Computer Technology Improve Sports.

Athletes are better at their sport today than they've ever been, and much of the improvement can be attributed to an increased focus on training and preparation. But another factor also plays into athlete performance -- technology, specifically computer technology. Computer software now allows sporting goods to be designed and manufactured with maximum performance at the forefront. But that's not all; computers have also greatly enhanced the fan experience as well.

Technology, in various forms, has been utilised in sport for many years and plays a particularly vital role in elite sport. Some of the thematic applications of technology include, sporting equipment; clothing and wearables; facilities; competition adjudication and formats; media broadcasting and communications; and performance analytics. 

A major trend in sports technology is toward real-time application of devices that provide athletes, coaches, and analysts with immediate feedback across a wide range of performance factors. Another trend is toward devices that are smaller, lighter, more powerful and easier to use.

Key Messages:

1. Technology in all of its formats is playing a greater role in sport, particularly at the elite level.
2. Technology that leads to innovation in sport can lead to the development of 'competitive advantage'.
3. Technological advancements at the elite level may flow down to consumers and also used by the entertainment industry. 

 

Design:

Computer-aided design (CAD) software makes designing the likes of golf clubs, hockey sticks and other athletic equipment faster and much more efficient. CAD design software allows for the creation of products in a 3D virtual environment. Also, CAD files can be transferred and input into analysis and manufacturing software to streamline product development. They can also be uploaded into rapid prototyping machines such as 3D printers to create test parts.

Simulation:

After the design and engineering phase of product development comes the testing, or prototyping, phase. Traditionally, this was done by creating an actual physical prototype. But thanks to computer technology, such product simulations can be carried out on a computer screen in what's called virtual prototyping. Simulation software helps test for design and engineering flaws, from hockey sticks to footballs, so that product development personnel can make changes easily and without having to create expensive prototypes. Simulation software has accelerated the development process of numerous products, getting new, innovative products into the hands of athletes faster.

Fan Viewing:

Computer technology doesn't just improve sports for the athlete, but for the television viewers as well. For instance, media outlets telecasting sports such as hockey and football have implemented telestrators so broadcasters can break down plays for the viewing audience during a game. In football, specifically, there's also been the implementation of the "first down line," a line that is digitally added to television broadcasts so viewers have a better perspective of how far an offense needs to go to earn a fresh set of downs.

Fan Experience:

The Internet has made it easier than ever for fans not only to punch their ticket to their next live event, but to stay in touch with their favorite teams. Teams and leagues sell tickets and merchandise on their websites; in addition, sites such as StubHub.com have created a secondary market for tickets, allowing sellers to connect with buyers in a way they never could. Sports leagues and teams are releasing smartphone apps so fans can receive updates on their teams when they're on the go. Finally, many leagues and teams also stream live in-game video and audio over the Internet for out-of-market fans. This video and audio is available via desktops and laptops -- and, increasingly, via mobile devices as well. Computers and the Internet have also largely supplanted printed newspapers as the primary source for sports news.

Importance of Computer Education to Students.

    

The basic computer skills that every person regardless of age should know include common application programs such as Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Power point and Notepad. They should know how to go online, check their email account, and send mail with an attachment and how to use simple email features. The use of email and familiarity with the internet are becoming basic requirements for almost every job. Most jobs are posted online, and how can a person respond to an online advertisement without knowing how an email works? We use this technology wonder to balance our check, entertain ourselves, keep in touch with our friends, and find information on a particular subject. With the Internet, we can obtain information, exchange messages, and perform other important tasks. In most places of business, a computer is standard. In the bank they use computers to look up your account information. They use computers in the auto repair shop to assess your car. You can’t find books in the library by looking in a card catalog you must use a computerized database. Doctors’ utilize computers to store patient information. The point is this, no matter where you find employment, there is a good chance a computer will be a basic tool you will have to use. It is in your best interests to start off computer literate. It will help you get a job and it will help you advance in your career. 

Benefits of Computer Education -  

Improves Research:

Computer education improves students’ research skills by encouraging them to look for information on the Internet. It enables them to research various topics by seeking relevant books that could be digitally available online. The Internet also contains search options, which expose students to diverse ways of obtaining information. Thanks to the speedy nature of the Internet, students can research their desired topics within minutes.

