text:
1638: Backslashes
Comic #1638 (February 3, 2016)
Backslashes
Title text: I searched my .bash_history for the line with the highest ratio of special characters to regular alphanumeric characters, and the winner was: cat out.txt | grep -o "[[(].*[])][^)]]*$" ... I have no memory of this and no idea what I was trying to do, but I sure hope it worked.
Most programming languages use the concept of a string literal, which is just a text between some delimiters, usually quotes. For example, "Hello, world" is a string literal. The text being represented is Hello, world without the quotes. However, the quotes are also written to mark the beginning and end of the string. This is a problem when the text itself contains a quote, as in "This is a "quoted" string". The quotes around the word "quoted" are intended to be part of the text, but the language processor will likely confuse it for the end of the string, which would thus be two strings with quoted outside these strings (probably resulting in a syntax error).
To avoid this problem, an escape character (usually a backslash) is prepended to non-string-terminating quotes. So, the previous text would be written as "This is a \"quoted\" string". The language processor will substitute every occurrence of \" with only the quote character, and the string terminates at the quote character which does not immediately follow a backslash. In this case the resulting text string would be This is a "quoted" string as intended.
However, the problem now is that the intended text might contain a backslash itself. For example, the text "C:\" will now be interpreted as an unterminated string containing a quote character. To avoid this, literal backslashes also are escaped with a second backslash, i.e. instead of "C:\" we write "C:\\", where the language processor interprets \\ as one single backslash and the quote terminates the string to give C:\ as the output.
This doubling of backslashes happens in most programming and scripting languages, but also in other syntactic constructs such as regular expressions. So, when several of these languages are used in conjunction, backslashes pile up exponentially (each layer has to double the number of slashes). See example of a backslash explosion and alternatives to avoid this below.
This kind of backslash explosion is known as Leaning toothpick syndrome, and can happen in many situations. Below is an explanation of all the entries in the comic.
The backslash explosion in the title text is about a bash command (which uses the backslash to escape arguments) invoking the grep utility which searches for text following a pattern specified by means of a regular expression (which also uses the backslash to escape special characters). This leads to 3 backslashes in a row in the command, which could easily become 7 backslashes in a row if the text being searched for also contains a backslash.
Even advanced users who completely understand the concept often have a hard time figuring out exactly how many backslashes are required in a given situation. It is hopelessly frustrating to carefully calculate exactly the number of backslashes and then noticing that there's a mistake so the whole thing doesn't work. At a point, it becomes easier to just keep throwing backslashes in until things work than trying to reason what the correct number is.
It's unclear whether the regular expression in the title text is valid or not. A long discussion about the validity of the expression has occurred here on this explanation's talk page. The fact that many editors of the site, often themselves extremely technically qualified,[citation needed][citation needed] can't determine whether the expression is valid or not, adds a meta layer to the joke of the comic. This is an example of nerd sniping (oh, the irony\!\!\!\).
Entries in the list[edit]
The first four examples have names that are (somewhat) based on what they actually produce:
Backslash: 1 backslash appropriately named
Real backslash: 2 backslashes are labeled correctly as they do indeed refer to an escaped backslash.
Real real backslash: 3 backslashes would refer to an escaped backslash followed by an unescaped one. The first two backslashes would combine to make a real backslash while the third one would combine with the character following it to form an escape sequence. The name does thus not make a lot of sense, as this is two escape sequences and not a single "very real" one.
Actual backslash, for real this time: 4 backslashes form one single backslash escaped twice (the first escaping produces two backslashes, the second escaping doubles each of the backslashes). This is so common that even the documentation for the Python regular expression library has a section called Regular expression operations that mentions "\\\\" explicitly. In this case, the backslash has to be escaped once for being part of a regular expression and then each of these once more as the regular expression needs to be written inside a Python string. This is named in reference to the fact that the previous examples didn't contain enough escaping.
