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0.999896 | linkThe documentation says that Initialize() is called once, during process initialization, but I have potentially multiple clients using this library concurrently. How should I proceed?
Initialize() should be called in your application/library OnInitialize()/Main() method. In case you don't have such method, you could call Initialize() multiple times (PDFNet will make sure that it is initialized only once), you only need to make sure that it is called before any other PDFNet method. | 2019-04-24T04:30:40 | https://www.pdftron.com/documentation/windows/faq/multi-client/ |
0.999635 | Cisco Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast projects that there will be more people on Earth using smartphones in 2021 than there are with access to running water.
Cisco Systems came out with its annual state of mobile networking report on Feb. 7, and there was no shortage of both expected and unexpected data points.
This also could indicate that the well-watered people in the world should move faster to help get that vital liquid resource to other places that need it.
What follows in this article are a lot of large and predictive analytics-based numbers emanating from systems that we write about virtually each day here at eWEEK. How accurate will they be in the long run? We hesitate to project that answer without writing a query and running it through IBM Watson.
--By 2021, more members of the global population will be using mobile phones (5.5 billion) than bank accounts (5.4 billion), running water (5.3 billion), or landlines (2.9 billion).
--Mobile data traffic shows no signs of slowing down: This isn't much of a surprise. Mobile data traffic will represent 20 percent of total IP traffic globally; this is up from only 8 percent of total IP traffic in 2016.
--4G connection growth and measurable impact of 5G: 4G will support 58 percent of total mobile connections by 2021; this is up from 26 percent in 2016. It will account for 79 percent of total mobile data traffic. Measurable 5G impact is expected to begin by 2020, and subscriptions will sell very fast, the report said. That's not a surprise.
--Mobile devices are getting even smarter: If you read eWEEK on a regular basis, you already know this is true. Machine-to-machine (M2M) connections will represent 29 percent (3.3 billion) of total mobile connections, up from 5 percent (780 million) in 2016, as the internet of things (IoT) continues to grow in consumer and business environments.
--More video with an even larger footprint: Mobile video will have the highest growth rate of any mobile application category and will represent 78 percent of all mobile traffic by 2021.
--Impact of virtual reality adoption: VR headsets will grow from 18 million in 2016 to nearly 100 million by 2021, a fivefold growth. VR traffic will grow 11-fold from 13.3 petabytes/month in 2016 to 140 petabytes/month in 2021 globally.
Look for the popularity of mobile video to continue to escalate. According to the study, mobile video will increase 8.7-fold from 2016 to 2021 and will make up 78 percent of all mobile network traffic by 2021.
Mobile data traffic overall will increase seven-fold in the next five years from 87 exabytes in 2016 to 587 exabytes in 2021, according to the study.
Cisco also said that machine-to-machine connections are the fastest growing type of IoT connections and will account for 29 percent of connections, or 3.3 billion, up from 5 percent, or 780 million in 2016.
Interestingly, the Cisco study says that by 2021, 46 percent of M2M connections will be over the 4G cellular network, compared to 31 percent that will be on a low-power wide area (LoRa) M2M network.
In 2016, LoRa carried about 7 percent of M2M traffic compared to 4G, which carried about 23 percent of M2M traffic.
The Cisco VNI Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast (2016-2021) uses independent analyst forecasts and real-world mobile data usage studies. Upon this foundation are layered Cisco's own estimates for mobile application adoption, minutes of use and transmission speeds.
Key enablers such as mobile broadband speed and device computing power are also factored into Cisco mobile VNI projections and findings, the company said.
You can read the complete report in whitepaper form here. | 2019-04-20T03:12:58 | https://www.eweek.com/mobile/cisco-report-mobile-phones-will-number-5.5-billion-by-2021 |
0.999264 | Just What Will They Talk About?
Certainly the two topics on Right-Wing radio today will be Caroline Kennedy's withdrawal from the race to fill the New York Senate seat now vacated by the confirmation of Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State; and the re-oath of President Barack Obama as the 44th President of the United States. Without hearing a word or seeking a soundbite prior to my writing this piece, I sit and wonder what it will sound like.
First to Kennedy: There is no shortage of those on the Right who hate anything Kennedy. That being said, no one out there believes the reason Caroline Kennedy dropped out of the race was due to the concern she has for her Uncle Teddy (and I say that without doubting her love for the elder Kennedy statesman - but not much has changed in his position since he was diagnosed with brain cancer). The writing appeared to be on the wall that New York Governor David Paterson wasn't going to appoint Kennedy to the spot she threw her hat into the ring for.
There are no shortage of qualified people to take Clinton's place in New York State. And while Kennedy certainly has the pedigree and the smarts to be able to grow into the job, it became real obvious real quick by her mishandling of the New York and national media that she wasn't ready for the spotlight... yet.
On CNN's morning shoe this morning, the hosts spoke of the fact that Paterson's thought process for New York's Junior Senate seat had to include the fact that a woman was leaving it and, possibly, a woman should be the new appointee. Among the choices they put out there were Rep. Carolyn Maloney, who became a US Congresswoman in the wake of her husband's death and son's injury by Colin Ferguson on the Long Island Railroad; and Randi Weingarten, the United Federation of Teachers' Labor Union President.
Then, of course, the same hostess who claimed Barack Obama hadn't done enough less than 24 hours into his presidency stated that Paterson might be considering the appointment of an Hispanic to the office because there were none in the Senate. I bet Mel Martinez (REPUBLICAN-FL) and Bob Menendez (DEMOCRAT-NJ) were surprised to hear that.
The Senate seat Clinton vacates will be a hard one to keep regardless of who gets it (I'm putting my money on Andrew Cuomo, the current New York State Attorney General and son of former Governor Mario). Cuomo has both the pedigree and, more importantly, the experience for the job, although Rep. Maloney would be just as good a choice.
New York State's Senate situation leaves the state in a curious position. Whereas an appointment is permanent, it isn't for the length of the remaining tern unless that term is two years of less. In Menendez' case, he left the House of Representatives and moved over to the Senate for a year until now-Governor Jon Corzine's elected term in that house was up (2005-2006). He did win the seat outright in 2006. Paterson's appointee will serve two years (until 2010) and then run for the remainder of Clinton's term (due to expire in 2012). In 2012, the appointee would run for his or her own full six0year term. That's three elections in three consecutive federal election cycles.
And if that weren't enough, in 2010 there will be two US Senate seats up for re-election: Charles Schumer, the Senior Senator from The Empire State will be running as well.
President Barack Obama has taken a new oath of office. after Chief Justice John Roberts decision to wing it on January 20th (and get it wrong), the new President and his staff thought it best to get the oath right. In a small swearing-in ceremony took place in the White House map room without video cameras or a bible for Obama to put his hand upon. Media outlets immediately filed a protest that their cameras weren't allowed into the room with just an audio and still pictures being the only proof of the event.
Certainly this is fuel for the Righties fire's flame which they will gladly fan. First, there was no bible. Surely the Muslim rumors will begin to swirl upon hearing that. The Lincoln Bible Obama had his hand on will make no difference to those on Fox News, New York's WABC Radio and other outlets.
Next they'll complain about openness. Whereas former President Bush would have used the occasion to strut his do-nothing feathers one more time (had he had a second chance at taking the oath), Obama decision to get it over with without any more pomp and circumstance has to, in their world of spin, been an attempt at closing the door.
If one doubts that the Right Wing will do and say things along these lines, think back to what they did when it became apparent that a Black man named Barack Obama was going to be the front-runner for the US presidency. In spite of his obvious citizenship they actually filed a lawsuit against his being President due to his foreign birth, even though all of the proof that Obama was born in the US. No matter where he was born, he would still be a US citizen due to his mother's US citizenship. But regardless of that, it still became the fodder for the Righties to feed to their zombie-like followers.
The reason why all of this is relevant for those of us in the center or on the Left to talk about is this: We saw what can happen when rumors and innuendo run rampant from the Right and permeate the real news and the American psyche. It helped defeat both Al Gore and John Kerry and left us with eight years of the horrific disaster known as George W. Bush.
copyright c 2009 Journal Register Newspapers, Inc.
Emotional events are difficult to characterize. We use the same adjectives again and again, in greater and greater superlatives. Yet they ring hollow because they are in the end just words and what we feel is so much more, so inexpressible.
So it was with the Inauguration of Barack Obama as the nation’s first African-American president.
The question was almost rhetorical–no one said yes.
Each of us brought our own personal history to Obama’s inauguration based on our race, age, gender, class status. Each of us felt different emotions welling up as the day progressed. But over everything floated the collective yet singular emotion that emanated from the Washington Mall: joy.
Joy is one of those feelings we rarely have after the age of five or six. It doesn’t come readily to those who have dealt with life’s harsher moments or who have gained the perspective that comes with adulthood. Excitement is almost always tempered in some way and joy rarely has the purity it had for us as children.
I felt joy on Inauguration Day and I saw joy resonate through the crowd of nearly two million people who braved the bitter cold for hours just to be in the presence of history. It was palpable, that joy. It was like a sound wave without the sound. It was that other thing we rarely experience as adults: magic.
There were moments within the moments: Aretha Franklin’s piercing and soulful rendition of “My Country ’Tis of Thee,” Rev. Joseph Lowery’s resounding chorus of “amens,” Itzak Perlman and Yo-Yo Ma, the bank of former presidents looking on behind sweet little Sasha and Malia Obama, Elizabeth Alexander’s rich and complex inaugural poem. And then there was Barack Obama himself, taking the oath and giving his address.
Obama’s speech resonated with the urgency of reinventing America and American democracy once more after eight years of war and terrorism, torture and evisceration of the Constitution.
Obama delivered the speech with his characteristic fervor. He referenced a “nagging fear that America's decline is inevitable, and that the next generation must lower its sights” and then went on to explain why that was a misreading of our nation and ourselves.
Obama looked directly at America as he said that–because it is we who have to re-gain our place in the world. This is not a job solely for the new president and his cabinet. We citizens have been called to service, as well.
But the fact is, there are no real comparisons. Barack Obama is not a child of 1960s black radicals nor a child of the inner city. He’s not the child of wealth and privilege like George W. Bush was, nor is he the child of poverty like Bill Clinton was. He grew up in Kansas, Indonesia and Hawaii. He went to good schools. He is the first American president from a multi-ethnic and multi-racial family, with a white mother, African father, Indonesian half-sister, white, black and Asian in-laws.
Biracial, with a multi-ethnic family, he is the living emblem of the melting pot most of us were taught America is.
There’s been a lot of hyperbole about Obama since he first began running. Right-wing pundits even referred to the Inauguration as the “Immaculation” or the “Messiahanation.” But the fact is, Obama is only human and his speech reflected his humanness. He made it clear that the job of getting America back on its feet must be taken on by all of us and that we are all, to a certain extent, responsible for where we are today–at war, in debt, flailing.
There were the few who felt the need to nit-pick the speech and who actually seemed to want Obama to fail. There will always be people like that, and perhaps we need them to keep things focused and remind us that even in the midst of light, there’s always something dark lurking in the corner that we must be wary of.
But the day was still about light–about a great dark cloud lifting in the cold winter wind. It was about change in the air. Change that we don’t have to convince ourselves to believe in, because it already happened at noon Jan. 20.
He stopped and told me that he was ashamed to admit it, but he had never voted before this election. Ever. “More than 35 years and I never voted,” he said, shaking his head. “But I couldn’t miss this opportunity.” He told me he made his 18 year-old nephew vote, too. “I should have before this, but now...” The emotion was raw on his face. We shook hands and he walked away.
Beyonce sang Etta James’s “At Last” for the opening dance between the President and Michelle Obama at the first inaugural ball. The singer spoke to ABC news immediately afterward.
That was tone that got set on Inauguration Day: that we all need to live up to our potential–individual and collective. That as a nation we can and must do better. That we need to rise up and step up and get it together and be the Americans we used to be before 9/11 happened and we lost our way from fear and anger and bad leadership.
My parents were civil rights workers and I grew up surrounded by some of the great men and women of that era–ordinary men and women who became great leaders of necessity, because we were at a crossroads as a nation and change had to happen.
I wish my parents could have witnessed the Inauguration of America’s first black president. I wish that they and every other man and woman who faced down the injustice of that era could all have been there as witness.
But I was a witness, and you were a witness and our children were all witnesses. We all saw how in the span of only 44 years since the signing of the Civil Rights Act, in the 40 years since Dr. Martin Luther King said he had been to the mountaintop and he had seen the promised land and that he might not get there with us, but we would get there, that a black man is now living in the White House built by black American slaves.
There are dark days ahead for America and most of us know that and are dreading the loss of jobs, homes, health care. The war in Iraq will shift to the war in Afghanistan. But we have a new leader, we have a new opportunity to reinvent ourselves as Americans and as a nation and we have a real chance to achieve the thing we all most want: change.
On Jan. 20, at the cold but sun-drenched Capitol, we turned a page in our history. We must set ourselves to do what our new president has exhorted us to do: sacrifice for our future as a nation, stand up and do not falter. Remember that with citizenship comes responsibility.
Change is in the air. Now it is up to each of us to breathe deep and take it in.
Yes but did you notice that the market came right back up on the first day of Obama's Presidency? It has nothing to do with Obama and everything to do with business news. On the day that it went down, there were poor earnings report from State St. Bank (considered to be a conservative bank). On the day it went up, there were good earnings report from IBM. Politicians don't make / break markets, business does. | 2019-04-18T20:33:28 | http://nationalview.org/Newsletter09/newsletter_012209.htm |
0.999998 | Aspiring apparatchiks of the coming world dictatorship, tiring of the hopeless race against facts in their anti-industrial carbon dioxide hoax, have finally given up the pretense of science in favor of pure, old-fashioned doomsday preaching. Having been outlasted by reality in the pseudo-science of "global cooling," undone once again in the pseudo-science of "global warming," and ultimately laughed off the stage in the unfalsifiable quackery of "global climate change," it is apparently time at last for the advocates of tyranny in the name of Gaia to play their last card: global mass hysteria.
Consider a recent New York Times editorial by James Hansen, head of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, and adjunct professor at -- where else? -- Columbia University, the headquarters of the U.S. East-Coast wing of the global socialist movement. The article is an assault on the Canadian oil sands project, and a plea to the Obama administration to do something to stop the Canadian government from allowing wealth and jobs to be created.
Hansen's diatribe -- I choose that word merely as a literal description of the article, which bears no resemblance to an argument -- is noteworthy on three fronts: (1) its tone of angry defiance, suggestive of a man whose instinct, in the face of rational defeat, is to say, "Damn all of you!"; (2) Hansen's attempt to use the Times' friendly confines to double down on the projections of his discredited climate models, without compunction at having no remaining grounds for his claims; and (3) the straightforwardness with which his proposed course of action on this issue proclaims the real, but hitherto half-concealed, purpose of the global climate fraud -- namely, a government takeover of the world economy by means of a proletarian uprising against the "capitalists."
Consider Hansen's opening statement. After years of basing everything on climate modelling, in which he himself was a pioneer, Hansen is now prepared to jettison all that -- as indeed he must -- by dismissing the core of climate modelling -- i.e., prediction -- in favor of the bald assertion that "[g]lobal warming isn't a prediction. It is happening."
Is it happening? Not according to Hansen's British counterpart, Phil Jones of East Anglia University (of "Climategate" fame), who in 2010, when asked whether he agreed that there has been "no statistically-significant" warming since 1995, pathetically conceded, "Yes, but only just." (To paraphrase, "I'm wrong -- but barely!") And not -- as Timothy Birdnow recently detailed at American Thinker -- according to James Lovelock, popular climate alarmist and inventor of the Gaia Hypothesis, who recently acknowledged that "we don't know what the climate is doing. We thought we knew 20 years ago."
In other words, even some of the most prominent advocates of "hiding the decline" have finally been forced by inescapable facts to come out of the closet and confess what many honest scientists have been saying for years -- namely, that global temperatures simply aren't following the primary rule programmed into the computer models -- namely, that increased CO2 equals increased rates of warming.
James Hansen, however, is sticking to his guns. In fact, he's coming out all guns a-blazing.
Canada's tar sands, deposits of sand saturated with bitumen, contain twice the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by global oil use in our entire history. If we were to fully exploit this new oil source, and continue to burn our conventional oil, gas and coal supplies, concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere eventually would reach levels higher than in the Pliocene era, more than 2.5 million years ago, when sea level was at least 50 feet higher than it is now. That level of heat-trapping gases would assure that the disintegration of the ice sheets would accelerate out of control. Sea levels would rise and destroy coastal cities. Global temperatures would become intolerable. Twenty to 50 percent of the planet's species would be driven to extinction. Civilization would be at risk.
First of all, this wild guess in the form of an authoritative conclusion is explicitly predicated on the full exploitation of all the oil in the tar sands. Who is proposing to extract (and burn) all of it? And how long would that take?
Assuming this were to happen, and CO2 "eventually" reached levels comparable to the Pliocene epoch, when, exactly, would sea levels reach Pliocene heights? How does one quantify statements such as "disintegration of the ice sheets would accelerate out of control"? What does "out of control" mean? Who controls such things now? Is Hansen saying that people in coastal cities would suddenly wake up one morning to find themselves in an octopus's garden?
Yes, that is precisely what he is saying. For he is no longer engaged in pseudo-science; he is simply screaming, "We're all gonna die! Run for the hills!" In his actual words: "If this sounds apocalyptic, it is."
Given the obvious boon to plant life that such an enormous boost in CO2 might entail, the fact that Hansen provides no evidence that the Pliocene epoch was characterized by a widespread reduction in life forms, and the fact that modern technology would make a voluntary migration of mankind to more tolerable -- and at present largely uninhabited -- climatic regions relatively easy, it is, on its face, unclear why Hansen is so "apocalyptic" about these projected changes, even assuming, charitably, that he isn't talking through his hat.
Why, then, is this alleged man of science speaking so incautiously? For a reason made all too apparent by his proposed solution to all of this, his policy advice to President Obama: palliate the masses with widescale wealth redistribution. Seeing that his project of decades -- and with it the "global governance" dreams of leftists like Al Gore and Herman Van Rompuy -- is crumbling in the face of growing public skepticism, he, along with others, is refusing to go down without one last desperate fear-mongering swing. If the climate frauds can get the policy action they want now, it will no longer matter, five years hence, whether there is anything left of the theory underpinning their ruse.
We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month. The government would not get a penny. This market-based approach would stimulate innovation, jobs and economic growth, avoid enlarging government or having it pick winners or losers. Most Americans, except the heaviest energy users, would get more back than they paid in increased prices.
"We should impose a fee." A fee is a charge for service. But those paying the fee proposed here would be receiving no service -- on the contrary, they would be having their source of income, and those of their thousands of employees, destroyed. So why should they choose to pay this fee? Naturally, they would not "choose" it. That is why "we" should "impose" it on them. An imposed fee? That is a euphemism for one of two things: theft, if the fee is imposed privately, or a tax, if imposed by the government. Presumably, Hansen intends the latter, in which case "we" might generously be interpreted as "we voters," although it is more likely that what he had in mind was something like "we power brokers, we the elite, we who control things."
So a new tax -- a tax imposed exclusively on the fossil fuel industry, and then "distributed" to "all Americans on a per-capita basis every month." Tax certain people, and hand the money directly to other people. Hansen conveniently leaves the prefix "re-" off the word "distribute," so the little people won't notice what he is really driving at.
But the best part of this "fee" which will be "distributed" to "all Americans" is the next part: "The government would not get a penny." So when the government collects taxes, and then spends the revenue on redistribution of wealth, this does not constitute the government "getting a penny." If I rob a bank and distribute the cash among my friends, this no longer counts as my having acquired money illegitimately from the bank. Money-laundering made easy! Feel better now? When tax dollars are used to subsidize other people's lives, this is, according to Columbia University professor Hansen, a "market-based approach."
Further, following the fairness doctrine of the post-partisan president, this "market-based approach" even-handedly avoids having the government "pick winners or losers." What about all those people working in the fossil fuel industry, or related fields, you say? Well, they were picked as losers by Gaia -- the government had nothing to do with it.
And don't forget the best part: "Most Americans, except the heaviest energy users, would get more back than they paid in increased prices."
In other words, this demolition of the fuel industry will obviously lead to vast price increases -- not to mention scarcity and subsequent price increases in all other areas of the economy -- but these will be offset for "most Americans, except the heaviest energy users," by the direct transfer of "fees" from the fuel companies to your pocket. Or it will be offset until the money from those companies dries up, which, under such a "market-based approach," should probably be about six weeks. By then, certainly, those imposed "distributions" will have "stimulated" enough "innovation" in alternative energy to get everyone off those over-priced fossil fuels anyway, right?
Think, finally, of what Hansen is asking of those who would receive these "distributed" "fees" -- i.e., "all Americans." He is banking everything on the idea that the majority of people would shamelessly accept the premise that private companies with hundreds of thousands of employees supporting millions of family members should directly hand them a portion of their revenues for no reason other than as punishment for producing CO2. If his presumption is correct -- it may well be -- the battle for liberty has already been lost.
Forget Hansen's scare tactics -- he has officially forsaken semi-rational argument, so there is no reason to pay attention to his claims. Focus instead on his practical proposal. Shout it from the rooftops, in fact. If fear is to be used as a political weapon, then let's give everyone something really scary to think about.
This famous global warming "theorist" has laid everything on the table: he is proposing the direct confiscation of legally earned wealth for the express purpose of temporarily offsetting the hardships that will result from destroying the industrial economy.
And when the destruction is complete, and the confiscated wealth has dried up? Well, then of course Hansen, Obama, and the rest of the redistributionist planet-savers have a plan for restoring the liberty that had to be suspended temporarily in Gaia's name -- wouldn't you think? | 2019-04-19T22:22:07 | http://climaterealists.com/?id=9646 |
0.999485 | I got an error message stating “All [i] tags must have a closing [/i] tag.” What should I do?
If you include [i], [b], or [u] as part of your post, you will need to format that text as a code snippet by using the “code” formatting button.
[i]This text[/i] will be formatted as This text.
[b]This text[/b] will be formatted as This text.
[u]This text[/u] will be formatted as This text.
This formatting requires a closing tag (such as [/i]) for every opening tag (such as [i]). The error message that “All [i] tags must have a closing [/i] tag” means that somewhere in the text of your question, comment, or article, you have entered [i] without [/i]. Note that you may also see this message with [b] or [u] in place of [i].
To include [i] without using it to format any other text, you’ll need to highlight the portion of your text that contains [i] and click the “code” formatting button. This will format all that highlighted text as a code snippet, and you’ll be able to submit your post without this error. You should try to format all code that you post as a snippet in this way.
This is how the text will appear within the body of your question. | 2019-04-21T22:20:27 | http://support.experts-exchange.com/customer/en/portal/articles/765528-i-got-an-error-message-stating-%E2%80%9Call-i-tags-must-have-a-closing-i-tag-%E2%80%9D-what-should-i-do- |
0.999938 | Obama is proposing a total of $1.5 trillion in new taxes over the next decade, mostly on corporations and high-income households. He would use much of that money � nearly $280 billion � to pay for targeted tax breaks for low- and middle-income families.
Obama's proposed tax cuts would benefit households with two wage earners, families with young children in child care and those with older children in college. One proposal would automatically enroll workers in individual retirement accounts, unless they opt out. Another would extend the Earned Income Tax Credit to low-wage workers without children.
Middle-income families that don't fit these categories won't see many changes in their taxes, according to an analysis by the Tax Policy Center, a research group formed by the Urban Institute and the Brookings Institution.
For families making between $50,000 and $75,000 a year, about a quarter of them would get a tax cut, averaging $545, according to the analysis. About 6 percent would get a tax increase, and the rest � about 70 percent � would see no change in their tax bill.
Among the bottom 20 percent � families with incomes averaging $15,600 � nearly a third would get tax cuts averaging $617. The rest would see little or no change in their taxes.
"The key thing is that, overall, there will be winners, losers and a lot of people unaffected," said Roberton Williams, a fellow at the Tax Policy Center.
The center's analysis focused on the effects of the two-earner tax credit, the child-care credit, the expanded education credit, the tax credit for low-wage workers and the program making it easier for workers to enroll in retirement accounts, Williams said. The analysis also took into account Obama's proposal to increase taxes on some investments and estates.
All of these proposals were part of Obama's larger budget plan, which he unveiled Monday.
Obama would pay for middle-class tax cuts by raising taxes on the wealthy � including increasing the tax on capital gains � and changing the way the U.S. taxes the foreign profits of American corporations. Obama's proposals are designed to further talks on Capitol Hill about revamping American business taxes, lowering the overall tax rate while eliminating or reducing many tax breaks.
Obama's proposed tax increases, however, are running into strong opposition from Republicans in Congress.
"I want to work with this administration, and I hope that we can find common ground," said Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., chairman of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee. "But the president has to demonstrate that he's interested in governing, not just posturing."
Obama's proposed tax cuts are getting a friendlier welcome � House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said he is open to Obama's plan to increase a tax credit to help pay for childcare expenses. But Boehner has been critical of Obama's overall plan.
The Obama administration says its proposal addresses decades of rising income and wealth inequality, and a tax system that "lets the wealthy shelter hundreds of billions of dollars from taxes each year."
"The president's budget proposes targeted policies to strengthen the middle class, level the playing field for American businesses, create more fairness in our tax code, and lay the groundwork for long-term economic growth for our country that is broadly shared, all while setting a course to put our country on sound fiscal footing," Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew said in a statement.
� Create a tax credit of up to $500 for families with a second wage-earner, which the administration says would benefit 24 million couples. Cost: $89 billion over 10 years.
� Triple the child care tax credit � to a maximum of $3,000 per child � and make the full credit available to families with incomes up to $120,000. Families with higher incomes could get a reduced credit. Cost: $50 billion over 10 years.
Obama's plan would repeal tax breaks for flexible spending accounts for child-care expenses.
� Extend the Earned Income Tax Credit to low-wage workers with no children. Cost: $60 billion over 10 years.
� Consolidate several education tax breaks into an enhanced tax credit of up to $2,500 a student to help pay for college expenses. The tax credit, which is scheduled to expire at the end of 2017, would be made permanent. Cost: $31 billion over 10 years. | 2019-04-21T08:12:02 | https://www.columbusceo.com/content/stories/apexchange/2015/02/02/us--budget-taxes.html |
0.999995 | Should Future Bonuses Be Used in Calculating Child Support?
Many employees receive a bonus in addition to their base salary. Bonuses can be a one-time event or recur periodically. While you may not think that a state would consider future bonuses when calculating child support during a divorce, since they are often speculative, most states do use them in their calculations. The courts reason that it would be unfair to exclude them from their definition of income. If bonuses didn't count towards child support, parents who get bonuses would have an advantage over those who earn the same amount but receive the income as part of their regular salary.
Child support calculation is based upon the laws of individual states and therefore varies from place to place. In general, child support guidelines take into account the incomes of the parents along with certain child-related expenses like medical insurance and work-related child care costs. A payor's income is a critical factor in determining how much child support he or she must pay. Usually, states include all income from all sources, including future bonuses. Many states specifically mention bonuses in their child support codes. Other states do not include bonuses in child support calculations, but require the payor to report them yearly. The party then pays a percentage of the bonus as child support after it is received.
Some states allow courts to exclude one-time bonuses if the party can show that they will not or are unlikely to receive the bonus in the future. This does not mean, however, that sporadic bonuses will always be excluded; states can aggregate sporadic bonuses over a given time period to derive a monthly average. The only way to escape the averaging of sporadic bonuses will be to satisfy the court that bonuses will not be received in the future. In some states, the law includes one-time bonuses in determining child support by reasoning that child support is based on the payor's economic situation at the time child support is calculated, not upon what it may or may not be in the future.
When a party receives a recurring bonus, some states calculate child support by averaging the party's income over a period of time. The state may also prorate the income if it is recurring, but periodic. For instance, if a person receives a bonus every five years, the state may allocate that income by dividing the bonus by 60 -- the number of months in a five-year period -- and adding it to the payor's monthly income.
If a party paying child support receives a large bonus one year, but does not get one the next year, that party can petition the court for a modification of his child support. The moving party bases the modification petition upon earning less income than was projected in the last support order. Even if a projected bonus was not received, however, the court could still take an average of bonuses that were received in the past and add that amount to the payor's income for child support purposes.
Will Child Support Still Be the Same If the Child Turns 18 & I Still Owe Arrears?
How Does Underreported Income Affect a Divorce?
In community property states, income is a marital asset. One spouse might earn it, but both have an equal right to it. Equitable distribution states treat marital income in much the same way. It affects virtually every aspect of a divorce, so both spouses may have a great deal to gain by telling the court they earn less than they actually do. However, if a court discovers the misrepresentation, the judge can punish the lying party by imposing sanctions -- anything from ordering him to pay the other spouse's attorney's fees to not allowing him to argue against the other spouse's requests at trial.
How Do I Calculate Disposable Net Income for Child Support Payments?
States take the position that both parents are responsible for financially supporting their children after divorce. When one parent has more overnights with a child under a custody order, she is generally entitled to support payments from the other parent. Some states calculate the obligation based on a percentage of the parents' combined net incomes, while others look at only the net income of the parent who pays child support. In either case, knowing what is included in net income is typically an important first step in calculating child support.
Can a Custodial Parent Collect a Portion of VA Disability & Child Support?
When a child lives primarily with one parent after divorce, child support orders help ensure that both parents contribute a fair share financially to support the child. To determine a support amount, states can factor in the income of one or both parents. If you were awarded custody of your child in the divorce and expect to receive veteran's disability benefits, the amount you draw from the government could affect the amount of child support that the court will order the other parent to pay.
What Does Child Support Typically Pay For? | 2019-04-24T08:03:37 | https://info.legalzoom.com/should-future-bonuses-used-calculating-child-support-24821.html |
0.998633 | It's not possible to say which of these sentences is correct without knowing the context, as both sentences could be used depending on what you want to say. But in general, the past perfect isn't used to refer to a past action unless you want emphasise that it occurred before another past action.
The past simple is used far more often than the past perfect in most contexts. If you read some of the articles in our Magazine or most anywhere on the internet, you can see this for yourself.
Is it correct to say "I had been awake till 7am" or "i was awake till 7am"?
Both can be correct but it depends on the context. The past simple ('was') tells us about an action in the past. The past perfect ('had been') also tells us about an action in the past, but requires another action in the past to which it refers. Perfect forms are only used when relating the time of one action to another time reference. Therefore it may be appropriate to use 'had been', but it will depend on the context.
I want to ask which one of these sentences is correct ?
-She looks very tried. She had been cleaning the house for a long time.
-She looks very tired. She has been cleaning the house for a long time.
and I also want to know if they are both correct, what's the difference between them.
The second example is correct and shows the relationship between a present state (looking tired) and the past action which caused it (cleaning the house for a long time).
The first example is not correct. The past perfect is used to show relationships between two events in the past, not a present situation and a past action.
Hello.teacher.why the second example not correct. As i know we use present perfect continues for action started in the past and continued to present.
My apologies - I got the examples mixed up and my comments refer to the other examples: the second example is fine; the first example is not. I'll edit the first reply to correct it.
Can you please explain the diference between these two sentenses?
1.She didn’t want to move. She had lived in Liverpool all her life.
2.She didn’t want to move. She had been living in Liverpool all her life.
We have a page which describes the different between present perfect simple and continuous. These sentences are past perfect, but the distinction is the same. You can find the page here and I am sure it will answer your question very fully.
"She didn’t want to move. She had been living in Liverpool all her life."
"She has been living in Liverpool all her life."
To be more specific I want to know when to use past perfect and present perfect.
As far as I have studied the articles it has been written both indicates the work is finished. | 2019-04-20T02:19:38 | http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/english-grammar/past-perfect?page=10 |
0.999979 | James Russell Lowell war ein amerikanischer Lyriker, Essayist, Herausgeber, Hochschullehrer und Diplomat.
Context: In the scales of the destinies brawn will never weigh so much as brain. Our healing is not in the storm or in the whirlwind, it is not in monarchies, or aristocracies, or democracies, but will be revealed by the still small voice that speaks to the conscience and the heart, prompting us to a wider and wiser humanity. | 2019-04-20T12:29:21 | https://beruhmte-zitate.de/autoren/james-russell-lowell/ |
0.986443 | WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Teachers in the U.S. are slightly more likely to see student use of digital devices as having a positive rather than negative effect on the overall education of students. In contrast, they are far more negative about the effects of those devices on students' physical and mental health.
Please think about the effects of digital devices on students. Do you believe that students' use of digital devices such as smartphones, tablets and computers has helpful or harmful effects in the following areas?
The nationally representative March 5-12 poll of U.S. teachers finds that more than four in ten K-12 teachers say students' use of digital devices has a "mostly helpful" effect on students' education, while 28% of teachers instead describe the effect of these devices as "mostly harmful."
While estimates vary, there is little doubt that a substantial share of K-12 students own and regularly bring some type of digital device to school. According to 2015 research by the educational organization Pearson, majorities of students at all grade levels own a smartphone, including 53% of elementary school students, 65% of middle school students and 82% of high school students. Separately, Pew Research estimated in 2015 that more than two-thirds of teens (72%) own smartphones.
Despite their potential use to students, researchers and education policymakers remain divided as to whether these devices can be effective learning tools for students. Most schools have banned the use of cellphones by students, though this number has declined in recent years. These results suggest that while the greater share of teachers see the educational potential of these types of technology, there is no broad consensus among teachers.
By a nearly 2-1 margin, elementary and middle school teachers are more likely to see students' use of digital devices as more helpful than harmful to their students' education, with 48% expressing the former sentiment and 23% the latter.
Teachers of high school students, where ownership of certain digital devices is nearly universal, are less positive about the educational impact of these devices than their counterparts. Nearly as many high school teachers see the effect of these devices on students' education as mostly helpful as see it as mostly harmful, at 36% and 34%, respectively.
Younger teachers (40 or younger) are more likely than their older counterparts to see the digital devices as helpful to students' overall education. Fifty-one percent of teachers under the age of 40 say digital devices will have "mostly helpful" effects on students' education, compared with the 36% of teachers aged 40 and older who agree with this sentiment. And while 22% of U.S. teachers under 40 see the use of digital devices in students' education as "mostly harmful," 32% of teachers over 40 say the same.
Among all U.S. adults, younger individuals tend to rely on their digital devices more frequently than older adults; they also exhibit greater levels of attachment to these devices relative to older age groups. If these broad patterns apply to teachers, young teachers may have more favorable views of the educational value of digital devices due to their greater familiarity with and reliance on the technology.
Despite major growth in the educational technology industry and widespread adoption of digital devices in schools across the U.S., only a slight plurality of teachers see these tools as helpful to students' education -- and decisive majorities see them as harmful to students' physical or mental health. The implications of these findings for schools and educational technology providers are potentially significant. Without strong support from teachers regarding the value of digital devices in the classroom, the promise of technology in education won't be fully realized.
Studies suggest that ownership of digital devices will only continue to grow in the future. If these powerful resources are to be integrated in a productive way into students' education, schools must take appropriate action -- including professional development programs for teachers on using digital devices in classrooms.
Regardless, the overall skeptical view among teachers about digital devices and students calls for more research to understand how, why, when, where and for whom this technology is helpful or hurtful -- and in what ways. Additionally, the apparent divide between educators and parents on this matter further suggests additional research is necessary to better understand how technology can aid the learning process.
Results are based on a Gallup Panel web study completed by 497 national adults, aged 18 and older, who teach K-12 students in the U.S. The survey was conducted March 5-12, 2018. The Gallup Panel is a probability-based longitudinal panel of U.S. adults who are selected using random-digit-dial (RDD) phone interviews that cover landlines and cellphones. Address-based sampling methods are also used to recruit panel members. The Gallup Panel is not an opt-in panel and members are not given incentives for participating. For results based on this sample, one can say that the margin of sampling error is ±7 percent, at the 95% confidence level. Margins of error are higher for subsamples. In addition to sampling error, question wording and practical difficulties in conducting surveys can introduce error or bias into the findings of public opinion polls.
*These data are based on results from an online web-based survey with 1,000 U.S. adults who are parents of children aged 2-18. The study was fielded using the Survey Sampling International (SSI) panel of consumers and was fielded Jan. 12-14, 2018.
Twenty-two percent of U.S. teachers say they have considered leaving the teaching profession because of issues related to school safety. However, most are satisfied with their profession and would make the same career choice again. | 2019-04-25T14:02:56 | https://news.gallup.com/poll/232154/teachers-digital-devices-net-plus-education.aspx?g_source=link_NEWSV9&g_medium=LEAD&g_campaign=item_&g_content=U.S.%2520Teachers%2520See%2520Digital%2520Devices%2520as%2520Net%2520Plus%2520for%2520Education |
0.998101 | There is a dispute between Normandy and Brittany as to where the striped T shirt was first created. Nor can the French agree on the origins of the 21 stripes - could it be the number of Napoleon's victories or more prosaically simply the number of stripes of a certain width to ensure visibility when a sailor fell into the water!?
Either way the striped Breton top (there is a hint in the adjective as to the origins) has stood the test of time. I love the story at Armorlux of the French Navy's edict from 1858 in which the Admiralty stated the exact number of stripes and the colour required to contrast with the white - "bleu teints a l'indigo". A century later Hollywood adopted the styling using their own interpretations in a number of films including "Fire Down Below" which was first screened in 1957, starring Robert Mitchum, Rita Hayworth and Jack Lemmon. The gorgeous Audrey Hepburn wears a short sleeved red and white striped Tee in Two for the Road in which she starred with Albert Finney in 1967, while France's very own female icon Brigitte Bardot was often to be seen around Saint Tropez driving her Riva wearing the striped mariniere top. Even Sting adopted "le look" in 1979 when singing with The Police, and Picasso was often photgraphed in his baggy well worn long sleeved version of this chic French classic.
In the well known rowing capital of Henley-on-Thames Boatique can be found at 5 Friday st with an array of striped Tees and jumpers from all three French brands which have adopted the mariniere - Petit Bateau with the striped lining on their sou'wester, St James and Armorlux with Tees of all shapes and sizes.
Vive la mariniere ! Long live stripes! | 2019-04-22T20:28:43 | https://www.henleyglass.com/blog/Stripy-Chic/ |
0.933992 | As scores of people fled the scene of the Manchester terror attack, a homeless man walked directly into the chaos and offered aid to the injured.
Chris Parker, a 33-year-old who has been homeless for about a year, stationed himself in the concourse area outside of the Manchester Arena where he'd planned to beg for money from those leaving the Ariana Grande concert Monday night.
Pandemonium unfolded, however, when Salman Abedi, 22, set off a homemade explosive outside the venue — killing 22 people and injuring another 59.
"It knocked me to the floor and then I got up and instead of running away, my gut instinct was to run back and help," Parker said. "There were people lying on the floor everywhere."
He recalled cradling a dying woman in his arms and rushing to assist a young girl, severely injured in the blast.
"I saw a little girl ... she had no legs. I wrapped her in one of the merchandise T-shirts and I said 'Where is your mum and daddy?' She said, 'my dad is at work and my mum is up there," Parker said, noting he believed the mother had died.
Parker's story has earned him widespread attention from both the media and the internet. His kindness has sparked several crowd-funding campaigns and could even result in a family reunion.
After hearing about what happened to her son, Parker's mother — who did not know he was homeless — put out a plea online.
"Hi this is my son and I am desperate to get in touch with him, we have been estranged for a very long time and I had no idea he was homeless," she wrote on a GoFundMe page dedicated to Parker. "I am very proud of him and think he might need me right now."
Stephen Jones, another homeless man nearby when the blast went off, similarly rushed in to assist the victims.
"Just because I'm homeless, it doesn't mean I haven't got a heart and I'm not a human still," he told ITV News.
"It's just instinct to go and help, if someone needed your help. It was children and it was a lot of children with blood all over them, crying and screaming. We were having to pull nails out of their arms and a couple out of this little girl's face."
He also recalled holding up a woman's legs, which were severely injured in the blast. Jones said he was afraid she would have bled out if he left her alone.
His appearance on ITV similarly sparked online fund-raisers and praise. Son of West Ham Football co-chairman, David Sullivan, launched a Twitter campaign to locate the homeless man.
On Tuesday he announced they'd found him and that he and his father intended to pay six months of his rent to help him get on his feet.
"It had to be done," Jones explained. "If I didn't help I'd never be able to live with myself for walking away and leaving kids like that." | 2019-04-19T11:30:03 | https://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/homeless-heroes-recall-helping-inujured-manchester-attack-article-1.3192309 |
0.999872 | President Bush's plan to send more troops to Iraq ran into a wall of criticism on Capitol Hill on Thursday as administration officials drew confrontational and sometimes mocking challenges from both Democrats and Republicans.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates said in response that the administration might abandon the increase if the Iraqi government doesn't do its part, but he provided no timetable. "I think most of us, in our minds, are thinking of it as a matter of months, not 18 months or two years," he told the House Armed Services Committee.
Bush and top members of his national security team sought to rally support for the troop buildup a day after he unveiled his plan for turning around a conflict that has lasted nearly four years and cost the lives of more than 3,000 American military personnel.
Instead, Gates and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice found themselves embroiled in the first pitched exchanges in a battle that is likely to dominate Congress for months or longer and is already shaping the 2008 presidential election.
"I think this speech given last night by this president represents the most dangerous foreign policy blunder in this country since Vietnam, if it's carried out," Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., a potential 2008 presidential contender, told Rice.
As many as a dozen Republican senators could jump ship on the plan, reports CBS News correspondent Gloria Borger. As for the Democrats, their "no's" were nearly unanimous.
"Why should we give you the benefit of the doubt this time, when it appears so evident that so many mistakes have been made in the past?" said Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Fla.
His colleague, Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., noted his own past support for the administration on the war but said he could not continue. He declared, "I have not been told the truth over and over again by administration witnesses, and the American people have not been told the truth."
Americans' opinions apparently were not swayed very much by President Bush's speech outlining his new strategy, according to a poll.
Fifty percent of those who saw the speech said they disapprove of the president's proposals, while 37 percent said they approve. Just one-third of those surveyed said they support Mr. Bush's call to send more than 20,000 additional troops to Iraq.
Following the speech, 68 percent of Americans — the same number as prior to the speech — said they were uneasy about the president's ability to make decisions about Iraq.
Bush, visiting with troops at Fort Benning, Ga., cautioned that the troop increase "is not going to yield immediate results. It's going to take a while."
"American patience is limited, and obviously if the Iraqis fail to maintain their commitments we'll have to revisit our strategy," said Gates.
At one point Gates, just three weeks on the job, told lawmakers, "I would confess I'm no expert on Iraq." Later, asked about reaching the right balance between American and Iraqi forces, he told the panel he was "no expert on military matters."
Committee members pressed Gates, who replaced Donald Rumsfeld at the Pentagon, on an exit strategy for the United States.
"At the outset of the strategy, it's a mistake to talk about an exit strategy," he said.
Gates, in testimony to the committee and earlier at a news conference, said he was requesting increasing the size of the Army and Marine Corps by 92,000 troops over the next five years. He also said the Pentagon would recall to duty sooner than planned some National Guard and Reserve troops who have served yearlong tours in Iraq or Afghanistan.
As Rice testified to the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Rep. Howard Berman, D-Calif., likened Bush's plan to a "Hail Maliki pass" — jokingly combining Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's name with the football "Hail Mary" desperation pass.
The U.S. led a coalition that invaded Iraq in March 2003, despite failing to win U.N. Security Council support. The government of Saddam Hussein quickly crumbled and Bush declared major combat operations over two months later.
Bush's war effort initially had strong support, both in Congress and among other Americans. Yet that support has eroded as violence has continued.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said he hoped to bring up a nonbinding resolution next week expressing opposition to any troop buildup. A similar move is expected in the House.
Reid, in a Senate speech, said Bush ignored the results of November's midterm elections that ended 12 years of GOP control of Congress, the advice of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group and that of his own top generals. "In choosing to escalate the war, the president virtually stands alone," Reid said.
The Senate's top Republican, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, threatened a filibuster — a delaying tactic — to block any legislation expressing disapproval of the buildup plan.
McConnell conceded that GOP lawmakers as well as Democrats are troubled by Bush's new policy, but he said, "Congress is completely incapable of dictating the tactics of the war."
Options for critics of the war to try forcing its end are limited, given the slim margin of Democratic control, especially in the Senate. But votes stating symbolic opposition to the troop buildup could embarrass many Republicans leery of supporting Bush's plan.
Rice appeared in the morning before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and in the afternoon before the House counterpart. She was grilled sharply by members of both parties.
Not a single member of the Senate panel expressed outright support for the president's plan. One after another offered skepticism on various points — from the rationale for the war to al-Maliki's sincerity and resolve, from the need for additional troops to the administration's ruling out talking to Iran and Syria.
"You're going to have to do a much better job" explaining the rationale for the war, "and so is the president," said Sen. George Voinovich, R-Ohio. He said Mr. Bush could no longer count on his support for the war.
Rice acknowledged widespread skepticism among Americans. "I want you to know that I understand and indeed feel the heartbreak that Americans feel at the continued sacrifice of American lives," she said.
Rice engaged several tense exchanges with members, including with Hagel, a Vietnam veteran and longtime critic of Bush's Iraq policy. She disputed his characterization of Bush's buildup as an "escalation."
"Putting in 22,000 more troops is not an escalation?" Hagel asked. Responded Rice: "I think, senator, escalation is not just a matter of how many numbers you put in."
"Would you call it a decrease?" Hagel asked.
"I would call it, senator, an augmentation that allows the Iraqis to deal with this very serious problem that they have in Baghdad," she said.
When Rice disputed Hagel's contention that Iraq was in the throes of civil war, Hagel shot back: "To sit there and say that, that's just not true."
Said Committee Chairman Joe Biden of Delaware: "I believe the president's strategy is not a solution, Secretary Rice. I believe it's a tragic mistake."
Rice told senators there was a "national imperative not to fail."
The Senate panel was flush with 2008 presidential hopefuls and possible contenders, including Hagel, Biden and Democrats John Kerry of Massachusetts, Christopher Dodd of Connecticut and Barack Obama of Illinois.
Meanwhile, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., another presidential hopeful, said after a meeting at the White House that he was concerned about al-Maliki's capabilities as well as "whether these are sufficient number of troops."
But, he said, "I do think we can succeed." McCain is among a handful of lawmakers who have called for more — not fewer — U.S. troops in Iraq. | 2019-04-25T22:16:11 | https://www.cbsnews.com/news/iraq-plan-draws-criticism-mockery-on-hill/ |
0.999567 | Location: South Pacific Coast, Costa Rica. Grid Reference: Costa Rica.
The Costa Rica Stone Balls: (Stone Petrospheres).
Described by Columbus as the 'Rich Coast'. Over 300 of the carved stone balls have so far been discovered. The stones are believed to have been carved between 200 BC and 1500 AD. However the only method available for dating the carved stones is stratigraphy, and most stones are no longer in their original locations. They spheres range in size from a few centimetres to over 2 metres (6.6 ft) in diameter, and weigh up to 16 short tons (15 t). (1) Most are sculpted from gabbro, the coarse-grained equivalent of basalt. There are a dozen or so made from shell-rich limestone, and another dozen made from a sandstone.
Photo: Archaeologist Samuel Lothrop pictured with his wife Eleanor during their investigation of sites in the Disquis Delta in 1948.
Background: Dr. Stone (1943), Verneau and Rivet (1912-1922) and others discussed the distribution of stone balls, large and small, throughout the New World. They concluded that the spheres served different functions in different areas. Large examples outside the delta area are rare. Isolated specimens up to 3 feet in diameter are known from Olmec sites in Vera Cruz Mexico. They have also been reported at Zaculeu in the Guatemalan Highlands (largest 15 1/2 inches in diameter), occurring in the first level of occupation in what is regarded as Early Classic Maya. (3) It is noted in this respect that there are no 'stone-heads' in Costa Rica, of which there are several in Mexican Olmec sites, so the two cultures were likely unrelated.
Context: There are only a handful of petrospheres still in their original settings, so we have little context within which to place them. A program is underway to try and replace or at least recognise more of the original locations for the balls, many of which were recorded by Doris Stone. Small (10 and 24 inches) stone balls have been found individually in burial mounds and in at least 2 instances, balls were placed in graves indicating individual ownership. Sometimes balls occurred singly, other times in groups. The largest group known to Lothrup contained at least 45 balls. Depressions in which balls previously stood could still be detected at the time. Some spheres were buried. Another interesting aspect of some balls, was that a small number had residual lime coatings, suggesting they might have been used as beacons in the forest (3).
Reports say that they were often found in groups of three, in the shape of a triangle, and always placed in the North-South direction. The layout of the stones above was recorded by S.K. Lothrop. Spheres E and F are now in the Museo Nacional in San Jose, Costa Rica.
Making the Balls: The rock-source for the Costa Rica balls is both from far and near. There is a local Limestone called Coquina, located near the mouth of the Diquis River which was used to make some of the smaller spheres. Even though it is relatively close, it was still transported several miles. The larger spheres have an igneous granite rock source, of which the croppings come from across rugged terrain over 50 miles away high up in the Talamanca Mountains.
Archaeologist Doris Z. Stone photographed these round stones being shifted during jungle clearing to make way for railway tracks that would service the United Fruit Company banana plantations (Photo: 1943).
At this time then, very little can be said to be known about the origin or purpose of the Costa Rica stone balls. There is no question that they were manmade, and each would have required huge investments in both time and labour to transport and shape. While it is most likely that they served as a symbols of ritual or status, their artistic merit is not to be ignored. The simplicity of these vastly sized spherical stones on the landscape is both pleasing to the eye comforting in its contrast to a natural background. Perhaps this in itself was the reason for their existence.
"The balls have been endangered since the moment of their discovery. Many have been destroyed, dynamited by treasure hunters or cracked and broken by agricultural activities. At the time of a major study undertaken in the 1950s, fifty balls were recorded as being in situ. Today, only a handful are known to be in their original locations".
"The earliest reports of the stones come from the late 19th century, but they weren't really reported scientifically until the 1930s — so they're a relatively recent discovery," Hoopes said. "They remained unknown until the United Fruit Company began clearing land for banana plantations in southern Costa Rica."
"We date the spheres by pottery styles and radiocarbon dates associated with archaeological deposits found with the stone spheres," Hoopes said. "One of the problems with this methodology is that it tells you the latest use of the sphere but it doesn't tell you when it was made. These objects can be used for centuries and are still sitting where they are after a thousand years. So it's very difficult to say exactly when they were made."
"We think the main technique that was used was pecking and grinding and hammering with stones," said Hoopes. "There are some spheres that have been found that still have the marks of the blows on them from hammer stones. We think that that's how they were formed, by hammering on big rocks and sculpting them into a spherical shape."
