Orkut Flaw

Orkut, the premier online social networking software, has a serious flaw. While trying to update my profile photo, I discovered that there was no way to delete the previous profile photo. The only way to change the picture was to upload a new one. Hence, replacing the older one. So what happens to the old picture? Surely, implementing a delete algorithm is not difficult and requires a few lines

Posted on: 12 April 2005 | 12:06 pm

The Freedom of Information Act

The Freedom of Information Act is probably the biggest hindrance to e-government efforts in Pakistan. As of now, anything declared as classified by the federal government is considered out of bounds. Technically, this means each and every piece of information could be excluded from public scrutiny. It does not take a lawyer to figure out how such vague laws could be misused.The e-government

Posted on: 14 March 2005 | 7:17 pm

Corporate Blogging and Financial Treatment

Blogs are proving to be an excellent communications tool. By forging one-to-one relationships with customers, organizations have discovered a new medium to retain the customers. Organizational theories have confirmed that retention is more financially feasible than exploring newer ones. This is claim is backed by research and known to all executives.Uusing a blog often signifies the redefinition

Posted on: 8 March 2005 | 5:05 am

Virtual Psychology

Virtual World requires a whole new branch in psychology that deals with issues of- Internet addiction- Personality changes in chat rooms- Virtual needs of today's net users- Human emotional needs and desires and how these are fulfilled virtually (love, sex, belongingness, friends, recognition)- Net related stress, hypertension, fear, anxiety My goal in this and many of the later posts would be to

Posted on: 6 March 2005 | 11:45 am

E-government is simply providing better services to the public using electronic means. By adding a layer between the government and the public, e-government can provide quality services that reach the maximum possible people. Have a look at the elementary model below that explains the concept of e-government. The e-government layer in the preceding model could provide the benefits depicted in

Posted on: 20 January 2005 | 8:29 am

Offshore Outsourcing Dead?

Are we about to face another war?A war against outsourcing.According to this article, the American job market is continuously experiencing a downward shift due to offshore outsourcing. A strategy shift at bringing down offshore outsourcing is a thorny idea for our region.Read this article and tell me if you think offshore outsourcing could be used as a new weapon.http://www.newsfactor.com/

Posted on: 19 January 2005 | 12:48 pm

Delusions

Software Engineering is a continuous process that involves a series of steps. In a nutshell, an ideal software engineering approach starts by analyzing the problem and culminates at delivering a solution. This solution must be both technically and economically feasible.Feasibility is like a coin. It has two faces: one deals with organizational variables such as profitability and Return on

Posted on: 6 January 2005 | 11:44 am

IT Growth Structure

Why have been Pakistani businesses slow to adopt IT despite tremendous benefits? After thinking over it for some time, I came up with a growth structure that we have followed thus far. Apart from the inconsistent and derogatory policies, the growth structure that we followed is unsatisfactory. It is depicted below: In such a structure, there is more supply than demand at the initial stages,

Posted on: 3 January 2005 | 11:11 am

Food for Thought

Could the Internet ever end?Would it ever be 100 percent secure?Would we ever see the end of virus attacks?Could the organizational investment in IT be happily and fairly justified by IT managers, ever?Would the Internet ever be free of spam nuisance?Could the Internet ever be free?

Posted on: 8 December 2004 | 9:20 am

Has Competitive Intelligence Gone Too Far?

Companies today recognize the dynamics of the new digital economy: customization, digitization, personalization, Just-in-Time processes and lack of inventory. In their bid to leverage the new model to their benefits, companies have found the Internet to be a reliable and efficient information arbiter. Gathering data about the consumers' behavior to gain competitive intelligence is the first

Posted on: 8 December 2004 | 9:16 am

Could the Internet Ever Replace the book?

I am always hearing my friends degrading the status that a book has. Some claim that whatever is found in the books is hardly applicable in the real world, so why bother reading them. Still others from the same school of thought attribute their belief to the Internet. Here is an interesting article that talks about why the Internet may never replace a conventional library of books.Perhaps, it is

Posted on: 8 December 2004 | 9:02 am

Google Scholar

Google has an amazing sense of business. It's engineers and business analysts seem to be more competent than of any other in the industry. Take Google Scholar for example. There is nothing new that Google couldnt already do. Google had allowed the use of prefixes that allowed filtering of online documents through its google.com entry point. The scholar.google.com service is basically a front-end

