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Ecology/Biosphere Organization

<< Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 >>

Chapter 2. Organization within the Biosphere

Units of the Biosphere
You have been presented with a definition of the term biosphere above. This chapter will consider the question: How is the biosphere organized? We will initially look at this organization over a range of scales so to familiarize you to important terms used in ecology. In later chapters, we will cover the details and significance of the concepts only introduced here.

Ecologists regard ecosystems as basic structural units, implying that the biosphere is a collection or mosaic of definable ecosystems. However, an ecosystem is really more conceptual than actual. By this we mean that the definable boundaries of an ecosystem are more in the mind of the ecologist than geographical. We can certainly observe that there are many boundaries in nature—some fairly sharp—and what we are observing are physical manifestations between volumes wherein different conditions prevail. These are biocycles, subdivisions of the biosphere. Consider a lake shore, or even the water surface for that matter; the transitions between the biocycles—land, the air or atmosphere, and the body of water—are sharp and recognizable upon casual inspection. But are they really?

There is no doubt that under gravity, water in the liquid phase sorts itself out from gaseous air—a lake surface exists. But along the shore, the water moves into the earth wherever the soil or voids in the rock allow. Constantly water-saturated soil becomes a wetland. Further, atmospheric gases dissolve in the water of the lake, and molecules of water move off the lake as gaseous moisture, evident perhaps as fog on a cool morning. The sharpness of the boundaries is both actual and illusionary. Actual, because conditions encountered within each of the separate spaces or volumes (air, land, water) are very different. Illusionary, because no biocycle is completely isolated from adjacent biocycles, and typically each has influence over the other.

We have, so far considered just the physical environment. Ecosystems include organisms. And we can expect that most, though certainly not all, organisms will sort themselves out along the same physical boundaries described. That is, fish will find life conditions suitable only in the lake; conifers only in the uplands. Yet organisms are no more isolated from adjacent biocycles than are the substances of the physical world. The food of many fish will be insects living only on the land and moving through the atmosphere, which upon death or by accident, fall into the water. The conifers draw up moisture from the earth, some directly from the lake or the groundwater body connected to the lake. Ecologists use the term biotope to mean a topographic unit characterized by a particular set of physical conditions and a uniform assemblage of plant and animal species. Considering our example above, the lake is part of the major freshwater biocycle and would be a biotope of the region in which it is located, being perhaps just one of many ponds and lakes comprising that biotope. A biochore is a subdivision of the biosphere consisting of the biotopes that resemble one another; thus, our lake is but one example of the temperate zone, freshwater, lake biochore.

The terms "biotope", "biochore", and "biocycle" fill a need in descriptive ecology. We can speak in a general way about the life forms and climatic conditions that constitute a desert biochore, or a northern forest biochore. And we can describe, from our example illustrated by the photograph, lake, marsh, and upland forest biotopes, each with a distinct listing of species perhaps unique to just that geographical region near Minsk (in our photo example), or more broadly represented across the continent.

Gaia Theory
Consider the importance of the functional relationships between species comprising an ecosystem, and how those relationships contribute to the very survival of the ecosystem. Consider that ecosystems are not, in most cases, isolated units, but parts of a larger functioning whole, at its broadest being the biosphere. Is it possible that biosphere—all life on earth and at least those physical things utilized and modified by life on earth—is one, large integrated system?
 * Read Gaia Theory ( Follow links that interest you. )

Species and Habitat
In biology, the concept of species is basic. A species comprises a group of related organisms that share a more or less distinctive form and are capable of interbreeding. According to Ernst Mayr, species are:
 * groups of actually or potentially interbreeding natural populations which are reproductively isolated from other such groups.

 * Read Species ( Although you will be familiar with this material from biology studies, you should explore the topic to satisfy a more complete understanding )

In biology, it is generally the case that focus on the species concept is largely the concern of taxonomy and taxonomists. In ecology, the more important aspect is that of the species population (or population as we shall more often use the term). Note in Mayr's simple definition, that "interbreeding populations" is somewhat central. In ecology we are less concerned with all considerations of what "potentially interbreeding" might mean and more interested in the group of individuals that are, in fact, interbreeding. By which is meant, not that sexual reproduction must take place between all extant (living at the same time) members, but that there exists a gene pool that is open and potentially contributed to by each member. The concept of species would admit all those individuals separated by great distances and physical barriers as included if breeding could still take place. The species population takes into account the isolation that might actually exist, frequently dividing a single species into more than one population. Within the population, alleles presumably flow freely through time, held (at any given point in time) within the nuclei of the cells of the individual organisms constituting the population. Using the term habitat in describing the ecological conditions surrounding an assemblage of species or a community, we are speaking of a biotope. Many ecologists extend the term habitat in the manner originally defined to cover physical parameters relative to a community of species, but others would substitute the term "biotope" for "habitat" in such cases. Note that this is not exactly the same as "biotope" defined above, which included the biota as well as the physical or abiotic environment. Odum (1959, p. 28) stated that "habitat... includes other organisms as well as the abiotic environment... [but a] description of the habitat of the community would include only the latter"—a point of view opposite to that expressed by most ecologists today.

Any term in ecology that attempts to separate the biotic and abiotic components of an ecological unit of organisation will encounter this difficulty. Consider that if the habitat of a bird is the place it lives, and the bird lives in a pine forest (actually up among the branches of the pine trees), then the physical environment (the "habitat") of that bird species must include a life form (pine trees); and now extend this reasoning to any manner of invertebrates, such as flea or tapeworm, that really do live most of their life on or in other organisms. A reasonably solid definition of habitat would be simply the environment of a species (Sweet, 2005).

 * Read Habitat ( You need follow links only as necessary to clarify terms; include the following: )
 * Read Biotope

A niche or ecological niche is essentially what a species does. We do not mean so much what activities it participates in (although these could be pertinent), but the role the species plays in the functioning of the ecosystem: the "functional status of an organism in its community" (Charles Elton, in Odum, 1959).

 * Read Niche ( You need follow links only as necessary to clarify terms )

Habitat Selection
The choice of habitat affects reproductive success. How do species choose which place to inhabit? Wecker (1963) and Klopfer (1963) determined this choice is partly genetic. It is also partly psychological. Habitat selection is a common behavior among vertebrates. Garter snakes (Thamnophis elegans) choose rocks of intermediate thickness over thicker or thinner rocks, maintaining their preferred body temperature for extended periods (Huey et al. 1989, Huey 1991). Many species show some flexibility in habitat selection. Organisms are often forced to make these choices, sometimes choosing less suitable habitats. Optimal habitats are occupied more quickly, then marginal habitats, then poor habitats, where reproductive success is limited (Fretwell and Lucas 1969).

We have just touched upon the many aspects of the biology of species populations that concern or interest us as ecologists and this topic will be much expanded upon in Chapter 5 of the Guide.