The remaining five examples of backslashes have more and more occult names (explanations) and do not refer to any more real uses of backslash escapes:
Elder backslash: 5 backslashes would be a doubly-escaped backslash plus an unescaped one. The reference to Elder in the comic has many meanings. It has become known through fantasy media; Most prominent with the Elder Days, which are the first Ages of Middle-earth in The Silmarillion, the more-or-less prequel to The Lord of the Rings. More recently it has been used in the Harry Potter universe where the Deathly Hallow called the Elder wand, made from Elder wood, is a very important part of the last book Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Other examples are the Elder Gods of the Cthulhu Mythos as well as various 'Elder' magical items and beings in the Dungeons and Dragons mythologies.
Backslash which escapes the screen and enters your brain: 6 backslashes is a play on the word "escape" as the backslash is supposed to be an "escape character" but obviously not "escaping the screen" and entering your brain. This could also be understood as the programmer getting backslashes on their mind, when they go beyond the Elder backslash domain...
Backslash so real it transcends time and space : 7 backslashes goes further than escaping the screen as they now transcends both time and space
Backslash to end all other text: 8 backslashes would be a triply-escaped backslash (same as 4 backslashes but with an additional escaping layer). It is said to "end all other text", i.e. there should never be any more text if someone uses eight in a row. But there could be more as indicated in the last example.
The true name of Ba'al, the Soul-Eater: ∞ backslashes (11 are shown but followed by "..." to indicate that they continue forever). If you could write an infinite number of backslashes it would actually be The true name of Ba'al, the Soul-Eater. This indicates that if you continue misusing backslashes like this you will end up devoured by a demon, for instance Beelzebub, for being so thoughtless... Ba'al has been mentioned before in 1419: On the Phone and in the title text of 1246: Pale Blue Dot.
Backslash explosion and alternatives[edit]
A reasonable example of a backslash explosion would be a PHP script on a web server which writes JavaScript code with a Regular Expression to be run on the client. If the JavaScript code has to test a string to see if it has a double-backslash, the Regular Expression to do so would be:
\\\\
where the first two backslashes represent a single backslash and the second two also represent a single backslash, so this searches for two consecutive back slashes. And the JavaScript would be:
RegExp("\\\\\\\\").test(str);
where every two backslashes means just one backslashes in the string, so the 8 backslashes in JavaScript become 4 backslashes in the Regular Expression. However, since this JavaScript code is to be written through a PHP script, the PHP code would be:
echo "RegExp(\"\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\").test(str);";
The word echo is the PHP command for writing something
The first quote starts the string
The RegExp( - including the open parenthesis - is written literally
The \" following that is a literal quote to be written
The first two slashes produce one single slash
And so on until 8 backward slashes are written
The next \" produces a literal quote character
The ).test(str); is written literally
The next quote finishes the string.
The final semicolon terminates the echo command
So, the presented scenario has escalated from a simple test for \\ to no less than seventeen backslashes in a row without stepping out of the most common operations.
If we go a bit further and try to write a Java program that outputs our PHP script, we'd have:
System.out.println("echo \"RegExp(\\\"\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\").test(str);\";");
Here, we have 35 backslashes in a row: the first 34 produce the 17 we need in our PHP script, and the last one is for escaping the quote character. (This comes closer to The true name of Ba'al, the Soul-Eater).
Some programming languages provide alternative matching string literal delimiters to limit situations where escaping of delimiters is needed. Often, one can begin and end a string with either a single quote or a double quote. This allows one to write 'This is a "quoted" string' if double quote marks are intended in the string literal or "This is a 'quoted' string" if single quote marks are intended. Both kinds of delimiters can't be used in the same string literal, but if one needs to construct a string containing both kinds of quote marks one can often concatenate two string literals, each of which uses a different delimiter.
