How To Get Selected For Microsoft Student Partner Programme?

Beginning today, I Rohit Ajmani ,the founder of TechHunk.com and a Microsoft Student Partner would elaborate by journey through all these years being a part of microsoft. but firstly, i would like to throw light on how to get selected for the msp proggrame!!

Guide to MSP SELECTION FOR 2011-2012 SESSION.:

MICROSOFT-STUDENT-PARTNER–MSP Program is a program run by Microsoft across the globe in order to enhance the availability of Microsoft technologies and softwares and ofcourse the Knowledge about all the technologies available. Under this program MS might select 1/2/3..any number of Campus Ambassador in your college to represent as a guy who is both linked by students of that institute and Microsoft and will help their peers to obtain various softwares and their knowledge for free. Also MSP has to conduct a lot of activities in order to distribute the knowledge to his/her peers. Being an MSP is itself a thing to be proud of. Your peers will admire you, you will have a special image of yours among your faculties and students, other then that you will be provided with a lot of technical support, material, opportunities by MS to gain various abilities either technical or manageerial. Overall being an MSP is one of the greatest achievements you can have at your student (college) life.

After all 10000 people applied in 2010 and 600 got selected! I being one of the lucky few.so its a tough process to be an msp!!!

I being an msp will guide U how to get selected to one of the most prestigious community prograame ever!!!! the benifits are endless:

* Companies view you as a trained experienced personell

*It adds a striking charm to your resume.

*Huge learning experience and benifit in internships/training in microsoft!!

Benefits from microsoft:
As an MSP, a host of benefits are available:

* Welcome kit (including invitation letter & ID card)
* Exclusive MSP Boot-camps conducted by Microsoft(all expense paid trips to goa etc):p)
* MSDN subscription
* Rewards & Recognition for top performers
* Networking opportunities
* Technical training & resources
* Microsoft events
* Interactions with MVPs & Microsoft Employees
* Internship & Recruitment announcements for top-performers

Its an amazing experience as MSP as the time passes by you learns and learns a lot. This poster is a visual presentation of my tech interest. Size of logo specifies my favs. Get the reflection of what you as MSP do n enjoy…

Also, this is the glimpse of what MSPs will revolve around, which all technology and activities this year. So guys, Let’s create the difference…

Elegibility criteria to apply:

To consider applying for the MSP Program, you must be:

• Over 17 years of age.
• Studying a full-time course at an officially recognized University/College in India.
• Bachelor’s/Master’s Degree student who will complete the course after May 2010.

A good MSP is one who has the following basic qualities:

• Technical competencies
• Passionate about software
• Quick learner
• Respected by peers
• Community-building competencies
• Enthusiastic about technology
• High level of social activity, both online & offline
• Can organize college and city-level events
• Fundamental competencies
• Passionate about Microsoft
• Confident & outgoing
• Good rapport with faculty
• Willing to share knowledge & eager to uplift self and peers

MSP Program

Rounds in selection process(these were , at my selection time):

Round1: Online form submission

Round2:Record videos ( communication & Leadership, details in the attachment) using your mobile phone/ webcam/ handy cam/ any recording means.

round 3: Gd on any general topic

round 4:Quiz on a microsoft worldwide competetion, imagine cup!!!

Ill guide you in my subsequent posts , how to pass through all of these.It is not necessary that these are the selection procedure every year, it depends on year to year.

In the end,some FAQ’S:

MICROSOFT STUDENT PARTNERS
Frequently Asked Questions
1. I have completed my graduation. Can I apply for the MSP Selection?
No. you can participate in the MSP Selection only if you are a current student pursuing your graduation or post-graduation.

2. I am not studying in an Engineering college. Can I apply for the MSP Selection?
MSPs
are not restricted to engineering colleges only. If you are a student
of a recognized Science, Technology, Engineering, Math or Design
college, you are eligible to participate in the MSP Selection process.

3. Will I get a confirmation email after I register?
No.
If you have registered on the correct link and have provided the
complete information required, we will get it. There is no need for you
to email us informing that you have completed all the steps.

