USB flash drives

USB flash drives The USB (Universal Serial Bus) Flash drives are small storage devices which can store large amount of data in the form of flash memory and are portable. They are available in different sizes varying from 256MB to 64GB. The history to when the USB pen drives first came in existence is quite controversial, however, it is said that the first commercially-available USB flash drive was called the ThumbDrive, it was produced by Trek Technology in the year 2000. Soon IBM came out with its own model known as the DiskOnKey. By 2002, there were several companies which entered the market producing a similar product and marketing it. Pen drives comparatively have a much larger size than a usual floppy disk, which has a maximum data capacity of 1.44MB, or a compact disk, which has a maximum capacity of 700MB. This invention was a vast transformation from the era of floppy disks, as people required a device that would have a larger memory and yet be portable. The previous technology could only be used to store small size data for a short period of time that is 3-5 years, while Pen drives can store much larger size data for at least 10 years and no special care is required unlike in the case of CDs. The latest pen drives consist of a built-in MP3 player and finger print scanners. They only concept of data storage seems to be common between both the technologies. This technology highly attracted consumers as it made large amount of data transfer possible, which would otherwise be very expensive to carry out. This invention can be classified to be a discrete change from the traditionally used floppy drives or compact disks. This is because it was completely transformed by size, shape and its features. Alternatively, since it still belongs to the segment of device for storing memory, it may also be considered a gradual change. Its uniqueness and the fact that it has been further developed and integrated with appliances, like music players and cameras; make it a more discrete change. In the recent years many firms have entered the industry and started supplying the product, there have been gradual changes made to the initial design. The intense competition in the industry is mainly based upon the amount of features provided by each competitor at the lowest rate possible. This is a clear contrast to its initial stage where the degree of competition was low with only a few firms supplying. With the degree of competition increasing in the industry the level of uncertainty has always been high as the companies and the businesses are unaware of what is next? However, the recent upgrades made to the design show comparatively a smaller change in the initial design. It can be said that the product has probably reached the highest point in its growth stage or is entering the maturity phase and thus further developments need to be done for it to survive. The level of uncertainty seems to be declining with the progression in the industry. When speaking of Economic contribution, pen drives have not made any contributions to the economy as such. However, they have had a positive impact on the society as mentioned above, they made large data transfer possible at cheaper rates. The invention of USB flash drives has affected many stakeholders (with respect to IBM); Stakeholders are those group of people who are affected either directly or indirectly by an organisations actions (business dictionary). The ones most affected would be competitors, consumers, suppliers, mangers and shareholders. The competitors are stakeholders directly interested in the decisions made by its rival, IBM. Pen drive was a new advanced product which almost replaced the previous technology thus attracting the consumers to it, who later switched from companies supplying floppy disks and compact disks to IBM, thereby reducing the competitors market share. The competitors then had to incur huge research and development costs and produce a product at least equivalent to IBM in order to retain their market share. The invention also affected the suppliers of IBM. As the technology got older, cost reduction was essential for IBM in order to survive the cut-throat competition. Hence, the sup pliers would have to be efficient enough to supply at reasonable rates. Consumers were amongst the highly affected stakeholders, they are the ones who tryout new products and provide feedback to the companies. They are high risk takers as they initially entered an unknown market as this kind of technology was an entire new concept. Pen drives are no doubt smaller and more compact when compared to compact disks and floppy drives. By compact we mean that they are physically smaller than the latter and are capable of storing larger amount of data. When compared to CDs they are also scratch proof, making them more portable. Latest designs have reduced the size further, as small that it can be easily carried in a wallet. Also some are available with cameras and MP3 players built in them. This factor also shows that it is not resistant to innovation, further improvements and modifications are being done to develop the product further. The development will attract consumers who are more technology savvy; it could also be done to overcome the drawbacks it currently suffers. Over the years the invention has innovated a number of time, however there are drawbacks to this kind of technology also. Despite the fact that the storage capacities have improved over the years not a lot has been done to improve the security of storing information. Many businesses supply their employees with pen drives for them to access work from almost anywhere, thus security is a major issue as important data could be misplaced, if pen drive is misplaced. There is no technique available to track the device or to retain or erase the information on it. Also these devices are not compatible with some operating systems thereby not proving to be efficient enough for the consumers. It can alternatively be argued as they are compatible with most of the commonly used operating systems like Microsoft Windows XP, Mac OS X, etc. A lot of information is stored on a drive and it can be used on almost all the computers, the more it is used on different systems the higher are the chances for i t to contain a virus. This means that if a computer contains virus and a pen drive is attached to it, unless it is write-protected it is very easy for a virus to copy itself on a pen drive and attack other computers. This again reduces security of information as some anti viruses often delete the virus affected file, therefore essential information could be lost. The technology may be getting better each day but the new releases and latest pen drives are very expensive. This can also be considered to be a disadvantage as the consumers are unable to buy it and by the time they do a better version of it is available. As far as personal experience says, pen drives have a slower transfer rate when compared to hard disks. However, the size factor nullifies the impact as pen drives are much smaller and portable. It could also be one of the future development possibilities for the businesses to make it even more sleek and stylish. They could enhance its security by probably adding an auto-lock code to it, so if it is in wrong hands it would probably lock itself and be of no use. They could also work on the transfer rate and increase the storage capacity to around 1 tetra byte. References http://www.buzzle.com/articles/usb-flash-drives.html http://www.ehow.co.uk/about_5484089_invented-usb-flash-drive.html?cr=1 http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/stakeholder.html

