The Controversy Surrounding Computer Cryptography :: Technology

The Controversy Surrounding Computer Cryptography The topic of cryptography is being debated in the computer lately, especially since September 11, 2001. To begin with, though cryptography is secret writing or the enciphering and deciphering of messages in secret code or cipher. Cryptography has become very popular in all aspects of life that deal with computers, which is almost every aspect of our daily lives. Ever since the mid-seventies, cryptography is the new way of keeping information secret or private. However, just how good and safe is cryptography? There have been many forms of codes that were used to send messages from group to group or person to person. One of the first know type of secret messaging was done by the Spartans of Ancient Greece around 484 to 425 BC. Secret messages were written on wooden tablets and covered with wax to make the tablet look like wood again. The message could then be read after the wax was removed. The slaves trying to escape used another type of secret messaging. Some messages that they would use to signal each other were quilts. Certain patterns on some quilts gave directions to these slaves in how to escape into Canada. In addition, they used secret words to help guide their fellow slaves to freedom. One such code phrase was "Follow the drinking gourd." This referred to the Big Dipper in the night sky. Because most slaves traveled at night because it was safer, that phrase gave them directions to their freedom. Those were just a sample of early types of secret codes. Modern cryptography is far more complicated. It consists of long mathematical formulas that to most people looks like total gibberish. However, these formulas turn a normal sentence into undecipherable code. Modern encryption codes are used daily throughout our daily lives For example they are used widely throughout he Internet for security purposes.

Analysis of the Text “the Time-Sweepers” by Ursula Wills-Jones

Analysis of the text â€Å"The Time-Sweepers† By Ursula Wills-Jones The following short story is about time-sweepers and lost time. They are people who sweep up all the time that is lost or wasted. They are invisible, but sometimes they can be noticed. They carry a broom, a mop and a big dustpun. The time-sweepers are hard-working. They work every day and are never sick. The lost and wasted time is packed and recycled.But not every type of time can be recycled, the most poisoned time is buried in a tank underneath a disused army base. The rest of the time can be sold to the people who need it or distributed to good causes or emergency situations. The full text is built on the conflict between people who waste time and people who sweep up all the time that is lost and wasted. Ursula Wills-Jones idealizes the time-sweepers and ridicules people.The author uses the stylistic device of climax in order to describe different types of time wasting: the man who has waited so long to pr opose to his girlfriend; the woman who has spent thirty-five loathed years in an estate agents, dreaming of opening a florists. The author refers to the stylistic device of hyperbole in order to laugh at the people who waste time: the time-sweeper will pass straight by the desk of the woman who is reading a holiday catalogue under the desk, poring over photos of tropical beaches.They will pass by the next desk, where a man is enjoyably wondering what his mother-in-law looks like naked, and stop by the desk of the young man who is counting every minute, and loathing the hours. The author creates a constant presence of time sweepers. The reader feels that they are everywhere: in the railway station, in the office, at your desk. The time-sweepers are hard-working; they don’t like to rest because there is so mush wasted time after holidays: it takes them around three weeks to resume normal service†¦