Another feature that seems to be popular in modern programming languages is to provide an alternative syntax for string delimiters designed specifically to limit leaning toothpick syndrome. For example, in Python, a string literal starting with r" is a "raw string" [1] in which no escape processing is done, with similar semantics for a string starting with @" in C#. This allows one to write r"C:\Users" in Python or @"C:\Users" in C# without the need to escape the backslash. This does not allow one to embed the terminating delimiter in the middle of the string and prevents the use of the backslash to encode the newline character as \n, but comes in handy when writing a string encoding of a regular expression in which the backslash is escaping one or more other punctuation characters or a shorthand character class (e.g., \s for a whitespace character). For example, when looking for an anchor tag in HTML, developers may encode the regular expression as <[Aa]\s[^>]*>. If they express this regular expression as a raw string literal, the code looks like r"<[Aa]\s[^>]*>" instead of "<[Aa]\\s[^>]*>". The point here is that "leaning toothpick syndrome" is such a real problem that it has influenced programming language implementations.
[A list of the names of different numbers of backslashes. After each "item" there is a gray line to the text describing each item. As the text is aligned above each other, the lines becomes shorter as the sequence of backslashes becomes longer until there is just a line with the length of a single hyphen for the last item. There are 1 to 8 backslashes and then 11 plus "..." in the last entry.]
\------------ Backslash
\\----------- Real backslash
\\\---------- Real real backslash
\\\\---------- Actual backslash, for real this time
\\\\\--------- Elder backslash
\\\\\\-------- Backslash which escapes the screen and enters your brain
\\\\\\\------- Backslash so real it transcends time and space
\\\\\\\\------ Backslash to end all other text
\\\\\\\\\\\...- The true name of Ba'al, the Soul-Eater
Note on Title Text[edit]
The title text when first published was
I searched my .bash_history for the line with the highest ratio of special characters to regular alphanumeric characters, and the winner was: cat out.txt | grep -o "\\\[[(].*\\\[\])][^)\]]*$" ... I have no memory of this and no idea what I was trying to do, but I sure hope it worked.
It was changed within a few days to
I searched my .bash_history for the line with the highest ratio of special characters to regular alphanumeric characters, and the winner was: cat out.txt | grep -o "[[(].*[])][^)]]*$" ... I have no memory of this and no idea what I was trying to do, but I sure hope it worked.
The original title text seems to be more relevant to the comic, but the revised title text seems to make more sense as a legitimate command line due to the way backslashes are interpreted in regular expressions. See the Discussion below for much more on the topic.
It should be noted that this also occurs in almost every programming language where "\" is the escape character. i.e.
print("Hello")
> Hello
print("\"Hello\"")
> "Hello"
print("\\Hello\\")
> \Hello\
Oh, and by the way, isn't this the third comic to mention "Ba'al, the Soul Eater"? Maybe we should start a category. (Others are 1246 (title text) and 1419.) 173.245.54.29 06:14, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
Did that before seeing you comment, so yes I agree. --Kynde (talk) 09:47, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
But Davidy did not so the category has been deleted again. I have just cleaned up after my mess ;-) so there are no left over links to the dead category... --Kynde (talk) 22:27, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
The last entry may also be an oblique reference to the infinitely-expandable recursive acronym "GOD = GOD Over Djinn" mentioned in Richard Hofstadter's Gödel, Escher, Bach.Taibhse (talk) 16:42, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
I don't think the regex is invalid
Note: The regex changed after initial publication. See Changed Regex below
According to man grep you need to specify the -E option to use extended regex; without it unescaped parentheses are not interpreted, so they don't need to match.