Gallery of Images: The Costa Rica Petrospheres.
Musee National du Costa Rica.
Above Right: Isla Del Cana.
Other stone spheres have been reported to have been found in Bosnia, West Mexico, Easter Island, Scotland, United States (Joshua Tree National Park), central Serbia and Japan (Nishijima Islet, Hypogo Pref. And at Yamazoe village, Nara Pref).
1). "The stone spheres of Costa Rica". BBC News. 29 March 2010. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8593717.stm. | 2019-04-20T06:28:06 | http://www.ancient-wisdom.com/costarica.htm |
0.99715 | Who needs a marketing consultant?
For small businesses operating in crowded markets with a limited budget to spend on marketing activities, it is essential to have a well-conceived, up-to-date marketing strategy and implementation plan. A plan that maximises the use of both existing and new marketing channels, has clear objectives and which is measurable against defined objectives.
With the help of an expert marketing consultant who has business expertise and sector knowledge, this can be achieved through site visits, market investigations and a targeted consultancy piece that will set the business on a course of continued improvement and growth.
What will the marketing consultant do?
In order to create a marketing strategy and implementation plan for a small/ medium business, the consultant will ascertain how best to promote and advertise the company's products or service offer in a way that brings measurable results and is cost-effective to deliver. The consultant will bring in-depth knowledge of the latest trends and techniques that will bring the best results for their client, blending a mix of digital and print marketing, online and offline advertising, press activity and social engagement, plus face-to-face networking, sales opportunities and other channels for marketing, sales, advertising, communications and engagement.
The consultant will carry out market analysis to truly define the scope of the market, the niche that the company operates, the competitors in the space and the customer profiles or personas. This information will be used to guide the company's brand development and presence-building strategy.
The consultant might also carry out primary research alongside this secondary research process described above. This could involve conducting focus groups, surveys online or personal interviews to learn more about prospective customers, their needs, wants and desires.
Using this insight, the consultant will craft a marketing plan with clear deliverable measurement mechanisms and marketing channels in which to deliver activities. These could include website or app development, online advertising and SEO, print collateral development, events and networking, PR and social media development, e-mail marketing and so forth. The aim is to build up an engaged audience of prospects and to provide leads for the sales team to then convert.
An external business consultant will bring experience, professional know-how and best practice techniques to a client business - as well as a fresh perspective and objective view. He or she will challenge established thinking and know-how to craft a strategy and delivery plan that makes sense in terms of delivering against objectives and sticking to the business's delivery budget.
To find out more about how Fullbrook Associates can help you with your marketing strategy and implementation in the thorough, professional manner explored above, contact us today. | 2019-04-23T06:43:01 | https://fullbrookassociates.com/marketing-strategy |
0.999836 | and in Canada For That Matter?
Being a culinary novice at best, my opinion when it comes to choosing the best restaurant in Whistler would likely not be valued by too many folks.
Sure, I know that there are many fine eating establishments located in the resort of Whistler, and I have, over the years had the opportunity to dine in many of them. Could I offer up my personal favorites? Sure. But for me to choose "the best" Whistler restaurant would be difficult.
Instead, I will defer to celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay for his opinion.
While I was watching The Hour (a talk show/current affairs show here in Canada) last evening, one of the guests was British chef and TV personality Gordon Ramsay. At one point in the interview the host, George Stroumboulopoulos (Strombo), and Gordon were talking about how important it is for a restaurant to serve food that is local, and in season. Gordon then began talking about how he had just recently spent two weeks in Whistler BC, and how he had been very impressed with the restaurant Araxi, which is located right in Whistler Village.
The entrance to Araxi, the best restaurant in Whistler... and Canada?
One of the reasons he gave for his high praise of this Whistler restaurant was the fact that all of the ingredients used to prepare the dishes are fresh (in season) and locally produced (within 100 miles). Even the wine list has a local bias.
Later in the interview George asked Gordon what was, in his opinion, the best restaurant in Canada. His answer?
"The Araxi restaurant in Whistler."
Of course, if he feels that Araxi is the best restaurant in Canada, then through clever deduction, it must also be the best restaurant in Whistler in his opinion.
I've include the video of the full interview below, but to save you some time I have also transcribed the portions of the interview in which they are talking about Whistler and the Araxi restaurant.
Here are the transcribed portions and the time frame in the video to which they correspond (if you want to jump right to those parts).
Gordon: I spent a couple of weeks in Whistler last month, and I had the most amazing time.
Strombo: You brought up a neat point about eating food when it's in season, 12 months a year.
Strombo: We keep thinking that we can have whatever we want whenever we want, and that's not the best way right?
Gordon: Absolutely, definitely. I'm just going back to the Whistler restaurant recently. The Araxi Restaurant. It was localized within 100 miles, all the fruit, veg, even the fish. Even the vineyards and the wine served locally within 100 miles of that restaurant. It was great. And if it's not available, it's not on the menu. It's as simple as that. If that menu has to become smaller and more reduced then the quality becomes better because if it's not in season it shouldn't be on the menu.
Strombo: Best restaurant in Canada?
And here is the complete interview. I'll warn you ahead of time that there are a few "F" words in the interview, one coming right before the last reference to Whistler at 12:18.
Gordon doesn't make reference to this in the interview, but there was a reason he was in Whistler for those two weeks. You see, as it turns out the winner of the sixth season of Gordon's show Hell's Kitchen would become the Head Chef of Araxi Restaurant during the Olympic Games in 2010.
Not only has Araxi received the "thumbs up" from Chef Ramsay, it has also received the award for "Best Restaurant in Whistler" for 9 consecutive years from Vancouver Magazine.
And its wine cellar? Again, for 9 consecutive years, Araxi has received the coveted 'Best Of' Award Of Excellence from Wine Spectator Magazine. In 2008 it also received the 'Award Of Distinction' from Wine Enthusiast Magazine.
What Others Are Saying About "The Best Restaurant In Whistler"
And not only is Araxi one of the best restaurants in Whistler, it is also one of the oldest. It opened its doors in 1981 (around the same time that Whistler Village was built) and has been going strong ever since.
If you would like ensure that you get to dine at the best restaurant in Whistler, make sure that you make a reservation before you arrive so that you are not disappointed! | 2019-04-23T06:41:44 | http://www.whistler-vacation-tips.com/best-restaurant-in-whistler.html |
0.998645 | What Is The Reason For The Increase In Fuel Consumption Of Semi-trailers?
The horsepower of the semi-trailer head is different in fuel consumption. Different semi-trailer brands have different engines and different fuel consumption. The cargo load is also related to fuel consumption. The heavier the weight, the more fuel consumption, but if the fuel consumption is abnormal. If you increase, you should check your reasons.
1, tire pressure problems. It is necessary to check the tire pressure of the semi-trailer regularly to see if it meets the air pressure standard. Generally speaking, the tire pressure is insufficient and the fuel consumption will increase.
2, tire wear. Regularly check the wear and tear of the semi-trailer tires. If the semi-trailer tires are seriously worn, it will often slip and increase the fuel consumption.
3. Check the bearings and brake system. It is necessary to regularly check whether the semi-trailer bearing and brake system are faulty. If the wheel does not rotate properly, it will affect the speed of the vehicle and increase the fuel consumption. | 2019-04-23T06:03:40 | http://m.longvehicletrailer.com/news/what-is-the-reason-for-the-increase-in-fuel-16509512.html |
0.999635 | How is the procedure for orthodontics?
Orthodontics is an alternative treatment that can completely change the structure of the teeth. Can help people who have problems in chewing food and have a proper bite. To help people have a perfect well aligned structure for both upper and lower teeth. There are several type of braces, but they all have similar procedure.
1. Research about the advantage and disadvantage of getting braces. Read some information on orthodontic treatment.
2. Choose a reputable clinic near your house, because it will make it easier for you to come for your monthly check-ups.
3. Consultation day, the doctor will make a preliminary examination and assess if there is a need to do tooth extraction or not. At this stage, the doctor will arrange for you to get an x-ray and dental impression.
4. When you agreed to proceed with the treatment, teeth cleaning & scaling should be done first, then filling and check if there is a need for root canal treatment.
5. Then the dentist will put a rubber tooth splint to be worn for about 1 week.
6. On the next appointment the doctor will attach the brackets on to the teeth using adhesive cement tools.
7. The doctor will schedule one visit a month to change the rubber band. (In case of braces with rubber bands) and adjust the braces. The teeth will gradually moves about 1 mm per month.
8. While teeth have braces, it should always be cleaned by brushing every after meal and go to the dentist for scaling to remove plaque. Every 6 months.
9. The doctor will take care of the structure of our teeth until teeth are in the proper position. The doctor will then remove the braces, then clean the teeth, scrape the limestone and take an impression to make retainers. This is a device to prevent the teeth from shifting back to the original position. This should be worn for as long as the dentist advice to do so.
It is a long time procedure and will require a lot of money and many trips to the dentist. | 2019-04-25T04:22:32 | https://www.dentalclinicthailand.com/the-procedure-for-orthodontics/ |
0.999016 | This article is about the Florida criminal lawyer and his defense of his client. It explains what the attorney will do and his responsibilities.
The criminal lawyer is a legal representative that helps people and companies that have been charged with a crime. In many cases, the client calls an attorney to help him if he is faced with criminal charges, is arrested in connection to a crime or faces an investigation related to a crime.
The defendant is entitled to being presumed as innocent until proven guilty. This means that the attorney who will be defending him will employ different legal techniques to makes sure that his client has as many options as possible when it comes to clearing his name and not being accused of a crime. When the client is arrested, it does not necessarily mean that he or she is found guilty of the crime. It just means that there is a suspicion that the client may be related to it. An investigation is usually launched when there is no person who is charged with the crime as yet. It is also possible for the criminal lawyer in charge of the defense to initiate their own investigation in order to suppress any charges from being filed against his client. During this investigation, the attorney should be able to gather enough evidence and witnesses that can help the client. In the United States of America, the defendant should be proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt in order for him to be imprisoned for the crime. Usually a judge decides for the court but if a felony is committed, it requires a jury of several members to decide the fate of the defendant.
Included in the many responsibilities of the criminal lawyer, is the pursuit of determining whether any laws were broken when his client was arrested, charged with the crime or during the gathering of evidence for the crime. This means reviewing the evidence and the reports for any constitutional violations that may have occurred. The defendant has rights that need to be protected and upheld during the entire process. If there may be any constitutional violations, it is possible that the case can be negotiated outside of court or even before it is presented in court. A plea bargain may be an option for the client is he or she allows the attorney to present it to the judge or the prosecution.
Other responsibilities of the Florida criminal lawyer such as Musca Law in charge of defending his client are to make motions for the case to be dismissed if there are any anomalies or violations and to look for any chances of the case being declared a mistrial if there are any possibilities. The goal is to prevent a conviction or to go for the least sentence that can be given in equivalent to the crime that the client is accused of. The attorney will make drafts and finalize the necessary paperwork needed by the court as well as represent his client in any hearings or invitations to questioning that may come from the investigators of the case. He will also counsel his clients regarding the best option for his best interests. | 2019-04-18T12:19:46 | http://christysclipart.com/2019/02/10/florida-criminal-lawyer-specializing-in-defense/ |
0.991222 | So you've finally decided that it's time to engage a freelance copywriter for your business's marketing efforts. Maybe you're tired of going it alone, trying to hack out your own content word by exhausting word, instead of spending your valuable time actually running your enterprise. Maybe your marketing team feels overwhelmed and needs assistance. Maybe you're just looking for a fresh perspective. In any case, you may find yourself wondering where to start, what to look for, and how to tell you're getting the right writer for your needs. Here are four key questions you'll want to ask every candidate on your list before you actually schedule that first assignment.
1. "What are your rates and terms?"
You might as well get this question out of the way ASAP, for both of your sakes. You need to know how you're going to plug this professional into your budget, and the writer needs to know whether this job will be worth the bother. It's helpful if the writer offers fixed per-project rates; if not, find out how you can secure a reliable estimate based on hourly rates. You also need to know whether the entire amount if due up front, whether you need to put up a deposit, or whether you're simply billed after the fact. Don't immediately reject a writer who insists on full payment in advance, though -- you may be allowed to break a large job into multiple pre-paid batches or phases.
2. "What kind of writing do you specialize in?"
Different writers typically specialize in different things, especially in larger metropolitan areas where there are lots of writers staking out their respective slices of the market. It's not unusual for a writer to focus on one type of writing project, one narrow range of industries, or one particular form of writing. For instance, I'm a generalist in terms of industry -- I can write for pretty much anybody -- but I focus on "short-form" marketing content such as website pages, blog articles, brochure content and so on. Don't feel limited if your writer says, "I only do such-and-so type for writing." The beauty of hiring freelancers is that you can keep several of them on hand, attaching the appropriate writer to the appropriate project as needed, without any impact on your full-time payroll.
3. "How well established are you?"
This is an important question because it can help predict the experience you're going to have with your writer. While rookies can and do create brilliant work, they haven't reached the point where they can point to a performance track record. It's not a matter of having written for every big name in the business world; it's an assurance that your writer has coped with a wide range of situations, worked with a variety of clients, and has developed a certain amount of professional wisdom that could prove invaluable to you for years to come. In other words, buy writing expertise, not just writing. Don't forget to ask about professional references, associations and/or certifications that can help reinforce your writer's credibility.
4. "What are your turnaround times?"
The best freelance copywriters aren't just the most skilled writers -- they're also the most professional ones. Make sure your copywriter can guarantee a specific turnaround window for each job, and don't put up with a freelancer who is all "free" and no "lance." At the same time, however, make sure your expectations are realistic ones. The busiest writers may not be able to squeeze in that rush job; some of us don't have time to accept rush jobs at all. Understand in advance what your writer can and can't realistically do for you, and you'll know you should realistically ask of your writer. The result will be high-quality work, turned in on time, every time.
Try these four questions on for size the next time you're interviewing freelance copywriters. You'll find that most of us will be happy to answer them! | 2019-04-24T18:21:22 | https://blog.reynoldswriting.com/2018/04/4-key-questions-when-choosing-freelance.html |
0.998588 | I recently picked up a CM11a and CM17a (Firecracker) to experiment around with Heyu and X10. The CM11a plugs into the wall and has an outlet on it that I have a lamp plugged into. Does the CM11a have a house/unit number that can be used to switch the lamp on/off?
I have the same setup on my CM17a and the instruction manual describe the default house/unit numbers which I'm able to use to turn the lamp attached to it on/off. I've poured over the documentation and spent far too much time searching with Google but can't seem to find any information about setting the house/unit code on the CM11a. Any suggestions?
The outlet on the CM11A is a pass through outlet. Always On.
The CM11A does not use an X10 address.
The CM17A Firecracker. Also has no X10 Address. It just takes the data your program sends it and converts it to an X10 RF command.
I have the same setup on my CM17a and the instruction manual describe the default house/unit numbers which I'm able to use to turn the lamp attached to it on/off.
The Cm17a is the serial port firecracker. It doesn't have any outlets on it, only a 9-pin serial connector at each end.
Thanks for the info on the CM11a outlet. I piggy backed a lamp module onto the CM11a and that did the trick.
Yes, it was late, way too late. What I was thinking, but not typing, was the TM751 transceiver that the firecracker talks to.
You don't need to piggyback them, you should be able to plug that lamp module into a different outlet if you want.
In that case, the TM751 is permanently set to UnitCode 1.
It also doesn't have a PLC receiver in it. So, if you send any commands over the powerline (like with the CM11A), the TM751 won't see them, or react to them. It can only be controlled via RF, either from a hand-held remote, or from an RF-enabled PC transmitter (CM15A / CM17A / CM19A). | 2019-04-25T03:48:05 | http://forums.x10.com/index.php?topic=26022.msg146587 |
0.999997 | A Thought Experiment: OFF THE EQUATOR?
The optimal location for tether's Marine Anchor is on the Equator where tether will extend vertically to GEO Node. Current plans calls for tether to anchor a slight distance off the Equator (as shown); thus, tether will be almost vertical.
If anchored well away from Equator, the tether will likely angle well away from the equatorial plane which might possibly prove detrimental. Of course, we can currently only speculate about either the equatorial tether or the non-equatorial one.
TE chooses to also speculate about the Ion Beam which would be best based on the Equator, directly under GEO Node. HOWEVER, a non-vertical particle beam could easily locate off the equator with none of the problems of an off equator tether. Thus, Beam Rider's Base Station has much more flexibility than the Tether Climber's Marine Anchor.
and MA must always serve as the platform's nadir.
Thus, the GEO Node, MA, and Earth's center are co-linear.
...the Marine Anchor anchored well off the Equator?
...the orbital platform had a different path?
Off Equator Anchor Causes "Sub-orbit"
What if the Marine Anchor (MA) moved 8.7 degrees south of the Equator?
Due to centrifugal force, taut tether maintains co-linearity among Earth's center, MA and elevated node. Thus, the 35,780 km tether now points to a new, parallel plane 6,357 km below the equatorial plane.
At new plane, node would trace a new circular path with a slightly reduced diameter. Due to continued tether restraint, node's new position still rotates around the Earth's axis at 15°/hour; thus, it remains geosynchronous. We see this new circular path is no longer equatorial, and it is no longer orbital because this new plane does not pass through Earth's center.
CONCLUSION: TE chooses to call node's new circular path a "sub-orbit"; perhaps, we now call the elevated node a "Sub-Orbital Node".
To make one complete rotation in 24 hours, a platform (GEO Node) on the Geosynchronous Equatorial Orbit (GEO) must move about 3.07 kilometers per second (kps). Bound by same tether as for the GEO, sub-orbital platforms will also rotate about the Earth's axis in 24 hours; however, their circumference will be less than the GEO, and their speed will also be less. This speed decreases as the tether's anchor moves away from the equator. It decreases as the cosine of the latitude.
which shrinks as sub-orbit's effective radius decreases.
CONCLUSION: Tether is best anchored on or near the Equator. As anchor increases distance away from Equator, less and less mass can be suspended by tether.
Thought Experiment (TE) assumes an ocean based particle accelerator can send a constant stream of high speed ions for many minutes and even hours without interruption. TE further assumes continuous, collective momentum of many high speed particles can impart a relatively small acceleration of perhaps one tenth Earth Gravity (.1G) to a vehicle, (i.e. Beam Rider).
Preliminary calculations indicate that at .1G acceleration, the Beam Rider could arrive at midway to the GEO Node (about 18,000 km above Earth surface) in about 100 minutes. Finally, TE assumes Beam Rider will use internal means to .1G decelerate for another 100 minutes to arrive at GEO Node at relative zero velocity.
SUMMARY: Base Station's Ion Beam has overwhelming advantage; the entire trip (surface to GEO) would take only 200 minutes versus 7 long days for the tether's climber with an average speed of about 200 km per hour.
Another huge benefit of Beams versus Tethers, is that Beam Base Stations can locate well away from Equator and still propel vehicles to GEO Node on GEO.
Unlike tether dynamics, centrifugal force is not a factor; thus, ion beam angles to where pointed not due to where anchored.
GEO Node restrained not by physical tether but by Kepler's Laws of Orbital Mechanics. Thus, Base Station can locate literally anywhere and just point the particle stream toward the GEO Node; main consequence for choosing to locate off equator will be a slightly longer flight path.
EXAMPLE: If base station locates 8.7° south, the flight distance would increase from 35,780 km to 35,793 km. TE speculates this might increase total travel time from 200 mins to perhaps 201 mins, a minuscule amount.
Anchoring tethers well off the equator is not practical; however, basing ion beams in any oceanic location is possible. If relatively isolated, an oceanic launch location is very practical for Beam Riders on particle beams. | 2019-04-19T14:39:40 | http://starsdestination.blogspot.com/2011/09/getting-ready.html |
0.999995 | If a player pulls out of a match (eg. due to injury), do they still get the prize money and points for it?
So say, player A has qualified for the australian open which has a prize money of 50k and 10points for a first round loser (http://www.tennisguru.net/2017/01/australian-open-2017-prize-money-breakdown-ranking-points/).
Now if he pulls out before the match, I assume he doesn't get the money and the guy replacing him would get it.
But what would if he limps onto the court and plays one point and retires, would he pocket 50k for doing that or would he need to play up to a certain point (eg. similar to some betting agencies, which will only honour as having played if the match lasted beyond the first set)?
How about if this is not the first round but after the tournament has progressed and therefore there is no one to replace him. Would he still get the prize money and points even if he retires? So say, the player wins the 3rd round then pulls out of the tournament, would he get the same prize money and points as someone losing in the 4th round?
Your question contained several questions so I'll break them down and answer them one at a time.
That is correct - a "lucky loser" (someone that lost during qualifying rounds) would replace them in the main draw and that "lucky loser" player also would receive the rankings points and prize money for the result they achieve.
It doesn't happen so much in smaller tournaments offering less prize money and rankings points, but the scenario you describe is common for the four major grand slam tournaments because of the money & points potential. If you were to look at the first round matches in any major that ended because of a player retiring, you will find some that didn't even reach the second set of the match. The player that retired (in most cases) knew - going into the match - that they had a health or injury issue that was going to prevent them from competing for an entire match. But the lure of an easy pay day usually has them play a few games before retiring rather than withdraw from the tournament and give up that money to another player. You probably wouldn't get the players themselves to admit to it - but that's what is going on.
It helps to think of points and prize money being awarded based on a player's wins, not their losses or matches played. So in the scenario you describe here yes, the player would get the same points and prize money for pulling out of the tournament after a 3rd round win as a player that lost a 4th round match. Both players won the same number of matches.
Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged tennis finances ranking or ask your own question.
How steep a hill does a low seeded (tennis) player have to climb? | 2019-04-20T20:17:03 | https://sports.stackexchange.com/questions/15747/at-what-point-does-a-player-earn-his-prize-money-and-points-for-getting-to-a-cer |
0.999558 | Is Toshiba's Portege R600 the ultimate ultraportable laptop?
The Toshiba Portege R600 is the ultimate ultraportable laptop for a user who's constantly on the move. It's extremely light and strong, and it has a built-in optical drive and all the ports you're likely to require.
You'd be hard pressed trying to find a lighter notebook than Toshiba's Portege R600 (PPR61A-00400R), which weighs only 950 grams and is aimed at business users who regularly need to travel. It's a 12.1in laptop and it's very thin, but it doesn't have cut-price parts running it: you still get an Intel Core 2 Duo CPU, 3GB of RAM and a 120GB solid-state drive. It runs Windows Vista (or Windows XP — you get to choose).
The Intel Core 2 Duo U9400 runs at 1.4GHz and it is an Ultra Low Voltage CPU. This means that it produces less heat than a regular CPU, which is important given how small the notebook's chassis is. It's not a very quick CPU, which means you won't want to use it for advanced content creation, such as editing and creating videos. However it is efficient for everyday office and Web tasks, encoding music, creating presentations, editing photos and watching movies. It recorded a time of 2min 7sec in our Blender 3D rendering test, which is about one minute slower than a laptop with a high-end (non-low-voltage) Core 2 Duo.
Its performance was swift when using office applications and browsing the Web, but it became a little slow when it was displaying a DVD in the background (with CPU usage at 27 per cent). Web sites with plenty of Flash advertisements might also slow it down depending on how many pages you have open at one time.
You also get 3GB of RAM, integrated Intel graphics (which use up approximately 150MB of the RAM), and a fast 120GB solid-state drive. This drive recorded a speed of 33.31 megabytes per second in our file transfer tests, which is a shade quicker than the 7200rpm drive in Dell's XPS 13 and approximately 13MBps faster than a notebook with a 5400rpm drive (such as Sony's VAIO VGN-Z17GN/B).
The design and build quality of the Toshiba Portege R600 (PPR61A-00400R) are what set it apart from most ultraportable laptops. Its magnesium body is very light and strong, and Toshiba claims it can withstand up to 100kg of pressure (if it's evenly dispersed across the whole unit). Its screen feels very flimsy because it's so thin (only 5mm thick!), but it's actually designed to be flexible. It 'floats' inside the lid, instead of being screwed in place, which is one of the things that allow it to be so flexible. It's 2mm thinner than the Portege R600's DVD burner, which is 7mm thick!
The 12.1in screen has a native resolution of 1280x800 pixels, and it is transreflective. This means that it can use sunlight to produce its brightness, instead of the backlight. This can prolong the battery life, and there is a switch just above the keyboard that allows you to switch off the backlight when you are outdoors. In our tests the screen was easily viewable in bright sunlight, where it achieved the equivalent brightness of the backlight. In shaded areas it was a little dimmer than it was when using the backlight. Indoors, the backlight will have to be used.
A spill-proof keyboard is installed on the Portege R600. It can withstand accidental water, coffee, and coke spills. It doesn't have drainage points, as it uses a seal to keep the liquid from entering the base of the unit; you'll have to tip it upside down to get rid of the liquid. It's a comfortable keyboard to use because the keys are full sized and produce good bounce-back, but we found the notebook's touchpad to be a little inaccurate — sometimes it did not allow us to move the pointer smoothly. Its buttons are also uncomfortable to press.
After a long period of use on your lap, the Toshiba Portege R600 will get a little warm on its left side, which is where the CPU sits, but it doesn't get hot enough to cause discomfort. Because it uses a solid-state drive the component that makes the most noise is the CPU fan; it won't drive you nuts, however.
On the road, the Toshiba Portege R600 can be used for a longer time than most ultraportable laptops. It lasted 3hr 8min in our DVD rundown test, and it will last longer if you don't run many CPU-intensive applications (for example, if you're just typing up a document or reading reports).
Despite the Portege R600's size, Toshiba hasn't skimped on connections for the laptop; it has two USB 2.0 ports (one of them doubles as an eSATA port), Gigabit Ethernet, 802.11n wireless networking, D-Sub, an SD card reader and headphone and microphone ports. It also has a rotational volume control, which is more convenient than using a function key combination to adjust the volume level. However, if you will be listening to music you'll want to wear headphones or plug in some speakers, because the Portege R600 has only one speaker and it's very weak.
Despite being so thin, the Portege R600 even has an ExpressCard/54 expansion slot, which can be used to house a 3G data card or fast external storage. When in the office, you can sit the laptop in a docking station.
There's no doubt that the Toshiba Portege R600 (PPR61A-00400R) is the ultimate ultraportable laptop for a user who's constantly on the move. It's extremely light and strong, and it has a built-in optical drive and all the ports and slots you're likely to require. | 2019-04-19T08:41:09 | https://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/review/toshiba/portege_r600_ppr61a-00400r/299324/ |
0.999999 | Why are psychologists watching disturbing video art?
A few years ago while watching Paul McCarthy's video Painter (1995) at Ballroom Marfa, Texas, an artist friend murmured to me, 'This stuff makes me feel a bit sick.' Yes, me too. Before she said that, I probably would have felt obliged to use some sort of detached aesthetic terminology to express my response. But 'a bit sick' is better, not only because it's honest, but also because, as we now know, you can take the same thing for disturbing video art that you take for a cold: paracetamol.
The first interesting thing about meaning threats is that, after enduring one, people try to compensate by reaffirming some sort of dependable meaning somewhere else in their world. For instance, in another study with a great title, 'The Case of the Transmogrifying Experimenter', the woman giving the subjects the questionnaire was replaced half-way through by a different woman wearing the same outfit. Most of the subjects didn't consciously notice the swap, but afterwards they tended to set a higher bail for a prostitute in an imaginary courtroom scenario, as if on some deep level they were unsettled by the visual anomaly and looking for order and authority to cling to.
The second interesting thing about meaning threats is that you can soothe them with painkillers, just like physical pain. For instance, social rejection can be regarded as a type of meaning threat; and another study has shown that, if you leave someone out of a ball game, they won't be as upset about it if they've taken paracetamol, also known as acetaminophen.
David Lynch, Rabbits, 2002, film still.
In 'The Common Pain of Surrealism and Death', the psychologists from the University of British Columbia decided to apply these findings to yet another type of meaning threat: the avant-garde. They showed some of their subjects a four-minute clip from David Lynch's 'sitcom' Rabbits (2002). Now, Lynch fans will already have noticed that the aforementioned 'transmogrifying experimenter' is quite reminiscent of Lost Highway (1997), in which the protagonist is first played by Bill Pullman and then by Balthazar Getty. So I emailed Steve Heine, the psychologist involved in both of the studies, to ask him about this.
'You know, I think Lost Highway is the only Lynch movie that I haven’t seen,' he replied. He told me that he used Rabbits and the 'transmogrifying experimenter' trick because he 'had good theoretical reasons from a lot of psychological research to expect they should elicit the same unconscious feeling,' whereas 'Lynch seemed to intuitively know that on his own.' So Heine isn't deliberately working his way through Lynch's filmography in a clinical setting, but I still can't help hoping his next paper is as loaded with Twin Peaks references as an art pop band's Tumblr.
In the 'Surrealism and Death' study, the subjects were given another imaginary courtroom scenario, in which they were asked to set the fines for rioters convicted of vandalism after a hockey match. The ones who'd watched four minutes of Rabbits tended to slap on higher fines. Unless they'd taken paracetamol, in which case they didn't.
What are we to make of these results? At first sight, they seem to suggest that people who consume a lot of disorienting video will end up more right-wing. But that doesn't sound plausible. For instance, I have seen few works of video art more captivating in their strangeness than Marianna Simnett's bionic nightmare-cantata Blue Roses (2015), but in the conversations I had at the opening of her show at Seventeen Gallery, London, recently, I did not detect an undertone of draconian social conservatism. In fact, a previous study, which used a Monty Python sketch for its meaning threat, found that people don't engage in compensatory affirmation when they've been warned in advance that they're about to see something surreal. In other words, the video art lovers don't get any heebie-jeebies from it, because they already know what they're getting into.
Recent neuroscience suggests that meaning threats activate the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC), a hook-shaped area near the front of the brain. As well as surrealism and transmogrifying experimenters and social rejection, the dACC responds to contemplation of morality and physical pain. It's been characterized as a general alarm system for errors, conflicts and discrepancies. This doesn't mean that watching David Lynch is neurologically the same as getting a headache. But there is some sort of overlap, which is why paracetamol helps with all of the above.
Artists sometimes complain that the market has no appetite for genuinely experimental or challenging work. But imagine if, before the arrival of a collector on a studio visit, you could spike their latte with an undetectable aesthetic tranquiliser. Imagine if you could do the same to every glass of champagne at the opening of an art fair. Perhaps the art market would become suddenly fearless.
One might argue that this would betray the work. For a lot of artists, keeping collectors comfortable is not exactly the top priority. Part of the point of Painter or Rabbits is to produce an involuntary reaction. Art moves us in many different ways; confusion and dread are profound emotions just like rapture and pity.
But if those emotions are integral to the work in some cases, perhaps they're a mere distraction in others. If you knew that your audience was dosed on paracetamol, you could count on them to appreciate even your most eldritch and fractured work in precise formalist terms, their responses unmuddied by primitive instincts from our evolutionary past.
Indeed, paracetamol abuse could spur artists to new extremes. When clubbers started taking ketamine, what followed was music even more cavernous and static than existing techno. Tomorrow's young gallery-goers, their limbic lobes numbed by swigs of calpol sizzurp, might demand ever more intense meaning threats, just to feel something. If a dACC-inhibitor even more potent than paracetamol is ever discovered, a sort of Modernist Singularity might follow, with art advancing on an unchecked exponential curve until we have revolutions and paradigm shifts on a weekly basis.
I tried taking a paracetamol myself before watching Painter on YouTube. I couldn't tell if it affected me any differently this time, and also I didn't make it all the way through the video, and also I have not yet been empowered to decide the fate of prostitutes or rioters (which is a shame because I would do an incredibly astute, Solomon-like job of it). So perhaps my little experiment would not pass peer review. But the next time I see some sickening art, I will be conscious that I am making a choice not to smooth out my response. Instead, like a woman in labour refusing an epidural, I will grit my teeth through the meaning threats, because that is the natural way. | 2019-04-21T17:06:53 | https://frieze.com/article/side-effects-may-include?language=en |
0.999982 | How stem cells can treat eye problems?
Currently, there is no treatment that slows the progression of age-related macular degeneration, which is the leading cause of vision loss in people over 65. An injection of stem cells into the eye may slow or reverse the effects of early-stage age-related disorder that causes vision loss, according to researchers.Age-related macular degeneration occurs when the small central portion of the retina, known as the macula, deteriorates. When animal models with macular degeneration were injected with induced neural progenitor stem cells, which derive from the more commonly known induced pluripotent stem cells, healthy cells began to migrate around the retina and formed a protective layer.This protective layer prevented ongoing degeneration of the vital retinal cells responsible for vision.
The stem cells could provide a much-needed alternative to current treatments, which either destroy much of the retina with a laser or require patients to receive an injection directly into their eyeball as often as monthly for the rest of their lives. The stem cells is a first step to demonstrate that you can use these stem cells to impact aspects of eye disease associated with diabetes.
An injection of stem cells into the eye may soon slow or reverse the effects of early-stage age-related macular degeneration. When animal models with macular degeneration were injected with induced neural progenitor stem cells, which derive from the more commonly known induced pluripotent stem cells, healthy cells began to migrate around the retina and formed a protective layer. This protective layer prevented ongoing degeneration of the vital retinal cells responsible for vision. Next steps included testing the efficacy and safety of the stem cell injection in preclinical animal studies to provide information for applying for an investigational new drug. From there, clinical trials will be designed to test potential benefit in patients with later-stage age-related macular degeneration.
Those who might benefit the most from this stem cell treatment are people who suffer from macular degeneration. To perform the stem cell transplant, researchers initially tested things out in blind mice. They injected stem cells into the rear of the eye. The stem cells were able to replace the damaged photoreceptors, which are small, important cells found in the retina. These photoreceptors are vital to your ability to see things and they are very sensitive to light. Interestingly enough, previous studies using stem cells had failed to restore sight. One reason for the problem relates to the choice of stem cells. In the most recent study, researchers used stem cells that were more mature than the ones previous researchers had used. The choice proved successful as the stem cells developed into photoreceptors and were able to join with the nerves that lead to the brain.
How to remove redness from eyelids?
Does Lupus Cause Eye Problems? | 2019-04-21T02:43:00 | https://www.firmoo.com/answer/question/13933.html |
0.999999 | The country star has been dealing with it for most of his life..
Brett Eldredge has become one of the most successful artists of the country genre, however, it doesn't mean life comes easy for him. The singer-songwriter opened up in a recent interview about his struggle with anxiety and panic attacks.
The 32-year-old revealed to ABC that he's been dealing with it for most of his life" and at times it's made it hard for him to celebrate his successes." Eldredge shared details of the panic attacks he experienced as a kid and even later on in college.
The esteemed country act described his struggle as "a very physical" aspect of his life while it also followed him into adulthood. "I went through a stage where I was so hyped up about it [my career> that I wasn't able to really enjoy what I loved to do," Eldredge told ABC.
The country singer is currently out on the road for his 2018 'The Long Way Tour' with special guest Devin Dawson. Brett Eldredge released his self-titled fourth studio album in August of 2017 which includes his current single, "Love Someone." | 2019-04-18T22:33:11 | https://kfrog.radio.com/blogs/lauren-hoffman/brett-eldredge-opens-struggle-anxiety |
0.998841 | Which tooth color is natural?
White teeth belong to the beauty ideals and stand for success and self-confidence. However, most people have slightly yellowish teeth, but this is quite natural and it is not always due to unhealthy teeth or lack of oral hygiene.
Certain eating habits and the daily enjoyment of tea, coffee, red wine or tobacco cause discoloration. In addition, lack of oral hygiene and some antibacterial mouthwashes cause discolorations. Use a mouth rinse and dental floss in your daily oral hygiene to get your white teeth. In addition, malnutrition, tooth decay or certain medications can lead to an unwanted change in teeth whitening.
There are many ways to make your teeth appear whiter but you cannot change the actual color of your teeth without having a professional whitening. Keep in mind that all of these methods only help with light surface stains and are in no way a substitute for the professional results you get at a dental office.
Surely you have seen many brands promising to whiten your teeth. They contain fine abrasive particles that act as a polishing agent to remove light surface stains. For some individuals, this is all it takes to make their teeth appear whiter. Because these kinds of toothpaste are slightly more abrasive, it is not advisable to use them on a regular basis.
Whitening strips are an inexpensive approach to whitening teeth. These strips are covered with a thin layer of low strength whitening gel that you adhere to your teeth. Results are limited.
This is a true teeth whitening process that is accomplished using very specific chemicals. This can only be done by seeing a dentist. You could also have an in-office whitening that does not require trays.
Your wedding is coming up, and you want your smile to be its brightest, or maybe you have an important speaking engagement. Whatever the reason, tooth bleaching is not just for movie stars and not just for one day. Many people have had their teeth bleached and probably millions more are thinking about it. The desire for a brighter smile with whiter teeth is very appealing, and tooth bleaching safely lightens the color of the teeth, lasting for many years with isolated touch-up applications. The most effective and safest method of tooth bleaching is dentist-supervised.
Generally, bleaching is successful in at least 90 percent of patients, though it may not be an option for everyone. Consider tooth bleaching if your teeth are darkened from age, coffee, tea or smoking. Teeth darkened with the color of yellow, brown or orange respond better to bleaching. Gray stains caused by fluorosis, smoking, or tetracycline use can be lightened, but results are not as dramatic. If you have very sensitive teeth, periodontal (gum) disease or teeth with worn enamel, your dentist may discourage bleaching.
If you have asked around, you might have noticed that teeth whitening prices do vary greatly. The cost of your treatment depends on many factors, such as what brand of whitening agents are being used, how much care is being taken to fabricate the trays, and how difficult your teeth are to whiten. These are some of the questions you should ask your dentist.
No one can really predict how much lighter your teeth will become. Every case is different. Typically, in most cases, the shade will improve. The success rate depends upon the type of stain involved, the type of bleaching procedure, and your compliance. Bleaching can only provide a shift in color. Also, bleaching does not lighten artificial materials such as bonding, crowns, or veneers. Make sure you discuss this with your dentist.
Do bleaching gels sold online work? Are they safe?
You probably have noticed brand name whitening gels being sold online such as on eBay or Amazon, but are they actually safe? And how can the seller offer those for less than what the manufacturer sells those to dental offices?! And how did the online seller even managed to obtain those products when the federal law prohibits selling those to anyone but to a dental professional?
It is not so much about safety but rather what you are actually receiving. The online products were packaged at the same facilities that also sell those to dental offices. You probably assume that these must be of the same quality and work just as well. The answer is yes and no. Below is an explanation of how the seller managed to obtain those whitening gels in the first place.
Assume a reputable US company manufactures whitening gels to be sold in Europe. These will get packaged and shipped to Europe under ideal storage conditions. A year goes by and a bulk of the product does not get sold. This is when things take a turn. All of the leftover products get shipped back to the US. It is not clear what the shipping conditions will be. In order to cut down the cost, those gels will most likely be stored and shipped in less than ideal conditions, such as being stored in containers without proper temperature regulation where the inside temperature could climb to over 100 ̊F. The chemicals inside the whitening gels are sensitive and will deteriorate. Once the shipment makes it to the US, the content is distributed to small vendors. This is what we call products entering the “gray market”. These are products that are not supposed to be resold. These products will eventually make it to online stores. You as a buyer will have no way to know if what you are buying is actually of acceptable quality or not. For all you know, it could be an old product that sat in an unventilated, non-air-conditioned warehouse for months before being sold and delivered to your mailbox.
The point here is that you have no idea what you are buying. It may be an acceptable product. It may be an old and depleted whitening gel with low whitening potency. It is basically a gamble. Even if you do receive a good product, you will still need trays with excellent fit.
What gel strength is best?
Whitening gels come in a variety of concentrations, such as 10%, 15%, 20%, 35%. The general public assumption is that the highest strength provides the best and fastest results. If that were true, then why would the manufacturers bother producing a variety of strength types?
Those people with higher teeth sensitivity cannot tolerate the higher strength gels; therefore, a 10% or 15% strength would be ideal which should cause a lesser degree of sensitivity. And yes, the lower the strength the longer you have to wear the trays. For example, a 10% gel will need to be applied for 6-8 hours and a 35% gel for only 30 minutes. So common sense would tell you to apply the 35% if your teeth are not too sensitive. Why would anyone without sensitivity wear trays overnight when a 30-minute application is available?
The rule of thumb is that the faster you bleach the teeth the shorter the results will last. Slow bleaching may be of an annoyance but it will give you the most consistent, reliable, and longer lasting result.
The in-office systems utilize very strong gels that give you a great immediate result but they too have a shorter lasting result. The best way to whiten teeth would be a combination of slow take-home bleaching followed by a fast in-office bleaching. This procedure will give you the whitest and the longest lasting results possible.
Are over the counter systems effective?
Over-the-counter bleaching systems are also available and are generally safe and effective, although it is best to check with your dentist before using these products. These systems, which come in the form of strips and gels, usually contain a lower strength of bleaching agent than products used in the dentist’s office. For this reason, they must be used longer to achieve the desired effect, but they are also cheaper. These will not be as effective as having a professionally done whitening.
Can I use my old bleaching trays?
It may not seem critical to you but the fit of the trays are very crucial. The saliva contains an anti-oxidant enzyme that destroys the whitening agent on contact. A very well fitted tray will keep the saliva out so the gel can do its job. If you have old trays, chances are they are not fitting well. Your dentist will be able to confirm this for you. If you are using ill-fitting trays, you are basically wasting the whitening gel. You may be under the assumption that you are whitening your teeth but, in fact, you are either getting a very little result or no result at all. A leaky tray that becomes contaminated with saliva will deactivate the bleaching agent within few minutes.
Is in office whitening using a light source more effective?
If you have heard or noticed firsthand, some bleaching systems utilize a light source and others do not. What is the difference? A light source claims to be more effective. If so, why is it not used in all systems? The truth is that despite what you may have been reading or believing, there is not a single research document confirming that a light source will enhance the effectiveness of your treatment! Manufacturers do not promote their systems based on the light source. They know the light is nothing more than a marketing tool to sell their product. Not only does the light source not accomplish anything, in fact, it raises the temperature of your tooth by a few degrees just enough that it could cause unnecessary irritation. There are research documents confirming this finding. If you are getting whitening without a light source, rest assured that it will not have any impact at all on the whitening results. | 2019-04-23T13:58:47 | https://lakeviewdentalfl.com/procedures/teeth-whitening/ |
0.999366 | Since City Council directed the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability to develop a concept plan for annexingWestHaydenIsland, staff have strived to develop a proposal that meets the multiple objectives of human, environmental and economic health for the island, the city and the region.
The amended proposal is now before the Planning and Sustainability Commission (PSC), which has held several public hearings and work sessions over the past six months to consider the details. The proposal includes a draft intergovernmental agreement (IGA) between the City and the Port as well as land use and transportation plans for the island.
Funding for parks improvements and health mitigation.
Noise and air quality impacts to neighborhoods.
Amendment procedures for the IGA.
At the end of the meeting, commissioners directed staff to make final amendments to the proposal.
The bureau will release an updated version of the WHI draft proposal the week of June 17. Then the PSC will hold another work session on July 9 at 12:30 p.m. to make a recommendation to City Council, which will likely hold a final hearing on the project later this year. If adopted, the plan for WHI would annex the site into the City limits, and zone 500+ acres as open space and slightly under 300 acres for future marine terminal development.
Add a significant asset to the regional network of open space, increasing access to nature and recreation while adding hundreds of acres of forest planting and restoration.
Solidify Portland’s role as a trade gateway, consistent with the City’s adopted Economic Development Plan and the Regional Export Strategy.
Create much-needed family wage job opportunities in North Portland, strengthening the middle class and addressing issues of economic equity.
Generate $18-$30 million in new tax revenue to local and state government, annually.
Bring new parks and recreational opportunities to Hayden Island, a park-deficient neighborhood.
Make a significant investment in housing conditions for low-income residents of Hayden Island.
Help make Hayden Island a more walkable community by making a significant investment in North Hayden Island Drive.
To help address community concerns about noise and air quality impacts to neighborhood, the plan incorporates a Health Analysis.
The Economic Opportunities Analysis, prepared and adopted as part of the Comprehensive Plan Update, reveals a shortage of industrial land supply (635 acres) to meet projected employment growth over the next 25 years. If annexed into the City of Portland, the proposed 300 acres of marine industrial land on West Hayden Island would reduce that shortage by nearly half. Industrial land is unique for the type of manufacturing jobs it can generate — well-paying jobs that increase job opportunities for low income communities and minorities.
As the City works to meet its industrial land needs, the Comprehensive Plan Update process will also assess the impacts of public policy decisions and investments on human health and equity to ensure livability for all.
For more information about West Hayden Island and upcoming dates, please visit the WHI website. | 2019-04-23T10:53:54 | https://www.portlandoregon.gov/bps/article/453778 |
0.999794 | Ho a cuore le politiche pubbliche, e cerco di contribuire al loro miglioramento. Sto esplorando l’Internet sociale come strumento per collegare i cittadini tra loro e alle istituzioni, analizzare i problemi di governance, progettarne soluzioni e realizzarle – il tutto in modo decentralizzato. Ho scritto un libro per mostrare che è stato fatto, e argomentare che si dovrebbe farlo più spesso.
Non è una discussione facile. Molti decisori rimangono scettici: cosa ci garantisce che la discussione online converga verso un consenso basato su argomenti razionali e dati empirici? Un ristretto numero di persone con un metodo di lavoro comune possono formare un gruppo efficace, ma grandi masse di cittadini diversi tra loro e autoselezionati sono destinate a crollare sotto il peso di controversie, trolling e puro e semplice sovraccarico informativo. Abbiamo esempi di casi in cui questo non è successo, ma non abbiamo una teoria a guidarci nella progettazione di ambienti per la conversazione che producano i risultati voluti. Non è abbastanza.
Recentemente ho fatto un po’ di ricerche che potrebbero aprire uno spiraglio. Si tratta di un’analisi di rete della conversazione su Edgeryders. L’ho scritta in inglese – la trovate qui sotto. Per chi non legge l’inglese ma fosse interessato: non esitare a metterti in contatto con me, è facile trovarmi in rete (basta anche lasciare un commento qui). Nel video qui sopra (anch’esso in inglese) si trova un’analisi più dettagliata dei dati e una visualizzazione carina della crescita della rete.
I care about public policies, and try to contribute to their betterment. The road I am exploring is to take advantage of the social Internet to connect citizens among themselves and with government institutions to assess governance problems, design solutions and implement them – all in a decentralized fashion. I wrote a book to show it has been done, and to argue for it to be done more.
But it remains a tough sell. Many decision makers remain skeptical: why should online conversations converge onto evidence-based consensus? A few people who share a common work method can make an effective group, but a large number of very diverse and self-selected citizens – what I have been arguing for – is likely to collapse under the weight of trolling, controversy and sheer information overload. We have examples in which this did not happen: but we don’t have a theory to guide us in designing conversation environment which produce the desired results. Not good enough.
Louvain modularity of the network. This parameter identifies the network’s subcommunities and computes the difference between its subcommunities structure and what you would expect in a random network. Modularity can take any value between 0 and 1: higher values indicate a topology that is unlikely to emerge by chance, so they are the signature that some force is giving the network its actual shape; low values mean that the breakdown into subcommunities is weak, and could well have emerged by chance.
These indicators for Edgeryders agree that there is no partitioning in the network. All active members are connected in one giant component, whose modularity values stay consistently low (around 0.3-0.2) throughout the period analyzed. This is not surprising: my team at Edgeryders had clear instructions to engage all newcomers into the conversation, commenting their work (and therefore connecting them to the giant component). From a network perspective, the job of the team was exactly to connect every user to the rest of the community, and this means compressing modularity.
there is a significant number of “active singletons”, active nodes that are only talking to the team members, but not to each other. This might indicate a user life cycle effect: when a new user becomes active, she is first engaged by a member of the paid team, who tries to facilitate her connection to the rest of the community (by making introductions etc. My team has specific instructions to do this). The percentage of active singletons decreases over time, from about 10% to less than 5%.
not counting active singletons, there are several components in the induced conversation network. A giant component emerges in February; from that moment on, the number of components is roughly constant.
Subcommunities are color coded. Knowing Edgeryders and being part of its community (and having access to non-anonymized data), I can easily see that some of those subcommunities correspond to subjects of conversation. For example, the yellow group in the upper part of the graph is involved in a web of conversation about the Occupy movement and how to build and share a pool of common resources. Also, looking at the growth of the graph over time, subcommunities seem to grow sequentially more than simultaneaneously. This might be related to the management structure of Edgeryders: we launched campaigns (roughly one every four weeks) to explore broad issues that have to do with the transition of youth to adulthood. Examples of issues are employment/income generation and learning. So, an interpretation could be this: each campaign summoned users interested in the campaign’s issue. These users connected to each other in clusters of conversation, and some of them act as “bridges” across the different cluster, giving rise to a connected, yet highly modular structure. The video above has some nice visualizations of the network’s growth and of the most relevant metrics.
This looks very much like parallel computing (except this computer is made of humans), and could be the engine of scalability. As more people join, online conversation does not necessarily become unmanageable: it could self-organize into clusters of conversation, increasing its ability to process a certain issue from many angles at the same time. Also, this interpretation is consistent with the idea that such an outcome can be helped by appropriate community management techniques.
Ten years ago, Clay Shirky warned us that communities don’t scale. He was right, by his own definition of community – which is what in network terms is called a clique, a structure in which everybody is connected to everybody else. I would argue, however, his definition is not the most appropriate to online communities. Communities do scale, by self-organizing into structures of tight clusters only weakly connected to each other.
If we could generalize what happens in Egderyders, the implications for online policies would be significant. It would mean we can attack almost any problem by throwing an online community at it; and that we can effectively tune how smart our governance is by recruiting more citizens. appropriately connected, into it. We at the Dragon Trainer project are following this line of investigation and developing tools for data-powered online community management. If you care about this issue too, you are welcome to join us onto the Dragon Trainer Google Group; if you want to play with Edgeryders data, you can find them on our Github repository.
Coming soon: posts about conversation diversity and community sustainability based on the same data.
The analysis is fascinating but i still find the relevance for policy-making quite weak. Policy by definition pursues the public interest. I am personally convinced that structuring appropriatly the consultation with informed citizens can improve the public-orientation of policy, and in other ways improve its quality. However, showing that communities scale up and in doing so they partition into sub groups of discussion does not seem to bring home the point that conversations improve policy definition. This can be proven in specific cases (only?) by showing that the quality of policy deisgn has improved through expanded consultation of this kind: evidence of this is scant not only in your work, but in general.
