Questions from 31 to 35 are based on the following passage:

A . Explain that the files never existed in the first place. B . Explain that during a Migration install the /tmp filesystem is overwritten. C . Explain that after a Migration install， all system filesystems will be empty. D . Explain that /tmp is temporary storage and files are automatically removed every 30 days.

A . Questions from 31 to 35 are based on the following passage:

A . Questions from 36 to 40 are based on the following passage:

A . Explain that the files never existed in the first place. B . Explain that during a Migration install the /tmp filesystem is overwritten. C . Explain that after a Migration install, all system filesystems will be empty. D . Explain that /tmp is temporary storage and files are automatically removed every 30 days.

M: No, but ... who is Dolly？ Q: What is the man most probably doing？ (17) A．He is having a biology class. B．He is having a literature class. C．He is listening to a speech on history. D．He is listening to a speech on the life of a famous actress.

Until a few years ago, the most doctors could do was to counsel patients with bad breath about oral cleanliness. Now they are finding new ways to treat the usually curable condition. Bad breath can happen whenever the normal flow of saliva (唾液) slows. Our mouths are full of bacteria feeding on protein in bits of food and shed tissue. The bacteria emit evil smelling gases, the worst of which is hydrogen sulfide (硫 化物). Mouth bacteria thrive in airless conditions. Oxygen rich saliva keeps their numbers down. When we sleep, for example, the saliva stream slows, and sulfur producing bacteria gain the upper hand, producing classic “morning breath”. Alcohol hunger, too much talking, breathing through the mouth during exercise anything that dries the mouth produces bad breath. So can stress, though it’s not understood why. Some people’s breath turns sour every time they go on a job interview. Saliva flow gradually slows with age, which explains why the elderly have more bad breath trouble than younger people do. Babies, however, who make plenty of saliva and whose mouths contain relatively few bacteria have characteristically sweet breath. For most of us, the simple, dry mouth variety of bad breath is easily cured. Eating or drinking starts saliva and sweeps away many of the bacteria. Breakfast often stops morning breath. Those with chronic dry mouth find that it helps to keep gum, hard candy, or a bottle of water or juice around. Brushing the teeth wipes out dry mouth bad breath because it clears away many of the offending bacteria. Surprisingly, one thing that rarely works is mouthwash. The liquid can mask bad breath odor with its own smell, but the effect lasts no more than an hour. Some mouthwashes claim to kill the bacteria responsible for bad breath. The trouble is, they don’t necessarily reach all offending germs. Most bacteria are well protected from mouthwash under thick layers of mucus (粘液). If the mouthwash contains alcohol-as most do-it can intensify the problem by drying out the mouth. 第31题：The phrase “emanate from” in Paragraph 1 most probably means “________”. A) thrive on B) account for C) originate from D) descend from

Jason Frank, the marketing and research director at the communications agency SAS, says this creates tough competition for the good graduates. "Companies are finding it difficult and expensive to attract top talent," he says. "The people doing this sort of thing (running their own businesses) are often the sort of people that they want." The supermarket giant Sainsbury's conducted a lot of research into what graduates wanted in an employer and used this information to develop appealing graduate advertising. Unfortunately, the reality didn't always match the glitz. "People would say things such as, 'Where's my office？' but there wasn't one--it's working on the shop floor," says the director of the recruitment department. This mismatch was one of the reasons cited when people left the scheme early. "Where it becomes difficult for us is that retail isn't seen as a sexy career. In the past we've fallen into the trap of trying to compete about being sexy, but now we're looking at what the job actually involves. Let's be really honest with them about what life's going to look like." Now graduates know before they start that they will be expected to work hard on the shop floor in return for early responsibility, such as running their own team. Frank says that a warts-and-all approach to recruitment marketing will probably reduce the number of applicants, but should also make sure the people who do apply are a better fit for the company. "When people go in with the wrong expectations everyone's wasting their time. The student starts on a bad note, there's not a cultural fit, he might not have the right skills and the company will spend ￡100,000 training him and he will be gone in two years," Frank advises companies to use a niche marketing approach that targets segments of the student population, rather than trying to get everyone on every campus to read their brochure. It's also up to students to ensure that they think carefully about what work environment will suit them. Frank says that many fail to do any research at all. "They end up sending out applications to the companies that they have heard of in campus advertising, regardless of whether they truly know what the company does." By his words in Paragraph 2, Jason Frank means that the drop in the number of graduates who enter the job market ______. A．makes it difficult for good graduates to start their own business B．creates fierce competition among companies to attract good graduates C．creates tough competition among graduates to get a position in large companies D．makes it difficult for companies to recruit talented people with work experience

