Fiber Optic Circulator Applications

• Add-Drop Multiplexing
• Fiber Sensors
• Bi-directional Pumping
• Bi-directional Signal Transmission Systems
• Coupling In-line Chromatic Dispersion Compensation Devices

Fiber optic circulators are non-reciprocating, one directional, three-port devices that are used in a wide range of optical setups and for numerous applications. An optical circulator is analogous to an electronic circulator and both perform similar functions. An optical circulator is a three-port device that allows light to travel in only one direction. A signal entered to Port 1 will exit Port 2, while a signal entering Port 2 will exit Port 3 all with minimal loss. Light entering port 2 experiences a large amount of loss at port 1, and light entering port 3 experiences a large amount of loss at ports 2 and 1.

Optical circulators are non-reciprocal optics. This means that any change in the properties of the light caused by passing through the device are not reversed by traveling in the opposite direction. Another example of non-reciprocal optics are Faraday rotators which are sometimes used in isolators. Because of its high isolation and low insertion loss, optical circulators are widely used in advanced communication systems as add-drop multiplexors, bi-directional pumping, and chromatic dispersion compensation devices. The example to the right depicts the use of a circulator to drop an optical channel from a DWDM system using a fiber bragg grating. The input DWDM channels are coupled into Port 1 of the device with a FBG device connected to Port 2. The single wavelength reflected off the FBG then reenters the circulator in port 2 and is routed accordingly to Port 3. The remaining signals pass through the FBG and exit on the top fiber.

Circlulators can also be used to send optical signal in two directions down a single fiber. A circulator is located at both ends of the fiber. Each circulator functions to add a signal in one direction while removing the signal in the other. See the example below.

 

 

 

 

 

Juniper Training.

During my training at Juniper last week I found these important document resources. I felt that these will be useful for all and sending across. The training basically covered all the topics for JNCIA-M. The training was great. Now I feel very comfortable with Junos configurations. Obviously I should keep using what I learnt there :)

JNCIA-M Study Guide:
You can download all the study guides from Juniper for free. Herewith I am attaching the link for JNCIA study Guide. I am motivated to take this exam.
http://www.juniper.net/training/certification/JNCIA_studyguide.pdf

Juniper Technical documents:
This link has all Juniper technical documentation. It will be worth to book mark.
http://www.juniper.net/techpubs/

Junos to IOS command reference:
I thought I need to make a list of equivalent commands in Junos to IOS, but they have it already on their website. You can download that from the following link.
https://www.juniper.net/customers/csc/documentation/techdocs/downloads/pdf/350023.pdf

Juniper router simulators:
Not but least. The following links explain how to simulate Juniper router on your PC. The simulator will help you in practicing the commands and other features.
http://www.smogey.net/tech/Juniper/Olive/index.htm#credit
http://brokenpipes.blogspot.com/2008/01/olive-is-alive.html

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you.

Junos Documentation.

JNCIA Study Guide can be downloaded from:

http://www.juniper.net/training/certification/JNCIA_studyguide.pdf

Juniper Technical Documentation can be found at:

http://www.juniper.net/techpubs/

Mapping of basic Junos commands to IOS commands

https://www.juniper.net/customers/csc/documentation/techdocs/downloads/pdf/350023.pdf

IP Fast Switching, Process Switch and CEF Switching.

I found nice information on Fast Switching, Process Switch and CEF Switching in the following link.

 

http://ciscogeek.wordpress.com/2008/10/14/ip-switching-fast-switching-process-switching-cef-switching/

 

 

Cisco Express Forwarding vs Fast Switching:

Cisco Express Forwarding vs Fast Switching:

 

Enabling CEF may be a method to alleviate the increased traffic load . CEF is supported in IOS releases 11.1( )CC, 12.0, and later on the Cisco 7200/7500/GSR platforms. Support for CEF on other platforms may be in IOS release 12.0 or later. You can investigate further with the Software Advisor tool on CCO.

 

It may not be possible to enable CEF on all routers for one of the following reasons:

 

--Insufficient memory

 

--Unsupported platform architectures

 

--Unsupported interface encapsulations
 
Fast Switching Behavior and Implications:
 
The following are implications of using fast switching:

 

--Traffic driven cache, or the cache is empty until the router switches packets and populates the cache.

 

--First packet is process switched (since cache is initially empty).

