The life and affect of St.Thomas Aquinas Research Paper

The life and affect of St.Thomas Aquinas - Research Paper Example Some claim that the family acquired the name Aquinas from the small Italian town they lived in. Saint Thomas was an exceptional and extraordinary man, who rose above all human challenges to become what he became. The writings and teachings of Saint Thomas were and will be of great impact to humankind. Though he lacked much appreciation, Thomas came to recognition roughly three hundred years ago, when they realized that he was the greatest and most influential catholic teachers of all time (Anonymous). Saint Thomas was so influential that despite his existence many centuries ago, some of his hand written work exist to date and are available in libraries. As such, this paper will provide a description of the life and affect of St. Thomas Aquinas otherwise referred to as a biography. Early life His father was Landulph Aquinas the count of Aquino and his mother Theodore the countess of teano. The Italian family of Aquino was linked to several royals of Europe like Fredrick II and Henry V I. Despite being related to the royals, the Aquino family was poor and lacked all the glory that royalty brings along. Saint Thomas had eight siblings and the family youngest child, and the sixth son of the Aquino. Saint Thomas was of light complexion, big bodied and impressive physique. Like any other human being, Thomas had a thunderstorm phobia or in other words great fear of thunderstorms. This transpired after Thomas witnessed lightning killing his little sister one night and this experience lived with him forever (Schmitz 12). Thomas had a normal life as a child though it halted when he was taken to Monte Casino when he was only nine years old. Education Saint Thomas Aquino left of the abbey of Monte Casino to enroll in religious education when he was only nine years of age. This was the norm or tradition of those early days. Saint Thomas stayed at the abbey until he was 13 years old, the time he left for Naples University to further his religious education. He excelled tremen dously and it is in the university where he explored both the natural and metaphysical work of Aristotle. At the age of nineteen years, Saint Thomas secretly joined the Dominican monks, who were enlisting young scholars at the time. In 1244, young Saint Thomas was ordained and a huge crowd of people attended the big ceremonial event. The good news spread everywhere like bush fire and eventually the family of Saint Thomas leant about the event (McInerny and O'Callaghan). They were very annoyed and thus when they strategized to bring him home despite the family’s state of poverty. They tried all possible means of retrieving their son from the clutches of the Dominicans and even went further to consulting the pope to no avail. As the family was inventing other strategies to kidnap him, Saint Thomas left for Rome at a very short notice and the family was shocked. However, despite his relocation to Rome, his brothers who were in the imperial army captured him. His brothers took hi m to a family castle and imprisoned him for almost two years. The family of Saint Thomas then grasped the chance to discourage and dissuade him from resuming to the Dominican institution. His brother even went ahead and brought him a prostitute into the prison so as to tempt him, but Saint Thomas drove her away holding on in his faith. While still in prison Saint Thomas did not stop studying and learning in his own. His

Concrete mixing Lab Report Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 5000 words

Concrete mixing - Lab Report Example e is influenced by the chemical composition of the cement, hydration as well as development of microstructure, admixtures, and characteristics of the aggregate. In addition, the quality is strongly influenced by placement, consolidation, as well as curing. The performance of the concrete throughout its service life is also largely influenced by the method employed in mixing, placing, curing and transporting the concrete. It is also necessary for the civil engineers to perform various quality control tests which should include slump tests, air content tests, as well as strength-gain-with-time tests. It is a well known fact that concretes which are considered as good and those considered as bad may have the same ingredients. The difference between good and bad concretes may come about due to the expertise of the engineer as well as the technicians who handle the concrete during construction. Concrete has been employed in many more applications in the past few decades due to the advances that have been made in concrete technology. It is necessary for civil and construction engineers to be aware of the available alternatives to the conventional concrete, roller-compacted concrete and fiber-reinforced concrete. The weight of air entraining agent should 0.05% of cement. Air is entrained in the concrete by the air-entraining admixtures which contain surface-active agents which are concentrated at the air-water interface. Bubbles are formed readily when the surface tension is lowered, and the bubbles stability remains after being formed. The mixing water foams with the air-entraining admixtures and the formed consequently locked into the paste during the hardening of concrete. The entrapped air voids are not the same as entrained air voids. This is because the air voids are formed by chance when air enters the fresh concrete during mixing whereas the entrained air voids are formed on purpose as described above. The size of the entrapped air voids can be as large as 3 mm

Professional Development of Nurses Essay Example for Free

Professional Development of Nurses Essay In 2008, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) partnered with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) to form an initiative on the future of nursing. The RWJF is an independent organization that focuses on healthcare innovations and programs such as childhood obesity, health coverage, and public health. The IOM is a non-government resource that assists the government and private agencies in making informed decisions about healthcare issues (ISNA bulletin, 2011, p. 11). This 2 year study focused on the current state of healthcare, specifically nursing, and provided recommendations to improve the nursing profession and enhance the infrastructure of healthcare. Key points were safety, technology, and interdisciplinary collaboration of practice. The study focused on nursing education, practice, and nursing’s role of leadership (Committee on the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Initiative on the Future of Nursing, at the Institute of Medicine [RWJF], 2011). The focus on education was primarily driven to advance the educational system and to further advance nursing care in the changing face of healthcare reforms. The study showed that nurses have a significant impact in healthcare, with more than 3 million members; they are posed to generate a large role in the reform of the healthcare system (Committee on the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Initiative on the Future of Nursing, at the Institute of Medicine [RWJF], 2011). The IOM strives to achieve higher levels of education through improved educational systems. Nurses are encouraged to practice to the full extent of their education and training. The IOM initiative is promoting removal of the barriers that are in place regarding scopes of practice for advanced practice nurses and to standardize the scope of practice delineations across state lines. The report recommends support of nursing education and programs expanded to graduate more upper level nurses who will then focus on becoming educators. The goal of the IOM is to have 80% more baccalaureate prepared nurses by 2020. By increasing the number of nursing programs that are now in place and changing those from purely traditional learning to a hybrid of traditional and innovative or online programs more nurses will graduate with higher degrees. Intensifying the traditional curriculum to include interprofessional collaboration, communication, and systems thinking helps to encourage higher level thinking and superior leadership skills. Additionally encouraging nurses to engage in lifelong learning to retain and renew competencies is very important; the competencies should be relative to the knowledge, experience, and practice of the nurse. Another part of the education process is the implementation of nurse residency programs. These programs are important because it takes time and experience for a nurse to become fully prepared to be functional in the acute care setting and these new opportunities will encourage the nurses to stay at the institution. This IOM report has a tremendous impact on nursing practice, particularly in primary care with the focus being on increasing nursing education to provide higher quality care for the patients. Keeping up with facility and national competencies is important to ensure that the nurse’s practice is up to date and current. Improved technology also increases the nurse’s efficiency and the amount of time that the nurse is able to spend with their patients. Additionally, this helps with the education of the patient because when the nurse is able to spend more time with the patient more effective teaching is done. Patient safety is one of the most important parts of nu rsing and by utilizing education as well as technology nurses are able to prevent critical errors and maintain patient safety more effectively. With the new Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) traditional healthcare is evolving to patient centered care delivered in the community rather than in the acute care setting. Advanced practice nurses will have a bigger â€Å"voice† in the community and an enormous impact on healthcare. This will impact me in my nursing facility because as I am better educated and up to date on my competencies, my patients are safer, I am utilizing the most recent technology in caring for them, and therefore providing them the best and safest care. The IOM report is describing an ideal