El juego de las diferencias. Compara estas dos figuras publicadas el 13 de marzo y el 19 de noviembre de 2009 por las colaboraciones CDF y DZERO del Fermilab con lo más reciente sobre los límites de exclusión de la masa del bosón de Higgs. La nueva tiene más luminosidad, 5.4 comparado con 4.2. La región de exclusión de masas entre 160 y 170 GeV se ha reducido, ahora sólo entre 163 y 166, ambas al 95% de límite de confianza. ¿Cómo es posible que el límite de exclusión se haya reducido? Los nuevos resultados nos indican que la evidencia para dicha exclusión era debida a una fluctuación aleatoria en los datos que ha sido “corregida” tras 6 meses de nuevas colisiones. Esto pasa a veces. Un intervalo de confianza del 95% deja libre un 5% para que pasen cosas como ésta. Nos lo cuentan en muchos foros, como no, Tommaso Dorigo, “New Tevatron Higgs Limits Got Worse, But The 115 GeV Excess Is Growing!,” Quantum Diaries Survivor, November 19th 2009, y Peter Woit, “Higgs Escapes Part of Exclusion Region,” Not Even Wrong, November 19th, 2009.

Por supuesto, los interesados en las fuentes originales y en los detalles técnicos pueden recurrir al informe original de marzo, The TEVNPH Working Group for the CDF and DZERO Collaborations, “Combined CDF and DZERO Upper Limits on Standard Model Higgs-Boson Production with up to 4.2 fb^-1 of Data,” March 13, 2009, y al nuevo informe, The TEVNPH Working Group for the CDF and DZERO Collaborations, “Combined CDF and D0 Upper Limits on Standard Model Higgs-Boson Production with 2.1 – 5.4 fb^-1 of Data,” November 19, 2009.

Sigamos jugando al juego de las diferencias. Compara estas dos figuras publicadas el 13 de marzo y el 19 de noviembre con los intervalos de máxima verosimilitud para la hipótesis de la observación de un bosón de Higgs en los datos del Tevatrón (Run II). Observa atentamente la curva negra continua en la figura de la derecha alrededor de 115 GeV y hasta 140 GeV. La línea se encuentra en la zona amarilla (desviaciones de 2 sigma) y por debajo de la línea roja, lo que se esperaría para eventos debidos a la suma del fondo (background, B) y de la señal de un Higgs del Modelo Estándar (S). No es una evidencia grande, pero indica que hay más eventos tipo Higgs de los esperados en la señal de fondo en dicho rango. Casi 2 sigma para un Higgs con una masa de 115 GeV y más de 1.5 para uno entre 135 y 140 GeV. Esto son buenas noticias, ya que mejora la evidencia de un Higgs poco masivo observada en el LEP2, que fue sólo de 1.7 sigma para una masa de unos 115 GeV. Ahora el Tevatrón nos ofrece una evidencia más fuerte en la misma región de masas.

Buenas noticias, sin lugar a dudas. Espero que te hayas divertido jugando al juego de las diferencias. Nuevos resultados se publicarán de nuevo, espero, en marzo de 2009. Habrá que estar al tanto…

Libnanews

La présidence de la République a signé le décret de la formation du premier gouvernement Saad Hariri, mettant fin à la crise politique que traversait le Liban depuis les élections législatives de juin 2009, le précédent gouvernement Saniora II se chargeant de l’expédition des affaires courantes.

Le secrétaire général de la présidence du Conseil Souheil Bouji a annoncé les noms des ministres du gouvernement d’union nationale présidé par le Premier ministre Saad Hariri :

Le ministère de la Défense et vice-Premier ministre : Elias Murr, Présidence, Grec Orthodoxe.

Le ministère de l ’Intérieur et des Affaires Municipales : Ziad Baroud, Présidence, Maronite.

Le ministère de l’Agriculture : Hussein Hajj Hassan, Opposition, Hezbollah, Chiite.

Le ministère de la Culture : Selim Wardé, Majorité, FL, Grec orthodoxe.

Le ministère  de l’Economie et du Commerce : Mohamed Safadi, Majorité, Bloc de Tripoli, Sunnite.

Le ministère de l’Education  Nationale : Hassan Mneymné, Majorité, Courant du Futur, Sunnite.

Le ministère des Ressources Hydrauliques et Electriques : Gebran Bassil, Opposition, CPL, Maronite.

Le ministère de l ’Environnement : Mohamed Rahal, Majorité, Courant du Futur, Sunnite.