 

--Cache built at a granularity of the most specific Routing Information Base (RIB) entry part of a major net (if RIB has /24s for major net 131.108.0.0, the cache is built with /24s for this major network).

 

--/32 caching for load balancing - per destination load-balancing only (when load balancing, cache is built with /32s for that major net).

 

Note: These last two issues can potentially cause a huge cache that would consume all memory.

 

--With default route, caching is done at major network boundaries.

 

The Cache Ager runs every minute and checks 1/20th (5 percent) of the cache for unused entries under normal memory conditions, and 1/4th (25 percent) of the cache in a low memory condition (200k).
The command to change the above values is: ip cache-ager-interval X Y Z, where:

 

X is <0-2147483> number of seconds between ager runs, default = 60 seconds.

 

Y is <2-50> 1/(Y+1) of cache to age per run (low memory), default = 4.

 

Z is <3-100> 1/(Z+1) of cache to age per run (normal), default = 20.

 

CEF Advantages:

--The Forwarding Information Base (FIB) table is built based on the routing table, therefore forwarding information exists before the first packet is forwarded. The FIB also contains /32 entries for directly connected LAN hosts.

 

--The Adjacency (ADJ) table contains the Layer 2 rewrite information for next-hops and directly connected hosts (an ARP entry creates a CEF adjacency).

 

--There is no cache ager concept with CEF to spike CPU utilization. A FIB entry is deleted if a routing table entry is deleted.

 

--There is a more efficient lookup with CEF (maximum of 4 lookups).

 

Caution: Again, a default route pointing to a broadcast or multipoint interface means that the router will ARP for every new destination, potentially creating a huge adjacency table until the router runs out of memory. If CEF fails to allocate memory CEF/DECF will disable itself and will have to be manually re-enabled.

AutoSecure feature in Cisco IOS.

AutoSecure

By using a single command-line interface (CLI), the AutoSecure feature allows a user to perform the following functions:

•Disable common IP services that can be exploited for network attacks

•Enable IP services and features that can aid in the defense of a network when under attack.

 

 

More details can be found from:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/ios/12_3/feature/guide/ftatosec.html#wp1027129

Understanding Access Control List Logging

 

Please find the following extracts from Cisco's website which help in reducing CPU by ACL logging.

---------------------------------

 

There are two primary factors that contribute to the CPU load increase from ACL logging: process switching of packets that match log-enabled access control entries (ACEs) and the generation and transmission of log messages.

 

The log and log-input Access Control Entry OptionsL:

 

The log and log-input options apply to an individual ACE and cause packets that match the ACE to be logged. The log-input option enables logging of the ingress interface and source MAC address in addition to the packet's source and destination IP addresses and ports.

 

The first packet logged via the log or log-input options will generate a syslog message. There are two scenarios in which subsequent log messages will not be sent immediately. If the log-enabled ACE matches another packet with identical characteristics to the packet that generated a log message, the number of packets matched is incremented and then reported at five-minute intervals. Similarly, if any log-enabled ACE in any ACL on any interface matches a packet within one second of the initial log message, the match or matches are counted for five minutes and then reported. These periodic updates will contain the number of packets matched since the previous message.

 

 

Configuring a Log Update Threshold:

 

The ip access-list log-update threshold threshold-in-msgs and ipv6 access-list log-update threshold threshold-in-msgs commands can be used to configure how often syslog messages are generated and sent after the initial packet match. These commands use a threshold described as a number of packets, not as a time interval. This is in contrast to the periodic updates, which are sent every five minutes. A user configurable, time-based threshold does not presently exist.

 

Limiting ACL Logging–Induced Process Switching:

 

The ip access-list logging interval interval-in-ms command was released in IOS version 11.3. This command limits the effects of ACL logging–induced process switching by providing a rate limit for process-switched packets. The interval configured in the command allows only one packet per interval to be process switched no matter how many log-enabled ACEs exist. The interval applies globally, and the process switching limit affects all log-enabled ACEs in all ACLs on all interfaces. Packets that are not process switched will not be examined and will not be accounted for in logging. This functionality requires Cisco Express Forwarding to be enabled using the ip cef global configuration command.

 

The ip access-list logging interval interval-in-ms command does not apply to logging-enabled IPv6 ACLs and there is no IPv6 equivalent. As a result, all packets matching log-enabled ACEs in IPv6 ACLs are process switched.