Influence Career Aspirations:

Incorporating computer education in schools can inspire students to undertake careers in technology and enhance their understanding of how computer technology impacts people’s daily lives. The knowledge acquired in elementary and high school may increase their interest in computer-related fields during their college education. Furthermore, computer education provides students with a grounding in computer-related software and activities, such as using office suite, programming languages and creating data sheets. Students can apply these skills to a range of occupations later in life.

Enhanced Creativity:

Computer classes allow students to put their creativity to use. For example, classes can involve assembling and disassembling computer parts, which require students to think about and understand how parts function. Students can transfer their enhanced creativity to other activities in their lives, including memorizing scientific facts, historical information or mathematical formulas. Computer education also reduces the time needed to efficiently learn new material.

Improved Performance:

Computer education may influence student performance by enabling them to become more involved with their school work. Computers can potentially enhance students mathematical thinking, and improve scores in problem solving and critical thinking tasks. Computer education also plays a major factor in students’ ability to score highly on their standardized assessment tests. Exposing 3- and 4-year-old children to computer education and supporting activities produces developmental gains such as abstraction, intelligence, nonverbal skills and long-term memory.

Securing the Smart City.

 How smart can turn dumb -

A smart city uses technology to automate and improve city services, ultimately making citizens’ lives better. It describes a city full of connections, where information technology and the Internet of Things (IoT) is embedded into everyday life. The problem is, for each connection, there’s a risk. Data is shared across networks that, if poorly encrypted, can be accessed. Each connection, however remote or seemingly innocuous, could provide an entry point for a hacker who could potentially manipulate that system for their own devices.

Digital security experts like Cesar Cerrudo, CTO for IOActive Labs, have concerns about how robust this encryption is. Cerrudo points out that many use weak encryption algorithms, and others have poor key encryption generation or fixed keys that hackers can gain access to. It’s not just fragile encryption or weak connection security - citizens in a smart city have a part to play too. Simple or shared passwords and lost memory sticks could potentially offer hackers the opportunity to access personal and business information that we hold. Malware can be stored within apps we freely download.

And how many of us ever read the terms and conditions when we sign up for apps or do much checking before clicking the button to allow our apps to access our data? Given that many of them are longer than novels (Apple’s Terms and Conditions are notoriously longer than Shakespeare’s Macbeth), it’s not surprising we don’t, but it could have implications for our security.

“If that technology is not secure and if it’s not properly protected, city infrastructure and citizens won’t be safe and will suffer cyber attacks,” Cerrudo says, warning that smart cities run the risk of becoming dumb cities if they continually suffer cyber attacks because of weak infrastructure.

Cerrudo himself has demonstrated how simple our cities’ systems can be to hack. Using a laptop and hardware that cost under $100, he was able to access individual traffic lights, changing them at will. Pushing further, he could access these systems from up to a mile away and even from an airborne drone.

The technology used for managing traffic lights in New York is also used to manage the traffic infrastructure in cities across the world, including Washington DC, New York, Seattle, San Francisco, London, Lyon, and Melbourne. Cerrudo’s example illustrates just how incredibly fragile our cities are, with small incidents having big consequences. It’s the principle of the ‘cascade’ effect. In a cyber attack, hackers may use the cumulative impact of a number of small intrusions that, when multiplied together, can cause havoc.

As an example of what can be achieved, in 2006 two aggrieved Los Angeles traffic operators remotely accessed four traffic lights at busy intersections. This seemingly minor interruption caused gridlock that lasted for days. Even more concerning was that it took three years for the perpetrators to be found, after they owned up to the crime.

Hyper-Cat -

If multiple entry points and unsecured data sharing across systems is the biggest risk for our smart cities, then surely the answer must be in having one system that manages everything?

The idea of the Urban Operating System (UOS) has in the past been a key part of the concept of a Smart City. From one single operating system, the entire infrastructure of a city can be connected, organised and managed. But it’s increasingly viewed negatively by smart-city experts like Tom Saunders, senior researcher at Nesta, who believe we’re actually safer if systems are fragmented.

