18 December 2012

What Is Moore’s Law, And What Does It Have To Do With You? [MakeUseOf Explains]



moore's law Bad luck has nothing to do with Moore’s Law. If that is the association you had, you are confusing it with Murphy’s Law. However, you were not far off because Moore’s Law and Murphy’s Law are connected.


Moore’s Law was formulated by Gordon E. Moore, co-founder of Intel. In 1965 he reported observations about how fast semiconductor technology had advanced since the late 50s. Based on this data, Moore made projections for the future development of semiconductors, i.e. microchips and microprocessors. This Law has held true ever since.


Much more than that, it has served as a guiding principle for many companies in the industry. Although the technology repeatedly faced challenges that seemed like they would bring development to a halt and break Moore’s Law, engineers kept solving them with ever new innovations. Due to its history, Moore himself once described his law as a violation of Murphy’s Law: “Everything gets better and better.


And according to Intel, this trend will continue for at least another decade, a statement they have been issuing for more than three decades.


What Is Moore’s Law?


In 1965 Gordon E. Moore published his observation that the number of transistors per square inch on integrated circuits had doubled approximately every year since the invention of the integrated circuit in 1958.


At the time Moore predicted this trend would continue for at least ten more years. In his 1965 paper Cramming More Components Onto Integrated Circuits Moore wrote:



With unit cost falling as the number of components per circuit rises, by 1975 economics may dictate squeezing as many as 65,000 components on a single silicon chip.



This projection wasn’t quite right. When by 1975 chips only held 10,000 transistors each, he updated his prediction to a doubling approximately every two years. Almost 50 years later, Moore’s (updated) Law still holds true. Today, over a billion transistors find space on a single chip.


moore's law


Intel:



If the transistors in a microprocessor were represented by people, the [above] timeline gives an idea of the pace of Moore’s Law. Now imagine those 1.3 billion people [at the end of the timeline] could fit onstage in the original music hall [at the beginning of the timeline]. That’s the scale of Moore’s Law.



Why Did Moore’s Law Persist?


As Moore himself anticipated, the economics dictated the continuous development. In its original formulation, Moore’s Law was already tightly associated with minimum component costs.



The complexity for minimum component costs has increased at a rate of roughly a factor of two per year.



In other words, Moore’s projection for the future was also based on the observation that costs had decreased with increasing complexity. However, Moore emphasized that each evolution of the technology has a specific complexity that achieves minimum component costs. When complexity increases beyond this point, so does vulnerability to defects, narrowing the yield and thus effectively increasing component costs. Thus constant evolution of the technology, driven by innovation, has been and always will be inevitable if Moore’s Law is to be upheld.


So to fully answer the question why Moore’s Law is in effect until this day, we must also examine its effect on technology.


what is moore's law


What Effect Did Moore’s Law Have On Technology?


Moore’s Law became widely accepted and the industry began to establish road maps and set goals based on Moore’s projection. As the production of integrated circuits became more complex and involved the interplay of various specialized companies, a plan was needed to help all parties set individual targets and advance at an equal pace.


Since 1998, the ITRS (International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors), a yearly report produced by a group of semiconductor industry experts, provides the basis for such a plan. The ITRS documents assess the directions of research in all areas relevant to semiconductors and provide timelines for up to 15 years into the future. Ultimately, the law has been serving as a vision for an entire industry and has become something like a perpetual self-fulfilling prophecy.


What Does Moore’s Law Have to Do With Me?


On the one hand Moore’s Law has fueled technological advancement. An entire industry was driven to keep up with Moore’s projection. As a result, many of Moore’s other predictions about technology, e.g. home computers or personal portable communications equipment have also been realized. Today, all of us enjoy and benefit from this technology, we have become used to fast paced developments, and are anticipating future innovations. So you, a representative of the customer side, are said to keep expecting and demanding technological advancements. Do you?


moore's law


On one of the flip-sides of Moore’s Law, however, we have The Great Moore’s Law Compensator (TGMLC), also known as software bloat or Wirth’s Law, and several derivatives. TGMLC is based on the adage coined by Swiss computer scientist Niklaus Wirth, who in 1995 quoted Martin Reiser in his paper A Plea for Lean Software:



Software is getting slower more rapidly than hardware becomes faster.



So in essence, end users don’t necessarily benefit from developments on the hardware side, as software developers feel compelled or liberated to create products that are equally more complex and resource hungry.


