Labels: , , ,

Although you get firewall and anti-spyware tools as part of Windows, Microsoft has always been reluctant to give Windows users free anti-virus software. Indeed, for the past couple of years it has encouraged customers who want anti-virus protection to subscribe to the Windows Live Onecare service which also includes firewall, anti-spyware, backup and other tools. A Onecare Server implementation is also available specifically for small businesses. Unfortunately the Onecare anti-virus tools don’t compare well against those from specialist vendors such Mcafee, Sophos and Symantec, and very few customers have signed up to use them.  

The world's biggest software maker is now into antivirus software.Although you get firewall and anti-spyware tools as part of Windows, Microsoft has always been reluctant to give Windows users free anti-virus software. Read More: http://www.bench3.com/2009/06/microsoft-is-to-launch-free-antivirus.html
Microsoft To Discontinue Live OneCare:
As a result, Microsoft has announced that it will be discontinuing the Onecare service in favour of a free anti-virus product, code-named Morro, which is expected to start shipping in the second half of 2009. Onecare will be discontinued on 30 June 2009 but updates, support and subscription renewals will continue to be available until Morro ships. Our advice is to keep your wallet firmly closed and wait until that happens, especially if you’re not already a Onecare customer.

Haja is currently working in a multi-disciplinary role that combines programming including, SAP Administration, Network Management, and System Administration. He is passionate about Technology and this blog is his platform for sharing his ideas. If you like this post, Please leave a comment. And if you have any queries, mail to help @ bench3 . com


Labels: ,

With its slender white body and glowing amber tip, the electronic cigarette can easily pass for a regular cigarette. It even releases what looks like remnants of white smoke. Don’t be fooled, because what you see is not a real cigarette, it is an electronic cigarette. According to a published report, when using an electronic cigarette, the smoker is not actually smoking. The electronic cigarettes are battery powered and they vaporize nicotine, so you are actually inhaling the nicotine vapor. 

You’re getting the nicotine hit, but without the toxic smoke and contents of the cigarette and tar. However, since these product is from chine, there is no proof or gurantee these cigarettes are safe. And as these cigarettes are made in China, are unregulated and have not been approved by the FDA. It is unknown how much nicotine is actually in the cigarette and we are unaware of the contents within the vapor.
Could the electronic cigarette be worse for you than cigarettes?
There is a good chance it could be worse than regular cigarettes. Manufacturers seem to think it is a safer bet, but there has been no analysis done of the vapor.

Johnny Watts, who is a current electronic cigarette user, said he started using the e-cigarette after a friend introduced him to the device. “A friend of mine was telling me about it and I decided to try it out,” he said. “I was a regular cigarette smoker before I started using the e-cigarette, so instead of smoking regular cigarettes, I use the e-cigarette everyday. I have been using the e-cigarette for three months now and I will never go back to smoking regular cigarettes if I don’t have to.”

According to a national study, fewer college students (one in five) are smoking. The tobacco industry plays a huge role in fluctuating rates of college student smoking. Roughly 20 percent of today’s college students who smoke are regular smokers. According to a published report, one study found that students at 109 of 119 schools surveyed reported seeing tobacco promotions in an on-campus event. Tobacco industry documents revealed campaigns to target young adults during transitional life stages, such as moving from high school to college or work. Tobacco companies believe those life stages are a perfect time to develop new behaviors such as smoking. In an attempt to utilize this vulnerability, tobacco companies sponsor promotions in bars and nightclubs in an attempt to make young adults view smoking as a social norm. That may move them from experimenting with cigarettes to becoming pack-a-day smokers.

According to the American Lung Association, each year 440,000 people die in the U.S. from tobacco use. Nearly one of every five deaths is related to smoking. Cigarettes kill more Americans than alcohol, car accidents, suicide, AIDS, homicide and illegal drugs combined. At least 30 percent of all cancer deaths including cancers of the lung, larynx (voice box), oral cavity, pharynx (throat) and esophagus are attributed to smoking cigarettes. It is a contributing cause in the development of cancers of the bladder, pancreas, liver, uterine cervix, kidney, stomach, colon and rectum, and some leukemia. Secondhand smoke causes almost 50,000 deaths in adult nonsmokers in the United States each year, including approximately 3,400 from lung cancer and 22,700-69,600 from heart disease.