world where nurses are significant as leaders, in a partnership with physicians and other healthcare professionals, in redesigning the healthcare system. To accomplish this reform, nurses must be educated as leaders by focusing on communication, professionalism, interprofessional collaboration and decision making (ISNA bulletin, 2011, p. 12). The nurse should be actively involved in identifying problems, collaborating with the physicians to seek solutions, and be committed to providing safe and effective healthcare to the patients and community. Leadership also plays an active role in policy making, institutional model development, and improving work processes. Nurses, with their backgrounds in patient care, have a unique understanding of patient well-being, institutional policies, and flow of the healthcare team which helps them to be on the forefront of change. In closing, the IOM report is a detailed description of recommendations that describe how nurses can and should be actively participating in the healthcare reform. It is time for a change and nurses have the opportunity and responsibility to participate in these transformational changes. Education, leadership, changes in nursing practice, and collaboration of the healthcare team are the keys to change. References Committee on the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Initiative on the Future of Nursing, at the Institute of Medicine. (2011). Institute of Medicine. [Article]. Retrieved from http://iom.edu/~/media/Files/Report%20Files/2010/The-Future-of-Nursing/Future%20o Fights, S. D. (2012, March/April). Nurses Lead From Where We Stand: How Can You Impact the Future Of Nursing? [Article]. MEDSURG Nursing, 21(2), 57-58. Retrieved from http://library.gcu.edu:2048/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=truedb=a9hAN=74576360site=eds-livescope=siteâ€Å"Nurses Lead from Where We Stand: How Can You Impact the Future of Nursing? IOM Report on the Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health. [Journal article]. (2011, January 11). Med-Surg Matters, 1, 3. Retrieved from http://library.gcu.edu:2048/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=truedb=rzhAN=2010978901site=eds-livescope=site†IOM Report on the Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health. Visioning the future of nursing: analysis of the IOM/RWJ foundation report [independent study]. (2011, august, September, October). Indiana State

Changes On Employees Retention And Performance In Kfc

Changes On Employees Retention And Performance In Kfc Employees are considered as the best resources particularly in the service business sector. Also employees are the key stakeholders who are affected mostly due to organisational management or ownership change. Downsizing and rightsizing are some of the key issues resulting from the mergers and acquisitions globally and this affects the international policies and strategies of the multinationals. Also employees policies are mostly at stake. This issue is, therefore, being analysed to study the impacts of frequent ownership changes in KFC particularly from 1971 to 1986 on the employees retention and growth. As KFC is a global giant in fast-food / service business sector and faced frequent ownership changes in a short span of time so this case can add value to the reader of this report and other businesses to understand the relation of employees retention, performance and productivity with the leadership / ownership issues and how such situation can be dealt. Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) An Introduction In 1930 KFC was launched and the mission was to provide quality, service and cleanliness (QSC) to the customers and consumers. Competition level was very low in the industry particularly in the domestic market. KFC growth was good in its initial decades but with the increasing competition in the domestic market the cake size started squeezing. Popeyes, the major competitor for KFC, was born in 1972 which comes second with a share (12.7%) and KFC (55.2%) (http://lidan.y3k.org/blog/en/2004/04/kfcs-localization-strategies-in-china/). In early 1950s KFC went in the foreign market (http://www.kfc.com/about/history.asp ). 3.0 Research Question Did the past frequent ownership changes in KFC have an impact on the employees retention and performance? 4.0 Objectives The key objectives of this study are to; Assess whether frequent ownership changes affect managerial policies Study whether the frequent ownership changes have an impact on employees retention rate Evaluate the impacts of organisational ownership change son employees performance Literature Review Fast-food is considered as convenience food that can be cooked and served very quickly. On the average, 1/5th of the population of the USA (which is approximately 45 million people) eats every day in a fast-food restaurant. The term fast-food denotes speed in both food preparation and customer service, as well as speed in customer eating habits. The designation, quick service (http://www.answers.com/topic/fast-food?cat=entertainment ) has been traditionally preferred by the restaurant industry. There are certain forces which makes an industry attractive globally. As fast-food industry grew in the USA competition also became tough in the domestic market. Industry faced maturity stage (http://www.kfc.com/about/history.asp). At this stage of industry life cycle companies started entering in the foreign markets in order to survive. The doors for industrial growth and reforms had opened due to the economic revolution after World War II. Governments needed the foreign businesses to come and participate in the economic development of the country. For example China relaxed its policies regarding the western service businesses particularly agricultural modernisation plans of China needed poultry industry to grow (http://www.franchisetochina.com/h3.htm). Fast-food is considered as economical and easy to cook food. Chicken is relatively cheaper ingredient as compared to mutton and beef. Also chicken growth is economical because it grows faster and consumes fewer inputs. In many Asian and Latin Americans countries chicken is traditional food. These all factors lead to economies of scale for fast food industry particularly related with chicken meals. Consumer market has changed tremendously. Drivers like global economic reforms and higher divorce rate in the USA have led to more female workers (http://lidan.y3k.org/blog/en/2004/04/kfcs-localization-strategies-in-china/) and they need ready meal to save time. The average mother of a child under 15 spends more on fast food every year than on books, music, movies and video games combined, according to a new report (Mindlin, 2008). Health conscious consumers taste has also changed. People like to have some light meal during work hours (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/sub jects/f/fast_food_industry/index.html). These forces made the industry attractive and increased the potential and demand of fast-food in the world. Fast-food industry apparently has a localisation approach. McDonalds, Pizza Hut, KFC, etc have adapted their organisational culture and menu according to host country culture and values. Particularly KFC deployed localisation strategies in China and McDonalds removed pork from its menu in India. Figure 2 below explains that a balance is necessary to achieve a successful strategic move in the foreign market. Respond locally through learning the cultural values of host country and integrate them with the companys global core values. Global Integration Local Responsiveness Cross Boundary Learning Fast-food industry flourished in the USA during the last centaury. The chicken segment was the 5th in terms of sales in the fast-food industry and there were few competitors as compared to other segments. For instance the sandwich chain segment which included McDonalds, Burger King and Wendy had 12 competitors while KFC had only 5. KFC was the overall 6th biggest (http://lidan.net/blog/2004/04/kfcs_localization_strategies_in_china.html). In 1999 fast-food industry sales rose by 5.4% with around 0.8 million restaurants in the USA and during the same period full service restaurants grew by 7%. Gradually the due to saturation in the sector companies started exiting the industry (like Boston was acquired by McDonalds) or decided to enter in the foreign markets. Domestically the chicken market seemed saturated and the growth rate in the USA was only 1% (http://lidan.y3k.org/blog/en/2004/04/kfcs-localization-strategies-in-china/). According to available literature, the estimated annual worth of the UK fast-food market is  £7.82 billion (Keynote 2003), equal to an average spend of  £20/month/adult (Schrà ¶der and McEachern, 2005). Due to busier consumer lifestyles and dual-working families with children emphasis is increasingly being placed on quick meal solutions (Atkins and Bowler 2001). Therefore there is a market growth of 19% in fast-food since 1998 (Keynote 2003). For service business sector, particularly, manpower or employees are key resources to gain profitability (Heskett and Sasser, 1994). Take figure 3 below. Customer loyalty stimulates profit and growth in the business and customers loyalty is a direct result of the customer satisfaction. Satisfaction is largely influenced by the services value provided to the customers and consumers and this value is created by the loyal, satisfied and productive employees. However employees satisfaction is resulted primarily from the high-quality support services and policies that enable the employees to deliver results to the customers (http://hbr.org/1994/03/putting-the-service-profit-chain-to-work/ar/1). Service Value Chain This model reveals that employees are key resources particularly for the service business organisations. Streamlined organisational processes and consistency in the organisational policies help facilitate the employees in service industry (particularly) to deliver quality services to the customers and add value with efficient performance to achieve sustainable growth and profitability. However consistent policies and long term strategic planning