EJB QL or EJB-QL is a portable database query language for Enterprise Java Beans. It was used in Java EE applications. Compared to SQL, however, it is less complex but less powerful as well. == History == The language has been inspired, especially EJB3-QL, by the native Hibernate Query Language. In EJB3 It has been mostly replaced by the Java Persistence Query Language. == Differences == EJB QL is a database query language similar to SQL. The used queries are somewhat different from relational SQL, as it uses a so-called "abstract schema" of the enterprise beans instead of the relational model. In other words, EJB QL queries do not use tables and their components, but enterprise beans, their persistent state, and their relationships. The result of an SQL query is a set of rows with a fixed number of columns. The result of an EJB QL query is either a single object, a collection of entity objects of a given type, or a collection of values retrieved from CMP fields. One has to understand the data model of enterprise beans in order to write effective queries.
2024 National Public Data breach
In August 2024, three class-action lawsuits were filed against National Public Data along with over 14 complaints filed in federal court, claiming that the company permitted hackers to steal sensitive private information covering millions of individuals. The theft was alleged to have occurred in April 2024. One of the lawsuits specifically claims that in April, a hacker going by the moniker "USDoD" posted a notice on the dark web, offering the data for sale at the price of US$3.5 million. The information stolen is alleged to include 2.9 billion records containing full names, current and past addresses, Social Security numbers, dates of birth, and telephone numbers. The stolen data contains records for people in the US, UK, and Canada. National Public Data confirmed on August 16, 2024, there was a breach originating from someone trying to breach their systems since December 2023, with the breach occurring from April 2024 and over the next few months. The company also confirmed that 2.9 billion records were obtained, though they were still working to determine how many people were affected by the breach, and were working with law enforcement to identify the hacker. == Jerico Pictures == Jerico Pictures, Inc., doing business as National Public Data, was a data broker company that performed employee background checks. Their primary service was collecting information from public data sources, including criminal records, addresses, and employment history, and offering that information for sale. On October 2, 2024, Jerico Pictures filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy as it currently faces over a dozen lawsuits over the breach, and is potentially liable "for credit monitoring for hundreds of millions of potentially impacted individuals." In December 2024, National Public Data shut down, showing a closure notice on its website.
LTE Advanced
LTE Advanced, also named or recognized as LTE+, LTE-A or 4G+, is a 4G mobile cellular communication standard developed by 3GPP as a major enhancement of the Long Term Evolution (LTE) standard. Three technologies from the LTE-Advanced tool-kit – carrier aggregation, 4x4 MIMO and 256QAM modulation in the downlink – if used together and with sufficient aggregated bandwidth, can deliver maximum peak downlink speeds approaching, or even exceeding, 1 Gbit/s. This is significantly more than the peak 300 Mbit/s rate offered by the preceding LTE standard. Later developments have resulted in LTE Advanced Pro (or 4.9G) which increases bandwidth even further. The first ever LTE Advanced network was deployed in 2013 by SK Telecom in South Korea. In August 2019, the Global mobile Suppliers Association (GSA) reported that there were 304 commercially launched LTE-Advanced networks in 134 countries. Overall, 335 operators are investing in LTE-Advanced (in the form of tests, trials, deployments or commercial service provision) in 141 countries. == Name == LTE Advanced is also named (indicated as) LTE+, LTE-A, or (on Samsung Galaxy and Xiaomi smartphones) as 4G+. Such networks have also often been described as ‘Gigabit LTE networks’ mirroring a term that is also used in the fixed broadband industry. == History == The mobile communication industry and standards organizations have therefore started work on 4G access technologies, such as LTE Advanced. At a workshop in April 2008 in China, 3GPP agreed the plans for work on Long Term Evolution (LTE). A first set of specifications were approved in June 2008. Besides the peak data rate 1 Gb/s as defined by the ITU-R, it also targets faster switching between power states and improved performance at the cell edge. Detailed proposals are being studied within the working groups. The LTE+ format was first proposed by NTT DoCoMo of Japan and has been adopted as the international standard. It was formally