text:
The Desmond Tutu TB Centre (DTTC) at the University of Stellenbosch will today receive an international award for its groundbreaking research into childhood TB and for its pioneering community-based approaches to TB and HIV care.
The U$65 0000 Kochon Prize is awarded annually for the past six years to persons, institutions or organisations that have made a highly significant contribution to combating TB, a disease that is curable but still causes the deaths of three people every minute.
This 2012 prize was announced at the World Health Organisation's Stop TB Symposium, an annual event at the World Conference of the International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease.
Professor Anneke Hesseling, director of the paediatric TB programme at DTTC, accepted the award this morning (SUBS: TUES) in Kuala Lumpur.
"This prize is a wonderful recognition of our center's work in childhood TB over the last two decades and indicates the unique contribution made, cumulatively, by individuals in our group over the years. More importantly, this prize highlights the importance of childhood TB, which has been neglected for many decades," said Hesseling.
She added that childhood TB was an indication of how well we are doing with our overall TB control strategy.
TB in young children indicates recent TB transmission from adults to children, often at the household level, and is an indication of failing TB control among adults with TB, who typically transmit the organism.
Childhood TB also represents a significant burden of disease in high-burden countries such as South Africa, where almost 15% of all TB cases occur in children.
Since young children are more prone to a severe form of disease, such as TB meningitis, often with poor outcome, TB in young children can be a very serious disease, causing considerable morbidity and mortality.
Hesseling believes that for the first time, there seems to be hope in the fight against childhood TB.
"We have more emphasis on childhood TB from WHO and from public health programs which have traditionally only focused on adult infectious TB cases. Developing countries are writing guidelines and are implementing care for childhood TB while child-friendly TB drugs are being developed. New diagnostic tools are being developed; such tools should also specifically consider the needs of children, which remains a challenge," said Hesseling.
However, a new, more effective TB vaccine is urgently needed if there was any hope of winning the battle against childhood (and adult) TB.
Several new TB vaccines are currently being evaluated, including in South Africa, and all these trials include children.
New TB drugs are being evaluated to treat drug-resistant and susceptible forms of TB in adults and there are plans to also test these and make them eventually available in children.
"The biggest current challenge for TB control in children is that we have good knowledge, but that implementation is lagging behind – the 'implementation infidelity' phenomenon," Hesseling added.
Asked what items she would place on wishlist, Hesseling listed:
· Increased political commitment for the prevention and treatment of childhood TB at programmatic level
· An effective and safe vaccine to prevent TB in children.
· The use of more family-friendly integrated ways to address both TB and HIV at the household and community level
· Funding and research to generate new child-friendly accurate TB diagnostic tests in children
· Effective and safe, shorter treatment regimens to prevent and treat TB in children
Hesseling ascribes the growing international interest in childhood TB over the past five years to the fact that the HIV research community now recognises that TB and HIV are inextricably linked, and the fact that childhood TB has been placed on the international TB control and advocacy agenda. She added that attention was also increasingly given to the design and implementation of very rigorous high-quality research for childhood TB, which is impacting on policy and practice, but also on the awareness of childhood TB in the international research funding community.
"We have a long way to go in this regard, but for the first time, there is a feeling that 'childhood TB is coming of age'," she said.
Dr Lucica Ditiu, Executive Secretary of the Stop TB Partnership said it was shameful that every day, across the world, 200 children die of tuberculosis.
"This is absolutely shameful, considering that we are in 2012, and it costs less than 3 cents a day to provide preventive treatment and 50 cents a day to provide treatment that will cure the disease. But children are often forgotten. The Desmond Tutu Centre has been at the forefront of organisations fighting to end the tragedy of TB in children," said Ditiu.
The Desmond Tutu TB Centre has established a number of outreach projects in areas where research is conducted; operating on the principle that research should be integrated with the services delivered by the Department of Health. It also established and runs the world's first international childhood TB training programme.
The scientific body of work on childhood TB produced by the centre's researchers includes more than 300 articles on the epidemiology, prevention, diagnosis and treatment of childhood TB. This work has engendered ten international policy documents on childhood TB, creating a robust evidence base for addressing childhood TB.


Imagine a typical African village. A village named Kpowé is of that nature, which is in the northern part of Togo. The nearest small town is some 10 km away. The source of water for people in this village is the Binah river, which runs 6 km away from the village. In summer, men dig small holes here and there in the river, and the women folk wait until water appears.


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How can I construct the function segs that returns a list of all contiguous segments in a list? For example, (segs '(l i s t)) should produce the following answer:
(() (t) (s) (s t) (i) (i s) (i s t) (l) (l i) (l i s) (l i s t))
I'm especially interested in how to solve this problem in accordance with the design principles described in HtDP (no, this is not the problem from the book, so please feel free to discuss it!) How to solve it? Which principles to use in program derivation?
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To ask for clarification, post a comment on the answer and/or amend your question, don't try edit the answer itself. – Ryan Culpepper Jan 10 '12 at 19:21
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2 Answers
up vote 5 down vote accepted
Start by building up a set of related examples, most trivial first:
(equal? (segs '())
 (list '()))
(equal? (segs '(z))
 (list '()
(equal? (segs '(y z))
 (list '() '(z)
 '(y) '(y z)))
(equal? (segs '(x y z))
 (list '() '(z) '(y) '(y z)
 '(x) '(x y) '(x y z)))
By looking at the examples you can make an observation (which I've used the formatting to highlight): the answer for each example includes the all of the elements from the answer for the previous example. In fact, the contiguous subsequences of a non-empty list are just the contiguous subsequences of its tail together with the non-empty prefixes of the list itself.
So put the main function on hold and write non-empty-prefixes
non-empty-prefixes : list -> (listof non-empty-list)
With that helper function, it's easy to write the main function.
(Optional) The resulting naive function has bad complexity, because it repeats calls to non-empty-prefixes. Consider (segs (cons head tail)). It calls (non-empty-prefixes tail) twice: once because it calls (segs tail) which calls (non-empty-prefixes tail), and again because it calls (non-empty-prefixes (cons head tail)) which calls (non-empty-prefixes tail) recursively. That means the naive function has unnecessarily bad complexity.
The problem is that (segs tail) computes (non-empty-prefixes tail) and then forgets it, so (segs (cons head tail)) has to redo the work. The solution is to hold on to that extra information by fusing segs and non-empty-prefixes into a single function that computes both answers:
segs+ne-prefixes : list -> (values (listof list) (listof non-empty-list))
Then define segs as an adapter function that just drops the second part. That fixes the main issue with the complexity.
(Edited to add) Regarding segs+ne-prefixes: here's one way to define non-empty-prefixes. (Note: the empty list has no non-empty prefixes. No need to raise an error.)
;; non-empty-prefixes : list -> (listof non-empty-list)
(define (non-empty-prefixes lst)
 (cond [(empty? lst)
 [(cons? lst)
 (map (lambda (p) (cons (first lst) p))
 (cons '() (non-empty-prefixes (rest lst))))]))
And segs looks like this:
;; segs : list -> (listof list)
(define (segs lst)
 (cond [(empty? lst) (list '())]
 [(cons? lst)
 (append (segs (rest lst))
 (non-empty-prefixes lst))]))
You can fuse them like this:
;; Return both the contiguous subsequences and the non-empty prefixes of lst
(define (segs+ne-prefixes lst)
 (cond [(empty? lst)
 ;; Just give the base cases of each function, together
 (values (list '())
 [(cons? lst)
 (let-values ([(segs-of-rest ne-prefixes-of-rest)
 ;; Do the recursion on combined function once!
 (segs+ne-prefixes (rest lst))])
 (let ([ne-prefixes
 ;; Here's the body of the non-empty-prefixes function
 ;; (the cons? case)
 (cons '() ne-prefixes-of-rest))])
 (values (append segs-of-rest ne-prefixes)
This function still follows the design recipe (or it would, if I had shown my tests): in particular, it uses the template for structural recursion on a list. HtDP doesn't talk about values and let-values, but you could do the same thing with an auxiliary structure to group the information.
HtDP talks about complexity a little bit, but this sort of regrouping of computation is usually discussed more in an algorithms course, under "dynamic programming and memoization". Note that an alternative to fusing the two functions would have been to memoize non-empty-prefixes; that also would have fixed the complexity.
One last thing: the arguments to append near the end should be reversed, to (append ne-prefixes segs-of-rest). (Of course, that means rewriting all of the tests to use the new order, or writing/finding an order-insensitive list comparison function.) Try benchmarking the two versions of the function on a large list (around 300-400 elements), see if you can tell a difference, and see if you can explain it. (This is more algorithms material, not design.)
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Ryan, can you explain the mechanics I need to apply to obtain this "fused" segs+ne-prefixes function? – Racket Noob Jan 10 '12 at 19:58
_USER_ Noob, I've added an explanation to the end of my answer. – Ryan Culpepper Jan 10 '12 at 20:11
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There's 2 recursions going on: the first chops atoms off the left, and the second chops atoms off the right. Here's how I'd solve it recursively in 2 functions, in plain terms (since I'm not fluent in Scheme):
Start with the FullList variable in function A,
accumulate right-chop results on FullList from recursive function B,
then chop off the left character of FullList and call function A with it.
Stop when an empty list is received.
Accumulate all results, and you're golden.
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Your Answer


