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• Workstation video card in a laptop?

  - by david

  I am going to buy an HP EliteBook 8740w. The problem is it comes with Nvidia quadro 2800m and ati 7820m firepro 3d? please advise which is better?

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• Workstation Card

  - by david

  I am going to buy an HP EliteBook 8740w. The problem is it comes with Nvidia quadro 2800m and ati 7820m firepro 3d? please advise which is better?

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• What are incentives (if any) to use WinRT instead of .Net?

  - by Ark-kun

  Let's compare WinRT with .Net .Net .Net is the 13+ years evolution of COM. Three main parts of .Net are execution environment, standard libraries and supported languages. CLR is the native-code execution environment based on COM .Net Framework has a big set of standard libraries (implemented using managed and native code) that can be used from all .Net languages. There are .Net classes that allow using OS APIs. WPF or Silverlight provide a XAML-based UI framework .Net can be used with C++, C#, Javascript, Python, Ruby, VB, LISP, Scheme and many other languages. C++/.Net is a variation of the C++ language that allows interaction with .Net objects. .Net supports inheritance, generics, operator and method overloading and many other features. .Net allows creating apps that run on Windows (XP, 7, 8 Pro (Desktop and Metro), RT, CE, etc), Mac OS, Linux (+ other *nix); iOS, Android, Windows Phone (7, 8); Internet Explorer, Chrome, Firefox; XBox 360, Playstation Suite; raw microprocessors. There is support for creating games (2D/3D) using any managed language or C++. Created by Developer Division WinRT WinRT is based on COM. Three main parts of WinRT are execution environment, standard libraries and supported languages. WinRT has a native-code execution environment based on COM WinRT has a set of standard libraries that more or less can be used from WinRT languages. There are WinRT classes that allow using OS APIs. Unnamed Silverlight clone provides a XAML-based UI framework WinRT can be used with C++, C#, Javascript, VB. C++/CX is a variation of the C++ language that allows interaction with WinRT objects. Custom WinRT components don't support inheritance (classes must be sealed), generics, operator overloading and many other features. WinRT allows creating apps that run on Windows 8 Pro and RT (Metro only); Windows Phone 8 (limited). There is support for creating games (2D/3D) using C++ only. Ordered by Windows Team I think that all the aspects except the last ones are very important for developers. On the other hand it seems that the most important aspect for Microsoft is the last one. So, given the above comparison of conceptually identical technologies, what are incentives (if any) to use WinRT instead of .Net?

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• What is the most Linux friendly video card chipset/manufacturer on the market?

  - by rrc7cz

  I've wasted an absurd amount of time trying to get my nVidia card to function properly in Linux (Ubuntu & Fedora). I've decided to purchase a new video card that will "just work" with any Linux I throw at it. Making things even easier, I'm not a gamer, though I do appreciate some of the 3D or alpha blending effects seen in modern GUIs. What cards and/or manufacturers do you recommend for the maximum acceleration with minimum problems?

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• Intel GMA 965 M - OpenGL missing

  - by pestaa

  I have a Lenovo 3000 N200 notebook with integrated GMA 965 VGA, using Windows 7. All my drivers are up to date, downloaded directly from the vendor site, installed with administrative privileges, etc. Yet, all OpenGL applications cannot render the interface (or any visuals). Examples are Blender (3D modeling software) and Babo Violent (top-down FPS). All the controls, sound effects and music are live, but the screen is black or light gray, respectively. What can one do?

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• Filter file types on desktop

  - by Jonathan

  I've seen videos of things like 3D desktops and used things like Stardock's fences. But are there any programs that will allow me to have a filters like on the side of my desktop which I can click to only who certain file types. So like on the right of the desktop is a list of filetypes which have files on my desktop and I can click them and it will only shows files on my desktop (not in explorer windows) of that filetype.

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• Some keys not working under screen in vim

  - by Art

  When using vim under screen, some keys are not working. Namely, Pressing Alt-Left produces '3D' and Alt-Right produces '3C' Also, pressing Up/Down when scrolling list of files in Command-T plugin produces 'A' and 'B' respectively. When I exit the screen and run vim just under ssh session, all works fine. Are there any settings in screen itself or terminal server/client I can tweak to fix this issue?

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• How to change boot first screen resultion

  - by Joshua

  when i start my pc when the first screen i see the resultion is small but when it gets to log in screen its good how di i change the resultion screen size of the first screen thats the screen thats small and the log in screen and when i log in all thats good only that screen pls help me someone thanks the graphic card is gtx 680 thanks im not sure wht topic this goes in It worked perfectly one day I didn't read the nividia 3d thing and i didn't read and i unstalled the drivers and that change and then later installed it back after how do I fix this? Thanks

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• how to set windows 7 resolution to 16:9 in virtualbox running in ubuntu 12.04 as a host?

  - by Gabriele

  I have installed Virtualbox in Ubuntu 12.04, and I created a virtual guest with Windows 7 64bit. Guest additions were also installed. It works fine, but I can't set the resolution to anything higher than 1600 x 1200, whereas my screen is 1920x1080. Here's my system specifications: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-3632QM CPU @ 2.20GHz AMD Radeon 7650 VGA 8 Gb RAM DDR3 Moreover, if I try to enhable 3D acceleration in the settings of my guest, when I expand to full screen it aborts... Thanks in advance Gabriele

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• domain/IN: has no NS records

  - by thejartender

  I have set up a home web server using Ubuntu 12.10 and I can safely say that it works with regards to router forwarding and ports being found. I know this, because switched my hosting provider's VPS SOA record to use my ISP IP with an 'A' value and had my website running from home. This verified that my server was configured correctly so I started what I believe to be the final step in making my old desktop into a full DNS server. I found this tutorial that got me started My LAN network consists of the following: My router with a gateway of 10.0.0.zzz My server with an IP of 10.0.0.xxx A laptop with an IP of 10.0.0.yyy Step 1: I installed bind via sudo apt-get install bind9 Step2: I configured /etc/bind/named.conf.local with: zone "sognwebdesign.no" { type master; file "/etc/bind/zones/sognwebdesign.no.db"; }; zone "0.0.10.in-addr.arpa" { type master; file "/etc/bind/zones/rev.0.0.10.in-addr.arpa"; }; Step3: Updated /etc/bind/named.conf.options with two ISP DNS addresses Step 4: Updated /etc/resolv.confwith: nameserver 10.0.0.xxx search lan search sognwebdesign.no Step5: created a ``/etc/bind/zones directory Step6: Created /etc/bind/zones/sognwebdesign.no.dbwith: $TTL 3D @ IN SOA ns.sognwebdesign.no. admin.sognwebdesign.no. ( 2007062001 28800 3600 604800 38400 ); sognwebdesign.no. IN NS ns1.sognwebdesign.no. sognwebdesign.no. IN NS ns2.sognwebdesign.no. sognwebdesign.no. IN NS ns3.sognwebdesign.no. NS1 IN A 10.0.0.1 NS2 IN A 10.0.0.2 NS3 IN A 10.0.0.3 www IN A 10.0.0.4 yuccalaptop IN A 10.0.0.19 gw IN A 10.0.0.138 TXT "Network Gateway" Step 7: created/etc/bind/zones/rev.0.0.10.in-addr.arpawith: $TTL 3D @ IN SOA ns.sognwebdesign.no. admin.sognwebdesign.no. ( 2007062001 28800 604800 604800 86400 ); zzz IN PTR gw.sognwebdesign.no. 1 IN PTR ns1.sognwebdesign.no. 2 IN PTR ns2.sognwebdesign.no. 3 IN PTR ns3.sognwebdesign.no. yyy IN PTR yuccalaptop.sognwebdesign.no. I then restart bind and dig-x sognwebdesign.no and it works Lastly I perform named-checkzoneon each of my zone files, but me reverse zone fail fails with: sognwedesign.no/IN: has no NS records Can anyone explain what I am doing wrong here or assist me in getting this configured correctly?

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• Referencing ASP.net textbox data in JavaScripts

  - by GoldenEarring

  I'm interested in making an interactive 3D pie chart using JavaScript and ASP.net controls for a webpage. Essentially, I want to make an interactive version of the chart here: https://google-developers.appspot.com/chart/interactive/docs/gallery/piechart#3D I want to have 5 ASP.net textboxes where the user enters data and then submits it, and the chart adjusts according to what the user enters. I understand using ASP.net controls with JS is probably not the most effective way to go about it, but I would really appreciate if someone could share how doing this would be possible. I really don't know where to begin. Thanks for any help! <%@ Page Language="C#" %> <!DOCTYPE html> <script runat="server"> void btn1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e) { double s = 0.0; double b = 0; double g = 0.0f; double c = 0.0f; double h = 0.0f; s = double.Parse(txtWork.Text); b = double.Parse(txtEat.Text); g = double.Parse(txtCommute.Text); c = double.Parse(txtWatchTV.Text); h = double.Parse(txtSleep.Text); double total = s + b + g + c + h; if (total != 24) { lblError.Text = "Warning! A day has 24 hours"; } if (total == 24) { lblError.Text = string.Empty; } } </script> <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> <head> <title></title> <script type="text/javascript" src="https://www.google.com/jsapi"></script> <script type="text/javascript"> google.load("visualization", "1", { packages: ["corechart"] }); google.setOnLoadCallback(drawChart); function drawChart() { var data = google.visualization.arrayToDataTable([ ['Task', 'Hours per Day'], ['Work', 11], ['Eat', 2], ['Commute', 2], ['Watch TV', 2], ['Sleep', 7] ]); var options = { title: 'My Daily Activities', is3D: true, }; var chart = new google.visualization.PieChart(document.getElementById('piechart_3d')); chart.draw(data, options); } var data = new google.visualization.DataTable(); var txtWork = document.getElementById('<%=txtWork.ClientID%>') txtEat = document.getElementById('<%=txtEat.ClientID%>') txtCommute = document.getElementById('<%=txtCommute.ClientID%>') txtWatchTV = document.getElementById('<%=txtWatchTV.ClientID%>') txtSleep = document.getElementById('<%=txtSleep.ClientID%>'); var workvalue = parseInt(txtWork, 10) var eatvalue = parseInt(txtEat, 10) var commutevalue = parseInt(txtCommute, 10) var watchtvvalue = parseInt(txtWatchTV, 10) var sleepvalue = parseInt(txtSleep, 10) // Declare columns data.addColumn('string', 'Task'); data.addColumn('Number', 'Hours per day'); // Add data. data.addRows([ ['Work', workvalue], ['Eat', eatvalue], ['Commute', commutevalue], ['Watch TV', watchtvvalue], ['Sleep', sleepvalue], ]); </script> </head> <body> <form id="form1" runat="server"> <div id="piechart_3d" style="width: 900px; height: 500px;"> </div> <asp:Label ID="lblError" runat="server" Font-Size="X-Large" Font-Bold="true" /> <table> <tr> <td>Work:</td> <td><asp:TextBox ID="txtWork" Text="11" runat="server" /></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Eat:</td> <td><asp:TextBox ID="txtEat" text="2" runat="server" /></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Commute:</td> <td><asp:TextBox ID="txtCommute" Text="2" runat="server" /></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Watch TV:</td> <td><asp:TextBox ID="txtWatchTV" Text="2" runat="server" /></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Sleep:</td> <td><asp:TextBox ID="txtSleep" Text="7" runat="server" /></td> </tr> </table> <br /> <br /> <asp:Button ID="btn1" text="Draw 3D PieChart" runat="server" OnClick="btn1_Click" /> </form> </body> </html>