Posted on: 22 November 2004 | 10:48 am

Google Search Techniques

Students these days are well aware of the power of search engines for their assignments, reports, presentations, etc. The load of information accessible via the Internet has made the use of search engines very popular among students, especially those enrolled in undergraduate and graduate programs. Search engines amass a wealth of information on a daily basis and sorting through the results could

Posted on: 22 November 2004 | 10:41 am

IT Education : Time for a Radical Change

IT is an acronym for what many people consider to be the path to more money, a better career or land at the highest echelons of the social circle. Judging by the existence of various round-the- corner IT institutes in various localities of Karachi, demand for an IT education seems to know of no limits. The abundance of institutes and universities offering courses in the various disciplines of IT

Posted on: 21 November 2004 | 6:43 am

SWOT Analysis for Firefox

Strengths: a) free of cost b) integrated download manager c) integrated popup blocker d) integrated spyware detection e) integrated adware detection f) makes for a small download - 4.9 MB Weaknesses: a) in competition with Microsoft - which as we all know is loaded. b) doesnt come integrated with Windows Opportunities: a) more feasible for markets where intellectual property rights are

Posted on: 21 November 2004 | 6:32 am

Digital Pakistan News Aggregator Launched

Hello, I have recently put out my news aggregator for beta testing. Users can quickly add ATOM feeds of their blogs and then generate code to add live content to their blogs. Please give me your comments on the service. The URL is http://cyberdev.visit.ws

Posted on: 28 October 2004 | 9:39 pm

Has BLUETOOTH replaced the Singles' Bar in Europe?

There is a trend these days in Britain to find a date using BLUETOOTH. BLUETOOTH technology allows people to send anonymous messages to people in a close vicinity. Read this article to find out more. http://mklink.com/email/mkLINKNewsletter/april-newsletter/april.html It's quite interesting.

Posted on: 23 October 2004 | 8:28 pm

Who is the Culprit: MSN or GMAIL?

For the past few days I have been receiving strange emails from a known email address with a hotmal.com domain! What happened was that a person contacted me on my GMAIL account via an email address with a Pakistani SMTP and IP address. I added this person to my MSN. After about an hour of adding this person, I received a sex email with an attachment that my hotmail account detected as infected.

Posted on: 23 October 2004 | 7:53 pm

Congratulations LUMS!

An international panel of experts has selected the work of the students of Lahore University of Management Sciences who made it to the top ten of the IEEE Computer Society's 5th Annual International Design Competition (CSIDC), 2004 held at Washington DC- USA. Their project was titled "SensUS Structure Security System." The system is actually a sensor based for security purposes. It can detect

Posted on: 23 October 2004 | 7:47 pm

CBR Plans Reference Value Database

According to the DAWN Business, Friday Oct. 22, 2004, CBR has decided to establish a database with the intent "for maintaining uniformity in assessment of imported goods at all custom stations." The effort is worth a pat on the back.How manu custom officials would actually consult such a database is anybody's guess. Unless the plague of corruption is carefully diagnosed and eradicated, such

Posted on: 22 October 2004 | 7:41 pm

Federal Govt Data Center and Intranet

The federal government has decided to setup a data center and an intranet. The strategy is to construct a data warehouse and automate the federal government operations. Seems encouraging.

Posted on: 22 October 2004 | 7:36 pm

Spam Mail on Rise

Spam Mail is at it again! The back to school season and the US Presidential Elections in November were subjects of about 82 percent of spam mail sent this August.

Posted on: 21 October 2004 | 8:03 pm

India under the Spotlight Again

Offshore outsourcing has come under the spotlight as an antagonist because of stolen code. According to Computer World Pakistan, Australian companies have began to rethink their corporate IT strategies while outsourcing projects to India. According to Ajoy Ghosh, a IT security consultant at Jolly Technologies in Mumbai, jacked code is partly due to the lack of strict laws relating to

Posted on: 21 October 2004 | 7:55 pm

Added Live Content Syndication to Digital Pakistan

I have recently added a content syndication for this blog. You can see it right above the shoutbox. If you would like to add content syndication to your blogs, please email me at rafayali@gmail.com. I am also working on a script for a membership based site that would automatically allow people to create content syndication individually. Wish me Luck! I need all that I can get :)

Posted on: 21 October 2004 | 4:26 pm

Use Blogs to Earn Money

Ever wondered how to make money using your blog? Stop wondering and start clicking. http://sheysrebellion.ipadder.com/?view_id=5706#cstart

Posted on: 20 October 2004 | 11:22 am