Friday, January 31, 2020

The Portrayal of Existentialism Within Becketts Play, Rockaby Essay Example for Free

The Portrayal of Existentialism Within Becketts Play, Rockaby Essay The Portrayal of Existentialism Within Beckett’s Play, Rockaby â€Å"Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better. † The words of Samuel Beckett, from his play Worstward Ho, written in 1983, echo the ideals and philosophies behind absurdist theatre and Existentialism. Created in the early 1950s, absurdist theatre rejects the conventional techniques of theatre in favour of strange and absurd conventions in order to create an impact and impression, and present the worldview of Existentialism to an audience through an artistic medium. Absurdism is influenced by the Existentialist worldview, especially the notion of human existence preceding any essence in life. Absurdist playwrights such as Samuel Beckett, Eugene Ionesco and Jean Genet, present a distorted view of humanity in their plays, through their own worldview which echoes the tenets of Existentialism. Samuel Beckett’s play, Rockaby, is one such play that incorporates non- ­? realist (absurd) theatre techniques to accentuate the existential worldview. Beckett effectively manipulates the Dramatic Languages and Elements of absurdist, non- ­? linear narrative, symbolism and voice, to demonstrate Existentialism through an artistic illustration of the worldview. Beckett effectively exploits the technique of absurdist, non- ­? linear narrative to accentuate the philosophy of Existentialism within Rockaby. One of the most common quotes used to explain Existentialism is â€Å"existence precedes essence. † This phrase can be translated into the notion of not knowing anything about the past or future, but just ‘being’ – existence comes before any meaning of life interpreted from knowledge of historic or future events. The technique of non- ­? linear narrative, used within Rockaby, expresses this belief perfectly in dramatic terms. Absurdist, Non- ­? linear narrative is utilised through the circular, repetitive nature of the script – a technique that highlights the existentialists’ view of life as meaningless and the repetitious passing of time waiting for death. Furthermore, this circular narrative provides no beginning or end, emphasising the existential belief of existence coming before any meaning of life, including both knowledge of history as well as future (beginning and end). The play begins with the word ‘more’. There is no context, no understanding of what has happened or is about to happen. The woman just appears, says ‘more’, then the play begins. This continues in each of the four sections, beginning with ‘more’, and ending with silence, broken only by the next ‘more’. This circular motion highlights the meaningless state of life, and the absurdity of living only to wait until death. The circular narrative is irregular in that it still develops and evolves, with the narrative progressing from sitting at a window, to drawing the blinds, to moving down the stairs, to waiting in the rocking chair for death, to dying. Though this does not perfectly follow a circular narrative, it still does highlight Existential belief: that life is meaningless, useless and absurd, that the only choice we have in a meaningless life is to exercise our minds, to understand our absurdity and therefore become responsible for our own existence. The play begins with the woman sitting at the window, searching the outside world for another like herself – another who can give her meaning and prove her existence. This action in itself is an exercise of her mind. However, her standards drop later in the play and her mental stimulation grows less, as she becomes content just to see movement within one of the windows opposite hers as proof of the existence of another life, and therefore creating meaning in her own life. Upon the realization it was ‘time she stopped’ this searching in vain, she closes the blind (a symbol of death) before descending – both literally and emotionally – to her rocking chair, where she sits and waits for death. Though the narrative is somewhat circular, it still conveys a story of the woman’s original searching for meaning, a realisation of her absurdity and isolation in a meaningless world, her acceptance of the absurdity, and her resolve to wait for death. Through this use of absurdist narrative, Beckett brings out the philosophy of Existentialism stronger than through any of the other dramatic techniques he incorporates. In a similar way, Samuel Beckett incorporates symbolism within Rockaby to effectively present the worldview of Existentialism to the audience. One of the most significant principles within Existentialism maintains the belief that life is meaningless, useless and absurd, and that humans live to die and evaporate into nothingness in an empty, meaningless universe. The focus subject in the play, ‘W’, and her actions, are used to convey this belief to the audience. One of the first, most obvious uses of symbolism is within the costume choices. Beckett’s [1984] notes on the play, as published in the ‘Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel Beckett,’ are very particular in describing what sort of gown should be worn: â€Å"Black lacy high- ­? necked†¦ Long sleeves. Jet sequins†¦ Incongruous headdress set with extravagant trimming to catch the light† – A funeral gown. This highlights the feeling of death and ending of life, a concept that is echoed throughout the play. The notion of ‘drawing down the blind’ is another symbol