MICROSOFT UNVEILS NEW OPERATING SYSTEM, DUBBED WINDOWS 10

WINDOWS 10 

Microsoft has unveiled its initial work on the next version of the Windows operating system, calling it Windows 10.

Revealed during a press event in downtown San Francisco, the new OS is designed to run across a wide range of machines, including everything from tiny “internet of things” devices in business offices to phones, tablets, laptops, and desktops to computer servers running in the massive data centres that underpin the world’s internet services. “Windows 10 will deliver the right experience at the right time on the right device,” said Microsoft operating systems Chief Terry Myerson.

The OS will be available to consumers, but it was designed, in particular, for use by the world’s businesses. According to Myerson, businesses will be able to manage all their Windows 10 machines by way of a single central piece of software, and they will have the option of creating their own “app store” for use by employees across these devices.

In demonstrating an early incarnation of the new OS, Joe Belfiore, corporate vice president of Microsoft’s operating systems group, began by showing off the new Windows Start Menu that allows users to navigate applications and data on the OS. The previous version of the OS, Windows 8, moved away from the familiar Windows Start Menu, and this, according to many pundits, hurt the progress of the operating system. As demonstrated by Belfiore, the new Start Menu combines the look and feel of Windows 8—which introduced a colourful “tile” interface—with the more traditional Start Menu offered by its predecessor, Windows 7 (see images above).

Judging from initial comments from Myerson and Belfiore, Windows 10 is in many ways a response to Microsoft’s struggles with Windows 8, introduced two years ago. According to David Johnson, an analyst with Massachusetts-based research outfit Forrester Research, businesses have been slow to adopt Windows 8 because its interface—meant to serve both mouse-and-keyboard machines as well as touch screen devices—was difficult to use, but also because upgrading to a new Windows OS is still not as easy as it should be.

Belfiore said that Microsoft is “not giving up” on touch devices. The aim is to provide an interface that suits both mouse-and-keyboard devices and touch screens. But as Windows 8 showed, this is a difficult thing to pull off. Apple, by contrast, continues to handle desktops and touch screen devices with separate OSes. At one point, Belfiore demonstrated code that would allow devices to automatically switch between a mouse-and-keyboard interface and a touch screen interface, depending on what hardware is attached to the machine.

Tomorrow, Microsoft will release a “technical preview” of the OS to a select group of users and testers. The final version of the OS is expected to arrive in the middle of next year, and Microsoft has indicated it will continually release updates to the new OS after it first ships.

Before revealing the name of the new Windows, Myerson gently teased the room full of reporters, who have closely followed all the online speculation about what the OS would be called. At first, he seemed to indicate it would be called Windows 9, the natural successor to Windows 8. Then he insinuated it would be called Windows One, a nod to Microsoft’s Xbox One gaming console and an apparent attempt to highlight that the OS will run on a wide range of devices. But then he revealed the Windows 10 name, an apparent effort to show that the new OS wants to take a particularly large step forward.

Here are some photos of the new Windows 10 operating system:

 

Facts and Secret about the Bermuda Triangle

Here are the facts and Secrets behinds the Bermuda Triangle. It is a mythical section of the Atlantic Ocean roughly bounded by Miami, Bermuda and Puerto Rico where dozens of ships and airplanes have disappeared. Unexplained circumstances surround some of these accidents, including one in which the pilots of a squadron of U.S. Navy bombers became disoriented while flying over the area; the planes were never found. Other boats and planes have seemingly vanished from the area in good weather without even radioing distress messages. But although myriad fanciful theories have been proposed regarding the Bermuda Triangle, none of them prove that mysterious disappearances occur more frequently there than in other well-traveled sections of the ocean. In fact, people navigate the area every day without incident.

LEGEND OF THE BERMUDA TRIANGLE

The area referred to as the Bermuda Triangle, or Devil’s Triangle, covers about 500,000 square miles of ocean off the southeastern tip of Florida. When Christopher Columbus sailed through the area on his first voyage to the New World, he reported that a great flame of fire (probably a meteor) crashed into the sea one night and that a strange light appeared in the distance a few weeks later. He also wrote about erratic compass readings, perhaps because at that time a sliver of the Bermuda Triangle was one of the few places on Earth where true north and magnetic north lined up.

Did You Know?

After gaining widespread fame as the first person to sail solo around the globe, Joshua Slocum disappeared on a 1909 voyage from Martha’s Vineyard to South America. Though it’s unclear exactly what happened, many sources later attributed his death to the Bermuda Triangle.

William Shakespeare’s play “The Tempest,” which some scholars claim was based on a real-life Bermuda shipwreck, may have enhanced the area’s aura of mystery. Nonetheless, reports of unexplained disappearances did not really capture the public’s attention until the 20th century. An especially infamous tragedy occurred in March 1918 when the USS Cyclops, a 542-foot-long Navy cargo ship with over 300 men and 10,000 tons of manganese ore onboard, sank somewhere between Barbados and the Chesapeake Bay. The Cyclops never sent out an SOS distress call despite being equipped to do so, and an extensive search found no wreckage. “Only God and the sea know what happened to the great ship,” U.S. President Woodrow Wilson later said. In 1941 two of the Cyclops’ sister ships similarly vanished without a trace along nearly the same route.

A pattern allegedly began forming in which vessels traversing the Bermuda Triangle would either disappear or be found abandoned. Then, in December 1945, five Navy bombers carrying 14 men took off from a Fort Lauderdale, Florida, airfield in order to conduct practice bombing runs over some nearby shoals. But with his compasses apparently malfunctioning, the leader of the mission, known as Flight 19, got severely lost. All five planes flew aimlessly until they ran low on fuel and were forced to ditch at sea. That same day, a rescue plane and its 13-man crew also disappeared. After a massive weeks-long search failed to turn up any evidence, the official Navy report declared that it was “as if they had flown to Mars.”

