Many of the questions and problems I have encoutered during my experience with the ZX Spectrum have provided material for this book. The masses of hints and tips contained will help you the programmer to get a deeper understanding of the ZX Spectrim microcomputer - hopefully much more than you ever thought possible.

The aim of this volume is to provide both the beginner and the experienced computer user with a ready source of reference on a number of useful, interesting or entertaining machine code routines for the ZX Spectrum. To this end the book is divided into two sections. The Section A describes the features of the Spectrum which are of interest to the machine code programmer—what is meant by a machine code routine, the important internal features and routines of the Spectrum and the structure of the machine language itself.

The Section B presents the routines themselves. They are laid out in a standard format which is explained in detail at the beginning of the section. The routines are complete in themselves so that they can be loaded individually without reference to any other routines.

It is not necessary to understand how a routine works in order to use it because each routine can be loaded using the simple M/C Loader listed at the beginning of Section B. Hence if you are really impatient to use, say the List Variables routine simply turn to the relevant page, enter and RUN the M/C Loader and enter the decimal numbers listed in the column headed "Numbers to be entered". When all the numbers are loaded compare the value of the Check sum PRINTed by the M/C Loader with the value given with the routine. If they are the same you can be sure that the numbers have been entered correctly (unless you have made two or more errors which cancel out exactly). The routine is now ready for you to use.

Throughout history, thinkers from mathematicians to theologians have pondered the mysterious relationship between numbers and the nature of reality. In this fascinating book, Mario Livio tells the tale of a number at the heart of that mystery: phi, or 1.6180339887...This curious mathematical relationship, widely known as "The Golden Ratio," was discovered by Euclid more than two thousand years ago because of its crucial role in the construction of the pentagram, to which magical properties had been attributed. Since then it has shown a propensity to appear in the most astonishing variety of places, from mollusk shells, sunflower florets, and rose petals to the shape of the galaxy. Psychological studies have investigated whether the Golden Ratio is the most aesthetically pleasing proportion extant, and it has been asserted that the creators of the Pyramids and the Parthenon employed it. It is believed to feature in works of art from Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa to Salvador Dali's The Sacrament of the Last Supper, and poets and composers have used it in their works. It has even been found to be connected to the behavior of the stock market!

The Golden Ratio is a captivating journey through art and architecture, botany and biology, physics and mathematics. It tells the human story of numerous phi-fixated individuals, including the followers of Pythagoras who believed that this proportion revealed the hand of God; astronomer Johannes Kepler, who saw phi as the greatest treasure of geometry; such Renaissance thinkers as mathematician Leonardo Fibonacci of Pisa; and such masters of the modern world as Goethe, Cezanne, Bartok, and physicist Roger Penrose. Wherever his quest for the meaning of phi takes him, Mario Livio reveals the world as a place where order, beauty, and eternal mystery will always coexist.

About the Author

Mario Livio is head of the Science Division at the Hubble Space Telescope Institute, where he studies a broad range of subjects in astrophysics, particularly the rate of expansion of the universe. He is the author of one previous book, The Accelerating Universe (2000). He is a frequent public lecturer at such venues as the Smithsonian Institution and the Hayden Planetarium. He lives in Baltimore, Maryland.

At its core, the process of designing reports hasn’t changed substantially in the past 15 years. The report designer lays out report objects, which contain data from a known data source, in a design application such as Business Objects Reports or Microsoft Access. He or she then tests report execution, verifies the accuracy of the results, and distributes the report to the target audience.

Sure, there are enough differences between design applications to mean that the designer must become familiar with each particular environment. However, there’s enough crossover functionality to make this learning curve small. For example, the SUM function is the same in Business Objects Reports as it is in Microsoft Access as it is in Structured Query Language (SQL). With Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services (referred to as SSRS throughout the book), there is, again, only a marginal difference in the way reports are designed from one graphical report design application to another. So, if you do have previous reporting experience, your learning curve for SSRS should be relatively shallow. This is especially true if you come from a .NET environment, because the report designer application for SSRS is Visual Studio 2008 or the application included with SQL Server 2008, Business Intelligence Development Studio (BIDS). Having said all this, several differences set SSRS apart from other reporting solutions:

• It provides a standard reporting platform based on Report Definition Language (RDL), which is the XML schema that dictates the common structure of all SSRS reports. This allows for report creation from any third-party application that supports the RDL schema.
• SSRS is an integral part of the SQL Server 2008 release.
• SSRS offers features out of the box that in other products would be expensive additions to a basic deployment. These features include subscription services, report caching, report history, and scheduling of report execution.
• SSRS, being a Web-based solution, can be deployed across a variety of platforms.

