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Research article 22 Mar 2018
Research article | 22 Mar 2018
Complex network description of the ionosphere
Complex network description of the ionosphere Complex network description of the ionosphere Shikun Lu et al.
Shikun Lu1,2, Hao Zhang1, Xihai Li2, Yihong Li2, Chao Niu2, Xiaoyun Yang2, and Daizhi Liu2 Shikun Lu et al. Shikun Lu1,2, Hao Zhang1, Xihai Li2, Yihong Li2, Chao Niu2, Xiaoyun Yang2, and Daizhi Liu2
1Department of Electronic and Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
2Xi'an Research Institute of Hi-Tech, Xi'an, China
Correspondence: Hao Zhang (haozhang@mail.tsinghua.edu.cn)
Received: 20 Jun 2017 – Discussion started: 27 Jun 2017 – Revised: 25 Jan 2018 – Accepted: 24 Feb 2018 – Published: 22 Mar 2018
Complex networks have emerged as an essential approach of geoscience to generate novel insights into the nature of geophysical systems. To investigate the dynamic processes in the ionosphere, a directed complex network is constructed, based on a probabilistic graph of the vertical total electron content (VTEC) from 2012. The results of the power-law hypothesis test show that both the out-degree and in-degree distribution of the ionospheric network are not scale-free. Thus, the distribution of the interactions in the ionosphere is homogenous. None of the geospatial positions play an eminently important role in the propagation of the dynamic ionospheric processes. The spatial analysis of the ionospheric network shows that the interconnections principally exist between adjacent geographical locations, indicating that the propagation of the dynamic processes primarily depends on the geospatial distance in the ionosphere. Moreover, the joint distribution of the edge distances with respect to longitude and latitude directions shows that the dynamic processes travel further along the longitude than along the latitude in the ionosphere. The analysis of "small-world-ness" indicates that the ionospheric network possesses the small-world property, which can make the ionosphere stable and efficient in the propagation of dynamic processes.
Lu, S., Zhang, H., Li, X., Li, Y., Niu, C., Yang, X., and Liu, D.: Complex network description of the ionosphere, Nonlin. Processes Geophys., 25, 233–240, https://doi.org/10.5194/npg-25-233-2018, 2018.
Including large numbers of irregularities with different sizes and affected by various factors (like solar irradiation, geomagnetic field, gravity wave and tidal wave; Kelly, 2009), the ionosphere performs as a complex system in terms of the spatial and temporal variation. A complex network is an efficient tool to study the characteristics of complex systems that contain a large number of interacting parts. Its application spans various scientific fields (Zerenner et al., 2014), such as biology (e.g., protein interaction networks), information technology (e.g., World Wide Web) and social sciences (e.g., social networks; Wang et al., 2016a, b). The application of complex network theory to ionosphere science is still a young field, since few research studies have been reported. The network theory was discussed by Podolská et al. with two abstracts in the 2010 and 2012 EGU General Assembly Conference (Podolská et al., 2010, 2012). The aim of the first abstract was to examine the influence of geomagnetic disturbances and solar activity on thermal plasma parameters. The other abstract was focused on an attempt to find out time shifts between fundamental ionospheric parameters. Therefore, none of them tried to describe the global ionosphere based on a complex network.
In modern statistical mechanics of geophysics, especially seismological science, the idea of complex networks is receiving significant attention. Baiesi and Paczuski (2005) constructed directed networks of earthquakes by placing a link between pairs of events that were strongly correlated. Their results showed that the network was scale-free and highly clustered. Abe and Suzuki (2006) constructed growing random networks by adding an edge between two successive earthquakes and found that these earthquake networks were scale-free and small-world. The constructions of the above two networks were based on the expert judgment of adding an edge and ignored the uncertainty in the system. Jiménez et al. (2008) divided the southern California region into cells of 0.1∘ and calculated the correlation of activities among them to create networks, which showed the small-world features. Suteanu (2014) proposed a network-based method for the assessment of earthquakes' relationships in space–time–magnitude patterns and further applied the results for the study of temporal variations in volcanic seismicity patterns. Those two networks were built based on correlation, which was a linear measurement of the interactions in the objective system.
Another geophysical application of complex networks is in climate science (Nocke et al., 2015). Peron et al. (2014) also built a temperature network by correlation and regarded the global grid points as nodes. They showed that the network characteristics of the North American region marked the differences between the eastern and western regions. Such differences can be viewed as a reflection of the presence of a large network community on the west side of the continent. To depict the nonlinearity and uncertainty in the climate, information theory is introduced to construct the complex network of climate. Donges et al. (2009a, b) used complex networks to uncover a backbone structure carrying matter and energy in the global surface air temperature field. They used mutual information (MI) to construct the network, which was undirected because the mutual information was symmetric, in order to measure the dynamical similarity of surface air temperature between regions. Hlinka et al. (2013) investigated the reliability of directed climate networks being built by conditional mutual information (CMI), using dimensionality-reduced surface air temperature data. Compared with MI, CMI is asymmetric and able to build directed networks for global surface air temperature. However, both MI and CMI are standard bivariate methods, which only describe the interactions between two spatial points without considering the influence of the others. The same is true of the correlation. A probabilistic graph is an efficient method to describe the nonlinear interactions within the system from a holistic perspective (Koller and Friedman, 2009). Furthermore, similar to seismology and climate science, the ionosphere is also distributed geographically. The ionospheric variation involves spatial interactions and flows. These research studies propose a possibility that approaches from the perspective of complex networks may also shed new light on ionospheric features. In this article, a probabilistic graph is employed to model the dynamic processes within the ionosphere and build the ionospheric complex network.
Within the global ionosphere, there are interactions among the variations over different positions. Variations over one position may cause variations over other positions. The motivation of the current study is to explore the causal interactions between the vertical total electron content (VTEC) over different positions or cells of a global ionosphere map (GIM) within the global ionosphere based on the directed complex network. Hence, we can have a deep understanding of the dynamic processes within the ionosphere. We interpret the dynamic ionospheric processes as the information flow in the directed network and explore the ionospheric characteristics on a global scale. The VTEC dataset supplied by the Centre for Orbit Determination in Europe (CODE) in 2012 is selected.
The article is organized as follows. The data and method description are provided in Sect. 2. Furthermore, the results about the patterns of the ionospheric interactions are presented in Sect. 3. The scale-free topology of the ionospheric network is checked by conducting a power-law hypothesis test. The distribution of the edge distances is calculated to analyze the propagation of the dynamic processes in the ionosphere. The small-world structure of the ionospheric network is explored to examine the stability of the ionosphere. Section 4 discusses the summaries and conclusions.
2 Description of data and methods
2.1 VTEC data source
As a critical physical quantity of the ionosphere, VTEC carries abundant information about the variations of the ionosphere (Ercha et al., 2015). The International Global Navigation Satellite System Service (IGS) supplies global VTEC data with 2 h time resolution. The dataset is determined from more than 200 IGS stations on a global scale (Wei et al., 2009). CODE, as one of the analysis centers of IGS, has estimated VTEC from the dual-frequency code and phase data of GPS since April 1998 (Guo et al., 2015). In the current research, VTEC data are derived from CODE (ftp://ftp.aiub.unibe.ch/CODE/) in the form of a GIM. The GIM ranges from −180 to 180∘ along the longitude and from −87.5 to 87.5∘ along the latitude. The negative values stand for the south latitude and west longitude. The size of an elementary GIM cell is 5∘ along the longitude and 2.5∘ along the latitude. Each GIM cell is defined as a variable, which is a node in the ionospheric network. The VTEC data over the GIM cells are the observations. For the decrease of the computation by reducing the variables' quantity, the size of the GIM cells has been doubled. Therefore, the latitude and longitude of GIM cells become 5 and 10∘. The number of variables (GIM cells) is 36×36, which is 1296, because 180 and -180∘ are the same for longitude. In this paper, we select the data from 2012.
2.2 Mapping the data to a complex network
As a complex system, the ionosphere is usually characterized by the presence of multiple interrelated aspects, which are spatially distributed. Affected by various factors, the ionosphere also involves a significant amount of uncertainty. Moreover, our observations are always noisy; even observed aspects are often measured with some error. Thus, probability needs to be used to represent such random properties. Furthermore, a probabilistic graph can efficiently describe the nonlinearity within the system from a holistic perspective (Koller and Friedman, 2009). As a result, a probabilistic graph is selected to model the interrelation and uncertainty in the ionosphere. We describe the GIM data as the realization of a multivariate probabilistic graph on the global spatial grid.
Probabilistic graphs use a graph-based representation as the basis for compactly encoding a complex probabilistic distribution over a high-dimensional space (Koller and Friedman, 2009). A probabilistic graph is a useful way of visualizing interactions between multiple variables. Therefore, in addition to inference, probabilistic graphs can also be used to discover the knowledge within the dataset. As a kind of complex network, probabilistic graphs are constructed to represent a joint distribution by making conditional independence (CI) assumptions. The nodes in the networks represent variables, and the edges represent CI assumptions (Murphy, 2012). The absence of an edge between two nodes implies that the corresponding variables are conditionally independent given all other nodes. Based on the probability theory, we say variables X and Y are CI if the conditional joint distribution can be written as a product of conditional marginal:
(1) X ⟂ Y | Z ⟺ p ( X , Y | Z ) = p ( X | Z ) p ( Y | Z ) .
In our study, X and Y are the two given GIM cells and Z represents the GIM cells except X and Y. Thus, the analysis is performed from a holistic perspective. As suggested in Zerenner et al. (2014), a directed complex network can offer additional knowledge, like the distinction between child and parent nodes. Thus, we construct the ionospheric networks that only include directed edges between GIM cells. Suppose two GIM cells are not directly connected (conditionally independent) within the ionospheric network, there should be no interactions between these cells after eliminating all of the existing edges. The directed edges here represent the causal interactions. In other words, after the variations of VTEC over a certain GIM cell, there are some related variations appearing over other GIM cells. In the following, the construction of the directed ionospheric network (also known as a Bayesian probabilistic graph or Bayesian network) is introduced to describe the dynamic processes in the global ionosphere. Dynamic processes are constituted by a series of causal interactions among the GIM cells. Conditional independence tests involving sets of variables can be used to determine the existence and direction of edges (Ebert-Uphoff and Deng, 2012).
The cells in the GIMs are defined as the variables of VTEC distributed throughout the globe. As the nodes on the network, the variables are separated by their own geospatial locations. The VTEC of each variable is arranged in the form of a time series with 2 h time resolution. Thus, for the year 2012, the length of the observations is 4392 (12day-1×366days). We employ a structure learning algorithm for Bayesian networks as a basis for the construction of the ionospheric networks. In our study, the measurements of the 1296 variables are all continuous. To build the directed network, we should determine the existence and directions of edges between any two variables from a holistic perspective instead of just considering the two. The Fast Greedy Equivalence Search (FGS) algorithm proposed by Ramsey et al. (2017) works well for large numbers of continuous variables to build Bayesian networks. This algorithm utilizes the strategy that edges are iteratively added starting with an empty network, according to maximal increases in the Bayesian information criterion (BIC) score (Schwarz, 1978). Here, the variables' distributions are assumed to be Gaussian. We use the implementation of the FGS algorithm in the TETRAD package (Version 5.3.0-2, available at http://www.phil.cmu.edu/projects/tetrad/, last access: 22 March 2018) and make the penalty discount 10. TETRAD possesses a convenient user interface to enter preknowledge. As the ionospheric network includes 1296 nodes and 10 985 directed edges in the globe, it is hard to fully present such a complex network. Here, we exhibit part of the ionospheric network. The result is shown in Fig. 1.
Figure 1The directed complex network of the ionosphere (in part). The network is developed from the GIM dataset by the FGS algorithm. The nodes indicate the GIM cells, while the directed edges represent causal interactions between cells.
Figure 2The degree distributions of the ionospheric network. Panel (a) shows the out-degree distribution; panel (b) shows the in-degree distribution. The red curves delineate the distribution fitting.
3 Results and discussion
3.1 Degree distribution of the ionospheric network
