Titanic photo shows evidence of human remains

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By Claudine Zap | The Upshot – 19 hrs ago

A newly released photo from the North Atlantic site of the shipwrecked RMS Titanic shows evidence of human remains, federal officials are saying.

In observance of the 100th anniversary of the ship’s sinking, a 2004 image was reissued to the public in an uncropped version, which shows a coat and boots buried in the mud at the site two-and-a-half miles below the ocean’s surface, where the legendary passenger liner now lies.

Word of the new photo caused Yahoo! searches to surge on “titanic remains,” “real titanic pictures underwater,” and “titanic may hold passengers.”

Dr. James P. Delgado, the director of the Maritime Heritage Museum at the National Oceanic and Atmosphere Administration told Yahoo News over the phone that the way the boots are placed together makes a “compelling case” that they belonged to a body.

This photo provided by the Institute for Exploration, Center for Archaeological Oceanography/University of Rhode Island/NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration, shows The remains of a coat and boots, articulated in the mud on the sea bed near Titanic’s stern, are suggestive evidence of where a victim of the disaster came to rest. (AP Photo/Institute for Exploration, Center for Archaeological Oceanography/University of Rhode Island/NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration)

The scientist, who was responsible for mapping the shipwreck during a 2010 expedition for NOAA, says that the image was rereleased in its full form (it was originally published to show only one boot) to serve as  a reminder that the ship is an “underwater resting place” and needs to be better protected and respected.

The newly published image was first reported by the New York Times—which also noted that not all Titanic experts agree there are bodies at the site of the wreckage, first discovered in 1985. James Cameron, who directed the movie “Titanic,” and has explored the site multiple times, said he’s never seen human remains: “We’ve seen shoes. We’ve seen pairs of shoes, which would strongly suggest there was a body there at one point. But we’ve never seen any human remains.”

This photo provided by the Institute for Exploration, Center for Archaeological Oceanography/University of Rhode Island/NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration, shows a pair of shoes, lying in close proximity, are, while the visible remains of the victim have disappeared, suggestive evidence of where a victim of the Titanic disaster came to rest. (AP Photo/Institute for Exploration, Center for Archaeological Oceanography/University of Rhode Island/NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration)

Delgado said that the issue is more one of “semantics.” The researcher said of Cameron, “He’s seen the pairs of shoes and clothing that’s down there, and so when he sees that, perhaps he’s not seeing what we see as archeologists.” He added, “When I see shoes together I see someone who came to rest.” Delgado added that when Titanic finder Robert Ballard first showed the photo in 2004, “the room went silent.” He said the explorers who looked at it could tell it had once been a lost soul from the ship.

A bill introduced by Sen.  John Kerry would amend the Titanic Maritime Memorial Act of 1986 to protect the wreck from salvage and intrusive research. But since the ocean liner sank in international waters after hitting an iceberg on April 14, 1912, there are limits to what the U.S. can do.

One thing that is in Delgado’s power:  to raise awareness of the undersea site, which he believes should be treated as a museum—and as hallowed ground. Noting that many of the ship’s passengers were on their way to the U.S. to become American citizens, he said,”There are some places that are so special we should take a different approach. “

Girl in Pulitzer-winning picture still has nightmares

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By Lawrence Bartlett | AFP – 3 hrs ago

This photo dated December 6, shows Tarana Akbari crying near dead and injured people after a suicide bomber targetted Shiite worshippers during a religious ceremony outside the Abul Fazel shrine in Kabul where Shia Muslims were marking the Day of Ashura. Agence France-Presse photographer Massoud Hossaini won the agency’s first Pulitzer Prize for the picture on April 16, 2012 in the breaking news photography category “for his heartbreaking image of a girl crying in fear after a suicide bomber’s attack at a crowded shrine in Kabul,” the committee announced. AFP PHOTO/ Massoud HOSSAINI ++GRAPHIC CONTENT++

Down a rutted dirt alley in Old Kabul, the “Girl in the green dress” — the subject of AFP’s Pulitzer-winning photograph — still has nightmares about the day a suicide bomber made her image world famous.

Tarana Akbari, 11, no longer wears her best dress, which was drenched in her own blood and that of her relatives who were among 70 people who died around her at a religious festival on December 6 last year.

AFP photographer Massoud Hossaini, 30, won the prestigious US journalism prize for his “heartbreaking image of a girl crying in fear after a suicide bomber’s attack at a crowded shrine in Kabul,” the Pulitzer committee said.

Tarana still cries sometimes when she remembers that day, but she managed an occasional shy smile in an interview with AFP at her modest home on Tuesday, as she cuddled her sisters, who were both wounded in the blast.

Afghan girl Tarana Akbari, 11, poses for a photograph after an interview with an AFP reporter at her home in Kabul. Down a rutted dirt alley in Old Kabul, Tarana — the subject of AFP photographer Massoud Hossaini’s Pulitzer-winning photograph — still has nightmares about the day a suicide bomber made her image world famous

That her picture has been featured on newspaper front pages around the world means little to her, she says, with a small shrug and a fleeting smile.

