days: doc, certification, and various other OTN page updates etc.
Take a look here

Here is the download matrix

SOA Suite 10.1.3.1.0 includes all of the following

-- SOA Suite CD --

Oracle HTTP Server (1.3.x based)
Oracle Containers for J2EE (OC4J)
Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g Application Server Control
Oracle Application Server Guard
Oracle Application Server Recovery Manager
Oracle ADF
Merant DataDirect JDBC drivers
Oracle BPEL Process Manager
Oracle BPEL Process Manager Control
Oracle Business Rules
Oracle Enterprise Service Bus
Oracle Enterprise Service Bus Control
Oracle Web Services Manager
Oracle Web Services Manager Control
Oracle Lite (Windows only)
Oracle Application Server Cloning Tool
Oracle TopLink
XML Query Service

-- Companion CD --

Oracle HTTP Server 2.0
Oracle Application Server Guard
Oracle JDeveloper 10g
Oracle ADF Installer
Oracle Application Server Proxy Plug-In
Oracle Application Server OC4J Plug-In
Oracle Application Server OSSO Plug-In
Oracle Application Server Web Service Proxy Plug-In
OC4J Client zip file
OC4J Web Service Client zip file
OC4J IIOP Client zip file
OC4J Standalone zip file
OC4J Admin Client
Oracle Sensor Edge Server
Oracle TopLink
Oracle TopLink Foundation Library
Oracle TopLink Workbench
Oracle Business Rules Standalone zip file
Oracle Configuration Manager
Oracle Fail Safe (Windows Only)

-- BAM CD --
Oracle Business Activity Monitoring (Windows Only)

Management Methods | Management Models | Management Theories

2006-10-24T01:23:00.000-07:00

Management Methods | Management Models | Management Theories: Framing Tversky - Excellent Resources.....

Gorillaz

2006-10-08T12:38:00.000-07:00

Flip-Flotsam

2006-10-01T12:13:00.000-07:00

Ever wondered what happens to your footwear after you're finished with it? This original documentary traces the fantastic journey of the flip-flop.

Filmed over a two-year period, this startling and uplifting film takes an ingenious look at the lifecycle of the flip-flop. It's especially noteworthy for the beauty of its photography and editing. We guarantee you will have never seen anything like it.

The flip-flops' journey begins in the factories of Mombasa, where 20 million pairs a year are made. Worn-in and worn-out they are taken to the cobblers, who specialise in flip-flop maintenance. But some are too damaged to be repaired and lie rejected. Every May, the monsoon rains wash the rubbish to the ocean. The downpour enables the discarded cast-offs to make their escape.

Brushing shoulders with other marine wanderers, they are swept along by the ocean's current. Sea borne for years, their buoyancy and resilience are put to good use by ocean hitch-hikers. They eventually come to rest on distant coastlines.

Islanders search the beach for flip-flops washed up by the sea. Later, they ingeniously carve life back into the tide's offerings.

The islanders prize the discarded flip-flops as a valuable resource. They are carved into dolphins, turtles and mobiles, fuelling a new cottage industry, which provides precious income for many families. Newly transformed, the flip-flops begin yet another journey. Leaving the quiet shores of Kiwayu, they are transported back to the shop-lined shores of Mombasa, where their first journey began.

Apocalypse Now - Video blogging :-)

2006-09-28T08:49:00.000-07:00

Nice One - HBR IdeaCast 4: The Joys of Deliberate Mistakes and "Middlescence"

2006-09-10T03:04:00.000-07:00

HBR IdeaCast 4: The Joys of Deliberate Mistakes and "Middlescence": "Featured in HBR IdeaCast 4:

The Art of Deliberate Mistakes: We all know we can learn from our mistakes. So why not go out and make some deliberately? In this interview with Harvard Business Review senior editor Gardiner Morse, you'll learn about a systematic approach to making carefully planned mistakes that pay off.

Managing Middlescence: Tamara Erickson, co-author of Workforce Crisis: How to Beat the Coming Shortage of Skills and Talent, shares her very creative ideas about managing mid-career workers, particularly those who may be on the verge of becoming disengaged or disillusioned."