According to smokingeverywhere.com, the electronic cigarette is driven by a micro-electronic technology. The actual cigarette body is made up of three parts: a nicotine cartridge, an atomization chamber and a smart chip with a lithium battery. The atomization chamber device creates a vapor-like smoke when puffed on, just like a real cigarette. This vapor is a result of the nicotine found in the cartridge, heated up by the atomizer device and creating vapor smoke, but without any smell of smoking real tobacco. This is when the smoker gets the nicotine hit and the smoke-likeillusion, but without having to smoke a real cigarette.
The electronic cigarette is eco-friendly, non-flammable and can be smoked anywhere- yes, it can be smoked anywhere. The electronic cigarette can be smoked in restaurants, bars, in the airport and it can even be smoked while you are sitting in class.

The electronic cigarette has many perks and smoking real cigarettes is something that is unhealthy for someone’s body. So before you take your chances with the electronic cigarette, talk to your doctor and get started with a program that helps smokers kick the nasty habit.

Haja is currently working in a multi-disciplinary role that combines programming including, SAP Administration, Network Management, and System Administration. He is passionate about Technology and this blog is his platform for sharing his ideas. If you like this post, Please leave a comment. And if you have any queries, mail to help @ bench3 . com


Labels: ,

Water cooling used be seen as the domain of the ultra-enthusiast locked away in a darkened room, eking out the last drop of performance from a CPU or graphics card with home-made systems, using various bits of car radiators and parts normally found in fish aquariums. Now, however, many system builders are using it to produce silent or very high-performance PCs – and it’s not just the boutique builders either. Both Dell and HP produce water-cooled high-end gaming systems. So what’s so special about water cooling? Well as we all know, the number one enemy inside a case is heat, hence the need for so many fans whirring away. Water cooling, as the name suggests, uses water pumped across special blocks sitting on the CPU and/or the  graphics processing unit to remove heat generated by the processors, faster and more efficiently than a standard air cooler. This helps keep the running temperature of the processors within limits, and that’s why it’s ideal for overclocking. The heat generated by increasing the front-side bus speed, clock speed, and core voltages is quickly dealt with, allowing stable increases in processor clock speeds that can be way in excess of the standard speeds. As water cooling becomes more visible in the mainstream market, many people are tempted to try it out. For anybody curious about trying out water cooling the good news is that today’s DIY kits are far safer, easier to install and more complete than those of old, the source of many scare stories. You can either choose an external cooler that has the radiator and water tank sitting outside the case, pumping the water back into the case (the reason most of the cases in this review have a pair of holes drilled in the rear panel) or choose to mount everything internally using a kit from the likes of XSPC, which use small water tanks and compact radiators that replace the existing case fan(s) for tidy installations.

Haja is currently working in a multi-disciplinary role that combines programming including, SAP Administration, Network Management, and System Administration. He is passionate about Technology and this blog is his platform for sharing his ideas. If you like this post, Please leave a comment. And if you have any queries, mail to help @ bench3 . com


Labels: , ,

During the filming of the 1989 movie The Return Of the Musketeers, actor Roy Kinnear fell from a horse in Toledo, Spain, sustaining a broken pelvis. He was taken to hospital in Madrid, and died from a heart attack the following day.

The film's director, Richard Lester, quit his own film career as a direct result of Kinnear's death. 

  The Return of the Musketeers (1989): actor Roy Kinnear felt from his horse and died
 

Jumper (2008): set dresser fatally struck by frozen debris
 
While dismantling an outdoor set in wintry conditions for Jumper, a sci-fi thriller starring Samuel Jackson, set dresser David Ritchie was fatally struck by frozen debris. Investigators later found that the sand and earth frozen to the wall for exterior design came unstuck as the set was being torn down, falling and crushing Ritchie. 

The film kept going, eventually receiving widespread criticism and poor reviews from critics.

