Object-Oriented Design…think before you leap!
As I learn and discover more about functional programming each day, I personally feel that have I wasted these many years (over 15+) in working with objects and object orientation? It does leave me frustrated to an extent, but hey, its never too late to pick up things. I just feel bad that with typical web apps what we really do is take the data, convert it to object hierarchy and graphs and eventually persist them in some Relational DB using an OR mapper; only to be read back as some view or to be iterated over a collection of objects for projections or aggregated views. Just makes me feel stupid…all these years, did I do that type of work and got paid?
I ask further – Why do we need these intermediary steps, when data can simply be transformed by transforming operations like flat map, map, groupBy etc… in a functional way? Why do we have to do this lifting with heavy tooling like objects? Can we not use the data as it is and avoid casting them into objects?
When we design objects, we really make decision about the design of data and the operations that work on that encapsulated data. With that, we have confined that data within the boundaries of an object and as a side effect the operations that are possible on that data. This object representation of information in problem domain is in some sense like pre-mature optimisation. In other words, as my friend – Ryan Lemmer says – "we have poured concrete on the data and essentially lost the plasticity" – or the liquidity, which is inherent with data when left uncasted.
This is because the pace at which business changes, forces a change in the information that needs to be viewed and manipulated. This in turn means, that the representation of that information (i.e data) changes and the question then is….can these Objects which are like "concretes" be morphed to a new form with least resistance? If we did not have them in first place, we would then have been able to deal with that information directly without having to go through the additional layer of object graphs and hierarchies and persist it using some OR mapper, thus avoid wading through viscosity.
Also, the entropy is quite high in systems that front-end the business directly, and modelling using objects may not be best way to deal with that at this inter-change, where fluidity is an essential trait to meet business needs; instead object modelling may be more suitable for parts in the system are relatively stable from business perspective (less frequently changing parts).
All I am saying here is that the cost of changing the objects here is higher as compared to cost of changing data in its original form. So, would it make more sense to approach this in Data-Driven rather than being Object-Driven (Domain-Driven) fashion at inter-changes where changes are frequent?
Further, as I look at the talk by Dean Wampler (thanks again Ryan for this link), I feel quite convinced about the thoughts above; he goes on to say that for apps to work with large volumes of Data (at scale – Big Data) going functional is a requirement, OO would not cut it. Also, I really like the way he says – "as God intented"….true that!


text:
Q: Error when selecting timestamp from XMLType column in Oracle 11g I have 2 Oracle 11g databases with a table containing a XMLType column and some test data differing only in the separator (.,) for the milliseconds of the timestamp:
create table TEST_TIMESTAMP (
  ID  number(19,0) constraint "NN_TEST_TIMESTAMP_ID" not null,
  DOC xmltype      constraint "NN_TEST_TIMESTAMP_DOC" not null
);

insert into TEST_TIMESTAMP values ( 1, xmltype('<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?><test><ts>2015-04-08T04:55:33.11</ts></test>'));
insert into TEST_TIMESTAMP values ( 2, xmltype('<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?><test><ts>2015-04-08T04:55:33,11</ts></test>'));

When I try to extract the timestamp with the following statements, it fails either with the first document on one database or with the second document on the other database.
select x.*
from TEST_TIMESTAMP t,
     xmltable(
     '/test'
     passing t.DOC
     columns
       ORIGINAL varchar2(50) path 'ts',
       RESULT timestamp with time zone path 'ts'
 ) x
 where t.ID = 1;

 select x.*
 from TEST_TIMESTAMP t,
 xmltable(
      '/test'
      passing t.DOC
      columns
        ORIGINAL varchar2(50) path 'ts',
        RESULT timestamp with time zone path 'ts'
 ) x
 where t.ID = 2;

The error I get:
ORA-01858: a non-numeric character was found where a numeric was expected
01858. 00000 - "a non-numeric character was found where a numeric was expected"
*Cause: The input data to be converted using a date format model was
        incorrect.  The input data did not contain a number where a number was
        required by the format model.
*Action:   Fix the input data or the date format model to make sure the
           elements match in number and type.  Then retry the operation.

The only differences between those databases I've found are:

*

*DB1: version=11.2.0.1.0, NLS_CHARACTERSET=AL32UTF8    -> fails on document 2

*DB2: version=11.2.0.2.0, NLS_CHARACTERSET=WE8MSWIN1252 -> fails on document 1

DB1 has the behaviour that I would expect. Does anybody know why those databases behave differently and how to fix the issue in DB2?
Thanks in advance,
Oliver

A: My guess is that the nls_timestamp_format is different between the two databases.
However, rather than forcing the implicit conversion down at the XMLTABLE level, I would do an explicit conversion in the select list:
with test_timestamp as (select 1 id, xmltype('<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?><test><ts>2015-04-08T04:55:33.11</ts></test>') doc from dual union all
                        select 2 id, xmltype('<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?><test><ts>2015-04-08T04:55:33,11</ts></test>') doc from dual)
select x.original,
       to_timestamp(x.original, 'yyyy-mm-dd"T"hh24:mi:ss,ff2') result
from   test_timestamp t,
       xmltable('/test' passing t.doc
                columns original varchar2(50) path 'ts') x;

ORIGINAL                                           RESULT
-------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------------------
2015-04-08T04:55:33.11                             08/04/2015 04:55:33.110000000
2015-04-08T04:55:33,11                             08/04/2015 04:55:33.110000000

N.B. I found that using "ss.ff2" errored, but "ss,ff2" handled both cases just fine. I'm not sure if that's reliant on some other nls setting or not, though.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


IMMACULATE 3 BEDROOM APT. IN EDGEMONT SCHOOL DISTRICT!!! Don't miss out on this meticulously maintained 3 bedroom apartment in the sought after Scarsdale Ridge Community. The unit is one of a kind, built originally for the builder's mother. With 1400 square feet, there is no other unit like it. This unit is located in Edgemont school district. This is one of the largest units in the complex, boasting a spacious living room, formal dining room, eat in kitchen, oversized master bedroom with master bath, two additional bedrooms with many closets throughout. Scarsdale Ridge has many amenities such as pool and playground. The unit includes one assigned parking space. Maintenance includes real estate taxes and does not include Basic STAR reduction if qualified. Scarsdale living awaits!


text:
The challenge supports and promotes books by Australian women. Find out about AWW2019 here. This year I'm aiming for the Franklin level (read ten books, review at least six).
01. Florence Broadhurst: Her Secret & Extraordinary Lives by Helen O'Neill
02. No Country Woman by Zoya Patel
03. Goodwood by Holly Throsby
04. Small Wrongs by Kate Rossmanith
05. The Arsonist by Chloe Hooper
06. In the Garden of the Fugitives by Ceridwen Dovey
07. The Choke by Sofie Laguna
08. Man Out of Time by Stephanie Bishop
09. Bluebottle by Belinda Castles
10. The Erratics by Vicki Laveau-Harvie
Challenged completed on March 2 but I'll keep going…
11. The Bridge by Enza Gandolfo
12. The Year of the Farmer by Rosalie Ham
13. Pink Mountain on Locust Island by Jamie Marin Lau
14. Little Gods by Jenny Ackland
15. Axiomatic by Maria Tumarkin
16. The Van Apfel Girls Are Gone by Felicity McLean
17. Exploded View by Carrie Tiffany
18. What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty
19. The Fragments by Toni Jordan
Memoir Reading Challenge
I read lots of memoirs so figure I can manage a memoir challenge. This one is hosted by Whatever I Think Of and the task is to read five memoirs from a list of 29 categories (such as humour, best-sellers, political, illness).
01. Because We Are Bad by Lily Bailey (mental health)
02. Flesh Wounds by Richard Glover (journalist)
03. No Country Woman by Zoya Patel (under 40)
04. Small Wrongs by Kate Rossmanith (under 300 pages)
05. The Erratics by Vicki Laveau-Harvie (thought-provoking)
06. Lets Explore Diabetes with Owls by David Sedaris (LGBTQIA)
07. A Really Good Day by Ayelet Waldman
08. Denial by Deborah Lipstadt
09. How Did You Get This Number by Slone Crosley (travel)
10. The Prettiest Horse in the Glue Factory by Corey White
Mount TBR Challenge
Mount TBR Challenge is hosted by My Reader's Block and is all about reading from what you already own. I'm aiming for the Mt. Ararat level: Read 48 books from your TBR pile/s.
01. Tin Man by Sarah Winman
02. Because We Are Bad by Lily Bailey
03. How Hard Can It Be? by Allison Pearson
05. The Birds of the Air by Alice Thomas Ellis
07. The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford
08. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
10. Bridge of Clay by Markus Zusak
11. Some Tests by Wayne Macauley
12. A Good School by Richard Yates
14. Laura & Emma by Kate Greathead
15. Wimmera by Mark Brandi
16. Don't Tell Alfred by Nancy Mitford
17. The View From Penthouse B by Elinor Lipman
18. Dietland by Sarai Walker
19. How Did You Get This Number by Slone Crosley
20. Did You Ever Have A Family by Bill Clegg
22. Putney by Sofka Zinovieff
23. The Vegetarian by Han Kang
Around the World in 80 Books
Around the World in 80 Books is an ongoing reading challenge hosted by Hard Book Habit. I read books representing 19 countries in 2017 and 18 countries in 2018 (America, Armenia, Antarctica, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Cameroon, Canada, China, Denmark, England, France, Finland, Germany, India, Indonesia, Iran, Ireland, Japan, Lesser Antilles, Morocco, New Guinea, Norway, Pakistan, Poland, Romania, Russia, Scotland, Singapore, Slovakia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Syria, Turkey, Vietnam and Zimbabwe). I will continue the journey this year and hope to visit at least ten more countries –
01. How Hard Can It Be? by Allison Pearson (Wales)
02. No Country Woman by Zoya Patel (Fiji)
03. In the Garden of the Fugitives by Ceridwen Dovey (Italy)
04. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides (Greece)
05. The Vegetarian by Han Kang (Korea)

