What is cryptocurrency, how does it work and why do we use it?

What is cryptocurrency, how does it work and why do we use it?

Crypto = Using Digital Encryption
Currency = A System of Money

Cryptocurrency is an encrypted, decentralized digital currency used to verify transactions on a distributed system with open source software between peers.

The transfer of funds operates on the internet, independently of central banking and governments.

Transactions are added to a public ledger – also known as the blockchain via nodes on the network with consensus (agreement) achieved through a proof-of-work system referred to as mining.

Cryptocurrencies are a subset of alternative currencies or specifically, digital currencies..

How do cryptocurrencies work? 

Cryptocurrencies use decentralised technology to let users make secure payments and store money without the need to use their name or go through a bank. They run on a distributed public ledger called blockchain, which is a record of all transactions updated and held by currency holders.

Bitcoin

What is it?

A digital currency, used to make payments of any value without fees. It runs on the blockchain, a decentralised ledger kept running by “miners” whose powerful computers crunch transactions and are rewarded in bitcoins

Who invented it?

Satoshi Nakamoto, a secretive internet user, invented bitcoin in 2008 before it went online in 2009. Many attempts to identify Satoshi have been made without conclusive proof

What’s it for?

People see value in money free from government control and the fees banks charge; as well as the blockchain, to verify transactions. Bitcoin has been seen as a tool for private, anonymous transactions, and it’s the payment of choice for drug deals and other illegal purchases

Is it worth anything?

Yes. As of July 2017, there were around 16.5m bitcoins in circulation. In March 2017, the value of a Bitcoin, at $1,268, exceeded that of an ounce of gold ($1,233) for the first time.

What is Bitcoin Cash?

In August 2017, the blockchain forked to support another cryptocurrency, Bitcoin Cash, which is optimised slightly differently. People who held Bitcoin received an equal value of Bitcoin Cash following this ‘hard fork’.

Cryptocurrencies and applications of blockchain technology are still nascent in financial terms and more uses should be expected. Transactions including bonds, stocks and other financial assets could eventually be traded using the technology.  

What are the most common cryptocurrencies? 

• Bitcoin: Bitcoin was the first and is the most commonly traded cryptocurrency to date.  The currency was developed by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2009, a mysterious figure who developed its blockchain. It has a market capitalisation of around $45 billion as of July 2017. 
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• Ethereum: Developed in 2015, ethereum is the currency token used in the ethereum blockchain, the second most popular and valuable cryptocurrency. Ethereum has a market capitalisation of around $18bn as of July 2017. However, ethereum has had a turbulent journey. After a major hack in 2016 it split into two currencies, while its value has in recent months reached as high as $400 but crashed briefly to as low as 10 cents.
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• Ripple: Ripple is another distributed ledger system that was founded in 2012. Ripple can be used to track more kinds of transactions, not just of the cryptocurrency. It has been used by banks including Santander and UBS and has a market capitalisation of around $6.3 billion.
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• Litecoin: This currency is most similar in form to bitcoin, but has moved more quickly to develop new innovations, including faster payments and processes to allow many more transactions. The total value of all Litecoin is around $2.1 billion.

• Why would you use a cryptocurrency?

  Cryptocurrencies are known for being secure and providing a level of anonymity. Transactions in them cannot be faked or reversed and there tend to be low fees, making it more reliable than conventional currency. Their decentralised nature means they are available to everyone, where banks can be exclusive in who they will let open accounts. 
  As a new form of cash, the cryptocurrency markets have been known to take off meaning a small investment can become a large sum over night.
  But the same works the other way. People look to invest in cryptocurrencies should be aware of the volatility of the market and the risks they take when buying. 
  Because of the level of anonymity they offer, cryptocurrencies are often associated with illegal actvity, particularly on the dark web. Users should be careful about the connotations when choosing to buy the currencies.

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Determining the Best Link Building Strategy for Your Website

Determining the Best Link Building Strategy for Your Website

Promoting a website is as important as building it, but how to promote it is a very confusing task. There is no best strategy for promoting a website. Just like humans, each website is a different entity with a different set of treatment for every problem.

A large number of sites have shown that even after implementing great techniques, they failed to promote it to masses and a blunder on social media gave them the highest hit rate ever. So, from the best techniques to the greatest blunders, you never know the activity, which will generate maximum traffic for your website.

