Official Google Blog: Google learns to crawl Flash

Official Google Blog: Google learns to crawl Flash

Information System and Services

Basically, a database is carefully designed and constructed repository of facts. The fact repository is part of larger whole known as an information system. An information system provides for data collection, storage, and retrieval. It also facilitates the transformation of data into information and the management of both data and information. Thus, a complete information system is composed of people, hardware, software, the database, application programs, and procedures. System analysis is the process that establishes the need for and the extent of an information system. The process of creating an information system is known as system development.

The performance of an information system depends on a triad of factors: database design and implementation, application design and implementation, and administrative procedures.

The use of Information Technology provides the following benefits to the company:

• The Computerized system is always up-to-date
• There is no data duplication and data inconsistency
• The computerized system always generates useful information. It’s also useful in generating reports
• The system does allow ad hoc queries
• Computerized System is very fast to process data
• The use of computerized inventory system makes data management very easy. It provides greater control and provide the ability to manage the inventories effectively
• Ready access to crucial inventory management data is available. For example which item have been ordered, from which vendor were they ordered, which item have been ordered but have not yet been received and so on
• The organization must need to know the available stock and average use of supplies to effectively manage the supply inventory, to determine optimal order quantities, and to place necessary orders, this information has effectively provided by the Computerized Inventory System
• The company does not always know the actual location of any item at any given time. The computerized system makes it possible to track inventory by category, by location, or by manufacturer
• The company can not easily generate a repair and maintenance history for each piece of equipment without computerized system
• The company cannot determine the status of items currently subject to maintenance procedures with the use of computerized systems.

Problems due to lack of Information System Strategy

The development of Information System strategy proceeds on the basis of domino effects obtained from the study of industry and competition. By the revelation of business strengths and weaknesses, for the growth of a wide range of strategic plans for the successful administration of environmental openings and threats is called the Strategy Formulation. It comprises exploratory or redefining the corporate or project mission by indicating attainable goals, emergent strategies, and setting execution procedure for Information Systems. It should be noted that going to Information Technology in the organization could be done in many ways.

At present, although both the companies AB and CD merged together, but still they are running their independent Management Information System. This is not an ideal situation for both the companies and could be responsible for many problems like:

• Duplication: As both the companies run their Information system independently there is a chance of duplication. The computerized systems of both the companies control the stock of items by location as well as by inventory type. The system also track consumable items by recording their usage (Schreibfeder). Similarly, The systems also generate information about the total orders placed, total cost of orders by vendor, by order, and by inventory type. It also generates a grand total cost, to be used by the company for budgeting purposes. This sounds an appropriate system for a single company, but after the merger of AB and CD companies they both need a more comprehensive system which avoids the chances of data redundancy and duplication
• Inefficiency: the maintenance of separate database by both the companies even after the merger may enhance inefficiency. It is possible that data of any client may be available into the database of AB company while now it’s CD company which is going to deal with that particular client and hence client may suffer some inefficiency
• Failure: it is also possible that as database cannot be maintained at any central point, some of it may be lost for any reason, this will cause the failure of the system

The Proposed System

At present both the companies used an overlapping system for Customers and suppliers files. The proposed system is a centralized system in which inventory items will be updated when:

• An ordered item is received
• An item is checked out of inventory or checked in inventory
• A consumable item is withdrawn from inventory in order to be used
• If the physical inventory check reveals that an item is missing (Bar Codes).

This centralized system provides many benefits to the companies like:

• Cost Reduction: it saved the cost of the hardware. As both the companies used centralized Information system they only have to use server at one end and dumb terminals to all departments, this will reduce the cost of maintaining data at two different independent ends. It also reduces the labor cost, as now the data is maintained at a centralized position which would almost cut the labor cost to half.
• Reduced time for searching: when the system is managed with computer at a centralized position, it is much easy to track any item. With the help of computerized system it is possible to record any movement of the items from one place to another place by just entering its primary key
• Effective Customer Services: It is much easier to provide the best customer services to the customers by adapting centralized Information management system because
  1. The system produces the accurate results
  2. The system produces consistent results
  3. The system produces reliable results
  4. The system is easy to learn
  5. The system is easy to use
  6. The system is flexible to new or exceptional situations
  7. The system is flexible to change
  8. The system is compatible with other systems
  9. The system is well coordinated with other systems
• Reduction of Wrong Sale or Purchase: the use of centralized information system reduces or rather eliminating the chances of wrong shipping or any wrong sale or purchase
• Improved Coordination: the centralized information system break down the barriers among departments and across hierarchical levels.
• Improved Decision-making: information is the lifeblood of organizations. Managers at different levels use different kind of information. Management information system provides information reports to help managers to make decisions.
• Financial Control: management information system provides the exact situation of the company in the form of different reports and helps managers to control any resource leakages. This ultimately provides a better financial control to the decision-makers of the company
• Growth: Management Information System would help to enhance the market growth of the company. By having Salespersons use laptop computers in the field, a quick call can confirm inventory availability and instantly close a deal. The speed and timely service, achieved by an efficient management information system, give an advantage over competitors

Implementing Management Information System

Although management information system provides a bundle of benefits to the companies but still it is not very easy to implement such system. In order to implement centralized management information system to the companies AB and CD, following approaches may be used:

• Negotiations: managers of different departments are interviewed about their information needs. The problem for using this approach is that it is time consuming
• Involvement: involve different departmental heads by asking the most important information they need to run their department smoothly. This varies from company to company. It only uses the most important information and hence eliminate the useless data
• Retraining: in order to run the management information system efficiently, it is necessary that users must be trained in a manner that they can use the system as immaculately as they can. For this purpose training is necessary. Training helps the individual learns skills and more knowledge necessary to meet the requirements of the job. For an experienced worker, training is a process of re-orientation to meet the additional job requirements. The purpose of training is to increase productivity and job performance. Thus retrain the employees is an essential part for implementing management information system
• Recruitment: recruitment of computer personnel to manage, implement and maintain management information system is also very important

Conclusion

We are living in Information age, and in this Information society it is almost impossible to ignore the importance of computers in any walk of life. Computer has not only reshaping our society but also our business environment locally and worldwide. As we have discussed in this report, use of information technology in the AB and CD companies have many benefits, it reduces the cost, enhances the efficiency, provide better customer support and improved decision-making facilities.

Although management information system have many benefits; but it needs a solid strategy to be implemented. The implementation process may include techniques like negotiations, involvement, retraining, recruitment etc.

Decision Making

Decision-making is every manager’s primary responsibility. It is also a process affected by the organization’s needs and characteristics. The manager’s decisions are determined by his personal skills and abilities, and also by the resources and constraints that organizations provide.

Collectively, the decision of manager gives form and directive to the work an organization does.
Viewing decision-making solely as a choice among alternatives is too simplistic, although some minor decisions may be made in this way, complex decisions are not unique, isolated events; they reflect prior behavior and anticipated consequences. Focusing only on the moment of choice among alternatives, according to Simon, leads to a false concept of decision, and “ ignores the whole lengthy, complex process of exploring and analyzing that precedes the final moment”.

The process nature of decision-making reveals the influence of time:

• The past, in which problems develop, information accumulates, and the need for a decision is perceived
• The present, in which alternatives are found and the choice is made; andThe future, in which decisions are carried out, evaluated, or changed.
• The future, in which decisions are carried out, evaluated, or changed.

Moreover major decisions involve a series of related and increasingly detailed decisions as time unfolds and consequences appear.

The fact that decision-making is a process is frequently obscured by the sudden appearance that some decisions seem to make. The forces behind a particular decision are often hidden or unknown. For strategic reasons, managers may reveal decisions only after a great deal of planning. For example, a company president who decides to close a plant in one location and build another in some other location may not announce the decision until after planners have at least partially dealt with the anticipated consequences, such as employee reactions. Critical decisions require months of planning, fact gathering, and analysis. But even in the snap decisions, in which the manager responds to an urgent stimulus, background conditions have influenced the mental processes that are involved. The urgency has merely altered the timings.

The Problem

Let us take a real life example and then find out different alternative solutions for this problem.
It has been observed that after the turnaround led by Lee Iacocca, Chrysler found itself with greater demand for cars in both America and European markets than it could provide. This was a daunting task and requires some serious thinking by the senior executives to find a best way out.

The senior executives follow the basic techniques of decision-making like:

Diagnosis and Analysis of Causes

It is the step in the decision making process in which managers analyze underlying casual factors associated with the decision solution.

In this process manager asks several questions to specify underlying causes, including:

• What is the state of dis-equilibrium affecting us?
• When did it occur?
• Where did it occur?
• How did it occur?
• To whom did it occur?
• What is the urgency of the problem?
• What is the interconnectedness of events?What results came from which activity?

Such questions help specify what actually happened and why. Executives of Chrysler asked such questions in order to find an alternative of their problem.
Perception and definition of a problem are necessary but not sufficient conditions for effective decisions. Actions can follow only when there is sufficient consensus that a problem exists and should be dealt with. Managers need an understanding of the norms or standards that govern the selection and definition of problems. in some cases, norms are specific.

Development of Alternatives

Once the problem or opportunity has been recognized and analyzed, the executives of Chrysler began to consider taking action. The next stage is to generate possible alternative solutions that would respond to the needs of the situation and correct the underlying causes.
A human being who has the ability to learn, to imagine, to remember, and to organize complexity is highly rational. By rational analysis, managers may choose among alternative decisions according to purpose. Purpose provides a rational standard against which to compare results.
Some decisions can be evaluated by objective criteria; others must be judged by qualitative standards. A dilemma in the evaluation of decisions is whether to measure a decision by its outcomes, or to assess the process by which it is made. Focusing on outcomes is a common practice, it is an easy method, because one can reduce the problem to a single criterion: if I like it, it is good. This allows for considerable subjectivity, especially in the absence of objection or criticisms from others. Evaluation processes differ for various types of decisions and decision situations, and by focusing on processes the manager can take steps to improve the quality of whole classes of decisions.

The first Alternative

The first alternative was to build new plants. But this alternative was not feasible enough because if Chrysler built new plants, it might get stuck with high overhead and excess capacity and thus the whole plan would fail. So this alternative was not a feasible solution of the problem.

Second Alternative

The second solution of the problem was to have employees work nights and weekends in existing plants. This alternative, after further consideration proved a failure because current plant was working full tilt, and hence additional labor hours would not produce many additional cars.

Third Alternative

The third alternative was to rent additional production capacity on a temporary basis. This alternative is the best and presented a creative solution of the problem as it presented the most appropriate solution of the problem.