To Build A Fire: Theme Essay -- essays research papers

In the story "To Build a Fire" by Jack London, there are three principal themes. They are respecting nature, and considering results of actions. The main theme, or universal truth, is heeding warnings. The themes are shown through the character and his actions. The main character in the story had an attitude that prevented him from heeding internal and external warnings. He did not respect nature's power, and therefore he paid with his life.His attitude was arrogant and careless. The man had no imagination and only understood facts. He knew it was very cold and his body was numb, but he failed to realize the danger. A newcomer with no experience, he thought he was invincible. Neither the "absence of sun from the sky," nor "the tremendous cold" made any effect on him. For example, the temperature was less than -50 degrees. He did not care about how much colder it was. To him, it was just a number. He did not think of his "frailty as a creature of temperature." When the "old-timer at Sulphur Creek" warned him not to travel alone in such cold, the man laughed at him. The old-timer had experience and knowledge, yet the man called him "womanish." Even when the man knew he was about to die, he thought, "freezing was not so bad as people thought," and "When he got back to the States he could tell folks what real cold was." These quotes show that the man did not take his situation seriously. Instea...

Biography of William Shakespeare Essay

It is known that he was born in April 1564 and that he died on 23rd April 1616 at the age 52. He was baptized on 26th April 1564. How fitting that the great English writer is so closely identified with the patron saint of England. Shakespeare had seven siblings. They were: Joan (1558); Margaret (1562); Gilbert (1566); Joan II (1569); Anne (1571); Richard (1574) and Edmund (1580). Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway when he was 18. She was 26 and she was pregnant when they got married. Their first child was born six months after the wedding. Shakespeare and Anne Hathaway had three children together – a son, Ham net, who died in 1596, and two daughters, Susanna and Judith. His only granddaughter Elizabeth – daughter of Susanna – died childless in 1670. Shakespeare therefore has no descendants. Shakespeare died a rich man. He made several gifts to various people but left his property to his daughter, Susanna. The only mention of his wife in Shakespeare’s own will is: â€Å"I give unto my wife my second best bed with the furniture†. The â€Å"furniture† was the bedclothes for the bed. Shakespeare was buried in the Holy Trinity Church, Stratford-upon-Avon. He put a curse on anyone daring to move his body from that final resting place. His epitaph was: â€Å"Good friend for Jesus’ sake forbear, To dig the dust enclosed here: Blest be the man that spares these stones, And curst be he that moves my bones. † Though it was customary to dig up the bones from previous graves to make room for others, Shakespeare’s remains are still undisturbed. During his life, Shakespeare wrote 37 plays and 154 sonnets! This means an average 1. 5 plays a year since he first started writing in 1589. His last play The Two Noble Kinsmen is reckoned to have been written in 1613 when he was 49 years old. While he was writing the plays at such a pace he was also conducting a family life, a social life and a full business life, running an acting company and a theatre. Few people realize that apart from writing his numerous plays and sonnets, Shakespeare was also an actor who performed many of his own plays as well as those of other playwrights. During his life Shakespeare performed before Queen Elizabeth I and, later, before James I who was an enthusiastic patron of his work. Shakespeare’s profession was acting. He is listed in documents of 1592, 1598 and 1603 as an