Troy (2004): hurricanes, a broken leg, and ironically, Brad Pitt's achilles tendon
 
What could go wrong in a gazillion-dollar epic production starring Brad Pitt, Orlando Bloom and Diane Kruger? Ironically, during the filming of Troy, Brad Pitt who played Achilles had a mishap during the production and tore his left achilles tendon. But the worst was yet to come when George Camilleri, a keen bodybuilder, broke his leg while filming an action sequence at Ghajn Tuffieha. He was operated on the following day but suffered complications and died 2 weeks later.

In addition to that, while filming in Cabo, Baja California Sur, Mexico, the production had to deal with two hurricanes in less than a month; the last hurricane came the last week of production, when everything was pretty much wrapped. Despite all of that, the movie kept going and was finally a box-office hit.

Haja is currently working in a multi-disciplinary role that combines programming including, SAP Administration, Network Management, and System Administration. He is passionate about Technology and this blog is his platform for sharing his ideas. If you like this post, Please leave a comment. And if you have any queries, mail to help @ bench3 . com


Labels: , ,

Harry L. O'Connor, Diesel's stunt double on the xxx action movie, was killed on a scene in which he was supposed to rappel down a parasailing line and land on a submarine. When O'Connor failed to rappel down the line fast enough, he hit a bridge at high speed and was killed instantly.

His death was caught on camera Director Rob Cohen decided to include the footage of the scene, with the final moments edited out, as a matter of respect for the stuntman's final act.XXX (2002)
Vin Diesel's Stuntman Smashed Into A Bridge And Died
  
A Comment From A Reader:"I think it is notable for the list that Diesel's stuntman had already done the stunt successfully before he was killed. He felt that it wasn't good enough, that he hadn't got close enough to the bridge(for suspense purposes) and asked the director if he could do it again. It was during this second take that he was killed. I believe, as a side note, that his family had arrived in Prague just before the accident to watch his stunt and were present during his death."


 Top Gun (1986)
An Aerobatic Pilot Crashed After His Scene

 
Tom Cruise's worldwide most famous movie Top Gun was dedicated to the memory of Art Scholl. A renowned aerobatic pilot, the 53 year-old was hired to do in-flight camera work for the film and was engaged to fly the difficult "flat spin" scene. When he climbed into his Pitts S-2 camera-plane on the set of Top Gun – as he had so many times before - he had no idea of the dark fate that awaited him. During this scene, Scholl reported a problem with the plane; he was unable to recover from it and crashed his Pitts S-2 into the Pacific Ocean, off the southern California coast near Carlsbad on September 16, 1985. Neither Scholl nor his aircraft were recovered, leaving the official cause of the accident unknown. 

The Final Season (2007)
A Camera Man, Killed On A Helicopter Crash
 
 While filming the baseball movie The final season, released on October, 2007, camera man Roland Schlotzhauer was killed while filming some parade sequences. Roland was well-known for his ability to capture shots from helicopters and he was filming from a Bell 206 when it hit power lines. The helicopter then crashed into a field seriously injuring the pilot and a producer on board, while ending Roland's life.
- - - To Be Continued - - -

Haja is currently working in a multi-disciplinary role that combines programming including, SAP Administration, Network Management, and System Administration. He is passionate about Technology and this blog is his platform for sharing his ideas. If you like this post, Please leave a comment. And if you have any queries, mail to help @ bench3 . com


Labels: , ,

Of the 220 persons who worked on The conqueror on its location near Utah in 1955, 91 had contracted cancer as of the early 1980s and 46 died of it, including stars John Wayne, Susan Hayward,Afnes Moorehead, and director Dick Powell. Experts say under ordinary circumstances only 30 people out of a group of that size should have gotten cancer. 

The cause? No one can say for sure, but many attribute the cancers to radioactive fallout from U.S. atom bomb tests in nearby Nevada.Produced by Hower Hughes, he thought the movie was so bad that he bought up every copy (which cost him about $12 million) and refused to distribute the film.

For years thereafter, the only person who saw it was Hughes himself, who screened it night after night during his paranoid last years, this until 1974 when Paramount reached a deal with him. This would be the last film that Hughes would produce.
The Conqueror (1956): 
The Radioactive Set That Caused Cancer To John Wayne And 90 more



The Twilight Zone - The Movie (1983)
  A Helicopter Decapitated Three Actors
 
During the filming of a segment of the 1983 movie The twilight zone producted by Steven Spielberg, actor Vic Morrow and child actors Myca Dinh Le (age 7) and Renee Shin-Yi Chen (age 6) died in an accident involving a helicopter being used on the set. The helicopter was flying at an altitude of only 25 feet (8 meters), too low to avoid the explosions of the pyrotechnics used on set. 