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• VMware guest eats 100% cpu

  - by chris

  I have a Windows 7 x64 guest that acts very strange - the VM is very slow and taskmgr will consume 50% (with 2 cores) or up to 99% (single) of the CPU when everything else is idle. Host is Windows 7 x64 with VMware Workstation 7.0.1 VMware tools are installed the same VM, when running on another PC with VMware Server 2.0 will work OK (CPU at ~0% when idle) I've tried (with no effects) enabled/disabled 3d selected 1 or 2 cores adjusted memory (1gb/500mb) adjusted the bios mem.hotadd = "FALSE" disabled page trimming Windows 7 x86 guests on the same machine do not have this problem.

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• Is there a Telecommunications Reference Architecture?

  - by raul.goycoolea

  @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Abstract   Reference architecture provides needed architectural information that can be provided in advance to an enterprise to enable consistent architectural best practices. Enterprise Reference Architecture helps business owners to actualize their strategies, vision, objectives, and principles. It evaluates the IT systems, based on Reference Architecture goals, principles, and standards. It helps to reduce IT costs by increasing functionality, availability, scalability, etc. Telecom Reference Architecture provides customers with the flexibility to view bundled service bills online with the provision of multiple services. It provides real-time, flexible billing and charging systems, to handle complex promotions, discounts, and settlements with multiple parties. This paper attempts to describe the Reference Architecture for the Telecom Enterprises. It lays the foundation for a Telecom Reference Architecture by articulating the requirements, drivers, and pitfalls for telecom service providers. It describes generic reference architecture for telecom enterprises and moves on to explain how to achieve Enterprise Reference Architecture by using SOA.   Introduction   A Reference Architecture provides a methodology, set of practices, template, and standards based on a set of successful solutions implemented earlier. These solutions have been generalized and structured for the depiction of both a logical and a physical architecture, based on the harvesting of a set of patterns that describe observations in a number of successful implementations. It helps as a reference for the various architectures that an enterprise can implement to solve various problems. It can be used as the starting point or the point of comparisons for various departments/business entities of a company, or for the various companies for an enterprise. It provides multiple views for multiple stakeholders.   Major artifacts of the Enterprise Reference Architecture are methodologies, standards, metadata, documents, design patterns, etc.   Purpose of Reference Architecture   In most cases, architects spend a lot of time researching, investigating, defining, and re-arguing architectural decisions. It is like reinventing the wheel as their peers in other organizations or even the same organization have already spent a lot of time and effort defining their own architectural practices. This prevents an organization from learning from its own experiences and applying that knowledge for increased effectiveness.   Reference architecture provides missing architectural information that can be provided in advance to project team members to enable consistent architectural best practices.   Enterprise Reference Architecture helps an enterprise to achieve the following at the abstract level:   ·       Reference architecture is more of a communication channel to an enterprise ·       Helps the business owners to accommodate to their strategies, vision, objectives, and principles. ·       Evaluates the IT systems based on Reference Architecture Principles ·       Reduces IT spending through increasing functionality, availability, scalability, etc ·       A Real-time Integration Model helps to reduce the latency of the data updates Is used to define a single source of Information ·       Provides a clear view on how to manage information and security ·       Defines the policy around the data ownership, product boundaries, etc. ·       Helps with cost optimization across project and solution portfolios by eliminating unused or duplicate investments and assets ·       Has a shorter implementation time and cost   Once the reference architecture is in place, the set of architectural principles, standards, reference models, and best practices ensure that the aligned investments have the greatest possible likelihood of success in both the near term and the long term (TCO).     Common pitfalls for Telecom Service Providers   Telecom Reference Architecture serves as the first step towards maturity for a telecom service provider. During the course of our assignments/experiences with telecom players, we have come across the following observations – Some of these indicate a lack of maturity of the telecom service provider:   ·       In markets that are growing and not so mature, it has been observed that telcos have a significant amount of in-house or home-grown applications. In some of these markets, the growth has been so rapid that IT has been unable to cope with business demands. Telcos have shown a tendency to come up with workarounds in their IT applications so as to meet business needs. ·       Even for core functions like provisioning or mediation, some telcos have tried to manage with home-grown applications. ·       Most of the applications do not have the required scalability or maintainability to sustain growth in volumes or functionality. ·       Applications face interoperability issues with other applications in the operator's landscape. Integrating a new application or network element requires considerable effort on the part of the other applications. ·       Application boundaries are not clear, and functionality that is not in the initial scope of that application gets pushed onto it. This results in the development of the multiple, small applications without proper boundaries. ·       Usage of Legacy OSS/BSS systems, poor Integration across Multiple COTS Products and Internal Systems. Most of the Integrations are developed on ad-hoc basis and Point-to-Point Integration. ·       Redundancy of the business functions in different applications • Fragmented data across the different applications and no integrated view of the strategic data • Lot of performance Issues due to the usage of the complex integration across OSS and BSS systems   However, this is where the maturity of the telecom industry as a whole can be of help. The collaborative efforts of telcos to overcome some of these problems have resulted in bodies like the TM Forum. They have come up with frameworks for business processes, data, applications, and technology for telecom service providers. These could be a good starting point for telcos to clean up their enterprise landscape.   Industry Trends in Telecom Reference Architecture   Telecom reference architectures are evolving rapidly because telcos are facing business and IT challenges.   “The reality is that there probably is no killer application, no silver bullet that the telcos can latch onto to carry them into a 21st Century.... Instead, there are probably hundreds – perhaps thousands – of niche applications.... And the only way to find which of these works for you is to try out lots of them, ramp up the ones that work, and discontinue the ones that fail.” – Martin Creaner President & CTO TM Forum.   The following trends have been observed in telecom reference architecture:   ·       Transformation of business structures to align with customer requirements ·       Adoption of more Internet-like technical architectures. The Web 2.0 concept is increasingly being used. ·       Virtualization of the traditional operations support system (OSS) ·       Adoption of SOA to support development of IP-based services ·       Adoption of frameworks like Service Delivery Platforms (SDPs) and IP Multimedia Subsystem ·       (IMS) to enable seamless deployment of various services over fixed and mobile networks ·       Replacement of in-house, customized, and stove-piped OSS/BSS with standards-based COTS products ·       Compliance with industry standards and frameworks like eTOM, SID, and TAM to enable seamless integration with other standards-based products   Drivers of Reference Architecture   The drivers of the Reference Architecture are Reference Architecture Goals, Principles, and Enterprise Vision and Telecom Transformation. The details are depicted below diagram. @font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoCaption, li.MsoCaption, div.MsoCaption { margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; font-size: 9pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(79, 129, 189); font-weight: bold; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; } Figure 1. Drivers for Reference Architecture @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Today’s telecom reference architectures should seamlessly integrate traditional legacy-based applications and transition to next-generation network technologies (e.g., IP multimedia subsystems). This has resulted in new requirements for flexible, real-time billing and OSS/BSS systems and implications on the service provider’s organizational requirements and structure.   Telecom reference architectures are today expected to:   ·       Integrate voice, messaging, email and other VAS over fixed and mobile networks, back end systems ·       Be able to provision multiple services and service bundles • Deliver converged voice, video and data services ·       Leverage the existing Network Infrastructure ·       Provide real-time, flexible billing and charging systems to handle complex promotions, discounts, and settlements with multiple parties. ·       Support charging of advanced data services such as VoIP, On-Demand, Services (e.g.  Video), IMS/SIP Services, Mobile Money, Content Services and IPTV. ·       Help in faster deployment of new services • Serve as an effective platform for collaboration between network IT and business organizations ·       Harness the potential of converging technology, networks, devices and content to develop multimedia services and solutions of ever-increasing sophistication on a single Internet Protocol (IP) ·       Ensure better service delivery and zero revenue leakage through real-time balance and credit management ·       Lower operating costs to drive profitability   Enterprise Reference Architecture   The Enterprise Reference Architecture (RA) fills the gap between the concepts and vocabulary defined by the reference model and the implementation. Reference architecture provides detailed architectural information in a common format such that solutions can be repeatedly designed and deployed in a consistent, high-quality, supportable fashion. This paper attempts to describe the Reference Architecture for the Telecom Application Usage and how to achieve the Enterprise Level Reference Architecture using SOA.   • Telecom Reference Architecture • Enterprise SOA based Reference Architecture   Telecom Reference Architecture   Tele Management Forum’s New Generation Operations Systems and Software (NGOSS) is an architectural framework for organizing, integrating, and implementing telecom systems. NGOSS is a component-based framework consisting of the following elements:   ·       The enhanced Telecom Operations Map (eTOM) is a business process framework. ·       The Shared Information Data (SID) model provides a comprehensive information framework that may be specialized for the needs of a particular organization. ·       The Telecom Application Map (TAM) is an application framework to depict the functional footprint of applications, relative to the horizontal processes within eTOM. ·       The Technology Neutral Architecture (TNA) is an integrated framework. TNA is an architecture that is sustainable through technology changes.   NGOSS Architecture Standards are:   ·       Centralized data ·       Loosely coupled distributed systems ·       Application components/re-use  ·       A technology-neutral system framework with technology specific implementations ·       Interoperability to service provider data/processes ·       Allows more re-use of business components across multiple business scenarios ·       Workflow automation   The traditional operator systems architecture consists of four layers,   ·       Business Support System (BSS) layer, with focus toward customers and business partners. Manages order, subscriber, pricing, rating, and billing information. ·       Operations Support System (OSS) layer, built around product, service, and resource inventories. ·       Networks layer – consists of Network elements and 3rd Party Systems. ·       Integration Layer – to maximize application communication and overall solution flexibility.   Reference architecture for telecom enterprises is depicted below. @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoCaption, li.MsoCaption, div.MsoCaption { margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; font-size: 9pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(79, 129, 189); font-weight: bold; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Figure 2. Telecom Reference Architecture   The major building blocks of any Telecom Service Provider architecture are as follows:   1. Customer Relationship Management   CRM encompasses the end-to-end lifecycle of the customer: customer initiation/acquisition, sales, ordering, and service activation, customer care and support, proactive campaigns, cross sell/up sell, and retention/loyalty.   CRM also includes the collection of customer information and its application to personalize, customize, and integrate delivery of service to a customer, as well as to identify opportunities for increasing the value of the customer to the enterprise.   The key functionalities related to Customer Relationship Management are   ·       Manage the end-to-end lifecycle of a customer request for products. ·       Create and manage customer profiles. ·       Manage all interactions with customers – inquiries, requests, and responses. ·       Provide updates to Billing and other south bound systems on customer/account related updates such as customer/ account creation, deletion, modification, request bills, final bill, duplicate bills, credit limits through Middleware. ·       Work with Order Management System, Product, and Service Management components within CRM. ·       Manage customer preferences – Involve all the touch points and channels to the customer, including contact center, retail stores, dealers, self service, and field service, as well as via any media (phone, face to face, web, mobile device, chat, email, SMS, mail, the customer's bill, etc.). ·       Support single interface for customer contact details, preferences, account details, offers, customer premise equipment, bill details, bill cycle details, and customer interactions.   