actor. We know that he acted in a Ben Jonson play and also in his own plays but it’s thought that, as a very busy man, writing, managing the theatre and commuting between London and his home in Stratford where is family was, he didn’t undertake big parts. There is evidence that he played the ghost in Hamlet and Adam in As You Like It. In Elizabethan theatre circles it was common for writers to collaborate on writing plays. Towards the end of his career Shakespeare worked with other writers on plays that have been credited to those writers. Other writers also worked on plays that are credited to Shakespeare. We know for certain that Timmons of Athens was a collaboration with Thomas Middleton; Pericles with George Wilkins; and The Two Noble Kinsmen with John Fletcher. Some scholars have maintained that Shakespeare did not write the Shakespeare plays, with at least fifty writers having been suggested as the â€Å"real† author. However, the evidence for Shakespeare’s having written the plays is very strong. Shakespeare is the second most quoted writer in the English language – after the various writers of the Bible. Suicide occurs an unlucky thirteen times in Shakespeare’s plays. It occurs in Romeo and Juliet where both Romeo and Juliet commit suicide, in Julius Caesar where both Cassius and Brutus die by consensual stabbing, as well as Brutus’ wife Portia. Some of Shakespeare’s signatures have survived on original documents. In none of them does he spell his name in what has become the standard way. He spells it Shakespere and Shakespear. Shakespeare lived a double life. By the seventeenth century he had become a famous playwright in London but in his hometown of Stratford, where his wife and children were, and which he visited frequently, he was a well known and highly respected businessman and property owner. The American President Abraham Lincoln was a great lover of Shakespeare’s plays and frequently recited from them to his friends. His assassin, John Wilkes Booth was a famous Shakespearean actor. Although it was illegal to be a Catholic in Shakespeare’s lifetime, the Anglican Archdeacon, Richard Davies of Litchfield, who had known him wrote some time after Shakespeare’s death that he had been a Catholic. Candles were very expensive in Shakespeare’s time so they were used only for emergencies, for a short time. Most writers wrote in the daytime and socialized in the evenings. There is no reason to think that Shakespeare was any different to his contemporaries. It was illegal for women and girls to perform in the theatre in Shakespeare’s lifetime so all the female parts were written for boys. The text of some plays like Hamlet and Antony and Cleopatra refer to that. It was only much later, during the Restoration, that the first woman appeared on the English stage. There are only two Shakespeare plays written entirely in verse: they are Richard II and King John. Many of the plays have half of the text in prose. Shakespeare wrote many more plays than the ones we know about. It’s certain that he wrote a play titled Cardenas, which has been lost, but scholars think he wrote about twenty that have gone without a trace. Shakespeare’s shortest play, The Comedy of Errors is only a third of the length of his longest, Hamlet, which takes four hours to perform. Two of Shakespeare’s plays, Hamlet and Much Ado About Nothing, have been translated into Klingon. The Klingon Language Institute plans to translate more. All Uranus’ satellites are named after Shakespearean characters. William Shakespeare’ is an anagram of ‘I am a weakfish speller’. Shakespeare’s original grave marker showed him holding a bag of grain. Citizens of Stratford replaced the bag with a quill in 1747. â€Å"William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world’s pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England’s national poet and the â€Å"Bard of Avon†.

