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Sunday, September 9, 2012

Upcoming Movies

Some of the big movie releases like The Avengers, The Dark Knight Rises, MIB3, The Amazing Spiderman, and The Bourne Legacy made their way to cinemas in Sri Lanka over the past few months. However, one of the most anticipated movies of 2012, "Prometheus" which was also reviewed as one of the few "good" 3D movies of the year did not make it to any movie theater in Sri Lanka.

Here are three upcoming movies that look interesting. We'll have to wait and see whether these three movies will be screened at cinemas in Sri Lanka.

Looper

image from Wikipedia

Looper is a science fiction film starring Bruce Willis, Joseph Gordon Levitt(Robin Blake in TDKR) and Emily Blunt. It has a plot related to time travel and Bruce Willis and Joseph Gordon Levitt both play the same character at different ages of his life. Aside from the possible paradoxes arising due to the time travel plot, the film seems to be an entertaining action flick.


Cloud Atlas

image from Wikipedia

This is termed an ""experimental" movie because it differs in style to most movies produced today. It is based on a book of the same name and revolves around six different narratives. It is a drama film with sci-fi elements. While the reception at the Toronto film festival has been positive, its uniqueness might also be off-putting to some.


Dredd 3D

image from Wikipedia

This movie can be seen under the upcoming movies section in the EAP movies website. It will most probably come to Savoy 3D after Step Up Revolution. It is an adaptation of a comic strip "Judge Dredd" and is set in the future. While it looks like a low budget cheesy sci-fi movie, so far it has got positive reviews from the rotten tomatoes website. The story revolves around a violent cop who is given the power of judge, jury and executioner to maintain law and order.




Friday, September 7, 2012

The Games Behind Portal

The first person puzzle game, Portal became instantly popular due to its unique gameplay and humorous script. It was a fresh new addition to the video game industry and it left gamers yearning for more after completing the brilliant but short game. The release of Portal 2 was well recieved by gamers and critics alike because it brought back the unique gameplay of portal with additional elements in a full-length gaming package. The custom map editor of portal 2 brought about more opportunities for fans to immerse themselves in the puzzle riddled portal universe.

After completing both Portal games and additional maps, if you are still looking forward to a gaming experience similar to it, then the best place to look for it is, the birthplace of the concepts of these games - DigiPen Institute of Technology. DigiPen Institute is a leading game developing institute that has produced prolific game developers over the past few years.

The game that Portal is based upon is, Narbacular Drop. The idea of solving puzzles by manipulating objects through a system of portals was introduced in Narbcular Drop. Unlike in Portal though, it has a fantasy background and it's possible to create portals through an existing portal. The entire development team of Narbacular Drop was hired by Valve corporation to work on Portal. Being the predecessor to Portal, this game is definitely worth checking out. This game can be downloaded through the link at he end of this post.




The concept of propulsion and repulsion gels in portal 2 is also taken from a game called "Tag - the power of paint" which was also developed by students at DigiPen institute and just like before, hired by Valve to work on Portal 2. In Tag, the player is equipped with a paint gun that can spray different colours of paint onto surfaces that will give the player special abilities which are to be used to solve puzzles. Follow the link below to download.




 To download these games,

Narbacular Drop

Tag - The Power of Paint



Tuesday, September 4, 2012

A Brief History of Management

Management is an essential component in any business or organization and it applies at every level in all types of organizations. Management can be defined as "The attainment of organizational goals in an effective and efficient manner through planning, organizing, leading and controlling organizational resources." The terms planning, organizing, leading and controlling are called "management functions". Today management is a broad area of study that has been developed throughout the past century and is still evolving.

The invention of the steam engine by James Watt kick-started the industrial revolution. With the industrial revolution, the concept of a factory emerged. Factories that did mass production with thousands of workers from different backgrounds mushroomed in the industrial world and thus a need for management arose. The idea of management at that time was to bring efficiency and order to an otherwise chaotic workplace.

This was the time when management was perceived and studied as a science. Frederick Winslow Taylor is considered the father of Scientific management. Through his experience and observations, Frederick Taylor came up with scientific management which aimed at increasing efficiency at the production level. In his monograph "The principles of Scientific Management", he highlighted four principles. They are
1. Study the way a job is performed and create a new scientific way to perform it with maximum productivity
2. Codify the new method into rules and train and equip the workers with the new method
3. Select workers whose skills match the rules developed and provide detailed instruction and supervision.
4. Establish fair levels of performance and reward higher performance.
In Scientific Management it it assumed that man is an "economic animal" and that money is the motivating factor. Also this system of management only applies at the operational level of the organization.

While efforts in management were only applied to the operational level of an organization, gradually attention moved to the upper hierarchical levels of the organization. This led to the development of the "Modern Management theory". A french mining engineer Henry Fayol is considered the father of modern management theory. Fayol was the first to define the 4 management functions quoted in the first paragraph of this post. In his book, "Industrial and general Administration", he divided all administrative activities into six categories. They are,
1. Technical
2. Commercial
3. Financial
4. Security
5. Accounting
6. Administrative
He also proposed 14 principles of administration - Division of work, Authority and responsibility, discipline, unity of command, unity of management, subordination of individual interests to the common good. remuneration, centralization, hierarchy, order, equity, stability of the staff, initiative, espirit de corps.
Unlike Taylor's Scientific management which focused in the operational level of an organization, Fayol's theory of management focused in the managerial level. Fayol also claimed that workers can be motivated by more than just money and also argued for equal treatment of all workers.

While the management process that is practiced today is mostly based on Fayol's theories, certain aspects of management are still evolving. The functions of management are interconnected and each function needs to be performed collectively and to various degrees for the management process to be successful. Although based on scientific principles management also requires a certain level of creativity in application. The management process can also depend on factors such as the culture and structure of the organization. By adapting to this dynamic nature and selecting the proper approach to management, organizations will be able to succeed in today's world.