？For each question 15—20, mark one letter (A, B, C, or D) on your Answer Sheet for the answer you choose. Cooperative cooperation. Competitive cooperation. Confused？ Airline alliances have travelers scratching their heads over what's going on in the skies. Some folks view alliances as a blessing to travelers, offering seamless travel, reduced fares and enhanced frequent-flyer benefits. Others see a conspiracy of big business, causing decreased competition, increased fares and fewer choices. Whatever your opinion, there's no escaping airline alliances: the marketing hype is unrelenting, with each of the two megs-groupings, One world and Star Alliance, promoting itself as the best choice for all travelers. And, even if you turn away from their ads, chances are they will figure in any of your travel plans. By the end of the year, One world and Star Alliance will between them control more than 40% of the traffic in the sky. Some pundits predict that figure will be more like 75% in 10 years. But why, after years of often ferocious competition, have airlines decided to hand together？ Let's just say the timing is mutually convenient. North American airlines, have exhausted all means of earning customer loyalty at home, have been looking for ways to reach out to foreign flyers. Asian carriers are still hurting from the region-wide economic downturn that began two years ago-just when some of the airlines were taking delivery of new aircraft. Alliances also allow carriers to cut costs and increase profits by pooling manpower resources on the ground and cede-sharing—the practice of two partners selling tickets and operating only one aircraft. So alliances are terrific for airlines—but are they good for the passenger？ Absolutely, say the airlines: think of the lounges, the joint FFP (frequent flyer program) benefits, the round-the-world fares, and the global service networks. Then there's the promise of "seamless" travel= the ability to, say, travel from Singapore to Rome to New York, all on one ticket, without having to wait hours for connections or worry about your hags. Sounds utopian？ Peter Buecking, Cathay Pacific's director of sales and marketing, thinks that seamless travel is still evolving. "It's fair to say that these links are only in their infancy. The key to seamlessness rests in infrastructure and information sharing. We're working on this. n Henry Ma, spokesperson for Star Alliance in Hong Kong, lists some of the other benefits for consumers. "Global travelers have an easier time making connections and planning their itineraries. ' Ma claims alliances also assure passengers consistent service standards. Critics of alliances say the much-touted benefits to the consumer are mostly pie in the sky, that alliances are all about reducing costs for the airlines, rationalizing services and running joint marketing programs. It is believed that alliances will ultimately result in decreased flight choices and increased costs for consumers. Instead of two airlines competing and each operating a flight on the same route at 70% capacity, the allied pair will share the route and run one full flight. Since fewer seats will be available, passengers will be obliged to pay more for tickets. Those who've already made the elite grade in the FFP of a major airline stand to benefit the most when it joins an alliance: then they enjoy the PFP perks and advantages on any and all of the member carriers. For those who haven't made the top grade in any FFP, alliances might be a way of simplifying the earning of frequent flyer miles. For example, I belong to United Airline's Mileage Plus and generally fly less than 25,000 miles a year. But I earn miles with every flight I take on Star Alliance member-Ail Nippo A．Delight. B．Indifference. C．Objection. D．Puzzlement.

