Nust Launches Pakistan’s Fastest Supercomputer

National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST) inaugurated its fastest supercomputing facility in a ceremony held on Tuesday at its Research Centre for Modeling and Simulation (RCMS).

The supercomputer installed in NUST is the fastest GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) based parallel computing system operating in any organization/academic institution in Pakistan till date.

The supercomputer can perform parallel computation at a peak speed of 132 Teraflops (132 Trillion Operations per second).  It is equipped with multi-core processors and graphics co-processors with inter-processor communication speed of 40 Gbps.

Techinical Specifications:

• Computer’s Cluster configuration:
  • 66 NODE supercomputer with 30,992 processor cores
  • 2 Head Node (16 Processor Cores)
  • 32 Dual Quad Core Computer Nodes (256 Processor Cores)
  • 32 Nvidia Computing Processors
  • Each processor has 960 Processor Cores (30,720 processor Cores)
• QDR Infiniband Interconnection
• 21.6TB SAN storage

Imaginational ceremony was presided over by Chairman Higher Education Commission (HEC) Dr Javaid Laghari.

Speaking at the ceremony, Principal RCMS Engr Sikandar Hayat highlighted some of the unique features of this state-of-the-art computing facility recently acquired by Nust through financial grant by Ministry of Science and Technology (MoST).

Hayat said that besides the supercomputer’s extensive utilisation in the computation-intensive research projects in the areas of Fluid Dynamics and Biosciences, this massively parallel facility can also be utilized to handle huge data processing applications of social sciences such as Flood and Weather Forecasting, Oil and Gas Exploration, energy efficient building designs and national transportation management.

Addressing the event, Laghari appreciated the efforts of the entire team associated with the project and encouraged all institutions to come forward and benefit from the facility acquired by Nust. He assured HEC’s full support in this regard.

Rector Nust Engr Muhammad Asghar, in his welcome address, sharing his vision, specifically mentioned that the acquisition of the supercomputing facility would be a source of inspiration for PhD scholars, abroad, to return to Pakistan.

“This will give an impetus for collaborative research between universities and other research organisations within the country and abroad.”

Dr Imran Akhtar, the key note speaker, gave a highly motivating and thought provoking speech on the occasion, encouraging young researchers to come forward and utilize the facility in solving national challenges in the areas of engineering, bio-informatics, political science, psychology and social sciences.

Meezan Bank giving Dell Laptops at installments

Meezan Bank, which was awarded the best Islamic bank in Pakistan in 2011, is now planning to provide consumer finance to DELL brand of laptops.

After the announcement of bank’s plan to start 25 new branches in March, Meezan Bank has now joined hands with M/s Unique Technologies for financing of Dell Laptops.

A statement issued by the bank said that this financing of laptops will be materialized through Meezan Bank’s Laptop financing product – Laptop Ease.

It said that in this regard an MOU was signed by Arif ul Islam, COO of Meezan Bank and Asif Bukhari, CEO of Unique Technology here at Meezan Bank Head Office. Shahzad Aslam Khan, Country Head Dell and Naveed Siraj, Country Head Intel were also present on the occasion.

The statement pointed out that Laptop Ease is a Riba Free financing product based on the concept of `Musawamah’ whereby Meezan Bank provides financing for purchase of laptops at easy installments payable over 3 to 24 months.

Muhammad Raza, Head of Consumer Banking and Marketing at Meezan Bank said that the Laptop Ease product was launched in April last year.

It should be noted that last year Meezan Bank signed similar agreement with M/s New Horizon but that was not particular for any brand.

Salient Feature of Laptop Ease

• Easy Installment options for financing period for 3 to 24 months.
• 2 years warranty with parts provided by vendor.
• Free Carrying Case will be provided by vendor.
• Absolutely Free Takaful Coverage. All laptops acquired through Meezan Laptop Ease will be covered by Takaful (Islamic Insurance) before delivery to the customers
• Complete surety and peace of mind that purchased laptop is a genuine brand
• Laptop model offerings will vary from time to time in consistence with the latest & upgraded features and market demand.

More details on Meezan Bank’s laptop financing are available here:http://www.meezanbank.com/laptopfinancing.aspx

ICT R&D Scholarship Applications Deadline Extended upto March 16

National ICT R&D Fund fully funded scholarships for talented students is being offered and scholarship applications will be accepted till 5pm of March 16, 2012.

Students from urban and rural areas from all provinces could apply for scholarship program titled Prime Minister’s National ICT Scholarship Program (PM-NICTSP) for 4-year undergraduate program in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) related disciplines in the top ICT universities of Pakistan.

The Scholarship program is being extended to provide opportunity to students who could not benefit from it in Fall 2011 semester. For year 2011 (Extended Spring 2012) there will be no ICT Scholarship Award Test.

National ICT R&D Fund offers fully funded scholarships for talented students from rural/non-metropolitan areas of Pakistan with the objective to develop human resource capacity in ICT fields in Pakistan.

This program is run with the financial collaboration of Public Sector Development Program (PSDP) of Government of Pakistan.