submitted as a candidate 4G to ITU-T in late 2009 as meeting the requirements of the IMT-Advanced standard, and was standardized by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) in March 2011 as 3GPP Release 10. The work by 3GPP to define a 4G candidate radio interface technology started in Release 9 with the study phase for LTE-Advanced. Being described as a 3.9G (beyond 3G but pre-4G), the first release of LTE did not meet the requirements for 4G (also called IMT Advanced as defined by the International Telecommunication Union) such as peak data rates up to 1 Gb/s. The ITU has invited the submission of candidate Radio Interface Technologies (RITs) following their requirements in a circular letter, 3GPP Technical Report (TR) 36.913, "Requirements for Further Advancements for E-UTRA (LTE-Advanced)." These are based on ITU's requirements for 4G and on operators’ own requirements for advanced LTE. Major technical considerations include the following: Continual improvement to the LTE radio technology and architecture Scenarios and performance requirements for working with legacy radio technologies Backward compatibility of LTE-Advanced with LTE. An LTE terminal should be able to work in an LTE-Advanced network and vice versa. Any exceptions will be considered by 3GPP. Consideration of recent World Radiocommunication Conference (WRC-07) decisions regarding frequency bands to ensure that LTE-Advanced accommodates the geographically available spectrum for channels above 20 MHz. Also, specifications must recognize those parts of the world in which wideband channels are not available. Likewise, 'WiMAX 2', 802.16m, has been approved by ITU as the IMT Advanced family. WiMAX 2 is designed to be backward compatible with WiMAX 1 devices. Most vendors now support conversion of 'pre-4G', pre-advanced versions and some support software upgrades of base station equipment from 3G. == Proposals == The target of 3GPP LTE Advanced is to reach and surpass the ITU requirements. LTE Advanced should be compatible with first release LTE equipment, and should share frequency bands with first release LTE. In the feasibility study for LTE Advanced, 3GPP determined that LTE Advanced would meet the ITU-R requirements for 4G. The results of the study are published in 3GPP Technical Report (TR) 36.912. One of the important LTE Advanced benefits is the ability to take advantage of advanced topology networks; optimized heterogeneous networks with a mix of macrocells with low power nodes such as picocells, femtocells and new relay nodes. The next significant performance leap in wireless networks will come from making the most of topology, and brings the network closer to the user by adding many of these low power nodes – LTE Advanced further improves the capacity and coverage, and ensures user fairness. LTE Advanced also introduces multicarrier to be able to use ultra wide bandwidth, up to 100 MHz of spectrum supporting very high data rates. In the research phase many proposals have been studied as candidates for LTE Advanced (LTE-A) technologies. The proposals could roughly be categorized into: Support for relay node base stations Coordinated multipoint (CoMP) transmission and reception UE Dual TX antenna solutions for SU-MIMO and diversity MIMO, commonly referred to as 2x2 MIMO Scalable system bandwidth exceeding 20 MHz, up to 100 MHz Carrier aggregation of contiguous and non-contiguous spectrum allocations Local area optimization of air interface Nomadic / Local Area network and mobility solutions Flexible spectrum usage Cognitive radio Automatic and autonomous network configuration and operation Support of autonomous network and device test, measurement tied to network management and optimization Enhanced precoding and forward error correction Interference management and suppression Asymmetric bandwidth assignment for FDD Hybrid OFDMA and SC-FDMA in uplink UL/DL inter eNB coordinated MIMO SONs, Self Organizing Networks methodologies Within the range of system development, LTE-Advanced and WiMAX 2 can use up to 8x8 MIMO and 128-QAM in downlink direction. Example performance: 100 MHz aggregated bandwidth, LTE-Advanced provides almost 3.3 Gbit peak download rates per sector of the base station under ideal conditions. Advanced network architectures combined with distributed and collaborative smart antenna technologies provide several years road map of commercial enhancements. The 3GPP standards Release 12 added support for 256-QAM. A summary of a study carried out in 3GPP can be found in TR36.912. == Timeframe and introduction of additional features == Original standardization work for LTE-Advanced was done as part of 3GPP Release 10, which was frozen in April 2011. Trials were based on pre-release equipment. Major vendors support software upgrades to later versions and ongoing improvements. In order to improve the quality of service for users in hotspots and on cell edges, heterogeneous