CRM applications interact with customers through customer touch points like portals, point-of-sale terminals, interactive voice response systems, etc. The requests by customers are sent via fulfillment/provisioning to billing system for ordering processing.   2. Billing and Revenue Management   Billing and Revenue Management handles the collection of appropriate usage records and production of timely and accurate bills – for providing pre-bill usage information and billing to customers; for processing their payments; and for performing payment collections. In addition, it handles customer inquiries about bills, provides billing inquiry status, and is responsible for resolving billing problems to the customer's satisfaction in a timely manner. This process grouping also supports prepayment for services.   The key functionalities provided by these applications are   ·       To ensure that enterprise revenue is billed and invoices delivered appropriately to customers. ·       To manage customers’ billing accounts, process their payments, perform payment collections, and monitor the status of the account balance. ·       To ensure the timely and effective fulfillment of all customer bill inquiries and complaints. ·       Collect the usage records from mediation and ensure appropriate rating and discounting of all usage and pricing. ·       Support revenue sharing; split charging where usage is guided to an account different from the service consumer. ·       Support prepaid and post-paid rating. ·       Send notification on approach / exceeding the usage thresholds as enforced by the subscribed offer, and / or as setup by the customer. ·       Support prepaid, post paid, and hybrid (where some services are prepaid and the rest of the services post paid) customers and conversion from post paid to prepaid, and vice versa. ·       Support different billing function requirements like charge prorating, promotion, discount, adjustment, waiver, write-off, account receivable, GL Interface, late payment fee, credit control, dunning, account or service suspension, re-activation, expiry, termination, contract violation penalty, etc. ·       Initiate direct debit to collect payment against an invoice outstanding. ·       Send notification to Middleware on different events; for example, payment receipt, pre-suspension, threshold exceed, etc.   Billing systems typically get usage data from mediation systems for rating and billing. They get provisioning requests from order management systems and inquiries from CRM systems. Convergent and real-time billing systems can directly get usage details from network elements.   3. Mediation   Mediation systems transform/translate the Raw or Native Usage Data Records into a general format that is acceptable to billing for their rating purposes.   The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Mediation system in the end-to-end solution.   ·       Collect Usage Data Records from different data sources – like network elements, routers, servers – via different protocol and interfaces. ·       Process Usage Data Records – Mediation will process Usage Data Records as per the source format. ·       Validate Usage Data Records from each source. ·       Segregates Usage Data Records coming from each source to multiple, based on the segregation requirement of end Application. ·       Aggregates Usage Data Records based on the aggregation rule if any from different sources. ·       Consolidates multiple Usage Data Records from each source. ·       Delivers formatted Usage Data Records to different end application like Billing, Interconnect, Fraud Management, etc. ·       Generates audit trail for incoming Usage Data Records and keeps track of all the Usage Data Records at various stages of mediation process. ·       Checks duplicate Usage Data Records across files for a given time window.   4. Fulfillment   This area is responsible for providing customers with their requested products in a timely and correct manner. It translates the customer's business or personal need into a solution that can be delivered using the specific products in the enterprise's portfolio. This process informs the customers of the status of their purchase order, and ensures completion on time, as well as ensuring a delighted customer. These processes are responsible for accepting and issuing orders. They deal with pre-order feasibility determination, credit authorization, order issuance, order status and tracking, customer update on customer order activities, and customer notification on order completion. Order management and provisioning applications fall into this category.   The key functionalities provided by these applications are   ·       Issuing new customer orders, modifying open customer orders, or canceling open customer orders; ·       Verifying whether specific non-standard offerings sought by customers are feasible and supportable; ·       Checking the credit worthiness of customers as part of the customer order process; ·       Testing the completed offering to ensure it is working correctly; ·       Updating of the Customer Inventory Database to reflect that the specific product offering has been allocated, modified, or cancelled; ·       Assigning and tracking customer provisioning activities; ·       Managing customer provisioning jeopardy conditions; and ·       Reporting progress on customer orders and other processes to customer.   These applications typically get orders from CRM systems. They interact with network elements and billing systems for fulfillment of orders.   5. Enterprise Management   This process area includes those processes that manage enterprise-wide activities and needs, or have application within the enterprise as a whole. They encompass all business management processes that   ·       Are necessary to support the whole of the enterprise, including processes for financial management, legal management, regulatory management, process, cost, and quality management, etc.;   ·       Are responsible for setting corporate policies, strategies, and directions, and for providing guidelines and targets for the whole of the business, including strategy development and planning for areas, such as Enterprise Architecture, that are integral to the direction and development of the business;   ·       Occur throughout the enterprise, including processes for project management, performance assessments, cost assessments, etc.     (i) Enterprise Risk Management:   Enterprise Risk Management focuses on assuring that risks and threats to the enterprise value and/or reputation are identified, and appropriate controls are in place to minimize or eliminate the identified risks. The identified risks may be physical or logical/virtual. Successful risk management ensures that the enterprise can support its mission critical operations, processes, applications, and communications in the face of serious incidents such as security threats/violations and fraud attempts. Two key areas covered in Risk Management by telecom operators are:   ·       Revenue Assurance: Revenue assurance system will be responsible for identifying revenue loss scenarios across components/systems, and will help in rectifying the problems. The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Revenue Assurance system in the end-to-end solution. o   Identify all usage information dropped when networks are being upgraded. o   Interconnect bill verification. o   Identify where services are routinely provisioned but never billed. o   Identify poor sales policies that are intensifying collections problems. o   Find leakage where usage is sent to error bucket and never billed for. o   Find leakage where field service, CRM, and network build-out are not optimized.   ·       Fraud Management: Involves collecting data from different systems to identify abnormalities in traffic patterns, usage patterns, and subscription patterns to report suspicious activity that might suggest fraudulent usage of resources, resulting in revenue losses to the operator.   The key roles and responsibilities of the system component are as follows:   o   Fraud management system will capture and monitor high usage (over a certain threshold) in terms of duration, value, and number of calls for each subscriber. The threshold for each subscriber is decided by the system and fixed automatically. o   Fraud management will be able to detect the unauthorized access to services for certain subscribers. These subscribers may have been provided unauthorized services by employees. The component will raise the alert to the operator the very first time of such illegal calls or calls which are not billed. o   The solution will be to have an alarm management system that will deliver alarms to the operator/provider whenever it detects a fraud, thus minimizing fraud by catching it the first time it occurs. o   The Fraud Management system will be capable of interfacing with switches, mediation systems, and billing systems   (ii) Knowledge Management   This process focuses on knowledge management, technology research within the enterprise, and the evaluation of potential technology acquisitions.   Key responsibilities of knowledge base management are to   ·       Maintain knowledge base – Creation and updating of knowledge base on ongoing basis. ·       Search knowledge base – Search of knowledge base on keywords or category browse ·       Maintain metadata – Management of metadata on knowledge base to ensure effective management and search. ·       Run report generator. ·       Provide content – Add content to the knowledge base, e.g., user guides, operational manual, etc.   (iii) Document Management   It focuses on maintaining a repository of all electronic documents or images of paper documents relevant to the enterprise using a system.   (iv) Data Management   It manages data as a valuable resource for any enterprise. For telecom enterprises, the typical areas covered are Master Data Management, Data Warehousing, and Business Intelligence. It is also responsible for data governance, security, quality, and database management.   Key responsibilities of Data Management are   ·       Using ETL, extract the data from CRM, Billing, web content, ERP, campaign management, financial, network operations, asset management info, customer contact data, customer measures, benchmarks, process data, e.g., process inputs, outputs, and measures, into Enterprise Data Warehouse. ·       Management of data traceability with source, data related business rules/decisions, data quality, data cleansing data reconciliation, competitors data – storage for all the enterprise data (customer profiles, products, offers, revenues, etc.) ·       Get online update through night time replication or physical backup process at regular frequency. ·       Provide the data access to business intelligence and other systems for their analysis, report generation, and use.   (v) Business Intelligence   It uses the Enterprise Data to provide the various analysis and reports that contain prospects and analytics for customer retention, acquisition of new customers due to the offers, and SLAs. It will generate right and optimized plans – bolt-ons for the customers.   The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Business Intelligence system at the Enterprise Level:   ·       It will do Pattern analysis and reports problem. ·       It will do Data Analysis – Statistical analysis, data profiling, affinity analysis of data, customer segment wise usage patterns on offers, products, service and revenue generation against services and customer segments. ·       It will do Performance (business, system, and forecast) analysis, churn propensity, response time, and SLAs analysis. ·       It will support for online and offline analysis, and report drill down capability. ·       It will collect, store, and report various SLA data. ·       It will provide the necessary intelligence for marketing and working on campaigns, etc., with cost benefit analysis and predictions.   It will advise on customer promotions with additional services based on loyalty and credit history of customer   ·       It will Interface with Enterprise Data Management system for data to run reports and analysis tasks. It will interface with the campaign schedules, based on historical success evidence.   (vi) Stakeholder and External Relations Management   It manages the enterprise's relationship with stakeholders and outside entities. Stakeholders include shareholders, employee organizations, etc. Outside entities include regulators, local community, and unions. Some of the processes within this grouping are Shareholder Relations, External Affairs, Labor Relations, and Public Relations.   (vii) Enterprise Resource Planning   It is used to manage internal and external resources, including tangible assets, financial resources, materials, and human resources. Its purpose is to facilitate the flow of information between all business functions inside the boundaries of the enterprise and manage the connections to outside stakeholders. ERP systems consolidate all business operations into a uniform and enterprise wide system environment.   The key roles and responsibilities for Enterprise System are given below:   ·        It will handle responsibilities such as core accounting, financial, and management reporting. ·       It will interface with CRM for capturing customer account and details. ·       It will interface with billing to capture the billing revenue and other financial data. ·       It will be responsible for executing the dunning process. Billing will send the required feed to ERP for execution of dunning. ·       It will interface with the CRM and Billing through batch interfaces. Enterprise management systems are like horizontals in the enterprise and typically interact with all major telecom systems. E.g., an ERP system interacts with CRM, Fulfillment, and Billing systems for different kinds of data exchanges.   