Summarization
There is but one known biosphere, that of the planet earth. The biosphere can be subdivided into a number of biocycles, each with fairly specific gross physical characteristics and limited by geography and topography as determined by planetary dynamics, especially gravity. Biocycles are divided into biochores, units with both similar basic physical attributes and life forms. Biochores are made up of a multitude of biotopes, divisions of the landscape that feature both similar physical attributes and a more or less consistent species composition. Some ecologists would use "biotope" for just the physical properties of this level of organisation, and biocoenosis for the biotic component. However, such definitional division of highly integrated and complex ecological systems is difficult to uphold. At the level of the species population (essentially an organism and its relatives), the habitat describes where it is found, where that species occurs in the landscape. The very different term, niche, describes what that organism does as a functional role in the ecosystem. The ecosystem concept differs from traditional (or the "old") biology by its clear emphasis on functional relationships among organisms.

title: Ecology/Biosphere Organization


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Cookbook:Hot and Sour Soup

| Soup

Hot and sour soup is a popular soup served at Chinese restaurants in the United States. This version tastes exactly like that served at various Chinese restaurants in California.

Ingredients

 * 6 cups chicken stock or broth (or 4 cups water and 4 chicken bouillon cubes)
 * 4 ½ tablespoons soy sauce
 * ⅓ cup cooked shredded chicken or pork
 * ¾ cup mushrooms, diced
 * ¾ tablespoon garlic chili sauce
 * ⅓ teaspoon freshly-ground black pepper
 * ⅓ cup white vinegar
 * ½ cup canned bamboo shoots, julienned
 * 4 ½ oz block of tofu, cut into ¼-inch dice
 * 3 tablespoons cornstarch and 2 tablespoons cold water
 * 1 egg, beaten
 * 3 green onion stalks, diced (including tops)
 * ¾ teaspoon toasted sesame oil

Procedure

 * 1) Bring chicken broth to a simmer in a 2-quart saucepan.
 * 2) Add soy sauce, shredded meat, mushrooms and garlic chili sauce. Simmer for 5 minutes.
 * 3) Add black pepper, white vinegar, bamboo shoots, tofu. Simmer for 5 minutes.
 * 4) Combine 3 tablespoons of cornstarch with 2 tablespoons of cold water in a cup. Stir until mixture is smooth. Add cornstarch mixture to soup and stir well.
 * 5) Simmer for 5 minutes until soup is thickened.
 * 6) Beat egg in a cup until yolk and white are combined. Pour beaten egg slowly, in a fine stream into soup. Stir soup several times, then wait 30 seconds.
 * 7) Add green onions and sesame oil to soup. Stir well and remove from heat.
 * 8) Serve hot.

Notes, tips, and variations

 * Adjust vinegar, ground black pepper, garlic chili sauce and soy sauce to taste. American vinegar is much more acidic than its Chinese counterpart, so start with very little and add slowly.
 * Add or remove mushrooms, bamboo shoots, or tofu as needed. These three ingredients don't add much to the taste, mostly they add to the texture of the soup.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Cookbook:Hot and Sour Soup


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Cookbook:French Dressing

 * Salad Recipes | Appetizers | California cuisine

French dressing is a salad dressing commonly used with green salads. It can also be used as a sandwich spread, or many other uses. A commercial version is also called "Catalina Dressing".

Ingredients

 * ⅔ cup ketchup
 * ¾ cup white granulated sugar
 * ½ cup white wine vinegar
 * ½ cup vegetable oil
 * ¼ cup minced onion
 * 2 teaspoons paprika
 * 2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce

Procedure

 * 1) Combine all ingredients in a food processor or blender, and process until smooth. The goal is to have a smooth red/orange sauce.
 * 2) Pour the sauce into a bowl and chill covered in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes prior to use.

Notes, tips and variations

 * Instead of using the blender, you can whisk the ingredients in a bowl.

Warnings

 * Keep refrigerated

title: Cookbook:French Dressing


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SPM/Spatial smoothing

Spatial smoothing is usually performed as a part of the preprocessing of individual brain scans.

In SPM the spatial smoothing is performed with a spatially stationary Gaussian filter where the user must specify the kernel width in mm "full width half max". Kernel widths of up to 16mm are being used in the literature.

The purpose of spatial smoothing is to cope with functional anatomical variability that is not compensated by spatial normalization ("warping") and to improve the signal to noise ratio. In other words: smoothing increases statistical power. The less one smoothes, the less likely it is to obtain significant results. Understanding the exact impact of spatial smoothing on statistical power is not trivial: smoothing not only increases the signal to noise ratio of each voxel, it also reduces the number of resolution elements ("resels") that are assumed to be independent and used for correction of multiple testing. With respect to the signal to noise ratio, it is being argued that an ideal filter kernel matches the size of the signal to detect [1]. After all, the level of smoothing that is optimal for real, measured data can only be determined empirically [2] and it may make sense to reanalyze the same data with several levels of smoothing [3].

The drawback from smoothing is a loss of spatial precision. Especially when using larger smoothing kernels (and when separately estimating the local variance for each smoothed voxel, which has been the standard in SPM, including SPM2, [4]), one should keep in mind that the loss of spatial precision is more dramatic in the resulting t-map than in the images itself due to nonlinear effects on the voxel variances [5]. In the worst case, the maximum t-value may be located in an area with no signal at all (e.g. white matter).

title: SPM/Spatial smoothing


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Finnish/Nimet ja kansalaisuudet

^^Contents^^ <>

Now we are going to learn how to ask what someone's name is and ask what your name is. We are also looking on how to say your nationality, but first you need to know how to say the verb “to be”.

Olla – to be

 * 1) “Minä” and “sinä” are “mä” and “sä” in the common Finnish slang.
 * 2) “Hän” means 'he' or 'she', there's no distinction.
 * 3) "Te olette" can also be used when being polite, to only one person. This polite form is sometimes used to people who you are not acquainted with. This is similar to the French vous and the German Sie, although it is used more rarely.

In Finnish, minä, sinä, me and te are usually not used, as the verb form shows the person and number in question. If they are used, it is usually to emphasize the subject in the sentence.

Name
Mikä on nimesi? – What is your name?

Mikä on teidän nimenne? – What is your name? (more polite)

Nimeni on... – My name is...

Olen... – I am...

Example Dialog Number One
Pekka is meeting someone.

 * Pekka: Hei, mikä on nimesi?
 * Päivi: Terve. Nimeni on Päivi.
 * Pekka: Olen Pekka.

Example Dialog Number Two
Mr. Virtanen is meeting a new client.

 * Herra Virtanen: Hyvää huomenta, mikä on teidän nimenne?
 * Herra Hämäläinen: Hyvää päivää, nimeni on Hämäläinen. Mitä kuuluu?
 * Herra Virtanen: Kiitos, hyvää, herra Hämäläinen.

Nationality
We are now going to learn how to say your nationality. You say I am “Olen...” then the country, say England, “englanti” and a stem -lainen or -läinen”. So I am English is “Olen englantilainen”. It works for other countries “Olen ranskalainen”, “I am French”. To ask for someone's nationality, say:

Mikä on kansallisuutesi? – What is your nationality?

