Drive By Download

A drive-by download is a program that is automatically downloaded to your computer without your consent or even your knowledge. Unlike a pop-up download, which asks for assent (albeit in a calculated manner likely to lead to a "yes"), a drive-by download can be initiated by simply visiting a Web site or viewing an HTML e-mail message. If your computer's security settings are lax, it may be possible for drive-by downloads to occur without any further action on your part.

Frequently, a drive-by download is installed along with a user-requested application. (In this case, the unwanted application is sometimes called a barnacle.) For example, a file sharing program might be included with a spyware program that tracks and reports user information for targeted marketing purposes. An associated adware program can then generate pop-up advertisements using that information.

Xupiter, an Internet Explorer toolbar program, was frequently installed as a drive-by download in the early 2000s. The program replaced a user's home page, changed browser settings, and used a redirect to take all searches to the Xupiter Web site. In some versions, the program initiated drive-by downloads of other programs. Furthermore, although it came with an uninstall utility, Xupiter was quite challenging for the average computer user to remove.

Drive-by downloads continue to be a major security issue online. In April 2007, researchers at Google discovered hundreds of thousands of Web pages that initiated drive-by downloads. One in ten pages was found to be suspect. Sophos researchers in 2008 reported that they were discovering more than 6,000 new infected Web pages every day, or about one every 14 seconds. Many of these infections are connected to botnets, in which each PC is turned into a zombie that may then be directed to further malicious activity, like spam or DDoS attacks

Source: http://whatis.techtarget.com

VAR to VAR

VAR-to-VAR is a business model based on cooperation between value-added resellers (VARs) that allows the companies to obtain professional services and solutions that would not have been accessible to them otherwise.

Successful VAR-to-VAR partnerships expand geographic reach, tap each other's expertise and enhance the brainstorming process. Such cooperative ventures can increase the buying power of both companies and reduce overhead and production cost. By buying in bulk, VAR-to-VAR partnerships are sometimes able to negotiate pricing from suppliers of critical components. VAR-to-VAR partnerships have successfully challenged larger, consolidated enterprises for lucrative contracts when neither of the smaller companies could have done so alone.

VARs tend to be ideal clients for one another because they understand each other's service-related challenges. The ultimate result is good for the end user because it encourages the evolution of the best possible product. Nevertheless, some companies find the VAR-to-VAR paradigm difficult to accept, especially if their past experiences have involved rivalries with other players in their field.

Source: http://whatis.techtarget.com

XNA Game Studio

XNA Game Studio is an integrated development environment (IDE) that includes tools and code development libraries that hobbyists, students and other nonprofessionals can use to create computer games for Microsoft Windows and X-Box 360.
To get started with XNA Game Studio, you'll need to have a basic working knowledge of C# and object-oriented programming (OOP). The basic version of XNA Game Studio, which includes Visual C# 2005 Express, development tools and a runtime environment, is free of charge. Debugging can be done from the Windows desktop. XNA Game Studio does require a Direct 3D video adapter card that can support Shader Model 1.1 or later, along with the latest DirectX runtime updates, so some hardware expense may be involved.

If a programmer wants to develop, debug or play games on an Xbox 360, however, he or she must subscribe to the XNA Creator's Club. Friends or family that want to play a game created with XNA Game Studio on Xbox 360 must also have XNA Game Studio installed on the gaming console, along with the runtime environment and a subscription to creator's club. Games developed with XNA Game Studio cannot be shared using any removable storage medium or burned to disc.

Games created with XNA Game Studio or XNA Game Studio Express for Windows can be sold commercially. Games created for XBox 360, however, are limited to non-commercial use by the Microsoft EULA and technical requirements.

With this initiative, Microsoft hopes to attract developers to create games for Windows and its popular Xbox 360. Programmers that create and upload games to the Creators Club community will have the opportunity to receive up to 70% of the revenue from sales of the applications.

Source: http://whatis.techtarget.com

Virtual Flopply Disk

A virtual floppy disk is an alternative to the traditional floppy that exists as a file rather than physical media. A virtual floppy is mounted to the same drive letter (A:) and accessed in the same way but is actually a disk image stored as a file on the hard drive.

Virtual floppy disks are used for a number of reasons. Although many manufacturers are no longer including floppy drives on computers and fewer retailers are selling floppy disks, some software installation processes still require their use. Other uses include partitioning a hard drive, accessing the command line prompt and transfering files between virtual machines. Some people prefer to use virtual floppies simply because they are easier to manage - there is no physical media to get damaged or lost.
A virtual floppy disk can be created by copying a physical disk to an image file.

There are also a number of programs, such as Diskcopy, Virtual Floppy Drive (VFD) and Floppy Image Creator, that can create a virtual floppy in the absence of a physical disk (or, possibly, the absence of a computer with a floppy disk drive).

Source: http://whatis.techtarget.com

Enlightenment

Enlightenment, also called E, is a popular free and open source (FOSS) windows manager that can serve as a standalone desktop environment. E can also be used along with other desktop environments like KDE and GNOME.

