Monday, December 31, 2007

The first bullets

Advances in one either resulted beginning or precipitated advances in the other. Originally, bullets were surrounding metallic or stone balls placed in front of an explosive charge of gun powder at the end of a closed tube. As firearms became more scientifically advanced, from 1500 to 1800, bullets changed very little. They remained uncomplicated round lead balls, called rounds, differing only in their diameter.

The development of the hand culverin and matchlock arquebus brought regarding the use of cast lead balls as projectiles. "Bullet" is consequential from the French word "boulette" which roughly means "little ball". The original musket bullet was a spherical lead ball two sizes slighter than the bore, wrapped in a loosely-fitted paper patch which served to hold the bullet in the barrel firmly upon the powder. (Bullets that were not firmly upon the concentrate upon firing risked causing the barrel to explode, with the condition known as a "short start".) The loading of muskets was, therefore, easy with the old smooth-bore Brown Bess and comparable military muskets. The original muzzle-loading rifle, on the other hand, with a more intimately fitting ball to take the rifling grooves, was loaded with difficulty, particularly when the bore of the barrel was dirty from previous firings ("fouled"). For this reason, early rifles were not generally used for military purposes. Early rifle bullets necessary cloth patches to grip the rifling grooves, and to hold the bullet securely against the powder.

The first half of the nineteenth century saw a different change in the shape and function of the bullet. In 1826, Delirque, a French infantry officer, imaginary a breech with abrupt shoulders on which a spherical bullet was rammed down until it caught the rifling grooves..

Tuesday, December 25, 2007

Bullet

A bullet is a rock-hard projectile propelled by a firearm or air gun and is normally made from metal (usually lead). A bullet (in contrast to a shell) does not contain explosives, and damages the intended target solely by imparting kinetic energy upon impact. Modern bullets for firearms are generally part of a cartridge, also known as a round. In contrast, bullets for air guns are not part of a cartridge. The word "bullet" is sometimes used to refer to the grouping of bullet, case, gunpowder and primer more properly known as a cartridge or round.; the Oxford English Dictionary definition of a bullet is "a projectile of lead ... for firing from a rifle, revolver etc."

Monday, December 17, 2007

JAR Files

A JAR file has a manifest file situated in the path META-INF/MANIFEST.MF. The entries in the manifest file conclude how the JAR file will be used. JAR files which are intended to be executed as separate programs will have one of their classes specified as the "main" class. The obvious file would have an entry such as

Main-Class: myPrograms.MyClass

Such JAR files are characteristically started with a command similar to

java -jar foo.jar

These files can also include a Classpath entry, which identifies other JAR files to be overloaded with the JAR. This entry consists of a list of absolute or relation paths to other JAR files. Although intended to simplify JAR use, in practice, it turns out to be infamously brittle as it depends on all the relevant JARs being in the exact locations specified when the entry-point JAR was built. To change versions or locations of libraries, a new manifest is required.

Wednesday, December 12, 2007

JAR

In computing, a JAR file (or Java ARchive) file used to deal out a set of Java classes. It is used to store compiled Java classes and connected metadata that can constitute a program.

* WAR (file format) (Web Application aRchive) files are also Java archives which store XML files, java classes, Java Server Pages and extra objects for Web Applications.

* EAR (file format) (Enterprise ARchive) files are also Java archives which store XML files, java classes and additional objects for Enterprise Applications.

* RAR (file format) (Resource Adapter aRchive) files are also Java archives which store XML files, java classes and added objects for J2EE Connector Architecture (JCA) applications.

JAR files can be created and extracted by the "jar" command that comes with the JDK. It can be done using zip tools, but as WinZip has a custom of renaming all-uppercase directories and files in lower case, this can raise support calls with whoever shaped the JAR or the tool authors themselves. WinRAR, on the additional hand, retains the original case of filenames.

Tuesday, December 4, 2007

Grape

A grape is the non-climacteric fruit that grows on the permanent and deciduous woody vines of the folks Vitaceae. Grapes develop up in clusters of 6 to 300, and can be black, blue, golden, green, purple, red, pink, brown, peach or white. They can be eaten raw or used for producting jam, grape juice, jelly, wine and grape germ oil. Development of grapevines occurs in vineyards, and is called viticulture. One who studies and practises increasing grapes for wine is called a viticulturist. The leaves of the grape vine itself are painstaking safe to eat and are used in the production of dolmades.

