Saturday, 23 October 2010
Process descriptors in FreeBSD-Capsicum
Capsicum is a set of new features for FreeBSD that adds better support for sandboxing, adding a capability mode in which the capabilities are Unix file descriptors (FDs). The features Capsicum adds are orthogonal, which is nice. One of the new features is process descriptors.
Capsicum adds a replacement for fork() called pdfork(), which returns a process descriptor (a new type of FD) rather than a PID. Similarly, there are replacements for wait() and kill() -- pdwait() and pdkill() -- which take FDs as arguments instead of PIDs.
The reason for the new interface is that kill() is not safe to allow in Capsicum's sandbox, because it provides ambient authority: it looks up its PID argument in a global namespace.
But even if you ignore sandboxing issues, this new interface is a significant improvement on POSIX process management:
 1. It allows the ability to wait on a process to be delegated to another process. In contrast, with wait()/waitpid(), a process's exit status can only be read by the process's parent.
 2. Process descriptors can be used with poll(). This avoids the awkwardness of having to use SIGCHLD, which doesn't work well if multiple libraries within the same process want to wait() for child processes.
 3. It gets rid of the race condition associated with kill(). Sending a signal to a PID is dodgy because the original process with this PID could have exited, and the kernel could have recycled the PID for an unrelated process, especially on a system where processes are spawned and exit frequently.
 kill() is only really safe when used by a parent process on its child, and only when the parent makes sure to use it before wait() has returned the child's exit status. pdkill() gets rid of this problem.
 4. In future, process descriptors can be extended to provide access to the process's internal state for debugging purposes, e.g. for reading registers and memory, or modifying memory mappings or the FD table. This would be an improvement on Linux's ptrace() interface.
However, there is one aspect of Capsicum's process descriptors that I think was a mistake: Dropping the process descriptor for a process causes the kernel to kill it. (By this I mean that if there are no more references to the process descriptor, because they have been close()'d or because the processes holding them have exited, the kernel will terminate the process.)
The usual principle of garbage collection in programming languages is that GC should not affect the observable behaviour of the program (except for resource usage). Capsicum's kill-on-close() behaviour violates that principle.
kill-on-close() is based on the assumption that the launcher of a subprocess always wants to check the subprocess's exit status. But this is not always the case. Exit status is just one communications channel, but not one we always care about. It's common to launch a process to communicate with it via IPC without wanting to have to wait() for it. (Double fork()ing is a way to do this in POSIX without leaving a zombie process.) Many processes are fire-and-forget.
The situation is analogous for threads. pthreads provides pthread_detach() and PTHREAD_CREATE_DETACHED as a way to launch a thread without having to pthread_join() it.
In Python, when you create a thread, you get a Thread object back, but if the Thread object is GC'd the thread won't be killed. In fact, finalisation of a thread object is implemented using pthread_detach() on Unix.
I know of one language implementation that (as I recall) will GC threads, Mozart/Oz, but this only happens when a thread can have no further observable effects. In Oz, if a thread blocks waiting for the resolution of a logic variable that can never be resolved (because no other thread holds a reference to it), then the thread can be GC'd. So deadlocked threads can be GC'd just fine. Similarly, if a thread holds no communications channels to the outside world, it can be GC'd safely.
Admittedly, Unix already violates this GC principle by the finalisation of pipe FDs and socket FDs, because dropping one endpoint of the socket/pipe pair is visible as an EOF condition on the other endpoint. However, this is usually used to free up resources or to unblock a process that would otherwise fail to make progress. Dropping a process descriptor would halt progress -- the opposite. Socket/pipe EOF can be used to do this too, but it is less common, and I'm not sure we should encourage this.
However, aside from this complaint, process descriptors are a good idea. It would be good to see them implemented in Linux.
1 comment:
jan g said...
WRT the GC problem: I agree, sometimes it's necessary to alter the disposition of the parent towards its child. Perhaps an fcntl() on the PD to put it into a "detached" state would be appropriate? (What this would do to open PDs probably needs some careful thinking about.)


Taxes and subsidies on Energy in Denmark
Denmark | April 2015 - June 2015
Taxes on energy serves to purposes. Besides raising government revenue, taxes promotes climate and energy policy objectives. Consumption of electricity and fossil fuels used for heating purposes are subject to substantial taxes, while renewable energy is exempt of taxes. It provides a significant incentive to replace coal and natural gas with biomass and solar. In the transport sector, is biofuel generally imposed the same tax structure.
Ea Energy Analyses has carried out an overview of the Danish system for taxes on behalf of the municipality of Fåborg-Midtfyn in relation to Energiplan Fyn. Furthermore, the analysis included recommendations of changes in the tax system to support the green transition of the Danish energy system.
The analysis consists of the following subjects: Fuels, emissions, tariffs, heatand chp plants, renewable electricity production, energy saving obligations, heat pumps, electric heaters, surplus heat and transport.


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David R. Harris
This issue of Connecting with Cornell features several articles about things that fly. They include John Hermanson on bats, Timothy DeVoogd on birds, Jane Wang on dragonflies, and Kenneth McClane on butterflies.
Perhaps surprisingly, only one of these articles focuses on flight, and it is not the article about birds. Each illustrates how Cornell researchers find answers to common questions in unexpected places. Hermanson details how he and a group of undergraduate and graduate students have studied the bats of Trinidad to understand something that we don't usually associate with bats—walking.
DeVoogd studies birds to gain insights into something we don't usually associate with birds—learning. It turns out that birds are excellent for studying the neurobiology of learning because the more complex a male's song, the more attractive he is as a mate. DeVoogd and associates have been able to observe the brains of young birds learning complex songs. They have also been able to observe how the brain's capacity for learning responds to environmental conditions.
Jane Wang and her associates are fascinated by the mechanics of flight, a topic that has intrigued humans for millennia. Rather than focusing on birds, however, their research concentrates on a seeming anomaly in the world of flight—dragonflies. From Wang we learn that very little is known about the mechanics of insect flight. How exactly does a dragonfly hover? How does it move forward and turn? In addition to helping us understand this unusual creature, Wang's answers to these and other questions about dragonflies are already yielding insights that will improve aircraft design.
Finally, Kenneth McClane reminds us that in the hands of an artist, butterflies and crows can prompt deep reflection about the mundane and the spiritual.
I hope that you enjoy these examples of how Cornell researchers find answers to common questions in unconventional places. For more, please visit the Cornell website and research portals, such as the Institute for the Social Sciences, the Society for the Humanities, and the Virtual Life Sciences Library.
"I hope you enjoy these examples of how Cornell researchers find answers to common questions in unconventional places."

source: HuggingFaceFW/fineweb-edu


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A course format refers to the layout of a course. The course format can be selected in Administration > Course administration > Edit settings.
An administrator can enable, disable or delete course formats for courses in Administration > Site administration > Plugins > Course formats > Manage course formats. They can also change the order in which available course formats are displayed to teachers in the course settings.
- 1 Standard course formats
- 2 Contributed Course Formats
- 3 See also
Standard course formats
- TIP: If you want all your students to work on the same materials at the same time, this would be a good format to choose.
- NOTE: Make sure your course start date is correct. If it is not your weeks will have the wrong date on it. This is especially important if you are restoring a course to use with a new section of students.
TIP: This is great to use if your course is objective based and each objective may take different amounts of time to complete. An example of this would be scaffolding where the students are building upon the knowledge from earlier topics.
"Show only one section"
With the Weekly, Topics and any contributed format that implements the functionalty, it is possible via Administration > Course administration > Edit settings to "show one section per page". Here is a course with eight topics, with the third one currently shown. The links left and right lead to topics two and four:
- The course home page shows just the section names and any text in the section description along with activity and resource numbers, with the names being click-able. This is what you see the first time you access the course. Once you have selected a topic by clicking on its name, you then see one section at a time.
- If editing is ON, then the Main course page will display all the content in all the sections.
- There is a 'Jump to...' menu at the bottom of each single section page
This format is oriented around one main forum,the social forum, which appears listed on the main page. It is useful for situations that are more free form. They may not even be courses. The Moodle Lounge is an example of a social format course.
When selecting the social format, it is possible to specify how many discussions you wish to display on the course page:
The social forum can be edited by clicking the 'Update this forum' button on the social forum page. The forum introduction is displayed at the top of the course page. Activities and resources can be added on the side by using the Social activities block.
Single activity format
The single activity format only has 1 section, and allows the teacher to add one activity only to the course. When the single activity format is selected, a drop down menu appears for the teacher to choose the activity they wish to use. See the "See also" section below for a screencast and working example of the single activity course format.
Note: This course format replaces the SCORM format in earlier versions of Moodle, as it is possible here to select a SCORM package as the single activity.
Single activity format with a forum as the activity and social format are very similar. The only difference is when the course contains other activities. The single activity format displays them as "orphaned" and for teachers only; the social format displays them in an activities block and available for students.
Contributed Course Formats
See MDL-27646 and MDL-28555 and maybe the discussion _URL_
Buttons course format
This is a format that is essentially the same as the standard Topic and Weekly formats but with a 'toggle' for each section except '0'. The toggles' purpose is to reduce the amount of initial information presented to the user thus reducing the'scroll of death' that can plague courses with a lot of content. The'state' of the toggles is remembered on a per course per user basis. For more information, please visit Collapsed_Topics_course_format.
For an overview of 'Collapsed Topics' please see this video:
The daily format is a modification of the weekly format that shows sections by day rather than by week.
The grid format is a modular and visual course format. Hides all topics and creates a grid of icons (one for each topic) with short titles. Clicking on an icon brings up the content from the corresponding topic in a "lightbox" style display.
The menutopic format allows you to display the topics/sections in a menu.
The Noticeboard format presents the latest post in the news forum at the top of the course.
The onetopic format shows each topic in a tab, keeping the current tab between calls to resources, in such a way that when it returns from a module as the blog or the glossary it returns to tab from where you started. This format is based on the Moodle standard format: "Topics".
Topic format (colors)
The colored topic format is based on the 'Topics' standard format and allows a teacher to specify the foreground and background colours for each course section.
Flexible sections format
The flexible sections format for Moodle 2.4+ allows to have nested sections and each section may be displayed expanded (with all content on the parent section page) or collapsed (as a link to a separate page)
Other contributed course formats are available from the modules and plugins database.
- Screencast: Single Activity course format
- Example of a single activity course format on school.demo.moodle.net: Moodle History Quiz (Log in with username: parent and password: moodle)
- Using Moodle Course formats forum
Using Moodle forum discussions:

source: openbmb/Ultra-FineWeb


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The Colonial Pennsylvania Plantation is a living history museum located in beautiful Ridley Creek State Park. The museum strives to represent and recreate the every day lives of the regular citizens who lived in Southeastern Pennsylvania from 1760 to 1790. The 112 acre farm is dubbed a plantation according to land descriptions of the time. Holdings under 100 acres were described as farms, those over 100 acres as plantations, and those over 1000 acres as manors.
Costumed interpreters, livestock, and restored and reconstructed buildings all serve to take you back in time and help you to experience how most people in this area lived during the end of the colonial period.
During your self-guided tour you are invited to talk to our interpreters and you may even be able to join in the work. Everyone will find something they enjoy at Colonial Pennsylvania Plantation where the past is your present.