How to Prepare Your Data
Correctly preparing data is important if you want Zebra BI (or any other reporting tool for that matter) to produce meaningful visualizations. Fortunately, we have managed to make this extremely simple in Zebra BI 🙂
Below you'll learn how to structure your data tables, how to name your column headers and you'll see a visual representation of how Zebra BI creates a chart from your data table.
Exploring the basic data structure - a table
Data in a table is arranged in rows and columns. We use row headers and column headers to give meaning to the values in your table:
Basic structure of source data table
Basic structure of source data table
 1. Row headers are written in the leftmost column. They represent data categories, for example time periods, product names, sales regions, customer names, etc. In some cases two columns can be used for row headers (e.g. when inserting a waterfall chart).
 2. Column headers are written in the first row. They represent the series names. In business reporting they often describe the type of data in each column, for example "Previous year", "Actual", "Budget", etc. See below for more details on column headers.
 3. Values should always be numbers, never text! Well, some of them can also be empty or have a "not available" value (_TAG_ value in Excel).
 4. Title is optional. If you want to display the title in a chart, than write it exactly above the first column header.
3 basic rules for preparing data in Zebra BI
When preparing data in a table, just make sure you follow these three simple rules and Zebra BI will produce meaningful results:
1. Avoid empty rows or columns
1. No empty rows or columns
Avoid empty rows or columns between the data!
2. Put text left, numbers right
2. Text left, numbers right
Put data categories (usually text) on the left side and numerical values (numbers) on the right side of the table.
3. Use meaningful column headers
3. Meaningful column headers
Headers (column names) should match the names defined in reporting standards.
 - You can use horizontal tables as well!
 Sometimes when working with time series tables it makes sense to put data in a horizontal table: Months (or quarters or years) as columns and categories as rows (see the picture below).
 Don't worry, Zebra BI can handle these kinds of tables as well:
 Place your time periods in rows or columns
 Place time periods in rows or columns
What do you mean by "Meaningful column headers" ?
In business reporting you'll often deal with so-called business data scenarios. They represent different types of business data, such as "Previous year", "Actual", "Forecast" and "Budget".
For practical reasons we typically use abbreviations for business scenarios. The standard abbreviations are:
Scenario Standard & other acceptable abbreviations Short description
"Previous year" PY, LY, VJ Actual data of the respective period (month, quarter, year) of the previous year.
"Actual" AC, ACT, Actual, IST Data of the currently running period or the last completed closed period.
"Forecast" FC, LE, RE An updated plan or budget (see below) in the course of the running year.
"Budget" BU, BUD, TGT, Plan, PL, BP, Budget The approved plan for one future year. A plan is the anticipation of future results.
Labels PY, AC, FC and BU are most standard abbreviations for business scenarios. Furthermore, they are recommended by International Business Communication Standards (IBCS). That's why we strongly recommend that you use these standard labels in your organization as well.
 - Can I use my own labels in column headers?
 Of course! If you want to use your custom abbreviations for business scenarios that Zebra BI doesn't recognize automatically, you're welcome to do so. Two typical examples when you'd want to do that are:
 - You want to use the column headers in your language
 - You're working with non-business-related data
 If that's the case, head to this article to learn how you can define your own scenarios using the Zebra BI Style editor.
A visual representation of Zebra BI at work
Ok, now let's observe an example, how specific parts of your data table are displayed in a Zebra chart:
Please take note of the following advanced features:
 - The title is displayed as chart title at the top-left position.
 - This time row headers (categories) consist of two columns: (3) represents category names while (4) represents additional category class names or labels, which (if present) are displayed below the axis labels.
 - The values in the first value column (AC - "Actual") are only present until August. The last four values are _TAG_/A. This is intentional because Zebra BI charts work best if "empty" data cells are filled with _TAG_/A values. Zebra BI treats these values as non-existent and produces a chart with two business scenarios (actual values until August, budget values for the rest of the year).
Congratulations, you've just learned the most important points of preparing the data for visual analysis in Zebra BI!
Of course, there are some more details and advanced options, specific to some Zebra charts. You will learn them along the way, when you explore Zebra charts in more detail. Hint: Especially exciting is the option of inserting multiple charts from a single data table with just one click (read Preparing data for "Small Multiples" report to learn how to do this).
Wait... just one more thing:
The data structure, that we have just described, is in fact a completely standard Excel data table, right? The good thing about that is that you can prepare such a table in numerous ways and with several technologies within Excel. Just think about it - you can use:
 - Plain Excel cells with values and/or formulas, that you just enter manually or possibly link with Excel formulas.
 - Pivot Tables, that can be inserted either from Excel data or connected directly to external data sources.
 - OLAP Pivot Tables, connected directly to OLAP data sources, such as MS Analysis Services.
 - PowerPivot tables.
 - Data tables created with popular Excel analytic tools, such as SAP Business Objects Analysis for Office, SAP BPC/EPM, XLCubed, Tagetik, Jedox and many others.
We have designed Zebra BI to work with all of the above-mentioned technologies! That's one of the features that make Zebra BI a powerful reporting tool, regardless of how you extract and prepare your data. That said, you have many options to completely automate your reports as well...
What's next?
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text:
How can today's "Electronic Troubadour" musicians claim to be truly independent if they have to keep plugging into the corporate-and-establishment-controlled electricity power grid? Noah Vawter, PhD candidate and research assistant at the Computing Culture Group of MIT Media Lab, has created the concept of Exertion Music. The key point is that an electronic musical instrument could harvest its required electric power directly from the player – the musician will need to exert him/herself in order to power-up their battery-free instrument via an onboard generator. And the Physically Engaged Exertion Instruments described in Mr. Vawter's PhD proposal might provide a way. For an example video of the prototype instruments in action see : Hey Jude Duet (Quicktime®.mov format)
- Quite a few non-electronic musical devices might also fall into the category of Exertion Instruments – see for example :
- Noah Vawter is also one of the co-authors of the now famous 2010 investigation: On the Effectiveness of Aluminium Foil Helmets.
- For another human-power concept see : Implementing a knee-energy harvester (Improbable Research October 2011)

source: openbmb/Ultra-FineWeb


text:
Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 190):
The propositional (ideational) type occur only with declarative clauses. They appear at the same locations in the clause as the mood Adjuncts — though for different reasons: they are less integrated into the mood structure, being located rather according to their significance for the textual organisation of the clause. In particular, they are strongly associated with the boundary between information units — realised as a boundary between tone groups: hence the commas that typically accompany them in writing. So they often occur medially, following the item which is prominent; otherwise, they may occur as Theme, frequently as a separate information unit, or in final position as Afterthought.


