5 Must-have Apps for Samsung Galaxy S5 for power users

It has been about 3 months since I starting using Samsung Galaxy S5. Here are my top 5 picks for Samsung Galaxy S5

1.Google Keep
This is similar to Notes but because it is Google, you can have access to your notes from your desktop browser as it is synced with the Google Account. You can use Google Keep app for all kinds of stuff, storing memos, lists, recipes, random articles, URLs to news articles etc. You can color code your notes to differentiate memos from recipes. What I really like is the list feature which automatically strikes off an item when I click on the check-box. That makes grocery shopping super easy. It also has a search feature within the notes which makes it easy for you to search among thousands of notes.  

2. Push Bullet
I absolutely love the Push Bullet app. I frequently use multiple devices, my desktop at home, my work computer and the phone. If I am reading an interesting article on my desktop or find a recipe for example, and I want to save it on my phone, the only ways to do that is email it to yourself or type the link on your phone. With Push bullet, you can install an extension in your browser and by the click of a button it sends the article that you are reading to your phone or any other device. The same applies to your phone, if you are reading an article on your phone you can push it to any other device. It isnt limited to just articles, you can push photos, videos, notes etc. You can also push it to your family's devices. So I frequently share articles using push bullet with my family as well.

3. CamScanner
I frequently have to scan documents. But its a tedious process on the scanner. So the CamScanner app allows you to take a picture and then converts it to a scanned document. Best part is even if the picture is a little distorted or angled incorrectly or the lighting is not right, the app adjusts everything and makes it look like an actual scan.

4. Beep'nGo
This is a Samsung native App, so download it from the Samsung Apps store. Love this app because it has all the offers in one place, no need to search for coupons! Beep'nGo app has offers on apparels, dining, grocery and automobiles. Plus, you can also scan your own coupons with the bar codes and you never have to carry them again. You can also scan your gift cards along with their bar codes so you can use the gift cards from your phone and never have to carry them in your wallet!

5. NightCamera
Honestly, Samsung Galaxy S5 has a great camera but it does not take good pictures at night. If you are a party animal who loves to take pictures in the dark or at night, you are better off with the IPhone. IPhone has way better picture quality at night than the Samsung Galaxy S5. So I have installed the NightCamera app which takes a good night picture. The only thing annoying about this app is the advertisement, but hey, if that's what keeps it free, then I am ok with it. ;)

Business Case Development Template and Guidelines

Before we get into the details of business case development, it is important to understand what is a business case, why do we prepare business cases, and how much time should we be spending on developing a business case.

What is a Business Case?

A business case serves as the center piece in integrating IT governance, portfolio management processes, and financial management processes. Business cases are an important document in helping leadership and management understand the business value of an investment or business opportunity. A business case is part sales and part marketing. But it is the “business” units’ opportunity to present an overwhelming and compelling justification for funding an investment to achieve organization or business unit mission, goals, and objectives.

An effective business case is a multi-purpose document that generates the support, participation and leadership commitment required to transform an idea into reality. A business case identifies an idea, problem, or opportunity. It provides context and content around the problem and equally illustrates the desired objectives and outcomes. The problem and desired outcomes are normally defined and described in terms of the business. The business case describes how and who will be affected. The how and who typically evolve around individual or organization behavioral changes; also know as change management. Change management also involves the people and process changes that would be required. The business case will breakout specific alternatives that were examined, their associated impacts, risks, costs, and benefits. Alternatives focus more towards a technical component contributing to the overall business solution.

Business case development is a collaborative effort:

·         It is business driven, lead by the business or program area that is making the proposal,

·         Information technology representative(s) form the Office of Information Services,

·         Change management representative(s) from the Office of Information Services, Business Process Engineering Unit,

·         Financial analyst representative(s) from Finance Policy and Analysis,

·         Any (all) stakeholders who will be impacted by the proposal, and to ensure approval and ongoing support

·         And a benefits sponsor.

Why Prepare a Business Case?

The simple answer to the question of “why?” would be:  1. it makes sense, 2. it is the right thing to do, and 3. business cases are recognized and accepted as a best practice.

Those three reasons either alone or together may not appear to be compelling enough. Below are more concrete requirements as to “why” we prepare business cases, founded upon statute and policy.

Governor’s Priorities and Initiatives:  In response to the current budget crisis and in support of the Governor’s priorities to “Restore Confidence and Accountability in Government” and “Make Government Live within its Means,” the Governor’s initiative on Regulatory Streamlining, and the activities of the Governor’s Advisory Committee on Government and Performance and Accountability, the Department of Administrative Services (DAS) and state agencies must do what we can to appropriately control information technology (IT) spending and stretch limited IT dollars.