6. External Interfaces/Touch Points   The typical external parties are customers, suppliers/partners, employees, shareholders, and other stakeholders. External interactions from/to a Service Provider to other parties can be achieved by a variety of mechanisms, including:   ·       Exchange of emails or faxes ·       Call Centers ·       Web Portals ·       Business-to-Business (B2B) automated transactions   These applications provide an Internet technology driven interface to external parties to undertake a variety of business functions directly for themselves. These can provide fully or partially automated service to external parties through various touch points.   Typical characteristics of these touch points are   ·       Pre-integrated self-service system, including stand-alone web framework or integration front end with a portal engine ·       Self services layer exposing atomic web services/APIs for reuse by multiple systems across the architectural environment ·       Portlets driven connectivity exposing data and services interoperability through a portal engine or web application   These touch points mostly interact with the CRM systems for requests, inquiries, and responses.   7. Middleware   The component will be primarily responsible for integrating the different systems components under a common platform. It should provide a Standards-Based Platform for building Service Oriented Architecture and Composite Applications. The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Middleware component in the end-to-end solution.   ·       As an integration framework, covering to and fro interfaces ·       Provide a web service framework with service registry. ·       Support SOA framework with SOA service registry. ·       Each of the interfaces from / to Middleware to other components would handle data transformation, translation, and mapping of data points. ·       Receive data from the caller / activate and/or forward the data to the recipient system in XML format. ·       Use standard XML for data exchange. ·       Provide the response back to the service/call initiator. ·       Provide a tracking until the response completion. ·       Keep a store transitional data against each call/transaction. ·       Interface through Middleware to get any information that is possible and allowed from the existing systems to enterprise systems; e.g., customer profile and customer history, etc. ·       Provide the data in a common unified format to the SOA calls across systems, and follow the Enterprise Architecture directive. ·       Provide an audit trail for all transactions being handled by the component.   8. Network Elements   The term Network Element means a facility or equipment used in the provision of a telecommunications service. Such terms also includes features, functions, and capabilities that are provided by means of such facility or equipment, including subscriber numbers, databases, signaling systems, and information sufficient for billing and collection or used in the transmission, routing, or other provision of a telecommunications service.   Typical network elements in a GSM network are Home Location Register (HLR), Intelligent Network (IN), Mobile Switching Center (MSC), SMS Center (SMSC), and network elements for other value added services like Push-to-talk (PTT), Ring Back Tone (RBT), etc.   Network elements are invoked when subscribers use their telecom devices for any kind of usage. These elements generate usage data and pass it on to downstream systems like mediation and billing system for rating and billing. They also integrate with provisioning systems for order/service fulfillment.   9. 3rd Party Applications   3rd Party systems are applications like content providers, payment gateways, point of sale terminals, and databases/applications maintained by the Government.   Depending on applicability and the type of functionality provided by 3rd party applications, the integration with different telecom systems like CRM, provisioning, and billing will be done.   10. Service Delivery Platform   A service delivery platform (SDP) provides the architecture for the rapid deployment, provisioning, execution, management, and billing of value added telecom services. SDPs are based on the concept of SOA and layered architecture. They support the delivery of voice, data services, and content in network and device-independent fashion. They allow application developers to aggregate network capabilities, services, and sources of content. SDPs typically contain layers for web services exposure, service application development, and network abstraction.   SOA Reference Architecture   SOA concept is based on the principle of developing reusable business service and building applications by composing those services, instead of building monolithic applications in silos. It’s about bridging the gap between business and IT through a set of business-aligned IT services, using a set of design principles, patterns, and techniques.   In an SOA, resources are made available to participants in a value net, enterprise, line of business (typically spanning multiple applications within an enterprise or across multiple enterprises). It consists of a set of business-aligned IT services that collectively fulfill an organization’s business processes and goals. We can choreograph these services into composite applications and invoke them through standard protocols. SOA, apart from agility and reusability, enables:   ·       The business to specify processes as orchestrations of reusable services ·       Technology agnostic business design, with technology hidden behind service interface ·       A contractual-like interaction between business and IT, based on service SLAs ·       Accountability and governance, better aligned to business services ·       Applications interconnections untangling by allowing access only through service interfaces, reducing the daunting side effects of change ·       Reduced pressure to replace legacy and extended lifetime for legacy applications, through encapsulation in services   ·       A Cloud Computing paradigm, using web services technologies, that makes possible service outsourcing on an on-demand, utility-like, pay-per-usage basis   The following section represents the Reference Architecture of logical view for the Telecom Solution. The new custom built application needs to align with this logical architecture in the long run to achieve EA benefits.   Packaged implementation applications, such as ERP billing applications, need to expose their functions as service providers (as other applications consume) and interact with other applications as service consumers.   COT applications need to expose services through wrappers such as adapters to utilize existing resources and at the same time achieve Enterprise Architecture goal and objectives.   The following are the various layers for Enterprise level deployment of SOA. This diagram captures the abstract view of Enterprise SOA layers and important components of each layer. Layered architecture means decomposition of services such that most interactions occur between adjacent layers. However, there is no strict rule that top layers should not directly communicate with bottom layers.   The diagram below represents the important logical pieces that would result from overall SOA transformation. @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoCaption, li.MsoCaption, div.MsoCaption { margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; font-size: 9pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(79, 129, 189); font-weight: bold; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Figure 3. Enterprise SOA Reference Architecture 1.          Operational System Layer: This layer consists of all packaged applications like CRM, ERP, custom built applications, COTS based applications like Billing, Revenue Management, Fulfilment, and the Enterprise databases that are essential and contribute directly or indirectly to the Enterprise OSS/BSS Transformation.   ERP holds the data of Asset Lifecycle Management, Supply Chain, and Advanced Procurement and Human Capital Management, etc.   CRM holds the data related to Order, Sales, and Marketing, Customer Care, Partner Relationship Management, Loyalty, etc.   Content Management handles Enterprise Search and Query. Billing application consists of the following components:   ·       Collections Management, Customer Billing Management, Invoices, Real-Time Rating, Discounting, and Applying of Charges ·       Enterprise databases will hold both the application and service data, whether structured or unstructured.   MDM - Master data majorly consists of Customer, Order, Product, and Service Data.     2.          Enterprise Component Layer:   This layer consists of the Application Services and Common Services that are responsible for realizing the functionality and maintaining the QoS of the exposed services. This layer uses container-based technologies such as application servers to implement the components, workload management, high availability, and load balancing.   Application Services: This Service Layer enables application, technology, and database abstraction so that the complex accessing logic is hidden from the other service layers. This is a basic service layer, which exposes application functionalities and data as reusable services. The three types of the Application access services are:   ·       Application Access Service: This Service Layer exposes application level functionalities as a reusable service between BSS to BSS and BSS to OSS integration. This layer is enabled using disparate technology such as Web Service, Integration Servers, and Adaptors, etc.   ·       Data Access Service: This Service Layer exposes application data services as a reusable reference data service. This is done via direct interaction with application data. and provides the federated query.   ·       Network Access Service: This Service Layer exposes provisioning layer as a reusable service from OSS to OSS integration. This integration service emphasizes the need for high performance, stateless process flows, and distributed design.   Common Services encompasses management of structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data such as information services, portal services, interaction services, infrastructure services, and security services, etc.   3.          Integration Layer:   This consists of service infrastructure components like service bus, service gateway for partner integration, service registry, service repository, and BPEL processor. Service bus will carry the service invocation payloads/messages between consumers and providers. The other important functions expected from it are itinerary based routing, distributed caching of routing information, transformations, and all qualities of service for messaging-like reliability, scalability, and availability, etc. Service registry will hold all contracts (wsdl) of services, and it helps developers to locate or discover service during design time or runtime.   • BPEL processor would be useful in orchestrating the services to compose a complex business scenario or process. • Workflow and business rules management are also required to support manual triggering of certain activities within business process. based on the rules setup and also the state machine information. Application, data, and service mediation layer typically forms the overall composite application development framework or SOA Framework.   4.          Business Process Layer: These are typically the intermediate services layer and represent Shared Business Process Services. At Enterprise Level, these services are from Customer Management, Order Management, Billing, Finance, and Asset Management application domains.   5.          Access Layer: This layer consists of portals for Enterprise and provides a single view of Enterprise information management and dashboard services.   6.          Channel Layer: This consists of various devices; applications that form part of extended enterprise; browsers through which users access the applications.   7.          Client Layer: This designates the different types of users accessing the enterprise applications. The type of user typically would be an important factor in determining the level of access to applications.   8.          Vertical pieces like management, monitoring, security, and development cut across all horizontal layers Management and monitoring involves all aspects of SOA-like services, SLAs, and other QoS lifecycle processes for both applications and services surrounding SOA governance.     9.          EA Governance, Reference Architecture, Roadmap, Principles, and Best Practices:   EA Governance is important in terms of providing the overall direction to SOA implementation within the enterprise. This involves board-level involvement, in addition to business and IT executives. At a high level, this involves managing the SOA projects implementation, managing SOA infrastructure, and controlling the entire effort through all fine-tuned IT processes in accordance with COBIT (Control Objectives for Information Technology).   Devising tools and techniques to promote reuse culture, and the SOA way of doing things needs competency centers to be established in addition to training the workforce to take up new roles that are suited to SOA journey.   Conclusions   Reference Architectures can serve as the basis for disparate architecture efforts throughout the organization, even if they use different tools and technologies. Reference architectures provide best practices and approaches in the independent way a vendor deals with technology and standards. Reference Architectures model the abstract architectural elements for an enterprise independent of the technologies, protocols, and products that are used to implement an SOA. Telecom enterprises today are facing significant business and technology challenges due to growing competition, a multitude of services, and convergence. Adopting architectural best practices could go a long way in meeting these challenges. The use of SOA-based architecture for communication to each of the external systems like Billing, CRM, etc., in OSS/BSS system has made the architecture very loosely coupled, with greater flexibility. Any change in the external systems would be absorbed at the Integration Layer without affecting the rest of the ecosystem. The use of a Business Process Management (BPM) tool makes the management and maintenance of the business processes easy, with better performance in terms of lead time, quality, and cost. Since the Architecture is based on standards, it will lower the cost of deploying and managing OSS/BSS applications over their lifecycles.