But when she first saw the searing image she wondered: “How come I am alive. I can see all the dead bodies around me but only I survived.”

She is still frightened at times, and that bloody day still haunts her, awake or asleep, but she says she is getting better.

One of the two spartan rooms that Tarana shares with her family of seven has a television in a corner, but what she sees there does not always help her recovery.

Last Sunday, squads of Taliban suicide bombers infiltrated the capital and unleashed gunfire and explosions in an 18-hour assault before all being killed by security forces.

“It made me frightened again,” she said. “I am not happy, because that day when the bomb went off destroyed my family.”

Of the bomber and those who sent him on his mission, she says only: “They did a bad thing. They should not have done it.”

Her unemployed father, Ahmad, 35, lifts the shirt of Tarana’s four-year-old sister to show horrific scars covering her entire stomach from the shrapnel that ripped through the celebrating crowd.

Out of 17 women and children from her extended family who went to a riverside shrine near her home that day to mark the Shiite holy day of Ashura, seven died, including her seven-year-old brother Shoaib.

Tarana herself has scars on her legs and arms and walks with a limp. She no longer attends school because her legs hurt, she says, adding: “I hope I can get well soon and go back to school.”

Asked about her hopes for the future, the sweet smile makes an appearance and she says she would like to be a teacher, with the local language Dari being her favourite subject.

She spends her days playing with her sisters in the ramshackle house and in the dirt courtyard outside which leads to an alley where huddled young men openly inject heroin against crumbling mud walls.

Behind those walls, the “Girl in the green dress” nurses her pain and her fears, now dressed in a plain, baggy, shalwar khameez hiding the scars from the day her life was torn apart.

 

Spectacular Solar Flare Erupts From the Sun

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By Tariq Malik , SPACE.com Managing Editor Space.com | SPACE.com – 13 hrs ago

• The sun unleashed a beautiful prominence eruption from its east limb (left side) on Monday, April 16, 2012. Here, the M1.7-class solar flare was seen by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory. (NASA/GSFC/SDO)

The sun erupted in an amazing solar flare today (April 16), unleashing an intense eruption of super-heated plasma that arced high above the star’s surface before blasting out into space.

The powerful solar flare occurred at 1:45 p.m. EDT (1745 GMT) and registered as a moderate M1.7-class on the scale of sun storms, placing it firmly in the middle of the scale used by scientists to measure flare strength. The storm is not the strongest this year from the sun, but photos and video of the solar flare captured by NASA spacecraft revealed it to be an eye-popping display of magnetic plasma.

“Great eruption happening on the sun now,” scientists with NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) wrote in a Twitter post.

 

The solar flare erupted along the sun’s eastern limb (its left side) from an active region that may also be responsible for solar storm activity observed on Sunday, SDO mission officials said. The flare kicked up a massive amount of solar plasma in an explosion known as a coronal mass ejection, or CME.

“Such eruptions are often associated with solar flares, and in this case an M1 class (medium-sized) flare did occur at the same time, though it was not aimed toward Earth,” officials with NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., explained in an image description. The Goddard center oversees the sun-monitoring SDO mission.

When aimed at Earth, strong solar flares and CMEs can supercharge the planet’s auroras, also known as the northern and southern lights. Extremely powerful CMEs can pose a danger to astronauts and satellites in space, as well as power grids, navigation and communications systems on Earth.

Astronomers measure solar flares on a letter scale, with the strongest events falling into three categories: C, M and X. C-class solar flares are the weakest events, with the X-class sun storms marking the most powerful events on the sun.

The sun is currently in an active phase of its 11-year solar weather cycle and is expected to reach its peak activity in 2013. The current solar weather cycle is known as Solar Cycle 24.

10 Pioneers of the Background Check Industry

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Posted on April 16, 2012 by admin | in Background Check

 

Though its recent popularity is greater than ever before, the background check industry has roots that extend farther back than one might think. Many developments came together to create the industry as we know it today. Here are ten of the pioneering people and organizations in background screening.