To explore the influence of the VTEC's variation over a certain GIM cell, the degree of the ionospheric complex network is employed. As one of the most critical parameters to depict the nodes in a complex network, the degree is the number of edges the node possesses. Concerning ionospheric networks, the degree of a cell can be selected to quantify how many GIM cells display a causal interaction with that given cell in the globe; that is to say, cells with a large degree can influence large numbers of GIM cells. In the complex network, "hubs" refer to the nodes with large numbers of links that significantly exceed the average. Hubs have a significant effect on the system, which is described by the network. The emergence of hubs results from the scale-free property of networks (Barabási and Albert, 1999). Hence, to study the hub positions where the dynamic ionospheric processes mainly originate or converge, we have to check the scale-free topology of the degree distribution of the ionospheric network. The degree distribution is the probability distribution of these degrees over the whole network. For the directed ionospheric network, the degree distribution is divided into two different kinds, the out-degree distribution (the distribution of outgoing edges) and the in-degree distribution (the distribution of incoming edges). The degree distributions of the ionospheric network are shown in Fig. 2.
It has been reported that real complex networks often exhibit scale-free properties (Barabási and Albert, 1999). This means their degree distribution follows a power law, at least asymptotically; that is, the number of links of a given node exhibits a power-law distribution, P(k)∼k-γ, where k is the number of links. P(k) can be calculated by the statistical frequency, and γ is a parameter whose value is typically in the range 2<γ<3. From the distributions shown in Fig. 2, it is hard to determine whether the observed degree is drawn from a power-law distribution or not. Clauset et al. (2009) presented a principled statistical framework for discerning power-law behavior in empirical data. As for the method shown in Clauset et al. (2009), we have tested the power-law hypothesis quantitatively. Both the results of the out-degree and in-degree distribution reject the hypothesis, indicating that the ionospheric network is not scale-free. Thus, most GIM cells have approximately the same number of edges, indicating that the causal interactions shown by the network of the global ionosphere are homogeneous. For the dynamic processes in the ionosphere, there is no unique spatial position acting as the source or sink. This property is completely different from that of the geomagnetic field. In other words, there are no visible hub GIM cells for the ionospheric variations. Moreover, from the curves of distribution fitting shown in Fig. 2, we can see that both the distributions are more likely Poisson, just like the network of climate (Tsonis et al., 2007).
Figure 3The distribution of the directed edge distances in the global ionospheric network. Panel (a) shows the distribution of edges against the latitudinal and longitudinal distances; panel (b) shows the distribution of edges against their latitudinal distances; panel (c) shows the distribution of edges against their longitudinal distances. The red curves delineate the distribution fitting.
3.2 Distribution of the edge distances
The propagation of the dynamic processes is related to the transmission of energy or particles in the ionosphere. To analyze such a transport property, the distribution of the edge distances is calculated. The edge distance is defined by the geographical distance between the origin and destination of an edge. The height of the VTEC supplied by CODE is H = 450 km. As the measurements are on the earth which can be regarded as a sphere, the distances between any two positions can be calculated by the arc lengths on the sphere d=Rθ, where R=R0+H, R0 is the earth radius and θ is the corresponding central angle. Compared with the undirected probabilistic graphs, the directed ones can provide additional knowledge about the directions of the causal interactions within the ionosphere. To study the directional characteristics of the propagation of the dynamic ionospheric processes, the edge distances are mapped in the latitude and longitude directions.
The latitudinal distances are calculated by dlat=(lat2-lat1)R, where lat1 and lat2 are the latitudes of the origin and destination of the given edge. Meanwhile, the longitudinal distances are calculated by dlong=(long2-long1)R′, where long1 and long2 are the longitudes of the origin and destination of the given edge. As the radii of different latitudinal circles are different, the radius of an equivalent latitudinal circle is calculated by the average of the radii of the two latitude circles on which the origin and destination of the given edge are located; i.e., R′=12[cos(lat1)+cos(lat2)]R. The positive signs of the distances represent the directions of edges and can either be eastward or northward. The result is shown in Fig. 3.
As is shown in Fig. 3a, the edges are mainly distributed around the origin of the coordinate system in the ionospheric network. Thus, the GIM cells are mostly connected with their spatial neighbors. The local connections indicate that, in the ionosphere, the propagation of the dynamic processes is primarily affected by the geospatial distance and almost satisfies the proximity principle in geospace. Furthermore, from the approximate symmetry along the x axis in Fig. 3b and c, we can discover that it is almost the same for the westward and eastward propagation of the dynamic processes, and also for the southward and northward. From Fig. 3b and c, we can see that the number of edges decreases as the absolute value of latitudinal and longitudinal distance increases. This phenomenon also reveals that the local interactions account for a considerable proportion in the ionospheric network. The proximal propagation may be due to the diffusion effects of charged particles in the ionosphere. In addition, comparing the standard deviations (SDs) of the edges' longitudinal and latitudinal distances, which are 0.53 and 0.28, we find that the distribution curve in the latitude direction is steeper than that in the longitude direction. Therefore, the rate of decrease along the latitude is larger than that along the longitude. Accordingly, the dynamic processes are propagated more efficiently along the longitude than along the latitude. Such a phenomenon may relate to the north–south currents or geomagnetic field in the ionosphere. Moreover, the ionospheric network is not entirely connected locally. Long-range edges emerge both along the latitude and longitude. The long-range propagation may be caused by the geomagnetic field or other global factors. Thus, the ionospheric network possesses a primarily ordered structure with some exceptional long-range connections.
3.3 Small-world structure of the ionospheric network
As for a complex network, the concept of being "stable" is defined as the high capability of the dynamics in the network to withstand disturbance attacks. In other words, the topology structure of the stable network cannot be easily destroyed and the dynamics can still be propagated throughout the network, even when some edges are removed by the disturbance attacks. "Efficient" is defined as the ability of rapid and easy propagation of dynamics in the network. In this subsection, we explore the small-world structure of the ionospheric network to examine the stability and efficiency of the ionosphere, which is regarded as a dynamical system.
Lying between the completely random and completely regular network, the small-world network is a type of graph in which any given node is likely to reach every other node by a small number of steps compared with the total number of network nodes (Gallos et al., 2007). The "six degrees of separation" in social networks is one of the most famous examples. Watts and Strogatz (1998) initially found that some networks can be highly clustered, like regular lattices, yet have small characteristic path lengths, like random graphs. Networks of such a nature are called small-world networks. To investigate the small-world structure of the ionospheric network, the original network has to be reduced to an undirected graph (Abe and Suzuki, 2006, 2009). Furthermore, to mathematically describe the small-world property, two critical parameters are often selected, which are the average clustering coefficient C and the average shortest path length L. Their definitions are shown in Eqs. (2)–(2).
(2)Ci=2Δiki(ki-1),(3)C=1N∑i=1NCi,(4)L=2N(N-1)∑i≥jdij.
Here, Ci is the local clustering coefficient of node i; ki is the degree of node i and Δi denotes the number of edges between the neighbors of node i, with node i itself being excluded. The global clustering coefficient C is defined as the average of all local clustering coefficients Ci. N is the number of nodes and dij denotes the length of the shortest path between the nodes i and j; dij is calculated by Dijkstra's algorithm (Newman, 2010). Thus, C describes the local connections in the ionospheric networks, while L characterizes a network's connectivity structure globally (Zerenner et al., 2014).
To quantitatively define a small-world network, values for the network properties must be compared with those values acquired from the equivalent random networks, which have the same degree as the given network on average. A measurement of "small-world-ness" is proposed as follows (Humphries and Gurney, 2008; Humphries et al., 2011):
(5) σ = C / C r L / L r .
Here, C and L are the average clustering coefficient and the average shortest path length of the given network, while Cr and Lr are those of the equivalent random network. If the given network fulfills the conditions σ>1 and C/Cr>1, it meets the small-world criterion. To reduce the impact of randomness during the analysis of the ionospheric network, the results shown in Fig. 4 are calculated by 150 random networks.
From Fig. 4a and c, we can see that the results all satisfy σ>1 and C/Cr>1. Shown in Fig. 4b and d, the frequencies are approximately Gaussian, and the SDs are 0.028 and 0.035. Such small SDs indicate that the results are close to the real values (the averages) 6.64 and 8.08. Therefore, the ionospheric network behaves as a small-world graph. The propagation of the dynamic processes in the ionosphere exhibits a small-world property. As was defined by Watts and Strogatz (1998), the small-world network possesses a small average shortest path length (compared to the regular network) and a large clustering coefficient (compared to the random network). When the number of edges per node is high, networks have a high clustering coefficient. In this case, accidental removal of some edges does not break the network into unconnected parts; the network is stable. On the other hand, a small average shortest path length L means faraway nodes can be connected as easily as nearby nodes. The smaller the L, the easier the propagation in the network. Within the networks with small L, the propagation of dynamics is efficient. Thus, small-world networks are stable and efficient in reacting to the abrupt variations (Tsonis et al., 2007).
Figure 4The test of the small-world structure in the ionospheric network. Panel (a) shows the 150 results of σ; panel (b) shows the frequency of the results of σ; panel (c) shows the 150 results of C∕Cr; panel (d) shows the frequency of the results of C∕Cr.
As is shown by the results above, the ionospheric network is small-world with a small average shortest path length and a large clustering coefficient. Thus, the ionospheric network exhibits properties of stable networks and of networks where dynamic processes are transferred efficiently. For example, a solar flare may create a disturbance in the ionosphere at high latitudes. However, the small-world property of the ionospheric network allows the system to respond quickly and coherently to the anomalies introduced into the system. This dynamic propagation diffuses local anomalies, thereby reducing the possibility of prolonged local extremes and providing greater stability for the global ionosphere system. Thus, chances of major ionospheric shifts are reduced. The above theory and its application to the ionosphere data suggest that the ionosphere system may be inherently stable and efficient in transferring dynamics. Just as the small-world property in the atmosphere does (Donges et al., 2009b), such an ionospheric property also results from the teleconnections beyond the geospatial distance in the ionospheric network. Such teleconnections play an important role in stabilizing the ionosphere system and cause the dynamic ionospheric processes to be transferred efficiently (Donges et al., 2009b; Tsonis et al., 2007).
4 Conclusions
The ionosphere can be regarded as a spatially extended complex system. Therefore, the complex network is used to analyze the dynamic processes in the global ionosphere based on the VTEC from CODE. As a Bayesian probabilistic graph, the ionospheric network is constructed based on the conditional independence theory by the FGS algorithm. The edges of the network represent the causal relationships between any two GIM cells from a holistic perspective. We have analyzed the structure of the directed ionospheric network. The results of the power-law hypothesis test show that both the out-degree and in-degree distribution of the ionospheric network are not scale-free. The ionospheric network is homogenous. None of the geospatial positions play an eminently important role in the propagation of dynamic ionospheric processes. The importance of the ionosphere over various spatial locations in the propagation of the ionospheric dynamic processes is similar. Based on the latitudinal and longitudinal distances between the beginnings and ends of the edges, the joint distribution is analyzed to explore the propagation of the dynamic processes in the ionosphere. The results show that the edges principally exist between adjacent geographical locations, indicating that the propagation of the dynamic processes mainly satisfies the proximity principle in the ionosphere. Moreover, the joint distribution of the edge latitudinal and longitudinal distances shows that the dynamic processes travel more efficiently along the longitude than along the latitude. Also, the small-world structure is studied to examine the stability of the ionosphere. The small-world-ness of the ionospheric network is found to be larger than 1. Meanwhile, the clustering coefficient is larger than those of the equal random networks. Thus, the ionospheric network possesses a small-world property, which makes the ionosphere stable and efficient in the propagation of the dynamic processes. In general, the complex network provides a unique perspective in ionosphere research. Depending on the choice of nodes, edges and methods, ionospheric networks may take different forms to study different properties of the ionosphere.
Code is available by email request.
VTEC data are derived from CODE (ftp://ftp.aiub.unibe.ch/CODE/) (AIUB, 2018) in the form of a global ionospheric map.
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (41374154 and 41774156). We are grateful to Adam Woods from CIRES, University of Colorado, David Skaggs Research Center, and Rolf Dach and Stefan Schaer from the Astronomical Institute, University of Bern. They are all so kind to help us with obtaining the data. Moreover, Shikun Lu would like to thank, in particular, the ongoing and unwavering support from Taotao Sun over the years.
Edited by: Stéphane Vannitsem
Reviewed by: three anonymous referees
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Watts, D. J. and Strogatz, S. H.: Collective dynamics of 'small-world' networks, Nature, 393, 440–442, 1998. a, b
Wei, N., SHI, and Zou, R.: Analysis and Assessments of IGS Products Consistencies, Geomatics and Information Science of Wuhan University, 34, 1363–1367, 2009. a
Zerenner, T., Friederichs, P., Lehnertz, K., and Hense, A.: A Gaussian graphical model approach to climate networks, Chaos an Interdisciplinary Journal of Nonlinear Science, 24, 023103-1–023103-10, 2014. a, b, c
Description of data and methods