also need stability in the organisations management (http://www.referenceforbusiness.com/management/Or-Pr/Planning.html) and author also understands that the organisational ownership change should not influence and change the organisational policies especially employees policies in the service business sector at a stroke or right from day one rather lead time should be given to the employees and other stakeholders so that everybody can adjust with the changing environment. Employees are considered as a companys live hood. If employees in an organisation are highly motivated and proactive, every effort will be done by the employees to achieve the organisational goals as well as keep track of industry performance to address any potential challenges. This two-prong approach builds an organisations stability. On the other hand with low motivation level of employees an organisation is completely vulnerable to both internal and external challenges because the employees are not going the extra mile to maintain the organisations stability and thus unstable organisation ultimately underperforms (http://www.ehow.com/how-does_5407144_employee-motivation-impact-organizational-performance_.html). In todays work environment want a relaxed and hygienic work environment and have fun with a balance between the life, work and family (http://humanresources.about.com/od/motivationrewardretention/Employee_Motivation_Recognition_Rewards_Retention.htm). Literature also reveals that key employee retention is critical to the long term health and success of any business or organistaion. Managers agree that managers ole is key to retain best employees to ensure business success (http://humanresources.about.com/od/retention/a/more_retention.htm). Important organising principles include organisational values in designing HRM polices. Compensation and developing an individual are deeply related with the satisfaction and commitment of the employees which mean particularly in the service business sector employee retention and growth with performance also depends on managements policies at strategic board level (Rosete, 2006). Employees retention in the quick service industry is key to success of the business. Quick service companies retain the most desirable employees by recognizing employees contribution to the organisation because recognition is an effective leadership tool that motivates the employees and acknowledges the efforts and creativity or willingness of employees to exert extra effort. The biggest problem for the quick service industry and which creates major drains of profit and human resources is employee turnover. According to a report the annualised turnover rate of employees was 16% in 2000. The same turnover numbers as related to the quick service industry are employees 150% and management 20%. The cost of turnover shares an average cost of replacing an employee is equal to the annual salary plus benefits. In the aftermath of industry downsizing, employee loyalty is also on decline. There is 11% decline in the workers commitment. However leadership (which means a consistent organisationa l policies with least possible changes) is key to retain and develop employees because the quick service industry has a direct correlation of sales, profits as compared to employee turnover (Forrer and Guerrieri, 2002). Organisational culture is developed by the management policies and leadership style. once established, the organisational culture is highly resistant to change. Employees tend to stick to a set way of working. However frequent management or ownership changes also change the working pattern and organisational goals. This may make the employees more resistant with decreased performance (Tom and Michael, 2000). In 1930 KFC was launched with a mission to provide quality, service and cleanliness (QSC) to the customers. KFC grew well in domestic market but later competition became hard in the local market. McDonalds, Wendy, Boston etc had entered in the market leading to shrunken market size. The major competitor for KFC, Popeyes, was born in 1972 which comes second with a share (12.7%) and KFC (55.2%) (http://lidan.y3k.org/blog/en/2004/04/kfcs-localization-strategies-in-china/). In 1950s KFC went in the foreign market (http://www.kfc.com/about/history.asp). Thus KFC earned first mover advantage and brand recognition. In 1964 it entered the UK, in 1970s Japan and Asia Pacific, in 1987 China and in 1990s South Asia (http://www.kfc.com/about/history.asp). KFC has a multi domestic strategy (http://mason.gmu.edu/~tgoddar1/m411wk7.htm) to enter the foreign markets because of cultural, economical, social, legal and political factors in the host countries and this strategy also resulted in certain benefits which include; helped KFC to react to high pressures for local responsiveness, to tailor products to meet customer needs in each country of operation, to create wholly owned foreign divisions and to help core competencies transfer from home country. In addition to this; access to resources and skills in the host country, differentiation advantage through combined core competences, becoming the dominant competitor, increased profits and reduced bureaucratic costs were some of the factors to adopt multi domestic strategy. Market Entry Strategies Few Examples KFCs international composition provides a mix of foreign market entry strategies (please refer to figure 4). KFC enters the foreign / international market either through joint venture or company-owned foreign subsidiary. However mostly KFC expands its global franchise network. This is also important to know that organisational culture of KFC is mostly decentralised at operational level because franchisees are business partner or allies of KFC and the KFCs employees policies are implemented through franchising channel. It is also important here to note that organisational culture must be matched or aligned with the national culture or domestic culture. KFC is a global organisation working in many countries around the globe. KFC core organisational culture must be adapted in the host culture so that employees in the host country and customers in the host country can adopt and adapt KFCs themes and menu easily and there should be no communication gaps. This also helps facilitate the emp loyees to adjust with the organisational culture and deliver quality services to the customers. A high demand for services has been created due to the socioeconomic development in 1980s and 1990s (Davis, 2000). This reflects the potential for service businesses growth like the fast-food businesses. In recognition of the distinct nature of transitional markets (Arnold and Quelch 1998), many foreign companies have sought other ways to compete with the domestic or local offerings by clothing their brands in local costumes (Belk, 2000). According to Zhou and Hui (2003) localisation of language, product characteristics, advertising content and even product meanings is a common way accepted by the multinationals in most transitional economies. Hofstede (1980) states that culture is a complex and multifaceted construct. One of the basic dimensions of the culture is individualism collectivism. Individualistic culture stresses on independence, freedom, high levels of competition, achievement and pleasure. However the collectivistic culture has a tendency to embrace the interdependency, family security, social hierarchies, low level of the competition and cooperation (Triandis, 1993). Also advertising is a type of shared or social communication. It is reflective and indicates or specifies cultural values and norms (http://lidan.y3k.org/blog/en/2004/04/kfcs-localization-strategies-in-china/). As cultural differences are reflected by the advertising and advertising appeals which are specific approaches or ways advertisers use to communicate the customers needs and wants (Bovee and Arens, 1989), should manifest such differences across the countries. Collectivism involves the subordination of personal interests to the goals of the group and stresses on sharing, cooperation and coordination and a group welfare concern (Zhang and Neelankavil, 1997). Sometimes minor differences in the culture put major impacts on the strategies of the companies which may affect positively or negatively the employees and the customers. Some cultures are very open to franchising especially for western businesses. An example is the UK and Europe. There are big franchising association or bodies in such countries for example British Franchise Association promoting and accrediting excellence in franchising and European Franchise Federation whose aims and objectives include promotion of franchising in European countries, protecting the franchise industry with Code of Ethics, encouraging and developing franchising in European countries, requesting the interest of franchising to international organisations, promoting European franchising worldwide, serving the members along with the exchange of documentation and information between the national association or federations in Europe and in the world (http://www.thebfa.org/index.asp). Such big platforms secure the franchisors even during the recession or economic downturn or situations like credit crunch periods and provide security to foreign businesses in the host countries to come and invest in a relatively risk free environment. Also franchising is cost effective, time saving, secure and easy to learn way to enter a new country. This reflects that a right foreign market entry strategy may help reduce the impacts of recession or economic downturns (if any) but also the cultural implications need to be integrated in the organisational employees strategies so that talent retention and development can be facilitated. But it is also important to note from the following paragraphs that organisational cultures are dependent on the leadership (owners) policies and practices and a consistent policy should be there to gain long lasting profitability and employees performance with minimum organisational changes. Literature reveals that KFC has faced a lot of managerial and organisational changes since KFCs inception. The changes