text:
Critical Chain (novel)
First edition cover
|Publisher||North River Press|
|4 September 1997|
|Media type||Print (paperback)|
|Pages||246 pp (first edition, paperback)|
|ISBN||0-88427-153-6 (first edition, paperback)|
Like Goldratt's book The Goal, Critical Chain is written as a novel, not like a project manager's how-to guide. This book is a story about a professor trying to attain his tenure at a university's business school. The plot is used to maintain interest in the subject and provide a real life feel to the book. It provides plenty of real-world examples. The plot of the novel is fourfold:
- A professor trying to become tenured,
- A business school's struggle to improve enrollment,
- Teaching philosophy,
- Applying the Theory of Constraints to project management
The goal of the book is the last point, but Goldratt makes it clear that educational systems must change to better accommodate the quickly changing world of business.
The book walks the reader through a series of steps to establish the principles for the discussion. It is written for someone with a modicum of project management background.
The book starts by pointing out the problems with how time estimates are normally done on projects. It then provides a primer on the Theory of Constraints and an example of its implementation in a steel mill. With the foundation set, it proceeds to show how the Theory of Constraints can be applied to schedule generation, resources constraints and multiple projects.
Goldratt claims that the current method of generating task time estimates is the primary reason for increased expense of projects and their inability to finish on time. The commonly accepted principle is to add safety (aka: pad or slop) to generate a task time length that will essentially guarantee the step gets completed. He asserts that estimates for a task are based on individuals providing values that they feel will give them an 80-90% chance of completing the step, these estimates are further padded by managers above this person creating a length of time to complete a task that is excessive - as much as 200% of the actual time required. It is this excessive padding that has the opposite effect - guaranteeing the task will run full term or late. As counter intuitive as this seems, he provides examples of why this is the case. This predisposes the people on the project to consume the time estimate by:
- Triggering the "student syndrome" in the resource assigned to the task - they have more than enough time to do the task, therefore they start the task late using up all the safety.
- Encouraging multitasking. The safety is added knowing that the resource will not be able to focus on the task and hence encouraged to multitask on multiple projects at a time, which significantly impacts all projects.
- Not claiming early completion. In order to preserve the safety concept in future projects, resources do not report tasks completed early. Obviously, though, there is no way to hide a late completion.
Theory of Constraints Primer
The book presents a primer for Theory of Constraints. This is done in the form of a lecture by a professor who has recently returned from a sabbatical at a large conglomerate that uses the Theory of Constraints. The discussion focuses on the current methods of measuring success at a work center (cost and throughput) and shows how they are contradictory to the success of the production line as a whole.
The book enumerates the five principle steps of the Theory of Constraints:
- Identify. Identify the bottleneck of the system.
- Exploit. Exploit this bottleneck, making its throughput efficient by changing processes, equipment maintenance procedures, training, policies, etc.
- Subordinate: Subordinate the throughput of all other work centers to this work center.
- Elevate. Invest in this work center to increase its throughput - add equipment, manpower, etc.
- Inertia. Start the process over on the line to determine the new bottleneck.
This philosophy keeps the cost and throughput models at odds with one another since the subordination process necessarily decreases efficiency. Hence, evaluation criteria for properly managing a work center must change to properly reward the organization's success.
The book points out this conflict with respect to an axiom in the Theory of Constraints that states that if two concepts are in direct conflict, then there is an assumption as part of those concepts that is incorrect.
Steel Mill Example
To illustrate, the book uses an example of a steel mill with significant production problems, excess inventory and cost issues. It methodically assigns all the issues of the plant to the method in which success of a work center is measured. The errant assumption is efficiency being measured by tons of steel per hour. The flaw in the measurement is that not all material takes the same length of time to produce and not all work centers have the same throughput. It concludes the sources of the problems for the steel mill are:
|Raw material shortage||
After subordination, the key is to maintain a small buffer of material in front of the bottleneck to ensure it never stops producing due to lack of material.
After laying this groundwork, the book turns to applying this to Project Management. After declaring the constraint to be the schedule's critical path, the book maps out a set of terms. The result is:
|Production term||Project term|
|Pre-work center inventory||Work buffer from the feeding tasks of the critical path|
|Bottleneck work center||Bottleneck resource|
It proposes a method of schedule generation where all tasks are estimated at a reasonable time for completion. This would be a time estimate that would give the resource a 50%-60% chance of completing the task on time. The theory being that one task may take less than its estimated time but another may take more - on the average evening out. Since there is no safety, the conditions above that cause misuse of time on the task do not exist.
Safety is not added to individual tasks. Safety is added to the project as a whole (at the end) or to the end of a sequence of tasks feeding the critical path.
Using numerous analogies and examples, the concept of a resource buffer is introduced. This concept claims that one must ensure the resource bottleneck on the critical path is always busy and stays focused. They should be:
- Kept on task. In other words, minimize multitasking
- Be ready for the assignment; even if it means they are idle waiting for dependencies to complete.
The book introduces increasingly complex situations to remove the non-practical classroom approach until it reaches two common project situations:
- A bottleneck resource on the critical path and non-critical paths,
- Multiple projects contending for constrained resources,
The book emphasizes that the project manager has to understand that he or she is not working with absolutes. Resolution of these issues are not absolute. The time estimates are just that - estimates - they cannot be treated as absolute times. This is essential for the following two points.
A project example is given with a single bottlenecked resource on multiple paths. Since this resource is over utilized on multiple paths its tasks need to be considered when determining the project duration. This results in the introduction of the term critical chain - the aggregate of the critical path and the constrained resource leveled tasks.
Projects are going to use common resources. Organizations need to accommodate parallel projects while adhering to the Theory of Constraints concepts. This requires developing a prioritization scheme for the resource to determine the correct order to do work (i.e. proportion of the project buffer remaining). As before, once the scheme has been developed, the resource needs to be focused (not multitasking) on completing the task as soon as possible.
Cost of money
The book closes by introducing a concept for a method for determining which projects should be selected for execution. It is based on looking at the investment in each project in terms of money-days. Money-days is the product of the investment in the project and its duration.
Reviews and analysis
The book was reviewed by a number of academic and business journals including Harvard Business Review and IIE Transactions. In addition, a number of academics have studied Critical Chain Project Management and shown that while the packaging of the content is novel, the ideas are not necessarily original and in some cases, not advisable.
- J. Elton, J. Roe. 1998. "Bringing Discipline to Project Management." Harvard Business Review, 76(2), 153-159.
- K.N. McKay, T.E. Morton. 1998. "Review: Critical Chain." IIE Transactions, 30(8), 759-762.
- W. Herroelen, R. Leus. 2001. "On the merits and pitfalls of critical chain scheduling." Journal of Operations Management, 19, 559-577.
- W. Herroelen, R. Leus, E. Demeulemeester. 2002. "Critical chain project scheduling: Do not oversimplify." Project Management, 33(4), 48-60.
- T. Raz, R. Barnes, D. Dvir. 2003. "A Critical Look at the Critical Chain Project Management." Project Management Journal, 34(4), 24-32.
- D. Trietsch. 2005. "Why a Critical Path by Any Other Name Would Smell Less Sweet? Towards a Holistic Approach to PERT/CPM." Project Management Journal, 36(1), 27-36.


text:
The development of Competitiveness - A theoretical approach in a European context
The aim of this paper is to theoretically establish a framework for the basics of international trade between countries creating competitiveness. Since the environment in which trade takes place is changeable so is the concept of competitiveness. It is therefore argued in the paper that in order to understand the underlying factors of competitiveness one have to understand the environment in which trade takes place in. Today the concept of competitiveness will therefore be better understood by employing an industrial perspective. This approach can answer questions, which national aggregate estimates cannot. The question asked in the paper is; which industries in Europe, based on the assumptions of international trade theories is competitive? The European industries that came out as competitive were the one using high-skilled labor and produced or used ICT intensively in their production. The question also provided some answers to the always up-do-day wonder namely, in which direction European competitiveness is heading.
Source Type:Master's Thesis
Keywords:competitiveness traditional trade theories new comparative advantages
Date of Publication:08/19/2008


Engineering and BIC: A Perfect Match
by Marilyn Medlock, Class of 2005
Currently a master's student in the bioengineering program at Stanford University
BIC takes a hands-on approach to education, encouraging students to experience the world and learn outside the classroom through study sessions, open-ended discussions, and fieldtrips. With diligent studying and an open mind, the benefits from BIC are endless.
Though not many engineering students choose to complement their math and science courses with BIC, I feel like it was a beautiful match. BIC helped me to develop a broad understanding of how groups of people have interacted through history and how religion can be studied from the perspective of its influence on a people's art, customs, laws, and daily habits. My engineering courses developed my technical skills, but BIC helped me discover what the world is really about.


NMLS #: _PHONE_ BRE #: 01954763
Trust Deed Investments
Home / Trust Deed Investments
HML investments teamhard money lenders California
Learn more about Trust deed investing & Mortgage Pools on our Partner Website: _URL_
What is Trust deed investing?
Banks are reluctant to lend to this market not because the loans are particularly risky, but because banks have a great deal of bad real estate loans on their balance sheets as a consequence of the loose lending practices of recent years. Presently, banks are unwilling to make real estate loans unless they fit a very strict set of criteria. They often do not want to lend to opportunistic real estate investors because the property which is security for the loan is not "move-in ready" at the time of loan funding—it usually needs some work. For this reason, real estate investors have limited financing options available to them, and lenders to this market are able to command relatively high interest rates.
Who are the borrowers and how can they afford to pay double digit interest rates?
Why are banks reluctant to lend to this market?
What makes trust deed investing attractive?
What is the margin of safety in a trust deed investment?
The margin of safety is the difference between the loan amount, and the value of the underlying property. The core concept of trust deed investing is that if the borrower does not perform, the lender can foreclose on the property and sell it to recoup the investment, plus any past due interest. If the loan is sufficiently conservative, i.e. the property value is high relative to the loan amount, then the investment should not lose money even if the borrower defaults on the loan. A well structured trust deed investment might have a loan-to-value of 65%.
What are the disadvantages and risks associated with trust deed investing?
With Trust Deed investing there is little chance for capital appreciation. For the most part the only returns that the investor will be entitled to will come from interest income generated from the loan.
What returns can trust deed investors expect?
Why do trust deeds yield more than bonds?
Trust deed investing seems too good to be true. What is the catch?
The risk adjusted returns of trust deed investments are very attractive. That being said, there is no such thing as a free lunch. First of all these investments are not liquid and therefore cannot be converted into cash quickly. Secondly, there is real risk involved, the most obvious of which being that the borrower defaults and the lender cannot sell the home for more than the amount of the loan. To a great extent this risk can be mitigated by properly valuing the property and structuring the deal with a high enough margin of safety.
That being said, investing in trust deeds can be done in a safe manner. The investor needs to be armed with the proper knowledge and to take care in crafting each investment including conducting the proper financial analysis and thorough due diligence.
During the recent financial crisis, real estate loans caused billions of dollars in losses. How are new investments in real estate loans any safer?
During the financial crisis, real estate values dropped about 40% from peak to trough. Given that many real estate loans were set at 75% or more of market value, there was no way to avoid lenders taking losses. In the latest financial crisis, lenders' losses were exacerbated by a number of factors including the following: (1) many residential loans were made at 80%, 85% or even 90% of market value, so that the original margin of safety for the lenders was very slim; (2) many loans were made to borrowers with poor credit; (3) in the case of commercial real estate loans, some loans were for development of high rise buildings and subdivisions that only made sense under very optimistic assumptions.
Today's real estate loan investments are not immune from losses. However, the risk is lower to the extent that: (1) another 40% drop in values from today's much lower values is unlikely; (2) experienced bridge lenders limit their loan amount to 60% or 65% of current market value; (3) most bridge lenders require a personal guarantee and require that the borrower have good credit and a good balance sheet.
Why don't major Wall Street firms offer trust deed investments?
In short, Wall Street firms cannot make enough money from trust deed investments to make it worth their while. The size of each investment and the work involved in creating each investment properly combine to make this business "non-scalable" from their perspective. It is the absence of huge amounts of capital in this market that explains the strong risk-adjusted returns available to those willing and able to participate in the market. However, Wall Street banks are major players in the securitized loan industry, which does relate to trust deed investing.
How does the securitized loan market relate to and impact the market for trust deed investments?
In the universe of real estate loans, many loans are funded by a bank or other financial institution and held on the bank's balance sheet as an asset. Other loans are funded by the lender with the intention that the loan will be sold off within a period of weeks to an investor who will package the loan with others and then sell a security in the capital markets whose underlying assets include the loan.
Yet another variation for commercial real estate loans are Commercial Mortgage Backed Securities (CMBS). In this case, a Wall Street firm makes the loan using its own funds and then sells off the loan as part of a security when enough loans have been funded to create a diversified pool of loans.
What will happen if Wall Street increases its issuance of Commercial Mortgage Backed Securities (CMBS)?
During the financial crisis, the volume of CMBS loans plummeted from the record levels achieved before the crash. As the CMBS market recovers, it will absorb more loans that might have otherwise gone to private lenders. However, for opportunistic situations that require quick funding, and for unstabilized properties that don't have steady cash flow, there is always a role for competent private lenders and trust deed investors.
What makes your money protected?
2. Your lien position is always 1st. This is very important to be in first position because if borrower will default on the loan, you will be the first person to get paid.
What is C-ALTA title insurance:
Contact Us


