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Hillary Clinton on IT business:

However, the breakfast meeting with corporate India dealt with subjects ranging from protectionism to outsourcing. She did put opinion on President Obama’s comment on to stop outsourcing and to bring jobs from Bangalore to Buffalo. She diplomatically spoke that it is friendly competition that has been talked about and there is not protectionist policy being adopted by US government. But, on the other hand she did claim that outsourcing is a genuine problem in US and that back home her government needs to look into it with serious thoughts.

 Madam Senator on Education:

Ina special interaction with the students of St. Xaviers College and interview with Arnab Goswami, of Times Now, US Secretary of State was greatly impressed with the Teach India campaign and praised involvement of celebrity icon Aamir Khan in this great initiative. She emphasized that global prosperity lies in collaboration and co-operation among countries and among people. This is important to bridge the gap between talent and opportunities. She also went in to praise India’s technical education and says it to be the best in the world. 

 US Secretary of State on Environment:

Hillary at the opening of the ITC Green Center in Gurgaon spoke her mind out and said that this building will soon be one of the monuments of 21^st century. Referring to her visit earlier as the First lady at the Taj Mahal, she says that ITC Green building will soon become a stopover in the India’s Tourist Map just as the other wonders of the world.

 US wants India to sign on the dotted lines to put a restriction on carbon emission but India is reluctant to do so as it is believed that India figures quite low in statistical data of carbon emission and feels it would be detrimental to its growing industries (US is responsible for 20 percent of carbon emission while India accounts only 1.8 tonnes per capita). Madam Senator was quick to state that US will not impose any restrictions on India that would be unfavorable for India’s growth and development.

 Hillary Clinton on Agriculture:

Cutting-edge technology should be incorporated to harp greater benefit and to raise crop yields. She visited Indian Agricultural Research Institute and was vocal about the need to identify the root causes of hunger. It is important to begin with the next generation of agrarian economy but was tight lipped on emotive GM (genetically-mapped) food crops.

 Hillary’s visit impact on Defense:

Besides sale of US weapons to India, India did approve two sites for US firms to build two nuclear power plants.

Windows Azure Platform

Microsoft’s first step into Cloud Computing is by providing cloud platform known as Windows Azure. It is a platform that provides with wide range of services for both internets as well as on-premise environment. In simple words, Windows Azure platform allows applications to be hosted, managed as well as to run at Microsoft datacenters.

The hosting environment of Windows Azure is called Fabric controller. Besides supporting Microsoft and non-Microsoft languages, Windows Azure platform welcomes third party languages as well such as Ruby, Python, PHP and Eclipse to usher in enhanced cloud-based computing capabilities. Additionally, the open architecture of Windows Azure platform enables developers to build web applications that will run on PCs, connected devices or servers, thus providing with best of hybrid solutions for both on-premises and online. The environment also supports multiple internet protocols such as HTTP, SOAP, XML and REST. It can also integrate well with Microsoft Visual Studio for development of Azure-based applications.

Windows Azure Platform includes following five services that the developers can use to run the applications in the cloud.

Live Services:
It is the building block for the developers to build rich social applications for larger section of population in web. Using the Live Services components, developers can build applications as well as mash up.

SQL Azure services:
It is the relational database that allows search, relational queries as well as data synchronization with remote offices and mobile devices. In simple words it offers data storage capabilities. This Microsoft SQL Azure can store as well as retrieve unstructured, semi-structured and structured data and information.

.Net services:
This service can be used to secure applications as well as for communication across all applications. One can create federated applications using Microsoft’s .Net services so that the applications can span from on-line premises to the cloud.

Sharepoint services & Dynamics CRM services:
These are the other two components which the developers will be using in the long run to build strong customer relationship. These two capabilities integrated in applications will enhance cloud-computing experience manifold.

Read also Azure Benefits … to complete the knowledge cycle. Keep reading!

IT Infrastructure

For any growth and transformation of business, IT infrastructure is a key factor. It is very important for the technology dependent business to conform to increasing regulatory compliance. As there are various business processes with associated risk which is dependent on IT infrastructure, so a proper governance of it becomes increasingly mandatory.

Across globe there are two big standards that the world is following: COBIT and ITIL.

COBIT: The Control Objective for Information and related Technology is adopted by ISACA (Information Systems Audit and Control Associations) in 1996. COBIT aims to bridge the gap for the managers between the business potential, technical issues and the risk associated with it. It aims to strike the right balance between the nature of the business, the organisational goals and the various technical and non technical methods involved in it. COBIT edition 4.1 is released in May 2007. It aims to provide a framework on which IT related decisions and investments can be made. Moreover, COBIT also helps auditors identify if any control issues within a company’s technology infrastructure.

ITIL (Information Technology Infrastructure Library) is a set of techniques that manages IT infrastructure, development and its operations.ITIL until recently was taken as a default international standard for IT Service Management. Currently, in its version 3, ITIL has adopted a integrated service lifestyle approach to IT service Management. ITIL is a comprehensive documentation of IT service management. It consists of several books available in various languages providing guidance on quality IT services anf also positive environment facilities to support IT. ITIL is supported by qualification scheme, training organisation and implementation and assessment tools.

Microsoft Office 2010

Microsoft announced the technical preview of the much awaited MS Office 2010 at Worldwide Partner Conference in New Orleans on 13^th July, 2009 and unveiled the enhancements to MS Office 2007.  The development of Office 2010, codenamed as Office 14, started in 2006. This will be the first office application to be available both in 32-bit and 64-bit version.

