title: Web service

text: A Web service is a method of communication between two electronic devices over a network. It is a software function provided at a network address over the Web with the service "always-on" as in the concept of utility computing.


title: Web service

text: Many organizations use multiple software systems for management. Different software systems often need to exchange data with each other, and a Web service is a method of communication that allows two software systems to exchange this data over the Internet. The software system that requests data is called a "service requester", whereas the software system that would process the request and provide the data is called a "service provider".


title: Web service

text: Different software may use different programming languages, and hence there is a need for a method of data exchange that doesn't depend upon a particular programming language. Most types of software can, however, interpret XML tags. Thus, Web services can use XML files for data exchange.


title: Web service

text: All of these rules for communication are defined in a file called WSDL (Web Services Description Language), which has a codice_1 extension. (Proposals for Autonomous Web Services (AWS) seek to develop more flexible Web services that do not rely on strict rules.)


title: Web service

text: A directory called UDDI (Universal Description, Discovery, and Integration) defines which software system should be contacted for which type of data. So when one software system needs one particular report/data, it would go to the UDDI and find out which other systems it can contact for receiving that data. Once the software system finds out which other systems it should contact, it would then contact that system using a special protocol called SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol). The service provider system would first validate the data request by referring to the WSDL file, and then process the request and send the data under the SOAP protocol.


title: Web service

text: Automated tools can aid in the creation of a Web service. For services using WSDL, it is possible to either automatically generate WSDL for existing classes (a bottom-up model) or to generate a class skeleton given existing WSDL (a top-down model).


title: Web service

text: Critics of non-RESTful Web services often complain that they are too complex and based upon large software vendors or integrators, rather than typical open source implementations.


title: Web service

text: There are also concerns about performance due to Web services' use of XML as a message format and SOAP/HTTP in enveloping and transporting.


title: Web service

text: Functional and non-functional testing of Web services is done with the help of WSDL parsing. Regression testing is performed by identifying the changes made to upgrade software. Web service regression testing needs can be categorized in three different ways, namely, changes in WSDL, changes in the code, and selective re-testing of operations. We can capture the above three needs in three intermediate forms of Subset WSDL, namely, Difference WSDL (DWSDL), Unit WSDL (UWSDL), and Reduced WSDL (RWSDL), respectively. These three Subset WSDLs are then combined to form Combined WSDL (CWSDL) that is further used for regression testing of the Web service. This will help in Automated Web Service Change Management (AWSCM), by performing the selection of the relevant test cases to construct a reduced test suite from the old test suite.


title: Web service

text: Web services testing can also be automated using several test automation tools like SoapUI, Oracle Application Testing Suite (OATS), Unified Functional Testing, Selenium, etc.


title: Web service

text: Work-related to the capture and visualization of changes made to a Web service. Visualization and computation of changes can be done in the form of intermediate artifacts (Subset WSDL). The insight on the computation of change impact is helpful in testing, top-down development and reduce regression testing. AWSCM is a tool that can identify subset operations in a WSDL file to construct a subset WSDL.


title: Web service

text: While UDDI was intended to serve as a service directory and become the means to discovering web services, many vendors discontinued their UDDI solutions or repositories between 2005-2008, including Microsoft, SAP, IBM, among others. A key study published in WWW2008 Conference (Beijing, China) presented the state of SOAP-based web services and concluded that only 63% of the available SOAP-based web services at the time of the study were actually active or can be invoked. The study also found that search engines were becoming an ideal source for searching for web services compared to that of service registries like the UDDI due its design complexity.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahanas ("Sādavāhana" or "Sātavāhana", IAST: ), also referred to as the Andhras in the Puranas, were an ancient Indian dynasty based in the Deccan region. Most modern scholars believe that the Satavahana rule began in the late second century BCE and lasted until the early third century CE, although some assign the beginning of their rule to as early as the 3rd century BCE based on the Puranas, but uncorroborated by archaeological evidence. The Satavahana kingdom mainly comprised the present-day Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, and Maharashtra. At different times, their rule extended to parts of modern Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, and Karnataka. The dynasty had different capital cities at different times, including Pratishthana (Paithan) and Amaravati (Dharanikota).


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The origin of the dynasty is uncertain, but according to the Puranas, their first king overthrew the Kanva dynasty. In the post-Maurya era, the Satavahanas established peace in the Deccan region and resisted the onslaught of foreign invaders. In particular their struggles with the Saka Western Satraps went on for a long time. The dynasty reached its zenith under the rule of Gautamiputra Satakarni and his successor Vasisthiputra Pulamavi. The kingdom had fragmented into smaller states by the early 3rd century CE.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahanas were early issuers of Indian state coinage struck with images of their rulers. They formed a cultural bridge and played a vital role in trade and the transfer of ideas and culture to and from the Indo-Gangetic Plain to the southern tip of India. They supported Hinduism as well as Buddhism and patronised Prakrit literature.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The date and place of origin of the Satavahanas, as well as the meaning of the dynasty's name, are a matter of debate among historians. Some of these debates have happened in the context of regionalism, with the present-day Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Telangana being variously claimed as the original homeland of the Satavahanas.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: According to one theory, the word "Satavahana" (Brahmi script: ' "Sādavāhana" or ' "Sātavāhana", IAST: ) is a Prakrit form of the Sanskrit "Sapta-Vahana" ("driven by seven"; in Hindu mythology, the chariot of the sun god is drawn by seven horses). This would indicate that the Satavahanas originally claimed association with the legendary solar dynasty, as was common in ancient India. According to Inguva Kartikeya Sarma, the dynasty's name is derived from the words "sata" ("sharpened", "nimble" or "swift") and "vahana" ("vehicle"); the expression thus means "one who rides a nimble horse". Saatakarni means one who possesses capability of "lion ears". Saatavahana means one who uses Lion as his vehicle.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Another theory connects their name to the earlier Satiyaputa dynasty. Yet another theory derives their name from the Munda words "Sadam" ("horse") and "Harpan" ("son"), implying "son of the performer of a horse sacrifice". Several rulers of the dynasty bear the name or title "Satakarni". Satavahana, Satakarni, Satakani and Shalivahana appear to be variations of the same word. Damodar Dharmanand Kosambi theorised that the word "Satakarni" is derived from the Munda words "sada" ("horse") and "kon" ("son").


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Puranas use the name "Andhra" for the Satavahanas. The term "Andhra" may refer to the ethnicity or territory of the dynasty (see Original homeland below). It does not appear in the dynasty's own records.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Tamil epic "Silappatikaram" mentions a "Nurruvar Kannar", who helped Chera king Senguttuvan during his Himalaya campaign. The direct translation of the term Nurruvar Kannar is "the hundred Karnas" or "Satakarni", hence the Nurruvar Kannar has been identified with the Satavahana dynasty.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Kathasaritsagara ascribes a mythical etymology in which a widowed, childless king named Deepakarni was prophesied to find a lion-riding child as his heir. During a jungle hunt, he found such a child riding a yaksha-turned-lion named Sāta. After adoption, the child became the king eventually and came to be known as Sātavāhana or Sāta-supported.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The use of the names "Andhra" and "Andhra-Jatiya" in the Puranas has led some scholars, such as E.J Rapson and R.G Bhandarkar, to believe that the dynasty originated in the eastern Deccan region (the historic Andhra region, present-day Andhra Pradesh and Telangana). At Kotilingala in Telangana, coins bearing the legend "Rano Siri Chimuka Satavahanasa" were found. Epigraphist and numismatist P. V. P. Sastry initially identified Chimuka with the dynasty's founder Simuka, Coins attributed to Simuka's successors Kanha and Satakarni I were also discovered at Kotilingla. Based on these discoveries, historians such as Ajay Mitra Shastri, D. R. Reddy, S. Reddy, and Shankar R. Goyal theorised that Kotlingala was the original home of the Satavahanas. Ajay Mitra Shastri stated that the finding of the coins at Kotilinga give "a clear pointer to the region where we have to locate the original center of the Satavahana political authority." However, the coin samples from Kotlingala are small, and it is not certain if these coins were minted there or reached there from somewhere else. Moreover, the identification of Chimuka of Kotilingala with the dynasty's founder Simuka has been contested by several scholars including P. L. Gupta and I. K. Sarma, who identified Chimuka as a later ruler. P.V.P. Sastry also later changed his view and stated that the two kings were different. In addition to the Kotilinga find, a coin of the Satavahana prince Saktikumara, who was in the fourth generation of the founder, has been reported as a stratified find from the Kurnool district of Andhra Pradesh. As for the Puranas, these texts could have been compiled at a later date and it is not certain if the Satavahanas were referred to as Andhras during their time.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Andhra tribes were known to be living near Yamuna river bank during 700 BCE and "Apastamba" who is author of Apastamba Dharmasutra was their preacher. They started moving south and initially settled south of Vindhya Mountains.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: They established Kingdoms. Built Several Cities. These cities are widely spread between present South Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh states.Paithan (Prathishtanapuram) was their capital. They are Satavahana Kings. It was mentioned, described by Megasthenes during Chandragupta Maurya reign in his book Indica.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Another section of scholars believe that the Satavahanas originated in western Deccan (present-day Maharashtra). All four extant inscriptions from the early Satavahana period (c. 1st century BCE) have been found in and around this region. One of the earliest known Satavahana inscriptions was that found at of the Pandavleni Caves in Nashik district, which was issued during the reign of Kanha (100-70 BCE). An inscription found at Naneghat was issued by Nayanika (or Naganika), the widow of Satakarni I; another inscription found at Naneghat has been dated to the same period on a paleographic basis. A slightly later inscription dated to the reign of Satakarni II has been found at Sanchi in Madhya Pradesh, located to the north of Maharashtra. The majority of the other Satavahana inscriptions have also been found in western Deccan. On the other hand, the epigraphic evidence from eastern Deccan does not mention the Satavahanas before the 4th century CE. At Nevasa, a seal and coins attributed to Kanha have been discovered. Coins attributed to Satakarni I have also been discovered at Nashik, Nevasa, and Pauni in Maharashtra (besides places in eastern Deccan and present-day Madhya Pradesh). Based on this evidence, some historians argue that the Satavahanas initially came to power in the area around their capital Pratishthana (modern Paithan, Maharashtra) and then expanded their territory to eastern Deccan. Carla Sinopoli cautions that the inference about the western Deccan origin of the Satavahanas is "tentative at best" given the small sample of early inscriptions.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Kanha's Pandavleni mentions the term "maha-matra" (officer-in-charge), which indicates that the early Satavahanas followed the Mauryan administrative model. C. Margabandhu theorised that the Satavahanas were called Andhras because they were natives of eastern Deccan (the Andhra region), although they first established their empire in western Deccan after having served as Mauryan subordinates. Himanshu Prabha Ray (1986) opposes this theory, stating that the Andhra was originally an ethnic term, and did not come to denote the geographical region of eastern Deccan until well after the Satavahana period. According to Vidya Dehejia, the writers of the Puranas (which could have been written after the Satavahana period) mistook the Satavahana presence in eastern Deccan as evidence for their origin in that region, and wrongly labelled them as "Andhra".