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• Service-Oriented Architecture and Web Services

  Service oriented architecture is an architectural model for developing distributed systems across a network or the Internet. The main goal of this model is to create a collection of sub-systems to function as one unified system. This approach allows applications to work within the context of a client server relationship much like a web browser would interact with a web server. In this relationship a client application can request an action to be performed on a server application and are returned to the requesting client. It is important to note that primary implementation of service oriented architecture is through the use of web services. Web services are exposed components of a remote application over a network. Typically web services communicate over the HTTP and HTTPS protocols which are also the standard protocol for accessing web pages on the Internet.  These exposed components are self-contained and are self-describing.  Due to web services independence, they can be called by any application as long as it can be accessed via the network.  Web services allow for a lot of flexibility when connecting two distinct systems because the service works independently from the client. In this case a web services built with Java in a UNIX environment not will have problems handling request from a C# application in a windows environment. This is because these systems are communicating over an open protocol allowed by both environments. Additionally web services can be found by using UDDI. References: Colan, M. (2004). Service-Oriented Architecture expands the vision of web services, Part 1. Retrieved on August 21, 2011 from http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/ws-soaintro/index.html W3Schools.com. (2011). Web Services Introduction - What is Web Services. Retrieved on August 21, 2011 from http://www.w3schools.com/webservices/ws_intro.asp

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• How do I generate mipmap .png and model .obj files for LibGDX?

  - by John Murdoch

  I'm playing a bit with LibGDX (OpenGL ES 2.0 wrapper for Android). I found some sample code which used prepared files to load models and mipmap textures for them, e.g., at https://github.com/libgdx/libgdx/blob/master/demos/invaders/gdx-invaders/src/com/badlogic/gdxinvaders/RendererGL20.java it reads .obj file for the model and RGB565 format .png file to apply a mipmapped texture to it. What is the best / easiest way for me to create these files? I understand .obj files are generated by a bunch of tools (I installed Blender, Wings3D and Kerkythea so far), but which ones will be the most user friendly for someone unfamiliar with 3D modelling? But more importantly, how do I produce a .png file with the mipmapped texture? The .png I looked at ( https://github.com/libgdx/libgdx/blob/master/demos/invaders/gdx-invaders/data/ship.png ) seems to include different textures for each of the faces, probably created with some tool. I browsed through the menus for the 3 tools I have installed but didn't find an option to export such a .png file. What am I missing?

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• HTC Legend get’s 2.2 Froyo update – India

  - by Boonei

  HTC Legend started to received 2.2 Froyo update from yesterday night. If you did not receive an automatic update prompt, please check the same manually in your phone, I am pretty sure you will get it now. Ok, lets get into business Good news Update went off smooth – over Wi-Fi App’s like, Flash light, App sharing, easy adding of attachments in sms, etc are part of update Google Maps 5.0 [But no 3D view] Much awaited Good voice with full integration with the phone!!!! Flash 10 Now for really bad news Phone seems to slow down a lot, that’s not something that we really want New browser with the Froyo update does not seems be all that good as the one installed already Since phone is little sluggish, the really smooth touch effects seem to be bad! This article titled,HTC Legend get’s 2.2 Froyo update – India, was originally published at Tech Dreams. Grab our rss feed or fan us on Facebook to get updates from us.

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• Aero Isn’t Gone in Windows 8: 6 Aero Features You Can Still Use

  - by Chris Hoffman

  Many people think Aero is completely gone in Windows 8, but this isn’t true. Microsoft hasn’t helped matters by saying they’ve “moved beyond Aero” in several blog posts. However, hardware acceleration and most Aero features are still present. Aero is more than Glass. What’s actually gone is the Aero branding and the Aero Glass theme with transparent, blurred window borders. The Flip 3D feature, which wasn’t used by many Windows users, has also been removed. How To Delete, Move, or Rename Locked Files in Windows HTG Explains: Why Screen Savers Are No Longer Necessary 6 Ways Windows 8 Is More Secure Than Windows 7

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• Mouse input not updating in custom XNA/Winforms panel

  - by ChocoMan

  I have a custom Panel residing within my WinForm. the custom Panel holds the XNA rendering. So far, I've rendered an 3D test model. What I'm doing now is trying to handle the input.Using a camera from another working game, keyboard input works fine moving the camera in all 6 directions. But when it comes to handling the mouse to yaw and pitch the camera, nothing happens. I've searched about to see if anyone has come across this problem, but found no testable solutions to my problem. Does anyone understand as to what may be causing the Mouse not to be called when moved? Within MainForm constructor: public MainForm() { InitializeComponent(); Mouse.WindowHandle = panel3D.Handle; } Panel3D.cs Custom XNA Panel class FreeCamera.cs FreeCamera class

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• Oracle Database Security Protecting the Oracle IRM Schema

  - by Simon Thorpe

  Acquiring the Information Rights Management technology in 2006 was part of Oracle's strategic security vision and IRM compliments nicely the overall Oracle security set of solutions. A year ago I spoke about how Oracle has solutions that can help companies protect information throughout its entire life cycle. With our acquisition of Sun this set of solutions has solidified and has even extended down to the operating system and hardware level. Oracle can now offer customers technology that protects their data from the disk, through the database to documents on the desktop! With the recent release of Oracle IRM 11g I was tasked to configure demonstration and evaluation environments and I thought it would make a nice story to leverage some of the security features in the latest release of the Oracle Database. After building these environments I thought I would put together a simple video demonstrating how both Database Advanced Security and Information Rights Management combined can provide a very secure platform for protecting your information. Have a look at the following which highlights these database security options.Transparent Data Encryption protecting the communication from the Oracle IRM server to the Database server. Encryption techniques provide confidentiality and integrity of the data passing to and from the IRM service on the back end. Transparent Data Encryption protecting the Oracle IRM database schema. Encryption is used to provide confidentiality of the IRM data whilst it resides at rest in the database table space. Database Vault is used to ensure only the Oracle IRM service has access to query and update the information that resides in the database. This is an excellent method of ensuring that database administrators cannot look at or make changes to the Oracle IRM database whilst retaining their ability to administrate the database. The last thing you want after deploying an IRM solution is for a curious or unhappy DBA to run a query that grants them rights to your company financial data or documents pertaining to a merger or acquisition.

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• Alpha interpolation in a pixel shader

  - by c4sh

  How does the interpolation in a fragment shader work when it comes to the alpha parameter? I'm programming a shader with SharpDX, DirectX11. My idea is to interpolate 2 3d points of a segment, so that I'll have the position interpolated in between in the pixel shader. But I want to know what happens with the alpha parameter when that position is blocked by another polygon. For instance, if alpha is 1.0 at the left end of my segment and 0.0 at the other one. What is the value of alpha in the middle, 0.5? Or does it depend on the visibility at that point (meaning it could be, for instance, 1.0 OR 0.0 depending on if that part of the segment is hidden by a poolygon?