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David Lockett is a middle school STEM teacher, whose interest in STEM and astronomy started when he attended Fisk University. As a result of that interest, he founded a non-profit that focused on innovative methods to bring science, technology, engineering and math education to all students.
Over the past few years, he attended NASA Socials for the Orion First Flight Launch, the OLYMPEX campaign, and the New Horizons mission. His efforts integrating STEM and astronomy were recognized with a Congressional STEM proclamation.
During a recent visit to Chile as part of a teacher enrichment program, David received extensive training about the instruments, science, data products, and communicating concepts. His mission is to provide unique learning opportunities and assist students with developing an understanding our universe.
Past Events Hosted By This Ambassador:
There Goes the Sun: The Aug. 21 Eclipse via Tennessee Crossroads, NOVA & PBS Kids Adventure Science Center
Bok at solar eclipse Bok Academy
International Observe the Moon Night (InOMN) Lake Wales Park


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In the vibration of certain sounds and sight, there is healing--a returning of our awareness to the perfection that is our true nature. I wish you, my friend, to know the resonance of your perfection.
blessings and love,
Note: Icaros are medicine songs--healing songs
Full Text from Video:
Within every atom of the universe,
exists the blueprint of infinity,
the blueprint of perfection.
Within every cell of your body
is the pattern of perfection.
In serenity, that memory begins to arise
reconnecting you to your true nature,
restoring perfect unison with the universe.
Serenity may come in inaction
or practiced silence--like meditation--
but serenity is not dependent on
the absence of stimuli.
It can find you in exertion,
in the creation of your art, or
absorbed in another's art.
It can come in joyful dance,
in the laughter of loved ones,
or in communion with Nature.
Without your awareness,
serenity will begin to envelope you
whenever you are in full release,
completely present in the moment
When you relax,
In truth, you are never separated from
or less than perfection but
discord can distort your perception
misshaping your experience
into the pattern of itself.
Certain colors, sounds, and experience
can induce serenity.
As some vibrations can sicken/distort,
others can heal/restore harmony.
They cause your awareness to
resonate with the song of the universe,
which is always singing within you
even when you cannot hear it.
Feel the voice of your spirit
Singing in harmony with infinity.


IDSA Design Swarm 2015
Reinvent Learning on Purpose
IDSA International Conference 2015 Seattle
Design Learning Swarm
of Design Learning Network
Learning Brief
What if we were to reinvent learning on purpose – to ensure all people have access to public spaces where they can freely engage in meaningful content and effective interactions regardless of age, gender, learning need, geographic location, or social construct?
Anchored in lifelong learning practices, how might we develop meaningful educational pathways intended to offer every human being the legal right to health, justice, equity, creative fulfillment, and sustainable prosperity?


Small, drug-releasing battery could dissolve completely over time
A magnesium-based battery dissolves completely over time (clockwise).--Courtesy of U. of Illinois
A study published this week in Advanced Materials highlights a biodegradable battery that could be designed to deliver drugs in a controlled manner and then disappear within a set amount of time.
The implantable device uses magnesium foil as its anode and iron, molybdenum or tungsten as its cathode, all of which dissolve in the body over time. Held together in the biodegradable polymer polyanhydride, the battery uses a phosphate-buffered solution as an electrolyte between the two electrodes, according to an article in Nature.
In further research, the creators, who hail from the University of Illinois, hope to turn these batteries into delivery devices that can be implanted in the body and then controlled by radio signals to release their payload. This could happen in response to a specific signal, such as that of a seizure, according to the article.
And once it's dissolved, the battery releases about twice as much magnesium as a dissolving stent, an amount that isn't considered to be dangerous in the body.
For now, the device can be used for about one day at a time, but the team is looking to improve its capability while keeping its size at a reasonable level. They say that a 0.25-square-centimeter battery that is just a micrometer thick could eventually power a wireless sensor for a day.
- here's the Nature report
- and here's the Advanced Materials abstract


kids encyclopedia robot
Dominic O'Brien facts for kids
Kids Encyclopedia Facts
Quick facts for kids
Dominic O'Brien
Dominic O'Brien.jpg
Dominic O'Brien (right)
Born August 10, 1957 (1957-08-10) (age 63)
Known for Author of memory-related books
Dominic O'Brien (10 August 1957) is a British mnemonist and an author of memory-related books. He is the eight time World Memory Champion and works as a trainer for Peak Performance Training.
He began developing his mnemonic techniques in 1987 when he saw Creighton Carvello memorise a pack of 52 playing cards in less than three minutes on the BBC television programme Record Breakers. To memorise numbers, O'Brien developed the mnemonic Dominic system, which is similar to the Major System. He has written books about memorisation techniques such as How to Develop a Perfect Memory, Quantum Memory Power, Learn to Remember, How to Pass Exams, The Winning Hand, and The Amazing Memory Box.
He gives lectures, and has been seen on television programmes such as The Human Body.
Dominic O'Brien had an entry in the Guinness Book of Records for his 1 May 2002 feat of committing to memory a random sequence of 2808 playing cards (54 packs) after looking at each card only once. He was able to correctly recite their order, making only eight errors, four of which he immediately corrected when told he was wrong.
kids search engine
Dominic O'Brien Facts for Kids. Kiddle Encyclopedia.


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The main goal of the KI-Campus project is to attract a wide range of interested parties in Germany and provide them with training in the area of AI. The use of the pilot online learning opportunities for AI is open to both students and lifelong learners. Therefore, as the project progresses a varied and high-quality academic portfolio will be established.
In the initial stage of the project, a digital learning platform ("KI-Campus"), specializing in the topic of AI, will be developed as a prototype. Various actors (universities, educational institutions, companies, etc.) are enabled to provide online learning opportunities on AI. While achieving the goal of strong networking, the need and acceptance of a nationwide platform will be clarified and long-term operating models developed.
In the sub-project "MOOC platform for the AI campus," HPI is transforming its existing and proven MOOC platform openHPI into an open source project. This includes the control and moderation of the developer community, as well as quality control of the code components contributed by the community. In addition, the HPI MOOC platform will be further developed for specific projects with a focus on AI-driven features and then, for example, be integrated with features such as chatbots, transcription, translations, and recommendations.
More information: _URL_


[翻译字幕]Words and Their Stories: Bigwig
来源：慢速英语 时间：2012-04-08 08:00:41
Now, the VOA Special English program WORDS AND THEIR STORIES.
Some expressions describe people who are important, or who at least think they are. One such expression is bigwig.
In the seventeenth century, important men in Europe began to wear false hair, called wigs. As years passed, wigs began to get bigger. The size of a man's wig depended on how important he was. The more important he was -- or thought he was -- the bigger the wig he wore. Some wigs were so large they covered a man's shoulders or back.
Today, the expression bigwig is used to make fun of a person who feels important. People never tell someone he is a bigwig. They only use the expression behind his back.
Big wheel is another way to describe an important person. A big wheel may be the head of a company, a political leader, a famous movie star. They are big wheels because they are powerful. What they do affects many people. Big wheels give the orders. Other people carry them out. As in many machines, a big wheel makes the little wheels turn.
Big wheel是另外一种描述重要人物的方式。Big wheel可能是公司负责人、政治领袖、或著名影星。他们是Big wheel，因为他们极具影响力。他们的所作所为能够影响很多人。Big wheels下达命令，其他人来贯彻落实。就像在许多机器中，大轮带动小轮转。
Big wheel [became] a popular expression after World War Two. It probably comes from an expression used for many years by people who fix parts of cars and trucks. They said a person rolled a big wheel if he was important and had influence.
二战后，Big wheel变成一个常用表达，它可能源于轿车或卡车修理工人使用了很多年的一种说法。这些工人称，如果一个人很重要而且有影响力，就由他来转动大轮。
The top of something is the highest part. So it is not surprising that top is part of another expression that describes an important person. The expression is top banana. A top banana is the leading person in a comedy show. The funniest comedian is called the top banana. The next is second banana. And so on.
某个物体的顶部是最高的部分，所以top是另一个描述重要人物的短语的一部分，这并不奇怪。这个短语就是top banana。Top Banana是喜剧中的主角。最有趣的喜剧演员被称为top banana，接下来就是second banana。以此类推。
Why a banana? A comedy act in earlier days often included a part where one of the comedians would hit the others over the head with a soft object. The object was shaped like the yellow fruit: the banana.
Top banana still is used mainly in show business. Yet the expression can also be used to describe the top person in any area.
Top banana仍主要用于娱乐行业。然而，这个短语还可以用来形容任何领域的重要人物。
A kingpin is another word for an important person. The expression comes from the game of bowling. The kingpin is the number one pin. If hit correctly with the bowling ball, the kingpin will make all the other nine pins fall. And that is the object of the game.
So, the most important person in a project or business is the kingpin. If the kingpin is removed, the business or project is likely to fail.
Kingpin is often used to describe an important criminal, or the leader of a criminal gang. A newspaper may report, for example, that police have arrested the suspected kingpin of a car-stealing operation.
This VOA Special English program, WORDS AND THEIR STORIES, was written by Marilyn Christiano. I'm Warren Scheer.