text:
SET @diff = (SELECT network_start_integer FROM blocks ORDER BY network_last_integer ASC LIMIT 1);
CREATE TABLE tmp_blocks (
    network_start_integer INT UNSIGNED,
    network_last_integer INT UNSIGNED,
    geoname_id INT UNSIGNED,
    -- registered_country_geoname_id INT UNSIGNED,
    -- represented_country_geoname_id INT UNSIGNED,
    -- is_anonymous_proxy INT UNSIGNED,
    -- is_satellite_provider INT UNSIGNED,
    -- postal_code VARCHAR(10),
    -- latitude DECIMAL(8,4),
    -- longitude DECIMAL(8,4),
    INDEX (network_last_integer),
    INDEX (geoname_id)
) ENGINE=MyISAM DEFAULT CHARSET=utf8mb4 DEFAULT COLLATE=utf8mb4_unicode_520_ci AS (
SELECT
    x.gap_start_integer AS network_start_integer
    , x.gap_end_integer AS network_last_integer
    , NULL AS geoname_id
    -- , NULL AS registered_country_geoname_id
    -- , NULL AS represented_country_geoname_id
    -- , NULL AS is_anonymous_proxy
    -- , NULL AS is_satellite_provider
    -- , NULL AS postal_code
    -- , NULL AS latitude
    -- , NULL AS longitude
FROM (
    SELECT
        network_start_integer,
        network_last_integer,
        geoname_id,
        network_start_integer - @diff AS diff,
        NULL AS new_geoname_id,
        @diff + 1 AS gap_start_integer,
        (network_start_integer - 1) AS gap_end_integer,
        @diff := network_last_integer AS ref
    FROM blocks
    ORDER BY network_last_integer ASC) AS x
WHERE x.diff > 1);