Implementation of Chosen Alternative

Chrysler executives rented an American Motors plant in Kenosha, Wisconsin, to build Chrysler automobiles. The AMC workers avoided a layoff and Chrysler fulfilled its requirement of greater short-run reduction capacity.

Developing decision alternatives led to a creative idea that helped Chrysler stay efficient and at the same time sell more cars.

The real success of the executives of Chrysler laid in the fact that they had evaluated all three alternatives considerably with proper feedback from the employees and mangers concerned with each alternative. At the same time they did not show hindsight bias, overconfidence, did not influence by the problem framing and did not give too much weight to the readily available information.

Their decision illustrates all the decision steps, and the process ultimately ended in success.

Coca Cola

As we all know that Coca Cola is a multinational company, and have branches in almost every part and country of the world. Although Coca Cola company in other parts of the world works autonomously but all their activities are monitored at it’s headquarter. In this paper we will discuss the following four issues:

• Financial Statement Analysis
• Foreign Currency Translation
• Foreign Price Changes
• Reporting and Disclosures

All these points play a vital role when it comes to the franchise of any company, without considering these points a company cannot decide to go for globalization.

Financial Statement Analysis

As it is quite simple and straightforward that financial information is very important for any business, especially when it comes to multinational company it becomes obligatory. Financial statements of the company can be used for many purposes but in this report we will discuss and analyze financial statement for the purpose of the global management of the multinational company.

Financial statements should be analyzed by the global management of a multinational company to figure out the position of their business in the market. As we are talking about the company Coca Cola, so we would discuss a case in which we show why the analysis of financial statements is important for the global management of a multinational company.

By analyzing the financial statement thoroughly, the global management have concluded that how their regional management is running their business in any specific region. They have also figured out what necessary measures should be taken to improve the condition of the business in any region. They can get the amount of revenue generated and the net profit derived from it and compares it with the figures of any different region.

Foreign Currency Translation

One of the most important issues in this regard is the translation of currency, because every region has its own currency, which does contain different value. In this matter global management should recognize the value of currency of that specific region and compare it with the value of the currency they are changing in, this is something very important in order to recognize the amount of profit earned. It has been estimated that due to foreign currency translation, Coca Cola, in the fourth quarter of 2003 alone, earned more than $5 billion.

Foreign Price Changes

We have discussed the importance of foreign currency translation in the previous paragraph, now we will discuss importance of foreign price changes. If the foreign price fluctuates with high values, it would affect the business because when comes to the translation of currency it would definitely reflects some big changes. Some definite measure must be taken to resolve the issues related the problem specified in this point.

Reporting and Disclosures

It has been noticed that the quality of financial reporting directly affects the capital markets. Arthur Leviit, Chairman of the SEC says, “Disclosure systems that are founded on high quality standards give investors confidence in the credibility of financial reporting, and without investor confidence, markets cannot thrive”.

Coca Cola Company has mentioned the disclosure in its financial statement that almost 90% of the sales of Coca cola Company comes from the selling of Coca Cola products. Coca Cola is the only supplier of sweetener and concentrate for its products. Thus it is possible that company at any time may not be able to fulfill the requirement of sweetener and concentrate which leads to the shortage of the product. Coca Cola has also mentioned disclosure that it acquires its cans from two suppliers and it is possible that it may face shortage of cans and hence the shortage of the product if no alternative supplier is arranged.

Information Revolution

According to several historians, the Information Revolution is the third revolution in the history of the world after agricultural and industrial revolutions. Information age is the time, which brought fundamental changes in intellectual, social, philosophical and cultural aspects of the world.

Some historians are of the opinion that actually information revolution was the first revolution ever occurred and the agricultural and industrial revolutions were caused due to information revolution. To prove their claim they said that when civilization started, travelers and traders traveled from one place to another, as they have access to many cultures and traditions, they shared information and this information was actually the beginning of civilization as well as led the humanity towards the agricultural and industrial revolutions.

The Information Society can be determined as the large group of people within a country or a region wherein most workers generate or depend upon information for performance of their jobs. Today information is the largest export of most News services, banks, insurance companies, television stations etc. these all organizations collect data, process it into information, distribute it, and store it as a major part of their business.

Although we are living in an information society but it is equally true that only a part of the world has access to all its facilities. For example Internet is the best source of sharing information but there were digital, cultural and content gap between different parts of the world.

Digital Gap

The digital gap is most evident at the phase of connectivity; the lack of affordable access to PCs, Internet devices, modems, telephone lines, and Internet Connections. Steps to reduce this gap include devising cheaper access devices, creating Internet community access centers and bringing down access prices by creating a favorable climate of competition among Internet Service Providers.

It has been estimated that there are more phones in the New York alone than the whole rural area of Africa and almost 80% of the world population has never made a phone call (World Bank 1998). It has also estimated that there are more Internet Connections in London alone than the whole Africa

The developed countries, whose population comprises only 15% of world population, has almost 88% of Internet users (United Nations, 1997)

It has also been estimated that only 1% of the Internet users live in Africa and, if we exclude South Africa then the number of Internet users is less than 100,000 in whole Africa, which is only .02% of the global Internet content (Africa)

Developing countries share of Internet users is less than 5% etc. The reason for such low usage of Information and Communication Technology in developing countries is the cost of Internet. In Africa, the average cost of using Internet for 5 hours only is approximately $50 per month. Most of the developing countries have not enough per capita income to cover the expenses of the usage of Information and Communication Technology and that is the main reason why the growth of Internet users is so slow in developing countries (World Bank, 1998).