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Puranas called the Satavahana kings as "Andhrabhrityah". Andhra is both a tribal and a territorial name, the latter territorial denotation of present Telugu lands came into usage only well after the Satavahana period had ended, which meant that the term Andhra represented only the Andhra tribe (who had originated in North India along the Yamuna river banks as per Rigveda) and not the present Andhra region or its Telugu people. The term "Andhrabhrityas" (Andhra servants) may imply two things, one being that the Andhras were originally servants of the Mauryas or the Sungas. The other one, as per some scholars is that the expression is taken to indicate the servants of some other Andhra rulers. These scholars also suggest Kannada origin for the Satavahanas meaning that the dynasty originated in present-day Karnataka, and initially owed allegiance to some Andhra rulers. A Satavahana inscription found on a slab of the upper drum (medhi) of the Kanaganahalli mahastupa mentions year 16 of Vasisthiputra Sri Chimuka Satavahana's reign, which can be dated from ca. 110 BCE. V. S. Sukthankar theorised that the territorial division Satavahani-Satahani (Satavahanihara or Satahani-rattha), in present-day Bellary district, was the homeland of the Satavahana family. However, Dr. Gopalchari challenged Sukthankar's theory by pointing out that not a single inscription of the early Satavahanas is found in Bellary District and that the only Satavahana inscription in Bellary District was that of Pulumavi, who belongs to the later-phase of Satavahana history. A stupa in Kanaganahalli village of Karnataka, dated between the first century BCE and first century CE, features limestone panels depicting portraits of Chimuka (Simuka), Satakani (Satakarni) and other Satavahana rulers. As per historian Parmanand Gupta, in the medieval times, Srisailam region or the Sriparvata area was known as "Kannadu" and "Kannavisaya" which is the contracted form of "Satakarninadu" and "Satakarnivisaya", which seem to be identical with the territorial indicator "Satavahanihara" of the Myakadoni inscription of Pulumayi or the "Satavahaniratta" of the Hirahadagalli grant consisting of the Ballari region indicated to be the original homeland of the Satavahanas as per another historian V. S. Sukthankar. Ptolemy (100-170 CE) mentions a Satavahana king Sire Polemaios, who is identified with Sri Pulumayi (or Pulumavi), whose name is derived from the Kannada word for "Puli", meaning tiger. Some scholars indicate that the name Pulumayi is actually Kannada's "'Puli Maiyi"' or '"One with the body of a tiger"' indicating native Kannada origin for the Satavahanas.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Information about the Satavahanas comes from the Puranas, some Buddhist and Jain texts, the dynasty's inscriptions and coins, and foreign (Greek and Roman) accounts that focus on trade. The information provided by these sources is not sufficient to reconstruct the dynasty's history with absolute certainty. As a result, there are multiple theories about the Satavahana chronology.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Simuka is mentioned as the first king in a list of royals in a Satavahana inscription at Naneghat. The various Puranas state that the first king of the dynasty ruled for 23 years, and mention his name variously as Sishuka, Sindhuka, Chhismaka, Shipraka, etc. These are believed to be corrupted spellings of Simuka, resulting from copying and re-copying of manuscripts. Simuka cannot be dated with certainty based on available evidence. Based on the following theories, the beginning of the Satavahana rule is dated variously from 271 BCE to 30 BCE. According to the Puranas, the first Andhra king overthrew the Kanva rule. He is named as Balipuccha in some texts. D. C. Sircar dated this event to c. 30 BCE, a theory supported by many other scholars.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The "Matsya Purana" mentions that the Andhra dynasty ruled for around 450 years. As the Satavahana rule ended in the early 3rd century, the beginning of their rule can be dated to the 3rd century BCE. The "Indica" of Megasthenes (350 – 290 BCE) mentions a powerful tribe named "Andarae", whose king maintained an army of 100,000 infantry, 2,000 cavalry and 1,000 elephants. If Andarae is identified with the Andhras, this can be considered additional evidence of Satavahana rule starting in the 3rd century BCE. The "Brahmanda Purana" states that "the four Kanvas will rule the earth for 45 years; "then" (it) will "again" go to the Andhras". Based on this statement, the proponents of this theory argue that the Satavahana rule began immediately after the Maurya rule, followed by a Kanva interregnum, and then, a revival of the Satavahana rule. According to one version of the theory Simuka succeeded the Mauryans. A variation of the theory is that Simuka was the person who restored the Satavahana rule by overthrowing the Kanvas; the compiler of the Puranas confused him with the founder of the dynasty.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Most modern scholars believe that the Satavahana ruler began in the first century BCE and lasted until the second century CE. This theory is based on Puranic records as well as archaeological and numismatic evidence. The theory that dates their rule to an earlier period is now largely discredited because the various Puranas contradict each other, and are not fully supported by epigraphic or numismatic evidence.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The oldest Satavahana inscription is the one found on a slab of the upper drum (medhi) of the Kanaganahalli Great Stupa mentioning year 16 of Vasisthiputra Sri Chimuka Satavahana's reign, which can be dated from ca. 110 BCE.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: On another stone slab at Kanaganahalli, the king is possibly shown together with a Nagaraja, and the inscription reads:


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Simuka was succeeded by his brother Kanha (also known as Krishna), who extended the kingdom up to Nashik in the west. His successor Satakarni I conquered western Malwa, Anupa (Narmada valley) and Vidarbha, taking advantage of the turmoil caused by Greek invasions of northern India. He performed Vedic sacrifices including Ashvamedha and Rajasuya. Instead of the Buddhists, he patronised Brahmins and donated a substantial amount of wealth to them. The Hathigumpha inscription of the Kalinga king Kharavela mentions a king named "Satakani" or "Satakamini", who some identify with Satakarni I. The inscription describes dispatching of an army and Kharavela's threat to a city. Since the inscription is only partially legible, different scholars interpret the events described in the inscription differently. According to R. D. Banerji and Sailendra Nath Sen, Kharavela sent out an army against Satakarni. According to Bhagwal Lal, Satakarni wanted to avoid an invasion of his kingdom by Kharavela. So, he sent horses, elephants, chariots and men to Kharavela as a tribute. According to Sudhakar Chattopadhyaya, Kharavela's army diverted its course after failing to advance against Satakarni. According to Alain Daniélou, Kharavela was friendly with Satakarni, and only crossed his kingdom without any clashes.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Satakarni's successor Satakarni II ruled for 56 years, during which he captured eastern Malwa from the Shungas. This allowed him access to the Buddhist site of Sanchi, in which he is credited with the building of the decorated gateways around the original Mauryan Empire and Sunga stupas. Satakarni II is known from a dedicatory inscription at Sanchi. He was succeeded by Lambodara. The coins of Lambodara's son and successor Apilaka have been found in eastern Madhya Pradesh. However, Andrew Ollett argues that there is only one Satakarni, as the alleged first Satakarni is assigned ten years, and the second, fifty years by other scholars, but the only dated inscription of this king is Candankheda seal from his reign's year 30, around 60 BCE, and he ruled ca. 88-42 BCE.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahanas contributed greatly to the embellishment of the Buddhist stupa of Sanchi. It was heavily repaired under King Satakarni II. The gateways and the balustrade were built after 70 BCE, and appear to have been commissioned by the Satavahanas. An inscription on the Southern Gateway records that it was the work of Satakarni II's royal architect Ananda. An inscription records the gift of one of the top architraves of the Southern Gateway by the artisans of the Satavahana Emperor Satakarni:


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Little is known about Apilaka's successors, except cryptic references to one Kuntala Satakarni. The next well-known ruler of the dynasty was Hāla, who composed "Gaha Sattasai" in Maharashtri Prakrit. Like Hala, his four successors also ruled for very short periods (a total of 12 years), indicating troubled times for the Satavahanas.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Epigraphic and numismatic evidence suggests that the Satavahanas earlier controlled the northern Deccan Plateau, the northern Konkan coastal plains, and the mountain passes connecting these two regions. During 15-40 CE, their northern neighbours - the Western Kshatrapas - extended their influence into these regions. The Western Kshatrapa ruler Nahapana is known to have ruled the former Satavahana territory, as attested by the inscriptions of his governor and son-in-law, Rishabhadatta.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahana power was revived by Gautamiputra Satakarni, who is considered the greatest of the Satavahana rulers. Charles Higham dates his reign . S. Nagaraju dates it 106–130 CE, the new consensus is shared by Shailendra Bhandare, Akira Shimada, and Oskar von Hinuber, who regard Gautamiputra Satakarni's reign was ca. 60-85 CE, as it is evident from history that "Gautamiputra Saatakarni" in the year 78CE defeated Vikramaditya of Ujjain, which in turn was celebrated and named "Yug Aadi" means Beginning of New Era (New Year for Andhra, Karnataka, Maharashtra (Gudi padwa), Telangana states). Ever since these states people followed Saatavaahana calendar. Andrew Ollett considers it as 60-84 CE. The king defeated by him appears to have been the Western Kshatrapa ruler Nahapana, as suggested by Nahapana's coins overstuck with names and titles of Gautamiputra. The Nashik "prashasti" inscription of Gautamiputra's mother Gautami Balashri, dated to the 20th year after his death, records his achievements. The most liberal interpretation of the inscription suggests that his kingdom extended from the present-day Rajasthan in the north to Krishna river in the south, and from Saurashtra in the west to Kalinga in the east. He assumed the titles "Raja-Raja" (King of Kings) and "Maharaja" (Great King), and was described as the Lord of Vindhya.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: During the last years of his reign, his administration was apparently handled by his mother, which could have been a result of an illness or military preoccupation. According to the Nasik inscription made by his mother Gautami Balashri, he was the one ...