INSERT INTO tmp_blocks
SELECT *
FROM blocks;

TRUNCATE TABLE blocks;

INSERT INTO blocks (
    network_start_integer
    , network_last_integer
    , geoname_id
    -- , registered_country_geoname_id
    -- , represented_country_geoname_id
    -- , is_anonymous_proxy
    -- , is_satellite_provider
    -- , postal_code
    -- , latitude
    -- , longitude
)
SELECT
    network_start_integer
    , network_last_integer
    , geoname_id
    -- , NULL AS registered_country_geoname_id
    -- , NULL AS represented_country_geoname_id
    -- , NULL AS is_anonymous_proxy
    -- , NULL AS is_satellite_provider
    -- , NULL AS postal_code
    -- , NULL AS latitude
    -- , NULL AS longitude
FROM tmp_blocks
ORDER BY network_last_integer ASC;

DROP TABLE tmp_blocks;

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Below is a copy of the contents revealed in the Press Conference of Dr. Subramanian Swamy in Ahmedabad on Nov 19. You can get a downloadable copy of the contents here.
Why is Home Ministry delaying probe on Rahul Gandhi's secret British citizenship case for the past 16 months?


This free 2 day workshop in Epping will give you a practical understanding of how to build a basic website and create an e-commerce capability.
An overview of the options available to build a website, with benefits and drawbacks of each.
Using Important aspects to consider in building a website (customer journey, desired outcomes, style reflecting value proposition).
Understanding strategic options for creating an e-commerce capability.


Below you can download free 20000 dollar bail font. This font uploaded 11 October 2015. 20000 Dollar Bail font viewed 141 times and downloaded 0 times. See preview 20000 dollar bail font, write comments, or download 20000 dollar bail font for free. This font available for Windows 7 and Mac OS in TrueType(.ttf) and OpenType(.otf) format.


text:
megalithix@yandex.com
Barrows, Cairns, Tombs & Tumuli
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St Winefride's Well, Holywell, Flintshire.
11th July 2011 19th October 2019 sunbright57
Holy Well: OS Grid Reference – SJ 1851 7627
Ffynnon Gwenfrewi
St. Winifred's Well
St.Winifred's Well
From the Chester ring road head into north Wales along the coast road (A548) from Connah's Quay for about 13 miles taking you through Flint. After 12 miles turn left into Holywell town (Treffynnon). At the western end of the town go down the Greenfield-Mostyn road back towards the A584 taking you down a hill. After 500 hundred yards you arrive at the holy well/shrine and pilgrimage centre on the right-hand side; there is parking on the opposite side of the road. There is a small entrance fee, but as well as the famous healing well and bathing pool, they have a gift shop, toilet facilities and a late medieval/Gothic two-storey structure that is built over the polygonal, vaulted well chamber, whilst at the side (at the corner of the hill) stands another Gothic chapel from 1500.
According to the well known legend, a young Welsh girl called Winefride or Gwenfrewi, was the daughter of patrician parents, Thenith (Thewyth) and Gwenlo, who lived at Bryn-y-Castell (Treffynnon) at the beginning of the 7th century AD. She was a very religious girl who was known for her kindness and charities to people in the area that was then called Tegeingl (after the Decengle tribe). Winefride grew up to be a very beautiful young woman which troubled her because she had no wish to marry, only to live a life of chastity and serve God as only she knew how.
St. Winefrides Well 1742
One day a local chieftain from Hawarden (Penarlag) called Caradoc ap Alyn came hunting in the area. He became very thirsty so stopped off at the house where Winefride lived with her parents. However, on this particular day her parents were attending the local church where St Beuno, her uncle, was conducting a service. Prince Caradoc soon began to seduce her so she ran to the church but with the prince in hot pursuit. When he caught up with poor Winefride, she again resisted him so he took his sword and beheaded her. Her severed head fell to the ground and rolled down a hill and where it came to rest a spring of water gushed forth from the ground. Her parents and uncle came rushing out of the church at which point St Beuno cursed the evil prince, who was calmly wiping blood from his sword, causing him to sink into the ground — never to be seen again. St. Beuno then placed the severed head back into place, restoring Winifred to life again but leaving her with a thin scar round her neck.
Later, Winifred was entrusted for her education to St Beuno whom sent her to various holy men including St. Elerius at Gwytherin near Llanwrst. Here she became abbess of a convent that had been founded by Elerius, with his mother St. Theonia as first abbess; and it was here for the next 40 years that Winifred lived out her life. She was said to have died at Gwytherin in either 65o or 670 AD. Her body was first interred in the churchyard there, however in 1138 her relics were transferred to Shrewsbury Abbey. Sadly however, her shrine there was destroyed in the 16th century and now only a few relics remain with a finger-bone being housed at a convent in Holywell.
The holy well and shrine of St. Winifred at Holywell became a place of pilgrimage during the middle-ages and many miracles of healing were wrought there. The sick were cured of infirmities of the legs and body; crutches were left at the well and many were cured of leprosy, eye complaints, loss of hearing, being not able to bear a child, mental illness, palsy and lung disorders etc. During the Reformation the holy well suffered much, but from the 17th century onwards pilgrims were returning to the holy place and, more recently it has become the Welsh Lourdes and still pilgrims come in droves from all over Wales and beyond. The vaulted Gothic structure covering the well shrine is richly carved with bosses depicting various characters including St Beuno, Earl Stanley, Lady Margaret Beaufort, biblical characters, animals and an abbot of Basingwerk abbey, but there is also much recent graffiti too. A tall statue of St Winefride looks down over the well while candles burn all around. In the larger bathing pool outside, a stone lies at one side — this is claimed to be where St. Beuno sat whilst teaching his young niece. Red stains on stones at the front of the well-basin were long taken to be the martyr's bloodstains, but now these are thought to be iron oxide pigmentation on the lichens. Today the people still come either to bathe in the special pool, throw coins in the well, or fill bottles with holy water from a tap on the wall. Faith in miracles of healing is still much in evidence here and may it continue to be for many years to come. Everyone is welcome here, you don't have to be a Roman Catholic!
Bord, Janet & Colin, Sacred Waters, Paladin: London 1986.
David, Christopher, Saint Winefride's Well – A History and Guide, Gomer Press: Llandysul 2002.
Edwards-Charles, Thomas, Saint Winefride and Her Well – The Historical Background, Holywell 1962.
Heath, Sidney, In the Steps of the Pilgrims, Rich & Cowan: London 1950.
Jones, Francis, The Holy Wells of Wales, University of Wales Press: Cardiff 1992.
Liebreich, Karen, UneXplained: Spine-tingling tales from Real Places in Great Britain and Ireland, Kindle 2012.
Simcock, Richard, North Clwyd At Random, Countryside Publications Ltd: Chorley 1986.
Spencer, Ray, A Guide to the Saints of Wales and the West Country, Llanerch: Felinfach 1991.
Copyright © Ray Spencer 2011
St Winefride's Well
St Winefride\'s Well 53.277123, -3.223558 St Winefride\'s Well
Flintshire, Holy Wells, Walesancient monuments, antiquarian, antiquities, Archaeology, architecture, Catholicism, christianity, christians, earth mysteries, Flintshire, folklore, hagiology, healing, Holywell, hydromancy, legends, sacred sites, sacred springs, saints, Wales, water, Welsh heritage
Written by sunbright57
Green Plain, Blubberhouses Moor, North Yorkshire
Nussey Green (404), Appletreewick, North Yorkshire
One thought on "St Winefride's Well, Holywell, Flintshire."
sunbright57 says:
Cheers Paul, the site looks pretty good now. Thanks.
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St John's Well, Dunrobin, Golspie, Sutherland
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Hero Or Nero? Is Trump The Worst Thing To Happen To America In 156 Years?
"I don't think he goes away. I -- you know, this is a Caesar crossing the Rubicon moment. He's got an army. What's he going to do with that army?"
Or maybe one of history's greatest deplorables - Nero. The problems with this Nero is that his loyal followers act more like unwashed bourgeois French Revolutionaries or revolutionaries of the June Rebellion of 1832.
We have all been witnessing a candidate for President of the United States who lives in an alternate reality and has convinced a great many people to follow him and do the same. To them, he is a cult hero who speaks the truth but is demonized by the media elite. They listen to him and only to him. Lies! False accusations! All by a rigged system rife with conspiracy! He alone can fix things! He cares for this country!
But more importantly, he cares for THEM. With him "WE HAVE A VOICE!"


This History-based homework project encourages children to investigate how power has changed over time.
Use this resource for a whole range of cross-curricular activity ideas relating to wind power!
Investigate climate change and energy.
This amazing time-lapse video shows the construction of 3 new wind turbines.
A collection of cross curricular activities designed for children to investigate solar energy.
Use this superb resource for a whole range of activity ideas relating to solar power!
Design a wind powered machine in this renewable energy challenge.
Explore issues around renewable energy in the developed world.
Reinforce your pupils' understanding of renewable energy sources.
Come with us on this virtual fieldtrip, and inspire your pupils to investigate solar energy!