A popular example is Microsoft Office. In 2008, Randall C. Kennedy, a former Intel employee, demonstrated TGMLC using a standard computer of the year 2000 running Office 2000 and a standard computer of the year 2007 running Office 2007. When both versions of Office ran the same task, Office 2007 did so at half the speed of Office 2000.


So you’re not crazy when your new computer seems slower than your old one after very little time. Chances are, you merely updated your software.


Conclusion


What you can learn from Moore’s Law is that the future can be shaped by goals. If a simple law can unleash this enormous creativity to fuel constant innovation and motivate an entire industry to continuously work together to meet a boring and above that imaginary number target, imagine what a compelling vision could do. Focusing on a positive and desirable future will help you manage even the greatest challenges.


What do you anticipate for the future?


Image credits: Futuristic Microchip via Shutterstock, Moore’s Law Visualized, Microprocessor Transistor Counts, Customers


The post What Is Moore’s Law, And What Does It Have To Do With You? [MakeUseOf Explains] appeared first on MakeUseOf.



Maxthon Cloud Browser: A Completely Different Browsing Experience



maxthon web browserMaxthon has come a very long way since originally dubbing themselves as a mere replacement to Internet Explorer. As MyIE Browser, it boasted features like tabbed browsing and mouse gestures. Today, it’s much more.


You and I have both witnessed browsers like Rockmelt come and go without even denting the browser market. While Maxthon currently has no significant presence beside names like Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and IE, it’s still worth your attention. I’ve seen competing browsers take an approach to cloud browsing and do it much less effectively.


Let’s check out what new developments have come to the latest version of Maxthon and go over what makes this application interesting.


Maxthon


If you used Maxthon more than a year ago, I’m not doubting you if you say that you weren’t impressed. Maxthon offered absolutely nothing new to the world of web browsing and, at the very best, it came across as the next best browser to Internet Explorer (wherever that may reside in the rankings).


maxthon web browser


The browser climate has now completely evolved, and everything is now up in the cloud. The Maxthon team deserves great credit for how quickly they revved up to speed and followed what’s current.


maxthon browser


As MUO’s keeper of portable applications, I love that Maxthon offers an official portable version of their browser. Too many browsers dismiss portability and rely on third-party developers to pick up the slack for them. Maxthon has excelled in this area.


The Maxthon web browser has also been made fully available on Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android platforms. Reaching such a broad audience on every platform is another way to see your browser succeed. A wide range of compatibility works perfectly with the in-cloud nature of the browser.


Cloud Features


Signing up for a Maxthon Passport opens you up to a wide range of awesome cloud features.


maxthon browser


Cloud Push is the most significant integration. After registering for Maxthon Passport, feel free to right-click any image, link, block of text, or tab and select Cloud Push to…. From there, you’ll be prompted to log into your account.


maxthon browser


You’ll then be met with the Choose a device prompt that will allow you to push this content directly to any other device that you have (assuming Maxthon has been connected). As you can see in the above screenshot, I’ve got no other devices connected through Maxthon but you’re still able to push content to your cloud storage.


Another very useful feature is Cloud Download. When prompted to download any file through the Maxthon browser, you can tick a box that will additionally send that download straight to your cloud.


maxthon website


Cloud Tabs is a feature that is coming up commonly in mobile versions of some of our other favorite browsers, where your open tabs will synchronize across Mac, Android, and iOS devices. Cloud Sync is becoming just as common in browsers like Firefox and Opera, where all of your favorites, settings, and form data can be saved to the cloud so that you never lose that important information.


Other Features


Magic Fill is like a localized version of LastPass. You’re able to save identities and login information within your browser and sync it to the cloud (as aforementioned). Most browsers today support this functionality, but not all of them support the cloud.


maxthon website


Ad Hunter is Maxthon’s integrated solution to blocking pesky advertisements and pop-ups. Be advised that not all advertisements are blocked by Ad Hunter (which I completely support), but you’re given a point-and-click option that will allow you to add rules to your list of blocked ads. It’s a great feature.


maxthon website


My favorite new functionality may be Resource Sniffer, which is an all-in-one way to rip video, audio, and images from a website. No more third-party image scrapers and no more YouTube-to-video converters. Just use this.


maxthon web browser


Additional features includes neat perks like New Session, allowing you to create two instances of the same website for multiple logins, SkyNote, allowing you to create and access notes within the browser, and Maxthon Snap, an integrated way to take beautiful webpage screenshots.


Do you guys think the new Maxthon web browser is worth a try? I gave the browser a spin and was very impressed by all of the new features. Let me know what you think in the comments.