networks (HetNets) are formed of a mixture of macro-, pico- and femto base stations serving corresponding-size areas. Frozen in December 2012, 3GPP Release 11 concentrates on better support of HetNet. Coordinated Multi-Point operation (CoMP) is a key feature of Release 11 in order to support such network structures. Whereas users located at a cell edge in homogenous networks suffer from decreasing signal strength compounded by neighbor cell interference, CoMP is designed to enable use of a neighboring cell to also transmit the same signal as the serving cell, enhancing quality of service on the perimeter of a serving cell. In-device Co-existence (IDC) is another topic addressed in Release 11. IDC features are designed to ameliorate disturbances within the user equipment caused between LTE/LTE-A and the various other radio subsystems such as WiFi, Bluetooth, and the GPS receiver. Further enhancements for MIMO such as 4x4 configuration for the uplink were standardized. The higher number of cells in HetNet results in user equipment changing the serving cell more frequently when in motion. The ongoing work on LTE-Advanced in Release 12, amongst other areas, concentrates on addressing issues that come about when users move through HetNet, such as frequent hand-overs between cells. It also included use of 256-QAM. == First technology demonstrations and field trials == This list covers technology demonstrations and field trials up to the year 2014, paving the way for a wider commercial deployment of the VoLTE technology worldwide. From 2014 onwards various further operators trialled and demonstrated the technology for future deployment on their respective networks. These are not covered here. Instead a coverage of commercial deployments can be found in the section below. == LTE Advanced Pro == LTE Advanced Pro (LTE-A Pro, also known as 4.5G, 4.5G Pro, 4.9G, Pre-5G, 5G Project) is a name for 3GPP release 13 and 14. It is an evolution of LTE Advanced (LTE-A) cellular standard supporting data rates in excess of 3 Gbit/s using 32-carrier aggregation. It also introduces th
Deluxe Media
Deluxe Media Inc., also known simply as Deluxe and formerly Deluxe Entertainment Services Group, Inc., is an American multinational multimedia and entertainment service provisions company owned by Platinum Equity, founded in 1915 by Hungarian-born American film producer William Fox and headquartered in Burbank, California. The company services multiple clients in the film, television, digital content and advertising industries across the globe, and has been recognized with 10 Academy Awards for scientific and technical achievements, including developments in CinemaScope pictures (as part of 20th Century Fox) and more recently for a process of creating archival separations from digital image data. == History == Deluxe began as a film processing laboratory established in 1915 by William Fox under the name De Luxe as part of his eponymous film conglomerate corporation in Fort Lee, New Jersey. In 1916, Fox Film Corporation opened its studio in Hollywood on 13 acres at Sunset and Western. The first Deluxe film laboratory on the west coast was built on the south side of the lot (Fernwood and Serrano), and the laboratory was moved to the new Fox studios building on Manhattan's west side in 1919, where it remained for over 40 years. The "business manager" (later president) of the laboratory was Alan E. Freedman, who guided the company into the 1960s. In 1927, Fox (Deluxe) received a patent for sound-on-film, the Fox Movietone system. In 1927, "Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans," an early Movietone film, opened. Fox Movietone News, ran weekly in theaters until 1963. During the Great Depression, Fox Film Corporation encountered financial difficulties. Among the actions taken to maintain liquidity, Fox sold the laboratories in 1932 to Freedman, who renamed the operation Deluxe. Under Freedman's leadership, Deluxe added two more plants in Chicago and Toronto. In January 1934, Fox was granted an option to rebuy DeLuxe before December 31, 1938. On 31 May 1935, under Sidney Kent, Fox merged his film company with Twentieth Century Pictures to form The Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation following a bank-infused reorganisation. The merged company then exercised this option in July 1936, with Freedman remaining as president. In 1953, Deluxe developed the widescreen format CinemaScope. Titles included "There's No Business Like Show Business" (1954) and "The Seven Year Itch" (1955). Other innovations included the processing and sound striping of CinemaScope, and were patented and/or received Academy awards. In 1962 Freedman retired. In the 1960s, Deluxe closed its New York plant, followed by its plants in Chicago and Toronto, as motion picture production declined on the East Coast. In 1972, Deluxe began large volume videocassette production, with a billion by 1996. In 