1. Henry Fielding – The creator of the forerunner to the modern police records system, Henry Fielding’s contributions to law enforcement and modern private investigation is undeniable. His Bow Street Runners, the first professional police force, were responsible for several advancements in criminal justice.
2. J. Edgar Hoover – His creation of the first fingerprint database and obsession with data collection left an indelible mark on the methods investigators use to collect information.
3. Eugene Francois Vidocq – One of the most important and controversial aspects of a full background check is the ability to access sensitive consumer report information; this is due in part to the work of French convict-turned-lawman Eugene Francois Vidocq who created the world’s first credit reporting agency.
4. Allan Pinkerton – America’s first private investigator, the legendary Scottish-born Allan Pinkerton was responsible for many advancement in law enforcement and investigative techniques in both the public and private sectors.
5. Jim and Sarah Brady – After being injured in the assassination attempt on President Reagan, Jim Brady suffered permanent paralysis and some brain damage. In response to this, he and his wife Sarah became crusaders for more stringent gun control laws, which spawned the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act. This law requires that all people attempting to purchase a firearm must first submit to a background check.
6. Lester Rosen – The founder of Employment Screening Resources, Lester Rosen formed his firm in 1996 after working for the Doane Agency. Qualified as a employment screening expert and a recognized expert in the field, Mr. Rosen is one of the industry’s foremost figures.
7. NAPBS – The National Association of Professional Background Screeners is the leading non-profit trade association for companies that offer background screening services. Their mission of promoting ethical hiring and compliance with federal law places them among the figureheads in the industry.
8. Steve Brownstein – In response to the lack of industry standards, Steve Brownstein held the first background check industry conference in Long Beach, California in 2000. This conference led to more events in Tampa, Florida on an even larger scale and strove to introduce an industry standard system.
9. Pre-Employ.Com – As one of the very first internet-based background screening companies, Pre-Employ.Com helped to revolutionize the process of background checks by streamlining and speeding up the process.
10. Past-Employ.Com – Part of the Pre-Employ.Com family, this website was designed in 2005 to streamline the employment verification process even further by creating a system for verifying past salary and employment information.

The background screening and investigative industry is an ever-evolving one; as legal implications and admissibility changes, so must the service providers and industry leaders. These companies and individuals have aided dramatically in creating today’s multi-million dollar industry.

10 Colleges That Are Taking on Personal Finance

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by Staff Writers

April 16, 2012

As the economy struggles to recover from the downturn that has marked the past few years, many are focusing increased amounts of attention on their personal finances, hoping to spend less, save more, and plan for the future. The trouble is, the majority of young people have no idea where to start. A 2011 survey by Charles Schwab found that only 52% of high school students have savings accounts, even though 75% of them claim to be knowledgeable about money management. Somewhere along the line, students are missing out on key pieces of financial education and many schools are starting to take note.

Several states now require personal finance courses at the high school level, but colleges are getting in on the game as well, with some even making personal finance courses a requirement for graduation. Whatever the rules, it’s clear that young people need a bit of help when it comes to learning how to manage money, and these colleges are making sure that their students will be ahead of the game. Mark this year’s Financial Literacy Month by learning about just a few of the colleges and universities that are stressing financial education.

1. Penn State Erie

   In a partnership with National Educators Council, Penn State Erie is taking part in the Financial EduNation Campaign. Starting in April 2012, the college will be providing free personal finance programs to students, parents, educators, and other organizations throughout the state as their part of promoting the campaign. Aimed at teens and young adults, the programs are completed online through a program that features celebrities, business leaders, and sports stars. So far, the school has reached out to more than 25,000 students in middle school through college, but they hope to expand the program during the coming month.

2. Indiana University Kelley School of Business

   Students at this business school can get a crash-course in financial education in a sophomore course taught by Professor Brian Jbara. Jbara has reported an increased interest in his course in recent years, as students worried about a poor job market, student loan debt, and a generally poor economy look to build real-world skills before graduation. Jbara believes that helping students to learn more about their financial lives is critical to their success in their first jobs and beyond. His course has grown from just 25 students to 225 over the past 10 years he has been teaching it, a testament to the growing popularity of personal finance education on college campuses.

3. NYU

   At NYU’s School of Continuing and Professional Studies, there are a number of personal finance courses students can take. While the courses may have been largely ignored in past years, that isn’t the case anymore, as students flock to the office to register for personal finance courses. In fact, the courses were so popular and had so much interest from students outside of professional fields that the school actually added several other sections to their line-up. In addition, the school has been approached by family members of students who want to learn more about how to address their own financial situations, and the school may branch out further in coming years to meet the needs of a community that increasingly wants to build better personal finance skills.

4. Washington University, St. Louis

   Professor Michael Gordinier has taught a personal finance course at Wash U since 2003, open to any student at the school in their junior or senior year of study. Over the past few years, the course has grown in popularity and has become one of the better-attended and most-requested classes on campus, boasting a class size of almost 200 students, up from just 80 a decade ago. The course is often more full than that, however, as many business students often audit the course (they cannot take it for credit) just to get information. At the end of the semester, many students thank Gordinier for helping them save more or get out of debt, a big payoff for a semester of work. Gordinier thinks all schools should offer similar programs, which are currently pretty uncommon, to students so that they can learn practical skills in money management.