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


In our previous installments, we explored the framework's nine (9) layers, including enterprise platforms, business applications, business and legal processes, and legal-specific applications. See Part 1 A Service Delivery Framework. The framework suggests technology delivery can be viewed as a series of building blocks, starting with infrastructure and hardware (brown layers) that support enterprise business systems and legal systems (white and green layers). These bottom, foundational layers also include (likely nascent but growing) intentionally designed data warehouses.
Leaders build upon these layers to architect future technology strategies by breaking down and rebuilding legal service delivery models ("digitization"; and "legal project management"), coupled with investments in "new" technologies (e.g., document automation and augmented intelligence). See part 2, Invest With Purpose .(blue layers).
Collectively, these process and technology changes enable practice efficiencies and generate data about the nature and cost of legal services. This data is critical not only to measure the value derived from the changes, but also to enable further, iterative change.
For example, imagine a digital transformation of the current contract negotiation paradigm. Today, lawyers generally exchange contract drafts by e-mail, sharing redlines with the counterparty and the business. Presume these lawyers have a rich knowledge management resources (playbooks and model agreements with fallback provisions), perhaps on an internal SharePoint portal. Assuming the contracting process continues via e-mail, the enterprise has no visibility into (i) which clauses are most heavily negotiated, the degree of variation of the agreed-upon language to the company standard; (ii) which individuals and teams perform at or beyond expected service levels; or (iii) the actual cost (or lost revenue) associated with producing the contract.
By contrast, assume adoption of a new process that integrates these playbooks into a contract negotiation platform that measures all of the element suggested above (e.g., ContractRoom, Akorda, Kim). Visibility into all contract negotiation steps enables greater contracting velocity for business clients. In parallel, contract (legal/business) risk can be reduced by embedding playbooks and best practices in the revised flow. Finally, the technology-based contract platform will capture data about the contract terms, the lawyers and business partners involved, and how those contacts are impacted by end-of-quarter business cycles. In sum, the re-imagined contact process delivers more value. Put another way, although the business client wants a contract, lawyers need to deliver more than a signed piece of paper.
In order to (re)envision this process, leaders must assess the talent sitting atop the framework and within each of the layers below. Do you have people who can see the forest for the trees in the top purple layer? In parallel, do you have people who can see the trees for the forest, dynamically managing systems, permissions, security, and system integrations in the layers below? In this context, lawyers are necessary but not sufficient.
– Talent to make sense of all the layers – solution and knowledge architects who know how all the legal and business elements align, adapting designs and systems to drive change to meet the legal/business challenges of today and tomorrow.
This talent is critical to derive the promised value from any system you purchase today or, more broadly, your collective technology portfolio. Prepare your workforce for your future; become a "Talent Champion." See "Success Personified in the Fourth Industrial Revolution – Four leadership personas for an era of change and uncertainty" — "Talent: Reality Sinks In," p.16 (Deloitte, 2018). See also CLOC Legal Operations Career Toolkit (suggesting a suite of IQ and EQ skills needed to enable an agile legal service model).
Businesses will continue to digitize, whether leveraging data to drive greater internal efficiency and/or to change the way the business interacts with customers and potential customers. As the business changes, so must those who deliver legal services to their business clients and partners. In this series we attempt to offer a structured framework of a legal technology roadmap – an intentional, synergistic mix of people, process and technology. Although leaders can use this framework to align agilely technology strategies for the future, it is critical that these strategies include the right talent above and within all framework layers. Absent this integrated talent, you may design a technology forest but miss the nuances of the legal trees that must be cultivated to keep your lawyers and clients happy.
Note: We never charge for editorial. If you want to pay to play you can find other options out there but we publish purely on merit.


Needed to change a primary DNS server to one that would properly resolve .biz addresses, in order to keep the SpamAssassin plugin for CommuniGate from getting all choked up. But OS X client doesn't let you alter DNS via ssh. Turns out that components of OS X Server work perfectly well when copied over to OS X Client and placed in a parallel path, problem solved. Wonder if this would work with some of the graphical/remote setup tools as well? Probably not without deeper surgery.
When the east coast lost power back in August, birdhouse lost both its primary and secondary DNS servers. For extra insurance, I then set up 3rd and 4th DNS servers through another host. Shortly thereafter, I started getting occasional reports that people couldn't send mail to birdhouse addresses. We were handling thousands of messages a day, but a few inbound messages were bouncing back to senders undeliverable. birdhouse wasn't bouncing them, the senders' mail servers were.
Finally sleuthed the solution. Unlike A records, MX records should always reference domains, not IPs. This enables them to stay linked to A records if machines change IPs. Not knowing this when I set up the 3rd and 4th, I had entered the IP rather than the domain. As it turned out, certain sending mail servers were looking up the backup DNS before the main, and refusing to send to a mail server that wasn't registered per spec. Tweaking the backup MX records fixed the problem.
When I chose ZoneEdit to handle all the DNS stuff for birdhouse, one of the criteria was that they use widely distributed servers for maximum reliability. When you set up a zone with them, the nameservers assigned are in different states, so if one has a power outage or failure, the other is still there to pick up the slack. The nameservers assigned to birdhouse were in New York and New Jersey. This, of course, became a problem when half the Eastern seaboard went down in yesterday's power outage. So we had a frustrating service blackout yesterday. I moved birdhouse DNS over to dotster last night, but that change of course needed all night to percolate through the DNS tables.
Interestingly, each domain I've set up for customers gets assigned a different pair of nameservers, and most of those pairs had at least one machine stay up. So most of my customer sites kept right on running through the outage, even though they're on the same machine.
Needed to set up traffic analysis for birdhouse customers and had heard good things about awstats. Decided to give it a shot instead of analog + report magic, which I've always used in the past (I've also used and liked AXS for smaller projects, though it requires placing custom code in each page you want to track, which makes it a non-contender for anything serious). awstats rocks. More succinct, easier to configure and customize, easy to create separate reports for specific parts of sites, just a generally clean and pleasant implementation. In fact, liked it so much I also replaced the J-School's reporting systems with it today.
Moved our web and mail server into the colo facility at Cliq tonight — birdhouse now hanging off a lightly shared T1. Enough moving around – it's been a bumpy few weeks. Should be nestled in for the foreseeable future now.
birdhouse hosting welcomes asecondopinionfilm.com, a site promoting a documentary film by J-School student Hadas Ragolsky.
A Second Opinion is a 25-minute documentary film that takes the viewer on a journey to the occupied Territories with Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, a group of Israeli doctors, nurses and human rights activists who provide medical care for Palestinians.


Pollen.com---it is one of those sites that I use way too much and wish that I didn't have to. I have had massive allergy problems for my whole life. While my symptoms are constantly morphing into new incarnations, one thing doesn't change--that I have allergies. So, after years of suffering, I have gotten a little wiser and try to stay ahead of my allergies by checking the allergy forecast on Pollen.com.
Pollen.com is really easy to navigate. You can get a 4 day forecast for your area, so you can prepare yourself. Also, it provides information about the predominant pollen. This sometimes is helpful if you already know what you are allergic to. It may also help you identify possible allergens irritating you.


Young people who are drawn to a career in watchmaking have two possibilities open to them. One is an apprenticeship, with time shared between the classroom and the workplace. Alternatively, they can choose academic study at a school of watchmaking, a technical college or university.
Holders of a Swiss school-leaving certificate (maturité gymnasiale) can enrol on a Bachelor's programme at a university of applied sciences after one year's on-the-job experience in their chosen field, or in the first-year Bachelor's programme at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne.
Initial vocational training provides the theory and expertise required to practice a given profession. A two-year course leads to a federal vocational education and training certificate (AFP). A three or four-year course leads to a federal vocational education and training diploma (CFC). A federal VET diploma can be completed by a maturité professionnelle technique or a maturité professionnelle artistique, a general curriculum which qualifies students to move on to tertiary-level education.


text:
IP/N/1/TON/L/1
Uncertain Protection of Layout-Designs (Topographies) of Integrated Circuits Act (IP/N/1/TON/L/1 - 08/06/2009) Copyright Act 2002 (IP/N/1/TON/C/1 - 08/06/2009) Industrial Property Act 1994 (IP/N/1/TON/I/1 - 08/06/2009) Industrial Property (Amendment) Act 1999 (IP/N/1/TON/I/1/Add.1 - 08/06/2009) Industrial Property (Amendment) Act 2002 (IP/N/1/TON/I/1/Add.2 - 08/06/2009) Protection of Geographical Indications Act (IP/N/1/TON/G/1 - 05/06/2009) Protection against Unfair Competition Act (IP/N/1/TON/O/1 - 05/06/2009) Supreme Court Rules 2007 made pursuant to section 6 of the Supreme Court Act (Cap. 10) (IP/N/1/TON/1 - 02/06/2009)
It is an Act, which puts forward the basic principle, namely, that protection may only be obtained for layout-designs or topography of integrated circuits, which are original. This was drafted along the lines of the Washington Treaty and the TRIPS Agreement to ensure Tonga's compliance therewith. Draft regulations to the Act are currently with Crown Law, its status being that the regulations need to be redrafted according to drafting protocols and drafting instructions.