Le ministère des Finances : Raya Haffar, Majorité, Courant du Futur, Sunnite.

Le ministère des Affaires étrangères : Ali Chami, Opposition, Amal, Chiite.

Le ministère des Emigrés : Akram Chehayeb, Majorité, PSP, Druze.

Le ministère de l ’Industrie : Abraham Dadayan, Opposition, Tachnag, Arménien Orthodoxe.

Le ministère de la Justice : Ibrahim Najjar, Majorité, FL, Grec Orthodoxe.

Le ministère du Travail : Boutros Harb, Majorité, 14 mars, Maronite.

Le ministère de l ’Information : Tarek Mitri, Majorité, Courant du Futur, Grec Orthodoxe.

Le ministère des Télécommunications : Charbel Nahhas, Opposition, CPL, Grec Catholique.

Le ministère de la Santé : Mohamed Jawad Khalifé, Opposition, Amal, Chiite.

Le ministère des Travaux publics et des transports : Ghazi Aridi, Majorité, PSP, Druze.

Le ministère des Affaires Sociales : Selim Sayegh, Majorité, Kataëb, Maronite.

Le ministère du Tourisme : Fadi Abboud, Opposition, CPL, Maronite.

Le ministère de la Jeunesse et des Sports : Ali Abdallah, Opposition, Amal, Chiite.

Le ministère d’état pour la Réforme administrative : Mohamed Fneish, Opposition, Hezbollah, Chiite.

Ministre d’états :
Waël Bou Faour, Majorité, PSP, Druze.

Mona Ofeich, Majorité, Courant du Futur, Sunnite.

Adnane Kassar, Présidence, Sunnite.

Adnane El-Sayed Hassan, Présidence, Chiite.

Youssef Saadé, Opposition, Marada, Maronite.

Fra due ore siederò in Consiglio di Facoltà. All’ordine del giorno l’approvazione del bilancio preventivo per il prossimo anno. Una settimana fa, ricevevo questa risposta in merito alla possibilità di dedicare un punto dell’ordine del giorno alla discussione circa il DDL Gelmini: “Ma no, è solo un DDL”. Parallelamente la professoressa De Francesco, prorettrice alla didattica, ha gentilmente invitato i presidenti dei corsi di laurea ad adeguarsi alle disposizioni della nota ministeriale 160, in cui la Gelmini inasprisce i requisiti riguardanti il numero di docenti necessari per l’attivazione dei corsi. Questo è puro assoggettamento. In via informale, presidi e presidenti minacciano di non approvare il bilancio preventivo se non vedranno corrisposto loro un finanziamento di entità pari ad almeno il 90% di quello ottenuto per l’anno precedente. In cambio, dicono, si presenteranno ben disposti ed aperti al dialogo in materia delle nuove regole di governance universitaria. Questo è puro mercantilismo.

Nel clima utilitaristico in cui versano le componenti del Consiglio di Facoltà tutti gli occhi saranno puntati sulla destinazione finale di ogni singolo centesimo. Tutto il resto resterà immerso in un gelido black-out. A nome del Collettivo, prenderò parola. Dirò che questo silenzio rappresenta il primo passo verso la costruzione di una Università privatizzata, che questa è la messa in vendita del diritto fondamentale allo studio e alla realizzazione delle persone in quanto tali. Vorrei solo che tutte le facce silenziose abbandonassero ogni tipo di ipocrisia e dichiarassero di essere del tutto coscienti e solidali con questo progetto di smantellamento dell’Università pubblica. Credo siano del tutto sordi, incapaci di riconoscere il peso dei loro silenzi.

Introduction:

The IP Multimedia subsystem provides a well defined and streamlined architecture for charging multimedia calls and services. The IMS network elements interface to the charging platform over the DIAMETER protocol to enable both pre-paid and post-paid charging.

Architectural Overview of IMS Charging:

The IMS charging platform is sub-divided into two major components:

1. The Charging Data Function (CDF).

2. The Online Charging System (OCS).

The CDF is responsible for receiving triggers for offline (post-paid) charging, while the OCS  is responsible for receiving pre-paid charging triggers. The CDF supports the Rf DIAMETER application, while the OCS supports the Ro DIAMETER application interface.

The Charging Detail Records (CDRs) are collected and co-related at the Charging Gateway Function (CGF). The CGF acts as a gateway to the Billing System, which performs mediation duties.

