英語大學生課外閱讀

　　課外閱讀1

　　現在，經營一個飛機制造公司便意味著虧錢，這點印度的Jet航空公司可以證明。1992年Naresh Goyal成立了自己的Jet航空公司，從而改寫了印度的飛機制造歷史。在公司成立早期，幾乎控制印度整個國家的一半的市場，並慢慢地成為印度航空業的大戶。然而，2007年末，Jet公司營業額大幅度下降，直至現在情況窘迫。

　　Airline-Sector航空部門 Woes 困難Slam猛攻India's Highflier

　　Running an airline is a reliable way to lose money. The turbulent 洶湧的，狂暴的ride ofIndia's Jet Airways shows why.

　　Naresh Goyal shook up使改組 Indian aviation 飛機制造業when he founded Jet in 1992. With punctual 準時的，正點的flights, new planes and friendly service, Jet was the firstcarrier運輸機 here to truly modernize現代化 air travel.

　　Jet controlled nearly half the domestic 國內的market by early this decade, with most ofthe rest going to state-owned國有的 Indian Airlines. In Jet's 2004 fiscal year, as many ofthe world's carriers were still recovering from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the U.S., itoutpaced趕超 the industry with net profits淨利潤 of $33 million. Jet's initial 主要的public offering, in 2005, valued Mr. Goyal's 80% stake at $2 billion.

　　課外閱讀2

　　China recovery hopes gather pace

　　Despite signs of the bottoming-out 降至最低點shown in the first half of this year, Asia'srecovery from the global economic downturn開始下降 will be mild and slow, a topeconomist of the Asian Development Bank ADB亞洲開發銀行 said.

　　In a group interview with reporters based here, ADB Chief Economist 首席經濟學家Jong-Wha Lee said Asia is now in a transition period 過渡時期from the bottom of the crisis to theroad of recovery.

　　But he warned that there are a lot of downsized 縮小尺寸的risks along the road. "It is goingto be long and bumpy崎嶇的，不平的," Lee said.

　　The ADB in March forecasted the economic growth for developing Asia to plunge to 3.4 percentin 2009 and climb up to 6 percent next year.

　　Lee said countries like China, India and Indonesia continued to show strong growthmomentum 勢頭while manufacturing sectors製造業 in some other export-dependent依賴出口的 countries improved over the past quarter.

　　But he said the unexpected scale of economic deterioration 墮落，衰退in industrialized 工業化的countries especially the Europe prolongs 延長，拖延the recovery of Asianeconomies.

　　Lee said now the consensus一致意見 is that the European economy will contract 4 to 5 percent this year, worse than ADB's projection of 3 percent made in March. The prospect of theU.S. economy largely stays the same while Japan sends mixed signal on its current economicsituation.

　　The chief economist said export remains an important drive of Asia's growth and without theglobal recovery it will be very difficult for Asia to go back to its sustained growth path.

　　Lee said while Asia's current mild growth feeds on regional demand, the industrialized world, especially the U.S., remains a key market for Asia's exports.

　　Aside from the risk posed by a prolonged and deeper recession in the industrialized countries, Lee said the rise in commodity prices商品價格 and protectionism 保護主義measuresadopted by the developed countries will also affect Asia's recovery.

　　Keke Vew: Dawn always appears at the end of the dark.

　　課外閱讀3

　　谷歌公司官方網站稱將將會在今年晚些時候推出一款新的膝上型電腦作業系統，該訊息一出，立即在業內引起巨大的反響。眾所周知，目前，微軟的作業系統約Windows約佔市場的90%。雖然近期有所下降，但仍是市場主力。究竟誰將是最後的贏家呢?估計在短時間內不會有結果，然而這來那個大巨頭之間的爭戰必定會給蕭條的市場帶來不小的衝擊。

　　Google vs Microsoft: Clash of the titans

　　THE announcement came as a humble blog post on Google’s corporate website late onTuesday July 7th, but it delivers what is likely to be a dramatic shake-up 騷動，變革for theinformation-technology IT industry. By promising to release, at some point later this year, an operating system for personal computers the online giant is launching a direct attack onMicrosoft, the world’s biggest software firm.