Monday, November 26, 2007

Lighthouse of Alexandria

The Pharos of Alexandria was a large tower built in the 3rd century BC (between 285 and 247 BC) on the island of Pharos in Alexandria, Egypt to give out as that port's landmark, and later, its lighthouse.

With a height variously expected at between 115 and 150 meters (383 - 450 ft) it was among the tallest man-made structures on Earth for many centuries, and was recognized as one of the Seven Wonders of the World by Antipater of Sidon. It was the third big and tallest building after the two Great Pyramids (of Khufu and Khafra) for its whole life. Some scientists calculate approximately a much taller height exceeding 180 metres that would make the tower the tallest building up to the 14th century.

Monday, November 19, 2007

Traffic Claming

Traffic calming is a set of strategies used by urban planners and traffic engineers which aims to slow down traffic and get better safety for pedestrians and bicyclists, although some of these features can also be hazardous to cyclists. It is now comparatively common in Europe, especially Northern Europe; less so in North America.Traffic calming has conventionally been justified on the grounds of pedestrian safety and reduction of noise and local air pollution which are side effects of the traffic. However, it has become more and more apparent that streets have many social and recreational functions which are severely impaired by fast car traffic. For much of the twentieth century, streets were designed by engineers who were charged only with ensuring traffic flow and not with development other functions of streets. The rationale for traffic reassuring is now broadening to include designing for these functions.

Monday, November 12, 2007

Bareboat charter

A bareboat charter is an arrangement for the hiring of a boat, whereby no crew or provisions are contained as party of the agreement; instead, the people who rent the boat from the owner are responsible for taking care of such things.

There are legal differences between a bareboat charter and another types of charter arrangement, such as crewed or luxury yacht charter, commonly called time or voyage charters. In these charters the charterer can direct where the ship will go but the owner of the ship tells possession of the ship through its employment of the master and crew. In a bare-boat or demise charter, on the other hand, the owner gives possession of the ship to the charterer and the charterer retriew its own master and crew. The bare-boat charterer is sometimes known as a "disponent owner".

Monday, November 5, 2007

Banana boat

A banana boat (or a boat made of bananas), often referred to simply as a banana, is an unpowered recreational boat designed to be pulled by a bigger boat. Riders sit astride a big tube which is supported by two smaller tubes which provide balance and footrests, permit them to experience some of the thrill of moving fast and close to the water much more easily and safely than by water-skiing or surfing and they are therefore a popular ride for children. Many large motor yachts or luxury yachts have a banana as one of their onboard "toys", but any powered boat can pull a banana, and they are sometimes available as a commercial ride at holiday resorts. Most models seat middle of three and ten people. Two models with two seating tubes side by side are available. Banana boats are often yellow and are sometimes actually builted into the shape of a banana.

Monday, October 29, 2007

Types of boats

Airboat

Airboats are needlly flat-bottomed vessels propelled in a forward direction by an aircraft type propeller and powered by either an aircraft or automotive engine. The engine and propeller are covered in a protective metal cage that prevents objects, i.e., tree limbs, branches, clothing, beverage containers, wildlife from coming in contact with the whirling propeller, which could cause devastating falt to the vessel and traumatic injury to the operator and passengers.

The propeller gives a rearward column of air that propels the airboat forward. Steering is accomplished by forced air passing across vertical rudders. There must be a forceful airflow in order to the vessel to be steered. Airboats not have brakes and are incapable of traveling in reverse. Stopping and reversing direction are dependent upon operator/pilot/driver skill.

Monday, October 22, 2007

Parts of a boat

The roughly horizontal, but cambered structures spanning the hull of the boats are reffer to as the "deck". In a ship there are often many, but a boat is unlikely to have more than one. The similar but generally lighter structure which spans a raised cabin is a coach-roof. The "floor" of a cabin is properly known as the sole but is more likely to be called the floor. (A floor is properly, a structural member which ties a frame to the keelson and keel.) The underside of a deck is called the deck head. The keel is a lengthwise structural member to which the frames are constant one (sometimes referred to as a backbone). The vertical surfaces splitting the internal space are known as bulkheads. The front of a boat is known as the bow or prow. The rear of the boat is known as the stern. The right side of the boat is called starboard and the left side of the boat is called port.