Business cases are fundamental in identifying accountable business or benefit owner(s), high level business performance metrics, and the associated investment cost model.

How much time to spend on developing a business case?

General Rule of thumb: Business case time = approximately 5-10% of anticipated implementation project time. An anticipated:

• 25 day project to implement the business opportunity = 2 days to put together a complete but straightforward and simple business case
• 3 month project to implement the business opportunity = 9 days to put together an appropriately detailed business case
• 1 year project to implement the business opportunity = 1 – 1.5 months to put together a detailed business case
• 3 year project to implement the business opportunity = 3 months to put together a comprehensive business case

The Business case template is scalable to the nature and impact of the proposal.  The number of pages of a business case varies based on the subject matter of the case. It may be a brief 2-4 page document or an extensive evaluation consisting of 20 to100 pages. However, the length of the business case should be kept to a minimum, ensuring it stays on topic, presents relevant information in a clear and concise manner, and is focused on supporting management in making decisions. The time and effort spent on a business case should be in proportion to the scope of the problem.The definitive answer for the amount of time allocated to develop a business case is:  It takes as long as it takes. It is a function of time, commitment, understanding, and resources.

Business Case Template

At a minimum, the business case shall include the following sections:

• Executive Summary
• Introduction & Background
• Problem Definition & Desired Business Goal(s) and Objectives
• Alternatives
• Assumptions
• Benefits Estimates, and Benefit Metrics
• Cost Estimates
• Risk Assessment
• Financial Analysis
•  Recommendation
• Implementation Approach/Timeline
• Appendices

Project Management Process Groups & Knowledge Areas for PMP Certification

One of the basic concepts of PMBOK are the Project Management Process Groups and Project Management Knowledge Areas. For the PMP Certification exam, you need to know each of the process groups and knowledge areas and the mapping between the Project Management process groups and knowledge areas. So let's begin.

There are five Project Management process groups - Initiation, Planning, Execution, Monitoring and Control and Closing.

There are nine Project Management Knowledge Areas

1. Integration Management
2. Scope Management
3. Time Management
4. Cost Management
5. Quality Management
6. Human Resource Management
7. Communications Management
8. Risk Management
9. Procurement Management

For the PMP Certification exam, you will need to know the each of the tasks under the individual process groups as well as which of these tasks map to which Project Management Knowledge area. Note that Integration Management is the only knowledge area which has tasks in all the process groups. Hence it is the most important chapter in PMBOK as well as the PMP certification exam. 

W3schools PHP Quiz Questions and Answers

PHP QUIZ

1. What does PHP stand for?

You answered:

PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor

 Correct Answer!

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2. PHP server scripts are surrounded by delimiters, which?

You answered:

<?php…?>

 Correct Answer!

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3. How do you write "Hello World" in PHP

You answered:

echo "Hello World";

 Correct Answer!

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4. All variables in PHP start with which symbol?

You answered:

$

 Correct Answer!

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5. What is the correct way to end a PHP statement?

You answered:

;

 Correct Answer!

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6. The PHP syntax is most similar to:

You answered:

Perl and C

 Correct Answer!

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7. How do you get information from a form that is submitted using the "get" method?

You answered:

$_GET[];

 Correct Answer!

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8. When using the POST method, variables are displayed in the URL:

You answered:

False

 Correct Answer!

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9. In PHP you can use both single quotes ( ' ' ) and double quotes ( " " ) for strings:

You answered:

True

 Correct Answer!

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10. Include files must have the file extension ".inc"

You answered:

False

 Correct Answer!

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11. What is the correct way to include the file "time.inc" ?

You answered:

<?php include "time.inc"; ?>

 Correct Answer!

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12. What is the correct way to create a function in PHP?

You answered:

function myFunction()

 Correct Answer!

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13. What is the correct way to open the file "time.txt" as readable?

You answered:

fopen("time.txt","r");

 Correct Answer!

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14. PHP allows you to send emails directly from a script

You answered:

True

 Correct Answer!

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15. What is the correct way to connect to a MySQL database?

You answered:

mysqli_connect(host,username,password,dbname);

 Correct Answer!

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16. What is the correct way to add 1 to the $count variable?

You answered:

$count++;

 Correct Answer!

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17. What is a correct way to add a comment in PHP?

You answered:

/*…*/

 Correct Answer!

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18. PHP can be run on Microsoft Windows IIS(Internet Information Server):

You answered:

True

 Correct Answer!

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19. In PHP, the die() and exit() functions do the exact same thing.