4. Who do I contact in case I have any queries, etc.?
This
FAQ is designed to answer almost all questions that you might face. Go
through it carefully and if you still have any doubts, you can email
them to studpart@microsoft.com.

5. How long do I remain an MSP?
You are a MSP for one academic year, subject to your performance and decision made by the MSP India Team.

6. How many MSPs are selected from a particular college?
We generally take one or two MSPs per college.

7. If I already have an existing Imagine Cup username, can I enter the same on www.surveymonkey.com/s/mspround2?
If
you have an active login on http://imaginecup.com and you have logged
in successfully after 10th July 2010, you can specify the existing
username.
If not you can create a new username and you can provide us with the new username

What kind of technologies do u study at msps?

The technologies you can learn to become technically updated or for your coming future are -
cloud computing, windows phone 7, windows azure and many more…

…..! ALL THE BEST FOR BECOMING MSP.!……

source: http://techhunk.com

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Now you can search on google by the image

Search by Image in Google Search
Discover all sorts of content that's related to a specific image. Just specify an image, and you'll find other similar or related images as well as relevant results from across the Web.

For example, search using a picture of your favorite band and see search results that might include similar images, webpages about the band, and even sites that include the same picture.

How to search

There are a few ways to search by image:

• Visit images.google.com, or any Images results page, and click the  camera icon in the search box. Enter an image URL for an image hosted on the web or upload an image from your computer.

• How to enter an image URL
1. On any webpage, right-click an image and select the option to copy it. In most browsers, this option's name starts with "Copy image," except Internet Explorer for which you'll select "Properties" and then copy the URL that's then displayed.
2. Visit images.google.com, or any Images results page, and click the  camera icon in the search box.
3. Paste the copied URL into the search box
4. Click Search
How to upload an image
1. Visit images.google.com, or any Images results page, and click the  camera icon in the search box
2. Click the Upload an image link
3. Click Choose File
4. Select the image from your computer
5. Wait for the file to upload, then click Search
Tip: You can also drag and drop an image to initiate a search. Simply click on an image, hold down the mouse, and begin dragging it toward the search box. You should see a blue box appear, and then you can drop the image into that box.
• Download a browser extension for Google Chrome or Firefox to search by any image on the web, simply by right-clicking on the image.

Search by image is optimized to work well for content that is reasonably well described on the web. For this reason, you’ll likely get more relevant results for famous landmarks or paintings than you will for more personal images like your toddler’s latest finger painting.

How it works

Google uses computer vision techniques to match your image to other images in the Google Images index and additional image collections. From those matches, we try to generate an accurate "best guess" text description of your image, as well as find other images that have the same content as your search image. Your search results page can show results for that text description as well as related images.

The results page

When you search by image, your results will look different than your normal Images or Web results page. The biggest difference is that your results can include non-image results like webpages that seem relevant to the image that you searched for. The elements of your results page will change depending on your search and on the information that's most relevant to that search.



Elements you might see

• Preview image: see a small version of the image that you searched with. (Note that if you return to that results page after a certain time, you may not see this image anymore.)
• Best guess: if our system can find a text description for your image, you'll see it appear as a link to further search results. You might also see a few top web results for that text query. To change your search, edit or add to the best guess by typing in the search bar.
• Visually similar images: see a set of images that are close matches to the image that you searched with. Click the link to see additional images that are similar.
• Pages that include matching images: see web pages that show your image on their site
• Other searches related to this image: if our system finds more than one "best guess" description, you'll see them as links at the bottom of the page. Click one to see full search results for that query.

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HOW TO: Get Started With the COMPASS CSS Framework

Anybody who’s built a website of any size knows how quickly CSS can get out of hand. Style sheets can grow bloated and lengthy, making it difficult to find things, introducing redundancy and producing an end product that makes code maintenance tedious. Let’s face it — CSS is not very well-designed.

Over the years, a number of solutions have cropped up that attempt to deal with these problems. One of the most popular is the CSS framework, COMPASS.

Below, we’ll give you a quick introduction to how COMPASS works, and some tips on how to make it work for you.

---

What is COMPASS?