occurred mostly due to the changes in the ownership (or better to say in the leadership). Colonel Sanders first sold KFC in 1964 to a small group of investors that eventually took KFC public. Heublein, Inc, purchased KFC in early seventies (in 1971) and was highly involved in day to day operations. R. J. Reynolds then acquired Heublein in 1982. R. J. Reynolds had a more laid back approach and allowed business as usual at KFC. Finally in 1986, KFC was acquired by PepsiCo, which was trying to grow the quick service restaurant segment. PepsiCo, which presently runs Taco Bell, Pizza Hut and KFC, has a management style and corporate culture significantly different from that of KFC. PepsiCo has a consumer product orientation. In 1992, KFC did another reorganisation in the middle management ranks. KFC eliminated 250 out of the 1500 management positions at corporate and gave the responsibilities restaurant franchises and marketing managers (http://kelley_keith.tripod.com/mgmnt5313.html). KFC history reveals that Heublein favoured a franchising strategy but had a low RD budgets, Reynolds strategy was to leave the managers with freedom to run units with managerial expertise and PepsiCo though provided heavy financial backing to KFC but PepsiCos hard employees policies resulted in dissatisfaction, high turnover and decreased loyalty of the employees. A service business cannot afford employees dissatisfaction (Irfan, 2008 and http://lidan.y3k.org/blog/en/2004/04/kfcs-localization-strategies-in-china/ http://www.reocities.com/TimesSquare/1848/kfc.html). Literature review reveals that the weaknesses of KFC have been determined as confusing corporate direction due to selling and reselling of KFC. KFC was sold three times between 1971 and 1986. However the organisational culture of KFC and PepsiCo are conflicting with each other. KFC was based on a laid back approach while PepsiCo culture has a fast track attitude. Since the acquisition KFC employees lacked the job security that KFC employees enjoyed before. Also top management turnovers like top managers of the KFC were replaced by the PepsiCos own management have changed the organisational culture and leadership style which is creating job insecurity in the organisation (http://ivythesis.typepad.com/term_paper_topics/2009/09/kentucky-fried-chicken-and-the-global-fast-food-industry.html). In conclusion from the information above it can be revealed that mergers and acquisitions are good for business growth but when ownership changes the resulting changes in the polices and culture of the organisation not only threaten the employees but also develop a resistant to change. This sometimes leads to employees turnover or decreased performance. It does not mean that organisational change is not healthy for the organisational growth but there should be a reasonable frequency and in the organisational change pattern and particularly in the service business sector where employees are key resources to deliver value to the customers because losing skilled staff due to frequent change in the organisational policies (and sometimes change in organisational culture to which the skilled staff has stuck) may result in losing the right employees and business profitability and performance may decline. To conclude this further following methodology has been suggested in the literature to analyse such cases; A case study has been suggested as a useful approach when the area of research is relatively unknown (Marschan-Piekkari and Welch, 2004). It is a more flexible approach suited to different types of research questions and is most frequently used approach in business studies particularly international business. It has been suggested that case studies involve data collection through multiple primary and/or secondary sources such as verbal reports, personal interviews, observation and written reports (Marschan-Piekkari and Welch, 2004). Accordingly, the secondary research in this case study will involve written reports, journal articles, online information etc. 6.0 Methodology To conclude this further following methodology has been suggested in the literature to analyse such cases; A case study has been suggested as a useful approach when the area of research is relatively unknown (Marschan-Piekkari and Welch, 2004). It is a more flexible approach suited to different types of research questions and is most frequently used approach in business studies particularly international business. It has been suggested that case studies involve data collection through multiple primary and/or secondary sources such as verbal reports, personal interviews, observation and written reports (Marschan-Piekkari and Welch, 2004). Accordingly, the secondary research in this case study will involve written reports, journal articles, online information etc. The study will be an analytical case study involving secondary research. A number of business models and frameworks like service value chain, Bartlett and Ghoshal and Total Global Strategy George S. Yip will be used to analyse the situation at macro and micro levels. To meet the criteria for analytical approach (Dubey, 2009) the facts of information already available will be used and analysis of these facts will be done to make a critical evaluation of the material. It is important that there must be sufficient information to characterise, analyse and explain the unique features of the case, as well as to point out the characteristics and properties that are common to several cases or case studies. Finally, this approach relies on the integrative powers of research: the ability to study an object with many dimensions and then to draw the various elements together in a cohesive interpretation (Marschan-Piekkari and Welch, 2004). So where the area of research is relatively not known a more flexible approach which can suit the different types of research questions will be a case study approach. Also through secondary research the already available information and data is used and analysed to answer the research question but important issue is to understand that the data and information should be sufficient enough to analyse the unique features of the issue or case. 7.0 Limitations There are following limitations in this case study; Being a case study it will be focused on one company only and can give no additional analyses for the competitors business situations. Primary research is not part of the methodology in this case study. Primary research can add value by validating the past or historical information (gathered by the secondary research) under current business circumstances.

Main Types of Business Ownership Essay -- Business and Management Stud

Different types of ownership of business ranging from the simple to the complex. Here I will cover the main types, outlining the advantages and disadvantages of each leading to a decision on which type of ownership is most appropriate for my business. Types of ownership ================== There are many different types of ownership of business ranging from the simple to the complex. Here I will cover the main types, outlining the advantages and disadvantages of each leading to a decision on which type of ownership is most appropriate for my business. Sole Proprietors ================ A sole proprietor, or sole trader, is the name given to someone who runs the business by themselves. This is usually someone who is particularly skilled in one area or had a very good and marketable idea. There are many advantages and disadvantages to setting up a sole proprietorship. Advantages ========== Sole proprietorships often require less capital to start up than the bigger businesses. This is because they are usually smaller and have less staff to start with. This cost is minimal and often only a few hundred pounds. Sole proprietorships are easy to set up, few forms and licenses need to be obtained and the business can start almost straight away, resulting in less time being unemployed. The only official form you need to fill in is a inland revenue form for use when calculating income tax, it also entitles you to many tax advantages outlined later. Of course you need to write a business plan, complete with cashflow forecasts etc but this was it. These businesses are easy to maintain and run. This is because the owner has little or no oppositon for her ideas and plans. Also, it is possible for the owner to act as their own accountant, saving them lots of money. The owner has an increased level of control, they have the rite to change the business whenever they feel like it and have the advantage of not having to call shareholder meetings. One of the largest advantages is the allocation of profits. Unlike larger companies sole proprietorships don't need to distribute profit amongst it's shareholders. All profit goes directly to the owner, who does with it as he or she sees fit. Because of the owner's status as a sole trader, she does not need to publish her accounts. Therefore she can keep her business priv... ...large amounts of debt then the owners would not be obliged to pay off any of that personally. This is a big bonus to the company as it is much easier to attract potential investors who are not willing to risk unlimited liability. These are the main advantages of becoming a limited company, and while they don't seem much they are actually a huge bonus. Disadvantages ============= A limited company has to display information to the public at the end of every fiscal year. Some companies may not want so much information released. It can also be fairly expensive, costing a minimum of  £700 a year to prepare a report. Complying with the rules of the London stock exchange is also a big disadvantage to any limited company and very costly. However companies can list themselves in the alternative investment market (AIM). This is quite a lot cheaper but is seen as more risky by prospective employers. This can make it quite hard for a business to attract new shareholders. Suitability =========== Overall I think this is the most suitable choice for my business. This way I am likely to attract more investors plus I would not have to suffer from unlimited liability.

