TECHNOLOGY

Microsoft's Imagine Cup:

Excitement heats up

The world's premier student technology competition: IMAGINE CUP comes back with a bang in 2011, putting forward a theme of global proportions: "Imagine a world where technology helps solve the toughest problems".

This year, winners of the local competition will represent the country at the worldwide finals held in the bustling and vibrant heart of USA - New York.

Microsoft launched this student technology competition, Imagine Cup, in 2003, with a vision of igniting a new wave of technological innovation, bringing together the brightest young minds from around the world and encouraging them to use their creativity to harness technology to solve the world's toughest problems.

The core objective behind this initiative was to offer young people a recognised platform to broaden their technological horizons, unleash their innovation, cultivate their ingenuity, activate their ideas and present their creativity to the world.

This year too, Microsoft Sri Lanka, is conducting a local round in the Software Design Category (the category offering the largest amount of prize money in the world finals), to select a team to represent Sri Lanka at the world finals to be held in New York in July 2011.

Previous years' winners had the opportunity to represent Sri Lanka at the Imagine Cup Worldwide Finals held in some of the most exciting and picturesque cities in the world such as India, Japan, Spain, Brazil, Seoul - Korea, Paris - France, Cairo- Egypt, and most recently in Warsaw, Poland.

Seventh year

"This is the seventh year of the Sri Lanka competition and the response is more overwhelming than in the years before.

The competitiveness has also been progressively intensifying over the past few years", said Director - Developer Platform Evangelism, Microsoft Sri Lanka, Wellington Perera.

The Sri Lankan participation at the Imagine Cup has been continual since the inception of Microsoft in Sri Lanka.

The main concept in this competition is imagining a world where technology helps solve the world's toughest problems where prospective competitors are encouraged to think along the lines of the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) proposed by the United Nations by the year 2015.

These MDGs were agreed upon by 189 nations around the world more than nine years ago and embrace universally accepted human rights such as ending hunger and poverty, achieving primary education for all, promoting gender equality and empowerment, reducing child mortality, improving maternal health, combating widespread disease, ensuring environmental sustainability, and developing a global partnership for development.

"Now, with just a few more years to go it is time to get creative and make a difference," said Perera encouraging the next lot of participants to hone in on their creativity.

Real-world impact

In adhering with this year's theme, Imagine Cup invites students to make a real-world impact by undertaking the challenge to take on real-world problems submitted by various IGOs, NGOs and Non-Profit Organisations under the 'Imagine Cup Solve This' Program.

With the initiation of this program, competitors now have access to a database of real-world problems submitted by worldwide IGOs and NGOs such as NetHope, United Nations Development Program(UNDP), USAID, United Nations Program on Youth (UNPY), United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) and the United Nations World Food Program(WPF).

This list is yet to grow as more and more real-world problems will continue piling into this unique database offering students a chance to take on a real problem, putting their ideas into action to create solutions which have the potential to change the world.

While students are free to choose any problem on which to focus, Imagine Cup Solve This would provide very realistic ideas to help inspire their creations.

From solutions that offer greater survival prospects, a healthier environment, less poverty, hunger, disease or a way to foster greater cooperation between developed and developing nations to work in harmony for global development, students have diversity of choice.

Considering the current status of nations worldwide and the baffling discrepancies that exist, the 2011 Imagine Cup theme could not be more befitting.

The Imagine Cup has become a common call for young techies around the world, a hallmark competition which inspires them to get creative.

With 325,000 participants from over 100 countries in 2010, in comparison to a mere 1000 participants from 25 countries at the commencement of this competition in 2003, the Imagine Cup has spread its wings to inspire innovation in youth from all corners of the globe.

"What ignites a simple burst of imagination, coupled up with hard work can lead to the birth of the next big technological breakthrough, a jump-start for a new career or even the stepping stone for a flourishing new industry.

Imagine cup invites students to learn, collaborate and change the world by applying their imagination to solve real-world problems to make an actual difference," said Perera.

Motivation

In Sri Lanka, Microsoft is reaching out to many Universities across the island in an effort to encourage a wider participation of talented youngsters in the country to step up to the challenge with Imagine Cup.

Over the years, the Universities, most frequently participating, have been the University of Moratuwa, the University of Colombo, the University of Peradeniya and the Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology (SLIIT).

