The Explorer

Cloud Computing - Definition

2009-05-21T07:41:00.000-07:00

The National Institute of Standards and Technology(NIST) has come up with detailed definition for "Cloud Computing"

Cloud computing is a pay-per-use model for enabling available, convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources (e.g., networks, servers, storage, applications, services) that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction. This cloud model promotes availability and is comprised of five key characteristics, three delivery models, and four deployment models.

Those five key characteristics are:

* On-demand self-service.
* Ubiquitous network access.
* Location-independent resource pooling.
* Rapid elasticity.
* Pay per use.

And the three delivery models?

* Cloud Software as a Service (SaaS).
* Cloud Platform as a Service (PaaS).
* Cloud Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS).

Cloud software takes full advantage of the cloud paradigm by being service oriented with a focus on statelessness, low coupling, modularity, and semantic interoperability

And finally, the deployment models:

* Private cloud.
* Community cloud.
* Public cloud.
* Hybrid cloud.

Each deployment model instance has one of two types: internal or external. Internal clouds reside within an organizations network security perimeter and external clouds reside outside the same perimeter.

Details on all of these characteristics and models are available here. Keep in mind that this document is only a draft, which means that if you have any thoughts, suggestions, complaints, or whatever, you can participate in the dialog. Just send email to cloud@nist.com.

Courtesy: Dr.Dobb's CodeTalk

Stimulus Watch

2009-02-06T06:08:00.000-08:00

Wanna know ,how the stimulus will be spending. Check out this site "http://www.stimuluswatch.org/" will provide you the details, to which projects the money is spending.

Energy Consumption by more populated countires

2009-01-24T06:50:00.000-08:00

Just came across this chart from a site. Since the oil companies CEO's are not any more U.S President and Vice president, I really hope, Obama administration takes some drastic measures to reduce the Non-renewable energy consumption by United States. United States is only 5% of world population, but it's using 23% of world energy resources With rising energy consumption from BRIC countries especially China (Monster demand for energy), it's really high time, some siginificant break through should happen in Renewable energy business. I really hope, we should fix this problem, before the coming generation blame us. Recently I listened to Vinod Khosla lecture, he said there is huge rise in the Scientfic research towards Renewable energy and hopefully they come up with the good and affordable solution to the consumers. and I also little worry, if we comeup with a great solution, then everybody will be cranking more energy than ever. It's upto the individual to use energy wisely.

John Holdren(New white science advisor) on Global Climatic Disruption at UC - Berkley

2009-01-20T18:49:00.000-08:00

Here is the new White House science advisor John Holdren's excellent talk on climate disruption

Very eye opening and has latest data about the climate disruption.

Windows 7 Beta - A threat to Linux in consumer desktop market ??

2009-01-16T06:13:00.000-08:00

I have installed windows 7 beta (Build 7000) on my Dell Vostro 1400 laptop. There were some minor issue with the task bar flashing occasionally, besides that it's pretty neat, simple, rich user interface and more secure OS ever released by Microsoft. The installation is very abstract. For a advanced user, it would be frustrating to hide all the information. Wireless drivers are fantastic and the user interface is pleasing to eyes. After installing Windows 7, I installed Ubuntu 8.10. After very long time, it's nice to have dual OS on my laptop. I really hope, all the linux distros especially Ubuntu should grow with the release of Windows 7. Hopefully Windows 7 should not be death of all Linux distros in the consumer market.

Dropbox - Ultimate Synchronization solution among multiple computers

2009-01-09T07:01:00.000-08:00

I accidentally stumble on "Dropbox" when I was looking for "Tech Crunchies 2008 award nomination" and I immediately tried this product, because I have been looking for a Sync-up solution like this to sync-up multiple computers with different operating system(Supports Windows, Linux, Mac OS X). I have a 2 laptop which runs Ubuntu and Windows XP and I have a desktop which also runs Windows XP and I can easily move around the file just by dropping my file at "Open box" folder and the magic starts then....it's available in all three computers instantaneously. It works seamlessly(I really mean it...) and they also have a web interface and also Public folder option where you can share the file with anyone. For more information Check out the video tutorial on their site .

On buying this product, there are two options, the basic option is free and they provide 2 GB space and to get 50GB space, it costs $99 / year.