Fortu Powercell GmbH Case

Nowadays, it is critical for the companies of many industries to pay a lot of attention and efforts on the management of technology and innovation. Indeed, the development of new technologies is a potential source of competitive advantage and the ability of the companies to innovate and/or to respond to competitors’ innovation determine their survival in a long-term basis. This ability is more or less developed in companies, regarding their maturity and their structure. Most of the start-ups, which usually function as adhocracies, have a good ability to innovate but struggle to bring these innovations to the market. fortu Powercell GmbH represents a typical example of a start-up with a promising technology offering a lot of possibilities, a new type of battery, but which does not know what strategic direction to take in order to achieve long-term profitability. Studying its situation would the occasion for us to present several concepts that managers in fields where technology and innovation matter need to embrace if they want to take relevant strategic decisions. We are going to start our analysis with a quick reminder of the case, what are the critical points to keep in mind before to present some considerations relative to the work of several experts, researchers in the management of technology and innovation. Finally, we will conclude with some suggestions for the executive team of fortu Powercell. It would help us to answer adequately to the questions of fortu Powercell’s executive team. Another work we would like to quote is the work of Christensen on disruptive innovation. To summarize, we can differentiate two type of innovation: sustaining and disruptive. A sustaining innovation targets demanding, high-end customers with better performance than what was previously available. A disruptive innovation consists in the introduction of a product, a service which is not as good as currently available products but compensates thanks to its simplicity, its convenience, its low cost which would appeal new or less-demanding clients. Thus we distinguish two types of disruptive innovations, the new-market disruption and the low-end disruption. The first one is competing with non-consumption, at the beginning, before pulling out customers out of the mainstream market into the one because of the convenience of the product/service. The second one is focusing at the low-end of the original mainstream value network, on the customers whose expectations regarding the product are lower than what is actually proposed on the market. It is quite critical to define what kind of innovation is the fortu Powercell because the way people should manage sustaining and disruptive innovations are totally different. A sustaining technology strategy is not a viable way to build new-growth businesses for instance and usually once they have developed and established the viability of their superior product, entrepreneurs who have entered on a sustaining trajectory should turn around and sell out to one of the industry leaders behind them. Also, an idea that is disruptive to one business way be sustaining to another. If this is the case, it is better to redefine the product or the service in a way that it would be an opportunity which is disruptive relative to all the established players in the targeted market space or another solution is to not invest at all. Otherwise, it could be extremely difficult to beat the established companies which would defend their positions. Burgerlman and Siegel would also contribute to our analysis with their work on the minimum winning game. This is the â€Å"first ajor market opportunity that is limited enough to provide a clear target for technology and product development efforts in the short-to-medium term, and sufficiently large that successfully pursuing it provides a foundation for long-term corporate development†. When the MWG has been defined, the top management can set relevant milestones against which meaningful progress can be measured. The risk of an undefined MWG is a focus on a set of feasible but fairly limited and unconnected milestones along a road that leads nowhere or the elaboration of a serie of vague visions. The first MWG is influenced by 3 drivers, the technology development, the product development and the business strategy. The management team should put a lot of efforts to balance their influence in order to prevent one of them to dominate the interplay, because of the potential negative effects related to each one of these driver. Nevertheless, one of them should be the main driver but not all the time the company is trying to achieve its MWG. Shifting the balance of drivers in due time is necessary to achieve this goal. We mention this work because we would like to determine if one of the options considered by the fortu Powercell management team is a correct MWG, if they have developed a correct thinking about the options they defined. Considering the nature of the product fortu Powercell wish to sell, we must consider the work of Henderson and Clark on architectural innovation or the technology S-curve for components of Christensen. About the first named, it raises a distinction between several innovations as they could be incremental, modular, architectural or radical. Incremental innovation basically refines and extends an established design whereas radical innovation establish a new dominant design. A modular innovation is an innovation that changes a core design concept without changing the product’s architecture and finally a architectural innovation change a product’s architecture but leaves the components and the core design concepts that they embody unchanged. Qualify the fortu Powercell innovation would give us some clues about how established firms would react if the product is commercialized. The input of the S-curve theory in our thinking is that it forces us to not forget that the other technologies are maybe not mature and still have some potential that could lead to a fierce competition between them and the fortu Powercell technology. Finally, we would like to mention the work of Christensen, Musso and Anthony about capturing the returns from research, which talk about when, where and why integration is needed and introduce the notion of decoupling point. Basically, it illustrates the fact that a product with proprietary, interdependent architecture is subject to an interdependence of its components. The way one component is designed and made depends on the way the other components are being designed and made. In this case, the control of the design and manufacturing of every critical component of the system by a process of integration allows companies to develop a competitive advantage. A product with a modular architectures means that individual sub-systems can be upgraded without redesign everything. In