My - very wild - guess is that it was the command he used to find the line with the most special characters, but I am not confident enough to edit the article (if someone can confirm?). 141.101.66.83 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)
If it was supposed to do that, it doesn't work. Running it on my bash history matches no lines, and I have lots of special characters in there 197.234.242.243 07:12, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
Explain it to me like I'm dumb. What is this comic going on about? I think the explanation needs more examples like that hello, above, because that's almost understandable. --198.41.238.231 07:47, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
I agree. But I cannot help either.--Kynde (talk) 09:51, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
This is the third time Randall has mentioned Ba'al the Soul Eater xD International Space Station (talk) 08:26, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
Yes, that was already mentioned a few hours before you comment, see the first comment. --Kynde (talk) 09:51, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
After passing the regex through bash, you get \\[[(].*\\[\])][^)\]]*$ That is, the literal character \, followed by [ or (, followed by any number of any characters, followed by \, followed by ] or ), followed by any number of characters that aren't ) or ], until the end of the line. 108.162.216.44 08:33, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
It sounds like you know what you are talking about. Anyone who can explain it good enough for the explanation, and correct the explanation of the title text if it is wrong to say that it would not work. I have added this as the reason for incomplete. But maybe also examples are needed for people with not programming skills/knowledge. We also enjoy xkcd ;-) --Kynde (talk) 09:51, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
I'm thinking that it's grepping for regular expressions that contain regular expressions. A regex containing "\[...\]" or "\(...\)" will match other regular expressions, as almost all non-trivial regexes use either character lists or groups. Now why out.txt is likely to contain not just regexes but rather regexes that search for regexes I have no idea - perhaps he had actually put too many backslashes in and he was trying to grep just for "[...]" or "(...)" (i.e. to locate probable regular expressions in out.txt, or anything else in parenthesis for that matter such as countless kinds of code/markup)? 162.158.152.185 17:35, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
For fun:
cat ~/.bash_history | xargs -d "\n" -n 1 -I {} bash -c 'chars="$(echo "$1" | grep -o "[a-zA-Z0-9 ]" | wc -l)"; echo "$(( 100 - $(( $chars * 100 / ${#1} )) )) $1"' _ {} | sort -nrk 1 | less
Outputs your bash_history, ordered by relative gibberishness. This was copied by hand from desktop to mobile, might well have a few typos.--162.158.90.208 10:04, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
Besides the fact that -d is a GNU extension to xargs (so it won't exist on OS X, FreeBSD, or anything else but Linux), this is a weird way to calculate gibberishness; I'm guessing functions, variable substitutions, .. and ./, etc. are going to swamp the more unreadable grep and the like. Plus, I think you need a uniq in there somewhere; otherwise, aren't the first few pages are all going to be filled with the 78 copies of "422 cd .." that tied for most gibberishy in my last 500 commands? --162.158.255.82 22:51, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
The problem in the comic is not with regexes per se but with situations when the entered text or expression passes through several interpreters, like bash -> grep/sed/awk, or program text -> external shell command. In such cases, you have to escape backslashes for each program in the sequence, and it gets worse if you have 'real' backslashes in the final text that you're processing with the utilities (Windows' file paths, for example). See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaning_toothpick_syndrome. Feel free to lift this to the explanation page, since I'm not good at longer and more careful explanations than this one. Also, gotta notice that Feedly stripped paired backslashes in the title text (probably passed it through some 'interpreter' embedded in its scripts). Aasasd (talk) 10:13, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
A funny comment about the MediaWiki software, which is even worse than this comic: <Nikerabbit> I looked the code for rlike and didn't find where it does this. Can you point me to it? <vvv> $pattern = preg_replace( '!(\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\)*(\\\\\\\\)?/!', '$1\\/', $pattern ); <Nikerabbit> I thought that was ascii art :) (source) --162.158.91.215 10:18, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
Interestingly, I first looked at this on my phone (using Chrome Feedly for Android), but the title text did not display correctly in that the backslashes didn't appear (which was a little confusing!). In Chrome on my Windows desktop, the title text appeared correctly. Jdluk (talk) 11:36, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
enough with the harry potter fancruft. "elder" is a perfectly good word. just because you came across it for the first time in harry potter means you are *typing carefully* the kind of person that likes harry potter. unless this is a harry potter reference wiki, of course. in which case i'll prepare a complete list of every word that appears both here and there and put a list on every page. oh, right, no i won't. --141.101.106.161 12:41, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
Remember that "Elder" is used in a lot of RPGs to denote high level enemies or items. I feel like that's what Randall's referring to here, more than Harry Potter or the general sense of the term "Elder." 108.162.245.156 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)
+1. Between the fact that harry potter (, ages, or tribes) aren't mentioned anywhere else in the text and the comic being a progressive list, I see this being the most likely explanation. Plus the metion of demons, which are easily the most* common usage of the modifier.