for death, according to Professor Eoin O’Brien [1986] who states, â€Å"A drawn blind is an old custom signifying death†. The last thing the woman does before sitting down in her rocking chair is â€Å"let down the blind,† therefore emphasising the morbid, meaningless ideals of life portrayed in absurdism and its existential foundations. The window is also use to create symbolism, as a representation of the woman’s search for another â€Å"one living soul†¦ like herself,† which alludes to the yearning for meaning, order and the finding of self- ­? value and self- ­? definition in the discovery of another life. Beckett echoes the implications of Bishop Berkeley’s words: â€Å"to be is to be perceived. † [Cited in Davis, R. : 1988] Berkeley is saying that life is nothing more or less than the state of being perceived. It is this existential purpose and meaning of life that the woman searches for. In searching for another living soul, she yearns to find meaning for herself, a search that is in vain, as she finds no one and is seen by no one. The woman’s life and act of living is further explored through the symbol of the rocking chair. The title, Rockaby, refers to a children’s lullaby, and, the original French name, Berceuse, translates to mean both ‘rocking chair’ and ‘lullaby’. In using this title, Beckett brings together two juxtaposed concepts: that of birth (in the sense of the Rockaby baby nursery rhyme) and death (the baby falling from the treetop). This is further explored in the use of the childlike demand for â€Å"more† coupled with the symbolic references to old age and death, through the costume and demeanor of the woman in the chair. Therefore, it is evident that Beckett incorporates many different symbolic references within his play to bring to the forefront the philosophy of Existentialism. Furthermore, Beckett utilises the techniques of voice to emphasise the absurdity within his play, Rockaby. â€Å"The Absurdists’ plays reflect†¦ that human beings have lost the ability to communicate. † [Crawford, A. , et al. , 2003] This is reflected in many of Beckett’s plays as the techniques of voice and language frequently carry a disjointed, nonsensical, empty tone that is characteristic of absurdism. This is no different in Rockaby, where the voice over, recounting the life of the woman in the chair, follows a very disjointed, yet rhythmic, pattern. This disjointedness echoes the concept of juxtaposing youth with frailty and old age. The simplicity and fragmentation of the voice creates a childlike sentiment, but the frailty of the voice maintains the notion of age and weakness. Rhythm in voice is also a frequently used technique in absurdist plays. The script of Rockaby follows a rigid ‘to and fro’ feeling, following the trance- ­? like state of the rocking chair and the dimetric flow of the lines, which are very verse like: â€Å"Time she // stopped Sitting at her // window Quiet at her // window Only // window Facing other // windows Only other // windows All // eyes All // sides High and // low Time she // stopped† The techniques of silence and pause within the voice are also widely used within absurdist theatre, and Rockaby is no exception. The voiceover used often pauses, adding stress and effect to the verse- ­? like lines. Silence is further incorporated in the break at the end of each ‘section’ of the play. The woman in the chair intermittently joins in with the last lines of each section: ‘time she stopped’, ‘living soul’ and ‘rock her off’. This leads to a silence, ended only by the woman’s demand for ‘more’, before the voice over continues the disjointed, rhythmic narrative. Each time the woman joins in with the narration, her voice grows weaker and more fragile, slowly diminishing until, at the end of the last section, she fails to join in, falling into darkness and death. Absurdism is even further explored in the voice through the way the voice over speaks in third person, yet is the woman’s own voice. This detaches the woman from the voice over, through the use of the word ‘she’, yet they are still one in mind, through sharing the same thoughts, feelings and intentions. Furthermore, voice represents the only proof of the woman’s existence; a point that is strongly related to absurdism and easily falls into line with Existentialism. Just as Berkeley said, â€Å"to be is to be perceived,† so too is voice the only object that ‘perceives’ the woman. There is no other ‘living soul’ that acknowledges her existence, therefore, the only way she can prove her existence is through the narration of her life from the voiceover: â€Å"Voice has become the woman’s own Berkeleyan observer, without whose surveillance any claim to existence would be invalidated. † [Brown, V. , 2005] Therefore, it is evident that the use of the dramatic language of voice has been effectively manipulated within Beckett’s play to create the appropriate absurdist impression, which demonstrates an effective portrayal of the existentialist understanding seen through the absurdist techniques. In his play, Rockaby, Samuel Beckett incorporates many different techniques of Absurd Theatre, which accentuates his worldview of Existentialism. The quintessential belief of Existentialism – existence recedes essence – is brought to the forefront of the audience’s attention through the use of the absurdist techniques of symbolism, voice, and non- ­? linear, absurdist narrative. Beckett effectively manipulates these Dramatic Languages to create a play that is not necessarily about Existentialism. Rather, it is a play that highlights the