text:
Magny et al. utilizing advanced scientific techniques, reconstructed 1,000 years of past summer (July) temperatures for the Swiss Jura Mountains region. Unequivocally, they found that July temperatures during the Medieval Period were significantly warmer than modern summer temps.
"Working at Lake Joux in the Swiss Jura Mountains...employed a multi-proxy approach with pollen and lake-level data to develop a 1000-year history of the mean temperature of the warmest month of the year (MTWA), which was July...based on the Modern Analogue Technique. This work revealed what they describe as an "MWP between ca. AD 1100 and 1320," during which time the MTWA at Joux Lake exceeded that of the _PHONE_ reference period by fully 2.0°C....Thus, it would appear that the peak warmth of the MWP at Lake Joux exceeded that of the CWP at that location by something on the order of 0.4-1.0°C." [Michel Magnya, Odile Peyrona, Emilie Gauthiera, Boris Vannièrea, Laurent Milleta, Bruno Vermot-Desroches 2011: Quaternary Research]

source: HuggingFaceFW/fineweb-edu


text:
Lesins, G, Bourdages, L, Duck, TJ, Drummond, JR, Eloranta, EW, Walden, VP (2009). Large surface radiative forcing from topographic blowing snow residuals measured in the High Arctic at Eureka. ATMOSPHERIC CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS, 9(6), _PHONE_.
Ice crystals, also known as diamond dust, are suspended in the boundary layer air under clear sky conditions during most of the Arctic winter in Northern Canada. Occasionally ice crystal events can produce significantly thick layers with optical depths in excess of 2.0 even in the absence of liquid water clouds. Four case studies of high optical depth ice crystal events at Eureka in the Nunavut Territory of Canada during the winter of 2006/07 are presented. They show that the measured ice crystal surface infrared downward radiative forcing ranged from 8 to 36 W m(-2) in the wavelength band from 5.6 to 20 mu m for 532 nm optical depths ranging from 0.2 to 1.7. MODIS infrared and visible images and the operational radiosonde wind profile were used to show that these high optical depth events were caused by surface snow being blown off 600 to 800 m high mountain ridges about 20 to 30 km North-West of Eureka and advected by the winds towards Eureka as they settled towards the ground within the highly stable boundary layer. This work presents the first study that demonstrates the important role that surrounding topography plays in determining the occurrence of high optical depth ice crystal events from residual blowing snow that becomes a source of boundary layer ice crystals distinct from the classical diamond dust phenomenon.


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Pepper 'Jalapeno White'
- Availability: In Stock
PACKAGING: Sachet Zip-lock 12-15 SEEDS
1. Original Name: White Jalapeno.
2. History: Originating from the town of Jalapa, Mexico. Scoville scale: 2,500-8,000 SHU. In Mexico, this pepper is also known as Jalapeno Guero. The word 'guero' is a Spanish term for a blonde-haired girl or yellow color.
3. Plant Specifications: Mid-season. It can produce fruits for a long time. Suitable for growing in a greenhouse and outdoors. Short plant, growing 1.6-2.3 feet (50-70 cm) tall.
4. Training Instructions: No staking or pruning is required.
5. Shape and Weight: Tapered fruits. Weight: 0.4-0.5 oz. (12-15 g). The fruits are 2-3 in. (5-8 cm) long.
6. Color: The fruits are white at the mature-green stage. You can eat the fruits at this stage. They mature to yellow and turn orange and red. In Mexico, they sell white fruits on local markets. The skin of fully ripe fruits is slightly firm.
7. Flavor Profile: Sweet, juicy and crisp at first and later very hot. Pepper flavor. The walls are meaty and thick being about 0.08-0.1 in. (2-3 mm) thick.
8. Culinary Use: A good choice for eating fresh, making sauces and vinegar pickling.


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Archaeologists working at Royal Oak discovered evidence of a prehistoric landscape centred on the upper reaches of the Westbourne river. The Westbourne once flowed from Hampstead in the north, south to the Thames.
The river channel dates back 68,000 years. Pollen sampling indicates that the valley would then have been open and treeless, dominated by grasses and herbs. About 100 fragments of animal bone were recovered and have been identified as bison and reindeer. Gnawing marks on three of the bison bones indicate the presence of carnivores, such as wolves or bears, in the area.
The remains included those of the Auroch, a large ancestor of modern cattle. Bison and deer were also found within soils that have filled in a Pleistocene river channel.
The soil sequence shows that the river channel filled up with fine grain soils during a warm period during the last ice age. Erosion is likely to have washed the animal remains into the channel from a nearby bank, preserving them for thousands of years.
The rare find was of major scientific importance. Assistance was also provided by Oxford Archaeology and specialists from the Natural History Museum. The bones are now being cleaned and studied before they are incorporated into the Natural History Museum's permanent collection.
Prehistoric West London
About 100 fragments of animal bone were found, including three bison bones and a fragment of reindeer antler. The earliest dated sediments at the site date to about 88,000 years ago, with the animal bone layer probably around 68,000 years ago.
Analysis of the bones indicates that the animals had died near the site. Their carcasses had been scavenged by carnivores, such as wolves and bears. The antler fragments came from male reindeer and had been naturally shed, indicating that reindeer were spending the autumn and winter months at the site.


text: - Typical recommender systems adopt a static view of the recommendation process and treat it as a prediction problem. We argue that it is more appropriate to view the problem of generating recommendations as a sequential optimization problem and, consequently, that Markov decision processes (MDPs) provide a more appropriate model for recommender systems. MDPs introduce two benefits: they take into account the long-term effects of each recommendation and the expected value of each recommendation. To succeed in practice, an MDP-based recommender system must employ a strong initial model, must be solvable quickly, and should not consume too much memory. In this paper, we describe our particular MDP model, its initialization using a predictive model, the solution and update algorithm, and its actual performance on a commercial site. We also describe the particular predictive model we used which outperforms previous models. Our system is one of a small number of commercially deployed recommender systems. As far as we know, it is the first to report experimental analysis conducted on a real commercial site. These results validate the commercial value of recommender systems, and in particular, of our MDP-based approach.


text:
An interactive presentation by Graeme Lennie.
- It takes about 100 gallons of water to grow and process a single pound of cotton, and the average American goes through about 35 pounds of new cotton material each year. Do you really need that additional T-shirt?
- One of the best ways to conserve water is to buy recycled goods, and to recycle your stuff when you're done with it. Or, stick to buying only what you really need.
- The water required to create your laptop could wash nearly 70 loads of laundry in a standard machine.
- Recycling a pound of paper, less than the weight of your average newspaper, saves about 3.5 gallons of water. Buying recycled paper products saves water too, as it takes about six gallons of water to produce a dollar worth of paper.
(Source: National Geographic)