When the blasts severed the tail rotor, it spun out of control and crashed, decapitating Morrow and Le with its blades. Chen was crushed to death as the helicopter crashed. Everyone inside the helicopter survived sustaining minor injuries.
The accident led to legal action against the filmmakers which lasted nearly a decade, and changed the regulations involving children working on movie sets at night and during special effects-heavy scenes.

The incident also ended the friendship between director Landis and producer Spielberg, who was already angered before the accident that Landis had violated many codes, including using live ammunition on the set.



The Crow (1994)
Brandon Lee, Killed By A Prop. 44 Magnum
  
As one of the scenes of The crow was being filmed, Brandon Lee --Bruce Lee's son-- was shot and killed by a prop .44 Magnum. The scene involved the firing of a full-powder blank (full charge of gunpowder, but no bullet) at Brandon's character; however, unknown to the film crew/firearms technician, a bullet was already lodged in the barrel and hit Lee in the abdomen. 

But that wasn't the only accident; the set was plagued by numerous accidents even before Lee's death. On the first day of shooting, February 1, 1993, a carpenter was severely shocked and received serious burns when the scissor lift he was driving came into contact with high-voltage power lines.

On March 13 heavy storms destroyed some of the elaborate sets causing delays. Later a prop master discovered a live round in one of the prop guns and an enraged carpenter drove his car into the studio's plaster shop. Also a worker was injured when a screwdriver was accidentally driven through his own hand and a stuntman fell through the roof of one of the sets.
After Lee’s death, a stunt double, Chad Stahelski replaced Lee in some scenes to complete the film. Special effects were used for digitally compositing Lee’s face onto the double. The original footage featuring Lee’s actual death is the source of some controversy. Some accounts claim it was destroyed immediately, without even being developed while others suggest it was later given to Lee’s family. Brandon Lee was buried beside his father.
- - - To Be Continued - - -

Haja is currently working in a multi-disciplinary role that combines programming including, SAP Administration, Network Management, and System Administration. He is passionate about Technology and this blog is his platform for sharing his ideas. If you like this post, Please leave a comment. And if you have any queries, mail to help @ bench3 . com


Labels: , ,

For any blog to be success, it needs content. “Content is the king of any blog.” Without content, there are no links. Content is the foundation of traffic. Everything starts with content. You have no content, you don’t have a blog.
So let’s take a look how to make a creative content.

Source Of Content
There are many places and ways to get content. I write all the content for this blog myself and if you’re doing a blog then you should do most of the article like a blog with free articles on it. Many people have asked how to keep up the level of content generation? It’s really not that hard. This is how I go about it.

The Blog Comments
Much of my content ideas come from blog comments. This article is in answer to requests made in the comments of the blog. Producing content this way is really the best because you know this is the content your readers are looking for – you can’t get better targeting than giving the readers what they asked for. Chances are, this article will lead to future articles as readers comment on it.

If you don’t have a reader base yet, then your method of creating content will have to be based on what niche your blog covers. When I wake up in the afternoon, I really don’t have an idea on what I’m going to write about. The first thing I do is read the blog comments, as this is my best source for article ideas. After that, I surf the list of sites in my bookmarks. This is my second biggest source of article ideas. I also get article ideas from magazines and newspapers.

Surfing For Content
When surfing, I’m looking for stories which I think would interest my readers. The object is not to just repost the stories, which would be too easy. I want to put my own spin on it. If I were to just repost a story with a link, I haven’t added any value to it.

Blogging is about adding your personal touch to a story. While sites like nytimes.com just report the story without emotion or opinions, bloggers are expected to get down and dirty with it. Make the content your content. Don’t be afraid to state your views or piss people off. We have the right to say our opinions.