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Gautamiputra was succeeded by his son Vasisthiputra Sri Pulamavi (or Pulumayi). According to Sailendra Nath Sen, Pulumavi ruled from 96 to 119 CE. According to Charles Higham, he ascended the throne around 110 CE, according to Shailendra Bhandare, Akira Shimada, and Oskar von Hinuber Vasisthiputra Sri Pulamavi ruled ca. 85-125 CE, and Andrew Ollett considers it to be ca. 84-119 CE. Pulumavi features in a large number of Satavahana inscriptions and his coins have been found distributed over a wide area. This indicates that he maintained Gautamiputra's territory, and ruled a prosperous kingdom. He is believed to have added the Bellary region to Satakarni's kingdom. His coins featuring ships with double mast have been found on the Coromandel Coast, indicating involvement in maritime trade and naval power. The old stupa at Amaravati was perhaps renovated during his reign. though recent scholarship tends to spread the dates of this wider.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Pulumavi's successor was his brother Vashishtiputra Satakarni. According to S. N. Sen he ruled during 120–149 CE; according to Charles Higham, his regnal years spanned 138–145 CE. He entered into a marriage alliance with the Western Satraps, marrying the daughter of Rudradaman I.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Junagadh inscription of Rudradaman I states that he defeated Satakarni, the lord of Dakshinapatha (Deccan), twice. It also states that he spared the life of the defeated ruler because of close relations:


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: According to D. R. Bhandarkar and Dineshchandra Sircar, the ruler defeated by Rudradaman was Gautamiputra Satakarni. However, E. J. Rapson believed that the defeated ruler was his son Vasishthiputra Pulumavi. Shailendra Nath Sen and Charles Higham believe that the defeated ruler was Vashishtiputra's successor Shivaskanda or Shiva Sri Pulumayi (or Pulumavi).


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: As a result of his victories, Rudradaman regained all the former territories previously held by Nahapana, except for the extreme south territories of Pune and Nasik. Satavahana dominions were limited to their original base in the Deccan and eastern central India around Amaravati.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Sri Yajna Sātakarni, the last person belonging to the main Satavahana dynastic line, briefly revived the Satavahana rule. According to S. N. Sen, he ruled during 170–199 CE. Charles Higham dates the end of his reign to 181 CE. His coins feature images of ships, which suggest naval and marine trade success. Wide distribution of his coins, and inscriptions at Nashik, Kanheri and Guntur indicate that his rule extended over both eastern and western parts of Deccan. He recovered much of the territory lost the Western Kshatrapas, and issued silver coinage, imitating them. During the last years of his reign, the Abhiras captured the northern parts of the kingdom, around Nashik region.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: After Yajna Satakarni, the dynasty was soon extinguished following the rise of its feudatories, perhaps on account of a decline in central power. On the other hand, the Western Satraps would continue to prosper for the next two centuries, until their extinction by the Gupta Empire. Yajna Sri was succeeded by Madhariputra Swami Isvarasena. The next king Vijaya ruled for 6 years. His son Vasishthiputra Sri Chadha Satakarni ruled for 10 years. Pulumavi IV, the last king of the main line, ruled until . During his reign, several Buddhist monuments were constructed at sites including Nagarjunakonda and Amaravati. Madhya Pradesh was also part of his kingdom.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahana territory included northern Deccan region, spanning the present-day Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Telangana states. At times, their rule also extended to present-day Gujarat, Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh. The Nashik "prashasti" inscription issued by Gautami Balashri, the mother of Gautamiputra Satakarni, claims that her son ruled an extensive territory that stretched from Gujarat in the north to northern Karnataka in the south. It is not clear if Gautamiputra had effective control over these claimed territories. In any case, historical evidence suggests that his control over these territories did not last long. Moreover, this realm was not continuous: many areas in this region remained under the control of the hunter-gatherers and other tribal communities.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: As per historian M. Govinda Pai, Ptolemy (100-170 CE) states that when Siro Polemaios (Vasishthiputra Sri Pulumayi) was ruling from his capital Paithan in the north (reign c. 85-125 CE), another Satavahana prince called Baleokouros or Baleokoura (Vilivayakura) was ruling from Hippokoura (Huvina Hipparagi) of Basavana Bagewadi taluk of Vijayapura district of present Karnataka in the south who was none other than his own son. Pai identifies this prince Vilivaya-kura as another form of Vilivaya Kumara (meaning the son of Vilivaya), and he goes on to prove that Vilivaya is indeed merely another rendering of Pulumayi which was transformed as per Prakrit rules, the spoken form of this language during that period, and due to common parlance. Thus, Vilivayakura means a son of Pulumayi who was ruling from Huvina Hipparagi in present Karnataka. Pai identifies all the 10 cities mentioned by Ptolemy as lying between the river Benda (or Binda) or Bhima river in the north and Banaouasei (Banavasi) in the south, viz. Nagarouris (Nagur), Tabaso (Tavasi), Inde (Indi), Tiripangalida (Gadhinglaj), Hippokoura (Huvina Hipparagi), Soubouttou (Savadi), Sirimalaga (Malkhed), Kalligeris (Kalkeri), Modogoulla (Mudgal) and Petirgala (Pattadakal), as being located in Northern Karnataka.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahana capital kept shifting with time. The Nashik inscription describes Gautamiputra as the lord of Benakataka, suggesting that this was the name of his capital. Ptolemy (2nd century CE) mentioned Pratishthana (modern Paithan) as the capital of Pulumavi. At other times, the Satavahana capitals included Dharanikota and Junnar. M. K. Dhavalikar theorised that the original Satavahana capital was located at Junnar, but had to be moved to Pratishthana because of Saka-Kushana incursions from the north-west.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Several Satavahana-era inscriptions record grants to religious monasteries. The settlements most frequently mentioned as the residences of donors in these inscriptions include the sea ports of Sopara, Kalyan, Bharuch, Kuda (unidentified), and Chaul. The most frequently mentioned inland settlements include Dhanyakatakam/Dharanikota, Junnar, Nashik, Paithan, and Karad.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Other important Satavahana sites in western Deccan include Govardhana, Nevasa, Ter, and Vadgaon-Madhavpur. The ones in eastern Deccan include Amaravati, Dhulikatta, Kotalingala and Peddabankur.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahanas followed the administration guidelines of the Shastras. Their government was less top-heavy than that of the Mauryans, and featured several levels of feudatories:


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The appears to have been the largest geographical subdivision of the Satavahana polity. Several inscriptions refer to named after the governors appointed to rule them (e.g. Govardhanahara, Mamalahara, Satavanihara and Kapurahara). This suggests that the Satavahanas attempted to build a formal administrative and revenue collection structure.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The inscriptions of Gautamiputra Satakarni suggest the existence of a bureaucratic structure, although it is not certain how stable and effective this structure was. For example, two inscriptions from Nashik Cave 11 record donations of agricultural land to ascetic communities. They state that the ascetics would enjoy tax exemption and non-interference from the royal officials. The first inscription states that the grant was approved by Gautamiputra's minister Sivagupta on the king's verbal orders, and preserved by the "great lords". The second inscription records a grant by Gautamiputra and his mother, and mentions Syamaka as the minister of the Govardhana . It states that the charter was approved by a woman named Lota, who according to archaeologist James Burgess' interpretation, was the chief lady-in-waiting of Gautamiputra's mother.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahana-era inscriptions mention three types of settlements: "nagara" (city), "nigama" (market town) and "gāma" (village).


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: According to Sastri, "the Satavahanas were described as 'lords of the three oceans' and promoted overseas colonization and trade. Under them, Buddhist art attained the superb forms of beauty and elegance preserved to this day in the cave-temples of western India and the survivals from the stupa of Amaravati, Goli, Nagarjunikonda". This tradition was followed by successors of Satavahana in the eastern and western Deccan.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahanas participated in (and benefited from) economic expansion through intensification of agriculture, increased production of other commodities, and trade within and beyond the Indian subcontinent.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: During the Satavahana period, several large settlements emerged in the fertile areas, especially along the major rivers. The amount of land under agricultural use also expanded significantly, as a result of forest clearance and construction of irrigation reservoirs.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The exploitation of sites with mineral resources may have increased during the Satavahana period, leading to the emergence of new settlements in these areas. Such sites facilitated commerce and crafts (such as ceramic ware). The increased craft production during the Satavahana period is evident from archaeological discoveries at sites such as Kotalingala, as well as epigraphic references to artisans and guilds.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahanas controlled the Indian sea coast, and as a result, they dominated the growing Indian trade with the Roman Empire. The "Periplus of the Erythraean Sea" mentions two important Satavahana trade centres: Pratishthana and Tagara. Other important urban centres included Kondapur, Banavasi and Madhavpur. Nanaghat was the site of an important pass that linked the Satavahana capital Pratishthana to the sea.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahanas were Hindus and claimed Brahmanical status, although they also made generous donations to Buddhist monasteries. The lay people in the Satavahana period generally did not exclusively support a particular religious group .


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Naneghat inscription of Nayanika, recorded on the walls of a Buddhist monastic cave, mentions that her husband Satakarni I performed several Vedic sacrifices, including "ashvamedha" (horse sacrifice), "rajasuya" (royal consecration), and "agnyadheya" (fire ceremony). The inscription also records substantial fees paid to Brahmin priests and attendees for these sacrifices. For example, 10,001 cows were granted for the "Bhagala-Dasaratra" sacrifice; and 24,400 coins were granted for another sacrifice, whose name is not clear.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: In the Nashik inscription of Gautami Balashri, her son Gautamiputra Satakarni is called "ekabamhana", which is interpreted by some as "unrivaled Brahmana", thus indicating a Brahmin origin. However, R. G. Bhandarkar interprets this word as "the only protector of the Brahmins".