Cultural Gap

Culture represents probably the biggest challenge in closing the digital gap. It involves overcoming cultural inhibitions and insecurities about developing competence for surveying the breakneck speed of the Internet age. Closing the Internet gap includes getting governments in developing countries to stop treating their telecom monopolies like cash cow and instead, getting government telecom players to invest in areas like research and development on Internet telephony, so that the technology is seen as a market opportunity on a global scale and not a threat on a local scale. It also includes getting career-track diplomats, bureaucrats, academics and public sector employees to take up Internet training and harness the opportunities as well as the plentiful challenges that accompany Internet diffusion. Closing the cultural gap entails the creation of a risk taking culture, in which accepting some initial failures should not be treated as sign of weakness or a loss of face.

Content Gap

There is a huge content gap between developed and developing countries. According to the International Telecommunication Union, there were more Internet hosts in Finland than in all of Latin America and the Caribbean in 1999, there were more hosts in New York than in all of Africa, and more than 80% of web pages were in English (International Telecommunication Union, 1999).

Advantages and Disadvantages of living in Information Society

Some positive points of living in an Information society are:
· In Information Society, communities are more equipped with the facility to generate employment opportunities and wealth in the global market
· Information society helps to improve the welfare trends of the world
· It has the ability to support the overall condition of cohesiveness and integration of the communities of the world
· Information society encourage the unemployed persons to work for their own
Although living in an Information society has several advantages but it has some disadvantages too:
· There is a huge gap between the people of different areas of the world. Although information society promotes a global world but it also promotes inequality between the people of developed and undeveloped regions
· Information society promotes risk to job security as it is not easy to maintain jobs in competitive market terms
· As information society encourages the unregulated free trade, this leads to the wider gap between the rich and the poor.

Right of Information

Information is the right of every human being. But due to different social, economical and political conditions people of different demographic regions of the world are not enjoying it equally. It has an important point to notice that developed countries have better opportunities for the right of Information than the developing countries.

The concept of right to information is based on the concept of freedom of Information. The freedom of Information and the intellectual freedom are the rights, which protect the human development.

According to the United Nations human Development report, “Human poverty constitutes a denial of fundamental human rights. To promote social progress and raise the standard of living within the wider concept of freedom, international human rights law... recognizes economic and social rights with the aim of attacking poverty and its consequences. Among these rights are an adequate standard of living food, housing, education, health, work, social security and a share in the benefits of social progress” (United Nations, p. 106). These all rights are more important than the right to information. For example if a person do not have food, health, work or shelter he or she do not need the right of information. The United Nations rectification status of major rights tell us that economic, social and cultural rights are ratified by 135 countries while 57 countries have not ratified them.

World War II

World War II has often viewed as the best war ever in which United States played a very positive and effective role. Michael C.C. Adams in his book The Best War Ever: America and World War II revealed that United States had played as negative role in this war as all Axis powers (Germany, Italy and Japan). Adams discusses many myths in this book which were usually propagates to pronounce World War II as the “best war ever”. Adam says, “If the past is remolded too drastically, it ceases to be real history. It becomes what we call myth, or folklore, instead. One task of the historian is to try to keep our knowledge of the past as complete and accurate as possible so that our popular version does not depart too far from reality.

One myth that is usually presented by people is that, minority groups were very well treated in United States during World War II and there was no ethnical or racial problem in United States. This is not true. According to Adams, around 300,000 Mexican-Americans fought for America in World War II but neither government of United States nor American society gave them their due right. They were mistreated and humiliated in the society. White members of GI attacked and mugged Mexican-Americans due to their odd and unusual clothing. These riots were called “zoot suit” riots. “Here’s a guy riding a streetcar and he gets beat up ‘cause he happens to be a Mexican”. Japanese-Americans were also mistreated in United States. Government took away their civil rights and thousands of Japanese were sent to internment camps.

It has been portrayed in media and books that United States played a heroic role in World War II but Adams discloses that United States committed more violence and massacre in this war than any other country. United Sates soldiers used to boil the heads of Japanese and sent these boiled heads “to their families in United States”. Urinating into the mouths of Japanese and killing their wounded prisoners were usual practices. United States soldiers used poor women to fulfill their sexual desire by giving them basic food and household necessities.

On 6th August 1945, Americans dropped an atomic bomb to Hiroshima and one on Nagasaki three days later; after which the Japanese government surrendered. These bombs proved to the final blow for Axis forces and ended the Second World War. These atomic bombs have killed hundreds of thousands of, mostly innocent, people. People who considered World War II as “best war ever” justified the droppings of atomic bombs by saying that it ended the war and saved the lives of thousands of people. But according to Adams, America had no need to drop atomic bombs on Japan, because Japan was fairly disabled by the destruction of their Naval force and industry and the war was near to its end anyway. United States also dropped napalm bombs to different cities of Japan, which have killed “more than half a million people”.

Conclusion

Adam’s book describes that war is blight to our civilization. The horrors of wars, huge toll of human lives, immense loss of property and resources, heinous and inhuman war crimes; and above all the aftermath-miseries, diseases and moral decay can never be justified. Although America’s role in the war portrayed as heroic but in reality United States played as negative role in the war as all the axis forces.