5. Champlain College

   At Champlain College, students don’t get a choice when it comes to taking courses in finance; they’re required. Undergrads at Champlain must attend two sessions on financial literacy during their time at the school, a change that was made because administrators felt too many students were graduating without basic financial skills. The courses cover topics like credit scores, saving, budgeting, retirement, and credit strategies, among others. Students learn fundamentals that will help them get jobs, buy homes, and manage debt. In addition to the required courses, students at Champlain can continue their financial education through courses in student loans and employment benefits. The school hopes to host a financial literacy conference in the coming years.

6. Drexel University

   If you want to take a personal finance course at Drexel University in Philadelphia, you had better get ready to battle for a spot. The last three times the school offered a personal finance course for business students the sections filled up almost immediately, forcing the school to schedule additional sections to meet the demand. While personal finance courses were limited to business majors in the past, the school is working to create additional sections of the course for non-business majors due to its overwhelming popularity. School administrators say they aren’t surprised by the number of students looking for practical, real-world information, especially in an uncertain job market.

7. Baylor University

   Baylor University first launched a personal finance course 15 years ago at the request of parents who wanted their children to emerge from college with some practical skills under their belts. Franklin Potts, the professor teaching the class, now sees hundreds of students each semester. Potts believes that schools put too much emphasis on information that isn’t useful to everyday life, sacrificing lessons in important practical matters. And the course isn’t popular with just liberal arts majors; business school students flock to it as well, as many business courses don’t ever touch on issues like retirement, insurance, or budgeting.

8. Wellesley College

   Called Econ 223, you might not realize this class even has anything to do with personal finance at first glance, but it’s helping students at Wellesley learn some pretty fundamental skills. Professors Anne Witte and Saundra Gulley inundate students with the essentials of personal finance, from insurance, to retirement funds, to managing credit. The duo created the course about five years ago when they noticed that students on campus seemed wholly unprepared to manage their own finances, and it remains a popular choice on campus today. Witte says that she believes every student should have to take a class like this one, so that they can learn from things in the classroom rather than making real-world mistakes.

9. Kansas University

   Students at KU now have the option of taking a personal finance course during their time at the school, getting the chance to learn about topics like budgeting, bill paying, renting, retirement, investing, and even buying a home. The course was created in the fall of 2007 at the urging of parents and business school faculty who thought the school sorely needed a more practical financial course for students. Today, about 100 students from different majors and levels are enrolled in the course and it is growing in popularity as students reap the benefits of their newfound financial knowledge.

10. Georgetown University

    Georgetown costs students a pretty penny to attend, so it only makes sense that it would offer a course to help students manage their financial lives. After all, they’re going to have some serious loans to pay back. Seniors at the school can take part in a series of financial literacy workshops that cover topics like loan repayment, spending, credit cards, taxes, and employment benefits. In addition to these workshops, the school’s alumni association also takes part in a series called Common $ense, where students can connect with alumni to learn about a variety of financial issues.

25 Exciting Stats on Green Job Growth

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Although many past Earth Days have come and gone with little in the way of good news regarding the environment, there is much to celebrate on April 22, 2012. Backed by one of the more environmentally-friendly presidents in recent memory, the United States has seen huge funding for alternative energy sources, a drive for better fuel economy, and a massive movement by colleges and other groups to live cleaner, greener, and more efficiently. So this Earth Day, think of these 25 exciting statistics about the growth of jobs for work that benefits the environment, and be happy. The future is bright.

1. Hydropower is estimated to have the potential of adding 1.4 million jobs by 2025

   Every state has the potential to create hydropower projects, from ocean water, streams, or pumped storage water, meaning plants all over the country could be created and staffed with workers.

2. The government has created a $2 million green job competition for veterans

   In March 2010, the government announced it would allocate $2 million toward grants for training military veterans in industries like bio-fuels, renewable electric power, energy-efficient construction, and more.

3. The green construction industry will add 2.3 million workers to its labor force

   According to the U.S. Green Building Council, green construction employed more than 1 million people from 2000 to 2008. This number is expected to rise to 3.3 million by 2013, about a 230% increase. Nearly half of American solar power firms plan to hire more workers: In August 2011, almost half of 2,100 solar power companies surveyed said they plan to add an expected 24,000 jobs by August 2012.

4. The solar industry job growth rate is 6.8%

   Compared to the fossil fuel industry’s negative growth rate of 2%, the nearly 7% growth in solar power jobs, including manufacturing and installation, is very promising.

5. Tennessee will see the creation of 10,000 new green jobs by 2014

   A handful of companies like Volkswagen and Nissan Leaf and Storage Battery Manufacturing will help the state continue to see an 8% growth rate annually, with jobs like energy brokers and solar installation managers becoming available.

6. Ohio could see 23,000 new auto industry jobs in the next 10 years

   A recent report by non-profit research group Ceres found that because of new federal regulations for fuel efficiency, hiring will increase by automakers and companies that make fuel-efficient tech.

7. The geothermal industry has added 7,000 jobs and counting since 2008

   Executive Director of the Geothermal Energy Association Karl Gawell estimated in 2011 that new geothermal construction projects, which have no fuel costs and produce very little CO2, will add another 3,000 jobs in California, Nevada, and elsewhere.