text:
Spring training is an American ritual of low-key exhibition games that almost, almost brings the sport back to its small-town roots for a few precious weeks each year in March until opening day at the start of April.
Florida is the focus of the action, a tradition that goes back to 1914, when the St. Louis Browns wintered in St. Petersburg. Today, 15 teams train and compete here, making up what's known as the Grapefruit League.
See the Philadelphia Phillies and the New York Yankees
The Philadelphia Phillies have one of the most fan-friendly stadiums in MLB, the 8,500-seat Bright House Networks Field in Clearwater. The New York Yankees, though, are the most famous team, and their stadium, George M. Steinbrenner Field in Tampa, is the largest in MLB's Grapefruit League, with seating for 10,387 fans and field dimensions identical to those at the team's Bronx home. Fans can tour a miniature Monument Park with plaques commemorating each Yankees Hall of Famer, or crowd above the dugout before the first pitch to try for autographs. Those who want to live the experience can sign up for Yankees Fantasy Camp, a week-long immersion into the world of Yankee baseball, with daily instruction and coaching from former players and current coaches, your own Yankee uniform, a locker in the clubhouse and a dream game against the pros. Batter up!
Visit St. Pete-Clearwater
Visit Tampa Bay
Visit Florida
7 Dishes You Must Eat at U.S. Baseball Stadiums
Where to Shop on Your Visit to Tampa Bay, Florida
Tampa Bay, Florida: Thrill Rides and Local Vibes in a Waterfront City
Orlando to Tampa: Where to Stop on Your Florida Road Trip
Eat Your Way Through Tampa's Ybor City
City Tour - Tampa Bay, Florida
Tampa Bay: Family Fun, Outdoor Adventure, Upscale Shopping and Exciting Nightlife
St. Pete/Clearwater, Florida: A Tour of Nature, the Arts and Beaches
Local Brews: The St. Pete/Clearwater Craft Beer Trail
Stay and Play at the Blue Heron Beach Resort in Orlando
Fort Lauderdale: Shopping and Dining in the Sun
Kissimmee: The Gateway to Fun
Sand, Sea and Sun in Surfside
A Travel Guide to Walt Disney World, Florida
Charlotte County: Dream Holiday in Sunny Florida
Florida Treasures: Vero Beach and Indian River County
Gainesville, Florida: Springs, Wildlife Watching and Hiking
A Visual Guide to Miami
Indian River County's Natural Wonders
Mission Possible: Three Florida Theme Parks In Three Days
Natural North Florida: Untouched Paradise
Soak up the Sun – and Arts and Culture – in Vero Beach
The Suwannee River Valley: Discovering Florida's "Other Side"
Universal Orlando Resort – Full of Holiday Experiences
7 Cool College Towns in the USA


text:
Q: Use of the function IsWin2000() produces a C++ warning: C4996 - Deprecated Function So when I am using the function, IsWin2000(), to figure out whether or not the computer running my application is running windows 2000, i get the warning:
warning C4996: 'IsWin2000': This function is exported to support existing modules and is obsolete.

If this is an obsolete, deprecated function, what is the proper way to query what operating system is running? Is there any other way to achieve this task, or is my only option to simply suppress the warning? Thanks!

A: GetVersionEx
See the Remarks at OSVERSIONINFO for a list of results and how to interpret them. See Getting the System Version for a fully fledged example.
And lets not forget what the spec says:

Identifying the current operating
  system is usually not the best way to
  determine whether a particular
  operating system feature is present.
  This is because the operating system
  may have had new features added in a
  redistributable DLL. Rather than using
  GetVersionEx to determine the
  operating system platform or version
  number, test for the presence of the
  feature itself

A: This is not a standard Windows API function.  Maybe if you mention where you got it, we can provide more information.
The proper way depends on what you are trying to accomplish.  Creating a debug log or error report, you should call GetVersionEx.
For any other purpose, you should test for the actual feature you're trying to use, often with GetProcAddress, and not hard-code a version test.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
3D mammograms may be useful in investigating abnormalities, but as a means of routine screening, they may do more harm than good. From shutterstock.com
For routine breast screening, you may not need a 3D mammogram
Meagan Brennan, University of Sydney
Meagan Brennan
Clinical A/Prof Breast Physician, Westmead Breast Cancer Institute, University of Sydney
Meagan Brennan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
University of Sydney provides funding as a member of The Conversation AU.
Victorian Minister for Health Jenny Mikakos recently announced six new 3D breast screening machines would be rolled out across the state.
These will be used to assess women recalled for further investigation when a standard 2D screening mammogram picks up something that wasn't anticipated.
Offering this sophisticated technology within the public system is designed to help women with breast cancer receive an accurate diagnosis in a timely manner, in turn ensuring they can start appropriate treatment as early as possible.
Read more: What causes breast cancer in women? What we know, don't know and suspect
But there's a distinction to be made here. While this funding will provide 3D mammography machines to be used for further assessment when there may be a problem, many 3D mammography machines are already operating throughout the private system, offered to women as a means for routine screening.
Newer medical technology is often assumed to be better than traditional technology. But when we're talking about mammography for routine breast screening, this may not be the case.
While evidence shows 3D mammograms detect more cases of breast cancer than the 2D version, many of the additional cancers detected may not go on to cause harm. In these cases, their detection will only lead to anxiety and unnecessary treatment.
A mammogram is an x-ray of the breasts that can be used to investigate breast symptoms such as lumps and pain. It can also be used for screening, to pick up early breast cancer in healthy women who have no symptoms.
In Australia, the BreastScreen program invites women aged 50 to 74 for a free screening mammogram every two years. All women over 40 are welcome to attend if they choose to.
The BreastScreen program offers conventional 2D digital mammograms. During this standard mammogram, compression is applied to the breast, and two images are taken of each breast using a small dose of radiation.
Read more: Women should be told about their breast density when they have a mammogram
What does a 3D mammogram do differently?
3D mammography, also called breast tomosynthesis, has been introduced over the last decade.
It's not currently used for screening as part of the BreastScreen program, but it is available in many private radiology practices around the country.
A 3D mammogram applies the same compression to the breast as a 2D test, but takes multiple images, like thin "slices".
The radiologist can scroll through the collection of images on a computer screen to get a 3D picture of the breast, which can be examined layer by layer, one millimetre at a time. This aims to see through layers of normal breast tissue to find hidden cancer.
Source: Breast Imaging Victoria.
Research has shown 3D mammograms are able to pick up some cancers not seen on conventional 2D mammograms. The cancer detection rate of 3D mammography was around 1.4 times higher than for 2D mammography.
The additional cancers detected by 3D mammograms were small and had not spread to the lymph glands; these are early cancers expected to have better survival rates.
Cancer can be difficult to see in lumpy or dense glandular breast tissue, which is typically seen in women before menopause. 3D mammography appears to be particularly good at detecting cancer in women with dense breast tissue, which may partially account for the increase in detection.
The possibility of overdiagnosis and overtreatment
Some cancers are indolent or slow growing and will never cause clinical symptoms. These cancers can be difficult to distinguish from aggressive cancers detected early. So when they're found by a screening mammogram, they may be treated with surgery and radiotherapy, causing harm without improving survival.
When we're talking about breast screening, we'll often mention the recall rate. That's the number of women asked to return for further testing, and possibly treatment, when an initial screening shows up something abnormal.
The recall rate is important because, we know for 2D mammography, around 80-90% of women recalled for assessment do not have cancer.
In these cases, being recalled can lead to anxiety, risks and pain associated with biopsy and surgery, and costs for unnecessary procedures.
While a 3D mammogram might pick up more cancers, it could necessitate treatment for cancers not destined to cause harm. From shutterstock.com
Earlier research found the recall rate was lower for 3D mammography than 2D mammography, so there were fewer false positive studies or false alarms that added extra tests, biopsies and anxiety.
But new Australian research, published in the Medical Journal of Australia, has drawn this into question. This study included more than 10,000 women attending a BreastScreen centre in Victoria for routine screening. Some were invited to have a 3D mammogram, while others had a conventional 2D mammogram.
Again, the cancer detection rate was around 1.5 times higher for 3D mammography. However, the recall rate was actually higher for 3D mammography compared to 2D – so more women were asked to return for further work-up (mammogram, ultrasound and/or a biopsy).
Read more: Three questions to ask about calls to widen breast cancer screening
Should I have a 3D mammogram?
Public health experts are currently debating the issue of overdiagnosis in breast screening. The extent of overdiagnosis in screening is not agreed upon, but it is accepted that it exists to some extent.
In the 3D mammography studies, including the latest Australian study, a higher proportion of cancers in the 3D groups were very small invasive or "in situ" malignancies less likely to cause harm than more aggressive cancers. This means many of the additional cancers detected by 3D mammograms could be "over-diagnosed" cancers that cause women to undergo gruelling cancer treatments without real benefit.
Read more: Treating 'stage 0' breast cancer doesn't always save women's lives so should we screen for it?
It's unlikely BreastScreen will introduce routine 3D mammography screening in the short term based on the current evidence.
But should you have a 3D mammogram through a private radiology practice? Perhaps, if you have dense breast tissue or you are starting screening in your 30s or 40s due to a family history of breast cancer.
For older women, there may not be additional benefits of 3D mammography over 2D. All women should consider the balance of potential benefits (early detection) and potential harms (overdiagnosis, overtreatment and anxiety) before deciding on a 3D versus a 2D screening mammogram.
Overdiagnosis


text:
void APAddressBookExternalChangeCallback(ABAddressBookRef addressBookRef, CFDictionaryRef info,
                                         void *context);

@interface APAddressBook ()
@property (nonatomic, readonly) ABAddressBookRef addressBook;
@property (nonatomic, readonly) dispatch_queue_t localQueue;
@property (nonatomic, copy) void (^changeCallback)();
@end

@implementation APAddressBook

#pragma mark - life cycle

- (id)init
{
    self = [super init];
    if (self)
    {
        CFErrorRef *error = NULL;
        _addressBook = ABAddressBookCreateWithOptions(NULL, error);
        if (error)
        {
            NSLog(@"%@", (__bridge_transfer NSString *)CFErrorCopyFailureReason(*error));
            return nil;
        }
        NSString *name = [NSString stringWithFormat:@"com.alterplay.addressbook.%ld",
                                   (long)self.hash];
        _localQueue = dispatch_queue_create([name cStringUsingEncoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding], NULL);
        self.fieldsMask = APContactFieldDefault;
    }
    return self;
}

- (void)dealloc
{
    [self stopObserveChanges];
    if (_addressBook)
    {
        CFRelease(_addressBook);
    }
#if !OS_OBJECT_USE_OBJC
    dispatch_release(_localQueue);
#endif
}

