Knowledge Book.

Steve Jobs and Wozniak co-founded Apple in 1976 to sell Wozniak's Apple I personal computer. Together the duo gained fame and wealth a year later with the Apple II, one of the first highly successful mass-produced microcomputers. Jobs saw the commercial potential of the Xerox Alto in 1979, which was mouse-driven and had a graphical user interface (GUI). This led to the development of the unsuccessful Apple Lisa in 1983, followed by the breakthrough Macintosh in 1984, the first mass-produced computer with a GUI. The Macintosh introduced the desktop publishing industry in 1985 with the addition of the Apple LaserWriter, the first laser printer to feature vector graphics. Jobs was forced out of Apple in 1985 after a long power struggle with the company's board and its then-CEO John Sculley. That same year, Jobs took a few of Apple's members with him to found NeXT, a computer platform development company that specialized in computers for higher-education and business markets. In addition, he helped to develop the visual effects industry when he funded the computer graphics division of George Lucas's Lucasfilm in 1986. The new company was Pixar, which produced the first 3D computer animated feature film Toy Story (1995).

Apple acquired NeXT in 1997, and Jobs became CEO of his former company within a few months. He was largely responsible for helping revive Apple, which had been on the verge of bankruptcy. He worked closely with designer Jony Ive to develop a line of products that had larger cultural ramifications, beginning in 1997 with the "Think different" advertising campaign and leading to the iMac, iTunes, iTunes Store, Apple Store, iPod, iPhone, App Store, and the iPad. In 2001, the original Mac OS was replaced with a completely new Mac OS X, based on NeXT's NeXTSTEP platform, giving the OS a modern Unix-based foundation for the first time. Jobs was diagnosed with a pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor in 2003. He died of respiratory arrest related to the tumor at age 56 on October 5, 2011.

Pandit Jasraj (28 January 1930 – 17 August 2020) was an Indian classical vocalist, belonging to the Mewati gharana (musical apprenticeship lineage). His musical career spanned 75 years resulting in national and international fame, respect and numerous major awards and accolades. His legacy includes memorable performances of classical and semi-classical vocal music, classical and devotional music, albums and film soundtracks, innovations in various genres including Haveli Sangeeth and popularizing the Mewati Gharana - a school of thought in Hindustani classical music. Pandit Jasraj taught music to amateur and professional students in India, Europe, Canada and the United States. Some of his disciples, such as vocalist Tripti Mukherjee, violinist Kala Ramnath, vocalist Sanjeev Abhyankar and vocalist Ramesh Narayan, are highly successful and accomplished musicians in their own right.

What does Brexit mean?

It is a word that has become as a shorthand way of saying the UK leaving the European Union (EU) – merging the words Britain and exit to get Brexit.

What is happening ?

A referendum is being held on Thursday, 23 June, to decide whether Britain should leave or remain in the European Union.

What is the European Union ?

The European Union – often known as the EU – is an economic and political partnership involving 28 European countries. It began after World War Two to foster economic co-operation, with the idea that countries which trade together are more likely to avoid going to war with each other.

It has since grown to become a “single market” allowing goods and people to move around, basically as if the member states were one country. It has its own currency, the euro, which is used by 19 of the member countries, its own parliament and it now sets rules in a wide range of areas – including on the environment, transport, consumer rights and even things like mobile phone charges.

With GDP of more than $18,000 bn and a population of more than 500 m, it is the biggest economy in the world. Member states remain the most powerful actors within the EU — with Angela Merkel, German chancellor, the bloc’s most powerful leader.

Arvid Hallén

Arvid Hallén (born 3 July 1950) is a Norwegian sociologist and the Director-General of the Research Council of Norway (since 2004).

He holds a mag.art. (PhD) degree in sociology from the University of Oslo. He served as Director of the Norwegian Institute for Urban and Regional Research from 1986 to 1995, and was employed at the institute as a researcher since 1978. He became Director for Humanities and Social Sciences in the Research Council of Norway in 1995, and Director-General in 2004.

He is a member the Norwegian Academy of Technological Sciences.

Sir Gilbert Walker

Sir Gilbert Thomas Walker, CSI, FRS (14 June 1868 – 4 November 1958) was a British physicist and statistician of the 20th century. He is best known for his groundbreaking description of the Southern Oscillation, a major phenomenon of global climate, and for greatly advancing the study of climate in general.

