Cybrosys Technologies

Overly (un)wired?

2011-04-12T00:06:00.000-07:00

-‘The guy behind the post. Yeah, the one in the white shirt. See him now?’

-‘Oh yeah yeah, I do.. He really is muttering to himself, isn’t he?’

-‘Yeah, man! Nobody will even imagine, right? His nice shoes and cool glasses!’

Crazy? We used to know immediately. What else can you possibly call somebody in a tie screaming into the air – ‘You should have asked first, stupid!’

Now, not so fast. Chances are, his ears have a tiny metal clip clamped on. And no, he is not the Spock guy who wandered off the Star Wars film set. It just happens that hands-free bluetooth headset is the new thing. And it is here to stay, no matter how weird people are going to find it.

And weird it is. In the train, we find a guy smiling softly into space, his eyes all tender, speaking in a voice that is very gentle. Classic signs of romance, but – ‘Whom are you talking to?’, asks the lady sitting next to him, obviously freaked out.

This snaps the guy out of his sweet mood in which he is all by himself: he raises his eyebrows, points to his ears where he has a bluetooth headset clamped on, and continues the conversation like before, though somewhat terse.

The lady says ‘oh!’ and looks away embarrassed, but you know and sympathize with what the lady is feeling, because you have been wondering yourself.

Some poor souls have been the butt of bluetooth jokes too. Check this story:

‘Today, I was in the elevator with a girl I really liked. She suddenly asked, ‘So, do you want to come to my place and talk for sometime?’ I got all excited and shouted ‘YES!’. That was when the girl looked at me oddly, pointed to her bluetooth headset, and walked out of the elevator muttering’

‘It looks plain loony, no doubt about that’, says a friend of ours, consultant of an IT firm. ‘I had promised myself I will not get myself a wireless headset no matter how busy I get, but now I’m a fanboy’, he grins. ‘There simply came a point when it was either a simple hands-free headset, or certain death due to stress.’

What stress?

‘Heaps!’, explains a business owner we talked to. ‘I have to constantly cock the head to keep the cell in place while I juggle a hundred tasks. I cannot afford to miss calls and it is a problem when I drive. And on the rare occasion when I can hold the cell with my hand, I found out that my hand hurt. Real bad.’

That is Cellphone Elbow (aka Cubital tunnel syndrome) for you, folks! It happens when you damage the nerve in your hand by keeping it bent too long. Strain your hands for a while, and your pinkie and ring fingers start tingling. Strain it for too long, and you have just earned yourself probably permanent nerve damage.

Conclusion: bluetooth headsets are a bit weird, but it still acts as a lifesaver for a lot of people. Especially if you are a harried professional who could use your hands for a thousand other things other than holding a cellphone to your ear. But just in case, here are a few guidelines to get you by:

#2:
Train yourself to look straight ahead when you are talking. Do not make eye contact with anyone. Not unless you want to make them think you are talking to them, in which case, may the Force be with you!

#3:
In case someone stares too long, even after the reasonable period of time you have allowed them to figure out what you are doing, pretend to:

Tuck your hair behind your ears and give them a clear view of the headset (works if you are a woman)
Frown and fiddle with the headset and given them a clear view of the headset again (works irrespective of gender)
Ignore it completely (works like heck and is perhaps the best thing you should do)

#4:
Prepare and practise a gesture that indicates very clearly to your co-workers, friends, family, date and maybe even strangers that you are on call and yes, you have bluetooth headset on.

#5:
When you are talking on the wireless headset, know that other people can hear you when you are viciously cursing the stock market nosedive. Know that they can also see your expression when your partner tells you about the amount he just threw away on a bad deal. Going green? Can’t breathe? Gasping wildly? Let people know that it is not a heart-attack you are having. Not physical, anyway.

Thought we missed number 1? Nope! We just saved the best for the last.

#1:
The mother of all rules, the Holy Grail of an unwired user, the burden a bluetooth headset fan has to bear: know that a bluetooth headset is not for the cowards. You have to prepare yourself for ‘what a weirdo!’ looks and ominous muttering as you pass by. Learn the rule, and learn it well!