8. The bio-fuel sector could produce 807,000 jobs by 2022

   The Biotechnology Industry Organization said in late 2011 that the bio-fuel industry could produce hundreds of thousands of jobs while lowering U.S. oil imports by $70 billion.

9. Knoxville, Tennessee’s green jobs grew by 14.6% annually from 2003 to 2010

   In 2009 alone, Knoxville added more than 16,000 green jobs, helping lower the unemployment rate to 7.7% for the city, a full two points lower than the rest of the state.

10. The green industry in the U.S. now employs 3.1 million workers

    Green jobs now outnumber jobs in the fossil fuels industry (although some have taken issue with the definition of “green job” used in the calculation).

11. In Little Rock, Arkansas 11,933 green jobs were created in 2010

    Being home to clean-tech companies like LM Wind Power and CLEAResult Consulting helped Arkansas’ capital become one of the fastest-growing cities in America for green jobs.

12. President Obama’s Recovery Act of 2009 invested $90 billion in clean energy

    This money has already helped sponsor 40 clean-tech projects that will eventually employ upwards of 60,000 people.

13. With more than 28,000, Albany has the highest concentration of green jobs in the country

    One out of every 15 workers in and around Albany has a clean job, or 6.7%, thanks in large part to the business of GE, which houses many of its clean-tech operations in Schenectady.

14. The U.S. is only tapping 20% of its hydropower capacity

    There is much, much more room for job growth in hydropower because out of the 500 gigawatt capacity, the U.S. is only making use of 100 gigawatts.

15. The Dept. of Energy’s Loan Guarantee Program will help create 10 times the number of the failed Keystone Pipeline

    And what’s even more exciting is that the DOE program will cost taxpayers $2 billion less than originally expected.

16. Jobs for the Future is expanding green job training in seven cities across the country

    Funded with $38 million from the Dept. of Labor, JFF will equip workers with skills necessary for the green industry, adding thousands of jobs to Boston, Chicago, Detroit, and more.

17. Worldwide, the green energy sector could create 20 million to 30 million jobs by 2030

    And that’s just the energy sector of green technology. This many jobs would inject trillions of dollars into a struggling world economy.

18. North Carolina’s green industry grew by 700 companies from 2009 to 2010

    Job figures are certain to increase in “The Triangle,” the nickname applied to the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area, which already has one of the highest totals of green jobs in the country.

19. California is projected to spawn more than 200,000 jobs by 2020

    A 2011 report by The Donald Vial Center on Employment in the Green Economy stated that energy efficiency policies will produce 211,000 skilled, high-paying jobs and more than $11 billion in revenue for the state.

20. The number of green jobs in Toledo, Ohio have gone up 72% since 2003

    The city added 4,000 jobs during the period, and in one 18-month period the jobs helped lower unemployment nearly four percentage points.

21. Organic farmers’ markets rose 17% in 2010 alone

    A key part of the green movement is locally sourced, organic food. Farmers had plenty of work in 2010, as the markets’ surge in popularity swelled their numbers to 7,175 across the nation.

22. Des Moines, Iowa is growing in green jobs at 11.4% per year

    Since 2003, more than 2,500 green jobs have been created, moving the city’s total to over 5,200 green industry jobs and helping keep unemployment low.

23. Albuquerque lowered unemployment 2.6% in 2010 thanks to green jobs

    The city’s 9,000-plus clean-tech jobs at manufacturing companies like Advent Solar and Schott AG have helped make it a hub of environmentally-friendly work.

24. Ogden, Utah has been growing at a rate of 8.6% for new green jobs each year

    The 927 jobs the Ogden area has added in recent years are thanks to openings created at green companies like recycling company American Specialty Glass Inc. and green manufacturer W.R. Grace & Co.

Joomla

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Joomla is a free and open source content management system (CMS) for publishing content on the World Wide Web and intranets and a model–view–controller (MVC) Web application framework that can also be used independently.

Joomla is written in PHP, uses object-oriented programming (OOP) techniques (since version 1.6) and software design patterns, stores data in a MySQL or (since version 2.5) MS SQL database, and includes features such as page caching, RSS feeds, printable versions of pages, news flashes, blogs, polls, search, and support for language internationalization.

As of March 2012, Joomla has been downloaded over 30 million times. Over 9,200 free and commercial extensions are available from the official Joomla! Extension Directory, and more are available from other sources. It is estimated to be the second most used CMS on the Internet after WordPress.

