VIDEO FORMATS

I'm going to focus on a few video formats and their main characteristics.

QuickTime: It is a video and animation system created by Apple. Therefore, it is mostly used by Apple or Macintosh applications. However, other computers, which are not Macintosh can use Quicktime, by downloading a QuickTime driver.
- QuickTime offers various formats, such as: JPEG, AVI and MPEG.
- It includes mostly every encoding format.
- Another characteristic is that it can be used at any PC.
- It includes Cinepak, which is a data compression technique.

AVI: It is the abreviation for Audio Video, and was created by Microsoft's Video for Windows.
- It stores audio and video information.
- This format has a high resolution from 320 x 240.
- It is widely used since many producers use it because it allows
  to sell products to the largest base of users.
- It also contains data compression techniques, such as: RLE, 
  Indeo and Cinepak.

MPEG-1: This format allows a video resolution of 352 x 240.

MPEG-2: It has a higher resolution than MPEG-1. It offers either 720 x 480, or 1280 x 720. It has high audio quality and it is mostly used for TV standards. Such format can compress a video into a small amount of gigabytes.

MPEG-3: It was designed for HDTV, but then it was replaced again by MPEG-2.

MPEG-4: It compresses graphics and video, and it is based on both MPEG-1 and MPEG-2. They are used to transmit images and video to a lighter weight and to be mixed with text, 2-D and 3-D animations.

DivX: It is the abreviation for Digital Video Express. It was promoted by great film companies, such as the known Disney, Dreamworks, Paramount and Universal.
- A movie with DivX can be played during an amount of time.
- DivX movies are linked to outside servers to exchange billing
  data.
- DivX replace video tapes.
- These are recommended for rent, since there aren't any fees.
- It isn't available to all DVD readers, so it is necessary a
  DivX player to watch any movie with such format.
- It is based on MPEG-4.
- DivX format files can be quickly downloaded, at a high quality.

DVD: It is the abreviation for Digital Video Disc. It is a type of CD-ROM, which hold a minimum of 4.7 gigabytes.
- Mostly used as multimedia presentations of a mixture of sound
  with graphics, or as movies.
- These are compatible with CD-ROMs, CDs, CD-I, etc, so they can
  play CD-ROMs.
- It has the capacity of 4.7GB to 17GB.

OpenOffice

The most known programs with Open Source Iniciative, is OpenOffice. 

It is the best-known open-source office software of programs for the following offers:

- word processing

- spreadsheets

- presentations

- graphics

- data-bases

- ...and more

It is available for all the computers and you can configure or set up in every language you wish to. It saves your work on a standard format, therefore, it can be opened in any computer. It also reads formats from other common office software programs. 

It is a free service. As a free service, you can download freely, modify freely, and use freely the programs belonging to OpenOffice.                                

And finally, it is able to interchange data by the ISO/IEC standard OpenDocument Format (ODF).

analysts say Apple will overcome HP as a Worlwide Supplier

 Apple vs. HP

This article mentions how Apple is developing and improving, therefore it is becoming more powerful over other computing companies.

Analysts declare that Apple will overcome over HP the first half of the year 2012, since Apple has a 6%, from 9% up to 15% within four quarters.

For example, the iPad has revolutionized possitevely PC industry. And since this, Apple has become the second place worlwide PC market in the third quarter of this year 2011. I mean, Apple has become the second more powrful PC company.

Canalys is hoping and wishes that Ultrabooks can increase the sale growth in the next five years, although the prices must be lowered. 

The companies Apple and Samsung are the only British or UK suppliers to show any trace of market share increase by 22% to reach 230,000 shipments and 40% to reach 217,000 shipments respectively.

Furthermore, the use of Blackberrys have decreased since the use of Apple devices such as the iPhone have increased.  

OSI - Open Source Initiative

The Open Source Initiative is an organization which promotes Open Source software.



Some History...
It was founded in February, 1998, by Bruce Perens and Eric S. Raymond, sponsored by Netscape Communications Corporations, who published the source code for their flagship Netscape Communicator. Later on, in August of that same year, a board of directors was added to the organization.

         

                       Bruce Perens                                               Eric S. Raymond

Raymond was President of the organization until 2005. Nowadays, the President is Michael Tiemann.



Michael Tiemman

What is an Open Source?

Any program in which source code is available for users to work on it or modificate from the original design, either free or charging. Open Source is an effort made by many joined programmers to improve and share changes with the users.

Open Source Products

- Apache HTTP Server

- osCommerce

- Mozilla Firefox

- GNU/ Linux

- Android

- OpenDocument

- OpenOffice.org

- StarOffice

- X Windows System

- Eclipse

- OW2

- GIMP

- Sun's Java

- FreeBSD

- Launchpad

- SourceForge

- Scribus
- Audicity

...



Summer Vacation 2011

I can't actually complain about my summer vacation! I can say this has been the best summer of my life, up 'till now. I still remember the last day of school, and I really admit it was the first time I felt I was fed up with school, although I've returned happy and I actually wanted to start school, after all!

My summer started the day of my birthday, June 24th. Since it was Saint Juan, and in Castro a well-known festival is celebrated, I went out with my friends to celebrate my birthday too.

Next day, I went to Madrid because I had to get a plane all the way to Boston, where I stayed for 3 weeks in Amherst University. I had a lot of fun, as well as learning a lot. The program I was in was based on the two activities I chose: Architecture and Darkroom Photography. I enjoyed both activities and I can prove I am good at them, with the evaluation sheet they hand me. They took us to do certain trips, such as visiting Boston (the city), staying a weekend in Cape Cod, and doing other daily trips.

Therefore, I stayed since June 26th until July 16th, 3 weeks. After that, I returned home. I was glad to see my friends again, and those who come to stay for their summer vacations to Castro, the city where I live. I stayed here for more than a month, about a month and a week enjoying of constant parties everywhere, and since my cousin came to stay for a month (as she does every summer), she also came with us. I had a very great time here, although I live the whole year here, Castro turns amazing during summer!

On July 21st, I flew all the way to Ibiza to visit a friend of mine which I met this same summer on camp, at Amherst College. We got very friendly and invited me to her house in Ibiza; she actually lives there the whole year. I had a great time and had the opportunity of enjoying of the clear water beaches of Ibiza during the mornings and the afternoons, as well as the famous night life of Ibiza.

A few days after, while I still was in Ibiza, my parents flew to Menorca. And a few days after, I flew to Menorca too, to spend 4 days there with my parents. Menorca is known as the most relaxing island of the Balear Islands. I enjoyed of every single cove and beach, since every single of them had its own charm.

After spending 4 days in Menorca, we returned back to Castro. I stayed in Castro for two weeks and had to go to Madrid to spend the last weekend of the summer there, because my mother's godfather was very ill in the hospital and he unfortunately die on that Sunday, as it was foreseed. Instead, I didn't have a very bad weekend, in the bright side I stayed for a sleepover in a friend's house and the next day I ate lunch with a friend of mine y really missed and didn't see her since four years ago, so it was a pleasure to see her back again!

That's all my summer vacation. However, it was extremely worthy!