Mikä on kansalaisuutenne? – What is your nationality? (more polite)

Olen... – I am ...

yhdysvaltalainen – from United States

amerikkalainen – American

englantilainen – English

skotlantilainen – Scottish

walesilainen – Welsh. Note that the word Wales ends in a consonant. An i is added between "wales" and "lainen" to make it flow better.

pohjoisirlantilainen – Northern Irish

irlantilainen – Irish

eteläafrikkalainen – South African

kanadalainen – Canadian

australialainen – Australian

uusiseelantilainen – New Zealander

hollantilainen - Dutch

suomalainen – Finnish (Suomi - Finland)

ruotsalainen - Swedish (Ruotsi - Sweden)

venäläinen - Russian (Venäjä - Russia)

However, there are some exceptions to the rule:

brittiläinen or britti – British, because the word for Britain is Iso-Britannia.

The way of Olen... -lainen/-läinen exists even in cities and areas, so Olen helsinkiläinen is “I am a Helsinkian”, or Olen newyorkilainen "I am a New Yorker".

Note that although countries, cities and other definite areas are written with a capital letter in Finnish too, all nationalities are written with a small letter.

Exercise Number Two
These people are saying where are they from. Can you figure out the cities they are from? Beware, for some of them are quite difficult.

Tip: They are all capital cities.

Answers are on the Answer pages at the back of the book.

 * 1) Olen lontoolainen.
 * 2) Olen pariisilainen.
 * 3) Olen tokiolainen.
 * 4) Olen berliiniläinen.
 * 5) Olen kööpenhaminalainen.
 * 6) Olen riikalainen.
 * 7) Olen pekingiläinen.
 * 8) Olen kapkaupunkilainen.
 * 9) Olen ateenalainen.
 * 10) Olen tukholmalainen.

title: Finnish/Nimet ja kansalaisuudet


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Finnish/Answers to exercises

Here are the answers to the exercies that are in the Wikibook.

= Introduction =

Exercise Number One

 * 1) history
 * 2) project
 * 3) list
 * 4) fax
 * 5) gallery
 * 6) link
 * 7) scandal
 * 8) copy (noun)
 * 9) idiot
 * 10) classic

Exercise Number Two

 * 1) lamp
 * 2) glass
 * 3) bomb
 * 4) stick, splinter
 * 5) thousand
 * 6) nail
 * 7) man
 * 8) card
 * 9) white
 * 10) Thursday

= Names and nationalities =

Exercise Number Two

 * 1) London (Lontoo)
 * 2) Paris (Pariisi)
 * 3) Tokyo (Tokio)
 * 4) Berlin (Berliini)
 * 5) Copenhagen (Kööpenhamina)
 * 6) Riga (Riika)
 * 7) Beijing or Peking (Peking)
 * 8) Cape Town (Kapkaupunki)
 * 9) Athens (Ateena)
 * 10) Stockholm (Tukholma)

title: Finnish/Answers to exercises


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Investing/Insurances

Praveen Padalia stock exchange

organized market for the trading of stocks and bonds (see bond ; stock ). Such markets were originally open to all, but at present only members of the owning association may buy and sell directly. Members, or stock brokers, buy and sell for themselves or for others, charging commissions for their services. A stock may be bought or sold only if it is listed on an exchange, and it may not be listed unless it meets certain requirements set by the exchange's board of governors. There are stock exchanges in all important financial centers of the world; the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, in nearly continuous operation since 1792), which had a trading volume of $7.3 trillion in 1998, is the largest in the world. Tokyo, London, and Frankfurt also have major facilities, and Euronext, an inter-European exchange combining facilities in Amsterdam, Brussels, Paris, and other cities, is also significant. By providing a centralized, ready market for the exchange of securities, stock exchanges greatly facilitate the financing of business through flotation of stocks and bonds. However, speculation in stocks can sometimes accentuate the instability of an economy. The reality of the Great Depression was emphasized by the stock market crash in 1929. The interstate sale of securities and certain stock exchange practices in the United States are regulated by federal laws administered by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Today, a large percentage of stocks are traded through such over-the-counter organizations as Nasdaq (National Association of Securities Dealers Automatic Quotations) and its European equivalent, Nasdaq Europe (formerly Easdaq). Through these organizations, many securities not listed on a major stock exchange may be traded by dealers using computer and telecommunications technology; in 1994, Nasdaq, on which many computer and other high-technology stocks are traded, surpassed the NYSE in annual share volume. After the deregulation of the British securities market in 1986, the London Stock Exchange saw a decline in business due to a new computerized market similar to Nasdaq.

Computer-driven trade has significantly affected the stock exchange. Computer and telecommunications technology, besides opening a wide market in over the counter dealings, has also given rise to trading on an international level. Personal computers and modems allow trading to occur around the clock (after-hours NYSE and Nasdaq trading began in 1999), and the securities trading on one major stock exchange can now significantly affect the trading on others. Many contend that the traditional manner of trading will eventually become obsolete. Technology also now allows for “day trading,” a high-risk business in which numerous computerized trades are made during a single day, with large gains (and large losses) possible.

title: Investing/Insurances


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Movie Making Manual/Animation

Animation is the process of creating moving images from a series of still images. In film making, this can be used to create a shot or sequence that cannot be shot on camera.

There are many techniques that can be used, including drawings, photos (pixilation), 3D (model or puppet), and 2D and 3D computer animation.

Animations can be produced on film or as a movie file or still image sequence. Still images - created at high resolution and uncompressed (or with lossless compression) are often preferred as they give flexibility and high image quality. In an NLE (Non Linear Editor) a still image sequence can usually be imported as a group, and edited into the film, with the option of adjusting the individual frames.

In modern film making, 3D computer animation (CGI) is most often used as it can come close to matching the look of the rest of the film, while offering great flexibility.

Animation is by nature a slow and highly skilled process, but the tools are readily available, for example there are low cost or free trial versions of many animation software packages (expect a steep learning curve). --Peter strickland 17:21, 25 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Companies also often offer student discounts on their products along with free software available for non-commercial use.

/Post-production /Effects

title: Movie Making Manual/Animation


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User:Peter strickland

Peter Strickland is a 3D computer animator, a fan of open source software, supporter of environmental issues, and sci-fi nut. Based in the UK.

title: User:Peter strickland


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Radiation Oncology/IMRT/IMRT Overview

This section is about how intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) works (in brief) and the history of IMRT. More technical aspects of IMRT should be placed in the section Radiation Oncology:IMRT Technical. Clinical results of IMRT should be placed elsewhere.

Timeline of IMRT

 * 1992 - 1994 - proprietary IMRT development at NOMOS (initially named VISUS Medical Devices, then Cognos*centi, then NOMOS)
 * 1994 - NOMOS PEACOCK system (first patient treated in 1994 at The Methodist Hospital, Houston, TX, USA)
 * 1996 - First IMRT treatment with a conventional linac equipped with a multileaf collimator (MLC)

NOMOS PEACOCK
The introduction of a commercial IMRT system into popular use began with the PEACOCK system produced by the NOMOS Corporation (Pennsylvania, USA). The PEACOCK system consists of the MIMiC, which is a "bolt-on" multileaf collimator, and a dedicated treatment planning system. Treatment with the PEACOCK is described as "serial tomotherapy" in which the treatment is delivered using non-overlapping arcs (thus "tomo" or slice therapy) with couch movement occurring between each arc (thus "serial").