The closing story is by Darragh Jones, the Los Angeles Times journalist who tried to investigate how people view those who (apparently) talk to thin air. Winner, that one is:

Across Dupont Circle struts a debonair man, swinging his sunglasses all jaunty and confident.
‘All right,’ he's saying. ‘That's right.’ He looks like he's finishing up a business call and is about to spend the afternoon playing hooky. ‘Uh huh.’
We walk towards him, armed with questions on what he thinks about the wireless technology, then notice: there is no headset. He keeps talking. We back away.

GUARDING THE CARD: HOW SAFE IS YOUR MEMORY CARD?

2011-03-02T22:46:00.000-08:00

Sometimes, you got to hand it to technology! For all the hype and the size of the human brain, there are still times when we forget what we had for dinner last night!

That is when we have memory cards no bigger than our pinky fingernails: they can store mountains of information, and they’re everywhere -- phones, cameras, game consoles, and what not! (Yes, you own one too even if you do not know it, if you own any gadget at all!)

We humans ought to be ashamed, because our condition is becoming obsolete every minute: the memory card does not even forget anything stored in it!

And the operative phrase here? ‘DOES NOT EVEN FORGET’.

Because how many of you knew that your card does not erase anything you had in it? Not even when you delete it! Not until it absolutely has to, anyway. Talk about being good to a fault!

Let us talk about the file system, and it will all make sense in a minute.

Your pictures and music files, or ‘data’ for your memory card, will all be stored in physically close and continuous groups of memory spaces called clusters in your card. Why close and continuous? Because had they been jumbled up, not even Superman will be able to locate all the millions of different places where bits of your pic was stored in! Plus, you might also have to hear the card accidentally play Black Sabbath in the middle of Mozart’s soulful Magic Flute. Scary thought!

Your card also has a kind of a table in addition to the data region. The card checks the table to see what data went where. Think of it as a bunch of entries, where each one describes each cluster in the data region.

So obviously, when you transfer a file to your card, the card writes the data in some clusters in the data region, and makes a mark in the table about which clusters it filled up.

But when you delete a file, all the card does is erase the entry in the table, and mark those clusters empty in the table (and table alone!). The data is still there in the data region, and is only erased when the card runs out of ‘really’ empty clusters to store new incoming data. When it does, it resigns to overwriting the ‘deleted’ data and filling in the new data instead. (Do not blame the card: We have a strong suspicion that the inventor of the memory card just passed on his inherent laziness.)

So what’s the big deal in that, you might ask. Here’s the big deal: you send us your memory card, and we shall send it back with 90% of the stuff you thought you had deleted. And that includes the pic you took in that skimpy dress posing like Marilyn Monroe. If it had been any other guy, he would have loved that pic and kept a copy for himself. And if he is enterprising enough, so would the whole world, thanks to the web!

To ye who still embraces thy doubt: never wondered why transferring files to your card takes forever, while deleting them takes just half a second?

You should know that recovering deleted data is easy too. Data recovery softwares are abundant in the internet like maggots in rotten cheese.

It is not just about the pictures you stored. If you had stored backups of your messages, contacts or business information in your card, you almost deserve being victimized: backups should be under lock and key in a system, not in a flimsy memory card!

Think all this might not happen to you? We hate to break your bubble, but there seems to be a buying spree for ‘second-hand memory cards’. And it is definitely not triggered by low cost. Proof? One word: China. The number of downloads for data recovery softwares on the internet has hit an all-time high. If you watch the news, you would know that there is no dearth of creeps who would do anything for a fleeting moment of pleasure, so better be safe than sorry.

The problem with memory cards is that it is so small, and yet so powerful. Small, so you can easily lose it. Powerful, because it is so durable: one of our colleagues actually ran a card through a full cycle in the washing machine, but the card survived without a scratch, and the pictures in it were still ‘awesome’. (That is the word he used.)

First things first: your memory card is NOT the place where you store your wild-night-out pics or the company’s annual report. Or anything that can get you in trouble for that matter.

Secondly, when you are about to throw away your memory card, follow the FFF rule – Format, Fill with junk, Format again! Explanation: you format the card, and then fill the card with stuff that is not even remotely private, like a lot of songs or pictures of apples. Then format it all over again! So when someone stealthily tries to recover your data, he gets a load of garbage, and you get the last laugh!