Walker was an established applied mathematician at the University of Cambridge when he become director-general of observatories in India in 1904. While there, he studied the characteristics of the Indian Ocean monsoon, the failure of whose rains had brought severe famine to the country in 1899. Analyzing vast amounts of weather data from India and lands beyond, over the next fifteen years he published the first descriptions of the great seesaw oscillation of atmospheric pressure between the Indian and Pacific Ocean, and its correlation to temperature and rainfall patterns across much of the Earth's tropical regions, including India. He is also worked with the Indian Meteorological Department especially in linking the moonsoon with Southern Oscillation phenomenon. He was made a Companion of the Order of the Star of India in 1911.

Walker continued his studies of yearly weather and climate change after his retirement from India (in 1924) and acceptance of a professorship in meteorology at Imperial College London. He had only mixed success in his original goal, the prediction of monsoonal failures; however, his theories and broad body of supporting research represented an invaluable step forward, allowing his successors in climate study to move beyond local observation and forecasting toward comprehensive models of climate worldwide. He served as president of the Royal Meteorological Society from 1926 to 1927.

He died at Coulsdon, Surrey on 4 November 1958. He was 90 years old.

Shailesh Nayak- Interim Chairman of ISRO - Indian Space Research Organisation...

Dr. Shailesh Nayak is an Indian Scientist and present secretary of Ministry of Earth Sciences, Indian government since August, 2008. He is also the Chairman of Earth Commission in India. He was appointed as the interim Chairman of ISRO on 31 December 2014.

He has also served as Director, Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, INCOIS, Hyderabad, India, an autonomous institution under ESSO (May 2006 to July 2008). At ESSO-INCOIS, he set up a state-of-the-art Early Warning System for Tsunami and Storm Surges in the Indian Ocean. He was responsible for the conceptualization and development of Marine GIS. He made outstanding contributions in improving advisory services related to potential fishing zones, ocean state forecast, and Indian Argo project.

He has been providing leadership for the programs related to science of climate change, weather services, polar science, ocean science and modeling, ocean survey, resources, and technology. He chaired an expert group and conceptualized to establish National GIS in the country.

The AirAsia jet carrying 162 passengers that disappeared over 24 hours ago is suspected to be on the bottom of the ocean floor, Indonesia's top rescue officials said at a press conference Monday.

"Based on the coordinates that we know, the evaluation would be that any estimated crash position is in the sea, and that the hypothesis is the plane is at the bottom of the sea," National Search and Rescue chief Henry Bambang Soelistyo told a news conference, according to the Associated Press.

First Admiral Sigit Setiayana, the Naval Aviation Center commander at the Surabaya air force base, told the Associated Press that 12 navy ships, five planes, three helicopters and a number of warships were talking part, along with ships and planes from Singapore and Malaysia. The Australian Air Force also sent a search plane.

Setiayana said visibility was good. "God willing, we can find it soon," he told The Associated Press.

Malaysia and Singapore each planned to deploy one C-130 plane and three ships. Australia will also help, he added.

William Waldock, an expert on air crash search and rescue with Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Arizona, cautioned against drawing comparisons to Flight 370.

The circumstances bode well for finding Flight 8501 since the intended flight time was less than two hours, and there is a known position where the plane disappeared, he told the Associated Press.

A groom-to-be, his parents and three brothers are believed to be among those aboard an Air Asia jet carrying 162 people that vanished over the Java Sea early Sunday amid stormy weather.

The fiancé of Alain Oktavianus Siaun told reporters that she was trying to stay positive after hearing the news that AirAsia Flight 8501 had disappeared en route to Singapore, the Star in Malaysia reported Sunday.

“I heard it on the radio and immediately browsed the Internet and saw the news,” Louise Sidharta said, according to told the newspaper. “My heart knew by then that my fiancé was on that flight.”

Siaun was heading to Singapore to vacation with his family for the last time as a bachelor. Sidharta took a later flight from Surabaya to Singapore. She spoke to a horde of reporters at the Singapore Changi International Airport.

“We have to stay positive and hope that they (loved ones) could be found soon,” she said.

AirAsia said there are 155 passengers on board—138 adults, 16, children and one infant. Also on board are two pilots and five crew members.

The Associated Press said dozens of relatives of people aboard the plane gathered in a room at the Surabaya airport to await word about their loved ones.

Sky News said a British businessman and his two-year-old daughter are believed to be on the flight. Most on board are from Indonesia, with three from South Korea and one each from Singapore, Malaysia, France and the United Kingdom.

