All eyes on World Expo 2010 Shanghai China

It is about 2 years after China successfully organized the Olympics 2008 in Beijing, now all the eyes are attracted to China again with another worldwide event - Expo 2010 Shanghai China (中国2010年上海世界博览会).

With the theme of "Better City – Better Life", this Expo officially started today 1 May 2010, and will continue on for half a year until 31 October 2010. The venue is on both banks of the Huangpu River (黄浦江) in the city of Shanghai, covering a waterfront area of 5.28 kilometer square.

This Expo has made (or targetted to make) several world records, including:

• The 1st Expo held in a developing country.
• The largest world's fair site ever at 5.28 kilometer square.
• The most expensive Expo in the history of the world's fairs.
• The most participated Expo from 192 countries and 50 international organizations.
• Targetted for the largest crowd of visitors of more than 70 million people.
• The Expo Axis is the world largest membrane construction with a surface of 65,000 meter square in total.

There are 5 zones (from A to E) and 5 themed pavillions in Expo 2010, namely:

• Urbanian Pavilion
• Pavilion of City Being
• Pavilion of Urban Planet
• Pavilion of Footprint
• Pavilion of Future

The Expo logo is a Chinese character "世" (means "World") modified to projects the image of 3 people -- you, me and him/her -- throwing arms around each other.

The mascot of this Expo is named as HaiBao (海宝), which means the treasure of the sea. It is created from the Chinese character "人" which means "people".

To recap, the 1st Expo was held in The Crystal Palace in Hyde Park, London, Great Britain in 1851. Since then, this Expo has been taken place from city to city around the world, and has evolved through 3 distinguish eras:

• Industrialization (1851–1938) - focused on trade and famous for the display of technological inventions and advancements.
• Cultural exchange (1939–1987) - based on a specific theme of cultural significance, and began to address issues of humankind.
• Nation branding (1988–present) - used by countries as a platform to improve their national images through their pavilions.

Canonical will release Ubuntu 10.04 LTS tomorrow 29 Apr 2010

Good news to all Ubuntu Linux fans. Ubuntu 10.04 LTS (Long Term Support) codename Lucid Lynx will be officially released by tomorrow, Thursday 29 April 2010.

As this is an LTS version, Canonical will provide at least 3 years support on Ubuntu Desktop, and 5 years on Ubuntu Server.

It is announced that more than 80 ISVs (Independent Software Vendors) are announcing support for about 100 applications in it.

Among the applications available for version 10.04 LTS are the Acquia-Drupal content management system from Drupal, IBM Lotusnotes and the DB2 database, Cloudera Hadoop distributed computing software from Hadoop, the Tcat server from Mulesoft, the Mozilla Firefox browser, and SugarCRM's self-named CRM system.

Ubuntu Desktop 10.04 LTS will feature extensive design work, faster boot speed, social network integration, online services and the Ubuntu One Music Store.

There will also be a Ubuntu 10.04 Netbook Edition, which enables netbook users, in addition to benefiting from the improvements in the Desktop Edition, see even faster boot speeds on SSD-based devices and faster suspend/resume that will extend battery life. However, this 10.04 Netbook Edition will not be an LTS.

Ubuntu Server 10.04 LTS extends the cloud-computing capability of Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud, powered by Eucalyptus. The Cloud enhancements include a minimal installation profile for minimum-footprint virtual machines and multi-language Amazon Web Services library support. This version also includes many major applications and packages added or updated since the previous LTS release, giving new and upgrading users an extended range of applications that can be easily installed at launch.

Are you ready for the upgrade?

Ho Yan Hor herbal tea in Drinho Tetra Pak cartons

Yesterday while I was looking for some Wong Lo Kat (王老吉) canned herbal tea in Tesco...

I discovered a Malaysian made alternative in Tetra Pak carton selling at cheaper price. It is a new product in the Drinho's family, herbal tea from Ho Yan Hor (何人可).

The Ho Yan Hor herbal tea comes in 2 flavours -- Lo Han Guo (罗汉果) and sour plum (酸梅, buah asam).

This Ho Yan Hor herbal tea is packaged into 6-pack cartons, and selling at the price of RM8.99 in Tesco. That will be equilvalent to about RM1.50 per pack. Each pack is 250ml, so price per ml is 0.6 sen.

Meanwhile, Wong Lo Kat herbal tea is selling at RM2.20 per can, each can in 310ml, and price per ml is 0.7 sen.

Ho Yan Hor is a traditional remedy since 1941, and similar to the function of Wong Lo Kat, it is traditionally used to relief body heat, common cold, indigestion and waning appetite.

Malaysian and Singaporean, especially the Chinese, should be very familiar with the Ho Yan Hor brand. They have been selling herbal tea in sachets for decades, and they are listed in KLSE as Hovid (7213). Now they are collaborating with Drinho to sell the herbal tea in ready made packs.

The packaged Ho Yan Hor emphasizes on "no preservatives, no flavouring and no colouring". However, I noticed that its sour plum flavour has one additive, which is food conditioner (Acid 330).

The ingrediants of Drinho's Ho Yan Hor Luo Han Guo herbal tea are: water, extract of Luo Han Guo and dried Longan, Ho Yan Hor herbal extracts and cane sugar.

The ingrediants of Drinho's Ho Yan Hor sour plum herbal tea are: water, cane sugar, Ho Yan Hor herbal extracts, Pu Erh (普洱) extract, Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C) and sour plum extract powder.

Both flavours are Halal certified and Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP) certified.