text:
Liberals peddle debunked myths about corporate personhood
By Hans Bader April 21, 2015 April 21, 2015
Progressivism is essentially a religion based on a set of shared myths and boogeymen. True believers cling to those myths no matter how many times they are debunked by economists, legal historians, or other experts. These shared myths create a sense of belonging and moral superiority to others who don't share those beliefs.
A classic example of this is the myth that the Supreme Court's 2010 Citizens United decision created the concept of corporate personhood, giving corporations constitutional rights for the first time. In reality, corporate constitutional rights were recognized by 1819, if not earlier. Yet, progressive op-ed writers repeat this myth even after its fallaciousness has been pointed out over and over again in their own newspapers, by experts who know more about law and history than they do.
In a recent op-ed debunked by people who actually know something about the law, The New York Times' Timothy Egan claimed: "In 2010 [referring to the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision] five judges created the notion of corporate personhood." As legal writer Damon Root, who has written a book about the Supreme Court, notes:
In fact, the U.S. Supreme Court has accepted the notion of corporate personhood in constitutional cases dating back more than a century. In its 1897 decision in Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railroad Company v. Ellis, for example, the Court said that it was "well-settled that corporations are persons within the provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment." Citizens United accomplished several things, but creating the notion of corporate personhood was simply not one of them.
Trending: House Republicans Demand FDA Withdraw Race-Based Criteria For Monoclonal Antibodies
Over the years, multiple letters to the editor in the Times by lawyers have pointed out the long history of corporate personhood, citing relevant Supreme Court decisions. But Times editorialists continue to ignore them, apparently without even bothering to read the Supreme Court decisions they cite.
In The Atlantic, former ACLU board member Wendy Kaminer wrote years ago about The New York Times' refusal to correct repeated falsehoods in its editorials about the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision, and its decision to repeat those false claims even after their falsity was pointed out by lawyers and a constitutional law professor.
Critics of the Times like Root actually understate the case. The recognition that corporations have constitutional rights long predates even the late 19th century line of cases cited by Root, which was discussing whether corporations qualified as "persons" for purposes of one specific provision of the Constitution—the Fourteenth Amendment, which was ratified in 1868.
The Supreme Court first recognized corporate constitutional rights much earlier than that, in its decision in Dartmouth College v. Woodward (1819). In that decision, the Court ruled in favor of an incorporated entity's constitutional challenge under the Contracts Clause and expressly rejected the idea that incorporation strips entities of rights or "transfers to the government any new power" over them. As the current Wikipedia entry for this ruling explains: "It is in this case and not Citizens United v. FEC in which the Supreme Court first recognized corporations, as associations of people, may exercise many of the rights of natural persons." Nor is the idea that corporations have First Amendment rights in any way new, as decisions like First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti (1978) and New York Times Co. v. Sullivan (1964) illustrate.
Corporate personhood is not an invention of the current Supreme Court, or even a peculiarly conservative notion, as I explained at length in 2009. As I noted in the Times in 2009: "[M]odern human-rights charters protect corporations. The European Convention on Human Rights, for example, allows 'any person, nongovernmental organization or group of individuals' to seek redress, leading to many court rulings in favor of companies, like Dubus S.A. v. France." (Alas, this was in a letter to the editor buried amidst letters from angry leftists claiming that the Supreme Court had recently made the "'discovery' that the Constitution grants rights to business institutions." I received angry emails in response to my letter, calling me a liar. They apparently did not read the court rulings I cited, which proved my point.)
Confronted with these historical realities, progressives simply ignore them, viewing the letter writer who points them out as a conservative, who is thus automatically a liar or ignoramus. Although the Times prints moderate or conservative columns occasionally to create the facade of balance on its editorial page, it ignores facts in them that contradict Progressive mythology. Times editorial page editor Andrew Rosenthal once even argued, "The problem with conservative columnists is that many of them lie in print."
I have a Harvard law degree, and have worked on landmark Supreme Court cases, but over the years, I have been dismissed as an ignoramus or liar by New York Times staff, even when I furnish them with documents proving what I have said.
I have previously written about The New York Times' failure to correct repeated falsehoods in its coverage of the Supreme Court's 2007 Ledbetter v. Goodyear decision (which you can find at this link). Times reporters like Linda Greenhouse made it sound like the plaintiff in that case, Lilly Ledbetter, had been arbitrarily prevented by the Supreme Court from suing despite only recently learning of the pay discrimination around the time she retired. But this is untrue, as I explain in this law journal article. And as I explained in The Washington Post:
In reality, Ledbetter knew for years that she was being paid less, as she made clear in her deposition. When she was asked, "So you knew in 1992 that you were being paid less than your peers?' she answered, "Yes, sir.
[T]he Supreme Court's 2007 decision in Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. indicated that she did know. In footnote 10 of its ruling, the court pointed out that Ledbetter had not even claimed in court that she did not discover the discrimination until the deadline for suing had passed. As it explained, "We have previously declined to address whether Title VII suits are amenable to a discovery rule. . . . Because Ledbetter does not argue that such a rule would change the outcome in her case, we have no occasion to address this issue."
When I brought these indisputable facts to the attention of the Times, its senior editor, Greg Brock, simply ignored what I had to say, along with the relevant portions of the Supreme Court's decision that contradicted the Times' coverage, claiming I must be wrong because the Times had said otherwise.
Posted in: Economy, Law and GovernmentTagged: liberals, Supreme Court
Hans Bader
Hans Bader practices law in Washington, D.C. After studying economics and history at the University of Virginia and law at Harvard, he practiced civil-rights, international-trade, and constitutional law. He also once worked in the Education Department. Hans writes for CNSNews.com and has appeared on C-SPAN's "Washington Journal." Contact him at hfb138@yahoo.com
Students hold 'sh*t-in' for gender neutral bathrooms, tell peers to check 'potty privilege'
Parents angry: K-3 classes read story about transgender child without their permission


The Social Security Administration (SSA) pays billions of dollars in Disability Insurance and Supplemental Security Income to people with disabilities. The TW program provides eligible beneficiaries with a ticket they may assign to employment networks (EN). ENs help them obtain employment and reduce dependence on SSA benefits. ENs receive payments from SSA once a ticket holder (TH) has earnings exceeding a set threshold. Due to low participation, SSA changed program regulations. to provide ENs and TH with more incentives to participate. This report examines: (1) changes in TH and EN participation over time; (2) service approaches used by ENs; and (3) SSA's efforts to evaluate TH and ENs.
Entry filed under: New Government Reports. Tags: disability insurance and supplemental security income, employment networks, gao, government, government accountability office, report, social security, social security administration, ssa.


I opened the doors to the Eric Roos Allstate Insurance Agency in Basking Ridge in September 2009. I can say with great confidence that customers receive the personalized service that they should expect from their local insurance agency. I have a great team in place – we know the importance of our role as trusted Allstate advisors and take that responsibility to heart.
I am proud to call Basking Ridge my home. I have had the privilege to raise my three daughters in such a beautiful area amongst wonderful people. As a small business owner, I understand the importance of knowing my community and building strong relationships through local organizations. I am an active member of the Bernards Township Chamber of Commerce and a board member on the Ridge Sports Foundation. I am a proud sponsor of many sports and clubs at Ridge High School, including Project Graduation, the Touchdown Club, the marching band and the drama club. I also help sponsor the football, basketball, baseball and ice hockey teams at the high school. I am also a proud sponsor for other local community organizations, like the Somerset Hills YMCA, Somerset Hills ice hockey team, Somerset County Vocational & Technical School, Liberty Corner Presbyterian Church Annual 5k, Rotary Club of Bernardsville, Legs for Lungs Annual 5k and the Ridge Baseball Club. When I'm not in the office, you will most likely find me at my daughter's Irish dance or horseback riding competitions. I enjoy seeing live performances including sporting events and concerts, getting in a round of golf whenever possible, and spending a relaxing day at the beach!
We can help you learn about coverage options that would work to fit your needs - whether it's auto, home or life insurance and if you are looking to start saving for college or retirement we can help you prepare!


Jeff Stoker, Owner of Home Helpers Nampa, provides you education and inspiration for today's in-home care needs.
24 Hour Home Care and Live-In Care are unique in-home care services we offer for seniors and those recuperating from illness. 24 Hour Home Care or Live-in Care helps support the fundamental desire of elderly clients who wish to age in place in their own home.
Why Home Helpers of Nampa for In-Home Care?
Home Helpers In-Home Care Services of Nampa is more than an in-home health care agency: we're your extended family when family can't be there. We're a locally owned, trusted provider of quality, compassionate in-home care. We also provide 24-hour care, live-in care, Alzheimer's and dementia care, care for adults with disabilities along with personal assistant services and errand services. We customize our home care solutions to your unique situation for an affordable solution that keeps your loved one where they're happiest: at home.
We offer total transparency when it comes to caring for your loved ones. Watch to learn more.
As a Best of Home Care Provider of Choice, 4 years running, Home Helpers of Nampa provides the highest standard of senior care, personal care, companion care, respite care, 24-hour home care, live-in care, and Alzheimer's and dementia care.
We are honored to be among the Top In-Home Care Agencies in the Nation by being named "Caring Star of 2019" for Service Excellence.
Looking for a Rewarding Career in Home Care? Apply Online!


Robert Owen on marriage, religion & private property and on the necessity of immediately carrying into practice the "Rational system of society," to prevent the evils of a physical revolution.
Report of the discussion between Robert Owen, Esq., and the Rev. Wm. Legg, B.A which took place in the Town Hall, Reading, March 5 & 6, 1839, on Mr. Owen's new views of society.
The dissection of Owenism dissected, or, A socialist's answer to Mr. Frederic R. Lees's pamphlet, entitled "A calm examination of the fundamental principles of Robert Owen's misnamed rational system"
by: Owen, Jane, of God-stow.