If you believe my conjecture, you could indeed use it to discover information (and perhaps even solutions) you had not thought of before. How? By attracting diverse people; giving them a relatively unbridled interaction space (multiple choice questionnaires perform obviously very badly in this respect); and deploying some animation.
Then, even if the exercise works very well and you get a lot of fresh information out of it, you might still design bad policy. There are a lot of factors involved in policy making beyond good ideas (political acceptability and administrative constraints come to mind); also, while I am convinced that online communities are very good at exploring issues and processing large masses of information, I am not so convicned they are good at making decisions too.
Alberto: Thank you for reflection.
I think we are still far from being able to define a methodology for this question. I think in a methodology, with a minimum success rate, that it could help governments to gather collective intelligence.
Concepts like scalability haven’t yet been explored sufficiently, this post providing here is very interesting in order to tackle this problem from a new perspective.
Please notify me if you progress more in this area.
from my point of view of coordinator of the Digital agenda of Bologna Municipality I have observed phenomena which can confirm your analysis.
For the first time, we have tried to map the digital activities and through projects such as incrediBOL for startups, Di nuovo in centro and TDays for a new urban mobility, PAES for activities to reduce environmental impact, Bologna estate to support summer cultural activities, for example, we have identified some communities using instruments calibrated depending on the available energy (human resources principally) like blogs, web pages and social media, using online form and questionnaires.
So I can confirm that there are vertical comunities with different tags and interests like meeting point. We are now considering to try this approach on the “intercultural” activities” with another (new?) community in the process.
The data I have is about access to events or to the web sites, about fans / followers on social media and about questionarios completed so I do not provide complete graphic like yours but the feeling is that now the next step would be to provide a support to all projects, not only strategic consulting but also horizontal community management, to create a large community made up of city users + lovers of the city of Bologna. It ‘s a matter of resources but also because the projects that I have listed are in different departments with different logic and grammar. If every project were indicated by different colors we could map the relationships between nodes, highlighting ties between different communities and to the core, I think your analysis is confirmed with a change that still does not change your initial thesis, indeed: A Bologna does not have 2 levels (your staff and between communities) but 3 levels ( communication staff that speaks to the various departments who in turn manage the community).
In Matera we gonna speak about this!
Well, Michele: would you be interested in a partnership? My tiny team and I can probably finish some version of this project alone, but it gets better with every addition of people, approaches, sub-projects. If you launch a community, it would be quite simple to design for data extraction in a way that enables this kind of analysis: and then we could compare notes. This is important because requests for functionalities of DT are going to be made by data analysts who need certain data in order to make certain inferences. See this thread for an example.
Other ways in which you could collaborate are helping with development, helping assemble the community around the project etc. Yes, let’s definitely talk in Matera.
Very interesting stuff, loved reading your post and had to re-read it twice (ok im lying, 3 times) in order to get some the points and extrapolate their implications for the work we do within UNDP in Montenegro (this isnt necessarily unique to Montenegro, but we see a lot of ‘public consultations’ taking place that merely serve the purpose of ticking the box- they’re state centric, tend to involve citizens at a relatively late stage with little or no scope for real influence, and lacking user perspective).
This fall we’re about to launch a public consultation process on establishment of several regiona parks in the country, aimed at rural parts of the country with low levels of quality infrastructure… and we’re thinking of ways in making that process meaningful and engaging. Your idea of ‘throwing online communities’ at an issue- it sparked an idea of actually involving a Diaspora, that returns to these places where Regional Parks will be formed from various corners of the world, in the process of consultations and getting their input on various management policies that the Government will be designing.
All in all, thanks for the post…looking forward to following your work closely on this!
Hello Millie, you think it is not clear? I am trying my best not to be too technical.
My two cents: involving diasporas is definitely a good idea. The main reason is that they add diversity to the conversation and connect it to the wider world. To be fair, in my experience, involving anyone is mostly a good idea: there is no way to know in advance who is going to make the pivotal contributions, and the marginal cost of accommodating one more person in an online conversation is near-zero. In fact, to be honest, I don’t think the concept of “stakeholder” makes a whole lot of ex ante sense. | 2019-04-24T06:43:53 | http://www.cottica.net/2012/08/01/come-scalano-le-conversazioni-online/ |
0.999999 | Can Bourdain’s death please generate a conversation about alcoholism and not just befuddlement about his fantastic life countless people wish they had. Because you don’t. The travel, the breadth of his life, sure, maybe. What an experience-rich life. But this man on the move had to stop sometimes. No cameras, no action. Just himself. I do not presume to know him, but I do know addiction and it can be a fiercely critical companion that may take a back seat but lies in wait. It can tear us down and sometimes just won’t shut up — goading shame, self-loathing, and inviting emotional isolation.
We’ll be talking about depression and suicide for days now, with Kate Spade’s and Bourdain’s suicides, until another famous person with a seemingly magnificent life shocks us. Bourdain was a famous, beloved “bad boy” as one friend described him. He demonstrated a generosity of self. He cared deeply, it would seem, about injustice, and about the opiate addicted with whom he empathized. I’ve found, working with the addicted, both using and in recovery, that addicts/alcoholics are generally extremely sensitive souls.
A short clip of No Reservations host and star Anthony Bourdain when he came to South Carolina to get a taste of Gullah culture on St. Helena Island, SC.
Alcohol “works” for the alcoholic until it doesn’t. It promises and delivers what we seek from it for years, until it stops working. Yet still we want to drink like everybody else. Drinking is fun, right? It goes with culinary delights, correct? It enhances life, isn’t that so? Well, yes, and no. Certainly ultimately “no” if you have the malady, which quietly marches on and in time takes our joy, even our will to live and carry on and pretend we’re OK. We’re not OK. We are just good actors. He perhaps was one of the best. With alcoholism, we make rules by the way, to prove we have control. We also break those rules. We take life by the tail, but, dare I say, some weary of the show and let go.
Alcoholics minimize, deny, believe their drinking is under control, and refuse to connect the dots — that drinking for escape, relief or to solve problems is creating more problems, and is taking a toll on self-worth and perhaps cognition. The substance they are drinking for “a lift” is a depressant. The guilt, shame, powerlessness and depression can take us down.
Jo Ann Towle of Lexington is a certified intervention professional with a national practice helping people find treatment for addiction. | 2019-04-20T14:33:37 | https://www.kentucky.com/opinion/op-ed/article213293169.html |
0.999999 | Does anyone know if it's possible to get a feed of a given user's comments (or just your own) in Dreamwidth?
Context: I want to comment here more, which means I would like to set up a Beeminder goal for doing so, and those work a lot better if they're automatic (i.e. I want to connect the feed of my comments, on anyone's journal, to Beeminder so that it adds a datapoint to the goal whenever I write a comment). I don't mind using IFTTT to do the connecting. I can also see valid and obvious privacy reasons why this wouldn't be available, but maybe it does?
Disclaimer: using external tools to make me communicate more with humans might feel weird and artificial, but -- *handwaves in ADHD* -- that's how my brain works. Sometimes. When it does. | 2019-04-22T12:02:00 | https://katzenfabrik.dreamwidth.org/tag/beeminder |
0.550648 | I'm interested in your research area and would like to become one of your graduate students or post-docs. What should I do?
We welcome inquiries regarding opportunities in the lab for both graduate students and postdoctoral fellows at any time. Before doing so, you should browse the web page descriptions of some of our group's current projects, and apply to the graduate program in Electrical and Computer Engineering at McGill University, specifying your interest in working with me in Human-Computer Interaction or Computer Vision as part of the Intelligent Systems research group.
Due to the high volume of applications we receive, we are generally limited to responding only to promising candidates.
If you're a scholarship student (or expect to receive an NSERC or equivalent) and live within reasaonble proximity to Montreal, please contact me directly to arrange a time to visit our lab.
What qualifications do I need to become a graduate student in your group?
First, you should have excellent grades; the department's minimum threshold is a CGPA of 3.0 out of 4 or a GPA of 3.2 out of 4.0 for the last two full-time academic years, but in general, we accept only students with much stronger records. There are TOEFL requirements for non-Canadian applicants (GRE is optional). See the admissions requirements page for details. You should also posess a solid background (e.g. an undergraduate degree) in Electrical and Computer Engineering or Computer Science, have strong programming skills in C, Java, Python, or equivalent, and have excellent communication skills.
For students wishing to enter the Ph.D. program, you should have relevant experience in a core subject area pertinent to the research project of interest and ideally, a number of publications.
What sort of funding is available to support my studies?
We provide funding to a limited number of graduate students every year through research grants and contracts. However, other than cases where a prospective student already has a scholarship (see below), we are unlikely to provide support for M.Eng. students. Qualified Canadian applicants are strongly encouraged to apply for NSERC or FRQNT scholarships. Additional scholarships are also available, based on academic merit. See the the McGill Fellowships and Awards pages for graduate students and Postdocs. All incoming Ph.D. students are also eligible for the McGill Engineering Doctoral Award (MEDA), which is determined largely by excellence of your academic and research record.
Ph.D. students are likely to receive differential fee waivers, which reduce international tuition to the equivalent of Canadian fees. Graduate students may also obtain some financial support by working a limited number of hours as Teaching Assistants. Further information is available from the ECE Graduate Studies Fees and Expenses page.
How do I choose a thesis project?
There are generally a number of reasonably well defined projects in my lab that are directly suitable for a M.Eng. or Ph.D. thesis. However, I encourage students to spend (at least part of) their first semester working on a few small projects in parallel to help decide what fits best with their interests.
What courses should I take as a graduate student in your group?
There are no hard-and-fast rules for how to split your course load between semesters. Some students try to get as many courses as possible out of the way early in their studies so that they can concentrate on thesis research later; others spread the load more evenly over three or four semesters. Regardless, the trick is often dealing with scheduling constraints, as most courses are offered only once per year.
Note that you're unlikely able to manage more than 3 courses in any one semester, in particular as you'll be expected to begin some preliminary thesis research shortly after the start of your studies.
Keep in mind that if you're having a hard time choosing between several potentially interesting options, you can always start with extra courses to try them out for the first couple of weeks, and then withdraw from any of them without penalty as long as you do so before the add/drop deadline.
If you're a new M.Eng. student joining my group, you should consult the listing of graduate courses being offered for the coming year and make tentative selections before arriving at McGill. You can revise this during the "course add/drop" period in the first few weeks of the term, in consultation with your supervisor. Further information regarding the program regulations is available from the department web site.
Students must also register each semester for "thesis research" courses, which are simply placeholders to ensure you have enough credits to maintain full-time status.
For new graduate students whose first language is not English, I strongly recommend you taking one of the technical writing courses offered by the university. Previous students have found these courses immensely valuable, in particular when it comes to help in composing research papers and theses.
How much vacation time do I have as a graduate student or post-doc?
McGill's Vacation Policy states that "Graduate students and Postdocs should normally be entitled to vacation leave equivalent to university holidays and an additional total of fifteen (15) working days in the year. Funded students and Postdocs with fellowships and research grant stipends taking additional vacation leave may have their funding reduced accordingly."
Can I carry out an undergraduate design project or honour's thesis under your supervision?
f you have strong marks, an interest in the research areas of my group, and an ability to learn the necessary tools quickly, I would be happy to consider you. Please see the description of our ongoing and past research projects as many of these have sub-topics that are well-suited for advanced undergraduate students.
If you undertake a project in my lab, expect to work hard. As Josh Redel (2012-2013 president of SSMU, the Student Society of McGill University) noted, "To be perfectly honest, I asked you to be my supervisor because I knew you would be critical... I knew you would provide more of a challenge..." If you're looking for an easy "A", please consider working with another professor.
Can I apply for an undergraduate research internship in your lab?
We accept a number of research intern students each year, often for the summer months, but in general, cannot offer any funding unless you qualify for an NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Award, McGill's Summer Undergraduate Research in Engineering program, or a MITACS Globalink internship. Students from outside McGill who do not meet these criteria can apply as undergraduate research trainees through the procedures described here.
In general, it is helpful to contact me in advance, summarizing your interests in an internship, and including a CV describing your relevant experience.
Can I conduct part of my thesis research in your lab as a visiting graduate student from another university?
If you have strong marks and have identified a research interest that is closely aligned with current Shared Reality Lab activities, I would be happy to discuss your application as a graduate student trainee.
What other professors are doing research in the Intelligent Systems area at McGill?
Tal Arbel: Object recognition, recognition based on motion signatures, active vision, active recognition, Bayesian inference, statistical models, statistical pattern recognition, as well as medical imaging, neurology and neurosurgery, image registration.
What other professors are doing research in Human-Computer Interaction at McGill? | 2019-04-24T16:29:09 | http://srl.mcgill.ca/faq/ |
0.999946 | I have a 40-gallon electric water heater. It has triggered my upper thermostat reset button twice. What causes this?
When the reset switch goes off on an electric water heater, it generally means the element or the thermostat has gone bad. Elements can be tested by removing the wires from the element and putting an ohm test on the leads. Testing should be done only by a qualified service technician. You should not attempt to work with high-voltage unless you are familiar with all of the proper lock-out tag-out procedures and are qualified to work with electricity, as it can cause death or serious injury.
Both the element and the thermostat should be replaced at the same time, but first consider the age of the water heater. The life expectancy of most water heaters is 15 years. If the water heater is more than 10 years old, the labor cost of replacing the elements is about the same as the installation costs of a new electric water heater. You will pay for the water heater, but you will recoup some of the loss in energy savings over the next 10 years. | 2019-04-23T18:50:33 | https://www.rotorooter.com/plumbing-basics/frequently-asked-questions/water-heater/why-is-my-water-heater-resetting-my-upper-thermostat/ |
0.999781 | Rahul Gandhi Says, "Prime Minister Acting Like Anil Ambani's Middleman"
New Delhi: The Congress President, Rahul Gandhi launched a blistering attack on PM Modi and said that he acted as Anil Ambani's "middleman," citing an email that he said revealed, that the industrialist had visited France and met with the French Defence Minister a fortnight before PM Modi announced the 36-jet deal. Mr Gandhi had also alleged that Anil Ambani was aware of the deal when even "the Defence Minister and Foreign Secretary didn't know."
Rahul Gandhi, held up a copy of what he said was an email by an Airbus employee with details of the meeting.
The businessman Anil Ambani visited then French Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian's office in Paris and had a meeting with his top advisers in March 2015.
However, the Reliance Defence said that the visit had nothing to do with Rafale; they say he visited France to discuss a Naval Utility Helicopter deal for which the government of India had issued a Request for Information in 2015. | 2019-04-19T16:23:39 | http://dailyaddaa.com/Read/rahul-gandhi-says-prime-minister-acting-like-anil-ambanis-middleman-14881.html |
0.998363 | There are plenty of posts around describing things that can be done at the command line with Bash history, but the first step into a smörgåsbord of functionality is almost always through a single convenient doorway. This doorway is !$, which Bash expands to the last argument of the previous issued command.
How often do you edit a file and commit changes?
Or how about moving a file before editing it?
Though it looks weird onscreen, !$ is actually kinda enjoyable to type as well; it just feels good to fork the '1' and '4' keys while holding shift with the right pinkie. It's a straightforward and memorable gesture that the strange '!$' combination belies.
TL;DR: 10/10, would use again. | 2019-04-25T18:16:00 | http://www.stacoscimus.com/bash-history/ |
0.999878 | Write a review on Axion-Pharma MD1T!
MD1T is a potent combination of 17alpha methyl-17beta-hydroxy-andros (1-ene-3-one) aka Methyl 1-Testosterone and 17a-methyl-17beta-hydroxyestra-4,9(10)dien-3-one in one capsule.
I am 23 days into this cycle and have had the worst side effects. I have been more irritable, started losing hair and growing extra hair in the wrong places, and my testicles shrunk dramatically. I was also extremely lethargic the first 2 weeks. I read that this can be due to liver toxicity. I didn't load milk thistle or anything before starting the cycle. I also got bad acne the first 2 weeks.
On the positive side (and the only reason I have stayed on the cycle) I have gained 15 pounds. I imagine at least half of it is water weight. My strength has increased in every lift by at least 20%. My run time has dropped considerably due to the extra weight.
I started with two pills for the first three weeks and have increased to three pills now that I have built up a tolerance. At 30 days I am going to start a PCT (Novadex XT likely) while still on the cycle.
All in all this is a great product for lean muscle mass gains. However, the gains come with some side effects.
makes you a little tired or it might just be me. i started using this product and gained 5 lbs in the first week then i didnt gain anything the 2nd and gained 1 pound the 3rd week. use for 4 weeks then start a pct. Not too strong where you will have to have a serm on your pct. Its overall good but everyone wants that magic pill to get you huge but that just aint the case. work hard and youll get there. | 2019-04-22T04:20:29 | http://www.supplementarium.com/supplements/322-axion-pharma-md1t/reviews |
0.999278 | To work on low-level, high-performance, intellectually stimulating software development projects.
C/C++, Java, Perl, shell scripting, SQL, Python, R, LaTeX.
ant, Apache, bind, Cognos BI, CiviCRM, CXF, Drupal, emacs, gcc, gdb, git, junit, m4, make, mysql, postfix, rsync, sendmail, spring, SQL Server, svn, Sybase IQ, tomcat.
HTTP, SMTP, DNS, LDAP, firewall configuration (Netscreen/Juniper), iptables.
Linux (Redhat, Debian, SuSE), Mac OS X, Windows.
I started my career at KAYAK by building low-level components for Java web applications (configuration, logging, error handling, servlet lifecycle event listeners, and such). I also authored KAYAK's first build and deployment framework, which scaled by a factor of 30x before we had to rearchitect it.
Architected KAYAK's data warehouse, and the surrounding ETL processes. This system loads ~ 40 million rows/day into 43 fact tables. As of last count, our data warehouse contained 18 billion rows and a couple terabytes of data. I've also learned a lot of database tuning tricks, to get efficient query execution on large tables.
Built a piece of middleware called "Business Broker". Business Broker (aka "BB") is a Java web service that automates data exchange between Salesforce.com, Doubleclick, KAYAK's internal ad engine, and our data warehouse. This automation has significantly improved the efficiency of KAYAK's commercial team.
Finally, I've done the usual set of things that you'd expect employee #9 at a startup company to do: firewall and VPN configuration, Linux administration, Drupal development, submitting bug fixes to open-source projects, babysitting httpd, bind, MySQL, and a variety of different mail delivery subsystems.
Why is my title "Reverse Engineer"? It's a play on words: I like to tinker with things to figure out how they work, and I'm a fairly proficient debugger.
Designed, implemented, and tested low-level component libraries for use by business units across Intuit.
Established a standard Apache build for use throughout Intuit, including source modifications to meet specialized business needs.
Responsible for administration and configuration of 60+ Solaris machines in 6 deployment environments.
Wrote a collection of tools for harvesting and analysis of application logfile data. (Gathering business data, operational performance, state-flow analysis). These tools were used to process 4-6 GB of log data per day.
Served as a member of the development team for QuickBooks Site Solutions. Wrote APIs for domain registration and domain management. Managed domain name renewals for 75,000 web sites.
Recorded, mixed, and/or mastered several hundred recording projects, done in collaboration with a wide range of clients.
Provided creative assistance to recording clients.
Involved in the diagnosis, troubleshooting, and repair of studio equipment.
Assisted in design and installation of facility upgrades.
Performed additional duties such as billing, inventory management, and client relations.
Work environment is almost entirely project-based, tailored to individual client needs, goals, and schedules.
Held the responsibility of maintaining the quality of the on-air signal and keeping station logs during weekend overnights.
Screened, prepared, and cataloged regularly-aired syndicated shows; varying from 15 - 30 hours of material per week.
Produced and scheduled promotional spots, participated in fundraising events, and took part in the administration of WUMB's audio servers.
Awarded PhD in Computer Science.
Dissertation: Precisely Serializable Snapshot Isolation.
My dissertation involved the development of algorithms to achieve full serializability under snapshot isolation. I did two implementations: a prototype tiny database that was written from scratch and implemented a small subset of SQL (basic CRUD), and a "real" implementation using MySQL's InnoDB storage engine.
Attended 1/2001 - 5/2003. Final Graduate CGPA: 3.93.
Awarded MS in Computer Science.
Graduate Project: "Mayan Translation Assistant", a java GUI application written to assist users in identifying Mayan Hieroglyphs. The Mayan Translation Assistant was an image matching application with a snazzy Swing interface.
Attended 5/1998 - 12/2000. Final Undergrad CGPA: 3.98.
Awarded Major Certificate in Computer Science (BA equivalent for math and CS courses).
Attended 9/1989 - 12/1992. Final CGPA: 3.85.
Awarded BM in Music Production and Engineering.
Attended 9/1988 - 5/1989. CGPA: 3.94.
Member, Arlington Zoning Recodification Working Group. (September 2016 - February 2018) Member of a working group to recodify Arlington's Zoning Bylaws. The recodification was passed by a special town meeting on Feb 12, 2018.
Submitted and tested patches for several open source software products, including tomcat, mod_jk, GNU findutils.
Member of ACM and SIGMOD.
Completed Fagan Defect-Free Training Process from Michael Fagan Associates.
Comfortable working with large bodies of code.
Comfortable working in distributed computing environments.
Good written and verbal communication skills. Excellent organizational skills.
At KAYAK, I interacted heavily with the Business Operations and Finance teams. I speak reasonably fluent finance.
I used to be a pretty decent guitar player. I don't play much these days, but I can still bang out the guitar riffs to Smoke on the Water and White Room.
Years ago, I did sound design and editing for the CD-ROM Tom Peters Career Survival Guide. It was the most fun you could possibly have with a condenser microphone and bag full of fortune cookies.
Ported JDK 1.1.7 and Swing 1.1 API documentation to the Classic Macintosh platform. Sun kept this up on their website for years; Oracle took it down. This was my first non-trivial shell scripting project.
This page was last modified on 24 February 2019, at 22:26. | 2019-04-21T14:29:32 | https://www.srevilak.net/wiki/Resume |
0.983267 | Once again, the Game Developers Conference is almost upon us! GDC 2018 promises to be an awesome event, chock full of great opportunities for us to learn and grow as video game music composers. I always look forward to the comprehensive sessions on offer in the popular GDC audio track, and for the past few years I've been honored to be selected as a GDC speaker. Last year I presented a talk that explored how I built suspense and tension through music I composed for such games as God of War and Homefront: The Revolution. This year, I'm tremendously excited that I'll be presenting the talk, "Music in Virtual Reality." The subject matter is very close to my heart! Throughout 2016 and 2017, I've composed music for many virtual reality projects, some of which have hit retail over the past year, and some of which will be released very soon. I've learned a lot about the process of composing music for a VR experience, and I've given a lot of thought to what makes music for VR unique. During my GDC talk in March, I'll be taking my audience through my experiences composing music for four very different VR games –the Bebylon: Battle Royale arena combat game from Kite & Lightning, the Dragon Front strategy game from High Voltage Software, the Fail Factory comedy game from Armature Studio, and the Scraper: First Strike Shooter/RPG from Labrodex Inc. I'll talk about some of the top problems that came up, the solutions that were tried, and the lessons that were learned. Virtual Reality is a brave new world for game music composers, and there will be a lot of ground for me to cover in my presentation!
In preparing my talk for GDC, I kept my focus squarely on composition techniques for VR music creation, while making sure to supply an overview of the technologies that would help place these techniques in context. With these considerations in mind, I had to prioritize the information I intended to offer, and some interesting topics simply wouldn't fit within the time constraints of my GDC presentation. With that in mind, I thought it would be worthwhile to include some of these extra materials in a couple of articles that would precede my talk in March. In this article, I'll explore some theoretical ideas from experts in the field of VR, and I'll include some of my own musings about creative directions we might pursue with VR music composition. In the next article, I'll talk about some practical considerations relating to the technology of VR music.
No discussion of virtual reality is complete without some time spent on the perils of Visually Induced Motion Sickness (a.k.a. VIMS). My upcoming GDC talk will include research on this topic pointing to a specific music approach that can play an important role in alleviating VIMS symptoms.
Let's picture ourselves sitting in a movie theater. We're watching a silent film that shows a first-person perspective of a high-speed bicycle ride full of wild twists and turns. It looks stressful, but as we sit and watch the visuals, we're not really all that stressed. Okay, so now let's imagine that the film isn't silent anymore. We can hear the bumps and jogs in the road, the air whooshing by, the aurally chaotic soundscape. It's a bit more exciting to watch, but we're still feeling comfortable in our movie-theater seats. Now, let's imagine that we aren't looking at a flat 2D screen anymore. Now it's a 3D stereoscopic image of that wild bicycle ride. Oncoming traffic leaps off the screen at us. Obstacles seem to whip by our heads as the road before us corkscrews madly. Are we still comfortable? Or could all that dizzying 3D motion be finally getting to us?
In their study to better understand the causes of motion sickness, professors Behrang Keshavarz and Heiko Hecht gathered 69 experimental test subjects and exposed them to the visual presentation I described above. There were two variables: viewing mode (2D or 3D stereoscopic) and sound (on or 0ff). The 2D film didn't cause a problem. Likewise, the presence (or absence) of sound wasn't an issue. But when 3D visuals were introduced, motion sickness became a big problem. The findings of the study support the conclusion that immersive visual stimuli has the potential to negatively impact our sense of balance and equilibrium. However, there's also a secondary conclusion that's equally interesting to us as game audio folks: sound doesn't seem to have anything to do with it. Yes, the 3D bicycle ride with sound was pretty nausea-inducing, but according to the study, a silent 3D bike ride has just as much potential to cause motion sickness.
So what does that mean for audio and music in virtual reality? Does it mean that the aural spectrum simply doesn't matter? Or does it present us with some interesting creative opportunities? Let's explore that idea a bit further.
First, let's dispense with the notion that music and sound design doesn't matter when it comes to VIMS. Specifically, the presence of music actually has a powerful influence on the VIMS state, but that influence is therapeutic rather than harmful.
In my upcoming GDC talk, I’ll be exploring the specific type of music that exerts the most beneficial effects when it comes to Visually Induced Motion Sickness. By virtue of both my own experiences with multiple VR projects and the results of relevant scientific studies, I'll be showing how video game composers can best alleviate the effects of VIMS through their musical compositions, and under which circumstances those compositions should be deployed.
While there's a certain musical strategy that has the most beneficial effect (which I'll define in my GDC talk), the mere presence of music is a proven therapeutic agent that has been shown to diminish nausea symptoms. In a study conducted by the Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Research Center at Ohio State University, researchers found that the use of music during high-dose chemotherapy sessions led to a significant reduction in symptoms of nausea. Music acts both as a diversion and a targeted therapeutic agent, shifting the listener's attention away from physical discomfort while at the same time acting to reduce the symptoms.
In my talk I'll be exploring how we can best employ an effective music strategy within the constructs of virtual reality in order to cushion VR players and make them more comfortable in the immersive environment. There is, however, an additional dimension to the relationship between music, audio and VR exploration, which I didn't have time to include in my upcoming GDC talk. I'd like to share my thoughts on that here.
What makes virtual reality so real? It can't be just the encompassing imagery, because then we wouldn't need VR, we could just go to a 3D movie. No, in order for VR to engage us, it has to make us feel as though we are personally present in the virtual world. This phenomenon can be alternately called telepresence or virtual presence, but the end result is the same. We feel as though we're physically occupying the same world as the imaginary visuals we're encountering. How does the game make us feel this sense of presence?
According to MIT Professor Thomas B. Sheridan, the sensation of presence depends on the operation of three important factors: a "sufficiently high-fidelity display, a mental attitude of willing acceptance, and a modicum of motor "participation". In other words, we need to find the visuals to be sufficiently convincing, we have to be willing to be convinced that they're real, and we must be able to move about freely and interact with the environment. Unfortunately, it's that third factor that causes the VIMS problem. Moving around in VR opens us up to motion sickness. How is this problem typically addressed?
According to Steve Bowler, cofounder of the VR game company CloudGate Studio, the community of VR game developers have “zero tolerance for user motion sickness." In an interview with ScienceNews.org, Bowler describes the way in which developers typically solve the problem. By virtue of a system of in-game navigation that relies on a type of teleportation, developers allow us to wander their VR worlds. We point our controllers where we want to be, we hit the teleport button and zip! We're there in a flash. It's highly effective in avoiding the perils of VIMS. However, it also sharply curtails our sensation of being able to "move about freely and interact with the environment."
The effect of this audio-only universe can be very immersive, and its power depends on the sensation of an active soundscape that surrounds, enfolds and interacts with the player in ways that exaggerate and heighten reality. Could these techniques make VR players feel more of a sense of presence in virtual reality, even if their physical mobility is limited? Should we be thinking about opportunities to present a soundscape with moving components and an exaggerated sonic palette?
Conversely, if we decide to exaggerate our audio world, would this disrupt the impression of realism that virtual reality attempts to convey? Here's where we come to another interesting concept that I wasn't able to include in my GDC talk, but that has some bearing on the train of thought we're currently pursuing.
Back in 2015, I wrote an article for Gamasutra about the "Uncanny Valley" - a concept that's been a long-time fixture in the visual arts but has just started to be discussed in connection with audio. When applied to the visual world, the "Uncanny Valley" pertains to representations of living things (most often humans, pictured left) that are impressively close to the real thing but that subtly miss the mark. This imperfection leads to a deeply unsettling impression of wrongness. In my Gamasutra article, I discussed how audio in the world of VR may be in danger of dipping into the "Uncanny Aural Valley," in which sound gets impressively close to perfect realism but misses the mark. Within the context of virtual reality, this subtle imperfection has the potential to impact players in a far more pronounced way than it would in a traditional video game. That barely-perceptible sonic wrongness can (theoretically) pull virtual reality players out of the immersive experience.
So, is VR audio in danger of dipping into the "Uncanny Aural Valley" anytime soon? Not according to Sean Earley, the Executive Editor of AR/VR Magazine. "The visual uncanny valley will still be around for a while," observes Earley. "Unless you are a super audiophile, however, digital audio has progressed to the point where a good engineer can make a recording that is very hard to distinguish from reality. Spatial audio, when mixed with simple VR can add a totally new level of realism to an experience."
That takes us back to our previous train of thought: if perfect sonic realism is achievable in VR, is it desirable? Or would we rather aim for a form of hyperrealism that emphasizes aural motion and more fully envelops the player? Do we want to dip into that Uncanny Aural Valley?
"Pure, super smooth and natural spatialized sound may be not immersive enough to get the sort of user experience/effect needed for VR," writes Gabor Szanto, the creator of the Superpowered audio software development kit for mobile. "You don’t want the most natural chirping bird sound, you actually want the cleanest and most 3D-like bird sound. You want to amaze the listener."
So, in a virtual reality environment in which we're forced to limit the physical mobility of players, is it possible that by making the aural environment hyperreal and supremely encompassing, we can compensate for any loss of presence that players might feel when they can't move around exactly as they please? I think it's an interesting idea to ponder, and one to which we should give some consideration as VR audio moves forward and becomes more ambitious. Also, as video game composers, we might want to consider how our music mixes can more fully surround players. For more surreal, synthetic or ambient-driven musical scores, we might even introduce spatial motion into our musical mixes, letting sounds float around players to convey an even greater level of sonic immersion.
In my next article, I'll be discussing some more down-to-earth technical issues that pertain to music and audio in VR. While my GDC presentation on Music in Virtual Reality will include several important technical issues and topics, there simply wasn't enough time to include everything that might be of interest. With that in mind, I'll be happy to explore some of these technical concerns in my next article! I’ve included the official GDC description of my upcoming talk below. Please feel free to share your thoughts and insights in the comments section!
The discussion will also include an examination of the VIMS phenomenon (Visually Induced Motion Sickness), and the role of music in alleviating its symptoms. Phillips' talk will offer techniques for composers and audio directors looking to utilize music in the most advantageous way within a VR project.
Winifred Phillips is an award-winning video game music composer whose recent projects include the triple-A first person shooter Homefront: The Revolution and the Dragon Front VR game for Oculus Rift. Her credits include games in five of the most famous and popular franchises in gaming: Assassin’s Creed, LittleBigPlanet, Total War, God of War, and The Sims. She is the author of the award-winning bestseller A COMPOSER'S GUIDE TO GAME MUSIC, published by the MIT Press. As a VR game music expert, she writes frequently on the future of music in virtual reality games. | 2019-04-23T17:55:24 | https://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/WinifredPhillips/20180213/314609/Video_Game_Composers_The_Art_of_Music_in_Virtual_Reality_GDC_2018.php |
0.999997 | I'm not discussing IF it's coming, I telling you that if you grow plants in Texas IT IS COMING!
The "it" to which I am referring is fungus disease. Vegetables can and will be infected by disease-causing organisms. In plants, these organisms may produce leaf spots, wilt, yellow leaves, stem, fruit and root rots. The symptoms expressed by the plant are a signal that either an organism is infecting the plant and causing disease or other factors in the environment have injured the plant. Few gardeners in Texas have escaped the disastrous symptoms on tomato plants universally described as "the leaves on my tomato plants are turning yellow and dying from the bottom of the plant moving upward. Last year this "blight" killed my entire plant!"
Plant disease is the result of living organisms such as fungi or bacteria infecting the plant tissue and disrupting normal functions carried on in the plant. The organisms infecting the plant can multiply and spread the disease within the plant and/or to other healthy plants.
Damage caused by non-living factors such as weather, air pollution and chemicals is not contagious and does not spread unless the source of the problem persists in the area of the plants.
Three things MUST be present for plant disease to occur: 1) a disease-causing organism, 2) a susceptible plant and 3) an environment suitable for the organism to infect the plant and multiply in.
What are these organisms that cause plant disease?
Fungi are actually simple plants without true leaves, stems or roots. They grow in thread-like forms and produce minute 'seeds' called spores. These spores can be carried by wind, water, animals, tools or machinery (even clothing) to other parts of the same plant, as well as to healthy plants. Under favorable conditions, the spores infect plant tissue and produce new fungus structures.
Plants react to fungi and other disease-causing organisms in much the same way the human body does. The infected tissue may release substances to ward off the organisms or to kill the plant tissue itself, leaving no food for the organism to live on. In some instances, plants produce swollen 'bubbles' inside their vessels to stop the spread of the fungus.
These defense reactions, in addition to toxic substances secreted by the fungi itself, cause the brown spots, yellow tissues, wilting and other symptoms of disease. When the fungus is able to produce spores and spread to other parts of the plant, the damage it causes begins to interfere with normal plant functions and death or production losses occur.
A number of diseases attack the foliage and fruit of vegetables. Controlling diseases that are caused by fungi differ from insect control techniques in that fungus problems must be prevented rather than cured. Prophylactic remedies are justified. When a gardener sees a fungus problem, irreversible damage already has been done. Cloudy, damp mornings encourage the growth of fungus spores.
Each spring, gardeners become extremely disturbed about leaves on tomato plants dying. Every year, it’s the same old story. Plants are beautiful, loaded with fruit and growing like mad. Then, disaster! The leaves begin turning yellow and dying at the bottom of the plant. The sickening disorder slowly moves up the plant until nothing remains except the green frame of stems with small, green shriveling fruit. This is not a horror story; this is an annual reality for Texas gardeners.
There are two main diseases which cause this disaster every spring. Early blight (Alternaria) and Septoria leaf spot are the culprits. Early blight is characterized by irregular brown spots appear first on older foliage. With age, the spots show concentric rings forming a target pattern. A yellow, diffuse zone is formed around each spot. Although this fungus disease can be observed throughout the year, it is most common during the fruiting period. The more tomatoes a plant produces, the more susceptible to and disastrous are the effects of an early blight infection. The fungus is susceptible to high humidity and high temperatures. Even if rainy weather is not prevalent, morning dews provide sufficient moisture to support the occurrence of the fungus. The only control is prevention, which begins when the plant begins setting fruit. During periods of high humidity, which includes most of the spring, apply a fungicide weekly. The best fungicide to use is one containing chlorothalonil (Ortho Daconil, Fertilome Broad Spectrum Liquid Fungicide, HiYield Daconil, Rigo Lawn & Garden Fungicide, or Fung-onil Multipurpose Fungicide).
Peppers and potatoes can be destroyed by the same diseases, so when you are spraying your tomatoes, share a little protection with your peppers and potatoes. Peppers also suffer from bacterial diseases that cause rapid leaf drop if infection occurs. As a preventive measure, streptomycin (1 teaspoon per gallon of Agri-Strep) or Kocide 101 can be added to the previously mentioned products. These can be applied to most vegetables. Follow label instructions. | 2019-04-25T21:43:31 | https://www.plantanswers.com/garden_column/april04/4.htm |
0.999458 | Tariq Ramadan Is Coming to New York: Care to Greet Him?
Tariq Ramadan, Europe's slickest Islamist, is set to appear in the United States for the first time since the Obama administration lifted a six-year-old entrance ban — imposed not to muzzle speech, as is often claimed, but because of donations he had sent to Hamas-funding charities.
Tariq Ramadan may be lauded as a Muslim "reformer," but his type of reform is closer to the Islamist version laid out by his grandfather, Muslim Brotherhood founder Hasan al-Banna. When one removes his carefully crafted doublespeak about tolerance and diversity, a disturbing portrait of the Oxford professor emerges: Ramadan finds nothing to reject in al-Banna's supremacist ideas; he has been accused of links to terrorists; he has justified bombings in Israel, Russia, and Iraq as legitimate resistance; he went no further than calling for a "moratorium" against stoning while the practice is debated; he supports restrictions on the public lives of women; he demands that integration take place on Muslims' terms; he led a boycott against the 2008 Turin Book Fair because it honored Israel; and on and on. He is no moderate; he is a master of taqiyya.
Dalia Mogahed, another panelist, runs the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies and serves on Obama's Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, where she arrogates to herself the role of "convey[ing] … what it is Muslims want." A promoter of the canard that America is rife with Islamophobia, she coauthored Who Speaks for Islam?: What a Billion Muslims Really Think, which has been slammed for artificially minimizing the fraction of radical Muslims. In 2009, Mogahed was a guest on Muslimah Dilemma, a show on the UK's extremist-heavy Islam Channel. Interviewed by a Hizb-ut-Tahrir member, Mogahed stated that "the majority of women around the world associate gender justice, or justice for women, with Shari'a compliance." Moreover, she offered no defense of liberal democracy when it came under attack.
Joan Wallach Scott, a leftist professor at the Institute for Advanced Study, completes the panel. In her former position as chair of the academic freedom committee of the American Association of University Professors, she protested the firing of jihadist operative Sami al-Arian and dismissed critics of Middle East studies as a "well-organized," "pro-occupation lobby." Scott also compared David Horowitz's anti-indoctrination campaign to the work of Nazis, while laughably asserting that "there is no lack of balance in the academy as a whole."
She probably sees "no lack of balance" on the Cooper Union panel either. However, IW does see one and encourages concerned citizens to attend (Thursday, April 8, 7:00 p.m.; details here) and challenge panelists with questions that they would rather be left unasked. Activists led by Lorna Salzman also plan to educate audience members about the speakers; anybody interested in helping may contact her at [email protected] or 718-522-0253. | 2019-04-20T02:21:46 | https://www.meforum.org/islamist-watch/30056/tariq-ramadan-is-coming-to-new-york-care-to-greet |
0.99734 | Find a Food & Culinary trip that explores New Zealand. There are 3 tours to choose from, that range in length from days up to days. The most popular month for these tours is , which has the most tour departures. | 2019-04-25T08:53:58 | https://www.tourradar.com/i/new-zealand-food-culinary |
0.999202 | Impromptu Fire: Is artillery support without pre-registered points allowed? How long does it take to arrive and how accurate is it? How common is this?
Pre-registered Fire: How long does it take to arrive and how accurate is it? How common is it?
Deviating from Pre-registered Fire Points: How long does it take to arrive and how accurate is it? Is deviating from preset coordinates even an option?
Forward Observers: Are there models on the table that can correct fire and if so, how often are they available? Are they dedicated FO's or can any officer do it? Do they use radios (and thus may move) or do they used fixed posts with cable telephone (and are thus immobile during the game)?
Pre-game Stonks: How large are pre-game bombardments? How complex are the patterns? How often is this available?
Limitations: What other limitations existed? Fixed cable lines or portable radios? Limited ammunition making artillery support in general rare? Defensive emphasis over offensive or vice versa? Pre-battle stonks over reactive fire? Limitations in calibre or type of guns/mortars?
From these categories, I will tentatively attempt to define Finnish artillery doctrine in '39/'40 and hopefully others will come in and correct and add to this.
Impromptu Fire: I am going to say by FO only and probably very rare. Another problem is that Finns appeared to divide up their guns among the infantry divisions (like the Germans did) and thus would have small batteries with fewer and lighter guns (mostly 75mm?).
Pre-registered Fire: I am going to guess that this was the default and would be used for defensive positions only and for the most part on the Karelian Isthmus (less so on other fronts, with probably little to no artillery support in the Lapland).
Deviating from Pre-registered Fire Points: I'm guessing this wasn't available, or if it was, it would take a few minutes… maybe 5+ minutes? Less accurate too, but not terribly so.
Forward Observers: I'm going to say almost never, and where it did exist, only with cable telephone lines to fixed observation outposts (that is, immobile FO's).
Pre-game Stonks: This is probably the most common type of artillery support and only for attacking forces. Probably pretty small/weak affairs, due to the aforementioned practice of parcelling out the artillery, but Finns were also known for well-planned and coordinated maneuvers, so perhaps their pre-battle stonks would use adhoc artillery groups assembled from all the guns in the area.
Limitations: The most obvious other limitation to me would be the very low ammunition at the start of the war, making artillery support rare and relatively weak during the Winter War, apart from signification offensive operations and important defensive lines (like the Mannerheim line).
Impromptu Fire: Available when an FO is present, but usually weaker than normal due to strict ammo conservation policies (see limitations for a "half-barrage," below). Arrives after 4 turns with 3d6 deviation.
Pre-registered Fire: The most common type of artillery support on the defense. Arrives one turn after it is requested. Any officer may request this fire, if it is available, as long as he is near the forward observer post (which could simply be a communications bunker in hardened defensive positions).
Deviating from Pre-registered Fire Points: Like pre-registered fire, but arrives 2 turns after it is requested with 2d6 deviation.
Forward Observers: Each battery had at least one forward observer. FO's used fixed outposts with cable lines and are thus immobile.
Stonks: Rare and relatively weak offensive artillery support, as the Finns saved most of their ammunition for defensive fire. On the Karelian Isthmus front, the Finnish doctrine was to mass artillery and use the artillery battalion as the basic firing element (producing three stonks in a line). Smaller fire missions would have been more typical north of Lake Ladoga, where guns were few and had to be parcelled out to support the frontline units. In the latter case, an attacking company-sized force could be supported directly by a single battery (one stonk).
Limitations: Artillery support is rare outside of major operations or significant defensive positions (like the Mannerheim line), due to a crippling shortage of guns and ammunition. The Finnish doctrine held that forward observers and artillery commanders were to work closely with infantry commanders, meaning that if the overall Finnish commander is within 4" of the forward observer (and thus his cable telephone), he may request artillery support on his card. Nevertheless, Finnish infantry commanders had very little experience with combined arms warfare and artillery prior to the Winter War, and often failed to use it effectively, particularly in the first half of the war. If you would like to model this in a scenario, then treat the overall Finnish commander as a Hesitant Commander for the rest of the turn after a Finnish fire mission is resolved.
Finnish artillery mostly consisted of light 76mm guns, with 122mm howitzers used as well (although only about a quarter as often as the lighter guns). Moreover, ammo conservation regulations meant that that fire missions were shorter and often fired half as many rounds as normal or even fewer. In game terms, this means the number of barrages is limited by the scenario (often as little as a single fire mission), continuous barrages are not allowed (a second volley on the same target must be requested separately as per pre-registered fire) and the scenario might stipulate that only a half-barrage is used (treat as 1 or 2 guns firing instead of 3 or 4).
Finally, given the variability of weather during the Winter War, a scenario may increase deviation by one or two dice. This would be most evident in the northern fronts, where the weather was worse, accurate maps were not available, and the meteorological service was slow to establish itself.
During Winter War our artillery notoriously had humongous shortage all throughout the war.
This meant that ammo would be conserved like crazy. So no trivial firing and when firing just few odd round.
Luckily the fire tended to be rather accurate.
One thing that is always ignored is that in late Continuation War Finns were using their own invention, Fire Correction Circle, to co-ordinate massed artillery in extremely simple and quick manner. Something no one else could do as quickly or effectively.
The biggest number used was in '44 during the Soviet Offensive when 66 batteries were used. Imagine that amount of fire hitting the target quickly and at the same time!
Naturally none of this tends to be reflected in the rules. Can't have some pesky Finns be more able than anyone else!
Very true, Finnish artillery seems to have advanced by leaps and bounds during the Continuation War, mostly thanks to radios becoming more common and artillery doctrine evolving to match the new equipment.
Their artillery doctrine during the Winter War was not bad, per se, and one could say that the basic elements were there for it to develop into what we see later. It was fairly fast, fairly accurate and in theory was coordinated well with the frontline units as it could be subordinated directly to even low-level infantry commanders. That matched the combined arms approach of the Winter War Finns, where adhoc tactical subgroups allowed for flexible force organization tailored for a particular mission. The biggest problems were: appalling low ammo (due to meager pre-war budget), lack of equipment (radios and heavy howitzers) and lack of infantry experience with artillery coordination (the Finnish artillery arm was still new in 1939). Much of that was starting to be corrected by 1941.
Artillery of all sorts (field, anti-tank or anti-aircraft) was low in priority when it came to military spending in Finland in the 20's and 30's. Granted, the defense budget was limited, but in material purchases navy was at one point given quite a high priority.
A good number of the field artillery pieces dated back to late 19th century, and these tended to have relatively low rate of fire. Regarding munitions, the only problem was not their quantity, but also the reliability of fuses on very cold weather – though this to my understanding affected both sides. I have seen estimates that up to 25 % of the ordnance fired could fail to explode when landing on target.
As regards accuracy of artillery fire, I have read an account of a forward observer who managed to direct the fire of his battery (firing single shots only) to land a direct hit on an enemy tank after a couple of adjustments. Apparently the tank crew was not sufficiently concerned about ranging shots landing near by to change their position.
Infantry at least had a decent allocation of 81 mm mortars, which proved pretty effective in Finnish conditions. Unlike many other European militaries, Finnish army had not adopted any of the 40-60 mm mortar designs that were so popular in the interwar years (and became less popular as the war progressed), though a number of Soviet 50 mm pieces were captured during the war. Actually in Finnish terminology the 81 mm mortar is considered "light" mortar, while in many other forces it would be called medium.
As for heavy mortars, a Finnish company had developed a 120 mm version in the 30's, but at the time Finnish military was not interested in purchasing any – though this opinion changed after Winter War, and by 1941 these would be found in the regimental mortar companies. This was not a copy of the Soviet 120 mm design (which the Finns were also happy to employ when cpatured). | 2019-04-19T12:29:22 | http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=492936 |
0.999903 | How much is Spike Jones Worth?
Spike Jones net worth: Spike Jones was an American musician and bandleader who had a net worth equal to $10 million at the time of his death (after adjusting for inflation). Spike Jones was born in Long Beach, California in December 1911 and passed away in May 1965. He specialized in his satirical arrangements of classical music and popular songs. During the 1940s and 1950s he played with the band Spike Jones and his City Slickers and they toured as The Musical Depreciation Revue. Jones released several albums throughout the years. His single "All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth" reached #1 in 1948 and his other popular songs include "Cocktails for Two", "Holiday for Strings", "Hawaiian War Chant (Ta-Hu-Wa-Hu-Wai)", "Williams Tell Overture", "Dance of the Hours", "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer", "Tennessee Waltz", "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus", and more. On television he starred in The Spike Jones Show. Jones received two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for Recording and Radio. He was married twice including to Helen Grayco. Spike Jones passed away on May 1, 1965 at 53 years old from emphysema. | 2019-04-19T18:27:28 | https://www.celebritynetworth.com/richest-celebrities/rock-stars/spike-jones-net-worth/ |
0.956692 | Is it heresy to reject the teachings of Vatican II?
I’m not convinced that nothing was taught by Vatican II under Conciliar infallibility. However, given the premise that all Vatican II doctrines were proposed non-infallibly, can it be a heresy to reject any particular teachings of Vatican II?
But even if we consider the individual teachings of Vatican II as non-infallible, it may still be a heresy to reject those teachings.
Suppose that a non-infallible teaching of Vatican II is subsequently taught universally by successive Popes and by the body of Bishops dispersed through the world. If the teaching were non-infallible in its assertion by the Second Vatican Council, that same teaching becomes infallible and a required belief when subsequently it is taught universally. But it is not as if that universality were unrelated to the Council. The ordinary teaching of any Ecumenical Council certainly may contribute substantially to the universality of the teaching. And the subsequent exercise of the Magisterium by Popes and Bishops on that same point may occur as a result of the non-infallible teaching of that Council.
Once a non-infallible teaching of the ordinary Magisterium is taught universally by the body of Bishops led by the Pope, then it becomes a teaching of the infallible Magisterium. Teachings that are ordinary but not universal are non-infallible; teachings that are ordinary and universal are infallible. The teachings of the Universal Magisterium are required beliefs under pain of heresy. It is a grave sin to reject any infallible teaching of the Magisterium, whether taught by Papal Infallibility, or Conciliar Infallibility, or the Universal Magisterium.
But this is not a mere hypothetical. In fact, many of the teachings of the Second Vatican Council continued to be taught by successive Popes after the Council, and by the Bishops dispersed through the world. These teachings have been incorporated into the Catechism of the Catholic Church, into the Compendium of the Catechism, into the USCCB Catechism, into other magisterial documents, and into the daily teachings of the Bishops in the world. Therefore, these teachings have not been taught universally and infallibly; their rejection is abject heresy.
As an intellectual exercise, we might be able to find some minor points, taught by Vatican II non-infallibly, and not yet taught universally by the Magisterium. But it is certainly the case that the subsequent Popes and the body of Bishops have continued to teach all of the main teachings of Vatican II universally, and therefore those teachings, even if they were non-infallible at the time of the Council, are now infallible dogma and required belief.
Therefore, any Catholic Christian who knowingly and obstinately chooses to reject all the teachings or any of the main teachings of Vatican II, commits the sin of heresy and suffers the penalty of automatic excommunication.
Furthermore, the validity of the Second Vatican Council is a dogmatic fact, under the temporal authority of the Church. And so anyone who rejects the validity of that Council commits the sin of schism and suffers the penalty of automatic excommunication.
As for the Society of Saint Pius X, it could not be more clear that they have utterly rejected all of the teachings of the Second Vatican Council, including those that have subsequently been taught universally by successive Popes and by the body of Bishops in communion with him. They have therefore rejected multiple teachings that are infallible under the ordinary and universal Magisterium — even if those teachings were originally proposed by the Second Vatican Council non-infallibly.