Citing MorphoSource in Peer-Reviewed Publications
If you are using data or images you found on MorphoSource to conduct the analyses of your study or make inferences, you need to cite MorphoSource to maximize the transparency and reproducibility of your study. Whether you downloaded or simply viewed (e.g., for the purpose of scoring a character state) a file, you need to list in your study the specific files that you referenced.
You should always state somewhere that "Data were accessed and/or archived on"
You can mention the title of the project(s) containing the data, but this is not as important as citing individual data identifiers.
 1. Information to cite:
 1. Unique media identifiers: Always include DOI if available for each data file you viewed or downloaded. If there is no DOI, cite the ARK identifier. Citing media number can be useful, but is optional if ARK or DOI are provided.
 2. Specimen numbers: Always include either the official museum managed specimen identifier as a Darwin Core Triplet (Institution code: collection code: alphanumeric string; e.g., UF:Herp:12345) or the occurrence ID (e.g.,
 3. Grant numbers that funded creation of data: When funder information is available for a dataset, it is nice to continue crediting them to help show scholarly impact of funding decisions. Some contributors explicitly ask that their grants be cited upon re-use.
 4. Any publications the contributing author requests be cited when using the data: The most obvious case here is when you found out about particular MorphoSource datasets through data citation papers.
 2. Where to cite it:
 1. Unique media identifiers and specimen numbers should be cited in the main text or, if this is not possible, in the supplementary information of the paper. If there are just a few specimens, the information can be narrated in the methods section. If there are many specimens and scans, a separate table may be necessary.
 2. If citing grant numbers, this should probably done in text, next to each dataset, as well as in the acknowledgments section. If many funders were involved, a simple list of funders and grant numbers can be used. E.g., "Creation of datasets accessed on MorphoSource was made possible by the following funders and grant numbers: NSF DBI-_PHONE_; Sloan Foundation Grant #5677; Sigma Xi Grant to J. Doe titled: "Why Pigs Can't Fly Anymore" 2012...etc"
 3. As usual, publications like data citation papers should be cited in the bibliography of your article.
If you are contributing new data
 1. All of the information above is still applicable.
 2. If you need help assigning large numbers of DOIs, contact the MorphoSource administrators.
 3. Review the terms and conditions and make sure you have the necessary approvals from any museum stakeholders and are documenting the ownership and use restrictions on the data correctly.
 4. Again, citing your MorphoSource data project URL can be helpful, but it is NOT a replacement for listing individual data identifiers. You do a disservice to yourself and the scientific community by not listing individual files, because individual file listing allows for automatic determination of impact by third-party tools in a way that project URLs or simply acknowledging MorphoSource or the creators of the data do not.
For examples of different ways of citing identifiers check out which uses a main text DOI table for referencing a large number of scans and, which references a smaller number of scans in the data citation statement. Again, other solutions are also possible like an in-text list of DOIs and ARKs or simply including the DOI or ARK after in-text references to a specimen or scan.


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A review of the magnitude, impacts of abandoned / lost fishing gear and options for mitigation
Food and Agricultural Organisation FAO - Project Dates:
Description of Project:
Abandoned, lost or otherwise discarded fishing gear (ALDFG) is a problem that is increasingly of concern. Various United National General Assembly resolutions now provide a mandate for, and indeed require, action to reduce ALDFG. However there is a lack of good information about a) the reasons for ALDFG, b) the extent of the problem, and c) the most effective solutions for ensuring that the prevalence of ALDFG is reduced in the future.
Poseidon prepared a Technical Paper, the principle purpose of which was to consider a number of discrete issues related to ALDFG;
- What is the magnitude and composition of ALDFG;
- What are the impacts of ALDFG on the marine environment and what are the financial costs;
- Why is fishing gear abandoned, lost or otherwise discarded;
- What is being done to combat ALDFG and how successful are these initiatives proving to be;
- Recommendations on a range of possible solutions to reduce ALDFG.


text: Is Device in Collection activity This activity verifies if a device exists in an SCCM device collection. The Is Device in Collection activity uses the PowerShell activity template to verify if a specific device exists in an SCCM device collection. The activity is configured to use a MID Server with PowerShell capabilities and to run a MID Server script called IsDeviceInCollection.ps1 to perform the test. To access this activity in the workflow editor, select the Custom tab, and then navigate to Custom Activities > System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM). Input variables Table 1. Is Device in Collection input variables Variable Description sccmServer The fully qualified domain name (FQDN) of the SCCM server. collection Name of the device collection. device Name of the device to verify is in the collection. Output variables Table 2. Is Device in Collection output variables Variable Description output Variable that contains the test result: True/False errorMessage Variable that contains the activity output error message. Conditions Table 3. Is Device in Collection conditions Condition Description Exist The device exists in the collection. Not exist The device does not exist in the collection. Failure Activity failed.


We matched that to:
How do I add another Username or Access Card to the EasyWeb login screen?
EasyWeb can conveniently store and remember multiple Usernames and Access Cards.
To add additional Username or Access Cards to the login screen
 1. Select the drop-down arrow in the Username or Access Card input box
 2. Select Add Username or Access Card
 3. Enter your additional Username or Access Card number. Do not enter spaces or dashes.
 4. If you wish, add a Description that will associate the Access Card with the user (e.g. Dad's Card)
 5. Check the box "Remember me".
 6. Enter your password.
 7. Select Login.
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The Evolving Urban Form: Quanzhou
Quanzhou? Quanzhou (pronounced "CHWEN-JOE"), despite its urban population that is approaching 5 million this urban area is so unfamiliar to Westerners and the rest of the world as to require an introduction. Quanzhou is a prefecture ("shi") in China's Fujian province. Fujian is just to the north of Guangdong, home of Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Hong Kong's former province (before the British) and just to the south of Zhejiang, the large rich province at the south flank of the Yangtze Delta (which abuts Shanghai). Quanzhou is also adjacent to Xiamen, one of the original special economic zones established by the legendary reformer Deng Xiao Ping.
Quanzhou has more than 8 million people in an area similar in size to that of Los Angeles County (4,400 square miles or 11,200 square kilometers). Continuous urbanization spreads through 8 of Quanzhou's 11 political subdivisions.
In Situ Urbanization: Quanzhou has experienced an unusual urban development pattern. Yu Zhu, Xinhua Qi, Huaiyou Shao and Kaijing He at Fujian Normal University have documented an "in situ" urbanization (or urbanization in place, rather than by expansion from a core) that involves conversion of rural areas in place to urban areas, with agricultural employment being replaced by non-agricultural employment. A similar process has been identified in the Indian state of Kerala and some other prefectures in south China. These could be the first natural examples that defy the expansion of urban areas from a core to the periphery that has been the rule since human kind gathered in settlements.
Quanzhou: The Ultimate: Quanzhou appears to be the most extensive case of in situ urbanization in the world. The older multistoried and single family detached farm houses have become integrated into an urban fabric, though many are falling victim to demolition. Like the economic dynamos of Shenzhen, Dongguan and Guangzhou in Guangdong to the south, Quanzhou has become a major manufacturing center for exports and urbanization is intensifying.
A Low Density Urban Area for China: The result of in situ urbanization has been a very low density urban area by Chinese standardssomething more akin to what some Western planners decry as "sprawl". Currently, the continuous urbanization of Quanzhou covers an area of more than 500 square miles (1,300 square kilometers) with an estimated population of more than 4.5 million people. At more than 9000 persons per square mile (3,500 per square kilometer), Quanzhou is a quarter more dense than Los Angeles, similar in density to Paris but slightly more than half as dense as Shanghai. Even at its core, Quanzhou has comparatively low density compared to other Chinese urban areas. For example, the highest density local jurisdiction (Licheng) has a population density similar to that of the city of San Francisco (approximately 18,000 per square mile or 7000 per square kilometer). The three central jurisdictions of Shanghai are 8 times as dense.
This low density pattern does not extend to nearby urban areas. For example, the core areas of Fuzhou, (Fujian's capital), just 100 miles up the 8-lane freeway are four times as dense as the core of Quanzhou and the urban area more than double the density.
Balanced Population Growth: Because it is urbanizing in place, Quanzhou's population density is increasing throughout the large urban divisions. There is plenty of vacant land throughout the urban area for development, while redevelopment is also taking place at the usually hectic Chinese pace.
The historic core jurisdictions of Licheng and Fengze grew approximately 30% between the 2000 and 2010 censuses. The largest nearby urban jurisdictions, Jin Jiang and Shi Shi combined for a population increase of approximately 34%, while the outer metropolitan jurisdictions grew only 3%. The outer jurisdictions have far more rural land and are less attractive to residents since low automobile ownership makes them less accessible (see table). There was a population loss of 6 percent in the rural jurisdictions, which is typical for China, as people move for better lives to the urban areas.
Quanzhou (Fujian) Population Trend by Sector
Sector 2000 2010 Change % Change
Jurisdictions with Substantial Urbanization
Historic Core: Licheng & Fengze 690,000 898,000 208,000 30%
Near Urban (Jin Jiang & Shi Shi) 1,978,000 2,660,000 682,000 34%
Outer Urban & Exurban 2,785,000 2,864,000 79,000 3%
Balance of Prefecture (Principally Rural) 1,830,000 1,719,000 (111,000) -6%
Total 7,283,000 8,141,000 858,000 12%
Note: Urban extent estimated at over 4.5 million in 2010
A Multi-Centric Urban Area: As would be expected in such a low density urban area, Quanzhou is multi-centered, following the pattern of urban areas like Los Angeles, Houston, and Mexico City. The largest center is the historic core, which is divided between Licheng and Fengze (Photograph: Historic core). This core is genuinely historic, with the Kaiyuan Temple (Buddhist) complex dating from 686 AD. Two similar towers (one shown above) were built during the Song Dynasty.
Historic Core
But the historic core has substantial modern development. There is extensive new residential high rise and mid-rise development on an island in the Jin river, which is the southern border of Fengze, just north of Jin Jiang. The new high speed rail station is located far from this core and more remote than the major airport, which is located in Jin Jiang.
There is another strong center in Shi Shi, which is 12 miles (20 kilometers) southeast of the historic core. Shi Shi has a large stock of medium rise buildings and has a small, though dense core (Photograph: Shi Shi core). There are also a number of large residential developments under construction in Shi Shi and major parts of the old core are under redevelopment.
Shi Shi Core
Jin Jiang is the largest of the jurisdictions in the metropolitan area, with nearly one quarter of the population. It is located just across the Jin River from Fengze. Jin Jiang also has a commercial core (Photograph: Jin Jiang core), though it is less concentrated than the historic core and the core of Shi Shi. Jin Jiang is also home to the airport serving Quanzhou. New, large multi-building high-rise residential development are under construction in many areas of Jin Jiang.
Jin Jiang Core
Vanishing Old China: Quanzhou may be the best place to see remnants of China's urbanization that preceded the rise of places like Shanghai, Beijing, Wuhan and Chengdu. All three of the largest urban jurisdictions are modern, but each has areas with the dusty roads one would expect to see in a lower income nation. At the same time, Quanzhou is on its way to becoming one of the large, prosperous urban areas of China. Already its gross domestic product and the population of its urban extent exceeds that of Fuzhou, the provincial capital. Most typical throughout urban Quanzhou are the multiple building high rise residential developments typical of all large Chinese urban areas. At the same time, there are wide expanses of demolition, where the remnants of the older buildings remain, as sites are readied for more modern projects.
Replicability? The process of in situ urbanization requires very high rural densities that can equal or exceed the 1000 per square mile or 400 per square kilometer standard used to delineate urban areas by census authorities in Canada, France, the United Kingdom, the United States and some other nations. There would simply be too much space between villages and houses in the rural areas of places like Kansas, Saskatchewan or the Ukraine. As a result, it situ urbanization is likely to remain the rare exception. However, if the world, especially Europe, were to follow the integrative urban-rural model suggested by Thomas Sieverts at the University of Darmstadt (Cities without Cities), something like in situ urbanization would be the result.
Lead Photo:
Zenguo Tower at Kaiyuan Temple, Licheng district of Quanzhou (all photos by author)
See the attached file for 100 more photos of the region.
rac-quanzhou.pdf3.99 MB