Introduction

Before discussing the effect of globalization, it seems relevant that two terms described first. The first of these terms is Least Developed Countries (LDCs). Those countries, which are described poor, un-industrialized and whose economy based on the export of commodities fall into this category. United Nations had put 24 countries into the category of LDC in its 1968 conference on Trade and development.
Second term is Globalization. Globalization is the process of expanding global preferences in cultural, environmental, political, social and economical issues. The key economic characteristic of globalization is the free movement of goods throughout the world.
Globalization has affected every country but it particularly affected the LDCs in a negative way. It is the name of economic challenges like collapse of commodities market, debt crisis and structural adjustment policies for LDCs, which ultimately tightened the international poverty trap for them.

Direct Effects

Collapse of commodities market was the outcome of poor economic policies of 1980, which ultimately resulted in debt crisis, as LDCs had tried to expand commodity production and economic growth and had borrowed large sums of money. Banks then insisted on readjustment of interest rates on new and existing loans and LDCs agreed. At that moment, globalization compelled them to decline commodity prices. Commodities were the main source of income for LDCs, so it became more and more difficult for them to reduce or pay their debts, which ultimately caused unemployment in many commodity sectors.
In order to repay their debts, LDC tried to adopt IMF’s Structural Adjustment Program (SAP) to obtain funds from IMF. The strategy behind SAP program was to export more than import and produce hard cash to pay for the imports and direct the surplus towards debts. Although SAP was imposed for the betterment of economic condition of LDCs, but it did not work as it was planned. SAP created de-industrialization in LDCs and compelled them to again rely on export of their commodities. Selling of public assets to foreign investors also created unemployment.
Globalization made traders disappears, which in the past, worked as bridge between buyer and seller. Now big companies with shipping and warehousing facilities can buy commodities directly from the farmer. This need more sophisticated technology and human skills, and companies of developed countries have clear advantage in all these respects.
There is a huge digital gap between developed countries and LDCs. It has been estimated that there are more phones in the New York alone than the whole rural area of Africa and almost 80% of the world population has never made a phone call (World Bank). It has also estimated that there are more Internet Connections in London alone than the whole Africa and only 1% of the Internet users live in Africa, if we exclude South Africa then the number of Internet users is less than 100,000 in whole Africa, which is only .02% of the global Internet content (Africa). This digital gap made it almost impossible for LDCs to compete with developed countries and get their even share in present world trade.

Conclusion

Thus, in the light of above discussion, it can easily be concluded that globalization had slumped the economies and trade of Least Developed countries as they have to face the crises like collapse of commodity markets, increased debts and SAP.

The Alchemist

In every few decades a masterpiece is published that influences the lives and left the unforgettable impressions on its readers. The book The Alchemist written by Paulo Coelho's is a book, which has achieved the status of a modern classic due to its above-mentioned characteristic.

This book has many different essences in it. This book is basically a story of shepherd boy who is searching his destiny and during his search he experienced many different things of the world. Alchemist can be the story of anyone, because everyone has his own destiny and he/she seeks for it for their whole life. Some are lucky enough to find it, while others do not; but whatever happens one thing is for sure, that the things that life taught them during their search is something, which has its own meaning and worth and can be very useful for them. This search has given them such intelligence, which they can use it for the rest of their lives.

The name of that old boy is Santiago; he had a dream of finding a treasure in the pyramids of Egypt. A gypsy woman and an old man claiming to be a mysterious king told him to follow his dream. Gypsy woman told him, “To realize one's destiny is a person's only obligation” and that old man said, “when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”

The boy sells his sheep and starts his journey to Tangiers in Africa, unfortunately all his money is stolen by a thief. He then works in a crystal shop for a year and earns enough money to travel back home. In a desert caravan he meets an Englishman who has lot of knowledge on alchemy, which inspires Santiago to pursue his own dream of finding a treasure. As the Englishman searches for the two hundred year old alchemist who resides in the desert oasis, Santiago falls in love with a young woman, Fatima. After loving the girl Santiago finds the eternal alchemy of love and thinks that he has found his dream. Moreover with the help of alchemist he finds his treasure somewhere he least expected it.

As I have mentioned in the beginning of this document that this story has many quintessence in it, which cannot be mentioned comprehensively in this short review. This book also has issues of social work in it, as a justification I would give an example of all the help Santiago received from every other character of this story, especially from the crystal merchant.

In the conclusion, I would say that it is the story of every person who wants the treasure. Treasure does not mean any hidden or buried treasure but the treasure of secrets and experience of spending a good and successful life. This treasure can only be gathered when we observe our lives more closely and concentrate on our destinies with more intensity.

In the end, I must add that in order to understand this novel completely, it is necessary that the reader should put himself/herself in place of Santiago; this is the best way to understand the moral of the story perfectly.

Salmonella Virginia

Salmonella is actually a kind of bacteria, which invades the stomach and gut cells. Salmonella uses protein staples to hurt and restructure the gut cells of an effected person. Rockefeller team joined hands with the researchers of University of Virginia Health Science Center, and discovered that Salmonella bacteria injects protein cells into the guts of the host to create a structure of long filaments which can fold itself around this Salmonella bacterium.