(*) or second most, after "elder gods", who are, let's face it, also demons. 162.158.180.125 14:41, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
I'm pretty sure that "Elder backslash" is in reference to the "Elder gods" of Lovecraft. 173.245.54.35 16:51, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
Note also that it's called 'The Elder Wand' not as an intensifier, as in this comic and the other examples given, but because it is literally made from the wood of an Elder Tree I'm pretty sure it's not an intentional reference. -Graptor 173.245.54.23 19:29, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
If it's an intentional reference to anything, it's to Lovecraft (or to something similar). I suspect the Elder Wand was an intentional pun by Rowling, however. --162.158.180.137 04:16, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
Since no-one else seemed to want to, I just restructured that paragraph to make it more clear that if anything Harry Potter was inspired by the older examples, not the other way around. Expanded the LOTR reference and added DnD. If anything Randall is likely to be referencing either the Lovecraft references, or the concept of Elder in general. 141.101.64.173 11:50, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
Attempting to add to the discussion: This regex is not necessarily invalid or incomprehensible. (Note: The regex changed after initial publication. See Changed Regex below.) It looks like he was looking for a line with a regular expression or definitely some code. You just have to work your way through the backslashes. Although it might be invalid depending on the precise rules. He has some unescaped closing brackets and closing parenthesis. If these have to always be escaped then the regex is invalid. If however you don't have to escape a closing bracket with no opening bracket, then things are fine. I'm not familiar enough with grep's regex parser to know how it handles that edge case. Presuming those unescaped paren and brackets are fine, his regex searches for:
1. A backslash
2. An opening bracket
3. An opening parenthesis (this is a character set but the only character in it is an opening paren)
4. Any number of any characters
7. A closing bracket
8. A closing paren (presuming it doesn't have to be escaped when there is no opening paren)
9. A closing bracket (presuming it doesn't have to be escaped when there is no opening bracket)
10. Any number of character that are not a closing paren or closing bracket
11. The end of the line
Basically he is looking for a string that looks like:
\[(AAAAA\[])]AAAAA
Looks like a regex to me, and it looks like this regex also doesn't escape closing paren/brackets that don't have an opening paren/bracket, so I'm guessing that he knows what he is doing and his regex is fine. Maybe he was playing regex golf? Cmancone (talk)cmancone
Ninjaed by Cmancone, above. I agree with that result in every respect except for the start-of-string being potentially anything, but putting my own analysis in here because it took long enough to type!
Depth-of-backslash might depend upon depth of utility. In Perl, ''-quotes (among others) treat everything within as literal whilst ""-quotes (and variations) interpolates any special characters, variables, etc that you put in it. (Search for "Quote and Quote-like operators" in your favourite PerlDocs source.) '\sss' is a literal backslash followed by three 's' characters , while "\sss" is the special \s escape (a whitespace) followed by two further regular characters. You might need to define the first when you need to use it to provide a not-previously-escaped \s so that it might be escaped within another context. Or you define it as "\\sss" (escaped-\) the first time, as equivalent to '\sss'. But '\\sss' would be a literal that, later, could be interpreted as an escaped-\ to the input of a further context where the \s finally becomes 'match a whitespace'.
'\\\sss' would be literal, whilst "\\\sss" could be equivalent to '\ ss' (literal backslash, literal space, rest of characters). Then, instead of literal '\\sss', for some purpose, you could interpolate two escaped-backslashes "\\\\sss"... and so on.