Screenshot [show] Joomla! 1.5 administration backend
Developer(s)	The Joomla Project Team
Stable release	2.5.4 / 2 April 2012; 7 days ago (2012-04-02)
Development status	Active
Written in	PHP
Operating system	Cross-platform
Size	7.6 MB (compressed) 20.9 MB (uncompressed)
Type	Content management system
License	GNU General Public License
Website	www.joomla.org

Development

Joomla was the result of a fork of Mambo on August 17, 2005. At that time, the Mambo name was trademarked by Miro International Pvt Ltd., who formed a non-profit foundation with the stated purpose of funding the project and protecting it from lawsuits. The Joomla development team claimed that many of the provisions of the foundation structure went against previous agreements made by the elected Mambo Steering Committee, lacked the necessary consultation with key stakeholders and included provisions that violated core open source values.

The Joomla development team created a website called OpenSourceMatters.org to distribute information to users, developers, web designers and the community in general. Project leader Andrew Eddie wrote a letter that appeared on the announcements section of the public forum at mamboserver.com. A little more than one thousand people had joined OpenSourceMatters.org within a day, most posting words of encouragement and support, and the website received the Slashdot effect as a result. Miro CEO Peter Lamont gave a public response to the development team in an article titled “The Mambo Open Source Controversy — 20 Questions With Miro”.This event created controversy within the free software community about the definition of “open source”. Forums at many other open source projects were active with postings for and against the actions of both sides.

In the two weeks following Eddie’s announcement, teams were re-organized, and the community continued to grow. Eben Moglen and the Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC) assisted the Joomla core team beginning in August 2005, as indicated by Moglen’s blog entry from that date and a related OSM announcement.The SFLC continue to provide legal guidance to the Joomla project.

On August 18, Andrew Eddie called for community input on suggested names for the project. The core team indicated that it would make the final decision for the project name based on community input. The core team eventually chose a name that was not on the list of suggested names provided by the community. On September 1, the new name, “Joomla!,” was announced. It is the anglicised spelling of the Swahili word jumla meaning “all together” or “as a whole. On September 6, the development team called for logo submissions from the community and invited the community to vote on the logo; the team announced the community’s decision on September 22. On October 2, brand guidelines, a brand manual, and a set of logo resources were published for the community’s use.

Joomla won the Packt Publishing Open Source Content Management System Award in 2006, 2007, and 2011.

On October 27, 2008, PACKT Publishing announced that Johan Janssens was the “Most Valued Person” (MVP), for his work as one of the lead developers of the 1.5 Joomla Framework and Architecture. In 2009 Louis Landry received the “Most Valued Person” award for his role as Joomla architect and development coordinators.

Version history

Joomla versions

Version	Release date	Supported until
1.0	2005-09-16	2009-07-22
1.5 (LTS)	2008-01-22	2012-04-24
1.6	2011-01-10	2011-08-19
1.7	2011-07-19	2012-02-24
2.5 (LTS)	2012-01-24	2013-12
3.0	2012-09	2013-04
3.1	2013-03	2013-10
3.5 (LTS)	2013-09	2015-06

Release no longer supported

Release still supported

Future release

Joomla 1.0 was released on September 16, 2005 as a re-branded release of Mambo 4.5.2.3 that combined other bug and moderate-level security fixes.

Joomla 1.5 was released on January 22, 2008. The latest release of this version was 1.5.26 on March 27, 2012.This version was the first to attain long term support (LTS). LTS versions are released each three major or minor releases and are supported until three months after the next LTS version is released.

Joomla 1.6 was released on January 10, 2011. This version adds a full access control list functionality plus, user-defined category hierarchy, and admin interface improvements.

Joomla 1.7 was released on July 19, 2011, six months after 1.6.0. This version adds enhanced security and improved migration tools.

Joomla 2.5 was released on January 24, 2012, six months after 1.7.0. This version is a long term support (LTS) release. Originally this release was to be 1.8.0, however the developers announced August 9 that they would rename it to fit into a new version number scheme in which every LTS release is an X.5 release.. This version was the first to run on other databases besides MySQL.

Joomla 3.0 is due to be released in September 2012. Originally, it was supposed to be released in July 2012; however, the January/July release schedule was uncomfortable for volunteers, and the schedule was changed to September/March releases.

Deployment

You can install Joomla in various ways:

• Extract the source code to a server that has PHP.
• Use a package management system.
• Use a virtual appliance.
• Use TurnKey Linux Virtual Appliance Library. However, doing so comprises the application and its dependencies as a ready-to-use system.

Many web hosts have control panels that allow you to install Joomla. On Windows, you can install Joomla using the Microsoft Web Platform Installer, which automatically detects and installs any missing dependencies, such as PHP or MySQL.

Examples

These are some of the websites that use Joomla:

• Linux.com
• iTWire.com

The official Joomla! site has a directory of example sites: Official Community Showcase

See also

• List of content management systems
• List of web application frameworks

 

Whatever hapenned to the Iceberg that sank the Titanic ?

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By Alasdair Wilkins

Exactly one hundred years ago today, an ocean liner struck a block of ice and sank in the North Atlantic. The story of the ocean liner has been told hundreds of times. This story is about the block of ice.