Guidelines
Guidelines for the implementation and quality assurance for IMRT.

 * NCI Guidelines on the Use of IMRT in Clinical Trials:
 * (July 25, 2006) "ATC Guidelines for the use of IMRT" - PDF
 * (Jan 14, 2005) "The National Cancer Institute Guidelines for the Use of Intensity-Modulated Radiation Therapy in Clinical Trials" - PDF

 * Advanced Technology Consortium (ATC):
 * 2004 - PMID 15234063 — "Credentialing of institutions for IMRT in clinical trials." Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys. 2004 Jul 15;59(4):1257-9

title: Radiation Oncology/IMRT/IMRT Overview


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Cookbook:Chipped Beef on Toast

| Breakfast

Chipped beef on toast is slivers of meat in a creamy sauce, served on toasted bread. In military slang it is commonly referred to as "Shit On a Shingle" (SOS). Chipped beef is a dried, smoked, and salted meat product, generally sold wadded up in jars or flat in plastic packets.

The 1910 edition of the Manual for Army Cooks provides the following recipe, for a quantity sufficient for 60 men.

This recipe omits the soaking of the beef to reduce the salt content. Later recipes were creamier.

Ingredients

 * 1 ½ pound (680 g) fat (butter preferred)
 * 1¼ lbs (560 g) flour
 * 2 cans (24 oz) evaporated milk
 * 6 quarts (6 L) beef stock
 * 15 pounds (6.8 kg) chipped beef
 * 1 bunch parsley
 * ¼ oz (7 g) pepper

Procedure

 * 1) Brown the flour in the melted fat.
 * 2) Dissolve the milk in the beef stock, and then add that to the pot.
 * 3) Stir this together slowly to prevent lumping, and then add the beef.
 * 4) Cook for a few minutes, add the parsley and pepper, and serve over toast.

External links and references

 * See http://www.seabeecook.com/cookery/cooking/cooking_sos.htm

title: Cookbook:Chipped Beef on Toast


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Systems Theory/Open/Closed System Structure

Open Systems
A system that interfaces and interacts with its environment, by receiving inputs from and delivering outputs to the outside, is called an open system. They possess permeable boundaries, that permits interaction across its boundary, through which new information or ideas are readily absorbed, permitting the incorporation and diffusion of viable, new ideas. Because of this they can adapt more quickly to changes in the external environment in which they operate. As the environment influence the system, the system also influences the environment. Allowing a system to be open ultimately sustains growth and serves its parent environment, and so both have a stronger probability for survival.

Examples of open systems: Business organization, Hospital system, College or University system.

Conversely, a closed system is more prone to resist incorporating new ideas, that can be deemed unnecessary to its parent environment and risks atrophy. By not adopting or imps, a closed system ceases to properly serve the environment it lives in.

Adaptability and Survival
This adaptability and survival of open systems has been exhibited in society's recent global information age. Current information technology have absorbed new technologies and approaches have sustained long term success. Systems which incorporate efficient data representation, storage, and transfer, and good operating system design and effective use of processor power have retained their public user base. Information technology initiatives which adapted slowly to their rapidly changing environment ultimately lost significance in the industry and have disappeared.Operating technologies such as the Network File System, initiated by Sun Microsystems, and Netscape Internet Browser, designed by Marc Andreessen, are examples of effective open IT systems. These technologies have established the backbone of information technology within society. Both technologies represent open systems with the common initiative for sharing data. NFS is used to distribute access to shared disk file system across several servers within a local network. Netscape is used as a portal to gain access to the volumes of data within the world’s Internet. Both technologies fostered further growth within the environments in which they were introduced. The NFS standard created synergy for the growth of SUN Microsystems and has been adopted by other operating system designers. Netscape ultimately fostered the growth of the amount and types of data made available through the Internet. These technologies foster an open paradigm where data is absorbed by an infinite number of participants.

Increase Chances
The rate of change within the technology sector is extremely rapid, and systems groups have consciously adopted an “open systems” approach to increase their chance of survival. Prioritizing the adaptability of a system for different OS platforms, database designs, and communication protocols has been seen within the IT industry as the wisest approach. Any technologies designed to solely propagate the success of one platform or particular technology have been methodically eliminated. At the risk of domination of the user’s personal computer desktop, Microsoft's introduction of a closed design embedding the company’s internet browser into kernel operating modules was halted by an investigation of monopolistic practices. The initiative of Microsoft to manipulate technology such that the primary benefits were for the propagation of their technical product alone was halted by the natural tensions created by the unhealthy closed system. The system did not serve the environment in which it lived by posing the threat of limiting user’s access to the world’s internet. Outcry from users as well as judicial entities has forced Microsoft to evolve it's operating system into a more accommodating, dynamic and viable system.


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Physics Textbook/Light

What is light
Light is electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength that is visible to the eye, or in a more general sense, any electromagnetic radiation in the range from infrared to ultraviolet. The three basic dimensions of light (and of all electromagnetic radiation) are: Due to wave-particle duality, light simultaneously exhibits properties of both waves and particles.
 * intensity (or brilliance or amplitude, perceived by humans as the brightness of the light),
 * frequency (or wavelength, perceived by humans as the color of the light), and
 * polarization (or angle of vibration and not perceivable by humans under ordinary circumstances)

Wave-particle duality
The modern theory that explains the nature of light is wave-particle duality, described by Albert Einstein in the early 1900s, based on his work on the photoelectric effect and Planck's results. Einstein determined that the energy of a photon is proportional to its frequency. More generally, the theory states that everything has both a particle nature, and a wave nature, and various experiments can be done to bring out one or the other. The particle nature is more easily discerned if an object has a large mass, so it took until an experiment by Louis de Broglie in 1924 to realise that electrons also exhibited wave-particle duality. Einstein received the Nobel Prize in 1921 for his work with the wave-particle duality on photons, and de Broglie followed in 1929 for his extension to other particles.

Color and wavelengths
The different wavelengths are detected by the human eye and then interpreted by the human brain as colors, ranging from red at the longest wavelengths (lowest frequencies) to violet at the shortest wavelengths (highest frequencies). The intervening frequencies are seen as orange, yellow, green, blue, and, conventionally, indigo.

The wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum immediately outside the range that the human eye is able to see/detect are called ultraviolet (UV) at the short wavelength (high frequency) end and infrared (IR) at the long wavelength (low frequency) end. Although humans cannot see IR, we do perceive the near IR (shorter wavelength, higher frequency, higher energy) as heat through receptors in the skin. Cameras that can detect IR and convert it to light are called night-vision cameras.

UV radiation is not perceived by humans at all except in a very delayed fashion, as overexposure of the skin to UV light causes sunburn, or skin cancer. Some animals, such as bees, can see UV radiation while others, such as pit viper snakes, can see IR using pits in their heads.