This product is running on Amazon Storage services...Cloud computing is way to go...

TIOBE Programming community Index

2008-12-27T07:57:00.000-08:00

After a long time, I checked the TIOBE programming Index to know which programming languages are dominating in the software market. Still surprisingly the Complicated Java programming language ranks #1. The other surprise is, though there are a lot of talk on "Ruby" and "Python" everywhere these days, surprisingly they are going down in the ranking. The other surprise is, I don't see ASP.net in top 20 category, but I have seen many websites using ASP.net now lately.

Website referred by Tim O'Reilly at Interop 2008

2008-12-23T12:04:00.000-08:00

Just compiled all the websites mentioned by Tim O'Reilly at Interop 2008 conference. It's quite amazing to know the kind of change happening in the world because of "Web 2.0". Harnessing the collective intelligence and the User generated content and the business model evolving around "Web 2.0" is quite interesting. Anyway here is the all website list mentioned by Tim.

Weather Related :-

http://www.stormpulse.com/ - Hurricane tracking and mapping
http://qcn.stanford.edu/ - Collaborative Quake-Catcher Network

Some cool stuff :-

http://www.botanicalls.com - If you have Indoor plants @ u'r home, check this site
http://www.ideastorm.com/ - Dell site for storming some new ideas
http://www.singularity.com - Ray Kurzweil - Artificial intelligence Guru
https://www.23andme.com/ - Get your DNA pattern

Energy Related :-

http://www.seriousmaterials.com - Informative
http://www.wattzon.com/ - Eye-opening site on energy usage
http://www.amee.com/ - APIs to implement at energy sites
http://www.energycamp.org/ - “unconference” on IT-related carbon footprints

Funding for startup - with a great cause to improve humanity :

http://www.instedd.org/ - Innovation lab for early disease detection and rapid disaster response
http://www.benetech.org/ - Funding for social cause projects
http://www.omidyar.net/ - Funding for social cause projects( Run by founder of e-bay)

Medicinal and Emergency issues and Financial :

http://www.ushahidi.com/ - Rapid emergency in Africa (highly recommend to check it out)
http://www.witness.org/ - See It, Film It,Change It
http://www.prosper.com/ - Want a personal loan
http://www.clickdiagnostics.com/ - Connecting rural patients with remote doctor
http://www.patientslikeme.com/ - Social networking for Patients with same diseases

Eye opening Sites :

http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/ - Connecting digital technology with public life.

Best Video Podcast software for Linux (Ubuntu) - Miro

2008-12-20T08:37:00.000-08:00

Miro (http://www.getmiro.com/) - The best video podcast software in the linux world(It's available for Windows too). Not only just a video podcast software , it's also support RSS and Bit torrent. To put it simply, it's more like "Itune" in the linux world. The good thing is, it comes as pre-installed with Ubuntu. You just have turn on it in snaptic software Manager. This software has a concept of "Channel", there are tons of channels and one can easily spend their lifetime watching all those channel. "Open source"....Way to go..Baby !!!!!!

Another cool website

2008-12-19T11:48:00.000-08:00

Just came across this website "http://www.dubmenow.com/" by following my friend Girish on Twitter. Sometime it's really surprise to see, how on the earth they comeup with such cool and useful website. It's high time we all have to find those untouched business cards and "dub" it now.

Centos Vs Ubuntu

2008-12-19T08:49:00.000-08:00

I'm relatively quite new to Linux world. So I have tried two distribution Ubuntu & CentOS so far in the past 5 months of Linux life. I know they both are targeted for different segment of market. Ubuntu is targeted to Consumer world and the CentOS is target to enterprise world and CentOS is a mirror image of Redhat Enterprises Edition. My friend Ron guided me to install CentOS for the very first time and I picked up good understanding about Linux. Over the period of time, by attending various user conference , I gained valuable knowledge and prompted by status in Linux from beginner to Intermediate. I love CentOS because of Stable Kernel build and nice sleeky look and the main drawback with CentOS is unavailbilty of the drivers for Wireless, Soundcard and webcam. In one of the redhat conference , I bumped into one of the lead developer, he helped me in installing ALSA drivers and after 4 installation of CentOS, atlast my Sound card worked in CentOS distribution. On talking about Ubuntu, Oh..boy...It is seamless installation. I love Ubuntu for their abdundant driver base. Everything works fine from Day one. Never I have to spend many days to do googling to find the drivers like in CentOS. so Overall, Ubuntu is great and it makes my life so easier. Thanks a ton to Mark shuttle worth for bringing a great OS like Linux to the consumer market. Any non-techinical person can install Ubuntu so easily.

