September 2007 - Posts
Currently blogging live (after 18hours) of non-stop coding and sleep deprivation.
One of our partners, AIT Technologies, sent us their 32" LCD Touch Screen that uses Samsung 32" LCD with 3M Touch. (specs: http://ait.sg/brochures/TM/Samsung320p.pdf)
We will be building an inventory check-in/out system based on RFID which will take advantage of this beautiful screen. Powering this LCD, we will be using Windows Embedded(Kiosk Mode).
http://www.clarkezone.net/default.aspx?id=c7a6bb98-f42b-49b6-aeba-e061722d69b8
Many new feature in the final build; looking forward to using it to encode all the videos on InnovativeSG.
A very interesting concept behind one of the most challenging problems in Computer Science (Artificial Intelligence).
Mechanical Turk
Amazon introduced a beta service that connects human intelligence to computer processing power through smart programming and web services.
Basically, what it does is for developers to instead of writing a complex block of code trying to determine if a photo has a house in it; it will post the picture automatically to mechanical turk where real humans will look at the photo and post back the result to the application.
A very interesting way to tackle the problem.
Free IIS7 beta hosting for brave developers:
http://www.iis.net/default.aspx?tabid=7&subtabid=791
And for people who loves retro stuff, the Windows 95 version Command and Conquer (C&C) can be download here for free!
http://www.commandandconquer.com/intel/default.aspx?id=61#NewsMain
http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/08/31/ifa_casio_fastest_digicam/
640x480 video at 300fps. Can our eyes notice the difference between 60fps and 300fps?
For the next 24 weeks, we will have 6 students working in the Microsoft Innovation Center!
Last Friday, the MIC team finally completes the selection of 6 out of a pool of 40 top students from the different polytechnic in Singapore that will be part of the upcoming Student Attachment@MIC program.
More information on their profile will be posted on Innovative Singapore in the very near future as we get them to blog about their experience in MIC.
If you are a student studying in Singapore, reading either a computer science or engineering degree/diploma and be able to work for at least 12 continuous week FULL TIME, feel free to contact me directly at my email address if you are interested to work in the Microsoft Innovation Center (Singapore).
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On the heels of the popular black Zune – Halo 3 Edition, Microsoft is introducing a new brown version of the Halo-themed player for military service members. After receiving feedback on the popularity of the Zune players from U.S. soldiers, teams from Microsoft Zune and Microsoft’s U.S. Federal business joined together to develop a special Zune – Halo 3 Military Edition, which will be available exclusively at military retail stores in August. The new version of the Zune – Halo 3 Edition player will be packaged in a collectible Halo 3 box, and will come pre-loaded with artwork, trailers, and music from all three Halo games.
A group of soldiers leaving for active duty from the Baltimore Washington International airport on August 6th will be the first to receive the new Halo Zune devices. Working closely with the USO, a non-profit organization focused on improving the quality of life of service members, Microsoft contributed 300 of the new Zune players to the USO of Metropolitan Washington to be part of a special USO care package the soldiers will receive. While visiting the USO lounge at BWI, soldiers can use the Windows PCs at the lounge and a special Zune listening station to load their devices with additional content before their departure.
“Microsoft has been a great partner to the USO of Metropolitan Washington for several years, supporting both our U.S. soldiers and the USO’s mission,” says Elaine Rogers, president of the USO of Metropolitan Washington. “ From Zune devices and Xbox 360 gaming consoles to new computers with the latest Windows Vista and Office software, Microsoft’s technology has helped service members stay connected and entertained.”
Microsoft is offering the Zune – Halo 3 Military Edition to military personnel and their families at discounted rates through military retailers, including AAFES, and Navy and Marine Corps commissaries, beginning in early August. All versions of the Zune device have 30GB storage, a 3-inch screen that displays content in portrait or landscape mode, a built-in FM tuner, rugged exterior, and wireless capabilities that provide Zune-to-Zune sharing so users can exchange songs, playlists and photos with the click of a button.
<unofficial picture; obtained from: http://zuneinsider.com/archive/2007/08/07/exclusive-halo-zune-for-military-personnel.aspx>
More hardware upgrades are going to happen on our server infrastructure as the new FY comes. Looking ahead, we are planning to upgrade the server that this site is sitting on currently.
While surfing around on what sort of processor we should get, I learnt that there's actually processor that are built with virtualization in mind. (I'm not a very hardware guy by nature)
AMD:
http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/ProductInformation/0,,30_118_8796_14287,00.html
Intel:
http://www.intel.com/technology/platform-technology/virtualization/index.htm?iid=platform_home+virtualization
http://www.intel.com/technology/platform-technology/virtualization/products.htm?iid=platform_home+virtualization_products
I will be reading up on what sort of performance boost does these new features bring to servers that does a lot of virtualization.
Add me in twitter if you want to know what I am doing :)
http://twitter.com/yizhe
It's a pain to migrate blogs from Community Server without server access. Is it me or the migration-using-RSS is broken even if I use blog ML?
Just spent 3 hours migrating 3 blogs over...
Successfully migrated my blog to the new server located in Singapore!
Blog will load faster and we can now put soapbox videos onto our post.
More exciting changes on Innovative Singapore soon!