---

COMPASS is an open source CSS authoring framework written in Ruby that attempts to fix a lot of the shortcomings of CSS. It also streamlines development by providing a number of utilities and tools to make writing your CSS files easier and faster.

Those features include:

• Support for variables and mixins.
• SASS-style nesting of CSS rules.
• Helper functions for images, fonts, colors and more, including mathematical calculations.
• Flexible tools for ensuring cross-browser compatibility and graceful fallback states.
• Integration of a Blueprint module, including several default styles for rapid prototyping and styling commonly used elements.

With all that and dozens more tidbits to offer, COMPASS provides a robust authoring environment for CSS creation that automatically monitors your code as you write it, compiling it down to pure CSS for use on your site. So while the COMPASS gem is needed for authoring, your website needs no special software or libraries to display CSS written in COMPASS.

---

How Does COMPASS Work?

---

Now that we’ve gone over what COMPASS is and discussed a few of its features, let’s take a look at some of them in action. In this, we’ll use a few variables and a custom mixin, as well as an image helper and nesting to show how COMPASS makes it easy to reuse content throughout your CSS files.

---

$dark-accent:   #333;
$light-accent:  #eee;

@mixin default_fonts {
    font-family:    helvetica;
    font-size:      10pt;
    color:          $dark-accent;
}

#info_box {
    width:      400px;
    height:     300px;
    padding:    10pt;
    border:     1px solid $dark-accent;
    background: $light-accent;
    @include    default_fonts;

    input[type=button] {
        background:  image-url('button.png') top left repeat-x;
        color:       #fff;
        font-weight: bold;
        border:      none;
    }
}

---

Here you see that we’ve set up a couple of variables (dark and light accent) which we use in the mixin, in addition to the CSS rules for our info box.

Next, the mixin itself contains the rules for our default fonts. After that comes an example of how nesting works. The rules for our input button, in this example, only apply to those found within the info box.

Finally, the image URL helper here is used to generate the output for the background image, so we don’t have to type the full image path each time (path information is defined in a small config file that sits in the root directory of your project).

Now let’s take a look at the COMPASS-compiled output:

---

/* line 10, ../sass/demo.scss */
#info_box {
  width: 400px;
  height: 300px;
  padding: 10pt;
  border: 1px solid #333333;
  background: #eeeeee;
  font-family: helvetica;
  font-size: 10pt;
  color: #333333;
}
/* line 18, ../sass/demo.scss */
#info_box input[type=button] {
  background: url('/images/button.png') top left repeat-x;
  color: #fff;
  font-weight: bold;
  border: none;
}

---

As you can see, the mixins become included, variables substituted, image URLs generated, and inheritance is determined via the nesting. When generating the CSS, COMPASS also includes comments that clearly show us where each element is defined in its corresponding CSS file. If there’s an error at the time of generation, COMPASS will drop a helpful stack trace right into the CSS file where the error occurs.

At first glance, the original COMPASS code may look more verbose than the generated CSS output, but when you consider that those variables and mixins can be used throughout your entire project, you begin to see the advantages. COMPASS all but eliminates the need for adding presentational classes (e.g. “align-right” or “big-text”) without making you constantly repeat yourself. In addition, it’s feasible to completely change a color scheme for an entire project simply by updating a few variables and perhaps changing an image path or two.

This is only a small example of the power and flexibility COMPASS offers, but you can begin to see its amazing potential.

---

Where to Go From Here

---

If you’d like to learn more about COMPASS, you can check them out at compass-style.org. Thedocumentation is particularly well done.

Keep in mind that COMPASS uses SASS and Blueprint, so you may want to read up on those as well.

You’ll also need a working installation of Ruby and RubyGems to install and use COMPASS.

Finally, we recommend taking a look at the Setup & Install Guide on the COMPASS website.

source: http://mashable.com

source:

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GIMP Keyboard ShortCuts

GIMP: GNU Image Manipulation Program is one of the powerful Open Source Image Editing Software. It is a freely distributed program for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition and image authoring. It has many capabilities. It can be used as a simple paint program, an expert quality photo retouching program, an online batch processing system, a mass production image renderer, an image format converter, etc.