philosophy through the narrative, and silently conveys the principles and ideals of Existentialism, without directly referring to the philosophy itself. In this regard, Beckett has effectively communicated the philosophy of Existentialism to a contemporary audience through the manipulation of the Dramatic Languages. Bibliography: Beckett, S. , (1984) ‘Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel Beckett,’ London: Faber and Faber, p 273. Brown, V. (2005) ‘Yesterday’s Deformities: A Discussion of the Role of Memory and Discourse in the Plays of Samuel Beckett’ (Doctorate paper in Literature and Philosophy), University of South Africa. Crawford, A. , Hurst, C. , Lurgering, M. , Wimmer, C. , (2003), ‘Acting In Person And In Style in Australia,’ Macquarie Park: McGraw Hill Australia Pty Ltd. Hale, J. A. , ‘Perspective in Rockaby’ in Davis, R. J. and Butler, L. St J. , (Eds. ) ‘Make Sense Who May’: Essays on Samuel Beckett’s Later Works (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe, 1988), p 74. O’Brien, E. , ‘The Beckett Country’ (Dublin: The Black Cat Press, 1986), pp 197,198 ‘Rockaby’, (2012), Wikipedia – the Free Encyclopedia, URL found: http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Rockaby (Last Accessed Saturday 27th October, 2012).

Thursday, January 23, 2020

Coral Bleaching Essay -- Geology

Coral Bleaching Abstract Coral reefs have been called the rainforests of the ocean and are one of the most diverse and important ecosystems on the planet. This paper will explore how global warming has effected these fragile ecosystems. It will focus on the impact of increasing ocean temperatures on coral reefs. Coral Reefs Coral reefs exist globally from 30N to 30S latitude and have existed in some form on Earth for over 200 million years. Over 2500 species of coral have been identified 1000 of which are reef building hard coral. Reefs are actually limestone structures produced by small animals called coral polyps. These polyps contain unicellular plants (algae) called zooxanthellae in their tissue. They have a symbiotic relationship which means, "living together." During the day the zooxanthellae rise to the surface of the animal and produce food by photosynthesis. At night the polyp extends a stinging, multitenticled mouth that feeds on any planktonic animals. They both benefit from the waste products of the other. They also work together to capture calcium carbonate from seawater and convert it into the hard limestone structures in which they live. Because corals survive due to this fragile relationship, they are very sensitive and tolerate relatively narrow ranges of water temperature, salinity and transparency. Coral reefs are estimated to cover less than .2% of the ocean floor but contain approximately 25% of the ocean’s species. They provide protection for shorelines, reducing erosion. They also give food, shelter and protection to almost one million marine species and act as a nursery for growing fish. Humans benefit directly from coral reefs. They supply us with food, jobs (through fishing and tourism) a... ...astrous to lose the existing coral reefs of the world. References 1. William Fitt. Bleaching of Symbiotic Algae Available http://zircon.geology.union.edu/Carb/fitt 2. Reef Relief. Reef Relief Available http://www.blacktop.com/coralforest/index.html 3. Knauer Communication. Global Warming is a Problem Available http://www.enviroweb.org/edf/isproblem/isproblem_frameset.html 4. Michael Van Woert. ORAD Available http://140.90.191.231/orad/ 5. Indiana University. Reef Resource Page Available http://www.indiana.edu/~reefpage/. 6. Ingrid Guch. NOAA Available http://www.ara.polytechnique.fr/surface.html 7. PCRF. Planetary Coral Reef Foundation Available http://www.pcrf.org/ 8. The Coral Reef Alliance. Get the Facts on Coral Reefs Available http://www.coral.org/Facts.html

Tuesday, January 14, 2020

Instant Car-Pooling on the Android Platform

CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 CS 8803 – AIAD Project Report. Instant Car-Pooling on the Android Platform Vinaya Shenoy Parikshit Sudumbrekar Madhura Tipnis 1 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 Table of Contents: Introduction Objectives Motivation Technology Overview Related Work Architecture Project Screen-Shots Evaluation Future Work Project Experience Conclusion References 3 3 3 4 5 5 6 14 14 15 16 17Table of Figures Figure 1: Android Technological Overview Figure 2: Carpool Application – Starting Window Figure 3: Carpool Application – Create a new Event Figure 4: Carpool Application – Contact List Figure 5: Carpool Application – Events Created history Figure 6: Carpool Application – SMS for carpool invitation received Figure 7: Carpool Application – Car pool Invitation Details Figure 8: Carpool Application – Details for the event creator Figure 9: Carpool Application – Map showing pick-up points 4 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 2 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORTTEAM#2 Introduction: With increasing convergence between different technologies like the cellular world, internet (IP) world, different applications have become popular and many more are under development. One of the prominent services popular amongst the users is the â€Å"Location Based Services† and â€Å"presence†. The current location-based services out there in the market use the policy of ‘broadcasting locations' while enabling any activity between the various users. This may lead to unintended recipients being the beneficiary of certain events.With this in mind, we aim to develop an application/service that would enable selective delivery of events/messages to the intended recipients based on their location. This would help in avoiding thousands of messages being sent to unintended recipients. Thus, not only the location of the intended recipient is taken into consideration; but the context of the location i s also taken into consideration. In this project, we define the context of the recipient as its distance from the initiator of the event. Objectives: The objectives of the „Instant Car Pooling Application? can be stated as follows: 1.Enable users to create events that would specify the following information? The total vacancy in the car. ? The time at which the event is going to take place. ? The Final destination. 