The game industry has come a long way exploring narrative systems in recent decades. The crown jewel however, procedural narrative, has not yet been fully attained. Procedural narratives are generated on-the-spot by advanced algorithms, allowing for a level of content ordinarily impossible to produce. Several conversations are now taking place discussing how one might go about designing these narrative systems. After reviewing their contributions, I will present my own suggestion for an implementable solution.
Procedural narrative requires a structured, dramatic sequence of behaviors to render entertaining experiences whilst simultaneously requiring autonomous AI characters that act believably human, but without regard to whether they make dramatic, "story-relevant" decisions.
Creating these experimental systems requires an interdisciplinary team of people to build the AI logic, compose the narrative, design art and animations, etc. These combinations are typically found in large companies that can't afford to risk investments on risky products.
Building tools for users to create limited content for a given game.
Relying on machine learning to derive structured content from analysis of existing works.
Nathanael Chambers and Dan Jurafsky have demonstrated machine learning's effectiveness at narrative induction (identifying a narrative's protagonist, narrative history, & possible holes or extensions to the narrative) in their essay Unsupervised Learning of Narrative Event Chains.
represent character desires that determine AI behavior.
can be known, hidden, and/or discoverable.
pulled from a procedural pool of potential Passions.
each consist of a linear spectrum of support or criticism of the player character's actions.
includes reward/punishment tiers at given levels of support/criticism.
The passion system is meant to generate zero-sum environments where the player must lose support (gain criticism) from one character to gain support from another.
Different characters will represent different factions.
Passions are highly modular and integrated; therefore, DLC can be added "into" the game rather than "onto" the end of it.
Modeling characters' behavior on a linear spectrum renders human memory nonexistent. Lost favor can be regained through positive actions, regardless of the crime committed.
The reward-tier emphasis of the Passion system and its zero-sum game concept encourages a dynamic in which players "game" the narrative system purely to acquire in-game benefits. This trivializes narrative relationships and renders human emotion nonexistent.
Information simulation would be an important component of such a system: leveraging / manipulating misinformation, deception, and limited knowledge to determine actionable character options.
It isn't interesting for characters to only react based on player actions. Characters should develop alongside the actions of other NPCs, reacting to and developing them in turn. This is far more interesting than the player's interactions with the same characters.
Rather than attempting to tackle an interactive system right off the bat, developers should first prioritize developing a solitary environment to simplify the testing of the narrative system.
functional human emotion (they exhibit and elicit emotional reactions and are relatable / believable).
Russian Developer Twisted Tree Games (@atwistedtree on Twitter) is hard at work on an indie game called Forest of Sleep that relies on pure imagery to communicate a procedurally generated story to players. It does not require explicit lines of dialogue and instead relies on "emergent narrative" where players craft the narrative using their own imaginations.
Just as Majewski believes our primary focus should first be on crafting a non-interactive system, I believe it would be to the advantage of the game development community at large to focus first on designing a robust, free and open-source middle-ware application that could be integrated into a variety of games to supply narrative content and manage character data.
Consequently, the software would need to focus less on producing direct game assets and more on identifying concepts, relationships, and actions in the abstract sense; that way, developers would be able to match the character behavioral predictions and world scene-descriptions to whatever type of concrete asset they prefer. Developers from any background could then adapt the software to almost any kind of gameplay system.
Incorporating all of the above research, I propose a number of suggestions regarding design concepts that should bolster the fidelity of any product crafted towards the purpose of narrative generation.
The most powerful form of interactive, narrative-infused, & dynamic content generation is table-top role-playing games. A storyteller describes a world while players collaborate to design creative solutions to the problems presented to them.
Players are limited only by their imagination, ingenuity, character abilities, and available technology.
The storyteller produces most content in-place: dialogue, scene descriptions, lore-crafting, etc.
The storyteller manages story tension behind-the-scenes.
Carefully designs suspenseful engagements and problems.
Ensures that players are able to survive to be proud of their achievements or review what went wrong in failure.
If we are to develop a procedural system inspired by roleplay, then we should have a similar distribution of responsibilities: a Storyteller fulfilling the role of the world, and the Agents who participate in that world independently of the Storyteller's influence.
A Storyteller facade would largely be responsible for moving the narrative towards a targeted plot structure.
Full power to craft new content that will make progress towards the targeted structure.
Limited power to mutate the properties of existing content. In essence, the storyteller should be free to change any element of the story or the characters so long as unmodified characters are unable to perceive a difference in the resulting story-space/timeline (which implies new content is compatible with the relational requirements of the previous content).
Example: if it has been indicated to a plot-relevant character that a monarch has an heir, then assuming there is a dramatic reason for doing so, the storyteller can change the heir from being a boy to a girl if the gender of the character has yet to be published.
The Storyteller may need to have even more severe limitations over characters that are, in fact, controlled by live players.
deriving a list of possible actions to take based on narrative relevance/personality/skillset/perceived technology/etc.
The Storyteller might also indirectly manipulate Agents by manipulating access to technologies/abilities/skills in an environment.
making a decision about what to do based on the character motivations and priority of relationships.
As suggested by Aylett et. al., machine learning algorithms have the potential to drastically change the way game narrative is produced.
determine the plot-relevance of a potential action.
learn makes decisions that trick players into believing they are making human-like decisions vs. random ones.
determine what constraints the environment should place on characters.
Example of a social constraint: generate an unawares bad guy nearby to limit what the player can visibly do, creating tension.
Example of a technological constraint: add the detail that someone has tampered with a needed tool, creating tension. Perhaps accompanied by a perpetrator (a compatible, existing character or a manifested one).
determine what types of potential actions make sense in a given environment.
determine what new characters/items/places to introduce that are likely to pull characters towards a dramatic sequence.
Any solution we come up with should rely on a computer's ability to improve itself over time, to make progress towards an ideal narrative portrayal indistinguishable from that of a human being.
As software developers begin putting together narrative systems, it is important that they keep writers and sociologists close by as expert consultants during the process.
strong forms of plot structure such as nested loops, en media res, and the hero's journey.
various types of narrative patterns, themes, and motifs (which a Storyteller could dynamically draw upon to generate content).
the influence different types of relationships have over different people's decision-making.
the ways in which a given type of interaction affects the Agents involved.
In order for developers to properly accumulate the data for a large-scale procedural narrative system, a public database of associations between concepts, relationships, and interactions will likely be necessary. To build these associations, it is best if we leverage the input of the global community.
We might have a given concept, like a "king", that requires us to know about what many kings are like and what kinds of actions they are likely to engage in. We can add an interaction with the concept, such as "kill king" which may generate different related events based on how the king was killed, etc. Finally, by adding a relationship such as "vassal kills king", we can identify what emotions are typically evoked and by whom, helping us determine how agents might respond to a vassal killing a king, etc.
The vast number of possibilities for these logical associations make compiling a database of this sort a futile mission for any single studio. With the public's involvement, however, its invention is plausible.
A free side-benefit would be the simple localization of the software to other parts of the world. If society is contributing associations for narrative themselves using their local language, then the content produced by a middle-ware application, namely word-based descriptions of characters, items, places, interactions, and events, would be created already in the native tongue as needed.
The gaming community, and the indie community in particular, could benefit greatly from an open-source, large-scale, & robust solution to producing narrative content. To that end, we should pull from a variety of disciplines pertinent to writing realistic narrative in the first place, develop smart algorithms that can simulate narrative non-player agents, and work with our community to build the system.
Comments, criticisms, and suggestions are encouraged of course. As always, I look forward to future conversations with everyone.