GIMP is expandable and extensible. It is designed to be augmented with plug-ins and extensions to do just about anything. The advanced scripting interface allows everything from the simplest task to the most complex image manipulation procedures to be easily scripted.

GIMP is written and developed under X11 on UNIX platforms. But basically the same code also runs on MS Windows and Mac OS X.

Keyboard shortcuts can be a great time saver when working within GIMP.  Rather than navigating through the menu structure to find what you are looking for, if you learn some of  the common shortcuts it will increase your productivity greatly.

File Menu - Shortcuts	Function
Ctrl + N	New Image
Shift+Ctrl+V	Create a new Image from Clipboard
Ctrl + O	Open Image
Ctrl+Alt+O	Open as Layers
Ctrl+S	Save Image
Shift+Ctrl+S	Save As
Ctrl+P	Print
Ctrl+W	Close
Shift+Ctrl+W	Close All
Ctrl+Q	Quit
Edit Menu - Shortcuts	Function
Ctrl+Z	Undo
Ctrl+Y	Redo
Ctrl+X	Cut
Ctrl+C	Copy
Shift+Ctrl+C	Copy Visible
Ctrl+V	Paste
Shift+Ctrl+V	Past as New Image
Delete	Clear
Ctrl+,	Fill with FG Color
Ctrl+.	Fill with BG Color
Ctrl+;	Fill with Pattern
Select Menu - Shortcuts	Function
Ctrl+A	Select All
Shift+Ctrl+A	Select None
Ctrl+I	Invert Selection
Shift+Ctrl+L	Create a Floating Selection
Shift+O	Select by Color
Shift+V	Select from Path
Shift+Q	Toggle Quick Mask
View Menu - Shortcuts	Function
Ctrl+E	Shrink Wrap - Reduce image window to size of image
F11	Toggle Fullscreen View
Ctrl+T	Show Selection
Shift+Ctrl+T	Show Guides
Shift+Ctrl+R	Show Rulers
Image Menu - Shortcuts	Function
Ctrl+D	Duplicate Image
Ctrl+M	Merge Visible Layers
Alt+Return	Display Image Properties
Layer Menu - Shortcuts	Function
Shift+Ctrl+N	New Layer
Shift+Ctrl+D	Duplicate Layer
Ctrl+H	Anchor Layer
Page Up	Select Previous Layer
Page Down	Select Next Layer
Home	Select Top Layer
End	Select Bottom Layer
Tools Menu - Shortcuts	Function
Selection Tools
R	Rectangle Select
E	Ellipse Select
F	Free Select
U	Fuzzy Select
Shift+O	Select by Color
I	Intelligent Scissors
Paint Tools
Shift+B	Bucket Fill
L	Blend
N	Pencil
P	Paintbrush
Shift+E	Eraser
A	Airbrush
K	Ink
C	Clone
H	Heal
Shift+U	Blur / Sharpen
S	Smudge
Shift+D	Dodge / Burn
Transfrom Tools
Q	Align
M	Move
Shift+C	Crop
Shift+R	Rotate
Shift+T	Scale
Shift+S	Shear
Shift+P	Perspective
Shift+F	Flip
General
B	Paths
O	Color Picker
Z	Zoom
Shift+M	Measure
T	Text
Ctrl+B	Toolbox
D	Default Colors (Sets foreground to black and background to white)
X	Swap Colors
Filters Menu - Shortcuts	Function
Ctrl+F	Repeat Last
Shift+Ctrl+F	Re-Show Last
Windows Menu - Shortcuts	Function
Dockable Dialogs
Ctrl+L	Layers
Shift+Ctrl+B	Brushes
Shift+Ctrl+P	Patterns
Ctrl+G	Gradients
Ctrl+B	Toolbox
Help Menu - Shortcuts	Function
F1	Help
Shift+F1	Context Sensitive Help

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Design Your Own Android Apps Without Programming Skills

If you like the idea of creating your own App but don’t have any coding skills, you may be very interested to hear about Google’s new offering. The App Inventor (with the obligatory BETA in the title) is a new tool which allows non-programmers to build fully working applications for Android. Google announced the availability of the App Inventor on its blog earlier this week.