During the 2009 Imagine Cup, four teams from Sri Lanka competed in the worldwide finals, equaling the number of teams from large countries in the region.

Both the Software Design Team (Mahee) and Embedded Development Team (SAS_EN) made it to the world top 12 at the worldwide finals held in Egypt.

Team Speak-Up from the University of Colombo, School of Computing (UCSC) were able to bag the championship award at the Imagine Cup Sri Lanka finals in 2010 whilst Team HELY from SLIIT and Team SAGGEZZA from the University of Moratuwa followed close behind as the 1st and 2nd Runners Up. "The competitiveness of Imagine Cup entries have been intensifying over the last couple of years," Perera said.

"Some of the ideas put forward are simply fantastic, and are as competent as any I have seen at my visits to the worldwide finals in the years before. We have a lot of talented students here in Sri Lanka. What they need is proper motivation to participate in this sort of challenge."

An experience

Gayan Garusinghe, a member of the Imagine Cup Sri Lanka winning team which represented the country at the worldwide finals in Warsaw, Poland in 2010 said, "The Imagine Cup is not just a competition, it is an experience.

From the time of registering to being selected and hopefully reaching the finals, it is a vivid learning experience, teamwork and the thrill of facing a global challenge.

Having participated and progressed to the worldwide finals, I feel that every bit of the journey has definitely been worth it."

The Imagine Cup comprises a variety of competitions in a range of technological areas.

While some of these competitions mandate team participation, others function on an individual level.

The 2011 Imagine Cup includes: the Software Design, Embedded Development, Game Design, Digital Media, Windows Phone 7 as well as several online challenges such as the Interoperability, IT and Orchard Challenges.

The most popular competition category, Software Design is ideally for the best programmers, solution builders and thinkers to use their ingenuity to create a software or service solution along the 2011 theme.

With a team of upto four participants, students can set about developing their own unique applications to address a problem which they believe applies on a global proportion.

In Embedded Development, another mainstream category, competitors are encouraged to work on tomorrow's technology, today.

This competition is for hardcore inventors to build a complete suite of hardware and software applications using Windows Embedded Compact 7 platform on the given embedded device, in par with the theme.

Another popular category - Game Design invites participants to create 2D or 3D Games using Microsoft XNA Game Studio 3.0, Visual Studio 2010 and/or Silverlight.

Whether it be games for the differently abled or a game to better educate about the environment or how we can sustain it, participants have a plethora of areas to creatively choose from in a manner that could spark inventiveness.

The Imagine Cup is the key opportunity in the global technological realm for those with the right talents and ingenuity to be a part of something bigger.

The challenge is 'ON', and the quest to seek out the world's most brilliant young minds is 'on the go'.

What remains now is for those who have the courage to bring about the next revolution or even evolution in technology to step up and show that together, we can change the world!

Toshiba launches Android Smartbook series

Toshiba's Computer Division, recently entered the Smartbook market with the Toshiba AS100 and AC100, designed with a slate and traditional clamshell format respectively.

Their slimness and light weight, coupled with their always-on capability make them ideal devices for consuming media, browsing the Internet, viewing and editing documents, emails and other messages while out and about.

Easy and enjoyable to use, the Toshiba AS100 and AC100 are powered by NVIDIA Tegra 250 mobile processor and feature highly intuitive graphical interfaces developed by Toshiba to run on top of the Android 2.2 operating system.

Each device also features a built-in 1.3M pixel web camera and useful connectivity options including a SD card slot, HDMI and USB 2.0 connectors.

"The Toshiba Smartbook series is a great solution for users who need a secondary computing device while on-the-go.

Both Smartbooks are highly portable with a 14mm slim design and are extremely lightweight, making them really easy to carry around," commented a Senior Manager for Product Marketing of Toshiba's Computer Systems Division.

Weighing just 750g, the Toshiba AS100 comes in a handy slate form factor that makes it convenient to use when on the move.

Its capacitive multi-touch 10.1 inch widescreen display and highly friendly intuitive graphical user interface promises an easy and highly enjoyable user experience.

For users who prefer a keyboard, there is the Toshiba AC100 which comes in a traditional clamshell design.

This device is equally lightweight at 870g and sports a black textured finish with Fusion Orange trims.

