Computer Science Stuff

In the IT world I heard a lot about certifications but have you ever wondered for yourself why should you get it? Let’s say you know Java and your probably at the top of your class with it, but you are having a hard time getting a job or not getting the desired salary that you want. The next best thing to boost up your resume is to get a certification. In basic terms getting a certification shows that your knowledge meets up with professional standards. This is important because everyone has something that they feel they are the top of their game at but if it doesn’t fall inline with standards of the industry your knowledge can be considered invalid if you do not have no experience on the job.

Lately I have been studying to get certifications and have recently received my certification in MySQL. But did my salary increase? Did my prices rise for my clients? The answer is no. The reason is because I’m not doing anything MySQL intensive for anybody but myself. So it was something more so for myself and also challenged me to push my knowledge further with MySQL and see if my knowledge met up with professional standards. But the next couple certifications I will be getting will increase my pay and opportunities. So this brings me to my next topic what are some of the top certifications in IT.

I pick the top 5 certifications from the list on about.com.

1.CCIE

The CCIE always ends up on lists like these, and with good reason. With a pass rate of only 26% it is certainly the most difficult of all IT certifications. Once you place this on your resume, you know you have a truly impressive credential and can expect to earn an average salary of $93,000.

2.CISA

With the economic climate these days, big business needs auditors more than ever. The CISA is designed to certify audit skills, both technical and ethical. According to GoCertify.com, the average CISA can earn as much as $115,000.

3.CCSE

The CCSE is another high level security certification that created for individuals who work with Checkpoint products and must maintain secure VPNs. The demand for this certification is evident in the pay as shown on PayScale.

4.MCSD

The Microsoft Certified Solution Developer certification is designed for people who like to problem-solve. You are expected to know about enterprise solutions and Microsoft products. You will be expected to use business analysis skills to decide which solution is best for a particular environment or business. Here is the PayScale for the MCSD.

5.PMP

The Project Management Professional certification is here because it is another that requires an extensive amount of skill and experience to obtain. Once you have passed the exam and fulfilled the requirements you can pull in around $101,000 (based on a ZDNET Salary Survey).

I did look at other lists and the ones that kept showing up were CCIE and PMP. I will also mention Java, Oracle are in high demand. Even though there are several certifications you can get it is best you get ones that fall inline with what you really want to do. If you get a certification in something that may be the top in the field but never use it, all you did was waste time and money, and give your clients or employers a false sense of your abilities. So get those certs!

Popularity: 1% [?]

Lately, I have been going back and forth trying to decide should I get the iphone on the google phone and it has been killing me. Currently I have Verizon and as we all know is that Verizon has higher customer satisfaction and more towers which give less drop calls than any other service. With AT&T they have the iphone but do not have as many towers causing dropped calls. So let’s take a look at some of things going into my decision.

Question: Who has the better phone plan between Verizon and AT&T?
Answer: In terms of plan it will probably range from $80 to $100 with the data plans I want with either phone but AT&T has roll over minutes which I really like and Verizon has not taken a liking towards that yet.

Question: Which phone is better?
Answer: I look at this from a customer standpoint and developer standpoint. As a consumer iphone has very organized app store and strong brand with customer satisfaction with the iphone than the Android. The Android operating system will be placed on more phones but I haven’t seen it operate on any attractive phone and their app store is nothing to get excited about. Also from a developer standpoint the iphone owns alot of the smart phone market share and you could generate alot of money from developing an app for the iphone. Also since Apple develops the operating system and hardware for the phone the iphone has a higher compatibility rating than any phone out there. The Android has to be made to be a adaptable operating system since it is a open-source operating system which will be on phones and eventually netbooks. So if the vendor does not study it in and out it will not fully utilize the capabilities contained within it.

The Droid phone is coming to Verizon phone from what I have heard in November (don’t quote me, lol). So I will love to see who wins when it drops into stores than I will test it out so I can switch from my unattractive phone.

One thing I know for certain is that if Verizon had the iphone I wouldn’t have this problem! Let me know what you think?

Popularity: 1% [?]

I love Apple products and really love their branding but one thing I hate is to see the truth and completely over look it when just because you love it. Lately I have been coming across information detailing that Mac OS X is not secure it is just not attacked as much as Windows. I don’t know if you ever came across a competition called PWN2OWN. It is a competition is which people are competing against each other to hack computers with different operating systems and different browsers. The first browser to come to submission was safari on the mac.