 

Administrators can determine the number of packets being process switched using the show interface switching EXEC command. Although log messages may not be comprehensive after enabling the ip access-list logging interval command, the counter values displayed using the show access-lists and show ip access-lists commands are updated properly regardless of the presence or configuration of the ip access-list logging interval command.

 

Rate Limiting Syslog Messages:

 

The logging rate-limit message-rate [except severity-level] command limits the CPU impact of log generation and transmission. This command applies to all syslog messages and is not exclusive to those created through ACL logging. Although this command does limit the number of packets that must be generated and sent by the network device, it does nothing to reduce the number of input packets that are process switched by the device CPU. For this reason, it is imperative that the ip access-list logging interval command be used in conjunction with the logging rate-limit command.

 

Optimized ACL Logging:

 

The Catalyst 6500 series switches and Cisco 7600 series routers include hardware support for ACL logging. This feature, known as optimized ACL logging (OAL), was added to Cisco IOS Software version 12.2(17d)SXB and is available on devices that include the Policy Feature Card 3 (PFC3). It should be noted that OAL applies only to unicast IPv4 packets. All other packet types will be logged in software on the Multilayer Switch Feature Card (MSFC).To allow OAL to function properly, the mls rate-limit unicast ip icmp unreachable acl-drop 0 global configuration command must be entered.

 

Understanding OAL:

 

Optimized ACL Logging (OAL) provides hardware support for ACL logging. Unless you configure OAL, packets that require logging are processed completely in software on the MSFC. OAL permits or drops packets in hardware on the PFC3 and uses an optimized routine to send information to the MSFC3 to generate the logging messages.

 

OAL Guidelines and Restrictions

 

The following guidelines and restrictions apply to OAL:

 

­   OAL and VACL capture are incompatible. Do not configure both features on the switch. With OAL configured, use SPAN to capture traffic.

­   OAL is supported only on the PFC3.

­   OAL supports only IPv4 unicast packets.

­   OAL supports VACL logging of permitted ingress traffic

­   OAL does not provide hardware support for the following:

­   Reflexive ACLs

­   ACLs used to filter traffic for other features (for example, QoS)

­   ACLs for unicast reverse path forwarding (uRPF) check exceptions

­   Exception packets (for example, TTL failure and MTU failure)

­   Packets with IP options

­   Packets addressed at Layer 3 to the router

­   Packets sent to the MSFC3 to generate ICMP unreachable messages

­   Packets being processed by features not accelerated in hardware

­   To provide OAL support for denied packets, enter the mls rate-limit unicast ip icmp unreachable acl-drop 0 command.

CCIE SP Lab Scenarios.

This website has lot of SP scenarios along with Dynamips NET files.  Excellent resource.

 

http://pwp.netcabo.pt/amsoares/dynamips/dynamips.htm

Power Consumption comparison between Nexus 7K and Cat 65K.

I got so curious to know about power consumptions by each card in Nexus 7K and Cat 6095 and calculated power consumption as per typical requirements. It is very evident from the following data that Nexus 7K draws double the power, but it also provides double the port capacity on certain modules. The fan modules draw very high amount of power in Nexus 7K.

8700 Watt Enhanced AC Power Supply for Cisco Catalyst 6500 Series Switches.

Product Overview from Cisco's Website:

 

The 8700 Watt (W) enhanced AC power supply for Cisco® Catalyst® 6500 Series Switches is a triple AC input power supply with remote restart capability. The 8700W enhanced AC power supply is designed for the 6-, 9-, and 13-slot Cisco Catalyst 6500 Series Switch chassis. A Cisco Catalyst 6500 Series Switch configured with the 8700W enhanced AC power supply will support up to 420 IEEE 802.3af Class 3 (15.4W) Power over Ethernet (PoE) devices with full redundancy in a single chassis, providing superior PoE scalability. A Cisco Catalyst 6500 Series Switch along with the 8700W enhanced AC power supply is PoE plus ready with ability to support up to 1750W of power per slot.

The 8700W enhanced AC power supply provides the ability to remotely power cycle or shut down Cisco Catalyst 6500 Series Switches for maintenance using Normally Open (NO) or Normally Closed (NC) built-in external relay contacts using a front-panel terminal block interface. The power supply relay contacts can be controlled through any appropriate third-party relay controller.