The AC100 also features a 10.1 - inch LED Clear Super View backlight screen, a large touchpad and dedicated apps buttons.

No recharge

Powered by NVIDIA Tegra 250 - 1.0GHz processor that offers a perfect balance between high performance and low battery consumption, both systems can go for up to seven days without having to be recharged.

When used intensively, it can provide up to seven hours of mixed browsing and video playback on one charge (65percent web browsing, 10percent video playback, 25percent standby).

The Android based system also takes less than a second to switch from standby to full activity mode whilst offering a smartphone-like 'always-on' capability.

BellVantage appointed Siemens partner

Siemens Enterprise Communication (Pvt) Ltd, has appointed BellVantage (Pvt) Limited as its authorised business partner in Sri Lanka.

With this tie up BellVantage will be able to market the total range of Siemens Enterprise Communication solutions to the Sri Lankan market.

"We are pleased to appoint BellVantage (Pvt) Ltd as our new business partner in Sri Lanka. With their well trained, experienced technical and sales staff we are confident that they will be able to successfully market, implement and provide after sales services to all existing as well as potential clients of Siemens communication products in Sri Lanka" said Managing Director Siemens Enterprise Communications (Pvt) Ltd, Anil Jain.

The appointment will enable BellVantage to offer customised communication solutions to organisations of various sizes such as SOHO (Small Office Home Office), Medium size enterprises as well as the sophisticated technologically driven high end corporate segment by strategically positioning the total range of Siemens digital and IP enabled state-of-the-art PABX systems.

These systems can be tailor-made from between two to six extensions going up to large scale system configuration exceeding 32,000 ports.

From a user perspective the well-known Siemens Hipath Next generation PABX systems can cater to businesses of any size ranging from a highly service driven hospitality environment like a hotel or hospital to a manufacturing plant in the industry sector.

Dell unveils open solutions for virtual era

"Enterprise innovation and efficiency depends on solutions that are open, capable and affordable," said Storage Solutions Consultant, Dell Sri Lanka Kaushala Lankadhikara.

"Dell's solutions are uniquely open and un-tethered to legacy assets and proprietary approaches to deliver against these needs.

From left Business Development Manager, Sri Lanka Glen Speering, Storage Solutions Consultant, Rest of Asia Pacific Kaushala Lankadhikara, Snr. Manager Storage Solutions Consultant, South Asia William Tan, Country Manager, Sri Lanka Shermal Jayatilaka and Marketing Manager, Rest of Asia Pacific Jessica Wong.

The CIO agenda isn't about managing OPEX at the expense of CAPEX or innovation. It is about driving efficiency without compromise and reinvesting the savings towards innovation and returning shareholder value".

More than ever, customers are dealing with two fundamental pain points - storing and sorting the explosion of data, and managing and operating the infrastructure and applications needed to run the business. Dell's Efficient Data Center (EDC) solutions allow enterprises to dynamically and rapidly deliver strategic IT services with a host of new capabilities.

This helps avoid resource silos and allows organisations to allocate resources in a dynamic manner in order to meet changing work load demands. Dell Services also delivers end to end portfolio of data center services to help customers achieve greater efficiency in their data center. Dell helps to extend the life of the customer's existing data center investments through various strategies including rightsising data centre capacity, data centre facilities design and management, virtualisation and data center migration.

With the use of modeling techniques to assess customer's data center environments, Dell Services provide recommendations to resolve immediate problems and to address longer term issues.

Dell services and data center consulting practice is at the heart of Dell's data center solutions which is focused on five key areas that include data center planning and management, platform optimization and virtualisation, facilities efficiency, networking and data management.

EDC is built on four key fundamental building blocks, which is essential for the virtual era.

The four main features include intelligent data management (IDM), streamlined application and workload management, simplified infrastructure management and intelligent infrastructure.

The explosion of data has left businesses grappling with the complexity of managing, maintaining and protecting their data, especially unstructured data such emails and rich media files that are projected by 2012 to reach five times the size it was in 2008 (IDC).

Dell's Intelligent Data Management automates the management of data through predictable, scalable and open data storage through storage virtualisation, automated data tiering and deduplication, companies can reduce storage costs by more than 50%. Streamlined Application and Workload Management automates the day-to-day tasks, from workload deployment to image creation and is designed to use best-of-breed technologies regardless of vendor.