Monday, October 15, 2007

ship


Usually a ship has enough size to carry its own boats, such as lifeboats, dinghies, or runabouts. A rule of thumb is "a boat can fit on a ship, but a ship can't fit on a boat". Consequently submarines are referred to as "boats", because early submarines were little enough to be carried aboard a ship in transit to distant waters. Other types of big vessels which are traditionally called boats are the Great Lakes freighter, the riverboat, and the ferryboat. Though big enough to carry their own boats and/or heavy cargoes, these examples are designed for operation on inland or protected coastal waters. Often local law and regulation will define the correct size (or the number of masts) which a boat requires to become a ship. Nautical meaning is related to sailors, particularly customs and practices at sea. Naval is the adjective pertaining to ships, step by step in common usage it has come to be more particularly associated with the noun "navy".

Monday, October 8, 2007

Boat

A boat is a watercraft designed to plane on, and provide transport over, water. However, boats such as the whaleboat were designed to be operated from a ship in an offshore environment. In Naval terms, a boat is small enough to be carried aboard another vessel (a ship). Boats that are notable exceptions to this concept due to their large size are the riverboat, narrowboat and ferryboat. These examples do, however, generally operate on inland , protected coastal waters. Modern submarines may also be referred to as boats but this is possibly due to the fact that the first submarines could be carried by a ship and were certainly not capable of making offshore passages on their own. Boats are may have military, other government, research, or commercial usage.

Monday, September 24, 2007

Society

A society is a grouping of individuals, which is characterized by common interests and may have characteristic culture and institutions. In a society, members can be from a different ethnic group. A "Society" may refer to a particular people, such as the Nuer, to a nation state, such as Switzerland, or to a broader cultural group, such as a Western society. Society can also refer to an prearranged group of people linked together for religious, benevolent, cultural, scientific, political, patriotic, or other purposes.

Monday, September 17, 2007

The structure of pollen

Each pollen grain contain vegetative cells only one in the greater part flowering plant but several in other seed plants and a generative cell contain a tube nucleus that produces the pollen tube and a generative nucleus that divide to form the two sperm cells. The group of cells is surrounded by a cellulose cell wall and a thick, rough outer wall made of sporopollenin.

Pollen is created in the microsporangium contained in the anther of an angiosperm flower, male cone of a coniferous plant, or male cone of other seed plants. Pollen grains come in a broad multiplicity of shapes, sizes, and surface markings characteristic of the species see photomicrograph at right. Most, but surely not all, are spherical, Pollen grains of pines, firs, and spruces are wing. The minimum pollen grain that of the Forget-me-not plant (Myosotis sp.), is approximately 6 µm (0.006 mm) in diameter.

Pollen grains may have furrows, the course of which classify the pollen as colpate or sulcate. The number of furrows or pores helps categorize the flowering plants, with eudicots having three colpi (tricolpate), and other groups having one sulcus.

Monday, September 10, 2007

Earth's atmosphere

Earth's atmosphere is a layer of gases surrounding the planet Earth and retain by the Earth's gravity. It contains roughly (by molar content/volume) 78% nitrogen, 20.95% oxygen, 0.93% argon, 0.038% carbon dioxide; trace amounts of other gases, and a changeable amount (average around 1%) of water vapor. This mixture of gases is usually known as air. The atmosphere protects life on Earth by captivating ultraviolet solar radiation and reducing temperature extremes between day and night.

There is no exact border between the atmosphere and outer space, it slowly becomes thinner and fades into liberty. Three quarters of the atmosphere's mass is within 11 km of the terrestrial surface. In the United States, people who travel above a height of 80.5 km (50 statute miles) are selected astronauts. An altitude of 120 km (400,000 ft) marks the boundary where atmospheric property becomes obvious during re-entry. The Kármán line, at 100 km (328,000 ft), is also often regarded as the boundary between atmosphere and outer space.

Tuesday, September 4, 2007

Dance

Dance means in Old French dancier, perhaps from Frankish generally refers to human movement also used as a form of expression or presented in a social, spiritual or performance setting.

Dance also is used to explain methods of non-verbal communication (see body language) between humans or animals (bee dance, mating dance), motion in inanimate objects (the leaves danced in the wind), and certain musical forms or genres.

Choreography is the art of making dances, and the human being who does this is called a choreographer.