Indonesia and Singapore have launched a search and rescue operation after the flight was reported missing.

Flight 8501 was scheduled to make a relatively short early-morning flight from Surabaya, Indonesia to Singapore, but lost contact with Jakarta air traffic control at 6:24 a.m. local time (6:24 p.m. Eastern Time Saturday), approximately an hour before it was due to land.

Eleven minutes earlier, according to Djoko Murjatmodjo, Indonesia's acting director general of transportation, the pilot had "asked to hinder cloud by turning left and go higher to 34,000 feet." Murjatmodjo said that there was no distress signal from the plane. AirAsia Indonesia had earlier confirmed that the pilot had asked to change course due to bad weather in the area.

"We hope we can find the location of the plane as soon as possible, and we hope that God will give us guidance to find it," Murjatmodjo told reporters. "We don't dare to presume what has happened except that it has lost contact.”

Flight 8501 was last seen on radar at 6:16 a.m., and a minute later was no longer there, he added.

"This is my worst nightmare," AirAsia founder Tony Fernandes said in a tweet. Earlier, Fernandes, the face of the company and an active Twitter user, sent out a tweet that said: "Thank you for all your thoughts and prays[sic]. We must stay strong."

Sunardi, a weather forecaster at the Indonesia's Meteorology and Geophysics Agency who uses only one name, told the Associated Press that dense storm clouds were detected up to 44,000 feet in the same area at the time the plane was reported to have lost contact.

"There could have been turbulence, lightning and vertical as well as horizontal strong winds within such clouds," he said.

AirAsia said the single-aisle Airbus A320-200 had an Indonesian captain and a French co-pilot. The airline's statement added that the plane's captain had a total of 6,100 flying hours, while the first officer had flown 2,275 hours.

Flightradar24, a flight tracking website, said the plane was delivered in September 2008, which would make it six years old. It said the plane was flying at 32,000 feet, the regular cruising altitude for most jetliners, when the signal from the plane was lost. AirAsia said that the plane had undergone its last scheduled maintenance on Nov. 16.

Murjatmodjo, the Indonesian official, said the plane is believed to have vanished somewhere over the Java Sea between Tanjung Pandan on Belitung island and Pontianak, on Indonesia's part of Kalimantan island.

Transport Minister Ignasius Jonan told reporters in Surabaya that the position was believed to be near the coast line. He said search and rescue efforts now involved the Indonesian army, the national Search and Rescue Agency as well as Singapore and Malaysia. The Search and Rescue Agency's operation chief, Maj. Gen. Tatang Zaenudin, said 200 rescuers had been deployed to the east side of Belitung island.

Air Force spokesman Hadi Tjahjanto said three aircraft, including a surveillance plane, had been dispatched to the area. The Singapore air force and the navy also were searching with two C-130 planes.

The Singapore aviation authority said it was informed about the missing plane by Jakarta ground control about half an hour after the contact was lost.

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, expressed solidarity with AirAsia. In a tweet he said: "Very sad to hear that AirAsia Indonesia QZ8501 is missing. My thoughts are with the families. Malaysia stands ready to help."

White House spokesman Eric Schultz said in a statement that President Obama had briefed about the missing flight and officials would continue to monitor the situation.

According to the website FlightAware.com, Flight QZ8501 was scheduled to depart from Juanda International Airport, near Surabaya on the Indonesian island of East Java at 5:30 a.m. local time, with arrival in Singapore scheduled for 8:20 a.m. Singapore time (7:20 p.m. Eastern Time Saturday). It had last flown the route on Dec. 26.

The Airbus A320 is a workhorse of modern aviation. Similar to the Boeing 737, it is used to connect cities anywhere from one to five hours apart. There are currently 3,606 A320s in operation worldwide, according to Airbus. The A320 family of jets, which includes A319 and A321, has a very good safety record, with just 0.14 fatal accidents per million takeoffs, according to a safety study published by Boeing in August.

AirAsia, which has a presence in several Southeast Asian countries, has never lost a plane before. AirAsia Malaysia owns 49 percent of the Indonesian subsidiary. The airline typically flies short routes of just a few hours, connecting large cities of Southeast Asia. However, recently it has tried to expand into long-distance flying through its sister airline AirAsia X.

Earlier this year, national carrier Malaysia Airlines lost two planes. Flight MH370 vanished on March 8 with 239 passengers and crew on board. On July 17, Flight MH17 was shot down over Ukraine, killing all 298 people on board.