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: A number of Buddhist monastic sites emerged in the Deccan region during the Satavahana period. However, the exact relations between these monasteries and the Satavahana government is not clear. The Pandavleni Caves inscription issued during the reign of Kanha states that the cave was excavated by "maha-matra" (officer-in-charge) of the shramanas (non-Vedic ascetics). Based on this, Sudhakar Chattopadhyaya concludes that Kanha favoured Buddhism, and had an administrative department dedicated to the welfare of Buddhist monks.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: However, Carla M. Sinopoli notes that although there are some records of donations to the Buddhist monasteries by the Satavahana royals, the vast majority of the donations were made by the non-royals. The most common among these donors were merchants, and many of the monasteries were located along the important trade routes. The merchants probably donated to the monasteries, because these sites facilitated trade by serving as rest houses, and possibly by directly participating in the trade. The monasteries appear to have been an important venue for displaying charitable donations, including the donations made to non-Buddhists (especially Brahmins).


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Most of the Satavahana inscriptions and coin legends are in a Middle Indo-Aryan language. This language has been termed "Prakrit" by some modern scholars, but this terminology can be considered correct only if the term "Prakrit" is defined broadly to include every Middle Indo-Aryan language that is "not exactly Sanskrit". The language of the inscriptions is actually closer to Sanskrit than to the literary Prakrit used in the "Gaha Sattasai" anthology attributed to the Satavahana king Hala.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: According to Gunadya, besides Sanskrit and Prakrit there is another language called 'Desi' which may mean the native language or the language of common man. Commenting on the Desi language Dr.D.C.Sircar remarks "It was apparently Early Telugu which was in older times closer to Tamil than it is now was the mother tongue of the common people". Later Satavahana kings like Gauthamiputra Satakarni, Vastistiputra pulamovi and Yajna Satakarni had their names in two languages i.e.; Prakrit and Desi, a native language.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satvahanas also used Sanskrit in political inscriptions, but rarely. A fragmentary inscription found close to the Nashik prashasti of Gautamiputra Satakarni uses Sanskrit verses in "vasanta-tilaka" metre to describe a deceased king (probably Gautamiputra). A Sanskrit inscription found at Sannati probably refers to Gautamiputra Shri Satakarni, one of whose coins also features a Sanskrit legend.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahanas also issued bilingual coins featuring Middle Indo-Aryan language on one side, and Tamil language on the other side.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Several Brahmi script inscriptions are available from the Satavahana period, but most of these record donations to Buddhist institutions by individuals, and do not provide much information about the dynasty. The inscriptions issued by the Satavahana royals themselves also primarily concern religious donations, although some of them provide some information about the rulers and the imperial structure.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The earliest extant Satavahana inscription is from Nashik Cave 19, which states that the cave was commissioned by Mahamatra Saman of Nashik during the reign of king Kanha.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: At Naneghat, an inscription issued by Nayanika, the widow of Satakarni I, has been found. It records Nayanika's lineage and mentions the Vedic sacrifices performed by the royal family. Another inscription at Naneghat comprises names of Satavahana royals, appearing as labels over their bas-relief portraits. The portraits are now completely eroded, but the inscription is believed to be contemporary to Nayanika's inscription on a paleographic basis.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The next oldest Satavahana-era inscription appears on a sculpted gateway element of Stupa 1 at Sanchi. It states that the element was donated by Ananda, who was the son of Siri Satakarni's foreman of artisans. This inscription is probably from the reign of Satakarni II.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahanas were the earliest Indian rulers to issue their own coins with portraits of their rulers, starting with king Gautamiputra Satakarni, a practice derived from that of the Western Kshatrapas he defeated. The Western Satraps themselves had been following the features of the coins of the Indo-Greek kings to the northwest.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Thousands of lead, copper and potin Satavahana coins have been discovered in the Deccan region; a few gold and silver coins are also available. These coins do not feature uniform design or size, and suggest that multiple minting locations existed within the Satavahana territory, leading to regional differences in coinage.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The coin legends of the Satavahanas, in all areas and all periods, used a Prakrit dialect without exception. In addition, some reverse coin legends are in Dravidian (similar to the Tamil and Telugu languages), in the Dravidian script (similar to the Brahmi script apart from a few variations).


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Several coins carry titles or matronyms that were common to multiple rulers (e.g. Satavahana, Satakarni, and Pulumavi), so the number of rulers attested by coinage cannot be determined with certainty. The names of 16 to 20 rulers appear on the various coins. Some of these rulers appear to be local elites rather than the Satavahana monarchs.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahana coins give unique indications as to their chronology, language, and even facial features (curly hair, long ears and strong lips). They issued mainly lead and copper coins; their portrait-style silver coins were usually struck over coins of the Western Kshatrapa kings. The Satavahana coins also display various traditional symbols, such as elephants, lions, horses and chaityas (stupas), as well as the "Ujjain symbol", a cross with four circles at the end.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahanas patronised the Prakrit language instead of Sanskrit. The Satavahana king Hāla is famous for compiling the collection of Maharashtri poems known as the "Gaha Sattasai" (), although from linguistic evidence it seems that the work now extant must have been re-edited in the succeeding century or two. Through this book, it was evident that agriculture was the main means of livelihood. Also many sorts of superstitions had prevailed. Additionally, Gunadhya, the minister of Hala, was the author of Brihatkatha.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Madhukar Keshav Dhavalikar writes that "The Satavahana sculptures unfortunately has never been recognized as an independent school in spite of the fact it has its own distinctive characteristic features. The earliest in point of time is that in the Bhaja Vihara cave which marks the beginning of sculptural art in the Satavahana dominion around 200BC. It is profusely decorated with carvings, and even pillars have a lotus capital crowned with sphinx-like mythic animals." Dhavalikar also writes that in Chankama "the panel occurring on the west pillar of Northern Gateway portrays a very important event in Buddha's life. It depicts votaries, two each on either side of what looks like a ladder which actually is the promenade which Buddha is supposed to have walked. It is said that Buddha, after attaining Enlightment, spent four weeks near the Bodhi tree. Of these, the third week he spent walking along the promenade ("chankama") to and fro."


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Along with some of the above major Satavahana sculptures some more sculptures existed—namely, "Dvarapala, Gajalaksmi, Shalabhanjikas", Royal Procession, Decorative pillar, etc.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Several metal figurines are found that could be attributed to the Satavahanas. A hoard of unique bronze objects were also found from Bramhapuri. Numerous articles obtained from there were Indian but also reflected Roman and Italian influence. A small statue of Poseidon, wine jugs, and a plaque depicting Perseus and Andromeda were also obtained from the house from where the objects were found. The fine elephant in the Ashmolean Museum, the Yaksi image in the British Museum, and the cornucopia found in Posheri, kept at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya can also be attributed to the Satavahana period.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The sculptures of the Amaravati Stupa and the wider Amaravati style represent the architectural development of the Satavahana periods. They built Buddhist stupas in Amravati (95 feet high). They also constructed a large number of stupas at Goli, Jaggiahpeta, Gantasala, Amravati Bhattiprolu, and Shri Parvatam. Caves IX and X, containing Ajanta paintings, were patronised by Satavahana, and the painting throughout the caves appear to have started with them. Ashokan Stupas were enlarged, the earlier bricks and wood works being replaced with stone works. The most famous of these monuments are the stupas, the most famous among them being the Amravati Stupa and the Nagarjunakonda Stupa.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahana paintings are the earliest surviving specimens—excluding prehistoric rock art—in India, and they are to be found only at the Ajanta Caves. There were two phases of artistic activity of Ajanta: the first occurring in the 2nd to 1st centuries BC, when Hinayana caves were excavated during Satavahana rule; the later in the second half of the 5th century under the Vakatakas. Vagaries of nature and some vandalism have taken a heavy toll on the Ajanta Caves. Only a few fragments related to the Satavahanas have survived in Caves No. 9 and 10, both of which are chaitya-grihas with stupas.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The most important surviving painting of the Satavahana period at Ajanta is the "Chhadanta Jataka" in Cave No. 10, but that, too, is only fragmentary. It is a painting of an elephant named Bodhisattva with six tusks, related to a mythological story. The human figures, both male and female, are typically Satavahanas, almost identical with their counterparts on the Sanchi Gateways so far as their physiognomy, costumes, and jewellery are concerned. The only difference is that the Sanchi figures have shed some of their weight.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The Satavahana rulers are also remarkable for their contributions to Buddhist art and architecture. They built great stupas in the Krishna River Valley, including the stupa at Amaravati in Andhra Pradesh. The stupas were decorated in marble slabs and sculpted with subjects including scenes from the life of the Buddha, portrayed in a characteristic slim and elegant style. The regional Amaravati style of sculpture also influenced the sculpture of Southeast Asia.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Multiple Puranas contain chronology of Satavahana kings. However, there are inconsistencies among the various Puranas over the number of kings in the dynasty, the names of the kings, and the length of their rule. In addition, some of the kings listed in the Puranas are not attested via archaeological and numismatic evidence. Similarly, there are some kings known from coins and inscriptions, whose names are not found in the Puranic lists.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The reconstructions of the Satavahana kings by historians fall into two categories. According to the first one, 30 Satavahana kings ruled for around 450 years, starting from Simuka's rule immediately after the fall of the Mauryan empire. This view relies heavily on the Puranas, and is now largely discredited. According to the second (and more widely accepted) category of reconstructions, the Satavahana rule started in around first century BCE. The chronologies in this category contain a smaller number of kings, and combine Puranic records with archaeological, numismatic and textual evidence.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Because of uncertainty regarding the establishment date of the Satavahana kingdom, it is difficult to give absolute dates for the reigns of the Satavahana kings. Therefore, many modern scholars do not assign absolute dates to the reigns of the historically attested Satavahana kings, and those who do vary greatly with each other.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Himanshu Prabha Ray provides the following chronology, based on archaeological and numismatic evidence:


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The various Puranas give different lists of the Satavahana rulers. The "Matsya Purana" states that 30 Andhra kings ruled for 460 years, but some of its manuscripts name only 19 kings whose reigns add up to 448.5 years. The "Vayu Purana" also mentions that there were 30 Andhra kings, but its various manuscripts name only 17, 18, and 19 kings respectively; the reigns add up to 272.5, 300, and 411 years respectively. Many of these kings are not attested by historical evidence. On the other hand, some Satavahana kings attested by numismatic evidence (such as Rudra Satakarni) are not mentioned in the Puranas at all.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Different scholars have explained these anomalies in different ways. Scholars such as R. G. Bhandarkar, D. C. Sircar and H. C. Raychaudhuri theorised that the "Vayu Purana" mentions only the main imperial branch of the dynasty, while the "Matsya Purana" puts together princes of all its branches.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: The names of the Andhra kings (in IAST), as mentioned in the various Puranas, are given below. These names vary across different manuscripts of the same Puranas, and some names are missing in some of the manuscripts. The list given below for each Purana contains the most exhaustive version. In the Puranas, Krishna (IAST: Kṛṣṇa) is described as brother of the first king, who overthrew the Kanva king Susharman. All other kings are described as sons of their predecessors. The first king of the Andhra-Bhrityas is also known as Shudraka or Suraka in the "Kumarika Khanda" of "Skanda Purana" (not present in the table below).