Malcolm X Essay -- essays research papers fc

Malcolm X   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Being an African American in the United States during the civil rights movement was one of toughest times to live through. The African American felt as if they were treated as non-humans being sent to the United States as slaves, being deprived of their education, forced to live in separate segregated areas, and given the careers that were the lowest paying jobs. They also had no political rights or legal protection. After the North had fought for the African American population to gain freedom from slavery, they were abandoned and were forced to fight for themselves. The Blacks were then left with much ambivalence in regard on how they would go about achieving civil rights. During this time was when a man named, Malcolm X, stood up for what he believed in and is now one of America’s greatest civil right leaders in history still today. On May 19, 1925 Malcolm Little was born in a small Midwest town called Omaha, Nebraska. He grew up in a family of eight children with his mother, Louis Norton Little, who was a homemaker and his father, Earl Little, who was a Baptist minister and supporter of Black Nationalist leader Marcus Garvey. Earl’s active part in with the civil rights provoked death threats from the white organization Black Legion, forcing the Little family to relocate. At this time Malcolm experienced friction between his parents and the child abuse of his older siblings by his mother. Despite this hostility, the family lived well in a good part of Michigan. Then one night, after a fight Rev. Little went out to take a walk, Malcolm and family were awaken by the terrible news of their father’s death. This simple act of racism drastically affected the lifestyle of the Little family, and a large insurance policy which Rev. Little signed for, refused to pay leaving the family with hardly anything. W ith only unskilled jobs to support the nine-person family, Malcolm’s mother began receiving welfare checks. With this came the deterioration of her pride and eventual mental breakdown and she was then admitted to a mental institution. Soon the family fell into poverty and could not feed themselves. After much struggle, the welfare agency split the family among various foster homes and orphanages. Malcolm was anxious to meet new friends but he found that he did not fit in with the upper-middle-class boys and girls so he g... ...the murder of Malcolm X had ties back to the Nation Of Islam and they were sentenced to life in prison. Malcolm’s death created many mixed feelings amongst the people of the world. However the influence of Malcolm X did not end with his death. Some Black activists started campaigning â€Å" Black Power† instead of the traditional anthem, â€Å"We Shall Overcome.† The actions from the African Americans started following more of Malcolm’s teachings and beliefs after his death and they eventually did not have to ask for white acceptance, and held power to create a better society for themselves. In fact many today are still learning about how he became an important figure in history. Malcolm X became a hero for black people everywhere because he was one who spoke out with controversial ideas without fear or compromise. Malcolm’s actions made him one of the most memorable leaders in our history today. Works Cited http://www.brothermalcolm.net/  © 1999 TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY BOOKS Ohio http://www.cmgww.com/historic/malcolm/bio.html http://www.galegroup.com/free_resources/bhm/bio/malcolmx.htm The African American Almanac, 7th ed., Gale, 1997. Malcolm X Talks TO Young People betty shabazz &pth

Internetworking End-to-End Requirements Essay

– Hence such characteristics as: performance, reliability, scalability, mobility, and QoS of DS are impacted by the underlying network technology and the OS ? Principles of computer networking – Every network has: ? An architecture or layers of protocols ? Packet switching for communication ? Route selection and data streaming ? Comm Subsystems (network technologies rest on): – Transmission media: wires, cables, fiber, wireless (sat, IR, RF, mwave) – Hardware devices: routers, switches, bridges, hubs, repeaters, network interfaces/card/transceivers. – Software components: protocol stacks, comm handlers/drivers, OS primitives, network-focus APIs ? Hosts – The computers and end-devices that use the comm subsystem – Subnet: A single cluster or collection of nodes, which reach each other on the same physical medium and capable of routing outgoing and incoming messages – The Internet is a collection of several subnets (or intranets) ? Networking issues for distributed systems – Initial requirements for DS applications: ftp, rlogin, email, newsgroup – Subsequent generation of DS applics. : on-line shared resources. – Current requirements: performance, reliability, scalability, mobility, security, QoS, multicasting ? Performance – Key: time to deliver unit(s) of messages between a pair of interconnected computers/devices – point-to-point latency (delay) from sending out of outgoing-buffer and receiving into incoming-buffer. Usually due to software overheads, traffic load, and path selection – Data transfer/bit rate: speed of data transfer between 2 computers (bps). Usually due to physical properties of the medium. ? Message trans time = latency + length/bit-rate ? Bandwidth vs. bit-rate. – The total system bandwidth (volume of data sent and received in a unit time, e. g. , per sec. ) is a measure of its throughput – Bit rate or transfer rate is restricted to the medium’s ability to propagate individual bits/signals in a unit time – In most LANs, e. g. , Ethernet’s, when full transmission capacity is devoted to messaging (with little or no latency), then bandwidth and bit-rate are same in measure – Local memory vs network resources: ? Applications access to shared resources on same network usually under msec ? Applications access to local memory usually under msec (1000x faster)? However, for high speed network web-server, with caches, the access time is much faster (than local disk access due to hard disk latency) ? Scalability (Internet and DSs) – Future growth of computing nodes of Internet (hosts, switches) in 109’s (100’s of 106 hosts alone) – Requires substantial changes to routing and addressing schemes (more later! ) – Current traffic (load) on Internet approx. measured by the latencies (see www. mids. org), which seem to have reduced (with advances in medium and protocol types). – Future growth and sustainability depend on economies of use, charge rate, locality/placement of shared resource? Reliability – Failures are typically, not due to the physical medium, but at the end-end (at host levels) software (application-level), therefore, error detection/correction is at the level – Suggesting that the communication subsystem need not be error-free (made transparent/hidden to user) because reliability is somewhat guaranteed at the send/receiver ends (where errors may be caused by, e. g. , buffer overflow, clock drifts causing premature timeouts) ? Security – Most intranets are protected from external (Internet-wide) DSs by firewall. – A firewall protects all the resources of an organized from unlawful/malicious access by external users, and control/monitoring of use of resources outside the firewall – A firewall (bundle of security software and network hardware) runs on a gateway – the entry/exit point of the corporate intranet – A firewall is usually configured based on corporate security policy, and filters incoming and outgoing messages. – To go beyond firewalls, and grant access to world- or Internet-wide resources, end-to-end authentication, privacy, and security (Standards) are needed to allow DSs to function – E. g., techniques are Cryptographic and Authentication – usually implemented at a level above the communication subsystem – Virtual Private Network (VPN) security concept allows intranet-level protection of such features/devices as local routers and secure links to mobile devices ? Mobility – Need wireless to support portable computers and hand-held devices – Wireless links are susceptible to, e. g. , eavesdropping, distortions in medium, out-of-sight/range transmitters/receivers – Current addressing and routing schemes are based on ‘wired’ technologies, which have been adapted and, therefore, not perfect and need extensions? QoS (Quality of Service) – Meeting deadlines and user requirements in transmitting/processing streams of real-time multimedia data – E. g. , QoS requirements: guaranteed bandwidth, timely delivery or bounded latencies, or dynamic readjustments to requirements ? Multicasting – Most transmissions are point-to-point, but several involve one-to-many (either one-to-all – broadcast or selective broadcast – multicast) – Simply sending the same message from one node to several destinations is inefficient – Multicasting technique allows single transmission to multiple destination (simultaneously) by using special addressing scheme 3. Multimedia Transmission and Internetworking Heterogeneous Systems ? Types of Networks – LANs: (confined to smaller, typically, 2. 