There are two types of excommunication: automatic (latae sententia) and juridical (ferendae sententia). Pope John Paul II issued a ferendae excommunication against the leaders and formal members of the SSPX, but automatic excommunication also applies because of the sins of heresy and schism. Pope Benedict XVI lifted the sentence of ferendae excommunication, but the automatic excommunication still applies because they are still unrepentant from formal heresy and formal schism. Pope Benedict XVI cleared a path for the SSPX to return to the Church by lifting one of the two types of excommunication. The other type can only be lifted by repentance and confession. But the leaders and members of the SSPX remain unrepentant.
All formal members of the SSPX are automatically excommunicated for the sin of heresy, for rejecting the teachings of the ordinary and universal Magisterium taught at Vatican II and subsequently universally. All formal members of the SSPX are also automatically excommunicated for the sin of schism, since their Bishops are not in communion with the Roman Pontiff and the Bishops united with him. May God punish the leaders and members of the SSPX — and their supporters among conservative Catholics — for all the harm that they have done to the innocent sheep of the poor and weak flock of Jesus Christ. | 2019-04-24T14:59:26 | https://ronconte.com/2012/01/03/is-it-heresy-to-reject-the-teachings-of-vatican-ii/ |
0.999999 | Blood pressure on the moon. When we eventually establish lunar colonies, people living there will need to have their blood pressure taken. Assume that we continue to express the systemic blood pressure as we now do on earth (see previous problem) and that the density of blood does not change. Suppose also that normal blood pressure on the moon is still (which may not actually be true). If a lunar colonizer has her blood pressure taken at her upper arm when it is raised 25 cm above her heart, what will be her systemic blood pressure reading, expressed in the standard way, if she has normal blood pressure? The acceleration due to gravity on the moon is 1.67 m/s2. | 2019-04-20T13:13:35 | https://www.chegg.com/homework-help/blood-pressure-moon-eventually-establish-lunar-colonies-peop-chapter-13-problem-25p-solution-9780321902566-exc |
0.999779 | If at turns, especially abrupt, from the region of an arrangement of a wheel external in relation to turn noise is heard, it indicates damage of the bearing of a wheel.
1. Remove a brake disk, address to the Section Removal and installation of a brake disk/support of a forward brake.
2. Disconnect the pulse ABS (1) sensor. Address to an accompanying illustration.
3. Remove a tip of steering draft from a rotary support, address to the Section Removal and installation of a tip of steering draft.
4. Unscrew the bottom bolt of fastening 3/4. Remove a rotary fist (5) down from an amortization rack. If necessary put marking of provision of a rack, address to the Section Removal and installation of an amortization rack.
5. Turn out 4 bolts (8) and remove the bearing (6) from a rotary fist.
1. Clear adjacent surfaces of the bearing of a wheel and a rotary fist, and also carving openings. Remove greasing traces.
2. Establish the bearing and fix it new being self-stopped bolts the moment of 110 Nanometers.
3. Establish a rotary fist up, on a rack against the stop that the put labels coincided previously.
4. Insert tightening a bolt and tighten with a being self-stopped nut effort of 80 Nanometers.
5. Establish on a rotary support a head of steering draft, address to the Section Removal and installation of a tip of steering draft.
6. Fix the pulse ABS sensor.
7. Establish a brake disk, address to the Section Removal and installation of a brake disk/support of a forward brake. | 2019-04-25T08:31:21 | http://koolinarka.ru/html/12_1_5.htm |
0.999759 | What are the most popular online bachelor's degrees offered in Connecticut?
Connecticut has taken major steps to keep its online and distance learning programs up to national education standards. In 1998, the state launched the Connecticut Distance Learning Consortium, which provides support and services to educators using technology to broaden their learning opportunities.
Today, most of Connecticut's top universities offer online degree programs and coursework, including Quinnipiac University, the University of Connecticut, Southern Connecticut State University, and Yale University. Additionally, the state has licensed more than more 200 online degree programs for operation, with a total of 46 degree-granting institutions statewide.
While total enrollments in public degree-granting programs climbed 25.9 percent from 2000 to 2010, appropriations continue to sit below the national average. It's part of a trend that has seen tuitions at both public and private institutions rise steadily in recent years. As a result, many students are seeking online degree programs, which are typically more affordable than their on-campus counterparts. Residents of the state can choose from a wide range of professional and educational opportunities.
St. Vincent's is one of the best online colleges in Connecticut for students looking to pursue a career in healthcare. The school offers two online degree programs: a bachelor of science in nursing (BSN) completion program, and a radiologic sciences program. The only time students must come to campus is for a student orientation in Bridgeport. All coursework can be completed remotely. Non-degree-seekers interested in taking online courses at St. Vincent's can opt for their certificate programs, which require a smaller time commitment but lead to credits that can be later transferred to a degree.
Both degree and certificate programs at St. Vincent's use the Blackboard Learn online education portal to facilitate remote learning. The school offers technology support and resources to students as they use web materials to complete their courses.
Founded in 1963 in Fairfield, Connecticut, Sacred Heart University offers various online programs, including several nursing degrees and a master's degree in social work. As one of the top online colleges in Connecticut, Sacred Heart’s instructors deliver coursework asynchronously to ensure that students can maintain their work and family obligations while earning a degree.
The school provides both bachelor's degree and graduate degree options online. While each program structure varies, most bachelor's degrees -- such as the RN to Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) -- feature eight-week course sessions. With a maximum of 90 transfer credits eligible, students can complete the bachelor's degree in 18 months. For master's degrees, students take classes over the course of 16 weeks and graduate in about three years. Sacred Heart requires bachelor's degree applicants to possess a high school degree with a 2.5 GPA. The school requires master's degree applicants to possess a bachelor's degree with a 3.0 GPA.
In 1985, Albertus Magnus College introduced accelerated programs, offering learners a qualitative and flexible educational option. Over the last 30 years, the school added online programs, becoming one of the best online schools in Connecticut along the way.
In addition to individual courses available online, the college offers online students 13 majors and programs to choose from at both the undergraduate and graduate level. Instructors deliver online classes asynchronously within eight-week sessions, and students can take one class at a time to accelerate the pace at which they graduate. Applicants with transfer credits can decrease their overall study time given that the school allows up to 90 credits with a 2.0 GPA or better to transfer. Once admitted, online students at Albertus Magnus gain access to career services, which offers workshops and career fairs throughout the year.
Since 2001, Quinnipiac University has been offering online courses to students. Over the years, the school has finessed its program to offer three highly regarded online bachelor's degrees. Each program is designed with flexibility in mind to support students working full time jobs. As such, Quinnipiac provides an array of support services accessible every day of the week. These resources range from technical help to billing questions. All online students can also connect with academic advisors who assist students with course changes, elective options, and online degree program pacing and completion timelines.
One feature that makes Quinnipiac University stand out among Connecticut online colleges is its online summer courses. These courses are specifically designed to allow students -- both online students, and those earning their degree primarily on campus in Hamden -- to catch up or get ahead on required or prerequisite courses in their degree program without being on campus during the summer.
Of all the online colleges in Connecticut, Bridgeport's distance learning program is particularly well established. The school, based out of Bridgeport, has been offering online courses since 1997. Today, remote students can choose from four online bachelor's degree programs, several of which have tracks to select from and specialize in. Within its programs, students are assigned a full-time academic advisor who will provide help with course selection and support students in graduating on their desired timeline.
Those enrolled in the school's online program use the web-based learning tool called Canvas to complete their work. Through this portal, students take their classes following either a 16-week format or accelerated eight-week format. All courses in each bachelor's degree program are offered asynchronously to cater to students' different day-to-day schedules.
Connecticut is one of the smallest states in the U.S. by size, however it is also one of the most densely populated; Connecticut's Hartford-Springfield region is home to more than 25 universities and 160,000 students and is New England's second most populous area. While the state continues to boast one of the highest per capita rates in the country, the cost of living and of higher education have risen accordingly. In-state tuition for public and private universities increased by 28.9% and 26.1%, respectively, in the last five years.
After a steady decline of four years, in 2014 Connecticut expanded its budget for higher education programs to increase spending on state programs by over 7%. Of Connecticut's estimated 2014 higher education budget of nearly $676 million, the largest percentage (44.5%) was allocated to the Connecticut State Colleges and Universities system under the Board of Regents, responsible for facilitating the majority of both on-campus and online programs for college students in the state.
Browse our list of the best online colleges in Connecticut for more insight into distance learning programs in this state.
Recent NCES reports indicate that 6.8% (14,701) of students enrolled in Connecticut's Title IV institutions were in exclusively online programs.
The governing agencies over higher education in Connecticut have implemented several key initiatives to drive distance education in the state. Connecticut Distance Learning Consortium receives partial state funding to provide online education programs and resources for students in middle school, high school, secondary and postsecondary school. The Connecticut State Colleges and Universities system also connects students of all ages with comprehensive distance programs, available through both private and public Connecticut institutions. In addition, both the CDLC and CSCU support adult learning programs provide student-employer workforce solutions.
Employment growth in this profession is moderate in Connecticut. According to the Connecticut Department of Labor, long term projections show an increase of 5% in the total number of jobs between 2014 and 2024. Wages increased by 3% from 2011-2016.
In Connecticut, what were the top careers in 2016 for people who had a degree in registered nursing?
Data source: Connecticut Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics. Data may not be available for every year.
In Connecticut, employment growth in this profession is strong. According to the Connecticut Department of Labor, long term projections show an increase of 19% in the total number of jobs between 2014 and 2024. Wages increased by 2% from 2011-2016.
In Connecticut, what were the top careers in 2016 for people who had a degree in business administration and management?
Employment growth in this profession is poor in Connecticut. According to the Connecticut Department of Labor, long term projections show a decrease of 1% in the total number of jobs between 2014 and 2024. Wages increased by 12% from 2011-2016.
In Connecticut, what were the top careers in 2016 for people who had a degree in criminal justice/safety studies? | 2019-04-21T20:20:48 | https://www.bestcolleges.com/features/best-online-colleges-in-connecticut/ |
0.998972 | From the outset of the debt-ceiling fight, House Republicans have made two clear demands: any agreement to raise the debt limit must include offsetting cuts of at least $2.4 trillion and could not include any revenue increases. For a time, it appeared that some grand bargain to reform the tax code and entitlement programs might obviate these demands. But those talks fell apart. Democrats first pushed for a deal that would include roughly 3 to 1 spending cuts to revenue increases. Then 4 to 1. And then, last night, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid threw in the towel and announced he'll introduce a bill with at least $2.7 trillion in cuts and no revenue increases at all. That's a clear win for Republicans, although they're certain to ask for more.
Last week, I predicted that the final deal would be $1.5-$2 trillion in cuts, no revenue and a stern lecture from President Obama. That was based on my belief that Republicans would not yield on taxes, and Democrats, unwilling to risk the economic damage from a default, would meekly agree to the cuts devised during the Biden negotiations. Such a deal wouldn't quite have met the Republican demand for $2.4 trillion--but I figured Republicans would not choose default over $1.5 trillion in cuts and no new taxes. In hindsight, I underestimated the Democrats' willingness to keep making concessions (in fairness, their capacity to do so seems practically limitless).
The extra trillion in cuts Reid conjured up appears to come from war spending, the formal name for which is Overseas Contingency Operations funds, or OCO funds. What are OCO funds? A bit of background: when Obama became president, one of his early, high-profile actions was to put the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan onto the books -- George W. Bush had kept them off budget to mask their costs. Administration officials applauded themselves for this act of honesty in budgeting, but one obvious effect was that the budget would grow. The CBO, the official budget scorekeeper, said the wars cost about $1.4 trillion a year decade. But Obama is (gradually) bringing both wars to an end, drawing down troops and thus also reducing costs. That's where the savings come from. Right now, CBO estimates future spending by project current costs forward, plus inflation. But if the budget were to formalize the drawdown that the president has already announced, CBO has said it would amount to a cut in outlays of $1.1 trillion over the next decade (and a savings of $1.4 trillion when you add in debt-servicing costs). So there's your extra trillion.
It's a bit gimmicky, yes. But Reid has good reason to think he might get away it -- Paul Ryan used the same gimmick in his budget, so Republicans are on record as accepting its validity.
But that shouldn't mask the larger point here, which is that the Democrats have capitulated utterly to Republican demands. Recall that last Tuesday, the bipartisan Gang of Six proposal included $2 trillion of revenue increases. Now, having offered to give this up, Democrats are sure to get no revenue.
As bad as this deal is for Democrats, it could have been worse (and could still get worse). Reid's deal would lift the debt ceiling through the 2012 election, so there wouldn't be another shakedown -- although John Boehner's counterproposal is built on a short-term raise that would require further cuts. Reid's proposal also protects the two sacred cows of entitlements and taxes. None of the cuts, as I understand it, come from Social Security or Medicare, so these programs would remain untouched and Democrats will have preserved their ability to run against Republicans on Medicare next fall. On taxes, the Bush cuts are still scheduled to expire next year. So if Obama wins reelection, he'll be in a position to raise revenue by letting some of them expire.
But there are still eight days until August 2nd. And that's enough time to give away a lot more. | 2019-04-24T23:51:38 | https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/07/the-democrats-cave/242467/ |
0.998487 | Since the closing of what was the world's best restaurant for many years, life has been busy for Albert Adria.
Known as the not-so-secret secret weapon behind the imaginative, acclaimed elBulli on the Catalan coast in Spain, the younger Adria brother was the creator of many of the restaurant's deconstructivist dishes that haunted the ambitions of young chefs around the world.
It's difficult to overstate the influence of his work at elBulli under the leadership of his older brother Ferran.
"Picture an armada without a flagship, a solar system without a sun, and that is what high-end Spanish cuisine will look like in the absence of El Bulli," was how the New York Times mourned the 2011 closing of "the world's most influential restaurant."
Coming out of the kitchen shadows in the years since, Adria is generating buzz and critical acclaim with the whimsical bars and restaurants he has opened in Barcelona -- cocktail bar 41ºExperience, tapas bar Tickets, Japanese-Peruvian restaurant Pakta and Bodega 1900, a casual vermouth bar.
Time Magazine highlighted him as "The Magician of the Moment" in the magazine's roundup of the most influential people in the gastronomy world.
In November, he received a Michelin star for Tickets and another one for 41ºExperience.
We caught up with the starred chef in Hong Kong as he prepared for a special dinner featuring his iconic dishes at Catalunya Hong Kong.
CNN: Could you talk a little about why elBulli closed? If profitability was an issue, as it has been reported, then why were the dishes not priced higher, given the massive popularity?
Albert Adria: My brother had been there 25 years and I had been there 23 years and we came to a conclusion together that it was the best idea to leave it when it was at its top. We were getting older and working for 16 hours a day was getting unsustainable.
The problem wasn't the economic side -- that it was never an issue. The problem with this kind of restaurant is the physical and mental exhaustion. So we had to give it a break.
CNN: Your new five restaurants (he has another one in the works in addition to the four already open) are not as exhausting?
Albert Adria: It's as if I made Ferraris before, and now I make Mercedes. Quality, but different quality.
CNN: What are the price points for these new projects?
Albert Adria: Tickets are around €80 ($109) per head, 41º Experience has two concepts -- you can go there and have cocktails -- around €12 ($16) each -- and snacks, or a closed menu which is €200 ($273).
At Pakta, the price is €130 ($177) and Bodega 1900 is €40 ($55). My next venture Yaguarcan, a Mexican restaurant, will be €50($68) at the bar and €80-€90 ($109-$122) at the restaurant.
The restaurants with higher pricing have less capacity.
CNN: Are people getting fed up with designer food?
Albert Adria: No, absolutely not. It's a cycle. It became popular and a lot of these kinds of restaurants opened but there were still very few very good restaurants. The question is never which style of cuisine is in fashion or not. There are only two kinds of cuisines -- good or bad. And the good always wins. That is clear.
These days, I like to go to small but very good restaurants. Thanks to high gastronomy training -- at elBulli for example -- a lot of young cooks are ready to make unbelievable things. Those in their 20s and 30s have a technical capacity that is unbelievable.
In Spain, for example, and anywhere really, you can eat very well because of these hundreds of young chefs who have trained with the greats.
All of these young chefs have adapted to the crisis and they have started to make all of these little restaurants with a different type of kitchen but one that is very, very good.
CNN: Do people taking photos of your food ever make you angry?
Albert Adria: It's a reality that people take pictures of all the dishes. There's a good side and a bad side. Obviously, the good side is that they are promoting your dishes, the bad side is that many of the photos are very bad.
At 41º Experience for example, the element of surprise is very important but if you type 41º on the Internet, you can see all the menus, which spoils the surprise and is very bad for me. At 41º, the creativity is so important. The restaurant only seats 16, but we have 20 people working there.
CNN: Are tapas becoming too cliche?
Albert Adria: The concept of tapas is actually a rather difficult one to explain so it's difficult to export the concept to certain countries.
In China, the concept of sharing is similar so it's gone down very well, but as for whether it is cliche, it is not really. As with any type of restaurants, you just have good tapas restaurants and bad tapas restaurants. The good ones do very well. And the quality depends on the quality of the products.
The best restaurants uses the best quality products, that is clear. Even when making a pizza, it's important to use the best flour, even the water is important. You must use the best water.
The industry is ready to make a lot better products but the problem is that the people are not ready to pay extra for the better product.
CNN: What do you think of the Michelin star ratings?
Albert Adria: Guides are always good if you are at the top.
The game has changed a lot since these paper guides started, and the information the customers are receiving changes very quickly these days.
On Tripadvisor for example, there are a thousand comments and you don't know who these people are, whether their opinions can be trusted. At the end of the day there's a lot more information these days but it's very unreliable.
There's a saying in Spain that it's better that people talk about you, even if it's bad. I don't agree with that. It should not be about a lot of information, if should be about who is giving the information, and whether it is reliable or non reliable.
Another thing, I received two Michelin stars last year, but this did not change anything at my restaurant in terms of reservations. In years past, at elBulli when we were given three Michelin stars, we became flooded with reservations. But now you don't see that and that is reference to how the world of guides has changed.
CNN: Do you ever just have a steak?
Albert Adria: Usually I don't eat much. In the morning, I make myself a good shake that has everything I need, and throughout the day I have to go try all the food from the restaurants so I don't ever sit down and eat something like a steak. All chefs have this way of life.
CNN: What is your perfect day off?
Every day is the best day of my life. I'm happy just where I am. So it's hard to think of what I would do on a day off.
With five restaurants I am so busy, so it's important to surround myself with a good group of people who make me laugh and happy every day. Otherwise I would go crazy.
CNN: Who is the best cook in your family? | 2019-04-26T16:13:24 | http://www.cnn.com/travel/article/albert-adria-interview/index.html |
0.999999 | MacKie has pointed out (Pensée, Winter, 1973, p. 6) that some of Velikovsky's claims are quite general, and that others are more specific. But when MacKie discusses the testing of the specific claims, and when he discusses the effect that the truth or falsity of some general claim might have on some more specific claim, it seems to me that MacKie's remarks display a certain amount of logical confusion.
MacKie would agree that the independence of two claims means that either one could be true without the other's being true, and that either one could be false without the other's being false. But then MacKie should not speak of theories that are "to some extent" independent of each other; theories either are or are not independent of each other, on purely logical grounds, and this independence is not a matter of degree.
What is more important, however, is that MacKie is wrong in any case in treating (1) and (2) as independent of each other. I agree that (1) could be true and (2) false, but surely if it is true that (2) Earth has come into near contacts with other planets with the result that "terrestrial cataclysms occurred," then it must also be true that (1) "catastrophes of global extent have afflicted Earth." Thus (2) implies (1), and the relationship between these two general theories is not even "to some extent" one of logical independence.
How is a general theory like (1) or (2)—call it "G"—related to a specific theory, "S"? MacKie describes S as "stemming from" G. Later on, the point is stated less metaphorically when he says that the specific theories "follow from" the general theories. So let us suppose that S does follow from G. Then if G were true, S would also have to be true. Similarly, if S were definitely false, then G, from which S follows, would also have to be false. How, then, can MacKie maintain, as he does, that ". . the specific theories could be drastically modified, or even disproved, without affecting the general theories"?
It might be suspected that what MacKie really wants to say is, rather, that G follows from S: that would at least permit. him to make his claim that S could be disproved without affecting G. Unfortunately, this would not be compatible with his other claim, that the specific theories "follow from the general ones," and he would still be in trouble.
After his preliminary remarks on theory testing—remarks that I consider untenable—MacKie proceeds to the main business of his paper, which is the testing of Velikovsky's theories of catastrophism on the basis of radiocarbon dating procedures. MacKie believes that these procedures will ". . demonstrate the contemporaneity, or otherwise, between major environmental changes (such as alterations in the sea level, in the extent of the ice sheets, volcanic eruptions) and human events (such as migrations and the destruction of cities and cultures)." But here again MacKie's approach appears to me to be undermined by logical difficulties. How can radiocarbon dating of events prior to twenty-seven centuries ago be applied to Velikovsky without begging the very questions at issue? For radiocarbon dating procedures have been based on a number of uniformitarian assumptions, such as the constancy of cosmic radiation in the vicinity of Earth, the constancy of Earth's magnetosphere, the constancy of oceanic temperatures, acidity, volume, and so on. These are only the explicit "constants"; the implicit ones, which are so "obvious" that few would bother to state them, are that no other planet has approached close to Earth, that the orbit of Earth has not changed to any significant degree, that the obliquity of Earth has not changed to any significant degree, and so on. But Velikovsky's catastrophism suggests that several thousand years ago these "constants" may have been considerably different from what they are now, different enough that we have to be extremely careful in evaluating the results of radiocarbon dating procedures, even if those procedures are being employed only to demonstrate contemporaneity, rather than to demonstrate the age in real years.
The difficulty is that we are supposed to be testing catastrophism against uniformitarianism, and that radiocarbon dating is not neutral in that conflict. What MacKie must do, before gathering radiocarbon findings as a test of catastrophism, is to demonstrate that catastrophism is compatible with the reliability of radiocarbon procedures in determining contemporaneity or non-contemporaneity. Among other things, this means that he must refute the claim that frequently "one and the same carbon age corresponds to two historical ages" (Pensée, Fall, 1972, p. 41). Unless and until MacKie has established the reliability of radiocarbon dating procedures on the basis of facts and arguments that take no stand on the issue of uniformitarianism versus catastrophism, MacKie cannot, without begging the question, use radiocarbon dating procedures in resolving that issue.
Nor is it legitimate for MacKie to confine himself to published radiocarbon tests in trying to resolve that issue, if he has not first established that there has been no pre-publication discarding of those test results that were incompatible with uniformitarianism or with other aspects of orthodox historiography. Unlike MacKie, I am fully persuaded that from the very inception of radiocarbon dating it has been the standard practice to scrap "contaminated", "statistically inconsistent", or "historically impossible" readings. If MacKie restricts himself to published dates, even though he knows of others, is he not obligated to examine the criteria that have influenced the decisions to put some dates in scholarly journals and others in wastebaskets? I am confident that an examination of those criteria will inevitably lead to the conclusion that a collection of published (that is, "approved") tests is of little worth as a basis for a statistical evaluation of catastrophism.
I will comment on Dr. Rose's points briefly and in the order in which he made them.
(A) The two general catastrophic theories I defined can be independent; presumably (2) could be true without involving Earth. The bracketed clause was inserted only to make clear the conditions in which the two theories do become interlinked, that is when Earth is involved in (2).
(B) Concerning the interrelations of specific and general elements in Velikovsky's theories, thinking of actual examples rather than abstract S's and G's should make all plain. It is surely obvious that catastrophic interpretations of separate terrestrial phenomena—based on the general theory that catastrophes have occurred—could be wrong in various ways without automatically invalidating the general theory. By leaving out 'some of' in his quotation Rose distorted my meaning ("some of the specific theories could be disproved without affecting the general theories"). Obviously if all the specific theories were disproved the general theory would become untenable but I did not dispute that.
(C) The comments on radiocarbon dating betray some uncertainty on the subject. There are three obvious ways in which the value of C-14 as a relative dating technique could be nullified (leaving aside the question of the reliability of individual samples in relation to their contexts). The first is if, at certain periods in the past, the concentration of C-14 in the atmosphere was markedly different in separate parts of the world for long enough periods for these differences to have been absorbed into organisms living at the times concerned. This does seem rather unlikely but should be revealed by another tree-ring chronology, built up in Europe for example, and carbon-dated.
Work at the Neolithic 'lake village' at Auvernier, Switzerland, has produced a floating tree-ring sequence several centuries long and the series of C-14 dates obtained for it showed fluctuations in the local atmospheric concentration of C-14 which closely matched the equivalent section on the tree-ring chronology from Arizona (1) (early 3rd millennium B.C. in real years).
The second way would be if there had been wholesale contamination of organic material by old carbon during catastrophes (from eruptions, falls of petroleum, etc.) in amounts which varied in different areas. Contrary to what Rose says, the obliquity of the ecliptic, the length of the year, the rate of cosmic radiation and the constancy or otherwise of the magnetosphere need have no effect on the value of C-14 as a relative dating tool unless the effects on the atmospheric reservoir or on the organic samples varied geographically at any particular epoch. Even then the resulting invalidation of C-14 would apply only to those epochs. The third way in which the value of the technique for relative dating might be reduced is dealt with in the next paragraph.
(D) The question of C-14 ages having more than one equivalent in real years is certainly a problem but is one that appears to apply only to short phases of the past according to the Suess calibration chart (2). However not all the experts seem to agree that the minor fluctuations in the graph are real though here again the work at Auvernier (1) may be suggesting that some are: the contrary has recently been argued from archaeological evidence in Britain (3).
It is amusing to reflect that such violent short-term fluctuations in the C-14 reservoir (presumably) might be interpreted as evidence that catastrophes have occurred, a conclusion which would surely appeal to Dr. Rose!
(E) Unpublished dates of natural environmental changes, assuming that some exist, are unlikely in my opinion to affect any overall pattern presented by the large number of known dates. As far as I know, no one has previously suggested that such dates for sea-level changes, eruptions and so on should be used to test for the occurrence of global convulsions so a uniformitarian motive for suppressing any can hardly have been in existence until now. Neither has anyone, as far as I know, tried to correlate the destruction of civilizations and cultures in different countries by this means so the same should apply here. Suppressions might occur for a variety of other minor reasons but the effect of this would surely be random as far as the catastrophic theory is concerned except in the field of ancient Egyptian history.
(F) I gave no opinion as to whether some historical C-14 dates have been suppressed.
(1) H. E. Suess and C. Strahm, "The Neolithic of Auvernier, Switzerland," Antiquity, 4S (1970), 91-99; also C. W. Ferguson, B. Huber and H. E. Suess, "Determination of the Age of Swiss Lake Dwellings as an Example of Dendrochronologically-calibrated Radiocarbon Dating," Zeitschrift für Naturforschung, 21 (1966), 1173-77.
(2) H. E. Suess, "The Three Causes of the Secular C-14 Fluctuations, Their Amplitudes and Time Constants," Proceedings, 12th Nobel Symposium (Almqvist and Wiksell, Stockholm, 1970).
(3) R. Burleigh, I. H. Longworth and G. J. Wainwright, "Relative and Absolute Dating of Four Late Neolithic Enclosures: An Exercise in the Interpretation of Radiocarbon Determinations," Proc. Prehist. Soc., 38 (1972), 389-407; Barbara and J. H. Ottaway, "The Suess Calibration Curve and Archaeological Dating." Nature, 239 (October 27, 1972), 512-13. | 2019-04-21T00:44:54 | http://mikamar.biz/Pensee%20V/0516-logic-of-theory-test.htm |
0.999238 | This year, we had 165 submissions for the long paper track, and we accepted 39 papers, yielding an acceptance rate of 23%.
Presenter instructions: full papers (including repro papers) will have 15 min presentation plus 5 min discussion (20 min in total).
Ameer Albahem, Damiano Spina, Falk Scholer and Lawrence Cavedon. Meta-Evaluation of Dynamic Search: How Do Metrics Capture Topical Relevance, Diversity and User Effort?
This year was especially competitive, as we received 151 submissions and accepted 44 short papers (approx. 29%).
Presenter instructions: Short papers will be presented as Posters only (no boosters).
Shurong Sheng, Katrien Laenen and Marie-Francine Moens. Can Image Captioning Help Passage Retrieval in Multimodal Question Answering?
Presenter instructions: Demo papers will be presented as Posters only (no boosters). A table for a laptop will be available. | 2019-04-24T07:07:58 | https://ecir2019.org/accepted-papers/ |
0.9979 | Please add the following dates to the all-church calendar. The March 10 date conflicts with a Women's mtg. in the Fellowship Center. The women's meeting will be moving a different date. I'll let you know when we get that.
Childcare needs: Childcare for babies through 5th grade, sign up deadline one week before each mtg. | 2019-04-20T14:33:48 | http://www.fbcmustang.org/ss-leader-training-lunch1 |
0.996732 | Mexican-American singer, known as the queen of Tejano, who was murdered before her 24th birthday. Name variations: Selena Quintanilla-Pérez. Born Selena Quintanilla in Lake Jackson, south of Houston,Texas, on April 16, 1971; died of a gunshot wound in Corpus Christi, Texas, on March 31, 1995; youngest of three children, two girls and a boy, of Marcela Quintanilla and Abraham Quintanilla, Jr.; married Chris Pérez (a guitar player), in 1992.
Known as the queen of Tejano, Mexican-American singer Selena was on the verge of a crossover to mainstream music when she was shot to death outside a motel in Corpus Christi, Texas, by Yolanda Saldivar . At the time of her death on March 31, 1995, two weeks shy of her 24th birthday and two days before her third wedding anniversary, Selena was not only a rising star, but a role model to a generation of young Hispanics who worshipped her. Hundreds of teenagers gathered at the scene of the shooting; thousands attended memorial services. At the Bayfront Plaza Convention Center in Corpus Christi, hour after hour 50,000 mourners from Canada and California, Guatemala and Mexico streamed slowly past her casket which was encircled by thousands of long-stemmed white roses. Her death spawned a Hollywood biopic, a cable movie, several books (one of which topped The New York Times bestseller list for several weeks), and thousands of articles. Five of her albums landed on Billboard's Top 200 chart, and the posthumous release of her half-English, half-Spanish album Dreaming of You made her one of the fastest-selling artists in music history.
Selena Quintanilla was born in 1971 in the factory town of Lake Jackson, Texas. When she was six, her father was laid off from his job as a shipping clerk at Dow Chemical and opened a Tex-Mex restaurant. Abraham Quintanilla had always loved music; in his youth, he had been the vocalist for a South Texas band called Los Dinos ("The Boys"). Recognizing talent in his young daughter—"Her timing, her pitch were perfect," he said, "I could see it from day one"—he organized a family band, with her brother Abraham III on bass and her sister Suzette on drums. They began performing at the restaurant. But when the Texas oil industry went belly up, so did small businesses throughout the state: the Quintanillas lost their restaurant, home, possessions, and jobs.
The family moved to Corpus Christi and began eking out a living in the music business, singing at weddings and road-house dance halls and traveling in the family van to venues throughout the back country of South Texas. When Selena was eight, she recorded her first song in Spanish, and when she was nine, the family started a Tex-Mex band, Selena y Los Dinos. Most of her teen years were spent on the road with the group, making it impossible for her to attend school. She received her high school diploma through the mail.
Eventually, the family band moved up to ballrooms and began cutting albums for a small regional label. Selena's breakthrough came in 1987, when she won in the categories of best female vocalist and performer of the year at the Tejano Music Awards. In 1989, she and the band, which now included her husband Chris Pérez, signed with EMI, the powerful record company.
By age 19, Selena was the center of the Tejano music industry. Tejano, which literally means Texan, is a blend of pop tunes, the rhythms of Colombian cumbia, and German polkas—an urbanized version of Tex-Mex (called conjunto). Tejano arrived in Texas with the Czech and German settlers of the 19th century and flourished in the cantinas of the Mexican working class. Its danceable beat is propelled by the accordion—the heart of the Tejano sound—and the bajo sexto guitar. With a microphone in hand, Selena was as exotic as the music itself. Clad in a signature bustier, tight Spandex pants, and heels, she sang and strutted across the stage, exuding a combination of earthy sensuality and innate sweetness, "a Madonna without the controversy," noted a Time correspondent. Ironically, Selena could barely speak a word of Spanish; rather, she spoke English with a Texas twang. In the beginning, she memorized the lyrics of each song, most of them written out phonetically for her by her brother Abraham. In 1990, she finally began taking Spanish lessons.
Each of Selena's next six albums grew in sales. At 21, she was a millionaire, drawing crowds as large as 20,000 at the Pasadena, Texas, fairgrounds. In 1994, 60,000 came to hear her in Houston. By then, she had sold more than 1.5 million records in the U.S. and Mexico, and her recording Selena Live had just won a Grammy for best Mexican-American album. Moreover, she had finished filming a scene in the movie Don Juan DeMarco with Johnny Depp; her song "Fotos y Recuerdos" (Photographs and Memories) was number four on the Billboard Latin charts; her single from the 1994 album Amor Prohibido (Forbidden Love) had sold 400,000 copies and had just been nominated for another Grammy; and she had just signed a $5 million record contract with SBK Records.
neighborhood of Corpus Christi where she grew up. (At the time of her death, she and Chris were designing a ten-bedroom house on ten acres of land in town.) Fans loved her because she was unpretentious and accessible. "She was one of us," said one of her Corpus Christi admirers. "I'd see her at Wal-Mart or Kmart without makeup, like she didn't have all that money."
Selena's assailant was Yolanda Saldivar, who had once run Selena's fan club and was then managing two of the singer's boutiques, Selena, Etc., which had opened in Corpus Christi and San Antonio. A 32-year-old registered nurse, Saldivar was suspected by the family of embezzling funds, and Selena had been given the unpleasant task of confronting her. Saldivar had called Selena, claiming she had papers to prove her innocence and begging her to meet alone to discuss the matter, preferably at Saldivar's room at the Corpus Christi Days Inn. Shot once in the back with a .38-caliber revolver, Selena staggered to the lobby of the motel for help, then collapsed and later died at Memorial Medical Center. Saldivar was arrested after a nine-hour standoff, during which she sat in a pickup truck in the motel parking lot, a gun to her head and a cellular phone in her hand to confer with police.
At Saldivar's trial in October 1995, her attorney pointed a finger at Abraham Quintanilla as the indirect cause of Selena's death, arguing that he was a controlling force over the singer and was fiercely jealous of her relationship with Saldivar whom he had threatened physically and falsely accused of embezzlement. Further, he claimed that Saldivar was distraught and had intended to kill herself, but when she gestured to the singer to close the door to the room, her gun accidentally discharged (despite the fact that Selena had been shot in the back). Selena's father denied the accusations on the witness stand, but was angered and hurt by them. The trial was also difficult for her mother Marcela Quintanilla who at one point was hospitalized with chest pains. At the end of the two-week ordeal, it took the jury of six women and six men just two-anda-half hours to find Saldivar guilty of first-degree murder. She was given a life sentence. In a jailhouse interview in 1995, Saldivar said she had been fighting with Selena over a "secret," that she could not reveal. Her family said the "secret" was Selena's "diary" and produced a page from the alleged journal written in Spanish. Selena's friends never saw the diary and doubted that she would write one in Spanish, a language she was just learning.
In the months following Selena's death, Abraham Quintanilla continued to market his daughter persistently, sometimes alienating music-industry insiders and journalists in the process. While many questioned Quintanilla's intentions, however, others saw a man merely trying to cope. "I personally see Abraham as burying himself in his work, being so busy that he doesn't have time to think about his loss," said Rick Garcia, a record producer. Abraham oversaw the singer's two boutiques, as well as her posthumous album Dreaming of You, which sold 175,000 copies on the first day of its release, an all-time record for a female artist. He also signed the deal for the biographical film Selena (1997), which after some on-again, off-again negotiations was written and directed by Gregory Nava. Quintanilla co-produced and served as an on-the-set advisor for the film, which drew thousands to its open auditions in San Antonio. Casting directors finally selected actress Jennifer Lopez for the role, which initially upset many of Selena's fans. The movie opened in March 1997 to mixed reviews but did well at the box office, supported predominantly by Latino audiences across the country.
While Selena's death devastated her family and those closest to her, it also had a lingering impact on the millions of young Hispanic women who saw something of themselves in her. "Across the nation, Hispanic girls have a 38 percent drop in self-esteem from elementary school to high school," wrote Alisa Valdes . "Selena—a strong, smart, talented, beautiful, successful Mexican-American woman—gave them permission to like themselves." Lizett Padilla , the 23-year-old Guatemalan-American actress who played Selena in the cable television movie The Selena Murder Trial, expressed her own strong bond with the singer. "You could tell that she was a nice person, someone you would like to have as a friend. Portraying her just exactly the way she was, that's my dream and my challenge. I just want to honor her."
"Before Her Time," in People Weekly. April 17, 1995, pp. 48–53.
Carr, Jay. "Actors rise above stilted script for 'Selena,'" in Boston Globe. March 21, 1997.
Carroll, Ginny, and John Leland. "The Other Murder Trial," in Newsweek. October 16, 1995, p. 75.
Chanko, Kenneth M. "Selena's song," in Boston Sunday Globe. March 16, 1997.
"Death of a Rising Star," in Time. April 10, 1995, p. 91.
Dominguez, Robert. "Latino audiences love 'Selena,'" in The Day [New London, CT. March 29, 1997.
Farley, Christopher John. "Old Rock, New Life," in Time. July 10, 1995, pp. 57–58.
Jerome, Richard. "Resolution," in People Weekly. November 6, 1995, pp. 49–51.
Kantrowitz, Barbara. "Memories of Selena," in People Weekly. April 1, 1996, pp. 110–112.
Leland, John. "Born on the Border," in Newsweek. October 23, 1995, p. 80.
Morthland, John. "Selena's Story," in TV Guide. December 7, 1996, pp. 29–36.
Sanz, Cynthia, and Betty Cortina. "After Selena," in People Weekly. July 10, 1995, pp. 36–44.
Tarradell, Mario. "Selena's Music," in The Day [New London, CT]. July 21, 1995.
Valdes, Alisa. "Remembering Selena," in The Day [New London, CT]. April 11, 1995, p. B1.
"Selena (1971–1995)." Women in World History: A Biographical Encyclopedia. . Encyclopedia.com. 26 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>. | 2019-04-26T09:54:23 | https://www.encyclopedia.com/women/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/selena-1971-1995 |
0.999887 | The makers of a software program that monitors employees' computer use at work have a simple recipe for productivity: Work hard for 52 minutes, then take a break for 17.
DeskTime — software that tracks how much time workers spend doing everything from making spreadsheets to watching cat videos — came up with that formula by examining their own data. The most productive 10 percent of its users, as noted in a piece published by The Muse last week, home in on their work for an average of 52 minutes straight. They then take a break from their computers for about a quarter of an hour before turning back to it.
"The common factor was they took few and long breaks," says Julia Gifford, who leads content marketing for the Draugiem Group, a business incubator in Riga, Latvia that counts DeskTime among its startups.
DeskTime was originally created for Draugiem's own use. With many remote workers and a rapidly expanding workforce, the company needed a way to help monitor how people were working. It now offers the software to small and medium businesses as a product, and more than 36,000 employees are active users.
The tracking software might call to mind Big Brother (or at least some kind of cyber-loafing police), but Gifford calls DeskTime less invasive than other products that allow for screen captures or keystroke recordings. She says it all depends on how management teams use the program, and notes that it can also be useful to employees who are trying to manage their own time.
DeskTime works by asking supervisors — with employees' input, if desired — to sort desktop applications and Web sites into three buckets. A financial analyst, for example, might label Excel "productive," Facebook "unproductive" and certain news sites or online journals "neutral." DeskTime then runs in the background, creating visual reports for both managers and employees to see how much time is spent in each bucket.
Realizing DeskTime was sitting on a "treasure trove" of information about how people work, Gifford says, she asked a programmer to dive into the data. She wanted to find out what commonalities there were among the most productive DeskTime users — those 10 percent who spent the highest ratios of time on tools that had been labeled "productive."
"We thought maybe they arrived later at work, maybe they worked during the night, maybe they took frequent breaks," Gifford says. But as it turned out, they took fewer breaks away from their computers, and longer ones. When the data were analyzed, Gifford says, she was surprised to find that "the most productive employees also spend a lot of time away from the computer during the day, which is counterintuitive."
Gifford doesn't know if the breaks are what's actually causing the most productive workers to stay on task. They could, after all, just be less tempted by the latest Internet meme than their colleagues are. "This entire experiment was just to see if maybe there is some kind of correlation, and we think it's interesting that the most productive people actually take pretty long breaks."
Also worth noting: Their breaks weren't used to answer email or check Facebook, but to step away from the computer entirely. Seventeen minutes might not seem all that long, but it's plenty of time to get a cup of coffee, walk around the block or catch up with a colleague. That is, if it's not being used up on cat videos. | 2019-04-20T14:30:18 | https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/on-leadership/wp/2014/08/05/what-the-most-productive-workers-have-in-common/ |
0.999147 | Why can't we ping IP from LAN while we can do it from the console?
We recently purchased a 1921 to replace our 871 because the bandwidth on our leased line has been upgraded beyond its capabilities.
I thought I could get away with copying the config (with a few edits obviously). While I can ping Internet IPs from the console I can't from the LAN. I suspected an ACL problem and found replecated entries in NAT, INSIDE and VPN, but removing them has had no effect. The 871 was running V12.4, the 1921 has V15.2 so I'm guessing that a command has changed or been introduced that I don't know about. I can also get telnet access from outside and inside.
Please find the config below, and to preempt the obvious comment I'm aware that we shouldn't be using the LAN range that we are, it's something I inherited and has been deemed "more trouble than it's worth" to change. Also the config is quite old and while I understand the basics I'm sure there will be stuff that could be improved. Any pointers would be most gratefully received.
What is the best approach to handle managmenet of switches in a DMZ?
What is the best approach to handle managmenet of switches in a DMZ? We are implementing a dual firewall solution (front external facing, and a rear internal/DMZ facing). I would like to be able to manage the switches from inside the corporate network, including SNMP etc.
Also, as we are looking to implement ISE, we would need the authentication to be handled by ISE on the internal network. Will this cause issues?
Fa0 would just be separate from anything to do with Fa1/0/1 therefor would be secure and nothing would be able to flow between them, however it seems as though this is not the case here. It would have been nice to make use of that management port. In any case this is too risky for a DMZ in my opinion. However what you could do is create a VRF which does do what we want to do. You can assign a vrf to a physical or virtual interface, provided that you have an IP services license. Im not sure if you can assign a VRF to the management port though.
etc...... if you have tacacs+ enabled too you can also do this via the vrf I think.
The more recent stackable switches come with a management port Fa0 or E0 in some cases. Or even with its own VRF - almost like a seperate routing instance, this stays separate from the switch itself. You can put this on the management network, depending on your organisations security policies. From here you can configure SNMP, SSH etc... to and from this interface / VRF. All authentication can be done via this interface / VRF also.
If there isn't any management port, you can always create a VRF and assign it to a port, keep that for management. It will have its own routing table, separate from the global routing table.
Please click here for the swint details and click here for vrf details.
Is there any benefit from configuring iBGP full mesh between the two CEs and the two core 6500s?
Currently designing the WAN connectivity for a new office. The new office will have dual MPLS connections handed off by two providers, these will terminate on separate 3900 series CE routers, we will have a private BGP AS number.
My initial plan is to connect the 3900 CEs to our 6500 core switches using point-to-point routed links and using OSPF/EIGRP to provide reachbility between the CE loopbacks. I will then configure eBGP to the MPLS providers and iBGP between the CEs loopback interfaces. BGP will be redistributed into OSPF/EIGRP to provide reachability from the core and I will use the BGP network statement on the CEs to advise the specific LAN networks. I'm using iBGP between the CEs to provide connectivity to different networks that might be connected to the different MPLS providers.
I was then thinking that the core 6500s also support BGP and if there is any benefit from configuring iBGP full mesh between the two CEs and the two core 6500s and not worrying about redistribution into the IGP? Does this provide much benefit or is it just complicating the design?
It depends on whether there are other L3 devices within the office. If there are then IBGP may not be the best choice because if you then had to enable IBGP on another L3 device you would run into the IBGP restriction of a route learned from an IBGP neighbor cannot be advertised to another IBGP neighbor.
So in that case route redistribution into an IGP would be the way to go.
With just one L3 core device (or a pair) it really is just a choice, there aren't necessarily any huge benefits to either. With IBGP you could use local pref to route traffic to the right device or you could just influence the metrics in the IGP as discussed in the other thread. And of course if you are using both links for equal cost load balancing it matters even less to an extent. | 2019-04-25T04:38:19 | http://blog.qsolved.com/2013/ |
0.999999 | Hi, Can you rewrite this sentence: "The second day of Lunar New Year has just passed."
---> The Lunar New Year has just passed for two days.
Is that correct? How will you rewrite the sentence?
It has been two days since the Lunar New Year passed.
The Lunar New Year started two days ago.
Two days ago the Lunar New Year began.
It is two days since the start of the Lunar New Year.
We have seen two days since the Lunar New Year.
I wouldn't like to sound too fussy but there is something I don't fully undersatand, so I'd be really grateful if you could help me. Among your suggestions I read 'It is two days since the start of the Lunar New Year'. My question is would 'It has been two days since the start of the Lunar New Year' also be possible? and, if so, what difference does it is / has been make, if any at all?. Thanks in advance.
Since it is now two days since something happened, the present is fine.
You can add "It has been two days since the Lunar New Year started" to the other options.
It is (only/barely/just) two days that the Lunar New Year has passed.
It is only two days ago that we celebrate the Lunar New Year.
I hope it is a typo and you really meant 'celebrated' or I'll go completely crazy. Just one thing, what's the problem with 'has passed'?, is it the present perfect or is it the verb 'pass' (=end, here)?. Why suddenly most people are so reluctant to use the present perfect in this kind of sentence?. Thanks in advance.
I think that in this context, "pass" is not good English. | 2019-04-19T22:26:01 | https://www.usingenglish.com/forum/threads/60552-Hi-Can-you-rewrite-this-sentence |
0.999619 | Over the next five years, the analysts that follow this company are expecting it to grow earnings at an average annual rate of 30%. This year, analysts are forecasting earnings decrease of -33.33% over last year. Analysts expect earnings growth next year of 146.88% over this year's forecasted earnings. | 2019-04-23T10:21:39 | https://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/lasr/earnings-growth |
0.999955 | Why is teaching students to set realistic goals so important? In our experiences, when we ask students to write down some of their goals, many of them quickly scrawl something along the lines of "Get an A in English," "Become Class President," or "Become a better student." These are great goals to have, but are they realistic for that particular student? Is the goal specific or is it too broad? Is the goal clearly defined? For example, getting an A in English is great, but does that mean an A on an assignment, on a unit test, or at the end of the term? These are three very different definitions of getting an A in English, so it is very important for students to clearly define what they would like to achieve. More importantly, is that A in English realistic for that particular student? If a child normally gets Ds in English, then it may be overwhelming to suddenly make that A. The fear is that a child who makes an unrealistic or poorly defined goal will not be successful and then feel disappointed in their perceived "failure." If a student receives Ds in English, then it is probably more attainable to first try to achieve a B on the next math test and then work towards the A after that. Set realistic and attainable goals.
Once teachers have worked with students to set a realistic goal, the next step is to develop an action plan that makes the goal more achievable. We define a realistic plan to not only include a set timeline and end date, but also "mini" goals to reach along the way. Students need to ask themselves, "What do I have to do in order to reach my goal?" In our experiences, we find a monthly plan to work well with students, as they then have a weekly check in to reflect on their progress. Let's take "I want to get a B on the next Enlgish test" as the goal for the month. What are some things the student can do to work towards this goal? Perhaps completing all their homework, asking the teacher for extra help, and studying each night during the week of the test are the mini-goals. We can look at this as a step-by-step progression. Each week, students can reflect on their progression towards their goal. This makes students accountable for their success and provides them with the opportunity to understand what they need to work on next. Create a step-by-step learning plan.
Students are to reflect upon their journey and whether or not they achieved their goal. It is important to understand that not everyone in the class may reach their goals—this may be due to lack of effort, difficulties along the way, or circumstances beyond their control. Too often, students only focus on the end point instead of considering the entire journey. The key lesson for students is that determination, hard work, and reflective thought is needed in order to recognize an area for improvement and actively work to accomplish a change. In order to help a greater amount of students with this endeavor, RootsEDU provides a unique curriculum and specificaly designed programs with preset goals and action plans that can fit individual student needs! Goal oriented, leveled, explicit and systematic programs that are proven to improve student test scores and class ranking. Please submit Student Application. | 2019-04-19T18:54:45 | https://rootsedu.org/zh-cn/8-company/3-academics.html |
0.999992 | The following post is the result of a long discussion with Anna Bellamy @Anna_Maths over my kitchen table while eating dinner and drinking gin, My writing in in purple and her comments are in tardis blue if that’s not too confusing.
TLDR: We both care a lot about GCSE maths resits and currently we are feeling a bit annoyed (Germanic translation by Anna a bit annoyed = angry!) by people wanting to come in and tell us how to do our jobs.
More and more funding keeps being announced for researching GCSE maths resits. It’s great that all of a sudden people care (do they? Isn’t our problem precisely that people who don’t care, bar the funding allocated to them, are doing research into something we are deeply professionally and personally invested in, regardless of the fact that it is, on the whole, a most ungrateful teaching experience?) but it’s been a long time coming and I’m worried by the tone of things. I’m quite protective of both my GCSE resit students and the teachers who teach them.
Too much of what I’ve seen feels like criticisms of the teachers and other people coming in to say they can solve this problem of GCSE resits if we just do x y or z. It is projects where things are being done to teachers rather than truly in collaboration and that just doesn’t feel right. This is, at least in part, explained – but not justified! – but how EEF funding is allocated. The bidding system, and the nature of the proposals, are not conductive in the slightest to an organic, teacher-led, or even teacher-centered, research. Yet, the universities keep applying for said funding – the ethical dimension of such decisions apparently not at a forefront of their concern.
Since I started teaching in 2009 I have been teaching GCSE resit classes alongside everything else from entry to A level. In that time I feel like I’ve learnt a lot, the main thing I’ve learnt though is that there isn’t a quick fix for most students. The lesson somehow lost on the policymakers. The lesson well learnt by the universities, yet happily ignored the moment that funding becomes available, that requires a “quick fix” approach. Yes we get the occasional students who didn’t get a C/4 at school because something went wrong that is easily fixed but for most there are complicated and deeply rooted individual reasons. I love working with these students and seeing them grow in confidence but it is a long process with huge ups and downs.