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St. Prince Vladimir Russian Orthodox Church Abroad in Miami was built in 1948 by Russian émigrés.
The first attempt to build a Russian Orthodox Church in the name of St. John the Baptist was made as early as 1936, but due to an ineffective contract and disagreements within the church leadership, the church could not claim rights to the building which went over to a private owner. The building has survived to this day but as a sectarian prayer house rather than an Orthodox church.
After the end of the Second World War the first and second waves of the Russian emigration resumed the construction of the church. Archbishop Vitaly (Maximenko) contributed greatly to building the church, due to his efforts a congregation on the canonical basis was founded. The first services were conducted in 1947 inside a large tent on a plot of land in an inhabited area of the western part of Miami.
The cornerstone of St. Vladimir Church was laid on November 7th, 1948. It was consecrated by Archbishop Nikon of Florida who arrived specifically from New York to perform the service. On this occasion, he donated to the church a holy icon of St. Martyr and Healer Panteleimon of Athens and some other holy relics.
The construction of the church was finished in November 1948.
Of those who founded St. Vladimir Church, a special tribute must be paid to a theatrical group of Russian midgets who found themselves in Miami at the outbreak of the Second World War. Especially respected and venerated among them are John and Paula Velikanoff, Basil and Maria Fillins who after years of serving the altar bequeathed their house to the congregation in order to financially support the church and the pastor's family.
The first pastor of St. Vladimir Church was Fr. Theodore Rajewski. He began to exercise his duties in July 1948 and continued construction works by building a frater house, pastor's house and making a garden. After the presvytera's death, Fr. Theodor was ordained bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad and set out for Australia in 1954.
The next pastor of the church was Fr. Paul Shamilsky but he didn't serve long and suddenly passed away during a liturgy. Upon his passing and for the next twenty years (1955 – 1975), the church was led by Fr. Eugene Seletsky. He extended the main part of the church and invited monk Cyprian from the Holy Trinity Monastery in New York to paint the walls and the altar.
Upon Fr. Eugene's retirement, he was followed by Archimandrite Victor Jankovich, who led the parish from 1975 until his death in 1988. From 1988 to 1989 the church was led by Fr. Raphael Renzenick.
The present pastor of St. Vladimir Church is Fr. Daniel McKenzie. After converting from Catholicism to the Orthodox faith, Fr. Daniel and his presbytera Matushka Sophia Aleexeevna Oustinoff and their seven children have led the church parish since Fr. Daniel's graduation of the Holy Trinity Seminary in Jordanville, N.Y.


Today, businesses and organizations are looking for more from social media when it comes to lead generation, customer acquisition, churn, and more.
This presentation highlights how companies can use behavioural insights from freely available data to meet these needs, and exceed them.
And if you're ready to talk about social selling and its place in your organization, make sure you download our Social Selling one-sheet, then contact us to arrange one of our social selling workshops for your organization.
Hessie, I remain grateful that you folks included Mantis Pulse Analytics in that slide deck. You know, I started out as a mechanical engineer…then got captivated by database and software development…then got captivated by data architecture optimized for reporting/dashboards (dimensional modeling).
Then, I got excited about the possibilities of taking unstructured social/review data and putting it in a dimensional model to really support granular analysis…and maybe even finding correlations you wouldn't have seen previously. The social signals you describe are great examples. I love our Pulse Analytics studies, and I still hope to see a forward thinking company come along that wants to apply your Influence Marketing methodology while using Pulse products as tools to support that methodology.
dbvickery Brian, it's so difficult for companies to imagine these day the insights and correlations that exist that they once had to either hypothesize or guess. Decision-making is becoming much easier if companies know to look to the data. Companies like Mantis Pulse Analytics are making this leap very possible and I, too look forward to the day when this all becomes a standard.


A night that looked to be going all wrong for United was turned on its head in the final ten minutes of this game. United, 2-0 down midway through this game came back from the dead to clinch victory.
United came flying out of the traps and had two great chances through Alex and Ian Ried, but Swiss 'keeper Deck was the equal of both. However, a mix up in the United defence let Grasshoppers take the lead, when Grahn side footed home from close range.
The second goal for Grasshoppers came just after the interval. This time from a great diving header by Meier. Now on the back foot, United stepped up a gear. First, Ian Reid reduced the deficit midway through the second half.
Then came the storming finish with both Stuart Markland and Alec Reid scoring in the last 10 minutes to win the game.
It's European Fairs Cup time once again at Tannadice and it is with great pleasure we welcome the Swiss side Grasshoppers of Zurich. This is our third appearance in the tournament and after a string of exciting games against clubs from Spain, Italy and England in previous competitions we are all hopeful this season will see us enjoy a longer run.
But while the Swiss side is not rated among the big European clubs I consider them to be a most impressive outfit and they canpot be underrated. Over a week ago I watched them in action in Zurich and was greatly taken with a number of their players.
Initially the thought of facing a part-time club led to many people thinking we were certainties for round two.And following the visit of two Grasshoppers officials to the Celtic game they claimed it would be a walk-over.
field but I discovered the players were released for games days in advance and on the field they are as fit . . . if not fitter . . . than full-time men.
tie can be the vital point in our favour and it's up to us to get on a sound footing for the second game. I have no doubt the Zurich game will be a tough proposition for us and this is a game we must start with a fair lead.
Meier, Swedish international Ove Grahn and Rainer Ohlhauser, a player who looks good value for the £30,000 paid to Bayem last season.
All over tonight s game could be as interesting and exciting as any we have had in the Fairs. We are all looking forward to an exciting and sporting game.


text:
Ali M Hashmi
King Edward Medical University
Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
Shahana Naz
Aftab Asif
Imran S Khawaja
UT Southwestern School of Medicine, Dallas, Texas, USA
Medical Director, Center for Sleep Medicine, VA Medical Center, Dallas, Texas
Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Neurology
Home > Vol 32, No 6 (2016) > Hashmi
Urdu translation of the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression: Results of a validation study
Ali M Hashmi, Shahana Naz, Aftab Asif, Imran S Khawaja
Objective: To develop a standardized validated version of the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression (HAM-D) in Urdu.
Methods: After translation of the HAM-D into the Urdu language following standard guidelines, the final Urdu version (HAM-D-U) was administered to 160 depressed outpatients. Inter-item correlation was assessed by calculating Cronbach alpha. Correlation between HAM-D-U scores at baseline and after a 2-week interval was evaluated for test-retest reliability. Moreover, scores of two clinicians on HAM-D-U were compared for inter-rater reliability. For establishing concurrent validity, scores of HAM-D-U and BDI-U were compared by using Spearman correlation coefficient. The study was conducted at Mayo Hospital, Lahore, from May to December 2014.
Results: The Cronbach alpha for HAM-D-U was 0.71. Composite scores for HAM-D-U at baseline and after a 2-week interval were also highly correlated with each other (Spearman correlation coefficient 0.83, p-value < 0.01) indicating good test-retest reliability. Composite scores for HAM-D-U and BDI-U were positively correlated with each other (Spearman correlation coefficient 0.85, p < 0.01) indicating good concurrent validity. Scores of two clinicians for HAM-D-U were also positively correlated (Spearman correlation coefficient 0.82, p-value < 0.01) indicated good inter-rater reliability.
Conclusion: The HAM-D-U is a valid and reliable instrument for the assessment of Depression. It shows good inter-rater and test-retest reliability. The HAM-D-U can be a tool either for clinical management or research.
doi: https://doi.org/10.12669/pjms.326.11399
How to cite this:Hashmi AM, Naz S, Asif A, Khawaja IS. Urdu translation of the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression: Results of a validation study. Pak J Med Sci. 2016;32(6):1479-1483. doi: https://doi.org/10.12669/pjms.326.11399

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Partials is a wondrous science fiction adventure fighting to reach an end goal as immense as it can be: to save humanity.
I revelled in the fictional scientific theories and evidence at the root of this novel. Dan Wells clearly put a lot of thought into the creation of Partials, the destructive virus – RM – that's causing every baby born to die, and Kira's attempt at discovering a cure. Although, the fact that it a teenager at the forefront of curing RM brought me back to reality, because, even though it is common for the teenager to be the hero in young adult novels, I couldn't help but think that these educated, intelligent adults wouldn't be as useless and obstinate as they appear to be. The politics, however, felt extremely real, and this is where the story becomes slightly dystopic.
Unexpectedly, I found myself most wanting to find out more about the enigmatic and complex Partial – Samm – who has been captured by Kira and friends. I delved into the book thinking that the relationship would be clear: humans will be the victims, and Partials are just artificially-created robots turned evil. However, like in I, Robot, it is much more complicated than that.
Partials is certainly a journey to behold. It's full of action and adventure, perhaps a little too much for me, but it also offers fascinating insight into what it is to be human. Are we the only species worth saving?
Go here to view Partials' impressive cinematic book trailer.