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• Fed Authentication Methods in OIF / IdP

  - by Damien Carru

  This article is a continuation of my previous entry where I explained how OIF/IdP leverages OAM to authenticate users at runtime: OIF/IdP internally forwards the user to OAM and indicates which Authentication Scheme should be used to challenge the user if needed OAM determine if the user should be challenged (user already authenticated, session timed out or not, session authentication level equal or higher than the level of the authentication scheme specified by OIF/IdP…) After identifying the user, OAM internally forwards the user back to OIF/IdP OIF/IdP can resume its operation In this article, I will discuss how OIF/IdP can be configured to map Federation Authentication Methods to OAM Authentication Schemes: When processing an Authn Request, where the SP requests a specific Federation Authentication Method with which the user should be challenged When sending an Assertion, where OIF/IdP sets the Federation Authentication Method in the Assertion Enjoy the reading! Overview The various Federation protocols support mechanisms allowing the partners to exchange information on: How the user should be challenged, when the SP/RP makes a request How the user was challenged, when the IdP/OP issues an SSO response When a remote SP partner redirects the user to OIF/IdP for Federation SSO, the message might contain data requesting how the user should be challenged by the IdP: this is treated as the Requested Federation Authentication Method. OIF/IdP will need to map that Requested Federation Authentication Method to a local Authentication Scheme, and then invoke OAM for user authentication/challenge with the mapped Authentication Scheme. OAM would authenticate the user if necessary with the scheme specified by OIF/IdP. Similarly, when an IdP issues an SSO response, most of the time it will need to include an identifier representing how the user was challenged: this is treated as the Federation Authentication Method. When OIF/IdP issues an Assertion, it will evaluate the Authentication Scheme with which OAM identified the user: If the Authentication Scheme can be mapped to a Federation Authentication Method, then OIF/IdP will use the result of that mapping in the outgoing SSO response: AuthenticationStatement in the SAML Assertion OpenID Response, if PAPE is enabled If the Authentication Scheme cannot be mapped, then OIF/IdP will set the Federation Authentication Method as the Authentication Scheme name in the outgoing SSO response: AuthenticationStatement in the SAML Assertion OpenID Response, if PAPE is enabled Mappings In OIF/IdP, the mapping between Federation Authentication Methods and Authentication Schemes has the following rules: One Federation Authentication Method can be mapped to several Authentication Schemes In a Federation Authentication Method <-> Authentication Schemes mapping, a single Authentication Scheme is marked as the default scheme that will be used to authenticate a user, if the SP/RP partner requests the user to be authenticated via a specific Federation Authentication Method An Authentication Scheme can be mapped to a single Federation Authentication Method Let’s examine the following example and the various use cases, based on the SAML 2.0 protocol: Mappings defined as: urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:PasswordProtectedTransport mapped to LDAPScheme, marked as the default scheme used for authentication BasicScheme urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:X509 mapped to X509Scheme, marked as the default scheme used for authentication Use cases: SP sends an AuthnRequest specifying urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:X509 as the RequestedAuthnContext: OIF/IdP will authenticate the use with X509Scheme since it is the default scheme mapped for that method. SP sends an AuthnRequest specifying urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:PasswordProtectedTransport as the RequestedAuthnContext: OIF/IdP will authenticate the use with LDAPScheme since it is the default scheme mapped for that method, not the BasicScheme SP did not request any specific methods, and user was authenticated with BasisScheme: OIF/IdP will issue an Assertion with urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:PasswordProtectedTransport as the FederationAuthenticationMethod SP did not request any specific methods, and user was authenticated with LDAPScheme: OIF/IdP will issue an Assertion with urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:PasswordProtectedTransport as the FederationAuthenticationMethod SP did not request any specific methods, and user was authenticated with BasisSessionlessScheme: OIF/IdP will issue an Assertion with BasisSessionlessScheme as the FederationAuthenticationMethod, since that scheme could not be mapped to any Federation Authentication Method (in this case, the administrator would need to correct that and create a mapping) Configuration Mapping Federation Authentication Methods to OAM Authentication Schemes is protocol dependent, since the methods are defined in the various protocols (SAML 2.0, SAML 1.1, OpenID 2.0). As such, the WLST commands to set those mappings will involve: Either the SP Partner Profile and affect all Partners referencing that profile, which do not override the Federation Authentication Method to OAM Authentication Scheme mappings Or the SP Partner entry, which will only affect the SP Partner It is important to note that if an SP Partner is configured to define one or more Federation Authentication Method to OAM Authentication Scheme mappings, then all the mappings defined in the SP Partner Profile will be ignored. Authentication Schemes As discussed in the previous article, during Federation SSO, OIF/IdP will internally forward the user to OAM for authentication/verification and specify which Authentication Scheme to use. OAM will determine if a user needs to be challenged: If the user is not authenticated yet If the user is authenticated but the session timed out If the user is authenticated, but the authentication scheme level of the original authentication is lower than the level of the authentication scheme requested by OIF/IdP So even though an SP requests a specific Federation Authentication Method to be used to challenge the user, if that method is mapped to an Authentication Scheme and that at runtime OAM deems that the user does not need to be challenged with that scheme (because the user is already authenticated, session did not time out, and the session authn level is equal or higher than the one for the specified Authentication Scheme), the flow won’t result in a challenge operation. Protocols SAML 2.0 The SAML 2.0 specifications define the following Federation Authentication Methods for SAML 2.0 flows: urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:unspecified urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:InternetProtocol urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:Telephony urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:MobileOneFactorUnregistered urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:PersonalTelephony urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:PreviousSession urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:MobileOneFactorContract urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:Smartcard urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:Password urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:InternetProtocolPassword urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:X509 urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:TLSClient urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:PGP urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:SPKI urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:XMLDSig urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:SoftwarePKI urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:Kerberos urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:PasswordProtectedTransport urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:SecureRemotePassword urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:NomadTelephony urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:AuthenticatedTelephony urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:MobileTwoFactorUnregistered urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:MobileTwoFactorContract urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:SmartcardPKI urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:TimeSyncToken Out of the box, OIF/IdP has the following mappings for the SAML 2.0 protocol: Only urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:PasswordProtectedTransport is defined This Federation Authentication Method is mapped to: LDAPScheme, marked as the default scheme used for authentication FAAuthScheme BasicScheme BasicFAScheme This mapping is defined in the saml20-sp-partner-profile SP Partner Profile which is the default OOTB SP Partner Profile for SAML 2.0 An example of an AuthnRequest message sent by an SP to an IdP with the SP requesting a specific Federation Authentication Method to be used to challenge the user would be: <samlp:AuthnRequest xmlns:samlp="urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:protocol" Destination="https://idp.com/oamfed/idp/samlv20" ID="id-8bWn-A9o4aoMl3Nhx1DuPOOjawc-" IssueInstant="2014-03-21T20:51:11Z" Version="2.0">  <saml:Issuer ...>https://acme.com/sp</saml:Issuer>  <samlp:NameIDPolicy AllowCreate="false" Format="urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.1:nameid-format:unspecified"/>  <samlp:RequestedAuthnContext Comparison="minimum">    <saml:AuthnContextClassRef xmlns:saml="urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:assertion">      urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:PasswordProtectedTransport </saml:AuthnContextClassRef>  </samlp:RequestedAuthnContext></samlp:AuthnRequest> An example of an Assertion issued by an IdP would be: <samlp:Response ...>    <saml:Issuer ...>https://idp.com/oam/fed</saml:Issuer>    <samlp:Status>        <samlp:StatusCode Value="urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:status:Success"/>    </samlp:Status>    <saml:Assertion ...>        <saml:Issuer ...>https://idp.com/oam/fed</saml:Issuer>        <dsig:Signature>            ...        </dsig:Signature>        <saml:Subject>            <saml:NameID ...>[email protected]</saml:NameID>            <saml:SubjectConfirmation Method="urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:cm:bearer">                <saml:SubjectConfirmationData .../>            </saml:SubjectConfirmation>        </saml:Subject>        <saml:Conditions ...>            <saml:AudienceRestriction>                <saml:Audience>https://acme.com/sp</saml:Audience>            </saml:AudienceRestriction>        </saml:Conditions>        <saml:AuthnStatement AuthnInstant="2014-03-21T20:53:55Z" SessionIndex="id-6i-Dm0yB-HekG6cejktwcKIFMzYE8Yrmqwfd0azz" SessionNotOnOrAfter="2014-03-21T21:53:55Z">            <saml:AuthnContext>                <saml:AuthnContextClassRef>                    urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:2.0:ac:classes:PasswordProtectedTransport                </saml:AuthnContextClassRef>            </saml:AuthnContext>        </saml:AuthnStatement>    </saml:Assertion></samlp:Response> An administrator would be able to specify a mapping between a SAML 2.0 Federation Authentication Method and one or more OAM Authentication Schemes SAML 1.1 The SAML 1.1 specifications define the following Federation Authentication Methods for SAML 1.1 flows: urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.0:am:unspecified urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.0:am:HardwareToken urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.0:am:password urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.0:am:X509-PKI urn:ietf:rfc:2246 urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.0:am:PGP urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.0:am:SPKI urn:ietf:rfc:3075 urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.0:am:XKMS urn:ietf:rfc:1510 urn:ietf:rfc:2945 Out of the box, OIF/IdP has the following mappings for the SAML 1.1 protocol: Only urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.0:am:password is defined This Federation Authentication Method is mapped to: LDAPScheme, marked as the default scheme used for authentication FAAuthScheme BasicScheme BasicFAScheme This mapping is defined in the saml11-sp-partner-profile SP Partner Profile which is the default OOTB SP Partner Profile for SAML 1.1 An example of an Assertion issued by an IdP would be: <samlp:Response ...>    <samlp:Status>        <samlp:StatusCode Value="samlp:Success"/>    </samlp:Status>    <saml:Assertion Issuer="https://idp.com/oam/fed" ...>        <saml:Conditions ...>            <saml:AudienceRestriction>                <saml:Audience>https://acme.com/sp/ssov11</saml:Audience>            </saml:AudienceRestriction>        </saml:Conditions>        <saml:AuthnStatement AuthenticationInstant="2014-03-21T20:53:55Z" AuthenticationMethod="urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.0:am:password">            <saml:Subject>                <saml:NameID ...>[email protected]</saml:NameID>                <saml:SubjectConfirmation>                   <saml:ConfirmationMethod>                       urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.0:cm:bearer                   </saml:ConfirmationMethod>                </saml:SubjectConfirmation>            </saml:Subject>        </saml:AuthnStatement>        <dsig:Signature>            ...        </dsig:Signature>    </saml:Assertion></samlp:Response> Note: SAML 1.1 does not define an AuthnRequest message. An administrator would be able to specify a mapping between a SAML 1.1 Federation Authentication Method and one or more OAM Authentication Schemes OpenID 2.0 The OpenID 2.0 PAPE specifications define the following Federation Authentication Methods for OpenID 2.0 flows: http://schemas.openid.net/pape/policies/2007/06/phishing-resistant http://schemas.openid.net/pape/policies/2007/06/multi-factor http://schemas.openid.net/pape/policies/2007/06/multi-factor-physical Out of the box, OIF/IdP does not define any mappings for the OpenID 2.0 Federation Authentication Methods. For OpenID 2.0, the configuration will involve mapping a list of OpenID 2.0 policies to a list of Authentication Schemes. An example of an OpenID 2.0 Request message sent by an SP/RP to an IdP/OP would be: https://idp.com/openid?openid.ns=http%3A%2F%2Fspecs.openid.net%2Fauth%2F2.0&openid.mode=checkid_setup&openid.claimed_id=http%3A%2F%2Fspecs.openid.net%2Fauth%2F2.0%2Fidentifier_select&openid.identity=http%3A%2F%2Fspecs.openid.net%2Fauth%2F2.0%2Fidentifier_select&openid.assoc_handle=id-6a5S6zhAKaRwQNUnjTKROREdAGSjWodG1el4xyz3&openid.return_to=https%3A%2F%2Facme.com%2Fopenid%3Frefid%3Did-9PKVXZmRxAeDYcgLqPm36ClzOMA-&openid.realm=https%3A%2F%2Facme.com%2Fopenid&openid.ns.ax=http%3A%2F%2Fopenid.net%2Fsrv%2Fax%2F1.0&openid.ax.mode=fetch_request&openid.ax.type.attr0=http%3A%2F%2Faxschema.org%2Fcontact%2Femail&openid.ax.if_available=attr0&openid.ns.pape=http%3A%2F%2Fspecs.openid.net%2Fextensions%2Fpape%2F1.0&openid.pape.max_auth_age=0 An example of an Open ID 2.0 SSO Response issued by an IdP/OP would be: https://acme.com/openid?refid=id-9PKVXZmRxAeDYcgLqPm36ClzOMA-&openid.ns=http%3A%2F%2Fspecs.openid.net%2Fauth%2F2.0&openid.mode=id_res&openid.op_endpoint=https%3A%2F%2Fidp.com%2Fopenid&openid.claimed_id=https%3A%2F%2Fidp.com%2Fopenid%3Fid%3Did-38iCmmlAVEXPsFjnFVKArfn5RIiF75D5doorhEgqqPM%3D&openid.identity=https%3A%2F%2Fidp.com%2Fopenid%3Fid%3Did-38iCmmlAVEXPsFjnFVKArfn5RIiF75D5doorhEgqqPM%3D&openid.return_to=https%3A%2F%2Facme.com%2Fopenid%3Frefid%3Did-9PKVXZmRxAeDYcgLqPm36ClzOMA-&openid.response_nonce=2014-03-24T19%3A20%3A06Zid-YPa2kTNNFftZkgBb460jxJGblk2g--iNwPpDI7M1&openid.assoc_handle=id-6a5S6zhAKaRwQNUnjTKROREdAGSjWodG1el4xyz3&openid.ns.ax=http%3A%2F%2Fopenid.net%2Fsrv%2Fax%2F1.0&openid.ax.mode=fetch_response&openid.ax.type.attr0=http%3A%2F%2Fsession%2Fcount&openid.ax.value.attr0=1&openid.ax.type.attr1=http%3A%2F%2Fopenid.net%2Fschema%2FnamePerson%2Ffriendly&openid.ax.value.attr1=My+name+is+Bobby+Smith&openid.ax.type.attr2=http%3A%2F%2Fschemas.openid.net%2Fax%2Fapi%2Fuser_id&openid.ax.value.attr2=bob&openid.ax.type.attr3=http%3A%2F%2Faxschema.org%2Fcontact%2Femail&openid.ax.value.attr3=bob%40oracle.com&openid.ax.type.attr4=http%3A%2F%2Fsession%2Fipaddress&openid.ax.value.attr4=10.145.120.253&openid.ns.pape=http%3A%2F%2Fspecs.openid.net%2Fextensions%2Fpape%2F1.0&openid.pape.auth_time=2014-03-24T19%3A20%3A05Z&openid.pape.auth_policies=http%3A%2F%2Fschemas.openid.net%2Fpape%2Fpolicies%2F2007%2F06%2Fphishing-resistant&openid.signed=op_endpoint%2Cclaimed_id%2Cidentity%2Creturn_to%2Cresponse_nonce%2Cassoc_handle%2Cns.ax%2Cax.mode%2Cax.type.attr0%2Cax.value.attr0%2Cax.type.attr1%2Cax.value.attr1%2Cax.type.attr2%2Cax.value.attr2%2Cax.type.attr3%2Cax.value.attr3%2Cax.type.attr4%2Cax.value.attr4%2Cns.pape%2Cpape.auth_time%2Cpape.auth_policies&openid.sig=mYMgbGYSs22l8e%2FDom9NRPw15u8%3D In the next article, I will provide examples on how to configure OIF/IdP for the various protocols, to map OAM Authentication Schemes to Federation Authentication Methods.Cheers,Damien Carru