text:
Answer: It sounds as though your plants are showing some transplant stress. It usually subsides in a week or so, once the roots become established. It might help speed the adjustment process along if you place the plants in filtered sunlight until they perk up. Then you can gradually move them back into a full sun position.
Enjoy your new plants!
Q&A Library Searching Tips


text:
Objective: The objective of this experiment is to study bending loss.
Whenever the condition for angle of incidence of the incident light is violated the losses are introduced due to refraction of light. This occurs when fiber is subjected to bending. Lower the radius of curvature more is the loss.
- Connect function generator square wave output to LED (emitter).
- Connect optical fiber between LED output and PIN (detector) input. An oscilloscope is connected to PIN (detector) output.
- Select the number of turn by clicking the options given. First click "1 Turn optical fiber" button.
- Click run continuously button to run the experiment.
- The received signal can be seen in the oscilloscope. Measure the amplitude of the received signal and name it V1.
- Then change the number of turns to 2 by clicking the option "2 turn optical fiber".
- Measure the amplitude of the received signal by oscilloscope and name it V2.
- Compare the value obtained previously with the latest one. It can be seen easily that due to bends, loss occurs in the cable.
- Explain through sketch how bending loss occur?
- How are micro bending losses reduced?
- Gerd Keiser, Optical Fiber Communications, Tata McGraw Hill, 2008.


text:
The Caribbean Broadcast Media Partnership on HIV/AIDS (CBMP)
is an unprecedented coalition of major Caribbean commercial and public broadcast companies.
NOT A MEMBER?
Formulaire d'Adhesion du PMDC
HIV/AIDS In The Caribbean
The HIV/AIDS epidemic has already claimed over 25 million lives and another 39 million people are currently estimated to be living with HIV/AIDS worldwide. HIV/AIDS cases have been reported in all regions of the world.
The HIV/AIDS epidemic has had a profound impact on the Caribbean region, the second-most affected region in the world, after sub-Saharan Africa, and the most affected in the Americas. AIDS is the leading cause of death among 15-44 year-olds in the region. The epidemic varies significantly across the region's countries and by population, reflecting the Caribbean's cultural, ethnic, and geographic diversity. Women are increasingly affected, comprising half of those living with HIV/AIDS. Young people– especially young women–are at particular risk.
To learn more, click on the links below to view relevant resources and reports on HIV/AIDS in the region.


text:
NYC Principal Carland Washington promotes health and wellness beyond the classroom.
- Name: Carland Washington
- Age: 36
- Occupation: Principal
In the two years Carland Washington has overseen West Prep Academy middle school in New York City, he's witnessed a changing view on how his students experience healthier food.
"Children are growing up in urban America and the only place they see relatively fresh produce is at their local deli. We're re-educating them to know that you get just as full eating healthy food," he says.
West Prep Academy partners with Wellness in the Schools, a program that pairs a chef with cafeteria staff and students. Each month focuses on a different produce item. When they studied beans, for example, the kids learned to make vegetable chili and hummus. "It's really broadened their horizons," Washington says. "We were chopping red peppers and one kid thought they were tomatoes. It's revealing that some of the students couldn't identify the basics we take for granted."
Washington's concerns extend beyond the boundaries of his own school. He hopes to encourage other communities to reimagine how they promote food choices and prioritize learning about health. "Home economics and nutrition classes are just as important as math and sports," he says. "We've got to educate the whole child—bring healthy food into the classroom, let the kids play and experiment and taste so they can engage and understand its uses and purpose."


text:
Caring for American Indian Objects
- More Info
- By: Edited by Sherelyn Ogden
- Format: Paper, 272 pp., 8.5" x 11", 48 color photos, 63 b&w photos, appendices, index
- Publisher: MHS Press (August 2004)
- Usually ships in: 1-3 business days
- ISBN 0-87351-505-6
A Practical and Cultural Guide2005 AASLH Merit Award Winner
Invaluable information and advice to anyone who wants to preserve these objects. Twenty-one contributors, fourteen of whom are American Indians, discuss general aspects of museum care, explain techniques for particular materials, and address important cultural considerations.
American Indian cultural objects, like most objects, deteriorate over time. Precious and irreplaceable pieces of a people's heritage can turn to dust, either slowly or rapidly, depending upon their composition and the ways in which they are stored and handled.
This practical guide, with over 100 color and black-and-white photos, offers Indian and non-Indian caregivers, conservators, and collectors helpful information on standard museum practice to aid them in making decisions to slow deterioration.
Sherelyn Ogden is the head of conservation at the Minnesota Historical Society. She is also the author of Preservation of Library and Archival Materials: A Manual and Preservation Planning: Guidelines for Writing a Long-Range Preservation Plan.
Praise for Caring for American Indian Objects
"An excellent and valuable book that will be useful to students, conservators, and tribal museum staff. It will make a great textbook as well as reference book." — Dr. Andrew Gulliford, Director, Center of Southwest Studies, Fort Lewis College
More Information about this book:
View the table of contents to Caring for American Indian Objects.
Our Price: $39.95


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Catel - Part 2 of n: Using WPF Controls and Themes
, 25 Nov 2010 CPOL
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This article explains some of the most important controls and windows of Catel.
Catel is a brand new framework (or enterprise library, just use whatever you like) with data handling, diagnostics, logging, WPF controls, and an MVVM Framework. So, Catel is more than "just" another MVVM Framework or some nice Extension Methods that can be used. It's more like a library that you want to include in all the (WPF) applications you are going to develop in the near future.
This article will explain the user controls and themes of the framework.
Article Browser
Table of Contents
 2. Introduction
 3. Controls
 4. Validation
 5. Windows
 6. Themes
 7. History
2. Introduction
Welcome to part 2 of the article series about Catel. This article explains some of the most important controls and windows of Catel. Not all controls are handled, simply because there are too many to mention them all.
If you haven't read the previous article(s) of Catel yet, it is recommended that you do. They are numbered, so finding them shouldn't be too hard.
This article contains three detailed information chapters:
 - Controls: This chapter describes the most important controls of Catel.
 - Validation: This chapter describes the validation controls of Catel. They are so special that they deserve to get a separate chapter.
 - Windows: This chapter describes the windows that ship with Catel.
Each item that is described contains an image (if applicable) of the object, the reason why it is built, and finally how it is built. Sometimes, it's so obvious how a control or window is built, that we leave out that part. If you can't figure out how the controls work, just let us know! This article is not a reference for the user controls, but more a showcase for what Catel has to offer on various aspects. Catel ships with a reference help file that includes the actual documentation for all methods of the objects in Catel, so use that if you are looking for the actual documentation. This is an introduction article to get you interested in the UI-elements that ship with Catel.
Most of these controls need to be incorporated manually into your own controls and windows. However, it is really recommended to use the MVVM Framework together with the controls described in this article. The MVVM Framework that ships with Catel is described and explained in the next article, but fully uses the power of the controls that are explained in this article (such as the validation controls).
3. Controls
3.1. BrowseForFile
The BrowseForFile control allows you to easily add 'browse for file' features to your application. The control includes a button so you don't have to take care of this yourself.
3.1.1. Example code
3.1.2. Why?
The control is very useful when the user must select a file from disk. This control saves the developer from creating a textbox with a button over and over again, and also incorporates the OpenFileDialog class.
3.2. DropDownButton
The DropDownButton is a very well-known control, so it's weird that WPF developers didn't include this control. The DropDownButton has a custom Content property, so it is fully customizable.
3.2.1. Example code