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WHO to Develop a Global Strategy to Reduce Alcohol Related Harm
Geneva, 22 May 2008. The World Health Assembly has adopted a resolution calling on the WHO Director-General to prepare a draft global strategy to reduce harmful consumption of alcohol.
The draft strategy is to be based on all available evidence and existing best practices and address relevant policy options, taking into account the different national, religious and cultural contexts.
In preparing the draft, the Director-General is to collaborate and consult with the Member States as well as to consult with intergovernmental organisations, health professionals, NGOs and economic operators on ways they could contribute to reducing harmful use of alcohol.
The resolution also urges the 193 Member States to collaborate with the WHO's Secretariat in developing the draft strategy and to develop systems to monitor alcohol consumption, the consequences of that consumption and the policy responses to it. It also urges them to consider strengthening national responses to reduce alcohol related harm.
The draft strategy will be discussed at the 63rd World Health Assembly in May 2010.
The assistant Director-General for Non-communicable Diseases and Mental Health, Ala Alwan, clarified that all consultations with the economic operators and other stakeholders would comply with WHO rules for appropriate contact with such parties and would avoid conflicts of interest.
The passage of the resolution is the result of a long process, including a resolution in 2005, discussions without conclusion during the 60th WHA last year, informal WHO consultation with Member States and the passing of a draft resolution at the WHO Executive Board in January this year. The draft was proposed by Rwanda on behalf of the African Member States.
The debate at the World Health Assembly was long, with 36 Member States taking the floor to intervene. Most of them thanked the Director General and the Secretariat for the good work done and the report on strategies to reduce the harmful use of alcohol prepared by the Secretariat. Many countries had strong interests in the issue and the suspense was prolonged until the very end.
According to the aforementioned report (A61/13), which served as the background for the debate, harmful use of alcohol is one of the main factors contributing to premature deaths and avoidable disease burden worldwide; and has a major impact on public health. Although there are regional, national and local differences in levels, patterns and context of drinking, in 2002 the harmful use of alcohol was estimated to cause about 2.3 million premature deaths worldwide (3.7% of global mortality) and to be responsible for 4.4% of the global burden of disease, even when the protective effects of low and moderate alcohol consumption on morbidity and mortality were taken into consideration.
The Global Alcohol Policy Alliance (GAPA) has welcomed the passing of the WHA resolution: "We are pleased that at last WHO has responded to the epidemic of alcohol problems that is increasing with growing alcohol consumption in all parts of the world. GAPA calls on WHO to develop a strong, evidence based global strategy to reduce these problems. We particularly note that the resolution properly distinguishes the roles of commercial and other participants in the development of the strategy and rejects WHO collaboration with the alcoholic beverage industry. GAPA looks forward to working with WHO and other civil society organisations in the important task before us."
- Resolution EB122/10 from the WHO Executive Board which constituted the starting point for the discussion at the World Health Assembly
- Report by the Secretariat on Strategies to reduce the harmful use of alcohol
 The World Health Assembly (WHA) is the supreme decision-making body for World Health Organisation (WHO). It meets once a year and is attended by delegations from all of WHO's 192 Member States. Its main function is to determine the policies of the Organization. It also appoints the Director-General and supervises the financial policies of the Organization.


text:
In 1952 David Huffman invented data compression by discovering a method to assign the optimal unambiguous encoding to the symbols in a given message. This article explains how data compression works, and Huffman's method in detail, and also explains how the module is implemented. The module implements the Huffman data compression algorithm in Perl.
There's a bug somewhere that I never bothered to track down. In some files, the last few bytes are garbled either in the compression or the decompression phase. I'm not sure which and I haven't found a short test file that fails. If you do find a short test case that exercises the bug, or you find the bug, please let me know.
17 December 2001: Eric Prestemon has found the bug. The problem was that the output was emitted in 8-bit chunks, and if there were leftover bits at the end, they were never written to the output file. Thanks to Jerrad Pierce for supplying a patch.
Return to: Universe of Discourse main page | What's new page | Perl Paraphernalia


text:
When news happens, text SDE and your photos or videos to 80360. Or contact us by email and phone.
Southampton's historic dock gates saved from demolition
SOUTHAMPTON'S famous dock gates have been saved.
A Government preservation order has been placed on the imposing landmarks, just days before they could have been knocked down.
When plans by Associated British Ports (ABP), owners and operators of the city's docks, emerged last month to demolish the distinctive structures, there was a local outcry to save the long-standing landmark gates.
Following a recommendation by English Heritage to the Government, the entrances at Dock Gate 8 and Dock Gate 10 have now been safeguarded for future generations and are officially listed as Grade II buildings.
Heritage watchdog the City of Southampton Society was so concerned over the planned destruction it submitted an application straight away once details of the proposed scheme were made public.
Arthur Jeffery, the society's vice-chairman, said: "We are absolutely delighted at this news as the gates are an important part of the city's historic waterfront.
"These are art deco style gates and the society feared that they could have gone the same way as the former Ocean Terminal in the Eastern Docks back in 1982."
Southampton City Council also recommended the gates to be listed, describing them as "a rare and evocative survival of inter-war maritime port structures of clear special architectural and historical interest".
A Grade II listing means a structure is considered to be nationally important and imposes strict regulations and limitations on future work and repairs, which can be carried out on the structure.
Back in the 1950s when the docks were known as the "Gateway the World" because of the many ships departing to all corners of the globe, these were the two gates through which most people began their journeys.
During the Second World War the structures, especially Dock Gate 8, guarded the docksides, especially during the build-up to D-Day in June, 1944, when more than two million American soldiers left Southampton for the beaches of Normandy.
The same gate was the backdrop when hundreds of dispirited German prisoners of war trudged from the waterfront before being dispersed to various camps.
ABP had wanted permission to demolish the gates and was making preparations for the work to be done at the end of this month.
The port operator argued that the gates, which have stood since the development of the Western Docks in the 1930s, were obstacles standing in the way of progress and demolition would allow bigger loads to enter the port, ease traffic delays and provide extra security facilities.
An ABP spokesman said: "We understand that the Southampton Dock Gates have been listed as Grade II structures. "ABP is of course happy to respect the decision and will take the existing infrastructure into account when planning any future developments."


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Plant Inspection Training
TWI offers plant inspector training courses at three competency levels, in modular format, for a clearly defined and structured career path. Each level leads to an internationally recognised CSWIP qualification.
Resources of successful plant operators can be stretched when faced with unforeseen problems or when time-investment is required for long-term planning. TWI plant inspector training courses prepare engineers for these pressures by teaching them how to identify the most cost-effective practical solution using state-of-the-art assessment tools and techniques.
This internationally recognised CSWIP plant inspector certification scheme responds to the critical need of industry to ensure that engineers involved in asset integrity management are suitably qualified to deliver optimised plant inspection and assessment.
CSWIP Plant Inspector - Level 1
CSWIP Plant Inspector - Levels 2/3
These plant inspection courses are designed for plant engineers, welding/NDT inspectors/practitioners, materials and corrosion engineers, and plant inspectors responsible for managing the safety and integrity of ageing process equipment, pipelines, boilers and storage tanks.
The scheme will suit personnel working for manufacturing works (Vendor), inspection organisations, equipment owners and operators, classification societies, insurance companies and safety regulators. The training has three goals:
to ensure inspectors and engineers responsible for assessing plant integrity have the essential tools and skills
to recognise and certify plant inspector competence
to provide a structured career path for continuing professional development of plant integrity practitioners through formal training/certification