Every year, the organization provide scholarship up to 600 students including all expenses that costs roughly Rs. 350 million to Rs. 400 million.

This year the modified scholarship program for the year 2011 will be conducted due to shortage of time. There will be no ICT Scholarship award test for the program of 2011. The aspiring students will apply for desiring universities of their choice, which is registered with ICT R&D.

Currently, following universities have provided their consent to participate in the National ICT Scholarship Program 2011.

• National University of Computer & Emerging Sciences (NU-FAST)
• University of Engineering & Technology, Lahore
• University of Engineering & Technology, Taxila
• University of Engineering & Technology, Peshawar
• Mehran University of Engineering & Technology, Jamshoro
• COMSATS Institute of Information Technology
• Institute of Business Administration, Karachi
• Institute of Business Administration, Sukkur
• International Islamic University, Islamabad
• Pakistan Institute of Engineering & Applied Sciences (PIEAS), Nilore, Islamabad
• Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan
• GC University, Lahore
• Hamdard University, Karachi
• The Islamia University of Bahawalpur
• GIK Institute of Science & Technology, Topi
• Balochistan University of IT, Engineering & Management Sciences
• Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS)
• Bahria University, Islamabad
• National University of Science & Technology (NUST)
• Punjab University College of Information Technology, Lahore

It is the responsibility of the interested students to stay informed about PM-NICTSP participating university selection criteria, entrance exam dates and take the entrance exams for selected universities on their own to be potentially eligible for the scholarship.

The application can be downloaded from this link http://www.ictrdf.org.pk/

School Student Sends PTA a List of 780,000 Adult Websites to Get Them Blocked... A Trend That Everyone Should Follow!

Ghazi Muhammad Abdullah, a fifteen year old school boy, has sent a list of 780,000 adult websites which he thinks should be blocked in accordance with Supreme Court’s orders but are still accessible to general internet users in Pakistan.

Abdullah told me that he has sent this list to PTA only because authority had asked him for a list of adult websites. He quotes an authority letter sent to him by Director General, Law and Regulations, as saying:

If there is any specific website that you wish to bring into the knowledge of PTA, it is requested that PTA may be informed of the same accordingly for further necessary action at our end.

Earlier, Abdullah had written letters to PTA, Ministry of Information Technology and Chief Justice of Pakistan to get adult websites blocked in Pakistan. After his repeated requests, and hack attempts on PTA and Supreme Court website PTA decided in principle to ban adult websites in Pakistan and issued directive for ISPs to block access to adult websites.

It was recently revealed that Pakistan ISPs have blocked 13,000 adult websites, while there are more still accessible, according to Abdullah.

Without detailing the criteria or selection process of adult websites, Abdullah, in an email, told me that he prepared this list of 780,000 adult websites with help of friends having expertise in computers. He wished not to disclose their names.

It merits mentioning here that Internet Service Providers Association of Pakistan is willing to block access to any number of websites, though they have concerns regarding the overhead involved in process. This is why they are advocating proposed national URL filtering system.

Pakistan Participated in APCERT Cyber Drill, It wasn't a Competition By the way

I am sure you must have read of this news recently, mainly on Facebook and blogs, claiming that Pakistani hackers won a hacking competition beating hackers hailing from 28 different countries. Well, that’s not true. There wasn't any competition at all, yes there was a Cyber Drill and it was related to Incident Response in which PISA (Pakistan Information Security Association) participated to represent Pakistan. Just to let you know, incident response is an organized approach to address and manage the aftermath of a security breach or attack (also known as an incident). Event was for Education purpose and to polish Incident Response practices to fight against Cyber Crimes. This event was organized by Asia Pacific Computer Emergency Response Team (APCERT). Participants were given some specific task, specifically designed to test Incident Response time, Methodology, Reporting, Accuracy and identification of incidents. In short there was a scenario in which confidential documents were stolen from a Company and was shared to public. All Teams had to response such Security Breaches according to International Standard. It merits mentioning here that Pakistani team participated in the event for the first time and successfully completed every task which was given to them. This is of course an achievement, which we all should share with others but without exaggerating it. Following is the official press release for the event: APCERT embarks on global coordination to mitigate advance persistent threats (Kuala Lumpur) – The Asia Pacific Computer Emergency Response Team (APCERT) today has successfully completed its annual drill to test the response capability of leading Computer Security Incident Response Teams (CSIRT) from Asia Pacific economies. For the first time, APCERT involved the participation from the Organization of the Islamic Cooperation – Computer Emergency Response Team (OIC-CERT) in the annual drill, following a Memorandum of Understanding on collaboration signed in September, 2011. The theme of the APCERT Drill 2012 is “Advance Persistent Threats and Global Coordination”. The objective is for participating teams to exercise incident response handling arrangements locally and internationally to mitigate the impact of advance persistent threats that involved large scale malicious software propagation and attacks capable of impairing the critical infrastructure and economic activities. This exercise reflected the strong collaboration amongst the economies, and it also enhanced the communication protocols, technical capabilities and quality of incident responses for assuring Internet security and safety. 22 CSIRT teams from 17 economies (Australia, Bangladesh, Brunei Darussalam, People’s Republic of China, Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Macao, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam) of APCERT and 3 CSIRT teams from 3 economies (Tunisia, Egypt and Pakistan) of OIC-CERT participated in the drill.