#pragma mark - public

+ (APAddressBookAccess)access
{
    ABAuthorizationStatus status = ABAddressBookGetAuthorizationStatus();
    switch (status)
    {
        case kABAuthorizationStatusDenied:
        case kABAuthorizationStatusRestricted:
            return APAddressBookAccessDenied;

        case kABAuthorizationStatusAuthorized:
            return APAddressBookAccessGranted;

        default:
            return APAddressBookAccessUnknown;
    }
}

- (void)loadContacts:(void (^)(NSArray *contacts, NSError *error))callbackBlock
{
    [self loadContactsOnQueue:dispatch_get_main_queue() completion:callbackBlock];
}

- (void)loadContactsOnQueue:(dispatch_queue_t)queue
                 completion:(void (^)(NSArray *contacts, NSError *error))completionBlock
{
    APContactField fieldMask = self.fieldsMask;
    NSArray *descriptors = self.sortDescriptors;
    APContactFilterBlock filterBlock = self.filterBlock;

	ABAddressBookRequestAccessWithCompletion(self.addressBook, ^(bool granted, CFErrorRef errorRef)
	{
	    dispatch_async(self.localQueue, ^
        {
	        NSArray *array = nil;
	        NSError *error = nil;
            if (granted)
            {
                CFArrayRef peopleArrayRef = ABAddressBookCopyArrayOfAllPeople(self.addressBook);
                NSUInteger contactCount = (NSUInteger)CFArrayGetCount(peopleArrayRef);
                NSMutableArray *contacts = [[NSMutableArray alloc] init];
                for (NSUInteger i = 0; i < contactCount; i++)
                {
                    ABRecordRef recordRef = CFArrayGetValueAtIndex(peopleArrayRef, i);
                    APContact *contact = [[APContact alloc] initWithRecordRef:recordRef
                                                                    fieldMask:fieldMask];
                    if (!filterBlock || filterBlock(contact))
                    {
                        [contacts addObject:contact];
                    }
                }
                [contacts sortUsingDescriptors:descriptors];
                array = contacts.copy;
                CFRelease(peopleArrayRef);
            }
            else if (errorRef)
            {
                error = (__bridge NSError *)errorRef;
            }

            dispatch_async(queue, ^
            {
                if (completionBlock)
                {
                    completionBlock(array, error);
                }
            });
		});
	});
}

- (void)startObserveChangesWithCallback:(void (^)())callback
{
    if (callback)
    {
        if (!self.changeCallback)
        {
            ABAddressBookRegisterExternalChangeCallback(self.addressBook,
                                                        APAddressBookExternalChangeCallback,
                                                        (__bridge void *)(self));
        }
        self.changeCallback = callback;
    }
}

- (void)stopObserveChanges
{
    if (self.changeCallback)
    {
        self.changeCallback = nil;
        ABAddressBookUnregisterExternalChangeCallback(self.addressBook,
                                                      APAddressBookExternalChangeCallback,
                                                      (__bridge void *)(self));
    }
}

#pragma mark - external change callback

void APAddressBookExternalChangeCallback(ABAddressBookRef __unused addressBookRef,
                                         CFDictionaryRef __unused info,
                                         void *context)
{
    APAddressBook *addressBook = (__bridge APAddressBook *)(context);
    addressBook.changeCallback ? addressBook.changeCallback() : nil;
}

@end


text:
IWA's Ward to return to Illinois after prolific career
Incarnate Word Academy senior Gabby Ward finished her high school career with 162 goals and is set to attend Division II soccer powerhouse McKendree.
IWA's Ward to return to Illinois after prolific career Incarnate Word Academy senior Gabby Ward finished her high school career with 162 goals and is set to attend Division II soccer powerhouse McKendree. Check out this story on caller.com: http://callertim.es/2GredB6
Quinton Martinez, Corpus Christi Caller-Times Published 6:04 p.m. CT March 13, 2018 | Updated 4:08 p.m. CT March 14, 2018
Incarnate Word Academy's Gabby Ward (right) and Carroll's Nicole Escamilla fight over the ball in the first half of their game in the Mira's Gulf Coast Classic Soccer tournament at Cabaniss Multipurpose Stadium on Thursday, Jan. 11, 2018. IWA won the game 5-0.(Photo: Rachel Denny Clow/Caller-Times)Buy Photo
Sometimes you can go home again.
Just ask Incarnate Word Academy's Gabby Ward.
Ward and her family moved to Corpus Christi from Illinois before her sophomore year and this fall she is returning, where she will play soccer for Division II McKendree University in Lebanon, Illinois.
In three years playing club soccer and at IWA, she will have left her mark in Corpus Christi, as one of the most prolific goal-scorer in the city's high school soccer history.
She finished with 162 career goals in high school play, including 24 goals as a freshman in Illinois.
"I've been involved in soccer in Corpus for 20-plus years in general," said Sebastien Giraldo of Giraldo Elite Futbol and also the assistant coach of Corpus FC. "I have never seen a high school boys or girls player score that many goals in a career. Ever.
"Not even close. I have never seen anyone through four years consistently average that many goals."
Giraldo coached Ward at the club level since she arrived in Corpus Christi.
"She is extremely talented," Giraldo said. "She has an instinct for (the) goal that is something that is extremely natural, and obviously developed through training over the years.
"She is a feisty, feisty forward that will do anything to put the ball in the back of the net, basically."
The utmost congratulations to @Gabbyy_ward for 152 career HS goals. A crazy, amazing accomplishment pic.twitter.com/RS9UdqICoO
— Sebastian (@GEFSebastian) January 31, 2018
Ward's high-water mark came as a junior when the Angels, armed with seven seniors, advanced to the TAPPS state championship game. It was the first time IWA advanced to the state championship game.
The prolific forward found the back of the next 64 times as a junior.
"It still seems like an unbelievable number," Ward said.
"Overall our team was really solid. We had a lot of midfielders that could get the ball up. My specialty is finishing. Once I had the ball up there, all I had to do was shoot it. And that is what I'm good at."
Ward remembered playing as a freshman with a goal of cracking her school's chart of top scorers, which meant she needed 100 goals.
She raced past the mark last year and scored 37 more as a senior to finish with 162.
"The hard thing is getting people that don't watch or follow soccer to understand how prolific that is," Giraldo said. "That would be like averaging 30 or 40 points a game in high school basketball. Every single night. In baseball, it is like hitting two or three home runs every single game.
"Gabby had a ridiculous junior year, but she has done it for four years."
In moving to Corpus Christi, soccer was something that helped her fit in and find friends.
Ward said she went to club practice on her second day in town and her teammates became her first friends in the city.
Now, in returning to Illinois, Ward will have the benefit of nearby family members, including her sister as well as familiar roommates.
She said three other members of McKendree's signing class are former club teammates.
"We are really good friends and we still hang out," Ward said. "They still come down and visit me. It is cool and now we are going to room together. I've known them since I was in fourth grade. It is cool that we grew up playing together and we get to go to college and play together again."
Ward said she plans to study pre-med at McKendree, which has a good acceptance rate into medical school, with a goal of becoming a pediatrician.
Ward, who has a grade point average more than 4.0, said becoming a doctor was her dream long before playing soccer in college was even a thought.
"I never really wanted to play in college," Ward said. "My goal was to be a doctor. I was always focused on school. I played soccer and I liked it, but when I moved here, my junior year everyone was talking about playing in college.
"I thought I could do that so I started going to ID camps and over the summer I went to the McKendree ID camp when I was in Illinois visiting family. They called me in August or September and asked if I wanted to verbally commit."
McKendree's enrollment of 1,450 and small class size was a big selling point for Ward, who said knowing her classmates and professors is very important to her.
"I am not nervous at all," Ward said. "My grandma lives an hour away, my aunt is 20 minutes away and my sister goes to school in Illinois. I'm excited."
Aaron Bonds inducted into CBCA Hall of Honor


These Under Armour Challenger Shorts are designed with an elasticated waistband and drawstring fastening. They are a lightweight construction and feature flat lock seams to prevent chafing when playing. These shorts have mesh panelling to help the skin to breathe easily. They are a block colour with a printed logo and are complete with Under Armour branding.


Solutions for System Engineers: Apache restart error: Unable to open logs!
Apache restart error: Unable to open logs!
As the error states, apache is not able to bind to its default ports because it has already been used by some processes.
Check which all processes are listening to port 80 or 443. You can use the following commands.
You can kill those processes and then restart httpd.


WELLINGTON, Fla. – Tyler Westra (a) from Sioux Falls, SD fired 77 to win the Training Division at Wellington National Golf Club. It was Tyler's 1st win on the MLGT in his 1st start. He earned a gift certificate for $100 to the PGA Tour Superstore for the win. He also won two skins worth $64 each. Nice playing Tyler!