Along with these general skills, the authors illustrate several applications that are relevant to data scientists, such as reading and writing spreadsheet documents both locally and via Google Docs, creating interactive and dynamic visualizations, displaying spatial-temporal displays with Google Earth, and generating code from descriptions of data structures to read and write data. These topics demonstrate the rich possibilities and opportunities to do new things with these modern technologies. The book contains many examples and case-studies that readers can use directly and adapt to their own work. The authors have focused on the integration of these technologies with the R statistical computing environment. However, the ideas and skills presented here are more general, and statisticians who use other computing environments will also find them relevant to their work.
Deborah Nolan is Professor of Statistics at University of California, Berkeley.
Duncan Temple Lang is Associate Professor of Statistics at University of California, Davis and has been a member of both the S and R development teams.


text:
Powerful Nor'easter bearing down on the East Coast is already causing chaos for air travelers as more than 2,000 flights were grounded Friday, including most scheduled to take off or land at Boston's Logan Airport
Biden signals he WILL move troops to Eastern Europe 'in the near term' but adds 'not too many' as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky downplays the US assessment of imminent Russian invasion
'You're about to get a lot more speeding tickets!' Critics slam 'Pothole Pete' Buttigieg's plan to fix the nation's roads crisis with MORE speed cameras and lower speed limits that will guarantee fines for drivers
Moment spectator wipes out race leader in brutal collision just yards from the finish line at Spanish cycling event
Video shows cyclists racing towards finish line surrounded by spectators
A woman walks out into the road and collides with the front-runner
Footage shows the pair both get knocked to the ground in the brutal crash
Woman was treated at the scene but rider went to hospital with a head injury
Incident took place at Condaca Salmor cycling event on El Hierro, Canary Islands
By William Cole For Mailonline
This is the shocking moment a spectator at a cycle race walked onto the track just before the finish line, knocking over the would-be champion.
Racing fans can be heard screaming as the woman and rider are sent crashing to the ground in the brutal collision, filmed on Saturday.
The incident took place at the Condaca Salmor cycling event on El Hierro in the Canary Islands.
Footage shows the cyclist with victory in his sights sprinting towards the finish line of the 55-mile route.
Spectators stand on both sides of the road, and at one point a man casually crosses the track with plenty of time to spare.
However, with the first cyclist now just yards away, a woman decides to follow in his footsteps.
She appears to lean out from the crowd before skipping across the road but the cyclist hits her head-on.
This is the shocking moment a spectator at a cycle race walked out onto the track just before the finish line. The incident took place at the Condaca Salmor bike event on El Hierro in the Canary Islands
Disturbing moment well-heeled cyclist in $1,000 sneakers and... Terrifying moment deer bounds into group of cyclists in the...
The collision sends both cyclist and spectator sprawling to the ground, with the cyclist robbed of victory.
Medical staff tended to the pair, with the woman only requiring treatment for minor injuries at the scene.
However, the cyclist suffered a 'moderate' head injury and was taken to the Nuestra Senora de Los Reyes Hospital in the island's capital, Valverde, for treatment.
The collision sends both cyclist and spectator sprawling to the ground, with the cyclist robbed of his imminent victory
Racing fans could be heard screaming as the woman and rider were knocked to the floor in the collision
According to reports, the cyclist suffered memory loss in the collision.
Local news outlet Cope reported that the Spanish Civil Guard got involved with the case, but it is not clear if any criminal charges have been pressed.
The identities of those involved were not reported.
Cycle race spectator wipes out frontrunner in brutal collision in Canary Islands [Video]


.NET strings are implicitly Unicode enabled. But any place that you exit .NET to store data, you must be sure to allocate and store Unicode rather than ASCII. This includes databases, registry, web services, text files, etc.
When doing web enabled applications, you need to encode the page using either UTF-8 or UTF-16, and with send it with the appropriate headers. This is controlled in .NET through the web.config file.
You need to discover what language and region the person using the program is using. In a Windows application, this is done by several .NET framework calls. In a web application, there is an HTTP header that has to be parsed.
Comparing and sorting strings can be simple or complicated, especially when dealing with multiple cultures. For example, where diacritical marks fall in a sorting sequence depends on the language and culture. If your application is dealing with a single culture, then it can be simple. If your application must deal with multiple cultures, then you can have problems, because data must be resorted based off language and culture info. You won't believe how many hours the Access program managers talked about how you sort databases in different cultures!
Calendars are very complicated things. They only seem simple because we've dealt with our calendar since we were young. To show how complicated they are, try to solve this question in your head: What day of the week is your birthday on in 2012? What does it take to figure that out? Figuring a date in any particular calendar isn't a problem, but if you deal with cultures that use calendars that aren't Gregorian, such as Japanese or Taiwan, then things get somewhat more complicated. You must allow input in the different calendars and output them correctly. .NET has some pretty extensive classes for dealing with calendar issues but I/O of the calendar data is still your responsibility.
Outputting dates is different in different parts of the world. The localization settings in Windows helps, but in a Web application, you must determine what format to output things in. You must be very careful about month/day/year versus day/month/year confusion. Many people have been burned because 6/3/2004 is ambiguous in an i18n context. It is either June 3rd or March 6th depending on where you are. Best practices are to output all dates in an unambiguous manner using either ISO format, 2004-06-03, or using a spelled out month as in June 6, 2004.
Time formatting is typically in a 12 or 24 hour clock. Same issues of isolation. In an application that is working across the world, it is very important to store and move around all times in UTC (Coordinated Universal Time), because local times are ambiguous (and dates can be, too, across the International Date Line). Converting to and from Local Time may cause more problems than it is worth, because if end-users are talking on the phone about a display, they may be seeing different data. Whether you can get away with having end-users deal with UTC or whether times must be output as local is an important decision.
Currency is a big can of worms. How is input, output, storage, and conversion handled? There is no universally base monetary unit, so all money must be stored in a particular currency. Is storage done in one particular currency (such as US Dollars) or multiple (Dollars, Euros, and Yen)? Is conversion between currencies done at the moment of input, the moment of output, or some other time (such as midnight Eastern Time)? Where is the exchange rate data coming from, and how often is it updated? Is it important to be especially precise--A difference of .00001 cent in the exchange rate can make a difference if you are dealing with millions of dollars. If conversion is done at the moment of input, the exchange rates at that moment may need to be stored depending on the application. Input and output is also complicated. Do you need to allow for input in multiple currencies? This requires some UI design consideration. Output is simpler, but also has considerations: . versus , as separators for example. .NET has parsing and formatting functions that helps here.
When outputting numbers, the localized setting may have to be addressed (. versus ,; where - signs go, etc.) . For a Windows application, this is easy. For a web application, the proper format must somehow be stored and retrieved to properly output the number.
There are UI and storage considerations necessary for addresses, especially Postal Codes. Countries don't all use the U.S. Zip Code format. If your I/O and storage are expecting 99999-9999 format and gets a Canadian A9A 9A9 postal code, will it choke?
Same issue as addresses. Telephone numbers vary across the world.
Paper sizes in the U.S. are typically Letter (8.5" x 11") or Legal (8.5" x 14"), whereas the rest of the world mostly uses ISO formats such as A4. You must be very careful when printing reports to allow for the different sizes of paper, otherwise truncation or excessive white space may occur. Selecting paper sizes may be important.
The U.S. largely uses English measurements, whereas most of the rest of the world uses Metric measurements. How is I/O and storage of units accomplished? Do you store everything in Metric, and do conversion as necessary, or do you store the size and a separate field for unit? You don't want your spacecraft crashing into Mars because of a screw-up here!
Different languages have different requirements for word length. English is among the tightest Roman Alphabet languages to express some word, whereas Finnish typically requires about 50% more characters to say the same word. This has some serious repercussions when designing the UI of a program or web page. If you create a nice looking screen in English, it may come out truncated or wrapped when expressed in Finnish. On the other hand, if you allow enough space to express the UI in Finnish, it may come out with unacceptable white space in English. In that case, multiple UI's may be necessary to account for different word length, or the UI may have to dynamical move and resize element on the dialog.
Output of Unicode requires the proper font to be installed on the end-user's system, otherwise the output will look like a bunch of gibberish. How are you going to ensure that the proper font is installed, and how are you going to keep the end-user from uninstalling it. It may be worthwhile in a Windows application to check that the proper font is installed at startup time. In a web application, there is not much that you can do here, unless you want to put all the data into PDF files or GIF files.
Fortunately, Windows does all the proper handling of the input of various keyboards and international characters.
Some languages write right-to-left or vertically instead of left-to-right. Frequently Windows and .NET take the hassle of dealing with these away from the application, but you may need different UIs to deal with these. There are many places where .NET has a property that you can set to right-to-left to accommodate these languages.
When you internationalize an application, you need to isolate all the strings that need to be localized in a small number of places. This means that an application cannot embed English strings into the application. All strings must be stored in a resource file, XML file, database, or other common location. All dialogs must either have their strings pulled from this repository, or individually recreated. The people translating the program into various languages do not want to look at code. .NET provides a number of tools, such as internationalized resource files to help with this process. Access 1.0 shipped within 30 days of the English version in three other languages because we took this into account. The earliest Microsoft had ever shipped another language edition of a program before that was six months.
Be very careful about string concatenation. Different languages use different word order than English. For example, English uses Subject-Verb-Direct Object, but a Maya language uses Verb-Direct Object-Subject. If you concatenate strings together to form, say, an error message, then when the string is internationalized, it may become gibberish. .NET provides a String.Format method that is designed to handle this, but it must be consistently used.
Besides the other considerations above, avoid putting text into graphics. An icon is an icon, not a billboard. If text is placed into graphics, then those graphics must then be internationalized, as well. .NET also provides things like multiple Tooltip controls that can be internationalized easily.
The application must be localized into at least one other language to test whether all the interface items that should be localized have been localized, and things that shouldn't be localized haven't. Then as development continues, needs to be rechecked regularly. I'll give a great trick for this that Microsoft uses: develop a tool that automatically localizes the English version into another language. You may think this is impossible because of the variability of different languages, but there is one language that has consistent rules for conversion from English: Pig Latin! It also has the added benefit that it adds two letters per word, making the word length more like Finnish. There is a Pig Latin version of most Microsoft programs somewhere. Testing may take considerable time.
Internationalizing a program is a non-trivial exercise, and planning to internationalize should be done from the earliest stages of design on a project. If done with proper planning, the cost can be small, maybe 15% more effort. If done after the fact, it may take a total redesign from ground up to re-do the application.