Cool website to share your expenses in a roomate environment

2008-12-19T08:41:00.000-08:00

I just came across this cool website "https://www.divitup.com". This website is a free web service for splitting bills with friends/roommates. I did some testing , this site is very useful. Look at some snapshots on the side of the screen.

Interesting Video On An Illustrated History Of Failure

2008-10-19T14:33:00.000-07:00

Click To Play

OSCON Player

2008-10-19T14:25:00.000-07:00

Video on tamilnadu

2007-02-16T21:35:00.000-08:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIuYpBaa3ns

An Inconvenient Truth

2007-02-04T07:34:00.000-08:00

Just happen to watch the movie "An inconvenient truth".Since i work for Electric energy based company,so i had some basic knowledge about the global warming prior watching this movie.After looking at this movie and seeing all the facts related to the global warming,that brings me the fundamental question "Is industrial revolution good for this world?" it's really shocking to see,just because of this human action,how many other living beings in this planet like plants,sea creatures ,and many birds and insects has ended their life.Irrespective of what Political party we support,it's high time all political leader has to change the Energy policy of the country.It's good to see some initiative are going in Europe,Asia, and also some countries in south America.

In addition to the political leaders,It's each individual contribution to less the Co2 emission and make the planet earth to live for many more wonderful creatures to live.The future of the earth really depends on this generation.

For more information,Click on the following link :-

http://www.climatecrisis.net/
http://www.participate.net/educators/

After a very long time

2006-09-23T08:51:00.000-07:00

It's been a very long time i have written a blog. A colleague of mine has started his own blog site....that inspired me to write again...Anyway I'm back...

Latin american Movies

2006-01-13T15:46:00.000-08:00

Lately i started watching some south american movies.Just thought of sharing two of good movies ("Amores perros" & "Diarios de motocicleta(The motorcycle diaries)") which i watched recently.I'm not a great movie critic.As regular moviegoer,i want to share my comments on those two movies

Amores perros

If you like more reality or art movie,i bet you will like this movie.
The direction is so briliant.This movie resemble me of one of maniratnam movie"Yuva".
Yuva & Amores perros has got one similarity.(i.e) the introduction scene. After that two movies are entrily different. this movies show the actual living condtion of mexico city and the intense of love.The crux of this particular movie is "What worst can happen,when a human being start loving crazily".The movie revloves around 3 charcters and the people who are connected to these 3 charcater. All 3 charcters at one point of time,they are ready to compromise anything for their loved one.

It's a brillant movie.

Motorcycle Diaries:-

"Gael García Bernal" is lived with charcter of "Ernesto".It's been very long time,i watched a travel movie like this.
I loved every scene in the movie.I was deeply movied with this movie.The crux of this movie is about 2 friends want to explore the south america by travelling in bike.
The start travel from argentia and then to chile,peru and Venezuvala.As the movie shows the economical,social & culture status of the south american countries and also it shows some of hidden oldest civilazation of the south america.

It's a very nice movie !!!

Wish You All Happy Pongal !!!

2006-01-13T11:35:00.000-08:00

Wish You All Happy & Prosperous Pongal !!!

To know more about this festival,Check the below link:-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pongal

A Master Piece

2005-12-25T15:50:00.000-08:00

Just thought of sharing this beautiful painting of vincent van gogh.The coloring look so wonderful and the sunflower looks so real.

Memento Movie

2005-12-25T08:33:00.000-08:00

I'm a great movie buff.
Y'day i was watching the movie "Memento".

Brilliant direction and wonderful screenplay !!

There was a similiar movie in my native language named "Ghajini".
Though they have something in common,still there are different in their own ways.

I like both the movies.

My first Blog..

2005-12-25T08:06:00.000-08:00

Just accidentally reading a friend of mine blog...
Wow..it's really cool thing...

Just thought of sharing my thoughts to the whole world.

Hope everybody will enjoy it