However, there is a slow and steady way to achieve a huge hit rate and public acceptance. This is called link building, which connects to a large number of users and portals to generate traffic for your website.

Here is a list of all the link-building techniques that you can use in order to gather a huge customer support for your website.

Blog Commenting

You can leave comments on successful blogs with a huge hit rate. These comments should be strictly on the topic. You can add your link at the end, but the major portion of the comment should be consistent with the blog.

Guest Posting

You can write a guest post on another website or blog and give a referral link to your blog at the end in the bio section. Make sure that you do not describe your company or product in the guest post. The guest post should be an informative article and you should stick to the topic of the blog. Make sure that others too write guest posts on your blog.

Strategic Content

When writing content or creating audio visual content make sure that the content can be pushed on other platforms like social media as well. The content should be easy to transform for all kinds of digital media.

Social Media Referrals

This is the biggest social media tool. The technique of referring your site on social media platforms is old. There is another step added to it, after posting about the site you have to either get it endorsed by a celebrity or by large masses. It gives your content a huge outreach, which is the basis of a great conversion rate.

Testimonials

One good tool to promote the site or blog is to write testimonials. It is also a two-way stream, you not only write testimonials, but you also have to be written about. If you are writing testimonials and people are not writing in return, it will not be a fruitful exercise.

A large number of blog writers and digital marketing experts feel that there is no best strategy to promote a website. Any one of the following strategies might work and give great results.

However, in case you are not getting huge response. You should focus on all the strategies until one of them gives you an exceptionally great result. You should never be prejudiced about a single technique.

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Guest Post By: Emma Ballet
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What is Search Engine Optimization? Search Engine Glossary for superior understanding about SEO

Search-Engine-Optimization (SEO)[/caption]

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What is Search Engine Optimization

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the exercise of growing the amount and superiority of traffic to website through organic search engine results. Search engine optimization is exactly how it sounds: optimizing your website’s content for search engines. That way Google (and other search engines) can easily index your content, categorize each of your pages based on the information they contain, and then serve those pages up to people who are looking for that information on the Internet.

How Search Engines Works

A search engine’s main process is threefold: crawling, indexing, and querying. Let’s define each.

• Crawling: A search engine runs a software program called a “spider” to discover content on the web.
• Indexing: The search engine analyzes the content it finds to determine what it’s about, then indexes it–or organizes the content–so that it’s quickly retrieved when the next step occurs.
• Querying: When you conduct a search online, the search engine fetches a list of results for you to consider. These search results appear on a SERP, or a Search Engine Results Page. As Google puts it, “…our algorithms look up your search terms in the index to find the appropriate pages.”

To recognize what SEO actually means, let's check below:

• Quality of traffic. You can attract all the visitors in the world, but if they're coming to your site because Google tells them you're a resource for WordPress Tips when really your website providing WordPress Tips information, that is not quality traffic. Instead you want to attract visitors who are genuinely interested in products that you offer by SERP.
• Quantity of traffic. Once you have the right people clicking through from those search engine results pages (SERPs), more traffic is superior.
• Organic results. Ads make up an important part of many SERPs. Organic traffic is any traffic that you don't have to pay for.

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In This post which is about Search Engine Glossary will help you enhanced understand some of the terms normally used in the SEO industry.

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• 404 Error Page

The web page that displays when a user tries to view a page that no longer exists or the page file name has changed.

• Bounce rate

The percentage of visitors to a particular website who navigate away from the site after viewing only one page

• Abandonment Rates

Percentage of site visitors who view a page and then exit without linking to other pages on the site.

• Alt tags

More correctly, these are ALT “attributes” (e.g. IMG is a “tag”). This is text coded in the HTML that associates words with web graphics.

• Back Links

The number of links pointing to a website, “link popularity”.

• Cache

Web content saved by the search engines in their indexes.

• Call-To-Action

A way to engage the website visitor that encourages them to interact with the company.

• Cloaking

At the same URL (web address) showing one page to a search engine spider and a different page to a human visitor. Frowned upon by search engines as deceptive, sites may be severely penalized by the engines if they use cloaking.

• Crawler-based search engines

Engines that use automated software to index the billions of files online.

• Conversion

When a website visitor takes a desired action, such as a sale or downloads a file.

• CTR (Click through Rate)

Percentage of users who click an online ad after viewing it.