Essential reading for any investor aiming for success at the highest levels in the thoroughbred industry, this year's magazine features industry articles on the future of racing in Asia, Champions that were overlooked as yearlings, how an auction works, plus insights from the bloodstock agent who purchased Dunaden and the breeder behind Black Caviar and All Too Hard.
All Too Hard's recent victory in the stallion making Caulfield Guineas underlines the dominance of Easter Sale graduates at the highest level, especially in a racehorse's Classic year. From just 8% of the Australasian yearling sale crop Easter graduates have won 44% more Group 1 races for three-year-olds in Australia over the last ten years than any other individual sale.
Entries for the 2013 Inglis Australia Easter Yearling Sale are headed by the most anticipated colt in Australia's thoroughbred auction history, All Too Hard and Black Caviar's half-brother by Redoute's Choice.
The colt from blue-hen mare Helsinge is one of 48 siblings to Group 1 winners previewed in the magazine, including Typhoon Tracy, Igugu, Alinghi, Gold Edition, King's Rose, Ortensia, Mosheen, Better Life, Starspangledbanner, Better Than Ever, Star Witness, Speed Baby, All American, Wanted and Zabeelionaire.
Easter Sale graduate Samantha Miss was the dominant filly for her generation winning the time honoured Group 1 VRC Oaks, AJC Flight Stakes and Champagnes Stakes. The Champion daughter of Redoute's Choice is one of 46 Group 1 winning dams with yearlings set for the 2013 Easter Sale, including Jolie's Shinju, Sun Classique, Makybe Diva, Bramble Rose, Star Satire, Ruby Clipper, Rostova, Unearthly, Eskimo Queen, Our Egyptian Raine, Black Mamba, Dizelle and Absolut Glam.
The subject of one of the stories in the magazine champion sire Fastnet Rock is set to be the most represented stallion at next year's Easter Sale, with 50 yearlings featuring in the preview.
High Chaparral (41 entries), Redoute's Choice (37), More Than Ready (32), Encosta de Lago (26), Flying Spur (25) and Lonhro (25) are also represented by significant size drafts.
"28% of all Australian Group 1 races for three-year-olds in the last ten years that were won by a horse offered at auction were won by an Easter graduate, setting a very high benchmark for all other sales," Inglis Managing Director Mark Webster comments.
"That fantastic statistic alone makes the Easter Yearling Sale Preview Magazine an essential read for anyone involved in the racing industry.
The online version of the Easter Preview features links through to all advertisers including studs and race clubs, stallion profiles that have been listed with bloodstock.com.au, race replays of Inglis' Group One graduates and additional interviews with leading industry professionals.


Stanley Greene was born in New York in 1949, and as a teenager was a member of the Black Panthers and an anti-Vietnam War activist.
An encounter with W. Eugene Smith turned his energies to photography.
By chance he was on hand to record the fall of the Berlin Wall, which made him a much-sought-after photojournalist.
He has photographed wars and poverty in Africa, the former Soviet Union, Central America, Asia and the Middle East.
He made a great impression with the photo book Open Wound: Chechnya 1994-2003, published by Trolley.
Greene is represented by Agence Vu, and won the W. Eugene Smith Award in 2004.


Travellers – what are some of the issues you face most while travelling?
I have just found a video that explains all the common "travel problems" with their tried and proven solutions as well.
Here are 22 travel-life hacks that every traveller needs to know to make travelling a little bit more special.


Venezuelan military officers blocked a bridge on the border with Colombia ahead of an anticipated humanitarian aid shipment, as opposition leader Juan Guaido stepped up his challenge to President Nicolas Maduro's authority. Earlier Tuesday the opposition-dominated National Assembly had warned the armed forces, which make up much of Maduro's power base, not to cross a "red line" by blocking aid.
Venezuelan military officers used a tanker truck and huge shipping container to block access to the Tienditas bridge, which links Cucuta, Colombia to Urena, Venezuela. Franklyn Duarte, an opposition lawmaker from the border state of Tachira, said that troops from the armed forces were blocking the crossing. The aid delivery was being coordinated by Guaido, who has declared himself interim president of the oil-rich country and now enjoys the backing of some 40 countries as Venezuela's legitimate leader.
Maduro, 56, has repeatedly accused the United States of fomenting a coup. The US, which has not ruled out a military intervention in crisis-wracked Venezuela, was the first to recognize him as acting president, followed by a dozen Latin American countries. In his State of the Union address Tuesday night, President Donald Trump reaffirmed US support for Guaido, saying "we stand with the Venezuelan people in their noble quest for freedom." Britain, France, Germany and Spain were among 20 EU nations to side with Guaido this week after Maduro ignored their demands that he announce new presidential elections by February 3.
Guaido, 35, claims his legitimacy from the constitution and has been ramping up pressure on Maduro by calling his supporters out into the streets. The next mass demonstration is due for February 12. Guaido must still find a way to bring in the humanitarian aid given the military's loyalty to Maduro. He accused the military on Monday of planning to divert aid being stockpiled in Colombia, Brazil and an unidentified Caribbean island, in order to distribute it through the socialist government's subsidized food program for its own supporters.
Maduro disclosed Monday that he sent Pope Francis a letter seeking help in mediating the country's crisis. The pope told journalists Tuesday that this would require agreement from both the government and the opposition. "Getting close to both sides to enact the possibilities of dialogue. That's how diplomacy works," the pope said on the plane bringing him back from the United Arab Emirates.


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LAPD celebrates Valentines Day with passed around George Floyd photo that says "You take my breath away"
January 9, 2022 January 9, 2022 admin	0 Comments
LOS ANGELES, CA — The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) is investigating a report of a mockery George Floyd photo that was sent around on Valentine's Day with the caption that read "You take my breath away."
Photo that was passed around mocking George Floyd "via Social Media"
The photo was "passed around" in a Valentine's Day-like format said Chief Moore who mentioned that the officer who made the report will be interviewed on Monday.
"Our investigation is to determine the accuracy of the allegations while also reinforcing our zero tolerance for anything with racist views," the chief said. "People will find my wrath," Moore said if he confirms this to be true of any of his officers.
Floyd was killed last May by Minneapolis Police officer Derek Chauvin who knelt on his neck for nearly eight minutes as he repeatedly cried, "I can't breathe."
Floyd's sickening death was caught on video and viewed by millions which sparked a flurry of international outrage and protests, leading most of the world to join Black people's longtime fight in ending police brutality.-
← Oldest juvenile lifer in U.S. is freed from prison after serving 68 years
Pink stops concert and hands microphone to a 12-year-old girl, marvels at her voice when she starts to sing →
The real reason why Caitlin Todd disappeared from 'NCIS' comes to light
Ancient Tales of Wisdom: The Tailor in Heaven
January 8, 2022 January 8, 2022 admin	0
Officer looks after toddler while her dad's in court – proving he's a 'father first and police officer second'


"I considered homosexuality- then I found God."
"I was sick and thought I was a fag and then found God and am all better now"
rally is coming to my town.
saying, "we love Jesus AND gay people"
i must admit, i have been visiting your site but felt a little unsure if i should comment in case i've misread you! but i love what you write about... so incredibly raw and honest. wish i could write like you, please keep writing...!
LOL - I would love to be there to see that rally.