The only browser that wasn’t cracked was Google Chrome on the windows operating system. This came at a surprise to me but after researching the Google Chrome sandboxing feature along with Windows randomization feature it is more secure than windows but it is attacked way more. For mac users I wouldn’t draw any concern over it now but when apple reaches a higher market share I think they will be in trouble.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Apple once again raised iPhone sales but this time it has risen sevenfold! But you have to ask yourself what if Apple wasn’t locked into a contract with At&t? What if Apple had a contract with Verizon, Sprint, T-mobile and other providers? There would be such an increase in profit it would be ridiculous. Especially when consumers are still not satisfied with the service at At&t. At&t has dropped calls, not as many towers as verizon and when you don’t have as many towers it creates a greater strain on the phone draining its power.

One solution realizing this Apple has done is create the iPod touch which can be distributed to anybody. But it does not have a provider so it does not have access to a 3G network. The only access it has to the internet is a wireless router, or through usb cable. Ipod Touch looks just like iPhone but without the service provider becomes nothing more then a ipod with wireless capabilities.

I really wish the iPhone would partner up with Verizon, but apparently Verizon CEO is not too fond of Apple. But congratulations to Apple increasing sales, it looks as though a recession is looked upon in laughter to great companies.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Over the past few months I have been testing out Windows 7  (64 bit Build 7100) and I must say I’m impressed by their level of effort. It seems as though their desperation borne nice fruits of labor. Instead of putting out products just for making money, they are putting out products that people like which actually makes even more money. Seems like they have a nice equation system going on. So let’s get down to business.

Windows 7 release candidate 1

What I look for in an operating system is ease of use, speed and stability. So I will give you a run down:

Ease of Use

Window 7 ease of use hasn’t really change compared to Vista to the common user. It seems as though make have gotten better with administrative tasks and putting forth a better attempt making a user more aware of getting antivirus programs and backuping programs. Thy also have advertise that they have better device management but all I see is that they made the icons bigger. I’m not impressed in this area.

Speed

Speed has increased nicely! I everything moves way faster and opens up so much quicker! It is almost like your old computer has turned into a new computer if you move to Windows 7. If you check the benchmarks windows 7 shows who moving in Zdnet benchmark.

Stability

Windows 7 is amazingly stable, I haven’t seen a blue screen of death or having incompatibility problems with hardware. It runs smooth and each windows explorer window is allocated the same amount of memory for each process. Even when I run multiple programs like photoshop, dreamweaver, eclipse, firefox and windows media player I do not see any stutter in my performance. I use hibernate alot and vista will so a stutter in my performance with windows 7 you couldn’t even tell that I use the hibernate function. I would even leave windows 7 on for hours on end get on program and let other people that don’t even know how to use the computer play around. So for stability I must say windows are on it.

Also remember this is still not the final version so when it is released we will see a true showdown between Windows 7, Windows Vista, Linux and Snow Leopard.

Also remember before using (This is from Microsoft Website)

Remember expiration dates: Please plan ahead for the Beta and RC expiration dates. To avoid interruption, you’ll need to rebuild your test machine using a valid version of Windows before the software expires. Windows will notify you that the expiration process is beginning and two weeks later your PC will begin shutting down every two hours. The Beta expires on August 1, 2009, and bi-hourly shutdowns will begin July 1, 2009. The RC will expire June 1, 2010, and the bi-hourly shutdowns will begin on March 1, 2010. In both cases, you’ll need to rebuild your test PC to replace the OS and reinstall all your programs and data.

Popularity: 2% [?]

One thing that has been really bothering me lately is the slow development of software adaptation to hardware. We have all of this powerful hardware being sold on the market but the software or the operating systems we use do not tap into its full potential and could relieve a lot of users speed problems. And one problem I believe that can be easily relieved is better conversion of 32 bit architecture to 64 bit architecture. You are probably like what is 32 bit architecture or architecture at all.  Well the architecture I’m talking about deals with the principles of design and construction of the way your processor and operating is designed and when I refer to 32 bit or 64 bit anything it refers to the number of bits (the smallest unit of information on a machine) that can be processed or transmitted in parallel, or the number of bits used for single element in a data format. So the more bits that can processed at one time the better the performance. So 32bit < 64bit (64 bit is greater than 32 bit architecture), but here lies the problem

The problem

Now as a common user you are probably thinking what is 64 bit architectures and what does this have to do with me? Well let me tell you why? First off people are always worried about speed, reliability and as long as it does what I want that all that matters. But what if I told you if are a common user and you are buying a new laptop or desktop that I will guaranteed 9 out of 10 that it is a 64 bit processor. For instance one of the most common 64 bit processors out there are :