Scalability Challenges:

In the IMS architecture, the P-CSCF, S-CSCF, SIP-application servers, MRF ,MGCF,BGCF and the I-BCF all need to support the offline charging application interface (Rf interface). This means, that they all act as charging clients (CTF) in case of post-paid scenarios and send triggers to the CDF.

The S-CSCF, the MRF and SIP Application servers support the online charging interface towards the OCS. The IMS Gateway function facilitates the online charging functionality in the IMS architecture by acting as a SIP AS.

A quick look at this architectural challenge, presents us with a nearly all connected architecture for the CDF (it interfaces with almost all network elements for postpaid charging). This means, that the CDF acts as a multiplexer of incoming DIAMETER commands.



Even for a simple IMS call, the CDF will receive triggers from the P-CSCF and the S-CSCF. If there is an application server involvement (Eg: Supplementary services) in the call flow, it will receive a trigger from that AS as well. If an I-BCF is present in the network, and the call needs to be terminated in another IMS domain, the I-BCF will also send a trigger to the CDF. This is a very practical scenario, as almost all IMS customers will subscribe to at least one supplementary service and every IMS core network is expected to have border control and peering functions for security (I-BCF acting as an entry and exit point to the network).

This translates into four DIAMETER transactions for the CDF for a single IMS transaction. A single IMS call initiated by an INVITE may have multiple chargeable transactions involved (those for UPDATEs, RE-INVITEs and finally for BYE).

The OCS interfaces with only the S-CSCF, the MRFC and SIP application servers. Hence it is expected to be less loaded as compared to the CDF as shown below:

Scalability Requirements Quantified:

Let us take an example of one IMS call for the sake of calculation. A reasonable load of 100 calls per second is assumed in the calculations.

We will only consider “chargeable” transactions i.e. transactions for whom a DIAMETER trigger will be sent to the CDF. A single call can have an INVITE transaction, an UPDATE transaction, a RE-INVITE transaction (assuming there was only 1 re-invite in the call) and finally a BYE transaction. Thus, we have 4 “chargeable” transactions. For each transaction, a DIAMETER ACR/ACA exchange takes place between each network node and the CDF.

Even for a reasonable load of 100 calls per second on the IMS core, the DIAMETER transactions for the CDF will need to scale up to 1600 TPS. This provides us with a 1:16 scalability requirement for the Charging Data Function.

For the Online Charging System, only the S-CSCF (through the IMS GWF), SIP application servers (if any in the call path) and the MRFC send charging triggers.

For the sake of calculation, if we have one application server in the path of an IMS call, then a single IMS transaction will result in 2 DIAMETER transactions on the Ro interface. Taking the above assumptions, where a single call has 4 “chargeable” transactions, and a moderate load of 100 cps, the OCS requires to support 800 TPS. This provides us with a 1:8 scalability requirement for the Online Charging System.

The scalability factor requirement for both the CDF and OCS is considerable. In case of the OCS, the response time of the CCR will also affect the call setup latency, as the calls to CCR are synchronous. Unless a CCA is received, the SIP signaling is not put through.

Other considerations to plan for scalability:

In view of the above scalability requirements, we can now plan further on the nature of the deployment architecture of the CDF and the OCS.  Even though the scalability requirements for the OCS may seem to be half (800 TPS) of what is projected for the CDF (1600 TPS) , but the complexity of the OCS is much more as compared to the CDF. The online charging system has many internal modules responsible for real-time rate determination, calculation of the units to be debited and account balance management. Moreover, these modules need to be invoked for each IMS call. The OCS also needs to support time based and content based charging paradigms. This means, that the OCS node is a mission-critical and real-time charging engine. Apart from real-time traffic, non-real time traffic such as pre-paid balance inquiries, pre-paid recharging etc also need to be handled at the OCS (either through an IVR or a SMS based mechanism).

On the other hand, the CDF is responsible for creating and dumping the CDR files. There is no real time rate determination or account balance management involved. The raw CDRs are transported to the billing system (BSS) over FTP, where the itemized billing and mediation takes place.

Deployment planning and possible scenarios:

In view of these architectural discrepancies and varying levels of complexities between the CDF and the OCS, it is clear that there needs to be an architectural separation between the OCS and CDF for deployment. This means, that we have to deploy both nodes independently on dedicated machines and possibly in their own independent clusters.

Let us consider a single IMS domain. A single IMS domain will consist of its own S-CSCF, P-CSCF, SIP application servers (as needed), MRF, I-BCF(or a comparable SBC) and the charging platform (consisting of the OCS and the CDF).

