Interesting
Reads – 2018-11-11
Contents
Articles
- Amazon and Google can change how we use energy
- IEEE India Info Jul-Sep 2018 issue
- 16 office furniture upgrades and other work space must-haves
- Constitutional democracy and technology in the age of artificial intelligence
- How virtual reality is transforming autism studies
- Happy Birthday Amitabh Bachchan: 76 quotes of the actor that got all thinking
- The Battle for the Next Billion Internet Users Has Begun
- Future Factory: How Technology Is Transforming Manufacturing
- The Future of Aging? The New Drugs & Tech Working To Extend Life
- What a 100-year-old idea can teach us about cybersecurity -- Randomness: The Fix for Today’s Broken Security
Events /
Announcements
- Two Days Workshop on “Ethical Hacking And Cyber Security”
- TEQIP-III Sponsored National Workshop on ”Android App Testing” at NIT Rourkela
- Anna University Sponsored Two Week FDP on “Wireless Communication” at Chennai
- Shri P K Das Memorial Best Faculty Award & Life Time Achievement Award
- Support for International Patent Protection in Electronics & Information Technology and for awareness seminars & workshops
- CSI-2018: 53rd Annual Convention of Computer Society of India 2018 at Udaipur during 14-16 Dec 2018
- INDICON 2018: Theme “Harnessing Technology For Humanity” at Coimbatore during 16-18 Dec 2018
========================================================
Articles
Amazon and Google can change how we use energy
Big tech — in this case, Amazon and Google — is starting to make its way into the energy industry on the backs of
voice technology and in-home devices. Over the next few years, we’ll see
the two companies help carve out a new landscape for residential energy
management.
For those familiar with Silicon Valley’s strategies,
this might come as expected: enter an old industry, solve some of its
inefficiencies, and dominate it. However, the energy industry is unique. Big
tech’s story in energy — at the moment we’re in — won’t be about domination. Instead, it will help support
the electric grid, teach us how to use electricity more efficiently, and even
promote the use of renewable energy.
IEEE India Info Jul-Sep 2018 issue
The issue of Jul-Sep 2018, IEEE India Info, the quarterly
newsletter of the IEEE India Council has the following 13 interesting articles,
two book excerpts and few regular columns apart from the report on various
activities held in the IEEE Sections in India.
- Embracing the Next Billion Users of the Internet by Ms. Pitinan Kooarmornpatana
- INO: A National Mega Science and Engineering Project by Dr. B. Satyanarayana
- Economics of ADITYA – India’s First Solar Ferry by Mr. Sandith Thandasherry
- Algorithmic Music Composition by Dr. Rangarajan Krishnamoorthy
- Commercial Buildings and Energy Conservation Building Code of India by Dr. N. Subramanian
- Robotic Process Automation – Doing It Right first time! By Mr. M. Ramkumar & Mr. Chandrashekar Sadashivaiah
- Kerala Floods - A Model of Rescue and Rehabilitation using Information Technology and Social Media based Crowdsourcing by Sebin Sabu & Nora Elizabeth Joby
- Story of keralarescue.in -- A report by Mr. Muraleedharan Manningal
- Review of Momo attack in WhatsApp by Mr. S. Manikandan
- International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) Competition -- Language Project by Team iGEM-IIT Madras
- Understanding Waste Management – Part 3 by Mr. Alok Kumar
- Start-ups – Founders Cardinal Rules by Dr. L. S. Subramanian
- Work Practices To Make The Best Of Your Time by Dr. M. Sasikumar
- Book Excerpts: “The Karma of Business” from the book Disrupt and Conquer: How TTK Prestige Became a Billion-Dollar Business
- Book Excerpts: The second part of the chapter 10 – “Leading Science and Technology: Vision for the Future” dealing with “What India Needs to Do?’ from the book Leading Science and Technology: India Next?
- IT in Jul - Sep 2018 by Prof. S. Sadagopan
- Information Resources by Mr. H.R. Mohan
- Books: Disrupt and Conquer: How TTK Prestige Became a Billion-Dollar Business, Software Testing: Effective Methods, Tools and Techniques, Knowledge Driven Development – Bridging Waterfall and Agile Methodologies, Software Wasteland: How the Application-Centric Mindset is Hobbling our Enterprises, The Forward-Looking Manager in a VUCA World, and Evolving Innovation Ecosystems: A Guide to Open Idea Transformation in the Age of Future Tech.
Read them at http://sites.ieee.org/indiacouncil/newsletter/
16
office furniture upgrades and other work space must-haves
From
standing desks to telepresence robots, ZDNet has has listed q6 interesting tech
buys for your office in a slideshow.
