Design and Development of English Learning Facebook Application based on Platform as a Service (PaaS) by using Smart Gamification

Social networking sites like Facebook are not just an element of passing time but a platform for learning as well. The goal of this paper is to show the effectiveness of a Facebook application named 201C;Wishdom201D; to teach English language based on cloud platform. This application tries to introduce English language in an authentic and communicative manner to the students, where they have to assume different roles (i.e. avatar) to achieve a particular goal. For that purpose they communicate with the other avatar and participate in several quizzes. This study shows the performance of a group of students who played 201C;Wishdom201D; game and take a quiz as a part of their assessment. Their performance has been presented to show their success rate in learning English. The performance of the application is also measured based on Facebook Graph API. In addition, platform as a service (PaaS) of cloud computing from Heroku has been integrated to host the application and its compatibility is checked in this study

Estimation of RFID Tag Population Size by Gaussian Estimator

Radio Frequency IDenti cation (RFID) systems are prevalent in all sorts of daily life endeavors. In this thesis we propose a new method to estimate RFID tag population size. We have named our algorithm Gaussian Estimation of RFID Tags, namely, GERT. We present GERT under both {0,1} and {0,1,e} channel models, and in both cases the estimator we use is a well justi ed Gaussian random variable for large enough frame size based on Central Limit Theorem for triangular arrays. The most prominent feature of GERT is the quality with which it estimates a tag population size. We support all the required approximations with detailed analytical work and account for all the approximation errors when we consider the overall quality of the estimation. Our simulation results agree well with analytical ones. GERT, based on standardized frame slotted Aloha protocol, can estimate any tag population size with desired level of accuracy using fewer number of frame slots than previously proposed algorithms

Do Muslims have equal right to free speech?

The right to free speech is perhaps a suspect virtue. In other words, writers and commentators may have the right to say what they want and artists, to express what they think or feel curious about. But they are morally obligated to maintain some degree of checks and self-censorship, and consider the socio-religious values and conventional morality that people cherish in a given cultural setting. A book or an artistic piece that insults people’s long-held views, beliefs, convictions and cultural practices and thus can potentially incite violent street demonstrations and can cause death/s is perhaps better not to be produced at all. Perhaps, the debate, whether or not freedom of expression is absolute, may remain a contentious issue for a long time. However, it is almost certain now that Muslims are currently the primary victims of a conceivable hypocrisy in the free speech discourse. While Muslim societies are maligned for a perceived lack of freedom of expression, Muslims do not have equal right to freedom of expression

Literary tourism: exploring Charles Dickens’ Rochester

Among all the places that inspired Dickens’ work, Rochester High Street is perhaps the most remarkable for the intensity of its association with the novelist. Fortunately, modernisation has not been able to encroach upon High Street to eliminate the pristine nature of Dickensian memorabilia, as buildings in the area largely remain as they were during Dickens’ time. Walking on High Street gives the look and feel of Dickens’ world

An Islamic reading of Thomas Gray’s “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard”

Perhaps, the earliest literary scholar to significantly discuss the issue of looking at English literature from an Islamic perspective is Syed Ali Ashraf (1925 – 1998). His “Islamic Principles and Methods in the Teaching of Literature” (1978) is a foundational work that discusses the place of literature in a total Islamic worldview. He talks about the fundamental moral responsibility of man on earth and looks at literature from that perspective. He argues that, being human production, literature as a whole cannot be completely good and completely bad, stating: “No human activity is entirely good or entirely bad because only God is absolutely good and Satan is absolutely bad” (1978: 52). Therefore, when approaching a text, practitioners of literary studies should bear in mind that some ideas it transmits can be acceptable in Islam, while some others cannot. Given this conceptual premise, this study will look at Thomas Gray’s “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard” (1751) from Islamic perspectives and will seek to identify common grounds and differentiations between Islamic teachings and Gray’s ideas as expressed in the poem

How muslims trivialize the Qur'an

The physical desecration of the Qur’an is a grave sin, but trivializing it is also a serious offence. Muslims certainly do not disrespect their holy book tangibly and physically. Their obvious reverence to the scripture and extreme caution when handling it are paradigmatic, as most of them wrap and place it on a raised surface in the house or in places of worship. However, they manifest, perhaps unaware, their conceptual irreverence for the sacred book in two ways: using it for lesser purposes and splitting it into pieces, which may amount to trivializing it

The bluestocking salons of eighteenth-century Britain

While pre-eighteenth-century British women writers mingled among acquaintances in what Margaret Ezell terms “coterie circles”, bluestocking women made one step ahead. They enjoyed a greater space and their gender-neutral gatherings placed them on a complementary equivalence with men in literary discussions. Emphasizing this aspect of bluestocking intellectual life, Bridget Hill, in Eighteenth-century Women: An Anthology, states that bluestocking women “not only insisted on their ability to converse on equal terms with men, but in their salons demonstrated such ability and received public recognition for their intellectual attainments and their conversational wit.

Intimate revelations: conversations among “evil” women in Rokeya’s Padmarag

Rokeya creatively demonstrates in Padmarag (1924) the socially embedded association of women with evil. She brings together a group of women on the premises of Tarini Bhaban in order to explore their psychological terrain, as they share with each other previously untold memories and document their experiences of patriarchal oppression and domestic abuse. Through their reminiscences and memories, Rokeya lays bare the angst of women in a patriarchal social order that silences and suppresses them. Beyond the premise of sisterhood at Tarini Bhaban, in one way or another, most of these women are considered “evil” in society as a whole. For example, Saudamini is a stepmother with no biological children of her own and is regarded as a dakini (witch) and rakshasi (a female demon). Other women of Tarini Bhaban have received comparable tags from society and experienced similar victimization. Based on the representation of “evil” women in the novel, in this article I will discuss their stories and examine some of the contributing factors to their victimization and characterization as wicked in the context of early twentieth-century Bengal

Ban smoking during Ramadan

REMEMBER once, as I was about to enter a mosque in Penang, I saw the imam smoking hurriedly before he walked in to lead the Zohor prayer. At a masjid in Kuala Lumpur, as I stood in a saf (prayer row) to perform the solat, a smoker stood beside me. I suspected that, like the imam in Penang, this man also had a few puffs before entering the masjid as I could detect the strong cigarette odour. I was irritated and distracted by the smell permeating from him. It was difficult to concentrate. I encounter this often at other masjid. Once, I saw a man in uniform on a motorbike having a puff before riding away. Another incident was when I was at a clinic and could smell smoke from the counter employee. Don’t get me started on public toilets because some smell strongly of smoke despite no smoking signs. I have seen fathers smoking in family cars, exposing family members to secondhand smoke. I have seen teens smoking secretly at school compounds or toilets

Feminism as Islamophobia: a review of misogyny charges against Islam

One important feature of Islamophobia is to caricature Islam as misogynistic and oppressive to women and thus to advance imperialist hegemony. This “gendered Islamophobia” stigmatizes the religion even though, compared to other world religions, its treatment of women is arguably preferable and more enlightened. Historically, one treasonous use of feminism has been to misappropriate it in order to serve colonial interests and support imperialist wars of occupation that repress subjugated people including women and children. This article argues that ignorance about, and prejudice against, Islam contribute to portraying it as a misogynistic creed. Wrong notions of Islam lead many feminists in Muslim societies to denigrate Islamic teachings and borrow Western ideas to advance women’s causes. Lampooning Islam and replicating Western feminist ideas in Muslim lands have served neither women nor feminism. Such feminist tendencies rather give a bad name to the women’s rights movement and fuel controversy, anger and resentment among Muslims