We’ve seen our funding at college cut year on year, on the whole I think that this has been dealt with as well as possible but we are struggling and all of the niceties are gone*. We need more time and resources to find ways to work with these students who have come to us so damaged in terms of their mathematical experiences. The current “cure all” championed by the minister of schools, the Shanghai approach, relies heavily on the additional time available to teachers for meaningful feedback and planning – hence it is not such an unreasonable request. Yet, the government prefers to make funding available for the research projects, rather than to empower the teachers to do their jobs better. It beggars the question: why? I’m very lucky to work somewhere that supported trying something new and resits over 2 years but there’s no extra time or money to do this. I then get contacted by research projects where university professors with little to no experience of teaching in this setting say they are going to improve teaching, outcomes and more including ofsted results. This sudden interest of theirs emerged only when they realised that there was money to be made out of a research project. All by running 2 half days of training for teachers one in January and one later on. That’s a lot of money being put into what amounts to a day of training for a few teachers.
Talk to the teachers who are already doing this day in day out, we’re generally a bit tired and overworked but there is a wealth of experience, energy and desire to help improve the experience and outcomes for these students.
*by niceties I really mean incredibly valuable things like cutting the librarians, learning support, fluffy subjects like dance and drama that help to engage the vulnerable and hard to reach students, admin staff to do some of the jobs on that once upheld list of things teachers shouldn’t do. So not really niceties at all! | 2019-04-26T10:21:17 | https://mssteelmaths.com/2017/11/22/gcse-resit-pilots-thoughts-from-my-kitchen-table/ |
0.999846 | Q: Where do i get a Tax Id Certificate For Florist?
A: You can obtain it here online.
population, though only about 14428 families in this area in MI.
Tax Id Certificate For Florist Macomb County Clinton Township Clinton Township, 48035 I will not hire any contractors or employees.
Q: Apply IRS ID North Carolina wildorchid florist in charlotte City of Charlotte & Mecklenburg County.
A: You can apply for a federal irs id ein here online. You also need a business license and a dba filing for the name Wild Ochid Florist.
The first thing to do is to get a Florist business tax registration license. Next, get an assumed business name registration because you will need it to open a bank account and order business cards. . In addition, you may need a federal tax ID number if you are a partnership or a corporation or LLC. Then, if you sell any merchandise, you will need a reseller tax ID number. Also note that Florist businesses need an occupational business license regadless of the business structure, that is whether sole owner, LLC or corporation. Also, if the business has more than one member, or you will file a corporation , you will need a federal tax ID number. Finally, Starting a Florist business fist step is to select the tax legal structure. 1. Sole proprietor, 2. Partnership, and 3. Corporation or Limited Liability Company. All small, home based Florist businesses as well as big businesses must choose and register as on of the above. If you decide to hire help, you will need a federal and state ein tax withholding numbers. | 2019-04-19T06:49:34 | http://www.fedtaxid.com/FedTaxIDAnswer/Tax%20Id%20Certificate%20For%20Florist.aspx |
0.999996 | On PC if I push the front panel power button to turn on the PC, it will power up but no post, and no full boot up. So I turn off the PC and turn off the power switch on the back of the power supply itself and turn it back on, then press the front panel power button, then it boots right up?
1. A hardware problem that requires a powercycle before a successful reset can happen.
2. A value that persistes in the CMOS between boots. This normally means something the BIOS has set.
Make sure your BIOS isn't set to be a plug and play OS in case the BIOS isn't querying all the devices in your system and successfully resetting them for the boot.
It may be worthwhile flashing to the latest BIOS too. You'll find it on your motherboard's manufacturer's website.
If the power supply is an ATX power supply, then the problem may be in how you are shutting down or in the BIOS. Most new motherboards based on the ATX form factor have a setting in the BIOS under power management called something to the affect of "restore state after power loss." If the system is not shutting down currectly then when you try to start it will try to restore the lost state (which usually results in a blank screen, with no beep codes). You then have to power down, switch the power supply off or unplug it then cycle the power which clears the system and then turn the power supply back on or plug it back it and the system should work fine. Check your motherboard manual for a setting that matches the above one. If you have it try disabling it. It you don't have an ATX power supply then it is probably bad.
I have had similar problems with a number of Socket A SDRAM based motherboards. Usually when using a CPU of 1GHz or faster.
The default CPU speed table in the BIOS is based on the 200MHz FSB.
However, with SDRAM, the FSB is limited to either 100MHz, or 133MHz.
The BIOS detects the CPU speed correctly, but as a result of the table, the CPU is clocked at 1/2 speed.
For a 200MHZ FSB CPU, set the FSB to 100MHz, the multiplier as needed to acheive proper clock speed, and is you are using PC133 SDRAM, set the Memory clock to FSB + PCI, (133MHz).
NOTE: You must use PC133 SDRAM for 266MHz FSB socket A CPUs.
It is also possible, that you need a BIOS upgrade, or you need to enable ACPI under power management in BIOS settings.
I'll take a simpler approach on the off chance it's a possibility. Is it possible your PC isn't turned off at the time you are hitting the power button to turn it on, but instead in sleep mode or hibernation? If so you may be having trouble with the PC recovering from sleep mode, rather than power supply or hardware problems.
You may want to verify your power saving settings and the action your power button is set to within the CMOS. | 2019-04-21T19:09:00 | https://www.techrepublic.com/forums/discussions/i-must-manually-reset-power-supply/ |
0.99741 | Is VA Gov. Northam misleading public on details of extreme abortion bill?
On Wednesday during a local radio show, Virginia Governor Ralph Northam shared his support for the controversial Repeal Act, which would have legalized abortion up until birth. However, his statements caused social media chaos when he misled listeners about what is in the expansive bill, which failed to make it out of the subcommittee on Tuesday.
During the ‘Meet the Governor’ radio show, Northam was asked whether or not he supports the bill, which he does. However, he was also asked to “explain” Virginia state delegate Kathy Tran’s statement that the bill would allow for abortion even up to the point when a woman is in labor with a full-term child (seen in the video below).
Northam stated that abortion decisions must be left up to the doctors and mothers. It was what he said next, however, that caused confusion and had some claiming he was advocating for killing a child after birth.
When we talk about third-trimester abortions, these are done with the consent of, obviously, the mother with the consent of the physicians – more than one physician, by the way – and it’s done in cases where there may be severe deformities. There may be a fetus that’s nonviable. So in this particular example, if the mother is in labor, I can tell you exactly what would happen, the infant would be delivered, the infant would be kept comfortable, the infant would be resuscitated if that’s what the mother and the family desired, and then a discussion would ensue between the physician and the mother.
But what Northam describes here — a terminally ill baby delivered alive and given proper medical care — is not what occurs during a third trimester abortion. The way Gov. Northam answered this question was as if the preborn child was never injected with poison and killed during the abortion. His description of an infant being born alive and given care is what happens during a natural birth and a child dying from natural causes — not from the tools of an abortionist. A third trimester abortion takes three or four days to complete, and involves injecting the baby with poison so his heart stops, then delivering a stillborn child.
Children who receive a terminal prenatal diagnosis should be allowed to be born and die naturally, on their own time.
This is not an abortion and this is not what The Repeal Act called for.
Northam convoluted the issue at hand, which is that The Repeal Act would have allowed for a woman to request a late-term abortion even after labor begins, as Tran had admitted. The Act would have allowed a preborn baby to be killed moments before he would have been born, likely through a lethal injection to the heart. Whether or not the baby had been deemed viable wouldn’t matter. The Repeal Act would have ensured that a last-minute abortion could have been committed on any child — even a viable baby — because of the mother’s health. And because of the Supreme Court case Doe v. Bolton, “health” can include even emotional and familial health.
However, the bill also clearly states that “measures for life support for the product of abortion or miscarriage [the baby] shall be available and utilized if there is any clearly visible evidence of viability.” If Northam supports the bill as he says he does, then he should support helping babies who survive abortions.
In addition to misrepresenting what happens during an abortion, Northam misleads when he states that “more than one physician” agrees that the abortion is necessary. That is the current law. The bill he is discussing and has supported would have eliminated this rule.
Gov. Northam’s office released a statement after the interview in response to the backlash he received. He claimed that “No woman seeks a third trimester abortion except in the case of tragic or difficult circumstances, such as a nonviable pregnancy or in the event of severe fetal abnormalities, and the governor’s comments were limited to the actions physicians would take in the event that a woman in those circumstances went into labor.” This claim is inaccurate.
Any woman facing an emergency medical situation during the third trimester would have a better chance at saving her health and life if an emergency C-section were performed rather than an abortion. An emergency C-section takes minutes, while a late-term abortion takes two to three days. And let’s be clear: the abortion would only be committed with the direct intent to kill the child, not to save the mother.
As for “severe fetal abnormalities,” Northam is not speaking of abortion. If a woman went into labor to deliver a yet-living child who was not expected to survive, that is called a live birth, and the child’s death would occur naturally as a result of the his or her health condition. The Repeal Act called for the legal right to kill that baby up until just moments before birth.
Although the bill in question has been tabled and will not leave the subcommittee, it is important for Virginians and all Americans to understand what is truly at stake. The bill could be taken up next session if pro-choice Democrats gain enough seats in the Statehouse after the fall election, and similar bills are being introduced in states across the country.
Editor’s Note: Read more about children who survived abortions and were left to die. | 2019-04-26T16:43:21 | https://www.liveaction.org/news/virginia-gov-misleads-bill-abortion/ |
0.999981 | How do I grow my Instagram followers and are Insta ads effective?
Instagram is growing rapidly in Australia. Naturally, we want to build an audience on Instagram as our initial research shows a lot of our target customers are there. We're producing and scheduling 3-5 posts a week currently.
How do you grow your followers? And have you used Instagram ads? Are they effective in bringing in sales?
Obviously, if your target market is on Instagram, you should make a real effort to engage with them on that platform. However, from your question, I understand that your aim is sales, not engagements.
I would recommend a rotation of 20-30 ads, which you'll promote to your target audience. You don't need to focus on followers, as they won't necessarily buy from you. If you make a compelling ad, clear call to action, and easy shipment / payment options, you'll increase your sales.
1. Define target audience (you've done that part).
2. Create multiple versions of display ads, specifically designed for Instagram.
3. Make sure the end-to-end customer experience is well mapped out, from discovery to delivery.
4. Capture customer details and purchase history in your CRM, so you can communicate with them via email after the initial sale.
If you struggle with any of the above - don't sweat it! Outsource it!
You have to do something that pushes your content to the greater public.
Several business owners I've met felt frustrated with the activities they do on Instagram.
Unfortunately, it's not just about posting contents.
Use highly targeted hashtags in your photos - make sure your content is relevant to your target market and do not use irrelevant hashtags.
Leave comments and like your target’s photos and engage. Be as genuine as possible when doing this to attract them to your profile. Find profiles and photos by exploring profiles through Instagram search. The best way to do this is to explore using hashtags.
DM your target - genuine connection always win on social! Start building a relationship with your target.
Post in Instagram stories - what's great about IG stories is having the ability to add hashtags to your stories allowing other people to discover your content. Hashtags and location adding in stories is another way for you to get organic reach. This helps make your profile discovered by your target market.
Interactions always are going to be the key to everything, if you don't interact with people or potential customers how are you going to grow followers? This is like a salesman knocking doors, nobody knows about your business, so you have to make sure that the ideal people know about it.
Actually, Instagram ads are one of the best sources for getting sales, if you have a seasoned pixel and a great audience, you are ready to start making a lot of sales, but always keep in mind that scaling your ads will be necessary! | 2019-04-24T14:03:49 | https://www.savvysme.com.au/question/2261-how-do-i-grow-my-instagram-followers-and-are-insta-ads-effective |
0.998328 | Jasper Desk Company is the oldest wood office furniture manufacturer in the United States. The company began as the Alles Brothers Furniture Company in 1876, and later changed to Jasper Furniture and Desk Co., then changed to Jasper Desk Company. Today we still operate at the original 1876 site.
During the intervening 138 years, many changes have taken place, such as new facilities, machinery, and product design to enhance and meet constant demand from consumers for greater office efficiency and style.
There were logical reasons for the woodworking industry to develop here in Jasper. Southern Indiana grows the finest textured white oak timber in the world. This undoubtedly influenced the industry here. Over the years, hundreds of roll-top desks were produced using the beautiful quarter sawn white oak of local origin.
On April 15, 1890, a patent was issued by the United States patent office to Mr. Frank Joseph and Mr. John Heim, the inventors. At the time it was the only patent issued to any operating plant in the USA. This patent covered the design of a dust-free roll curtain used on roll-top desks and was exclusively given to Jasper Desk Company.
About the middle of last century, a group of Germans migrated from the Black Forest area of Germany to southern Indiana. Many were wood craftsmen by trade, and naturally turned to the same kind of work in their new home. This migration of craftsmen to our community resulted in the passing of their talents on to others here through the years, we might say from generation to generation, therefore making Jasper an outstanding furniture manufacturing community, particularly in the office furniture field.
Jasper Desk is indeed proud of the fine family of employees that have given many years of quality service, producing items that have delivered customer satisfaction throughout the country. Through the years, many visitors, including exchange students have come here to learn about the industry.
When one digests the paragraph above, the word quality comes out very strong and maintains a priority here in the plant at all times. We do not believe that quality can be inspected into a unit. On the contrary, it must be built into it. We have top rated supervision and inspection to carry out this goal. Today, the company produces a very broad line of styles, such as Traditional, Transitional and Contemporary. All of these lines carry matching units such as credenzas, bookcases, hutches, files and a complete line of office tables.
We dedicate ourselves to continuing customer satisfaction and good will. We look with confident enthusiasm toward our next 138 years. | 2019-04-23T06:21:15 | http://jasperdesk.com/history.php |
0.99419 | Computer vision, which is a component of the field of artificial intelligence , is t~e study of methods and algorithms that enables machines and computers to "see" and "understand" images or multidimensional data . In this context, the term, "understand", means that some information is being extracted from the image or video data for a particular purpose. The image or video data that is fed into a computer vision system is often a color or grayscale image (obtained from a digital camera) but can also be stereo image (from a stereo camera) , video sequence (from a video camera) or a 3D volume (from a tomography device). As a scientific discipline, computer vision aims to implement the theories of computer vision to the modeling of computer vision systems. | 2019-04-26T12:42:28 | http://irep.iium.edu.my/21624/ |
0.998919 | 2) Place the coconut onto a folded towel set down in a large bowl. Find the 3 eyes on 1 end of the coconut and using a nail or screwdriver and hammer or meat mallet, hammer holes into 2 of the eyes. Turn the coconut upside down over a container and drain the water from the coconut. Store the water in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to a week.
3) Place the coconut onto a 1/2 baking tray and bake in the oven for 15 minutes. Remove from the oven. The coconut should have cracked in several places.
4) Using an oyster knife or other dull blade, separate the hard shell from the brown husk. Using a serrated vegetable peeler, peel the brown husk from the coconut meat. Rinse the coconut meat under cool water and pat dry. Break the meat into 5 to 7cm pieces.
5) With the grater disk attached to a food processor, grate the coconut.
1) Place 60g of the coconut into a small mixing bowl and pour over the boiling milk. Stir to combine. Cover tightly and allow to sit for 1 hour.
2) Transfer the mixture to the carafe of a blender and process for 1 minute.
3) Place a tea towel over a mixing bowl and carefully pour the mixture into it. Gather up the edges and squeeze until all of the liquid has been removed. Discard the coconut. You may use the milk immediately or store in the refrigerator for up to 2 days.
1) Repeat the same procedure as above only using 120g of freshly grated coconut. | 2019-04-19T18:49:05 | http://www.foodnetwork.co.uk/recipes/coconut-milk-and-cream.html |
0.999999 | Looking at words will help you to remember how they are spelled.
This Spelling quiz is called 'The Sound ea (head)' and it has been written by teachers to help you if you are studying the subject at elementary school. Playing educational quizzes is an enjoyable way to learn if you are in the 3rd, 4th or 5th grade - aged 8 to 11.
This 'Sound ea (head)' spelling quiz will inform elementary school children of the other sound these two letters make. The ‘ea’ sound can make a sound like ‘ee’ as in ‘bead’ but can also make the ‘eh’ sound, as in ‘head’.
The letters ‘ea’ can make two different sounds; this test is on the ‘eh’ sound it makes – like in the word ‘head’. See how many spellings you know using words with ‘ea’.
Spell the missing word: Would you like fruit ____?
Fruit is a much healthier option but both cake and fruit contain sugars - just different types of sugar!
Spell the missing word: He didn't mean that, he ____ he was sorry.
This word is interesting because as the word 'mean' the 'ea' makes an 'ee' sound but as the word 'meant' it changes to an 'eh' sound!
Spell the missing word: She has a hearing aid because she is ____.
The majority of deaf people are under the age of 65.
Spell the missing word: That elephant is very ____.
When an elephant is born they weigh more than 200 pounds - that's heavier than most grown ups!
Spell the missing word: Will you buy some ____.
Egyptians used to use bread like money - they could buy something with a loaf of bread.
Spell the missing word: ____ as she goes!
This is the kind of phrase a captain of the ship says.
Spell the missing word: He can't catch his ____.
It's natural to be out of breath after exercise but if you also have chest pains, you could have asthma.
The first and third answer are real words but they don't make the ea/eh sound. The word bed rhymes with head and so the 'e' makes the same sound!
Spell the missing word: Have you ____ that book?
Read is like the word mean. You can say 'Read your book' and the 'ea' is an 'ee'. Or, with the same spelling, you can say 'He read his book', which sounds the same as the word 'red'.
Spell the missing word: Unfortunately, he is ____.
The picture is of a young goldfinch. | 2019-04-21T04:09:53 | https://www.educationquizzes.com/us/elementary-school-3rd-4th-and-5th-grade/spelling/year-1-the-sound-ea-head/ |
0.999993 | I’ve lost track of how many times traders have related to me how some system, method or approach doesn’t work in real time. They readily admit that the given approach (none specific) works during simulated trading efforts, but once they switch to real money the whole thing falls apart.
Scientific study is all about working with constants and variables. The constants are a standard of measure while the variables are that stuff which one tries to make yet another constant. So in the equation of trading, when a trader applies some method or approach with profitable success in mock or simulated mode, that is a constant. All things being equal, if the hypothetical profit margin is high enough to overcome slippage and costs of execution, it is a winner. Add that one to the category of “constant”.
It does not matter to the market if you, me or anybody is attempting paper fills or actual real-dollar fills. This truth may hurt, but the market really doesn’t know or care if any of us are even alive. It doesn’t. The market exists to facilitate price discovery at highs and lows until all bidders in the auction are positioned accordingly. Whether we operate in paper trade mode, sim trade mode, one contract (100 shares) live, ten contracts (1,000 shares) live or one hundred contracts (10,000 shares) live is only a matter of market liquidity. If the chosen symbol can handle those fills in the normal course of its movement, there is scientifically = mathematically zero different across that spectrum to the market itself.
For example, if the S&P 500 futures (ES) is trading at the 1001.00 level and we decide ahead of time to fill a long trade at 1000.50 level, the very act of ES printing 1000.25 level after that decision means the trade decision was successful. In the normal course of a regular trading session period, that order would fill one contract or ten contracts or fifty contracts without one tick slipped. Most of the time you could fill 100 or 200 ES contracts on the mark or within one tick of slippage. In this example the market is agnostic and unbiased towards anyone and the actions they take. The only bias and prejudice, the only variable in this example is us.
Here’s a question that has a no-brainer predictable answer. Of these two hypothetical choices, would most traders rather make +$100 per day, every trading session… or +$4,000 per month for ten months out of twelve, remaining two months breakeven?
Yes, you guessed it: +$100 per session would be the choice of many if not most aspiring traders alive.
A calendar year has roughly 250 trading sessions available. Multiply +$100 per day to that and we get $25,000 per year as a result of the steady, consistent daily production. But wait: the other choice of +$4,000 per month times ten calendar months equals +$40,000 returned in the same year. How can this be a no-brainer choice? Are we dealing with some brain damage involved?
No, not at all. Just a matter of how the human brain is wired from birth and supported through life. Humans are animals and animals are wired to perform tasks for rewards. That’s the only way animals can be trained and/or behavior controlled at all. Perform a task, get a reward. Sit, stay = tasty treat. Push the right button each time from a selection of three = tasty treat. Jump on people when they walk through the front door = swatted with a rolled newspaper. Each of those three actions (performed tasks) by any dog were met with three rewards. Two were positive, one was negative but they were all nothing more than biofeedback response. Guess which ones the animal wishes to repeat versus the one to shy away from?
We could expend a few thousand words here rehashing the pleasure – pain operating system that runs the animal brain. I’m assuming everyone here is aware of animal = human psychology, so let’s get right to the core with trading at heart.
Trading is a profession, a job, a performance task, a contest, a game, a measuring stick, a source of entertainment all layered into one big roll. Each of us desire different degrees of each factor from trading. Some find it pure entertainment from the gaming aspect. Others find it a big contest to measure self-worth. A relatively few view trading as a job or profession above all, but they are actually a rather small minority of all aspiring traders. That last sentence is important for you: please read it several times over before continuing on.
That is generally how ten out of the twelve total months resulted. The remaining two months were breakeven, no net profit or loss either way. Do you see the major psychological problem there? It is staring us all right in the face.
Humans are taught to measure & compare everything. That’s how we make just about every decision in life, nil exceptions. Which apple is reddest and ripest? That’s the one to eat. Which loaf of bread appears freshest? That’s the one to buy. Which jeans make me look most fit? Those are the ones to wear. Which job pays most? That’s the offer to accept. Comparison shopping is how we get through our day. That’s how we are all wired to survive. Make the right choices for desired rewards. Pretty much describes the survival process itself. Would you agree?
Back to trade results. Most traders would think they died & arrived at the CME pearly gates if they could average +$100 daily per each ES contract. That x 20 per month would be perfect. Every day the same tasks are performed with expected positive outcome rewarded. Exactly what the animal behavior wiring craves. Task performed for reward realized. Task performed for immediate gratification = feedback. Perfect.
Now we all know by now that trading absolutely does not work that way in real life. Real life involves imperfection. No trader on earth has ever or ever will earn +2pts per ES contract daily, every day. That should go without any need to state, but we’ll say it anyway. But if it were possible, such would allow no need for comparison to anyone else, at all. With known input > outcome, task performed for reward realized is ironclad.
But what about the monthly sequence of +$500 > +$1,500 > -$500 > +$2,500 results? What is wrong with that? Simple & easy to explain. The first week of comparison to +2pts daily shows no advantage. The second week shows a great advantage.
The fourth week comes along and trades left to run for distance did exactly that. Knocked the proverbial ball out of the proverbial park. Worst of all, two random months sprinkled in there result in no gain or loss at all. One washes the other, but for eight long weeks the daily grind of tasks performed resulted in no reward realized. All that time spent running around the web from 4:16pm est onward peeking at “results” in every blog, every hindsight call & claim in public message boards, every crack & crevice on the web where two traders gather to compare whose was bigger that given day.
It feels good to measure up every day. Matter of fact, it feels so good to measure up every day that most traders will settle for less in the end just to enjoy the fuzzy feel-good emotional state through it all. Anyone focused on pure $ alone would find this long-term comparison a no-brainer themselves. But we already affirmed that traders with pure $ at the forefront of desire are a relative minority. The vast majority needs to enjoy constant positive feedback as the reward to their efforts = expenditure = risk. There cannot be one week of par results and another week of 3x worse results when compared. The key word here is compare. Traders who are in it for the thrill of game, the self-measure, the contest, the competition, the challenge have a core need to constantly compare.
They must be continually assured that all tasks performed are being met by positive reward. Otherwise, what if the reward stops? What if there is never another positive reward in the end, and all that effort of tasks performed is wasted? THAT my friend is the true fear which makes the choice of trader performance posed in the beginning as a no-brainer. A vast majority of traders would readily settle for less with $25,000 annual versus +$40,000, $250,000 annual versus +$400,000 annual, $2,500,000 versus +$4,000,000 annual earned due solely to the manner in which it came.
Task for reward. Relative comparison. Immediate feedback gratification. Do those core animal behaviors stand between you and what you aspire to achieve in trading? No single session ever makes a trader’s career, but any lone session can end one. If you find yourself on the fightin’ side of market trends, let yesterday be fair warning of what lies ahead in your career. It won’t be pretty unless you learn to do otherwise.
You could say that retail traders survive by learning to play in traffic. We are constantly hitching rides north or south for brief distances in small cars on highways crowded with big rigs. Some of those other cars wreck all around us. Every now & then we see big rigs bearing straight down on us head-on. It’s our job to learn where entering the highway, merging with traffic, maintaining our flow amidst vehicles of all sizes & speeds AND most importantly where to safely exit. All along the way, we must properly manage our natural fears.
How is it that so many aspiring traders fail to trade their plan? Where does the fear come from that holds them back? How does fear manifest itself in so many ways, through so many manifestations to wreck the simple mechanical process of paper-trading sim to one contract live, two contracts live, ten contracts live? Fear of loss is the first step on a straight path to overall loss.
Being well-capitalized is one important part for creating success. How many of us have at some point in our career fantasized about having account balances too big to fail? No matter how many mistakes we might make, no matter how bad a day we might have, in the end there would always be plenty of money left for recovery. Well I hate to be the bearer of terrible news, but no such account balance exists in this life. Plenty of traders and ex-traders can tell painful stories of how big accounts became small in a hurry.
Unfortunately, losing is a natural part of winning in our chosen profession here. Try as one might, there is no possible way to eliminate loss. Nor does that even matter… once traders grasp the truth that managing wins is much more, way more important than managing losses. It is the size of our wins which ultimately keeps an account balance black instead of red.
Cut losses short, let winners run. To me that sounds a lot like keeping losses smaller than wins. Do you interpret that aged adage any other way? Can it be interpreted any other way. No, but aspiring traders try mightily to do so.
You cannot and absolutely will not create lasting, sustained success from a core foundation where average losses in relative $ size exceed average wins. You cannot sustain a win rate of +70%, +80% or +90% of your trades over a long period of time. It is a statistical impossibility that no one has ever accomplished, and no one ever will. Regardless of system, method or approach, evolving market conditions will eventually roll around to the most adverse degree possible for awhile. During that stretch of “awhile” your high win rate will be decimated. Just like the balance in your trading account.
If you try to risk -$2 to make +$1, you are lost in the desert and wandering towards a steep cliff. The bottom is a long ways down, and it’s going to hurt badly (at best) if you survive the fall.
Over-trading kills. You already know this. Chances are you’ve already experienced this yourself. But the fear(greed) of loss = missing out on profits naturally overrides the logic & reason that tapes are moving, therefore opportunity for profit exists. You cannot win if you don’t play. Right? That’s certainly true… and it is likewise the cornerstone mantra of Vegas and Atlantic City for good reason. Think about it.
The desire to over-trade stems from fear/greed which is essentially the same emotion expressed in various ways. It is masked by excuses such as “scalping” or “high frequency” trading. You’ll often hear a new or beginning trader say they want to learn that approach because it fits their personality.
So what exactly does that say about their personality? It says they are seeking the thrill and excitement of pure action. This type of person has not asked which approach is easiest to succeed with, what the most profitable approach is or any other pre-qualifier. They are saying that the idea of pushing lots of buttons & keys in frenetic fashion while numbers roll around is the primary payoff they seek. If you try to learn the frenetic scalper game without first mastering all other aspects of trading, you are wandering lost in the desert. Without water for three days under a hot blazing sun. You will (fiscally) die without question, and you die real soon.
The trend is your friend. Trading is like swimming. You can swim with the current or against it. In a survival situation, you can swim with the current forever. Outside factors such as water temps, need for food and sleep are another matter, but as for pure swimming ability you could swim with a slow or strong current forever.
Not so with swimming against the current. You will eventually tire and drown. That is an absolute certainty. Unless you find intricate ways to reserve kinetic energy and escape the current’s ravage for periods of respite, you will die. The same concept is true for trading with market direction versus against it. If I only had $100 for every person I heard say, “I’m a contrarian… I don’t follow the herd” through the past ten years, I’d have $10,000s of free money right now. Any idea where all those market contrarians are today? Other professions than trading.
Here’s a news-slap of reality for trend fighters: the herd is always right at beginning of trend moves. The “herd” itself is contrarian. The “herd” or masses do not follow a trend… they collectively fight it. That’s the fundamental why the primary wave of a directional move following first pullback from breakout of congestion is so powerful. Ever wonder why? It is the collective herd of contrarians tossing in towels from failing their fight against prior direction. Their collective stop-out and re-enter reverse is the jet fuel behind that wave.
So for a little while the herd is right. Until the collective contrarian herd thinks = feels that move has reached its end. Then they begin fighting the trend and subsequent waves of price undulation are created. Downtrends end when there are no more sellers. But those sellers aren’t all sell-to-open interest. Most of the selling exhaustion to mark a market bottom comes from stubborn contra-trend longs getting slammed out on sell stops. Once a majority of contrarian buyers in a downtrend finally puke and stand aside (busted, disgusted and not to be trusted) the market is free to reverse and turn upwards.
That is the perverse part of market behavior. Those contrarian longs were correct: price would eventually turn as expected. But the collective herd of trend fighters missed picking a bottom and instead have to pick up the pieces of their remaining depleted accounts. It’s perfectly OK to swim cross-current at times. But trying to swim upstream in contra-trend fighting fashion will leave you soaking wet, cold, hungry and exhausted. There is only one outcome to that failed effort, and it always ends the same.
With 81% winning ETF trades in the model portfolio from October 2008 through August 2010 – you too can realize this level of success with Larry Connors’ Daily Battle Plan. | 2019-04-25T02:15:53 | https://tradingmarkets.com/recent/making_more_by_trading_less-677591.html |
0.990172 | Google Coder == "A simple way to make web stuff on Raspberry Pi.", well that is what they claim!
In my first Raspberry Pi article, I gave a quick look at the board, and showed how easy it was to load up an OS and kick the board into life, connect to the internet and browse to The CodeProject.
In this article, I will take a look at the new Google Coder environment, to see what the chocolate factory have been up to.
Google describe it as "A simple way to make web stuff on Raspberry Pi.", the question must be, how simple?
The instructions on the website were a bit lacking. I ended up extracting the downloaded file and using the same approach as I did in my first RasPi article i.e. Win32DiskImager. Simply point it to the image file from the extracted zip file and set the SD Card as the target and let it do its thing.
Once Win32DiskImager had done its thing, pop the SD Card back into the RasPi, hook up the screen and keyboard/mouse etc and boot it up.
I was using a wireless adapter and there is a simple GUI tool on the desktop for configuring a wireless adapter, once this was done I now had the RasPi on the network.
Finally, back on my normal PC, I install the Bonjour Print Services as instructed on the Coder Homepage.
Note: An alternative to this is just to look for the IP Address that is being used by the RasPi. In the screenshot above you can see by wireless adapter has been assigned to 192.168.0.28, so I can simply navigate to http://192.168.0.28/.
At this point everything should be good to go and hit the Coder environment via the browser.
Back on my normal PC, opening up a browser window and navigating to http://coder.local/ you are presented with a security warning (in Chrome at least) due to the site SSL certificate, but as this is your own RasPi it should be safe to "proceed anyway" so that's what I did.
At this stage you now get the start of the Coder environment. You are requested to set a password to protect your Coder.
Yes there are password rules as I found out!
Having set the password, you now login to your Coder environment to start coding.
Here we have it the Coder "Getting Started" page.
Clicking the "Gear" at the top right of the Coder environment allows you to set the name for your Coder, add your own name set the color and also access the Wifi settings and change the password.
It does say on the Coder website that if you forget your password, you can put the SD Card into another computer and create a text file name "reset.txt" in the coder_settings directory and this will allow you to then activate a password reset next time you reboot and connect to the Coder Console in the browser.
As you can see from the screenshot above, there are 3 demo apps already available to browse the source.
The Hello World is a very simple "Hello World" page. The Eyeball app is a simple animated eyeball that follows the mouse around the screen and blinks every so often. Now, the Space Rocks app, although it runs, the graphics didn't display correctly for me, so don't really know what was going on, all I could see was a lives counter, and when I pressed the arrow key, something must of moved because I died.
I thought this was a tad bizarre, so out of curiosity I fired up an IE10 session and pointed at the coder. This time I could happily see and play the Space Rocks app. It turns out to be an Asteroids clone.
Extremely disappointing that Google Chrome (29.0.1547.66) fails to play the game and IE10 succeeds. That will be Chrome 0 - 1 Internet Explorer. I thought that there is no way that Google team would have allowed this to be the case, so suspected something was up with my machine. Whether it was down to the machine being flat out folding on the CPU & GPU or just having a bad day. Having rebooted the machine and trying again, all was back in order and the Space Rocks now worked in Chrome and peace in the universe was restored.
D - Media manager, use this to upload artwork, audio etc.
F - Application settings, set the application title, colour, author.
Given that this is basically a cut down linux box, I dare say you could if you wanted put anything you want onto it. Maybe we will put that to the test at a later date, concentrate on the basics first.
The code editor used by the Coder environment is built on Ace.js.
The node modules are located in the /home/coder/coder-dist/coder-base/node_modules and had to use the File Manager to poke around to see what is included.
There is also a node package manager, NPM that can be used to extend the functionality of Node. This is performed from the command line, but is not scope for this article and you can do a bit of Googling if you really want to know more.
Shall We Build An App?
Of course we will, that is why we are here after all! How about something simple to start with. How about a simple Todo List application.
The first thing we must do it create the application. From the Coder environment start page, click the green tile with the plus symbol. Next, set the colour and the title for the application and then click "Create". In this example I am creating "Daves Todo".
Display a list of items.
Add items to the list.
Delete items from the list.
Delete All items from the list in a single action.
At the top there are some buttons to before the actions, the list of items todo complete with a link to remove a single item and the data entry form (which actually shows/hides and is not always visible). Quite a simple start, but everyone has to start somewhere!
At the bottom of the screenshot you can see Chrome's developer environment, this is a must when trying to debug what is going on and what is being passed around to and from the RasPi and Node.
Using a selection of web based generators (see the CSS references section at the end) I add the CSS markup for the styling. The only original CSS was the .pagecontent block.
The items array holds a local copy of the items returned from the server. They are parsed out of JSON by the the loadItems method. The item function is a general ToDo item object that we use to create new items for pushing onto the items array.
//Let us wait a wee bit to allow the raspi to catch up, it is a bit slow!
//then we will load the items.
When the document is loaded, jQuery binds up the events to the relevant objects as well as assign some of the functions that the events will perform. Raspberry Pi is a bit slow, so I will use a cheeky timeout function to delay todo item loading following performing an action. Yes, there are better ways of doing this, but this is just one of those 'hacks' used for the demo.
Next up, the code used for loading the items from the server. There is a jQuery get JSON call which then parses out the items and pops them into the local array. From here we iterate the array and build the table to display the items and also setup the link to delete the individual items.
Lastly, there is the deleteAll method, this sends a jQuery POST to make the delete request, before using another little delay before reloading the table.
//Yes, another delay to allow raspi to play catch up.
//settings.device_name - name given to this coder by the user, Ie."Billy's Coder"
//settings.coder_owner - name of the user, Ie. "Suzie Q."
//settings.coder_color - hex css color given to this coder.
The settings section was already in place and no changes were made for this demo.
The next two sections define the "GET" and "POST" route handlers.
The next method is the default index page handler. I have not made changes to this and as you can see it renders up the default index template file.
The on_destroy function is another method that was pre-defined, this is used to do any clean up etc. if required.
The getItems method is called by the client and simply creates a JSON string of the items array. The addItem parses out the form data from the post, creates the new item and pushes it onto the array. The deleteItem picks out the index of the item to delete from the query string (remember we are using an index at each side so they should always align, then splices the array to delete the item. Finally, the deleteAllItems does what it says on the tin and simply creates a new empty array to replace all existing items.
Be-aware - Lots of improvements required!
There are a whole host of bad practices in this demo. There are things like forgery, playback, injection etc. all present which you would not want to have in production code.
Other things that would obviously need to be considered are things like persistent storage to a database. Automatic mechanisms to update the UI on datastore changes, removal of client side array etc.
There is a whole lot of documentation missing. Trying to work out what actually is present, what libraries are already loaded by default, how the whole multi-app environment within Coder was doing its thing etc.
Trying to get my head round Node.js for the first time wasn't easy. Well, not in this limited environment anyway. Had I started to look at maybe pushing server console messages etc. back to the client then things might have become easier, but that would kind of defeated the "out of the box" experience being presented.
As a basic get you going with HTML and client side things yes, it might be sufficient. However, I would say that I found the Raspberry Pi tended to die on occasions, needed a reboot to recover. The terminal window etc. would remain responsive, but the Coder environment via the browser was just a no-go. The old "save often" mantra does apply here.
There is no doubt that this has potential, hopefully as the development team rev up the environment it will become a more rounded experience.
Me on the other hand, I think I am broken for the time being, I spent days trying to parse out a jQuery JSON post to Node, but in the end gave up and reverted to traditional query string posts.
Hopefully more articles will start to appear as the more proficient RasPi users and Node experts throw in to the mix their experience. So, if you have a RasPi go and download Coder, take it for a spin and see what you make of it!
Most of all though, have fun and just keep going!
To take the hassle out of crafting some of the CSS for the page, I made use of examples and generators already available on the net. Takes some of the pain out of demo making!
26th September 2013 - Added download to demo app section with the relevant code.
26th September 2013 - Added amendment regarding connecting via IP Address instead of coder.local.
25th September 2013 - Updated with narrative revisions, inline code markup.
Episode 2 - Where is it you may ask?
Episode 2 was started way back in November 2012, it has sufficient content not to scrap it and restart it, so decided I would just post this one as Episode 3 knowing I have plans to get #2 finished. There is no story line or plot that follows from 1 to 2 to 3, so what's in a number!
Great article! I just perused for now but will come back and digest it all later.
Windows 8 is the resurrected version of Microsoft Bob. The only thing missing is the Fisher-Price logo.
First off, kudos on having the ONLY example of a coder project that uses the node.js area.
I pasted all the code into a new coder project, but it didn't like the URL's in the includes.
Error loading items from server.
Any ideas? It looked as if you were disabling ajax calls in the js file.
Maybe the copy and paste messed up the code and there is something else broken. Have you (while running) gone into the dev console to see if there are any other errors showing on the browser console?
Ok, that is the code copied off my raspi and dumped into 4 files and zipped up and attached to the article. The link is at the start of the section where we start to write the demo app.
Initially, I named the app TODO DEMO, so this created a directory that was not daves_todo in the filesystem. So it gave a internal server error.... So for some reason the code WANTS daves todo as the name.
Again, thank you for posting this tutorial, it is the only think on the web that is allowing me to understand the node aspect of the coder.
BTW, are you the guy that helped the RaspPi team with the USB coding?
You could have just looked through the code and changed the urls in the AJAX calls to whatever new path you application was working on. | 2019-04-20T04:13:54 | https://www.codeproject.com/Articles/653230/Raspberry-Pi-Episode-3-Get-Coding-With-Coder |
0.999705 | Is 59-60 degrees F to cold to be room temperature? After blackening several aluminum test pieces in various solution strengths and time periods, and then soaking in sealer, I can wash all the black off all the pieces in cold water using my fingers. The pieces have been prepped using sandpaper or steel wool or abrasive blasting (evaluating for the best end result), and no touching with bare hands, so contamination should be at a minimum.
You need to clean the parts prior to dipping them in the solution. Use a good degreaser like Dawn Dish Soap or Soft Scrub. Then rinse with distilled water. 68-72 Degrees is a much better working temp then 60. | 2019-04-26T09:48:50 | https://forum.caswellplating.com/forum/other-metal-finishing-questions/143154-aluminum-cold-blackening?view=stream |
0.998628 | I'm trying to plot a curve using pchip but it is filling data points in the wrong direction.
How can I get the red line to be processed horizontally instead of vertically?
You are fitting the function in the WRONG direction. This NOT a problem of fitting pressure as a function of temp difference. There is no functional relationship there.
The relationship that you have seems to be of the form tempdif(pressure). Thus as pressure changes, the temperature difference changes dependently.
But fine, you can still plot it with the variables on the axes you have chosen.
You did make a good choice to use pchip instead of spline.
Thanks that's got the red line going in the right direction but somehow is flipping the axes for the data points. It's a plot of atmospheric temperature bias so I'm using the pressure as a representation of height. | 2019-04-25T07:56:51 | https://nl.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/398151-pchip-plot-in-relation-to-y-axis?s_tid=prof_contriblnk |
0.998739 | Who doesn't fancy a bright white smile? Besides boosting your confidence, it can help you improve your social relationships. Most people say that having a white smile is engaging, inviting and exciting. Even better, it can help you secure an amazing job. With a white sparkling smile, you can stand out in a crowd since it highlights a good self-image.
There are scores of teeth whitening tips on the internet. There are also dentists who offer professional teeth whitening treatments. You could also try whitening your teeth at home using mouthwash or toothpaste. Below are some of the best tips that can help you brighten your teeth.
Avoid using too much baking soda in your food (baked goods). Naturally, baking soda is the go-to ingredient for cleaning tough stains in your house and many people may assume that it works as a teeth whitener too. However, this is completely misguided. Too much use of baking soda will result in wearing out of the enamel resulting in darker teeth.
Eating darker foods frequently can also cause darker teeth. Therefore, on the list of foods to avoid eating frequently includes blueberries, marinara sauce, soy sauce etc. These foods have a darker pigmentation that can cause staining on your teeth. Note that, you don't have to eliminate these foods completely from your diet but rather reduce your frequency of consumption.
It's very clear that if you want your teeth to remain white, you need to avoid caffeinated beverages such as coffee or tea. Also, stay away from red wine and energy drinks. These drinks contain an acid that causes erosion of the enamel which causes staining of the teeth. Instead of halting your consumption of these drinks, you could try taking them using a straw to prevent any contact with the teeth.
Cleaning your teeth properly is a great way to keep your teeth looking white for longer. However, it all depends on the type of toothbrush you are using for the job. It's advisable to swap your toothbrush every 3 months or as soon as the bristles start coming out or bending. Cleaning your teeth with bad toothbrushes will definitely do more harm than good.
Don't forget to brush your tongue when you are brushing your teeth. Most people think brushing your tongue only promotes fresh breath. However, it's good to know that the tongue contains tons of bacteria, mostly from saliva. Therefore, if they are not cleaned out, you might end up having discolored teeth. Clean your tongue using long strokes with your toothbrush from the back to the front with a thorough rinse after each stroke. That way, you can remove the bacteria completely without returning them back to the tongue.
Once you are done brushing, you should consider rinsing your mouth with apple cider vinegar as well as water. It might not be an effective teeth whitening treatment but it works as a natural and organic effective. Add water to apple cider vinegar and swish it around in your mouth for at least a minute after brushing to brighten your smile.
ïAdd raw fruits and vegetables to your diet for a brighter smile. Crunchy foods are good for your teeth and your body as well. Carrots, cauliflower or apples help remove the surface stains on your teeth or plaque that's responsible for causing cavities. Inadvertently, these fruits and veggies will brighten your teeth.
There are dentists who offer their patients teeth whitening strips. Although they are good for brightening your teeth, they might not work as effectively as gel trays. Teeth are darker near the gum line and these strips don't reach these points. Therefore, you should replace your strips with gel trays for the best teeth whitening tips.
Everyone is fond of citrus fruits, especially because of the numerous nutritious benefits they provide. However, it's good to know that citric acid is bad for your enamel since it causes erosion which leads to staining. Well, since you can't stop eating these fruits completely, you should always rinse your mouth with water immediately after consumption. That way, the acid is completely rinsed and your teeth are in good shape.
There you have it, the best teeth whitening tips you could try at home! | 2019-04-22T07:00:54 | https://www.hainsdental.com.au/best-teeth-whitening-tips/ |
0.981326 | Who would have ever guessed Apple and this old competitor would someday forge a strategic partnership? But sure enough, the day has come.
Who would have ever guessed Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Big Blue would someday forge a strategic partnership to build a solution for millions of people? But sure enough, it just happened. Overnight, Apple just acquired a massive ally.
Equipped with its 15,000 analytics consultants, 4,000 analytics patents, 6,000 industry solution business partners, and 400 mathematicians, IBM (NYSE:IBM) has forged a partnership with Apple to "transform enterprise mobility." The implications for both companies are huge.
The intention in this new partnership is to take the strengths of both companies to offer an unparalleled mobile enterprise solution. The partnership is packed with substance. Consider some of these key initiatives to the new partnership.
Tapping into Apple's iPhone and iPad, IBM is developing "a new class of more than 100 industry-specific enterprise solutions including native apps, developed exclusively from the ground up, for iPhone and iPad." The partnership will also introduce iOS optimized IBM cloud solutions, an enterprise-specific AppleCare service, and a new system that makes it easier for IBM to activate, supply, and manage iOS devices for enterprise clients.
For IBM, the biggest advantage in this partnership is in going all out on the solution that Fortune companies were already using for mobile needs. Of the Fortune 500, 98% are already using iOS in their business. Ninety two percent of the Global 500 use iOS devices. Building a better enterprise mobile solution customized for iOS devices, therefore, will give IBM a distinct advantage over its corporate analytic solutions competitors by tapping into Apple's unprecedented and growing mobile enterprise user base.
Apple gains two major advantages.
First and foremost, this gives Apple an advantage over Google's Android and other mobile operating systems as an enterprise solution for large companies. IBM is a leader in enterprise analytics, cloud, software, and services -- the best ally Apple could have in its efforts to building enterprise solutions. Together, the two companies will be able to offer a more complete solution than competing mobile operating systems.
Second, Apple has just tapped into key distribution for its iPhone and iPads, the tech giant's two largest segments. Perhaps the most important line in Apple's press release announcing the deal was this: "As part of the exclusive IBM MobileFirst for iOS agreement, IBM will also sell iPhones and iPads with the industry-specific solutions to business clients worldwide." IBM will be able to sell, activate, and supply iOS devices directly to clients. Given the scale of IBM's reach in the corporate world, this is among the largest iOS device distribution channel Apple has ever tapped into.
Best of all, the advantages gained for both companies have more than near-term implications. IBM will be able to better meet the needs of its business clients and deepen relationships with them by finally tapping into the mobile operating system the enterprise world has became so attached to: iOS. Apple will become more entrenched in the corporate environment where the switching costs related to jumping from one OS to another are high. | 2019-04-26T15:38:46 | https://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/07/16/the-huge-implications-behind-apple-incs-new-partne.aspx |
0.999999 | Since the input values were set to the variables, a and b, we can use a and b to dictate the output values at pins P4 and P5. OUT4 = b OUT5 = a We could just as easily have used the commands OUT4=IN1 and OUT5=IN0; however, using variables to store the values in memory has advantages as the programs get more complicated. In the next experiment, it will be necessary to use variables to store values. The reason we used variables in this program is because they can be manipulated arithmetically, and the next task is to convert from binary to decimal.
Make sure the Board of Education has power and the programming cable is properly connected, then run the program. 1 Revision 0. 5} a b d VAR VAR VAR Bit Bit Nib INPUT 0 INPUT 1 OUTPUT 4 OUTPUT 5 DEBUG CLS DO a = IN0 b = IN1 OUT4 = b OUT5 = a d = (2*b) + (1*a) DEBUG HOME, "State of pin P0 is ", BIN a, CR DEBUG "State of pin P1 is ", BIN B, CR, CR DEBUG "2-bit binary number: ", CR DEBUG "P1 P0", CR DEBUG " ", BIN b, " ", BIN a, CR, CR DEBUG "Decimal equivalent: ", DEC1 d, CR LOOP The Output Here's how the program should work.
The numbers were chosen based on BASIC Stamp I/O pin numbers. ' -----[ Initialization ]------------------------------------CS PIN 0 CLK PIN 1 DataOutput PIN 2 Next there's the main routine section containing three GOSUB commands. The DO…LOOP loop runs 3 different subroutines over and over again. The subroutines are named ADC_Data, Calc_Volts, and Display. Subroutine is a small program that does a specific task within a larger program. ' -----[ Main Routine ]--------------------------------------DO GOSUB ADC_Data GOSUB Calc_Volts GOSUB Display LOOP So, how does a GOSUB command work? | 2019-04-19T05:25:15 | http://great403b.com/kindle/basic-analog-and-digital-student-guide-version-1-2 |
0.999995 | The alternating group of degree five, denoted , is a simple non-Abelian group of order .
It is, up to isomorphism, the only simple non-Abelian group of order .
There is no simple non-Abelian group of smaller order.
We eliminate all possible orders less than using the information from Sylow's theorems. First, some preliminary observations.
If the order is a prime power, then fact (1) tells us that the group has a nontrivial center. Hence, it cannot be a simple non-Abelian group. This eliminates the orders .
If the order is of the form where is a prime and , then fact (3) tells us that the group is not simple, since it has a nontrivial normal Sylow subgroup. This eliminates the orders . In toto, we have eliminated: .
. The list of numbers not eliminated is: .
Thus, the list is shortened to .
: Here, we have or . Fact (5.4) shows that since does not divide in either case, a group of order is not simple.
: Here, we have or . Fact (5.4) shows that sinc e does not divide in either case, a group of order is not simple.
This leaves only one number: .
: For this, we use fact (6).
Using Burnside's theorem, the order of a simple non-Abelian group must have at least three distinct prime factors. The only numbers less than satisfying this are and . Both of them can be eliminated using the methods discussed above.
Given: A simple group of order sixty.
To prove: is isomorphic to the alternating group of degree five.
Proof: The key idea is to prove that has a subgroup of index five. After that, we use the fact that is simple to complete the proof.
The number of -Sylow subgroups is either or : By fact (2) (the congruence and divisibility conditions on Sylow numbers), we have . By fact (4), cannot be or . Thus, or .
If , there is a subgroup of index five: The number of -Sylow subgroups equals the index of the normalizer of any -Sylow subgroup (fact (5.2)). Thus, there is a subgroup of index five.
We first consider the case that any two -Sylow subgroups intersect trivially: In this case, there are non-identity elements in -Sylow subgroups. This leaves other non-identity elements. We also know that by the congruence and divisibility conditions, and fact (4) again forces . Thus, there are non-identity elements in -Sylow subgroups. But , a contradiction.