• Directories

Websites that list other sites by category, e.g. Yahoo! Directory. Historically, directories typically listed entries on people or businesses, and their contact information; such directories are still in use today. A web directory includes entries about websites, including links to those websites, organized into categories and subcategories.

• Flash

Macromedia software that creates vector-based graphic animations with small file sizes for use online.

• Framed site

Using a specific type of HTML code that places “pages inside pages”. Has significant disadvantages and a few advantages.

• H1, H2, H3, H4, H5 tags

In HTML, the code used to define a page title or subhead.

• HTML Text

Text on a web page that is created using HTML (which can be indexed by the engines) as opposed to a graphic (which cannot).

• Hyperlinks

A link from one web page to another (links can also point to another location on the same page).

• Website Indexing 

Online content that the search engines can index. Some website contents are not indexing by(e.g. locked PDF files, text in a graphic, Robots.txt Blocking).

• JavaScript

A programming script used on websites.

• Keyword Stemming

Keyword stemming is a useful tool for web pages and search engine optimization. The process of keyword stemming involves taking a basic but popular keywords to a particular website and adding a prefix, suffix, or pluralization to make the keyword into a new word. Google searches not only for your search terms, but also for words that are similar to some or all of those terms, including plurals.

• Link Popularity

The number of links pointing to a website.Link popularity refers to the number of Backlinks (incoming links) that point to a given website. Link popularity is a term that refers to how many other links point towards a particular website. The term link popularity also has two different forms, Internal and External, which refer to the links coming from the websites own web pages and from other websites. Internal link popularity means the number of links to the website from web pages that belong to the particular website. External link popularity is the number of links from outside sources that lead back to the particular website. In the end, websites with high link popularity have what is called link superiority and have a reputation for being informative, as well as ranking highly on search engines. Link popularity is also an approach that many search engines take when deciding where to rank websites.

• Meta Description

HTML code that contains a descriptive sentence or two about the web page.The meta description is a ~160 character snippet, a tag in HTML, that summarizes a page's content. Search engines show the meta description in search results mostly when the searched for phrase is contained in the description. Optimizing the meta description is a very important aspect of on-page SEO.

• Natural Listings

That part of the search engine results that is not paid for, typically in the central area of the results page.

• Off-The-Page

Factors considered by the search engines when ranking a page that are not part of the web page, e.g. back links.

• On-The-Page

Factors considered by the search engines when ranking a page that are part of the web page, e.g. text content, title text, etc.

• Organic Listings

Organic search results are listings on search engine results pages that appear because of their relevance to the search terms, as opposed to their being advertisements. In contrast, non-organic search results may include pay per click advertising.

• Page Rank

Devised by Google, it measures not only how many links point to a website, but the “quality” of the sites providing the links.

• Page Views

The number of requests to view a specific web page in a specific time frame (the same person could make multiple requests).

• Paid Inclusion

Paying money to be listed in a search engine or online directory. Paid inclusion is a search engine marketing product where the search engine company charges fees related to inclusion of websites in their search index. The use of paid inclusion is controversial and paid inclusion's popularity has decreased over time among search engines.

• Paid Placement

Paying money to have an advertisement shown on a search engine results page. Paid placement is a program in which advertisers' listings are guaranteed to appear on a Results Page when particular Keywords are searched. The ranking of paid placement listings is determined by competitive bidding.

• Phrase Match

Performing a search with quotation marks around the phrase so that the search results will show web pages with the exact phrase.

• Pop-up Ads

A form of online advertising that opens a new web browser window to display advertisements.

• PPC “Pay per Click”

Paying a small amount each time a user clicks on an online ad.

• Redirect

A file on the server indicating that the requested page has permanently (301) or temporarily (302) been moved to another location.

• Robots.txt

A text file that instructs the search engines about pages or directories to exclude from its database.

• ROI “Return on Investment”

How much revenue is generated compared to how much was spent on a marketing campaign

• Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

The practice of marketing and advertising through the search engines.

• Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Designing a website so that it ranks highly in the search engines when someone searches for specific phrases related to the site.

• Search Engine Rankings

The position a site has on a search results page when a specific phrase is searched for.

• Search Engine Referrals

Visitors who arrive at a website after clicking a link on a search engine results page.

• Search Engine Results Page (SERP)

The page that displays in a search engine when a specific phrase is searched for.

• Search Term

The word or words entered by the user into the search engine.