• AMD’s AMD64 extensions (used in Athlon 64, Opteron, Sempron, Turion 64 and Phenom processors)
• Intel’s Intel 64 extensions (used in newer Celeron, Pentium 4, Pentium D, Xeon, Core 2, Core i7, and Atom processors)

Now heres the kicker as a common user you are most likely using an operating system that is 32 bits. So if you are using a 64 bit processor and 32 bit operating system you are not fully utilizing your processor it is just doing 32 bit work. Also if you have a 64 bit processor, 64 bit operating system and 32 bit program you still are not fully utilizing your processor. So here is the equation for full utilization of a 64 bit architecture:

1. First have a 64 bit processor (32 bit processor cannot work with 64 bit operating systems)
2. Than a 64 bit operating system to put on 64 bit programs (you can’t put 64 bit programs on a 32 bit operating system)
3. Than install a 64 bit program

So processor > operating system > program

So if you have this equation you will have a even faster performing machine. Also 64 bit is backwards compatible meaning you can install something that is lesser on it like 32 bit programs on a 64 bit operating system or 32 operating system on a 64 bit processor. But that is not the case with drivers (How your computer works with your hardware: printers, webcam, fax machine, etc). Is that all 64 bit architectures affect?

RAM

Also 64 bit architecture affects up to how much ram you can use if you have a 32 bit architecture you can only access up to 4 Gigs of Ram but if you have 64 bit architecture you access over 4 gigs to 1 terabyte of memory. Imagine how many programs you can manage if you had that much MEMORY!!!!!!

Operating Systems

Some of the top 64 bit operating systems 32 bit equivalents so pay attention to the numbers. I also provided supporting information for each operating system and its 64 bit technology:

Mac OS X Snow Leopard

Snow Leopard technologies

Vista and Windows 7

32-bit and 64-bit Windows: frequently asked questions

A description of the differences between 32-bit versions of Windows Vista and 64-bit versions of Windows Vista

Programming Guide for 64 bit Windows

Linux

Ubuntu: 32-bit v. 64-bit Performance

Ubuntu 64-bit More Competitive Against Mac OS X

Now you are on your way to 64 bit computing!!!

Popularity: 18% [?]

Google’s next big thing on the market, is Google Wave. Google Wave is a creative way for people communicate and work at the same time. The service utilizes existing google products, Gmail and Google Docs working as an extension them to create a great tool for communication using these products to organize documents collaboratively, plan events, play games or discuss recent news.

When communication you communicate in Google Wave, you create a new event called a wave.  SO what is a wave? Quoted from Google

A wave is equal parts conversation and document. People can communicate and work together with richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more.

A wave is shared. Any participant can reply anywhere in the message, edit the content and add participants at any point in the process. Then playback lets anyone rewind the wave to see who said what and when.

A wave is live. With live transmission as you type, participants on a wave can have faster conversations, see edits and interact with extensions in real-time.

Does this sound familiar? (Go down to the next section for EXPLANATION) It can also even be viewed as a social networking site in a sense, but with Google products. So imagine Facebook with it’s applications but under Google’s name. It’s pretty straight forward here’s a video on Google Wave.

What I think about this

Now this seems funny to me that Google decided to launch this but it seems as though this is twitter but BETTER! The whole purpose of twitter is updates and allowing people to follow you which main component is communication. I guess if Facebook was trying to buy Twitter for 500 million dollars it would raise some eyebrows. And since Twitter refuse offers to allow people to acquire the company I guess Google came up with this saying, “So if you can’t buy twitter just create something like twitter, lol”.

I’m starting to see a trend with Google now. It seems as though Google’s business model isn’t about creating new technology but jumping onto something that is popular or widely use and making it better. And it seems as though the next trend is communication. So let’s see if people will decide to tweet or ride the wave.

Popularity: 11% [?]

Of all the years I have been on this planet have never seen Microsoft get so desperate or feel the need to compete at a great level. Now that it is becoming more and more prevalent that they are no longer the big kid on the block anymore they are going on all out attacks now against Google and Apple. This is all because of their steadily declining market share.

Market Share lossage and to who

1. Internet browser(Internet Explorer) – lossage to Mozilla Firefox and Apple Safari
2. Operating system (Windows) – lossage to Apple Mac OS X and Linux
3. Search Engine (live.com) – lossage to Google and Yahoo

Not even mentioning other competitors such as Adobe (Multimedia) Flash vs Microsoft Silverlight and Sony (Game Consoles) Ps3 vs Microsoft XBOX 360 vs Nintendo Wii, Microsoft is really feeling the effects of spreading themselves thinner and thinner and producing products of lesser and lesser quality. Even some of the competitors who they are going against have a focus and produce so very nice products. Now they are spending more money creating attack ads against Apple and Google. People see it as strategy but I see it as a act of desperation before the giant falls. If you want a good website for identifying market share go here to see the information for yourself.