You answered:

True

 Correct Answer!

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20. Which one of these variables has an illegal name?

You answered:

$my-Var

 Correct Answer!

W3Schools SQL Test Questions and Answers

SQL QUIZ

1. What does SQL stand for?

You answered:

Structured Query Language

 Correct Answer!

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2. Which SQL statement is used to extract data from a database?

You answered:

SELECT

 Correct Answer!

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3. Which SQL statement is used to update data in a database?

You answered:

UPDATE

 Correct Answer!

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4. Which SQL statement is used to delete data from a database?

You answered:

DELETE

 Correct Answer!

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5. Which SQL statement is used to insert new data in a database?

You answered:

INSERT INTO

 Correct Answer!

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6. With SQL, how do you select a column named "FirstName" from a table named "Persons"?

You answered:

SELECT FirstName FROM Persons

 Correct Answer!

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7. With SQL, how do you select all the columns from a table named "Persons"?

You answered:

SELECT * FROM Persons

 Correct Answer!

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8. With SQL, how do you select all the records from a table named "Persons" where the value of the column "FirstName" is "Peter"?

You answered:

SELECT * FROM Persons WHERE FirstName='Peter'

 Correct Answer!

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9. With SQL, how do you select all the records from a table named "Persons" where the value of the column "FirstName" starts with an "a"?

You answered:

SELECT * FROM Persons WHERE FirstName LIKE 'a%'

 Correct Answer!

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10. The OR operator displays a record if ANY conditions listed are true. The AND operator displays a record if ALL of the conditions listed are true

You answered:

True

 Correct Answer!

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11. With SQL, how do you select all the records from a table named "Persons" where the "FirstName" is "Peter" and the "LastName" is "Jackson"?

You answered:

SELECT * FROM Persons WHERE FirstName='Peter' AND LastName='Jackson'

 Correct Answer!

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12. With SQL, how do you select all the records from a table named "Persons" where the "LastName" is alphabetically between (and including) "Hansen" and "Pettersen"?

You answered:

SELECT * FROM Persons WHERE LastName BETWEEN 'Hansen' AND 'Pettersen'

 Correct Answer!

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13. Which SQL statement is used to return only different values?

You answered:

SELECT DISTINCT

 Correct Answer!

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14. Which SQL keyword is used to sort the result-set?

You answered:

ORDER BY

 Correct Answer!

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15. With SQL, how can you return all the records from a table named "Persons" sorted descending by "FirstName"?

You answered:

SELECT * FROM Persons ORDER BY FirstName DESC

 Correct Answer!

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16. With SQL, how can you insert a new record into the "Persons" table?

You answered:

INSERT INTO Persons VALUES ('Jimmy', 'Jackson')

 Correct Answer!

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17. With SQL, how can you insert "Olsen" as the "LastName" in the "Persons" table?

You answered:

INSERT INTO Persons (LastName) VALUES ('Olsen')

 Correct Answer!

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18. How can you change "Hansen" into "Nilsen" in the "LastName" column in the Persons table?

You answered:

UPDATE Persons SET LastName='Nilsen' WHERE LastName='Hansen'

 Correct Answer!

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19. With SQL, how can you delete the records where the "FirstName" is "Peter" in the Persons Table?

You answered:

DELETE FROM Persons WHERE FirstName = 'Peter'

 Correct Answer!

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20. With SQL, how can you return the number of records in the "Persons" table?

You answered:

SELECT COUNT(*) FROM Persons

 Correct Answer!

What is the Salience Model in Project Management?

What is the Salience Model?

Every project has many stakeholders. Each project stakeholder has varying expectations. Stakeholder prioritization can be a nightmare. Managing the communication needs of the various project stakeholders is a tricky. Let’s see how the Salience Model helps put project stakeholders into perspective.

    Introduction

    The Salience Model for project stakeholders was developed by Mitchell, Agle, and Wood to help managers identify and analyze project stakeholder needs. Unlike, the Power/Interest or Power/Influence grids, the Salience Model uses three parameters to categorize stakeholders: Power, Legitimacy and Urgency. Each parameter is defined as follows:
        Power: Is the ability project stakeholders has to influence the outcome of an organization, deliverables, or a project
        Legitimacy: Is the authority, level of involvement project stakeholders have on a project.
        Urgency: Is the time expected by project stakeholders for responses to their expectations.

    This three-dimensional view of project stakeholders needs and expectations from a project can help managers narrow down the critical stakeholders for stakeholder management.
 