This book was written in parallel with a real SSRS deployment for a health-care application, so it covers almost every design and deployment consideration for SSRS, always from the standpoint of how to get the job done effectively. You’ll find step-by-step guides, practical tips, and best practices, along with code samples that you’ll be able to modify and use in your own SSRS applications.

Pro PerformancePoint Server 2007 is Microsoft’s latest product in its line of business intelligence applications, a piece of software that gathers data from corporate databases and delivers it to an end user in a friendly, graphical fashion. PerformancePoint offers the next step in the digitization world. Businesses now have gigabytes upon terabytes of data in databases; there’s a need to interpret the data and glean key business insights from it and PerformancePoint.

Author Philo Janus walks you through the business process management and architecture of the PerformancePoint product before delving into developing a complete business intelligence solution, from start to finish.

What you’ll learn

• Develop an end–to–end business intelligence solution.
• Harness and massage data using SQL Server Integration Services, SQL Server Analysis Services, and SQL Server Reporting Services.
• Use ProClarity Analytics to get a better view on corporate performance data.
• Build a portal with key performance indicators and business scorecards using PerformancePoint, Excel Services, and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007.
• Build out a complete business scorecard.
• Develop tools for business planning and forecasting.

Who is this book for?

If you’re interested in harvesting data from your corporate databases, developing solutions to represent it visually to different audiences in your business, and slicing and dicing that information in a variety of different ways, PerformancePoint—and this book—are for you.

About the Apress Pro Series

The Apress Pro series books are practical, professional tutorials to keep you on and moving up the professional ladder.

You have gotten the job, now you need to hone your skills in these tough competitive times. The Apress Pro series expands your skills and expertise in exactly the areas you need. Master the content of a Pro book, and you will always be able to get the job done in a professional development project. Written by experts in their field, Pro series books from Apress give you the hard–won solutions to problems you will face in your professional programming career.

About the Author

Philo Janus is a senior technology specialist with Microsoft. Over the years he has presented InfoPath to thousands of users and developers, and assisted with enterprise implementations of InfoPath solutions. With that background, he is particularly sensitive to the difficulties users and developers have had with InfoPath.

He graduated from the US Naval Academy with a BSEE in 1989 to face a challenging career in the US Navy. After driving an aircraft carrier around the Pacific Ocean and a guided missile frigate through both the Suez and Panama Canals, and serving in the US Embassy in Cairo, a small altercation between his bicycle and an auto indicated a change of career (some would say that landing on his head in that accident would explain many things).

Philo's software development career started with building a training and budgeting application in Access 2.0 in 1995. Since then he's worked with Oracle, Visual Basic, SQL Server, and .NET building applications for federal agencies, commercial firms, and conglomerates. In 2003 he joined Microsoft as a technology specialist evangelizing Office as a development platform.

This amply illustrated book is about building some of Leonardo da Vincis most famous inventions with LEGOs new breathtaking robot technology, the LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT. In this book, you will revive such fascinating devices as the flying machine, the aerial screw, the revolving bridge, the double leaf spring catapult, and the armored car, five centuries after their creation by the great Renaissance engineer. Using some of the most advanced programming environments for the NXT, you will make robots that work, move, and respond the way Leonardo intended his original inventions to do 500 years ago.

By engineering the LEGO models contained in this book you will not only become acquainted with the MINDSTORMS NXT technology but also with strategies to build advanced robots with NXT and to program them using different state-of-the-art NXT programming languages such as NXT-G, NXC, RobotC, pbLua, and leJOS NXJ.

For all five robots, historical background information is provided. Detailed high-quality step-by-step building instructions as well as an elaborate guide for each single program enable both the inexperienced LEGO user as well as the NXT aficionado to become acquainted with the art of producing marvelous NXT creations and make use of many sophisticated features of the NXT.

This book will unleash the creative powers that slumber in everyone and combine them with the pure joy of playing. But beware: you might be surprised by the stupendous results this combination is apt to spawn.

In this book, you'll:

• Get to know Leonardos most famous inventions and the theory behind them
• Build LEGO robots with the NXT kit
• Make use of advanced features of the LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT
• Program NXT robots with state-of-the-art NXT programming environments
• Meet the bustling worldwide community that has developed around the LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Advanced

About the Author

Matthias Scholz is a member of the LEGO Mindstorms Community Partners Program. His NXT-related Web site is extremely popular. He is also a frequent contributor to the well-known NXT blog, The NXT STEP. He majored in Mathematics at the University of Bayreuth and has held various positions in German IT enterprises.