text:
the following system.
If you would like to download the completed model, here.
First you will gather all the necessary blocks from the block
libraries. Then you will modify the blocks so they correspond to the
blocks in the desired model. Finally, you will connect the blocks
with lines to form the complete system. After this, you will simulate
the complete system to verify that it works.
Follow the steps below to collect the necessary blocks:
- Create a new model (New from the File menu or
Ctrl-N). You will get a blank model window.
- Double-click on the Sources icon in the main Simulink window.
This opens the Sources window which contains the Sources Block
Library. Sources are used to generate signals. Click here for more information on block libraries.
- Drag the Step block from the sources window into the left side of
your model window.
- Double-click on the Linear icon in the main Simulink window to
open the Linear Block Library window.
- Drag the Sum, Gain, and two instances of the Transfer Fcn
(drag it two times) into your model window arranged approximately as
shown below. The exact alignment is not important since it can be
changed later. Just try to get the correct relative positions. Notice
that the second Transfer Function block has a 1 after its name. Since
no two blocks may have the same name, Simulink automatically appends
numbers following the names of blocks to differentiate between them.
- Double-click on the Sinks icon in the main Simulink window to
open the Sinks window.
- Drag the Scope block into the right side of your model window.
Follow these steps to properly modify the blocks in your model.
- Double-click your Sum block. Since you will want the second
input to be subtracted, enter +- into the list of signs field. Close
the dialog box.
- Double-click your Gain block. Change the gain to 2.5 and close
the dialog box.
- Double-click the leftmost Transfer Function block. Change the
numerator to [1 2] and the denominator to [1 0]. Close the dialog
- Double-click the rightmost Transfer Function block. Leave the
numerator, but change the denominator to [1 2 4]. Close the
dialog box. Your model should appear as:
- Change the name of the first Transfer Function block by clicking
on the words "Transfer Fcn". A box and an editing cursor will appear
on the block's name as shown below. Use the keyboard (the mouse is
also useful) to delete the existing name and type in the new name, "PI
Controller". Click anywhere outside the name box to finish editing.
- Similarly, change the name of the second Transfer Function block
from "Transfer Fcn1" to "Plant". Now, all the blocks are entered
properly. Your model should appear as:
Connecting Blocks with Lines
Now that the blocks are properly laid out, you will now connect them
together. Follow these steps.
- Drag the mouse from the output terminal of the Step block to the
upper (positive) input of the Sum block. Let go of the mouse button
only when the mouse is right on the input terminal. Do not worry
about the path you follow while dragging, the line will route itself.
You should see the following.
The resulting line should have a filled arrowhead. If the arrowhead
is open, as shown below, it means it is not connected to anything.
You can continue the partial line you just drew by treating the open
arrowhead as an output terminal and drawing just as before.
Alternatively, if you want to redraw the line, or if the line
connected to the wrong terminal, you should delete the line and redraw
it. To delete a line (or any other object), simply click on it to
select it, and hit the delete key.
- Draw a line connecting the Sum block output to the Gain input.
Also draw a line from the Gain to the PI Controller, a line from the
PI Controller to the Plant, and a line from the Plant to the Scope.
You should now have the following.
- The line remaining to be drawn is the feedback signal connecting
the output of the Plant to the negative input of the Sum block. This
line is different in two ways. First, since this line loops around
and does not simply follow the shortest (right-angled) route so it
needs to be drawn in several stages. Second, there is no output
terminal to start from, so the line has to tap off of an existing
To tap off the output line, hold the Ctrl key while dragging the mouse
from the point on the existing line where you want to tap off. In
this case, start just to the right of the Plant. Drag until you get
to the lower left corner of the desired feedback signal line as shown
Now, the open arrowhead of this partial line can be treated as an
output terminal. Draw a line from it to the negative terminal of the
Sum block in the usual manner.
- Now, you will align the blocks with each other for a neater
appearance. Once connected, the actual positions of the blocks does
not matter, but it is easier to read if they are aligned. To move
each block, drag it with the mouse. The lines will stay connected and
re-route themselves. The middles and corners of lines can also be
dragged to different locations. Starting at the left, drag each block
so that the lines connecting them are purely horizontal. Also, adjust
the spacing between blocks to leave room for signal labels. You
should have something like:
- Finally, you will place labels in your model to identify the
signals. To place a label anywhere in your model, double click at the
point you want the label to be. Start by double clicking above the
line leading from the Step block. You will get a blank text box with
an editing cursor as shown below
Type an r in this box, labeling the reference signal and click outside
it to end editing.
- Label the error (e) signal, the control (u) signal, and the
output (y) signal in the same manner. Your final model should appear as:
- To save your model, select Save As in the File menu
and type in any desired model name. The completed model can be found
Now that the model is complete, you can simulate the model. Select
Start from the Simulation menu to run the simulation.
Double-click on the Scope block to view its output. Hit the autoscale
button (binoculars) and you should see the following.
Taking Variables from MATLAB
In some cases, parameters, such as gain, may be calculated in MATLAB
to be used in a Simulink model. If this is the case, it is not
necessary to enter the result of the MATLAB calculation directly into
Simulink. For example, suppose we calculated the gain in MATLAB in
the variable K. Emulate this by entering the following command at the
MATLAB command prompt.
This variable can now be used in the Simulink Gain block. In your
simulink model, double-click on the Gain block and enter the following
in the Gain field.
Close this dialog box. Notice now that the Gain block in the Simulink
model shows the variable K rather than a number.
Now, you can re-run the simulation and view the output on the Scope.
The result should be the same as before.
Now, if any calculations are done in MATLAB to change any of the
variab used in the Simulink model, the simulation will use the new
values the next time it is run. To try this, in MATLAB, change the
gain, K, by entering the following at the command prompt.
Start the Simulink simulation again, bring up the Scope window, and
hit the autoscale button. You will see the following output which
reflects the new, higher gain.
Besides variab, signals, and even entire systems can be exchanged
between MATLAB and Simulink. For more information, click here.
MATLAB Basics |
MATLAB Modeling |
Root Locus |
Frequency Response |
State Space |
Digital Control |
Simulink Basics |
Simulink Modeling |


text:
Students at Plum school observe history, show gratitude
By Karen Zapf
Published: Wednesday, October 3, 2012, 9:30 p.m.
Updated: Thursday, October 4, 2012
Serving as a Girl Scout for the past several years, Alexis McClintock regularly volunteers in her community.
McClintock, 12, and other students at Center Elementary School in the Plum School District, recently worked on a project that both helped those in need and taught them a history lesson.
In honor of Constitution Day on Sept. 17, the students wrote messages of inspiration on squares made of blue jean material. The squares are sewn together into quilts. The Four Freedom Gratitude Quilts are sent to injured and sick troops overseas as part of Operation Quiet Comfort.
Constitution Day commemorates the signing of the U.S. Constitution on Sept. 17, 1787.
Margi McClintock, Alexis McClintock's mother, said she found out about Operation Quiet Comfort when she was looking for a service project for her daughter's Girl Scout troop.
McClintock mentioned the project to Jeff Hadley, Center Elementary principal, who saw Operation Quiet Comfort as an appropriate history lesson.
Hadley said public schools across the country conduct history lessons on Constitution Day — formerly Citizenship Day.
"It was felt that kids were losing some understanding of history and how the Constitution came to be and how the country got started," Hadley said.
Hadley said writing messages to the troops helps children make the connection between the fight for freedom more than 200 years ago and today.
"It's not just about reflecting on the past," Hadley said. "It's about making the connection that we still stand for the principles and beliefs that are the foundation of our country."
Margi McClintock said each quilt is made up of 96 squares. Center Elementary, with 400 students, made enough squares for four quilts.
Alexis McClintock, a sixth-grader, hopes the quilt will brighten an injured soldier's day.
"I wrote 'We miss you, and God bless you,'" she said. "It felt really good to know that when they want to have some cheering up, they will have the quilts."
Amber Delahunty, 12, appreciates the sacrifices the troops make.
"I think it's a good way to show how much we appreciate the troops and how they protect our country," said Delahunty, also a sixth-grader. "I wrote, 'You are a hero to us.'"
Alexis McClintock would like to hear from the soldier who receives the quilt.
"I would love to get a message and see what they say about the quilt and how well we did," she said.
Hadley said the lesson was valuable because students got to send their personal messages to the injured soldiers.
"Most importantly, the students took the opportunity to say 'Thank you,'" Hadley said.
Karen Zapf is a staff writer for Trib Total Media. She can be reached at _PHONE_, ext. 8753, or _EMAIL_.
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text:
Ginger (Zingiber officinale) is one of the most widely consumed dietary supplements worldwide. Its anticancer potential has been demonstrated in various studies. However, ginger roots obtained from different geographical locations showed extensive variability in their activities, mainly due to differences in the levels of bioactive compounds. Here we evaluated the effect of these differences on the anticancer activity of ginger by performing efficacy-based fingerprinting. We characterized the fingerprint profiles of 22 ginger samples using liquid chromatography-mass spectroscopy, followed by a principal component analysis (PCA) and pearson correlation analysis. We also evaluated the anti-proliferative effects (IC50) of these samples on triple-negative breast cancer cells using the MTT assays. The supervised PCA identified a subset of analytes whose abundance strongly associated with the IC50 values of the ginger extracts, providing a link between ginger extract composition and in vitro anticancer efficacy. This study demonstrated that variation in the ginger fingerprint profiles resulting from differences in their chemical composition could have a significant impact on efficacy and bioactivity of ginger extracts. Also, this first-of-a-kind efficacy-based fingerprinting approach proposed here can identify potent anticancer candidates from the ginger fingerprint without the need for isolating individual components from the extracts.
Scopus Subject Areas