　　The confrontation對抗 is likely to be momentous重大的. Microsoft’s PC operatingsystem, Windows, boasts a market share of nearly 90%. Although the firm’s empire has beenshowing signs of decline, it remains a dominant power. Yet industry watchers see a hugethreat as the mighty internet company moves into new territory. TechCrunch, a leadingtechnology blog, made it clear how vulnerable it believes Microsoft to be, reporting the newsas “Google Drops A Nuclear Bomb On Microsoft”.

　　In reality it will be more of a slow explosion. At first Google’s Chrome OS鉻作業系統, as thenew software is called, will be targeted only at netbooks, the cheap and smallish laptops 輕小的便攜筆記本that are proving popular. The idea is to provide a compact operating systemwith a simple user interface that boots up in a few seconds and allows users to work securelyand easily with web-based applications, such as e-mail and social networks. This is why thesoftware is based on a stripped-down version of Linux, the popular open-source operatingsystem, and comes with Chrome, the browser that Google released late last year.

　　And it will take a while for the program to be ready for prime time. “We have a lot of work todo, and we’re definitely going to need a lot of help from the open-source community”, writesSundar Pichai, the Google executive in charge of the project, in the blog post announcing thenew product. The first netbooks running Chrome OS, he explains, will not be available forconsumers before the second half of next year.

　　Yet Google’s intention is clear. It plans to do what the now-defunct Netscape attempted whenit launched its first browser in the mid-1990s: to make Windows obsolete and turn the browserinto the dominant computing platform. Eventually Chrome OS will be used to power full-fledged PCs. All applications written for the software will be web-based and will work with otherbrowsers that are compliant with the latest web standards even those running on Windows. Chrome OS would also allow users to work offline and synchronise changes later.

　　Microsoft has not offered an official reaction yet. But the firm must have anticipated such amove. Google’s assault comes when the once almighty software giant is vulnerable. WindowsVista, the latest version of its operating system, has not been a success. Its forays 突襲intoGoogle’s main territory, web search and online advertising, have not brought big gains. European antitrust authorities are also still pursuing Microsoft, which limits its ability to strikeback at Google.

　　Yet it is much too early to count Microsoft out. It recently launched Bing, a new search service, which has taken some market share from Google. In October, roughly when Google will makeChrome OS available, Microsoft will release the next iteration of its operating system, Windows 7, a version of which is supposed to run well on netbooks. And the firm is spendingbillions on a “cloud”, a global network of huge data centres, which will rival Google’sinfrastructure and allow Microsoft to offer all kinds of web-based applications.

　　Will there be a clear winner? Probably not in the foreseeable future. The pockets of both firmsare simply too deep. And that is a good thing: the epic fight between the two giants promisesto speed up innovation. And that is what the IT industry needs to overcome the recession.

　　Keke Vew: Chrome OS是一款Google正式宣佈處於開發中的基於PC的作業系統。

　　Google Chrome OS是一款基於Linux的開源作業系統。Google在自己的官方部落格表示，初期，這一作業系統將定位於上網本、緊湊型以及低成本電腦。這款開源軟體將被命名為Chrome OS，將在明年下半年上市。

　　Chrome OS系統和Chrome瀏覽器一樣有三大重點要素，那就是速度、簡潔、安全，啟動和執行速度都會很快，介面元素將會最少化，並且直接整合Chrome瀏覽器、配合上網本提供流暢的網路體驗，並支援Web程式。 Google的網路取代桌面的戰略思想將再一次得到貫徹執行。快速、簡易和安全將是Chrome OS最強調的三大特性，這款作業系統將設計成為最快和最瘦身的作業系統，只需幾秒鐘的時間便可啟動PC並接入網際網路。

　　Chrome OS將同時支援x86和ARM兩種處理器架構。Google保證會在2009年年內提供Chrome OS的原始碼，並計劃2010年下半年正式釋出。