text:
The Puppet Show (Mu'ouxi)
The Puppet Show (kuileixi) is better known as mu'ouxi (play of wooden dolls), in the country, which has its roots in remote times. It is said that King Mu of the Zhou (c.10th century B.C.) of oral history, on his way home from a big hunt on the Kunlun Mountain, saw a choral dance performed by Yanshi, a skilled carpenter, with wooden dolls made by himself. However, it was not until the Han Dynasty that the puppet show was mentioned as a full-fledged form of amusement. Still, that puts it at least 2,000 years back in Chinese history.
based on material offered by Mr.Du Feibao
As in most other countries, three types of puppet shows are presented in China: the rod-top puppet, the marionette and the glove puppet. Of course, the first type is most popular in China. The puppet, generally less than a metre tall, is made with true-to-life features. It is raised overhead at the top of a stick by the puppeteer with one hand and manipulated by him with the other hand moving a pair of wire rods. This type of puppets generally do not show their feet.
One of the basic skills required of the operator is to be able to hold high the puppet, which weighs 2 to 3 kilograms, with one arm and to keep it either motionless or moving steadily on the same level as dictated by the scenario. Only on this basis may the puppet be convincing in its other dramatic actions.
The marionette appears on stage in full view of the audience. It is of a more complicated structure, with the head, shoulders, waist, hands and feet all jointed, movable and controlled by separate wires. During performance, it is operated from a concealed operating bridge high above the puppet.
The glove or hand puppet, rather like those in a Punch and Judy show, is also called "bag puppet" (budai mu'ou) in China. About 20 cm long, it is the smallest of the three types. Its dress is in the form of a small bag, from inside which the puppeteer's hand manipulates its postures and movements.


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Noun: impoverishment ,im'pó-vu-rish-munt
 1. The state of having little or no money and few or no material possessions
 - poverty, poorness, immiserisation [Brit], immiserization, immiseration
 2. The act of making someone poor
 - pauperization, pauperisation [Brit]
Derived forms: impoverishments
Type of: deprivation, financial condition, privation
Encyclopedia: Impoverishment


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This argument was used to claim that black people were better off as slaves on plantations than as free men and women. The same could also be said of people in prison, yet prison is considered one of society's harshest punishments. Animals on factory farms suffer so much that it is inconceivable that they could be worse off in the wild. The wild isn't "wild" to the animals who live there; it's their home. There they have their freedom and can engage in their natural activities. The fact that they might suffer in the wild is no reason to ensure that they suffer in captivity.
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Almost all of us grew up eating meat, wearing leather, and going to circuses and zoos. We never considered the impact of these actions on the animals involved. For whatever reason, you are now asking the question: Why should animals have rights? Read more.


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Thursday, 21 June 2012
Page: 4180
Senator JOHNSTON (Western Australia) (20:50): 'Vote early, vote often' is an expression I have come to know and understand is used by people of a different political persuasion from myself. Vote early, vote often is a catchcry of people who seek to abuse the democratic political process by committing acts to subvert and undermine the integrity of the electoral roll. Vote early, vote often is a blight, is an attack, is a cancer on the way we do our democratic political business in this country. These provisions support and make much easier the subterfuge and the dishonesty described by the expression 'vote early, vote often'. These electoral and referendum amendment bills do nothing to protect the integrity of the roll—they take us in the opposite direction.
In Western Australia we have a Minister for Electoral Affairs, and we believe that enrolling is a right and a duty that is not too onerous and one that should be fulfilled by a deliberate act of each elector or potential elector. People should voluntarily and earnestly undertake the responsibilities of the democratic process. The situation with respect to Western Australia is, as I have said, that they have a separate stand-alone and independent Electoral Affairs portfolio. When the Howard government brought in the Langer amendment to the electoral laws to insist on full, consecutive numbering of House of Representatives ballots, the then Court government in Western Australia deliberately went the other way to allow for errors in numerical sequence. It is a minor point, but it is a significant one because it shows that partisanship is something that must not be able to enter into the fundamental operation of the electoral roll and its underlying philosophy through these bills. In Western Australia, for example, prisoners are disqualified from voting if sentenced to more than 12 months imprisonment, whereas in the Commonwealth, by contrast, it is three years.
The joint roll arrangement between state and Commonwealth electoral administrators is very sensible. It is cost-effective. It means that there is a capacity to ensure that the people who elect a state government are close to being the same people who elect a Commonwealth government. In Western Australia, enrolment requires a witness. Under federal law, it is simply a matter of proof of identity. This results in limited numbers of people who are on one roll but not on the other—and this is a negative. This is something that does not advance the democratic process.
The discrepancy created by the automatic federal enrolment provisions contained in these bills will blow out the discrepancy between the legislative base of the roll in Western Australia and that of the Commonwealth roll. We can assume that the majority of apathetic enrollers will not enrol for state elections, so we will have the Commonwealth roll and the state roll heading in different directions. There will be one roll for the state and one roll for the Commonwealth. Furthermore, this situation apparently does not occur in New South Wales or Victoria, so we will have a plethora of electoral rolls state by state, with the Commonwealth assisting that by having a separate basis for enrolment—that is, automatic enrolment.
There will be major headaches in the joint electoral roll in Western Australia, and Western Australians resent having these changes foisted upon them through unilateral federal legislation. A joint but accurate electoral roll incorporating the same basis for federal and state enrolments, on a non-partisan basis, is sensible and efficient.
A joint roll in Western Australia will also have a greater capacity to deal with Indigenous people in particular. This is an important issue between state and federal elections, when different agencies try to analyse who is present in desert communities to work out who is going to be present on polling day and, indeed, present on the arrival of the mobile polling booth. And the basis of their participation—I am talking about the Central Reserve residents in Western Australia—should be the same. This legislation will make it more difficult, and the integrity of the electoral roll will come under greater threat. It assists those who believe in, as I mentioned earlier, the adage 'vote early, vote often'.
I turn briefly to automatic enrolment using databases. Automatic enrolment will occur without people's knowledge or consent. Here we are in the brave new world of government officials putting people and their details on the electoral roll without their consent or knowledge. I think that is a problem. Again, given that people have different names and given that the databases from which these names will be taken may have no integrity—or are not checked by anyone for their integrity—the integrity of the roll is under threat.
The coalition's concern with automatic enrolment is obviously, as I have said, to do with the integrity of the electoral roll. In enrolling people without their knowledge, there is a significant chance of errors occurring. There is the potential for electors who are not Australian citizens to be enrolled, again assisting the adage that I think sums up the threat to the integrity of our whole system: vote early, vote often. To enrol electors who are under 18, or electors who use different names, without their knowledge damages the integrity and the reliability of the roll, and that is the problem here. Having electoral officers acting on their best understanding is not satisfactory for maintaining the integrity of what is a very vital, basic ingredient of our democratic process.
As mentioned, following the inquiry into the Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Maintaining Address) Bill, coalition members of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters noted in their dissenting report in July 2011 the risks of using external data sources such as the Australian Taxation Office, Medicare and other government agencies. They said:
The reliance on external data sources that have been collated and that are utilised for other purposes does not make them fit for use in forming the electoral roll. As outlined in the previous report into these proposals, a 1999 report by the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Economics, Finance and Public Administration: Numbers on the Run—Review of the ANAO Report No.37 1998-99 on the Management of Tax FileNumbers, found that:
There were 3.2 million more Tax File Numbers than people in Australia at the last census.
Goodness only knows that rings a number of alarm bells and let me say fits right into the mischief I have portrayed in the expression 'vote early, vote often'. The quote goes on:
Vote early, vote often is given a much better opportunity here with this sort of nonsense going on referring to databases—tax databases, Medicare databases—which are completely inaccurate and have been an administrative nightmare for the Commonwealth for many years:
It is clear that where there are such examples of inconsistencies in Commonwealth data, there cannot be sufficient faith in this data being used to automatically update the people on the electoral roll.
One should not need to have to say that:
The potential for error is even greater when using data from state or territory governments, as the Commonwealth cannot—
roll its sleeves up, wade into state offices and determine the integrity and accuracy of that data. No access is available to Commonwealth officials to state offices :
The only way to ensure that the integrity of the Electoral Roll is maintained is to ensure electors continue to be responsible for changing their individual details.
That is the Australian way. That is the way we have done things in this country since 1901. It has served us well. Turning to the minister's second reading speech, he said on 23 November 2011:
This bill will allow the Electoral Commissioner to directly update an elector's enrolled address following receipt and analysis of reliable and current data sources from outside the Electoral Commission.
It might surprise you to know that the bill says nothing of the sort. Those words,'reliable and current data sources', are not mentioned in the bill. Clause103A(1)(b) says that the Electoral Commissioner are simply needs to be:
satisfied, for reasons other than a claim under section 98 and a notice under subsection 101(5), that the person lives at another address—
in order to change a person's address. What on earth was the minister up to? Why would he say:
This bill will allow the Electoral Commissioner to directly update an elector's enrolled address following receipt... of reliable and current data.
The Electoral Commissioner is not empowered to go exclusively to reliable and current data. He simply has to be satisfied. The minister is saying something here that is patently not true. I go on. In the same speech, the minister says:
This bill will enable the Electoral Commission to deliver a more accurate electoral roll. The Electoral Commissioner will be permitted to use accurate and timely information from reliable sources to maintain the current address of already enrolled electors.
The bill says nothing of the sort. We are being sold a pup here. The minister has dressed this up as something that is going to create greater integrity in the electoral role of the Commonwealth. It is not true. The Electoral Commissioner only has to be satisfied that there has been a change of some elector's address, on any basis. I could go to the Electoral Commissioner in say, 'Do you know Fred's moved two doors down?', and if the Electoral Commissioner believes me, he can change the address of that elector. Why would the minister not mandate, as he seems to imply he has, that the Electoral Commissioner must rely upon reliable and current data sources? He is, wittingly or unwittingly—and I will give him the benefit of the doubt—giving succour to the expression 'vote early, vote often'. He is undermining the integrity of our electoral system. Why would he say that? We all know you have to be able to find words in the bill. This bill does not only allow the Electoral Commissioner to use're


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The analyzer has detected a code fragment that is very likely to contain a typo. The fragment is a sequence of similar comparisons of class members, but one of the subexpressions is different from the others in that it compares a pair of members of different names, while the others compare pairs of members of the same name.
Consider the following example:
if (a.x == b.x && a.y == b.y && a.z == b.y)
In this code, the 'a.z == b.y' subexpression is different from the other subexpressions in the sequence and is very likely a result of a typo made by the programmer when editing the copied code fragment. This is the correct version, which would not trigger the warning:
if (a.x == b.x && a.y == b.y && a.z == b.z)
The analyzer outputs this warning for sequences of three and more comparisons.