1. Introduction to Functions
In everyday life, many quantities depend on one or more changing variables. For example:
(a) Plant growth depends on sunlight and rainfall
(b) Speed depends on distance travelled and time taken
(c) Voltage depends on current and resistance
(d) Test marks depend on attitude, listening in lectures and doing tutorials (among many other variables!!)
A function is a rule that relates how one quantity depends on other quantities.
Example 1
A particular electrical circuit has a power source and an 8 ohms (Ω) resistor. The voltage in that circult is given by:
V = 8I,
V = voltage (in volts, V)
I = current (in amperes, A)
So if I = 4 amperes, then the voltage is V = 8 × 4 = 32 volts.
If I increases, so does the voltage, V.
If I decreases, so does the voltage, V.
We say voltage is a function of current (when resistance is constant). We get only one value of V for each value of I.
Example 2
A bicycle covers a distance in 20 seconds. The speed of the bicycle is given by
s = speed (in ms−1, or meters per second, m/s)
d = distance (in meters, m)
If the distance covered by the bike is 10 m, then the speed is 's = 0.05 × 10 = 0.5\ "m/s"'.
If d increases, the speed goes up.
If d decreases, the speed goes down.
We say speed is a function of distance (when time is constant). We get only one value of s for each value of d.
Definition of a Function
We have 2 quantities (called "variables") and we observe there is a relationship between them. If we find that for every value of the first variable there is only one value of the second variable, then we say:
"The second variable is a function of the first variable."
The first variable is the independent variable (usually written as x), and the second variable is the dependent variable (usually written as y).
The independent variable and the dependent variable are real numbers. (We'll learn about numbers which are not real later, in Complex Numbers.)
Example 3
We know the equation for the area, A, of a circle from primary school:
A = πr2, where r is the radius of the circle
This is a function as each value of the independent variable r gives us one value of the dependent variable A.
General Cases
We use x for the independent variable and y for the dependent variable for general cases. This is very common in math. Please realize these general quantities can represent millions of relationships between real quantities.
Example 4
In the equation
'y = 3x + 1',
y is a function of x, since for each value of x, there is only one value of y.
If we substitute 'x = 5', we get 'y = 16' and no other value.
The values of y we get depend on the values chosen for x.
Therefore, x is the independent variable and y is the dependent variable.
Example 5
The force F required to accelerate an object of mass 5 kg by an acceleration of a ms-2 is given by: 'F = 5a'.
Here, F is a function of the acceleration, a.
The dependent variable is F and the independent variable is a.
Function Notation
We normally write functions as: 'f(x)' and read this as "function f of x".
We can use other letters for functions, like g(x) or y(x).
When we are solving real problems, we use meaningful letters like
P(t) for power at time t,
F(t) for force at time t,
h(x) for height of an object, x horizontal units from a fixed point.
Example 6
We often come across functions like: y = 2x2 + 5x + 3 in math.
We can write this using function notation:
y = f(x) = 2x2 + 5x + 3
Function notation is all about substitution.
The value of this function f(x) when 'x = 0' is written as 'f(0)'. We calculate its value by substituting as follows:
f(0) = 2(0)2 + 5(0) + 3 = 0 + 0 + 3 = 3
Function Notation: In General
In general, the value of any function f(x) when x = a is written as f(a).
Example 7
If we have 'f(x) = 4x + 10', the value of 'f(x)' for 'x = 3' is written:
'f(3) = 4 × 3 + 10 = 22'
In other words, when 'x = 3', the value of the function f(x) is '22'.
Mathematical Notation
Mathematics is often confusing because of the way it is written.
We write '5(10)' and it means '5 × 10= 50'.
But if we write 'a(10)', this could mean, depending on the situation,
"function a of '10'" (that is, the value of the function a when the independent variable is '10')
Or it could mean multiplication, as in:
'a × 10 = 10a'.
You have to be careful with this.
Also, be careful when substituting letters or expressions into functions.
See a discussion on this: Towards more meaningful math notation.
Example 8
This example involves some fixed constant, d.
If 'h(x) = dx^3+ 5x' then value of 'h(x)' for 'x = 10' is:
'h(10) = d(10)^3+ 5(10)'
'= 1000d + 50'
We leave the d there because we don't know anything about its value.
Example 9
This example involves the value of a function when the independent variable contains a constant.
If the height of an object at time t is given by
h(t) = 10t2 − 2t, then
a. The height at time 't = 4' is
h(4) = 10(4)2 − 2(4) = 10 ×16 − 8 = 152
b. The height at time t = b is
h(b) = 10b2 − 2b
c. The height at time 't = 3b' is
h(3b) = 10(3b)2 − 2(3b) = 10 × 9b2 − 6b = 90b2 − 6b
d. The height at time 't = b + 1' is
h(b + 1)
= 10(b + 1)2 − 2(b + 1)
= 10 × (b2 + 2b + 1) − 2b − 2
= 10b2 + 20b + 10 − 2b − 2
= 10b2 + 18b + 8
Evaluate the following functions:
(1) Given 'f(x) = 3x + 20', find
a. 'f(-4)' b. 'f(10)'
(2) Given that the height of a particular object at time t is
h(t) = 50t − 4.9t2, find
a. 'h(2)' b. 'h(5)'
(3) The voltage, V, in a particular circuit is a function of time t, and is given by:
V(t) = 3t − 1.02t
Find the voltage at time
a. 't = 4' b. 't = c + 10'
(4) If F(t) = 3tt2 for t ≤ 2, find F(2) and F(3).
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German Museum Has a Living Copy of Van Gogh's Famous Ear
Diemut Strebe, Sugababe (2014). Photo: courtesy the artist.
Diemut Strebe, Sugababe (2014). A living bioengineered replica of Vincent van Gogh's ear, grown from tissue engineered cartilage cells procured from a direct male descendant, Sugababe contains natural DNA from Vincent and genetic engineered components of historical and synthetic DNA.
Photo: courtesy Ronald Feldman.
Everyone knows that tortured Dutch artist Vincent van Gogh cut off his own ear. As if the actual act was not disturbing enough, another Dutch artist has for some reason fabricated the long-dead artist a new ear from genetic material provided oneby of the artist's relatives, reports the Guardian.
When Van Gogh, in the midst of a psychic breakdown (or, depending on who's telling the story, in a fight with Gauguin) chopped off his ear and presented it as a gift to a horrified prostitute way back in 1888, he had no idea that he was reserving a place in the art history textbooks for his now-missing appendage, which has since become one of the most famous body parts in human history.
Now, artist Diemut Strebe has taken genetic samples from Lieuwe van Gogh, the great-great-grandson of the artist's brother Theo van Gogh, and created a new ear, titled Sugababe, with computer imaging technology ensuring that the ear is a faithful copy of the artist's body part.
The science of growing artificial ears dates back to 1995 and was developed by Robert Langer of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University's Charles Vacanti. Believe it or not, the Van Gogh ear, which is displayed suspended in a clear nutrient solution inside a glass case, is probably less disturbing than Langer and Vacanti's first ear, which was incubated on the back of a mouse.
Before Strebe tracked down Lieuwe van Gogh, she actually tried extracting DNA from a postage stamp the famed Impressionist had allegedly licked. Eventually, she settled for a living relative, who willingly provided saliva and cartilage samples. The two should share the same Y-chromosome, and about one sixteenth of their genes in total.
The admittedly creepy project, a strange hybrid of art and science (the artist calls it a "living art-piece"), is on view at Centre for Art and Media in Karlsruhe, where visitors can use computer software that simulates nerve impulses to talk to the ear (whatever that means).
While the ear is just one of a limited edition, neither Van Lieuwe nor Amsterdam's Van Gogh Museum is interested in owning a copy, according to Dutch News.
Nevertheless, artificially-grown ears are becoming a trend of sorts. An episode of this season of Elementary, the Sherlock Holmes television series starring Johnny Lee Miller and Lucy Liu, featured a pair of replacement ears secretly incubated on a woman's back, that figured in an elaborate murder frame-up job. According to the show, convincing faux ears are very easy to cultivate, and can be grown around a cartilage frame.
Sugababe will be on view at the museum through July 6, 2014, but Strebe may have plans to bring it to New York for her show at Ronald Feldman Fine Arts next spring.
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Article topics


In Pearson's paper, he mentions that strong acid-strong base interactions are more favourable compared to hard-soft acid-base interactions. He cites the example of $\ce{H+ + H- -> H2}$. In this example, the hydrogen cation is a strong and hard Lewis acid while the hydride ion is a strong yet soft Lewis base. By just considering hardness and softness of the acid and base, we would not expect a particularly favourable interaction between the two species. However, Pearson says it is because of a more favourable interaction which is the strong acid-strong base interaction which is at work in this case.
Some background information:
When the HOMO of the Lewis base and the LUMO of the Lewis acid are similar in energy, the bonding molecular orbitals produced are significantly lower in energy and thus, electron occupation of these bonding MOs give rise to significant stabilisation. This occurs when hard Lewis acids and hard Lewis bases react and also when soft Lewis acids and soft Lewis bases react. This is the molecular orbital basis of Pearson's Hard Soft Acid Base Principle.
Can we explain the favourable interaction of strong Lewis acids and strong Lewis bases using molecular orbitals as well?
Reference: Pearson, R. G., & Songstad, J. (1967). Application of the Principle of Hard and Soft Acids and Bases to Organic Chemistry. Journal of the American Chemical Society, 89(8). Retrieved June 5, 2017 (link to paper)
The Klopman-Salem equation accounts for the energy gain (or loss) when the orbitals of one reactant overlap with those of another. The equation is
$$\Delta E=-\sum_{ab}(p_a+p_b)\beta_{ab}S_{ab}+\sum_{k


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I am getting an int value from one of the analog pins on my Arduino. How do I concatenate this to a String and then convert the String to a char[]?
It was suggested that I try char msg[] = myString.getChars();, but I am receiving a message that getChars does not exist.
share|improve this question
Do you really need a modifiable array? If not, you could use const char * msg = myString.c_str();. Unlike toCharArray(), c_str() is a zero-copy operation, and zero-copy is a good thing on memory-constrained devices. – Edgar Bonet Feb 14 at 9:44
2 Answers 2
up vote 60 down vote accepted
 1. To convert and append an integer, use operator += (or member function concat):
 String stringOne = "A long integer: ";
 stringOne += 123456789;
 2. To get the string as type char[], use toCharArray():
 char charBuf[50];
 stringOne.toCharArray(charBuf, 50)
In the example, there is only space for 49 characters (presuming it is terminated by null). You may want to make the size dynamic.
share|improve this answer
Saved me a lot of tinkering time. Thanks! In order to make the char[] size dynamic, do something like char charBuf[stringOne.length()+1] – loeschg Mar 23 '12 at 19:37
I did it dynamically like this: char ssid[ssidString.length()]; ssidString.toCharArray(ssid, ssidString.length()); – dumbledad Dec 14 '12 at 13:45
_USER_ Thanks, I tried without the +1 at first, but your solution worked for me! – Radical Fanatic Apr 18 '14 at 18:57
Just as a reference, here is an example of how to convert between String and char[] with a dynamic length -
// Define
String str = "This is my string";
int str_len = str.length() + 1;
// Prepare the character array (the buffer)
char char_array[str_len];
// Copy it over
str.toCharArray(char_array, str_len);
Yes, this is painfully obtuse for something as simple as a type conversion, but sadly it's the easiest way.
share|improve this answer
Your Answer