Meanwhile I think, just from visual inspection, "\\\[[(].*\\\[\])][^)\]]*$" in Bash should obey the interpolation rules quite nicely. The first two characters must be a literal backslash (from the escaped-backslash) and a literal open-square bracket (again, escaped). The next open-square and the close-square shortly after depict a character class that contains only an open-parenthesis, and could have been written as \(.
The .* indicates zero-or-more (the asterix) instances of any character (the dot). There is then a literal backslash (from the next \\ duo) and a literal open-square (the \[ pair) and close-square (the \] pair). The ) is literal and does not need escaping (as a parenthesis group had not yet been opened), as is the next ] character. To be sure, I would have written these two as the pair escapes \)\], but horses for courses...
Then there's another character class (the next [ and the final ]) required zero-or-more times (the asterix) to use up all the rest of the characters to the end (the ending $ character). As there was no ^ character (a.k.a. caret/circumflex/etc) at the start, the match isn't bothered about what unmatched characters appear before the original \(. This character class, however, starts with a ^ which in this context (the very first character of a character-class definition, not somewhere where an entire match-string starts) indicates negation of the following selection, so it is all characters but those specified, which is the regular close-parenthesis and (because it needs to be contained within a [] pair) the escaped close-square.
So, all matching strings must start with \[(, i.e. the backslash, open-square and open-paren. They can continue with any further text, before then having a \[])], i.e. backslash, open-and-close-squares and close-paren, close-square. After this, the match continues just as long as there are no non-closing square/classic brackets before the ending.
The minimum matching literal string would be \[(\[])] with longer variants being of the form X\[(Y\[])]Z where X and Y can be replaced by anything (or be absent), and Z can be replaced by anything (or absent!) so long as it doesn't contain possibly relevent close-brackets!. The latter stipulation is likely because the Y (and X) is allowed to contain these characters, and for some reason you don't want to confuse the test by finding some other \[])] segment within the X/Y-zones. (In this context, it doesn't actually seem to matter too much. But it might do in ways I haven't spotted or just be a hang-over from a prior permutation of the test.)
The "grep -o" function is working on the output to the file being cated (there are alternate ways of doing this that some people might prefer), to only accept the lines in the file that match the X\[(Y\[])]Z string. These lines would appear to be lines of out.txt (a fairly generic name that reveals little to its original purpose) that are well-formed for some other purpose. A safety-escaped (i.e. not to be taken literally by any simple parser) []-grouping containing a ()-group (not escaped, perhaps reasonably in context) containing potentially random text followed by an empty [] pair (again, safety-escaped). Depending on the source, the empty []-pair could mean many things, as with the other layers. And the lines may end with any further text.
The "out.txt" file might be the result of a prior Grep (string-search function) quote possibly scanning code for lines of particular importance by another pattern and dumping the results to out.txt for further perusal. And then Randall finds the need to dig further into the first result by extracting just those already selected that all have the X\[(Y\[])Z]-ish pattern to them.
But I could be wrong, and that's way too long for an official explanation. (Perhaps just something like the penultimate paragraph, if we're not entirely mistaken?) 162.158.152.89 14:14, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
The regex is supposed to be looking for (Note: The regex changed after initial publication. See Changed Regex below.):
\\\      backslash
[[(]     [ or (
.*       any character (repeated 0 or more times)
space    space
[[\])]   probably meant to match either [, ] or ). However, it's not correct, it instead matches the literal characters [)]
[^)\]]*  probably meant to match any character that isn't ) or ], repeated. Instead it means one character that's not a ), and then a ] zero or more times
$        end of string
The first problem is that you're not supposed to escape ] in a [...], and it also has to be first in the grouping (unless negated with a ^) It should be [][)] or something similar.