Today I went to the Bloor Hot Docs Cinema in downtown Toronto to see Chasing Trane: The John Coltrane Documentary. This is the first ever documentary about Coltrane. It's long overdue and it's obvious that Coltrane's family led by his sax playing son Ravi Coltrane have wanted to do this for a long time. The film was written and directed by John Scheinfeld who has directed many similar documentaries for PBS. The one I remember is the 2010 film Who Is Harry Nilsson (And Why Is Everyone Talkin' About Him?). I watched that on PBS. This is Scheinfeld's first attempt at chronicling a jazz artist. The biggest hurdle in trying to do a documentary about Coltrane is though there is plenty of performance video footage, he never did any video or audio interviews. He did print interviews with Down Beat Magazine for example and he also wrote liner notes for his albums. Obviously that's not very cinematic. So Scheinfeld asked Denzel Washington to read Coltrane's words for the film. Washington doesn't try to be Coltrane. He reads the words in his own voice. And there's not a lot of that so it's not really narration. I think Washington's participation helped promote the film. But I don't think it was necessary. And that's my only criticism of the film. Other than that, Chasing Trane is a straightforward chronicle of John Coltrane's life and career. Even if you're a big Coltrane fan and you're familiar with his story, you need to see this film because it hasn't been done before. And this needed to be done because Coltrane is one of the most influential figures in modern music history. There are plenty of interviews with Coltrane's musician pals like Benny Golson, Wayne Shorter, Sonny Rollins, McCoy Tyner and Jimmy Heath along with guys who he influenced like rapper Common, Bill Clinton (he plays sax), Carlos Santana and The Doors drummer John Densmore who are huge jazz fans, Wynton Marsalis, Kamasi Washington and of course Coltrane's son Ravi and other family members. We also see a lot of professor Cornel West who appears in a lot of black history documentaries. The film covers Coltrane's history comprehensively including things like his 50s heroin addiction. It also covers Coltrane's important music like A Love Supreme. And it talks about his family life. The most important thing is it chronicles how Coltrane's music changed over the years especially when in 1965 he changed to a free jazz style that was less accessible than his Classic Quartet. This film is a must for jazz fans. Check out the trailer.


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Continuing the Conversation: VAWA at 20
by Dr. Tiffany McNair | Sep 13, 2014 | Monitor
President Barack Obama signs S. 47, the "Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2013," (VAWA), which reauthorizes several Violence Against Women Act grant programs through FY 2018; and the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 through FY 2017, in the Sidney R. Yates Auditorium at the U.S. Department of Interior in Washington, D.C., March 7, 2013.
(Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy)
Today is the 20th anniversary of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA). On Tuesday, I had the incredible privilege of attending a commemoration of this milestone held at the National Archives. During the program, I learned more about the history of VAWA – stories recounting the long road leading up to its passage, its victories and challenges over the years, and the lives it has and continues to change. One survivor vividly shared her account of abuse, near death, plans of escape, and eventual freedom from her husband's victimization.
Vice President Biden then delivered a powerful address, using the lens of VAWA to chronicle our nation's evolution surrounding the dialogue on domestic violence and our treatment of women and girls; how this kind of violence no longer represents a "family affair," but rather behavior that should be exposed to the "sunlight" for the injustice that it is. While I was only in junior high when VAWA first emerged, now as a physician and advocate for women's health, I recognize the positive impact VAWA has had on the patients and communities I serve. Nevertheless, since joining the Office of the Vice President as a White House Fellow, I am also quickly learning how much more we all still have to do.
Since its original passage two decades ago, VAWA has dramatically changed the conversation, attitude, and work around domestic violence in America. In June of 1990, then-Senator Biden first introduced the bill, seeking to expose the all too pervasive problems of physical and sexual violence, stalking, and homicide – often at the hands of an intimate partner. VAWA's goals were clear: "…to make streets safer for women; to make homes safer for women; and to protect women's civil rights." After four years of grueling testimony by survivors, civil rights groups, researchers, and other impassioned advocates, Congress could no longer deny the magnitude of the issue; the dignity, respect, and welfare of millions of women, their families, and their communities were at stake. VAWA finally passed and was signed into law by President Clinton on September 13, 1994.
VAWA has been reauthorized three times, most recently in 2013. Since its inception, this critical piece of legislation has been the catalyst for reducing the personal and social costs of violence against women in the U.S. VAWA funding is responsible for higher rates of prosecution and offender accountability. Crucial medical, legal, and social services for survivors have been greatly expanded through the advocacy and assistance provided by agencies awarded VAWA grants. The collection and processing of forensic evidence have improved through the rise of sexual assault nurse examination (SANE) programs and by the increasingly high priority placed on testing formerly abandoned rape kits. Vice President Biden created the 1 is 2 Many campaign in 2011 to address dating violence and sexual assault among teens and young adults. Earlier this year, President Obama also established the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault. And the Administration has continued to raise awareness and institute federal strategies to confront violence against women and girls globally.
Still, as recent headlines confirm, there is more work to be done – not merely to identify and apprehend offenders, or even to assist survivors and their families; but to prevent violence in the first place. Today, nearly 20% of women in the U.S. have been a victim of completed or attempted rape in their lifetime. Moreover, both young women and men are at high rates of severe physical violence by an intimate partner. We also know that women and girls of color as well as LGBT individuals remain highly vulnerable to victimization. Given the prevalence of the problem, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Preventive Services Task Force, and numerous major medical associations have recommended routine intimate partner violence screening and early referral to intervention services. Through these efforts, healthcare providers like myself can play a significant role in creating a safe space for a conversation around healthy relationships; a conversation that could make a difference not just in attitudes, but also in behaviors and outcomes.
Vice President Biden is taking additional steps to continue the dialogue toward eliminating domestic violence in our nation. There will be a Summit on Civil Rights and Equal Protection for Women to gather key stakeholders and revisit some of the legal hurdles that remain. The Office of the Vice President also released a comprehensive report, 1 is 2 Many: Twenty Years Fighting Violence Against Women and Girls, detailing the progress made as well as identifying persistent challenges and opportunities for future success. An addendum to this report highlights the tremendous work and service of over 100 organizations around the country committed to this cause.
As we reflect on the last 20 years, may we each take a moment to recognize the impact of VAWA, express gratitude for the lives that have been saved as a result of this significant law, and then get back to work — for our patients, our colleagues, our friends, and our families. Let's make our streets and homes safer for women, and end the violence once and for all.
Tiffany McNair, MD, MPH is a White House Fellow in the Office of the Vice President, working on issues related to violence against women and health policy.


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Mitchell and Buggs headed to I-R
Seeing Kawika Mitchell and Marcus Buggs both carted off in the span of a quarter Sunday did not present a promising picture for the health of Buffalo's linebacking corps. On Monday the news was as bad as it could get as both suffered season ending knee injuries.
"Kawika and Marcus are both surgical knees so we'll lose them for the season," said head coach Dick Jauron. "It's just so disappointing for all of us particularly for the players and the team. For the injured player you really feel for them. They work so hard and it's such a huge part of their life. The whole offseason, all the preparation and to have it end early in a season is hard. It's really hard. So it's not a good thing for sure."
Mitchell, a defensive co-captain with Paul Posluszny, will be a big loss from both a playmaking and leadership perspective.
"Any time you lose a playmaker and game breaker the caliber of 'Veek' it's going to be tough," said safety George Wilson. "It's a tough loss with Kawika and Buggs both playing 'mike' linebacker, but we'll find a way to work through this and fill in the gaps."
"It's a big loss losing Kawika and Buggs," said Jon Corto. "Kawika is obviously one of our captains, but the guys that we've got behind them, I'm confident in them and I'll fill in my role whatever it may be. We just keep pushing forward and we'll be ready to play."
Posluszny, who is still recovering from a broken forearm suffered in Week 1, was labeled week-to-week by Jauron on Monday. With his status still up in the air, Buffalo's personnel department will need to act quickly to fill the soon to be vacant roster spots. Mitchell and Buggs will be placed on injured reserve in the next day or so to create roster room for reinforcements.
"We'll have those two roster spots so we'll clearly be bringing some people in and we'll work out some people and look at different things," said Jauron.
Players new to the team will create an additional challenge. Getting up to speed with Buffalo's defensive system and their new teammates will take some time.
"I'm sure the coaches with do a good job with whoever they bring in. We'll get guys ready. Whoever is going to play is just going to have to take it upon themselves to prepare well and learn from what the coaches are teaching us."
"I'm sure the coaches with do a good job with whoever they bring in," said Ellison. "We'll get guys ready. Whoever is going to play is just going to have to take it upon themselves to prepare well and learn from what the coaches are teaching us."
As of Monday the Bills were down to four healthy linebackers in Jon Corto, Keith Ellison and rookies Ashlee Palmer and Nic Harris with Palmer getting his first career start this past Sunday. But Harris has been practicing at safety the past two weeks due to the shortage there.
Jauron hasn't completely committed to moving Harris back to linebacker at this point.
"We'll see where Nic fits," said Jauron of Harris. "It makes sense right now before we have any of those workouts to think Nic would back up and give us help at that spot (linebacker)."
The Bills also have rookie Marcus Freeman on the practice squad, but he was signed just three weeks ago.
At the close of Sunday's game Keith Ellison manned the middle linebacker position with Jon Corto and Ashlee Palmer manning the outside spots. But Ellison hasn't been told if he's staying in the middle.
"I don't know you'll have to ask the coaches about it," Ellison said. "If it happens I'm ready to play it. Wherever they need me on the field, whatever they need from me to help this team win I'm willing to do it."
Ellison's most important role might prove to be leadership until Posluszny returns. The four-year veteran is now the elder statesmen of the linebacking corps, which still strikes him as strange being all of 25-years old. But Ellison sounds ready to step forward.
"With the injuries it's kind of hit us pretty hard this year, but it's not something that we can think about," he said. "We can't use it as an excuse. Guys just have to step up and guys that weren't expected to play a lot are going to be playing more so we've just all got to be ready."