5km diameter spread) ? higher speed, single medium for interconnection (twisted pair, coax, opt), no routing within ‘segments’ – all point-to-point (from hub), inter-segment connections via switches/hubs, low latency, low error rate ? E. g. , Ethernet, token ring, slotted ring protocols, wired. (1) Ethernet: 1970 with bandwidth of 10Mbps, with extended versions of 100/1000Mbps, lacking latency and bandwidth QoS for DSs: (2) ATM – using frame cells and optical fills the gap but expensive for LAN, newer high-speed Ethernets offer improvement and cost-effective – MANs: (confined to extended, regional area, typically, up to 50km spread) ? Based on high-bandwidth copper and fiber optics for multimedia (audio/video/voice), ? E. g. , technologies: ATM, high-speed Ethernet (IEEE 802. 6 – protocols for MANs), DSL (digital subscriber line) using ATM switches to switch digitized voice over twisted pair @ 0. 25-6Mbps within 1. 5km, cable modem uses coax @ 1. 5Mpbs using analog signaling on TV networks and longer distances than DSL – WANs: (worldwide, lower speeds over sets of varying types of circuits with routers) ? High latency (due to switching and route searching) between 0. 1-0. 5s, signaling speed around 3x105km/s (bounds latency) plus propagation delay (round-trip) of about 0. 2s if using satellite/geostationary dishes; generally slower at 10-100kbps or best 1-2Mbps – Wireless: (connecting portable, wearable devices using access points) ? Common protocol – IEEE 802. 11 (a, b, and now g) (WaveLAN) @ 2-11Mbps (11g’s bandwidth near 54Mbps) over 150m creating a WLANs, some mobiles connected to fixed devices – printers, servers, palmtops to create a WPANs (wireless personal area networks) using IR links or low-powered Bluetooth radio network tech @ 1-2Mbps over 10m. ? Most mobile cell phones use Bluetooth tech. e. g. , European GSM standard and US, mostly, analog-based AMP cellular radio network, atop by CDPD – cellular digital packet data communication system, operating over wider areas at lower speed 9. 6-19. 2kbps.? Tiny screens of mobiles and wearables require a new WAP protocol – Internetworks ? Building open, extendible system for DSs, supporting network heterogeneity, multi-protocol system involving LANs, MANs, WLANs, connected by routers and gateways with layers of software for data and protocol conversions – creating a ‘virtual network’ using underlying physical networks ? E. g. , the Internet using TCP/IP (over several other physical protocols) – Comparisons ? Range of performance characteristics: ? Frequency and types of failures, when used for DS applics? Packet delivery/loss, duplicates (masked at TCP level to guarantee some reliability and transparency to DSs; but may use UDP – faster but less reliable and DS applic’s responsibility to guarantee reliability) Diagram 3. 2 Network Principles †¢ Packet Transmission †¢ Packet transmission superseded telephone/telegraph switched network †¢ Messages are packetized and packets are queued, buffered (in local storage), and transmitted when lines are available using asynchronous transmission protocol †¢ Data Streaming †¢ Multimedia data can’t be packetized due to unpredicted delays. AV data are streamed at higher frequency and bandwidth at continuous flow rate †¢ Delivery of multimedia data to its destination is time-critical / low latency – requiring end-to-end predefined route †¢ E. g. networks: ATM, IPv6 (next generation – will separate ‘steamed’ IP packets at network layer; and use RSVP (resource reserv. protocol) resource/bandwidth prealloc and RTP play-time/time-reqs (real-time transp protocol) at layers 3 & 1, respectively) to work ? Switching Schemes – 4 Kinds of switching methods typically used. – Broadcast – no switching logic, all nodes ‘see’ signals on circuits/cells (e.g. , Ethernet, wireless networks) – Circuit Switching – Interconnected segments of circuits via switches/exchange boxes, e. g. , POTS (Plain Old Telephone System) – Packet Switching – Developed as computing tech advanced with processors and storage spaces using store-and-forward algorithms and computers as switches. Packets are not sent instantaneously, routed on different links, reordered, may be lost, high latency (few msec – msecs). Extension to switch audio/video data brought integration of ‘digitized’ data for computer comm. , telephone services, TV, and radio broadcasting, teleconferencing. – Frame Relay – PS (not instantaneous, just an illusion! ), but FR, which integrates CS and PS techniques, streams smaller packets (53 byte-cells called frames) as bits at processing nodes. E. g. , ATM – Protocols – – Protocols – implemented as pairs of software modules in send/receive nodes, – Specify the sequence of messages for transmission – Specify the format of the data in the messages – Protocols Layers – layered architecture, following the OSI suite – packets are communicated as peer-to-peer transmission but effected vertically across layers by encapsulation method over a physical medium Protocols Suites – The 7-layered architecture of the ISO-OSI †¢ Each layer provides service to the layer above it and extends the service provided by the layer below it †¢ A complete set of protocol layers constitute a suite or stack †¢ Layering simplifies and generalizes the software interface definitions, but costly overhead due to encapsulations and protocol conversions Diagram 3. 3 4. Service Provider Management On the Internet, a management service provider (MSP) is a company that manages information technology services for other companies. For example, a company could hire an MSP to configure and administer its business computers and related systems on a continuing basis, saving the company. An MSP is a service provider that offers system and network management tools and expertise. An MSP typically has its own data center that runs advanced network management software such as HP OpenView or Tivoli. It uses these tools to actively monitor and provide reports on aspects of its customer’s networks, including communication links, network bandwidth, servers, and so on. The MSP may host the customer’s Web servers and application servers at its own site. The services provided by MSPs have been called â€Å"Web telemetry† services. The MSP Association defines MSPs as follows: Management Service Providers deliver information technology (IT) infrastructure management services to multiple customers over a network on a subscription basis. Like Application Service Providers (ASPs), Management Service Providers deliver services via networks that are billed to their clients on a recurring fee basis. Unlike ASPs, which deliver business applications to end users, MSPs deliver system management services to IT departments and other customers who manage their own technology assets. TriActive is an example of an MSP. It provides management and monitoring of PCs, servers, networks, and Web sites from its own NOC (network operations center), which is hosted by Exodus Communications. Exodus ensures that the NOC has fully redundant power, network connectivity, routing, and switching to ensure maximum reliability and integrity. A â€Å"microagent† interacts with customer systems to provide system management. The agent is lightweight and designed for use over the Internet. It acts as a universal agent invoking and managing other agents and programs as required for specific actions. The service is delivered via the Web through a secure Internet portal that lets customers view management information, based on their role in the organization. For example, CIOs can view overall management information while help desk technicians can check call queues, escalations, and open ticket status. Systems analysts can conduct asset inventories and view virus reporting. Objective Systems Integrators is another management service provider that provides software solutions for unified network, service application, and process management. OSI was recently acquired by Agilent Technologies. A list of other MSPs may be found at the MSP Association Web site. Web application and infrastructure monitoring and management have suddenly become critical, yet the tools to do them are lacking. Management service providers (MSP), the latest addition to the current slew of service providers, claim to offer products and services that will oversee your Web operations. Companies staking claims as early MSPs include Candle Corp. in Santa Monica, Calif. ; InteQ Corp. in Burlington, Mass. ; and Nuclio Corp. in Skokie, Ill. What makes MSPs distinctive is that their products and services are provided over the Internet on a subscription basis. That means â€Å"MSPs can achieve economies of scale that companies who license software cannot,† says Christopher Booth, head of technical operations at FreightWise Inc. , a Forth Worth, Texas-based online transportation exchange. Though he declined to say how much his company is paying to use Nuclio’s MSP, Booth did say that the service has been â€Å"very advantageous. † The cost savings that MSPs can pass on may help them catch on with corporate customers. Gartner Group Inc. in Stamford, Conn., estimates that the $90 million MSP market will balloon to more than $3. 