The second problem is the same. The last bit should be [^])]*$ and not [^)\]]*$. Khris (talk) 14:24, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
I was reading through the regex, if using grep you run into an error with an unmatched ")". Removing this gets a string such as \[(AAAAA\[]]AAAAA$ http://regexr.com/3cng8 162.158.214.230 14:42, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
The regex relies on several special cases (*surprise*). (Note: The regex changed after initial publication. See Changed Regex below.) First: bash double-quote expansion (see [2]). Perhaps non-intuitively, \\\ followed by a character that \ doesn't escape is an escaped backslash followed by a literal backslash, effectively the same as \\\\ followed by that same non-escaped character. After bash double-quote expansion, this results in:
\\[[(].*\\[\])][^)\]]*$
grep interprets this as:
any leading non-\ characters
literal backslash
character class containing [ and (
zero or more *any* characters
another literal backslash
yet another literal backslash, via a character class containing only a backslash. Note this does not contain an escaped ], as it might appear at first glance. See [3]
literal )
literal ]
character class of anything except ), \
zero or more ]
Matching examples:
echo 'asdf\[asdfasdf\\)]a]]]]]]' | grep -o "\\\[[(].*\\\[\])][^)\]]*$"
echo '\(\\)]P' | grep -o "\\\[[(].*\\\[\])][^)\]]*$"
108.162.216.34 16:14, 3 February 2016 (UTC)rb
One key thing to understand is that \ is not a special character when it's in a bracket expression - you can't escape characters in bracket expressions. So [^)\] simply means any character other then ) or \. Also, ( and ) are just regular characters unless they are escaped in basic regular expressions - extended regular expressions reverse this rule. -- Kalfalfa (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)
I don't know about the regular expression in the title text, but I think the explanation is incorrect in that it starts off talking about regular expressions. Escaping backslashes is an issue with strings in programming in general. 173.245.54.46 17:12, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
I suspect that Randall may have used the regexp in the title text to *find* malformed regular expressions in a file (out.txt) that he (or someone) had previously filled with output from some error message (or collection of error messages, or at least the output of something where a regular expression had been expected to work but had not worked as expected). 162.158.252.227 19:06, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
You can use metacharacters in character classes, the only metacharacters in a character class that must be escaped are the closing square bracket (]), the backslash (\), the hyphen, and the carat and hyphen (^) if they are the first listed item in the set. The closing square bracket requires escaping because including it without would signal the end of the set otherwise, which then means the backslash must also be escaped. The hyphen must be escaped because, without it, it signals a range (unless it is listed first, then it is literal without escaping). Carat when listed first because otherwise it signals a negative set.
Therefore, the end of the title text regex matches a backslash followed by either ] or ), which is then followed by any number (including none) of characters so long as they are not ] nor ) which means the whole regex can match "\[something\] more" or "\(something\)more" or "\[something\) more" as well as "\[something\]". — 162.158.255.117 01:16, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
I'll add that I use an almost identical regex in my mail server for matching mailing-list subject lines which often have a format of "[Listname] normal subject line" which made it pretty recognizable to me. — 162.158.255.117 01:24, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
Example of a match
First, the shell will do some escaping substitution. So, in order to easily read it, let's see what grep really receives:
$ echo "\\\[[(].*\\\[\])][^)\]]*$"
Let's break it out:
\\ matches a \
[[(] matches either a [ or a (
.* matches any series of characters until the next match
[\] matches a \
)] matches )]
[^)\] matches anything but ) or \
]* matches any number of ] (including none)
$ matches the end of the string
So the string \[aaa\]\\)]a]]]]]] matches! 108.162.228.167 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)
...Maybe it's meant to search for all Game Grumps transcripts which make mention of the "Grep" gag? 108.162.216.55 15:53, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
...Wow, guys, and here I was thinking he wanted to put the cat out, when the cat didn't want to go out.... 108.162.249.158 04:03, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
What I think is that Randall probably intended the regex to match "backslash, opening round or square bracket, anything, backslash, closing round or square bracket, anything that doesn't involve closing round or square brackets", since (unlike most other possibilities given) that actually looks like something one might want to search for. Whether it does, in fact, match that or something else (or indeed anything at all) is another question entirely. (For all we know, it didn't work, Randall figured out it didn't, and wrote the correct thing the next line over.)