2. Development of the logic that would enable? Poll in the location information of all the intended recipients. ? Take decision based on the context on the location. ? Send „sms? to all the selected recipients and handle the accepted or rejected messages received from the recipients. 3. Generate a Google Map that shows the initiator the map between his location, all the recipients that agreed to his car pooling event and the final destination.We aim to demonstrate all these scenarios on the „Android Emulator?. Motivation: The application under considerat ion, the „Instant Car Pooling? application, is a novel idea which has never been implemented before. This became our source of motivation for going ahead with this project. All the current car pooling methods are 1. Time consuming. 2. Require a lot of before-hand planning. 3. Require several rounds of communications in the form of series of e-mails or a series of telephonic conversations. 3 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 Also, there seems to be an absence of a „Car Pooling? pplication on the mobile phones. This motivated us to develop our application on the „Android Platform? , one of the upcoming and latest mobile platforms launched by Google. A different source of motivation behind the development of this application is that of the „Georgia Tech India Club?. All the members of this club complained about receiving thousands of mails which either requested for a Car Pool or which offered a Car Pool. Thus, uninterested students used to receive such ma ils. We thought; why not develop a „mobile-based instant Car Pooling application? s our gift to the student community of Georgia Tech? This really gave us the passion to go after the completion of this project. The initiator of the event could select intended recipients from the contact list. The application then checks for the relative context of the location of all the selected recipients and forwards the event to only those recipients that satisfy the context. Technology Overview: Figure 1: Android Technological Overview Android is a new operating system for the G1 phone that has been released by Google in 2008.The main difference that sets the Google G1 phone apart from other operating systems is that the Android is based on an open source platform. This implies that anyone can view and even modify the source code. This results in constant evolution of the software. In case a developer senses that there is a certain feature that is currently not included then he or she can incorporate it in the phone and the software would develop. Since it is a fairly new platform, it is not as 4 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 developed as other mobile operating systems.But considering the open source nature and other features, it can go a long way beyond other mobile operating systems. The hardware associated with the phone is provided by various companies. As and when the hardware becomes more advanced, the Android OS will be able to support more features functions. Related Work: 1. Location tracking is the most essential thing and a definite pre requisite for any mobility related application. This can be done in different ways. 2. A social tool has been developed which helps the user connect with people around him. This tool has been developed on the Symbian Operating System.The location of the user is detected in the cell phone by getting information from the cell tower. This application doesn? t need GPS. Each user can keep up with what is happening wi th people in the friend? s list. Broadcasting of messages is the approach followed in this tool. It also provides other features like connecting people with similar interests. It helps the user explore various places in and around the location detected. 3. There is a mobile social networking service called Loopt which broadcasts the location of the user even when the phone is closed.It also allows sending of messages or sharing of photos between contacts. This Loopt is currently limited to the Sprint network. Architecture: The users that have this application installed on their cell phones can use this application as either initiators of car pooling event or as invitees for a car pooling event. When the user launches this application, the user is given three options to choose from. The user can create a new car pool event, view the events that he has created earlier or view invitations for car pool event from other users.When the user chooses to create a new event, he is given a for m which has fields such as subject of the car pool, time of the car pool, vacancies in the car, destination address of the car pool, and a button to choose from the list of his contacts. The user enters the values in the fields and then clicks on the contact list. The contact