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text:
work by Asimov
Cathy Lowne
I, Robot, a collection of nine short stories by science-fiction writer Isaac Asimov that imagines the development of "positronic" (humanlike, with a form of artificial intelligence) robots and wrestles with the moral implications of the technology. The stories originally appeared in science-fiction magazines between 1940 and 1950, the year that they were first published together in book form. Asimov's treatment of robots as being programmed with ethics rather than as marauding metal monsters was greatly influential in the development of science fiction.
Asimov, IsaacIsaac Asimov, 1979. © Reichenthal—AP/REX/Shutterstock.com
The nine stories are linked by a framing narrative involving a reporter's interview with Susan Calvin, a former robopsychologist at U.S. Robots and Mechanical Men, Inc., whose work involved dysfunctional robots and the problems inherent in human-robot interactions. The stories centre on problems that arise from the ethical programming, summed up in Asimov's famed Three Laws of Robotics:
A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First and Second Laws.
The first story, " Robbie," is set in 1998 and centres on a little girl, Gloria, who loves her nursemaid robot, Robbie. Her mother comes to believe that robots are unsafe, however, and Robbie is returned to the factory. Gloria is heartbroken. In an effort to show her that robots are machines, not people, her parents take her to see robots being assembled at a factory. One of the assembling robots is Robbie. Gloria endangers her life running to Robbie, and Robbie rescues Gloria, persuading Gloria's mother that robots can be trusted.
The next three stories take place over 18 months, beginning in 2015, and feature Calvin's colleagues Gregory Powell and Mike Donovan as they attempt to figure out why robots are malfunctioning. In one case, it is a conflict between two of the Laws of Robotics; in another, a robot refuses to accept human orders but nonetheless does the right thing; and in the third, a robot is unable to operate a large number of subordinate robots.
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The next story, "Liar!," takes place in 2021. A robot named Herbie has been erroneously programmed to have telepathic abilities. In order to avoid hurting the feelings of the people with whom it interacts, Herbie tells flattering lies. In addition, though Herbie is aware of the programming error, it knows that the researchers want to solve the problem themselves and so will not help them. Calvin tells Herbie that withholding the information and yielding the information will both be hurtful to humans, and the conflict causes Herbie to shut down.
In "Little Lost Robot," set in 2029, scientists working in a dangerous environment modify the First Law's programming in some robots to keep them from interfering with humans. After an exasperated researcher tells one such robot to lose itself, the robot hides in a group of identical but unmodified robots. Calvin devises several tests to trick the robot into identifying itself, but the robot outsmarts her until she bases one test on its superior physics programming. The modified robots are then destroyed.
Donovan and Powell return for "Escape!," about a positronic supercomputer attempting to figure out how to create a spaceship that will allow the crew to survive a hyperspace jump. The hyperspace jump causes humans to briefly cease to exist, and the supercomputer copes with having to violate the First Law by creating a spaceship filled with practical jokes.
The final two stories are set in 2032 and 2052, respectively, and concern a politician who may or may not be a robot and whether the Machines that order the economic systems are planning a war against humanity.
Asimov's Three Laws spread throughout science fiction, and almost every robot in books or film was subsequently created with them in mind. In the late 1970s American author Harlan Ellison collaborated with Asimov on a screenplay for I, Robot that was never filmed but was published in 1994 as I, Robot: The Illustrated Screenplay. The 2004 film I, Robot was inspired by but not adapted from Asimov's work.
Cathy Lowne Patricia Bauer
…robot stories (later collected in I, Robot [1950]). In the 21st century, "positronic" robots operate according to the Three Laws of Robotics:…
Short story, brief fictional prose narrative that is shorter than a novel and that usually deals with only a few characters.…
Science fiction, a form of fiction that deals principally with the impact of actual or imagined science upon society or individuals. The term science fiction was popularized, if not invented, in the 1920s by one of the genre's principal advocates, the American publisher Hugo Gernsback. The…
Ai, ancient Canaanite town destroyed by the Israelites under their leader Joshua (Joshua 7–8). Biblical references agree in locating Ai (Hebrew: ha-ʿAy, "The Ruin") just east of Bethel (modern Baytīn in the West Bank). This would make it identical with the large early Bronze Age site now called At-Tall. Excavations…
Robot, any automatically operated machine that replaces human effort, though it may not resemble human beings in appearance or perform functions in a humanlike manner. By extension, robotics is the engineering discipline dealing with the design, construction, and operation of robots.…
More About I, Robot
In Isaac Asimov
Rip Van Winkle
The Tell-Tale Heart
The Masque of the Red Death
The Murders in the Rue Morgue
Young Goodman Brown


text:
125 women murdered in Italy over the past year
News English news in Italy
Number of femicides in Italy up by more than 15 per cent over last 12 months.
125 women were killed in Italy over the past year, between 1 August 2021 and 31 July 2022, according to data released by the Italian interior ministry on Monday.
The figure represents an increase of 15.7 per cent compared to the previous 12-month period, when 108 women were killed, and is the equivalent of one woman murdered every three days.
Italy draws up plans to fights violence against women
The annual report found that of the 125 femicides over the past year, 108 murders were committed in a family-relationship context, with 68 women killed by their partner or ex-partner.
There was an overall increase of murders in Italy over the last year - 319, up from 276 in the previous 12 months - with femicides accounting for 39.2 per cent of this figure.
Femicide: Outrage in Italy as TV presenter asks if women at fault
Reports of stalking decreased during the past 12 months - 15,817 compared to 18,653 in the previous period - however the number of police cautions rose - 3,100 against 2,565 - of which more than half related to domestic violence.
Women suffering from gender-based violence in Italy can seek support from the multi-lingual women's helpline Telefona Rosa, which responded to 3,801 requests for help in 2021.
English news in Italy
Previous article Calls for pigs in Rome sanctuary to be spared from swine fever cull
Next article Italy marks 50 years since discovery of Riace Bronzes
Verona Arena damaged by giant steel comet
Emanuela Orlandi: Vatican reopens case of missing girl after Netflix series
Italy seeks UNESCO World Heritage Status for Appian Way
Italian air force pilot dies in Eurofighter crash in Sicily
Wanted in Rome - 14 Dec, 2022
Rome shooting death toll rises to four
Rome's Christmas tree at city hall to be lit with pedal power
Gunman kills 3 in Rome condominium meeting


text:
Q: How to use jgit to clone the existing repositories to new github instance? We have two separate GitHub instance running. One GitHub instance is https://github.dev.host.com and other github instance is https://github.host.com. I have various repositories in https://github.dev.host.com which I need to migrate to this new github instance https://github.host.com.
I am using JGit as I am working with Java. For example - Below are the repositories that are present in https://github.dev.host.com instance which I need to migrate to new github instance https://github.host.com
https://github.dev.host.com/Database/ClientService
https://github.dev.host.com/Database/Interest

As I am using JGit so I want to create these two above repositories in my new  GitHub instance through Java code. And after running my Java code, I should see all the above respositories and all its branches and contents from my https://github.dev.host.com into my new Github instance https://github.host.com as shown something like below -
https://github.host.com/Database/ClientService
https://github.host.com/Database/Interest

I just need to iterate the all the repositories list which I have in my old github instance and create those if they don't exit with all its contents and branches in my new github instance. And if they already exists, then overwrite all the changes from old to new instance.
Is this possible to do this using JGit? I also have https access to my both the github instances through my username and password.
As of now I can only do basic stuff as shown below which I learnt going through the tutorial.
public class CreateNewRepository {

    public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
        // prepare a new folder
        File localPath = File.createTempFile("TestGitRepository", "");
        localPath.delete();

        // create the directory
        Repository repository = FileRepositoryBuilder.create(new File(localPath, ".git"));
        repository.create();

        System.out.println("Having repository: " + repository.getDirectory());

        repository.close();

        FileUtils.deleteDirectory(localPath);
    }
}

Any suggestions will be of great help as this is my first time working with JGit.

A: A viable approach would be to clone the repositoy from the source server to a temporary location and from there push it to the destination server.
You can clone a repository with JGit like this:
Git.cloneRepository()
  .setCredentialsProvider( new UsernamePasswordCredentialsProvider( "user", "password" ) );
  .setURI( remoteRepoUrl )
  .setDirectory( localDirectory )
  .setCloneAllBranches( true )
  .call();

To transfer the just cloned repositoy to the destination, you have to create a repository on the destination server first. Neither JGit nor Git support this step. GitHub offers a REST API that lets you create repositories. The developer pages also list the language bindings that are available for this API with Java among them.
Once the (empty) repository is there, you can push from the temporary copy to the remote:
  Git git = Git.open( localDirectory );
  git.push()
    .setCredentialsProvider( new UsernamePasswordCredentialsProvider( "user",  "password" ) );
    .setRemote( newRemoteRepoUrl )
    .setForce( true )
    .setPushAll()
    .setPushTags()
    .call()

More information about authentication can be found here
Note that if the source repository contains tags, these have to be fetched into the temporary repository separately after cloning.


As part of Kicking Horse Culture Live Kicks series the Banff Mountain Film Festival World Tour will be stopping in Golden on Dec. 7.
The evening of film will be hosted at the Golden Civic Centre and will bring many of the best films from the festival to town.
The world tour spans the globe, reaching more than 280,000 audience members through more than 700 screenings in approximately 390 locations in 35 countries all around the globe.
The organizations in each tour location do their part in helping to choose a program that reflects the interests of their community.
Director of Kicking Horse Culture, Bill Usher, is excited to once again have Golden be a part of the world tour.
"As always I get to see what all those people who are much fitter and much more adventurous than I am are doing with their lives. I get to vicariously travel around the world and fly off the top of mountaintops. I think it is a hoot," Usher said.
One of the reasons Usher said this event is so much fun is because of the great variety of films that can be a part of the evening.
Tickets for the event are on sale at the Art Gallery of Golden and for information on this or any other Kicking Horse Culture event check out the group's website at www.kickinghorseculture.ca. You can also check out the Kicking Horse Culture Facebook page.