Haja is currently working in a multi-disciplinary role that combines programming including, SAP Administration, Network Management, and System Administration. He is passionate about Technology and this blog is his platform for sharing his ideas. If you like this post, Please leave a comment. And if you have any queries, mail to help @ bench3 . com


Labels: , ,

“Article 16 of the Constitution of India is a bundle of contradictions, as on the one hand it deals with equality of opportunity in matters of public employment, and, on the other, it enables the government to provide for reservation in public employment.”

Article 16 of the Constitution is part of the Fundamental Rights and provides for equality in the matters of employment in public employment. Many people feel that this Article, instead of equality in these matters, perpetuates the inequalities and offers a framework of contradiction. The Fundamental Rights should ideally provide the measures vide which the equality is ensured but the exceptions provided to this right overweigh the right provided. Article 16 provides that there shall be equality of opportunity for all citizens in the matters of employment or appointment to any office under the State. This Article also provides that no citizen shall be ineligible for any office or employment under the State on grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex, descent, place of birth or any of them. After having stated the above, several exceptions are also provided for.

Place of residence may be laid down by the legislature as a condition for particular classes of employment or appointment in any State or any local authority. Further, the State may reserve any post or appointment in favour of any backward class of citizens, who, in the opinion of the State, are not adequately represented in the services under that State. In addition, the offices connected with the religious or denominated institutions may be reserved for the members practicing that particular religion.

The most important and controversial exception pertains to the provisions of Article 16(4) relating to the claims of the members of the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities in the matters of appointment to the services and posts under the Union and the States, to be consistent with efficiency in administration as far as possible (Article 335). The Supreme Court has held that while the provisions of Article 16(4) are without any limitation upon the power of reservation, yet it has to be read with the provisions of Article 335 for maintenance of efficiency in administration.

The Apex Court also held that the total reservation under Article 16(4) should not exceed 50 per cent. Detailed study of the provisions of the Article 16 reveals that while originally this Article aimed at protecting the rights of common man with regard to equality of opportunity but gradually, due to the need felt by the government to extend the benefit of reservation to the other backward classes and also the political considerations, its focus has now shifted to providing the benefit of reservation to the backward classes and the SC/ST.

But one thing has been confirmed that the extension of the benefit cannot be arbitrary. Various pronouncements of the Supreme Court of India during the past almost six decades have plugged the gaps in the provisions of this Article and also provided a standard framework for extending the benefit of reservation in future to any other categories. The measures that looked to be controversial initially have also been settled by the judgments of the highest court of law in the country.

Haja is currently working in a multi-disciplinary role that combines programming including, SAP Administration, Network Management, and System Administration. He is passionate about Technology and this blog is his platform for sharing his ideas. If you like this post, Please leave a comment. And if you have any queries, mail to help @ bench3 . com


Labels: ,

Inflation is a situation of persistent rise in the prices in any economy. The percentage of inflation measures the relative increase in the price rise over the given period of time. Deflation, on the other hand, is a reverse situation under which the price levels actually fall over the previous time unit. While functional inflation of 3 to 5 per cent per annum is good for the economy, deflation in any form affects the economy adversely. Contrary to the belief that the dropping price levels should bring cheers to the people, the economists would never like the country to encounter a situation of deflation, where the fall in prices discourage the investors and the proposals for new investments are put on hold by investors, retarding the growth rate.

Haja is currently working in a multi-disciplinary role that combines programming including, SAP Administration, Network Management, and System Administration. He is passionate about Technology and this blog is his platform for sharing his ideas. If you like this post, Please leave a comment. And if you have any queries, mail to help @ bench3 . com


Labels: , ,

Every nation’s currency has its relative value with relation to certain important currencies of the world. The relative value keeps varying a bit every now and then, depending on the strength of the economy concerned, which depends on various economic parameters. Devaluation of a currency makes the domestic currency cheaper against the foreign currencies and exports of that country become more competitive in the global market. It turns out to be advantageous to the exporters and the imports under such a situation become more expensive in terms of domestic currency.

Haja is currently working in a multi-disciplinary role that combines programming including, SAP Administration, Network Management, and System Administration. He is passionate about Technology and this blog is his platform for sharing his ideas. If you like this post, Please leave a comment. And if you have any queries, mail to help @ bench3 . com