Labial commissure of mouth
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
Labial commissure of mouth
Fourteen Nylon sutures used to approximate the edges of this left cheek laceration, extending from the left commisure towards the left ear, allowing it to heal with considerably less scarring than it would without sutures.
Latin commissura labiorum oris
TA A05.1.01.012
FMA FMA:77268
Anatomical terminology
The commisure is important in facial appearance, particularly during function such as smiling. As such it is of interest to dental surgeons.
Diseases that involve the commisure include angular chelitis.
See also[edit]


text:
Real reasons for tension lost in rush to judgment
"The issues in Logan are those many migrant or ethnic youth face: clashing values, clashing behavioural expectations, limited resources and unclear or even dubious role models." Photo: Courtesy of Channel Nine
'Mobs tearing up Logan. Did any of them do a day's work today, or was it business as usual and welfare on tap?'' the Coalition's indigenous health spokesman, Andrew Laming, tweeted in response to recent violence in Logan, Queensland, between Aboriginal and Pacific Islander groups.
Clearly both groups face discrimination, yet we know comparatively little about Pacific Islanders as a marginalised minority group in Australia. As police were called in to broker peace talks between the two Logan families - the Briggs and the Palaus - it's important to ask why the fight broke out in the first place.
Violence is always a complex issue, but where Pacific Islander youths are involved there are several observations that might help us understand.
It needs to be stressed that those involved are a small minority. But the Logan violence is not an isolated incident. In 2011 there were riots in Mount Druitt in which Pacific Islander youths fought each other outside the local Westfield shopping centre. One aspect of the riots was the involvement of youth gangs. While ''Mounty Country'' was mostly Tongans from the Mount Druitt area, ''G40'' was a group of mainly Samoans. However, it was not interpreted by those involved as ethnic violence.
So what lies behind violence involving Pacific Island youth in places such as Logan and Mount Druitt? Every Pacific Island culture is different. There are some general characteristics, though, that some of the time might help explain some of the violence.
First is work. Although Laming pointed to unemployment in Logan, in fact sometimes the opposite is an issue. First-generation Pacific Islanders come to Australia to better themselves, their families here and their families back home. But they often end up in low-paying or unskilled employment, often involving shift work. In other words, they work very hard for very little.
Another issue is supervision. Although the first (and sometimes subsequent) generation of parents works hard, the kids get less parental supervision, and often the supervision they do get is from elder siblings. This means they lack parental role models in their everyday life. In Pacific cultures, you typically don't speak back to elders. So, these youths have very limited scope to express their frustration - and anger builds.
The next problem is education. First generation parents put a very high value on education. Their children are meant to be shy and respect elders. Talking to teachers, let alone questioning them, is difficult. At the same time, at home if they adopt Australian ways of interacting with their Pacific Island elders, they are sternly rebuked. On the other hand, if they don't succeed at school, they also face heavy stricture from their parents. They get in trouble whatever they do.
Recent changes in immigration laws have made many Pacific Islanders ineligible for HECS. Even if they do well in school, they are unlikely to pursue a university degree due to the additional financial pressures this involves. Hence, many feel stuck and unable to break the circle of unskilled employment and parental expectations.
Then there is the pressure to support the family, sending money to relatives in the Pacific Islands, or other parts of Australia and the world - known as remittances. There is significant social pressure to do this. Also, a lot of money is funnelled to churches as Pacific Islanders are generally very religious. Consequently, even if the parents are working hard and earning money, their immediate family in Australia may not enjoy the benefits of this. Because so much of their earnings needs to be distributed to family and church, working is actually not as financially rewarding as it might appear. It's almost like they are at the top tax rate but are only earning minimum wage.
Then there is the complexity of belonging. As a result of these work and educational issues, self-esteem problems often arise. Young people look for alternative communities where they can find acceptance and more freedom.
Last is locality. Most of these youths live in outer suburbs in our cities, areas of low income where many ethnic minorities reside. This has the effect of grouping them and the difficulties they face.
The issues in Logan are those many migrant or ethnic youth face: clashing values, clashing behavioural expectations, limited resources, and unclear or even dubious role models. These are just a few of the underlying issues that need to be taken into account before judgments about the violence in Logan or Mount Druitt are made.
Elisabeth Betz is a doctoral candidate in anthropology at La Trobe University.


text:
Researchers at UCLA have built a cheap, optics-free holographic microscope capable of detecting bacteria like E. coli in things like water, food, and blood. And by cheap, we mean really cheap. The researchers say it costs less than $100 to build.
The microscope has two ways of analyzing samples: a transmission mode and a reflection mode. The transmission mode is good for transparent media, like thin slices of a sample or clear liquids. In this case, the microscope's laser can easily penetrate and analyze microscopic objects. For denser, more solid samples the microscope uses holography to generate a 3-D image of the sample that can be beamed to remote computers for further analysis if necessary.In reflection mode, the microscope basically splits the laser beam using a mirror. It then uses one half of the beam to illuminate the sample. On the other side the sample beam and the control beam are recombined. Some "clever mathematics" can then use resulting the changes in the beam to generate a 3-D image of the object sampled.
But while that may sound fairly high-tech, there are no expensive optics or other pricey components required. The photo sensors are of the variety often found in smartphones, and small lasers like the one used in the device are really inexpensive these days as well. That all means that these holographic microscopes could be widely deployed at little cost.
And that's the idea. Places that don't have access to high-tech diagnostic equipment could use these devices to sample food and water--or even human blood--for harmful bugs and beam the images to more powerful computing devices elsewhere for analysis or diagnosis. That could help contain contaminations and outbreaks faster, saving lives while keeping costs down.
Five amazing, clean technologies that will set us free, in this month's energy-focused issue. Also: how to build a better bomb detector, the robotic toys that are raising your children, a human catapult, the world's smallest arcade, and much more.


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The Quantum Structure of Mass: In the Theory of Absolutes, mass is a densely compacted assembly of positive and negative DPs that maintains its particulate integrity with motion. Thus, rather than simply transmitting its organizational structure to another set of DPs each moment as a wave, the particle of mass maintains its structure, roughly retaining the same DP cohort composition from moment to moment. But, to justify this dense DP assemblage we must hypothesize a force that maintains this compressed DP structure, and to this we appeal to the concepts of quantum theory. Using the analogy of the electron orbitals, and the allowed states of energy, we hypothesize that additional ultrastructural levels of allowable energies exist at the subparticle levels. In particular, that space allows for stable energy structures to exist at a variety of levels, such as the gluon and quark. These particles likewise have octaves of allowable quantum assembly that correspond to higher energy quarks.
This concept of allowed quanta of DP assembly energies opens the door for organizing particles that fill these available stable energy states. Thus, the various quarks, mesons, baryons, and pentaquark states can form and maintain their structure for a time, until the statistical forces of collision, and tunneling displacement, degrade their integrity and precipitate decay. In summary, the amount of DP-compression associated with each particle corresponds to an allowed quantum of compression above the density of the resting DP Sea.
Particles depend upon disparity in charge polarity for their attraction. That charge disparity is maintained by the presence of the central DP, but the charge effect of even the smallest particle is much larger than the point-charge of the central DP. The charge effect of every particle is organized around the central DP, but the structure of the particle is continually shifting because of the small amount of "jumping around" (as noted above) due to the random annihilations and re-materialization of the Central DPs.
The polarization of the space around the Central DP is particle-like, in the sense that some of the DPs composing it maintain their integrity and proximity around the central DP. But, the particle is also wave-like in that even the DP does not maintain its identity, and the farther away from the central DP, the less likely the DPs enrolled to be part of the particle will maintain their association with that particle in the next moment. Again, the particle congeals around the polar force of the central DP, and as the particle moves through space, the central DP will be propelled forward by E field forces generated by the building and collapse of the magnetic field associated with the movement of the central DP and its cohorts. Thus, the particle retains both particle and wave-like properties, and depending upon the conditions in which it interacts, the particle can exhibit either wavelike or particle-like properties in the interaction.
Thus, because of the requirement to move a DP, the Central DP and its close cohorts, through space, the compressed DP structure comprising the mass does not propagate its DP concentration through space at the speed of light like other correlation waves such as photons. Rather, mass moves in response to the forces of momentum acting upon it after having been accelerated by the energy transferred to that mass. The field kinetic energy of the mass is self-perpetuating because it moves the Central DP, which in turn causes an increase in the E field in the space ahead of the advancing mass, and a decrease in E field in the space behind the advancing mass. The change in E field causes the space to react by forming a Magnetic orientation corresponding to the charge polarity and direction of the advancing charge. The decline of the E field behind the retreating charge likewise precipitates the collapse of the magnetic field. And, the declining magnetic field in turn generates an E field which points in the direction of which propels the mass forward. Thus, momentum is a delicate balance between forces seeking to accelerate and decelerate the mass, mediated by changing E fields in the space ahead of, and behind, the mass, collapsing and building B fields that form in response to the changing E fields, and E fields that propel and resist the movement of the mass generated by the changing B fields. The forward force, and backward force are equal, as indicated by the fact that there is no net acceleration of particles. But, if there is an equal force acting on the particles, pointing in opposite directions, then the mass would not move. Thus, to satisfy the condition that the force forward and backward are equal, but that the particle moves under the influence of force, the forces must be acting upon the mass in a sequential manner.
In summary, the energy of motion (the momentum and kinetic energy of the mass) is carried as a complex interrelationship between the Electric and Magnetic field as they form and decay in the space surrounding each moving DP. The sequence of movement arose by the accelerating force associated with a net force in a forward direction. During this period of acceleration, the accelerating force overcame the resisting force of static inertia. After the force has been applied, and velocity generated, the forward force still generates first, and the backward force lags.