When we return for recurring services, we don't simply repeat these tasks, we maintain them.
A move-in or move-out cleaning is a great way to clean and organize your new home. This cleaning service takes place when the home is empty.
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At ABF Professional Cleaning, Inc, we offer professional steam cleaning to get that deep-set grime out of your stone & hardwood flooring. We can safely and efficiently clean your stone or hardwood flooring without causing damage, showing off their original, beautiful surfaces.
Sometimes you can't be at your property all year round and we offer services to make sure your property remains safe and in perfect working condition.
Whether you need to wash away years of pollutant build-up or simply remove gum, pressure washing removes almost anything. We can get rid of dirt, atmospheric pollution, mold, mildew, gum, graffiti, stains, etc.
Why not enjoy amazing mountain views from the comfort of your own home? Our window cleaers will strive to exceed your expectations and make sure you are completely satisfied with any window cleaning work you may need.
Gutters are an integral piece of your homes well being. They serve to control the flow of rainwater to protect your roof, walls, foundation and landscape. But when neglected, gutters can turn into a nightmare. Gunked-up gutters can cause a leaky roof or water damage to the interior or exterior of your home.
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Remove leaves, debris and flush out downspouts.
Best to have gutters cleaned twice a year: Beginning of Spring and end of Fall.
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text:
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CBS News May 14, 2015, 8:39 AM
Amtrak engineer's lawyer speaks out on deadly crash
Last Updated May 14, 2015 10:18 AM EDT
The attorney for Brandon Bostian, the engineer for Amtrak Train 188, told ABC's "Nightline" his client has no memory of the deadly crash that killed at least seven people, CBS News' Kris Van Cleave reports.
"He remembers driving the train, he remembers going to that area generally, has absolutely no recollection of the incident or anything unusual," Bostian's attorney Robert Goggin said.
LinkedIn profile picture for Amtrak Engineer Brandon Bostian.
Bostian, who lives in Queens, New York, has been an Amtrak engineer since 2010. After the crash, he was treated for injuries. His lawyer told ABC News that Bostian suffered a concussion, leg injuries and a cut in his head that needed 14 staples to close.
He was then taken to a police station, where he declined to make a statement before leaving with his lawyer. As of Wednesday, he had yet to speak with National Transportation Safety Board investigators.
"We've not interviewed the engineer, but I want to point out that for somebody who's been through a traumatic event, this is not at all unusual for human behavior to have the mind blank out things like that, at least for the short term," the NTSB's lead investigator, Robert Sumwalt, said.
Amtrak train 188 derails
Eight people killed and more than 200 injured after an Amtrak train derailed in Philadelphia
The NTSB said the train was traveling at 106 mph where the track curves, more than double the speed limit for that section. Bostian applied the emergency brakes moments before it derailed, but it did little to slow the train down.
Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter said there is no reason the engineer should have been traveling that fast.
"Clearly he was reckless and irresponsible in his actions. I don't know what was going on with him, I don't know what was going on in the cab, but there's really no excuse that could be offered," Nutter said.
Sumwalt said he's "not going to agree with that at all."
"I think that's a subjective, judgmental statement," he said. "We're here right now just to find out what happened, and that's what we want to do. We want to find out what happened and why, and we're not casting any judgment because at this point right now we want to talk to this person and find out what his perspective was."
How positive train control can prevent tragedies
Surveillance video shows the train moments before it went off the tracks. The camera captured the electrical sparks from the crash.
Sumwalt said trains go over the curve at Frankford Junction many times a day and don't derail. This case was different.
"Here we got one that's doing twice the speed, and it derails," he said.
On Wednesday, rescuers expanded the search area looking for those still unaccounted for.
Crash survivor 30-year-old George Alexeiades suffered injuries to his right arm. He remembered the chaos inside the train.
"There was a girl that landed, ended up, where you put your luggage. She hit her head and ended up there, and I had to help her down," Alexeiades said. "I just still can't believe that I was on that train."
Amtrak has been in the process of installing a system that could have automatically slowed the train down if it was speeding, but it had not been applied to the set of tracks where the train derailed. The NTSB said the technology could have prevented this very type of accident.
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Inside Apollo 11
Eerie underwater photos of USS Hornet wreckage


As senior producer at Artsadmin, Nicky has been an integral part of the team involved with the development of the organisation over the past 30 years. Having established its base at Toynbee Studios in London's East End, Artsadmin is now a national resource; producing, developing and providing vital support for contemporary artists.
Nicky has produced a huge range of projects by artists on the cutting edge of dance, performance, theatre and visual arts both nationally and internationally. Varying in scale and context these have ranged from touring and one-off commissions to site-specific, participatory and socially-engaged projects working in collaboration with theatres, galleries, festivals, schools and other educational institutions.
Artists she has, or continues to work with include Rosemary Lee, Metis, la Ribot, Simon Vincenzi & Frank Bock, Gary Stevens, Tim Spooner, Anne Bean, Ackroyd & Harvey, Encounters, Ian Breakwell, Rose English, the Bow Gamelan and straybird.
Nicky has also coordinated small festivals; produced artists books and catalogues and has partnered on several EU funded networks & initiatives (Bamboo/Create to Connect).
Sue currently provides mentoring and coaching for people working in dance along with learning and development initiatives for organisations.
She offers one to one support with areas such as business, career and professional development. Sue's particular interest is in helping people make changes in their career at whatever stage, from emerging to those building a sustainable career. Recently Sue has worked with James Wilton (BBC Performing Arts Fellow), and Marie-Louise Flexen (Dance UK artist mentoring scheme) and private clients working as practitioners, producers, managers and directors.
Sue trained in dance education at the Laban Art of Movement Studio and Goldsmiths College. And has worked with dance organisations for over thirty years in a wide range of capacities from small-scale dance company manager, dance programmer, company education director, university lecturer, and has been freelance since 1989.
As Associate Consultant to the national dance agency, Swindon Dance, Sue devised and directed an extensive artist development programme from 1995 to 2010, and she continues to work as a consultant with Swindon Dance.
Sue is co-director of Charlton Associates www.charltonassociates.org that offers HR and organisational development for small to medium enterprises. She is a member of IDMN, a board member of GDance and treasurer of the Lisa Ullmann Travel Scholarship Fund. Her most recent professional qualification is in cognitive behaviour coaching.
Andrew is a Franco-British dancer, choreographer and an inclusive dance teacher. He made his first steps into performance at Lycée Bristol in Cannes. In 2010, he graduated from Trinity Laban.
As a choreographer, he created Quasi (2010) and In one Breath (2010). He was a member of 5X performance group which involves writing, performance lectures and performance laboratory workshops. Andrew has choreographed film works for artists such as Sam Lee, Anthony Graham and Adam James.
As a performer, he performed in pieces by Daniel Daw, H2Dance, Aurélia Thiérrée and Victoria Chaplin-Thiérrée, Xavier Leroy, Marten Spangberg, Simone Forti, Mike Kelley, Josiah McElheny and Tino Seghal.
From 2013 until 2016, he was a dancer at Candoco Dance Company, performing works by Trisha Brown, Emanuel Gat, Rachid Ouramdane, Hetain Patel, Thomas Hauert and Jerome Bel. Andrew is currently continuing to work with the company as a Candoco Artist, by leading workshops and learning activities with an inclusive approach.
Eva is artistic programmer and producer at Sadler's Wells. She also works as an independent performing arts curator, producer and consultant.
Born and educated in France with a Spanish heritage, she moved to the UK in 2000 and is currently based in London. She was recently the recipient of the Clore Leadership Programme Fellowship, supported by the Cultural Leadership Programme (2011). This opportunity has enabled her to benefit from a period of personal and professional development focused on the creation of added value for cultural organisations, with an emphasis on communication and strategic positioning, as well as the exploration of new avenues for creative producing. Eva is interested in communication and language, organisational change and professional development, specifically in terms of increasing the impact the arts has on our everyday life.
She most recently worked as dance and performance programmer at Southbank Centre, London (2009-2011) working in the team led by artistic director Jude Kelly.
She started her career in the UK at Trinity Laban (2002-2006), London's leading contemporary dance conservatoire and then joined Dance4, the Nottingham based national dance development agency (2006-2009) as artistic programme manager, doubling audiences for nottdance, its internationally acclaimed festival of new movements in dance.
Eva currently works as an independent curator (Migrations Festival Wales) and consultant (Siobhan Davies Dance), as well as producer, dramaturg and artistic mentor with several emerging artists (Hetain Patel, Nicola Conibere). She has recently been certified to work as a relational dynamics coach. She is a member of the Royal Society of Arts, a board member for national dance development agency SouthEast Dance (Brighton) and an Arts Council of England artistic assessor for dance.
Efrosini is a choreographer and scholar based in London since 2002. Her research interests lie in experimental and conceptual practices across dance, theatre and performance.
Having presented choreographic work across the UK, The Netherlands, Germany and Greece, Efrosini has also collaborated with artists such as Ivana Müller, Tino Sehgal, Frank Bock and Gill Clarke, and recently she created a series of works commissioned by Siobhan Davies Dance. She was awarded the Bonnie Bird New Choreography Award (2008) and was Artist in Residence at Dance4 (2008-2010) and a participating artist in the Sadler's Wells Summer University (2010-2014).
Efrosini works as a Senior Lecturer at the University of Roehampton where she convenes the MRes Choreography and Performance programme. She is co-editor of the book 'The Practice of Dramaturgy: Working on Actions in Performance' (Valiz, 2016), and is currently developing a choreographic research project titled 'the friend at work'. She teaches internationally, has published in journals, arts publications and catalogues for international performance festivals, and was a co-curator of the Performance Studies international Regional Cluster 'Encounters in Synchronous Time' in Athens (2011).
Sara is currently principal lecturer in dance and post-graduate coordinator for the School of Media & Performing Arts at Coventry University and a member of C-DaRE, the Centre for Dance Research. She has a long practice and research history in dance, somatic practice and somatic informed dance education. After initial study and training at the Laban Centre, she gained an MA in Performing Arts at Middlesex University across the disciplines of Theatre, Dance and Music and a PhD from the University of Surrey. Her experience has involved her in interdisciplinary practice across dance, fine art practices, music, choreography and theatre. She is a qualified Feldenkrais practitioner and trained with Scott Clark and Elizabeth Beringer in London and a practitioner of Scaravelli Yoga studying with Caroline Lang in Devon. She is on the Editorial Board for the Journal of Dance, Movement & Spiritualities and a reviewer for the Journal of Dance & Somatic Practices. Sara was a team member on the three-year Leverhulme Funded research project, In the Dancer's Mind (2015-18) with colleagues from Plymouth University and Trinity Laban London. She was a member of the Clore Leadership short course 2011 and her career has spanned a wide range of dance, performance, arts and education contexts including senior posts at: University of Surrey, Dartington College of Arts, Northern School of Contemporary Dance and Coventry University. She has also worked on a consultancy basis, for example with Northern School of Contemporary Dance, Dance East and Youth Dance England. Sara has published widely in her area of specialism, embodied practice, dance education and training.
Andy is an experienced business leader who specialises in working with law firms. He began his career in commercial property working with the investment arm of Prudential Corporation. He participated in the development, investment and management of a wide range of commercial property projects including the creation of a regional shopping centre in the South West. Andy also gained an MA in Law and Finance from City University alongside his LLB (hons) in Law.
In 1997 Andy made a career change and began working with law firms. After working with Berwin Leighton Paisner, Eversheds and DLA Piper, he went on to become COO of Boodle Hatfield, a boutique private client and property firm based in Blackfriars. He is currently the managing director of OJK Limited.
He has built up expertise in helping organisations to change, and making those changes happen. Andy worked for ten years with DLA Piper, an international law firm, and gained considerable experience working with lawyers from across the world. Having been an Englishman Abroad he now has a much better appreciation of the challenges that Brits present to the rest of the world! Andy has also worked on secondment with factory outlet developer BAA McArthur Glenn, Lloyds Banking Group and PWC.
Andy has also worked with a number of arts organisations through his association with Arts & Business. He particularly enjoys bringing an outsider's perspective to organisations that are very different to his own, but where values are shared. He confesses to coming late to the world of dance, and still asks what he describes as "beginners questions".