25 billion by 2005. 5. Programmable/Cognitive Networks A key strength of the Internet has been to reduce the intelligence within the network to that required placed at strategic places within the network such as at administrative boundaries, or at locations where there is a large mismatch between bandwidth, or where the certain location specific services can be used. Others believe that the entire architecture should be rethought as a computational environment, in which everything can be programmed, and the entire network becomes active. The research in this area is aimed at discovering how viable it is to open up such elements of the communications architecture as the routing table. A fundamental question raised by both the active service and the active network approaches is how to ensure that the shared resource of the network remains safe and is protected from misbehaving programs. Programs can abuse the network by generating packet explosions and can abuse the shared processor by using all the memory and the processor cycles. Worse, they may subvert the working of correct programs so that they too break. If network programmability is going to be available to the application designers, we need to ensure that they do not break things by accident, let alone by intention. Traditional systems approaches to protection are based upon what a program should be able to do, then using runtime checks to ensure that the program doesn’t exceed these bounds. This leads to the sandbox model of protection, as used in Java and enhanced to provide protection for Active Networks. However, there are major problems with this approach. First, each runtime check reduces the performance of the system, increasing the overhead of each use of system resources. Second, it is very difficult to ensure that the protection mechanisms are correct, and cannot be subverted in any way. An alternative approach is to use compile time checks upon what the program is doing. This uses the type system to represent predicates about program functionality and if a program is well-typed, then it proves the program to obey the policies implemented in the type system. This approach has been used to allow users to run programs within the kernel as in Spin, and in protecting access to router functionality in the Switchware project. †¢ To provide a network programming language based on Internet `best effort’ communication. †¢ To provide scaleable high-level communication based on `remote spawn’ from which other communication can be built. †¢ To make use of types as safety properties, to ensure that the safety and security policies of the network are maintained. †¢ To rapidly prototype tools such as compilers and simulators in order to drive the development of the language by examples. Best-effort distributed programming In the Internet, an application transmits a packet, which is sent to the next router on the way to the destination. At this router, the arrival of the packet causes code to run, which calls other code dependent upon the fields in the header of the packet. This code may access and modify local state stored in the router and then copy or create one or more packets to be sent out from the router. These packets are then routed on output links depending upon the destination for each packet, and so on until the packets reach their destination, or are destroyed within the network for whatever reason. In our programming model, we have attempted to replicate this basic structure of packet transmission. In the Internet, the arrival of a packet initiates some thread of control which uses the data within the packet to decide upon the disposition of the packet. In our model, a packet becomes a thread of control, carrying the code to be run and the names or values of any data referenced within that code. When a thread arrives at a Safetynet-aware router or end system, the thread code is instantiated within the runtime and runs within a de_ned scheduling class. The thread of control may call other code to be run on its behalf. The other code is encapsulated within classes, which are either present in the router, or are dynamically loaded from elsewhere. Threads can spawn other threads, either locally or on the next hop to some destination. 6. Design of an Internetwork We will discuss about the networking especially the internetworking. In this case we will need to discuss some topics related with the Internet Infrastructure, Internet routing, domain name and address resolution, internet protocol and the applications. Internet Infrastructure: The Internet backbone is made up of many large networks which interconnect with each other. These large networks are known as Network Service Providers or Naps. Some of the large Naps are UUNet, Cerf Net, IBM, BBN Planet, Sprint Net, PSINet, as well as others. These networks peer with each other to exchange packet traffic. Each NSP is required to connect to three Network Access Points or NAPs. At the NAPs, packet traffic may jump from one NSP’s backbone to another NSP’s backbone. NSPs also interconnect at Metropolitan Area Exchanges or MAEs. MAEs serve the same purpose as the NAPs but are privately owned. NAPs were the original Internet interconnects points. Both NAPs and MAEs are referred to as Internet Exchange Points or IXs. NSPs also sell bandwidth to smaller networks, such as ISPs and smaller bandwidth providers. Below is a picture showing this hierarchical infrastructure. Diagram 4 This is not a true representation of an actual piece of the Internet. Diagram 4 is only meant to demonstrate how the NSPs could interconnect with each other and smaller ISPs. None of the physical network components are shown in Diagram 4 as they are in Diagram 3. This is because a single NSP’s backbone infrastructure is a complex drawing by itself. Most NSPs publish maps of their network infrastructure on their web sites and can be found easily. To draw an actual map of the Internet would be nearly impossible due to its size, complexity, and ever-changing structure. The Internet Routing Working: It is general phenomenon that No computer knows where any of the other computers are, and packets do not get sent to every computer. The information used to get packets to their destinations is contained in routing tables kept by each router connected to the Internet. The Routers are called the packet switches. A router is usually connected between networks to route packets between them. Each router knows about its sub-networks and which IP addresses they use. The router usually doesn’t know what IP addresses are ‘above’ it. Examine Diagram 5 below. The black boxes connecting the backbones are routers. The larger NSP backbones at the top are connected at a NAP. Under them are several sub-networks, and under them, more sub-networks. At the bottom are two local area networks with computers attached. Diagram 5 When a packet arrives at a router, the router examines the IP address put there by the IP protocol layer on the originating computer. The router checks its routing table. If the network containing the IP address is found, the packet is sent to that network. If the network containing the IP address is not found, then the router sends the packet on a default route, usually up the backbone hierarchy to the next router. Hopefully the next router will know where to send the packet. If it does not, again the packet is routed upwards until it reaches a NSP backbone. The routers connected to the NSP backbones hold the largest routing tables and here the packet will be routed to the correct backbone, where it will begin its journey ‘downward’ through smaller and smaller networks until it finds its destination. Domain Names and Address Resolution. But what if you don’t know the IP address of the computer you want to connect to? What if the you need to access a web server referred to as www. anothercomputer. com? How does your web browser know where on the Internet this computer lives? The answer to all these questions is the Domain Name Service or DNS. The DNS is a distributed