Ray Approximation of Light
When studying refraction, mirrors and lenses we ignore the wave properties of light.

What is a ray of light?
Light acts as both a wave and a ray of particles. When observing the effects of light on large object such as cubes of glass, mirrors and lenses light can be observed to act like a ray of tiny little particles that can be bounced, directed or slowed.

Mediums slow light down -- lawn mower analogy

Mirrors bounce light -- converging mirrors, diverging mirrors

Lens direct light -- converging lens, diverging mirror lens

Reflection and Refraction
Refraction is the change in direction of a wave due to a change in velocity. It happens when waves travel from a medium with a given refractive index to a medium with another. At the boundary between the media the wave changes direction; its wavelength increases or decreases but frequency remains constant. For example, a light ray will refract as it passes through glass; understanding of this concept led to the invention of the refracting telescope.

In the diagram on the right, ripples travel from the left and pass over a shallower region inclined at an angle to the wavefront. The waves travel more slowly in the shallower water, so the wavelength decreases and the wave bends at the boundary. The dotted line represents the normal to the boundary. The dashed line represents the original direction of the waves. The phenomenon explains why waves on a shoreline never hit the shoreline at an angle. Whichever direction the waves travel in deep water, they always refract towards the normal as they enter the shallower water near the beach.

An example of this is looking into a bowl of water. Air has a refractive index of about 1.003, and water has a refractive index of about 1.33. If you look at a straight object, such as a pencil, which is placed at a slant, partially in the water, the object appears to bend at the water's surface. This is due to the light rays from the object being bent as they move from the water to the air. This causes water to appear shallower than it really is.

In the diagram, the dark rectangle represents the actual position of a pencil sitting in a bowl of water. The light rectangle represents the apparent position of the pencil. Notice that the end (X) looks like it is at (Y), a position that is considerably shallower than (X).

Refraction is also responsible for rainbows and for splitting up of white light into a rainbow-spectrum as it passes through a glass prism. Glass has a higher refractive index than air and the different frequencies of light travel at different speeds (dispersion), causing them to be refracted at different angles. The different frequencies correspond to different colours observed.

The amount that the light bends during refraction is calculated using Snell's law.

Recently some metamaterials have been created which have a negative refractive index.

f=f
Frequency is fundamental

The speed of light doesn't ever change.

The frequency and wavelength (λ) of light can change.

Frequency is the measurement of the number of times that a repeated event occurs per unit time. To calculate the frequency, one fixes a time interval, counts the number of occurrences of the event within that interval, and then divides this count by the length of the time interval.

In SI units, the result is measured in hertz (Hz) after the German physicist, Heinrich Rudolf Hertz. 1 Hz means that an event repeats once per second. Other units that have been used to measure frequency include: cycles per second, revolutions per minute (rpm).

Frequency of waves
Measuring the frequency of electromagnetic waves (such as light) the frequency in hertz is the number of cycles of the repetitive waveform per second. If the wave is a sound, frequency is what characterizes its pitch

Frequency has an inverse relationship to the concept of wavelength. The frequency f is equal to the speed v of the wave divided by the wavelength λ (lambda) of the wave:

 * $$f = \frac{v}{\lambda}$$

In the special case of electromagnetic waves moving through a vacuum, then v = c, where c is the speed of light in a vacuum, and this expression becomes:

 * $$f = \frac{c}{\lambda}$$

NOTE: Remember f=f When waves travel from one medium to another, their frequency remains more or less the same - only their wavelength changes.

Lawn mower analogy
To understand how light moves through a medium, such as glass, you can use the analogy of a person riding a self-powered lawnmower.

When the person is on the grass they slip and move slow. When they hit the pavement they stop slipping and speed up. The lawnmower moving over the grass is analogous to light moving through a medium, such as glass and the lawn mower moving over pavement is analogous to light moving through vacuum.

Furthermore when the lawn mower moves over the pavement and hits the grass at an angle one of the lawnmower's front wheel will hit the grass and slow down for a brief period while the other front wheel is going the same speed. This changes direction of the lawn mower. Much like a ray of light moving from vacuum to a medium such as glass changes direction when it hits the medium. The light ray bends towards the perpendicular.

Snell's Law
Snell's law is the simple formula used to calculate the refraction of light when travelling between two media of differing refractive index. It is named for its discoverer, Dutch mathematician Willebrord van Roijen Snell (1580-1626).

Overview

In the diagram on the right, two media of refractive indices n1 (on the left) and n2 (on the right) meet at a surface or interface (vertical line). n2 > n1, and light has a slower phase velocity within the second medium.

A light ray PO in the leftmost medium strikes the interface at the point O. From point O, we project a straight line at right angles to the line of the interface; this is known as the normal to the surface (horizontal line). The angle between the normal and the light ray PO is known as the angle of incidence, θ1.

The ray continues through the interface into the medium on the right; this is shown as the ray OQ. The angle with which is makes to the normal is known of as the angle of refraction, θ2.

Snell's law gives the relation between the angles θ1 and θ2:

 * $$n_1\sin(\theta_1) = n_2\sin(\theta_2)\, $$

Note that, for the case of θ1 = 0° (i.e., a ray perpendicular to the interface) the solution is θ2 = 0° regardless of the values of n1 and n2. In other words, a ray entering a medium perpendicular to the surface is never bent.

The above is also valid for light going from a dense to a less dense medium; the symmetry of Snell's law shows that the same raypaths are applicable in opposite direction.

A qualitative rule for determining the direction of refraction is that the ray in the denser medium is always closer to the normal. A handy way to remember this is to visualize the ray as a car crossing the boundary between asphalt (the less dense medium) and mud (the denser medium). Depending on the angle, either the left wheel or the right wheel of the car will cross into the new medium first, causing the car to swerve.

Total internal reflection
When moving from a dense to a less dense medium (i.e. n1 > n2), it is easily verified that the above equation has no solution when θ1 exceeds a value known as the critical angle:

 * $$\theta_{\mathrm{crit}} = \sin^{-1}\left( \frac{n_2}{n_1} \right)$$

When θ1 > θcrit, no refracted ray appears, and the incident ray undergoes total internal reflection from the interface.

Given a normalized ray vector v and a normalized plane normal vector p, one can work out the normalized reflected and refracted rays: (note that the actual angles θ1 and θ2 are not worked out)

 * $$\cos\theta_1=\mathbf{v}\cdot\mathbf{p}$$
 * $$\cos\theta_2=\sqrt{1-\left(\frac{n_1}{n_2}\right)^2\left(1-\left(\cos\theta_1\right)^2\right)}$$
 * $$\mathbf{v}_{\mathrm{reflect}}=\mathbf{v}-\left(2\cos\theta_1\right)\mathbf{p}$$
 * $$\mathbf{v}_{\mathrm{refract}}=\left(\frac{n_1}{n_2}\right)\mathbf{v}+\left(\cos\theta_2-\frac{n_1}{n_2}\cos\theta_1\right)\mathbf{p}$$

The cosines may be recycled and used in the Fresnel equations for working out the intensity of the resulting rays. The square root turns imaginary during total internal reflection, and the refracted ray is not real (there is apparently some kind of refracted ray, which decays very quickly, exponentially with distance).