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Q: How to use a loop to get user input? The purpose is to let the user to input a random amount of numbers and display these numbers on the screen. For example:
input: 12 34 45 12 3
output: 12 34 45 12 3
input: 2 4 100
output: 2 4 100

Here is my code:
section .text
GLOBAL main
EXTERN printf

section .data
integer: times 4 db 0     ;store the current data
num: times 4 db 0         ;store the current input character
count: times 4 db 0       ;count how many numbers
formatin: db "%d", 0      ; output format

main:
  push ebp
  mov ebp, esp                ;reserve the previous reg

  mov dword[integer], 1       ;set integer to 1
  mov dword[count], 0         ;set count to 0
read:
  mov eax, 3
  mov ebx, 0
  mov ecx, num
  mov edx, 1
  int 80h                     ; read in a character

  cmp dword[num], 0Dh         ; if it' s an enter
  je done
  cmp dword[num], 20h         ; if it;s a space
  je nextNum

  sub dword[num], 30h         ;replace integer to 10*integer+num
  mov eax, dword[integer]
  imul eax, 10
  add eax, dword[num]
  mov dword[integer], eax
  loop read

nextNum:                       ; push integer to stack
  add dword[count], 1
  push integer
  mov dword[integer], 1
  loop read

done:
  mov ecx, dword[count]
write:                         ; print the result
  push formatin
  call printf
  add esp, 8
loop write
  mov esp, ebp
  pop ebp
  ret

The problem is that it gets stuck in the loop and it can't jump out of it. What's wrong?
The code:
cmp dword[num], 0Dh

and
cmp dword[num], 20h

Seem to have no effect. Maybe there is problem with num? Should I change it to a byte?

Since some suggest the declaration dword[num] may cause problem, I fix some of the code like this:
in section .data
change num: times 4 db 0  to  num: times 1 db 0
in all dword[num]
change it to byte[num],
but keep add eax, dword[num] as before
But it is still stuck in the loop...

Thanks to @Michael Petch   , I've found some logic problems and replace the read and nextNum segment with the following code:
read:
  mov eax, 3
  mov ebx, 0
  mov ecx, num
  mov edx, 1
  int 80h                           ; read in a character

  cmp byte[num], 0Ah ; if it' s an enter
  je nextNum
  cmp byte[num], 20h ; if it;s a space
  je nextNum

  sub byte[num], 30h      ;replace integer to 10*integer+num
  mov eax, dword[integer]
  imul eax, 10
  add eax, dword[num]
  mov dword[integer], eax
  loop read

nextNum:
  add dword[count], 1
  push dword[integer]
  mov dword[integer], 0
  cmp byte[num], 0Ah
  je done
  cmp byte[num], 20h
  je  read

But it will now give unexpected answers. For example I give 12 34 , and it prints 2850, 12. Seems counting or data address calculating(which I still can not understand quite well ) go wrong

I've figured out what's wrong with the calculation. In fact, although mov dword[integer], 0 in nextNum segment give value 0 to integer, integer will be 256 actually in the second loop, and be 512 in the third loop, and be 768... and so on. Can anyone explain why...

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


From time to time, BPRW need bids and proposals for various projects and services. If we have an open bids, then you'll find them on the City's site!
Sealed BIDS for the construction of the City of Burlington, Burlington Bike Path Phase 3a Rehabilitation are due to the City of Burlington, Vermont, at the office of Parks, Recreation & Waterfront, 645 Pine Street, Suite B, Burlington, Vermont 05401 by 4:00 p.m., Friday, April 26, 2019.
This Bid Request solicits shop drawings, fabrication and installation services for the installation of wayfinding signs throughout Burlington, VT's Parks System.
We are requesting proposals for food concessions at Leddy Park on seven designated event dates this summer: June 19, June 26, July 10, July 17, July 24, July 31, and August 7. The selected responder(s) will be issued a concession agreement, reflecting the terms of the Request For Proposals ("RFP") and other mutually agreed upon terms reflected in a Concession Agreement to be executed after the selection process is complete.
Deadline for receipt of responses to this RFP is March 22, 2019 at 4:00PM. Proposals can be sent to Parks, Recreation & Waterfront via eallen@burlingtonvt.gov or delivered or mailed to 645 Pine St, Suite B, Burlington, VT 05401.


text:
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	header('Content-type: text/javascript');
	include "php/basis.php";

	echo '"use strict";';

	//include javascript
	include $pfadJS."TableSort.js";
	include $pfadJS."sprache.js";
	include $pfadJS."system.js";
?>