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Apart from the two traditional views (long and short chronologies) there is another kind of analysis pointing out to a "Mid-Chronology", as it was already proposed by Dr. Dehejia and others, and particularly most recently by Shailendra Bhandare, who regards Satavahana's rule extended more than three centuries (c. 150 BCE to 250 CE) with the flourish of trans-national trade, urbanism and monumental architecture in South India.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Bhandare regards Simuka to have ruled since around 160-150 BCE and that this date would still fit in well with Pargiter's 460 years to the Satavahanas, as it would fix the end of the dynasty around 300 CE, not too far from the mid-3rd century as consensus approximately lies. Regarding Siri Satakani and his wife Naganika, Bhandhare considers their rule to have been somewhere around 110 +/- 20 BCE.


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: Bhandare also suggests the following sequence of reigns, based on his analysis of Satavahana coinage:


title: Satavahana dynasty

text: On the other hand, based to a large degree on Shailendra Bhandare's work, with slight corrections, Andrew Ollett (2017) mentions the following reigns for the whole Satavahana dynasty:


title: JCB (company)

text: JCB is a British multinational manufacturer of equipment for construction, agriculture, waste handling, and demolition, founded in 1945 and based in Rocester, Staffordshire, England. The word "JCB" is also often used colloquially as a generic description for mechanical diggers and excavators and now even appears in the "Oxford English Dictionary", although it is still held as a trademark.


title: JCB (company)

text: Joseph Cyril Bamford Excavators Ltd. was founded by Joseph Cyril Bamford in October 1945 in Uttoxeter, Staffordshire, England. He rented a lock-up garage . In it, using a welding set which he bought second-hand for £2-10s (= £2.50) from English Electric, he made his first vehicle, a tipping trailer from war-surplus materials. The trailer's sides and floor were made from steel sheet that had been part of air raid shelters. On the same day as his son Anthony was born, he sold the trailer at a nearby market for £45 (plus a part-exchanged farm cart) and at once made another trailer. At one time he made vehicles in Eckersley's coal yard in Uttoxeter. The first trailer and the welding set have been preserved.


title: JCB (company)

text: In 1948, six people were working for the company, and it made the first hydraulic tipping trailer in Europe. In 1950, it moved to an old cheese factory in Rocester, still employing six. A year later, Bamford began painting his products yellow. In 1953, he developed JCB's first backhoe loader, and the JCB logo appeared for the first time. It was designed by Derby Media and advertising designer Leslie Smith. In 1957, the firm launched the "hydra-digga", incorporating the excavator and the major loader as a single all-purpose tool useful for the agricultural and construction industries.


title: JCB (company)

text: By 1964, JCB had sold over 3,000 3C backhoe loaders. The next year, the first 360-degree excavator was introduced, the JCB 7. In 1978, the Loadall machine was introduced. The next year, the firm started its operation in India. In 1991, the firm entered a joint venture with Sumitomo of Japan to produce excavators, which ended in 1998. Two years later, a JCB factory was completed in Pooler near Savannah, Georgia, in the US, and the next year a factory was opened in Brazil.


title: JCB (company)

text: In 2005, JCB bought a company, purchasing the German equipment firm Vibromax. In the same year, it opened a new factory in Pudong, China. Planning of a new £40 million JCB Heavy Products site began following the launch of an architectural design competition in 2007 managed by RIBA Competitions, and by the next year, the firm began to move from its old site on Pinfold Street in Uttoxeter to the new site beside the A50; the Pinfold Street site was demolished in 2009. During that year, JCB announced plans to make India its largest manufacturing hub. Its factory at Ballabgarh in Haryana was to become the world's largest backhoe loader manufacturing facility. Although JCB shed 2,000 jobs during the 2008 global financial crisis, in 2010 it rehired up to 200 new workers.


title: JCB (company)

text: In 2013, JCB set up its fourth manufacturing facility in India. In 2014, it was reported that three out of every four pieces of construction equipment sold in India was a JCB, and that its Indian operations accounted for 17.5% of its total revenue. JCB-based memes have also become prevalent in India.


title: JCB (company)

text: Many of the vehicles produced by JCB are variants of the backhoe loader, including tracked or wheeled variants, mini and large version and other variations, such as forklift vehicles and telescopic handlers for moving materials to the upper floors of a building site. The company also produces wheeled loading shovels and articulated dump trucks.


title: JCB (company)

text: Its JCB Fastrac range of tractors, which entered production in 1990, can drive at speeds of up to 75 km/h (40 mph) on roads and was featured on the BBC television programme "Tomorrow's World", and years later as Jeremy Clarkson's tractor of choice in "Top Gear". The firm makes a range of military vehicles, including the JCB HMEE. It licenses a range of rugged feature phones and smartphones designed for construction sites. The design and marketing contract was awarded to Data Select in 2010, which then lost the exclusive rights in 2013.


title: JCB (company)

text: JCB power systems make a Hydrogen combustion engine that reportedly in itself is cost effective as it reuses parts from their Dieselmax engines


title: JCB (company)

text: JCB Insurance Services is a fully owned subsidiary of JCB that provides insurance for customers with funding from another fully owned subsidiary, JCB Finance.


title: JCB (company)

text: In April 2006, JCB announced that they were developing a diesel-powered land speed record vehicle known as the 'JCB Dieselmax'. The car is powered by two modified JCB 444 diesel power plants using a two-stage turbocharger to generate 750 bhp, one engine driving the front wheels and the other the rear wheels.


title: JCB (company)

text: On 22 August 2006 the Dieselmax, driven by Andy Green, broke the diesel engine land speed record, attaining a speed of . The following day, the record was again broken, this time with a speed of .


title: JCB (company)

text: In December 2000, JCB was fined €39.6m by the European Commission for violating European Union antitrust law. The fine related to restrictions on sales outside allotted territories, purchases between authorised distributors, bonuses and fees which restricted out of territory sales, and occasional joint fixing of resale prices and discounts across different territories. JCB appealed the decision, with the European Court of First Instance upholding portions of the appeal and reducing the original fine by 25%. JCB appealed to the European Court of Justice but this final appeal was rejected in 2006, with the court slightly increasing the reduced fine by €864,000.


title: JCB (company)

text: In 2017, a Reuters study of JCB group accounts found that between 2001 and 2013, the JCB group paid £577 million to JCB Research, an unlimited company that does not have to file public accounts and which has only two shares, both owned by Anthony Bamford. JCB Research has been described as an obscure company, allegedly worth £27,000, but which donated £2m to the Conservative Party in the run up to the 2010 election, making it the largest donor. Ownership of the company which has never filed accounts is disputed by the Bamford brothers. According to a Guardian report, much of the Bamford money was held in shares in offshore trusts.


title: JCB (company)

text: JCB Service, the main JCB holding company, is owned by a Dutch parent company, ‘Transmissions and engineering Netherlands BV’, which is ultimately controlled by “Bamford family interests”. According to Ethical Consumer, JCB has six subsidiaries in jurisdictions considered to be tax havens, in Singapore, the Netherlands, Hong Kong, Delaware and Switzerland.


title: JCB (company)

text: On 12 February 2020, the United Nations published a database of all business enterprises involved in certain specified activities related to the Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, including East Jerusalem, and in the occupied Golan Heights. JCB has been listed on the database in light of its involvement in activities related to "the supply of equipment and materials facilitating the construction and the expansion of settlements and the wall, and associated infrastructures". The international community considers Israeli settlements built on land occupied by Israel to be in violation of international law.


title: JCB (company)

text: In October 2020, the British government decided to investigate a complaint that JCB’s sale of equipment to Israel did not comply with the human rights guidelines set by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The UK National Contact Point (NCP), part of the UK’s Department of International Trade, agreed to review a complaint against JCB submitted by a charity, Lawyers for Palestinian Human Rights. JCB said it had no “legal ownership” of its machinery once sold to Comasco, its sole distributor of JCB equipment in Israel.


title: JCB (company)

text: In 2020, JCB received a £600m loan in emergency financial aid from the UK government, during the coronavirus pandemic, despite its ultimate ownership being in the Netherlands and having reported a record £447 million profit the previous year. Its chief executive Graeme Macdonald said: “Although not a public company, we are eligible for CCF because of our contribution to the UK economy. We don’t expect to utilise it in the short-term but it gives us an insurance policy if there is further disruption from or second spike or other impact around the world.”


title: JCB (company)

text: The company was a member of the CBI business lobby group until October 2016, when it was reported that JCB had left the CBI in the summer of 2016 following the Brexit vote due to the organisation's anti-Brexit stand. In May 2021, JCB chairman Anthony Bamford rejected an invitation to rejoin CBI, after previously having called it a "waste of time" that "didn’t represent my business or private companies".


title: JCB (company)

text: Bamford donated £100,000 to Vote Leave, the official pro-Brexit group, and JCB has also been a significant donor to the UK Conservative Party; since 2007 JCB and related Bamford entities have given the party £8.1m in cash or kind.


title: Checkers

text: Checkers (American English), also known as draughts (; British English), is a group of strategy board games for two players which involve diagonal moves of uniform game pieces and mandatory captures by jumping over opponent pieces. Checkers is developed from alquerque. The term "checkers" derives from the checkered board which the game is played on, whereas "draughts" derives from the verb "to draw" or "to move".