Derivation
Snell's law may be derived from Fermat's principle, which states that the light travels the path which takes the least time. By taking the derivative of the optical path length, the stationary point is found giving the path taken by the light. In a classic analogy by Feynman, the area of lower refractive index is replaced by a beach, the area of higher refractive index by the sea, and the fastest way for a rescuer on the beach to get to a drowning person in the sea is to run along a path that follows Snell's law.

title: Physics Textbook/Light


text:
Bicycles/Maintenance and Repair/Tools and Supplies/Bottom Bracket Tool

A bottom bracket tool is specifically designed to remove and insert the bottom bracket of a bicycle.

Bottom brackets are, unfortunately, one of the less standardised parts of a bicycle. Over the years manufacturers have come up with many different approaches to providing gripping surfaces for the bottom bracket to be inserted or removed. A typical repair shop will, correspondingly, have a variety of tools available for different styles of bottom bracket.

One of the older and more common systems uses the combination of a lock ring remover and a pin wrench. the left bearing cone is removed in order for the bearings and axle to be removed.The bearing cone has two shallow holes drilled into it. When a pin wrench is inserted into these holes, the bearing cone can be threaded in or out.

The lock ring is a circular nut used to prevent the left bearing cone from loosening by accident. The lock ring remover is inserted into one of several notches in the lock ring in order for it to be removed.


text:
User talk:Zoohouse

Check out Blogging

Invitation to Visual Basic Classic
I see you edited Visual Basic a while ago. This is just an invitation to get back into it. The book needs a lot of work especially on providing exercises and introductory texts. --kwhitefoot 10:05, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

title: User talk:Zoohouse


text:
Blogging

This is an introductory wikibook about blogging: what it is, how and why to do it, what to use it for. Advanced chapters may follow on how to customize and create extensions for your favorite blogging platforms or how to integrate them seamlessly with other tools you use.

Table of contents

 * /Welcome/
 * /Purpose/
 * /Design/
 * /Updating/
 * /Tools/
 * /Networks/

title: Blogging


text:
Blogging/Welcome

Welcome to the Blogging 101 Wikibook. This book (which anybody can edit) is a collection of resources about blogs and blogging. It is divided into several categories. Please add whatever links you think would be useful to people under the appropriate headings. (Off-topic & inappropriate material will of course be edited out.)

Definitions
"A weblog, or simply a blog, is a web application which contains periodic, reverse chronologically ordered posts on a common webpage. Such a Web site would typically be accessible to any Internet user. Part of the reason "blog" was coined and commonly accepted into use is the fact that in saying "blog," confusion with server log is avoided.

Blogs run from individual diaries to arms of political campaigns, media programs and corporations, and from one occasional author to having large communities of writers. The totality of weblogs or blog-related webs is usually called the blogosphere.

The format of weblogs can vary from simple bullet lists of hyperlinks to article summaries with user-provided comments and ratings. Individual weblog entries are almost always date and time-stamped, with the newest post at the top of the page. Because links are so important to weblogs, most blogs have a way of archiving older entries and generating a static address for individual entries; this static link is referred to as a permalink. The latest headlines, with hyperlinks and summaries, are offered in weblogs in the RSS XML-format, to be read with a RSS feedreader.

A weblog is often run through a Content management system or CMS."

(visit: blog for more, plus relevant links) CRP

A good list of blog definitions is here.

Blogging Tools & Where to Find Them:
For a detailed breakdown of blog tool features see: [latestnewsknowledge.blogspot.com]

A similar German-language version is here.

Here is another good post on comparing blogging tools like Blogger vs TypePad vs Movable Type vs blosxom vs b2evolution vs Wordpress

Feature by feature comparison of the two most popular hosted blog solutions, TypePad vs Blogger

Weblogs Compendium has good and long list of a variety of blog tools.

Globe of Blogs is an excellent list of blog tools, hosting & design services, etc.

For an excellent blogging guide with Tips and Tutorials on How To Blog, click here

For a great Windows client that you can use to create rich text WYSIWYG posts for ANY blogging platform, including WordPress, Drupal, MovableType, TypePad, Blogger, LiveJournal, b2evolution, etc, download a free 30 day trial of BlogJet

Hosted on Somebody Else's Server:

 * Blog.com
 * Blog-City
 * Blogsome
 * Blogger
 * Centada
 * Typepad
 * Blogware - through re-sellers such as Blogmedia (and many others listed on the Blogware website.

Community-Oriented Blogging Tools:

 * MSN Spaces
 * LiveJournal
 * PhuseBox
 * Motime
 * Xanga
 * Diaryland
 * Journalspace
 * Mindsay

Mobile Community-Oriented Blogging Tools:

 * WINKsite

For Installation on Your Own Server:

 * ExpressionEngine
 * pMachine Free and Pro
 * movabletype: Movable Type

 * Plug-ins for Movable Type:

 * Prevents "comment spam": MT-BLACKLIST (Comment spam is spam that gets posted as a comment to a blog entry.)
 * Manila
 * RadioUserland

Open-Source Blogging Tools:

 * Bloxsom
 * WordPress
 * Drupal
 * Textpattern
 * Nucleuscms
 * Thingama
 * b2evolution

Blog-Like Tools That Aren't Really Used For Blogging (But Have Some Blog-Like Features):

 * Drupal
 * Scoop

How-To Resources:

 * Blog on 'How to Blog', from a technical perspective. Provides blogging tutorials, tips, tricks, templates, blog software comparisons, and more  Created by a blogger who documented her own experiences in learning how to blog.  Main focuses are on WordPress, TypePad, MovableType, Blogger, b2evolution, etc.
 * Blogging for nonprofits
 * How to increase your traffic
 * Guide to Business Blogging
 * ExpressionEngine and pMachine HowTo
 * Guides to building a blog from the ground up, centered around WordPress, but valid for anyone.

(Can't find a good "how-to" on something people keep asking you about, or you found hard to do? Please create one by making a separate wiki page for it here. Possible ones: BoostyourTraffic InstallingPlugins InstallyourBlogtools and ImportExport)

[BlogPolicies?] How To Create Blog Policies for your Site, and Why -- Your blog policy can cover how you'll handle corrections, troll comments, attribution, and whether or not content on your blog can be used/remixed by others. Why have one? Better to have a policy and apply it when the time comes than have a problem and make up something to deal with it retroactively. Policies can also give you and your readers a strong idea of what your blog is about and why you're blogging.

Books, Comic Strips, & Miscellaneous
Nowadays, there are several books available online and in bookstores on blogging.

An irregularly updated comic strip on the experiences of blogging [* http://sriks6711.wordpress.com/category/slob Secret Life of Bloggers]

-

Get Blogging jobs

Aggregators and Newsreaders
An aggregator enables you to skim lots of blogs by pulling together summaries of the new entries.