list is displayed from which the user selects the contacts he wants to send the invitation of the car pool to. All the invitees will be sent an SMS with the details of the carpool event.When the invitee accepts an invitation, the carpool application on his phone will respond back to the initiator with the current GPS location of the invitee. When the initiator gets back the positive reply from an invitee, he will retrieve the location co-ordinates from the sms and using reverse geocoding functionality of the Geocoder utility will calculate the street address of the contact. Now when the initiator views the event generated, he can see all those who all have responded to the event. A Google map is created with th e locations of all those who have responded to the event.It gives the order of pick up as per the order in which the invitees have responded. We have used the Google Map API here for 5 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 generation of the route map based on the location as detected by the geo coder. Once the vacancies are full, the other invitees who try to accept the invite later are displayed a message which says that the car is full. Project Screenshots: Figure 2: Carpool Application – Starting Window This is the first screen that appears on the cell phone display when the user starts the application. There are three options that are provided.They are ? ? ? Create an event – This allows the user to start a new car pool. View created events – This allows the user to go back and view the car pool events that have been created earlier by him. View Invitations – This option lets the user view invitations for other car pooling events from his friends. 6 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 Figure 3: Carpool Application – Create a new Event This screen appears on the cell phone display when the user chooses to create a new car pooling event. In the subject box, the user can type out a short description of the purpose of the car pool.Since it is an instant car pooling application, the day is set to the current day as recorded in the cell phone. The user is given a list of times to select from when he clicks on the â€Å"pick a time† option. Also the user is allowed to specify the number of vacancies in his car to go to a particular destination. The user enters his destination address in the destination 7 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 box. Then the user can select contacts from his contact list to whom all the event will be sent to. Figure 4: Carpool Application – Contact List This screen is the contact list.The user can select the contacts he wishes to send the car pool event invite to, with the hel p of check boxes provided next to the names of the contacts. When the user clicks on â€Å"add to event†, the invitation is sent to the selected contacts from the contact list. This event is sent in the form of a „sms?. 8 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 Figure 5: Carpool Application – Events Created history This screen is displayed on the cell phone display when the user chooses to view the car pool events created by him. The user can click on the individual events to view the details of each event.This list contains all the past events as well as the pending events. 9 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 Figure 6: Carpool Application – SMS for carpool invitation received When the message is sent to the contacts, the message as shown above appears on the display of the contacts to which the message is sent. The name of the car pool event generator also appears in the message pop up. 10 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 Figure 7: Carpool Ap plication – Car Pool invitation details When the user clicks on â€Å"view invitation† option on the main page, the user is displayed the screen above.The invitation gives details of the car pool which includes the subject of the car pool, the name of the initiator of the event, the time at which the car pool is scheduled to take place, the destination of the car pool and the status of the reply. The user is given to options to respond to the message of either attending or not attending. The user can click on either one depending on his choice. Once the user responds to a message he won? t be given an option to change his decision. 11 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 Figure 8: Carpool Application – Details for the event creatorThis page will be displayed to the user who created the events. It will give him a summary of the event with details such as the subject, the time of the event, vacancies in the car, destination of the car pool, invitees to the even t, and the order of pickup of the invitees who responded. The order of pickup is decided on first come first serve basis currently. Also the user is given an option to check the map of the route now by clicking on â€Å"show route map†. 12 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 Figure 9: Carpool Application – Map showing pick-up pointsThe route map is displayed to the creator of the car pool event when he clicks on the â€Å"show route map† option. Along the route, the pick-ups in the order of first come first serve are plotted. The interesting thing about this application is that in the beginning when no recipient has accepted the invitation, the initiator of the event can view a map of source (his location) and the final destination. As and when recipients accept the car pooling invitation, the map is updated and it shows all the intermediate pick-up points (the locations of the recipients who have accepted the car pooling invitation).Thus, the initiator of t he event now has the entire map, wherein he has all the information about the route to follow. 