Age has its privileges in America. And one of the more prominent of them is the senior citizen discount. Anyone who has reached a certain age—in some cases as low as 55—is automatically entitled to a dazzling array of price reductions at nearly every level of commercial life. Eligibility is determined not by one’s need but by the date on one’s birth certificate. Practically unheard of a generation ago, the discounts have become a routine part of many businesses—as common as color televisions in motel rooms and free coffee on airliners. People with gray hair often are given the discounts without even asking for them；yet, millions of Americans above age 60 are healthy and solvent (有支付能力的). Businesses that would never dare offer discounts to college students or anyone under 30 freely offer them to older Americans. The practice is acceptable because of the widespread belief that “elderly” and “needy” are synonymous (同义的). Perhaps that once was true, but today elderly Americans as a group have a lower poverty rate than the rest of the population. To be sure, there is economic diversity within the elderly, and many older Americans are poor, But most of them aren’t. It is impossible to determine the impact of the discounts on individual companies. For many firms, they are a stimulus to revenue. But in other cases the discounts are given at the expense, directly or indirectly, of younger Americans. Moreover, they are a direct irritant in what some politicians and scholars see as a coming conflict between the generations. Generational tensions are being fueled by continuing debate over Social Security benefits, which mostly involves a transfer of resources from the young to the old. Employment is another sore point, Buoyed (支持) by laws and court decisions, more and more older Americans are declining the retirement dinner in favor of staying on the job-thereby lessening employment and promotion opportunities for younger workers. Far from a kind of charity they once were, senior citizen discounts have become a formidable economic privilege to a group with millions of members who don’t need them. It no longer makes sense to treat the elderly as a single group whose economic needs deserve priority over those of others. Senior citizen discounts only enhance the myth that older people can’t take care of themselves and need special treatment； and they threaten the creation of a new myth, that the elderly are ungrateful and taking for themselves at the expense of children and other age groups. Senior citizen discounts are the essence of the very thing older Americans are fighting against-discrimination by age. 31. We learn from the first paragraph that ________. A) offering senior citizens discounts has become routine commercial practice B) senior citizen discounts have enabled many old people to live a decent life C) giving senior citizens discounts has boosted the market for the elderly D) senior citizens have to show their birth certificates to get a discount

A library is more than just a place where books are stored. A library is a source of information. The information may come from books (fiction , nonfiction, or reference book), from periodicals (newspapers, magazines, and journals), from audio-visual materials (records, cassettes, microfilms, video tapes, etc.), or even from a computer terminal. Students go to libraries to study and write research papers. The periodicals room of a university library is where foreign students often find newspapers and magazines from their countries . In the reference room, they can find catalogs(目录) from many universities in the U.S. and other countries. If you are buying a used car, the reference librarian can show you the Blue Book which lists the prices of new and used cars. People who need information in a hurry can telephone the reference librarian at many libraries. There are as many different library services as there are types of people who use them. Children’s libraries provide materials for young readers. They sometimes have storytellers who read stories to groups of children , and a few have computers for the children to play with. Music lovers can listen to recordings of their favorite musicians in music libraries . Some libraries have painting and sculpture exhibits, and most libraries offer special services for blind people, such as books in Braille, ―talking‖ books , and Kurzweil Reading Machines. Libraries provide entertainment as well as information. Novels and short stories from a library’s fiction collection are a good source of enjoyable reading practice. Public libraries often sponsor lectures on topics of interest to member of the community, and a few even offer concerts and films. No matter what your interests are, you will find that a library can be a great place to enjoy yourself while you learn. 1.What is another name for a library？() A.A bookstore. B.The periodicals room. C.A reference librarian. D.The information place 2.In the reference room of the library you can find(). A. the fiction collection B. newspapers and magazines C. university catalogs D. materials for young readers 3.Which of the following is NOT an example of a library service？() A. Used cars. B. Art exhibits. C. Children’s storytellers. D. Kurzweil Reading Machines 4."A library can be a great place to enjoy yourself while you learn." This means you can()in a library. A. talk and laugh as much as you want B. find entertainment and information C. play with computers D. enjoy yourself by doing everything you can 5.What is the main idea of the whole text？ Choose the BEST answer.() A. There are many kinds of libraries. B. There are many books stored in a library. C. Libraries provide entertainment. D. Libraries offer many different services.