The photos you see up top and down on the left are quite possibly the only known photographic evidence of the actual iceberg that struck the Titanic. Understandably, nobody had bothered to snap any photographs while the ship was actually sinking, so it’s impossible to make an absolutely confirmed positive identification. But both photographs feature the telltale sign of a collision with a ship, and likely a recent one at that: a streak of red paint.

The photo up top was taken by the chief steward of the German ocean liner SS Prinz Adalbert, which on April 15 was sailing through the North Atlantic mere miles away from where the Titanic had sank the night before. At the time, the chief steward hadn’t yet learned of the Titanic‘s fate, so he wasn’t even on the lookout for icebergs. He simply spotted a streak of red paint along the iceberg’s base, which most likely meant a ship had collided with it in the last twelve hours.

This next photo was taken by a Captain De Carteret of the Minia, one of a few cable ships – vessels ordinarily used to lay deep sea cables, such as those for telecommunications – sent to the site of the shipwreck to recover corpses and debris. The captain claimed this was the only iceberg in the area, and the red paint was again a clear sign that a ship had recently struck it. There’s some disagreement over whether this was the only iceberg in the area, but it certainly seems likely that something had hit it, and the odds are good that that something was the Titanic.

If you were to trace the story of the Titanic to its earliest human origins, you couldn’t really go much further back than 1907, when the White Star Lines first drew up plans to build the three largest ocean liners the world had even seen: Olympic, Titanic, and Gigantic, which was later renamed Britannic and sank in the Mediterranean during World War I. From conception to sinking, the Titanic really only lasted about five years, although obviously its memory has endured far longer.

But by comparison, the iceberg began its slow journey to the North Atlantic over three thousand years ago. Again, we can only guess at the exact details, but the story likely began with snowfall on the western coast of Greenland somewhere around 1,000 BCE. After a few months, this snow has been turned into a more compacted form called firn, which then over subsequent decades is compressed into dense ice by the weight of newer snow on top of it.

The frozen water in these glaciers is slowly forced further westward towards the sea. When they finally reach the coast of the Arctic Ocean, the lapping tides break off chunks of the ice, and icebergs are calved from the glacier, some thirty centuries after their source water was first deposited. The iceberg that sank the Titanic began its journey as a rough contemporary of King Tutankhamun, entire civilizations rising and falling while it made its slow march to infamy.

But once all that’s done, the iceberg’s life was a short one. We know that because the Titanic sank in the North Atlantic, rather than the Arctic, which means the currents must have taken it far south of where it was calved. Starting on the Greenland coast, it would have moved from Baffin Bay to the Davis Strait and then onto the Labrador Sea and, at last, the Atlantic.

The Titanic iceberg was one of the lucky ones, so to speak, as the vast, vast majority of icebergs melt long before they reach that far south. Of the 15,000 to 30,000 icebergs calved each years by the Greenland glaciers, probably only about 1% of them ever make it all the way to the Atlantic. On April 15, 1912, the iceberg was some 5,000 miles south of the Arctic Circle.

The water temperature on the night of the Titanic sinking was thought to be about 28 degrees Fahrenheit, just below freezing. Such a temperature was of course lethally cold for all those passengers who had been forced to take to the open water to escape the sinking ship.

But such temperatures are far too warm to sustain icebergs for very long. The average life expectancy of an iceberg in the North Atlantic is only about two to three years from calving to melting. That means it likely broke off from Greenland in 1910 or 1911, and was gone forever by the end of 1912 or sometime in 1913. In all likelihood, the iceberg that sank the Titanic didn’t even endure to the outbreak of World War I, a lost splash of freshwater mixed in imperceptibly with the rest of the North Atlantic.

Sources and Further Reading

Icebergs in the Northern Hemisphere: FAQ Titanic & Nautical Research Center Icebergs across the North Atlantic Titanic-Titanic.com: Icebergs Iceberg Map

The 8 Most Notorious Criminals in Hollywood History

Post 2.637

April 16, 2012

Hollywood may be the land of big dreams and promises, but this place definitely sees its fair share of tragedies as well. From crimes of passion to money-motivated crimes, Hollywood criminals have been known to attack for any and all reasons. And we all know that one of the quickest ways to be a show stealer in Hollywood is to do something bad. Here are the eight most notorious criminals in Hollywood history.

1. Paul Snider

   Paul Snider is the man responsible for killing his actress and Playboy model wife, Dorothy Stratten, before turning the gun on himself. The high-profile murder-suicide was a complete shock to Hollywood. The young Stratten had just been named Playboy’s Miss August 1979 and 1980 Playmate of the Year and landed a spot in Bob Fosse’s film Star 80. This increased level of fame caused her husband-manager, Paul Snider, to become increasingly jealous and bitter. On Aug. 14, 1980, Snider brutally shot and killed 20-year-old Stratten in their Los Angeles apartment and then committed suicide.

