Imagine Cup ---> 2008 (Categories)

Software Design

In the software design competition, students create real world, dynamic and powerful software solutions using Microsoft tools and technology. Competitors are asked to demonstrate innovation on the Microsoft .NET Framework and Microsoft Windows platform as they conceive, test, and build applications that can change the world for the better. This competition is the only one that is run locally, not online. Countries and regions who participate select their own team to advance to the worldwide finals in Paris in July 2008.

Embedded Development

Devices are becoming smaller, more portable and are having a greater impact on our everyday lives. Formerly the Windows Embedded Student ChallengE, this competition challenges students to go beyond the desktop, challenge your creativity, and to build a complete hardware and software solution using Windows CE and the hardware provided. A team of three-four competitors, and a faculty mentor will build a working prototype of a device that will have an impact on solving some of our world’s toughest problems.

Game Development

As video games are becoming a major part of mainstream entertainment the opportunity to do something socially responsible with the medium has arrived. This year's "Xbox 360 Games for Change Challenge" will represent the first time a game development category has been available during the Imagine Cup. This year's challenge will be the ultimate test of a student's creative and technical skills as they create a game that is not only entertaining but has a social message about creating a sustainable environment. Utilizing Microsoft's ground breaking new XNA Game Studio Express, competing students from around the world will have the chance to gain international exposure for their games. Not only will cash prizes be awarded, these winners will then have an opportunity to come to Microsoft and present their entry to the Microsoft games management team for possible inclusion as a download in the popular Xbox LIVE Arcade service or MSN Games Web site. The first place team, or individual, will also win the opportunity to become an apprentice at Microsoft's Interactive Entertainment Business as part of its internship program. We're announcing the winner next spring 2008 at the worldwide finals in Paris, France. Game Development is a game contest briefed by Games for Change and XNA Technology team.

Project Hoshimi

Comic-style graphics bring to life the world of Professor Hoshimi and his faithful crew of scientists and programmers as they engage in a fantasy battle of life and death. Programmers are faced with very real challenges, and compete directly online with people across the world to see who can create the fastest program to save the day. The game requires coding skills and algorithmic ability to devise and implement strategy for a multi-player head-to-head game. The results play out in a real-time 3-D environment for all to see.

IT Challenge

Students are challenged to develop, deploy, and maintain IT systems that are efficient, functional, robust and secure. Additionally, students must demonstrate proficiency in the science of networks, databases, and servers, and the areas of analysis and decision making in IT environments.

Algorithm

Through a series of brain teasers, coding challenges, and algorithmic puzzles, students discover and implement the right algorithms, attempting feats like decoding the human genome and routing millions of packets across networks.

Photography

By using a photo essay format, students are challenged to communicate a story about creating a sustainable environment using only photos as the communication medium.

Short Film

This invitational highlights the art and science of telling a story. Students are challenged to share a perspective on the Imagine Cup theme and to express themselves in the digital media. From concept and storyboard to footage and editing, the participants must be able to create a film that moves the audience while conveying its strong purpose and meaning.

Interface Design

Creativity and usability are the necessary ingredients to create a well-designed user interface, one that contributes to a successful piece of software or Web application. This invitational challenges designers all over the world to create functional, compelling, forward-thinking user interfaces. Competitors have a unique opportunity to envision an application, connect it to the theme of the Imagine Cup, and show the world how their skills bring it to life.

Labels : Imagine cup 2008 , Categories of competitions in imagine Cup

HCL introduces 1 Tera byte Hard drive for PC's

The 1TB PC has been launched as 2 models; an entry-level one, and a high-end Digital Content Creation Workstation. Both use Hitachi Global Storage Technologies' recently-launched Deskstar 7K1000 1TB hard drive.

The high-end Workstation features Intel Core 2 Duo processor, and a special bundle of Quadro FX 1500 and Adobe Production Studio Premium.

Whereas the entry-level PC features Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 1GB RAM, a 17-inch Flat Panel Monitor, HCL EC2 technology, and HCL Active Management Console.

The HCL 1TB PCs are available across the country, with entry-level models priced at Rs 35,000, and Digital Content Creation Workstations priced at Rs 99,000.

HCL introduces 1 Tera byte Hard drive for PC's

The 1TB PC has been launched as 2 models; an entry-level one, and a high-end Digital Content Creation Workstation. Both use Hitachi Global Storage Technologies' recently-launched Deskstar 7K1000 1TB hard drive.

The high-end Workstation features Intel Core 2 Duo processor, and a special bundle of Quadro FX 1500 and Adobe Production Studio Premium.

Whereas the entry-level PC features Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 1GB RAM, a 17-inch Flat Panel Monitor, HCL EC2 technology, and HCL Active Management Console.

The HCL 1TB PCs are available across the country, with entry-level models priced at Rs 35,000, and Digital Content Creation Workstations priced at Rs 99,000.

LG'S NEW KG920 MOBILE

This model is basically a slim phone with dimensions of 08 x 50 x 18.9 mm and features a 2-inch TFT display with 240 x 320 pixels resolution, in-built 8MB internal memory, and support for external memory through miniSD cards..

And some other features of this mobile are --

A tri-band phone, it supports GPRS, Bluetooth (v1.2)m, and USB (v1.1). And, it comes equipped with a media player that supports MP3, AAC, AAC+, WAV, and MPEG4 formats.