I would love to hear from you! Whether you are contemplating a session, or would like to discuss a project, please don't hesitate to contact me via email or phone. You can expect a reply within 48 hours.
Don't Be Shy! Love to hear any questions, ideas or inquiries.


text:
import Data.Time
import System.Info
import System.Process
import Network.Curl
import Text.HTML.TagSoup

data HackerNewsItem = HackerNewsItem { title :: String
                                     , link :: String
                                     , comments :: String
                                     , description :: String
                                     } deriving (Show, Eq)

data ViewedItem = ViewedItem { itemLink :: String
                             , itemHNLink :: String
                             , timestamp :: String } deriving (Show, Eq)

processWebRequest :: String -> IO (Either CurlCode (String, CurlCode))
processWebRequest  url = do
  (status, page) <- curlGetString url []
  case status of
    CurlOK -> return $ Right (page, status)
    _ -> return $ Left status

hnRss = "https://news.ycombinator.com/rss"
hnViewedFile = "viewed.csv"

parseWebPage :: String -> [Tag String]
parseWebPage = parseTags

printHnTags = do
  webRes <- processWebRequest hnRss
  case webRes of
    Left status -> putStrLn $ "Failed with code: " ++ show status
    Right (page, _) -> do
      let tags = parseWebPage page
      print tags

getNewsItems page = map getItem $ sections (~== "<item>") $ parseWebPage page
  where
    getItem tags = HackerNewsItem { title = tagText $ tags !! 2
                                  , link = tagText $ tags !! 5
                                  , comments = tagText $ tags !! 8
                                  , description = tagText $ tags !! 11 }
    tagText (TagText s) = s

getLatestNewsItems = do
  Right (page, _) <- processWebRequest hnRss
  return $ getNewsItems page

prettyPrintHNItem hnItem num = do
  putStrLn $ "[" ++ show num ++ "] " ++ title hnItem
  putStrLn $ "Link: " ++ link hnItem
  putStrLn $ "Comments: " ++ comments hnItem
  putStrLn ""

printHNLinks items = mapM_ (uncurry prettyPrintHNItem) $ zip items [1..]

openUrlInBrowser cmd = system openCmd
 where openCmd = case System.Info.os of
         "linux" -> "xdg-open " ++ cmd ++ "&"
         "darwin" -> "open " ++ cmd ++ "&"
         _ -> error $ "Unsupported OS: " ++ System.Info.os

-- Save viewed HN items to a file in a simple CSV format
-- Timestamp, Link, HN Comments link
saveViewedItemToFile timestamp item file = writeFile file itemLine
  where
    itemLine = show timestamp ++ ", " ++ itemLink ++ ", " ++ hnLink
    itemLink = link item
    hnLink = comments item

saveViewedItem item = do
  now <- getCurrentTime
  saveViewedItemToFile now item hnViewedFile

split p ls = go p ls []
  where
    go _ [] acc = [acc]
    go p (x:xs) acc = if p x
                      then acc : go p xs []
                      else go p xs (acc++[x])

splitByComma = split (==',')

readViewedItems = do
  content <- readFile hnViewedFile
  return $ map (toViewedItem . splitByComma) $ split (=='\n') content
  where
    toViewedItem [ts, ln, hp] = ViewedItem { itemLink = ln
                                           , itemHNLink = hp
                                           , timestamp = ts }

processCommands news = do
  putStr "> "
  cmd <- getLine
  putStrLn ""
  case cmd of
    "d" -> display news
    "display" -> display news

    "r" -> refresh
    "refresh" -> refresh

    ('s':' ':num) -> showInBrowser news num link
    ('s':'h':'o':'w':' ':num) -> showInBrowser news num link

    ('c':' ':num) -> showInBrowser news num comments
    ('c':'o':'m':'m':'e':'n':'t':'s':' ':num) -> showInBrowser news num comments

    "e" -> exit
    "exit" -> exit

    _ -> uknown news cmd

  where
    display news =
      case news of
        Nothing -> do
          putStrLn "Loading Hacker News..."
          items <- getLatestNewsItems
          printHNLinks items
          processCommands (Just items)
        Just items -> do
          putStrLn "Displaying Hacker News..."
          printHNLinks items
          processCommands news

    refresh = do
      putStrLn "Refreshing Hacker News..."
      items <- getLatestNewsItems
      processCommands (Just items)

    uknown news cmd = do
      putStrLn $ "Unknown command: " ++ cmd
      processCommands news

    showInBrowser news num what = do
      case news of
        Nothing -> putStrLn $ "Please refresh news by pressing 'display' or 'refresh' first"
        Just items -> do
          let itemNum = read num :: Int
          if itemNum <= 0 || itemNum > (length items)
            then do
              putStrLn $ "Erorr: Please enter a positive number less than or equal to " ++ num
            else do
              putStrLn $ "Opening item number " ++ num ++ " in system browser"
              let newsItem = items !! (itemNum - 1)
                  url = what newsItem
              putStrLn $ "Opening url: " ++ url
              status <- openUrlInBrowser url
              putStrLn $ "Status: " ++ show status
      processCommands news

    exit = putStrLn "Bye..."

testSaveViewedItems = do
  let item = HackerNewsItem { link = "http://bing.com"
                            , comments = "http://bing.com/images"
                            , description = "Something"
                            , title = "Google to Bing" }
  saveViewedItem item

main = do
  putStrLn "Welcome to HN Top"
  processCommands Nothing

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Roman Space by TRAY MEAD (2008)
Artist TRAY MEAD Platinum Member
Collection Space
TRAY MEAD's Recent Work
TRAY MEAD, Arizona
Artist Statement Tray Mead has a special daring in both his art style and the subject matter he selects. His specialness is readily apparent when capturing the essence of the otherworldly beings of the faerie realm or the wild ruggedness of his native Southwest.
Mead won three national art awards before he was 15 and has continued winning national art awards and recognition for both his artwork and major art exhibitions he has curated and directed as the founding director of the Southwest Museum. This includes the prestigious Dorothy Mullen Arts and Humanities Award. He has shown in numerous museums and galleries and his client list is impressive. Yet he is a very down-to-earth guy. His art is in the form of paintings, sculptures and photography which gives his patrons many ways to own his valuable artwork. Recently retiring from his museum director position, Mead says, "As I enter my twilight years it seems my art is getting more valuable by the day," Mead takes a long pause and continues "Guess I can't complain about that."
It is hard to say which of Tray Mead's art forms are more popular and valuable. His world photography is his most traditional art form. He had ten magazine covers published before the age of 25 and his photography has gone on to be seen and known around the world.
His painting is the most exotic and erotic of his art portfolios. They feature his very grown up faerie realm paintings. These exotic winged beings bring arousal and heat to his canvases.
His sculptures are his most unusual art form capturing creatures that lived 200 million years ago in stone to other creatures like dragons and mermaids that only live in our imaginations. In one single day his picture appeared in over 200 papers world-wide. This was in association with dinosaurs and his dinosaur art and sculptures.
Mead's art is truly original and intriguing in a world that often needs excitement and stimulation. To acquire a piece of Mead's work is to own excellence.
Subjects Architecture, Dreamscapes, Fantasy, Fantasy Architecture, Historic Buildings, Magical, Religious Structures, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Space
Tags Comets, MEAD, TRAY, asstroid, astronauts, comet, earth, galaxy, jupitor, mars, moon, moons, planets, pluto, rocket, ship, space, spaceship, stars, sun, universe, venus


