Google has achieved an iconic status on the internet by maximizing the relation between what people search for and what they actually get as their search results. But do you really know how Google delivers to you the most relevant pages from the whole of internet and how it achieves this task in a fraction of a second??

If you really wish to know it, read on!!!

Google performs this task, not through some high end servers but by using thousands of ordinary computers networked together in the form of clusters.

When you perform a query(search for something) on Google, first of all the browser performs a look-up of the domain name system(DNS) to link an IP address for the Google .com domain name.Since Google Web Servers are located at numerous locations geographically,the one nearest to the the user (and having less load) is selected for performing the search. This geographical load balancing helps is preventing the overuse a particular cluster, there by ensuring that the search is performed in the minimum possible time.

So how does Google ensures that there is no failure of the total system??

Of course as the GWSs are geographically distributed ,there is a reduced possibility of the whole system collapsing due to a power failure for example.If on of the clusters even fails, the other clusters in other regions will still work thereby ensuring that Google system is up all the time!!!

So if Google uses cheap computers than how will their failure not effect the Google system??

That is the question to really ask!!! See the diagram below-



Google instead of relying on the hardware, relies on the softwares that control them.The load balancer takes you to the server of proximity and less load balance. Each server has got several copies of the whole index of the internet(...almost!!).That is roughly some hundreds of terabytes of index.
That index is divided into several small parts each of which is shown as a small square in the diagram.Now each small part is having a cluster of computers . Each computer of that cluster is having all the components of the index which the cluster has got. In other words ,all the computers of a cluster have the same copy of internet index. So even if one of the systems get down, information can be retrieved from others systems of that cluster. So the internet index never dies on the cheap Google systems.


The diagram below shows one such Google cluster.





Besides making the information always available, this system introduces a whole lot of parallelism in Google web searches which further improves the speed of the internet search!!!

From the indexes, the search moves to Google Docs where information corresponding to most relevant indexes is retrieved.This information is the ordered in accordance with the relevance with the query.Almost in parallel advertisements corresponding to the search results are searched by the servers.
The final result you see is the output of all these and more complex procedures performed in less than a second!!!!!

A blog post soon on how Google actually algorithmically brings out the most relevant search results!!!!!

Having trouble with viruses on your computer...and do not wanna shell out the extra money for anti-virus, this is the page you were looking for!!!
So here is my complete list of all the generally used antiviruses and how you can obtain them for free-->

1-Avira Antivirus-

This is the best available free anti-virus you can search on the internet.It is the most downloaded anti-virus on the internet at present. It also won the 'CNET EDITOR'S CHOICE' award in April.
If you download and update it regularly you can rest all Virus fears away(...i am talking about computer viruses).It can be downloaded from Download.com.

If you wish to download it click here.

2-AVG Anti-virus-

Almost at par with Avira in popularity is AVG.The AVG internet security 8.5 is now available for
for free download for personal use.It also can be downloaded via Download.com.To download it click here.

The advantage with AVG and Avira is that their trial versions are free for unlimited use!!!
The rest of the anti-viruses are free for a trial period only. So if you wish to get rid of getting licensed keys of your anti-virus again and again, you can prefer these two.

3- NOD-32

It is another great free anti-virus.It has also been on the list CNET editors as one of the best anti-viruses available(..and that's why it is on my list too!! ).The 30 days trial version is available here.

4-McAfee Anti virus-

A widely known and used anti-virus. These days is facing tough competition from other equally good anti-viruses.A 90 days trial pack is available here.

5-Norton Anti-Virus-

You can visit the Norton official website to get 15 days free trial version or can click here to get a 90 days trial version of Norton!!!

There is another option-you can get it through Google.It is a limited security version but can be used indefinitely. To download it via Google click here.

6-Avast Anti-Virus-

Get home edition of this anti-virus here. Remember you have to register it within 60 days.

7-Panda Internet Security 2009-

Get the 90 day trial version of this anti-virus from Microsoft by clicking here.

8-Kaspersky Anti-Virus-

You can try the 30 day trial pack !!!

and last but not the least you can have CA Anti-virus.

9-CA Anti-Virus-

You can get the 90 days trial pack and live with complete freedom from viruses.

More posts soon ....have a 'Virus-Free' life with these 'Free Anti Viruses'!!!!!!!!

Opera has released its new browser-'Opera turbo'. If you regularly work over a slow internet connection, this browser is what you were looking for!!! It can increase your browsing speed by three to four times. So the natural question in your mind is-"How can can this browser increase my internet browsing speed??"...here goes the answer-

It uses the new 'Opera Turbo Technology', which is an optimization and compression technology. The webpage rendered by the browser is same as viewed in other browsers but the resolution of images in the page is lowered.This results in an average of four-fold increase in browsing speed, i would say that the speed is an awesome trade for the image resolution!!!

It truly adds a new meaning to 'Internet For Everyone' because using Opera turbo, one can browse easily even if he/she has got a slow internet connection!!

So how do you get it and use it??

You can download the free 'Opera Turbo' by clicking here.

After you download and install it you have to enable the 'Turbo' feature. To do that click on the 'Turbo Icon' at the bottom left side of the browser(as shown in the image).