• Similar Pages

Identifies sites that the search engines think are the same theme.

• Title Tag

In HTML, an area where text is placed that shows at the very top of the browser window. Search engines consider this area critical.

• Unique Visitors

The number of individuals who visit a website during a specific time (the same person visiting twice is only counted once).

• Web Spider

Software that browses the Web in an automated manner and keeps a copy of visited pages in its database. Also known also as a crawler.

• Webinar

Online seminar that may contain audio and video.

• Search Engine Saturation

The number of web pages that a search engine has indexed from your website.

• Search Engines

A system designed to make searching the web easier. The searcher types in a query and this results in a page is full of various relevant media types (text, imagery, video, etc.). Popular examples include Google, Bing and Yahoo.

• Algorithm

The procedures or formulas that establish computer programs. Examples = search engines use algorithms to find the right results for a search query. An image editing program would use an algorithm to process the image’s data.

• Bing

The search engine developed by Microsoft. It provides a basic web search, as well as a more focused search around categories such as images, shopping, news, maps, etc.

• PageRank

Google’s ranking software that determines how relevant a web page is based on a search query. It calculates both the number of incoming links and the quality of these links.

• SEO: Search Engine Optimization

The process of getting on the results page from a search query through free/organic means. This includes producing quality content and incorporating long-tail keywords in effective ways.

• Black Hat SEO

More aggressive methods of optimization that focus on taking advantage of the more technical side of searching rather than focusing on user behavior. This goes against what SEO is intended to do and can cause your site to be penalized. Examples = keyword stuffing, Hidden text, doorway pages. (Doorway pages are web pages that are created for spamming. This is for spamming the index of a search engine by inserting results for particular phrases with the purpose of sending visitors to a different page.)

• Keyword

A word or phrase which has been identified as the one that people would use when searching for that subject matter in the search query. There are ways to optimize keywords such as through SEO

• Keyword Stuffing

The method of filling a web page with numerous keywords in order to rank higher on a search results page. Doing this make the words appear unnatural since they aren’t necessarily appropriate in the phrase when overused. This is considered an ineffective SEO tactic and Google now punishes a website through lowering their ranking if the algorithm detects this practice.

• Long-Tail Keywords

Phrases, usually three to four words that are most pertinent to what is being sold. These are identified by analyzing what a searcher might type in their search query if they were looking for a specific product or service.

• Local Search

Using geographic areas as a factor in search engine results so that the product or service comes from a certain location in regards to the user.

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What is windows operating system and Types of Windows OS

What is windows operating system and Types of Windows OS

Windows is an operating system designed by Microsoft. The operating system is what permits you to use a computer. Windows comes preloaded on most new personal computers (PCs), which helps to make it the most popular operating system in the world. You can also install windows manually in your computer.

Windows makes it possible to complete all types of everyday tasks on your computer. For example, you can use Windows to browse the Internet, check your email, edit digital photos, listen to music, Create Project reports, play games, and do much more.

Windows is also used in many offices because it gives you access to productivity tools such as calendars, word processors, and spreadsheets.

Microsoft released the first version of Windows in the mid-1980s. There have been many versions of Windows since then, but the most recent ones include Windows 10 (released in 2015), Windows 8 (2012), Windows 7 (2009), Windows Vista (2007), and Windows XP (2001).

List of Windows Client OS with their Version Numbers

Operating System	Version Number
Windows 1.0	1.04
Windows 2.0	2.11
Windows 3.0	3
Windows NT 3.1	3.10.528
Windows for Workgroups 3.11	3.11
Windows NT Workstation 3.5	3.5.807
Windows NT Workstation 3.51	3.51.1057
Windows 95	4.0.950
Windows NT Workstation 4.0	4.0.1381
Windows 98	4.1.1998
Windows 98 Second Edition	4.1.2222
Windows Me	4.90.3000
Windows 2000 Professional	5.0.2195
Windows XP	5.1.2600
Windows Vista	6.0.6000
Windows 7	6.1.7600
Windows 8.1	6.3.9600
Windows 10	10.0.10240

Different Types of Windows Operating Systems

Computer users have differing requirements. While a distinctive business needs to manage network permissions and give many users concurrent access to shared resources, a home user may simply use his computer to check email and play an random games. Microsoft markets several versions of Windows to serve the needs of these markets. Each edition has a different price point and feature set from the others.