 

More details can be found from:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/collateral/modules/ps7189/ps7195/product_data_sheet0900aecd8059a1ef.html

Watch movies online for free.

I found this website which streams English movies online for free. It is up to you to watch the movies from this website. I am not responsible for any copy right violations.

 

http://www.movies-on-demand.tv/

 

Thank you.

Murthy

Displaying Hardware ACL hit counters.

This command should help us in identifying the ACL hit count on 6500, which makes most of the ACL filtering on Hardware. The hit count we see on Show access-lists only shows the hit count when the packets are filtered using processor.

show tcam interface vlan acl in ip

This command will be useful when we would like to clean the ACLs with hit count zero.

Some important points of ASA.

Multiple context mode does not support the following features:

• Dynamic routing protocols. Security contexts support only static routes.
• You cannot enable OSPF, RIP, or EIGRP in multiple context mode.
• VPN
• Multicast routing. Multicast bridging is supported.
• Threat Detection

Some important notes about ASA 5500.

Some important notes about ASA 5500.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

When the security appliance is configured for IPSec VPN, you cannot enable security contexts (also called firewall multmode) or Active/Active stateful failover. Therefore, these features are unavailable.

 

Phase 1 ISAKMP negotiations can use either main mode or aggressive mode. Both provide the same services, but aggressive mode requires only two exchanges between the peers totaling 3 messages, rather than three exchanges totaling 6 messages. Aggressive mode is faster, but does not provide identity protection for the communicating parties. Therefore, the peers must exchange identification information prior to establishing a secure SA. Aggressive mode is enabled by default.

• Main mode is slower, using more exchanges, but it protects the identities of the communicating peers.

 • Aggressive mode is faster, but does not protect the identities of the peers.

 

IPSec over TCP works with remote access clients. You enable it globally, and it works on all ISAKMP enabled interfaces. It is a client to security appliance feature only. It does not work for LAN-to-LAN connections

Preparing for an interview?

Are you preparing for a tech interview and not sure about type of questions people will ask, you can use the following website to look into some typical tech questions you normally get in interviews.

http://www.techinterviews.com

Encrypting the whole harddisk/USB drive or certain files.

I normally carry some sensitive personal information on a USB drive/pocket Hard Drive. I was also very afraid that what will happen if I loose the USB drive/pocket Hard Drive. I found the Truecrypt, which addresses the above mentioned problems. It is free. It encrypts either the whole hard disk or certain files on a hard disk.

You can download the software from,

http://www.truecrypt.org/

Synopsis from their documentation:

TrueCrypt is a software system for establishing and maintaining an on-the-fly-encrypted volume (data storage device). On-the-fly encryption means that data are automatically encrypted or decrypted right before they are loaded or saved, without any user intervention. No data stored on an encrypted volume can be read (decrypted) without using the correct password/keyfile(s) or correct encryption keys. Entire file system is encrypted (e.g., file names, folder names, contents of every file, free space, meta data, etc).
Files can be copied to and from a mounted TrueCrypt volume just like they are copied to/from any normal disk (for example, by simple drag-and-drop operations). Files are automatically being decrypted on-the-fly (in memory/RAM) while they are being read or copied from an encrypted TrueCrypt volume. Similarly, files that are being written or copied to the TrueCrypt volume are automatically being encrypted on-the-fly (right before they are written to the disk) in RAM. Note that this does not mean that the whole file that is to be encrypted/decrypted must be stored in RAM before it can be encrypted/decrypted. There are no extra memory (RAM) requirements for TrueCrypt. For an illustration of how this is accomplished, see the following paragraph.Let's suppose that there is an .avi video file stored on a TrueCrypt volume (therefore, the video file is entirely encrypted). The user provides the correct password (and/or keyfile) and mounts (opens) the TrueCrypt volume. When the user double clicks the icon of the video file, the operating system launches the application associated with the file type – typically a media player. The media player then begins loading a small initial portion of the video file from the TrueCrypt-encrypted volume to RAM (memory) in order to play it. While the portion is being loaded, TrueCrypt is automatically decrypting it (in RAM). The decrypted portion of the video (stored in RAM) is then played by the media player. While this portion is being played, the media player begins loading next small portion of the video file from the TrueCrypt-encrypted volume to RAM (memory) and the process repeats. This process is called on-the-fly encryption/decryption and it works for all file types, not only for video files. Note that TrueCrypt never saves any decrypted data to a disk – it only stores them temporarily in RAM (memory). Even when the volume is mounted, data stored in the volume is still encrypted. When you restart Windows or turn off your computer, the volume will be dismounted and files stored in it will be inaccessible (and encrypted). Even when power supply is suddenly interrupted (without proper system shut down), files stored in the volume are inaccessible (and encrypted). To make them accessible again, you have to mount the volume (and provide the correct password and/or keyfile).