Thus, there exist at least two -Sylow subgroups that intersect nontrivially. Suppose and are two -Sylow subgroups whose intersection, is nontrivial. The -Sylow subgroups are of order , hence Abelian, so are Abelian. Thus, and . This yields that . If , then , so the center is nontrivial. We thus get a proper nontrivial normal subgroup, a contradiction. Thus, is a proper subgroup of . Lagrange's theorem forces that has index either three or five in . cannot have index three, by fact (5.3). Thus, must have index five.
has a subgroup of index five: Note that steps (2) and (3) show that for both possible values of , has a subgroup of index five.
is isomorphic to a subgroup of : This follows fron fact (5.1).
is isomorphic to : By order considerations, the order of equals that of , so . Thus, is isomorphic to .
This page was last edited on 30 April 2012, at 21:38. | 2019-04-22T14:45:40 | https://groupprops.subwiki.org/wiki/A5_is_the_simple_non-abelian_group_of_smallest_order |
0.998376 | 1. Microwave 1/2 cup water for 1 minute. Sprinkle gelatin over water and let stand 5 minutes.
2. Combine mangoes, yogurt and sugar syrup in blender. Puree until smooth. With blender on, add gelatin mixture in thin stream. Pour into ice pop mold and cover.
3. Insert ice pop sticks into mold, keeping as upright as possible. Freeze 6 hours or overnight.
4. Remove cover. Run outside of mold under warm water and gently pry pops from mold. Place in freezer-safe resealable plastic bag and store in freezer until serving.
1. Combine sugar and water in a small saucepan. Heat over medium heat just to a simmer, stirring once. Cook 2 minutes until sugar is completely dissolved. Remove from heat and cool to room temperature.
Amount Per Serving: cal. (kcal): 64, Fat, total (g): 1, carb. (g): 14, Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet. | 2019-04-18T20:54:27 | https://www.parents.com/recipe/mango-yogurt-pops-0/ |
0.99992 | Every March, top lawmakers and political advisors gather in the capital from all over the country to attend the "lianghui," or "two meetings" where they review the performance of the government over the past year and hear new policies and major economic targets.
The two parts of the "lianghui" are the National People's Congress (NPC), which is the country's top legislature, and the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), a body that advises the government on a range of issues. The meetings typically last about 10 days.
Premier Li Keqiang delivers a report on the government's work to the 3,000 delegates on the first day of the NPC conclave, which this year begins March 5. His press conference on the final day (March 15) is also closely watched because he fields questions from foreign journalists. The report Li delivers will announce China's targeted GDP growth for the year and other key figures, such as the national defense budget.
Compared to the Communist Party's big meetings, the "lianghui" is more visible, perhaps intended to provide the public with a bit of political theater.
Technically it is the highest organ of state power. Its roughly 3,000 delegates meet once a year to ratify or approve policies, laws, the budget and top government personnel changes, which are mostly placed before it by other official organs. A 175-member NPC Standing Committee runs the legislature and passes laws between the annual meetings. It is chaired by Zhang Dejiang, No. 3 in the Communist Party after Xi Jinping and Li.
Has the NPC ever rejected legislation?
It has never voted down a proposed law, which has raised questions as to its function. However, since the legislature held its first meeting in 1954, there have been increasing instances of a lack of consensus. In 1982, three delegates abstained from a vote for the first time. The first "no" vote was cast six year later when Taiwan delegate Huang Shunxing voted against a nomination for chairman of the NPC's Education, Science, Culture and Public Health Committee. Then in 1992, only two-thirds of the legislature voted for the Three Gorges Dam project. More recently, hundreds of delegates have voted against or abstained from voting on the work reports given by the head of top prosecutor's office and the chief judge of the Supreme People's Court.
Who can be an NPC member?
Delegates are elected to five-year terms mostly by provincial people's congresses, who themselves are elected by lower-level assemblies. Only delegates at the lowest level – the county level or equivalent – are directly elected by the public. The People's Liberation Army also picks some members. The NPC has 2,943 members this year, meaning each one represents about 670,000 people. Some 406 delegates represent China's 55 ethnic minorities.
Then what does the CPPCC do?
The CPPCC is a collection of advisors that give party and government bodies suggestions on economic, political, cultural and societal issues. The membership is more varied than the NPC, and not everyone is a party member. Many CPPCC members are leading figures in fields such as academics, the legal profession and the business world. The body also has some star power, with luminaries like former NBA star Yao Ming and Hong Kong actor Jackie Chan holding posts.
China’s cold chain logistics industry, which now enjoys special status under the Chinese government’s macro economic control policy, will continue to strengthen and improve, while maintaining rapid operational growth. The industry was chosen as a favored industry because of its importance in maintaining public health and food security. At the same time, disposable incomes in China are rising, and food safety is becoming more of a concern for individual consumers.
According to recent studies conducted by the International Cold Storage Association, only 15% of products requiring temperature control were handled correctly in China, and only 10% of vehicles that are used for perishable products are equipped with cold storage equipment, not just ice cubes or ice bricks. Most of the logistics systems do not have any temperature control at all. As a result, more than 30% of the agricultural products produced in China are wasted during transportation. Due to lack of proper handling, product quality of the remaining 70% is in question. Food safety is becoming more of a concern for consumers and a complete system for cold chain logistics is in demand.
In 2015, meat production in China exceeded 80 million tons, vegetable 700 million tons, fruit 260 million tons, dairy products 27 million tons and seafood 60 million tons. Besides, large amounts of meat and frozen food are produced every year in China too. Temperature fluctuation in cold storage and transport is one of the main reasons for food quality decline. To ensure those perishable foods' freshness and quality, cold chain logistics is needed.
At the end of 2014, China had a freezer capacity of about 120 million cubic meters and less than 60, 00 refrigerator vehicles, lagging far behind developed countries in per capital terms.
As a high-end sub-industry of logistics, cold chain logistics will become the focus of many investors in the next few years. As e-business develops in China, e-business enterprises operating fresh food are springing up and the supporting cold chain infrastructure. Many e-business companies in China have got into the field of fresh food, for example, large e-business enterprises like Tmall and JD have published their own fresh food strategy. Besides, logistics enterprises like SF Best of SF Express are conducting e-business and a bunch of professional fresh food e-business enterprises like Too Too Organic Farm are developing fast too. According to CRI's estimation, the market size of fresh food e-business was about CNY 100-120 billion and CAGR during the period of 2016-2020 will exceed 50%.
Currently fresh food e-busines companies hardly invest in cold chain equipment but they indirectly force the construction of cold chain distribution networks. Enterprises such as JD and Tmall are still weak in cold chain warehouse, logistics delivery system and door to door delivery where they mainly cooperate with a third party cold chain logistics companies.
The cold chain logistics network can be divided into two parts: cold chain home delivery and cold chain artery, the former belonging to express and less-than-carload logistics while the latter involving supply chain management and third party logistics. Cold chain logistics is a sub-industry of logistics, with the largest potential market despite its complex operation and high barrier to entry. Cold chain logistics will be one of the fastes growing sub-industries of logistics in China in the next few years.
With sustained consumer growth, a fast increase in demand for food, drugs and cosmetics: the cold chain logistics industry in China will undergo a transformation enableling investment opportunities in China for cold chain equipment manufacturers and cold chain logistics enterprises.
47 qualified companies currently vie in the competition for refrigerated trucks. Among the top players including CIMC (Shandong), Zhengzhou Hongyu, Henan Bingxiong, Henan Frestec, Zhenjiang Speed Auto and KF Mobile, CIMC (Shandong) occupies the Shandong market, and seizes market share in Guangdong, Zhejiang, Hubei and other places; Henan Bingxiong performs outstandingly in Northeast China, Shanxi and Inner Mongolia; Zhenjiang Speed Auto and KF Mobile focus on East China and dominate the East refrigerated truck market. Zhengzhou Hongyu not only takes a favorable position via giants such as Shuanghui, Yurun, Topin, Sanquan and Synear in Henan, but also makes some achievements in Beijing, Hebei, Ningxia, Jiangsu and other markets.
CPC Central Committee's Proposal on Formulating the Thirteenth Five-year Plan on National Economic and Social Development - sets out the goals, principles and targets for China’s development in the next five years, and will have significant business implications, not only for China, but also for the world, given the size and global influence of China’s economy.
Becoming the world’s second largest economy, the largest trading nation, the largest destination for foreign direct investment and the third largest global investor, together with the largest foreign exchange reserves.
Achieving average GDP growth of 7.8% over the past five years, 48.1% of which was contributed by the services sector of the GDP, exceeding manufacturing and construction.
Reaching an urbanisation rate of 55%, lifting over 100 million people have out of poverty in the past five years.
government over-regulation and poor quality services.
China’s economic growth has slowed down to 6.9% in the first three quarters of 2015.
In the words of CPC leadership, China’s economic growth model is “unbalanced, uncoordinated and unsustainable”, and must be changed.
The 13th FYP is the first five-year plan formulated under President Xi Jinping's leadership and considered strategically important as the year 2020 will be the centennial anniversary of the founding of the CPC and the deadline for realising China's goal of becoming "a moderately prosperous society in all respects". In other words, China needs to double its 2010 GDP and per capita income of both urban and rural residents by 2020 – an enormous task given the current economic uncertainties.
strenuously promote environmental protection and low carbon growth.
President Xi Jinping later elaborated that, to achieve the goal, China would need to maintain an average annual GDP growth rate of 6.5% until 2020. This growth rate, coupled with a smooth transition to a growth model primarily driven by consumption and services, will hopefully guide the economy into its “new normal” period and help China avoid the “middle-income trap”.
The CPC proposed the following specific action points and targets for each aspect of the 13th FYP.
In declaring China’s future development “must rest on the basis of innovation”, the CPC has made clear the strategic importance of innovation in the 13th FYP.
Build a ubiquitous and fast mobile information network to balance improvements to the transportation and mail delivery networks.
Manufacturing remains the keystone of China’s economic growth and the basis for building an innovation-driven nation as well as for overseas expansion.
Establish a green development fund to promote clean production through clean energy, green transportation, control of carbon emissions in major industries and a circular economy.
Push for pilot projects on Near Zero Emission Zones.
Control and reduce agricultural pollution.
Ban commercial logging of natural forest and improve forest growing stock. The country will also strengthen protection of endangered species through breeding centres and gene banks, while improving management and control of wildlife imports and exports including ivory.
As stipulated in the new environmental law, the 13th FYP reconfirms that government officials will be audited upon leaving their posts on the balance sheets of natural resources.
Construct energy storage and smart grid and develop distributed power.
Raise the energy conservation standards for buildings and promote green building and green building materials.
Boost low-carbon public transportation with an improved rail transport system.
Promote cycling and new energy vehicles to encourage a "green" and sustainable lifestyle.
In line with its international commitments; According to official statistics, China is planning to invest US$6.6 trillion in the coming decade on low carbon technology, renewables, energy efficiency and emission reduction products, generating huge business opportunities for Chinese and foreign companies along the way.
Improve SOE vitality, controlling power, influence and resilience.
Strengthen its supervision over state assets by shifting its focus to capital management.
Encourage more state capital to be invested into the sectors and industries that are of significance to national security and the national economy.
Reduce government intervention in the operation of enterprises, reduce administrative approvals, break regional market segmentation and sectoral monopolies and create a fair competitive environment for all enterprises.
China is still at the early stage of urbanisation. The CPC anticipates over 100 million of farmers will become city dwellers, generating a market of US$6 trillion relating to their settlements and employment in the next five years.
Coordinate regional development to achieve balanced growth, by improving infrastructure development in the western region while rejuvenating the north-eastern industrial hub and facilitating the rise of the central region.
Enhance support to less developed regions, such as ethnic minority communities and border areas as well as resource-strained and ecologically degraded regions, and help shift excess industrial capacity from the affluent coastal cities to developing western regions.
Support the development of a series of city clusters across the country.
Call for proper and green city planning and industrial layout designs, and integrated growth of urban and rural areas.
Support the enhanced connectivity of inter-city transport and communications as well as the development of green cities, smart cities and forest cities.
Further reform the household registration systems (hukou system) to enable rural families to settle in cities and enjoy equal rights and the same treatment as city dwellers.
Draw up plans to open up the competitive businesses of power, banking, transport, telecommunications, oil and gas and public utilities.
Adopt a two-child policy so as to promote the balanced development of the Chinese population. It is estimated that under this new policy, 6 million more babies will be born each year, generating an infant-related goods and services consumption market worth US$16 billion.
Gradually postpone the statutory retirement age.
Make elderly care services a fully open market.
Encourage the private sector to invest and provide diversified education services.
Adjust the country’s income distribution system and narrow the income gap so as to "significantly" increase the wages of the low-income population, and increase the proportion of middle-income group.
Promote the mechanism of collective negotiations for wages and further increase the minimum wage levels.
Take a more positive approach by launching a free professional skills enhancement programme for the peasant workers and people from unprivileged backgrounds.
Remove barriers and restrictions for employment, and encourage more people to start their own businesses.
China has made remarkable progress in poverty relief. It was the first developing country to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) target of reducing the population living in poverty by half ahead of the 2015 deadline. Despite this, China still has 70 million people in the countryside living below the country's poverty line of 2,300 yuan (US$376) annual income by 2010 price standards.
A distinctive feature of the 13th FYP is that it’s the first five-year plan that shifts from the traditionally domestic focus to a much wider international perspectives by including more cross-border issues, in line with China’s rising position in today’s global economy.
Promote the development of local industrial capabilities.
Collaborate with international financial institutions, such as the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, the New Development Bank, together with China’s Silk Road Fund, to attract worldwide financial support.
Actively participate in the UN climate change negotiations and cut its emissions.
Expand the scale of foreign aid to developing countries and contribute to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
These statements and plans, while demonstrating China’s commitments as a responsible player of the international community, reflect China’s confidence as a world power and its rising global perspectives and aspirations.
Fully implement a pre-establishment national treatment to foreign investors.
Support will be given to coastal areas to participate in global economic cooperation.
Establish advanced manufacturing bases and economic zones, and continue to improve border and cross-border economic cooperation zones.
Encourage Chinese companies to invest overseas and sell more Chinese equipment, technology, standards and services to foreign countries.
Encourage Chinese companies to further their cooperation with foreign peers to improve their equipment manufacturing capabilities, added value and technological competitiveness.
Further integrate into the world’s supply chains and value chains through establishing overseas production bases and financial services platforms.
Transform the banking system into a multi-level and diverse system, and provide more financial support to small and micro-sized businesses and rural regions and impoverished areas.
Relax restrictions and allow more private entities to establish banks.
Provide strong support to green finance, including the issuance of green bonds.
In October, the Agricultural Bank of China issued its landmark listing of Renminbi and dollar-denominated green bonds with a total value of $1billion at the London Stock Exchange. The issue was four times oversubscribed.
Establish a standard financing mechanism for local governments.
Continue to press ahead with capital account liberalisation and the internationalisation of the Renminbi, which is already the world’s second currency for global trade finance and became the fourth most-used world payment currency in August 2015.
Actively push for wider international support for the inclusion of the Renminbi in the IMF Special Drawing Right (SDR) basket.
Increase the exposure and wide usage of the currency in international markets.
The government has vowed to promote the administration of rule of law, innovate its ways of macroeconomic control and social governance, and continue to fight corruption.
Cement achievements made in the anti-corruption campaign and tighten supervision and checks over power, in addition to working out an effective mechanism to stem corruption.
According to China’s political process, the CPC is responsible for formulating a proposal document that maps out the goals, principle and targets for the next five-year plan. The State Council will then add flesh to the bones and work out a more detailed outline, which will then be submitted to the top legislature – the National People’s Congress - for review and ratification in March 2016.
Following that, each province and central government ministry will accordingly formulate its own five year plan and be responsible for implementations.
The Johannesburg Summit and the 6th Ministerial Conference of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) were held in Johannesburg from 3 to 5 December 2015. Heads of State and Government, Heads of Delegation, the Chairperson of the African Union (AU) Commission and Ministers of Foreign Affairs and Ministers in charge of economic cooperation from China and 50 African countries (hereafter referred to as "the two sides") attended the Summit and Ministerial Conference respectively.
The two sides reviewed with satisfaction the development of relations between China and Africa and applauded the positive contribution FOCAC had made over the past 15 years since its inception in advancing the comprehensive and in-depth development of China-Africa relations, and agreed that FOCAC had become both a key platform for collective dialogue between China and African countries, and an effective mechanism for practical cooperation.
The two sides share the view that, as China works for the Two Centenary Goals and as Africa implements Agenda 2063 and its First 10-Year Implementation Plan, the current development strategies of China and Africa are highly compatible. The two sides shall make full use of their comparative advantages to transform and upgrade mutually beneficial cooperation focusing on better quality and higher efficiency to ensure the common prosperity of our peoples.
The two sides are satisfied with the effective implementation of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation Beijing Action Plan (2013-2015) adopted at the 5th Ministerial Conference of FOCAC, and decide, in the spirit of the Johannesburg Declaration of the Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, to jointly establish and develop comprehensive strategic and cooperative partnership between China and Africa featuring political equality and mutual trust, economic cooperation for win-win results, exchanges and mutual learning between Chinese and African civilizations, mutual assistance in security affairs, as well as solidarity and cooperation in international affairs.
In order to implement the outcomes of the Summit and the Conference, and chart the course of China-Africa friendly and mutually beneficial cooperation in all fields in the next three years under the theme of "China-Africa Progressing Together: Win-Win Cooperation for Common Development", the two sides jointly formulate and adopt with consensus this Action Plan.
The two sides will continue to encourage high-level mutual visits and dialogue in order to consolidate traditional friendship, enhance political mutual trust and deepen strategic consensus and coordination.
2.2.1 So as to enhance the planning and implementation of relations and cooperation between China and African countries, the two sides agree to improve and encourage mechanisms such as bilateral joint commissions, strategic dialogues, foreign ministries' political consultations, and joint/mixed commissions on economic and trade cooperation.
2.3.1 The two sides will enhance exchanges and cooperation between the National People's Congress of China and African national parliaments, regional parliaments, the Pan-African Parliament and the African Parliamentary Union, to consolidate the traditional China-Africa friendship and promote mutually beneficial cooperation.
2.3.2 The two sides will expand and enhance exchanges and cooperation between the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and African national parliaments, regional parliaments, the Pan-African Parliament and the African Parliamentary Union.
2.3.3 The two sides will deepen exchanges between the China Economic and Social Council, the AU Economic, Social and Cultural Committee, and the economic and social councils and other relevant institutions in African countries.
2.3.4 The two sides will increase the frequency of high-level contacts between political parties, enhance cooperation on personnel training, deepen bilateral and multilateral political dialogues, and increase experience sharing on governance and national development.
2.3.5 The two sides will promote exchanges and cooperation between local governments, and support the establishment of more sister provinces/cities relationships, as well as the institutionalization of the China-Africa Forum on Cooperation between Local Governments.
2.4.1 The two sides recognize the important role of the African Union in safeguarding peace and stability in Africa, promoting the development of Africa, and advancing the integration process of Africa. The two sides, furthermore, acknowledge with appreciation the efforts and contributions made by China to support Africa's peaceful and stable development and integration.
2.4.2 The two sides appreciate the comprehensive development of relations between China, sub-regional and pan-african organizations and the African Union, agree to maintain the momentum of high-level exchanges, continue to improve the strategic dialogue mechanism, and enhance strategic mutual trust and practical cooperation.
2.4.3 China appreciates the adoption of Agenda 2063 and its First 10-Year Implementation Plan by the African Union, and will continue to support the African Union in its efforts to build a united, integrated and prosperous Africa that is at peace with itself and the world.
2.4.4 The Chinese side appreciates the positive role of the African Union Commission since it became a member of the FOCAC, and will also continue to strengthen cooperation with and support for the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD).
2.4.5 The two sides agree to actively implement the Memorandum of Understanding on the Promotion of China-Africa Cooperation in the Fields of Railway, Highway, Regional Aviation Networks and Industrialization, making good use of existing cooperation mechanisms such as the Joint Working Group of Transnational and Trans-regional Infrastructure Cooperation in Africa, and to promote practical cooperation between China and the African Union in priority fields.
2.4.6 The African Union appreciates the establishment of the Mission of China to the AU in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. China invites the African Union to establish a representative office in Beijing at an early date.
2.4.7 The Chinese side will further support the capacity building of the African Union and sub-regional organizations in Africa in various forms, such as through human resources development.
2.4.8 The Chinese side will establish and improve mechanisms of economic and trade cooperation with regional and sub-regional organizations in Africa, enhance economic and trade cooperation between China and Africa at regional and multilateral levels. The Chinese side welcomes and supports African initiatives regarding the creation of free trade zones and will study the possibility of establishing free trade zone cooperation.
3.1.1 The two sides agree that realizing agriculture modernization in Africa by strengthening China-Africa agricultural cooperation is an important way to contribute to food security in Africa, and should be given priority in the context of China-Africa cooperation projects. The cooperation will enhance agricultural transformation and upgrading, increase agricultural production, processing and income, and safeguard food security in Africa bearing in mind the prevailing regulatory requirements.
3.1.2 The two sides will continue to strengthen cooperation in the fields of agricultural policy consultation, planning and design, and support the implementation of the Comprehensive African Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) through assisting to build agriculture technology demonstration centres, sending professionals for technical cooperation, and training agricultural technicians. In this regard, the African side appreciates the support already rendered by the Chinese government for African countries to implement the CAADP.
3.1.3 The Chinese side will carry out agricultural demonstration projects in Africa, build or upgrade agricultural technology demonstration centres, make effective use of such centres focusing on agricultural research, demonstration and training, expanding training, transferring breeding and plantation technologies and cooperate with African countries to increase agricultural unit productivity.
3.1.4 The Chinese side will continue to send 30 teams of senior agriculture experts and teachers to provide vocational education to African countries, as well as to increase the number of African personnel trained in agro-technology and administration in China, in order to improve overall agricultural technology and management.
3.1.5. The Chinese side will help African countries develop water conservancy and irrigation projects, implement the project of "Agriculture Leads to Prosperity" in 100 African villages, provide African countries with emergency food assistance.
3.1.6 The two sides will actively cooperate in agricultural project designing, financing and management under the framework of the CAADP, as implemented through the AU and NEPAD, and offer support to feasibility studies on agricultural infrastructure construction.
3.1.7 The Chinese side will continue to work with African countries to jointly implement high quality and high yield agricultural demonstration projects, encourage and guide China's agro-science research organizations and enterprises to work with their African counterparts to carry out experimental demonstrations for high-quality and high-yield agriculture, establish "10+10" cooperative mechanism among China-Africa agro-science research institutions, focus on facilitating joint research on breeding and the production of seeds as well as plant protection, specifically focusing on increasing outputs of grain, cotton and other key crops in African countries.
3.1.8 The Chinese side will encourage and support Chinese enterprises to invest in agriculture in Africa; implement cooperation projects focusing on technical support in grain planting, storage, sanitary and phytosanitary requirements, animal husbandry, agro-processing capacity, forestry, and fisheries to create a favourable environment for African countries to realize long-term food security supported by national agricultural production and processing.
3.1.9 The two sides will encourage the trade of agricultural products, improve trade policies, assess methods to promote agricultural trade, and continuously scale up the trade of agricultural products between China and Africa.
3.1.10 The Chinese side will continue to strengthen agricultural cooperation with Africa under the framework of the UNFAO "Special Programme for Food Security", and explore prospects of working with other institutions and countries to realise further agricultural cooperation with Africa.
3.1.11 The African side pledges to cooperate with the Chinese side in key fields such as exchanges on agricultural policies, agricultural infrastructure improvement, development of systems of agricultural support services, modern agricultural development capacity building, and investment in the complete value chain of agriculture to improve Africa's agricultural production and strengthen its capability to ensure food security. It will create an enabling environment for Chinese enterprises to invest and trade in agriculture in Africa, and offer support that includes preferential policies in agriculture, land, agricultural infrastructure, fiscal financing and insurance service, in accordance with local laws.
3.2.1 The two sides believe that industrialization is an imperative to ensure Africa's independent and sustainable development. There are mutual needs for industry partnering and industrial capacity cooperation between China and Africa. Both sides enjoy respective advantages and will bring opportunities to each other. The two sides are ready to combine China's competitive industries and high-quality industrial capacity with Africa's industrialization and economy diversification to promote bilateral cooperation aimed at comprehensive transformation and upgrading.
3.2.2 The two sides commit to following a balanced approach to interests and principles, win-win cooperation, openness and inclusiveness, market-based cooperation, and will actively carry out industry partnering and industrial capacity cooperation, while never pursuing development at the cost of the long-term interests and environments of their host countries.
3.2.3 The two sides will make full use of the existing multilateral and bilateral cooperation mechanisms, enhance planning, policy coordination and industry partnering, and promote the mutually beneficial development of industrial capacity.
3.2.4 The Chinese side is willing to give priority to Africa in industrial partnering and industrial capacity cooperation. The African side welcomes the transfer of labour-intensive competitive industrial capacities of China to Africa in an orderly way, assisting Africa to increase employment, taxation and foreign exchange, and achieving technology transfer and common development. The two sides agree to select several African countries to set up pilot and demonstration programmes, jointly establish or upgrade a number of industrial parks and support the development of infrastructure and public services facilities to accumulate experience, explore effective methods and offer a cooperation model for driving forward China-Africa industrial partnering and industrial capacity cooperation in a comprehensive and orderly fashion.
3.2.5 The Chinese side will set up a China-Africa production capacity cooperation fund, with an initial pledge of US$10 billion, to support China-Africa industry partnering and industrial capacity cooperation.
3.2.6 The Chinese side will send senior government experts and consultants to Africa countries to offer advice and assistance on industrialization layout, policy planning, operation and management.
3.2.7 African countries will continue to improve laws, regulations and infrastructure, introduce preferential policies and improve government services wherever possible, so as to create enabling conditions and an environment to attract investment by Chinese companies and support industries and industrial capacity from China, where mutually beneficial.
3.3.1 The two sides agree that underdeveloped infrastructure is one of the bottlenecks hindering independent and sustainable development of Africa. The two sides will take concrete measures and give priority to encourage Chinese businesses and financial institutions to expand investment through various means, such as Public-Private Partnership (PPP) and Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT), to support African countries and the African flagship projects, in particular the Programme for Infrastructure Development in Africa and the Presidential Infrastructure Championing Initiative, in their efforts to build railroad, highway, regional aviation, ports, electricity, water supply, information and communication and other infrastructure projects, support African countries in establishing 5 transportation universities and facilitate infrastructure connectivity and economic integration in Africa.
3.3.2 According to the plan of building transnational and trans-regional infrastructure in Africa, the two sides will explore and cooperate on the planning and construction of projects to achieve sub-regional connectivity and integration. The two sides will combine the national development demands and the projects' economic benefits, and drive Africa's infrastructure construction in a balanced and orderly way.
3.3.3 The two sides will enhance planning and coordination on the construction and renovation of highway networks in Africa, in particular promoting construction of transnational highway networks in Africa.
3.3.4 The two sides will jointly formulate the China-Africa Railway Cooperation Action Plan (2016-2020), promoting the construction of railway networks in Africa.
3.3.5 The two sides will implement the China-Africa regional aviation cooperation programme, actively supporting the establishment of transnational regional aviation networks linking African countries, and enhancing coordination and cooperation in standards, planning consultation, special training, improving aviation infrastructure, operating joint venture airlines, and offering regional civil airlines, taking into consideration local employment, sourcing, human capacity building and the transfer of technology.
3.3.6 The two sides will support each other on aviation market access, encourage and support more flights and shipping links between China and Africa by their airlines and shipping companies. The two sides encourage and support investment by competitive Chinese enterprises in ports, airports, and airline companies in Africa.
3.3.7 The Chinese side will explore the possibility of establishing a China-Africa civil aviation school in Africa, build infrastructure for aviation ground services, and enhance training of African civil aviation professionals, including technology transfer.
3.3.8 The two sides encourage and support the participation of Chinese businesses in investment, construction and operation of power projects in Africa through multiple means, including expanded cooperation in water resources, coal-fired power, solar energy, nuclear energy, wind power, biomass power generation, power transmission and transformation, and grid construction and maintenance.
3.3.9 The two sides will enhance exchanges and cooperation between departments in charge of information, communications, radio and television, and will increase personnel training in the information field, share experiences of development in information and communication, and work together to safeguard information security.
3.3.10 The two sides encourage Chinese enterprises to assist African countries' efforts to put in place digital radio and TV broadcasting systems, to promote digitalization of radio and TV services, and to benefit more people in the rural areas in Africa.
3.3.11 The two sides encourage and support the participation of competitive Chinese enterprises of information, communication, radio and TV in building information infrastructure in Africa, such as cable networks and interconnection networks, and their involvement in mutually beneficial construction, operation and offering of services with African businesses in order to assist Africa to build information networks covering the whole continent.
3.3.12 The two sides will actively explore and push forward cooperation in information and communication technology, help African countries to build "Smart Cities", and enhance the roles of information and communication technology in safeguarding social security, and fighting against terrorism and crime.
3.3.13 The two sides will cooperate with international organizations such as International Telecommunication Union, narrow the digital divide in Africa, and promote the building of an information society in Africa.
3.4.1 In view of the strong complementarity and cooperation potential between China and Africa in energy and natural resources, the two sides will encourage cooperation in the exploitation of resources, and support joint development and proper use of the energy and natural resources of the two sides, including beneficiation at the source.
3.4.2 The two sides will enhance African countries' capacity for intensive processing of energy and natural resource products during their cooperation, ensuring increased local employment and value addition of primary products, while protecting the local eco-environment.
3.4.3 The two sides will encourage energy and resources cooperation, support Chinese and African enterprises and financial institutions to conduct mutually beneficial cooperation, in particular encouraging these enterprises to assist the African side with beneficiation technologies through technology transfer and capacity building, thus helping African countries to translate their energy and natural resources potential into real socio-economic development.
3.4.4 The two sides agree to establish a training programme for the capacitation of African energy practitioners through research and development exchanges.
3.4.5 The two sides will encourage the establishment of a forum on energy and natural resources under the framework of FOCAC.
3.5.1 The African side welcomes the Chinese side's championing "the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road", which includes the African continent, and the two sides will promote mutually beneficial cooperation in the blue economy.
3.5.2 The two sides will enhance experience sharing in offshore aquaculture, marine transportation, shipbuilding, construction of ports and port industrial parks, the surveying and exploitation of offshore oil and gas resources, marine environment management, marine disaster prevention and reduction, marine scientific research, blue economy development, and support mutually beneficial cooperation between Chinese and African enterprises, in order to assist Africa to cultivate new economic growth drivers.
3.5.3 The Chinese side will enhance marine exchanges and technology cooperation with African countries, launch capacity building, and actively explore the possibility of jointly building marine observation stations, laboratories, and cooperation centres.
3.5.4 The two sides will encourage the establishment of a Ministerial Forum on marine economy under the framework of FOCAC.
3.6.1 The two sides will expand cooperation in tourism to encourage opening more direct air routes and tourism investment, increase tourism safety and quality, expand personnel exchanges aimed at skills training, and cultivate new economic growth drivers for Africa.
3.6.2 The two sides will continue to facilitate travels by their nationals between China and Africa and support tourism promotion activities in each other's countries and regions.
3.6.3 The Chinese side welcomes more eligible African countries to apply for the Approved Destination Status for Chinese tourists.
3.6.4 The two sides encourage and support the establishment of tourist offices in China and Africa, encourage and support investment by Chinese enterprises in tourism infrastructure in Africa, such as hotels and construction of tourist attractions.
3.7.1 The Chinese side will scale up its investment in Africa, and plan to increase China's stock of direct investment in Africa to US$100 billion in 2020 from US$32.4 billion in 2014.
3.7.2 The two sides will continue to encourage and support mutual investment, urge for negotiations and implementation of measures on the Promotion and Protection of Investment, ensure a conducive environment for mutual investment, promote investment cooperation, and safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of investors.
3.7.3 The two sides will actively carry out tax cooperation, negotiate and implement agreements on the avoidance of double taxation, and agree to resolve cross-border tax disputes to promote a favourable tax environment for China-Africa investment, economic exchanges and trade. The Chinese side will actively advocate signing the memorandum of bilateral tax cooperation with African national tax authorities, and support African countries to improve tax collection and administration capacities through technology assistance and transfer, and human capacity development.
3.7.4 The Chinese side will continue to support the development and operation of overseas business cooperation zones, special economic zones and industrial parks by competitive Chinese enterprises, while respecting the host countries' market rules and industrialization processes. The two sides will continue to give support and offer necessary facilitation and services to those overseas business cooperation zones that are already built or operated, taking into consideration local procurement and employment, as well as technology transfer in the countries in which they invest.
3.7.5 The two sides agree to ensure a conducive environment for increased mutual investment and to foster enterprise cooperation. The Chinese side will support the African side in its efforts to build industrial park zones and special economic zones, help African countries to attract investment, encourage and support the involvement of Chinese enterprises in the planning, designing, construction, operation and management of such zones. Local procurement and employment as well as technology transfer in the countries of investment will be taken into consideration.
3.7.6 The two sides will encourage industrial partnering and industrial capacity building to assist Africa to industrialize. The two sides will also encourage and support China's labour-intensive industries to move to Africa, cooperate on import-substitution and export-orientation, increase local employment, technology transfer, human capacity development and enhance export earning capacity.
3.7.7 The two sides will cooperate with international financial institutions and support the holding of Investing in Africa Forum and the establishment of Investing in Africa Think Tank Union, to share China's development experience, promote investment cooperation in Africa, and realize common development.
3.8.1 The two sides will scale up trade and try to elevate the China-Africa trade volume to US$400 billion in 2020 from US$220 billion in 2014 ensuring that the rate of growth is maintained in overall trade figures and that balance in trade is the desired outcome.
3.8.2 The two sides encourage and support the establishment of logistics centres by Chinese enterprises in Africa, standardize and improve quality of commodities exported from China to Africa, promote China's trade with Africa and encourage Chinese enterprises to engage in processing and manufacturing in Africa, ensuring local employment, technology transfers and human capacity development.
3.8.3 The two sides will enhance cooperation in entry-and-exit inspections and quarantine of animals and plants, and food safety and phytosanitary supervision, and promote the entry of food and agricultural products into each other's markets.
3.8.4 The Chinese side will implement 50 trade-promotion assistant programmes, supports the trade liberalization process in Africa and will continue to help African countries to improve facilities for trade and transport, for the beneficiation of African countries' products at the source, and to promote exports of products from Africa to China.
3.8.5 The Chinese side will continue to help African countries to strengthen capacity building in the trade in services, cultivate more professionals in various sectors of the service outsourcing industry, and expand exchanges, cooperation and training in the service outsourcing industry.
3.8.6 The Chinese side will continue to actively fulfil its pledge of giving zero-tariff treatment to the least developed African countries for most of their commodities exported to China, and gradually give zero-tariff treatment to products under 97% of all tariff items from the Least Developing Countries in Africa having diplomatic relations with China, according to the respective bilateral exchanges of letters.
3.8.7 The Chinese side will establish with African countries cooperation mechanisms on customs, inspection and quarantine standards, as well as the verification, certification and administration of imports and exports, in order to promote bilateral trade facilitation, and enhance law-enforcement cooperation to combat smuggling and fraud and to improve the quality of goods exported from China to Africa.
3.8.8 The Chinese side will conduct e-commerce cooperation with Africa, continue to help improve the local management capability and capacity of exporting African countries, develop and construct an internet visa system, introduce electronic certificates of origin, and promote paperless customs clearance of certificates of origin.
3.9.1 The Chinese side will offer African countries US$35 billion of loans of concessional nature on more favorable terms and export credit line, create new financing models, optimize favorable credit terms and conditions, expand credit scales, and support China-Africa industrial capacity cooperation, infrastructure building, and development of energy resources, agriculture, and manufacturing in Africa.
3.9.2 The Chinese side will encourage Chinese financial institutions to provide financing and insurance support for China-Africa cooperation in energy, mining, agriculture, processing manufacturing, shipping, metallurgy, construction materials, information and communication technology, electricity, railways, highways, ports and airports.
3.9.3 The Chinese side will enhance cooperation in currency exchanges and financial services, and encourage both Chinese and African enterprises to invest and trade in local currencies. The Chinese side welcomes central banks of African countries to invest in China's inter-bank bond market and include RMB into their foreign exchange reserves.
3.9.4 The Chinese side will encourage and support Chinese and African financial institutions to strengthen cooperation, including opening more branches in respective countries and enhancing exchanges and cooperation ensuring mutual benefit, as well as encouraging and supporting cooperation among financial institutions primarily supporting development to further enhance China-Africa financial cooperation.
3.9.5 The Chinese side will gradually expand the China-Africa Development Fund from US$5 billion to US$10 billion.
3.9.6 The Chinese side will gradually expand the Special Loans to Support Small and Medium Sized Enterprises in Africa from US$1 billion to US$6 billion.
3.9.7 The Chinese side will enhance cooperation with the African Development Bank and the sub-regional financial institutions, utilizing optimally the China-Africa Development Fund, Africa Growing Together Fund, and Special Loans to Support Small and Medium Sized Enterprises in Africa, also exploring and innovating cooperation mechanisms, supporting the development of infrastructure, agriculture and industrialization processes in Africa.
4.1.1 The African side highly appreciates China's longstanding assistance for social development and humanitarian assistance, without any political conditions, in diverse forms that help Africa to eradicate poverty and improve people's livelihood under the framework of South-South cooperation. The African side applauds the establishment of the Assistance Fund for South-South Cooperation by China to support African countries in implementing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
4.1.2 The Chinese side will continue to gradually scale up its assistance to African countries within its capacity, giving priority to enhanced cooperation with African countries in areas pertaining to people's livelihoods such as agriculture, health, infrastructure, education and human resources development, wildlife and environmental protection, while increasing the effectiveness of assistance, and supporting economic and social development of African countries.
4.1.3 The Chinese side will exempt the outstanding intergovernmental interest-free loans due by the end of 2015 owed by the least developed countries, land-locked countries and small island developing countries in Africa.
4.2.1 The African side expresses its appreciation for China's continued assistance to countries in need. In particular, the African side expresses its deep appreciation for China's rapid response to the Ebola Virus Disease crisis in West Africa and commends the latter for its selfless service and deployment of its expertise and resources to arrest and reverse the spread of this disease. The African side further appreciates China's continued support to reconstruct public health, economic and societal systems of affected countries during the Post-Ebola period.
4.2.2 The Chinese side will assist Africa to develop public health systems and policies, help African countries to improve the public health, surveillance, epidemiological and prevention systems, strengthen prevention and treatment of malaria and other common infectious and communicable diseases in Africa, enhance the assistance in maternal and child health, reproductive health and other major public health fields in Africa, support cooperation between 20 hospitals of China and Africa from each side on demonstration projects, upgrade hospital departments, and will continue to train doctors, nurses, public health workers and administrative personnel for African countries.
4.2.3 The Chinese side will support the building of an African Union Disease Control Centre and regional medical research centres, reinforce laboratory and diagnostic capacities and encourage the African Union Commission to play a leading role as the custodian of Africa's continental initiatives in the health sector.
4.2.4 The Chinese side will continue to send medical teams to Africa, including short-term medical teams consisted of clinical experts to African countries, and conduct the "Brightness Action" surgeries and other short-term free medical services in Africa, and provide Africa with doses of anti-malaria compound artemisinin.
4.2.5 The Chinese side will support the investment by Chinese medical and health care enterprises in Africa, encourage Chinese medical institutions and enterprises to jointly operate hospitals and produce medicines in Africa, improve health information systems, help Africa to improve the availability of health and diagnostic services and commodities, and improve Africa's capacity for independent and sustainable development in the field of medical care and health, support Africa's continental health initiatives.
4.2.6 The Chinese side will improve health infrastructure in Africa through the construction, renovation and equipping of medical facilities.
4.2.7 The Chinese side will continue to strengthen high-level exchanges in health, build an institutionalized high-level dialogue between China and Africa and agree to incorporate the Ministerial Forum on China-Africa Health Cooperation as an official sub-forum under the framework of FOCAC.
4.3.1 The two sides agree that the shortage of professional and skilled persons is another major bottleneck constraining Africa's independent and sustainable development. Both sides will further strengthen cooperation in education and human resources development.
4.3.2 The Chinese side will offer 2,000 degree education opportunities in China and 30,000 government scholarships to African countries, welcome more African youths to study in China, innovate and expand more ways for training, and train more African professionals on economic development and technical management.
4.3.3 The Chinese side will train for Africa senior professionals on government administration for national development through the South-South Cooperation and Development Institute.
4.3.4 The two sides will continue to implement the 20+20 Cooperation Plan for Chinese and African Institutions of Higher Education, improve the cooperation mechanism between Chinese and African institutions of higher education, encourage Chinese and African universities to carry out cooperation in regional and country studies, and support African universities in establishing China research centres and vice versa.
4.3.5 The Chinese side welcomes the inclusion by African countries of Chinese language teaching as part of their national education systems and will support more African countries in their efforts to establish Confucius Institutes and Confucius Classrooms.
4.3.6 The Chinese side will assist African countries to renovate existing as well as build more vocational and technical training facilities, establish a number of regional vocational education centres and colleges for capacity building in Africa, train 200,000 local African vocational and technical personnel and provide Africa with 40,000 training opportunities in China; help the youth and women improve their employment skills to enhance the self-development ability of Africa.
4.3.7 Having noted the successful UNESCO-China Funds-In-Trust established in UNESCO by the Chinese side, the two sides support the continued implementation of funds-in-trust and its extension by two years (2016-2017).
4.4.1 The two sides will use the "Programme for Strengthening Cooperation on Poverty Reduction between the People's Republic of China and the African Union" jointly published in 2014, as a guide to further strengthen experience sharing in poverty eradication and practical cooperation.
4.4.2 The two-sides agree to continue to jointly organize the China-Africa Poverty Eradication and Development Conference and to endorse it as an official sub-forum under the framework of FOCAC, in order to explore in-depth poverty eradication strategies and policies, and to gradually establish a multi-level inter-governmental and inter-society dialogue mechanism for poverty eradication.
4.4.3 The Chinese side will continue to host the workshop on poverty eradication policies and practice tailored to the needs of African countries, offer educational programmes with degrees on poverty eradication and development for African countries, and help Africa to train specialized personnel in the field of poverty eradication and development.
4.4.4 The Chinese side will, in conjunction with African countries carry out village-community-level small-scale demonstration projects on poverty eradication and cooperate to implement village-community-level comprehensive development projects, help implement Satellite TV projects in 10,000 villages in Africa.
4.4.5 The Chinese side will work with African countries and relevant institutions to launch joint research projects, offer consultancy services on poverty eradication policies for African countries, and send experts and/or volunteers for technical support.
4.4.6 The two sides will mobilize resources including non-governmental organizations to implement in Africa 200 "Happy Life" projects and poverty reduction programmes focusing on women and children.
4.5.1 The two sides will continue to promote the implementation of the "China-Africa Science and Technology Partnership Plan", build joint laboratories / joint research centres in the priority fields of common interest, jointly build agriculture science and technology demonstration parks and assist outstanding African youths and technical personnel to participate in exchanges to and training in China.
4.5.2 The two sides attach importance to knowledge sharing and technology transfer, and will carry out exchanges in technological innovation policies and the building of science and technology parks and encourage research institutions and enterprises to have intensive cooperation.
4.5.3 The two sides will actively launch cooperation in the field of space sciences, and the Chinese side will train professional personnel and share development experience with African countries.
4.5.4 The parties will continue to implement joint research and technology demonstration projects. The two sides will also step-up cooperation in research exchanges through their institutions of higher learning.
4.5.5 China will continue its support of the Square Kilometre Array project, which is a flagship science and technology project of the African continent. The two sides will design joint research projects around the SKA and facilitate the participation of their scientists in the project.
4.6.1 The two sides are satisfied with the progress of cooperation in environmental protection and addressing climate change and will continue to strengthen dialogue on these areas of interest, as well as work closely together on the management of border facilities, search, seizure, and destruction of poached resources, and intelligence gathering to undermine the responsible syndicates, acknowledging their linkages to international organized crime.
4.6.2 To enhance China-Africa environmental cooperation and promote African countries' green development, the Chinese side will introduce the "China-Africa Green Envoys Programme", set up the China-Africa Environment Cooperation Centre, and launch the China-Africa Green Innovation Project under the framework of "China South-South Environmental Cooperation-Green Envoys Programme". China will cooperate with the African side to launch environmental friendly technology cooperation, redouble its efforts to provide training for Africa in the fields of eco-environment protection, environment management and pollution prevention and treatment, push forward dialogue and cooperation on China-Africa green finance, and explore a model of environmental cooperation between Chinese and African governments and non-governmental capital.
4.6.3 The two sides will work together to promote the development of the "China-Africa Joint Research Centre" project and cooperate in biodiversity protection, prevention and treatment of desertification, sustainable forest management and modern agriculture demonstration. The Chinese side will support Africa in implementing 100 clean energy and wild life protection projects, environment friendly agricultural projects and smart city construction projects.
4.6.4 The African side highly appreciates that the Chinese government supports Africa in its efforts to protect wildlife resources. The two sides will strengthen cooperation in the area of wildlife protection, help African countries to improve the protection capabilities, build the capacity of environmental rangers, provide African countries with training opportunities on environmental and ecological conservation, explore the possibility of cooperating on wildlife protection demonstration projects and jointly fight against the illegal trade of fauna and flora products, especially addressing endangered species poaching on the African continent, in particular elephants and rhinos.
4.6.5 The two sides agree to work together to improve management of water resources, and rehabilitate disused mines.
4.6.6 China will advance cooperation with African countries in environmental surveillance, continue to share with African countries the data from the China-Brazil Earth Resources Satellite and promote the application of the data in land use, weather monitoring and environmental protection in Africa, discuss the establishment of meteorological satellite data receiving and processing application system.
4.6.7 The two sides will strengthen the policy dialogue on climate change, deepen China-Africa cooperation in tackling climate change, in particular climate change monitoring, risk and vulnerabilities reduction, strengthening resilience, promoting adaptation, support for mitigation in terms of capacity building, technology transfer as well as financing for monitoring and implementation and improve the China-Africa consultation and collaboration mechanism on climate change.
4.6.8 The African side welcomes the announcement by the Chinese side that it will make available 20 billion Renminbi Yuan for setting up the China South-South Cooperation Fund to support other developing countries to combat climate change, including to enhance their capacity to access Green Climate Fund funds. The two sides agree to enhance China-Africa South-South cooperation on climate change, in order to strengthen and add greater content to the cooperation with African countries to enhance their capacity to implement climate change mitigation and adaptation actions.
4.6.9 The two sides will set up a multi-level disaster reduction and relief cooperation and dialogue mechanism, expand exchanges in post-disaster response and recovery, risk assessment, disaster preparedness and recovery education programmes.
4.6.10 In times of emergency disaster responses, the Chinese side will provide rapid mapping service for disaster emergencies based on space technology at African countries' request.
5.1.1 The two sides will promote dialogue between the Chinese and African civilizations and mutual learning between the cultures of the two sides, while respecting the cultural uniqueness of each, work together to uphold the diversity and progress of human civilization and contribute to the development and prosperity of world culture.
5.1.2 The two sides appreciate that events such as the China-Africa Forum on Cultural Heritage Protection and China-Africa Cultural Industry Round-table provide an effective platform for bilateral exchanges in cultural policies, and will continue to hold similar dialogues.
5.1.3 The two sides agree to maintain the momentum of high-level inter-governmental mutual visits and dialogue in the cultural field and will continue to follow through on the implementation plan of the China-Africa bilateral government cultural agreements.
5.1.4 The two sides will continue to build brand activities such as "Happy Spring Festival", "Chinese and African Cultures in Focus", "Experience China" and hold large-scale cultural exchange activities such as "Africa Arts Festival" at an appropriate time.
5.1.5 The two sides appreciate the hosting of a "Country Year" in their respective countries and encourage more eligible African countries to hold "Country Year" activities with China to deepen understanding of and exchanges between each other.
5.1.6 The two sides will continue to implement "the Programme of China-Africa Mutual Visits between Cultural Personnel" and "China-Africa Cultural Partnership Programme" and support the exchanges and cooperation between Chinese and African culture and art managers, artists and cultural institutions.
5.1.7 The two sides will encourage and support the participation by Chinese and African art and culture groups and artists in international culture and art activities.
5.1.8 The two sides will continue to advocate for the establishment of cultural centres in China and Africa. The Chinese side will help build 5 cultural centres for Africa, and to establish more permanent platforms for cultural exchanges and cultural cooperation.
5.1.9 The two sides will strengthen human resources training in the cultural field. The Chinese side will establish ten major "Culture Training Bases for Africa" and execute the "One Thousand People Programme" for culture training in Africa.
5.2.1 The Chinese side will continue to implement the China-Africa Press Exchange Centre programme, continue to hold training and capacity building seminars for African countries' news officials and reporters, promote more exchanges and mutual visits between Chinese and African journalists and press professionals, train 1,000 African media professionals each year and support exchanges of reporters by more media organizations.
5.2.2 The Chinese side will actively provide technology support and personnel training for the digitalization of radio and TV services and industrial development in Africa. The African side welcomes the involvement of Chinese enterprises in investment and cooperation in building and operating radio and TV transmission broadcasting networks and the marketing of programmes, while ensuring local human capacity building and employment.
5.2.3 The two sides will provide films and TV programmes to each other's respective national broadcasting agencies, explore a long-term cooperative model, continue to participate in film and TV festivals and exhibitions held in their countries, encourage activities of holding film and TV programme exhibitions, and actively launch joint production of documentaries, films and TV programmes. The Chinese side further encourages African countries to produce programmes, conduct exchanges and promote African films and programmes in China.
5.2.4 The Chinese side will continue to take an active part in international book fairs in Africa and carry out cooperation in English book publishing. The Chinese side will encourage Chinese publishing enterprises to donate books on Chinese language learning and other Chinese publications to prestigious African public libraries and the libraries of higher and secondary learning institutes that address fields such as health, agricultural technology, culture and education. The two sides will hold a Forum on China-Africa Publishing Cooperation at an appropriate time.
5.2.5 The Forum on China-Africa Media Cooperation serves as an important platform for China-Africa media cooperation and cultural exchanges. The two sides agree to institutionalize the Forum as an official sub-forum of FOCAC.
5.3.1 The two sides note with satisfaction that the "China-Africa Joint Research and Exchange Plan" has been successfully implemented, which has effectively strengthened cooperation and exchanges between scholars and think tanks of the two sides and provides strong academic support to China-Africa cooperation.
5.3.2 The two sides will continue to hold "FOCAC-Think Tank Forum" and support the building of long-term and stable cooperation between the Chinese and African academia. The two sides further encourage the Forum and research institutions to conduct joint research on themes such as China-Africa industry partnering and industrial capacity cooperation and African industrialization and agricultural modernization to provide strong intellectual support and innovation to China-Africa's win-win cooperation and common development.