Lastly, your card, and all your personal information, is precious, and you have to treat it like the Holy Grail. Never ever lose your card. To those who think this is a remarkably useless piece of advice: see ya when you are the star in those sleazy websites! And oh, can we get an autograph when you are all over the news for being the ‘authentic inside source’ for startling news leaks about your company?

DATA PRIVACY DAY and THE INTERNET PANOPTICON

2011-01-27T03:58:00.000-08:00

Studies Says Webcam Users Under Serious Threat

So you own a webcam? Good! Welcome to being watched then.

Cyber crime is a fascinating field: constantly evolving, and always innovating. Meet its most latest brain child: hacking webcams without even the owner knowing!

The idea is simple: they turn on your webcam and watch you. Oh no, you will not be asked to pose or say cheese. They simply capture away pictures and videos of yours or anything in the webcam's field, when you go about doing stuff, blissfully unaware.

Switching off your cam is not going to help either. The webcam hacking spyware works with a Trojan backdoor software that will turn on the web cam on its own. This can be installed in your system when you download innocent-looking picture or video or music files.

Still skeptical? Okay, let us get you some more details. If your system has a webcam, then it also requires a software to control it. Even if your webcam is connected, it need not be on. That requires the software we are talking about. Ideal case is when there is just a single software that can access the cam, and you are its sole controller.

Having said that, there are apps that access the webcam other than the ones we are talking about. Examples are Yahoo! Messenger and the like. No cause to worry because these apps require you to 'allow' access.

But...

There are other softwares that can be installed in your system, softwares that can access your webcam without your permission. You don't have to be using the webcam or turning it on, consider it a job done by the software. The malicious code can be installed when you download something. Once installed, it can access your web cam, turn it on and click away! Shutter bug, did I say?

And hey, this ain't elaborate conjectures on possible threats in the future. What we are talking about has already been done.

Some news reports: in Cyprus, a 45-year-old man was arrested in connection with hacking a teenage girl's webcam, in order to take illicit pictures of the young woman in her bedroom. In Spain, police have arrested a man suspected of stealing online bank passwords and of writing a virus that is capable of spying on people through their webcams. More disturbing is the fact that the police found information from thousands of computers worldwide in his system. The Blake J Robbins v Lower Merion School District (PA) is legendary already, and the school used student laptop webcams to spy on them at school and home. Stories do not end here. Some of them can make Little Brother look tame.

So what do you do? Apart from panicking and biting nails, that is.

For starters, unplug your web cam cable whenever it is not in use. No software can plug your cable back and use your web cam. If you cannot unplug the webcam, like in a laptop, cover it using tape. If you do not want the tape residue on the lens, then at least cover it with an old sock.

Same goes for your internet connection too. Disable it when it is not in use. Not having a device connected to any network would be the only way to prevent broadcasting data from your system.

Stop downloading files from unknown sources like insecure websites or simply, strangers in chats. Those files are the surest way of being a victim of all sorts of hack attempts.

And if possible, get a webcam that turns on a small light, or gives a physical indication of some sort when in use. So if you ever see the web cam light go on, and if you have not executed the webcam software, you know you are being spied on. If you know your stuff well, you can insert a webcam light by simple hardware modification: check the chip's pins with a scope, find which signals correspond with activity, and connect the suitable ones to LEDs.

If you want to be fully sure, take your laptop apart, locate the cam, and insert a physical switch.

MOST IMPORTANTLY, ensure the security of your system. Update and tighten it like mad! Better antiviruses, better firewalls and better operating systems can help tonnes. Linux tends to be more secure, especially if you know what you are doing. In any case, a decent firewall should protect your system from outsiders accessing it in the first place.

The issue of webcams being hacked is creepy at the first glance, and the implications are scary in a blood-curdling way. Think about the degree of intrusion into privacy that this can facilitate. Your credit card numbers, sensitive financial information can all be hacked; even visuals of places used to store the information can be obtained easily.

Hacking surveillance cameras in public places can yield gigantic amounts of images. One may argue that this might not be personally sensitive material, but what if the surveillance cameras within an organization are hacked? That can be a veritable Mecca of privileged information.

