Hotspots in Paris

	Logan S Hotspot‎ 71, Avenue D Italie, 75013 Paris, France 01 00 00 00 00‎
	Hot Spot In A Box - Inventel‎ 35, Rue Tournefort, 75005 Paris, France 01 00 00 00 00‎
	Enet Hot Spot‎ 14, Rue Dombasle, 75015 Paris, France 01 00 00 00 00

Hotspot Design Graphique‎

22, Rue Hauteville, 75010 Paris, France

01 44 79 04 41

The city of Paris is putting in Wi-Fi at various locations across the city, including museums, libraries and parks around the city. Here you can find a full list of Wi-Fi hotspots.

First Hotspot in Paris in 2004.

Monitoring of several locations with remote surveillance center

The main problem that has to be solved in this case is transmission and recording of video data. The solutions used in modern installations divide the video surveillance system into smaller units with individual servers. Management functions can be executed by client station connecting with the servers. Additionally, setting access rights, Internet browser will allow to follow the video online, e.g. when motion detection has been triggered. The solution can be can be implemented with ACTi devices, as in the picture.

Real Time Operating System

Why RTOS (Real Time Operating System)? Operating system is the core of every digital recording device. It determines the overall quality and stability of the device. In industrial applications of computers, operating system decides on the sequence and way of performing the tasks. For RTOS it is important to take into consideration the time factor - positive result of operations depends not only on the sequence, but also on the time of completion.

The example is conversion and compression of analog video signals. Recording of the signals in digital form (with set parameters: resolution, frame rate, number of channels) is a priority and has to be performed in real time. Any delay will cause loss of video data (e.g. several video frames). Real-time algorithms enable the system to perform critical tasks in precisely defined periods of time. In practice - DVR will delay less important operations (e.g. playback of archives) to ensure proper recording of video even with the maximum quality requirements. DVRs that are not equipped with RTOS systems simply decrease recording parameters, e.g. frame rate, losing some information.

CeBIT 2008

New concept of CEBiT - a success? This year's CEBiT in Hanover - the world's largest trade fair for IT and telecommunications - took place between 4th and 9th of March.

There were about 5900 companies (by 5 percent less than last year). For the first time in the history of the fair, China had the largest representation, surpassing in numbers the previous leader, Taiwan.
Among the notable absentees were Sony, Sharp, Philips, Lenovo, Dell and Nokia.

After several years of decrease of the number of exhibitors, the organizers decided to increase the number of conferences - to attract professionals, and shorten the event by one day - to cut the costs of exhibitors. But probably the main focus was to define the objectives of the exhibition.

Unfortunately the organization efforts didn't seem to refresh the event. They couldn't eliminate the feeling of deficiency, a want for new technologies and for an impulse to stop the decrease of investments in European telecommunications.

During the trade fair we could see a steady factor in European industry - expansion of red tape. The organizers, using subsidizing, invite national exhibitors that, instead of products, are showing travel brochures, and grassroots movements - promoting projects like Green IT.

In this situation the most interesting trends seen at the fair were network and mobile solutions for television - as an extension of offers of telecommunication operators. The solutions are based on technologies that improve data transfers, especially those of mobile telephony. The example is LTE technology presented by Sony Ericsson and T-Mobile.

LTE (Long Term Evolution) is the newest transmission system for mobile applications, developed according to the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP). The specification accepted in January, 2008, adopts theoretical limit of 326 Mbps (practical speeds reach 100 Mbps).

Raptor - for wireless network

Raptor for outdoor operation as access point and wireless client, compliant with 802.11a standard (5 GHz band). It allows point-to-point or point-to-multipoint links. The device is managed by www interface, which permits easy configuration including setting up more advanced parameters. The main use for raptors is for city monitoring systems. The main problems there are caused by extensiveness of the systems - transmission of cameras' images to monitoring center and commands to the cameras (PTZ control).

IP CCTV installations have become the mainstream nowadays. At current stage of IP CCTV there is no problem. At current stage of IP CCTV there is no problem with transmitting data in central parts of cities, using common Internet infrastructure with adequate bandwidth. But the trouble begins when the system should cover some more isolated locations with limited connectivity.

Then the only feasible solution is doing individual wireless network, using WLAN technology.

Both for transmission of video stream and PTZ commands there can be used access points integrated with antennas, powered with use of PoE technology. There may be employed sector antennas, as well as the system itself can be divided into easily manageable sectors.

Practical potential of WLAN systems

• wireless access to local networks in homes, offices, businesses
  
• wireless access to public hot-spots at airports, stations, in coffee shops
  
• point-to-point links (bridging of LANs, telemetry, remote control, remote monitoring)
• delivery of Internet connectivity (in cities and in the country)
• redundancy for wired links (critical connectivity applications)

Wireless CCTV monitoring system

IP cameras win the market share battle due to simple installation and configuration. But the distance between buildings is often too large to use standard UTP/ FTP cable. An excellent solution to such a problem is wireless transmission based on Raptor family of devices. Schemes and more informations:

Raptor family of devices.

HD DVD - the end of competition

On February 19, 2008, Toshiba officially announced the discontinuation of HD DVD format. It means end of the "second technological war" for video recording standard. Before the latest campaign for blue-laser format - HD DVD vis a vis Blu-ray, there was the clash between videotape formats - VHS vis a vis Betamax.

Probably the final blow was dealt by Warner Bros - it was the information about decision of releasing its high-definition DVD titles exclusively in Blu-ray disc format - beginning since June this year. After that Wal-Mart Stores decided to withdraw HD DVD players. It did not help at all that Xbox 360 consoles equipped with HD DVD players sold well in the end of last year (ca 100,000 pieces). Toshiba informed about a million HD DVD players sold by January of 2008. There were released 386 HD DVD films in the U.S., and 214 in Japan.

Telecommunication in Israel

Telecommunications is one of the most important industries in this small country. Population of Israel: 7.7 million. Its technological level can be measured by the percentage of homes using broadband access to the Internet - ca. 70%, securing the fourth position in the world - after South Korea, Hong Kong and Iceland.

Mobile telephony is also included in the top rankings - already in 2006 there were more mobile phones than the number of inhabitants (7%). 97% of the residents can potentially use cable TV (52% of households subscribe it).

Israel belongs to the small group of countries having own satellites. The first satellite has been successfully launched on the orbit in 1996, and together with the second one - AMOS-2, is mainly used for direct TV transmissions.

Other satellites, Gurwin-II TechSAT and EROS, are used for communication, cartography, and other research purposes. Great potential of high-tech industries in Israel has attracted international corporations - IBM, Motorola, Cisco, or Deutsche Telekom were opened just in this country.
Among the companies listed on the NASDAQ stock market, Israeli firms are the second most numerous group, after Americans. They include Alvarion, Gilat Satellite Networks, Radware, RAD Data, Tadiran, Teledata, Telrad, VocalTec, Verint.

Photo report: http://www.dipolnet.com/telecommunications_in_israel_bib856.htm