1990, The Rank Organisation acquired Deluxe from Fox. In 2000, Deluxe began large volume DVD production. In 2006, The Rank Organisation sold Deluxe Film Group to MacAndrews & Forbes, renamed Deluxe Entertainment Services Group. On 9 February 2012, Deluxe acquired Hong Kong–based visual effects and post-production company, Centro Digital Pictures, with its founder John Chu remaining as president while reporting to Alaric McAusland, managing director for Deluxe in Australia. In May 2014, Deluxe shut down its Los Angeles plant at Sunset & Western Studios complex, where other studios themselves were demolished way back in 1971. Also that same year, Deluxe closed the Hollywood film labs, and they gave thousands of orphaned film elements to the Academy Film Archive. The Deluxe Laboratories Collection at the Academy Film Archive consists of over 7,500 35mm and 16mm film elements of various motion pictures dating back to the early 1960s. On 22 April 2015, Deluxe and its longtime competitor, Technicolor S.A., announced that they had entered into a binding agreement to create a new joint venture known as Deluxe Technicolor Digital Cinema which will specialize in cinema mastering, distribution and management services. Deluxe got acquired on 4 September 2019 by creditors in a debt-for-equity swap to avoid bankruptcy. On 3 October 2019, Deluxe filed for bankruptcy, pending in the Southern District of New York. The same month on the 24th, the company received court approval to emerge from bankruptcy with a comprehensive restructuring plan. On July 1, 2020, Platinum Equity agreed to acquire the distribution division of Deluxe and re-unite with former CEO Cyril Drabinsky who would merge CineVizion, a film distribution company he founded after leaving Deluxe in 2016, into it. The companies Company 3 and Method Studios which formed the creative divisions of Deluxe were sold to Framestore in November 2020.
Harmonic
In physics, acoustics, and telecommunications, a harmonic is a sinusoidal wave with a frequency that is a positive integer multiple of the fundamental frequency of a periodic signal. The fundamental frequency is also called the 1st harmonic; the other harmonics are known as higher harmonics. As all harmonics are periodic at the fundamental frequency, the sum of harmonics is also periodic at that frequency. The set of harmonics forms a harmonic series. The term is employed in various disciplines, including music, physics, acoustics, electronic power transmission, radio technology, and other fields. For example, if the fundamental frequency is 50 Hz, a common AC power supply frequency, the frequencies of the first three higher harmonics are 100 Hz (2nd harmonic), 150 Hz (3rd harmonic), 200 Hz (4th harmonic) and any addition of waves with these frequencies is periodic at 50 Hz. An n {\displaystyle \ n} th characteristic mode, for n > 1 , {\displaystyle \ n>1\ ,} will have nodes that are not vibrating. For example, the 3rd characteristic mode will have nodes at 1 3 L {\displaystyle \ {\tfrac {1}{3}}\ L\ } and 2 3 L , {\displaystyle \ {\tfrac {2}{3}}\ L\ ,} where L {\displaystyle \ L\ } is the length of the string. In fact, each n {\displaystyle \ n} th characteristic mode, for n {\displaystyle \ n\ } not a multiple of 3, will not have nodes at these points. These other characteristic modes will be vibrating at the positions 1 3 L {\displaystyle \ {\tfrac {1}{3}}\ L\ } and 2 3 L . {\displaystyle \ {\tfrac {2}{3}}\ L~.} If the player gently touches one of these positions, then these other characteristic modes will be suppressed. The tonal harmonics from these other characteristic modes will then also be suppressed. Consequently, the tonal harmonics from the n {\displaystyle \ n} th characteristic characteristic modes, where n {\displaystyle \ n\ } is a multiple of 3, will be made relatively more prominent. In music, harmonics are used on string instruments and wind instruments as a way of producing sound on the instrument, particularly to play higher notes and, with strings, obtain notes that have a unique sound quality or "tone colour". On strings, bowed harmonics have a "glassy", pure tone. On stringed instruments, harmonics are played by touching (but not fully pressing down the string) at an exact point on the string while sounding the string (plucking, bowing, etc.); this allows the harmonic to sound, a pitch which is always higher than the fundamental frequency of the string. == Terminology == Harmonics may be called "overtones", "partials", or "upper partials", and in some music contexts, the terms "harmonic", "overtone" and "partial" are used fairly interchangeably. But more precisely, the term "harmonic" includes all pitches in a harmonic series (including the fundamental frequency) while the term "overtone" only includes pitches above the fundamental. == Characteristics == A whizzing, whistling tonal character, distinguishes all the harmonics both natural and