This research helps to find out that how Salmonella bacterium affects intestinal track and gut cells and caused almost one billion new infections, all around the world, in a year. It has been noted that this bacteria cause more than 3 million deaths per year.

The process used by a Salmonella bacterium to enter into a host cell is considered to be one of the most intelligent and complex processes. When this bacterium wants to attack a host cell, it attaches with the host cell and use a syringe and needle to inject protein into the host cell. This protein, SipA, forced the proteins to joined together to make a filament, which changes the structure of the host cell.

The most commonly found Salmonella serotype in United States is Salmonella enterica serotype Typhimurium. According to the statistics this serotype caused 29 percent of the total infections caused by salmonella bacterium. Typhimurium is such a type of bacteria, which possesses and shows highest Antimicrobial resistance.The diseases and infection caused by Salmonella may last five to seven days and if the infection spread into the intestine, patients have to used antibiotics for treatment.

Finding Better Keywords

Keywords play a vital role in Search Engine Optimization. Keywords are the words, which users writes in a search engine to find out their desired result. It is very important for a webmasters or a Search Engine Optimizers to identify correct keywords for their site. Following are steps to find out keywords:

· Identifying Nature of Business

· Identifying Products & Vendors

· Using Tools

· Find Number of Searches and Click for Keywords

· Fetch Functional Keywords

Identifying Nature of Business

The identification of business is the fundametal steps before choosing keywords. It is very important for marketing purpose, one cannot obtain correct keywords without identifying the nature of business. For instance assume a person dealing in used cars but posting keywords like; brand new ford or new dodge. It will not give good popularity to the business and will also create a hectic situation for user, which will eventually give bad publicity to the website.

Identifying Products and Vendors

Identification of products and vendors is also very important because almost majority of the keywords originated from the name of either vendor or products. One has to be very careful while taking keywords from product or vendors because if he/she chooses generic keywords then the probablity of getting targeted traffic is not high. Suppose a person has a website, which sells cell phone and he selects cell as keywords then a user who need a battery and writes cell in search engine can also be re-directed towards his website, which is not a good marketing scenario.

Using Online Tools

To use online tools is also very helpful and popular technique to find out keywords. There are many online tools and softwares available on internet for this purpose. Google Adwords, Inventory.Overture, MSN Adcenter, Word Tracker, etc. There are both free and charged tools available on internet and you can also take their free trial to find out keywords.

Find Searches and Click

This another very important phase while finding keywords. In this phase one can find out number of clicks and impression his/her keywords will get in a month. One of the most important tools to do so is Inventory.Overture, SEO tools kit is another very good software in order to find the impression and clicks on a particular keyword.

Functional Keywords

After obtaining your keywords from your website and online tools, the final phase is to fetch functional or working keywords for your sites. These are the keywords with which you do the marketing of your products and website on different classified, forums, communities and paid channels.

Brain Cancer

Basics

There are two basic types pf brain tumors, one is primary brain tumor, which develop in brain directly and metastatic or secondary brain tumors which is originated in brain from any other cancer affected organ of the body through blood circulation. These tumors are rarely spread in to the other parts of the body, and the death is caused due to extra growth of tumor within the limited space of skull. Primary brain tumors can be cancerous or noncancerous but both of their sub types can cause some serious symptoms like, vision or hearing loss and stroke. All brain tumors are life threatening or in the medical terminology they are called malignant because they posses aggressive nature. A noncancerous primary brain tumor is life threatening when it compromises vital structures like when they acquire an artery.

Symptoms

A brain tumor can obstruct the flow of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), which results in the accumulation of CSF (hydrocephalus) and increased intracranial pressure (IICP). Nausea, vomiting, and headaches are common symptoms.

To create a better understanding for reader I should explain cerebrospinal fluid in rather detailed way. This fluid is present between brain and skull and works as cushion for brain, it can be said that this is the primary thing, which isolate brain function from the entire body.

Brain tumors are the big threat for vital neurological pathways and they could also take compress brain tissues to a rampage. This is not certain that all these symptoms or sign develop together, but in most of the cases it has been observed that these symptoms develop time to time as the growth of tumor increases, it also depends on the location of the tumor. A brain tumor in the frontal lobe may cause the following:

• Behavioral and emotional changes
• Impaired judgment
• Impaired sense of smell
• Memory loss
• Paralysis on one side of the body (hemiplegia)
• Reduced mental capacity (cognitive function)
• Vision loss and inflammation of the optic nerve (papilledema)

Another very complex classification of tumor is the one, which is located both right and left hemisphere of the front lobe, it can seldom cause behavioral changes, cognitive changes, and a clumsy, uncoordinated gait.

A tumor in the parietal lobe may cause the following symptoms:

• Impaired speech
• Inability to write
• Lack of recognition
• Seizures
• Spatial disorders

Tumor located in occipital lobe may cause loss of vision in either both or one eye.

Discussing almost all types of tumors, we should not forget the one, which is develop in temporal lobe. These are quite risky because they normally do not show any of their symptom but sometimes they may cause impaired speech and seizures.

A tumor in the brainstem may produce the following symptoms:

• Behavioral and emotional changes
• Difficulty speaking and swallowing
• Drowsiness
• Headache, especially in the morning
• Hearing loss
• Muscle weakness on one side of the face (e.g., head tilt, crooked smile)
• Muscle weakness on one side of the body Uncoordinated gait
• Vision loss, drooping eyelid or crossed eyes.
• Vomiting

Ependymoma

It originates in the lining of the ventricles and the spinal canal and may damage cranial nerves. When this happens, hydrocephalus, stiff neck, head tilt, and weakness may result.