What can Microsoft do?

Being that they still have the upper hand in most of their markets they need to create reliable products that cannot be compromised so easily. Firstly with windows it is known for viruses and its price. There are other products out there that are free and becoming easier to use for example linux. Or have little to no viruses and good quality, people go to apple mac os x. So if they can increase the quality of their product, include a higher level of security and speed and present it well I think we can see a nice increase in their market share. To even further back it up ask people who played around with Windows 7. They are impressed with the usability and speed which has increased alot of people’s curiosity and confidence. Now if they can launch a full-spectrum campaign on increasing quality of their products and decrease prices on licenses I guarantee we will see change in market share but only going up.

Popularity: 16% [?]

Yesterday I was on the radio station talking about how to find new customers through social networking sites along with the founder and president for Eye for Change. We were talking tapping into the power of Myspace, Facebook, Youtube and Twitter. After putting our ideas together we came up with a formula!

First figure out who is your target market?

Who are you trying to appeal to? Which social network are your audience most likely to go to? For example in the early stages of Facebook it was trying to appeal to people in college or use to be in college. So if your target market was for college students you would have fun fest. So do the research because there are literally hundreds and hundreds of social networking sites and you don’t want to waste your throwing the wrong message at the wrong people.

What are you selling and is it of high value or interest?

Remember people on social networking sites don’t respond well to direct advertising. They need something that is put into their line of sight and attention grasping! That all links from knowing your target market and what arouses their interests. So if your product is information writing a really grasping article! If it is a product then design it around their needs!

Next, be personable, let people know who you are and what you are about!

Being on a social networking site isn’t all about selling a product but getting to know people. So if you are strictly about business and selling people will see right through it. So open up a little but don’t expose yourself completely telling everything. Having a blog sometimes gives people a good feeling about a company when they see how the leader thinks. You ever know who you might meet or attracting, it might be your next ex-wife or ex-husband, lol, but try it out and have fun with it.

Popularity: 18% [?]

Safari 4 Beta, is officially the fastest browser to this date. On benchmarks it has blown internet explorer (of course) and firefox out the water with it’s speed. Now that we are stepping deeper and deeper into the age of web applications,  JavaScript is becoming more and more essential. Apple has something called, The Nitro Engine. This Nitro Engine is especially for JavaScript which also beat Google Chrome V8 engine for the JavaScript. The Nitro engine in Safari 4 runs JavaScript 4.2 times faster than Safari 3.

“Apple created Safari to bring innovation, speed and open standards back into web browsers, and today it takes another big step forward,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “Safari 4 is the fastest and most efficient browser for Mac and Windows, with great integration of HTML 5 and CSS 3 web standards that enables the next generation of interactive web applications.”

i-Bench HTML (in seconds)
Mac and Windows
Safari 4 Beta  - 1.06 s
Chrome   1.0  - 1.38 s
Firefox 3.0 - 3.11 s
Firefox 3.1 Beta 2 - 3.16 s
IE 7  - 3.25 s
IE 8 Beta - 4.71 s

i-Bench JavaScript (in seconds)
Mac and Windows
Safari 4 Beta – 0.14 s
Chrome 1.0 – 0.20 s
Firefox 3.0 – 0.76 s
Firefox 3.1 Beta 2 – 1.04 s
IE 7 – 1.81 s
IE 8 Beta – 0.73 s

SunSpider JavaScript (in milliseconds)
Mac and Windows
Safari 4 Beta – 657.07 ms
Chrome 1.0 – 853.13 ms
Firefox 3.0 – 2399.20 ms
Firefox 3.1 Beta 2 – 1034.47 ms
IE 7  – 19902.20 ms
IE 8 Beta  – 4137.80 ms

Now the next question is how secure it is? I mean Safari 4 can be fast but if it isn’t secure enough that means you can get robbed faster. Well this is what Apple has to say, “Safari also provides secure encryption technologies to prevent eavesdropping, forgery, and digital tampering while you browse the Internet. It offers standards-based authentication for logging into secure websites, and it supports the most popular proxy protocols.”

So we will see how that will draw out it is still in it’s beta version. I still believe Firefox 3 is the most secure browser, but Safari 4 has the title for the fastest browser for 2009.

Popularity: 45% [?]