artificial from the firmly stopped intervals; therefore their application in connection with the latter must always be carefully considered. Most acoustic instruments emit complex tones containing many individual partials (component simple tones or sinusoidal waves), but the untrained human ear typically does not perceive those partials as separate phenomena. Rather, a musical note is perceived as one sound, the quality or timbre of that sound being a result of the relative strengths of the individual partials. Many acoustic oscillators, such as the human voice or a bowed violin string, produce complex tones that are more or less periodic, and thus are composed of partials that are nearly matched to the integer multiples of fundamental frequency and therefore resemble the ideal harmonics and are called "harmonic partials" or simply "harmonics" for convenience (although it's not strictly accurate to call a partial a harmonic, the first being actual and the second being theoretical). Oscillators that produce harmonic partials behave somewhat like one-dimensional resonators, and are often long and thin, such as a guitar string or a column of air open at both ends (as with the metallic modern orchestral transverse flute). Wind instruments whose air column is open at only one end, such as trumpets and clarinets, also produce partials resembling harmonics. However they only produce partials matching the odd harmonics—at least in theory. In practical use, no real acoustic instrument behaves as perfectly as the simplified physical models predict; for example, instruments made of non-linearly elastic wood, instead of metal, or strung with gut instead of brass or steel strings, tend to have not-quite-integer partials. Partials whose frequencies are not integer multiples of the fundamental are referred to as inharmonic partials. Some acoustic instruments emit a mix of harmonic and inharmonic partials but still produce an effect on the ear of having a definite fundamental pitch, such as pianos, strings plucked pizzicato, vibraphones, marimbas, and certain pure-sounding bells or chimes. Antique singing bowls are known for producing multiple harmonic partials or multiphonics. Other oscillators, such as cymbals, drum heads, and most percussion instruments, naturally produce an abundance of inharmonic partials and do not imply any particular pitch, and therefore cannot be used melodically or harmonically in the same way other instruments can. Building on of Sethares (2004), dynamic tonality introduces the notion of pseudo-harmonic partials, in which the frequency of each partial is aligned to match the pitch of a corresponding note in a pseudo-just tuning, thereby maximizing the consonance of that pseudo-harmonic timbre with notes of that pseudo-just tuning. == Partials, overtones, and harmonics == An overtone is any partial higher than the lowest partial in a compound tone. The relative strengths and frequency relationships of the component partials determine the timbre of an instrument. The similarity between the terms overtone and partial sometimes leads to their being loosely used interchangeably in a musical context, but they are counted differently, leading to some possible confusion. In the special case of instrumental timbres whose component partials closely match a harmonic series (such as with most strings and winds) rather than being inharmonic partials (such as with most pitched percussion instruments), it is also convenient to call the component partials "harmonics", but not strictly correct, because harmonics are numbered the same even when missing, while partials and overtones are only counted when present. This chart demonstrates how the three types of names (partial, overtone, and harmonic) are counted (assuming that the harmonics are present): In many musical instruments, it is possible to play the upper harmonics without the fundamental note being present. In a simple case (e.g., recorder) this has the effect of making the note go up in pitch by an octave, but in more complex cases many other pitch variations are obtained. In some cases it also changes the timbre of the note. This is part of the normal method of obtaining higher notes in wind instruments, where it is called overblowing. The extended technique of playing multiphonics also produces harmonics. On string instruments it is possible to produce very pure sounding notes, called harmonics or flageolets by string players, which have an eerie quality, as well as being high in pitch. Harmonics may be used to check at a unison the tuning of strings that are not tuned to the unison. For example, lightly fingering the node found halfway down the highest string of a cello produces the same pitch as lightly fingering the node 1 / 3 of the way down the second highest string. For the human voice see Overtone singing, which uses harmonics. While it is true that electronically produced periodic tones (e.g. square