13 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 Evaluation/Testing: We tested our application by running four instances of the emulator on the same machine. In each emulator we stored three contacts with their numbers being the port numbers on which the other three emulators were running. We then tested the following scenario: 1. When a user creates a new event, the event is created properly ensuring that all the parameters are valid. For eg, the user can? put a time in the future or put a negative vacancy, give no invitees. Also, we verify the destination address provided by the user to ensure that the address is correct and exists on the map. 2. Once the event is created, we verified that all the invitees got an sms message with the proper details and the invitation is displayed in their invitation list. 3. When an invitee accepts an invitation a reply sms with his GPS coordinates is sent bac k to the initiator. 4. When the initiator gets a accept response, the event is updated and the initiator can see the pickup location of the invitee on the map. . When the carpool for an invite becomes full, all invitees who respond after that get a carpool full response sms. Future Work: This project provides a proof of concept of the „Car Pooling? application. It is a stripped down version of our dream „Car Pool? application. There are a lot of improvements that can be incorporated into this project that makes it more complete and feature rich. The future work with regards to this project can be summarized as follows: 1. Currently, the initiator sends car pooling invitation to his friends from his contact list.Their location is forwarded back to him when they accept the invitation. This helps in the creation of the Google Map for the event initiator. In the future, we could have a web service that handles all this location information. This would also solve some privacy related issues like the publishing of recipient location etc. 2. At the moment, the routes are decided on the „First Come First Serve? basis. This means, the route is decided on the order in which the recipients accept the car pooling invitation. But the path obtained from this may not always be the shortest path.Thus we could have algorithms like the „Dijkstra? s? algorithm or Algorithmic concepts like „Dynamic Programming? to calculate the shortest path between source, destination and all the recipients. Thus, optimization on this front can be obtained. 3. The web service can be programmed to handle the context of the location. The context of the location can be determined by its proximity to the location of the event creator. Thus, the web service can determine a radius and determine the recipients which fall within the 14 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 adius as the ones who would receive the car pooling event message; while those which lie outside the radius would be ignored. Thus, broadcasting of the event can be avoided. 4. Other features can include displaying only the events that are pending when the user clicks on the „View Created Events? button. All the past and completed events could be stored in a separate „history log?. 5. Currently, the final destination needs the complete address of the location. In the future, the final destination address could be populated by extracting information from the „subject? of the event and using Google Maps functionalities.For example, if the user types in „Trip to Wal-Mart? as the subject, then the final destination address could be filled automatically by the closest Wal-Mart store located near him. Project Experience: Working on the project was a learning process with a lot of interesting discoveries. The Android platform being comparatively new was a challenge to work on, since very less documentation was available as well as little support was available thro ugh the online communities. During the initial phase of the project, all the various APIs that were supported were studied to determine their use and feasibility towards the project.During this initial feasibility study, we realized that certain API support have been removed from the latest version of Android. This included the crucial one of Google Maps, which our project was dependent on. Thus, began another study to determine the use of actual Google Map APIs through the Android code. Also the basic idea of the project made us realize that how convenient car pooling can be made with this application. The project exposed us to the latest technology in the area of mobile platform development. In class the various issues in mobile computing were covered.Also there was an extensive explanation of mobile computing in general. This discussion helped us a lot in the project. We realized that issues such as less power on the device, etc. can be a problem if there are huge amounts of comp utations to be done. Thus, we made a point to keep the client as this as possible and with this aim in mind, we also aim to develop a web service in the future that would completely take care of all the computation and make the clients really „thin?. Location based services were extensively covered in the class. This motivated us to incorporate them into our project.We have extensively used locations in our project, in fact we have the plotted the Google Map by making use of them. Due to such background developed in class, we thought of experimenting on the Android platform. It gave us a boost to explore the yet not totally discovered areas in Android API usage. 