Bermuda Triangle Theories and Counter-Theories

By the time author Vincent Gaddis coined the phrase “Bermuda Triangle” in a 1964 magazine article, additional mysterious accidents had occurred in the area, including three passenger planes that went down despite having just sent “all’s well” messages. Charles Berlitz, whose grandfather founded the Berlitz language schools, stoked the legend even further in 1974 with a sensational bestseller about the legend. Since then, scores of fellow paranormal writers have blamed the triangle’s supposed lethalness on everything from aliens, Atlantis and sea monsters to time warps and reverse gravity fields, whereas more scientifically minded theorists have pointed to magnetic anomalies, waterspouts or huge eruptions of methane gas from the ocean floor.

In all probability, however, there is no single theory that solves the mystery. As one skeptic put it, trying to find a common cause for every Bermuda Triangle disappearance is no more logical than trying to find a common cause for every automobile accident in Arizona. Moreover, although storms, reefs and the Gulf Stream can cause navigational challenges there, maritime insurance leader Lloyd’s of London does not recognize the Bermuda Triangle as an especially hazardous place. Neither does the U.S. Coast Guard, which says: “In a review of many aircraft and vessel losses in the area over the years, there has been nothing discovered that would indicate that casualties were the result of anything other than physical causes. No extraordinary factors have ever been identified.”

Difference between a 32-bit and 64-bit CPU

The two main categories of processors are 32-bit and 64-bit. The type of processor a computer has not only affects it's overall performance, but it can also dictate what type of software it uses.

32-bit processor

The 32-bit processor was the primary processor used in all computers until the early 1990s. Intel Pentium processors and early AMD processors were 32-bit processors. The Operating System and software on a computer with a 32-bit processor is also 32-bit based, in that they work with data units that are 32 bits wide. Windows 95, 98, and XP are all 32-bit operating systems that were common on computers with 32-bit processors.

64-bit processor

The 64-bit computer has been around 1961 when IBM created the IBM 7030 Stretch supercomputer. However, it was not put into use in home computers until the early 2000s. Microsoft released a 64-bit version of Windows XP to be used on computers with a 64-bit processor. Windows Vista, Windows 7, and Windows 8 also come in 64-bit versions. Other software has been developed that is designed to run on a 64-bit computer, which are 64-bit based as well, in that they work with data units that are 64 bits wide.

Differences between a 32-bit and 64-bit CPU

The main difference between 32-bit processors and 64-bit processors is the speed they operate. 64-bit processors can come in dual core, quad core, and six core versions for home computing (with eight core versions coming soon). Multiple cores allow for increase processing power and faster computer operation. Software programs that require many calculations to function operate faster on the multi-core 64-bit processors, for the most part. It is important to note that 64-bit computers can still use 32-bit based software programs, even when the Windows operating system is a 64-bit version.

Another big difference between 32-bit processors and 64-bit processors is the maximum amount of memory (RAM) that is supported. 32-bit computers support a maximum of 3-4GB of memory, whereas a 64-bit computer can support memory amounts over 4 GB. This is important for software programs that are used for graphical design, engineering design or video editing, where many calculations are performed to render images, drawings, and video footage.

One thing to note is that 3D graphic programs and games do not benefit much, if at all, from switching to a 64-bit computer, unless the program is a 64-bit program. A 32-bit processor is adequate for any program written for a 32-bit processor. In the case of computer games, you'll get a lot more performance by upgrading the video card instead of getting a 64-bit processor.

In the end, 64-bit processors are becoming more and more commonplace in home computers. Most manufacturers build computers with 64-bit processors due to cheaper prices and because more users are now using 64-bit operating systems and programs. Computer parts retailers are offering fewer and fewer 32-bit processors and soon may not offer any at all.

Where two Oceans meet but doesn't mix

GOLF OF ALASKA

The Gulf of Alaska is an arm of the Pacific Ocean defined by the curve of the southern coast of Alaska, stretching from the Alaska Peninsula and Kodiak Island in the west to the Alexander Archipelago in the east, where Glacier Bay and the Inside Passage are found.
The entire shoreline of the Gulf is a rugged combination of forest, mountain, and a number of tidewater glaciers. Alaska's largest glaciers, the Malaspina Glacier and Bering Glacier spill out onto the coastal plain along the Gulf of Alaska. The coast is also heavily indented, with Cook Inlet and Prince William Sound the two largest connected bodies of water, but also including Yakutat Bay and Cross Sound. Lituya Bay is the site of the largest recorded tsunami in history and is a popular sheltered anchorage for fishing boats.

Ecology

The Gulf of Alaska is considered a Class I, highly productive ecosystem (more than 300 grams of carbon per square meter per year).

Many deep water corals can be found in the Gulf of Alaska. Primnoa pacifica has contributed to the location being labeled as Habitat Areas of Particular Concern. P. pacifica is typically a deep water coral normally found between 150 metres (490 ft) and 900 metres (3,000 ft) here.

Meteorology

The Gulf is a great generator of storms. In addition to dumping vast quantities of snow and ice on southern Alaska, resulting in some of the largest concentrations south of the Arctic Circle, many of the storms move south along the coasts of British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, and as far south as Southern California (primarily during El Nino events). Much of the seasonal rainfall and snowfall in the Pacific Northwest and Southwestern United States comes from the Gulf of Alaska.