    The Salience Model Diagram

    The Salience Model for project stakeholders is graphically depicted as a Venn diagram. Each assessment parameter has a major circle and the intersections of each major circle helps you identify project stakeholders that have multiple needs.




Mitchell, Agle, and Wood related each area within the Venn diagram to a specific type of stakeholder. Mentioned below is a description of each type of project stakeholder as per the Salience Model:

A) Core/Definitive: These are the critical project stakeholders. As a Project Manager, you need to provide focused attention to these stakeholders.

B) Dominant: Such project stakeholders have power and legitimacy, but do not have urgency. You should focus on their expectations, but always there is not a lot of urgency.

C) Dependent: As per the Salience Model, these project stakeholders have no real power on the project. However, they need to be managed because they can quite easily choose to align themselves with other project stakeholders and hence influence your project.

D) Dangerous: Appropriately named classification, these stakeholders have power and urgency, but no legitimacy. Imagine a very senior person trying to force her views on the outcome of your project, without really being a part of it! A Project Manager needs to keep such stakeholders appropriately engaged or satisfied.

E) Latent/Dormant: Possibly the best category project stakeholders. These stakeholders only get into the project, if there is something has gone horribly wrong with it. Over-communication of micro-level details with them is also not a great thing to do.

F) Demanding: Such stakeholders in the Salience Model are people that always seem to think that their work needs your immediate attention. If you spend too much time and effort on these stakeholders, you won’t actually gain to much project mileage. There are other more important people to work with.

G) Discretionary: Another wonderful classification of project stakeholders. Give them regular status updates and they’ll be happy.

H) Non-stakeholders: These people are not stakeholders in the project. Investing time and effort on such people will not help you shape the outcome of your project in any manner.

Samsung Galaxy S5 - diamond plated with retina scan?

Looking to buy a new phone and going through the specs of what's available (Moto X, Nexus 5, LG G2, and Iphone 5s ofcourse) and what's to come (Samsung Galaxy S5). Being a Samsung afficionado for 4 years, I am super excited to read that Samsung may be launching the Samsung Galaxy S5 in March 2014. So I have decided to put my phone shopping on hold till March 2014. Here's what the rumour grapevine has about the specs and features of Samsung Galaxy S5. Fingers crossed! 

1. First and foremost, it is supposed to be the Diamond Phone. Yes, move on Iphone 5s Gold, here comes the diamond! Samsung is finally ditching plastic for real metal. Well, it’s not just any metal, but diamond- plated metal. According to another Korean IT news portal the R&D team at Samsung Electronics have been working on mechanisms to apply the diamond metal surface treatment technology to metal cases. “Diamond material is coated onto the metal case surface of smartphones. If the metal case is coated with a diamond material, vulnerabilities to scratches and deformation can be redressed. What can I say? Diamonds are forever! :o)  
2. Second comes the display. Samsung is not averse to the idea of incorporating a flexible display into the Galaxy series. The Galaxy Round that was launched last year comes with a 5.7-inch Amoled screen. The new Galaxy S5 could also sport a similar vertically oriented curved display or may not. Galaxy S5 is supposed to have a 2K display with 560ppi for screens as small as five inches. This is a leaked image of the Samsung Galaxy S5 home screen. 
3. Third is the release date and price. The release date is expected to be sometime in March 2014, but rumour has it that Samsung may actually prepone the launch to February 2014 since the Samsung Galaxy S4 did not sell as many as predicted. Samsung Galaxy S5 will likely cost around £550 / $650 / AU$700

Ok, now for the nitty-gritties -- 

• Finger print or Retina scan? Anyone hoping that Samsung will follow in the footsteps of Apple and bring a fingerprint scanner to the Galaxy S5 could be disappointed if certain rumors are to be believed. A Samsung official apparently told the Korean Times that the company is "not yet developing the finger print technology" for its handsets. The eye scanning tech has been in talks after a Samsung exec spoke to Bloomberg and said "Many people are fanatical about iris recognition technology. We are studying the possibility." Ok either way is good as far as I am concerned. 
• More power and battery - Samsung has already developed a 3GB RAM chip that will likely go in the Samsung Galaxy S5. With each new version of the samsung galaxy phones, Samsung has upped the power pack for its battery. So its expected that the samsung galaxy S5 will have more power than its predecessor S4 which has 2,600 mAh. Can we hope for 4,000mAh pack? Surely! 
• Built-in projector? Yes please! - Rumour has it that the Samsung Galaxy S5 will have a built-in projector. Samsung already has built the Samsung Beam last year which was a niche device but its all about integrating the technology and Samsung has had one year to do it.. so they should be streaming and beaming with the Galaxy S5.
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