Reducing CPU usage due to ACLS on Catalyst Switches.

Based on the following documentation from Cisco I feel that if we implement “no ip unreachables” and Optimized ACL Logging, we will reduce some CPU load on the catalyst 6500 switches. Please let me know your thoughts. We may also take advantage of compiled (turbo) access-lists. This feature will index the ACLs and reduce the time taken to go through ACL linear matching and filtering process.


• ACL flows that match a "deny" statement in standard and extended ACLs (input and output) are dropped in hardware if "ip unreachables" is disabled.
• ACL flows that match a "permit" statement in standard and extended ACLs (input and output) are processed in hardware.
• Unless you configure optimized ACL logging (OAL), flows that require logging are processed in software without impacting nonlogged flow processing in hardware .
• When you enter the show ip access-list command, the match count displayed does not include packets processed in hardware

By default, the MSFC sends Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) unreachable messages when a packet is denied by an access group.
With the ip unreachables command enabled (which is the default), the supervisor engine drops most of the denied packets in hardware and sends only a small number of packets to the MSFC to be dropped (10 packets per second, maximum), which generates ICMP-unreachable messages.
To eliminate the load imposed on the MSFC CPU by the task of dropping denied packets and generating ICMP-unreachable messages, you can enter the no ip unreachables interface configuration command to disable ICMP unreachable messages, which allows all access group-denied packets to be dropped in hardware.
Thank you.

Human intelligency and internet.

Now a days I started observing my awareness to different things in the world and found that there is a tremendous increment in last 8 years. I should say thanks to internet especially to Google. In the year of 1999 when I was studying my final year of B.Tech and I was little exposed to internet. This was due to lack of technology advancements in India. I was doing a project in my final year on Reluctance Motors and I what I had was very old books from our library. Our guide asked us to go to IISc in Bangalore to collect the material. My friend and I went to library and made copies of the IEEE magazines and went to one of the students room in the college, where we got a brilliant advice from the student to search on internet. That time Altavista was famous. We searched internet and found some good material. Based on the material we collected we produced a thesis to our guide and external evaluator. Everything went well and we got good points for our project. All this would not have happened without internet.

Now a days I can learn new things, make decisions etc. based on internet. I do not need to feel shy to ask another person or read the old material from the library.

If we do not know something search in internet and you will get answers.

GNS3- Graphical Cisco Router Emulator.

I found GNS3 is a very useful Cisco router and PIX firewall simulator. Please find the descriptions I copied from their website.

You can download the software from http://www.gns3.net

GNS3 is a graphical network simulator that allows you to design complex network topologies and to launch simulations on them.
To allow complete simulations, GNS3 is strongly linked with :

Dynamips, an IOS emulator which allows users to run IOS binary images from Cisco Systems.
Dynagen, a text-based front-end for Dynamips.
Pemu, a PIX emulator.
GNS3 is a excellent complementary tool to real labs for administrators of Cisco networks or people wanting to pass their CCNA, CCNP, CCIP or CCIE certifications.
It can also be used to experiment features of Cisco IOS or to check configurations that need to be deployed later on real routers. This project is an open source product that may be used on multiple platforms, including Windows, Linux, and MacOS X.
Features overview
Designing high quality complex network topologies.
Emulating Cisco routers and PIX firewalls.
Simulating simple Ethernet, ATM and Frame Relay switches.
Load and save in Dynagen's INI-like format.
Image export (JPEG, PNG, BMP and XPM).

Leaders Should Know to Manage Failures

Nice article.