For greater scalability, it is proposed to have a dedicated cluster for each charging entity. The OCS application should have its own cluster and so should the CDF. Both the OCS and CDF may share the same gateway (CGF) to interface to the Billing domain. The clusters should have a DIAMETER load balancer (for the Ro and Rf applications) installed to distribute load amongst the cluster instances.

For hardware configuration, the cluster members may reside on the same machine (for smaller deployments) and on a hardware pair (active-standby) to achieve hardware redundancy. Usually, for carrier grade deployments, hardware redundancy is a necessity.

Discussed below are certain deployment configurations of the OCS and the CDF for varying load requirements. The deployment architectural choices shown below also consider hardware redundancy.

NOTE: “Servers” may vary from case to case. You may go for a T-1000, T-2000 or a higher end SUN server. You may also go for a “cheaper” option by using HP servers (8 cores and 16 GB RAM). For large-scale carrier grade deployments, an ATCA is a must (12 blades and above).

Deployment for up to 1 million BHCA (approx 270 CPS):

270 CPS is assumed to be the call rate of SIP signaling during peak load. This is the most common deployment scenario considered in telecom and usually serves as a benchmark.

For IMS deployments for up to 270 CPS, we can have multiple options. We may go for a HP server pair configured as follows:

a) Server-1 has CDF active and OCS as stand-by.

b) Server-2 has CDF stand-by and OCS as active.

This simple deployment will provide us with software and hardware redundancy, while also providing dedicated 8 core servers for each charging application (OCS and CDF).

Software redundancy can be performed by providing 2 independent processes of the CDF and OCS on each server (active) and 2 more processes of the CDF and OCS (for stand-by). A software load balancer may be used for distributing this load amongst the OCS and CDF processes.

This is called a 1+1 active-standby configuration. Each active instance of the CDF is expected to handle up to 4320 TPS at peak load. Each active instance of the OCS is expected to handle up to 2160 TPS at peak load.

This deployment scenario is shown below. The red-arrows depict change-over in case of hardware failure. Software fault tolerance is taken care of by switching between the software instances of the OCS and the CDF by using a software load balancer.

Each server may host multiple software processes for the CDF and the OCS. Each process can be a full CDF/OCS application in its own right. The load balancer may also be deployed in an active-standby configuration similar to the CDF and the OCS. The CDF and OCS active processes may be more in number, based on the scalability requirements. Each new process of the OCS or the CDF may be instantiated using a CLI or over SNMP, when the element management systems get an alarm of possible overload or traffic peaks.

This  kind of a deployment architecture is shown below:

Other interfaces for this deployment can be a command line interface (CLI) for polling the system and performing administrative tasks. Other interfaces will be over SNMP to the northbound management systems for monitoring the system health and servicing alarms.

Other possibilities:

In case of higher loads, the system can switch to a 1+1 Active-Active configuration, where all software processes of the CDF and the OCS are accepting DIAMETER requests. The load balancer will handle the distribution of the requests amongst the processes. In case the capacity is still not sufficient, new application processes of the CDF and the OCS can be started by firing the appropriate CLI command to scale horizontally.

For deployments for over 1 million BHCA, as shown earlier, the load on the charging platform will be even higher. For catering to such traffic, a time will come when the system needs to scale out. We may require a server pair for the CDF and the OCS dedicatedly.

Another interim option is to have all active CDF processes on one machine and all active OCS process on another machine and horizontally scale by increasing the number of processes.

Conclusion:

This post was an attempt to quantify the challenges at hand for scaling the Charging platform in the conetxt of IMS. As seen, the requirements for scalability for the charging platform is more challenging than the other core network nodes. The scalability factors increase almost exponentially as the load on the IMS core increases. Hence, a robust scalability architecture needs to be devised for catering to the same.

I forget that some home buyers are unaware that I can help them with their NEW home purchase from a builder. That’s only if they don’t register or give their names to the sales people prior to my being able to register them with the builder. One of many reasons you would want to do that is I can help with any misleading sales lingo.

I had a gentleman tell me recently that he was so lucky to have found a new home in Perris without Mello Roos. He asked up front if there was any Mello Roos and the sales person said no. So he signed all the paperwork.

