Monday, March 24, 2008

Location-based games

Games played on a mobile piece of equipment using localization technology like GPS are called location-based games. In other words: while it does not matter for a normal mobile game where exactly you are (play them anywhere at anytime), the player's coordinate and movement are main elements in a Location-based game. The best-known example is the treasure hunt game Geocaching, which can be played on any mobile appliance with integrated or external GPS receiver. External GPS receivers are generally connected via Bluetooth. More and more mobile phones with integrated GPS are expected to come.

Besides Geocaching, there exist several other location-based games which are somewhat in the stage of research prototypes than a commercial success.

Monday, March 17, 2008

Mobile phone

The mobile phone or mobile, also called a wireless, cellular phone, cell phone, cell or hand phone (HP), is a long-range, portable electronic device used for mobile communication that uses a network of specialized foundation stations known as cell sites.

In addition to the standard voice function of a telephone, current mobile phones may support many other services, and accessories, such as SMS for text messaging, email, packet switching for access to the Internet, and MMS for sending and receiving photos and video. Most current mobile phones attached to a cellular network of base stations (cell sites), which is in turn interconnected to the public switched telephone network (PSTN) (the exception is satellite phones).

Monday, March 10, 2008

Software tools

Software tools for distributed processing contain standard APIs such as MPI and PVM and open source-based software solutions such as Beowulf and openMosix which facilitate the creation of a sort of "virtual supercomputer" from a collection of ordinary workstations or servers. Technology like Rendezvous pave the way for the making of ad hoc computer clusters. An example of this is the distributed rendering function in Apple's Shake compositing function. Computers running the Shake software simply need to be in proximity to each other, in networking terms, to automatically discover and use each other's resources. While no one has yet built an ad hoc computer cluster that rivals even yesteryear's supercomputers, the line between desktop, or even laptop, and supercomputer is beginning to blur, and is probable to continue to blur as built-in support for parallelism and distributed processing increases in mainstream desktop operating systems. An easy programming language for supercomputers remains an open explore topic in Computer Science.

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Chemistry in Natural Science

Constituting the scientific learning of matter at the atomic and molecular scale, chemistry deals primarily with collections of atoms, such as gases, molecules, crystals, and metals. The composition, statistical properties, transformations and reply of these materials are studied. Chemistry also absorbs understanding the properties and interactions of individual atoms for use in larger-scale applications. Most chemical procedure can be studied directly in a laboratory, using a series of (often well-tested) techniques for manipulating materials, as well as an understanding of the underlying processes. Chemistry is often known as "the central science" because of its role in connecting the other natural sciences.

Early experiments in chemistry had their roots in the system of Alchemy, a set of values combining mysticism with physical experiments. The science of chemistry began to expand with the work of Robert Boyle, the discoverer of gas, and Antoine Lavoisier, who developed the theory of the Conservation of mass. The discovery of the chemical elements and the concept of Atomic Theory began to systematize this science, and researchers developed a basic understanding of states of matter, ions, chemical bonds and chemical reactions. The success of this science led to a complementary chemical industry that now acting a significant role in the world economy.