-----------------------------------------------------------
Former President of India, APJ Abdul Kalam while addressing an audience at Wharton India Economic forum, was asked to give an example, from his experience, as how leaders should manage failure and his reply was as follows;

"Let me tell you about my experience. In 1973 I became the project director of India’s satellite launch vehicle program, commonly called the SLV-3. Our goal was to put India’s “Rohini” satellite into orbit by 1980. I was given funds and human resources — but was told clearly that by 1980 we had to launch the satellite into space. Thousands of people worked together in scientific and technical teams towards that goal.

By 1979 — I think the month was August — we thought we were ready. As the project director, I went to the control center for the launch. At four minutes before the satellite launch, the computer began to go through the checklist of items that needed to be checked. One minute later, the computer program put the launch on hold; the display showed that some control components were not in order. My experts — I had four or five of them with me — told me not to worry; they had done their calculations and there was enough reserve fuel. So I bypassed the computer, switched to manual mode, and launched the rocket. In the first stage, everything worked fine. In the second stage, a problem developed. Instead of the satellite going into orbit, the whole rocket system plunged into the Bay of Bengal. It was a big failure.

That day, the chairman of the Indian Space Research Organization, Prof. Satish Dhawan, had called a press conference. The launch was at 7:00 am, and the press conference — where journalists from around the world were present — was at 7:45 am at ISRO’s satellite launch range in Sriharikota [in Andhra Pradesh in southern India]. Prof. Dhawan, the leader of the organization, conducted the press conference himself. He took responsibility for the failure — he said that the team had worked very hard, but that it needed more technological support. He assured the media that in another year, the team would definitely succeed. Now, I was the project director, and it was my failure, but instead, he took responsibility for the failure as chairman of the organization.

The next year, in July 1980, we tried again to launch the satellite — and this time we succeeded. The whole nation was jubilant. Again, there was a press conference. Prof. Dhawan called me aside and told me, “You conduct the press conference today.”

I learned a very important lesson that day. When failure occurred, the leader of the organization owned that failure. When success came, he gave it to his team. The best management lesson I have learned did not come to me from reading a book; it came from that experience

Free local and long distance calls in USA.

The following site is offering free local and long distance calls in USA. You will pay only 19.99 US$ per year for the membership. One of my friends told me that the voice voice quality is great. I do not take any responsibility for the quality. I do not represent the company. I am posting this in my blog to just give an idea.

http://www.magicjack.com/4/index.asp

Thank you.
Murthy

Watch Hindi movies for free.

This website got lots of Hindi movies for watching online. The site is legal, so you can happily enjoy watching.

www.rajshri.com

Enjoy watching.
Murthy

Money Saving Tips.

The following site has lot of tips how to save money. They say that small savings will add up over the years. It is nice to see that Americans are talking about savings.

http://www.feedthepig.org

Start saving.
Murthy

Let Go Your Ego

There was once a learned scientist after a lot of practice and efforts developed a formula and learned the art of reproducing himself. He did it so perfectly that it was impossible to tell the reproduction from the original. Thus was successful in his formula. One day while doing his research realized that the Angel of Death was searching for him. In order to remain immortal he reproduced a dozen copies of himself. The reproduction was so meticulous that all of them looked exactly like him.

Now when this Angel of death came down, he was at a loss to know which of the thirteen before him was the original scientist, and confused, he left them all alone and returned back to heaven.

But, not for long, for being an expert in human nature, the Angel came up with a clever idea. He said to the scientist addressing all thirteen of them, "Sir, you must be a genius to have succeeded in making such perfect reproduction formula of yourself. However, I have discovered a flaw in your work, just one tiny little flaw."

The scientist immediately jumped out and shouted, "Impossible! Where is the flaw?" "Right here" said the Angel, as he picked up the scientist from among the reproductions and carried him off.

The whole purpose of the scientist and his formula of reproduction failed as he could not control his pride and lost his life.

While your knowledge and skills takes you to the top of the ladder and make you successful, but the three letter word "EGO" will pull you down immediately…so let go your Ego.

Angry Renter

Congress is getting ready to pass a multi-billion dollar bailout of homeowners and their banks. That's right, Congress is going to use your tax dollars to bail out big banks and keep housing prices too high!

Please read from the below link.

http://www.angryrenter.com/

Making Difference.

Nice article
-------------------------------------

A vacationing businessman was walking along a beach when he saw a young boy near the shore walking towards the ocean.

There were many starfishes along the shore that had been washed up by the tide and were sure to die before the tide returned. The boy walked slowly along the shore and occasionally reached down and tossed the beached starfish back into the ocean.