The post Maxthon Cloud Browser: A Completely Different Browsing Experience appeared first on MakeUseOf.



Bring Back The Google Search Sidebar With These Tools



google search tools sidebarChange is the only constant. This is becoming even more true as we rely on web apps that can change out from under us. One day you’re using a familiar interface with features you rely on, and the next day you open your browser to realize that the interface you rely on is gone.


We’re naturally wired to dislike change – even positive change – but not all change is for the best (just look at Windows 8). Google’s new search page layout, placing search tools at the top of the page, makes more room of the search page for Google’s knowledge graph. However, it has some problems.


Search Tools – Now On Top


The new search tools layout cleans up the search page, especially for the majority of users out there who probably never touch these powerful tools. However, the search tools are now harder to get to for those of use who make use of them. Even worse, some options have been removed – there’s no longer any option to search for an image of an exact size, just an image that’s larger than a certain size.


google search tools sidebar


Google says they’re working on re-adding this feature, but if you want to back now – or just want to get that familiar search sidebar back where your muscle memory expects it to be – you can use one of the below tools.


The web doesn’t have to be something we’re powerless to control. Our browsers make it possible to remix the websites we use, changing their interfaces to add new features and do what we like with them. We’ve covered some of the many ways you can modify websites and your browser before, and the below tools make use of these methods.


Greasemonkey & Userscript


Websites use JavaScript code to modify their layouts and add interactive features. A user script is essentially a piece of JavaScript code that you choose to run on certain web pages. After you install this user script, it will run in the background whenever you open a Google search results page, modifying the page and putting the search sidebar back in place.


If you’re using Firefox, you’ll need to install the Greasemonkey browser extension to use user scripts. Chrome includes built-in support for user scripts, so you won’t have to install anything extra.


To install the Google Search Tools Back user script, visit its web page and click the green Install button. If you’re using Firefox, you’ll be prompted to install the user script without any problems. If you’re using Chrome, you’ll see a message saying you can’t install the script from this website and the .user.js file will be downloaded to your computer.


google search tools left sidebar


To install the user script anyway, click the menu button, point to Tools, and select Extensions. Drag and drop the .user.js file from the downloads bar onto your Extensions page to install it.


google search tools left sidebar


You’ll now see the sidebar whenever you visit a Google search page. If you want to give the new interface a chance in the future, you can uninstall this user script from your Extensions page. In Firefox, you can remove it from Greasemonkey.


google search tools left sidebar


Stylish & Userstyle


Stylish allows you to install user styles that affect the layout and functionality of web pages. Web pages use cascading style sheets (CSS) files for their layout. Stylish hooks into your browser, giving you the capability to add your own stylesheets to web pages when they load.


This user style works perfectly with Firefox, but it requires some manual tweaking with Google Chrome. The instructions for tweaking it for Google Chrome are on the user style’s page, but we recommend using the user script method if you’re using Chrome.


To get started, visit this page on the userstyles website. Click the link on the page to install the Stylish extension for your browser. After you’ve installed Stylish, click the Install with Stylish button to install the user style. The next time you reload the page, the search tools sidebar will reappear.


google search tools sidebar


How do you feel about the new Google search tools layout? Do you prefer the more compact use of space in the new layout, or do you find yourself yearning for the old layout and its features?


The post Bring Back The Google Search Sidebar With These Tools appeared first on MakeUseOf.



Make Free International Calls for a Month with Skype



This holiday season, you can talk to your far-away relatives and friends to your heart’s content without having to worry about the phone bills. The @Skype team has just tweeted an offer that is too good to ignore.


Skype to Skype calls have always been free but you can now also use Skype to make free and unlimited voice calls to mobile phones and landlines for 30 days. In addition to phone calls, you can also have video calls with a group of 3-10 friends during the same offer period.


Free Skype Calls


To get started, use this special link to sign-in to your Skype account, enter your credit card or PayPal details (you won’t be charged) and complete the sign-up process. Once your Skype Premium service is activated, you can cancel your recurring subscription immediately while the premium services will continue to work for the entire 30-day period.


The fine print says that you can make free calls to landlines and mobile phones in Canada, Guam, Hong Kong S.A.R., Puerto Rico, Singapore, Thailand and United States.


The countries where you can call landline numbers for free include Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Chile, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, United Kingdom and Venezuela.


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Digital Inspiration @labnol This story, Make Free International Calls for a Month with Skype, was originally published at Digital Inspiration on 17/12/2012 under Skype, Internet.