Dialog Tradenet among eight WSA winners

The WSA Awards held in Abu Dhabi UAE, saw Sri Lanka's ICT sector securing one of the eight Mobile World Summit Awards (WSA) with Tradenet powered by Dialog Axiata, winning Gold in the Mobile-Inclusion and Empowerment Category.

BBC Janala, the Wikitude World Browser and the mobile commerce engine of Marks & Spencer UK, featured among the other World Summit Award winners.

The World Summit Award Mobile is a global initiative within the framework of the United Nations World Summit on Information Society (WSIS), in collaboration with UNESCO, UNIDO and the United National Global Alliance for ICT and Development.

Secretary to the President, and Chairman of the Commonwealth Telecommunication Organisation and of the UN-ESCAP Committee of ICT Experts for Asia & Pacific, Lalith Weeratunga said "The WSA for Dialog Tradenet is a testimony to the significant changes taking place in our country.

The empowerment, Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) deliver to people, changes their lives and presents unprecedented opportunity for growth. This is why ICT and Access to Information are key pillars of the rapid development and expansion roadmap laid out by the government in the Mahinda Chinthana.

As a government, we are committed to making ICT an important part of our development story, and will support its growth and exploitation".

Director General of the Telecommunications Regulatory Commission of Sri Lanka (TRCSL) Anusha Pelpita said: "The TRCSL is committed to fostering and enabling environment for telecommunication operators to make their services - telephony as well as broadband, accessible to all citizens of Sri Lanka.

Tradenet is a good example of a Sri Lankan innovation which uses a range of mobile and internet technologies to link buyers and sellers from all parts of the country in a very affordable manner, empowering them in the sphere of trade and commerce through ICT".

Following its success as the winner of the regional M-Billionth award for m-inclusion earlier this year, Tradenet was nominated for the WSA by the Information and Communication Technology Agency (ICTA), the apex agency for ICT development in Sri Lanka.

Tradenet surpassed an aggressive field of global competition at the WSA to secure Gold for Sri Lanka.

ICTA CEO, Reshan Devapura, said: "As the organisation driving the e-Sri Lanka Initiative, the ICTA has actively promoted the mobile platform for extending essential and innovative services to the broadest section of the population.

Dialog Tradenet is a highly commendable effort which leverages on the latest developments in mobile technology to reach out to all levels of society."

'Dialog Tradenet' is an inclusive trade information exchange featuring the convergence of multiple access technologies - USSD, SMS, WAP, Voice (IVR/Call Centre) and Web, designed to reach multiple socio-economic segments and industrial/service sectors, empowering them to trade goods and services through a virtual market place.

Group Chief Executive of Dialog Axiata Dr. Hans Wijayasuriya said: "Dialog is passionate about leveraging the power of the mobile phone to bridge economic divides, and disparity with respect to the access to opportunity.

Tradenet seeks to attack information asymmetry with respect to the trading of goods and services across geographies and multiple layers of the socio-economic pyramid.

Tradenet is unique relative to other inclusive virtual market environments with respect to its supply/demand, buy/sell 'intelligent matching' engine and post-matching SMS alert facility.

Intelligence dimensions applied to the matching are proximity, target prices and product service quality and features.

The intelligent matching and alerting feature of Tradenet relieves user of the burden of exhaustive searching and/or extended engagement with the system.

The development of the Tradenet platform was commissioned to Microimage by Dialog. Chief Executive Officer Microimage Harsha Purasinghe said: "Winning this global award gives us immense pride as it's yet another testimony of our technology innovations and software engineering excellence.

Tradenet's robust scalable architecture, intelligent trading engine, complete localisation, price info service, and application of cutting-edge mobile technologies sets a new benchmark for a true multi-mode and completely inclusive virtual marketplace platform."

The virtual market place is enriched by the partnership with the three Dedicated Economic Centres at Dambulla, Meegoda and Narahenpita.

Director of Govi Gnaana Seva (GGS) Dr. Harsha de Silva, said: "With Dialog Tradenet, we found the perfect platform to provide rural farmers with their most critical information need; produce prices.

The fact that farmers are now using this price information in their decision-making to improve their living standards is a huge success of the tradenet-GGS partnership."

Price data collection relating to agricultural produce on the ground at the economic centres is done by (GGS).