The businessman, hoping to teach the boy a little lesson in common sense, walked up to the boy and said, "I have been watching what you are doing, son. You have a good heart, and I know you mean well, but do you realize how many beaches there are around here and how many starfish are dying on every beach every day. Surely such an industrious and kind hearted boy such as yourself could find something better to do with your time. Do you really think that what you are doing is going to make a difference?"

The boy looked up at the man, and then he looked down at a starfish by his feet. He picked up the starfish, and as he gently tossed it back into the ocean, he said, "It makes a difference to that one."

Free e-books.

The following website has a huge collection of technical e-books. I am not sure about the copy right so I do not take any responsibility for downloading the books from this website.

www.knowfree.net

It is upto you whether to download from here or not.

Thank you.
Murthy

Saving money on Gas.

I found this interesting article in Yahoo Finance about saving money on Gas. It is worth reading.

http://finance.yahoo.com/family-home/article/104752/Slow-Down-a-Lttle-Save-a-Lot-of-Gas

Enjoy reading.
Murthy

Watching Latest Movies Online.

The debate is, is it legal to watch movies online without violating copy right act?

For example the following site has lot of movies.

http://www.joox.net

Some people say that since we are not source of those movies it is fine to watch. They also mention that do not download the movies to your hard disk. Some people say that even watching online is violation of copy right.

Please post your comments.

Thank you.
Murthy

Reebok 40% discount coupon.

Enjoy the discount.

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Unlocking IE toolbar.

Our organization locks IE toolbars and due to this policy we can not open any toolbar attached to IE. I like using Google toolbar a lot and this policy annoyed me like anything. So, I searched in google and talked to co-workers and found an executable file which will unlock IE toolbar so that you can see google toolbar or something similar to it. Offcourse the policy will kickin again and close it but I will re-run the executable. I am not quitting. :)

The tool can be downloaded from:
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=VW2F9MJS

Enjoy.
Murthy

An Apple in the Bag.

Nice Article.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A teacher teaching Maths to seven-year-old Arnav asked him, “If I give you one apple and one apple and one apple, how many apples will you have?”Within a few seconds Arnav replied confidently, “Four!”

The dismayed teacher was expecting an effortless correct answer (three). She was disappointed. “Maybe the child did not listen properly,” she thought. She repeated, “Arnav, listen carefully. If I give you one apple and one apple and one apple, how many apples will you have?”

Arnav had seen the disappointment on his teacher’s face. He calculated again on his fingers. But within him he was also searching for the answer that will make the teacher happy. His search for the answer was not for the correct one, but the one that will make his teacher happy. This time hesitatingly he replied, “Four…”

The disappointment stayed on the teacher’s face. She remembered that Arnav liked strawberries. She thought maybe he doesn’t like apples and that is making him loose focus. This time with an exaggerated excitement and twinkling in her eyes she asked, “If I give you one strawberry and one strawberry and one strawberry, then how many you will have?”

Seeing the teacher happy, young Arnav calculated on his fingers again. There was no pressure on him, but a little on the teacher. She wanted her new approach to succeed. With a hesitating smile young Arnav enquired, “Three?”

The teacher now had a victorious smile. Her approach had succeeded. She wanted to congratulate herself. But one last thing remained. Once again she asked him, “Now if I give you one apple and one apple and one more apple how many will you have?”

Promptly Arnav answered, “Four!”

The teacher was aghast. “How Arnav, how?” she demanded in a little stern and irritated voice.

In a voice that was low and hesitating young Arnav replied, “Because I already have one apple in my bag.”


“When someone gives you an answer that is different from what you expect don't think they are wrong. There maybe an angle that you have not understood at all. You will have to listen and understand, but never listen with a predetermined notion.”

Words That Impact

Nice article.

_________________________________

One of the staff in a high school found it difficult to stop students running up and down the stairs. She continually told them not to run but it made little difference. She was at her wits' end.

It was suggested that instead of telling them not to run, she should say something like: "Slow down please" or "Walk down the stairs." She was excited and somewhat amazed to report that it had worked – such a little change in language brought such a marked improvement in the match between what she wanted the kids to do and what they actually did.

How does this happen?