Definition Essay Sample on Chicago A Picture of the City

Definition Essay Sample on Chicago A Picture of the City The article by Sweeney and Gorner entitled Teen Parolee Charged with Killing Chicago Cop, Former Cha Officer, The Devil in the White City by Larson, and For the Thrill of It by Baatz Simon introduces a picture of the city of Chicago, and the criminal acts that are associated with it defining the characteristics of a personality in Chicago. The common point that the three articles share is crime in the context of taking human life and the city of Chicago as an environment that allows this act to define the characteristics of a personality. Larson talks about the history of crime in the city of Chicago by defining the surrounding factors that made it so easy for crime to be committed. The author talks about the thousand trains that come in and left the city bringing with them young women who were single and had never seen the city yet hoped to live in a big and tough city like Chicago calling it their home. Larson describes Chicago by writing about the streets angling past gambling houses, bordellos, and bars, where vice thrived together with the indulgence of the officials. Describing the old Chicago trait, Larson mention Hecht’s description of how he perceived the city; â€Å"It was good or pleasant, in a certain way, to be aware that outside their windows, the devil was still capering in flare brimstone.† The surrounding of the streets in Chicago according to Larson describes death to come as often as unexpected to an extent that one could step out of a curb and lose his life or be killed. The deaths were as rampant as two people per day were, but this could not be recognized since other causes apart from killing also contributed. The causes that included fires, horses bolting and dragging carriages into the crowds, streetcars falling from the drawbridges, and cholera, typhus, diphtheria, and influenza, appeared to cover up the murders that were also going on in the city. The author argues that the rate at which women and men killed each other or committed murder rose steadily in Chicago and police realized that they had no expertise or work force to manage these acts. The causes for the murders in Chicago are recorded to be prosaic and arise from argument, sexual jealousy, or robbery. Larson mentions the five –murder spree by Jack the ripper as the act that defied every explanation ever given for the murders. This signified that a lot was changing and everyone was looking at the boundary that existed between the wicked and the moral as being degraded. â€Å" it was so easy or very simple to disappear, so simple to deny knowledge, so easy in the din and smoke to mask that a dark thing had occurred†(Larson) The tribune reporter’s (Sweeney and Gorner) story on the other hand presents Chicago as a city of the gun. A teenage parolee who is determined to escape arrest because of a burglary charge shoots and kills a victim breaking in. Calumet who is the area commander described this act as â€Å"unbelievably, unfathomable, and so egregious.† Herring a parolee guns down Flisk Michael, a police officer, and Stephen Peters, a former Chicago Housing Authority officer without the victims having a chance of defending themselves. The reason given for committing such murders is that Herring was avoiding being caught for a burglary. Flisk is said to be the second officer to be shot in a week. Chicago police has had a violent 2010 most of which is the response to burglary. The killing of the police officers is becoming a characteristic of the Chicago personality as this report indicates that in less than 5 months in 2010, six officers have died in the line of duty. â€Å"A sixth office r (a sergeant) was killed in a car accident in the month of February, when responding to burglary.† (Sweeney and Gorner) Darrow is campaigning free love in a case where he represents Loeb Richard and Leopold Nathan who shot Franks Bobby and now faces a death penalty. The arguments that Clarence Darrow presents to the court regarding this case seems to support the Chicago personality of committing murders because of the simplest reasons. The first point that Darrow presents to the court is about the ages of the defendants. â€Å"There is no precedent that the court hangs two defendants who had not yet reached their majority.† (Baatz 373) This reason that Darrow gives is aimed at persuading the court to lessen it ruling on the murder case involving the two defendants. The second key reason that the lawyer presents to the court as the cause of the murder is the world war. Darrow says, â€Å"It was the Great War, more than any other single event or factor, had contributed to the murder of Bobby Franks.† (Baatz 376). The argument by Darrow that the killing of human beings had become so routine, casual, and so commonplace, that society now possessed a bloodlust, which inevitably found its way into Richard and Nathan, emphasizes Larson’s argument of Chicago being a human with the skin removed. The age of the Richard and Nathan take a center stage in Darrow’s defense and the lawyer argues that if the judge can hung an 18 year old boy then some other judge will hang the boy at 14, 16, or 17 whereas Herring is a teen and also manages to shoot two officers. The point of appeasing the mob and an act of revenge that Darrow mention (377) if the judge rules that Richard and Nathan be hanged appears to describe the murders in Chicago as right so long as the court will consider the minor as emotionally incapacitated. The murder of the officers by Herring is committed by a minor similar to the one by Nathan and Richard. The common point in both of these cases is that a gun is used by the defendants to commit the murder. It is true that times have changed and the reasons why murder was committed in the black city of Chicago are no longer the same ones for today. The accidents that claim the lives of the officers while responding to the crimes involving gun shooting or burglary are all killings. The argument by Darrow that hanging Richard and Nathan will not bring Franks Bobby’s life back, or deter crime is opposed by Sweeney and Gorner report stating that the shooter (Herring) is arrested by the police in a swift response, and charges are announced after the arrest. Larson’s article gives a picture of what Chicago has became and the murders that are still going on both in Darrow’s case and Herrings shooting portray the gun as a personality characteristic in Chicago.