“Companies are still pushing the one-system model,” says Saunders, who is also the author of ‘Rethinking Smart Cities from the Ground Up’. But for him at least, it’s not the answer: “To be secure you want lots of separate systems that compete. That way, the whole city network can’t be hacked.”

One of the main reasons Saunders believes the UOS model won’t take hold is that, contrary to claims made, there are no real smart cities, just a collection of individual projects. “In the UK, we can’t afford to roll out 100,000 sensors across the city,” he says. Smart Cities like Bristol, Milton Keynes and most recently Manchester are investing in small-scale smart projects, not imposing a complete smart system upon the city. The infrastructure and technology behind the projects aren’t linked, meaning hacking them all would be complex and time-consuming.

If we’re unable to build our Smart Cities from the bottom up, then it’s essential that we impose security upon the systems that we already have. Symantec is one of a number of organisations working together to develop a secure communications standard that it hopes will do just that.

Called Hyper-Cat, the standard is a JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) catalogue that securely shares IoT asset information across the web, making it much more difficult for hackers to access. “The system isn’t a UOS,” says Sian John, Symantec’s head of resilience. “It’s a set of standards that enables the safe communication between IoT devices”.

At the moment, many city systems enjoy ‘security through anonymity’. As these systems are increasingly introduced to Smart City elements, experts like those at Hyper-Cat are calling for the introduction of a safe operating standard that can ensure that minimum security conditions are met.

Cerrudo agrees that securing this communication is the biggest challenge for a smart city, but he’s critical of the industry. “Most smart city technology vendors are immature and don’t have enough cyber security knowledge,” he says.

Rather than developing new communication standards, Securing Smart Cities - a non-profit organisation that brings together academics and businesses - creates resources and guidance for public and private sector organisations to help cities protect themselves. Securing Smart Cities is increasingly calling on governments to take a much greater involvement in smart cities. “Right now governments are blindly trusting vendors and deploying technology without making sure it’s secure,” says Cerrudo.

Smart crime-fighting -

Security in a smart city often focuses on the big threats to the population, and on how critical infrastructure can be protected. But smart, connected cities also play a key role in protecting the citizens. After all, smart cities thrive on ‘big data’. This mountain of seemingly unconnected data is being processed by sophisticated computer programs to help predict real crimes. It may sound like science fiction, but the concept - dubbed predictive analytics - is actually in development and being trialled in many places around the world.

In 2011, the Santa Cruz Police Department introduced such ‘predictive policing’ to the force, and saw arrests increase by 57 per cent. The system divides the city into cells 450m square, with a computer algorithm assigning a probability of crime based on an analysis of previous crime data, social media and other local data sources.

The technique is being further developed by companies like Hitachi, whose Visualization Predictive Crime Analytics system blends real-time event data captured from public safety systems and sensors with historical and contextual crime data from record management systems and other sources. Spatial and temporal prediction algorithms are used to assign threat levels for every city block and also to create threat level predictions, forecasting where crimes are likely to occur or additional resources may be needed. Hitachi estimates that the system can predict crimes to within a 200-metre radius.

New technology has always been used by police forces to tackle crime, with GPS trackers in cars, mobile phone records, bridge toll passes and more being used as evidence in cases. As our cities become increasingly connected, law enforcement agencies will be able to use this data to prosecute criminals. But information can also be misused. The police have strict rules defining how they investigate crimes and name suspects, but the general public doesn’t. In April 2013, Boston was shaken by the detonation of two bombs at its annual marathon. After the incident, the entire city went into lock-down as the perpetrators went on the run.

During this time, CCTV images, social media and a variety of other open sources were used by concerned citizens and media outlets to identify and name potential suspects. The problem was, these people were innocent bystanders and, in one case, a participant in the marathon. The smart city can help protect its citizens, but access to information should come with some responsibilities.

HOW TO MANAGE YOUR PROJECT RESOURCES ?

Project success often comes down to how well you manage your project team and the quality of the work they produce. Keep these four tips in mind and you will reap more success on the projects you manage.

           

Your project resources are always going to be critical to the success of each project you manage. So it makes sense that how you manage them and get the best cooperation and performance from them individually and as a team is key to project success, right?