2. Amy Fisher

   Amy Fisher, also known as the “Long Island Lolita,” was the infamous teenager responsible for nearly killing her then-boyfriend Joey Buttafuoco’s wife, Mary Jo, in 1992. Fisher was 16 years old when she began a relationship with the New York auto body shop owner and it didn’t take long before she wanted to get his wife out of the picture. On the afternoon of the shooting, Fisher had an accomplice drive her to the Buttafuoco’s home so that she could kill Mary Jo. When his wife answered the door, Amy lied and told her that Joey was having an affair with her younger sister. Mary Jo turned away in disbelief and Fisher shot her in the head and fled the scene. Mary Jo miraculously lived through the shooting, but suffered partial paralysis on one side of her face and a loss of hearing in one ear. Fisher was eventually arrested and sentenced to seven years in prison for attempted murder, and Joey served six months for statutory rape.

3. Paul and Tom Ferguson

   Paul and Tom Ferguson were the murderous brothers responsible for killing the famous silent movie star, Ramon Novarro, in 1968. On the night of his murder, Novarro invited the Ferguson brothers over to his house in hopes of having sex with one of the two men. The Fergusons believed that the actor had a large sum of money hidden inside the house, and planned to find it. After the rendezvous between Paul and Ramon was over, the brothers demanded that he give them the money. When Novarro said he didn’t have any money on him, Paul brutally beat him and left him to die. Police were able to trace a call that Tom made on the house phone to his girlfriend in Chicago on the day of the murder. She ratted them out and the brothers were arrested and sentenced to life in prison, but were paroled within seven years of the trial.

4. OJ Simpson

   OJ Simpson is one of the most notorious criminals in Hollywood. Although he was famously acquitted in the high-profile murder of his wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, in 1995, the former professional football player and actor did get arrested and imprisoned for another set of crimes. In 2007, Simpson was arrested after he and a group of armed men robbed a room in a Las Vegas hotel-casino and stole sports memorabilia from a dealer. Simpson was convicted on 12 charges, including armed robbery, conspiracy to commit a crime, assault, and kidnapping and was sentenced to a maximum of 33 years in prison with a possibility of parole in nine years.

5. Robert Bardo

   The tragic murder of 21-year-old My Sister Sam star Rebecca Schaeffer became one of the biggest crime stories in Hollywood history. Robert Bardo, 19, was the crazed fan who took the actress’ life. Bardo was obsessed with Schaeffer and began writing her love letters to get her attention. She wrote him back and the two corresponded through mail for months. On July 18, 1989, Bardo went to Schaeffer’s home after tracking it down from an Arizona detective agency and shot her in the chest and fled the scene. Bardo was ratted out by a family member who informed police that he told her he was going to visit the actress that day. He was arrested and charged with first-degree murder and is serving a life sentence.

6. Brynn Hartman

   The murder of comedian Phil Hartman shook Hollywood to the core. Hartman was shot and killed by his wife, Brynn, who turned the gun on herself hours after the shooting. The tragic murder-suicide was the result of the couple’s marital problems and Brynn’s excessive drug use. Brynn was under the influence of cocaine and alcohol when she returned home the night of the murder and got into an argument with Phil about her addiction. Phil threatened to leave her if she continued to do drugs. Brynn waited for her husband to fall asleep before she shot him three times with a handgun. She immediately confessed to a friend that she killed Phil, but he did not believe her. While police were escorting the couple’s two children out of the house, Brynn locked herself in the bedroom and killed herself.

7. The Menendez brothers

   The Menendez brothers made national headlines for the gruesome murder of their parents, entertainment executive Jose Menendez and his wife Mary “Kitty” Menendez in 1989. Lyle and Erik Menendez carefully plotted the brutal attack on their parents in their Beverly Hills home and even bought movie tickets to use as their alibi if they were suspected of the killing. The brothers’ motive was to kill their strict father and end the agony their mother had endured for years. After the boys viciously gunned down their parents, they dumped their shotguns and called police to report the crime. The Menendez brothers raised a great deal of suspicions when they spent their inheritance on luxury items and started phony businesses. During the investigation, Erik confessed to his psychologists that he and his brother killed their parents and the two were later taken into custody. The brothers were convicted of two counts of first-degree murder and are currently serving a life sentence without parole.

8. Marvin Gay Sr.

   The tragic death of famous singer Marvin Gaye in 1984 was a shocking surprise, specifically because it was his Pentecostal preacher father who killed him. On the day of his death, Marvin Jr. was at his parents’ Los Angeles home and got into a heated argument with his father. The fight turned physical and was temporarily broken up by Marvin Jr.’s mother, but when his father returned to the room they were in, he gunned down his son with the .38 pistol Marvin had given him. Marvin Sr. killed his son and was arrested and convicted of the heinous crime. He was originally charged with murder, but was given a plea bargain for a six-year suspended sentence.