A．He’s giving a lecture B．He’s attending a meeting． C．He’s speaking on another phone D．He’s away on a business trip．

As a result, many people avoid the very attempts that are the source of true happiness. They fear the pain inevitably brought by such things as marriage, raising children, professional achievement, religious commitment (承担的义务), self-improvement. Ask a bachelor (单身汉) why he resists marriage even though he finds dating to be less and less satisfying. If he is honest he will tell you that he is afraid of making a commitment. For commitment is in fact quite painful. The single life is filled with fun, adventure, excitement. Marriage has such moments, but they are not its most distinguishing features. Couples with infant children are lucky to get a whole night’s sleep or a three-day vacation. I don’t know any parent who would choose the word fun to describe raising children. But couples who decide not to have children never know the joys of watching a child grow up or of playing with a grandchild. Understanding and accepting that true happiness has nothing to do with fun is one of the most liberating realizations. It liberates time: now we can devote more hours to activities that can genuinely increase our happiness. It liberates money: buying that new car or those fancy clothes that will do nothing to increase our happiness now seems pointless. And it liberates us from envy: we now understand that all those who are always having so much fun actually may not be happy at all. 第31题：According to the author, a bachelor resists marriage chiefly because ________. A) he is reluctant to take on family responsibilities B) he believes that life will be more cheerful if he remains single C) he finds more fun in dating than in marriage D) he fears it will put an end to all his fun adventure and excitement

According to the text which THREE of the following conditions have been scientifically proved to have a psychological effect on humans？ Choose THREE letters A-G and write them in boxes 35-37 on your answer sheet. [A] lack of negative ions [B] rainy weather [C] food consumption [D] high serotonin levels [E] sunny weather [F] freedom from worry [G] lack of counselling facilities 【35】______

Since clothes are such an important source of social information, we can use them to manipulate people’s impression of us. Our appearance assumes particular significance in the initial phases of interaction that is likely to occur. An elderly middle class man or woman may be alienated (疏远…) by a young adult who is dressed in an unconventional manner, regardless of the person’s education, background, or interests. People tend to agree on what certain types of clothes mean. Adolescent girls can easily agree on the lifestyles of girls who wear certain outfits (套装), including the number of boyfriends they likely have had and whether they smoke or drink. Newscasters, or the announcers who read the news on TV, are considered to be more convincing, honest, and competent when they are dressed conservatively. And collage students who view themselves as taking an active role in their inter-personal relationships say they are concerned about the costumes they must wear to play these roles successfully. Moreover, many of us can relate instances in which the clothing we wore changed the way we felt about ourselves and how we act ed. Perhaps you have used clothing to gain confidence when you anticipated a stressful situation, such as a job interview, or a court appearance. In the workplace, men have long had well defined precedents and role models for achieving success. It has been otherwise for women. A good many women in the business world are uncertain about the appropriate mixture of “masculine” and “feminine” attributes they should convey by their professional clothing. The variety of clothing alternatives to women has also been greater than that avail able for men. Male administrators tend to judge women more favorably for managerial positions when the women display less “feminine” grooming (打扮)-shorter hair, moderate use of make up, and plain tailored clothing. As one male administrator confessed, “An attractive woman is definitely going to get a longer interview, but she won’t get a job.” 第31题：According to the passage, the way we dress ________. A) provides clues for people who are critical of us B) indicates our likes and dislikes in choosing a career C) has a direct influence on the way people regard us D) is of particular importance when we get on in age