Home Computers

Home editions of Windows such as Windows 7 Starter and Windows 7 Home Premium or Windows 10 provide the basic functionality that personal computers require. These include the ability to run software, play games, access the Internet and view or manipulate media such as music, videos and images. To keep consumers' costs down, these editions of Windows do not include some of the advanced features that business users require.

Business Computers

Business computers often require features not needed on standard home machines. For example, Windows 7 Professional or ultimate editions includes a feature called "Windows XP Mode" for running legacy software. It also includes the ability to act as a host for the Remote Desktop application and has a self-encrypting file system to prevent data loss from theft. Windows 7 Enterprise features data encryption for removable storage devices. It also has the ability to run on a computer with no hard drive by booting from a virtual image hosted on a server.

Servers Computer

Business networks may have many users logged in to their computers concurrently during the working day. Each user needs to access resources such as databases, intranet websites, email, Sharing files and Internet gateways. In addition, each user has her own password and access permissions. The powerful computer needed to manage network access for a large user base is called a server. Because servers perform very different roles from standard business computers, they require different operating systems. The Windows Server product line is Microsoft's offering for servers.

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What is Cache Memory. Types and functions of cache memory?

What is Cache Memory. Types and functions of cache memory?

Cache Memory

The Cache Memory is the Memory which is very near to the central processing unit , all the Fresh Commands are Stored into the Cache Memory. The Cache Memory is committed for storing the input which is given by the user and which is essential for the CPU to Implement a Task. But the Capacity of the Cache Memory is too small in compare to Memory and Hard Disk.

Prominence of Cache memory

The cache memory lies in the path between the processor and the memory. The cache memory consequently, has lesser access time than memory and is faster than the main memory. A cache memory have an access time of 100ns, while the main memory may have an access time of 700ns.

The cache memory is very expensive and hence is limited in capacity. Earlier cache memories were available separately but the microprocessors contain the cache memory on the chip itself.

The need for the cache memory is due to the mismatch between the speeds of the main memory and the CPU. The CPU clock as discussed earlier is very fast, whereas the main memory access time is comparatively slower. Hence, no matter how fast the processor is, the processing speed depends more on the speed of the main memory (the strength of a chain is the strength of its weakest link). It is because of this reason that a cache memory having access time closer to the processor speed is introduced. 

The cache memory stores the program (or its part) currently being executed or which may be executed within a short period of time. The cache memory also stores temporary data that the CPU may frequently require for manipulation.

The cache memory works according to various algorithms, which decide what information it has to store. These algorithms work out the probability to decide which data would be most frequently needed. This probability is worked out on the basis of past observations.

It acts as a high speed buffer between CPU and main memory and is used to temporary store very active data and action during processing since the cache memory is faster than main memory, the processing speed is increased by making the data and instructions needed in current processing available in cache.

A computer can have different levels and sizes of cache depending on the CPU architecture. The most common levels of cache are L1 and L2 cache, where L1 is closest to the Cpu and hence its access time is much faster compared to L2 cache , the sizes of these caches can vary from 8Kb - 128kb or even 256Kb in modern systems.

Another mode of caching is Disk Caching

Disk caching works under the same principle as memory caching, but instead of using high-speed SRAM, a it uses conventional main memory. The most recently accessed data from the hard drive (as well as adjacent sectors) is saved in a memory buffer. When a program needs to access data from the disk, it first checks the disk cache to see if the data is there. Disk caching can dramatically improve the performance of software. Because accessing a byte of data in RAM can be thousands of times faster than accessing a byte on a hard disk.

The effectiveness of any cache is determined by its hit rate. The higher the hit rate the better the performance of cpu and the better the caching algorithm implemented.

Two most common algorithm for caching are

· Least Frequently Used (LFU): This cache algorithm uses a counter to keep track of how often an entry is accessed.

· Least Recently Used (LRU): This cache algorithm keeps recently used items near the top of cache.

Recall: A lower size cache with high hit ratio, is far better than a large size cache with poor hit ratio. 

A CPU cache is a cache used by the central processing unit (CPU) of a computer to reduce the average time to access data from the main memory. The cache is a smaller, faster memory which stores copies of the data from frequently used main memory locations. Most CPUs have different independent caches, including instruction and data caches, where the data cache is usually organized as a hierarchy of more cache levels (L1, L2, etc.). 

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