This tumor may cause meninges (meningioma) depend on which area of the brain is being compressed. They include:

• Headache
• Hearing loss
• Impaired speech (i.e., dysphasia)
• Incontinence
• Mental and emotional changes (e.g., indifference, disinhibition)
• Prolonged drowsiness (somnolence)
• Seizures
• Vision loss

A tumor located in the pituitary gland (i.e., pituitary adenoma) may increase the secretion of hormones and cause discontinuation of menstruation (i.e., amenorrhea) and excess secretion of milk (i.e., galactorrhea) in women. Impotence may occur in men.

Metastatic brain cancer

It tends to invade the brain tissue indiscriminately. Some symptoms include the following:

• Bleeding
• Headache
• Impaired mental function
• Motor dysfunction
• Nausea
• Seizures
• Swelling
• Vomiting

Prevention

Well, it is fact that there is no prevention of any type of brain tumor generally, but still early diagnosis and proper treatment of metastatic tumors may reduce the risk factor of primary brain tumor.

The following factors have been suggested as possible risk factors for primary brain tumors. Avoiding the factors that can be avoided may reduce your risk.

• Radiation to the head
• Certain inherited conditions
• HIV infection

Causes

Unfortunately, even after the rapid improvement of medical science we cannot explain or define the main causes, which lead to brain cancer or tumor. Medical can only blame genetic factors, various environmental toxins, radiation, and cigarette smoking have all been linked to cancers of the brain, but they do not have any proper justification of any particular reason, which can cause brain tumor.

The following factors have been proposed as possible risk factors for primary brain tumors. Whether these factors actually increase your risk of a brain tumor is not known for sure.

• Radiation to the head
• Certain inherited conditions
• HIV infection

These are the same reasons as mentioned under the header of prevention, this is due to the fact that medical science is speechless regarding either the prevention or the causes of Brain Tumors.

Diagnosis

One should immediately concern his/her health professional if feel any of the following symptoms:

• Unexplained, persistent vomiting
• Double vision or unexplained blurring of vision, especially on only one side
• Lethargy or increased sleepiness
• New seizures
• New pattern or type of headaches

Headaches are known to be felt from the initial phase of Brain Tumor, in the other words it can be called that they are one of the most common symptoms of Brain Tumor. Specially after feeling of a significant change in the pattern of headache one should immediately visit his/her health professional without any delay.

If you have a known brain tumor, any new symptoms or relatively sudden or rapid worsening of symptoms warrants a trip to the nearest hospital emergency department. Be on the lookout for the following new symptoms:

• Seizures
• Changes in mental status, such as excessive sleepiness, memory problems, or inability to concentrate
• Visual changes or other sensory problems
• Difficulty with speech or in expressing yourself
• Changes in behavior or personality
• Clumsiness or difficulty walking
• Nausea or vomiting (especially in middle-aged or older people)
• Sudden onset of fever, especially after chemotherapy

Exams and Tests

Findings of your medical interview and physical examination will probably suggest to your health professional, whether your primary care provider or an emergency department physician, that you have a problem with the brain or brain stem.

• In most cases, you will have a CT scan of the brain.
• This test is like an x-ray but shows more detail in 3 dimensions.
• Usually, a harmless dye is injected into your bloodstream to highlight abnormalities on the scan.

Fortunately, it has been a common observation that people have brain cancer often have other medical complications, which result in regular medical treatments and laboratory tests.

• These include analysis of blood, electrolytes, liver function tests, and a blood coagulation profile.
• If you have mental status change as the main symptom, blood or urine tests may be done to detect drug use.

More and more, the MRI scan is being used instead of CT scan for suspected brain tumors.

• This is because MRI has a higher sensitivity for detecting the presence of, or changes within, a tumor.
• Currently, however, most institutions still use the CT scan as the first diagnostic test.

Skull x-rays are not widely used any longer to diagnose brain cancer.

If your scans indicate the presence of a brain tumor, you will be referred to a specialist in cancer (oncologist). If one is available in your area, you should be referred to a specialist in brain tumors (neuro-oncologist).

The next step in diagnosis is confirmation that you have a cancer. A small sample of the mass (a biopsy) is taken to identify the type of tumor.

• The most widely used technique for obtaining a biopsy is surgery. The skull is opened, usually with the intention of removing the whole tumor if possible. A biopsy is then taken from the tumor.
• If the surgeon is unable to remove the entire tumor, a small piece of the tumor is removed.
• In some cases it is possible to collect a biopsy without opening the skull. The exact location of the tumor in the brain is determined stereotactically, that is, by using CT of MRI scan while the head is held still in a frame. A small hole is then made in the skull and a needle guided through the hole to the tumor. The needle collects the biopsy and is removed. This technique is called stereotaxis, or stereotactic biopsy.
• The biopsy is examined under a microscope by a pathologist (a physician who specializes in diagnosing diseases by looking at cells and tissues).