Wireless and mobile telemedicine has drawn attention from health care providers and recipients, governments, industry, and researchers. Th ough various practices have been exercised, the realization of telemedicine depends on advances in computing and networking techniques. In recent decades technological development in computing and networking has largely made the delivery of health services, including medical diagnosis and patient care, possible from a distance. Many funded projects have evaluated the use of communications technology in the implementation and performance of telemedicine activities, and examined the impact of telemedicine on medical care in terms of cost, quality, and access. Telemedicine has become a growing new interdisciplinary fi eld, which will eventually contribute to improving the quality of health care for everyone. However, successful implementation of this vision depends not only on innovative telemedicine applications but also networking and computing technical readiness. Furthermore, many ethical, social, and political problems arising in telemedicine need technical solutions.

Th is book studies computing and networking problems which arise from wireless and mobile telemedicine. It is a contribution of many prominent researchers working on the telemedicine fi eld around the world. Th e book is divided into six parts: patient care and monitoring, cardiology, diabetes, security and privacy in telemedicine, networking support, and opportunities and challenges, including 20 chapters on a wide range of topics associated with novel telemedicine applications and pertinent networking and computing techniques. Th e book will shed light on future research of these areas. Th is book will serve as a good reference for researchers to know the state of the art and to discover uncovered territory and develop new applications, especially from a networking and computing perspective.

AS A STUDENT forced to flee Cambridge University during an epidemic in 1665–66, Isaac Newton—later knighted, becoming Sir Isaac—found a lot of time to do experiments. He put this time to good use, discovering the basis for many of the laws of physics he would go on to publish a few decades later. Newton’s equations accurately described acceleration and motion, and his universal law of gravitation explained in a concise and mathematical way gravity on Earth as well as in the solar system.

The physics of Newton dominated physics for more than 200 years. In Newton’s viewpoint, forces caused changes in motion, which could be precisely determined and calculated, and concepts such as space and time were absolute, the same for everyone. Physicists continued to accept this point of view until, in the 20th century, exceptions began to appear. With improved instruments and more imaginative theories, people began to probe objects and events that were not encountered in everyday life—tiny particles inside an atom, immense objects such as the entire universe, and small or large objects moving at exceptionally fast speeds. Laws described by Newton failed to hold true in many cases. New laws, and occasionally entirely new concepts, were needed. The new laws reduce to the old laws in familiar situations but increase their scope and accuracy.

JET AIRPLANES MADE their first appearance during World War II (1939–1945), almost 40 years after American inventors Orville and Wilbur Wright built and flew the first airplane. Although jet engines are powerful and efficient, early airplanes had to settle for slow, cumbersome propellers, driven by piston engines quite similar to automobile motors. The reason that jets failed to appear first is interesting and was not due to a lack of knowledge. Engineers knew about jets all along and even had a few examples in nature to study, such as squid, which propel themselves in the sea by using water jets. The reason it took so long to build jets was that people lacked the proper materials.

Ever since Democritus of ancient Greece proposed that all matter is made up of tiny particles, people have wondered how bits of matter interact and combine. An understanding of how matter behaves gives people a satisfying explanation for many of the materials of the world, as well as the ability to construct new ones. Jet engines, for instance, burn fuel continuously and become extremely hot during operation. This heat would melt most materials, so for a long time there was no way to build a functional jet engine. Then scientists discovered mixtures of metals that can withstand exceptionally high temperatures. These materials made jet engines possible.

SEVERAL THOUSAND YEARS ago people believed that vision involved the emission of some kind of radiation by the eye. Everyone realized the eyes are necessary—an eye injury causes a loss of vision—but people in ancient times imagined the eye sent out rays and bounced them off distant objects, providing a sense of vision by analyzing the returning radiation. If vision really worked this way, then eyesight would result from the eye actively exploring the environment.

But vision works differently. Arab scholar Abu Ali al-Hasan Ibn Al-Haitham (965–1040) correctly proposed that the eye receives radiation emitted by other sources; some of the radiation travels straight to the eye, which makes the source visible, and some of the radiation reaches the eye after bouncing off objects that do not otherwise emit radiation, which is how these objects become visible. The major source of this radiation, called light, is the Sun. Light is the messenger of vision, and the eye is tuned to detect it.

A LEGEND OF the ancient Greeks tells the story of a god called Prometheus, who taught people how to make fire. This gave a tremendous boost to humanity, and the other gods were furious with Prometheus for allowing humans to wield such potency.

Although the story of Prometheus is a myth, the ability to harness fire and heat did provide people with some of their earliest technology. Steam powered much of the Industrial Revolution, a period of time beginning in the late 18th century in which machines tremendously advanced the productivity of manufacturing and transportation. But heat, temperature, and their relationships are much broader subjects than just steam-powered machines. Warmth is associated with life and activity; cold is associated with death and stillness. Some organisms rely on the environment to provide warmth, and some organisms can generate their own, but all living beings must adapt and interact in a world in which temperature is not constant.