What I'd like to do here is discuss four tips you can use on each project going forward to help get the most out of the team and therefore also realize the best success and performance on each project you manage. Consider the following:

1. Engage them one-on-one monthly during the project. It's tough to make time for individuals when the project is in full swing. Nothing slows your progress down like a team member coming into your office to hide out and just talk. How do you make it clear that your office is not just a refuge or sanctuary for them? Well, don't do it. You their presence for two goods. One...to get to know them better and discuss their career interests and, two...to get updates on outstanding tasks and possibly to delegate new task assignments to them. It will help team cohesiveness and probably help ensure they don't come hideout in your office as often in the future.

Plus, knowing your project team members better individually is always a good idea. Gaining insight into their career aspirations and other things they may be working on at the moment will also serve to help you as there may be other areas of the project where their involvement could help you as a project manager and help them in terms of responsibility and career growth.

2. Make sure each leads at least one major project task or deliverable. Idle minds will wander...and idle hands are the devil's workshop. You want to try to always keep your project team members busy. They're going to be charging their time somewhere...so you might as well have them assigned to meaningful tasks. But even more than that, if it is at all feasible, have each one lead their own major tasks or deliverables.

Expect weekly reporting on that deliverable or on those tasks to the project client – and even to senior management if your project warrants that type of presentation. Don't do it all yourself. The amount of task and project ownership and accountability that you will get out of this will serve you for the rest of the project and make everyone better team members for this and all future projects.

3. Don't make major project decisions without full team engagement. There may be some exceptions, periodically, to this rule. But, whenever possible, be sure to include the entire team. You'll have a tighter, more cohesive, involved and accountable team as a result because they are playing some role in every key aspect of the project. Even if ultimately the decision is yours to make, involve and inform the team.

4. Keep the bar high. Don't settle for less than a full 100 percent accountability for assigned project tasks. And keep it that way even if you know they are swamped with work outside of your project. Expect the best and the highest cooperation and that's what you'll get. It's like raising your own kids...you wouldn't settle for them...why should you for the quality of the work your own project team produces?

INDIAN IT AND ITES JOURNEY: LIBERALIZATION AND BEYOND.

The 1991 reforms gave a fillip to India’s IT sector; 25 years on, India is poised to ride the next technology revolution as the third biggest start-up hub globally

Early public policy in an independent India focused on economic planning, adopting new technologies, and nurturing indigenous science and technology talent. About 50 years down the line, the early 1990s saw a move towards market-oriented economic policies to expand private investment in driving growth. This gave a fillip to the IT and ITeS industry.

The size of the Indian IT and ITeS industry grew from $100 million in 1990 to $1 billion by 1996, changing the course of development of this country forever. However, the journey began much earlier in the 1950s when the first modern computer was installed at the Indian Statistical Institute in Kolkata by Prof. P.C. Mahalanobis.

The 1960s saw the start of computer education programmes at Indian Institutes of Technology. The government of India established the department of electronics (DoE) in 1970 to oversee all aspects of electronics, including computers.

The first indigenously built TDC-312 computer was launched by the Electronics Corporation of India Ltd in 1974. The Santacruz Electronic Export Processing Zone—the first dedicated IT park—was established in Mumbai to promote the export of electronics products and software in 1973.

From a policy perspective, the 1970s was an interesting decade. While a DoE panel on minicomputers submitted a report on the indigenous manufacture of minicomputers in 1973, it was kept in the cold storage for five years.

The Foreign Exchange Regulation Act, which posed restrictions on the use of foreign exchange by Indian citizens and organizations, also came into play in 1973. The Act made it very difficult for Indian organizations to import computers. The minicomputer policy was finally announced in 1978, and companies such as DCM, ORG and HCL (founded by Shiv Nadar and team) started to make minicomputers in 1979.

The mid-1970s also saw multinational corporations dilute their stake or leave India due to the Foreign Exchange Regulation Act, leading to the establishment of the Computer Maintenance Corp. by the government to maintain existing IBM installations in India.

However, the most important policy in this era saw the DoE allowing the import of computers exclusively meant for software export, a step that in many ways set the tone for the future.

The 1980s witnessed India’s first wave of IT entrepreneurship. Wipro Information Technology Ltd (by Azim Premji and team), Infosys (by Narayana Murthy and team), NIIT (by Rajendra Pawar and team), Mastek (by Ashank Desai and team) and many more “start-ups” were established during this time.