Helicopter Moms vs. Free-Range KidsWould you let your fourth-grader ride public transportation without an adult？ Probably not. Still, when Lenore Skenazy, a columnist for the New York Sun, wrote about letting her son take the subway alone to get back to "Long story short:my son got home from a department store on the Upper East Side, she didn’t expect to get hit with a wave of criticism from readers. “Long story short: My son got home, overjoyed with independence,” Skenazy wrote on April 4 in the New York Sun. “Long story longer: Half the people I’ve told this episode to now want to turn on in for child abuse. As if keeping kids under lock and key and cell phone and careful watch is the right way to rear kids. It’s not. It’s debilitating (使虚弱)—for us and for them.” Online message boards were soon full of people both applauding and condemning Skenazy’s decision to let her son go it alone. She wound up defending herself on CNN (accompanied by her son) and on popular blogs like the buffington post, where her follow-up piece was ironically headlined “More From America’s Worst Mom.” The episode has ignited another one of those debates that divides parents into vocal opposing camps. Are Modern parents needlessly overprotective, or is the world a more complicated and dangerous place than it was when previous generations were allowed to wander about unsupervised？ From the “she’s an irresponsible mother” camp came: “Shame on you for being so careless about his safety,” in Comments on the buffongton post. And there was this from a mother of four: “How would you have felt if he didn’t come home？” But Skenazy got a lot of support, too, with women and men writing in with stories about how they were allowed to take trips all by them selves at seven or eight. She also got heaps of praise for bucking the “helicopter parent” trend: “Good for this Mom,” one commenter wrote on the buffongton post. “This is a much-needed reality check.” Last week, encouraged by all the attention, Skenazy started her own blog—Free Range, kids—promoting the idea that modern children need some of the same independence that her generation had. In the good old days nine-year-old baby boomers rode their bikes to school, walked to the store, took buses—and even subways—all by themselves. Her blog, she says, is dedicated to sensible parenting. “At Free Range Kids, we believe in safe kids. We believe in car seats and safety belts. We do NOT believe that every time school-age children go outside, they need a security guard.” So why are some parents so nervous about letting their children out of their sight？ Are cities and towns less safe and kids more vulnerable to crimes like child kidnap and sexual abuse than they were in previous generations？ Not exactly. New York City, for instance, is safer than it’s ever been; it’s ranked 36th in crime among all American cities. Nationwide, stringer kidnaps are extremely rare; there’s a one-in-a-million chance a child will be taken by a stranger, according to the Justice Department. And 90 percent of sexual abuse cases are committed by someone the child knows. Mortality rates from all causes, including disease and accidents, for American children are lower now than they were 25 years’ ago. According to Child Trends, a nonprofit research group, between 1980 and 2003 death rates dropped by 44 percent for children aged 5 to 14 and 32 percent for teens aged 15 to 19. Then there’s the whole question of whether modern parents are more watchful and nervous about safety than previous generations. Yes, some are. Part of the problem is that with wall to wall Internet and cable news, every missing child case gets so much airtime that it’s not surprising even normal parental anxiety can be amplified. And many middle-class parents have gotten used to managing their children’s time and shuttling them to various enriching activities, so the idea of letting them out on their own can seem like a risk. Back in 1972, when many of today’s parents were kids, 87 percent of children who lived within a mile of school walked or biked every day. But today, the Centers for Disease Control report that only 13 percent of children bike, walk or otherwise t themselves to school. The extra supervision is both a city and a suburb phenomenon. Parents are worried about crime, and they are worried about kids getting caught in traffic in a city that’s not used to pedestrians. On the other hand, there are still plenty of kids whose parents give them a lot of independence, by choice or by necessity. The After School Alliance finds that more than 14 million kids aged 5 to 17 are responsible for taking care of themselves after school. Only 6.5 million kids participate in organized programs. “Many children who have working parents have to take the subway or bus to get to school. Many do this by themselves because they have no other way to get to the schools,” says Dr. Richard Gallagher, director of the Parenting Institute at the New York University Child Study Center. For those parents who wonder how and when they should start allowing their kids more freedom, there’s no clear-cut answer. Child experts discourage a one-size-fits-all approach to parenting. What’s right for Skenazy’s nine-year-old could be inappropriate for another one. It all depends on developmental issue, maturity, and the psychological and emotional makeup of that child. Several factors must be taken into account, says Gallagher. “The ability to follow parent guidelines, the child’s level of comfort in handling such situations, and a child’s general judgment should be weighed.” Gallagher agrees with Skenazy that many nine-year-olds are ready for independence like taking public transportation alone. “At certain times of the day, on certain routes, the subways are generally safe for these children, especially if they have grown up in the city and have been taught how to be safe, how to obtain help if they are concerned for their safety, and how to avoid unsafe situations by being watchful and on their toes.” But even with more traffic and fewer sidewalks, modern parents do have one advantage their parents didn’t: the cell phone. Being able to check in with a child anytime goes a long way toward relieving parental anxiety and may help parents loosen their control a little sooner. Skenazy got a lot of criticism because she didn’t give her kid her cell phone because she thought he’d lose it and wanted him to learn to go it alone without depending on mom—a major principle of free-range parenting. But most parents are more than happy to use cell phones to keep track of their kids. And for those who like the idea of free-range kids but still struggle with their inner helicopter parent, there may be a middle way. A new generation of GPS cell phones with tracking software make it easier than ever to follow a child’s every movement via the Internet—without seeming to interfere or hover. Of course, when they go to college, they might start objecting to being monitored as they’re on parole (假释). 注意：此部分试题请在答题卡1上作答。 1. When Lenore Skenazy’s son was allowed to take the subway alone, he ________. A．was afraid that he might get lost B．enjoyed having the independence C．was only too pleased to take the risk D．thought he was an exceptional child