And in a world where terrorists are more clean-shaved tech jargon-speaking geeks than gun-branding wild-looking cavemen, the possibilities take on an entirely new level of threat. Horrible, but inevitable.

Make people aware. It is a clichéd line, but the principle still works best. Technology may be your best friend, but it is also your worst enemy. Looking over your shoulders constantly is not paranoia anymore, it is actually commendable caution. Like Mad eye Moody says, be in "CONSTANT VIGILANCE!!".

Of course, there are still people who tout the line "I don't have anything to hide, so I'm not concerned about privacy protection".

To them: know the laptop sitting in your 14 year old daughter's bedroom? A hacker who thinks it is worth the effort can hack into her webcam and watch her while she is changing. Nothing to hide, you say?

Green Crusade

2011-01-19T03:12:00.001-08:00

So, we Cybrosians are back again after a long dry spell..
No blog posts in 3 months!

Which company, a software provider at that, will fail to update its own blog, you might ask.. And our reply: only a busy one!

Now that we are breathing again, we knew it was time to reload our green crusade. We already have our Personal Manager software in place, and that helps us to cut down paper by tonnes, for sure.[If you have no clue on what we are talking about, go to http://www.cybrosys.com/personal_manager_software.aspx and download the free green software. That software alone can reduce your paper usage by a quarter]

But a single software alone will not suffice, except for quelling the guilt trips. So we thought long and thought hard of other ways we could adopt.

And that was when we came to the startling realization that even though there are tons we still have to do, there is a lot we have ALREADY DONE. Here is a list:

We have just a single printer. A single printer for the entire office! And we never print anything unless it is ABSOLUTELY necessary. On an average, a Cybrosian prints just one sheet every two month
We write and print on all sides of paper. There are some green enthusiasts among us who fold the paper as many times as they can and then write on every single side. Guess how we found out that no paper can be folded more than 7 times?
When we ‘jot down’ something or doodle while talking, we do it on the system. Never on paper. We have a stack of paper for anybody who needs it right in the office storage, but to get it, we have to get up from our cubicle and walk towards it, and who bothers for all that really?
NOTE: We are trying to encourage green-ness and NOT laziness here!
We use every tiny space on every tiny bit of paper we use before discarding it. If Ramanujan can write in red ink over paper strewn with blue ink and still be a great mathematician, we can certainly check out our codes and ideas on blank spaces in paper!
We do not use paper napkins in our office. Neither do we use paper décor for celebrations. We use stuff that we can re-use every single year to decorate. As for napkins, cloth hankies, FTW!

Ha!! Way to go, Cybrosians!! Pat, pat, pat in the back!!

Our advice: you cannot go completely without paper unless you burn the office down! But there are still heaps you could do to NOT use it so much.

There are some of you (not you, other evil people!) who do not care all that much for our earth and never was a Captain Planet fan, but hey! Bet they would not want THIS:

Get our point, non-green-believers??
Save trees AND get organized!
Cheers!!

GITEX-2010 the world's most dynamic and influential ICT exhibition

2010-10-18T20:33:00.000-07:00

GITEX-2010

Dubai...

The land of kohl-eyed beauties, deserts and folklores...

The land of lights, shopping malls and amazing constructions...

And the land of the most awaited event in UAE- GITEX, Dubai 2010.

Hosted by the makers of yet another techno synergy…

GITEX, the information technology expo in Dubai, takes off on Oct 17 2010.

5 selected companies under the Govt. of Kerala banner in GITEX in Dubai, Cybrosys Technologies Pvt. Ltd from the KINFRA IT Park of Calicut (Kerala) being one among them.

Cybrosys is on the go to provide high quality software at incredibly low prices, and has fully focused on promoting the GREEN IT campaign, which is why they come to GITEX with an extra baton in their hands: they plan to provide 1 crore worth Personal Manager software absolutely free at the Dubai expo!

A part of the Green IT initiative launched by Cybrosys, the Personal Manager software is aimed at minimizing paper usage and saving trees, and can manage and update all personal information from dental records to bank accounts…

And this means you don’t have to resort to laborious paper work anymore, which might mean you save a tree every time you use the software…

This software which costs $99 in the international market and Rs.3000 in the Indian market is given free of cost in the hope that somewhere, it might make our planet a little more greener.