this case, being specialized, not-integrated, is the best solution. We think it is important to keep in mind these notions as fortu Powercell is looking to enter the market of batteries for defined products. If the product has an interdependent architecture or a modular architecture, that makes a difference on how fortu Power should define its strategy. As a conclusion for this part, we want to remind that these theories and works presented are what we mainly used to mold our thinking about this case, to evaluate the situation of fortu PowerCell and its possibilities. III. Suggestions In this part, we are going to present a few suggestions for the fortu Powercell executive team regarding what we presented before. They should give them enough indications to help them find satisfying answers to their questions. If we look at the theories we mentioned, it seems that we can just start by defining a set of questions related to them and to other constraints and see if the first option, the plant in Lepzig, is such a good solution. We could also try to see if there is another solution, another market segment which appears to be better to the point it overcomes the loss of a potential market segment. First option: The plant in Lepzig (Market segment: Power Tools) -How well the fortu battery respond to the four set of questions of the management criteria theory, in the case of the power tools market ? Quite well actually. It appears at first sight that the fortu battery technology would be a profitable technology for the power tools market as it lift a fundamental prior constraint, provide enhanced effectiveness†¦ -Is the fortu battery a disruptive innovation or a sustaining innovation for the power tools battery market ? This question is subject to debate but as we see it, the fortu battery system is in part a disruptive innovation for the power tools battery market. Indeed, it would allow the creation of more powerful cordless tools which lead us to think that this is a new-market kind of disruptive innovation. On the other hand, if we only consider only the less powerful tools such as the screwdrivers, we can see the fortu battery technology as only a sustainable technology. It represents a battery with better characteristics compared to nickel based batteries and that is all. -Is the conquest of the power tools battery market a suitable MWG ? What are their following milestones ? We do not think that the power tools battery market is a suitable MWG because this is only a sustaining innovation for the single largest product category, which means than established players in the market would try to defend their market shares and, in a long-term perspective, we can imagine they would have to sell the business.    Second option: fortu Powercell gives up the power tools battery market and license its technology Another way to formulate the relevance of this option is to ask the question: is there a better MWG that fortu Powercell could choose ? A MWG that will compensate the loss of the power tools battery market segment ? After what we said in the previous argument, that the power tools battery market segment was not a very good MWG, and considering all the other opportunities offered by this technology, it would be surprising not to find a better one. The advantage with this option is that the first entrant with this technology in the global market won’t be fortu Powercell. They would have the chance to have a concrete feedback about what their technology is really capable of when it comes to mass production, what would be the reactions of major players in the business. Quick reminder: the first entrant is rarely the one that would capture the value of the technology. Also, it would give them some funds to be relatively independent from external capital, to keep doing some research or for a potential new venture. They will not have to use such a complicated financial operation to gather the funds and maybe they would not have to deal with conditions defined by their partners or at least it would be less constraining. Finally, they will have some time to think about everything we mentioned and there will maximize their chances to define what could be the perfect MWG for them and what milestones it could imply. But they have to keep in mind that is possible that this technology is not a disruptive technology for any market and consequently that long-term development would be difficult. So we think that there must be a better MWG for fortu Powercell and its technology but what would that be Final suggestions In this final part, now that we have defined that the second option is the best, as we see it, we are going to present what we think is a proposition of better MWG for fortu Powercell and we will conclude with a few recommendations. It is important to precise that this is only a proposition, we are not going to develop this thought too further as we think that the question of the fortu Powercell management team is answered and that they consequently have time to evaluate their different options. We think that the pedelecs (bicycle with electric assistance) would be a good MWG for fortu Powercell as it is limited enough to provide a clear target for technology and product development efforts in the short-to-medium term, and sufficiently large that successfully pursuing it provides a foundation for long-term corporate development. Indeed, the prices and margins are high in this market segment and most of the price depends of the battery. The segment size is important, around 100 million, which is big but not too much. It would be a low-end disruptive innovation compared to the NiCD and Li-on cells in the sense where the bicycles would be simpler, with a smaller battery that won’t need to be recharged too often, which is much more convenient. Indeed, we think that the technological advantage of the fortu Powercell would lead to these improvements, these enhancements for the product. The bicycles could also be cheaper as the price per Wh would be lower which could drive new customers, previously repelled by the high price. The important market of Netherlands will not be far from Karlsruhe, so a plant could be build over there. If this MWG would be a success, it would be possible to move to a sequence of MWG: electrical scooters (Italy is also not that far from Karlsruhe) – electrical cars (which can be considered as the ultimate target, the maximum winning game). Beyond the choice of the MWG, and as a conclusion, we would like to recommend fortu Powercell to pay attention to develop its absorptive capacity, in order to remain to the peak of the battery technology and then be able to respond with energy to the responses and attacks of other players, and in a long-term perspective, in the case they would be successful, to put a lot of efforts to define clearly its strategic intent.