It was during this time that the software services export market opened up lucrative opportunities. The government made some watershed decisions, including bringing in the new computer policy, which initiated liberalization of the computer industry. The Rangarajan Committee recommendations led to banking computerization. This, in turn, saw companies such as Tata Consultancy Services and Infosys develop banking products—a segment where Indian products would go on to be world leaders. The Rajaraman Committee report brought in concessions for the import of computers against software exports. The iconic Railways Passenger Reservation project was initiated in this same period.

The 1980s also saw the newly established Centre for Development of Advanced Computing set up a National Supercomputer Centre at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, and we sent our first email. Multinationals such as Citibank and Texas Instruments, for the first time, set up software development centres in India during the 1980s. This period saw several joint ventures in place to manufacture computers in India—Hinditron-DEC, HCL-HP, PSI-Bull and others, making PCs more affordable.

While the Manufacturers’ Association for Information Technology formed in 1982 represented the growing IT hardware industry, the establishment of Nasscom in 1988 gave the nascent software players a voice. The world increasingly became a connected one even though it was powered by 64kbps leased lines!

The 1990s was seminal not only for the IT and ITeS industries, but for the country as a whole. From policies that looked at regulated growth, we moved ahead, buoyed by the winds of liberalization. India’s super-computing programme was launched in 1991. The industry pioneered the global delivery model that redefined the way work was delivered. This could not have happened without the Software Technology Park scheme designed by IAS officer N. Vittal. Thousands of talented people joined the industry drawn by its promise. The industry embraced the quality movement—first with ISO 9001 and then with SEI-CMM. By 1999, 50% of the SEI-CMM Level 5 organizations in the world were from India. Indian IT majors listed on Indian and global bourses at the same time.

Encouraged by the government’s liberal policies, MNCs like IBM came back to India and expanded opportunities for the industry further. GE and Nortel set up the first large-scale offshore development centres. The Y2K opportunity opened up unprecedented opportunities for India—led by its vast technical talent pool and industry friendly policies. And thereafter, there was no looking back. By 2000, the Indian IT industry had grown to over $5 billion of revenue—that was 50x from 1990.

Today, the industry revenue stands at an estimated $160 billion, employing 3.5 million people. India is also poised to ride the next technology revolution as the third biggest start-up hub globally.

(Kris S. Goplakrishnan is co-founder, Infosys, and chairman, Axilor Ventures. He recently launched itihaasa, the first digital app tracking 60 years of Indian IT.)

Using smartphones to improve quality of city life.

Mobile devices such as smartphones are now so widely and intensely used that they have almost become extensions of the human body. Can we take advantage of this connectivity to save time, improve quality of life, and make cities run more efficiently? 

Moving towards this vision is Associate Professor Rajesh Balan at the Singapore Management University (SMU) School of Information Systems, who develops novel mobile computing technologies for diverse applications, including traffic management, digital wallets and social networking. He is also co-director of the SMU LiveLabs Urban Lifestyle Innovation Platform, a unique test bed for mobile technologies.

"This idea of creating live test beds is very exciting as it is unique and extremely useful not just for academic researchers, but also for companies that want to understand their customers better," Professor Balan says. "It also meshes very well with the government's plan to develop Singapore into a smart city."

Mobile computing in public transport:

Professor Balan was drawn to mobile computing because of its unique challenges. Like most other computing disciplines, the field makes use of technology to solve technical problems, such as extending the battery life of a smartphone. At the same time, however, human-centric technologies are also needed so that people will be willing to use the phone. "Whatever I develop has to be both technologically innovative and impressive, as well as easy to use and engaging," he explains. 

One of Professor Balan's earlier projects involved working with a large taxi company in Singapore to build a real-time trip information system. By rapidly searching a huge database of historical data, the system could predict the duration of any taxi trip to within one minute, and the fare to within 50 cents. It also took into account variables such as traffic conditions and Singapore's taxi fare structure, which charges different rates depending on the day of the week and the time of day.

The project, "Providing Real-Time Feedback for a Large Taxi Fleet", was published in 2011 in Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Mobile Systems, Applications, and Services. Besides taxis, the system also has potential to be useful to bus and train operators, as well as to logistics companies looking to improve their operations.