database which keeps track of computer’s names and their corresponding IP addresses on the Internet. Many computers connected to the Internet host part of the DNS database and the software that allows others to access it. These computers are known as DNS servers. No DNS server contains the entire database; they only contain a subset of it. If a DNS server does not contain the domain name requested by another computer, the DNS server re-directs the requesting computer to another DNS server. Diagram 6 The Domain Name Service is structured as a hierarchy similar to the IP routing hierarchy. The computer requesting a name resolution will be re-directed ‘up’ the hierarchy until a DNS server is found that can resolve the domain name in the request. Figure 6 illustrates a portion of the hierarchy. At the top of the tree are the domain roots. Some of the older, more common domains are seen near the top. What is not shown are the multitude of DNS servers around the world which form the rest of the hierarchy? When an Internet connection is setup (e. g. for a LAN or Dial-Up Networking in Windows), one primary and one or more secondary DNS servers are usually specified as part of the installation. This way, any Internet applications that need domain name resolution will be able to function correctly. For example, when you enter a web address into your web browser, the browser first connects to your primary DNS server. After obtaining the IP address for the domain name you entered, the browser then connects to the target computer and requests the web page you wanted. The Disable DNS in Windows If you’re using Windows 95/NT and access the Internet, you may view your DNS server(s) and even disable them. If you use Dial-Up Networking: Open your Dial-Up Networking window (which can be found in Windows Explorer under your CD-ROM drive and above Network Neighborhood). Right click on your Internet connection and click Properties. Near the bottom of the connection properties window press the TCP/IP Settings†¦ button. If you have a permanent connection to the Internet: Right click on Network Neighborhood and click Properties. Click TCP/IP Properties. Select the DNS Configuration tab at the top. You should now be looking at your DNS servers’ IP addresses. Here you may disable DNS or set your DNS servers to 0. 0. 0. 0. (Write down your DNS servers’ IP addresses first. You will probably have to restart Windows as well. ) Now enter an address into your web browser. The browser won’t be able to resolve the domain name and you will probably get a nasty dialog box explaining that a DNS server couldn’t be found. However, if you enter the corresponding IP address instead of the domain name, the browser will be able to retrieve the desired web page. (Use ping to get the IP address prior to disabling DNS. ) Other Microsoft operating systems are similar. Internet protocols: As hinted to earlier in the section about protocol stacks, one may surmise that there are many protocols that are used on the Internet. This is true; there are many communication protocols required for the Internet to function. These include the TCP and IP protocols, routing protocols, medium access control protocols, application level protocols, etc. The following sections describe some of the more important and commonly used protocols on the Internet. Higher-level protocols are discussed first, followed by lower level protocols. Application Protocols: HTTP and the World Wide Web One of the most commonly used services on the Internet is the World Wide Web (WWW). The application protocol that makes the web work is Hypertext Transfer Protocol or HTTP. Do not confuse this with the Hypertext Markup Language (HTML). HTML is the language used to write web pages. HTTP is the protocol that web browsers and web servers use to communicate with each other over the Internet. It is an application level protocol because it sits on top of the TCP layer in the protocol stack and is used by specific applications to talk to one another. In this case the applications are web browsers and web servers. HTTP is a connectionless text based protocol. Clients (web browsers) send requests to web servers for web elements such as web pages and images. After the request is serviced by a server, the connection between client and server across the Internet is disconnected. A new connection must be made for each request. Most protocols are connection oriented. This means that the two computers communicating with each other keep the connection open over the Internet. HTTP does not however. Before an HTTP request can be made by a client, a new connection must be made to the server. When you type a URL into a web browser, this is what happens: If the URL contains a domain name, the browser first connects to a domain name server and retrieves the corresponding IP address for the web server. The web browser connects to the web server and sends an HTTP request (via the protocol stack) for the desired web page. The web server receives the request and checks for the desired page. If the page exists, the web server sends it. If the server cannot find the requested page, it will send an HTTP 404 error message. (404 mean ‘Page Not Found’ as anyone who has surfed the web probably knows. ) The web browser receives the page back and the connection is closed. The browser then parses through the page and looks for other page elements it needs to complete the web page. These usually include images, applets, etc. For each element needed, the browser makes additional connections and HTTP requests to the server for each element. When the browser has finished loading all images, applets, etc.the page will be completely loaded in the browser window. Retrieving a Web Page Using HTTP: Telnet is a remote terminal service used on the Internet. Its use has declined lately, but it is a very useful tool to study the Internet. In Windows find the default telnet program. It may be located in the Windows directory named telnet. exe. When opened, pull down the Terminal menu and select Preferences. In the preferences window, check Local Echo. (This is so you can see your HTTP request when you type it. ) Now pull down the Connection menu and select Remote System. Enter www. google. com for the Host Name and 80 for the Port. (Web servers usually listen on port 80 by default. ) Press Connect. Now type GET / HTTP/1. 0 And press Enter twice. This is a simple HTTP request to a web server for its root page. You should see a web page flash by and then a dialog box should pop up to tell you the connection was lost. If you’d like to save the retrieved page, turn on logging in the Telnet program. You may then browse through the web page and see the HTML that was used to write it. Most Internet protocols are specified by Internet documents known as a Request for Comments or RFCs. RFCs may be found at several locations on the Internet. See the Resources section below for appropriate URL’s. HTTP version 1. 0 is specified by RFC 1945. Application Protocols: SMTP and Electronic Mail: Another commonly used Internet service is electronic mail. E-mail uses an application level protocol called Simple Mail Transfer Protocol or SMTP. SMTP is also a text-based protocol, but unlike HTTP, SMTP is connection oriented. SMTP is also more complicated than HTTP. There are many more commands and considerations in SMTP than there are in HTTP. When you open your mail client to read your e-mail, this is what typically happens: The mail client (Netscape Mail, Lotus Notes, Microsoft Outlook, etc.) opens a connection to its default mail server. The mail server’s IP address or domain name is typically setup when the mail client is installed. The mail server will always transmit the first message to identify itself. The client will send an SMTP HELO command to which the server will respond with a 250 OK message. Depending on whether the client is checking mail, sending mail, etc. the appropriate SMTP commands will be sent to the server, which will respond accordingly. This request/response transaction will continue until the client sends an SMTP QUIT command. The server will then say goodbye and the connection will be closed. Transmission Control Protocol: Under the application layer in the protocol stack is the TCP layer. When applications open a connection to another computer on the Internet, the messages they send (using a specific application layer protocol) get passed down the stack to the TCP layer. TCP is responsible for routing application protocols to the correct application on the destination computer. To accomplish this, port numbers are used. Ports can be thought of as separate channels on each computer. For example, you can surf the web while reading e-mail. This is because these two applications (the web browser and the mail clien.