The key features that Microsoft claims to have added across all applications in the MS Office 2010 package:

1. The applications will be available on your phone, PC and web. MS Word, excel, power point, OneNote becoming web based is one of the major leaps Microsoft is making through Office 2010. A lighter and free, web version of office 2010 can be accessed across devices (PC, phone etc) and will be available anytime, anywhere.  This cloud based web application will have fewer features than the desktop version of MS Office 2010 but will be good enough to edit and make changes in the document.
2. The ‘Ribbon User Interface’ (Ribbon is a combination of tool bar and tab bar which we see at top in most of our Office 2007 applications) is upgraded and is extended to all the applications including MS Outlook, MS Visio, OneNote, Project and Publisher.
3. Backstage view is something which is going to attract all of us. It acts as a substitute to the usual ‘File Menu’. This will redefine our experience of opening a new doc, with a good layout of templates of new document, different ways to share our work, different print settings and page layouts at one place.

Here goes the detailed analysis of enhancements of few applications in MS Office 2010 suite:

Microsoft Word 2010:

1. More than one user can work at a time on the same document at the same time. Word will alert the two or more users who are working on the same doc when the changes need to be synchronized with their document.
2.  We can have the live preview of paste function.
3. Word 2010 diminishes the use of ‘Print screen button’.  It is capable of taking screenshots directly from the word document by clicking on “screenshot “ .
4. We can remove the background of the picture directly, we need not use Photoshop.
5. Word 2010 makes available the visual panes with which it becomes very easy to navigate through the document.
6. Few amazing art effects are added in ‘word art’.  Features like pencil sketch, chalk sketch, glow edges, photocopy are included ‘artistic effect’.

Microsoft PowerPoint 2010:

1.  PowerPoint is powered to edit a video and image within itself with the help of basic video and photo editing tools.
2. We can share a slide with others via browser.

Microsoft Excel 2010:

1. One of the cutting edge feature of excel 2010 is ‘Sparklines’. It gives a visual snapshot image of the data trend over time with in a cell.
2. We can toss between tabs to access formula, insert diagrams and charts and get data from the connected source.
3. More kinds of charts are included in this version of excel and this will help us analyze the data more effectively.

Microsoft Outlook 2010:

1. The most striking feature is the ‘Ribbon user interface’ that Outlook possesses now,  like word, PowerPoint  and excel.
2. With improved search functionality it is easier to search contents.
3. The calendar can be previewed in e-mail itself.

Microsoft Share point 2010:

1. Like Word, Excel, SharePoint 2010 is also going to use ‘Ribbon user interface’.
2. The authors of the document can be tagged and they can be shared more easily.

There is an interesting trivia associated with Office 2010 being codenamed as Office 14 after MS Office 2007 being codenamed as Office 12. The version number 13 was not considered due to the “Number 13 phobia”.

The web-based MS Office 2010 is looked at as a huge challenge to Google docs and it will be in market in first quarter of 2010. So we need to wait for quite sometime before we experience the new, rich version of MS office.

 Indian corporate honcho Anil Ambani is in no petroleum or telecommunication deal this time, instead he recently signed on the dotted lines for an $825 million deal with greatest Hollywood filmmaker Steven Spielberg and made nation India’s entry into Hollywood with a bang.

What’s the deal with Los Angeles based production house is all about?

Anil Ambani will invest $825 million for making six films in a year. The movies that will be produced by DreamWorks Studios for global audience will be distributed by Walt Disney while India’s Reliance Big Entertainment would get the exclusive right for the films distribution in India, including DVD, theater rights and DTH. The first picture from DreamWorks production and under Touchstone banner will hit theaters in 2010.

DreamWorks board will include members such as Amitabh Jhunjhunwala from Reliance and Stancy Snider, partner of Spielberg’s production house.

Out of this first tranche of $825 million, $325 million is from Anil’s personal contribution in the form of equity, $150 million will be chipped in by Walt Disney,while rest of the money will be pumped by banks and financial institutions.

DreamWorks is always well known for making quality films and great works and with this joint venture with Disney and Reliance, the deal will sure be a success.

Caspian Airways Flight 7809 took off from Tehran in the noon today and crashed just 16 minutes after departure in the northwestern part of Iran. This airline was carrying 168 passengers and in it were 10 members of Iranian Junior Judo squad who were travelling to Yerevan for a summer camp.

 According to the state media report, the airline was bound for Armenia and it fears that all passengers are dead. This particular commercial airline basically operates within Iran and also travels to Syria, UAE, Ukraine, Armenia and Turkey. Reports say that this airline uses Tupolev jets made in Russia and Iranians fear that these Tupolev jets are extremely prone to accidents and malfunction.

As US has stopped supplying commercial aircraft and airplanes parts to Iran, people in that country feel that has put the lives of people at greater risks.

Social Networking Site Facebook gets more popular with Live Streaming

Be it the funeral procession of the King of Pops or Obama’s oath taking ceremony, millions of people tuned in online to catch a glimpse to be sad or happy and just to be a part of these great occasions. Live streaming is the most popular way to participate in these moments of life.

It is here, that people realized the need of live streaming in social networking site. The live stream box launched by Facebook brings in streaming video and chats to any site that will need it. This live streaming application from facebook called Justin.tv not only helps you watch it but allows for broadcasting as well.

This live streaming application in Facebook is minimalist and quite straightforward. This provides with a live stream, can broadcast information and most importantly users can experience real time live chat by integrating the application of Justin.tv with live streaming chat box of facebook.

The launch of this application is pitted against its adversary Ustream. However, Ustream requires an application to run live streaming while Justin.tv application in Facebook is open to all.

So, in the battle of dominating Facebook, we need to check out who wins it – Ustream or Justin.tv