text:
Aulus Gellius 5.19
Translation copyright 2001 Neil W. Bernstein; all rights reserved.
What adoption [adoptatio] and adrogation [adrogatio] are and how they differ. The formula that a person adrogating children uses to put this matter before the Roman people.
- When strangers are taken into another family in the place of legitimate children, the act happens either through the authority of the praetor or of the Roman people.
- When the act happens through the praetor's authority, it is called "adoption" [adoptatio]; through the people's authority, "adrogation" [adrogatio].
- Individuals are adopted as follows: their fathers, who hold legal power over them, cede them their rights through a triple emancipation [mancipatio] (1). They are claimed by the adopters in a legal action before a judge.
- Individuals are adrogated when, being under their own control [sui iuris], they give themselves into another person's legal power and are themselves responsible for this action.
- But adrogations are not undertaken randomly or without previous investigation.
- The comitia curiata (2), summoned by the authority of the priests, consider the following matters: the age of the person who wants to adrogate; whether he is the appropriate age to beget children himself (3); whether the property of the person being adrogated is being pursued for criminal purposes. Then the oath sworn in cases of adrogation, composed by Quintus Mucius Scaevola the chief priest (4), is pronounced.
- But a man cannot be adrogated unless he is already at the age of puberty [uesticeps]. (5)
- The process is called "adrogation", furthermore, because this kind of transition into a different family occurs through a rogation put before the Roman people. (6)
- The formula for this inquiry is as follows: "May it please you and may you command that Lucius Valerius be the son of Lucius Titius (7) by law and right, just as if he had been born of this father and mother into this family; and that Lucius Titius have the power of life and death over Lucius Valerius as a father has over his son. I ask you, fellow citizens, if these things should be as I have said."
- A ward cannot be adrogated, however, nor a woman who is not in her father's power. This is because there is no right of participation in assemblies for women, and it is not right for guardians to have so much authority and power over their wards that they could subject a free person, entrusted to their charge, to another person's control.
- Masurius Sabinus (8), however, wrote that the freeborn can legally adopt freedmen.
- But he thinks that freedmen are not permitted, nor ever should be permitted, to acquire the rights of freeborn men through adoption.
- "Also," he says, "if this ancient law were respected, even a slave could be given in adoption by his owner before the praetor."
- He says that many authorities on ancient law wrote that this can be done.
- I turn now to the speech On Morals that the censor Scipio Aemilianus delivered to the people. (9) Among other things that he criticized as defying the customs of the ancestors, Scipio particularly condemned the fact that a foster father could count his adopted son toward the special privileges of fatherhood. (10)
- Here is an excerpt from his speech: "The father votes in one tribe; the son votes in another. The adopted son helps his father as much as if he were a natural son. They order people to be counted in the census in absentia, so that there is no need for anyone to be present at the census." (11)
- For the triple emancipation, see Suet. Aug. 64, Gaius Inst. 1.134.
- Comitia curiata were formed of 30 lictors representing the thirty Roman voting wards [curiae] believed to have been created by Romulus. In addition to handling cases of adrogatio, these assemblies met to "pass the leges curiatae ratifying the status of elected magistrates and of promagistrates" (Andrew Lintott, The Constitution of the Roman Republic [Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1999], 49).
- Cf. Dig. 126.96.36.199-3 Ulpian (tr. Watson): "In cases of adrogation, the scrutiny of the court is directed to the question whether perhaps the adrogator is less than sixty years old, because then he should rather be attending to begetting his own children—unless it should so happen that sickness or health is an issue in the case or there is some other just ground for adrogation, such as his being related to the person he wishes to adopt. Likewise, one ought not to adrogate several people unless on some just ground. And adrogation of someone else's freedman or of an older person by a younger is out of the question."
- Quintus Mucius Scaevola was consul in 95 BC and died in 82 BC during Marius's proscriptions. His book of civil law is the oldest source compiled in Justinian's Digest of Roman Law.
- Cf. Gaius Inst. 1.102.
- A rogation [rogatio] is a formal proposal put before an assembly of the Roman people. For the procedure in cases of adrogation, cf. Gaius Inst. 1.99 (tr. Gordon and Robinson): "The authority of the people is used when we adopt someone who is an independent person. This kind of adoption is called adrogation, because the adopter is asked, that is, interrogated, whether he wishes the person whom he is about to adopt to be his lawful son; and he who is being adopted is asked whether he allows this to be done; and the people are asked whether they command it to be done."
- The formula uses these names for the sake of example; they do not designate real persons.
- Active in the first half of the first century AD, Masurius Sabinus was a prolific legal scholar; his book on civil law [Ius Civile] became the basis for legal commentaries by jurists of the later Empire.
- Scipio Aemilianus (185/4-129 BC) was consul in 147 BC and censor in 142; he captured Carthage in 146. For an excerpt from another speech of Scipio Aemilianus (condemning effeminates), see Gell. 6.12.5.
- Fathers of multiple children could claim particular advantages over the childless, particularly in the Augustan age; cf. Gell. 2.15.3.
- Fr. 14 Malcovati. For futher discussion of Roman adoption, cf. Suzanne Dixon, The Roman Family (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992), 112-113; Mireille Corbier, "Divorce and Adoption as Roman Familial Strategies", in Marriage, Divorce, and Children in Ancient Rome, ed. Beryl Rawson (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1991), 47-78.
Return to introduction and index.
Permission is hereby granted to distribute for classroom use, provided that both Neil W. Bernstein and Diotima are identified in any such use. Other uses not authorized in writing by the translator or in accord with fair use policy are expressly prohibited.


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Loss of pain and smell has a genetic link
feeling pain
Pain and smell sensations have more in common than you think (Source: Shaun Lowe/iStockphoto)
Professor Frank Zufall, of the University of Saarland School of Medicine, in Germany, and colleagues, report their findings online this week in the journal Nature.
The researchers tested three people in their 30s with a rare genetic inability to feel pain (congenital analgesia) and found they were unable to smell at all (a condition known as anosmia).
Interestingly, none of the subjects had been aware that they could not smell.
Being unable to feel pain sounds enticing, but people with congenital analgesia frequently bite their tongues, break bones or burn themselves without being aware of it, sometimes leading to severe damage.
On the plus side, two of the individuals in the study had given birth with completely pain-free labour.
It is known that the inability to feel pain is due to a particular defective gene (SCN9A), which codes for a particular type of sodium channel protein. These sodium channels are essential for pain nerves to be able to send messages.
The researchers wondered if the sodium channels could be important in smell detection too.
The team first showed that the olfactory sensory nerves that relay smell information in both humans and mice did indeed contain the sodium channels.
Then they produced a genetically-altered strain of mice that lacked the sodium channels and were unable to smell.
They compared these mice with normal mice, carefully recording the electrical activity of single nerve cells as the animals were exposed to smells.
Surprisingly, the nerve cells responded normally to smell, but the signals were not reaching further into the brain.
The sodium channels appear to be essential for triggering the release of neurotransmitter, which is essential for transmission of information from one nerve cell to the next.
Zufall sees this work as being of fundamental importance in understanding how the brain processes smell, but there could be other advantages.
"You can imagine a spray which you use to temporarily knock out your sense of smell", he suggests, "which may be useful for people working in situations with awful smells".
Smell (or lack of it) may be a side-effect we have to consider when we take a drug for severe pain in years to come, as several pharmaceutical companies are racing to develop pain relief drugs targeting these particular sodium channels.
Tags: pain, neuroscience