text:
Ph.D., Central European University
Areas of Interest: Philosophy of Mind and of Cognitive Science, Metaphysics
Personal Homepage: https://istvanaranyosi.net
Email: aranyosi@bilkent.edu.tr
Office: H146
István Aranyosi received his PhD in 2005 at the Central European University. He specializes in the philosophy of mind and of cognitive science and in metaphysics, and has further teaching competence in philosophy of language philosophy of religion, Ancient and Modern social and political philosophy. His publications include two books – The Peripheral Mind (Oxford University Press, 2013) and God, Mind, and Logical Space (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013) – as well as a number of articles on various topics within his fields of research, such as "A New Argument for Mind-Brain Identity" in British Journal for the Philosophy of Science (honorable Mention at the American Philosophical Association 2012 Article Prize), "The Solo Numero Paradox" in American Philosophical Quarterly, and "Should We Fear Quantum Torment?" in Ratio.
Sample publications
Aranyosi, I. (forthcoming). Preteriception: memory as past-perception. Synthese.
Aranyosi, I. (2020). Mental Time Travel and Disjunctivism, Review of Philosophy and Psychology, 11(2), 367-384.
Aranyosi, I. (2019). Prediction, Embodiment, and Representation, Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 42: e216.
Aranyosi, I. (2019). Enactivist Interventions. Rethinking the Mind, The Philosophical Review, 128(1), 138-141. [Book review]
Aranyosi, I. (2018). Body, Skill, and Look: Is Bodybuilding a Sport? Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences, 17 (2), 401–410.
Aranyosi, I. (2013). The Peripheral Mind: Philosophy of Mind and the Peripheral Nervous System. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Aranyosi, I. (2013). God, Mind and Logical Space: A Revisionary Approach to Divinity. Palgrave Macmillan.
Aranyosi, I. (2012). Quantifier vs. Poetry: Stylistic Impoverishment and Socio-Cultural Estrangement of Anglo-American Philosophy in the Last Hundred Years. The Pluralist, 7(1), 94–103.
Aranyosi, I. (2012). Should We Fear Quantum Torment?: Should We Fear Quantum Torment? Ratio, 25(3), 249–259.
Aranyosi, I. (2011). The Solo Numero Paradox. American Philosophical Quarterly, 48(4), 347-360.
Aranyosi, I. (2011). A New Argument for Mind-Brain Identity. The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 62(3), 489–517.
Aranyosi, I. (2010). The Nature of Shadows, from Yale to Bilkent. Philosophy, 85(2), 219.
Aranyosi, I. (2007). Shadows of Constitution. The Monist, 90(3), 415–431.
Aranyosi, I. (2003). Physical Constituents of Qualia. Philosophical Studies, 116(2), 103–131.


It's been like a t-shirt yarn necklace frenzy round here.
black cut up t-shirt and a chain from a hairband – think this cost about £3 – thanks Pradamark!
made from hoopla yarn and a few old keyrings from the car boot sale!
That should keep me going for a while, eh…?
Just thought I'd add a few pics of my new jewellery from my notonthehighstreet shop for your deliberation..
Available soon on notonthehighstreet.com – hurrah!


Awkward Zombie by Katie Tiedrich. Published May 21. Read more of Awkward Zombie.
Corpse Run by Alex Di Stasi. Published May 24. Read more of Corpse Run.
Double XP by M.S. Corley and Josh Crandall. Published May 23. Read more of Double XP.
Life in Aggro by Fei Hsiao and Cecilia Vasquez. From the archive, originally published April 2016. Read more of Life in Aggro.
Manly Guys Doing Manly Things by Kelly Turnbull. Published May 27. Read more of Manly Guys Doing Manly Things.
Nerd Rage by Andy Kluthe. From the archive, originally published July 2016(series is on hiatus). Read more of Nerd Rage.
Nerf NOW!! by Josué Pereira. Published May 26. Read more of Nerf NOW!!
Penny Arcade by Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik. Published May 26. Read more of Penny Arcade.


Hazel Suede Series - Premium Journal – MadCap - For the Imperfect You !
Slow down, look around, take a breath and feel the moment. Hazel's noonday brocade journal is made out of suede for you to feel the luxury of writing the most important decisions of your life. The journal also comes with an envelope at the back for you to store your important papers.


Proven workhorses, LI'L GUY filter Systems are durable, horizontal disc plate, precoated filter systems that provide superior filtration at an economical cost.
Models achieve flow rates ranging from 2,000 GPH with 11 sq. ft. of filter area up to 6,000 GPH with 39 sq. ft. of filter area. These high flow rates are achieved through efficient filter plate design. Cleaning is fast and simple with float-to-the-surface horizontal disc filter plates for quick removal. Minimal maintenance means minimal downtime. There are no expensive cartridges to buy or discard.
All Li'l Guy Filter Systems are complete for immediate installation and operation. Each compact durable system has a rubber-lined steel filter chamber, polypropylene slurry tank, pump, double suction and discharge mounted on a skid base plate with casters for easy maneuvering.
Features the proprietary Slim-Line horizontal disc plate filter system providing fine filtration and superior dirt holding capacity in an economical, compact mobile cart configuration. Ideal for jewelry & PC board plating.
• Instant mobility - maneuver over rough, uneven surfaces with ease, wherever filtration is necessary in your plant or shop. The space-saving, lightweight cart is equipped with large pneumatic tires and steering handle.
• Corrosion-proof construction - LI'L GUY II Filter Systems are 99% CPVC to perform in the harshest chemical streams and high temperature operation. An enclosed compact case protects working parts from corrosive environments and spills.
• Lower flow rate applications - models range from 750 GPH with 7.4 sq. ft. of filter area to 1,500 GPH at 14.3 sq. ft.
• Economical system - this entire CPVC, horizontal disc plate filter is engineered to provide an excellent value. The unique design of the filter plates seal at the ID and OD of the filter media offers positive filtration. The stack of filter plates are a one piece assembly that is easily removed and reinstalled from the top of the filter chamber for fast, efficient cleaning. LI'L GUY II is complete and ready to filter.
The LI'L GUY has a larger slurry tank to hold the entire contents of the filter chamber and a repositioned pump for easier inspection and maintenance. Select either a Sequence 1000 or a ANSIMAG Pump. All filter systems are complete with motor starter, baseplate or cart, slurry tank, double suction and discharge.
Eletrical components are UL & CSA certified. Specific engineering applications are available.


text:
How to use
=====================

```
$ git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/nicolasc-eu/electron-react-materialize.git new-project
$ cd new-project
$ rm -rf .git
$ git init
$ npm install
```

Build, run, watch & live reload
=====================

```
$ gulp
```

Builds
=====================
Build OSX package
---------------------

```
$ npm run dist-darwin
```

###Build Windows package

```
$ npm run dist-win32
```

###Build Linux package

```
$ npm run dist-linux

```

TODO
=====================

* Automate `app/resources/package.json` generation with valid version and project name,
* Icon customization,
* Win32 / Linux tests,
* Integrate Atom's `project-manager`,
* Add bootstraping scripts collection for models and components generation,
* Add Materialize's UI javascripts.