title: Checkers

text: The most popular forms of checkers in Anglophone countries are American checkers (also called English draughts), which is played on an 8×8 checkerboard; Russian draughts, Turkish draughts both on an 8x8 board, and International draughts, played on a 10×10 board – the latter is widely played in many countries worldwide. There are many other variants played on 8×8 boards. Canadian checkers and Singaporean/Malaysian checkers (also locally known as "dum") are played on a 12×12 board.


title: Checkers

text: American checkers was weakly solved in 2007 by a team of Canadian computer scientists led by Jonathan Schaeffer. From the standard starting position, perfect play by each side would result in a draw.


title: Checkers

text: Checkers is played by two opponents on opposite sides of the game board. One player has dark pieces (usually black); the other has light pieces (usually white or red). Players alternate turns. A player cannot move an opponent's pieces. A move consists of moving a piece diagonally to an adjacent unoccupied square. If the adjacent square contains an opponent's piece, and the square immediately beyond it is vacant, the piece may be captured (and removed from the game) by jumping over it.


title: Checkers

text: Only the dark squares of the checkerboard are used. A piece can only move diagonally into an unoccupied square. When capturing an opponent's piece is possible, capturing is mandatory in most official rules. If the player does not capture, the other player can remove the opponent's piece as a penalty (or muffin), and where there are two or more such positions the player forfeits pieces that cannot be moved (although some rule variations make capturing optional). In almost all variants, the player without pieces remaining, or who cannot move due to being blocked, loses the game.


title: Checkers

text: An uncrowned piece ("man") moves one step diagonally forwards and captures an adjacent opponent's piece by jumping over it and landing on the next square. Multiple enemy pieces can be captured in a single turn provided this is done by successive jumps made by a single piece; the jumps do not need to be in the same line and may "zigzag" (change diagonal direction). In American checkers, men can jump only forwards; in international draughts and Russian draughts, men can jump both forwards and backwards.


title: Checkers

text: When a man reaches the farthest row forward, known as the "kings row" or "crown head", it becomes a "king". It is marked by placing an additional piece on top of, or "crowning", the first man. The king has additional powers, including the ability to move backwards and, in variants where men cannot already do so, capture backwards. Like a man, a king can make successive jumps in a single turn, provided that each jump captures an enemy piece.


title: Checkers

text: In international draughts, kings (also called "flying kings") move any distance along unblocked diagonals. They may capture an opposing man any distance away by jumping to any of the unoccupied squares immediately beyond it. Because jumped pieces remain on the board until the turn is complete, it is possible to reach a position in a multi-jump move where the flying king is blocked from capturing further by a piece already jumped.


title: Checkers

text: Flying kings are not used in American checkers; a king's only advantage over a man is the additional ability to move and capture backwards.


title: Checkers

text: In most non-English languages (except those that acquired the game from English speakers), checkers is called "dame", "dames", "damas", or a similar term that refers to ladies. The pieces are usually called "men", "stones", "peón" (pawn) or a similar term; men promoted to kings are called "dames" or ladies. In these languages, the queen in chess or in card games is usually called by the same term as the kings in checkers. A case in point includes the Greek terminology, in which checkers is called "ντάμα" (dama), which is also one term for the queen in chess.


title: Checkers

text: Similar games have been played for millennia. A board resembling a checkers board was found in Ur dating from 3000 BC. In the British Museum are specimens of ancient Egyptian checkerboards, found with their pieces in burial chambers, and the game was played by the pharaoh Hatshepsut. Plato mentioned a game, πεττεία or "petteia", as being of Egyptian origin, and Homer also mentions it. The method of capture was placing two pieces on either side of the opponent's piece. It was said to have been played during the Trojan War. The Romans played a derivation of petteia called "latrunculi", or the game of the Little Soldiers. The pieces, and sporadically the game itself, were called "calculi" ("pebbles").


title: Checkers

text: An Arabic game called "Quirkat" or "al-qirq", with similar play to modern checkers, was played on a 5×5 board. It is mentioned in the tenth-century work Kitab al-Aghani. Al qirq was also the name for the game that is now called nine men's morris. Al qirq was brought to Spain by the Moors, where it became known as "Alquerque", the Spanish derivation of the Arabic name. The rules are given in the 13th-century book "Libro de los juegos". In about 1100, probably in the south of France, the game of Alquerque was adapted using backgammon pieces on a chessboard. Each piece was called a "fers", the same name as the chess queen, as the move of the two pieces was the same at the time.


title: Checkers

text: The rule of crowning was used by the 13th century, as it is mentioned in the Philippe Mouskés's "Chronique" in 1243 when the game was known as "Fierges", the name used for the chess queen (derived from the Persian "ferz", meaning royal counsellor or vizier). The pieces became known as "dames" when that name was also adopted for the chess queen. The rule forcing players to take whenever possible was introduced in France in around 1535, at which point the game became known as "Jeu forcé", identical to modern American checkers. The game without forced capture became known as "Le jeu plaisant de dames", the precursor of international checkers.


title: Checkers

text: The 18th-century English author Samuel Johnson wrote a foreword to a 1756 book about checkers by William Payne, the earliest book in English about the game.


title: Checkers

text: American checkers (English draughts) has been the arena for several notable advances in game artificial intelligence. In 1951 Christopher Strachey wrote the first video game program on checkers. The checkers program tried to run for the first time on 30 July 1951 at NPL, but was unsuccessful due to program errors. In the summer of 1952 he successfully ran the program on Ferranti Mark 1 computer and played the first computer checkers and first video game ever. In the 1950s, Arthur Samuel created one of the first board game-playing programs of any kind. More recently, in 2007 scientists at the University of Alberta developed their "Chinook" program to the point where it is unbeatable. A brute force approach that took hundreds of computers working nearly two decades was used to solve the game, showing that a game of checkers will always end in a draw if neither player makes a mistake. The solution is for the checkers variation called go-as-you-please (GAYP) checkers and not for the variation called three-move restriction checkers. As of December 2007, this makes American checkers the most complex game ever solved.


title: Checkers

text: In Nov 1983, the Science Museum Oklahoma (then called the Omniplex) unveiled a new exhibit: Lefty the Checker Playing Robot. Programmed by Scott M Savage, Lefty used an Armdroid robotic arm by Colne Robotics and was powered by a 6502 processor with a combination of Basic and Assembly code to interactively play a round of checkers with visitors to the museum. Originally, the program was deliberately simple so that the average museum visitor could potentially win, but over time was improved. The improvements however proved to be more frustrating for the visitors, so the original code was reimplemented.


title: Checkers

text: It is PSPACE-hard to determine whether a specified player has a winning strategy. And if a polynomial bound is placed on the number of moves that are allowed in between jumps (which is a reasonable generalisation of the drawing rule in standard Checkers), then the problem is in PSPACE, thus it is PSPACE-complete. However, without this bound, Checkers is EXPTIME-complete.


title: Checkers

text: Column draughts (Russian towers), also known as Bashni, is a kind of draughts, known in Russia since the beginning of the nineteenth century, in which the game is played according to the usual rules of Russian draughts, but with the difference that the captured man is not removed from the playing field: rather, it is placed under the capturing piece (man or tower).


title: Checkers

text: The resulting towers move around the board as a whole, "obeying" the upper piece. When taking a tower, only the uppermost piece is removed from it: and the resulting tower belongs to one player or the other according to the color of its new uppermost piece.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: Speedy Gonzales is an animated cartoon character in the Warner Bros. "Looney Tunes" and "Merrie Melodies" series of cartoons. He is portrayed as "The Fastest Mouse in all Mexico" with his major traits being the ability to run extremely fast, being quick-witted and heroic while speaking with an exaggerated Mexican accent. He usually wears a yellow "sombrero", white shirt and trousers (which was a common traditional outfit worn by men and boys of rural Mexican villages), and a red kerchief, similar to that of some traditional Mexican attires. To date, there have been 46 theatrical shorts made either starring or featuring the character.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: Speedy's first appearance was in 1953's "Cat-Tails for Two" though he appeared largely in name (and super speed) only. It would be two years before Friz Freleng and layout artist Hawley Pratt redesigned the character into his modern incarnation for the 1955 Freleng short of the same name. The cartoon features Sylvester the Cat guarding a cheese factory at the international border between the United States and Mexico from starving Mexican mice. The mice call in the plucky, excessively energetic Speedy (voiced by Mel Blanc) to save them. Amid cries of "¡Ándale! ¡Ándale! ¡Arriba! ¡Arriba! ¡Epe! ¡Epe! ¡Epe! Yeehaw!" (Spanish for "Go on! Go on! Up! Up!", although "Ándale arriba" may have been intended as meaning "hurry up"), Sylvester soon gets his comeuppance. The cartoon won the 1955 Academy Award for Best Short Subject (Cartoons).


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: While Speedy's last name was given as "Gonzalez" in "Cat-Tails" (on a printed business card shown in the cartoon), it was spelled with an 's' from "Speedy Gonzales" onward. Today, the earlier spelling is sometimes used.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: Freleng and McKimson soon set Sylvester up as Speedy's regular nemesis in a series of cartoons, much in the same way Chuck Jones had paired Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner in his Road Runner cartoons (and indeed, all four characters ended up competing with each other in the short "The Wild Chase"). Sylvester (often called ""El Gringo Pussygato"" by Speedy) is constantly outsmarted and outrun by the Mouse, causing the cat to suffer all manner of pain and humiliation from mousetraps to accidentally consuming large amounts of Tabasco hot sauce. Other cartoons pair the mouse with his cousin, Slowpoke Rodriguez, the "slowest Mouse in all Mexico." Slowpoke regularly gets into all sorts of trouble that often require Speedy to save him—but one cat in "Mexicali Shmoes" says that as if to compensate for his slowness, "he pack a gun!" In the mid 1960s, Speedy's main rival and second nemesis became Daffy Duck, whom Speedy usually referred to as "the loco duck."


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: Speedy has the reputation of being a hit with the female mice. In many cartoons, when the mice decide to get Speedy to help them, one mouse will say words to the effect of "Speedy Gonzales is friend of my sister". Another mouse will say "Speedy Gonzales is friend of everyone's sister".


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: Feeling that the character presented an offensive Mexican stereotype, Cartoon Network shelved Speedy's films when it gained exclusive rights to broadcast them in 1999 (as a subsidiary of Time Warner, Cartoon Network is a corporate sibling to Warner Bros.). In an interview with Fox News on March 28, 2002, Cartoon Network spokeswoman Laurie Goldberg commented, "It hasn't been on the air for years because of its ethnic stereotypes."