Enlightenment is highly customizable and includes the types of themes and high-end graphics familiar to users of Windows and the Mac OS. Many functions can be performed from the keyboard, without the need for mouse manipulation. The command line-driven mode is said to streamline operation. The portable, user-friendly interface is favored by graphics professionals and sophisticated hobbyists.
The three components of the Enlightenment project are Enlightenment DR16, Englightenment DR17 and the Enlightenment Foundation Libraries.

Carsten 'Rasterman' Haitzler released the first Enlightenment Windows Manager in 1997. Enlightenment DR16 (V.0.16), released in 2000, is still used today. V.16.8.13 was released in May 2008. Enlightenment DR17 (V.0.17), in development, is a complete rewriting of DR16, including a desktop shell. DR17 is expected to enhance graphics quality, improve performance and support new and emerging applications

Source: http://whatis.techtarget.com

Genetic Programming

Lately I was introduced to a new methodology of programming called Genetic Programming. Genetic Programming is a revolutionary algorithm based methodology inspired by biological evolution to find computer programs that performs a user-defined task. It is a specialization of genetic algorithms where each individual is a computer program.

Therefore it is a machine learning technique used to optimize a population of computer programs according to a fitness landscape determined by a program's ability to perform a given computational task.

Genetic Programming involves creating an environment in which tiny computer programs can evolve. This environment, also known as "the Universe", is a breeding pool for programs to pair and swap lines of codes as well as mutating.

In an article posted by NASA, Genetic Algorithms were used in designing high-efficiency antenna for space technology projects. The team were able to produce two designs using GA and was dubbed as the two best designs based on a criteria.

References
Genetic Programming using VB6
Genetic Programming - Wikipedia
Automated Antenna design using Genetic Algorithm

NetBeans 6.5 now in beta release

Good news to all Java guys! NetBeans 6.5 is already available on beta release. The NetBeans IDE is an award-winning Integrated Development Environment available for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Solaris. The NetBeans project consists of an open-source IDE and an application platform which enable developers to rapidly create web, enterprise, desktop, and mobile applications using the Java platform, C/C++, JavaScript, Ruby, Groovy, and PHP. It is supported by a vibrant developer community and offers a diverse selection of third-party plugins. The NetBeans IDE is a must-download for software developers.

Release Overview

The NetBeans IDE 6.5 Beta release provides several new features and enhancements, such as a new IDE-wide QuickSearch shortcut, more user-friendly interface, and automatic Compile on Save. In addition to full support of all Java editions (Java SE, Java EE, Java ME), the NetBeans IDE is the ideal tool for software development with PHP, C/C++, Groovy and Grails, Ruby and Rails, Ajax and JavaScript. The 6.5 release also includes enhanced support for web frameworks (Hibernate, Spring, JSF, JPA), the GlassFish application server, and databases.

Feature Highlights

PHP PHP Editor (Code completion, syntactic and semantic code highlighting) Support for heredoc notation and PHTML Xdebug Generators for MySQL database code snippets

JavaScript and Ajax JavaScript Editor and Debugger JavaScript Library Manager Yahoo UI, Woodstock, jQuery, Dojo, Scriptaculous, Prototype libraries CSS Editor

Java EE & Web Development Enhanced support for Spring, Hibernate, JSF, JSF CRUD generator, JPA (Java Persistence API) Create RESTful web services from database tables or from JPA entities Drag and drop SaaS services into PHP files SQL Editor Improvements (code completion, save/recall queries, and more)

Groovy and Grails Develop pure Groovy apps or use Groovy in Java SE projects Groovy editor (code completion, highlighting, and more) Grails web application framework Open existing Grails applications without adding metadata

Ruby and Rails Rake improvements: Rake Runner and a pre-generated Rake file Debugger: Conditional breakpoints and catchpoints Ruby projects accept JVM options from command line New Test Runner interface for displaying test results

GlassFish v3 Prelude for Web Development Modular, OSGi based architecture Small footprint, fast startup and deployment Support for scripting, including JRuby

C/C++ Improved code completion, error highlighting, and semantic highlighting Call graph, Memory window Remote development Packaging of application as tar files, zip files, or SVR4 packages

Java ME New project wizard for adding custom components to the Visual Designer Palette New SVG UI components in the enhanced SVG Composer enable rich UI design New Data Binding Custom Components in the Visual Designer Palette Upgraded obfuscation tool to ProGuard 4.2 and test framework to JMUnit 1.1.0

Java SE Multi-threaded Java debugging Java Swing GUI Builder: TreeModel Editor for JTrees Improved Eclipse project import and synchronization

IDE Tools and Usability One QuickSearch shortcut for IDE actions, files, options, and docs Support for Windows UNC paths (shared network folders) Automatic Compile on Save / Deploy on Save

For more information visit http://www.netbeans.org/community/releases/65/