Definitions of what constitutes dance are dependent on social, cultural, visual, artistic and moral constraints and variety from functional movement (such as folk dance) to codified, virtuoso techniques such as ballet. Dance disciplines live in sports such as gymnastics, figure skating, and synchronized swimming and martial arts kata are often compare to dance.

Monday, August 27, 2007

Leaf vegetable

Vegetable is a cookery term which usually refers to an edible part of a plant. The definition is traditional rather than scientific and is somewhat random and subjective. All parts of herbaceous plants eaten as food by humans, whole or in part, are in general considered vegetables. Mushrooms, though belong to the biological kingdom fungi, and are also commonly considered vegetables. In common, vegetables are consideration of as being savory, and not sweet, although there are many exceptions. Nuts, grains, herbs, spices and culinary fruits are usually not exact vegetables.

Sunday, August 19, 2007

Harrington jacket

A Harrington jacket is a type of tiny, lightweight jacket, made of cotton, polyester, wool or suede — generally with a tartan or check-patterned lining.

The initial Harrington-style jackets were made by British clothing company, Baracuta, in the 1930s; the company is still making the same model, the G9. This style of jacket got the nickname Harrington because it was worn by the personality Rodney Harrington (played by Ryan O'Neal) in the 1960s television program Peyton Place; John Simmons, who opened 'The Ivy Shop', Richmond, London, claims to have coined this explanation.

Sunday, August 12, 2007

Electric

The first electric cars were built in the early 1880s shortly before interior combustion powered cars appeared. For a period of time electrics were measured superior due to the silent nature of electric motors compare to the very loud noise of the gasoline engine. This supreme benefit was removed with Hiram Percy Maxim's invention of the muffler in 1897. Thereafter internal combustion powered cars had two critical advantages:
1) Long range and 2) high specific energy (far lower weight of petrol fuel against weight of batteries). The building of battery electric vehicles that could competitor internal combustion models had to wait for the introduction of modern semiconductor controls and enhanced batteries. Because they can deliver a high torque at low revolutions electric cars do not need such a complex drive train and transmission as internal combustion powered cars. Some post-2000 electric car designs are able to speed up from 0-60 mph (96 km/hour) in 4.0 seconds with a top speed around 130 mph (210 km/h). Others have a variety of 250 miles (400 km) on the EPA highway cycle requiring 3-1/2 hours to completely charge. Equivalent fuel efficiency to internal combustion is not well defined but some press reports give it at approximately 135 mpg.

Monday, August 6, 2007

Ganesha drinking milk again

NEW DELHI: In a re-run of the September 1995 frenzy when Ganesha statues were said to be drinking milk offered to them, devotees apparently thronged temples on Sunday night, making alike claims. This time, nevertheless, all idols were reported to be drinking milk.

This followed some reports received from additional parts of the country, particularly UP, earlier in the day. Shiv Mandir in Uttam Nagar and Shri Ram temple on Aruna Asaf Ali Marg in New Delhi witnessed a huge rush.

Said a Ram temple priest, "People observed that Ganesha is drinking milk around 8 pm, after which the word spread and thousands thronged the temple to try it out. Lord Ganesha drank milk from all. The crowd remained till around 11 pm."

Rationalists have explained the scientific cause behind this phenomenon, including surface tension, but faith and superstition always hit back. Said a devotee, "It was amazing.”

Sunday, July 29, 2007

Wireless Application Protocol

WAP is an open global standard for application that uses wireless communication. Its main application is to allow access to the internet from a mobile phone or PDA.

A WAP browser is to grant all of the fundamental services of a computer based web browser but cut down to function within the limits of a mobile phone. WAP is now the protocol used for the mainstream of the world's mobile internet sites, known as WAP sites. Presently the Japanese i-mode system is the only other major competing wireless data protocol.

Mobile internet sites, or WAP sites, are websites written in, or vigorously transformed to, WML (Wireless Markup Language) and accessed via the WAP browser.

Before the introduction of WAP, service providers had enormously restricted opportunities to offer interactive data services.

Sunday, July 22, 2007

Cell membrane

The cell membrane is also called the plasma membrane, plasma lemma or "phospholipids bilayer" is a semipermeable lipid bilayer frequent to all living cells. It contains a variety of biological molecules, primarily proteins and lipids, which are concerned in a vast array of cellular processes, and also serves as the attachment point for both the intracellular cytoskeleton and, if present, the cell wall.Robert Hooke was the first to name the parts of cells, as well as the plasma membrane.