No Pretty Pictures essays

No Pretty Pictures essays 1. What were your feelings after reading the first chapters of the book, After reading the first half, After finishing the book. When I first started reading this book, I thought it was going to be very draggy, and that there would really be no story to it. And that it would be such a hard book to get through even though it was so short. Then as I started getting further and further into the story it got more interesting. I started to enjoy reading it about half way through. Some things seem a little far fetched, thats what you get when you read fiction though. I dont really like fiction, so it all seems fake to me. There were some pretty interesting things that happened to Kino and his wife Juana. I liked the book, when it was over, I thought that it was a good book to have read. The ending I think is the best, I usually dont like endings that end quickly but for some reason I thought it fit this story. 2. Did this book make you laugh? Cry? Cringe? Smile? Cheer? Explain. Well there were a lot of different emotions that I felt during this book. So many good things and bad things happened. In the beginning I just couldnt wait to get done the book. Then when Coyotio got stung, I felt bad. And then I felt even worse when Kino didnt have money to hire a doctor. But it was cool that he happened to find a pearl that he thought was worth a lot of money. I could go on like this through the whole story, for every time that my emotions changed. But basically in the end I was sad. I didnt like the idea that the baby dies, after all of that started just because Kino wanted to save his sons life. And the baby dies in the end. So over all I would have to say that the story made me cry (even though I never actually cried or cheered or smiled). 3. What connections are there between the book and your life. The only connection I can see between the book and my life would be the n...

Tescos annual report Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Tescos annual report - Essay Example Customers bought over two million bags of barbecue fuel in the summer, and Christmas decoration sales were up by over 37% from the previous year. What will be interesting will be to see if this rise in non-food sales across the board will continue to grow on a year-by-year basis, or if at some point they will level off with only small incremental gains to be had. The underlying profit rose from 1832 (in 2004) to 2064 (in millions) (in 2005) and that rise is even more impressive since 2004 numbers were based on a 53 week year and 2005 was based on a 52 week year. The return on capital employed has not been 11% or higher since 2001, but in 2005 it was 11.5%. Earnings per share was also significantly higher and has been growing every year since 2001. In 2005 the earnings per share were 18.30 as compared to 10.66 in 2001. Last years earnings per share were 16.31. The increase from 16.31 to 18.30 represents an almost 17% higher earnings per share in one year. It would seem that the company's objective of focusing on superstores instead of smaller stores is working, especially in the UK. The overall number of stores in the UK dropped from 1,878 to 1,780 while the total sales area (in square feet) went from 23,291,000 to 24,207,000, which is an increase of almost 1 million square feet while closing almost 100 stores. The same scenario was taking place in the company's international markets, with one major difference. The company maintains only 554 international stores but has more square footage that than all the UK stores combined with 24,928,000 square feet. This is a significant difference. If each square foot generates the same amount of sales then international sales in the future are going to be significantly higher than UK sales, with not as much overhead or expenses. The Chairman's statement reflects the company's growth and aggressive style in an optimistic writing. He touts the fact that they have added two new non-executives to the Board, and that both were woman. He, and the company, faces shareholders and a public that are more discerning and political than ever before and has to manipulate the opinions held by those masses to maintain the edge developed over the company's competitors. By adding two women to the Board the company portrays its willingness to facilitate gender equity. The Chairman also touts how much the shareholders benefit from an investment in the company.The Chairman, and the Board, would certainly not wish to see a downswing in investor sentiment, with the resulting sales of shares that would lower the share prices, so he would present even bad news in a way that would seem positive, not that he would have had to with the numbers that Tesco has been generating. The numbers regarding cash flow are also strong. Net cash flow rose from 2,942 to 3,004 from 2004 to 2005 and the stronger number is reflected throughout the entire cash flow analysis. The cash inflow went from a negative (137) to a positive 259 (in millions). The company spent almost the same amount in 2005 as they did in 2004 to acquire tangible fixed assets. The company had less of a decrease in net debt than the year before, but it was still a substantial increase dropping from 4,090 to 3,842. That is a significant decrease in debt. As for the contributions made from each sector, as

The Future of Drinking Water Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words - 1

The Future of Drinking Water - Essay Example The primary sector comprises the primary production of raw materials or food, while the secondary sector concerns on the processing or refining of the produced goods or raw materials. As to the distribution of the finished products, the whole concern of it lies on the tertiary sector. However, all of these sectors require the availability or abundance of quality drinking water for them to function smoothly as possible. For instance, a quality and abundant drinking water source is necessary to ensure the sustainability of the basic needs in life, and consistency in the achievement of human health, and other related human needs. Furthermore, the availability of quality drinking water is necessary in order to successfully produce food or raw materials for the production of other products in the secondary sector. For example, a quality drinking water is necessary in the livestock industry so that there will be quality produced products that can be readily used in the processing industry. The processing industry on the other hand would require availability of clean and excellent water supply as integral component of the production of high quality standard processed foods. The above illustrations just simply depict the importance of drinking water in the production of raw materials and down to the processing and production of secondary product offerings.