Letters

For the longest time I have felt abandoned and deserted in this world. I see the world move fast   around, feeling dizzy of the haste and hurry of each day and yet in spite of the all the color and life of the world I still felt like I’m in a desert, alone and far from anything alive. Reading this book has opened my eyes and has led me to see God in my everyday life. In my life where I have felt alone and deserted for the longest time, it seems like a miracle that when you try and open your eyes and arms to embrace God’s presence you realize that he is indeed here with us. This book has taught me to open my heart to God and keep him welcome to stay and guide me. I believe that I felt that way for the longest time because I failed to recognize that everyday God is with me. That every achievement is a gift from God even the down times are gifts from God. You emphasized in your book that god is always with us, in the flesh of our brethren as Jesus has said in the bible that whatever we have done unto our brothers we have done unto him. Everyday God touches our lives through our fellowmen. I remember last Christmas, as I was walking home from the sweetshop, lonesome as I was, a young boy gave me a lollipop and it brightened my day. But back then I failed to recognize that it was God telling me that he is always with me, watching me and intending for me to be happy always. As I look back now I see that the emptiness that I felt is because I failed to recognize God’s presence in my life and my failure to offer back to his glory everything that I do in my life. It is more fulfilling to offer back to God everything that we do and to return to him all the praise and glory that we can give. There is no meaning in working for ourselves alone, but there is meaning in working for God and his people. Finally, I learned about forgiveness. I learned to forgive myself and other people as well by recognizing how forgiving God is with our trespasses. That no matter what we do, how much we have sinned, He always welcomes us with open arms and with his eternal love. This book is a call to return to God’s embrace. The Lord has used Elephant to call back his flock to return unto him. One chapter captures the great message of returning to God, the one which deals with Jesus, and who Jesus is. Indeed Jesus is the greatest love of all, he is God’s love for us all. He gave us Jesus his only son to save us from eternal damnation. As it is said in the Bible in John 3:16, â€Å"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever shall believe in Him, will not perish, but will receive eternal life.† All the discussion about life,Who is God, God’s presence, Marriage, who the devil is, and others are all to me suppletory to the renewal of our faith in God. Elephant has aptly summed in a single chapter the greatest reason to believe and return to God and his embrace. To know the sacrifice that God has made in order to save us and give us the eternal life which he intended for us in the beginning as can be seen in Exodus 20:3-7â€Å"I am the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt, where you were slaves. Worship no other god but me. Do not make for yourselves images of anything in heaven or on earth or in the water under the earth. Do not bow down to any idol or worship it, because I am the Lord your God and tolerate no rivals. I bring punishment on those who hate me and on their descendants down to the third and fourth generation. But I show my love to thousands of generations of those who love me and obey my laws.†Ã‚   Is enough reason for us to believe and believe firmly in God’s presence in our life. The small manifestations of his presence through our brethren should serve only to strengthen what he has proven when he gave us Jesus for our salvation. His greatest message of all, which God has conveyed through you, is that he, is here with us, he has always been here, and will always be here for us. There is no room for our faith to flicker because he is real and each of us is a living proof. I have angered God. In a lot of ways I have failed God. I have failed to render help to those who needed my help. I have failed to receive God when he needed shelter. I have failed to live a life that is pleasing to him. I have failed to be the child of God. I recognize all my failures but now I realize that I am wrong, I may have done all these but I have never angered God. God who has eternal love and a fountain of mercy and forgiveness. God who has given his son to save me from the fires of hell. I may be a sinner, but God has not given up on sinners like me. All throughout the bible, sinners are always given the chance to repent for their sins and God has always made a way for them to return back to him. I have realized, by reading this book that no matter how much you have sinned, if you receive God in your heart he will forgive you and receive you. If man comes with sincerity and bow before God, then God’s grace will forgive, and ultimately, save him Because God is love and love flows from him. I have long kept a fear that God hates me because I have angered him greatly through all my sins and wrongdoings but you have proven me wrong. I now know that His grace is eternal and unending. And I am no longer afraid of the end of my days because I know that God is with me and will always be with me, forgiving and loving until the end of time.

Describe the decision making model Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Describe the decision making model - Essay Example There are various decision making models; the pure rationality model, disjointed incrementalism model, rounded rationality model, intuitive model, recognition primed model, ultimate model and the cost/benefit analysis model. The pure rationality model is the most rational model in decision making but unrealistic as it is based on unlimited time, resources and knowledge assumption in its implementation. Cost benefit analysis model is a technique to analyze an opportunity to demonstrate the cost saving benefits towards receiving management support and commitment to implement (Tsl.state.tx.us 2010). It is usually carried out to determine how well or poorly an action will turn out. The model is mostly used in making of financial decisions. It encompasses the addition of positive factors and negative results subtraction in determination of the net outcome. It is commonly referred to as running the numbers. A cost benefit analysis finds, adds and quantifies all the positive factors or the benefits in relation to a decision option. It then identifies, subtracts and quantifies all the negative factors normally referred to as costs. The difference of the benefits and the costs of the related decision option is an indication of the viability of the decision option. To ensure the best option is taken, it is always advisable to include al the costs and benefits and proper quantification procedures are carried out. For example when dealing with healthcare decisions, we may require driver services. Drivers are very vital in the running of a health care services center. They are the ones who are major players in ambulance services therefore their well being should be treated with care. The sobriety of the drivers should be ensured as they are usually permitted by law to drive at very high speeds. A health care manager may be faced with the decision of whether to employ a new driver or pay overtime wages to the current drivers. In doing this the manager