15 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 Initially we wanted to test the project by executing instances of the Android emulator on different machines. These emulators would then communicate between each-other through means of messages. But, we were not able to demonstrate in this fashion due to certain technological challenges.In the end, we demonstrated the application by executing different instances of the Android emulator on the same machine. We further aim to test the performance of our application by adding a number of recipients and measuring the time taken for the Google Map to build. This would help us in determining whether the time remains for large number of recipients, finding the bottle-necks if any and moving towards a cut-off for the number of recipients for which the application shows normal execution time. Conclusion: Thus, this project successfully demonstrated a mobile based „Car Pooling? application.This application would help in the process of creation of „instant car pool? events. Thus, we successfully reduced the long conversations needed for normal car pool events. In future, more functionality can be added to make this application more robust and more feature rich. With the advent of smart phones, this application, when developed to its fullest, would be ab le for all to use and make their journeys much more enjoyable and comfortable. 16 CS 8803 AIAD TERM PROJECT REPORT TEAM#2 References: 1. Android API documentation. (n. d. ). Retrieved from Android Developers: http://developer. ndroid. com/reference/packages. html 2. Android Development Community Forum (n. d). Retrieved April 2009 from http://www. anddev. org/index. php 3. Google Maps API documentation. (n. d. ). Retrieved from Google maps: http://code. google. com/apis/maps/documentation/ 4. Strickland, J. (n. d. ). How the Google Phone Works. Retrieved April 2009, from How Stuff Works: http://electronics. howstuffworks. com/google-phone5. htm 5. What is Android. (n. d. ). Retrieved April 2009, from developer. android. com: http://developer. android. com/guide/basics/what-is-android. html 17

Monday, January 6, 2020

My Hero is Abraham Lincoln - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 5 Words: 1465 Downloads: 1 Date added: 2019/02/20 Category Society Essay Level High school Tags: My Hero Essay Did you like this example? A hero is someone who has been recognized for a courageous act or nobility in character. Heroes in my opinion are people who have attained special achievements in history and are remembered for their abilities and personal qualities which make them role models. Heroes are often remembered for risking or rather sacrificing their lives for the good of their people. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "My Hero is Abraham Lincoln" essay for you Create order However, not everybody is considered a hero in war, heroes are distinguished as ordinary people doing most ordinary things for a better good for their fellow humans. Moreover, the word hero tend to be overused nowadays making it lose its intended meaning. Heroes are meant to overcome their fears or dangers for the good of their people. Culturally, heroes are the people we look up to and possess admirable values. The long time heroes made a great impact on the society’s culture. Every time I hear the word hero, I think of Abraham Lincoln, the 16th president of the United States. Abraham was such a great person. He was the president during the time of civil war which was the bloodiest war ever in America. During his reign, my hero was able to free the slaves which is the main reason why I consider him as the most significant hero in American history. He stood for the rights of all citizens and encouraged freedom for all by considering everyone as equal. Abraham was born on 12th February in the year 1809. He grew up in a very poor family in Hardin County, Kentucky with his parents together with his sister. He was a well-educated passionate reader who studied both mathematics, literature, and law. He faced tragedy at the age of nine when his mother died from milk sickness. After the death of his mother, the father decided to marry a second wife named Sarah Bush Johnston. His sister also died later during childbirth leaving him as the only child. His family relo cated to southern Indiana in 1816. Lincolns faced challenges during his formal education as he needed to work always to help his family. His family relocated once more to the South of Illinois around Macon County in the year 1830, and Lincoln handled a position wearing down a stream flatboat pulling cargoes from river Mississippi down to New Orleans. After settling down in New Salem town in Illinois, where he filled in as a retailer and a postmaster, he joined the government in support of the Whig Party, and won the race of Illinois state authoritative body in 1834. Lincoln and his Whig Party legends Daniel Webster and Henry Clay, opposed the act of slavery and slave trade within the districts, and had a spectacular plans of developing the country, with consideration on business and urban zones instead of agriculture. Lincoln was a self-made lawyer, as he was able to learn law by himself and passed the bar examination in 1836 (Allison, Scott George 167-183). He later moved to the recently named capital state of Springfield. He worked there as a legal advisor for a couple of years where he was branded the