The summaries are actually RSS feeds. An RSS feed is a little file your blogging software probably creates automatically that contains either the first few lines of a blog entry or the entire thing, depending on how you've set it up. An aggregator goes to the blogs you tell it to and lists all the new entries. It does this by reading the RSS feed.

Why RSS is the Next Big Thing

Links to Newsreader Tools:

 * Bloglines
 * Newsgator
 * Sharpreader
 * Rojo
 * NetNewsWire
 * NewsFire
 * NewsMac
 * PulpFiction
 * Shrook

Mobile Feed Reader Tools:

 * WINKsite

Articles About Aggregators/Newsreaders and Why They're Important:
Present And Future Uses Of Feeds & Syndication On Mobile Phones
 * http://winksite.com/site/help_bl_view.cfm?blog_id=3730

Mobile Feed Reader With A Twist
 * http://winksite.com/site/help_bl_view.cfm?blog_id=3882

Interesting RSS Feeds:
A buoy has a feed of ocean conditions

Scientists are publishing molecular structures via RSS

Learning object repository feeds where you can watch learning objects appear magically

A feed of the spam in this guy's inbox.

Creating Feeds:

 * http://www.geckotribe.com/rss/jawfish/
 * http://www.howdev.com/services/feedsweep/ (free)

-

Traffic-Trackers

 * Extreme Tracking
 * Sitemeter
 * Refer 2.1
 * FeedBurner

Search Engines

 * Technorati

---

Video Blogging

 * Video Blogging Info

Audio Blogging (Podcasting)

 * iPodder
 * IT Conversations
 * Adam Curry's Weblog

Open Demo Blogs

 * plog: usename:test / password: test
 * WP: Login:admin / PASSWARD: beagoodman
 * Gblog: username/password combination:Administrator: admin/gblog ; Author: author/gblog (Coming soon)

Examples of Blogs Used in Different Ways
Junior high school student blogging: http://www.hangletonweblogs.org/

College class blogging: GW North Korea Blog

Medical School class blogging: Albany Medical College FP Class Blog

Physicians who blog: Medlogs.com

Politicians who blog: Boris Johnson Dominique Strauss-KahnTom Watson[

Lawyers who blog: Notes from the (Legal) Underground

Corporate blogs:

 * Microsoft's open blog
 * Googleblog
 * Macromedia MX

More info about corporate blogging and organizational blogging:

 * Robert Scoble's Corporate Blogging Manifesto
 * Corporate Blogging Policy Examples
 * Corporate Blogging Survey
 * Your Guide to Corporate Blogging
 * Edelman Survey on Employee Blogging (PDF)
 * Blogging for CEO's

How journalists use blogs:

 * How journalists use blogs
 * 51% of U.S. journalists use blogs

CEO blogs:

 * Mark CubanRichard Edelman

Activist blogs

 * Downhillbattle
 * Activism blogs index

Nonprofit blogs: Learning Alternatives

Other blogs
Social networking blogs:
 * AlwaysOn Network

Industry-specific blogs (not related to a specific corporation): David on IT Outsourcing in China Natural Products Industry Newswire

Money-making blogs:

 * Freeafterrebate

Blogs within a geographical community (in this case, a number of Scottish Islands): (http://www.bbc.co.uk/islandblogging)

title: Blogging/Welcome


text:
Blogging/Networks

How to find and evaluate blog networks
As of April 2006, there are dozens of blog networks on the Web. All of them have unique ways of paying their bloggers and arranging the ownership of the blog content. For example, some blog networks pay each blogger a percentage of the gross revenue for that blogger's blog(s) and allow the blogger to retain full ownership of her content, while others pay a flat rate for each post and thus buy content rights from the blogger.

BlogNetworkList.com, run by the Blogmedia blog network, offers various ways of evaluating and comparing blog networks, such as the number of incoming links to their sites from other blogs and from search engines.

How to boost your traffic
There are many ways to encourage traffic to your blog. Beware of programs that promise traffic without promising targeted traffic. If visitors come to your site without any interest in your topic, such as through a traffic exchange program, you are accomplishing little.

title: Blogging/Networks


text:
User talk:Matt Junk

Hi Matt Junk, if you voted for the book of the month March 2005, you were not logged in when voting. Please sign your vote again by logging in first. Your name has to appear in the page history in order for your vote to be valid. --Andreas 22:19, 25 Feb 2005 (UTC)

title: User talk:Matt Junk


text:
Talk:Blogging

Original content migrated from the spam-infested TuesdayWiki.

title: Talk:Blogging


text:
Talk:Linguistics/Typology

It is so great to see others contributing content here! Come back and add more.

Eventually we will probably want to tone down statements like "polysynthetic languages are definitely very cool", but for now I want to see that kind of enthusiasm here. We can worry about serious scholarly tone when the book has a couple of hundred pages. ACW 22:32, 25 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Discourse? Pragmatics? Sociolinguistics?  Psycholinguistics?
If the aim here is a survey style text book then I think it needs to cover some more material. I think that Discourse, Sociolinguistics and Psycholinguistics need their own sections and that Pragmatics could be dealt with under semantics. Psycholinguistics might also cover first and second lanuage acquisition and speech and language pathology. I haven't edited the book to add these section headings because I can't commit right now to contributing so it would be ill mannered.

3 small questions
1. is latin really the ultimate inflected language? aren't there lots of langs with more elaborated inflections?

2.question of audience: names some major languages in case you cant think of any but then says "every argument ... is inflected on the verb," a mildly technical use of "argument"

3. lutinative languages can have both lots of agreements and inflections, or have rigid word order, such as German.

but german also has inflections.

 * perhaps they meant that german had both agreements & inflections and rigid word order? --Schneedesu (discuss • contribs) 18:00, 19 August 2021 (UTC)

Syntatctic topology
It makes no sense.

Japanese example
From the little I know about Japanese from studying it a little while, isn't the example here a little grammatically odd? It seems like it would make more sense to use the wa-particle with watashi: watashi-wa hon-o yomimasu. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong! Schneedesu (discuss • contribs) 17:58, 19 August 2021 (UTC)

title: Talk:Linguistics/Typology


text:
Firewire Software RAID using Oxford 911 and Windows XP

Disclaimer
This may or may not be complete garbage. I have not completed and fully tested the RAID yet. '''The actions described here could damage your Oxford 911 enclosures, hard drives, Firewire controllers, motherboard, PC, maybe even burn your house down. Everything here is at your own risk! '''

I wanted to start a place to post information I've gathered and learned about how to build a software RAID using Windows XP, Oxford 911 external firewire enclosures and a little free time.

Why would you want to do this?