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: On the "Looney Tunes Golden Collection" DVD box sets, when the DVD is first loaded, it is introduced by a disclaimer which states:


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: The cartoons you are about to see are products of their time. They may depict some of the ethnic and racial prejudices that were commonplace in American society. These depictions were wrong then and are still wrong today. While the following does not represent the WB view of society, these cartoons are being presented as they were originally created, because to do otherwise would be the same as claiming these prejudices never existed.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: Despite such dubious controversy over a generally positive characterization in a cartoon character created in 1953, Speedy Gonzales remained a popular character in Latin America. Many Hispanic people remembered him fondly as a quick-witted, heroic Mexican character who always got the best of his opponents, at a time when such positive depictions of Latin Americans were rare in popular entertainment.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: In 2006, Volkswagen licensed Speedy Gonzales for a series of Spanish-language commercials for the Volkswagen Golf, using footage from the cartoon of the same name.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: In a March 2021 essay, "Los Angeles Times" columnist Gustavo Arellano wrote, “I love Speedy so much, I keep a large painting of him in my home office. His kind smile and brown skin takes me back to my childhood — and reminds me of where we as Mexicans exist today.”


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: The Hispanic-American rights organization League of United Latin American Citizens called Speedy a cultural icon, and thousands of users registered their support of the character on the hispaniconline.com message boards. Fan campaigns to put Speedy back on the air resulted in the return of the animated shorts to Cartoon Network in 2002.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: In 1983, he co-starred with Daffy Duck once again in "". He also made a cameo appearance in the ending scene of the 1988 film "Who Framed Roger Rabbit". He had one appearance in the "Tiny Toons" episode segment "The Acme Acres Summer Olympics", as the coach, and serving as the mentor of Lightning Rodriguez. He made a short appearance in the 1996 film "Space Jam". He made a cameo appearance alongside Porky Pig in the 2003 film "", making fun of his politically incorrect status. At around the same time, he made a non-speaking cameo in an episode of "¡Mucha Lucha!" titled "Lucha, Rinse and Repeat".


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: Volume 4 of the "Looney Tunes Golden Collection" DVD series, released on November 14, 2006, has an entire disc of Speedy shorts, although some of his other shorts had previously been released on Volumes 1 and 3. Speedy is mentioned in one "Duck Dodgers" episode, after Cadet sits on Dodgers, prompting him to say, "I knew I should've chosen Speedy Gonzales as a sidekick!"


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: Speedy Gonzales appears in "Bah, Humduck! A Looney Tunes Christmas". He is an employee at the Lucky Duck Superstore for the greedy Daffy Duck where he confuses Daffy with the Feliz Navidad comment.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: Speedy Gonzales also appeared occasionally on "The Looney Tunes Show". He is seen living with Bugs and Daffy as their "mouse in the wall" and running the pizza parlor Pizzarriba. Speedy is shown to act as Daffy's conscience, which is a far cry from the antagonistic relationship they had in the old days. The episode "Sunday Night Slice" showed that Bugs bought his favorite restaurant, Girardi's, to prevent it from being closed and hired Speedy to help him. When Bugs decides he does not want to own a restaurant anymore, he hands ownership of it to Speedy. In "The Black Widow", Speedy Gonzales answers Daffy Duck's call and races to Tacapulco to convince his cousin Sheriff Slowpoke Rodriguez to let Daffy Duck and Porky Pig out of jail.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: Speedy Gonzales appeared in the 2015 straight to video movie "". He is seen as Lola Bunny's landlord.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: An elderly Speedy Gonzales (voiced by Carlos Alazraqui) was "interviewed" by Al Madrigal for Madrigal's one-hour comedic documentary special "Half Like Me" (currently available on YouTube and formerly on Hulu).


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: Speedy Gonzales appeared occasionally in "New Looney Tunes", often as the leader of a gang of mice that also includes Hubie and Bertie, Sniffles, and "Minnesota Rats" (originally Minniesoda Fats; an aborted 1970s character revived and fleshed out in this series). He seems to have reverted to his personality from "Merrie Melodies".


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: In 1962, pop singer Pat Boone scored a top 10 hit in the United States with the song "Speedy Gonzales" which featured Mel Blanc samples as Speedy. It was also sung by Manolo Muñoz and several other artists.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: In 1965, the movie "Wild on the Beach" included the song "Little Speedy Gonzales" which was written by Stan Ross and Bobby Beverly and performed by The Astronauts.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: Speedy Gonzales starred in several video games: "Cheese Cat-Astrophe Starring Speedy Gonzales" for the Mega Drive/Genesis, Master System and Game Gear, "" for the SNES, "Speedy Gonzales" for the Game Boy and "Speedy Gonzales: Aztec Adventure" for the Game Boy Color. He also appeared as an enemy in "", and "" as both a miniboss and playable character.


title: Speedy Gonzales

text: In 2010, Warner Bros. and New Line Cinema announced a new Speedy Gonzales live action / animated feature film. George Lopez was attached to voice the character. In December 2015, it was reported that an animated film is in development at Warner Bros. In April 2016, it was announced that Eugenio Derbez will voice the character.


title: Amiga

text: Amiga is a family of personal computers introduced by Commodore in 1985. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16- or 32-bit processors, 256 KB or more of RAM, mouse-based GUIs, and significantly improved graphics and audio compared to previous 8-bit systems. This includes the Atari ST—released earlier the same year—as well as the Macintosh and Acorn Archimedes. Based on the Motorola 68000 microprocessor, the Amiga differs from its contemporaries through the inclusion of custom hardware to accelerate graphics and sound, including sprites and a blitter, and a pre-emptive multitasking operating system called AmigaOS.


title: Amiga

text: The Amiga 1000 was released in July 1985, but production problems kept it from becoming widely available until early 1986. The best-selling model, the Amiga 500, was introduced in 1987 along with the more expandable Amiga 2000. The Amiga 3000 was introduced in 1990, followed by the Amiga 500 Plus, and Amiga 600 in March 1992. Finally, the Amiga 1200 and Amiga 4000 were released in late 1992. The Amiga line sold an estimated 4.85 million units.


title: Amiga

text: Although early advertisements cast the computer as an all-purpose business machine, especially when outfitted with the Sidecar IBM PC compatibility add-on, the Amiga was most commercially successful as a home computer, with a wide range of games and creative software. The Video Toaster hardware and software suite helped Amiga find a prominent role in desktop video and video production. The Amiga's audio hardware made it a popular platform for music tracker software. The processor and memory capacity enabled 3D rendering packages, including LightWave 3D, Imagine, and Traces, a predecessor to Blender.


title: Amiga

text: Poor marketing and the failure of later models to repeat the technological advances of the first systems resulted in Commodore quickly losing market share to the rapidly dropping prices of IBM PC compatibles, which gained 256 color graphics in 1987, as well as the fourth generation of video game consoles.


title: Amiga

text: Commodore ultimately went bankrupt in April 1994 after a version of the Amiga packaged as a game console, the Amiga CD32, failed in the marketplace. Since the demise of Commodore, various groups have marketed successors to the original Amiga line, including Genesi, Eyetech, ACube Systems Srl and A-EON Technology. AmigaOS has influenced replacements, clones, and compatible systems such as MorphOS and AROS. Currently Belgian company Hyperion Entertainment maintains and develops AmigaOS 4, which is an official and direct descendant of AmigaOS 3.1 - the last system made by Commodore for the original Amiga Computers.


title: Amiga

text: Jay Miner joined Atari, Inc. in the 1970s to develop custom integrated circuits, and led development of the Atari 2600's TIA. Almost as soon as its development was complete, the team began developing a much more sophisticated set of chips, CTIA, ANTIC and POKEY, that formed the basis of the Atari 8-bit family.


title: Amiga

text: With the 8-bit line's launch in 1979, the team once again started looking at a next generation chipset. Nolan Bushnell had sold the company to Warner Communications in 1978, and the new management was much more interested in the existing lines than development of new products that might cut into their sales. Miner wanted to start work with the new Motorola 68000, but management was only interested in another 6502 based system. Miner left the company, and, for a time, the industry.


title: Amiga

text: In 1979, Larry Kaplan left Atari and founded Activision. In 1982, Kaplan was approached by a number of investors who wanted to develop a new game platform. Kaplan hired Miner to run the hardware side of the newly formed company, "Hi-Toro". The system was code-named "Lorraine" in keeping with Miner's policy of giving systems female names, in this case the company president's wife, Lorraine Morse. When Kaplan left the company late in 1982, Miner was promoted to head engineer and the company relaunched as Amiga Corporation.


title: Amiga

text: The Amiga hardware was designed by Miner, RJ Mical, and Dale Luck. A breadboard prototype for testing and development was largely completed by late 1983, and shown at the January 1984 Consumer Electronics Show (CES). At the time, the operating system was not ready, so the machine was demonstrated with the "Boing Ball" demo, a real-time animation showing a red-and-white spinning ball bouncing and casting a shadow; this bouncing ball became the official logo of the Amiga company. CES attendees had trouble believing the computer being demonstrated had the power to display such a demo and searched in vain for the "real" computer behind it.


title: Amiga

text: A further developed version of the system was demonstrated at the June 1984 CES and shown to many companies in hopes of garnering further funding, but found little interest in a market that was in the final stages of the video game crash of 1983.


title: Amiga

text: In March, Atari expressed a tepid interest in Lorraine for its potential use in a games console or home computer tentatively known as the . The talks were progressing slowly, and Amiga was running out of money. A temporary arrangement in June led to a $500,000 loan from Atari to Amiga to keep the company going. The terms required the loan to be repaid at the end of the month, otherwise Amiga would forfeit the Lorraine design to Atari.


title: Amiga

text: During 1983, Atari lost over a week, due to the combined effects of the crash and the ongoing price war in the home computer market. By the end of the year, Warner was desperate to sell the company. In January 1984, Jack Tramiel resigned from Commodore due to internal battles over the future direction of the company. A number of Commodore employees followed him to his new company, Tramel Technology. This included a number of the senior technical staff, where they began development of a 68000-based machine of their own. In June, Tramiel arranged a no-cash deal to take over Atari, reforming Tramel Technology as Atari Corporation.