5.3.3 The two sides will continue to implement the "China-Africa Think Tank 10+10 Partnership Plan" and encourage think tanks from both sides to expand cooperation, and invite 200 African scholars to visit China each year.
5.3.4 The two sides welcome and encourage support by Chinese and African enterprises, financial institutions and academic institutions for academic interactions and people-to-people and cultural exchanges between China and Africa.
5.4.1 The two sides take note of the successful holding of the 3rd and 4th China-Africa People's Forum, and believe that the institutionalization of the Forum has played an active part in boosting friendship between the Chinese and African peoples.
5.4.2 The two sides appreciate that the "China-Africa People-to-People Friendship Action" and the "China-Africa People-to-People Friendship Partnership Plan" have yielded positive results. The two sides agree to continue small and micro social livelihood projects, promote mutual visits by non-governmental organizations, and encourage and support extensive people-to-people exchanges and cooperation between these organizations.
5.4.3 The two sides appreciate the institutionalization of the China-Africa Young Leaders Forum, which serves as an important platform for China-Africa youth dialogue and cooperation.
6.1.1 The Chinese side continues to support the African Union, its Regional Economic Communities and other African sub-regional institutions that play a leading role in coordinating and solving issues of peace and security in Africa and further continues to support and advocate for African solutions to African challenges without interference from outside the continent.
6.1.2 The Chinese side will provide the AU with US$60 million of free military assistance over the next three years, support the operationalization of the African Peace and Security Architecture, including the operationalization of the African Capacity for the Immediate Response to Crisis and the African Standby Force.
6.1.3 The two sides will maintain the momentum of mutual visits by defence and military leaders, continue to deepen exchanges on technologies and expand personnel training and joint trainings and exercises.
6.1.4 The two sides will strengthen information and intelligence exchanges and experience sharing on security, and will share this information timeously to support mutual efforts in the prevention and fight against terrorism, in particular its symptoms and underlying causes.
6.1.5 The two sides will enhance cooperation in preventing and combatting the illegal trafficking of humans, fauna and flora products, marine products, narcotics, psychotropic substances and precursor chemicals.
6.1.6 The two sides will continue to support the United Nations (UN) in its efforts to play a constructive role in helping resolve regional conflicts in Africa and will intensify communication and coordination with the UN Security Council. The Chinese side will continue to take an active part in UN peacekeeping missions in Africa, offer the African side support on peacekeeping training and intensify communication and coordination with Africa in the UN Security Council, in adherence to UN Security Council Resolution 2033 that recognizes the importance of an enhanced relationship between the United Nations and the African Union, as well as a strengthened capacity of regional and sub-regional organizations, in particular the African Union, in conflict prevention and crisis management, and in post-conflict stabilization.
6.1.7 The African side appreciates the efforts of the Chinese government's Special Representative for African Affairs to actively engage in mediation efforts in Africa, and welcomes his continued constructive role in Africa's peace and security endeavours.
6.1.8 The African side appreciates China's counter-piracy efforts in the Gulf of Aden, the Gulf of Guinea and in waters off the coast of Somalia in accordance with the relevant resolutions of the UN Security Council. The two sides will strengthen cooperation on safeguarding the security of shipping routes in the waters concerned and peace and stability in the region. In this regard, the two sides agree that emphasis should also be placed by the international community on addressing the root causes of piracy, namely poverty, underdevelopment and illegal fishing.
6.2.1 The two sides will strengthen consular cooperation and actively carry out consultations on consular matters.
6.2.2 The two sides will strengthen cooperation between immigration departments and jointly fight against illegal immigration and to protect environmental resources from illegal exploitation. The Chinese side will support African countries in enhancing anti-riot capacity.
6.2.3 The two sides will explore the signing of Criminal Judicial Assistance and Extradition Treaties and strengthen cooperation in the fields of combatting and preventing transnational crimes, human trafficking, corruption and the illegal trade in fauna, flora and associated products, while strengthening narcotics control, fugitive extradition, repatriation of illicit funds and asset recovery, cyber security, and law enforcement capacity building.
6.2.4 The two sides will promote exchanges and cooperation in the judicial, law enforcement and legislative fields, including preventing and fighting transnational organized crimes in accordance with bilateral treaties and multilateral conventions.
6.2.5 The two sides will improve exchanges and cooperation on the judiciary, obtain in-depth understanding of respective legal systems, and promote mutual recognition and application of laws and regulations, so as to provide legal support and a law-based environment for personnel exchanges and the protection of legitimate rights and interests.
6.2.6 The two sides will improve the institutionalization of the "FOCAC-Legal Forum", continue exchanges and training of legal professionals, work together to establish a "China-Africa Joint Arbitration Centre", develop the Professionals Legal Training Base and China-Africa Legal Research Sub-Centre in Africa, and facilitate lectures by law experts from China and Africa. The two sides will actively support the implementation of "China-AALCO Research and Exchange Programme on International Law".
At present, international relations and the global landscape are undergoing and will continue to undergo profound and complex changes, including in terms of globalization and the spread of information. It serves the common interests of China and Africa to strengthen international coordination and to establish a new model of global development that is based on equality, accountability, mutual respect and that is more balanced, stable, inclusive and harmonious.
The two sides are committed to supporting each other in international fora and further strengthen cooperation in areas of trade, finance, environmental protection, peace and security, cultural exchanges, economic and social development and the advancement of human rights, while maintaining the sovereignty to choose their developmental paths.
8.1 The two sides are satisfied that, since the 5th FOCAC Ministerial Conference, the political consultation between Chinese and African Foreign Ministers on the side-lines of the UNGA, the Senior Officials Meeting (SOM), and consultations between the Secretariat of the Chinese Follow-up Committee and African diplomatic missions in China have continued to operate in an efficient and smooth manner.
8.2 The two sides agree that the Co-chairs, in cooperation with the Chinese FOCAC Follow-up Mechanism and the Group of African Ambassadors in Beijing, should conduct a review of FOCAC and develop recommendations to further strengthen FOCAC, drawing on the experience of the last 15 years, including relating to the optimal follow-up mechanism, the functioning of the various agreed FOCAC Sub-Forums including the establishment of certain new sub-forums, and the promotion of the institutionalization of existing sub-forums.
8.3 Following the FOCAC follow-up mechanism procedures, the two sides decided to hold the 7th Ministerial Conference in Beijing in 2018 and, before that, the 12th and 13th SOMs in Beijing in 2017 and 2018 respectively. The 4th political consultations between Chinese and African Foreign Ministers on the side-lines of the UNGA will be held in New York in September 2016.
The slow down of Chinese economy has been making headlines around the world, however there are a number of Chinese emerging cities where the economy is not only growing, but by double digits and accelerating.
Guiyang is the capital of Guizhou province in Southwest China. Guizhou has traditionally been a poor province with an economy heavily relying on state owned enterprises. With the population of 2.8 million, it is now fast becoming a hub of operations for Chinese telecom companies and “Big Data”. Private companies are also following the lead with Alibaba setting up cloud-computing facilities in the city.
Guiyang also serves as an important transportation hub for South Western China: the Guiyang–Guangzhou High-Speed Railway began operations in December 2014. Three more high-speed rail lines to Chongqing, Kunming, and Changsha will commence operations within the next few years. Whilst disposable income per person is currently around USD 5,100/year, almost half of China’s average of USD 9,800/year, this is quickly rising..
The city of Guiyang is one of China's three largest phosphate ore bases, with phosphate ore reserves of 428 million tons and more than 70 percent of the country's phosphate ore. The ore reserves in Kaiyang county alone amount to 390 million tons, or a third of the nation’s high-grade ore. The high-grade phosphorus pentoxide ore accounts for 78 percent of China's total. It also has three chemical industry bases -- the Kaiyang Phosphorus and Coal Chemical Ecological Industrial Demonstration Base, Xifeng Phosphorus and Coal Chemical Ecological Industrial Demonstration Base, and Qingzhen Coal Chemical Base. Total output value of the phosphorus-coal-based chemical sectors in Guiyang, in 2011, was 26.3 billion yuan ($4.29 billion).
The phosphorus-coal-based chemical industry is focused on improving output and efficiency, combining its phosphorus, coal, water, and electricity resources.
With proven reserves of 424 million tons of bauxite resources the province is a major Aluminum producer. Leading enterprises and producers are: Aluminum Corp of China (Chalco), Guizhou Aluminum Industrial Base, Galuminium Group and R&D institutes such as the Guiyang Aluminum Magnesium Design and Research Institute and the Chalco Guizhou Branch. The industry can produce 3 million tons of bauxite annually, as well as 1.2 million tons of alumina, 450,000 tons of electrolytic aluminum, 300,000 tons of carbon for aluminum use, 50 million tons of refined aluminum, and 200,000 tons of high purity aluminum.
Developing the downstream aluminum industry is a current focus in the province. The start of the Chalco aluminium strips project in 2010, with total amount of 150,000 tons and a total investment of 700 million yuan, marked a significant breakthrough in the aluminum deep processing industry in Guiyang.
In 2015 Geely Holding Group Co began construction of its new-energy car manufacturing base in Guiyang. The 0.6-square-kilometer factory consists of a modernized production line of punching press, welding, painting and assembly, and will make methanol-powered automobiles. Geely has made a total investment of around 10.2 billion yuan ($1.6 billion) and expects the first car off the production line in 2017.
Guiyang's Cigarette Factory, a subsidiary of the China Tobacco Guizhou Industrial Co, is a leading provincial enterprise. In the food sector, Guiyang has 47 food companies, covering poultry, chili peppers, corn, soybeans, rapeseed, peanuts, ginger, onions, and garlic, and 10 other product categories, with hundreds of types of food.
The Nanming Food Industry Park and Wudang Food Industry Park are leaders in the food sector in Guiyang. Work on the Longdongbao Food and Light Industry Park, on a 903 hectare space, began in September 2010 and will be completed in 2017. It is expected to pull in 13.6 billion yuan in investment. Work continues on the Wudang Food Industry Park and is expected to bring in nine enterprises during Phase I, and have 1 billion yuan in output value.
Guiyang's equipment manufacturing sector is rapidly and becoming a pillar of industry. Guiyang has a comprehensive array of mid-sized to large equipment manufacturers. The Guizhou Jonyang Kinetics Co is a domestic leader in hydraulic excavators, Guizhou Xianfeng Industrial Co is one of the Top 10 producers of large slide grinders and forging equipment and the Guiyang Xintian Oetech Co. focuses on the production of high-tech optical instruments. With its abundance of skilled workforce R&D capacity and production strengths, Guiyang has been able to build an industrial capacity that covers seven equipment manufacturing industries. It has industrial clusters in construction machinery, automobiles and automobile parts and electronic components.
With the support of the municipal government, Guiyang's logistics sector has grown and is playing an important role in the local economy. Guiyang is headed to become a regional logistics center with it`s two logistics hubs -- the Guizhou Mengguan International Logistics Center and Longdongbao International Aviation Logistics Park (and three regional logistics parks: Zhazuo Logistics, Qingzhen Logistics, and Jinhua Logistics). It further expects to build: cargo logistics, more distribution centers, dry ports and a bonded zone.
Guizhou province is known for its herbal medicines and has turned its pharmaceutical sector into a pillar of industry over the past decade It now has 74 pharmaceutical companies and an industrial structure that covers a diverse range of biological products, Chinese patent medicines, pharmaceutical chemicals, medical consumables, and Chinese medicinal decoctions.
China Telecom will invest 4-billion yuan ($469 million) in optical network construction, cloud computing, and big data development over the next three years. The aim being to turn Guiyang into a major data center for China: the municipal government sees the big data industry as key to its future economic development and has already established preferential policies for big data entrepreneurs.
The China Telecom Cloud Computing Guizhou Information Park covers an area of (33.3 hectares) in the Gui'an near the city. The first phase of the park , already completed, comprises eight datacentres, one power centre and two support centres. It is expected to accommodate one million servers.
By the end of 2017, cities and towns in the province are expected to have 100-megabyte broadband coverage and a fourth generation network in rural and urban areas and, at the same time, the two will cooperate in a Guiyang cloud computing platform, a municipal data sharing platform, and a Guizhou Internet exchange center.
1. Encouraged industries located in West China are levied corporate income taxes at a discount of 15 percent. Resource taxes for those enterprises are levied via ad valorem instead of specific duties.
2. Qualified high-tech enterprises located in the high-tech industrial development zone approved by the State Council are levied corporate income taxes at a discount of 15 percent.
3. Enterprises established in the different districts and industrial development zones within Guiyang can enjoy local preferential policies.
As of last year, the Shanghai municipal government has revised its restricted industries list for foreign investors and updated it for the Free Trade Zone (FTZ). Amendments made to current list are not considered a major change but a revision to the 2014 initiatives. The list below outlines industries where foreign investors are treated differently to domestic companies. There are number of changes where we believe there are various opportunities for new investors in the three FTZs.
- Agriculture, crop seeds, fishery and animal husbandry is a critical subject and remains sensitive to Chinese citizens. Fishing in certain waters is due to approval from Chinese government.
-All initiatives needs to be approved by concerned government bodies.
-rare earths, radioactive materials, tungsten, molybdenum, tin, antimony and fluorite is prohibited. It is restricted for lithium, precious metals and graphite.
- Multiple restrictions in manufacturing industry is now lifted. These includes, the processing of rice, corn, edible oils, tea, alcohol, tobacco and chemicals, anesthesia and blood products are now allowed.
- Construction vehicles, motorcycles and new energy vehicle batteries is lifted.
- It is still prohibited to operate news websites, online publications, online audiovisual programs or broadcasting of information on the internet. Except for music and those sectors that have been lifted as China’s membership of the World Trade Organization.
- If a domestic enterprise cooperates with a foreign enterprise to create official online content and news, needs prior approval from National Security Review.
- Foreign investors can now set up e-commerce companies in Fujian, Guangdong, Tianjin as well as Shanghai.
- Foreign banks may not conduct the following activities, also included in the Commercial Banking Law: acting as an agent to issue, honor and underwrite government bonds, issuance of bank cards and the acting as an agent for receipt and payments of funds. Apart from taking time deposits for Chinese nationals of less than 1 million RMB, foreign banks in China may not engage in RMB activities for Chinese nationals.
- The parent company of a foreign invested bank in China must provide its operational funds free of charge. The foreign invested bank must operate with an eight percent RMB capital reserve. Banks providing RMB services must follow the minimum required business hours.
- Foreign law firms may only be present in China through a representative office, which is subject to approval. Foreign nationals may not advice on Chinese law or become partners of a Chinese law firm. Representative offices of foreign law firms may not hire Chinese legal professionals, and its support staff may not provide legal advice.
- Market research is restricted to contractual or joint ventures with Chinese controlling interest.
- Foreign entities may not independently establish schools and educational institutions mainly enrolling Chinese nationals. This does not include "non-academic vocational training"
- Medical institutions can be set up as an equity or contractual joint venture.
- Sino-foreign productions of television and film series are subject to a licensing.
- Foreign news agencies may set up a representative office in China and employ foreign reporters upon approval of the Chinese government.
- Foreign press agencies may provide news services in China upon approval of the Chinese government.
- The establishment of performing arts groups in China is prohibited, and performance agencies must have Chinese controlling.
Beijing`s satellite townships are now in the spotlight in view of the Governments aim for the integrated development of Beijing, Tianjing and Hebei provinces, know as Jing-Jin-Ji. Over the next 15 years it is planed to transfer non-essential functions out of Beijing to the new townships.
A 40 minute metro ride east of Beijing`s CBD area is Tongzhou (pop.1.3 million est.), where construction of a new CBD area and Universal studios theme park are well under way: built at the intersection of the Beijing & Hangzhou Grand Canals, the new town is expected to cover over 80 square kilometers. Tongzhou will also be home to the new Beijing city Municipal Governmental Offices at Lucheng town: some 6km east of the new CBD. Also expected to relocate are state-owned-enterprises, hospitals and universities. Planners hope the area will draw in a further million people, the first phase of the project due to be opened in 2017.
The local government has agreed to fund 86 key projects in the area, setting aside over 160 Billon RMB. Currently housing prices run in the 30,000-40,000 rmb/sqm range.
As part of a move to connect and integrate transport, Beijing is to build its third civil airport, Daxing International Airport, located adjacent to Daxing district in Beijing and Langfang in Hebei province. It is due to be completed by the end of 2017 and operational in 2018 it is expected to carry 120 million passengers by 2050.
The Biomedical base is 60 minutes, via metro, from Bejing`s CBD area with numerous office and residential complexes already completed. As part of the district's growth, a new 391,000 sq m above- and belowground mixed-use development—dubbed the Vanke-Shoukai Mixed-Use Development Daxing—is also under way, scheduled to be completed in 2017.
Beijing will remain the national center of political, cultural, and international exchange activities as well as a technological innovation center.
Tianjin municipality will be a national research and development base for advanced manufacturing industry, a shipping hub for north China, a demonstration area for financial innovation, and an experimental area for further reform and opening up.
Hebei province will be an important national base for trade and logistics, an experimental area for industrial transition and upgrading, a demonstration area of modern urbanization and coordinated development of urban and rural areas, and an ecological buffer zone.
A medium-term aim of the strategy is to control the permanent population of Beijing within 23 million and to relieve air pollution and congestion. Long term, the strategy aims to form an integrated region of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, with a better economic structure, a cleaner environment and improved public services.
Industrial Parks in the Jing-Jin-Ji area.
Established in 2006, Tongzhou Industrial Park covers two industrial bases: Opto-Mechatronics Industrial Park and Jinqiao Science and Technology Industrial Base. The park has a total planned area of 14.5 square kilometers of which 11.41 square kilometers have already been developed. 360 enterprises have accessed the park, including 30 high and new-tech enterprises at national level and 76 at Zhongguancun park level.
Tongzhou Park prioritizes world-class industries of optic-mechanical integration, environmental protection and new energy, high-end equipment manufacturing. The park features microelectronics, optoelectronics, automotive electronics, avionics, advanced equipment manufacturing, intellectual instruments, laser technology, numerical control machine, printing machinery, medical equipment, semiconductor material, environmental protection equipment and auto parts.
The park project has so far invested 2.2 billion yuan ($346.28 million) to construct essential infrastructure and thus creates a favorable environment for production and R&D,.
Daxing Biomedicine Industrial Base is a biotechnology industrialization base built by the Beijing Municipal Government to revitalize its modern manufacturing industry. Being a bio-industry cluster area for the Bohai Economic Zone and the entire northern region, the base holds industrial functions such as biotechnology indigenous innovation, product R&D, industrialization of technical achievements, R&D and producer services in Beijing.
Situated in Daxing New Town in Beijing, 20 kilometers away from the urban area, 50 minutes' drive to Beijing Capital International Airport. The base is not far from Subway Line No.4 and the new international second capital airport.
The base has four development and support priorities – biopharmaceutical projects centering on vaccine and protein drugs; the import of modernized and internationalized TCM enterprises to drive the growth of medicine, health care products; the introduction of medical instrument programs to consolidate the leading position of Beijing in the field of instrument and diagnosis; and last but not least is to bring in innovative drugs and high-end generic drug industrialization projects to form preparation products that meet international certification standards.
Fengtai Science and Technology Park was established in 1991. It was listed as a national high and new-tech zone in April 1994 and was one of the earliest three sub-parks of the Zhongguancun Science and Technology Park.
Fengtai S&T Park realized a total revenue of 195 billion yuan ($30.69) in 2010, and has obtained strong industrial agglomeration effects. The major industries in the park include: electronic information, biomedicine, new materials, new energy, as well as engineering services, rail transit, military aerospace, cultural and creative industries and producer service industry. With more than ten years of development, the park has gradually formed the headquarters of an economic zone and is playing an increasingly important role in the development of southern Beijing.
The Beijing Economic Technological Development Area (Yizhuang) is the only state-level economic and technological development zone in the city, a core region for high-tech and modern manufacturing industries. It will become a cluster for the high-tech manufacturing and strategic-emerging industries in southern Beijing.
In 2010, the administrative resources of Daxing District and the BDA were integrated to form an industrial development pattern of "one base and six parks" with the BDA as an industrial development main platform to stimulate the planning and construction of six special parks: Daxing Biological Medicine Base, New Media Industrial Park, New-Energy-Vehicle Industrial Park, Military-Civilian Combination Industrial Park, Manufacturing Services Industrial Park and New Airport Industrial Park.
By the end of 2011, more than 4,800 enterprises from more than 30 countries and regions had come to the BDA, along with more than 100 projects invested in by 77 of the global top 500 corporations, along with high quality, domestically funded projects.
The leading industries are electronic information, bio-medicine, equipment manufacturing and automobile production industries; a communications industry cluster led by Nokia, a display industry cluster led by BOE, a microelectronics industry cluster led by SMIC, a medical equipment industry cluster led by GE, a bio-pharmaceutical industry cluster led by Bayer and an automobile industry cluster led by Beijing Mercedes have also been established.
Yanqing Park, a sub-organization of Zhongguancun Science Park, was founded in October 2010. Located in the northwest of Beijing the park covers an area of 4.91 square kilometers.
Part of the Beijing new energy base, the park has founded a high-end service industry area with the development of high-end equipment manufacturing, general aviation and modern service industries, finance and insurance background services, and research and development training.
Fangshan Park is composed of Beijing Petrochemical New Materials High-Tech Industry Base, Beijing High-end Manufactureing Industry Base, Liangxiang Economic Development Area, Beijing Haiju Foundation and Higher Education Park. It has an area of 15.73 square kilometers.
(1) Beijing Petrochemical New Materials High-tech Tech Industry Base.
It is one of the first 62 new industrialization demonstration bases in China. It is an important carrier of strategic cooperation between the Beijing municipal government and Sinopec and one of five industry bases under planned construction in Fangshan district.
The East District focuses on fine chemistry, petrochemical new materials and crucial projects. The West District is the core area of Yanshan Petrochemical.
(2) Beijing High-End Manufacturing Industry Base.
Changan Automobile, BWI Group, China CNR Corporation Limited, National Energy and Jinpengpa Unmanned Aerial Vehicle have settled here.
Haiju Base is a new effort to adjust the industry structure in the district. It complies with the National Thousands of Talents Plan and Beijing Haiju Project and is a focal point for leaders in the city and district.
Currently, there are eight projects in the base, including Beijing Feihang Jida Aviation Technology, the Environmental Protection of Xishan district project, Ntong Technology Co, Beijing Grish Co and Beijing Dongfang Xupu Technology Co.
It is one of the two higher education parks approved by the Beijing municipal government. The park is divided into the college park, central landscape area, central device area and allocation area.
There are six colleges and universities in the park. The construction of the graduate school of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing Institute of Technology, Capital Normal University, and Beijing Technology and Business University in the first stage has been completed with over 27,000 students and teachers. Plans are underway to construct Beijing University of Chinese Medicine and Beijing Vocational College of Transportation.
Supply Chain Leaders: YTO Express.
Founded in 2000, China`s largest and fastest growing express delivery company, YTO now employs more than 180,000 workers in 20,000 delivery centers across China. YTO delivered 14 billion packages last year. It`s services cover warehousing, distribution and special transport. In 2014 it launched it`s 90% owned subsidiary YTO Cargo Airlines which initially began operations, out of its Hangzhou hub.
Shanghai Yuan Tong Express Co., Ltd. (YTO Express) is now the largest express delivery business, by market share, in China after taking advantage of the booming domestic e-commerce industry. Yu Weijiao, YTO chairman, has turned the company into a market leader in China. With 84 centers in Beijing alone and 20,000 country-wide, the group is taking advantage of the government's decision to realign the economy from cheap, mass-produced exports toward more sustainable consumer-fuelled domestic growth.
In 2015 the company's revenue reached 204 billion yuan ($37.79 billion), up 42% compared to the same period in 2013, during a time of slowing economic activity, up to 19 billion yuan of which was indirectly generated by express delivery services, and that figure is expected to reach 60 billion yuan by 2020.
During the 2015 Singles' Day on Nov. 11th, the company received a record-breaking 53.28 million orders across China. The group handled more than 30.59 million packages, or roughly 21 percent of the industry's total.
Key to YTO's success has been expansion: from YTO's humble beginnings in 2000 when it started with a meager investment of 50,000 yuan and employed 17 staff the group now employs 180,000 staff and operates a network that covers about 93 percent of the counties across the country. In 2014, YTO delivered 2.1 billion packages, generating revenue of 24.6 billion yuan. The maximum number of parcels handled in a single day last year hit 25 million.
With huge growth potential in the Express delivery sector amid strong competition from competing companies only the strongest companies are expected to survive, while smaller players are likely to link up with the leading companies such as YTO.
As the State Council approved a proposal to promote the development of the express delivery sector, which will be worth 800 billion yuan by 2020, the key is to increase international competitiveness and expanded air delivery capacity facilitating the rapid rise of cross boarder e-commerce.
YTO also plans to expand its air cargo operations as the company completed the maiden flight of its first aircraft in September 2014. It hopes to have a cargo fleet of 50 aircraft by 2020 and 100 in 2025.
Although YTO has plans to take the company public, a timetable has yet to be announced, as the company is aiming at building a highly competitive international network first: last year, the group set up an overseas business department and the company has registered its trademark in more than 100 countries.
They plan to establish about 20 overseas branches in countries including South Korea, Australia, the United States, Thailand, India, Russia and France.
Designed to provide financial support for infrastructure development and regional connectivity in Asia the bank is headquartered in Beijing, China. Its first President, Mr Jin Liqun was elected in January 2016. The purpose of the Bank is twofold: to foster sustainable economic development, create wealth and improve infrastructure connectivity in Asia by investing in infrastructure and other productive sectors; and secondly promote regional cooperation and partnership in addressing development challenges by working in close collaboration with other multilateral and bilateral development institutions.
Under its Articles of Agreement, the AIIB's functions include: (i) promoting public and private investment in the Asia region for development, in particular for infrastructure and other productive sectors; (ii) utilizing the resources at its disposal for financing such development in the region; and (iii) encouraging private investment that contributes to economic development in the Asia region, in particular in infrastructure and other productive sectors, and supplementing private investment when private capital is not available on reasonable terms and conditions.
As of January 2016 the founding members are: Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Brazil, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, China, Denmark, Egypt, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Iran, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Korea, Kuwait, Kyrgyz Republic, Lao PDR, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Maldives, Malta, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Oman, Pakistan, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Thailand, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam.
The authorized capital stock of the AIIB will be US$100 billion, divided into 1 million shares having a par value of US$100,000 each. The original authorized capital stock will be divided into 20% paid-in shares and 80% callable shares.
The basic parameter for allocation of capital stock to members is the relative share of the global economy of members (based on GDP) within the regional and non-regional groupings, with the understanding that the GDP share is indicative only for non-regional members.
What are AIIB's key financial instruments?
The AIIB will focus principally on financing specific projects or specific investment programs, equity investments; and guarantees. It may: (i) make, co-finance or participate in direct loans; (ii) invest in the equity capital of an institution or enterprise; (iii) guarantee loans for economic development; (iv) deploy Special Funds resources in accordance with the agreements determining their use; or (vi) provide other types of financing as may be determined by the Board of Governors. Special Funds would be donor funds that are given to the Bank for use consistent with its purpose and functions.
In addition to the capital subscribed by members, the AIIB will raise funds primarily through the issuance of bonds in financial markets as well as through the inter-bank market transactions and other financial instruments. The AIIB may raise funds, through borrowing or other means, in member countries or elsewhere, in accordance with relevant legal provisions.
Hainan Airlines is the fourth largest carrier in China in terms of fleet size. However, it is the only airline based in the People’s Republic to earn a five star rating from Skytrax (not counting Hong Kong’s Cathay Pacific).
Much of Hainan’s service is focused on its namesake island, which is becoming a major tourist destination for both domestic and international travelers. In addition to its main base in Hainan’s provincial capital, Haikou, the carrier has a hub in Beijing and a number of focus cities around China (including in economic hotspots like Chongqing and Shanghai).
Now, the upstart airline is trying to take its five-star reputation to the bank by continuing to expand its international route offerings. The carrier plans to launch service to both Tel Aviv and Manchester, England starting next year.
Hainan has adopted a strategy that has become rather popular amongst up-and-coming airlines. In Manchester, they have found a market that has yet to be tapped. London residents already have nonstop connections to Beijing, but Manchester does not yet have such a service. Hainan’s goal is to create a new “air bridge” between Northern England and China. This kind of service is often appreciated by people in “secondary” cities because it means they do not have to travel to another hub in order to fly overseas.
This is not the first long-haul route that the airline has added to Hainan’s map. In fact, the Manchester service, slated for takeoff in June of 2016, will be the sixth major transcontinental route launched in recent times. The airline’s Beijing-San Jose flight is another example of trying to develop service in a new, underserved marketplace. Today, most transpacific flights take off from SFO, requiring a train or taxi trip north for travelers from San Jose and other parts of the Southern Bay Area.
Hainan Airline’s other new long-haul routes are Chongqing-Rome, Shanghai-Boston, Shanghai-Seattle and Beijing-Prague.
According to the carrier, more intercontinental flights are in the works. Hainan is banking on its image as a premium airline to differentiate itself from others in the crowded Chinese marketplace. They claim to have better food, better service and more spacious seating than the competition. These claims are backed up to a certain extent by the Skytrax rating, which is based on flier survey results. Billing itself as a premium airline has always worked quite well for one of Hainan’s main competitors, Cathay Pacific.
Hainan has also become a major player on the domestic front. It has snapped up or launched a number of regional carriers including business-oriented Beijing Capital Airlines, Fuzhou Airlines and Kunming-based Lucky Air. They are also a minority stakeholder in Hong Kong Airlines.
Hainan Airlines is obviously focused on leaving its niche behind and becoming one of the major players in China’s long-haul and domestic marketplaces. The strategy of expanding into underserved destinations like Manchester could work in the airline’s favor. At the very least, it is a welcome trend both for Chinese travelers (and East Asian fans of Manchester’s two popular soccer franchises) and for English fliers who are heading to China and don’t want to have to connect through London or another European hub.
The business of selling airline tickets and resort vacations to China's holiday-happy middle class is now a battleground for Internet giants, following a deal that brings Ctrip.com International Ltd. to the fore.
Ctrip was already the country's biggest online travel agency before announcing a share-swap agreement on October 27th that gave it virtual control of traveler services provider Qunar Cayman Islands Ltd., a subsidiary of the Internet search giant Baidu Inc.
In the deal, Baidu transferred 45 percent of its stake in Qunar to Ctrip. In turn, Baidu got a 25 percent stake in Ctrip. The swap strengthened Ctrip's grip on what market research institution iResearch says is China's 270 billion yuan online travel agency market. Ctrip already owns 37 percent of eLong Inc. and 6 percent of Tuniu Corp.
The tie-up of the two Nasdaq-listed companies with a combined market value of US$ 18 billion set the stage for a three-way travel market battle pitting Baidu and its new partner Ctrip against the nation's dominant social media company Tencent Holdings Ltd. as well as e-commerce leader Alibaba Group.
Tencent has an online travel information section on its qq.com platform, an instant messenger. The company has also invested US$ 84 million in travel service provider eLong in 2011 and US$ 78 million in LY.com in 2014.
Alibaba, meanwhile, has had one foot in the travel agency door since 2010 by selling ticket and hotel booking services through its Tmall and Taobao websites. It's also invested millions of U.S. dollars in several online travel sites including qyer.com and baicheng.com. And in October 2014, Alibaba formally launched its own travel service division called Alitrip.
But through their new partnership, Ctrip and Qunar now account for nearly 70 percent of all revenues generated through the country's online travel market.
Alitrip's is pitching it`s service as an open platform through which travelers and qualified service providers can find each other. Future plans call for offering various traveler conveniences, such as hotel room deposit waivers based on a client's credit record with Alibaba. In its first year of operations the company signed up more than 100 million members and averaged more than 10 million daily webpage views. But it's still lags behind Ctrip and Qunar.
And although big brands rule the market, a number of new players have recently joined the online travel services game. One is the group-buying website company Meituan.com, which for the second half of this year reported 5.3 billion yuan worth of hotel bookings as well as 1.8 billion yuan worth of other travel-related deals. Meituan established a new division in July aimed at expanding its services.
China is also seeing traditional, storefront-based travel agencies increasing their online exposure opportunities through a growing number of new websites.
Nevertheless, the country's online travel giants have fortified their market positions in ways that should keep their new rivals at bay for a long time. For several years the market had anticipated a Ctrip-Qunar merger.
The main focus of the merger is as a way to streamline business and counteract competitive pressure since many domestic companies in this industry are running in the red.
For the second quarter, Qunar reported an 816 million yuan loss. Elong.com registered a 356 million yuan loss and Tuniu said it lost 292 million yuan in the same period.
Ctrip outperformed its rivals by posting a 143 million yuan net profit for the second quarter, a 5.9 percent increase from the same period last year.
Baidu, meanwhile, has been singled out by market analysts as the biggest winner in the deal between Ctrip and Qunar. The search engine had controlled Qunar since buying a 62 percent stake for US$ 306 million in July 2011, just a few months after expanding into what was then a fledgling market for online travel services.
Ctrip and Qunar will likely continue to operate separately yet complement one another. Ctrip will focus on the business traveler, hotel and ticketing operations, while Qunar will function mainly as a platform for a variety of travel services based on packages, search and price comparisons.
But the merger also presents challenges for the companies involved. Baidu, for example, must figure out how to integrate and distribute traffic and resources between Ctrip and Qunar. In the short term Ctrip and other travel booking sites are expected to continue relying on investments to keep their businesses growing whilst being forced by the competitive environment to offer services at discounted rates. | 2019-04-22T20:33:35 | http://www.china-brain.com/resources.php?page=4 |
0.998907 | At around quarter to ten on a Wednesday night in March, a small figure with Icelandic blonde hair walks onto the stage at the Vortex Jazz Club and starts plucking a refrain on a ukulele. As the audience realises what is happening, the murmur of conversation subsides and she asks how everyone is, and introduces herself.
The musician in question is Ólöf Arnalds, a singer who, like many musicians from her native Iceland, defies categorisation. This is the second of two nights at the Vortex Jazz Club in Dalston, London, to promote her latest single, 'Surrender' (on which she duets with Iceland's most famous export, Bjork), and the room is packed.
Each song is played on one of a range of string instruments, accompanying Arnalds unique, folkish voice. She introduces each with a few words about who or where the song is about, a smile that lights up the room, and is greeted with a laugh from the audience who are being treated like close friends being told a secret. There is a song about her older sister (played on the guitar), followed by a song about her younger sister (played on the charango); a song about four friends from Reykjavik, with a verse for each; a song about Skúli Sverisson, a close friend and musical collaborator; and a song by Skúli Sverisson. There is a cover of Bob Dylan's 'She Belongs to Me', and even a short instrumental number about a town in the East of Iceland called 'Seyðisfjörður', where it's 'hip to be an artist', according to the introduction we are given.
We interviewed Ólöf Arnalds by email before the evening's entertainment to find out a little more about her.
What is your songwriting process? For example, do you decide one day to sit down and write some music, or are you inspired by things you see and experience that give you ideas?
I'm constantly writing music in my mind. Usually my ideas go around in my head for months before I start trying them out on instruments. When I get them I deliberately don't write them down because if they survive and I remember them then I think they are worth having a look at.
How do you decide when to write in English and when to use Icelandic?
To be honest I don't know. It just depends on the mood I'm in and how the song speaks to me.
Now that you're getting international recognition, the majority of people who hear your music won't necessarily understand Icelandic. Do you worry that people will miss out on some of the emotion of those songs in your native language (despite the album sleeve notes with translations)?
I don't worry about it because I listen to a lot of vocal music myself where I don't understand the language and I don't feel that it gets in the way of having an emotional understanding of that music.
Did you write 'Surrender' specifically with Bjork in mind? What made you choose her as your vocal partner?
I had finished writing and recording Surrender before Bjork came into the picture. I met up with her to play her the mixes of the record and she got an idea for a vocal part that she offered to record and said I could use it if I wanted and edit it as I liked.
Are there any other musicians you would like to work with on future projects?
There are some people that I'm looking into involving in my next project, but I like the idea of that revealing itself once the record has been made.
When you're not writing or performing, what do you do to unwind?
Daydream, swim, go for walks, meet up with friends.
What would you say is the biggest lesson that life as a touring musician has taught you?
Well for starters, it isn't as easy as it seems. I try to be friendly to people I meet and no matter how sick or tired I am I put everything that I've got into my performance. Otherwise it's not worth it.
Back at the performance, Ólöf Arnalds is inviting the people crammed at the back of the room by the bar to come and sit with her on the stage. It is a strikingly warm gesture and only adds to the impression that this is a very special performance just for those lucky enough to have made it to the intimate venue tonight. Nobody who is here will forget this evening. Ólöf Arnalds is a rare and unique artist who is to be treasured. | 2019-04-23T21:57:24 | https://www.thefourohfive.com/music/article/olof-arnalds-vortex-jazz-club-london-02-03-11-interview |
0.99771 | Do I need to install Windows XP and/or Windows 2000 to the first primary partition, or is it possible to install it to eg. the second primary so, that when the first primary is hidden, all the boot and system files will be placed to the same partition (eg. second primary)?
So I don't want to divide those boot and system files between P1 and P2 (being first and second primary), and I don't want to use the first primary. The P1 would be hidden or possibly even partition ID changed to gnu hurd type or something, that W2k/XP don't recognize, if needed.
I'm asking this, because the above is the way I have done my multiboot systems with W7/W8/W10 - using small P1 for grub4dos. However, when I once installed XP to an old computer, I put it to P1, generalized the BCD and used the image for cloning it to another partitions. So I put the grub4dos files to the P1 with the original XP installation. I did it because at least at the time, I thought XP was impossible to install straight to P2 (so that all the boot and system files would be there at P2 too, for easy generalizing & imaging & restoring to other partitions).
Now I'm planning to use another old computer for W2000/(possibly XP too)/linux multiboot system, because an old game needs W2k, so if I can install W2k/XP straight to P2 and P2, using P1 only for grub4dos files, it would be less hassle.
Another question: I don't necessarily need to clone W2k/XP images to logical partitions (that I did with W7/W8W10), but is it possible to boot W2k/XP from logical partitions so, that all the boot and system files are there too, at the same partition? The way it is possible to do with W7/W8/W10, aka generalizing BCD first before cloning it from primary, then respecializing it to the destination logical partition where the image is restored (without need for things like editing partition tables or other tricks, because correctly respecialized BCD is the key, at least for Vista and later OS's).
Some corrections to the above will follow. It was a few years ago, when I set up a multiboot system with Windows XP, and forgot a few differences with later systems (from Vista onwards).
I didn't need to generalize BCD with XP to successfully deploy a cloned P1 (first primary) installation to P2 and P3. I didn't have a need to deploy the image to logical partitions (but now I'm wondering if it would have been possible - without tricks like altering partition tables - and this was the second part of my question, especially to the expert here, Wonko - by doing the BCD generalizing pre-cloning like with Vista+ systems, but with bootfcg.exe instead of Vista+'s bcdedit.exe). I did, however, successfully deploy the XP image to other primary partitions P2 and P3, with only some registry editing pre-cloning.
The reason for this is simple cloning and deploying to other partitions with my methods while using the first primary only as a small 128 MB grub4dos partition. And if I want to do a relic multiboot system with both XP and W2k, I could install them straight to P2 and P3 from CD instead of installing one of those OS's (eg. W2k) to the (large) P1, then making the image from it, installing second OS (eg. XP) again to the P1, and deploying from those images to P2 and P3 (or perhaps to logical partitions, if it's possible). And the whole time using combined system/boot partitions.
Edited by sir_bootalot, 21 October 2016 - 04:06 PM.
There is nothing to "generalize" in NT/2K/XP, you just make sure that you have an entry pointing to the right ARCPath.
The real issue (on both NT/2K/XP and Vista and later) is about drive lettering that may need some tricks to be made the way you want it to be, like using an expressly made migrate.inf.
Ok, there was no BCD pre-Vista, my mistake. That's what I remembered originally, but got confused because of something I read about using bootcfg.exe instead of bcdedit (to edit BCD, was written somewhere, errornously).
Anyway, drive lettering isn't a problem because 1) this will be quite a minimal relic system just for some old games 2) they should go in place with some registry editing and booting, like in Vista -> W10.
2) This isn't necessary for me now, but I'm still interested: would it be possible to clone the W2k/XP installed to P1 or P2 to a logical partition so, that all the boot files used would be there at the logical partition too, making that logical partition both system and boot partition. (That's how I did it with Vista+ OS'es, and I generalized the BCD pre-cloning) And what actions would it need that those W2k/XP on logical partition systems booted? Editing boot.ini? That's all? I might try it just to see if it works, though.
And all above using grub4dos.
Edited by sir_bootalot, 26 October 2016 - 04:44 PM.
making P2 active. Then the boot files go to P2, making P2 both system and boot partition.
Yes, the boot files ntlr and boot.ini goes to the active partition.
Did you changed active partitio to P1.
Set active partition to P2 before XP booting.
Create a disk image and copy ntldr and boot.ini. Map the disk image at grub4dos to a virtual hard disk. Boot this virtual disk.
Only to add some info.
When you format a filesystem under NT4/2K or XP automatically a bootsector invoking NTLDR is created (regardless if the volume is a primary partition, active or non active or a logical volume inside extended partition).
When you format a filesystem under Vista or later a bootsector invoking BOOTMGR is created (as well regardless if the volume is a primary partition, active or non active or a logical volume inside extended partition).
If you need to replace the boot code wyou can use the bootsect.exe tool with the parameter /NT52 or NT60.
Still, the default MBR code will always chainload the Active partition bootsector (while a bootmanager like grub4dos can chainload *any* volume's bootsector). | 2019-04-21T04:27:45 | http://reboot.pro/topic/21284-multibooting-w2kxp-strange-ways-with-grub4dos/ |
0.999816 | Build on What You Know You read in Lesson 1 that Constantine renamed the city of Byzantium Constantinople. That city became the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. Because of the city's original name, historians call the Eastern Roman Empire the Byzantine Empire.
Mosaic of Justinian - Justinian regained lost lands and briefly reunited the Eastern and Western Roman empires. He is considered one of the Byzantine Empire's most important emperors.
ESSENTIAL QUESTION How did Justinian restore the Eastern Roman Empire?
The Byzantine Empire continued for about 1,000 years after the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Like the emperors of the Western Roman Empire, the emperor of the Byzantine Empire was its absolute ruler. Also like the Western Roman Empire, the Byzantine emperors struggled to keep Germanic peoples, Huns, and others out of their lands. Despite their efforts, much Byzantine land was lost to invaders.
One emperor was able to restore control over the former lands of the Eastern Roman Empire. Justinian was emperor from A.D. 527 to 565. His armies reconquered lost territories, including Italy, northern Africa, and the southern coast of Spain.
Hagia Sophia - Built by Justinian, Hagia Sophia was the greatest of all churches in Constantinople. Today it is a museum.
Justinian also began to rebuild Constantinople, which had suffered much damage from a revolt. He rebuilt the city walls. He also built schools, hospitals, law courts, and churches. The most famous church was Hagia Sophia (HAY•ee•uh soh•FEE•uh). Constantinople was again a glorious city.
Justinian appointed a committee to create a uniform code of law based on Roman law. These experts dropped outdated laws and rewrote others to make them clearer. The new code was called the Justinian Code. The code included laws on marriage, slavery, property ownership, women's rights, and criminal justice.
Although they spoke Greek, Byzantines thought of themselves as part of the Roman cultural tradition. Byzantine students studied Latin and Greek, and Roman literature and history. In this way, the east preserved Greek and Roman culture. In the former Western Empire, the Germanic peoples blended Roman culture with their own. However, they lost much of the scientific and philosophical knowledge of the Greeks and Romans.
Theodora was an empress of Byzantium—which was unusual, considering her background. Theodora was an actress, and Byzantine society looked down on actresses. Yet Justinian, the heir to the throne, married Theodora in A.D. 525. His choice was a good one.
Justinian and Theodora became emperor and empress in 527. In 532, rioters threatened to overturn the government. Theodora urged Justinian not to flee. She herself refused to leave. Her courage inspired Justinian, and his generals put down the rebellion.
Later, Theodora had laws passed that helped women. Divorced women gained more rights. She founded a home to care for poor girls. She also offered protection to religious minorities.
Theodora's mosaic portrait may still be seen in the Church of San Vitale in Ravenna, Italy.
ESSENTIAL QUESTION Why did the Christian church divide?
The division of the empire also affected the Christian church. Religious practices developed differently in the Christian churches of the east and of the west. Cultural practices and limited contact between the two areas caused these differences.
Another difference had to do with the authority of the emperor over church matters. In the east, the emperor had authority over the head of the church. In the west, there was no emperor and the pope began assuming more responsibilities in governing the former Western Empire.
Problems between the two churches began to grow. The pope claimed authority over the churches in both eastern and western empires. In A.D. 1054, delegates of the pope attempted to remove the eastern head of the church. The eastern church responded by refusing to recognize the authority of the pope.
Finally, the Christian church split in two. The church in the west became known as the Roman Catholic Church. Catholic means "universal." The church in the east became the Eastern Orthodox Church. Orthodox means "holding established beliefs." Over time, the split led to the development of two separate European civilizations. Each had its own view on the relationship between church and state.
The pope claimed authority over Christian emperors and kings. This authority allowed the Roman Catholic Church to influence government in the lands that were once a part of the Western Roman Empire. Disagreements between the church and some kings and emperors of Western Europe would later cause major conflicts in European history.
In the Byzantine Empire, the emperor was the absolute ruler. He had power over the church as well as the government. This meant that the emperor had power over the spiritual head of the Eastern Orthodox Church. Overall, the Byzantine emperor had greater power than the emperors or kings in the west.
ESSENTIAL QUESTION What happened to the Byzantine Empire?
For many years after the division of the Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire continued to carry on Roman traditions. But it was not easy. The Byzantine Empire faced constant threats from both the east and the west.
In the 600s, a new religion called Islam began in Arabia. Muslim armies arose and attacked nearby territories and Constantinople. Later, civil wars, as well as attacks by Ottoman Turks and Serbs, further weakened the empire. By 1350, all that remained of the Byzantine Empire was a tiny section of the Anatolian peninsula and a strip of land along the Black and Aegean seas.
Finally in 1453, an army of Ottoman Turks captured Constantinople. The city's conquest marked the end of the Byzantine Empire—a thousand years after the fall of the Western Roman Empire.
Lion of St. Mark - The winged lion stands guard near the Byzantine-style Cathedral of St. Mark located in Venice, Italy.
Emperor Justinian regained much of the Roman Empire's land and helped preserve Roman law and culture.
In 1054, the Christian church divided into the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches.
The pope of the Roman Catholic Church played a greater role in government in the west than the leader of the Eastern Orthodox Church played in the east.
Today millions of people practice their faith as members of the Roman Catholic Church or the Eastern Orthodox Church. | 2019-04-22T00:05:38 | https://nsms6thgradesocialstudies.weebly.com/the-byzantine-empire.html |
0.999997 | 'Felicity' co-creator Matt Reeves will executive produce 'Away,' which is inspired by Chris Jones' Esquire story.
Jason Katims is blasting off with Netflix.
The Friday Night Lights and Parenthood showrunner has landed a 10-episode, straight-to-series order for space drama Away at the streaming giant.
Written by Katims and Andrew Hinderaker (The Path, Penny Dreadful), Away is loosely inspired by Chris Jones' Esquire story of the same name. The project is described as an epic love story and thrilling tale of survival set against humanity’s greatest endeavor — the first human mission to Mars.
The series revolves around Emma Green, an American astronaut who must leave her husband and teenage daughter behind in order to command an international space crew embarking upon a treacherous, yearlong mission. Away explores themes including hope, humanity and how people need one another if we are to achieve impossible things.
Hinderaker penned the pilot. Katims, in addition to contributing writing duties on the series, will executive produce alongside Felicity co-creator Matt Reeves. The drama hails from Katims' Universal Television-based True Jack Productions banner and Reeves' 6th and Idaho shingle. Former True Jack topper Michelle Lee, who developed the series before she departed for Apple, will exec produce the first episode. Her replacement at True Jack, Fullscreen's Jeni Mulein, will co-exec produce episodes two through ten. Reeves' 6th and Idaho executive vp Adam Kassan will also serve as an exec producer. Hinderaker will also be credited as a co-EP after working briefly with Katims on his since-canceled Hulu cult drama The Path. Negotiations are underway to bring in a showrunner to oversee the series.
Jones' March 2015 feature followed astronaut Scott Kelly's yearlong mission on the International Space Station, which was considered the most ambitious manned space mission in decades. Jones spent three months reporting on the mission.
For Katims, Away comes weeks after NBC opted to cancel his high school theater drama Rise after one season and a month-plus after Hulu opted to cancel the Aaron Paul, Hugh Dancy and Michelle Monaghan drama The Path after three seasons.
Away arrives as Reeves is making a concerted push on the small screen. His Fox genre drama The Passage was picked up to series at Fox after it was redeveloped when it narrowly missed the cut last year. On the film side, his credits include The Cloverfield Paradox, which made waves when it was released on Super Bowl Sunday on Netflix. He also wrote and directed 2017's War for the Planet of the Apes and helmed 2014's Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.
Away comes to Netflix as space dramas continue to be a hot genre on both the big and small screens. Hulu is teaming with House of Cards creator Beau Willimon for the Sean Penn vehicle The First, while Amazon revived The Expanse for a fourth season after Syfy's unexpected cancellation. On the feature side, Ryan Gosling stars as Neil Armstrong in Damien Chazelle's First Man, among others.
Katims is repped by CAA and Schreck Rose. Reeves is with CAA, 3 Arts and Jackoway Tyerman. | 2019-04-26T16:20:36 | https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/jason-katims-space-drama-ordered-series-at-netflix-1118769 |
0.999922 | Sara and Hannah spent an hour with Charlie, asking him the questions that some of his readers have been asking them. Below are the questions that they asked Charlie and Charlie's answers to those questions!
Sara: For how long have you been writing stories?
Carrots has been kidnapped and is being held to ransom. Lucie believes the kidnapper to be the 'interesting boy' who lives across the street. However, when Phileas offers to help Lucie rescue Carrots she knows it can't be him and the pair set out to rescue her 'Prince amongst leaves' from a gang of ruffians who definitely get more than they bargained for.
'Carrots' Bad Day' will first be published for Kindle, then as a paperback.
'Carrots' Bad Day' is the first 'Lucie & Phileas' adventure and there will be more. The next, 'The Mara and The Alien' will be out very soon, but not before you've had a chance to enjoy this story.