name Honest Abe due to his honest nature. He served customers running from singular occupants of residential communities to national railway lines. Abraham was chosen to run for presidency during the 1860’s. He was the most opposed candidate at that time, and almost half the country seceded from the nation after he was elected. Although he was president for about four years, he is still considered as the greatest president leaving behind an important legacy in every nation today. During his reign, he was a courageous, humane and persistent president. First, he won the civil war that resulted at the end of slavery. He also managed to unite the nations despite the civil war. Amongst Lincolns opportunity, the war was set between the Northern and Southern parts of America. Southern people needed slavery to be lawful however the Northern people wanted to end slavery. Lincoln was one of the general population who tried to free the slaves. He made it his need to free them and in the long run, he did. He led the union to war in order to stop the separation of the Southern State from the United States. Thereafter, he rebuilt the S outhern State that was destroyed by the war and transformed it into an industrial state to boost the economy. In 1862, he signed the Homestead Act that entitled every settler who agreed to cultivate land for five years, sixteen acres of land. Being an abolitionist, Abraham Lincoln encountered several obstacles in his attempt to abolish slavery. The main obstacle was the constitution. Most founders of the constitution were against the abolition of slavery making it difficult to change it. Lincoln made an extremely important move towards the thirteenth amendment that took effect in 1865, at the time of emancipation proclamation, which marked two years later. Also, before becoming the president, my hero ran for the legislative seat but lost twice in all his attempts. He also runs for the position of the speaker of the state and lost again (Blumenthal Sidney 1849-1856). Next, he contest for the seats of the congress, senate, and vice president and missed all of them. However, in his final attempt to run for presidency, luck was on his side, and he won the election. In all his trials and errors, he was persistent. He stood stronger and showed determination in his mission to accomplish his dreams. Abraham Lincoln’s stor y shows that one should stand strong in the mission to accomplish their dreams. If you set your mind to do something, you will achieve it through patience and determination. His win was influenced by Grace Bell, an 11-year-old girl who sent him a letter telling him to grow a beard. The girl thought that if he grew a beard, he would stand a chance to acquire more votes for becoming the president of the United States. Despite being a determined and brave hero, he was also an honest man. He once got extra change from a lady who bought something at a higher price in his shop due to his wrong pricing. When he realized his mistakes, he had to walk extra miles to the ladies house just to return the extra money. In 1864, Lincoln went up against his rival, the democratic nominee the late Union General George McClellan in the last reelection battle. Union triumphs in challenge especially General William’s catch of Atlanta in September, obtained numerous presidential votes. In his second opening address, passed on March 4, 1865, Lincoln focused on the southern reconstruction mission and patch up the Union with philanthropy for all. Affiliation triumph was close, and Lincoln gave a speech on the White House plant on April 11, empowering the citizens to welcome the new Southern States into the overlay. Unfortunately, Lincoln was not able live to help achieve this goal. Many Americans consider him as the greatest president of all time history to hold the presidential office. I would say his reputation is very well deserved considering all his achievements during his time in office. He was never a coward. He always stood up tall and fought for what he knew was right. He ran for the presidential seat because he was convinced that being a president, he was entitled to the powers to uphold, protect and defend the constitution. The end of civil war lead by President Abraham Lincoln marked the end to slavery of African Americans. I consider him my hero because he stood up for the rights of the weak people who were treated unfair. He outsmarted his adversaries, competitions, and united the nation amongst an intense time. His splendor, courage and heroic act ended the civil war hence creating a better future for the country. The American view about heroes has somewhat been distorted. The particular qualities that make a person heroic have evolved with time to fit the preferable characteristics of the American culture at the present moment. To be considered a hero, one has to meet all the timeless and specific criteria of their society. Heroes who fail to meet their society’s changing standards lose their former echelon of respect and prestige from the society. Abraham Lincoln showed all the qualities of a hero and in America he is honored for his excellent work. What truly motivated Lincoln was the pursued of a better life; he was trying to run away from his rough childhood. He looked for books to read and what he read allowed him to see life beyond the farm. The farm did not challenge him intellectually; being poor was the challenge. He stood and led when many others fail to. Lincoln strived for success no matter the situation he found himself in; he either found a way or made a way.