With its record of providing ERPs at just $10,000 and a development team for just $10 per hour, Cybrosys has already revolutionized software development and is set to accelerate the campaign at Gitex.

What better platform is there to promote the importance of saving the planet than GITEX Dubai, the international electronics show and one of the most popular exhibitions in Dubai?

Visit the E6-2 stall at Hall-6, Gitex and get our personal manager CD absolutely free!! Hurry and keep following us at GITEX!!

Robo BABY

2010-04-21T00:15:00.000-07:00

Robo BABY

Cybrosys Technologies releasing soon their yet another patented software the "Robo baby". A teddy which will sing, dance and tell stories with action and emotions.

The robots will be like cartoon characters in appearance.

Read more details

Cybrosys business model diagram

2009-09-28T22:11:00.000-07:00

Cybrobis

2009-09-25T21:09:00.000-07:00

What is a Business Model?

A business model is nothing but a representation of how an organization makes money.
The old principles and models no longer work in the new economy. Today the main problem we face for a software product is its marketing. One of the main reasons for this is that the software products are costly. Another reason is that the marketing segment is not secure and satisfied with their job. Now cybrosys business model solves these problems and help to generate faster growth rate for a company.

Working...

In cybrosys model first the company has to create a good product. Then this product is given to a person who is called ‘end partner’. The specialty of ‘end partner’ is he can be a person or company or distributor or franchise or any one. This model gives fully rights of the product to the ‘end partner ‘. If he wants support from the company then he will have to pay for the support. The ‘end partner’ can sell his product or sell the entire product to another person if he fails to market it etc. Here the ‘end partner’ is free to take decisions. Then the product reaches to customers through end partners. Here the end partners can give support to customers, if they can provide support or other wise the customer can seek support from company and the customer will have to pay for it.

Advantages of CBM

A) Fast growth for company: - growth both in case of profit and branding
B) Easy marketing

Here the product given to the end partner should be cost effective, so that the end partner could not thing about that product at that rate. Thus making end partners is easy, as good product is available with full rights and cost effective rates. Thus, in this way, selling of a product can be made faster and profitable. Thus ultimately, the price of the product to customers is reliable or cost effective.

Statement 1:-Cybrosys model is better than other models.
Proof:

Let A be a company and let B be the end partner. Here there are two cases:-

A) A is selling the product in other business models
B) A is selling the product in cybrosys business model.

So let us take the first case:-

A) A is selling the product in other business models

Here suppose the product of A cost 100000 rupees and if A sells his product to B for rupees 120000.

Now let us look the normal problems faced by B in this case:-
1.1) High cost compared to production cost
1.2) Good software or not?.
1.3) Company reliability?.
1.4) Right product?. If it is not right product for B, then also B cannot sell the product.

Now let us look at the problems faced by A:-
2.1) Marketing (to get a client who could buy such costly product)

Now let us see second case:-
B) A is selling the product in cybrosys business model.

Here suppose the product of A cost 100000 rupees and according to this model A will sell the product with a cost less than the production cost. Let us suppose it as 50000 rupees, i.e. A will sell its product to B for rupees 50000.

Now let us look how the above problems of B are solved in this model:-
1.1) Less cost compared to production cost
1.2) Good software or not ? Generally B might have doubt about that product, it working etc. Here as price of product is less and as B cannot thing about that software at that rate, B will be ready to buy that software.
1.3) Company reliability ? Here A can produce the hard copy of the expenditure and make B believe about the reduction given to him.
1.4) If that product is not right for B’s purpose or if B fails in marketing the product etc B can sell that product to another person.

Now let us look how the problems of A are solved by this model:-
2.1) As the cost of the product is less and as the product is B’s product after buying, getting B (end partner) is easy. Thus the marketing cost is less.
2.2) And as A (Company) can get B (end partners) easily, company can make profit easily. Here if a product is given to B for rupees 50000, then if A gets four end partners (B’s), A’s profit is 100000.
2.3) And if B give this product to others (customers), branding of A will occur.

Thus cybrosys business model is better than other business models.