The cost of this phone in india would be approximately Rs.22,000..

Considering the competation it faces the other models available are Sony ericsson's N-72 , W-200i , W-220i and W-810i which are available at a much lesser cost than this .

Can LG with stand this competation and can it bring difference in the market ???


TIME has to give answers to all such questions !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A New mouse that works in Air

'MX Air' has a polished Black semi-transparent top case, a Silver base, and a svelte contoured shape. The innovative air mouse uses Logitech's 2.4GHz Digital Cordless technology with a range of up to 30 feet, and comes with a sleek charging cradle. The 2.4GHz micro-receiver allows plugging it into a desktop or notebook PC.

Significantly, the new air mouse combines 3 technologies: freespace motion-control, gesture command, and wireless.

Freespace motion control technology attempts to provide accurate and responsive navigation sans the limitations of earlier in-air pointing devices. The technology is in itself a combination of MEMS (microelectromechanical systems) sensors, DSP (digital signal processing) technology, and RF (radio frequency) wireless technology.

It also uses sophisticated algorithms to cancel the slight involuntary tremors that almost everyone experiences. With Freespace technology, users can hold the air mouse in any way, point it in any direction, and enjoy intuitive cursor control.

The air mouse integrates gesture-based commands; for instance, to change volume, users can press and hold the volume button, and simply gesture to the left to decrease volume, or to the right to increase volume.

The 'MX Air' features a touch-sensitive scroll panel instead of a traditional scroll wheel. So with a swipe of the finger across the surface, the scrolling mechanism is enabled. Besides, there are large, Orange backlighted buttons for media functions like Play/Pause, Volume/Mute, Back, and Select.

Rory Dooley, senior vice president and general manager of the control devices business unit, Logitech, said, "The MX Air mouse offers a radically new way for people to control their PC entertainment. It's for anyone who has listened to music on their PC and been frustrated by having to return to the desk to change songs or volume... It's for people with a living-room computer or media PC who want to navigate their media content on their terms."

Logitech's MX Air Rechargeable Cordless Mouse is expected to hit stores in the US and in Europe beginning August. It will be available for around $149.99 (Rs 6,750 approx).

IPOD's are dangerous while thunder stroms !!

In a recent incident Bunch, 18, was listening to Metallica on his iPod while mowing the grass at his home in Castle Rock, Colo., last July when lightning struck a nearby tree and knocked him unconscious. Bunch sustained similar burns and ruptured eardrums. He still suffers some hearing loss, but it is mild.
That is not the case of the Vancouver jogger. When Heffernan contacted him last week to alert him to the pending publication of the story, the man, now 39, gave Heffernan an update on his status two years later.

He has about 50 per cent hearing loss in both ears and wears two hearing aids. He no longer plays in the church orchestra because of his hearing deficit. "There are probably many notes he can't hear," Heffernan said.
In addition to the perforated tympanic membranes (eardrums), the man suffered dislocation of the tiny bones in the middle ear known as the ossicles, which conduct sound to the cochlea of the inner ear.


Surgery was needed to patch the eardrums with grafts as well as to reset the jaw, which was dislocated from both joints, and to fix the bone, which had been broken in four places. Heffernan said with this type of damage to the jaw it's likely the man will develop arthritis in it, and at an early age.

People who witnessed this close encounter of the electrical kind reported the man was thrown about 2.4 metres by the lightning's impact.
Rather than a direct strike, these cases may have been what is called a side flash or a side splash - when lightning coursing through an object breaks out and strikes something else nearby as well.

When that something is a person, the current is often conducted over the exterior of the body, because skin conducts electricity poorly. That phenomenon is called a flashover.
"But it's things like sweat and metal in contact with the body like this guy had that just caused some of the current to go through him," Heffernan explained.

(Heffernan, who is from Ireland, didn't actually work at Vancouver General when the man, who at that point couldn't hear a thing, was brought in for treatment. When Heffernan arrived at the hospital last summer to start a two-year radiology fellowship, he heard about the case and convinced two other radiologists - including one who was involved in the man's care - to write it up, arguing it belongs in the medical literature.)

Is it the end of Dvd's ??

Blu-ray, also known as Blu-ray Disc (BD), is the name of a next-generation optical disc format jointly developed by the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA), a group of the world's leading consumer electronics, personal computer and media manufacturers (including Apple, Dell, Hitachi, HP, JVC, LG, Mitsubishi, Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, TDK and Thomson). The format was developed to enable recording, rewriting and playback of high-definition video (HD), as well as storing large amounts of data. The format offers more than five times the storage capacity of traditional DVDs and can hold up to 25GB on a single-layer disc and 50GB on a dual-layer disc. This extra capacity combined with the use of advanced video and audio codecs will offer consumers an unprecedented HD experience.

To add to this feature came the Microsoft's partnership with Disney..

The steady and inevitable descent of the DVD into technological obsolescence might have been accelerated this week by Microsoft's announcement that it is partnering with Disney to offer movies and television programs through the Xbox 360 Live Marketplace. The announcement was made Tuesday at a Microsoft press conference held at the E3 Media and Business Summit in Santa Monica, California.