Oracle SOA Suite Preview Available for Download- From Reynold's blog

2006-08-23T02:12:00.000-07:00

Oracle SOA Suite Preview Available for Download: "SOA Suite 10.1.3.1 on OTN SOA Suite 10.1.3.1 has finally been posted to OTN. This is the release I have been playing with for the last couple of months and includes the Oracle Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) as well as several other key components. The following diagram is taken from the QuickStart Guide and provides a view of the components. SOA Suite is built on top of an J2EE Application Server (preview only supports Oracle Application Server but components will run on other App Servers later) which provides web services support, event services and access to the Java Enterprise environment. Sitting on top of this are the following components BPEL Process Manager This has a much improved workflow component. Workflow is now a true service configured via XML, which means that the wizard can and has been made re-entrant (you can now change workflows by altering your choices in the wizard). To me this is one of the biggest improvements. A lot of other areas of BPEL PM have been improved in this release and I will cover some of them in a futur"

Accenture Opens Innovation Center For Oracle - EFYTimes

2006-08-09T00:51:00.000-07:00

Accenture Opens Innovation Center For Oracle - EFYTimes: "Accenture Opens Innovation Center For Oracle
EFYTimes, India - 16 hours ago
Tuesday, August 08, 2006: Accenture has opened its Innovation Center for Oracle at the Oracle headquarters in Redwood Shores. The Accenture Innovation Center for Oracle will work towards the development of ...
"

JAXB RI 2.0.1 is released

2006-07-31T04:34:00.001-07:00

JAXB RI 2.0.1 is released: "The JAXB team is pleased to announce that JAXB 2.0.1 is released.

binary distribution bundle

release notes

change log

More downloads can be found in the download section"

New books from MIT Sloan faculty members

2006-07-20T08:57:00.000-07:00

New books from MIT Sloan faculty members: "New books from MIT Sloan faculty members address design-inspired innovation; using enterprise architecture to reduce costs and increase strategic effectiveness and business agility; designing and operating businesses based firmly on the customer perspective (a so-called outside-in approach); and the principles of corporate finance."

Blog Censorship by the Indian Government ?

2006-07-20T08:32:00.000-07:00

Blog Censorship by the Indian Government ?: "Over the weekend, news slowly started trickling in that some Indian bloggers were having difficulty viewing blogspot and typepad blogs. Mridula was one of the first bloggers to comment on this issue.

Neha took up the issue and asked people to check whether they were able to access these blogs. Slowly, a list of Indian ISPs that had these blocks in place began to emerge.

Various bloggers called their ISP call centers and asked them about the block. Some ISPs were clueless about the block, some mentioned that the government had ordered that the sites be blocked.

Shivam Vij contacted the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-IN) and recived a terse response.
'Somebody must have blocked some sites. What is your problem?'

Chacko's sources indicates the block might be directed at specific blogs being used by terror units to communicate. I am reminded of Anand's article cautioning the loss of civil liberties in the wake of the terrorist attacks.

The mainstream media has begun to pick up on the issue. I believe that it would be the mos"

SOA Gotchas from reynolds blog

2006-07-12T23:55:00.000-07:00

SOA Gotchas: "Just came across this great set of SOA anti-patterns by Steve Jones of Cap Gemini. Bottom line is that SOA must be done in conjunction with the business, focussed on delivering business services and business processes. Anything else is a recipe for disaster. Hmmmm, no different to any other thing in IT really :-)"

Kolkata kicks in

2006-05-26T03:36:00.000-07:00

Kolkata kicks in: "Soccer mania is all over Kolkata's cool schools. The city's GenX dudes would rather bend it like Beckham than play a straight drive..."

Oracle Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) - A First Impression (and it’s not bad at all!)

2006-05-18T09:07:00.000-07:00

Oracle Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) - A First Impression (and it’s not bad at all!): "You never get a second chance for a first impression, the shampoo ad warns us. So every software vendor is likely to be a little nervous about showing a 1.0 release of his software to a critical audience consisting of senior developers and - scary! - architects. It’s even worse to have to present them [...]"

Nice one - Official Google Enterprise Blog

2006-05-18T09:06:00.000-07:00

[Search to Start. Not Find]

Oracle Middleware Leads IT Pack - Forbes

2006-05-09T22:26:00.000-07:00

Oracle Middleware Leads IT Pack - Forbes: "Oracle Middleware Leads IT Pack
Forbes - 5 hours ago
Cowen & Co. analyst Peter Goldmacher maintained an 'outperform' rating on shares of Oracle after meeting with executives in charge of Oracle's middleware software group, Fusion Middleware.
"

Oracle Delivers Enhanced RFID Technology in Oracle(R) Fusion ... - PR Newswire (press release)

2006-05-03T23:16:00.000-07:00

Oracle Delivers Enhanced RFID Technology in Oracle(R) Fusion ... - PR Newswire (press release): "Oracle Delivers Enhanced RFID Technology in Oracle(R) Fusion ...
PR Newswire (press release), NY - 14 minutes ago
LAS VEGAS, May 3 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- RFID JOURNAL LIVE! -- Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) today announced significant enhancements to Oracle(R) Sensor Edge Server, a component of Oracle Fusion Middleware, to ...
"