 * The RAID is easy to build
 * Cost effective
 * Huge, Reliable Storage
 * Easy to expand (Sort of...)
 * Save power since it doesn't require a dedicated server
 * Works with laptops
 * Long Firewire cables allow placing the RAID in a closet to reduce noise

What applications should you use this for?
If your cabling is not perfect and your drives disconnect and reconnect, device numbers may get reassigned. Windows XP may not handle this reassignment very well. If you're lucky your volume will become inaccessible and you will be able to power down, power up and continue working. If you are not so lucky, data may get written to the wrong location producing a corrupted file or a corrupted filesystem table. A corrupted filesystem in a dynamic disk can be very hard to recover (I have been successful in retrieving files using r-tools but many other disk recovery tools failed). Note that even if you use redundancy it could easily be several drives simultaneously with errors and make recovery not possible.

External firewire raid is best suited for applications where the sustained high speed read/write bandwidth of RAID will be an important advantage but you can afford to occasionally lose your data. For example, if you are processing large video files where the original is in a safe location and at worst you lose your current editing session, the speed improvements could outweigh the occasional loss of data.

Ingredients

 * 1) Some cheap standard IDE drives. Lots of them. You'll fill them up later.
 * 2) * How many drives? Any amount you want. With software RAID 5 it doesn’t matter. Your usable space will be x * ( y – 1) where x is the capacity of the smallest drive in the array and y is the number of drives. That’s right, one drive is used for parity. Well, not really, its distributed. But this isn’t a RAID tutorial. Look that stuff up on your own. Just get some drives.
 * 3) Windows XP
 * 4) * Home or Professional or Windows 2003 Server
 * 5) * Windows 2000 may work
 * 6) * OS X is also reported to do similar things, but it is untested for this application.
 * 7) External Firewire enclosures or bridge boards. Make sure they use the Oxford 911 chipset.

''I think WindowsXP only puts "dynamic" drives into a RAID array. Does this work for external USB hard drives? Is it possible to make external USB drives "dynamic"?''

Windows XP requires dynamic disks for RAID. Basic drives can be converted to dynamic easily. However, Windows doesn't seem to allow basic to dynamic conversion on USB hard drives. There may be a registry hack for this, but I have not found it. One way to make it work might be to take the drive and put it into a PC or a firewire enclosure and convert it to a dynamic disk there. Then, return it to the USB enclosure. I believe Windows will recognize it and mount it.

As of Windows XP SP2 & Windows 2003 Server SP2, dynamic disks cannot be converted from basic via USB. Also, attempting to convert a basic to dynamic (on one computer), and then moving it to another computer will not work. Only the computer making the convert to dynamic will be able to read the dynamic drive.

It is possible to convert a USB disk to a dynamic disk ( at least in 2003 server ) by using the command line diskpart command.

Using a command line 1. Open Command prompt. 2. Type: diskpart 3. At the DISKPART prompt, type: list disk

Make note of the disk number of the disk you want to convert to dynamic.

4. At the DISKPART prompt, type: select disk n 5. At the DISKPART prompt, type: convert dynamic

Let's get down to work

 * 1) First step. Get Windows XP ready for RAID. Here are nice instructions which I will not repeat. http://www.tomshardware.com/2004/11/19/using_windowsxp_to_make_raid_5_happen/ Now you can create RAID volumes. However...
 * 2) By default, Windows XP will not allow you to convert a FireWire-connected disk to a dynamic disk. However, you can make a simple registry change to accomplish such an upgrade. To convert a FireWire-connected disk to a dynamic disk, perform the following steps:
 * 3) Start a registry editor (e.g., regedit.exe).
 * 4) Navigate to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\dmadmin\Parameters registry subkey.
 * 5) Double-click EnableDynamicConversionFor1394, set this value to 1, then click OK.
 * 6) Close the registry editor.
 * 7) Reboot the machine for the change to take effect.
 * 8) If you have decided to use one drive per enclosure, you’re done now. Just put your drives in the enclosures, daisy chain them together, create the array and you’re set. (Ok, that isn't a trivial matter, but this will be elaborated on later...)
 * 9) -This registry key does not appear to work under Windows 2000 SP5.

Two drives per bridge/enclosure??
It turns out it is possible to connect two drives in a master/slave configuration to each Oxford 911 bridge. That cuts down the cost, since you now have to buy half as many enclosures as you have drives.

 * 1) Go here: http://www.fwdepot.com/firewiredepot/firmware/firmware.html
 * 2) Get updated firmware for your Oxford 911 chipset. http://fwdepot.com/firewiredepot/firmware/FW911_V4_00_0000_Release.bin The file is called: FW911_V4_00_0000_Release.bin
 * 3) Get the uploader tool which will allow you to flash the Oxford 911 bridge and tweak settings to enable the slave device. http://fwdepot.com/firewiredepot/xp_updater_1_64.1.zip You may also need JRE. Follow their instructions to get that.
 * 4) Start the uploader program and flash your Oxford 911 bridge to the latest firmware.
 * 5) * I suggest you download and read the users guide for the Oxford Semiconductor software. It is helpful. http://www.oxsemi.co.uk/cgi-bin/general/prodhome.cgi?911 - Link not available - Try http://www.datoptic.com/PDF/Oxford_Semiconductor_Uploader_UG.pdf
 * 6) Here is the main screen of the program: http://web.archive.org/20090821071228/www.geocities.com/phrozenphreak2001/mainscreen.gif Yours should look something like that after flashing.
 * 7) Next, click on ‘Modify Configuration Information’. Enable the Slave details and fill in some values that might make sense. Set the device type for both Master and Slave to hard disk drive. http://web.archive.org/20090820182840/www.geocities.com/phrozenphreak2001/modify_configuration_information.gif
 * 8) Click on 'advanced'. In there, enable all the UDMA modes for both the master and the slave. http://web.archive.org/20090820163136/www.geocities.com/phrozenphreak2001/advanced_options.gif Select the following options below the pull-downs:
 * 9) * Enable GPI drive detect
 * 10) * Detect drives with non-std signature
 * 11) * Enable ATAPI UDMA on Master
 * 12) * Enable ATAPI UDMA on Slave
 * 13) Do not select other options. Some of them may render your bridge useless. It may be recoverable, though. I killed mine at first, but then was able to recover it by reloading the firmware through the force-flash mode. See the users manual.
 * 14) Ok. Once that’s done. Click OK. And click ‘Upload changes’ back at the 'Modify Configuration Information' screen.
 * 15) The bridge should upload the new changes and reboot.

Minor Details that need to be worked out
I forgot to mention. How do you connect these drives? Well, you’ll need a standard 80-pin IDE cable that is capable of ATA/100. Use whatever you like. Set the drive at the end of the cable to be the MASTER and the drive in the middle to be the SLAVE. Don’t rely on CABLE-SELECT, it doesn’t work. Tried it.

Next big question. How do you mount and power these drives? They obviously won’t fit in the enclosure, so you’re on your own there. I haven’t gotten that far yet. I’m thinking of finding some case with a good power supply and pulling the bridge boards from the enclosures and using them separately. Anyway, that’s up to you.

Disclaimer, again
'''The actions described here could damage your Oxford 911 enclosures, hard drives, Firewire controllers, motherboard, PC, maybe even burn your house down. Everything here is at your own risk! '''

I’m just saying it is possible and here are some hints.

This is all in development stage and will hopefully improve as I finish the project and get input from others.