Society as a living laboratory: 

For Professor Balan, solutions to research questions should always be useful to people. In 2012, this focus on the end-user led him and colleague Associate Professor Archan Misra to start LiveLabs, a platform that enables researchers to test lifestyle-related mobile computing technologies on real people in real environments. LiveLabs is currently available across the SMU campus, with 3,000 students voluntarily signed up thus far. It is also being expanded to other public spaces such as the Suntec Convention & Exhibition Centre and Sentosa. 

"This kind of in situ, real-time, mobile-based behavioural test bed is unavailable anywhere else in the world," notes Professor Balan. In LiveLabs, a marketing researcher could, for example, send students working in the library two different promotions on their smartphones: a standard discount for ten percent off a cup of coffee, or a more social "buy one coffee get one free" promotion. The researcher can then observe which version proves more popular. Using sensors already existing in participants' smartphones, malls can send out personalised, location-specific shopping recommendations and discounts. To safeguard individual privacy, participation would be opt-in, and sensitive information would be removed from all the collected data.

Trials of many different mobile technologies are now underway at LiveLabs, including detecting the location of free tables and chairs in the library, automatic tracking of food consumption using a smart watch, and peer-to-peer mobile gaming that allows train commuters to play games with each other without using data networks.

The future: a nation of smart citizens:

Professor Balan believes that in the near future, mobile connectivity can be leveraged to create the concept of a "smart citizen", where "each individual will play a much stronger role in the welfare and upkeep of their environment".

For example, trash cans are now emptied only when cleaning staff physically make their rounds. With the smart citizen concept, anyone who sees a full trash can can immediately report it—through a mobile app or a web form, for instance—and activate the cleaning staff. Customers in the supermarket can report how many people are ahead of them at the checkout counter, and commuters can provide feedback on the status of subway lines.\

By providing the right incentives, an advanced version of this concept could even get people to perform micro-tasks on behalf of others. For example, an elderly person who needs a carton of milk would simply state this request into an app. The app would then find someone whose route would take him past the grocery store as well as the elderly person's home; he could then be asked to buy and deliver the milk at only a small inconvenience to himself. In return, he would be rewarded—with vouchers sponsored by a company, for instance.

"This would open up completely new and innovative ways for people to help each other, while receiving something in return for their help," he says. "I see a future where everyone is connected with everyone else, and where those connections can be used to improve society as a whole."

Uber's new API is a 'smart city' game-changer

        

      (Image Credit: iStockPhoto/RoBeDeRo)

Uber has debuted a new feature which could be a game-changer for the smart city, known as the "Uber Trip Experience" API. The wealth of data provided by Uber will allow developers to enhance their applications in new and innovative ways. 

We reported on the launch of Uber's public API last August, which provided developers with the ability to book Uber rides from within their applications. Last month, Facebook took advantage of the public API by allowing its Facebook Messenger users to order a cab and provide visual evidence of pick-up times to other participants in a chat. 

The launch of 'Trip Experience’ builds upon the aforementioned launch and focuses on helping developers to build even more immersive experiences using Uber data about the current trip. A key example here is for the developers of smart home applications to include features such as switching-on the heating as the user is close to arriving, or ensure the kettle is boiled for your caffeine fix after a particularly long journey. 

Information provided by the API includes; the current location of the cab, how much free time users will have during their journey, where the user is coming from, where they're heading to, and how long it's expected to be until they arrive. Armed with this date, in-app notifications can be provided to users at the most relevant times. 

Due to such information being particularly sensitive, Uber ensures that users will need to provide specific permission before apps can access their trip details. Users can also turn-off the feature on an app-by-app basis if required. 

Uber has launched several interesting new initiatives over the past year, including;  

UberCommute – A carpooling solution for private car owners. 
UberAssist – A service which provides better assistance for disabled individuals and senior citizens. 
UberClub – A performance-based loyalty programme for Uber drivers. 
UberPool – A ride-sharing product for Uber customers to share a cab for a reduced fare. 
It's good to see Uber continuing to be innovative during their significant growth over the past few years. We look forward to seeing what you do with the new data provided by Uber's latest API. 

Have you tried Uber's new 'Trip Experience' API?