Also, look out for the next fable, ‘Peggy and Little Boy Lost’, which will be published in the near future and that story, together with 'The Marmoset who shared his lunch', will be published in paperback, as well as for Kindle. | 2019-04-23T04:19:27 | http://www.bookbuzzr.com/books/16505/carrots-bad-day-the-lucie-phileas-adventures |
0.999997 | How Do Economists Define Statistical Discrimination?
The phenomenon of statistical discrimination is said to occur when an economic decision-maker uses observable characteristics of individuals, such as the physical traits that are used to categorize gender or race, as a proxy for otherwise unobservable characteristics that are outcome relevant. So in the absence of direct information about an individual's productivity, qualifications, or even criminal background, a decision-maker may substitute group averages (either real or imagined) or stereotypes to fill the information void. As such, rational decision-makers use aggregate group characteristics to evaluate individual characteristics that may result in individuals belonging to certain groups being treated differently than others even when they are alike in every other respect.
According to this theory, inequality may exist and persist between demographic groups even when economic agents (consumers, workers, employers, etc.) are rational and non-prejudiced.This type of preferential treatment is labeled "statistical" because stereotypes may be based on the discriminated group's average behavior.
Some researchers of statistical discrimination add another dimension to the discriminatory actions of decision-makers: risk aversion. With the added dimension of risk aversion, statistical discrimination theory could be used to explain actions of decision-makers like a hiring manager who shows a preference for the group with the lower variance (perceived or real). Take, for example, a manager who is of one race and has two equal candidates for consideration: one who is of the manager's shared race and another who is a different race. The manager may feel more culturally attuned to applicants of his or her own race than to applicants of another race, and therefore, believe that he or she has a better measure of certain outcome-relevant traits of the applicant of his or her own race. The theory holds that a risk-averse manager will prefer the applicant from the group for which some measurement exists that minimizes risk, which may result in a higher bid for an applicant of his or her own race over an applicant of a different race all other things equal.
Unlike other theories of discrimination, statistical discrimination does not assume any sort of animosity or even preference bias toward a particular race or gender on the part of the decision-maker. In fact, the decision-maker in statistical discrimination theory is considered to be a rational, information-seeking profit maximizer.
It is thought that there are two sources of statistical discrimination and inequality. The first, known as "first moment" statistical discrimination occurs when the discrimination is believed to be the decision maker's efficient response to asymmetric beliefs and stereotypes. First-moment statistical discrimination may be evoked when a woman is offered lower wages than a male counterpart because women are perceived to be less productive on average.
The second source of inequality is known as "second moment" statistical discrimination, which occurs as a result of the self-enforcing cycle of discrimination. The theory is that the individuals from the discriminated group are ultimately discouraged from higher performance on those outcome-relevant characteristics because of the existence of such "first moment" statistical discrimination. Which is to say, for example, that individuals from the discriminated group may be less likely to obtain the skills and education to equally compete with other candidates because of their average or assumed a return on investment from those activities is less than non-discriminated groups. | 2019-04-21T08:32:16 | https://www.thoughtco.com/the-economics-of-discrimination-1147202 |
0.957392 | From front of dartboard to the circle - 237 cm?
The Shining and was changed by Stanley Kubrick to #237 in the film version of King's book.
I'm reading a book at the moment called Bullseye !, about achieving your goals and is an analogy about the bulls-eye at the centre of the dartboard that you aim for.
Interestingly enough, you are supposed to be at least 237cm away from a dartboard to throw a dart, and we see Danny playing darts in the movie The Shining, which is famous for the room 237 and what takes place in it.
I've also just bought a new washing machine and the default setting is a cotton wash that goes for 217 minutes (Room number for 237 in the King novel) and always comes up when you turn the machine on.
My new washing machine and the default 217 minute wash cycle.
Also the author of Bullseye! writes how he used to be a manager of a ski resort in Canada in his book.
The Big White Ski Resort that Blake was a manager of.
All work and no play? Jack throws a tennis ball.
Tennis ball rolling to Danny in The Shining.
A picture from the Big White Ski resort's website of dog retrieving a tennis ball.
I like how synchy it is that Blake uses the Apollo mission footage to introduce his You Tube above, considering the theories in the movie Room 237 about the moon landings and their connection to Kubrick's movie The Shining.
"In 2015, people from 75 countries participated in Pay it Forward Day with individuals working on proclamations in 42 states & 48 cities."
I have to first confess that I'm not one for having much faith in people who call themselves "psychics".
From my experiences of attending a few Spiritual Churches in my hometown and watching people who call themselves psychic work, I have to admit that I'm left feeling very disappointed in what I have seen with the majority of so called psychics and what they have to say.
Although, I do believe there are genuine psychics out there in the world, I have to say that I tend to recoil from people who call themselves psychics, because most are just self-deluded individuals with egos to be fed, or flat out con artists just after people's money for a few blanket statements of comforting words.
But I have to say the clip of Harry T above is very well worth listening to for the wisdom and heart felt words expressed, which really resonate with my own feelings on a lot of the subjects discussed in the clip above.
I have no idea what Harry T is like as a psychic, but his heart and ego do seem to be in the right place.
I received this e-mail today and I thought it was important enough to pass on to readers like you who may wish to support the independent media underdogs against the media barons such as Rupert Murdoch and his monopolizing media takeovers.
It doesn't even matter what country you live in on the planet you can still lend a hand whether you buy a subscription, or just sign up to receive a free newsletter.
Every bit helps in the bid to keep an independent voice alive in the media.
Right now, Echonetdaily subscribers like you are helping us to fight Rupert Murdoch’s growing control of the media in Australia.
Murdoch’s News Corp recently became the major shareholder in APN, the company that publishes the Northern Star, Byron Shire News, Ballina Advocate, Tweed Daily News and Lismore’s Northern Rivers Echo. But few people realise just how much News Corp’s political-influence footprint has grown throughout Australia in recent months.
At the same time, funding for government bodies such as the ABC and SBS is being cut, and they are under commercial pressures.
How could any politician or government resist this kind of influence? Without independent media like the ABC, The Echo, and Crikey, everyone will start to believe that mainstream media tells the truth.
Even more money is siphoned offshore to multinationals who pay little or no tax. Apart from News Corp, other major shareholders of APN are multinational corporations. And if you think online media will fix the problem, just consider how much tax Google pays in Australia (virtually none). Communities thrive on small businesses circulating money locally, not large companies sending it out of the area.
Huge online companies are getting too much power. Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc monitor your every online move, because if you can be told what to think you can be told what to buy.
Keep your subscription to Echonetdaily, and email your friends to encourage them to subscribe (it’s free, as you know). This shows potential advertisers that independent media is valued.
Support our advertisers. Even if you don’t buy anything from them, let them know that you value their support of independent media – they may not realise how important they are to the survival of a free press.
After all, twice as many people read The Echo as the Byron News .
Email [email protected] to tell the General Manager of the Byron Shire Council that you would have preferred council advertising to stay with the company that’s 95% locally owned (Council recently switched from The Echo to support the Murdoch-owned APN papers such as the Byron News and Northern Star).
Go to crikey.com.au and buy a subscription.
Support community radio (in the Byron area the station is called BayFM) – they have independent programming and opinions.
The Murdoch influence in Australia is unprecedented in the history of democracy. Even the news agenda of the ABC and Fairfax is partly a response to coverage in the Murdoch-owned press. The Echo has to source much of its international and national news from AAP Community radio often sources its coverage from Murdoch-owned media. We need to value what independence we have left.
If you’re sick and tired of the mainstream press multinational spin, and media manipulation of weak politicians, please keep your strong stance, vote with your wallet if possible and tell others how much you value an independent press in your area.
Source: investorcentre.apn.com.au June 17, 2015.
Source: Roy Morgan Research June 11, 2015.
AAP is 45% owned by Fairfax and 45% owned by News Corp. See politics.aapnewswire.com.au/Home/AboutUs.
A sincere thank you to those who signed up, even if it was only for a free newsletter.
Synchronicity's - The deal you made with the Universe?
Interesting video on the theory of Synchronicity that I stumbled across on a Google search.
and there are a lot of them banking up at the moment, which I feel I need to write...so stay tuned.
I've been told by my friend Andrew West Griffin that Leigh was a heartthrob star on "Dallas" in the 1980's.
Leigh as Mitch Cooper in the TV show "Dallas".
He played Mitch Cooper in that show.
I was never into "Dallas" and I'm still not, but I find his artwork and explanations of his artwork fascinating and worth checking out.
"A TV show host who systematically exposed fraud and superstition is killed in a forest where he intended to disprove the existence of the Latin-American mythological 'goat-thief', at first sight in the way the fable creature strikes.
Suspects include parties he exposed but also professional rivals.
Booth patiently sits trough Bones' pitiful attempt to practice humor and welcomes her explanation for his sole 'cryptozoological' encounter with an apparent yeti."
L. Coleman Appears On "Bones"
A Dalai Lama Miracle the Day After His Visit to the Red Centre?
"A hail storm in Central Australia that turned the Red Centre white has been met with a mix of joy and bewilderment.
The ice blanketed the ground around Alice Springs on Saturday afternoon, with people stopping their cars on the roads out of the town to capture the phenomenon.
Ray Rowe took video from the side of the road and wrote "So much ICE in Alice Springs right now".
The video, posted on the ABC Alice Springs Facebook page, has been shared over 7,000 times.
Bureau of Meteorology forecaster Angeline Prasad described the event as "unusual".
but [it is] more common during spring and summer." "
The Dalai Lama on his first visit to Uluru,Central Australia,yesterday.
"On his first visit to Uluru, the 79-year-old met with traditional owners at a sacred waterhole, where he spoke of the need for respect for the traditional cultures of the area.
"They are [the] local people right from the beginning, so their culture — it is very important to keep their cultural heritage," he said.
He emerged from his meeting hand-in-hand with two local Anangu women and told of one woman he met who could speak 80 traditional languages.
The Tibetan spiritual leader said he was astounded by the complexity of the local culture and told those in attendance they could preserve precious Aboriginal custom and traditional knowledge by adapting modern technology.
"The important part is, in different parts of the world, indigenous people, local people, they have their own cultural heritage, so that's the main reason [I am here]: in order to express my respect to your (Australian indigenous) culture," he said.
The Dalai Lama encouraged local Aboriginal people to maintain traditional names.
"It is important to keep their own traditional name — modern education, modern dress, but they would keep their traditional name," he said.
That message has gained the attention of local traditional owners, who said the Dalai Lama's support could help improve the wellbeing of their people.
The spiritual leader also spoke of his scientific fascination with Uluru.
"Monks, we always stress the importance of investigation, so therefore I am very, very keen to see future discussion from scientists about these rocks, the basis of the material."
Later, hundreds gathered on a local football oval to hear the Dalai Lama talk about the Tibetan pursuit of happiness."
The Dalai Lama is greeted on his arrival at Uluru.
"A Taiwanese man who was airlifted off Uluru after being trapped on the rock for more than 24 hours is recovering in hospital."
The 27-year-old fell about 20 metres into a crevice high on Uluru on Thursday and spent the night with multiple limb fractures and head injuries.
He was rescued in what police described as a slow and difficult process involving a helicopter and an abseiling operation.
The man is now stable and in a general ward in Alice Springs Hospital.
Keith Hutton, who coordinated the tourist's rescue, said the operation took 10 hours because of dangerous conditions on the rock."
"what does it all mean?".
The IBM Building and The 13 Floor?
"THE IBM building in Brisbane’s CBD is now back in the hands of the owner after a fire broke out in the ceiling of the 13th floor today.
Fire investigators conducted atmospheric testing in the building due to the excessive amount of smoke.
Special equipment, known as a MultiRAE, was used to declare the scene safe.
Most of the personnel and equipment had left the scene by 4pm.
Edward St has also reopened after being partially closed after the fire broke out around 12pm.
Investigators will return to the site in the morning."
"Computer scientist Hannon Fuller has discovered something extremely important.
(which looks like the 30's with seemingly real people with real emotions).
Fuller is murdered in our real world the same night, and his colleague is suspected.
Douglas discovers a bloody shirt in his bathroom and he cannot recall what he was doing the night Fuller was murdered.
He logs into the system in order to find the letter, but has to confront the unexpected.
The truth is harsher than he could ever imagine..."
I watched The 13th Floor for the first time last night (October 31st).
Not as good as I hoped it would be, but it was worth a watch...just.
at the moment and have to say that it is well worth the read from what I have read so far.
My friend Trish at Synchrosecrets wrote a post about using intuition to pick Powerball numbers, which is funny, because I've been doing the same thing for the last few weeks and like her I've had some good success rates (so far) at getting the powerball right, but failing at getting the normal numbers right. | 2019-04-19T22:46:00 | https://brizdazz.blogspot.com/2015/06/ |
0.998541 | The success or failure of the bilingual/bicultural approach to educating children who are deaf depends on the relationship between ASL proficiency and English literacy. If no such relationship exists, or if a negative relationship exists, the bi/bi approach will be unlikely to succeed.
Bilingual advocates often present Jim Cummins' Linguistic Interdependence Theory in support of a bilingual approach to education. According to the Linguistic Interdependence Theory, a language user possesses an underlying set of cognitive and language abilities that are similar to the base of an iceberg. The surface features of a language are similar to the caps of an iceberg. If a person knows two languages, it is like having a two ice caps with a common underlying base. As the theory goes, if you already have a language base, it is easier to acquire a second language (Cummins, 1989).
The question though is, does a knowledge of signed ASL enhance or expedite the acquisition of English literacy?
Not only is ASL a different language than English, it is also expressed via a different mode. English is expressed via speaking and writing. ASL is signed. Hearing, English-speaking people tend to develop inner speech that is for the most part similar to their spoken or outer speech. Writing is based on a person's inner speech. If a Spanish speaker wants to become literate in English, he can use his underlying proficiency in Spoken Spanish to expedite his acquisition of spoken English. He then has two bridges to written English. One is to bridge from spoken English to English based-inner-speech, then to written English. The other bridge is to utilize his underlying proficiency in writing Spanish as an aide to learning written English. Both of these bridges (acquisition of spoken English and transference of pre-existing writing skills) are, for the most part, not available to deaf children (Chamberlain, Morford, & Mayberry, 2000).
Since ASL has no widely established written form, (with a nod, tip of the hat, and polite applause to the Sutton's and their Signwriting system) it would be difficult to establish that there are any "reading and writing" skills to be transferred and applied to the acquisition of English reading and writing skills by deaf students.
In the absence of transfer of reading and writing skills, what then is the benefit of a deaf child learning ASL or using a bi/bi approach in the pursuit of English literacy? It seems fairly obvious that since ASL is expressed visually and gesturally that it is acquired by individuals who are deaf more readily than are spoken languages. The acquisition and use of a language enhances and promotes an individual's cognitive and metalinguistic abilities. These same cognitive and metalinguistic abilities then help facilitate the acquisition of written English.
Michael Strong and Philip Prinz conducted a three year study of 155 deaf students in which they found a statistically significant positive correlation between a high degree of ASL fluency and English literacy. What is interesting about their study is that they ranked their participants at three levels of ASL proficiency: low, medium, and high. Those participants who had low levels of ASL proficiency, having a deaf parent corresponded to higher English literacy skills than students with hearing parents. The participants who had medium or high levels of ASL proficiency had correspondingly good English literacy skills regardless of the hearing status of their parents (Chamberlain et. al., 2000).
Cummins, J. (1989). Empowering minority students (1st ed ed.). Sacramento, Calif. (926 J St., Suite 810, Sacramento 95814): California Association for Bilingual Education.
Emmorey, K., Lane, H. L., Bellugi, U., & Klima, E. S. (2000). The signs of language revisited an anthology to honor Ursula Bellugi and Edward Klima. Mahwah, N.J Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. | 2019-04-19T01:25:36 | http://www.lifeprint.com/asl101/pages-layout/literacy1.htm |
0.999931 | It’s seems like every week a new acronym is created and added to the IT industry parlance. A Term that is gaining more traction is RMAD, but what does it mean?
In a nutshell Rapid Mobile Application Development (RMAD) takes practices and principles of Rapid Application Development (RAD) and applies them to mobile. The models are based on concepts of higher-quality products can be developed quickly implementing lean and agile processes, including early prototyping and software component re-use and utilizing code-free programming tools to create applications for mobile platforms.
Generate a complete working mobile app quickly using a single platform.
Provide faster end-to-end app development capabilities.
Tools classified as RMAD provide end-to-end capabilities, from backend integration to front-end app development.
RMAD is used to describe a generic category of vendors who provide alternate and faster approaches to mobile app development. Two of the leading vendors in this space are PowWowMobile and Capriza.
Why RMAD is needed ?
The majority of the Enterprises have invested a lot of money developing and integrating a number of desktop and web applications to deliver too deliver convenient, centralised, scalable collaborative experiences for staff to function productively. However with the introduction of Mobile computing platforms, such as Mobile phones and tablet computers, there is increasing demand for enterprise developers to build mobile apps.
To deliver new mobile applications will often require developers to learn new programming languages and platforms. In a vast majority of cases organisations will need to attract and employ new skilled software developers or engage in expensive training programmes to re-train existing staff.
There is also increased risk experienced due to the need to completely re-architect or implement changes to existing stable platforms.
Most enterprise software development teams will experience that demand for mobile applications will often exceed their capability to deliver them. This also hampered by the fact that 80% of most IT budgets are spent on maintaining existing systems, leaving little room for innovative projects aimed at capitalising on new opportunities.
The Standish Group Chaos report highlighted that 94% of large IT projects either fail, over-shoot the budget and schedule, or deliver below expectations due to various factors.
RMAD enables business owners or decision makers to simplify the process of developing enterprise apps. RMAD tools have made it possible to generate functional apps much quicker, allowing companies to respond to new market developments as they occur, rather than in a few months down the line.
Utilising a platform like PowWowMobile , enterprises can generate new mobile applications easily integrating them with existing enterprise applications without the need for developing custom Rest API. This enables quick and easy prototyping of ideas, along with creating functional mobile applications that can be tested out in the field quickly.
There certainly is a lot of confusion out there amongst many Enterprise IT departments about which is the best strategy to take when developing mobile applications. This is compounded by the many half truths and misinterpreted messages that many mobile developers .
if you are thinking of developing for the mobile application market, an important decision is to decide between developing a native application or a hybrid one.
It’s an age old question that refuses to go away, we thought it was time to revisit… Which is the best?
Building native applications means using the native language of the platform, Objective-C on iOS, and Java on Android. The main advantage of native applications is their performance. Native apps are compiled into machine code (Dalvik byte code under Android), which gives the best performance you can get from the mobile phone.
The fact is that Native and Hybrid fulfil very different needs and preferences of users and developers and neither of them is perfect solution for all use cases. The fact is that if you are just developing Line Of Business applications then chances are a Hybrid solution will be more than adequate for your needs. The average lifespan for Line of Business mobile application is in the region of 12-24 months. This is due to the fact the Work place and practices are constantly evolving, and as companies continually evolve and innovate to meet and exceed customer expectations they will need to be able deliver quickly.
Despite a proliferation of cheap mobile devices within the corporate environment and even BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) policies, the typical employee will still only be able to use their device for basic productivity tasks such as Email and Calendaring.
Today CIO’s are well aware of the benefits of mobilising key enterprise applications, however the challenge has been that traditional mobile application development is expensive and time consuming. Rebuilding sophisticated enterprise applications requires teams of business analysts, developers and testers which are already busy.
Probably 80% of your enterprise mobile use cases are going to be things like approvals, information updates, data lookups, or quick data entry (e.g., making a vacation request). RMAD solutions are perfect for these use cases. MADP systems tend to be best for very custom applications built for very specific business needs or as your consumer-facing experience.
Successful enterprise mobility is about agility and learning. With an RMAD platform, you can quickly get use cases out to your employees and start delivering value in a fraction of the time and cost of a typical MADP (Mobile Application Development Project). You will learn tremendously from these first solutions, and this will help you to choose wisely where you want to make bigger investments.
So, should you jump on RMAD bandwagon?
RMAD platforms would make a suitable option for you if an app that does the basic things is all what you need. In addition to providing you with quick results, rapid mobile application development will help you save significant money as well. | 2019-04-23T00:58:11 | https://threenine.co.uk/what-is-rmad/ |
0.999438 | Q. How can I return downloadable eBooks and eAudiobooks?
You don't have to return any downloadable titles. eBooks and eAudiobooks are automatically returned to the library at the end of your lending period, so you never have to worry about late fees.
Some (but not all) downloadable titles can be returned early.
Visit www.aacpl.net/ebooks, click on Cloud Library, and login to your Cloud Library account. Click the My Books tab. Next to the title you wish to return, click the Check In button.
From your mobile device -- open the 3M app and log in. Tap My Books. Tap the Return button; then a Return button should appear next to each title. Tap Return.
The PC app does not currently support early returning of titles.
If you'd like to return an Overdrive checkout early, click here for instructions.
You can't return downloaded Open PDF eBooks before the end of the lending period.
You can only return downloaded Open EPUBs from OverDrive's app for Android, Chromebook, iOS, or Windows 8.
In your Kindle Library, click on the Actions dropdown menu next to the book you want to return and choose Return this book.
Select Yes to return the book.
After you return the book, it will still show in your Kindle Library because Amazon likes to show you your reading history. To remove it from the list, click Actions again, and choose Delete from library.
The title will remain on your Kindle until you re-sync the Kindle with your Amazon account.
Visit RB Digital from the Library website and login to your account.
Click on the "i" icon underneath the title you would like to return.
RBDigital eMagazine titles never expire and never have to be returned. There is no limit on how many you can borrow at a time. You may choose to delete them to save space on your device, but you are not required to do so. | 2019-04-21T08:47:48 | http://askus.aacpl.net/faq/160506 |
0.99999 | Q: Is it possible to connect an older desktop computer to a wireless network?
A: Yes it is possible to connect an older desktop computer to a wireless network. The first thing you have to do is figure out what operating system you are running. You will need to know this to make sure you get a wireless adapter that will work with your computer. To figure this out you should be able to just turn on your computer and eventually there should be a big splash screen that says Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows ME, Windows 2000, Windows XP, etc.
For best results you should consider going with a wireless PCI card. This does require you have an available PCI slot in your computer. The downside to this is you have to open up your computer and install the card or you can bring it to a computer shop and have them do it for you for a little bit of money.
The other option would be to to go with a wireless USB adapter. This is a little easier because you just connect it to your USB connection but it is not as powerful and most require that you have USB 2.0 so you will have to do some research to make sure your USB ports are USB 2.0 or better. | 2019-04-21T00:54:42 | http://www.askageek.com/2010/02/17/connect-an-older-desktop-computer-connected-to-a-wireless-network/ |
0.998587 | Q. How can I stop squirrels from eating the roots of my outdoor potted plants?
Squirrels can really make a mess digging for tasty bulbs or for places to hide nuts. But they won't invade if the soil surface is uncomfortable to their paws. So laying down chicken wire or hardware wire can deter them from digging. Alternatively, imbed bamboo cooking skewers vertically in the soil, with the pointed ends protruding up from the soil.
Large stones: Cover all exposed soil with stones too heavy for squirrels to easily push aside. Obviously this method won't work for seedlings or plants just breaking the soil surface, but it can be effective for established plants.
Crushed red pepper: sprinkle a little on the soil of your potted plants. Squirrels, like humans, can taste the spicy hot flavor, and once they’ve tasted it, they’ll try to avoid it. The spiciness of the pepper will not harm your plants. However, it’s not unthinkable that some brands may contain viable pepper seeds. Do some experiments first before you commit to using this across all your potted plants. Ground garlic and ground cloves are also distasteful to squirrels.
Vinegar: Some squirrels are repelled by the scent of cider or white vinegar. Place vinegar-soaked rags near plants, or spray vinegar onto hard surfaces such as plant pots.
Predator hair: Place human, canine or feline hair in mesh bags near your plants. Squirrels usually steer clear of an area that smells like one of their many predators. | 2019-04-24T17:02:14 | http://libanswers.nybg.org/faq/222921 |
0.999905 | An easy to prepare appetizer that is bursting with flavor, this exotic starter is full of Asian-inspired flavors. Prepare the night before and marinade overnight for an easy treat, or whip up a batch to wow last minute guests.
In large, shallow bowl combine mustard, soy sauce, honey, lime juice, garlic and ground red pepper. Whisk until blended. Remove and reserve ½ c. of marinade and set aside.
Add beef to marinade and toss to coat. Cover and marinate for 20 minutes.
Remove beef from marinade. Discard marinade. Place beef and onions onto metal skewers, alternating meat and onions.
Place skewers on prepared grill. Grill, uncovered for 10-12 minutes, basting frequently with reserved ½ c. marinade until meat is cooked through. Serve immediately.
This was really nice, the beef steak soaked up the marinade beautifully. I will make again.
Average rating of 5.00 stars based on 1 reviews.
Summary: An easy to prepare appetizer that is bursting with flavor, this exotic starter is full of Asian-inspired flavors. Prepare the night before and marinade overnight for an easy treat, or whip up a batch to wow last minute guests. | 2019-04-20T06:18:23 | http://beefrecipes.us/spicy-beef-satay.html |
0.999969 | Heat lamps are incandescent light fixtures whose main purpose is to provide a focused source of heat, although they also provide light as well. Heat lamps are most commonly used in places like showers and bathrooms, which are often the coldest places in the house – particularly in winter. Their advantage in these rooms is that they provide fast, radiant heat, and are reasonably economical to use for short periods. Likewise, they're often integrated into waterproofed units that also incorporate an exhaust fan.
Heat lamps are often integrated with exhaust fans.
How do heat lamps work?
Traditional light bulbs work by heating the tungsten filament in the bulb to such a high degree that it produces visible light energy. Heat lamp bulbs, on the other hand, have optimised filaments (usually made out of quartz) that resist electricity, resulting in the production of excess amounts of infrared radiation, which acts directly to heat the human body. Heat lamp bulbs normally include internal reflectors which serve to focus the light and heat straight down on a specific area.
Standard heat lamp bulbs typically consume about 200-250 watts of power, and as such are considerably more efficient than radiant bar heaters. Heat lamps can be quite bright, and the bulbs often feature red filters to reduce the amount of visible light they emit.
Electric heat lamps are typically designed for domestic use, and come in all kinds of shapes and styles. They can be wall-mounted, recessed, free standing, and they are often integrated with an exhaust fan for ventilation purposes. These types of units normally feature separate switches for the fan and the heat lamp components.
Where should I use one?
Heat lamps are designed to provide a small but concentrated source of heat, which makes them ideal for use in smaller areas like bathrooms, or to complement the heating in larger areas. There are heat lamps available that can be used in the kitchen to keep food warm as well. As most of the light will be blocked by the red filters (and because they're far less efficient than most 'light' bulbs), it’s generally inadvisable to use heat lamps as your primary lighting unless it’s for a relatively confined space, and where you need heat as well.
If you are planning to put a heat lamp in your bathroom, be sure to check that your bulb is waterproofed to a rating of IP67. Avoid positioning the heat lamp too close to things like towels or clothes, as they can be burnt. Heat lamps are most commonly instsalled on the ceiling to optimise their use - normally just above the space where you step out of the shower to dry yourself.
Heat lamps are also said to have therapeutic benefits, helping to provide relief for muscle aches and pains. While basking in the warmth from a heat lamp can be soothing, it’s important to remember not to stand too close to one for too long, as your skin can get burnt from overexposure to the intense heat.
How energy efficient are heat lamps?
Although heat lamp bulbs operate on a slightly higher wattage than other incandescent light bulbs, they're relatively energy efficient as far as instant sources of heat go.
Heat lamps should be installed by professional electricians.
With heat lamps, can the bulbs be replaced with a red filter bulb?
I want to do sauna therapy -- a NEAR infrared sauna therapy.
Not 100% sure what you're referring to when you say a 'red filter bulb' - if you mean a regular incandescent bulb that's coloured/filtered red, then the answer's probably no.
Heat lamps are designed with a special filament that optimises the way they give off energy (i.e. one made of quartz rather than tungsten). A regular tungsten bulb with a red filter is likely to be designed to give off energy as visible light more than infrared. | 2019-04-24T06:05:40 | http://www.build.com.au/heat-lamps |
0.997961 | 1. Tammy is competing in a 10-mile race. She bicycled 4 miles in 36 minutes. Assuming she keeps racing at the same speed, how long will it take her to complete the entire race.
Sorry, the answer is 90 minutes. This question is taken from a seventh-grade standardized test. It's asking a student to apply knowlede he should have learned in school. However, many of the other questions on standardized tests ask students to utilize information gained at home. Even if a student answered every question related to what he's learned in school correctly, he still might receive a poor score. This is unfair to the student who works hard at school, but whose home life is lacking in academic stimulus.
Sorry, the answer is 90 minutes. This question is taken from a seventh-grade standardized test. It's asking a student to apply knowlede he should have learned in school. However, many of the other questions on standardized tests ask student to utilize information gained at home. Even if a student answered every question related to what he's learned in school correctly, he still might receive a poor score. This is unfair to the student who works hard at school, but whose home life is lacking in academic stimulus.
Sorry, the answer is 90 minutes. This question is taken from a seventh-grade standardized test. It's asking a student to apply knowlede he should have learned in school. However, many of the other questions on standardized tests ask students to utilize information gained at home. Even if a student answered every question related to what he's learned in school correctly, he still might receive a poor score. This is unfair to the student who works hard at school, but who's homelife is lacking in academic stimulus.
Way to go! This question is taken from a seventh-grade standardized test. It's asking a student to apply knowlede he should have learned in school. However, many of the other questions on standardized tests ask students to utilize information gained at home. Even if a student answered every question related to what he's learned in school correctly, he still might receive a poor score. This is unfair to the student who works hard at school, but whose home life is lacking in academic stimulus.
2. Which of the following countries is located on the same continent as Brazil?
Sorry, it's Argentina. This question is taken from a sixth-grade standardized test. Once again, this question tests school smarts. Many questions on standardized tests not only test school smarts but also assess knowledge gained at home. This is unfair to the child who has an unsatisfactory home life. If all the questions on standardized tests assessed a child's school smarts, it would even the playing field. However, equality transltes into a lesser range of scores. A large range of scores is what test-makers are shooting for.
Congrats, you're right. This question is taken from a sixth-grade standardized test. Once again, this question tests school smarts. Many questions on standardized tests not only test school smarts but also assess knowledge gained at home. This is unfair to the child who has an unsatisfactory home life. If all the questions on standardized tests assessed a child's school smarts, it would even the playing field. However, equality transltes into a lesser range of scores. A large range of scores is what test-makers are shooting for.
3. A plant's fruit always contains seeds. Choose the item below that's not a fruit.
Sorry, it's celery. This question is taken from a sixth-grade standardized test and is testing knowledge that a child usually gains at home. A child whose parents can routinely afford to purchase fresh fruits and buy a fresh pumpkin to carve before Halloween is at an advantage.
You're right, but a child who's from a more affluent family gets a break on this item. This question is taken from a sixth-grade standardized test and is testing knowledge that a child usually gains at home. A child whose parents can routinely afford to purchase fresh fruits and buy a fresh pumpkin to carve before Halloween is at an advantage.
Sorry, it's carpenter. This question is taken from a fourth-grade standardized test and it's also too dependent on a child's background. If a child comes from a well-to-do family that has been able to do some home remodeling, that child will be well-versed in a carpenter's use of a saw. So once again, the child with the higher socioeconomic status is at the advantage.
You're right, but this question may not be fair to some students. This question is taken from a fourth-grade standardized test and it's also too dependent on a child's background. If a child comes from a well-to-do family that has been able to do some home remodeling, that child will be well-versed in a carpenter's use of a saw. So once again, the child with the higher socioeconomic status is at the advantage.
5. Larry wants the total of numbers in circle A to be equal to the total of numbers in circle B. Which two number tiles should he trade?
Sorry it's B -- tiles 4 and 2. This question isn't fair for many students. It's taken from a seventh-grade standardized test and it assesses a child's number smarts. People have many different kinds of intelligences -- mathematical, musical, linguistic -- to name a few. Standardized tests often only asses one or two of the seven intelligences. The child who may be musically or spatially gifted never gets to show his smarts.
You're right! However, this question isn't fair for many students. It's taken from a seventh-grade standardized test and it assesses a child's number smarts. People have many different kinds of intelligences -- mathematical, musical, linguistic -- to name a few. Standardized tests often only asses one or two of the seven intelligences. The child who may be musically or spatially gifted never gets to show his smarts.
6. Which of the animals has moved the most from Scene A to Scene B?
The correct answer is the elephant. This question is taken from a fourth-grade standardized test and it assesses a child's picture-smarts. This question isn't fair to the child whose spatial intelligence is weak but whose linguistic or artistic intelligence may be very strong. People have many different kinds of smarts and standardized tests only assess a select few.
You're right -- you must have a high spatial intelligence. This question is taken from a fourth-grade standardized test and it assesses a child's picture-smarts. This question isn't fair to the child whose spatial intelligence is weak but whose linguistic or artistic intelligence may be very strong. People have many different kinds of smarts and standardized tests only assess a select few.
The correct answer is to write on both sides of a piece of paper. This question is taken from a sixth-grade standardized test and assesses a child's word-smarts. In order for a child to answer this question correctly, he needs to know that "conserve resources" means to save them. A child who's linguistic skills are weak but whose interpersonal or spatial skills are strong is at a disadvantage.
The correct answer is to write on both sides of a piece of paper. This question is taken from a sixth-grade standardized test and assesses a child's word-smarts. In order for a child to answer this question correctly, he needs to know that "conserve resource" means to save them. A child who's linguistic skills are weak but whose interpersonal or spatial skills are strong is at a disadvantage.
You're right. This question is taken from a sixth-grade standardized test and assesses a child's word-smarts. In order for a child to answer this question correctly, he needs to know that "conserve resources" means to save them. A child who's linguistic skills are weak but whose interpersonal or spatial skills are strong is at a disadvantage. | 2019-04-25T20:41:41 | https://www.familyeducation.com/quizzes/standardized-tests/standardized-test-bias |
0.998711 | Should I be concerned if my website throws stack information?
Is this a big problem in terms of security? Are there any attacks a malicious user can perform that will allow him to deface or steal my database? Or is this relatively benign and I can ignore it?
On production (contrary to development) environments, stack traces and error messages should be logged to file instead of dumped on screen. This is because an attacker may learn things about your system that could help compromise your system.
Information such as operating system, web server version, PHP version and more. Some stack traces may contain system/environment variables that should not be made public!
The user/visitor should get a nice looking HTTP error page instead of a message that is of no use to the visitor.
Is the bug causing the stack trace a security vulnerability.
Is the framework configured to show stack traces to outsiders.
The error message Invalid Character Error sounds a lot like forgotten escaping, which can very often be exploited in some way. So you should be concerned about the stack trace because it is a symptom of a possible security vulnerability.
The other question is whether you should be concerned about stack traces being showed to outsiders. On one hand hiding information about the internals of a system is could be seen as security through obscurity. In most cases I would agree with that, but not in case of stack traces.
The stack traces only show up when there is a problem, so if there ever is a stack trace there is a significant risk that there is a bug, and if there is a bug there is a significant risk it can be exploited. Hence keeping stack traces away from outsiders is a good idea. Moreover if the stack trace contains not only names of the called functions but also parameter values, it can easily leak keys, passwords, cookies, or other kinds of credentials.
For both of the above reasons, it is important to be careful with where your stack traces show up.
It is however important that the stack traces be available to those who need to fix the problem. So logging of stack traces is important. If those cases where the stack traces are indications of actual security vulnerabilities, you want to fix them ASAP. Even though a non-descriptive error message won't give an attacker much to work with, simply from realizing which characters work and which don't, they can possibly figure out how to exploit it anyway.
There are two issues here, and the OP asks about the less important issue.
This is the issue that the OP asks about. There are debates regarding how much of an issue showing a trace is in general, and this particular example displays nicely that displaying a trace can be a security issue. The reason for that is that it lets us (you, me, and the hacker) know about the existence of the second issue.
This is a real problem. Not only do I know (thanks to the trace) that your application is passing unfiltered and unvalidated user input to the native PHP functions, I even know that DOMDocument->createElement() is the function in question. Now I'm going to start attacking this site and all sites that I can identify with this company for other filtration issues, such as SQL injection, XSS, CSRF, ad nauseum.
Notice that stack traces include parameters. If there are function calls that pass in passwords as arguments, those will end up in stack traces.
It's obviously a disaster if one user can cause the password of another to be displayed back at him. Less obviously, user passwords are now sitting in log files; which will make your users very mad. At the very least, you need to make sure that password logging doesn't happen.
In your example, the people can see the structure of your directories which they could use for potential attacks. You'd be surprised how much a 'hacker' can do with very little information. So Yes in general it's a big problem in terms of security. Like Alasjo is saying, it's also not user friendly and an error page is a good alternative.
Path traversal is also known as the ../ (dot dot slash) attack, directory climbing, and backtracking.
is bad, is because knowing the software stack used to build your application, allows attackers to exploit security flaws in those components (Security issues in common software is widely publicized information (see https://cve.mitre.org/) ) in addition to any flaws/defects in your application made apparent in the stack traces.
For example, since I know your site uses PHP now, I might try all PHP related security flaws (in the event that you've not patched your PHP installation to address that flaw... you do keep your software stack patch levels up to date right? :-)) even if your application did not expose any of its own flaws in the stack trace.
Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged web-application php vulnerability error-handling or ask your own question.
Is exposing exception information in web service a security risk?
What information should a error log record?
Should passwords be revealed in error message?
Do LAMP log files sometimes contain sensitive information?
Is a stack trace of a server application a vulnerability?
Does it make sense to isolate each web service user on his own servers?
Burpsuite accidental defacement, should I be concerned?
SQL injection possible with hidden GET parameters?
a mysterious & pointless long-term hacking attempt? | 2019-04-20T04:14:20 | https://security.stackexchange.com/questions/84465/should-i-be-concerned-if-my-website-throws-stack-information/84493 |
0.999884 | Is anything more underrated than German black metal? No other country seems so good at putting out interesting, thoughtful black metal that pushes the genre boundaries without violating them. I’ve been aware of mysterious five-piece Farsot since their debut IIII in 2008, yet neither that nor 2011’s Insects gave the band the attention and approbation that they deserve. It can be pleasant, as an (amateur!) music reviewer to discover a band, but it’s also hugely frustrating when only you seem to love them. Still, all I can do is recommend, and on that basis it’s a pleasure to recommend Farsot, back with a pleasingly atmospheric third platter of their moody metal. That strikingly creepy cover art fits the album theme of the battle of the sexes well, and the unnerving laughter that opens first track Vitriolic is equally as effective. Perhaps straying a little further from the purity of their genre than before, Farsot are something like Enslaved-meets-Agalloch with some Dornenreich-esque neofolk mixed in. A thinking man’s band, they're happy to allow their songs lengths of over eight minutes which reward relaxed, headphoned listens. Fail·Lure is as much atmospheric as it is progressive, and is very free of the usual shrieks 'n' satanism – Farsot here are slower, more reflective than angry, often moving steadily towards post-metal territory with some doom and even Celtic Frost-influenced experimentation (Triptykon’s V Santura produced the album, and did a great job).
That’s not to say the black metal elements are minimal; aforementioned opener Vitriolic initially takes a stern, blastbeat-backed path through forests dark with clean chanted vocals amidst the snarls to superbly eerie effect. That it opens up around the mid-point to prog-tinged melodic meandering doesn’t lessen the impact, nor does the variety that the band indulge in (the whispers that open Circular Stains are terrific for example, why don’t more black metal bands use whispered vocals?) that is always well-integrated into the songs and never feels out of place. The Burzumic keyboards and mournful shrieks in With Obsidian Hands are another highlight, soon followed by jagged riffing that could be from a recent Enslaved album and a perfectly measured post-black proggy instrumental section.
In a way, that repeated Enslaved comparison is Farsot’s biggest drawback – tracks like Undercurrents make it especially hard to ignore, and the comparison isn’t always flattering to the Germans. The influence is far more notable here than on their previous albums which is enough for me to rate them higher, as much as I do like the Norwegians. Yet these moments are in the minority, and Undercurrents itself soon moves onto more original-sounding material, as does the following The Antagonist, slower and almost gothic in its darkness. The post-black moments probably reflect the band’s future direction, particularly closer A Hundred to Nothing which starts interestingly but goes nowhere and does nothing interesting thereafter. Not quite as good as their previous albums, then, but Farsot are still a band very much worth your time. | 2019-04-26T13:59:49 | https://www.metalreviews.com/reviews/album/9728 |
0.998792 | What is a hero? That's one of the main questions that writer Ed Brubaker has been asking during his run on Captain America. What characteristics and qualities do you find in your heroes like Captain America, the Falcon or even Iron Man?
Ever since Brubaker revealed that Bucky Barnes was still alive and brainwashed into being the Winter Soldier, we've seen Steve Rogers doing everything he could to rescue and redeem his former sidekick, friend and fellow hero. As Steve Rogers struggled to believe in and help Bucky, we've had to ask if redemption and freedom was possible as we've seen the Winter Soldier be used and kill. The Winter Soldier was more weapon than man and he was a weapon in the wrong hands. Bucky, one of the great deaths in comics, was back but Steve Rogers was the only person who believed he could be saved and we watched as Captain America fought to reach out to his friend, his ally and his brother-in-arms. Now Steve Rogers is dead, killed by the Red Skull and Bucky is out for revenge. Without Steve Rogers around to guide him, can Bucky Barnes truly be a hero again?
In The Death of Captain America Volume 2: The Burden of Dreams, events begin to come more into focus following the killing of a national hero and icon. The book opens with two of the main characters, Sharon Carter and Bucky, captured by the Red Skull, one brainwashed into serving him and the other being tortured and brainwashed. Even as the Red Skull fights to keep control of his ally General Lukin, no one is in complete control of themselves or their actions but it does look like the Skull has the upper hand. But the Red Skull does not have as strong of a hold over everyone as he likes to think and Bucky soon winds up on a SHIELD helicarrier, under the control of Tony Stark.
While it is still part of the same larger story, The Burden of Dreams is a very different book than the The Death of Captain America volume one. Brubaker shakes up his storytelling, abandoning the quick and choppy transitional storytelling of the first volume and spending more time developing his scenes while he concentrates firmly on the growth and development of Bucky, who takes center-stage in this story. The chaos and confusion following the death of Steve Rogers is replaced by planning and action as Tony Stark and Bucky begin filling the void left following Steve Rogers' death. Borrowing a term from another superhero's famous death, what do you do in a world without Captain America?
I don't think it's much of a spoiler at this point to say that by the middle of this book, Bucky Barnes is wearing Captian America's uniform and slinging his shield. Does the fact that he's got the look make him Captain America? Does that make him a hero? Brubaker has shown since the beginning of his run on this title that there's more to the hero than the clothes and the shield. It's the man who's wearing those clothes that's important. Steve Rogers wasn't a hero because he was Captain America. He was Captain America because he was a hero first. That's the man he was, sacrificing himself in his last moments to save one of his guards from the assassins bullet. Brubaker has continually shown that Bucky Barnes was a fighter and that he was loyal but his heroism is still questionable.
Brubaker doesn't give any easy answers to the questions he raises. His story is a fantastic thriller, equal parts Bourne Identity, All The President's Men and old school Marvel. The best Captain America writers like Steve Englehart, Jack Kirby and Roger Stern have used the character to explore heroism and the American way. Brubaker continues the heritage of Captain America, questioning the characters role in the twenty-first century. Setting up the Red Skull as the now head of a large mega-conglomerate corporation, Brubaker shows America being attacked on many levels, from within and without. As well as the obvious and overt actions of Sin, the Skulls' daugther, at causing chaos in Washington DC, the Skull's company begins undermining the fabric of America, striking at Wall Street and Main Street through weak financial institutions. On all fronts, America has been beaten and weakened and is in need of a hero. It's in need of Captain America.
Bucky may have the costume and the mask but he's still not Captain America in The Burden of Dreams. It takes more than a costume to be a hero just as it takes more than a hero to be an icon. In this book, America is under attack and looking for a hero and that may be Bucky Barnes but he still has the same doubts about himself that others have -- can he fill the void left by Steve Rogers? Can he be a hero like Rogers was, fighting for something larger than himself? Of course, Steve Rogers wasn't the national icon overnight, so how can Tony Stark or the Black Widow expect Bucky Barnes to be? | 2019-04-24T20:43:40 | http://collectededitions.blogspot.com/2009/06/review-death-of-captain-america-burden.html?utm_source=review_index_sidebar&utm_medium=link&utm_campaign=review_index |
0.999096 | Given the hurdles created by Congress vis-à-vis the amendments to the HEA and Bankruptcy Code, what are some key takeaways for the restructuring professional in advising a financially troubled IHE?
appears to be off the table.
• While a sale of an IHE as a going concern in Chapter 11 may be possible, FCC Holdings illustrates that in many, if not most, instances, the machinations called for to accomplish the sale will be prohibitive.
we keep business liquid in the U.S. and Canada.
• Even with a qualified buyer, achieving the consensus of all vested parties—the DOE, state licensing agencies, accreditation commissions, and secured lenders—is also a prerequisite to a successful sale. As such, establishing a meaningful dialogue with these constituencies at the onset of the sale process is critical.
1 20 U.S.C. § 1070 et seq.
2 Id. § 1001 et seq.
3 See id. §§ 1001(a) & 1002(a).
4 11 U. S.C. § 101 et seq.
5 Betty Owen Schools, Inc. v. United States Department of Education (In re Betty Owen Schools, Inc.), 195 B. R. 23, 32 (Bankr. S.D.N. Y. 1996) (citing S. Rep. No. 102-204, 102d Cong., 1st Session. at 3, 44 (1991)).
6 20 U. S.C. § 1002(a)( 4); 34 C.F.R. § 600.7(a)( 2). 7 34 C.F.R. § 600.7(i)( 2).
8 Betty Owen Schools, 195 B. R. at 32.
9 11 U.S.C § 362(b)( 15).
10 Id. § 362(b)( 16).
11 Id. § 541(b)( 3).
12 134 B.R. 399 (Bankr. E. D. Cal. 1991).
albeit non-transferable under Section 363). 14 134 B.R. at 402.
15 195 B.R. 23 (Bankr. S. D. N. Y. 1996). | 2019-04-18T18:37:13 | http://www.tmajcr.org/journalofcorporaterenewal/june_2015?pg=25 |
0.998765 | It began they say, because Dino De Laurentiis wanted “a fish bigger than a shark”. It was 1976, Jaws had been a smash hit, and the Italian producer was eager to get a piece of the action. So they thought about an orca.
It doesn’t matter that orcas are not whales.
… and it’s Orchinus orca, not Orca orchinus – and it does not mean bringer of death in Latin.
Anyway, I re-watched this movie two nights back.
Only the following morning did I find out that director Michael Anderson had died. Strange coincidence.
I watched Orca because I’m writing a sea monster novel, one featuring a big killer cetacean, and therefore I decided to go back to the classics. I first saw this movie in the late ‘70s, in an open-air cinema while I was on vacation by the seaside.
The fact that I was 11 or 12 at the time, that I couldn’t swim and that my father was obsessing over the idea of packing me off to the Naval academy as soon as possible – because I was a weakling and they would make a man out of me and other such things1 – anyway, the whole mix made Orca a damn scary movie, for me.
The plot in a nutshell: captain Nolan (Richard Harris) is deep in debt and catches animals for aquariums for a living. A hunting mishap causes the death of a female orca, and the miscarriage of her pup. The mate of the dead orca proceeds to extract a devastating revenge on Nolan and his shipmates.
The first word that comes to my mind to describe this movie is bleak. This is a product of the ‘70s, and if it is true that it was a quick-and-dirty job to cash-in on the success of Jaws, it’s also true that the script touches on a number of real issues of the time, such as the economic crisis and the plight of the fishermen in the North Atlantic.
Nolan is a man that lost his wife and child in a car accident, and now does a dirty job to pay his debts. He actually empathises with the orca, which makes the whole thing more tragic. This is a war between two damaged individuals, thrashing against each other and circumstances beyond their control.
The cast is excellent: Richard Harris lends a lot of pathos to Nolan, and Charlotte Rampling is beautiful and believable as a marine biologist trying to sort the mess out. Bo Derek (at her screen debut), Keenan Wynn, Robert Carradine (in his pre-Revenge of the Nerds youth) and Will Sampson round up the crew.
Then, yes, there is the menace of a smart, intelligent and big marine predator, hell-bent on making the humans pay. The thing actually chomps off one of Bo Derek’s shapely legs. Two orcas from an aquarium and a sophisticated animatronic play the part of the killer whale.
The movie was not a success, in my opinion because the production played too much the card of “Jaws pumped up to eleven”, with the whole “bringer of death” rubbish and the sensationalist hype – Orca could have been a hard-hitting, socially-savvy and intimate drama, a fine example of “nature horror”, and it would have worked just fine.
It remains a fine movie, and it scared me witless as a kid. | 2019-04-25T02:41:22 | https://authorsdb.com/author-publicity/featured-author-blogs/orca-the-killer-whale-1977 |
0.999601 | What two pieces of equipment do you use to control your buoyancy?
An object will be more buoyant in _____ than it will be in _____.
When you exhale, your lung volume decreases. This means you have _____ buoyancy.
Pressure changes in water for a given ascent or descent are much more substantial than the same distance ascent or descent in air because water weighs more.
Equalization is adding air to an air space as you descend so the pressure in an air space equals the surrounding water pressure. | 2019-04-21T16:38:50 | http://sometests.com/tests/Sports/PADI-Open-Water-Chapter-One-Quiz.html |
0.999985 | A home recording was done in the house of each participant.
An underground music club that exists in the imagination of the participants .
Every month I invited an artist to design a poster to announce that month’s musician. Among the artists I invited were Bert Scholten, Waynehorse and Bart Nijstad.
Stickers of the club were spread around the city and can be found in many toilets of bars and clubs in Groningen.
During the period of eight months the club started to be known in the neighborhood and people started to advise Jouwersma where more home-musicians could be found or they would inquire about the last musician they heard "playing" in the club. In the night teenagers hung around the sounds coming from the tiles under their feet and when snow covered the streets a muffled trumpet or elderly choir could be heard somewhere under the snow.
The club gave rise to some form of perplexity among it's spectators, but worked socially binding among it's participants. All the physical parts were finally presented in a gallery together with a newspaper that reported about the events that happend during the eight months of existence.
Context: A Trainstation with a pub on the corner in a quiet neighborhood.
Materials: sewer tubes, speakers, sinks, street tiles. Posters, Flyers, stickers.
Thanks to: All Musicians, Designers and Klaas Koetje. | 2019-04-18T16:27:42 | https://www.stevenjouwersma.com/club-de-gootsteen/ |
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