Sunday, July 15, 2007

Petal

A petal from Ancient Greek petalon leaf, thin plate, regarded as a highly customized leaf, is one member or part of the corolla of a flower. The corolla is the name for all of the petals of a flower; the internal perianth whorl, word used when this is not the same in appearance (color, shape) as the outermost whorl (the calyx) and is used to attract pollinators based on its bright color. It is the inner part of the perianth that comprises the germ-free parts of a flower and consists of inner and outer tepals. These tepals are frequently differentiated into petals and sepals. The term tepal is usually useful when the petals and sepals are alike in shape and color. In a typical flower the petals are showy and colored and enclose the reproductive parts. The number of petals in a flower (see merosity) is analytic of the plant's classification: eudicots (the largest group of dicots) having typically four or five petals and monocots and magnoliids having three, or some multiple of three, petals.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Software tools

Software tools for distributed processing include standard APIs such as MPI and PVM, and open source-based software solutions such as Beowulf and openMosix which make easy the creation of a supercomputer from a collection of ordinary workstations or servers. Technology like ZeroConf (Rendezvous/Bonjour) can be used to make ad hoc computer clusters to for specialized software such as Apple's shake compositing application. An easy programming language for supercomputers leftovers an open research topic in computer science.

Sunday, June 24, 2007

Bluetooth

Bluetooth is an industrialized requirement for wireless personal area networks (PANs). Bluetooth provides a way to connect and swap information between devices such as mobile phones, laptops, PCs, printers, digital cameras, and video game consoles over a secure, short-range radio frequency. The Bluetooth provisions are licensed and developed by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group.


Bluetooth is a radio standard and communications protocol generally designed for low power consumption, with a short range based on low-cost transceiver microchips in each device. The device employs a radio communications system.

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Punt

A punt is a flat-bottomed boat with a square-cut bow, planned for use in small rivers or other shallow water. Punting refers to boating in a punt; the punter normally propels the punt by pushing beside the river bed with a pole.
Punts were initially built as cargo boats or platforms for fowling and angling but in modern times their use is almost wholly confined to pleasure trips on the rivers in the university towns of Oxford and Cambridge in England and races at a few summer regattas on the Thames.
A customary river punt differs from many other types of wooden boat in that it has no keel, stem or sternpost. In its place it is built rather like a ladder with the main structure being two side panels connected by a series of 4 in (10 cm) cross planks, known as "treads", spaced about 1 foot (30 cm) apart.
The first punts are traditionally linked with the River Thames in England and were built as small cargo boats or platforms for fishermen. Pleasure punts — particularly built for recreation — became popular on the Thames between 1840 and 1860. Some other boats have a similar shape to a traditional punt — for example the Optimist training dinghy or the air boats used in the Everglades — but they are normally built with a box construction instead of the open ladder-like design of a traditional Thames pleasure punt.

Wednesday, June 6, 2007

Pinnace

A pinnace is a light boat, propelled by sails or oars, previously used as a "tender" for guiding merchant and war vessels. In modern parlance, pinnace has come to mean a boat linked with some kind of larger vessel, that doesn't fit under the launch or lifeboat definitions. In all-purpose, the pinnace had sails, and would be used to ferry messages between ships of the line, visit harbors ahead of the fleet with messages of state, pick up mail, etc.

Sunday, May 27, 2007

Jet boat

A jet boat is a boat propel by a jet of water twisted out from the back of the craft. Unlike a powerboat or motorboat that uses a propeller in the water behind the boat; a jet boat draws the water from under the boat into a pump-jet inside the boat, and then expels it through a needle at the stern.
Jet boats were originally designed by Sir William Hamilton (who invented the water jet in 1954) for operation in the fast-flowing and shallow rivers of New Zealand, especially to overcome the problem of propellers striking rocks in such waters, although Italian inventor Second Camping had demonstrated a similar vessel as early as 1931 in Venice.
The difference between Campini's and Hamilton's inventions is that Campini's water jet had a very short lifetime in operation due to some unsolved material problems. Hamilton, unlike Camping, filed for a patent. Jet boats are extremely maneuverable, and many can, from full speed, be upturned and brought to a stop within their own length, in a maneuver known as a Hamilton turn.