title: Amiga

text: As many Commodore technical staff had moved to Atari, Commodore was left with no workable path to design their own next-generation computer. The company approached Amiga offering to fund development as a home computer system. They quickly arranged to repay the Atari loan, ending that threat. The two companies were initially arranging a license agreement before Commodore offered to purchase Amiga outright.


title: Amiga

text: By late 1984, the prototype breadboard chipset had successfully been turned into integrated circuits, and the system hardware was being readied for production. At this time the operating system (OS) was not as ready, and led to a deal to port an OS known as TRIPOS to the platform. TRIPOS was a multitasking system that had been written in BCPL during the 1970s for the PDP-11 minicomputer, but later experimentally ported to the 68000. This early version was known as AmigaDOS and the GUI as Workbench. The BCPL parts were later rewritten in the C language, and the entire system became AmigaOS.


title: Amiga

text: The system was enclosed in a pizza box form factor case; a late change was the introduction of vertical supports on either side of the case to provide a "garage" under the main section of the system where the keyboard could be stored.


title: Amiga

text: The first model was announced in 1985 as simply "The Amiga from Commodore", later to be retroactively dubbed the Amiga 1000. They were first offered for sale in August, but by October only 50 had been built, all of which were used by Commodore. Machines only began to arrive in quantity in mid-November, meaning they missed the Christmas buying rush. By the end of the year, they had sold 35,000 machines, and severe cashflow problems made the company pull out of the January 1986 CES. Bad or entirely missing marketing, forcing the development team to move to the east coast, notorious stability problems and other blunders limited sales in early 1986 to between 10,000 and 15,000 units a month.


title: Amiga

text: In late 1985, Thomas Rattigan was promoted to COO of Commodore, and then to CEO in February 1986. He immediately implemented an ambitious plan that covered almost all of the company's operations. Among these was the long-overdue cancellation of the now outdated PET and VIC-20 lines, as well as a variety of poorly selling Commodore 64 offshoots and the Commodore 900 workstation effort.


title: Amiga

text: Another one of the changes was to split the Amiga into two products, a new high-end version of the Amiga aimed at the creative market, and a cost-reduced version that would take over for the Commodore 64 in the low-end market. These new designs were released in 1987 as the Amiga 2000 and Amiga 500, the latter of which went on to widespread success and became their best selling model.


title: Amiga

text: Similar high-end/low-end models would make up the Amiga line for the rest of its history; follow-on designs included the Amiga 3000/Amiga 500 Plus/Amiga 600, and the Amiga 4000/Amiga 1200. These models incorporated a series of technical upgrades known as the ECS and AGA, which added higher resolution displays among many other improvements and simplifications.


title: Amiga

text: The Amiga line sold an estimated 4,850,000 machines over its lifetime. The machines were most popular in the UK and Germany, with about 1.5 million sold in each country, and sales in the high hundreds of thousands in other European nations. The machine was less popular in North America, where an estimated 700,000 were sold. In the United States, the Amiga found a niche with enthusiasts and in vertical markets for video processing and editing. In Europe, it was more broadly popular as a home computer and often used for video games. Beginning in 1988 it overlapped with the 16-bit Mega Drive, then the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in the early 1990s. Commodore UK's Kelly Sumner did not see Sega or Nintendo as competitors, but instead credited their marketing campaigns which spent over or for promoting video games as a whole and thus helping to boost Amiga sales.


title: Amiga

text: In spite of his successes in making the company profitable and bringing the Amiga line to market, Rattigan was soon forced out in a power struggle with majority shareholder, Irving Gould. This is widely regarded as the turning point, as further improvements to the Amiga were eroded by rapid improvements in other platforms.


title: Amiga

text: Commodore shut down the Amiga division on April 26, 1994, and filed for bankruptcy three days later. Commodore's assets were purchased by Escom, a German PC manufacturer, who created the subsidiary company Amiga Technologies. They re-released the A1200 and A4000T, and introduced a new 68060 version of the A4000T. Amiga Technologies researched and developed the Amiga Walker prototype. They presented the machine publicly at CeBit. Escom, in turn, went bankrupt in 1997.


title: Amiga

text: A U.S. Wintel PC manufacturer, Gateway 2000, then purchased the Amiga branch and technology. In 2000, Gateway sold the Amiga brand to Amiga, Inc., without having released any products. Amiga, Inc. licensed the rights to sell hardware using the AmigaOne brand to Eyetech Group and Hyperion Entertainment. In 2019, Amiga, Inc. sold its intellectual property to Amiga Corporation.


title: Amiga

text: The Amiga has a custom chipset consisting of several coprocessors which handle audio, video, and direct memory access independently of the Central Processing Unit (CPU). This architecture gave the Amiga a performance edge over its competitors, particularly for graphics-intensive applications and games.


title: Amiga

text: The architecture uses two distinct bus subsystems: the chipset bus and the CPU bus. The chipset bus allows the coprocessors and CPU to address "Chip RAM". The CPU bus provides addressing to conventional RAM, ROM and the Zorro II or Zorro III expansion subsystems. This enables independent operation of the subsystems. The CPU bus can be much faster than the chipset bus. CPU expansion boards may provide additional custom buses. Additionally, "busboards" or "bridgeboards" may provide ISA or PCI buses.


title: Amiga

text: The Motorola 68000 series of microprocessors is used in all Amiga models from Commodore. While all CPU in the 68000 family have a 32-bit ISA design (programmer uses and sees a 32-bit model), the MC68000 used in the most popular models is a 16-bit (or 16/32-bit) processor because its ALU operates in 16-bit (32-bit operations require additional clock cycles, consuming more time). The MC68000 has a 16-bit external data bus so 32-bits of data is transferred in two consecutive steps, a technique called multiplexing. This is transparent to the software, which was 32-bit from the beginning. The MC68000 can address 16 MB of physical memory. Later Amiga models featured higher-speed, full 32-bit CPUs with a larger address space and instruction pipeline facilities.


title: Amiga

text: CPU upgrades were offered by both Commodore and third-party manufacturers. Most Amiga models can be upgraded either by direct CPU replacement or through expansion boards. Such boards often featured faster and higher capacity memory interfaces and hard disk controllers.


title: Amiga

text: Towards the end of Commodore's time in charge of Amiga development, there were suggestions that Commodore intended to move away from the 68000 series to higher performance RISC processors, such as the PA-RISC. Those ideas were never developed before Commodore filed for bankruptcy. Despite this, third-party manufacturers designed upgrades featuring a combination of 68000 series and PowerPC processors along with a PowerPC native microkernel and software. Later Amiga clones featured PowerPC processors only.


title: Amiga

text: The custom chipset at the core of the Amiga design appeared in three distinct generations, with a large degree of backward-compatibility. The Original Chip Set (OCS) appeared with the launch of the A1000 in 1985. OCS was eventually followed by the modestly improved Enhanced Chip Set (ECS) in 1990 and finally by the partly 32-bit Advanced Graphics Architecture (AGA) in 1992. Each chipset consists of several coprocessors that handle graphics acceleration, digital audio, direct memory access and communication between various peripherals (e.g., CPU, memory and floppy disks). In addition, some models featured auxiliary custom chips that performed tasks such as SCSI control and display de-interlacing.


title: Amiga

text: All Amiga systems can display full-screen animated planar graphics with 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64 (EHB Mode), or 4096 colors (HAM Mode). Models with the AGA chipset (A1200 and A4000) also have non-EHB 64, 128, 256, and 262144 (HAM8 Mode) color modes and a palette expanded from 4096 to 16.8 million colors.


title: Amiga

text: The Amiga chipset can "genlock", which is the ability to adjust its own screen refresh timing to match an incoming NTSC or PAL video signal. When combined with setting transparency, this allows an Amiga to overlay an external video source with graphics. This ability made the Amiga popular for many applications, and provides the ability to do character generation and CGI effects far more cheaply than earlier systems. This ability has been frequently utilized by wedding videographers, TV stations and their weather forecasting divisions (for weather graphics and radar), advertising channels, music video production, and desktop videographers. The NewTek Video Toaster was made possible by the genlock ability of the Amiga.


title: Amiga

text: In 1988, the release of the Amiga A2024 fixed-frequency monochrome monitor with built-in framebuffer and flicker fixer hardware provided the Amiga with a choice of high-resolution graphic modes (1024×800 for NTSC and 1024×1024 for PAL).


title: Amiga

text: ReTargetable Graphics is an API for device drivers mainly used by 3rd party graphics hardware to interface with AmigaOS via a set of libraries. The software libraries may include software tools to adjust resolution, screen colors, pointers and screenmodes. The standard Intuition interface is limited to display depths of 8 bits, while RTG makes it possible to handle higher depths like 24-bits.


title: Amiga

text: The sound chip, named Paula, supports four PCM-sample-based sound channels (two for the left speaker and two for the right) with 8-bit resolution for each channel and a 6-bit volume control per channel. The analog output is connected to a low-pass filter, which filters out high-frequency aliases when the Amiga is using a lower sampling rate (see Nyquist frequency). The brightness of the Amiga's power LED is used to indicate the status of the Amiga's low-pass filter. The filter is active when the LED is at normal brightness, and deactivated when dimmed (or off on older A500 Amigas). On Amiga 1000 (and first Amiga 500 and Amiga 2000 model), the power LED had no relation to the filter's status, and a wire needed to be manually soldered between pins on the sound chip to disable the filter. Paula can read directly from the system's RAM, using direct memory access (DMA), making sound playback without CPU intervention possible.


title: Amiga

text: Although the hardware is limited to four separate sound channels, software such as "OctaMED" uses software mixing to allow eight or more virtual channels, and it was possible for software to mix two hardware channels to achieve a single 14-bit resolution channel by playing with the volumes of the channels in such a way that one of the source channels contributes the most significant bits and the other the least.


title: Amiga

text: The quality of the Amiga's sound output, and the fact that the hardware is ubiquitous and easily addressed by software, were standout features of Amiga hardware unavailable on PC platforms for years. Third-party sound cards exist that provide DSP functions, multi-track direct-to-disk recording, multiple hardware sound channels and 16-bit and beyond resolutions. A retargetable sound API called AHI was developed allowing these cards to be used transparently by the OS and software.