Jeffrey Bezos started Amazon.com in 1994, after recognizing that Internet usage was growing at a rate of 2,300 percent a year. Operating from a 400-square foot office in Seattle, Jeffrey launched Amazon.com on the Internet in July 1995. Amazon.com mission is to use the Internet to transform book buying into the fastest, easiest, and most enjoyable shopping experience possible. By the end of 1996, his firm was one of the most successful Web retailers, with revenues reaching $15.6 million. Almost overnight Amzon.com quickly became the world’s largest e-tail bookstore in the world. Amazon has continued to expand its customer base, and sales revenues have increased every year. The firm’s revenues increased from $15.7 million in 1996 to $2.76 billion in 2000 . Today, Amazon.com is the place to find and discover anything you want to buy online. Amazon offers the Earth’s Biggest Selection of products to 29 million people in Continue reading
Business and Technology
Cloud Computing – Models, Architecture and Characteristics
Cloud Computing, often referred to as simply “the cloud”, is a distributed architecture that centralizes server resources on a scalable platform, enabling ubiquitous access to configurable resources and services. It provides storage and access for data over the internet instead of our computer’s hard drive. Leveraging the Internet, it provides unparalleled and distributed services based on virtualization and service-oriented architecture. Cloud is not another recent technology, but rather it can be described as a delivery model for information services using existing technologies. It does an excellent job of reducing the time spent on IT infrastructure and maintenance. Cloud presents itself as a ubiquitous, dynamically scalable, and on-demand model, that can be purchased on a ‘pay-as-you-go’ basis without any prior subscription or under/overprovisioning. Cloud Computing Models 1. Service-Based Models There are three delivery models that the cloud utilizes to provide different types of services are delivered to the end-user. All the Continue reading
Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP)
Voice over Internet Protocol or Voice over IP or VoIP is a general term for a family of transmission technologies for delivery of voice communications over internet protocol networks such as the internet or other packet-switched networks. Other terms frequently encountered and synonymous with voice over internet protocol are internet protocol telephony, internet telephony, voice over broadband, broadband telephony, and broadband phone. Internet telephony refers to communications services – voice, facsimile, and/or voice-messaging applications – that are transported via the internet, rather than the public switched telephone network. Definition of Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) Voice over internet protocol can be defined as the ability to make telephone calls and to send facsimiles over internet protocol- based data networks with a suitable quality of service and a much superior cost/benefit. Equipment producers see Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) as a new opportunity to innovate and compete. The challenge for then Continue reading
Data Transmission Modes in Computer Networks
Data communication circuits can be configured in a huge number of arrangements depending on the specifics of the circuit, such as how many stations are on the circuit, type of transmission facility, distance between the stations, how many users at each station and so on. Data communication circuits can however be classified as either two point or multipoint. A two-point configuration involves only two stations, whereas a multipoint configuration involves more than two stations. Regardless of configuration, each station can have one or more computers, computer terminals or workstations. A two point circuit involves the transfer of digital information from a mainframe computer and a personal computer, two mainframe computers, two personal computers or two data communication networks. A multipoint network is generally used to interconnect a single mainframe computer to many personal computers or to interconnect many personal computers. Coming to transmission modes, there are three modes of transmission Continue reading
3 Levels of Grid Computing Deployment
Grid computing is the application of several computers to a single problem at the same time – usually to a scientific or technical problem that requires a great number of computer processing cycles or access to large amounts of data. Computational grids that couple geographically distributed resources are becoming the effective computing platform for solving large-scale problems in science, engineering, and commerce. According to John Patrick, IBM’s vice president for Internet strategies, “the next big thing will be grid computing.” Although Grid computing is firmly ensconced in the realm of academic and research activities, more and more companies are starting to turn to it for solving hard-nosed, real-world problems. Grid computing is emerging as a viable technology that businesses can use to wring more profits and productivity out of IT resources –and it’s going to be up to you developers and administrators to understand Grid computing and put it to Continue reading
The Five Phases of Ethical Hacking
It is debatable, if hacking can be ethical or not, the term “Hacking” over time has been associated with destructive activity. These are some of the terms used in the context of hacking which provides better clarity, Hacker is somebody who enjoys learning hacking for a defensive purpose; an ethical hacker is the security professional who exercises his skills for a defensive purpose. The term Cracker refers to a person who uses his hacking skills for destructive purpose. The ethical question here is in regard to the physical activity of hacking which is sometimes hard to differentiate from cracking. The main difference being, Ethical hacker just identifies vulnerabilities and does not exploit them unlike a cracker. Ethical hacking is the process adopted by ethical hackers to discover the vulnerabilities existing in information systems operating environments. With the growth of internet, computer security has become a major concern for business. Organizations Continue reading