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• Inside Sweden’s Nuclear Bunker Turned Data Center

  - by Jason Fitzpatrick

  A data center inside a decommissioned nuclear bunker is interesting enough, but one that looks as futuristic and awesome as the center under Stockholm begs to be seen. A hundred feet under the city of Stockholm is a decommissioned nuclear bunker that the government had previously leased out intermittently for various events, but it was never put to serious or extended use. Not until, that is,  Jon Karlung discovered the location and brought his vision of an ultra-modern, stylish, and secure data center to life. The passage from Wired’s write up of their photo tour that best encapsulates the feel of the bunker is: Most often data centers are built in boxy warehouses, so Bahnhof stands out as perhaps the world’s most stylish. In fact, it inspired Cisco IT Architect Douglas Alger to write a book on the world’s best-looking data centers. ”The idea that people were sitting in a design meeting and said, ‘what we need for our data center is waterfalls,’ that must have been a very fascinating discussion,” Alger says. Hit up the link below for the full photo tour. Deep Inside the James Bond Villain Lair That Actually Exists [Wired] Why Does 64-Bit Windows Need a Separate “Program Files (x86)” Folder? Why Your Android Phone Isn’t Getting Operating System Updates and What You Can Do About It How To Delete, Move, or Rename Locked Files in Windows

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• Your Day-by-Day Guide to Agile PLM at Oracle OpenWorld 2012