Constitutional
democracy and technology in the age of artificial intelligence
Given
the foreseeable pervasiveness of artificial intelligence (AI) in modern
societies, it is legitimate and necessary to ask the question how this new
technology must be shaped to support the maintenance and strengthening of
constitutional democracy. This paper first describes the four core elements of
today's digital power concentration, which need to be seen in cumulation and
which, seen together, are both a threat to democracy and to functioning
markets. It then recalls the experience with the lawless Internet and the
relationship between technology and the law as it has developed in the Internet
economy and the experience with GDPR before it moves on to the key question for
AI in democracy, namely which of the challenges of AI can be safely and with
good conscience left to ethics, and which challenges of AI need to be addressed
by rules which are enforceable and encompass the legitimacy of democratic
process, thus laws. The paper closes with a call for a new culture of
incorporating the principles of democracy, rule of law and human rights by
design in AI and a three-level technological impact assessment for new
technologies like AI as a practical way forward for this purpose.
This
article is part of a theme issue ‘Governing artificial intelligence: ethical,
legal, and technical opportunities and challenges’ of Philosophical
Transactions of the Royal Society of London A: Mathematical, Physical and
Engineering Sciences
How
virtual reality is transforming autism studies
Researchers
and autistic artists are exploring virtual reality to study, treat and simulate
autism traits.
Autism
therapists and researchers started to use VR in the mid-1990s, not long after
headsets became widely available to consumers and other forms of immersion,
such as first-person shooter games, became popular. Researchers often deployed
the technology to create virtual environments to help autistic people rehearse
stressful encounters. For instance, Rizzo’s team built a virtual job-interview
training program. In a study published last year, they recruited adults with autism
or other conditions for a training regimen involving interviewers who ranged
from gentle to aggressive. Rizzo says the participants with autism
significantly improved in their interviewing skills, as rated by job
counselors.
Happy Birthday Amitabh Bachchan: 76 quotes of the actor that got all
thinking
As Amitabh Bachchan turns 76 in Ocy 2018, here are
some memorable quotes by the legendary Bollywood actor.
The Battle for the Next Billion Internet Users Has Begun
Large parts of the world’s population are still
unconnected, further disadvantaging the least developed regions of the planet
Today, the world is more connected than ever. Soon,
5G will herald the next era of digitalization. While we are discussing trends
such as artificial intelligence, blockchain, and augmented reality, we tend to
forget that there are still about four billion people on our planet who are
unconnected, with the vast majority of those residing in developing and least
developed countries (LDCs) in Sub-Saharan Africa, Southeast Asia, and Latin
America. As high mobile network penetration already prevails in these markets,
mobile (as opposed to fixed) broadband services tend to be the prevalent form
of access technology. However, mobile broadband coverage is still very limited
in many regions and data plans as well as smartphones are often unaffordable
for the local population. In addition, available internet content is often not
relevant enough to local communities. Finally, digital illiteracy as well as
gender discrepancies in internet adoption pose additional barriers.
The digital divide between the developed and the
developing world is at risk of widening if broadband network deployment, price
decline, and subsequently consumer adoption do not keep up with the required
growth levels. 3G and 4G coverage is indeed expanding while data prices are on
a downward trajectory, even in developing countries. But at the same time, the
bar for what is considered a decent internet experience is constantly rising.
Modern applications consume more data and require faster connection speeds and
lower latency for an acceptable user experience, especially with video
streaming projected to make up 75% of global data traffic. The fast pace of
development of these factors puts developing countries at risk of falling
further behind the developed world.
The economic and societal impact of being connected
is significant, especially in emerging markets. The link between internet
access and economic growth is indisputable. In mature economies, the internet
is responsible for about a quarter of GDP growth. Universal internet adoption
in developing countries could make a tremendous difference for the state of
those economies. The possibilities for education and healthcare would better
lives for the poor and disadvantaged; increased literacy rates and life
expectancy would uplift underprivileged communities.
Future
Factory: How Technology Is Transforming Manufacturing
From
advanced robotics in R&D labs to computer vision in warehouses, technology is
making an impact on every step of the manufacturing process.
As
industrial technology grows increasingly pervasive, this wave of automation and
digitization is being labelled “Industry 4.0,” as in the fourth industrial
revolution.
So,
what does the future of factories hold?
To
answer this, we took a deep dive into 8 different steps of the manufacturing
process, to see how they are starting to change:
- Product R&D: A look at how platforms are democratizing R&D talent, the ways AI is helping materials science, and how the drafting board of tomorrow could be an AR or VR headset.
- Resource Planning & Sourcing: On-demand decentralized manufacturing and blockchain projects are working on the complexities of integrating suppliers.
- Operations Technology Monitoring & Machine Data: A look at the IT stack and platforms powering future factories. First, factories will get basic digitization, and further along we’ll see greater predictive power.
- Labor Augmentation & Management: AR, wearables, and exoskeletons are augmenting human capabilities on the factory floor.
- Machining, Production & Assembly: Modular equipment and custom machines like 3D printers are enabling manufacturers to handle greater demand for variety.
- Quality Assurance (QA): A look at how computer vision will find imperfections, and how software and blockchain tech will more quickly be able to identify problems (and implement recalls).
- Warehousing: New warehouse demand could bring “lights-out” warehouses even faster than an unmanned factory, with the help of robotics and vision tracking.
- Transport & Supply Chain Management: Telematics, IoT, and autonomous vehicles will bring greater efficiency and granularity for manufacturers delivering their products.