On January 16, 2018, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy signed legislation (S.B. 713) providing U.S. Armed Forces and Reserves members with protections against interference with their employment, trade, or business.
The law became effective on January 16, 2018.


text:
<?php
/**
 * Comments Template
 *
 * This template file handles the display of comments, pingbacks and trackbacks.
 *
 * External functions are used to display the various types of comments.
 *
 * @package WooFramework
 * @subpackage Template
 */

 // Do not delete these lines
if ( ! empty( $_SERVER['SCRIPT_FILENAME'] ) && 'comments.php' == basename( $_SERVER['SCRIPT_FILENAME'] ) ) { die ( __( 'Please do not load this page directly. Thanks!', 'woothemes' ) ); }

 // Password is required so don't display comments.
if ( post_password_required() ) { ?>
<?php _e( 'This post is password protected. Enter the password to view comments.', 'woothemes' ); ?>
<?php return; }

/**
 * Comment Output.
 *
 * This is where our comments display is generated.
 */

 $comments_by_type = &separate_comments( $comments );

 // You can start editing here -- including this comment!

	if ( have_comments() ) {

		echo '
';

	 	if ( ! empty( $comments_by_type['comment'] ) ) { ?>

<?php printf( _n( 'One Response to %2$s', '%1$s Responses to %2$s', get_comments_number(), 'woothemes' ), number_format_i18n( get_comments_number() ), '' . get_the_title() . '' ); ?>

				<?php
					/* Loop through and list the comments. Tell wp_list_comments()
					 * to use custom_comment() to format the comments.
					 * If you want to overload this in a child theme then you can
					 * define custom_comment() and that will be used instead.
					 * See custom_comment() in /includes/theme-comments.php for more.
					 */
					wp_list_comments( array( 'callback' => 'custom_comment', 'type' => 'comment', 'avatar_size' => 40 ) );
				?>

		 	<?php
		 	// Comment pagination.
		 	if ( get_comment_pages_count() > 1 && get_option( 'page_comments' ) ) { ?>

<?php previous_comments_link( __( '← Older Comments', 'woothemes' ) ); ?>

<?php next_comments_link( __( 'Newer Comments →', 'woothemes' ) ); ?>

			<?php } // End IF Statement

		} // End empty($comments_by_type['comment'] IF Statement

			if ( ! empty( $comments_by_type['pings'] ) ) { ?>

<?php  _e( 'Trackbacks/Pingbacks', 'woothemes' ); ?>

					<?php
						/* Loop through and list the pings. Tell wp_list_comments()
						 * to use list_pings() to format the pings.
						 * If you want to overload this in a child theme then you can
						 * define list_pings() and that will be used instead.
						 * See list_pings() in /includes/theme-comments.php for more.
						 */
						wp_list_comments( array( 'callback' => 'list_pings', 'type' => 'pings' ) );
					?>

			<?php }

		echo '
';

	} else {

		echo '
';

		// If there are no comments and comments are closed, let's leave a little note, shall we?
		if ( ! comments_open() && is_singular() ) { ?>
<?php _e( 'Comments are closed.', 'woothemes' ); ?>
<?php }
		else { ?>
<?php _e( 'No comments yet.', 'woothemes' ); ?>
<?php }

		echo '
';

	} // End IF Statement

/**
 * Respond Form.
 *
 * This is where the comment form is generated.
 */

 comment_form();
?>


January 28, 2019 – Seoul, Korea – Over 10 years have passed since the Global Financial Crisis.
In the post-crisis years, the world has recovered and, in its aftermath, the global building industry has boomed.
There is currently an unprecedented demand for new living spaces and office buildings around the world.
While each country and region has its own unique reasons, large construction companies are thriving.
BRUCE Piling Equipment CO. LTD, a piling equipment manufacturer, has provided Hydraulic Vibratory Hammer equipment to respond to various construction site needs around the globe.
The increase in global construction has increased the needs for BRUCE's Vibro Hammer thanks to its efficiency, reliability, and versatility.
The world's ageing population has left many countries with needs for new housing.
By the year 2050, there will be more the 2 billion people aged 60 or older in the world.
This need is one of the reasons the construction industry has soared in recent years.
In addition, the rise of newer cities such as Dubai and Abu Dhabi have increased the need for specialized equipment such as BRUCE's Hydraulic Vibratory Hammer.
The need for better living and working spaces won't end soon as countries around the globe modernize.
A member of the Shinsegae Powerquip company, BRUCE is fast becoming one of the leading manufacturing and supply companies in the field of foundation work.
Bruce utilizes a number of pile driving equipment pieces including Hydraulic Pile Hammer, Rotary Drilling Head, Vibratory Hammer, and Piling Accessories.
BRUCE's pile driving equipment has been used to complete foundation work on major building projects in the Middle East, Europe, Asia, and the United States.
The construction industry changes rapidly and the Korean firm has stayed on the cutting-edge adapting its Hydraulic Vibratory Hammer to the needs of customers.
According to James Y.S. Yoo, CEO of BRUCE Piling Equipment, the company is constantly developing and improving its machinery to deliver better results. Thanks to the company's continued efforts to make better, more advanced piling equipment, BRUCE has received worldwide praise.
BRUCE's pile driving equipment marketed by the Shinsegae Powerquip group is all ISO-9001 certified.
For more information on BRUCE Hydraulic Vibratory Hammer equipment or other pile driving apparatuses, please visit https://www.powerquip.co.kr/products/pile-driving-equipment.html.
BRUCE has been manufacturing top of the range piling equipment for over two decades.
Part of the Shinsegae Powerquip family, BRUCE provides Hydraulic Vibratory Hammers and other pile driving equipment to construction sites around the world.
The company's Vibro Hammer has achieved worldwide recognition has an industry standard in pile driving throughout Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.
CLICK HERE shows PRESS Released throughout 65 Media including FOX News, ABC News etc.
Company name: BRUCE Piling Equipment Co., Ltd.


Wanna see who people see you as? Pimp it!
This post will be open until Monday, August 15th, at which point it shall be closed and votes tallied.
* You may vote for anyone for any character. This includes one person for multiple characters.
* You may only vote once on a single character. You may not nominate two people for one character nor can you vote twice for the same person on one character.
* If the character isn't listed, feel free to start a new category with them.
* You have the right to revoke your vote by deleting it, no harm done.
* Note that the meme revolves around characters. Inanimate objects are not characters.
i have been nominated to be the first doctor by my friend dave.
i nominate my friend dave as the sixth doctor.


Fill out the pre-qualification form below and we will be in touch soon.
Is your firm certified by the State as a Minority Business Enterprise?
Upload any certification documentation if applicable.
Is your firm certified by the State as a Women Owned Business?
Copy of current certificates of insurance including General Liability, Workers Compensation and Commercial Auto.
Download a blank W-9 form here.
Please provide three (3) references. Include contact name, phone and fax number.
Include date started & completed, brief description of work, contract size and completed contract size, general contractor (contact name and phone).


An iconic London photo shoot with this family from overseas. They were on holiday and invited me along to take their family holiday photos in the city.
A family of 5 photo session in Wandsworth, including twin boys, a baby girl and their parents.


text:
package org.simpleframework.xml.core;

import java.lang.annotation.Annotation;
import java.lang.reflect.Constructor;

import org.simpleframework.xml.ElementArray;

/**
 * The ElementArrayParameter represents a constructor
 * parameter. It contains the XML annotation used on the parameter
 * as well as the name of the parameter and its position index.
 * A parameter is used to validate against the annotated methods
 * and fields and also to determine the deserialized values that
 * should be injected in to the constructor to instantiate it.
 *
 * @author Niall Gallagher
 */
class ElementArrayParameter implements Parameter {

   /**
    * This is the constructor the parameter was declared in.
    */
   private final Constructor factory;

   /**
    * This is the contact used to determine the parameter name.
    */
   private final Contact contact;

   /**
    * This is the label that will create the parameter name.
    */
   private final Label label;

   /**
    * This is the actual name that has been determined.
    */
   private final String name;

   /**
    * This is the type of the label represented by this.
    */
   private final Class type;

   /**
    * This is the index that the parameter was declared at.
    */
   private final int index;

   /**
    * Constructor for the ElementArrayParameter object.
    * This is used to create a parameter that can be used to
    * determine a consistent name using the provided XML annotation.
    *
    * @param factory this is the constructor the parameter is in
    * @param value this is the annotation used for the parameter
    * @param index this is the index the parameter appears at
    */
   public ElementArrayParameter(Constructor factory, ElementArray value, int index) throws Exception {
      this.contact = new Contact(value, factory, index);
      this.label = new ElementArrayLabel(contact, value);
      this.type = label.getType();
      this.name = label.getName();
      this.factory = factory;
      this.index = index;
   }

   /**
    * This is used to acquire the name of the parameter that this
    * represents. The name is determined using annotation and
    * the name attribute of that annotation, if one is provided.
    *
    * @return this returns the name of the annotated parameter
    */
   public String getName() throws Exception {
      return name;
   }

   /**
    * This is used to acquire the name of the parameter that this
    * represents. The name is determined using annotation and
    * the name attribute of that annotation, if one is provided.
    *
    * @param context this is the context used to style the name
    *
    * @return this returns the name of the annotated parameter
    */
   public String getName(Context context) throws Exception {
      return label.getName(context);
   }

   /**
    * This is used to acquire the annotated type class. The class
    * is the type that is to be deserialized from the XML. This
    * is used to validate against annotated fields and methods.
    *
    * @return this returns the type used for the parameter
    */
   public Class getType() {
      return factory.getParameterTypes()[index];
   }

   /**
    * This is used to acquire the annotation that is used for the
    * parameter. The annotation provided will be an XML annotation
    * such as the Element or Attribute
    * annotation.
    *
    * @return this returns the annotation used on the parameter
    */
   public Annotation getAnnotation() {
      return contact.getAnnotation();
   }

