Catalyst (software)

Catalyst is an open source web application framework written in Perl, that closely follows the model–view–controller (MVC) architecture, and supports a number of experimental web patterns. It is written using Moose, a modern object system for Perl. Its design is heavily inspired by such frameworks as Ruby on Rails, Maypole, and Spring.

A web application developer would use Catalyst to deal with code common to all web applications: it provides interfaces to web servers and receiving page requests, dispatching these into developer-written code to process and return the requests, and provides a standardised interface for data models, authentication, session management and other common web application elements.

All of these elements are implemented as plugins to a set of common interfaces, allowing the developer to change the specific method used (e.g. a session storing in shared memory versus as a database table, or using FastCGI versus operating as an within Apache's mod_perl) by changing the configuration of Catalyst to use a different plugin without altering the application code.

Catalysis

Catalysis (/kəˈtælᵻsᵻs/) is the increase in the rate of a chemical reaction due to the participation of an additional substance called a catalyst (/ˈkætəlᵻst/). With a catalyst, reactions occur faster and require less activation energy. Because catalysts are not consumed in the catalyzed reaction, they can continue to catalyze the reaction of further quantities of reactant. Often only tiny amounts are required.

Technical perspective

In the presence of a catalyst, less free energy is required to reach the transition state, but the total free energy from reactants to products does not change. A catalyst may participate in multiple chemical transformations. The effect of a catalyst may vary due to the presence of other substances known as inhibitors or poisons (which reduce the catalytic activity) or promoters (which increase the activity). The opposite of a catalyst, a substance that reduces the rate of a reaction, is an inhibitor.

Catalyzed reactions have a lower activation energy (rate-limiting free energy of activation) than the corresponding uncatalyzed reaction, resulting in a higher reaction rate at the same temperature and for the same reactant concentrations. However, the detailed mechanics of catalysis is complex. Catalysts may affect the reaction environment favorably, or bind to the reagents to polarize bonds, e.g. acid catalysts for reactions of carbonyl compounds, or form specific intermediates that are not produced naturally, such as osmate esters in osmium tetroxide-catalyzed dihydroxylation of alkenes, or cause dissociation of reagents to reactive forms, such as chemisorbed hydrogen in catalytic hydrogenation.

Public Relations Exercise

Public Relations Exercise were a Leicester, England based post-hardcore/alternative rock group. A five-piece combining aspects of screamo and math rock, layered with penetrative and socially observant lyrics.

History

The band began as a product of the development of bedroom songwriters Martin Smith and Lloyd Carter. From an early age, they worked on various projects with local drummer Danny Star, and with the later addition of Irish-born bassist, Tiernan Welch, and guitarist, Spencer Lee, their line-up was finalised in September 2005. The name is taken from the inlay of Radiohead's second album, The Bends.

In their short history; Public Relations Exercise played with acts including Youthmovies, 65daysofstatic, Foals and many others. After demoing material for some time, the band recorded their debut single 'Subteniente', at Far Heath Studios with producer Angus Wallace (The Fall, The Prodigy) in 2007, which was released as a through Nottingham based Field Records in conjunction an extensive UK tour with ex-Million Dead frontman Frank Turner and London Hardcore outfit Score One For Safety.

Catalyst (disambiguation)

A catalyst is a substance which increases the rate of a chemical reaction.

Catalyst may also refer to:

Buildings

Economics and finance

Events

Media and entertainment

Games

Literature and publications

Software (novel)

Software is a 1982 cyberpunk science fiction novel written by Rudy Rucker. It won the first Philip K. Dick Award in 1983. The novel is the first book in Rucker's Ware Tetralogy, and was followed by a sequel, Wetware, in 1988.

Plot summary

Software introduces Cobb Anderson as a retired computer scientist who was once tried for treason for figuring out how to give robots artificial intelligence and free will, creating the race of boppers. By 2020, they have created a complex society on the Moon, where the boppers developed because they depend on super-cooled superconducting circuits. In that year, Anderson is a pheezer — a freaky geezer, Rucker's depiction of elderly Baby Boomers — living in poverty in Florida and terrified because he lacks the money to buy a new artificial heart to replace his failing, secondhand one.

As the story begins, Anderson is approached by a robot duplicate of himself who invites him to the Moon to be given immortality. Meanwhile, the series' other main character, Sta-Hi Mooney the 1st — born Stanley Hilary Mooney Jr. — a 25-year-old cab driver and "brainsurfer", is kidnapped by a gang of serial killers known as the Little Kidders who almost eat his brain. When Anderson and Mooney travel to the Moon together at the boppers' expense, they find that these events are closely related: the "immortality" given to Anderson turns out to be having his mind transferred into software via the same brain-destroying technique used by the Little Kidders.

Software (disambiguation)

Software usually refers to instructions for computer hardware to execute.

Software may also refer to:

Software (band)

Software was a German electronic duo active between 1984 and 2000, comprising Peter Mergener (born 1951) and Michael Weisser (born 1948). Formerly the duo used the name Mergener&Weisser.

History

The group released their records under the IC (Innovative Communication) label, which also released a number of other electronic musicians, including Klaus Schulze and the Neue Deutsche Welle group Ideal.

From 1990 to 1992 Weisser produced, during a temporary break with Mergener, four albums under the Software name with a different group composition: Fragrance with Klaus Schulze and Georg Stettner (born 1970), and Modesty-Blaze I / II and Cave with Billy Byte (Stephan Töteberg).

After the dissolution of Software in 1999, the two musicians went their separate ways: Peter Mergener continues to compose and play electronic music, while Michael Weisser first founded the group G.E.N.E. (Grooving Electronic Natural Environments), and is currently, among other things, active as a media artist.