Wi-Fi (IPA: /ˈwaɪfaɪ/) is a trademark of the Wi-Fi Alliance, founded in 1999 as Wireless Internet Compatibility Alliance (WICA), comprising more than 300 companies, whose products are certified by the Wi-Fi Alliance, based on the IEEE 802.11 standards (also called Wireless LAN (WLAN) and Wi-Fi). This certification warrants interoperability between different wireless devices.
The alliance was founded because many products did not correctly implement IEEE 802.11 and some included proprietary extensions. This led to incompatibilities between products from different manufacturers.
The Wi-Fi Alliance tests the wireless components to their own terms of reference. Products that pass become Wi-Fi certified and may carry the Wi-Fi logo. Only products of Wi-Fi Members are tested, because they pay membership and per-item fees. Absence of the Wi-Fi logo does not necessarily mean non-compliance with the standard.
In France, Poland, the United States, and some other countries, the term Wi-Fi often is used by the public as a synonym for wireless Internet (WLAN); but not every wireless Internet product has a Wi-Fi certification, which may be because of certification costs that must be paid for each certified device type.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Keyboard
From mechanical typewriters
* Shift selects the upper character, or select upper case of letters. The Shift key in typewriters was attached to a lever that moved the character types so that the uppercase characters could be printed in the paper. Unlike mechanical typewriters, PC keyboards do not capitalize all letters properly when both shift keys are engaged simultaneously.
* Caps Lock selects upper case, or if shift is pressed, lower case of letters. In mechanical typewriters, it worked like the Shift key, but also used a lock to keep the Shift key depressed. The lock was released by pressing the Shift key.
* Enter wraps to the next line or activates the default or selected option. ASCII keyboards were labeled CR or Return. Typewriters used a lever that would return the cylinder with the paper to the start of the line.
[edit] From Teletype keyboards
* Ctrl shifts the value of letters and numbers from the ASCII graphics range, down into the ASCII control characters. For example, CTRL-S is XOFF (stops many programs as they print to screen) CTRL-Q is XON (resume printing stopped by CTRL-S).
* Esc produces an ASCII escape character. It may be used to exit menus or modes.
* Tab produces an ASCII tab character. Moves to the next tab stop.
* ~ is the tilde, an accent backspaced and printed over other letters for non-English languages. Nowadays the key does not produce a backspaceable character and is used for 'not' or 'circa'.
* ` is a grave accent or backtick, also formerly backspaced over letters to write non-English languages; on some systems it is used as an opening quote. The single quote ' is normally used for an acute accent.
* ^ is a circumflex, another accent for non-English languages. Also used to indicate exponentiation where superscript is not available.
* * is an asterisk, used to indicate a note, or multiplication.
* _ is an underscore, backspaced and overprinted to add emphasis.
* | is a vertical bar, originally used as a typographic separator for optical character recognition. Many character sets break it in the middle so it cannot be confused with the numeral "1" or the letter "l" (in most EBCDIC codepages, vertical bar and divided vertical bar are separate characters). This character is often known as a "pipe" or a "fencepost.
* Shift selects the upper character, or select upper case of letters. The Shift key in typewriters was attached to a lever that moved the character types so that the uppercase characters could be printed in the paper. Unlike mechanical typewriters, PC keyboards do not capitalize all letters properly when both shift keys are engaged simultaneously.
* Caps Lock selects upper case, or if shift is pressed, lower case of letters. In mechanical typewriters, it worked like the Shift key, but also used a lock to keep the Shift key depressed. The lock was released by pressing the Shift key.
* Enter wraps to the next line or activates the default or selected option. ASCII keyboards were labeled CR or Return. Typewriters used a lever that would return the cylinder with the paper to the start of the line.
[edit] From Teletype keyboards
* Ctrl shifts the value of letters and numbers from the ASCII graphics range, down into the ASCII control characters. For example, CTRL-S is XOFF (stops many programs as they print to screen) CTRL-Q is XON (resume printing stopped by CTRL-S).
* Esc produces an ASCII escape character. It may be used to exit menus or modes.
* Tab produces an ASCII tab character. Moves to the next tab stop.
* ~ is the tilde, an accent backspaced and printed over other letters for non-English languages. Nowadays the key does not produce a backspaceable character and is used for 'not' or 'circa'.
* ` is a grave accent or backtick, also formerly backspaced over letters to write non-English languages; on some systems it is used as an opening quote. The single quote ' is normally used for an acute accent.
* ^ is a circumflex, another accent for non-English languages. Also used to indicate exponentiation where superscript is not available.
* * is an asterisk, used to indicate a note, or multiplication.
* _ is an underscore, backspaced and overprinted to add emphasis.
* | is a vertical bar, originally used as a typographic separator for optical character recognition. Many character sets break it in the middle so it cannot be confused with the numeral "1" or the letter "l" (in most EBCDIC codepages, vertical bar and divided vertical bar are separate characters). This character is often known as a "pipe" or a "fencepost.
VCD
Overall picture quality is intended to be comparable to VHS video.[3] Poorly compressed VCD video can sometimes be lower quality than VHS video, but VCD exhibits block artifacts rather than analog noise, and does not deteriorate further with each use.
352x240 (or SIF) resolution was chosen because it is half the vertical, and half the horizontal resolution of NTSC video. 352x288 is similarly one quarter PAL/SECAM resolution. This approximates the (overall) resolution of an analog VHS tape, which, although it has double the number of (vertical) scan lines, has a much lower horizontal resolution.
VCD video is mostly compatible with the DVD-Video standard, except for any video encoded at 23.976 frames per second, which must use 3:2 pulldown.