   /**
    * This returns the index position of the parameter in the
    * constructor. This is used to determine the order of values
    * that are to be injected in to the constructor.
    *
    * @return this returns the index for the parameter
    */
   public int getIndex() {
      return index;
   }

   /**
    * This is used to determine if the parameter is required. If
    * an attribute is not required then it can be null. Which
    * means that we can inject a null value. Also, this means we
    * can match constructors in a more flexible manner.
    *
    * @return this returns true if the parameter is required
    */
   public boolean isRequired() {
      return label.isRequired();
   }

   /**
    * This is used to determine if the parameter is primitive. A
    * primitive parameter must not be null. As there is no way to
    * provide the value to the constructor. A default value is
    * not a good solution as it affects the constructor score.
    *
    * @return this returns true if the parameter is primitive
    */
   public boolean isPrimitive() {
      return type.isPrimitive();
   }

   /**
    * This is used to provide a textual representation of the
    * parameter. Providing a string describing the parameter is
    * useful for debugging and for exception messages.
    *
    * @return this returns the string representation for this
    */
   public String toString() {
      return contact.toString();
   }

   /**
    * The Contact represents a contact object that is
    * to be used for a label in order to extract a parameter name.
    * The parameter name is taken from the XML annotation.
    *
    * @author Niall Gallagher
    */
   private static class Contact extends ParameterContact<ElementArray>  {

      /**
       * Constructor for the Contact object. This is
       * used to create an object that acts like an adapter so that
       * the label can create a consistent name for the parameter.
       *
       * @param label this is the annotation for the parameter
       * @param factory this is the constructor the parameter is in
       * @param index this is the index for the parameter
       */
      public Contact(ElementArray label, Constructor factory, int index) {
         super(label, factory, index);
      }

      /**
       * This returns the name of the parameter as taken from the XML
       * annotation. The name provided here is taken by the label
       * and used to compose a name consistent with how fields and
       * methods are named by the system.
       *
       * @return this returns the name of the annotated parameter
       */
      public String getName() {
         return label.name();
      }
   }
}


text:
Awards, News
Image manipulation hits World Press Photo
The Final Game © Bao Tailiang, shooting for the Chengdu Economic Daily, which won the Sports Singles category in World Press Photo 2015
Manipulated images were entered into every category of World Press Photo - but sports was particularly bad
Twenty percent of the images in the penultimate round of World Press Photo 2015 were disqualified because they were manipulated, according to Lars Boering, managing director of the organisation – and the Sports Stories category was so badly affected that the jury were unable to award a third prize. "I don't want to say it is just sports photography because in every category was affected," Boering comments. "But after the penultimate round, after we had awarded the first and second place, there was nothing left. All the other images had been removed."
Rocked by scandal over suspected image manipulation in recent years, World Press Photo now insists that photographers who reach the penultimate round of the competition submit their raw files and negatives. "They are then all checked by a team of experts, who find everything," says Boering. "In this case we found a lot and that was very disappointing. It is about trust, about the basic ethics of journalism. These images should be genuine and real; we have to be able to trust the photographs they put in front of us….Of course we all know that photographs never show everything that's going on, they are always an interpretation, but we have to know that photographers are showing what's going on in the world.
[bjp_ad_slot]
"In the penultimate round, all raw files are requested and are looked at by a team of technicians who present to the jury their findings," adds jury member Michele McNally. "Some of those findings can be considered just a type of post-processing that a photographer legitimately does, and it's up to the jury to decide whether that's permissible. It might not be to the jury's taste, but it might be to industry standard. We had to work out whether they're acceptable.
"And then there was the extreme – we saw some real manipulation, a lot of photographers who added or subtracted elements of the image," she adds. "Real manipulation, and it's a remarkable thing to see. It was remarkable to see what things were, and what things become, what was removed. Sometimes you think it's a little thing, or they've made an accident, and then you realise 'No, they're trying to deceive us here.' It's very debilitating. Some of the members of the jury felt they were being treated badly, and these people were trying to cheat them….Those individual photographers get a letter why they're being disqualified, with the evidence and statements from the jury."
"I don't know how many [sports images] were eliminated – I work on the first jury, which selects the images then passed on to the final jury," adds Bob Martin, the distinguished sports photographer and member of World Press Photo's specialist sports jury. "But clearly there was a problem with the sports features category, and across the board lots of retouching – and very good retouching [as it could only be detected by experts using the raw files or negatives for comparison]…To have this many images disqualified is terrible and unacceptable.
"But we need to come together as a community of editorial people and decide what is acceptable," he continues. "My view is that if something is added that wasn't there, or something is removed, then clearly that's not on. But if the contrast is increased, or the corners darkened, or areas are dodged and burned – what then? We used to do all that in the darkroom, and now Photoshop is our darkroom."
Martin brushed off any suggestion these standards apply less to sports images than other kinds of photojournalism, arguing that they should remain reportage. But he pointed out that portrait photographs are regularly retouched, across the board, and added "if it is a news competition we must have the same standards across all categories".
Filed under: Awards, News
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text:
Q: Algorithm for shortest list of words The issue is as follows: the user provides a StartWord and EndWord string of X letters together with a list of strings that are also of length X (lets make it 4 but probably more)
static void Main(string[] args)
{
    string StartWord = "Spot";
    string EndWord = "Spin";
    List<string> providedList = new List<string>
                                {
                                "Spin", "Spit", "Spat", "Spot", "Span"
                                };
    List<string> result = MyFunc(StartWord, EndWord, providedList);
}

public List<string> MyFunc(string startWord, string endWord, List<string> input)
{
    ???
}

From the provided parameters I need to display to the user a result that comprises of the SHORTEST list of 4 letter words, starting with StartWord and ending with EndWord with a number of intermediate words that are to be found in the list, where each word differs from the previous word by PRECISELY one letter.
For example the above code should return a list of strings containing these elements:
Spot(as FirstWord),
Spit(only one letter is different from previous word),
Spin (as EndWord)
A bad exapmle would be: Spot, Spat, Span, Spin (as it takes 3 changes compared to the above 2)
I have been looking at some matching algorithms and recursion, but I am not able to figure out how to go about this.
Thank you for any kind of help in advance.

A: Create a graph where the vertices are words, and an edge connects any two words that differ by one letter.
Do a breadth-first search, starting at the StartWord, looking for the shortest path to the EndWord.

Here is sample code for this solution in a different language (Python).  That may give you an even better pointer. :-)
def shortestWordPath (startWord, endWord, words):
    graph = {}
    for word in words:
        graph[word] = {"connected": []}
    for word in words:
        for otherWord in words:
            if 1 == wordDistance(word, otherWord):
                graph[word]['connected'].append(otherWord)
    todo = [(startWord,0)]
    while len(todo):
        (thisWord, fromWord) = todo.pop(0)
        if thisWord == endWord:
            answer = [thisWord, fromWord]
            while graph[ answer[-1] ]["from"] != 0:
                answer.append(graph[ answer[-1] ]["from"])
            answer.reverse()
            return answer
        elif "from" in graph[thisWord]:
            pass # We have already processed this.
        else:
            graph[thisWord]["from"] = fromWord
            for nextWord in graph[thisWord]["connected"]:
                todo.append([nextWord, thisWord])
    return None

def wordDistance (word1, word2):
    return len(differentPositions(word1, word2))

def differentPositions(word1, word2):
    answer = []
    for i in range(0, min(len(word1), len(word2))):
        if word1[i] != word2[i]:
            answer.append(i)
    for i in range(min(len(word1), len(word2)),
                   max(len(word1), len(word2))):
        answer.append(i)
    return answer

print shortestWordPath("Spot", "Spin",
    ["Spin", "Spit", "Spat", "Spot", "Span"])

A: This is what I ended up using(please feel free to comment on the up and down side of it):
private List<List<string>> allWordSteps;
private string[] allWords;

public List<string> WordLadder(string wordStart, string wordEnd, string[] allWordsInput)
{
    var wordLadder = new List<string>() { wordStart };
    this.allWordSteps = new List<List<string>>() { wordLadder };
    allWords = allWordsInput;

    do
    {
        wordLadder = this.IterateWordSteps(wordEnd);
    }
    while (wordLadder.Count() == 0);

    return wordLadder;
}

private List<string> IterateWordSteps(string wordEnd)
{
    List<List<string>> allWordStepsCopy = this.allWordSteps.ToList();
    this.allWordSteps.Clear();
    foreach (var wordSteps in allWordStepsCopy)
    {
        var adjacent = this.allWords.Where(
            x => this.IsOneLetterDifferent(x, wordSteps.Last()) &&
                 !wordSteps.Contains(x));

        if (adjacent.Contains(wordEnd))
        {
            wordSteps.Add(wordEnd);
            return wordSteps;
        }

        foreach (var word in adjacent)
        {
            List<string> newWordStep = wordSteps.ToList();
            newWordStep.Add(word);
            this.allWordSteps.Add(newWordStep);
        }
    }

    return new List<string>();
}

private bool IsOneLetterDifferent(string first, string second)
{
    int differences = 0;
    if (first.Length == second.Length)
    {
        for (int i = 0; i < first.Length; i++)
        {
            if (first[i] != second[i])
            {
                differences++;
            }
        }
    }

    return differences == 1;
}