If I don't want you to think of pink elephants and I say "Don't think of pink elephants" what happens? You immediately get a picture of pink elephants in your mind and then, if you are feeling complicit as you read this, you try not to think about them. Now, if I'd asked you not to think about red rhinos, for example, there is much less chance of you conjuring up those pink elephants.

The mind works a bit like a search engine on the Internet. Put in a word, press SEARCH and all the references to that word come up on the screen. Put in a mental suggestion like pink elephants and you don't even have to press a button; up come images of pink elephants on the screen of the mind.

And that's what happens in kids' minds when we tell them not to do something. Its not willful disobedience so much as the mind making pictures and the body going towards them.

Bill Rogers – in his excellent behavior management series "Corrective Discipline" – suggests using the pattern "When …. then …." rather than "You can't …. Because…."

For example: "Johnny, when you have finished tidying your room, then you can go out to play." rather than: "Johnny you can't go out to play because your room is a mess"

With the first sentence Johnny gets a picture in his mind of tidying his room, then going out to play. Just what we want. In the second sentence we're inviting his subconscious to picture himself not being able to go out to play and with an untidy room.

Unlocking Windows toolbar.

Our organization Windows policy is so strict that they even lock the Windows toolbar. I felt very irritating because I use Quick Launch bar everyday and I could not use this because of this freaking policy. So, I Googled(Google Searched it) and found following VB script which can unlock the toolbar option. The policy might kick-in again and lock the toolbar but I will run this script again. Hope this script will be useful to you guys also.

http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/regs_edits/xp_taskbar_desktop_fixall.vbs

Enjoy the tool.
Murthy

Troubleshooting network application issues.

Hello,

We were constantly got reports about application latency between two locations which are geographically separated by 1000s of miles. Everytime our team used to check network link errors. But this approach was not finding any issues. We did research in using tools which can give more insight and fixed the problems. The tools used were,

• OPNET IT Guru from OPNET
• IXChariot from IXIA

OPNET IT Guru captures the data from end to end and combines the data to report possible causes. This tool got lot of different modules, which are expensive but they give lot of insight to application behaviour over the network. You can download OPNET IT Guru educational version from OPNET and model you network. This is pretty cool stuff.

IXChariot is used to generate certain type of traffic and capture the performance of the traffic between two end points. You can download trial version of IXChariot also.

There are various tools available in the market, but I recommend them because we used and found some good results.

Enjoy evaluating the software.

Murthy

Funny Video.

I found this funny video on Youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrzVI_5UK3c

Enjoy watching.

Thank you.
Murthy

Dialing through Aux port on router.

Hello All,

While working on modem remediation project I found that sometimes the phone line which is connected to modem has different number than our records and I could not trace the correct number. Instead of asking local tech to hook-up an analog phone for finding the number I felt that we could user our same old BCRAN skills. I used this following script in my lab. After applying the script to make an outbound call through Aux port on the router please type telnet 9.9.9.9, then router will dial the number specified in the script. To terminate the dial-up connection use CTRL+SHIFT and 6. To be on safe side please issue reload 30 before configuring and do not write memory until you are done. Please go through script and let me know if any modifications required. Please remove the configuration after getting the number.


chat-script Dialout ABORT ERROR ABORT BUSY "" "AT" OK "ATDT \T" TIMEOUT 45 CONNECT \c
modemcap entry MY_USR_MODEM:MSC=&F1S0=1
!
!
!
!
!
!
interface Loopback0
ip address x.x.x.x x.x.x.x --- If the router is already configured with loopback we do not need to configure again.
!

!
interface Async1
no ip address
encapsulation ppp
dialer in-band
dialer pool-member 20
!
interface Dialer10
ip unnumbered Loopback0
encapsulation ppp
dialer pool 20
dialer idle-timeout 900
dialer string
dialer-group 1
!

ip route 9.9.9.9 255.255.255.255 Dialer10
!

!
access-list 101 permit tcp any 9.9.9.9 0.0.0.0 eq telnet
dialer-list 1 protocol ip list 101
!

line aux 0
exec-timeout 0 0
script dialer Dialout
modem InOut
modem autoconfigure type MY_USR_MODEM
transport input all
stopbits 1
flowcontrol hardware


Thank you.

DNS Suffix Search list.

Our team was trying to find an option to push DNS suffix search list through DHCP server to all the clients. Eventually we found that it is not possible. The following article from Microsoft has more details.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/275553

Enjoy reading.
Murthy