waves or other non-sinusoidal waves) have "harmonics" that are whole number multiples of the fundamental frequency, practical instruments do not all have this characteristic. For example, higher "harmonics" of piano notes are not true harmonics but are "overtones" and can be very sharp, i.e. a higher frequency than given by a pure harmonic series. This is especially true of instruments other than strings, brass, or woodwinds. Examples of these "other" instruments are xylophones, drums, bells, chimes, etc.; not all of their overtone frequencies make a simple whole number ratio with the fundamental frequency. (The fundamental frequency is the reciprocal of the longest time period of the collection of vibrations in some single periodic phenomenon.) == On stringed instruments == Harmonics may be singly produced [on stringed instruments] (1) by varying the point of contact with the bow, or (2) by slightly pressing the string at the nodes, or divisions of its aliquot parts ( 1 2 {\displaystyle {\tfrac {1}{2}}} , 1
List of large language models
A large language model (LLM) is a type of machine learning model designed for natural language processing tasks such as language generation. LLMs are language models with many parameters, and are trained with self-supervised learning on a vast amount of text. == List == For the training cost column, 1 petaFLOP-day equals 1 petaFLOP/sec × 1 day, or 8.64×1019 FLOP (floating point operations). Only the cost of the largest model is shown. The number of parameters is measured in billions, and the training cost is measured in petaFLOP-days. === 2018 === === 2019 === === 2020 === === 2021 === === 2022 === === 2023 === === 2024 === === 2025 === === 2026 ===
Line splice
In electrical engineering and telecommunications, a line splice is a joint directly connecting lengths of electrical cables (electrical splice) or optical fibers (optical splice). The splices are often protected by sleeves. == Splicing of copper wires == The splicing of copper wires happens in the following steps: The cores are laid one above the other at the junction. The core insulation is removed. The wires are wrapped two to three times around each other (twisting). The bare veins on a length of about 3 cm "strangle" or "twist". In some cases, the strangulation is soldered. To isolate the splice, an insulating sleeve made of paper or plastic is pushed over it. The splicing of copper wires is mainly used on paper insulated wires. LSA techniques (LSA: soldering, screwing and stripping free) are used to connect copper wires, making the copper wires faster and easier to connect. LSA techniques include: Wire connection sleeves (AVH = Adernverbindungshülsen) and other crimp connectors. The two wires to be connected are inserted into the AVH without being stripped, which is then compressed with special pliers. The about 2 cm long AVH consist of contact, pressure and insulation. For wire connection strips (AVL = Adernverbindungsleisten) several pairs of wires (10 = AVL10 or 20 = AVL20) are inserted, the strip is then closed with a lid and pressed together with a hydraulic press, which ensures the connection. == Splicing of glass fibers == Fiber-optic cables are spliced using a special arc-splicer, with installation cables connected at their ends to respective "pigtails" - short individual fibers with fiber-optic connectors at one end. The splicer precisely adjusts the light-guiding cores of the two ends of the glass fibers to be spliced. The adjustment is done fully automatically in modern devices, whereas in older models this is carried out manually by means of micrometer screws and microscope. An experienced splicer can precisely position the fiber ends within a few seconds. Subsequently, the fibers are fused together (welded) with an electric arc. Since no additional material is added, such as gas welding or soldering, this is called a "fusion splice". Depending on the quality of the splicing process, attenuation values at the splice points are achieved by 0.3 dB, with good splices also below 0.02 dB. For newer generation devices, alignment is done automatically by motors. Here one differentiates core and jacket centering. At core centering (usually single-mode fibers), the fiber cores are aligned. A possible core offset with respect to the jacket is corrected. In the jacket centering (usually in multimode fibers), the fibers are adjusted to each other by means of electronic image processing in front of the splice. When working with good equipment, the damping value is according to experience at max. 0.1 dB. Measurements are made by means of special measuring devices including optical time-domain reflectometry (OTDR). A good splice should have an attenuation of less than 0.3 dB over the entire distance. Finished fiber optic splices are housed in splice boxes. One differentiates: Fusion splice Adhesive splicing Crimp splice or NENP (no-epoxy no-polish), mechanical splice