To use App Inventor, you do not need to be a developer. App Inventor requires NO programming knowledge. This is because instead of writing code, you visually design the way the app looks and use blocks to specify the app’s behavior.

Google has been working on the tool for over a year and it has been tested in schools and colleges. It works by using blocks for everything you can do with an Android phone, such as store information in a database, repeat actions and integrate with services such as Amazon and Twitter. The App Inventor also provides access to a GPS-location sensor, so you can build apps use your current location.

Here’s a sixty second video (with jazzy, xylophone background music) showing how a simple app can be created using the App Inventor.Here’s a sixty second video (with jazzy, xylophone background music) showing how a simple app can be created using the App Inventor.

You can learn more about the App Inventor and see tutorials and sample apps here. If you’re interested you can get an invite here.

So designers, do you think this is a good thing and something you might use? And developers, what do you think? Is this kind of block building setup the future or is it letting the lunatics* take over the asylum? Does a person even need design and development skills to put together a cool and fun app or just imagination?

source: http://blogs.sitepoint.com

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About colors for Designer

Everyday, we always encounter various colors – from the clothes we wear, the things around us, the food we eat, the things we use- everything. If our world doesn’t have this variation of colors, then everything will be so dull and boring. We cannot refute the fact that colors are part of our everyday lives.

Designers and artists of course make use of colors in their projects and are taking into account a lot of things before choosing which hue to use. Colors are said to activate the right brain for emotions. Emotions of a person can be seen depending on what color he/she uses. A project can easily reveal what it is trying to say merely by the choice of colors. Hence, it is very important to get acquainted with colors really well. Here are some things that designers need to know about colors.

1.THE COLOR WHEEL.

When you deal with colors, of course, you have to know the color wheel first. The color wheel serves as a reference for the different colors, the right color mixtures, the proper color harmony and many others. The color wheel shows the three primary colors red blue and yellow. When you combine these primaries, you’ll get the secondary colors orange, purple and green. Then if you combine the secondary colors to its neighboring primary color, you’ll get a tertiary color. There are six tertiary colors: yellow-orange, yellow-green, blue-green, blue-purple, red-purple and red-orange.

2.COLOR SCHEMES.

In working with colors, there are various color schemes that an artist or designer may use.

  >>Achromatic uses black, white and gray.

  >>Monochromatic uses a single color with various values and intensities. Black and white can be used     here to add various tints and shades.

  >>Analogous uses colors that are adjacent to the color wheel. Any three neighboring colors in the color wheel are called analogous. The colors vary slightly from each other and are harmonious.

  >>Complementary uses colors located opposite each other on the color wheel like red and green, yellow and purple, orange and blue. Opposites really attract.

  >>Triadic uses three colors from the color wheel which are equally spaced from each other. The primary colors when used together are considered triadic. Orange, green and violet are triadic colors.

3.EXPERIMENT

Don’t be afraid to experiment with colors. Try using various combinations and you might love the result of your designs. Just make sure that it looks pleasing to the eyes and it conveys the message you want to imply.

4.COLOR INTERACTION.

Consider how colors behave when they get together. There is a great tendency that it will look different when combined with another color. Colors may change in appearance depending on its surrounding.

5.READABILITY IN COMBINING COLORS. 

When you combine colors with type, make sure that the text is still readable. Choose colors that could emphasize and enhance type. Look into the values and saturation of colors. When you use colors whose value is near each other, the text becomes less visible and readable.Try experimenting which color can be best used for your type characters and for your backgrounds.

6.BASIC COLOR THEORIES ON HARMONY.

In making your designs, you would always want it to look pleasing. So we have to consider color harmony. In doing that, we merely have to know three theories according to A Guide to Top Color Combinations in Web Design: Examples of Color Schemes and Color Combinations Within Designs .

Two Colors Opposite of Each other on the Color Wheel are harmonious.

Any three Colors Equally Spaced Around the Color Wheel Forming a Triangle are harmonious.