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


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text:
Tag: anniversary
Happy 2nd Birthday to Boldwood Books
August 1, 2021 Jessica Redland AuthorLeave a comment
Today I'm delighted to wish my amazing publisher, Boldwood Books, a Happy 2nd Birthday. Woo hoo!
Boldwood officially launched in February 2019, opening up to submissions that day, and I was all ready with my manuscript the moment we passed midnight and was thrilled to get 'the call' the following month and join the team as one of the first twenty authors.
The reason today – 1st August – is the official birthday is that this is the date the first release went out into the world. Nina Manning's The Daughter in Law – a psychological thriller – was a huge success, as were the other August releases: romcom Honeymoon for One by Portia MacIntosh and contemporary women's fiction Villa of Sun and Secrets by Jennifer Bohnet.
My Boldwood debut, The Secret to Happiness, was the first September release and it was so exciting seeing a new release out pretty much every week as the portfolio grew.
During their two years, Boldwood have delivered exactly what they promised: publishing reimagined. They have taken the 'digital first' concept and said 'but that doesn't need to mean digital only' and, right from the start, all titles were released in several formats: eBook on all platforms, paperback, physical audio and audio download. But they haven't stopped there. All titles are available in large print formats too and all titles released since March this year have come out in hardback (and older titles will, over time, retrospectively be available in that format). Streaming services have also been added meaning that, whatever a person's reading or listening preferences, Boldwood have it covered.
They established a programme with The Works and I was thrilled to have three books – The Secret to Happiness, Making Wishes at Bay View and Finding Love at Hedgehog Hollow – go into The Works stores and online in 2020. This programme has also seen additional stock distributed around the UK, Ireland, USA and Canada meaning that books could appear in garden centres, post offices, small and large supermarkets in those countries. I've personally spotted one of mine in two local garden centres and a friend sent me a photo of one in her local post office which was such a thrill.
Two of my books in The Works together
Another amazing deal saw many books go into supermarkets in Australia. The distributor specified crime and thrillers only so mine weren't included but I was still able to enjoy the moment vicariously seeing shelfies from down under featuring books by my Boldwood buddies.
Across the two years, Boldwood have been nominated and shortlisted for various industry prizes, winning the regional heat of the Publisher of the Year in the British Book Awards 2021 and winning the Best Newcomer award at the Independent Publishing Awards 2020.
Team Boldwood have also:
Sold 4 million books (across all formats)
Had 45 Top 10 Bestsellers
Signed more than 60 authors
Published over 160 titles
Received more than 100,000 5-star reviews on Amazon
Expanded to a team of 8
Acquired over 15,000 social media followers
That's a lot of amazing achievements in only two years! Very much looking forward to where the next two years take us. I'm already aware of some exciting new opportunities which will be revealed in due course, and I'm sure there'll be many more.
First to Last Release in Two Years (well, give or take a couple of days!)
For me personally, two years brings an amazing milestone. On Tuesday (3rd August), the final book in my first twelve-book publishing contract is released. Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop is also the final book in my backlist, all of which Boldwood acquired, and was previously out as Charlee and the Chocolate Shop. Then, later this month, Snowflakes at The Starfish Café is published (31st August) which sees the start of a brand new twelve-book deal and a new series. I can't believe I'm already on my second contract! When it came to resigning with Boldwood, I didn't even need to think about it. A resounding YES!
A month before Boldwood's first birthday, I added Hedgehog Hollow to my settings and have been overwhelmed with the love for the hedgehogs. There are now three books out there with a fourth on pre-order and more to come from the hedgehogs in 2022.
The dawn of a new series
A huge CONGRATULATIONS to the whole team at Boldwood Books for creating such a warm, friendly, innovative company and for being so supportive. My particular gratitude goes to Amanda Ridout, our Founder and CEO, for her passion, enthusiasm and tremendous vision and to my editor (and Publishing / Sales & Marketing Director), Nia Beynon, who is an absolute dream to work with. Nia has been my editor from the start and therefore knows, understands, and loves the worlds of Whitsborough Bay and Hedgehog Hollow as much as I do. She is my sounding board and a shoulder to cry on and I have learned so much from her exceptional editing skills about how to turn a good story into a great one.
A thank you to Megan Townsend, Publishing Executive, who works behind the scenes preparing the books for publication and Claire Fenby, Digital Marketing Manager, who only joined the team fairly recently but has already made such a tremendous impact on our social media channels with her digital innovations.
I'm so grateful to the team of authors at Boldwood for being such a supportive, friendly group. Very excited to hopefully meet them all in person at some point. Congratulations to you all for writing such amazing books. I'm a very slow reader but I think I've maybe read about twenty Boldwood releases so far and they've all been exceptional. My mum, bless her, has read (and loved) nearly all of them!
Finally an enormous THANK YOU to all the readers and bloggers/reviewers who buy the books in whatever format, leave reviews, spread recommendations, send messages, and share the love. We wouldn't be here without your support. Huge hugs to every single one of you.
Happy 2nd Birthday Boldwood. Here's to an exciting third year…
Big birthday hugs
The one where something special happened a year ago today
June 18, 2020 Jessica Redland Author1 Comment
I opened up Facebook this morning and was presented with a memory from one year ago which momentarily confused me. It was stunning bouquet of flowers but why? My birthday is in May, Mother's Day is before that, and my wedding anniversary is in September. So what was significant about 18th June 2019 that warranted flowers? Hmm.
Then I scrolled down the memories a little further and all was revealed. One year ago today was the day Boldwood Books officially announced their first twenty authors. I'd been sitting on the news about my 9-book publishing deal for three months so it was so thrilling to see the full announcement go out and to be able to finally share the amazing news with the world. Woo hoo! You can read about the announcement here.
A year on, what a difference Boldwood have made to my writing career. After years spent languishing in the lower echelons of the Amazon charts, I have officially become an international bestseller with a Top 10 in the Kindle Canada charts, Top 20 in the Kindle UK and Australia charts, and Top 3 on AppleBooks UK. Eek! I never, ever imagined chart success like that.
My 9-book deal with Boldwood extended to a 12-book deal when I signed contract addendums this year for the rest of my back catalogue to be re-edited and re-released through them. When I first submitted to Boldwood in February last year, I was drawn to their promise to work with the author on developing their career and they have absolutely delivered on that. Earlier this year, for the first time ever, I felt like a real author.
And, thanks to Boldwood, this month I achieved a long-held dream of becoming a full-time author. A year ago, I hoped it might be possible one day. Six months before that, it seemed like an unreachable goal.
If anyone reading this is an aspiring writer and struggling, hang on in there and keep believing as you never know when it might happen for you. I wrote about my journey to publication here and it certainly had many dips in the road before I found my home with Boldwood.
My gratitude to the team at Boldwood Books is enormous, for believing in my stories in the first place and for delivering everything they promised – and so much more. They have 'reimagined publishing' in so many ways: by bringing out all books for all authors in all formats (eBook on all platforms, audio, paperback and now large print), by treating all authors equally whether debut or with a huge back-catalogue, and by having an individual brand and marketing strategy for each author. Everyone is friendly, supportive, passionate about what they do, and I'm so lucky to be part of the team. #TeamBoldwood which has now grown to 38 announced authors (may well be others lined up for a future announcement) is a pretty special place to be. My editor, Nia Beynon, is an absolute delight to work with and I have learned so much from her expertise in editing my work.
Happy announcement-anniversary to Boldwood and thank you. It took a lot of years and some major disappointments but I am so glad I found my home with you. The first year has been amazing beyond my wildest expectations and I look forward to a long and happy relationship.
June 3, 2020 Jessica Redland Author7 Comments
A couple of weeks ago, I shared a blog post celebrating five years as a published author and I'm being a bit greedy and sharing another one because it's also a special anniversary today – 3rd June 2020. As it happens, this should actually be my anniversary for five years as a published writer because my first book – a novella released on 23rd May 2015 – was not originally part of the plan.
3rd June 2015 was the publication day of my very first full-length novel, Searching for Steven, now re-edited and re-packaged as New Beginnings at Seaside Blooms.
My husband had my debut novel and novella covers printed onto canvas with this gorgeous message. The middle one is on my office wall, above my desk – a reminder of the day when life really did change for me
This was such a momentous occasion that I held a launch party for friends and family in my hometown of Scarborough. I was so excited about it but it didn't quite go to plan…
A cock-up at the printer meant I had no paperbacks which made me cry. A lot. A book launch with no books? Hmm.
The day itself was very hot and muggy and the function room that should have been fine at that time of year was unbearably melting. My hair was plastered to my head and I had no choice but to expose my arms as the lacy shrug I'd bought to go with my outfit made me too hot.
My sister in law made an amazing cake and I completely forgot to cut it and hand it out. I promise it wasn't a deliberate ploy to keep it all to myself! Although it might have been a bonus that I did have lots of cake to eat afterwards.
One of the few photos that got taken – after everyone had left!
My husband was on photography duty but got so tied up speaking to friends and family that barely any photos got taken so I have very few pictures from the event. I had to put my dress back on the follow day and pose for some photos in the garden.
I did my best to circulate round the room but the hours flew by and I didn't get to speak to half the guests which made me feel awful and, even five years on, I still feel guilty about it. Mind you, I still feel guilty about guests I didn't have a chance to speak to at my wedding and that was nearly fifteen years ago! This is something I might need to work on. As the song says, let it go!
As a result of circulating, I was too late for the buffet and didn't get anything more than a mini sausage roll and a few crisps. Soooo hungry.
I made a speech and forgot what I planned to say including forgetting to thank my SIL for the amazing cake. My daughter (eight at the time) got overwhelmed by it all and burst into tears mid-speech which didn't help with my recall!
So it definitely didn't go to plan. But it was still wonderful because it was a once-in-a-lifetime moment. After all, I will never have another debut novel.
I'm so grateful to everyone who travelled to Scarborough to share my special day with me, to those who placed orders for books, and to my publisher at the time who was so gutted for me about the books cock-up that they sent me a teddy bear in the post. She knew how to cheer me up! They also got the printer to cover the postage of sending my books out to everyone after they finally turned up.
Earlier this year, I'd briefly wondered whether I might have another launch party to celebrate the release of Finding Love at Hedgehog Hollow – the start of a new series – and five years as a published writer. Then a little virus started circulating and quashed any further thoughts of that. I will have a special celebration this weekend, though, as I mark my last ever HR assignment and deal with my final student query then hang up my tutor hat to become a full-time author.