Home Care Suggestions

It is the primary duty of one’s health care professional to discuss home care suggestions and provide him/her latest research regarding the issue, because it better to know every bit of information of your opponent. Following are the main points, which one should consider after suffered by Brain Tumors:

• Home care usually includes supportive measures according to your symptoms.
• For example, if you have trouble walking, you probably should have a walker available at home when you need to walk.
• If you have mental status changes, a care plan should be directed to your individual needs.

If your prognosis is poor, it is appropriate to discuss options of hospice care, advance directives to doctors, and provisions for a living will.

• Home hospice care is a way of providing pain and symptom relief, as well as emotional and spiritual support for the patient and the family, at home rather than in the hospital. It involves a multidisciplinary approach that may include a physician or other care provider, nurses, a pharmacist, aides, a social worker, a spiritual caregiver, and counselors.
• Advance directive and living will are legal documents that spell out specifically which treatments are to be given and which are to be withheld. For example, a person with advanced brain cancer may not want to be put on a ventilator (breathing machine) if he or she stops breathing. You have the right to make these decisions for yourself as long as you are mentally competent.

Search Engine Optimization - An Introduction

After the development of a website all you need is to generate as much traffic as possible on it. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is the way to make your website popular and in the other words it can be said that SEO is the set of techniques and procedures, which make your website generate traffic. I still remember that one of my companions once told me that there are no hard and fast rules in SEO, but we have to try different procedures and functions to make the website popular. According to a research more than 80% of the traffic comes from different search engines. If your website is a well developed project but still not producing desired result then you need to optimize it thoroughly.

I have mentioned some techniques below, which I believe are the basic but constructive when you talk about Search Engine Optimization:

Website Address

Your website address or domain should be easy to spell and pronounce because you don’t need to depend on search engine if your visitor can easily memorize it. Another reason for which your domain name should be easy is that it will also be used as your keyword because the domain name is always unique and do not have much competition.

Keywords

Before getting into the details of how to choose keywords, I would first explain what is a keyword? Keyword is the word or phrase, which a visitor writes in the search box of a search engine. One has to be very careful in choosing keywords, because these are the words, which take a visitor to your website. First of all make list of words which your website contains and highlight those, which are being searched. You can also use different keywords tools like Google Adwords, Word Track, Keyword Discovery, etc. Using wrong spelling of keywords can also be very useful another key factor, which is again very effective is to use keyword synonyms. You must also use the keywords in the meta tag of your webpage but be care while doing this because if you saturate your meta tag with keywords then your website may be penalized by some search engines.

Keyword Density

Keywords density is another important technique in SEO, it represents how many times are your keywords appearing in the content. You can concern competitor website to have an idea of it. Heavy density of keywords can reflect that you are trying to SPAM (Self Propelled Advertising Material). Once your website has developed its reputation like this it is very difficult to get away from it. Your keywords should be toward the top of your page and your keyword phrase be in either every paragraph or every second paragraph depending on your paragraph length.

Negative Techniques

There are also some negative or bad techniques of SEO, which can get you blacklisted in all search engines. Some techniques that are considered spam are cloaking, invisible text, tiny text, identical pages, doorway pages, refresh tags, link farms, filling comment tags with keyword phrases only, keyword phrases in the author tag, keyword density to high, mirror pages and mirror sites.

Amino Acids

Introduction

Amino acids are the chemicals that make up proteins. The human body needs 20 different amino acids to function properly. Some amino acids are made by the body, while others, called essential amino acids, can be obtained only from foods.

Functionality

Amino acids are very small biomolecules with an average molecular weight of about 135 daltons. They are the principal building blocks of proteins and enzymes. They are incorporated into proteins by transfer RNA according to the genetic code while messenger RNA is being decoded by ribosomes. During and after the final assembly of a protein, the amino acid content dictates the spatial and biochemical properties of the protein or enzyme. The amino acid backbone determines the primary sequence of a protein, but the nature of the side chains determines the protein's properties.

Alpha Amino Acids

Alpha-amino acids are the building blocks of proteins. Proteins form via the condensation of amino acids to form a chain of amino acid "residues" linked by peptide bonds. Each different protein has a unique sequence of amino acid residues; this sequence is the primary structure of the protein. Just as the letters of the alphabet can be combined to form an almost endless variety of words, amino acids can be linked in varying sequences to form a huge variety of proteins.

Recent Researches

The researchers also checked two U.S. studies on blood levels of homocysteine, an amino acid. Elevated blood concentrations of homocysteine appear to be a stroke risk factor, the researchers note. They found that after folic acid fortification, people in the U.S. had more folic acid and less homocysteine in their blood. "The increase in folate concentration in the population is inversely associated with homocysteine level, so if you have high folic acid concentration, you have lower homocysteine concentration," Yang says in a news release. Stroke is still a "major health burden" in the U.S., Canada, and many other countries, Yang's team writes. "Many factors" have probably helped cut down on stroke deaths, the researchers add. Additional studies are urgently needed to either prove or disprove what we observed," Yang says in the news release. His study only tracked stroke deaths, not stroke-related disability.

Abstract

Amino acids are known as the building blocks of protein in our body. They are the principal building blocks of proteins and enzymes. They are incorporated into proteins by transfer RNA according to the genetic code while messenger RNA is being decoded by ribosomes. Each different protein has a unique sequence of amino acid residues; this sequence is the primary structure of the protein. Elevated blood concentrations of homocysteine (An Amino Acid) appear to be a stroke risk factor, the researchers note.