HEC Announces Ranking of Pakistani Universities

A statement issued by HEC said that the primary purpose of the ranking exercise is to share with the general public a comprehensive data on the key issues that determine the state of higher education in a particular institution.

The Higher Education Commission (HEC) has announced the ranking of Pakistani universities on the basis of quality teaching and research, during a press conference held yesterday.

Institutions established after December 2008 as well as distance education universities are excluded from the ranking lists.

Speaking on the occasion, Dr. Laghari, Chairperson HEC,  said that ranking is a quality indicator and this information will help shed light on key indicators of higher education institutions in Pakistan to allow students, parents, potential employers and all other stakeholders to make informed decisions regarding higher education institutions.

Ranking criteria for the universities include student intake as well as graduates produced at BS, MS and PhD levels, number of qualified faculty members, student-teacher ratio, quality of research produced and published in journals of international repute, physical and technological infrastructure, international collaborations, resource generation and sports facilities.

The universities have been ranked specifically by category/area of specialization to make it logical. The sector-wise sorting has not been done to provide equal reflection to both the public and private sector institutions. Universities can only be comparable within the assigned category, comparisons to be made among different categories based on the above list will not be logical.

Top 10 Universities in Pakistan:

1. Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad
2. Pakistan Institute of Engineering and Applied Sciences
3. Aga Khan University, Karachi
4. University of Agriculture, Faisalabad
5. University of The Punjab, Lahore
6. National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST)
7. Pir Mehr Ali Shah Arid Agriculture University
8. University of Health Sciences, Lahore
9. COMSATS Institute of Information Technology (CIIT)
10. Lahore University of Management Sciences, Lahore

Category wise Ranking:

Agriculture/Veterinary

1. University of Agriculture, Faisalabad
2. Pir Mehr Ali Shah Arid Agriculture University, Rawalpindi
3. University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Lahore
4. KPK Agriculture University, Peshawar
5. Sindh Agriculture University, Tandojam

Art & Design

1. National College of Arts, Lahore
2. Indus Valley School of Arts and Architecture, Karachi

Computer Sciences & IT

1. COMSAT Institute of Information Tech Islamabad
2. National University of Computer and Emerging Sciences , Islamabad
3. Qurtaba University D.I.Khan
4. Balochistan University of Information Technology and Management Sciences, Quetta
5. City University, Peshawar

Engineering & Technology

1. Pakistan Institute of Engineering and Applied Science, Islamabad
2. National University of Sciences and Technology, Islamabad
3. Ghulam Institute of Engineering and Technology , Swabi
4. University of Engineering and Technology , Taxila
5. Institute of Space Technology, Islamabad

Business Education

1. Lahore University of Management Sciences, Lahore
2. Institute of Business Administration, Karachi
3. Iqra University, Karachi
4. Sukkur Institute of Business Administration
5. National College of Business Administration & Economics, Lahore

Medical

1. Aga Khan University, Karachi
2. University of Health Sciences, Lahore
3. Dow University of Health Sciences, Karachi
4. Isra University, Hyderabad
5. Khyber Medical University, Peshawar

General Universities (Large)

1. University of the Punjab, Lahore
2. University of Karachi, Karachi
3. Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan
4. University of Peshawar, Peshawar
5. International Islamic University, Islamabad

General Universities (Other)

1. Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad
2. Government College University, Lahore
3. Gomal University, DI Khan
4. Kohat University of Science and Technology
5. The University of Azad Jammu & Kashmir

ICT R&D to Finance National URL Filtering and Blocking System a.k.a National Firewall

National ICT R&D Fund has asked for proposals from academia/research institutions, companies, organizations for the development, deployment and operation of a national level URL Filtering and Blocking System. This URL Filtering and Blocking system will work as a country firewall and will potentially be able to block the access of any URL, throughout the country. According to RFP (Request for Proposal), available at ICT R&D Fund website, system should be capable of URL filtering and blocking, from domain level to sub folder, file levels and file types – in addition to have ability of blocking a single IP or range of IPs. It said that solution should be able to handle bandwidth of 85Gbps, with scalability for 40-50 percent growth every year. You can view RFP here, and FAQs here. Pakistani authorities have long urged to have a country-level firewall in place to block specific URLs countrywide, such as those which are blasphemous in nature. PTA even asked for quotations for blocking system from international players – those who are offering services in UAE or KSA, but couldn’t buy the solution due to higher prices. Vendors in China were also contacted but deal didn’t go through with any of them. It merits mentioning here that PTA recently asked ISPs to block as many as thirteen thousand websites, which were of explicit in nature. Activists, on the other hands, fear that such firewall can be misused by the government for political and other obvious reasons. They demand that list of blocked websites should be made public, possibly through PTA website, detailing the blockade reason for each website.