[edit] Audio
* Codec: MPEG-1 Audio Layer II
* Frequency: 44,100 hertz (44.1 kHz)
* Output: Dual channel or stereo
* Bitrate: 224 kilobits per second
o Rate Control: Constant bitrate
As with most CD-based formats, VCD audio is incompatible with the DVD-Video standard due to a difference in frequency; DVDs require 48 kHz, whereas VCDs use 44.1 kHz.
352x240 (or SIF) resolution was chosen because it is half the vertical, and half the horizontal resolution of NTSC video. 352x288 is similarly one quarter PAL/SECAM resolution. This approximates the (overall) resolution of an analog VHS tape, which, although it has double the number of (vertical) scan lines, has a much lower horizontal resolution.
VCD video is mostly compatible with the DVD-Video standard, except for any video encoded at 23.976 frames per second, which must use 3:2 pulldown.
[edit] Audio
* Codec: MPEG-1 Audio Layer II
* Frequency: 44,100 hertz (44.1 kHz)
* Output: Dual channel or stereo
* Bitrate: 224 kilobits per second
o Rate Control: Constant bitrate
As with most CD-based formats, VCD audio is incompatible with the DVD-Video standard due to a difference in frequency; DVDs require 48 kHz, whereas VCDs use 44.1 kHz.
DVD
DVD, also known as "Digital Versatile Disc" or "Digital Video Disc," is a optical disc storage media format. Its main uses are video and data storage. Most DVDs are of the same dimensions as compact discs (CDs) but store more than six times as much data.
Variations of the term DVD often describe the way data is stored on the discs: DVD-ROM (Read Only Memory), has data that can only be read and not written, DVD-R and DVD+R can record data only once and then function as a DVD-ROM. DVD-RW, DVD+RW and DVD-RAM can both record and erase data multiple times. The wavelength used by standard DVD lasers is 650 nm,[1] and thus the light has a red color.
DVD-Video and DVD-Audio discs respectively refer to properly formatted and structured video and audio content. Other types of DVDs, including those with video content, may be referred to as DVD-Data discs. As next generation high-definition optical formats also use a disc identical in some aspects yet more advanced than a DVD, such as Blu-ray Disc, the original DVD is occasionally given the retronym SD DVD (for standard definition).[2][3]
Variations of the term DVD often describe the way data is stored on the discs: DVD-ROM (Read Only Memory), has data that can only be read and not written, DVD-R and DVD+R can record data only once and then function as a DVD-ROM. DVD-RW, DVD+RW and DVD-RAM can both record and erase data multiple times. The wavelength used by standard DVD lasers is 650 nm,[1] and thus the light has a red color.
DVD-Video and DVD-Audio discs respectively refer to properly formatted and structured video and audio content. Other types of DVDs, including those with video content, may be referred to as DVD-Data discs. As next generation high-definition optical formats also use a disc identical in some aspects yet more advanced than a DVD, such as Blu-ray Disc, the original DVD is occasionally given the retronym SD DVD (for standard definition).[2][3]
Broadband
In telecommunication
Broadband in telecommunications refers to a signaling method that includes or handles a relatively wide range of frequencies, which may be divided into channels or frequency bins. Broadband is always a relative term, understood according to its context. The wider the bandwidth, the greater the information-carrying capacity. In radio, for example, a very narrow-band signal will carry Morse code; a broader band will carry speech; a still broader band is required to carry music without losing the high audio frequencies required for realistic sound reproduction. A television antenna described as "normal" may be capable of receiving a certain range of channels; one described as "broadband" will receive more channels. In data communications an analogue modem will transmit a bandwidth of 56 kilobits per seconds (kbit/s) over a telephone line; over the same telephone line a bandwidth of several megabits per second can be handled by ADSL, which is described as broadband (relative to a modem over a telephone line, although much less than can be achieved over a fibre optic circuit).
[edit] In data communications
Broadband in data can refer to broadband networks or broadband Internet and may have the same meaning as above, so that data transmission over a fiber optic cable would be referred to as broadband as compared to a telephone modem operating at 56,000 bits per second.
However, broadband in data communications is frequently used in a more technical sense to refer to data transmission where multiple pieces of data are sent simultaneously to increase the effective rate of transmission, regardless of data signaling rate. In network engineering this term is used for methods where two or more signals share a medium.[1]
Broadband in telecommunications refers to a signaling method that includes or handles a relatively wide range of frequencies, which may be divided into channels or frequency bins. Broadband is always a relative term, understood according to its context. The wider the bandwidth, the greater the information-carrying capacity. In radio, for example, a very narrow-band signal will carry Morse code; a broader band will carry speech; a still broader band is required to carry music without losing the high audio frequencies required for realistic sound reproduction. A television antenna described as "normal" may be capable of receiving a certain range of channels; one described as "broadband" will receive more channels. In data communications an analogue modem will transmit a bandwidth of 56 kilobits per seconds (kbit/s) over a telephone line; over the same telephone line a bandwidth of several megabits per second can be handled by ADSL, which is described as broadband (relative to a modem over a telephone line, although much less than can be achieved over a fibre optic circuit).
[edit] In data communications
Broadband in data can refer to broadband networks or broadband Internet and may have the same meaning as above, so that data transmission over a fiber optic cable would be referred to as broadband as compared to a telephone modem operating at 56,000 bits per second.
However, broadband in data communications is frequently used in a more technical sense to refer to data transmission where multiple pieces of data are sent simultaneously to increase the effective rate of transmission, regardless of data signaling rate. In network engineering this term is used for methods where two or more signals share a medium.[1]
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)