During the hours when you labor through your work you may say that you’re “hot”. That’s true. The time of day when you feel most energetic is when your cycle of body temperature is at its peak. For some people the peak comes during the afternoon. For others it comes in the afternoon or evening. No one has discovered why this is so, but it leads to such familiar monologues (自言自语) as: “Get up, John! You’ll be late for work again!” The possible explanation to the trouble is that John is at his temperature-and-energy peak in the evening. Much family quarrelling ends when husbands and wives realize what these energy cycles mean, and which cycle each member of the family has. You can’t change your energy cycle, but you can learn to make your life fit it better. Habit can help, Dr. Kleitman believes. Maybe you’re sleepy in the evening but feel you must stay up late anyway. Counteract (对抗) your cycle to some extent by habitually staying up later than you want to. If our energy is low in the morning but you have an important job to do early in the day, rise before your usual hour. This won’t change your cycle, but you’ll get up steam (鼓起干劲) and work better at your low point. Get off to a slow start which saves your energy. Get up with a leisurely yawn and stretch. Sit on the edge of the bed a minute before putting your feet on the floor. Avoid the troublesome search for clean clothes by laying them out the night before. Whenever possible, do routine work in the afternoon and save tasks requiring more energy or concentration for your sharper hours. 第31题：If a person finds getting up early a problem, most probably ________. A) he is a lazy person B) he refuses to follow his own energy cycle C) he is not sure when his energy is low D) he is at his peak in the afternoon or evening