Lot’s of people are looking for homes without Mello Roos these days so I thought I would check it out. What I found was that he was being charged $2,400 a year in CFD’s aka Mello Roos. That NEW home builder knew what he meant when he asked about the Mello Roos. He wanted to know if he was going to be paying anything extra over the next several years. They looked him straight in the eye and said NO, THERE’S NO MELLO ROOS CHARGES ON THESE HOMES, which one would you like?

Yes, the CFD’s were in the fine print. Yes, he should have read it and known what he was signing. I think they did mention the CFD’s but they implied that it was just the same “taxes” that everyone was paying. I assure you that everyone in Riverside County and the City of Perris is not paying these DFD charges. As sales professionals they should have made sure that he was very aware of the CFD’s since he specifically asked about the Mello Roos. Apparently they legally do not have the fiduciary duty of utmost care, integrity, honesty, and loyalty that I do.

• The Mello Roos/CFD’s/Special Taxes may not be the same as the builder next door or down the street.
• Some NEW homes don’t have any.
• Some have one and some have four or more.
• Some of the CFD’s have an option to renew after they are due to expire.
• Some are for hundreds of dollars and some are for thousands of dollars.

CFD’s are not a bad thing but they are an important thing to know about before you sign the bottom line.

CFD stands for Community Facilities District. Not exactly the same as Mello Roos but essentially the same thing. They are an annual charge passed on via your property tax bill for charges that the builder did not pay for up front.

Call Me and I Can Help You With Your NEW Home Purchase – 951-780-7225

The International Budget Partnership posted a short documentary on creating awareness of the Kenyan Constituency Development Fund (CDF) and how it’s spent. Essentially, CDFs provide members of parliament (MPs) a fund to spend on development of their constituency (i.e. schools, clinics, etc.). A local activist organization, Muslims for Human Rights (MUHURI) is prominently featured as the group organizing and training citizens to research how the CDF is being spent and ask questions when there are discrepancies.

H/T: Owen Barder.

For those who want to learn more about the CDF in Kenya, there’s a decent introduction in this brief paper by a [Kenyan] economist at the University of Connecticut. The American Political Science Review recently featured an article [older, ungated version here] that used CDF data from India to measure the influence of voter attachment to parties on legislator effort, and ultimately, policy outcomes.

Chile en el Mundial Parte 02: ¿Buen o mal presentimiento?

Por Paulo Sandoval

Huy… quizás el mundo se acaba. Chile va al mundial jugando bien, y realmente bien, con cabros jóvenes y habilidosos como nunca antes hemos visto, con una gerencia increíblemente efectiva y seria, aparte, junto a un grupo técnico de primer nivel.

“Todo bien”, “todo muy bien” cosa que en nuestro país no pasa, y estamos contentos y alegres, por que a pesar que nadie lo dice, por dentro de nuestras formas hay un sentimiento nuevo, casi irreconocible, ese sentimiento que es capaz de aniquilar cualquier adversidad, algo que nos dice vamos a ganar, y no sólo un partido.

Así que celebremos hasta que se nos olvide el porque estamos celebrando, gritemos al mundo un “Viva Chile” y tomemos, total hoy y mañana habrá cueca en casa. Compren televisores ultra definición si es que los venden, o compren esos pasajes que los harán endeudar hasta viejos, disfruten hueones disfruten, por que si pasa lo que yo creo, “el mundo se termina”; así sin más, se termina la wea, cataplum, pasamos a mejor vida. Cae un meteorito o los marcianos junto a los reptilianos se encargan de aniquilarnos a todos, o el mundo se enoja por tanta tontera y una ola nos liquida a todos.

Así que a celebrar, a celebrar, que el mundo se va acabar, por que cuando Bravo, nuestro capitán, esté levantando la copa del mundo, todos nos vamos a la mierda, y ningún tontito se salvará, aunque diga que “curao no vale”.  Sí, tal vez salgamos campeones del mundo, si las demás selecciones están jugando re mal, y estos cabros van para arriba y a tranco largo. Así que hueoncitos carreteen no más, que es muy posible que tengamos sentencia de muerte. Ahora a mí no me molestaría morir después de ver campeón a Chilito, lo único que debo carretear harto hasta esa fecha para no arrepentirme después, si es que hay algo después, aun así es una pena por el resto de los otros países; pero bueno todos sabíamos que algo así podía pasar, así que no se quejen hueones malos pa la pelota.

Revisa  CHILE EN EL MUNDIAL PARTE 01

RELATO GOLES CHILENOS  (Chile – Colombia) Y FINAL DEL PARTIDO POR ERNESTO DÍAZ CORREA (Radio Cooperativa)