  - by Kerrie Foy

  This year’s Oracle OpenWorld conference is nearly here, and we’re all excited about what we have planned! With five days of activities and customer presenters from market leaders and top innovators like The Coca-Cola Company, Starbucks, JDSU, Facebook, GlobalFoundries, and more, this is an event you don't want to miss. I've compiled this day-by-day guide to help anyone keep track of all the “Product Lifecycle Management and Product Value Chain” sessions and activities at OpenWorld 2012, September 30 – October 4 in San Francisco, California.  Monday, October 1 There are great networking activities on Sunday September 30, but PLM specific sessions start after general conference keynotes on Monday, October 1 at 10:45 a.m. at the InterContinental Hotel in room Telegraph Hill. In fact, most of our sessions this year will be held in this room, which is still close to the conference keynotes in Moscone, but just far enough away to allow some focused networking and discussions.   This first session, 10:45 – 11:45 a.m. is a joint session with the Agile and AutoVue teams, entitled “Streamline PLM Design-to-Manufacturing Processes with AutoVue Visualization Soltuions” featuring presenters from Oracle as well as joint AutoVue and Agile PLM customer GlobalFoundries. In the following 12:15 – 1:15 p.m. slot, there are two sessions to choose from, so if you have a team of representatives attending OpenWorld, you may consider splitting up to catch both of these: a) Our General Session will be held in the InterContinental Hotel Ballroom C, which will cover our complete enterprise PLM strategy, product updates, and roadmaps. It’s our pleasure to feature a customer keynote presentation from Chris Bedi, CIO, and Rajeev Sethi, Director IT Business Engagement, of JDSU. b) A focused session on integrating PLM with Engineering and Supply Chain Systems will be held on the second floor of Moscone West (next to the InterContinental) in room 2022. Join to discover how these types of integrations help companies manage common and integrated design information across all MCAD, ECAD, and software components. After a lunch break and perhaps a visit to the Demogrounds in Moscone West, select from two product roadmap sessions in the next time slot (3:15 – 4:15 p.m.): an Agile 9.3.x session located in the InterContinental’s Ballroom C, and an Agile PLM for Process session located back in the InterContinental’s Telegraph Room. Both sessions will have strong content around each product line’s latest releases, vision, and customer examples. We are very pleased to feature Daniel Soosai of Facebook in the A9 session and Vinnie D’Agostino of The Coca-Cola Company in the PLM for Process session. Afterwards, hang in there for one last session of the day from 4:45 – 5:45 p.m.; it’s an insightful discussion on leveraging Agile PLM as the Foundation for Enterprise Quality Management, and it’s sure to be one of the best. In the Telegraph Room, this session will feature Oracle experts, partner co-presenter David Bartlett from CPG Solutions, and customer co-presenter Thomas Crowe, CIO of PL Developments. Hear their experience around implementing collaborative, integrated solutions to ensure effective knowledge transfer throughout an organization, and how to perform analysis in real time to resolve product quality issues swiftly and efficiently. On Monday evening there will be plenty of industry, product, and partner dinners, so take advantage of all the networking opportunities and catch some great tunes at the 5 day Oracle OpenWorld Music Festival! Tuesday, October 2 Tuesday starts early with a special PLM Networking Brunch, sponsored by several partners, from 8:30 a.m. – 10:30 a.m. at the B Restaurant that sits atop Yerba Buena Gardens. You’ll have the unique opportunity to meet with like-minded industry peers and a PLM partner to discuss a topic of your choosing while enjoying a delicious meal. Registration is required, so to inquire about attending this brunch, please email Terri.Hiskey-AT-oracle.com. After wrapping up your conversations over brunch, head over to the Marriott Marquis in the Nob Hill CD room for a chance to experience the Oracle Product Lifecycle Analytics solution in a Hands-On Lab, open from 10:15 a.m. – 12:45 p.m. Experts will be there to answer your questions. Back in the InterContinental Hotel’s Telegraph room, the session on “Ideation and Requirements Management: Capturing the Voice of the Customer” begins at 11:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m. This may be the session for you if you’re struggling with challenges like too many repositories of customer needs, requests, and ideas; limited visibility into which ideas are being advanced by customers and field resources; or if you’re unable to leverage internal expertise to expose effort and potential risks. This session will discuss how Agile PLM can help you overcome ideation challenges to deliver the right products to their targeted markets and fulfill customer desires. Next, from 1:15 – 2:15 p.m. join us for a session on Managing Profitable Innovation with Oracle Product Lifecycle Analytics. If you missed the Hands-on Lab, have more questions, or simply want to be inspired by the product’s forward-thinking vision and capabilities, this is a great opportunity to meet the progressive-minded executives behind the application. After this session, it may be a good opportunity to swing by the Demogrounds in Moscone West and visit the Agile PLM demos at exhibit booths #81 for Agile PLM for Discrete Manufacturing, #70 for Agile PLM for Process, and #82 for AutoVue and Agile PLM Enterprise Visualization. Check out the related Supply Chain Management booths close by if you’re interested - here's the map. There’s always lots to see and do around the exhibit area. But don’t forget the last session of the day from 5:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. in Telegraph Hill on Managing Product Innovation and Compliance in Life Science Companies, a “must-see” if you’re in this industry. Launching innovative products quickly is already a high-stakes challenge, but companies in the life sciences industry face uniquely severe consequences when new products don’t perform or comply as required. In recent years, more and more regulations have become mandatory, and new ones, such as REACH, are currently going into effect for several companies. Customer presenters from pharmaceutical leader Eli Lilly will share how they’ve leveraged Agile PLM to deliver high-quality, innovative products in a fast-paced, heavily regulated market environment. Tuesday evening unwind at the Supply Chain Management Reception from 6:00 – 8:00 p.m. at the premier boutique Roe Nightclub and Lounge, which is located about three blocks down on Howard Street (on the other side of Moscone from the InterContinental Hotel). Registration is required. Click here for the details.   Wednesday, October 3 We have another full line-up on Wednesday, so be ready for an action-packed day. We start with a session at 10:15 – 11:15 a.m. in the Telegraph Room where we have a session on “PLM for Consumer Products: Building an Engine for Quality and Innovation” with featured presenters from Starbucks and partner Kalypso. This is a rare opportunity to learn directly from Starbucks how they instill quality and innovation throughout their organization, products, and processes, leveraging PLM disciplines with strong support from their partner.  If you’re not in the consumer products industry, we recommend attending another session at 10:15 – 11:15 a.m. in Moscone West room 3005: “Eco-Enterprise Innovation Awards and the Business Case for Sustainability” featuring Jeff Henley, Oracle’s Chairman of the Board and Jon Chorley, Chief Sustainability Officer. Oracle will honor select customers with Oracle’s Eco-Enterprise Innovation award, which recognizes customers and their respective partners who rely on Oracle products to support their green business practices to reduce their environmental impact while improving business efficiencies and reducing costs. The awards presentation is followed by a panel discussion with customers and Oracle executives, who describe how these award-winning organizations are embracing environmental initiatives as a central part of their business strategy and how information technology plays a pivotal role. Next at 11:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m. in Telegraph Hill attend our session devoted to exploring Product Lifecycle Management’s role in Software Lifecycle Management. This is a thought leadership session with Oracle experts in the field on the importance of change management, and we’ll discuss how Oracle has for years leveraged Agile PLM to develop Agile PLM. If software lifecycle management doesn’t apply to your business or you’d rather engage in some lively one-on-one discussions, we also have a “Supply Chain Meet the Experts” session in Moscone West Room 2001A. Product experts, thought leaders and executives will be on hand to discuss your questions/topics, so come prepared. This session tends to fill up fast so try to get in early. At 1:15 – 2:15 p.m. join us back in Telegraph Hill for a session focused on leveraging the Agile Product Portfolio Management application as the Product Development Master Schedule to improve efficiencies, optimize resources, and gain visibility across projects enterprise-wide to improve portfolio profitability. Customer presenters from Broadcom will explain how they’ve leveraged the product to enable a master schedule with enterprise-level, phase-gate program and project collaboration and resource optimization. Again in Telegraph Hill from 3:30 – 4:30 p.m. we have an interesting session with leading semiconductor customer LSI and partner Kalypso on how LSI leveraged Agile PLM to advance from homegrown applications to complete Product Value Chain Management. That type of transition can be challenging, and LSI details how they were able to achieve their goals and the value they gained along the journey – a fascinating account for any company interested in leveraging best practices to innovate their business processes and even end products. Lastly, we’ll wrap up in Telegraph Hill from 5:00 – 6:00 p.m. with a session on “Ensuring New Product Success by Achieving Excellence in New Product Introduction.” This is a cross-industry session, guaranteed to deliver insight in the often elusive practice of creating winning products, and we’re very excited about. According to IDC Manufacturing Insights analyst Joe Barkai, “Product Failures are not necessarily a result of bad ideas…they are a result of suboptimal decisions.” We’ll show you how to wire your business processes to enhance decision-making and maximize product potential. Now, quickly hit your hotel room to freshen up and then catch one of the many complimentary shuttles to the much-anticipated Oracle Customer Appreciation Event on Treasure Island. We have a very exciting show planned – check out what’s in store here. Thursday, October 4 PLM has a light schedule on Thursday this year with just one session, but this again is one of our best sessions on managing the Product Value Chain: at 11:15 a.m – 12:15 p.m.in Telegraph Hill, it’s a customer and partner driven session with Sonoco Products and Deloitte telling their story about how to achieve integrated change control by interfacing Agile PLM with Oracle E-Business Suite. Sonoco Products, a global manufacturer of consumer and industrial packaging materials, with its systems integrator, Deloitte, is doing this by implementing prebuilt integration (Oracle Design-to-Release Integration Pack for Agile Product Lifecycle Management for Process and Oracle Process) to integrate Agile with Oracle Product Hub/Oracle Product Information Management and Oracle E-Business Suite. This session presents a case study of how Sonoco is leveraging this solution to improve data quality and build a framework for stronger master data governance. Even though that ends our PLM line-up at OpenWorld, there will still be many sessions and activities at the conference, so visit the Oracle OpenWorld website to review agendas and build your schedule. And of course, download and bring this guide and the latest version of the Agile PLM Focus-On Document (available soon!). San Francisco is a wonderful city to explore, and we’re glad you’re considering joining the Agile PLM team at Oracle OpenWorld!  I hope to see you there! Follow me before the conference and on site for real-time updates about #OOW12 on Twitter @Kerrie_Foy or @AgilePLM.

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• what are the problems in game development that requires scientific research? [on hold]

  - by Anmar

  I been into Game Development for approximately 2 years for now mostly prototype development and testing ideas. Im in a point of my carrier where I am in a need to publish a research paper I would love to start doing research about game development however my lack of experience in actual game development in a commercial set of environment brings me into Game development in stackexchange My question is for the experience game developers out there What are the problems related to software engineering that you have faced or your team faced while developing games? Example Problems ? The lack of a strong technique for Fun detection in a game in an early stage of development A strong tailored Software Development Life Cycle for game development Agile methodology as a game development methodology Narrowing the goals gap between team members (Editors, Story Designers, Programmers, 3D artists, 2D Artists) - Community Suggestions Indie game marketing requirements for success by Yakyb Any problems you could define it I would be more than happy to take it into consideration for future research. My experience and work mostly involve process related basically SDLC (Waterfall, Spiral, Agile, RUP .Etc) Thank you for any input.

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• Legal question.

  - by Kjow

  Hi all, a question bounces in my head from some time. Copyright laws are different by nation to nation, but generally which is the border line to break a copyright? Suppose to make a game that is very similar to an other come out in the past, e.g. a Pacman clone or a Space Invaders clone, but nothing from original titles are grabbed and maybe they're not made in 2d, but in 3d. The titles aren't "Pacman clone - the return" or "Space Invaders - they did it again", and not also "Pocman" or "Space Evaders" (maybe this last could be fun for some "creative financers" that need to escape from earth :D). Finally suppose to call these some thing like "Popcorn, fruit and ghosts" (or the acronym: "PFG") and "Kill all enemy" (or the acronym: "KAE"). In this case (not grab- all self-made) and no references to original titles, but with a game that feels very similar to "ispiration ones"... they could be sold to somewhere like "Valve's Steam"? Regards, Kjow

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