Any Four Colors Forming a Rectangle, Each Opposite of Each other on the Color

7.COLOR TEMPERATURE.

The color wheel also shows color temperature. Color temperature could either be warm or cool. Colors on the red side of the wheel are warm while those on the green side are cool. But color temperature is relative. Red can be warmer or cooler sometimes. The use of color temperature also helps us determine the position of an object. Warm colors are said to make objects appear nearer while cool colors makes an object look farther.

8.COLOR PSYCHOLOGY OR COLOR MEANING.

Every color that we use have its own meaning and would manifest the effect on such designs to those looking at it. It is also important for you to know what the different colors mean. Below are a few adjectives that tells us what each color symbolizes as defined inColor Symbolism,Color and Personality, Gemstone Color & Meaning . You may check the site for you to have a more in depth understanding of color meanings.

Red symbolizes: action, confidence, courage, vitality

Blue symbolizes: youth, spirituality, truth, peace

Yellow symbolizes: wisdom, joy, happiness, intellectual energy

Pink symbolizes: love, beauty

Brown symbolizes: earth, order, convention

Orange symbolizes: vitality with endurance

Gold symbolizes: Wealth, prosperity, wisdom

Green symbolizes: life, nature, fertility, well being

Purple symbolizes: Royalty, magic, mystery

Indigo symbolizes: intuition, meditation, deep contemplation

White symbolizes: Purity, Cleanliness

Black symbolizes: Death, earth, stability

Gray symbolizes: Sorrow, security, maturity

9.CHOOSING COLORS FOR NEGATIVE SPACES.

For negative spaces, we have to use colors that could enhance graphics, text and other elements. Make sure that it doesn’t take over your design. Most of the time, lighter and cooler colors are used for negative spaces but it still depends on the artists. What’s important is the proper use of color combination knowing that colors look different depending on the surroundings.

10.COLOR CONCEPTS AND TERMINOLOGY.

In using colors,it is also imperative for artists and designers to know the different terms used to avoid confusion.Here are color terminologies from Color Theory For Designers, Part 2: Understanding Concepts And Terminology By Cameron Chapman. We have shortened the meanings of the terms but you can find more comprehensive meanings on Chapman’s article..

Also, you may want to read Elements of Design: Value and Color where some Color terms are also defined.

**Hue is color (blue, green, red, etc.).

**Chroma is the purity of a color (a high chroma has no added black, white or gray).

**Saturation refers to how strong or weak a color is (high saturation being strong).

**Value refers to how light or dark a color is (light having a high value).

**Tones are created by adding gray to a color, making it duller than the original.

**Shades are created by adding black to a color, making it darker than the original.

**Tints are created by adding white to a color, making it lighter than the original.

11.COLOR PRIMERS.

Color primers are important things for a graphic designer to know. With this knowledge, you’ll find the right color primer to use in your designs. Here are the color primers as defined by Digital Concepts for Business, Inc.

>>CMYK color is related to print work and describes how the colors Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black are combined. It is a subtractive process unlike how we view color on a computer monitor. So when a designer works on your project and works with a 4 color process they are working with colors that can be represented by % of their individual CMYK components.

>>The RGB color space is capable of producing many more colors than the process (CMYK) color space. The most important thing to get out of this is that colors that are in the CMYK spectrum may not be accurately displayed on a monitor, meaning you may see a difference in the colors between your monitor and what is printed. Before you get a job printed you should always view a realist proof from your printer.

>>Pantone PMS Colors or Spot colors are solid colors that you can specify – mostly used on logos or added to 4 color jobs to bring out a vibrant or color that cannot be produced with a CMYK process. Most logos are designed using 2 colors, the problem is that if you go to print the logo in a 4 color process the color will shift and may not match. If you are printing you brochures or catalogs in 4 colors and you want your logo to match your 2 color business cards you might be in for a surprise.

We just had a small trip in the world of colors and we surely learned a lot. So, if you were so occupied making lots of projects and have forgotten the basics of colors, this may help you refresh your mind about it. We hope that this article could help you in choosing the right color for your designs and whatever art works you are working on. Have a colorful day ahead!

source: http://naldzgraphics.net/

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