Operations Management of Airbus Company Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Operations Management of Airbus Company - Essay Example The paper tells that Airbus is considering taking production approach similar to the ones applied by Boeing. For the company to take appropriate measure in this endeavor it need to consider the following factors. Cancellation of orders or running out of business by airline companies is the main causes of production of white tail jets. As an Airbus consultant, the researcher will begin by investigating the causes and nature of cancellation of orders or running out of business by airliners in a long-term perspective. Secondly, the researcher need to investigate market trends by analyzing possible demands in the long-term. Finally, Airbus is facing competition from other competitors such as Boeing and McDonnell Douglas Company. The researcher would therefore investigate the implication of white tailed jet as a long-term competition strategy. These issues will require objectives that can be evaluated in order to determine their suitability of application in Airbus. Firstly, Airbus needs to determine the future demand resulting from the anticipated growth of the airline industry. The company also requires knowing the possibility of acquiring new customers from existing airliners and from possible new entrants. Thirdly, Airbus needs to evaluate possible competitive advantage that may result from the production of white tail jets. Finally, Airbus would require to measure the degree at which market trend is shifting from making of orders to buying of readymade aircrafts. Part 3; Operation management techniques Qualitative and quantitative techniques as applied in operational management will be useful in analyzing the stated important issues. Quantitative techniques are important technique in operation management since they enable operations managers to determine future anticipations in terms of quantity or numbers. This factor makes the technique to have wide application in forecasting of expected operation methods and procedures. The technique relies on data and model s and it would be appropriate for analyzing Airbus case. Unlike quantitative techniques, qualitative techniques are more subjective, this makes the technique fit perfectly in the given scenario. Qualitative techniques forecasts future prospect of a company based on answers to a series of question related to the management of a company (Slack, & Chambers, 2008). Using quantitative techniques it is possible to determine the time duration within which Airbus should continue producing white tailed aircrafts. Firstly, considering the rate at which airliners across the globe are grounding their planes from lack of business, Airbus is likely to have a continued production of white tailed jets. Although the move has some competitive advantage over its rival plane manufacture Boeing, the company needs to consider any long-term threats that may result from the move. Currently Boeing is involved in intensive management program to ensure that any delays and order cancellation do not turn out as a white tailed jet. Airbus need to evaluate possible risks that rival company is avoiding by taking the current moves. Boeing main customer Lufthansa has ground A300-600s and a similar move is likely to apply to A340-300 series. Other companies such as Quanta airlines are considering taking mergers and this will cause a reduction in the number of orders they make. This implies that the company is anticipating a sharp fall in the demand of aircrafts making it to take cautions in its manufacturing plans. Airbus also needs to determine the duration within which it should continue with production of white tail aircrafts considering the anticipated demands due to a shortfall in supply. Although airline companies are currently

Sonnet by Shakespeare to Explicate Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Sonnet by Shakespeare to Explicate - Essay Example While the sonnet is largely straightforward, it does have a number of challenging images. In the third line, Shakespeare writes, â€Å"And trouble deaf heav'n with my bootless cries† (Shakespeare 3). Here, the narrator is indicating this in his loneliness he cries out to heaven with useless (‘bootless’) cries. Shakespeare advances this theme of despondency and loneliness, indicating that the narrator wishes that he had the life of others; Shakespeare writes, â€Å"Desiring this man’s art, and that man’s scope† (Shakespeare 7). The sonnet follows a Petrarchan structure, which is visible in the final six lines when the narrator indicates that despite his despondency, â€Å"Haply I think on thee, and then my state,/ Like to the lark at break of day arising† (Shakespeare 10-11). In these regards, the overriding theme and rhetorical strategy indicates that while the narrator experiences considerable despondency, the thought and image of his love make the trying times bearable. In conclusion, this essay has considered Shakespeare’s ‘Sonnet 29’. It has considered theme and rhetorical strategy, indicating that the poem is a love sonnet with a Petrarchan structure. Ultimately, the sonnet is a powerful and unique one within Shakespeare’s canon. References Shakespeare, William. Sonnet 29. Shakespeare Online.