IBM 'clipped tag' technology speaks to RFID privacy - EETimes.com

2006-05-03T01:55:00.000-07:00

maybe subbu's got a point... 'clipped tag'.. big blue is going nuts...:-))IBM 'clipped tag' technology speaks to RFID privacy - EETimes.com: "IBM 'clipped tag' technology speaks to RFID privacy
EETimes.com - 2 hours ago
SAN FRANCISCO - Responding to RFID privacy concerns, IBM has developed a 'clipped tag' technology, offering consumers the ability to tear or scratch off RFID antennae, eliminating the threat of an un-authorized reading of the tag.
IBM RFID Tag May Ease Privacy Concerns InformationWeek
Retail-Safe RFID Unveiled Wired News
RFID Privacy Guidelines To Protect Consumers Issued InformationWeek
TechPlanet - CIO - all 32 related"

Reference for SOA Suite - Installing Oracle Database 10g Release 2 on Linux x86

2006-04-21T07:53:00.000-07:00

Installing Oracle Database 10g Release 2 on Linux x86

Software Tracks Internet Moodswings

2006-04-19T22:01:00.000-07:00

Software Tracks Internet Moodswings: "A trio of Dutch researchers claim they can track the 'mood' of the Internet by monitoring millions of blogs."

ESB: Wave of the Future

2006-04-15T10:43:00.000-07:00

ESB: Wave of the Future: "See the Enterprise Service Bus Forrester Wave results."

Oracle SOA Suite | | Feb 28, 2006 | Network Computing

2006-04-09T23:03:00.000-07:00

Oracle SOA Suite | | Feb 28, 2006 | Network Computing

Op-Ed Contributor: The Factories of Lost Children

2006-03-25T23:09:00.000-08:00

Op-Ed Contributor: The Factories of Lost Children: "As long as we don't question the source of the inexpensive clothing we wear, children will die in factory fires overseas."

Enabling SOA-based Architectures using WebSphere Messaging

2006-03-01T06:36:00.000-08:00

Enabling SOA-based Architectures using WebSphere Messaging: "Draft Redbook, last updated: Mon, 27 Feb 2006 - Service-oriented architecture and messaging- ESB implementation with WebSphere Message Broker- ESB implementation with WebSphere ESB Successfully implementing an SOA requires applications and infrastructure that can support the SOA principles. "

Slashdot | New Galactic Neighbor

2006-01-12T06:56:00.000-08:00

Slashdot | New Galactic Neighbor: "Dan Yocum writes 'The Sloan Digital Sky Survey reveals a new Milky Way neighbor: a galaxy so big we couldn't see it before. A huge but very faint structure, containing hundreds of thousands of stars spread over an area nearly 5,000 times the size of a full moon, has been discovered and mapped by astronomers of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey.'"

IBM - Refresh Pack 6.0.1.0 for WebSphere MQ V6.0 is available

2005-11-21T09:42:00.000-08:00

IBM - Refresh Pack 6.0.1.0 for WebSphere MQ V6.0 is available

WSIS: Secret police, hunger and booze

2005-11-21T00:29:00.000-08:00

WSIS: Secret police, hunger and booze: "The aftermath of a world summit

Secret policemen: you miss 'em when they're gone. It seems most people shipped out of Tunis soon after the closing ceremony ended around 7pm. When I got back to my hotel around 10pm, there was only one secret policeman standing guard and he didn't even bother to inspect my badge.…"

Everybody...........

2005-11-21T00:02:00.000-08:00

everybody was..............bang...idhoosh dhoosh...
FatBoy Slim

Blasts Kill 55 in New Delhi

2005-10-30T02:35:00.000-08:00

Blasts Kill 55 in New Delhi: "An apparently coordinated succession of explosions tore through two crowded markets and a public bus on one of the busiest shopping weekends of the year."

Delhi on high alert after blasts

2005-10-30T02:03:00.000-08:00

Delhi on high alert after blasts: "Security is tightened in the Indian capital Delhi after three explosions on Saturday which killed at least 61 people."

What's a Modern Girl to Do?

2005-10-30T02:01:00.000-08:00

What's a Modern Girl to Do?: "Burning your bra or padding it. Demanding 'Ms.' or flaunting 'Mrs.' Splitting the check or letting him pay. Playing it straight or playing hard to get."