text:
Historical Novelists and Fantasy Writers Should Be Friends
Author Christopher M. Cevasco says there's a surprising lack of crossover between the two. The post Historical Novelists and Fantasy Writers Should Be Friends appeared first on WIRED.
Gavin Newsom Reconsiders Closure of Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant
gordm writes: Following appeals from scientists, a Stanford and MIT study showing Diablo Canyon could save California $21 Billion, demand curtailment and a projected power supply shortfall, Gov. Gavin Newsom is now considering keeping the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant open. Diablo Canyon generated 6% of California's total electricity in 2021 and 12% of California's carbon-free electricity.
Elon Musk has tweeted in support of keeping Diablo Canyon open, and in support of keeping European nuclear power plants running. According to the L.A. Times, Newsom said the state would seek out a share of $6 billion in federal funds meant to rescue nuclear reactors facing closure. The money comes from the Biden administration's recently announced effort to rescue nuclear power plants at risk of closing. "The requirement is by May 19 to submit an application, or you miss the opportunity to draw down any federal funds if you want to extend the life of that plant," Newsom said. "We would be remiss not to put that on the table as an option."
A spokesperson for the governor clarified that Newsom still wants to see the facility shut down long term. "It's been six years since PG&E agreed to close the plant near San Luis Obispo, rather than invest in expensive environmental and earthquake-safety upgrades," the report notes. "But Newsom's willingness to consider a short-term reprieve reflects a shift in the politics of nuclear power after decades of public opposition fueled by high-profile disasters such as Chernobyl and Three Mile Island, as well as the Cold War."
An article by rss feed Posted in power
India To Launch Open E-Commerce Network To Take On Amazon, Walmart
Hmmmmmm shares a report from Reuters: India will on Friday launch an open network for digital commerce (ONDC) as the government tries to end the dominance of U.S. companies Amazon.com and Walmart in the fast-growing e-commerce market, a government document showed. The launch of the platform comes after India's antitrust body on Thursday raided domestic sellers of Amazon and some of Walmart's Flipkart following accusations of competition law violations.
The government's so-called ONDC platform will allow buyers and sellers to connect and transact with each other online, no matter what other application they use. It will be soft-launched on Friday before being expanded, the trade ministry told Reuters. The government document said that two large multinational players controlled more than half of the country's e-commerce trade, limiting access to the market, giving preferential treatment to some sellers and squeezing supplier margins. It did not name the companies. The document said India's ONDC plan aimed to onboard 30 million sellers and 10 million merchants online. The plan is to cover at least 100 cities and towns by August.
Interactive Fiction Compiler 'Inform 7' Is Now Open Source
New submitter Mononymous writes: Created by Graham Nelson, Inform 7 compiles a powerful object-oriented language resembling English into a working text adventure. Friendly GUIs for various platforms have been open source for many years, but the core compiler remained proprietary. Now, 16 years after its initial freeware release, Nelson has released the source code under the Artistic License 2.0 in a public GitHub repo. Inform 7 is one of the largest "literate programs" ever released.
An article by rss feed Posted in opensource
Most People Now Prefer Shopping Online For Cars Than Shopping In-Person
According to a survey of 501 people conducted by insurance company Progressive, most people prefer the process of buying a car online than at dealerships. Autoblog reports: Based on the 251 people who completed a transaction entirely online or through a dealer web site, and the 250 who did solely face-to-face business, there are two big takeaways. The first is that online shopping, still a small percentage of overall car sales, is growing rapidly in acceptance and actual transactions. […] The second takeaway is that millennials are a major part of the online sales growth.
Overall, though, online shoppers expressed more joy with the process than showroom floor shoppers. Compared to 78% of buyers highly satisfied with buying a car online, only 58% of in-person shoppers registered the same pleasure. That carried through to trade-ins and financing as well. Eighty percent of online shoppers were highly satisfied with the trade-in process, versus 57% of dealership visitors; 70% of online shoppers gave the highest marks to the financing process as opposed to 53% of guests asked to "Step into the office" and wait while the salesperson conferred with the finance manager.
EU Joins Mastodon Social Network, Sets Up Its Own Server
The European Union has joined the social network Mastodon, which has seen a staggering 30,000 new users after Elon Musk's bid for Twitter was accepted. PC Magazine reports: On Thursday, the European Commission said it had set up its own server, dubbed EU Voice, to join Mastodon's decentralized social network, also known as a "Fediverse." The effort is currently only a pilot, but it represents the EU's goal of supporting private and open-source software capable of rivaling mainstream social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube. On the same day, the European Commission also launched an account for PeerTube, another decentralized platform that revolves around video sharing. "With the pilot launch of EU Voice and EU Video, we aim to offer alternative social media platforms that prioritize individuals and their rights to privacy and data protection," said European Data Protection Supervisor Wojciech Wiewiorowski.
"In concrete terms this means, for example, that EU Voice and EU Video do not rely on transfers of personal data to countries outside the European Union and the European Economic Area; there are no advertisements on the platforms; and there is no profiling of individuals that may use the platforms," he added. "These measures, amongst others, give individuals the choice on and control over how their personal data is used."
An article by rss feed Posted in eu
Lyft Exec Craig Martell Tapped As Pentagon's AI Chief
According to Breaking Defense, the head of machine learning at Lyft, Craig Martell, has been named the Pentagon's Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Officer. From the report: The hiring of a Silicon Valley persona for the CDAO role is likely to be cheered by those in the defense community who have been calling for more technically-minded individuals to take leadership roles in the department. At the same time, Martell's lack of Pentagon experience — he was a professor at the Naval Postgraduate School for over a decade studying AI for the military, but has never worked in the department's bureaucracy — may pose challenges as he works to lead an office only months old. In an exclusive interview with Breaking Defense, Martell, who also worked as head of machine learning at Dropbox and led several AI teams at LinkedIn, acknowledged both the benefits and risks of bringing in someone with his background. […]
As CDAO, Martell will be responsible for scaling up DoD's data, analytics and AI to enable quicker and more accurate decision-making and will also play an important role in the Pentagon's Joint All-Domain Command and Control efforts to connect sensors and shooters. "If we're going to be successful in achieving the goals, if we're going to be successful in being competitive with China, we have to figure out where the best mission value can be found first and that's going to have to drive what we build, what we design, the policies we come up with," Martell said. "I just want to guard against making sure that we don't do this in a vacuum, but we do it with real mission goals, real mission objectives in mind."
His first order of business? Figuring out what needs to be done, and how to best use the $600 million in fiscal year 2023 dollars the CDAO's office was marked for in the Pentagon's most recent budget request. "So whenever I tackle a problem, whenever I go into a new organization, the first questions that I ask are: Do we have the right people? Do we have the right processes? Do we have the right tools to solve the visions [and] goals?" Martell said. To tackle that, Martell wants to identify the office's "marquee customers" and figure out what's "broken in terms of… people, platform, processes and tools" — a process that could take anywhere from three to six months, he added. "We really want to be customer-driven here," Martell said. "We don't want to walk in and say if we build it, they'll come."
An article by rss feed Posted in ai
Researchers Develop a Paper-Thin Loudspeaker
MIT engineers have developed a paper-thin loudspeaker that can turn any surface into an active audio source. MIT News reports: This thin-film loudspeaker produces sound with minimal distortion while using a fraction of the energy required by a traditional loudspeaker. The hand-sized loudspeaker the team demonstrated, which weighs about as much as a dime, can generate high-quality sound no matter what surface the film is bonded to. To achieve these properties, the researchers pioneered a deceptively simple fabrication technique, which requires only three basic steps and can be scaled up to produce ultrathin loudspeakers large enough to cover the inside of an automobile or to wallpaper a room.
A typical loudspeaker found in headphones or an audio system uses electric current inputs that pass through a coil of wire that generates a magnetic field, which moves a speaker membrane, that moves the air above it, that makes the sound we hear. By contrast, the new loudspeaker simplifies the speaker design by using a thin film of a shaped piezoelectric material that moves when voltage is applied over it, which moves the air above it and generates sound. […]
They tested their thin-film loudspeaker by mounting it to a wall 30 centimeters from a microphone to measure the sound pressure level, recorded in decibels. When 25 volts of electricity were passed through the device at 1 kilohertz (a rate of 1,000 cycles per second), the speaker produced high-quality sound at conversational levels of 66 decibels. At 10 kilohertz, the sound pressure level increased to 86 decibels, about the same volume level as city traffic. The energy-efficient device only requires about 100 milliwatts of power per square meter of speaker area. By contrast, an average home speaker might consume more than 1 watt of power to generate similar sound pressure at a comparable distance. The researchers showed the speaker in action, playing "We Are the Champions" by Queen. You can listen to it here.
An article by rss feed Posted in music
Bitcoin Becomes Official Currency In Central African Republic
The Central African Republic (CAR) has approved Bitcoin as legal tender — just the second country to do so. The BBC reports: CAR is one of the world's poorest countries, but is rich in diamonds, gold and uranium. It has been wracked by conflict for decades and is a close Russian ally, with mercenaries from the Wagner Group helping fight rebel forces. Lawmakers voted unanimously to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender, said a statement from the CAR presidency. The move puts CAR "on the map of the world's boldest and most visionary countries", it said.
El Salvador became the first country to adopt Bitcoin as an official currency in September 2021 – a move criticized by many economists, including the International Monetary Fund, which said it increased the risk of financial instability. Others have raised fears that cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin could make it easier for criminals to launder money, and that they are environmentally damaging because they use so much electricity to generate.
US Opens First Major Silicon Carbide Chip Plant
On Monday, the world's largest plant for making silicon carbide chips was opened in central New York. Nikkei Asia reports: The $1 billion, 63,000 sq. meter fabrication plant, or "fab," will be the first of its kind to make 200mm silicon carbide wafers, according to [North Carolina-based Wolfspeed]. Silicon carbide, or SiC, is an alternative to traditional silicon that is gaining popularity due to its energy efficiency when transferring power, something especially useful in electric vehicle manufacturing. Ahead of the fab opening, Wolfspeed announced a partnership with luxury EV maker Lucid Motors. It also has agreements with General Motors and China's Yutong Group to supply silicon carbide chips for their electric vehicles.
The U.S. share of modern semiconductor manufacturing capacity has declined to 12% from 37% in 1990, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association, a group that has lobbied for the CHIPS Act. This trend, the group says, is largely due to a lack of government investment compared to other nations. […] In New York, there are hopes that other plants will cluster around the Wolfspeed fab. Wolfspeed received $500 million in construction subsidies from New York as the state seeks to expand its semiconductor manufacturing industry, which has generated nearly $6 billion a year in economic impact and over 34,000 jobs, according to [New York Gov. Kathy Hochul].
The grand opening of a modern manufacturing facility has a special resonance in central New York. The fab stands in the Mohawk Valley, an area along the Erie Canal that was once filled with traditional industry but long ago slid into an economic decline that has defined the region in recent times. So far the Wolfspeed facility has created 265 jobs, with a goal of over 600 new jobs by 2029, according to the company. The site sits directly across from a campus of SUNY Polytechnic Institute, New York's public polytechnic college, and Wolfspeed has given the school $250,000 to help train potential future employees.


text:
Insider's Guide
Culture & People
Crafts & Craftsmen
Insider Views
Beaches & Seacoast
Rural & Nature
Cyprus Facts
Taste of Cyprus
Golden Companies
NewsWorldFACTBOX: Early details of new Brexit deal
FACTBOX: Early details of new Brexit deal
The European Union has agreed a new Brexit deal with Britain. Here are the initial details.
Northern Ireland remains in the United Kingdom's customs territory but all EU procedures will apply to goods arriving there in this complex system. There will be no customs checks on the island of Ireland – they will be done in ports.
For goods crossing from Great Britain to Northern Ireland that are deemed to be staying there, no EU tariff will apply.
No EU tariffs would be paid on personal goods carried by travellers across the Irish frontier and for a second category of exempted goods that can only be for immediate consumption rather than subsequent processing.
An EU-UK body called the Joint Committee will define this second group of goods more precisely after Brexit.
The UK will be allowed to reimburse excise duties for companies in Northern Ireland as long as it does not undercut EU state aid rules.
Northern Ireland will be able to benefit from future UK trade deals around the world. As long as the goods do not cross to Ireland and the EU's single market, only UK customs tariffs will apply.
The Northern Irish assembly will have to give consent after Brexit for the region's continued alignment with the EU regulatory regime.
Four years after Brexit, the assembly will have to decide by simple majority of those taking part in the vote whether to apply it. If the vote is positive, the system is extended for another four years.
If another vote then is positive with cross-community support, the system is extended by another eight years until another vote.
If consent is not granted, there is a two-year cooling off period during which sides need to find a new solution to prevent the return of a hard border on the island of Ireland.
If the regional assembly does not sit or vote, the system continues as the default position.
Unlike the "backstop" solution in the original deal, rejected by the British parliament, this system would not be replaced by a new free-trade deal between Britain and the EU. That marks a big concession from the EU side.
FUTURE TRADE DEAL, LEVEL-PLAYING FIELD
Sides aim at an ambitious free-trade agreement after Brexit with no tariffs and unlimited quotas. It comes together with a statement that sides will uphold high standards on environment, climate, workers' rights and other rules.
REST REMAINS AS IN PREVIOUS AGREEMENT
Previously agreed settlement on citizens' rights after Brexit and Britain's divorce bill stay as they were. That also goes for a transition period of 14 months until the end of 2020, which can be extended by one year or two years.
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