Opera Turbo will be enabled and you can browse speedily and happily!!

Another improvement is speed-dial , something like which you must already have seen in Google Chrome.With speed dial you can quickly open your favorite websites by just clicking on their images instead of typing their name.A typical speed-dial page looks like this-

You can have up-to 25 websites on the fast dial page(how many more favorite websites do you have??) .To make a change in the number of websites you want in the fast dial page-Just right click on the configure speed dial option and choose the number of websites you wish to have there.

Did you expect anything more??....here is the thing -you can also set the background image also.So what are you waiting for, go ahead and ,make your homepage look like this-

Wish you a happy and fast browsing experience!!! More technology updates soon!!

 

Ever thought about learning Matlab but were not having the books to learn from??
Here is the deal for you--->You can get the Matlab Interactive CD and Matlab Kit which has got extensive tutorials on using the Matlab tools.With a large number of examples to learn from, you can easily grasp the fundamentals of Matlab....all courtesy-MathWorks India.All you have to do is to fill a form (whose link is given at the bottom of the post), they will even ship it to you for free!!!!

Here is the complete list of the things which the training toolkit has got-

1-Introduction to MATLAB
2-Data Analysis with MATLAB for Excel® Users
3-Algorithm Development with MATLAB for C/C++ Products
4-Introduction to Statistics with MATLAB Products
5-Introduction to Optimization with MATLAB Products
6-Application Deployment with MATLAB
7-MATLAB for Signal Processing
8-Image Processing Using MATLAB
9-Data Acquisition with MATLAB Products
10-Using MATLAB to Develop Financial Products
11-Introduction to MATLAB for Life Scientists

To get the MATLAB Interactive CD and Kit click here.

More such technical freebies later....have a nice time!!!

Google Labs has launched its new product 'Google Squared' .This cool feature of Google allows you to compare and study the different characters of different varieties of the same object at one page.


As you can see in the above picture, it has got rows and columns. The columns have the common characteristics of the items which are in the rows.For example if you want to search for cars, just search cars on the Google squared page.The rows will show the different types of cars and the columns will show things like fuel type,seating capacity etc. But what really makes it exciting is that you can add a row or a column if you want. This means that if you do not get the price for the cars shown in the page, you simply have to add a column of price and Google squared will do the rest for you(although the prices were not correct when i searched them!!!).If you want to get the details of a car which was not listed in the rows, just add a row having the name of that car to the list-the details of columns will be automatically be filled for you!!

I think this is going to be a tough competition for Bing from Microsoft which is acclaimed by Microsoft to be a decision engine. I think 'Google Squared' by bringing all the components of different products as well as services on one page will definitely serve as a decision engine.......but lastly i would say ...BEWARE-->As the different components are obtained by searching the internet using some keywords and some other trends, the results will not always be accurate(as is the case with Google translator). So double check the price of an item before going to buy it!!!

To visit the Google squared page click here.

Ya recently i encountered this problem...i wanted to send an email with an attachment that contained some other folders as a result when i clicked on that folder ,the folder instead of being attached to the email, was getting opened.

I searched on the net and found this solution---
Just compress the folder which you want to send as an attachment and obtain a compressed folder. This compression can be achieved by the use of softwares such as Winrar, Winzip etc.


If you do not have Winrar software you can download it by
here(courtesy www.download.com). Once you have downloaded and installed the compressing software ,you can just right click on the folder and select the option 'Send to zip-folder'. After that a zipped folder will be created and that zipped folder can be attached to an email.

So enjoy sending more attachments with your e-mail......enjoy life!!!!!!!!!

The IT in the title means 'Industrial Training' nothing else!! These days i am getting industrial training which is an important part of our engineering course.My college makes it compulsory for every student to obtain two months of industrial training. So i am getting it.....Although being a computer science student i think i should not be getting industrial training because we never work in industries. I mean the term 'Industrial Training' is o.k. for guys of mechanical engineering or lets say for electrical engineering because they work in real 'industries' with huge machines surrounding them. While for us, sitting in an air-conditioned room hardly feels like an industry to us!!!!Also the company offices and training centers of most computer science companies look like amusement parks to me!!




Although we do have to sometimes study in the college, it turned out that i was in possession of no such skills as are required for a trainee of computer science.That was because in the college we have studied only data structures and Java and both of these were not used by the company which offered me training!!! So i had to learn something and i still have to learn a lot to finish the project i have been assigned.

Meanwhile a lot has happened in tech arena-Microsoft is ready to launch 'Bing' which it has touted to be a decision engine. The decision of Microsoft to launch the engine has come with much fan-fare but we have to see if the Microsoft engine can ruin the Google party!!
Also Microsoft has released the Visual Studio 2010 and SQL Server 2010 in the beta form. Technology enthusiasts can download the same for trail and enjoy the latest software!!
Meanwhile Yahoo has been forced to close down its social networking website 'Yahoo 360' '.The website never came of the beta-phase.This itself shows the lack of interest of Yahoo in entering the 'Social -Networking' area.On the other hand 'Facebook' continues to thrive and of late has become a favorite of my friends !! ....

More on these and others later..got to learn something for IT.