The
Future of Aging? The New Drugs & Tech Working To Extend Life
Senolytics. Blood transfusions. Placenta stem cells. These are just some of the innovative ways that startups are tackling mortality and increasing the human lifespan. In this report, we dive into each one and track what progress has been made in the quest to find the elusive fountain of youth.
What a
100-year-old idea can teach us about cybersecurity -- Randomness: The Fix for Today’s Broken
Security
A
100 year-old idea, brought to life by modern technology, can protect us from
even the smartest hackers, most powerful intelligence agencies and the fastest
quantum computers.
The
cyberworld in which we spend our days — and on which our
lives depend — is not safe, and
is becoming more dangerous all the time. From nation-states trying to sway
elections with fake news to ransomware that shuts down hospitals, we are living
in a “Wild West” in which any
data, or any transaction, may be attacked at any time. And like travelers in a
lawless frontier, we are left to scan the horizon constantly for trouble,
scrambling to plug the leaks in defenses we don’t quite trust.
We
are vulnerable not just because of the increasing sophistication of hackers,
who are today as likely to be well-funded criminal organizations or governments
as petty thieves or amateurs out for the thrill of defacing a Web site. Nor is
the greatest threat the development of new offensive tools such as quantum computers,
which might soon be powerful enough to crack today’s most widely used
cryptographic ciphers. The biggest problem is that our basic approach to cyber
security is flawed.
Events
/ Announcements
Two Days
Workshop on “Ethical Hacking And Cyber Security” at Chennai
AMET
Deemed to be UNIVERSITY, Chennai- is organising a two days’ workshop on “Ethical
Hacking and Cyber Security” during 22-23 Nov 2018 at Chennai.
The
registration fee is Rs 500/- for UG/PG Students & Rs. 600/- for Faculty and
Research Scholars.
Workshop
brochure at https://goo.gl/jdbjwV
For
assistance contact: Dr. Jagadeeswari, Email jegadeeswari.g@ametuniv.ac.in
Mobile:
7094898646
TEQIP-III
Sponsored National Workshop on ”Android App Testing” at NIT Rourkela
Department
of Computer Science & Engineering, National Institute of Technology, Rourkela
is organising a workshop on Android App Testing during 1-5 Dec 2018.
More
details at http://www.nitrkl.ac.in/docs/Workshop/CS/31102018200751562B.pdf
Contact:
Dr. Durga Prasad Mohapatra, Phone:
0661-2462356 (O), 09437648628 (Mob)
E-mail:
aat.nitrkl@gmail.com / durgapm2004@yahoo.com
Anna University Sponsored
Two Week FDTP on “Wireless Communication” at Chennai
Department of ECE, St. Joseph's College
of Engineering is organizing the Anna
University sponsored two week Faculty
Development Training Programme (FDTP) on “Wireless Communication” from
03/12/2018 to 15/12/2018.
Brochure at https://goo.gl/RLWkTE
Contact Email : kpkvendan@gmail.com Phone: 9677190102, 9626047967
Shri P K Das Memorial Best Faculty Award & Life Time Achievement
Award
Nehru Group of Institutions Coimbatore gives
awards (30 Nos) to Best Faculty (faculties from Tamilnadu, Kerala, Andhra
Pradesh, Karnataka, Telangana and Puducherry) & Life Time Achievement Award.
More details at http://nehrucolleges.info/happenings/2018/10/24/1213/
Support for International Patent Protection in
Electronics & Information Technology and for awareness seminars &
workshops
Ministry of Electronics and Information
Technology has launched a scheme, Support for International Patent Protection
in E&IT to provide financial support to MSMEs and Technology Startup units
for international patent filing to encourage innovation and recognize the value
and capabilities of global IP along with capturing growth opportunities in ICTE
sector.
In addition, to sensitize and create IP
awareness and to disseminate the scheme among stakeholders, a scheme to support
Education Institutes, Meity societies, etc. for organizing seminars &
workshops is also proposed.
More details at http://www.ict-ipr.in/sipeit/login
CSI-2018: 53rd Annual Convention of Computer Society of India 2018 at
Udaipur during 14-16 Dec 2018
The
53rd Annual Convention of CSI will be held at Hotel Inder Residency. Udaipur,
Rajasthan, India during 14-16 Dec 2018.
For
details visit the convention website at http://www.csi-2018.org
INDICON 2018:
Theme “Harnessing Technology For Humanity” at Coimbatore during 16-18 Dec 2018
With
the theme of “Harnessing Technology for Humanity”, the 15th IEEE India Council
International Conference (INDICON 2018), being organized by the IEEE Madras
Section during December 15-18, 2018, at Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Coimbatore,
with technical support from the Indian Institute of Technology Madras, promises
to be bigger and better than before. With plenary sessions, keynote addresses
by reputed academicians, tutorials, workshops, Student Paper contests, industry
exhibits and stalls and most importantly, high quality presentations from the
best of the researchers in India, no effort is being spared to make INDICON
2018, the best so far.
For
details visit the website at http://indicon2018.in/
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