Take the 2-minute tour ×
I am currently trying to draw a point with the ArcGIS Javascript API.
Pretty much like this example, _URL_ except the point will not be drawn with the mouse, but from an javascript object.
If we look at the code, we see that a geometry object/array is passed in the function.
function addToMap(geometry) {
 var symbol = new esri.symbol.SimpleMarkerSymbol(esri.symbol.SimpleMarkerSymbol.STYLE_SQUARE, 10, new esri.symbol.SimpleLineSymbol(esri.symbol.SimpleLineSymbol.STYLE_SOLID, new dojo.Color([255,0,0]), 1), new dojo.Color([0,255,0,0.25]));
 var graphic = new esri.Graphic(geometry, symbol);
If someone could write the structure for that object, and a method to draw the point (such as a button, with an onclick event, containing fixed xy coords)
Dumping geometry looks like this _URL_ (ouch!)
This code will be used in a GPS tracking experiement, where I'll pull the current position from a database every 20 seconds or so. (details will not be covered in this post)
Bonus question: How do I convert long/lat to xy coords from the sample?
I use UTM zone 29N, wkid: 32629
share|improve this question
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3 Answers
up vote 7 down vote accepted
Adding a point from a button click can be as simple as:
dojo.connect(dojo.byId('pointButton'), 'onclick', function() {
 map.graphics.add(new esri.Graphic(
 // Point coordinates are 0, 0
 new esri.geometry.Point(0, 0, map.spatialReference),
 new esri.symbol.SimpleMarkerSymbol()
And the pointButton node is:
Click to add a point.
To add a point when the map is clicked is pretty straightforward as well:
dojo.connect(map, 'onClick', function(evt) {
 map.graphics.add(new esri.Graphic(
 new esri.symbol.SimpleMarkerSymbol()
Live example showing both here: _URL_
Regarding converting from lat, long to another coordinate system: if you're converting to or from lat, long to web mercator, there are client side methods available to do this: esri.geometry.geographicToWebMercator and esri.geometry.WebMercatorToGeographic. If you need to convert from lat, long to something other than web mercator, then the geometry service's project method is the way to go.
share|improve this answer
Thanks a lot. Drawing the point works like a charm. In the conversion, I have been trying the geometry service's project method. The map I'm using is based on UTM zone 29N, wkid 32629. Using the geommetry service only gives me "X" = NaN, "Y = NaN". Any ideas? I tried the exact same code on the world map _URL_ (wkid:102100), worked fine. – Ragnar123 Aug 3 '11 at 12:20
It works with 32629 or 102100. I posted an example to a similar question a while back here: _URL_ – Derek Swingley Aug 3 '11 at 14:00
Yes, I see it works with 32629 and 102100, but how about conversion from 4326 to 32629? I keep getting NaN values – Ragnar123 Aug 3 '11 at 18:26
It should still work; maybe you should create a new question so you can provide your code and, ideally, the URL w/URL parameters that is being sent to your service. – Derek Swingley Aug 3 '11 at 19:52
add comment
Each of the geometry types has a constructor that builds a new geometry object from JSON -- for example: Point. There's an example of a Point JSON object on that page.
For your second question, the recommended approach is to use a Geometry Service to reproject the point from SRID 4326 (long/lat) to the map's native coordinate system. See here for an example.
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Thank you, looks good. Will try, and return with either further questions or a checkmark :-) – Ragnar123 Aug 1 '11 at 15:22
If you're using the 1.4 or later API, why wouldn't you use the esri.geometry.geographicToWebMercator(geometry) method instead of calling the geometry service? – kenbuja Aug 1 '11 at 17:52
_USER_ - I didn't realize they had that, thanks! I agree, that would definitely make more sense if you are converting between geographic and Web Mercator. – mrohlf Aug 1 '11 at 19:08
add comment
Sounds like your specific problem is that you have a lat/long coordinate and you need to place that on the map as geometry. Use the esri.Graphic(geometry, symbol, attributes, infoTemplate) constructor to make your graphic to put on the map.
If you follow the API reference sample, creating a point graphic from a lat/long is pretty straightforward.
But, if you are pulling the point from a database using a web service, then it might be more straightforward to use the json example right below it. Have the web service construct the point json rather than constructing it client side. If you need to modify any part of the json after it is returned by the service, you can do that client side on the json before passing it to the graphic constructor.
var myPoint = {
 "Plant":"Mesa Mint"
 "title":"Vernal Pool Locations",
 "content":"Latitude: ${YCoord}Longitude: ${XCoord}Plant Name:${Plant}"
var gra= new esri.Graphic(myPoint);
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Today it crossed my mind how could I translate this, and some confusion arose with the verbal forms to use.
If I wanted to say "I got cold", I would say
However, for "I'm getting cold", I would use
That left me wondering what would 寒くなる mean, as I would also translate this has "I'm getting cold".
Is there no difference between these in English? If not, what would be the difference in their meaning?
Side note: I omitted the わたし bit in the sentences before since I'm only interested in the conjugations.
Actually, because なる is a change of state verb,「寒くなっています」does not mean "it is getting cold", but rather "it is cold"- or more specifically, that it got cold and remains in that state.
Any verb that signifies a change in state used with ～ている means that the change happened in the past and remains in that state. That is why, for example, 「死んでいる」 means "is dead", not "is dying".
To properly say that it is getting cold, I would use the -てくる pattern. Thus, my translation would be:
It's getting cold.
You can use -てくる with a change in state verb (なる in this case) to show that something has been gradually changing until now. A more in-depth explanation on this can be found here.
| improve this answer | |
寒くなる literally translated is "to become cold". It can be used to signify future tense:
寒くなるだろう - "It will probably get cold"
and can be used in conjunction with such words as くらい and ほど to signify that something is so x that it will become cold:
雲が寒くなるほど多いですね。- "there are so many clouds that it could become cold"
| improve this answer | |
寒くなっている Is what is happening right now. So you're becoming cold right now. 寒くなる would be to become cold. Or you will become cold.
That being said, Japanese people don't really add the なる at the end when expressing this. When they're cold they just say 寒いよ
| improve this answer | |
 - Just to clarify: they would use 寒いよ to say that they are cold, but still use 寒くなっている to say that they're becoming colder? – Jak Feb 21 '19 at 9:11
 - 1
 寒くなっている means something already became cold and is still cold now... – Leebo Feb 21 '19 at 9:15
 - I could be wrong, but I understand it as roughly 寒いね = It's cold right, 寒くなる = It's gonna be cold, 寒くなっている = it's been getting cold (and it's likely to get even colder), 寒くなった = it got cold (but i'm not implying it will get even colder) – Felipe Oliveira Feb 21 '19 at 14:39
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In a German newspaper article an interviewed professor says:
For a long time the Japanese didn't have any interest in clocks: Until 1871, there hadn't even been a word for time and therefore no time measurement.
(Original text:)
Auch die Japaner hatten lange kein Interesse an der Uhr: Bis 1871 hatten sie nicht mal ein Wort für die Zeit und daher auch keine Zeitmessung.
(Text available in German here.)
Is it true that there was no word for time before the Meiji Restoration? Which word is he referring to? 時間 or the kanji 時?
 - 8
 - 5
 What actually happened at the end of 1871 is the switch to the western (Gregorian) calendar system. Before that, traditional time & calendar system was widely used. – naruto Jan 9 '17 at 5:15
 - Out of curiosity: Could you add the exact source? – Torsten Schoeneberg Jan 11 '17 at 5:23
 - 2
 _USER_ Yes, of course: It was in the Dossier part of "Die Zeit", issued 2017-01-05. The article is a long interview with Prof. Karlheinz Geißler. It couldn't find that article online, though. – elzell Jan 11 '17 at 7:17
The word 時{とき} is probably the oldest native Japanese word for "time". This term appears in the 万葉集{まんようしゅう} written in Old Japanese and compiled from poems composed from the 300s through the 700s, completed some time after 759 CE. These are some of the oldest surviving examples of written Japanese, suggesting that this term is quite ancient indeed. Consequently, claiming that ancient Japanese had no word for "time" is patently wrong.
The Japanese language also has the Chinese-derived on'yomi term 時刻{じこく}, also used to refer more specifically to the concept of "hour", as in "a specific length of time in a day". This term appears in the 平家{へいけ}物語{ものがたり} dating to the 1100s. Even prior to that, we know that the Ritsuryō legal system in place from the mid 600s through the Nara period ending 794 made use of water clocks to track the passage of time during a day: definite evidence of the Zeitmessung ("time measurement") that Professor Geißler mentions. In the traditional reckoning, each day consisted of 12 hours: 6 of day, and 6 of night. This meant that the length of a daylight hour and of a nighttime hour changed over the course of the year, with the shift of the seasons. Consequently, an argument could be made that the traditional Japanese hour required a greater awareness of time than the western hour -- timekeepers would need to be much more intimately in tune with time day-by-day in order to evenly distribute the number of hours in a day and night.
Even the western definition of "hour" has been known to some extent in Japan since the 1500s, when westerners brought their own clocks as gifts. So here too, Professor Geißler's claim falls through.
The term 時間{じかん} itself, though apparently extant earlier, does seem to have been repurposed in 1881 as a specific translation of the western term "time" in reference to philosophy. The Daijirin entry here explains:
〔明治初期には英語 time は「時・時刻」と訳され、「哲学字彙」（1881年）に訳語として「時間」と載る〕
 (The English term "time" was translated as 時{とき} or 時刻{じこく} at the start of the Meiji period [beginning 1868; here, likely including the 1870s], with the term 時間{じかん} appearing as a translation term in Tetsugaku Jii (1881) ["Philosophical Dictionary", compiled by Inoue Tetsujirō])
Notably, most (maybe all?) such "translation terms" were existing words in Japanese that were repurposed to express more western concepts, such as 社会{しゃかい} "society", or 自由{じゆう} "freedom, liberty".
Key points:
 - The concept of "time" clearly existed even in ancient Japanese culture.
 - The concept of "hour" as a specific span of time has also existed, for essentially the entirety of recorded Japanese history. Granted, that definition might have differed from the modern western concept, but it was a specific idea of "time measurement".
 - The main shifts related to "time" in the Meiji period were:
 1. widespread translation of western materials in an urgent and strategic push to catch up technologically, leading to the rejiggering of various cultural ideas, including "time", and
 2. the promulgation of the Gregorian calendar and western-style 24-hour day, as opposed to the traditional 12-hour day, with six hours of day and six hours of night.
You had specifically asked:
Is it true that there was no word for time before the Meiji restauration?
No, that is not true.
What word is he [Professor Geißler] referring to? 時間 or the kanji 時?
Professor Geißler is far enough off-base that I don't think he's referring to any specific term -- I suspect he doesn't know enough about Japanese history or the language for either term to be immediately relevant to his statement.
Professor Geißler clearly got the wrong end of the stick. I note that he is apparently a Professor of Wirtschaftspädagogik, or "economics pedagogy", with no apparent work in Japanese history, culture, or language. In his defense, it is easy to misapprehend things outside of one's field of expertise.
I think the word [時間]{じかん} was created in the Meiji era, but the word [時]{とき} is older. So it's definitely wrong that "the Japanese didn't have any interest in clocks (until 1871)".
I searched in an old-Japanese dictionary and found the usage of 「とき」 in 竹取物語:
Here, the word [子]{ね}のとき refers to a certain time which is around midnight.
竹取物語 was written more than 1000 years ago. So the word 「とき」 is at least 1000 years old.
The installation of the Gregorian calendar was on 1872.
It doesn't mean Japanese didn't have a concept of time, they used a lunar calendar (different one from Chinese).
They had a Japanese clock which divides a day in six and a night in six.
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Tips to Prevent Water Ingress on Electrical Assemblies
Prevent Water Ingress
We all know that water and electricity don't mix. But it's common for heavy equipment to be used in environments where water is present. So how can an OEM protect its equipment's electrical assemblies from water ingress? And what happens if the electrical components aren't protected properly from moisture? The answers to both of those questions depend on several factors.
When Water Meets Electrical Assemblies
If water meets unprotected electrical assemblies, the consequences can be costly or even deadly. Electrical shorts can cause the equipment to malfunction or, worse, it may not work at all. Water ingress can also lead to fire and shock hazards, which can severely injure or kill workers in a high voltage application.
No matter how significant the damage is, the costs to repair the equipment and any damage done can climb quickly. Even if no actual lasting damage occurs, the repairs will lead to downtime and project delays. If someone gets injured or the incident causes property damage, the OEM could face litigation and fines.
Steps to Prevent Water Ingress
The first step to protect electrical assemblies from water ingress is to understand what types of working environments the assembly will be used in. That way you can use appropriately rated components in the design.
Will the assembly get rained on, or will it be submerged while in operation? Different environments require varied levels of protection, which is where IP Codes come into play. The IP Code is a two-digit number that indicates how resistant components are to intrusion by solid particles and liquids. The chart below is a helpful guide to ensure your engineering team uses IP-rated components that meet or exceed the requirements of the working environment:
IP Code Chart
Tools and Tips to Prevent Water Ingress
 - Overmolding is an excellent way to protect small electrical components like printed circuit boards, resistors, capacitors, and diodes.
 - Gaskets can be used to seal the junction where multiple surfaces meet; they're typically used to help make something that wasn't designed to be watertight usable in a wet environment.
 - RTV silicone can also be used as a seal; it's better for small volumes because quality can be difficult to repeat. It requires application by an experienced technician and time to cure.
 - Cord grips and sealed connectors can protect electrical enclosures from water ingress.
 - On an enclosure, install the hinges outside of the gasket to prevent compromising the gasket's integrity.
 - Use braided loom on wire harnesses to allow liquids to flow through instead of getting trapped inside conduit.
 - If you need to use a conduit, leave a small gap between the conduit and the connectors to allow liquids to escape.
Preventing water ingress on electrical assemblies begins with knowing where and how the assembly will be used. Once that is determined, use properly rated components to protect the electrical assembly from any water that may be in its working environment.
It's also important to call out how watertight the assembly needs to be on the drawing so that any supplier who receives the design understands why you've chosen the components on the bill of materials (BOM). For example, a welder working on a custom enclosure for an electrical assembly that is headed to a wet environment will need to know if the weld needs to be watertight.
If you're working on the design for an electrical assembly, check out our Wire Harness Design Checklist to guide you. Click the button below to download your copy.
Wire Harness Design Checklist
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