Bosses Say “Yes” to Home Work Rising costs of office space, time lost to stressful commuting, and a slow recognition that workers have lives beyond the office—all are strong arguments for letting staff work from home. For the small business, there are additional benefits too—staff are more productive, and happier, enabling firms to keep their headcounts (员工数) and their recruitment costs to a minimum. It can also provide competitive advantage, especially when small businesses want to attract new staff but don’t have the budget to offer huge salaries. While company managers have known about the benefits for a long time, many have done little about it, sceptical of whether they could trust their employees to work to full capacity without supervision, or concerned about the additional expenses teleworking policies might incur as staff start charging their home phone bills to the business. Yet this is now changing. When communications provider Inter-Tel researched the use of remote working solutions among small-and-medium-sized UK businesses in April this year, it found that 28% more companies claimed to have introduced flexible working practices than a year ago. The UK network of Business Links confirms that it too has seen a growing interest in remote working solutions from small businesses seeking its advice, and claims that as many as 60-70% of the businesses that come through its doors now offer some form. of remote working support to their workforces. Technology advances, including the widespread availability of broadband, are making the introduction of remote working a piece of cake. “If systems are set up properly, staff can have access to all the resources they have in the office wherever they have an internet connection,” says Andy Poulton, e-business advisor at Business Link for Berkshire and Wiltshire. “There are some very exciting developments which have enabled this.” One is the availability of broadband everywhere, which now covers almost all of the country (BT claims that, by July, 99.8% of its exchanges will be broadband enabled, with alternative plans in place for even the most remote exchanges). “This is the enabler,” Poulton says. Yet while broadband has come down in price too, those service providers targeting the business market warn against consumer services masquerading (伪装) as business-friendly broadband. “Broadband is available for as little as ￡15 a month, but many businesses fail to appreciate the hidden costs of such a service,” says Neil Stephenson, sales and marketing director at Onyx Internet, an internet service provider based in the north-east of England. “Providers offering broadband for rock-bottom prices are notorious for poor service, with regular breakdowns and heavily congested (拥堵的) networks. It is always advisable for businesses to look beyond the price tag and look for a business-only provider that can offer more reliability, with good support.” Such services don’t cost too much—quality services can be found for upwards of ￡30 a month. The benefits of broadband to the occasional home worker are that they can access email in real time, and take full advantage of services such as internet-based backup or even internet-based phone services. Internet-based telecoms, or VoIP (Voice over IP) to give it its technical title, is an interesting tool to any business supporting remote working. Not necessarily because of the promise of free or reduced price phone calls (which experts point out is misleading for the average business), but because of the sophisticated voice services that can be exploited by the remote worker—facilities such as voicemail and call forwarding, which provide a continuity of the company image for customers and business partners. By law, companies must “consider seriously” requests to work flexibly made by a parent with a child under the age of six, or a disabled child under 18. It was the need to accommodate employees with young children that motivated accountancy firm Wright Vigar to begin promoting teleworking recently. The company, which needed to upgrade its IT infrastructure (基础设施) to provide connectivity with a new, second office, decided to introduce support for remote working at the same time. Marketing director Jack O’Hern explains that the company has a relatively young workforce, many of whom are parents: “One of the triggers was when one of our tax managers returned from maternity leave. She was intending to work part time, but could only manage one day a week in the office due to childcare. By offering her the ability to work from home, we have doubled her capacity—now she works a day a week from home, and a day in the office. This is great for her, and for us as we retain someone highly qualified.” For Wright Vigar, which has now equipped all of its fee-earners to be able to work at maximum productivity when away from the offices (whether that’s from home, or while on the road), this strategy is not just about saving on commute time or cutting them loose from the office, but enabling them to work more flexible hours that fit around their home life. O’Hern says: “Although most of our work is client-based and must fit around this, we can’t see any reason why a parent can’t be on hand to deal with something important at home, if they have the ability to complete a project later in the day.” Supporting this new way of working came with a price, though. Although the firm was updating its systems anyway, the company spent 10-15% more per user to equip them with a laptop rather than a PC, and about the same to upgrade to a server that would enable remote staff to connect to the company networks and access all their usual resources. Although Wright Vigar hasn’t yet quantified the business benefits, it claims that, in addition to being able to retain key staff with young families, it is able to save fee-earners a substantial amount of “dead” time in their working days. That staff can do this without needing a fixed telephone line provides even more efficiency savings. “With Wi-Fi (fast, wireless internet connections) popping up all over the place, even on trains, our fee-earners can be productive as they travel, and between meetings, instead of having to kill time at the shops,” he adds. The company will also be able to avoid the expense of having to relocate staff to temporary offices for several weeks when it begins disruptive office renovations soon. Financial recruitment specialist Lynne Hargreaves knows exactly how much her firm has saved by adopting a teleworking strategy, which has involved handing her company’s data management over to a remote hosting company, Datanet, so it can be accessible by all the company’s consultants over broadband internet connections. It has enabled the company to dispense with its business premises altogether, following the realisation that it just didn’t need them any more. “The main motivation behind adopting home working was to increase my own productivity, as a single mum to an 11-year-old,” says Hargreaves. “But I soon realised that, as most of our business is done on the phone, email and at off-site meetings, we didn’t need our offices at all. We’re now saving ￡16,000 a year on rent, plus the cost of utilities, not to mention what would have been spent on commuting.” 1. What is the main topic of this passage？ A) How business managers view hi-tech. B) Relations between employers and employees. C) How to cut down the costs of small businesses. D) Benefits of the practice of teleworking.

How can a discount voucher be obtained？ A．By purchasing more than two items B．By visiting the personnel department C．By calling a nearby Ruston office D．By sending an e-mail to the customer service department