It's been five years since my first novel was published but eighteen since I had the idea for it and seventeen since I started writing it. Good things come to those who wait and, my goodness, that's been a lot of years of waiting, Happy anniversary, me! Cheers!
The one where I celebrate 5 years as a published author
May 23, 2020 May 24, 2020 Jessica Redland Author2 Comments
Image by S. Hermann & F. Richter from Pixabay
Today – Saturday 23rd May 2020 – is a very special day for me because today is the day I first became a published author. Happy anniversary to me!
My first full-length novel was released on 3rd June 2015 but my publishers at the time – So Vain Books (no longer trading) – asked me if I'd write a short story linked to the series that they could release ahead of Searching for Steven (now refreshed and reissued through Boldwood Books as New Beginnings at Seaside Blooms). I was up for the challenge but 'short' proved to be a bit too much of a challenge and I actually wrote a novella.
The original cover, then two versions as indie releases
At the start of Searching for Steven, Sarah returns home to Whitsborough Bay for a weekend and helps her Auntie Kay, the owner of flower shop Seaside Blooms, prepare the flowers for a wedding. The brother of the bride, Nick, collects them and my idea for the novella was to tell the story of how his sister, Callie, met the man she's about to marry.
Raving About Rhys, released on 23rd May 2015, acted as a prequel to the trilogy that So Vain Books were going to publish, introducing the reader to the world of Whitsborough Bay and introducing Nick as one of the main characters in the trilogy.
A few years later, an idea for a sequel to Raving About Rhys kept nudging at me and Callie's Christmas Wish – a short novel – was born.
My publishing deal with Boldwood Books was for a combination of new books and those from my back catalogue. We made the decision to combine Raving About Rhys and Callie's Christmas Wish into one full-length novel – Making Wishes at Bay View – to be released as book 1 in the Welcome to Whitsborough Bay series. The full four-book series is available right now as an eBook on Kindle, Kobo and AppleBooks, as well as paperback and audio formats:
Book 1 – Making Wishes at Bay View
Book 2 – New Beginnings at Seaside Blooms
Book 3 – Finding Hope at Lighthouse Cove
Book 4 – Coming Home to Seashell Cottage
So much has changed in the five years since that first book was published. It's been a half-decade of highs and lows.
Image by Sasin Tipchai from Pixabay
Lows:
My original publisher ceasing trading
Failing to make an impact as an indie writer
Many days of zero sales and limited writing income
Being rank-stripped twice by Amazon
Giving a talk as part of a creative writing event in a cafe in town and nobody attending except two friends, the boyfriend of one of them, and two passers-by the embarrassed owner dragged in off the street
Rejections when I looked for a second publishing deal
Trying – and usually failing – to fit in writing on evenings and weekends around my demanding day job
Image by Jill Wellington from Pixabay
But these were definitely outweighed by the highs:
Securing my first publishing deal – and having two offers on the table
Seeing my work out there for the first time ever
Having a launch party for my friends and family
Receiving great reviews
The support of the blogging community, some of whom have been there since my very first release
Writing and releasing another five more novels as an indie writer
Obtaining a Masters in Creative Writing
Giving talks in my local libraries
Securing my publishing deal with Boldwood Books
Releasing another brand new novel – The Secret to Happiness – through Boldwood Books
Some amazing successes with the reissued Welcome to Whitsborough Bay series including Top 5 in the AppleBooks chart for Books 2-4 and #14 in the overall Kindle chart for Book 2
Officially becoming a UK and international bestselling author, with The Secret to Happiness reaching #11 in Australia and #9 in Canada
Holding the Boldwood paperbacks and audiobooks in my hands for the first time
Readers emailing me or contacting me on social media to say how much they've loved my stories
Readers telling me they've binge-read my entire back catalogue during lockdown and have valued the comfort and escapism my words have given them
Finally feeling like a 'real' author
Being able to resign from my day job to write full-time (two weeks left to go!)
Five years ago, I was wide awake at midnight, watching for Raving About Rhys appearing on my Kindle – a magical moment. I hoped it and the subsequent three books would be well-received but my dreams didn't go much further than that. I'd written three books and a novella and I genuinely had no idea where that would take me. Would anyone want to read the ones I'd written? If so, would I be capable of writing more?
During those five years, I've had times when I've felt so low about poor chart positions, lack of sales, rejection and imposter syndrome that I wondered whether it was time to call it a day.
But all good things come to those who wait – not easy for someone like me who is so impatient when it comes to their career – and they certainly did. I will be forever grateful to Boldwood Books for believing in me and making me one of their first twenty authors.
Happy five year anniversary to me and I'm so excited about what could happen in the next five years. Boldwood have helped me tick so much off my author's bucket list in the nine months since The Secret to Happiness was published, who knows what other amazing goals they'll help me achieve next.
A huge thank you to Amanda, Nia, Megan and the rest of the team and fellow-authors at #TeamBoldwood. You've made my five-year anniversary a very happy one. Cheers!
PS If you haven't already done so, you can sign up to my newsletter here: http://bit.ly/JessicaRedlandNewsletter
Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay
September 17, 2015 September 17, 2015 Jessica Redland Author6 Comments
There's a phrase I often use: "What a difference a day makes". I'm not sure of the original origin (it didn't come up on the first page of Google and I was far too lazy to look further), but it's the title of a few songs, including the lovely Dinah Washington classic so I've linked it through to You Tube if you fancy a listen. The song talks about Dinah's world changing from blue to joyous when the man of her dreams becomes hers. This isn't usually the context in which I use the phrase myself. I tend to use it more to describe those occasional days that change an aspect of your life. For me, a very life-changing day happened exactly a year ago today (17th September). It was the day that I received my publishing deal from So Vain Books because that email and subsequent phone call made me into the published author I am today.
As it happens, I was already on the path to publication because a little over two weeks before, on 1st September, I'd received an offer of a three-book publishing deal with another company. I'd verbally accepted it and was going through the paperwork, but I had one or two concerns. Although they'd said they loved Searching for Steven, I got the sense that they wanted to change it quite significantly and I was concerned that it wasn't going to end up the story that I set out to write. When the offer from SVB came through, my gut instinct told me that they were going to be the better home for Steven and I've never for one moment regretted that decision.
So that was a day that made a difference, but it's really been a year that's made a difference that I wanted to talk about in this blog post. It's certainly been an eventful year. In the non-writing part of my life, there've been some significant events:
Both of my parents have turned 70 (well, Dad turns 70 in two week's time but it's nearly within the year!)
Our gorgeous cat Pixie lost her battle with diabetes and left us at the young age of nine
We took our daughter (seven at the time) on her very first holiday abroad
I was made redundant completely unexpectedly, but thankfully walked straight into another job
Hubby and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary (again, I'm extending the year slightly because it's actually a week today but that's close enough between friends, isn't it?)
I re-joined bootcamp and have been rising again at 5.20am three mornings a week for the past year
Hubby decided to take his interest in photography to the next level and has grown into an incredibly talented photographer who has taken pictures at his first wedding as well as undertaking his first corporate commission. Very proud!
In the writing part of my life, I can't believe what's happened to me! I've:
Released a novel (Searching for Steven) AND a novella (Raving About Rhys)
Peaked at number 399 in the overall Amazon chart with Steven
Received x50 reviews for Steven and x33 for Rhys
Only got 5-star and 4-star reviews (so far; always preparing myself for that first 1-star review and promising myself I won't sob for hours when it appears!)
Been a contributor to an anthology of short stories (Winter Tales), raising money for Cystic Fibrosis Trust and Teenage Cancer Trust
Appeared in the local press: The Scarborough News, The Yorkshire Coast, The Scarborough Review, and The Scarborough Comet
Talked and signed books at two libraries, and secured talks at two others
Had Steven stocked across North Yorkshire Libraries
Got Waterstones to stock Steven in the Scarborough branch
Had a launch party attended by lots of incredibly supportive and lovely friends and family
Had a blue plaque named for me (OK, so it was a DIY-special courtesy of my dad but it's still pretty special!)
Finished my second novel, Getting Over Gary (well, it will be finished within two weeks as that's deadline time)
Planned my second novella. (Confession: when I say 'planned', I mean there's an idea in my head and I'll just run with that and see where it takes me, but I took the same approach with Rhys and it worked so let's hope second time will work too!)
Yes, what a difference a year makes! I still find it hard to believe that I'm a published author. It still doesn't feel real. I wonder if it ever will. Thank you so very much to everyone who has supported me over the last year and before that too. Thank you So Vain Books for taking a chance on me, thank you to everyone who has bought/read/reviewed Steven and all those who've promoted and recommended it to their friends and family. You're amazing, every last one of you. I've been touched and overwhelmed by how supportive some people have been. I'll admit I've also been very disappointed at the lack of support from some people who I thought would have been pleased for me and passed word on. If you're a prolific Facebook user, how difficult is it to like and share a post and say something like "My friend wrote this. I'm not a reader myself but if any of my FB friends are, it's got great reviews so why not give it a go?" I'd certainly have done that if roles had been reversed. I won't dwell on this, though, as this is a happy post and the non-supporters are absolutely in the minority. Plus it's their choice. I just thought …. *slaps wrist and tells self to stop dwelling on it* Thank you to North Yorkshire Libraries for their support, particularly Sharon Houghton from Eastfield Library, and to Waterstones for ordering copies of Steven. Huge thanks to my mum, Joyce Williams, who has left postcards on noticeboards whilst on holiday, and talked so many of her village residents into buying a signed copy of the paperback. Thanks to The Write Romantics for their eternal support. And finally thanks to hubby and the munchkin for letting me disappear into my world of imaginary friends on a regular basis without moaning that I'm neglecting them xxx
I can't wait to see what the next year brings …


The Ricoh Theta (~$300 street; reviewed here) is the most popular 360 camera by a huge margin. It has an excellent, — arguably ideal — form factor. It is slim, thus minimizing parallax stitching errors, and its stick-like shape also serves as a natural, comfortable handle for the Theta.
It's no surprise that the Theta's design is being copied by low-cost 360 cameras. Here's one of those clones.
This camera claims to have 8mp sensor. Actually it uses the OV4689, which is a 4-mp sensor. Therefore actually it is 4mp + 4mp, not 8mp +8mp.
The manufacturer claims that it can also record at 4k 24fps although I highly doubt that. I also doubt the 1.5 hour recording time.
I don't know the retail price or availability, but the wholesale price is under $100.
Win a 3D 4k live streaming 360 camera worth $1299 from Hubblo in this video editing contest!