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Parenthetically, it is interesting to note that a major impetus for
SI theory is intended to be a general theory of human intelligence. Its major application (besides educational research) has been in personnel selection and placement. Meeker (1969) examines its application to education.
The following example illustrates three closely related abilities that differ in terms of operation, content, and product. Evaluation of semantic units (EMU) is measured by the ideational fluency test in which individuals are asked to make judgements about concepts. For example: "Which of the following objects best satisfies the criteria, hard and round: an iron, a button, a tennis ball or a lightbulb? On the other hand, divergent production of semantic units (DMU) would require the person to list all items they can think of that are round and hard in a given time period. Divergent production of symbolic units (DSU) involves a different content category than DMU, namely words (e.g., "List all words that end in 'tion'). Divergent production of semantic relations (DMR) would involve the generation of ideas based upon relationships. An example test item for this ability would be providing the missing word for the sentence: "The fog is as ____ as sponge" (e.g., heavy, damp, full).
1. Reasoning and problem-solving skills (convergent and divergent operations) can be subdivided into 30 distinct abilities (6 products x 5 contents).
2. Memory operations can be subdivided into 30 different skills (6 products x 5 contents).
3. Decision-making skills (evaluation operations) can be subdivided into 30 distinct abilities (6 products x 5 contents).
4. Language-related skills (cognitive operations) can be subdivided into 30 distinct abilities (6 products x 5 contents).
Meeker, M.N. (1969). The Structure of Intellect.
Relevant Web Sites:
For more on


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Researchers from the Fraunhofer Institute for Medical Image Computing, Germany willl soon be showing off a new deep learning software that is able to measure the size of tumors undergoing treatment and detect new metastases that may otherwise be overlooked.
What's particularly interesting here is not how it outlines tumors, but that it improves its accuracy the more patient CT and MRI scans that it sees. In a test of the software using 149 scans of patient livers, the software kept getting better at outlining the relevant features.
"Our program package increases confidence during tumor measurement and follow-up," said Mark Schenk from the Fraunhofer Institute for Medical Image Computing in a published statement. "The software can, for example, determine how the volume of a tumor changes over time and supports the detection of new tumors."
The details of the research will be presented at the RSNA 2016 annual meeting at the end of November in Chicago, Illinois.


Typing Transliterated Arabic in MS Word
By: Shaykh Mustafa Umar
Note: An excellent alternative is to use the tools developed by Shaykh Mudassir Mayet here: arabictypist.com
Arabic is radically different from English, even in its letters. This causes a difficulty in transliteration. For example: the word for prayer is written "salah" while the word for peace is written "salam". Anyone familiar with Arabic would know that the "s" in salah and the "s" in salam represent two completely different letters. Therefore, it is better to use Unicode characters to clarify this for the reader. Another example is with the word "salam" and "salaam". Some people write the word for peace with three a's rather than two to clarify that there is a long vowel near the end. "Salam", without the long vowel, is also an Arabic word which refers to a type of economic transaction.
Therefore, to make things easier for readers of Arabic transliteration, special Unicode characters should be used. The word for prayer is written "ṣalah" [with a dot under the "s"] to specify that the letter is a ص and not a س. The word peace is written "salām" to clarify that we are referring to prayer and not an economic transaction.
To enable this feature in MS Word, download this file: Diacritic.dot
By double clicking on the file, MS Word will open and you can start typing the Unicode characters. Hold Alt and press "a". You will see an "ā" with a line over it appear. There are six letters in Arabic which resemble six others, therefore, they should be differentiated in transliteration. Long vowels can be written as "aa", "ii", or "uu", but it is much neater to use a line on top of that letter instead. Here is a table of options:
Alt + a = ā Alt + Shift + a = Ā Long vowel with alif
Alt + i = ī Alt + Shift + i = Ī Long vowel with yā
Alt + u = ū Alt + Shift + u = Ū Long vowel with wāw
Alt + d = ḍ Alt + Shift + d = Ḍ ض
Alt + h = ḥ Alt + Shift + h = Ḥ ح
Alt + s = ṣ Alt + Shift + s = Ṣ ص
Alt + t = ṭ Alt + Shift + t = Ṭ ط
Alt + z = ẓ Alt + Shift + z = Ẓ ظ
Alt + ' = ʿ ع
You will find it a hassle to have to load the Diacritic.dot file every time you want to transliterate, especially if you do it frequently. Here is how you can permanently load the file every time you open MS Office 2013 under Windows 7:
 1. Open "Windows Explorer"
 2. Go to "C:"
 3. Go to "Program Files" or "Program Files (x86)"
 4. Go to "Microsoft Office" or "Microsoft OfficeXX" [where XX stands for the version you have]
 5. Go to "root"
 6. Go to "OfficeXX" [where XX stands for the version you have]
 7. Go to "Startup"
 8. Copy the "Diacritic.dot" file into this directory
Now every time you load Word, it will automatically load the Diacritic.dot file for you.
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How to Add a URL Redirect in HubSpot
Any time you change a URL or remove a blog post, you need to make sure you have a redirect in place. Otherwise, people trying to access the old URL will get a 404 error page. Here's how to add redirects for URLs in HubSpot, so your visitors find the right page, every time.
As your website matures over time, it's likely you'll want to update your content, or remove pages from your site. When you adjust content, you might change the URL to match the updates. Changing or removing URLs should be avoided when possible, but if it's necessary, you'll need to apply a URL redirect so anyone accessing your content winds up in the right place.
Adding a URL Redirect in HubSpot
1. Go to "Settings > Domains & URLs" then click on URL Redirects in the top tab.
HubSpot URL Redirect Settings
2. Do a search to ensure that your redirect doesn't already exist & identify possible redirect chains.
Do a search for existing redirects on the URL you're updating that might have been created by your team or created automatically by HubSpot. If there are already redirects in the system you may need to update those for the redirect to work.
You'll also want to identify if you've been redirecting any other pages to this domain. If you have, you'll want to update those with the new destination page so that you're not creating a redirect chain (ie, if you're redirecting page B to page C, check for any page A to B redirects and edit them to be A to C).
Redirect chain: when there is more than one redirect between the initial URL request and the final destination URL. Redirect chains can inadvertently happen when you're redirecting a URL that has a different page redirecting to it already.
3. Add your redirect.
HubSpot URL Redirect
It's recommended that instead of putting in your absolute URL (, you use relative URL (/la-hug2). This will cover your bases and include requests for different variations of your page such as http/https page requests and www/non-www page requests.
4. Test the redirect.
Try visiting the URL of the page that you've just redirected -- if it redirects you to the new URL that you specified it to, good job! Your work is done.
5. Troubleshooting your redirect.
If your redirect isn't working as expected, you'll want to check these two things.
First, make sure you give HubSpot a moment to process the changes, sometimes it's not live instantaneously. You'll also want to make sure you're not viewing a cached version of the page. You can force your browser to clear the cache or do a 'hard refresh' of the page load by holding down shift while you refresh the page.
Second, double check the "Advanced Settings" of your redirect.
HubSpot Advanced Settings for URL Redirects
 - Match query strings - If this is checked it will only redirect if certain query strings match. This should be unchecked.
 - Ignore trailing slash - This means that and both would redirect. This should be checked.
 - Ignore protocol (HTTP or HTTPS) - This means that it will redirect the page regardless of if it's HTTP or HTTPS. This should be checked.
 - Disable redirect when a page exists at the requested URL - This means that if you have a page with this URL, the redirect won't trigger. This is the setting most likely giving you issues. To solve this issue, and get your redirect working, you can either uncheck this box or unpublish your page. It's best practice to unpublish your pages and move them to an 'Archived' folder to help keep your HubSpot resources nice and tidy.
If your URL still isn't redirecting, go through these steps one more time as there is a chance that you've copy+pasted something incorrectly or missed a conflicting redirect in the setup process. If it still isn't redirecting reach out to HubSpot support to help you troubleshoot and consult with your IT team who may have some server-side redirects or rules that are preventing your redirect from executing as expected.
Further Reading: Best Practice URL Naming Convention for SEO & UX