William Waldock, an expert on air crash search and rescue with Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Arizona, cautioned against drawing comparisons to the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.

"I think we have to let this play out," he said. "Hopefully, the airplane will get found, and if that happens, it will probably be in the next few hours. Until then, we have to reserve judgment."

The circumstances bode well for finding the plane since the intended flight time was less than two hours and there is a known position at which the plane disappeared, he said.

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2014: The year of Prime Minister Narendra Modi Prime Minister Narendra Modi was the top news and newsmaker in 2014. He led BJP to a historic election victory and formed a stable government at the Centre.

Year 2015 for Prime Minister NARENDRA MODI......

There is little doubt that one man dominated 2014 in India: Narendra Modi. But can he dominate 2015 as well? On recent form, we can’t be sure.
Let us first list his achievements so far. After a spectacular victory in May 2014, the Prime minister has been winning election after election for his party – the most recent one being Jharkhand - and has also restored the primacy of the PMO in policy matters. He is not just primus inter pares, but numero uno in all things that matter in this government. He has made waves in foreign policy, which is probably his most successful side so far. He has also made good changes in defence and railway leadership, with the induction of Manohar Parikkar and Suresh Prabhu as cabinet ministers.
Otherwise, the promise of his government exceeds performance by a wide margin. Modi has, for example, announced some bold policy initiatives (Make in India, Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, et al), and pushed through some modest legislation through parliament (the judges appointments bill, some minor labour law changes, and the small factories bill). Regulations (environment, etc) that can be changed by executive fiat are, however, being changed quickly, and their impact will be considerable in the years to come.
However, operative words in the previous paragraph are “announced” and “modest”. His announcements speak of high vision, but the actual achievements – especially in terms of path-breaking legislation – have been small and far between.
There are several reasons for this. First, there was the election cycle. Modi has had practically no respite from state assembly elections from the time he was elected Prime Minister in May. They will continue all the way to February 2015 with the Delhi polls. Second, Modi seems to prefer incrementalism to big-bang changes of the 1991 type. And third, just when he was getting ready to push through some new laws (on insurance, GST, etc), elements of the Sangh parivar have been acting up, shifting the focus of the media to extraneous issues like conversions and Godse. This has given a handle to his wounded opponents to strike back and block his moves.
This is why 2015 will be a make-or-break year for Narendra Modi. If the negative tides of December 2014 continue into 2015, Modi will have a tough time delivering what he promised the electorate.

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant,(Arabic: الدولة الاسلامية في العراق والشام) is also translated as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria or ash-Sham referring to Greater Syria (ISIS /ˈaɪsɪs/),) ad-Dawlah al-Islāmīyah fīl-ʻIrāq wa ash-Shām) The group is also known by the Arabic acronym Daʿish or DAESH (Arabic: داعش Dāʻish). Since June 2014 it calls itself the Islamic State (IS), a name widely rejected by non-members. ISIL is a Sunni extremist, jihadist terrorist rebel group based in Iraq and Syria, where it controls territory. It also operates in eastern Libya, the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt, and other areas of the Middle East, North Africa, South Asia, and Southeast Asia.

The United Nations has held ISIL responsible for human rights abuses and war crimes, and Amnesty International has reported ethnic cleansing by the group on a "historic scale". The group has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United Nations, the European Union, the United Kingdom, the United States, Australia, Indonesia, Canada, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, India, the UAE, and Egypt. Over 60 countries are directly or indirectly waging war against ISIL.

The group originated as Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad in 1999, which was renamed Tanzim Qaidat al-Jihad fi Bilad al-Rafidayn—commonly known as al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI)—when the group pledged allegiance to al-Qaeda in 2004. Following the 2003 invasion of Iraq, AQI took part in the Iraqi insurgency. In 2006, it joined other Sunni insurgent groups to form the Mujahideen Shura Council, which shortly afterwards proclaimed the formation of an Islamic state, naming it the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI). The ISI gained a significant presence in Al Anbar, Nineveh, Kirkuk and other areas, but around 2008, its violent methods, including su***de attacks on civilian targets and the widespread killing of prisoners, led to a backlash from Sunni Iraqis and other insurgent groups.

Indonesia: Plane Search Efforts Face Visibility Issues Dec. 29 -- Indonesian Vice President Jusuf Kalla talks about the search for the missing AirAsia jetliner that that disappeared en route from Indonesia to Singapore yesterday.