Unrelatedly: this comic (and the backslash proliferation in general) reminded me of the Telnet Song. --162.158.180.137 04:16, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
That explanation is wrong: [\] does not match a literal backslash; it would still need to be escaped inside the brackets. That backslash escapes the next character, a ], so the group doesn't end there. The actual expression there is [\])], a character group containing an escaped ] and a ). Just like the first part. It is most likely intended to catch content surrounded by [ ] or ( ). 141.101.104.15 13:43, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
To clarify: this makes the expression catch anything that starts with a block surrounded by escaped round or square brackets. So stuff like \(Hello world\)more text here but with either round or square brackets (or combinations, since there's nothing enforcing they have to match. I'd have made it an OR case with two groups with matching brackets, personally) -141.101.104.15 13:51, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
You're making the same mistake Randall did: while many (most?) regex dialects use \ as escape inside a character class, this is not true for grep's default syntax. I've expanded that interpretation in my comment below, however the analysis by 108.162.228.167 is a correct explanation of how this expression is actually interpreted by grep. --141.101.75.185 15:42, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
Your analysis is thorough and correct, however it is unlikely this is what the regex was intended to accomplish. (Note: The regex changed after initial publication. See Changed Regex below.) More likely, Randall is more accustomed to other regex dialects such as Perl(-compatible) regex where a backslash does work to escape special characters inside a character class. Under that assumption the regex (with some whitespace inserted for readability) would break up as:
\\ [[(] an escaped opening bracket or paren
.* anything
\\ [\])] an escaped closing bracket or paren
[^)\]]* $ no closing bracket or paren occurring on the remainder of the line
Although the final condition is still a bit obscure, this still makes a lot more sense. Unfortunately it also crushes Randall's hope the regex worked as intended, since this simply isn't how the expression is parsed with grep's default syntax (which is why I always use grep -P). --141.101.75.185 15:34, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
Did anyone notice the Useless Use of Cat? 141.101.106.101 19:36, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
Yup - I hereby award Randall with the Useless Use of Cat Award of the day. Cherish it.
Zedn00 (talk) 03:51, 5 February 2016 (UTC) Zedn00
Changed Regex
At some point before 2016-02-09 18:00 +0100, Randall has modified the bash command in the title text!
Original command:
cat out.txt | grep -o "\\\[[(].*\\\[\])][^)\]]*$"
New command:
cat out.txt | grep -o "[[(].*[])][^)]]*$"
For the old command, 108.162.228.167's and 108.162.216.34's explanations above were correct.
The new command matches:
[[(]  either a '[' or a '('
.*    an unbounded and possibly empty sequence of arbitrary characters
[])]  either a ']' or a ')'
[^)]  any character except for a ')'
]*    an unbounded and possibly empty sequence of ']'
$     anchored at end of line
It now e.g. matches 123[abc.<>)x]]]]]:
$ echo "123[abc.<>)x]]]]]" | tee /dev/stderr | grep -o "[[(].*[])][^)]]*$"
This makes hardly more sense than the original command. --Markus (talk) 17:38, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
Randal may have been sincere about finding it in his history and wondering if it worked. I think he probably meant
cat out.txt | grep -o "[[(].*[])][^])]*$"
which breaks down as:
[^])]*  any number of any characters except for a ')' or ']'
This matches any line that has a '[' or '(' followed by a ')' or ']', matching from the first '[' or '(' to the end of the line. The final part of the regex, '[^])]*$', is not really necessary here, but it is a common pattern to follow a character pattern with an opposite character pattern to be sure the first character pattern matches the last instance of a repeating character, so he might have added it out of habit, which would explain also why he got it wrong (since he just followed '[blah]' with '[^blah]' which in this special case doesn't work because 'blah' has a special character in it: ']').
Concerned Netizen (talk) 02:23, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
Funny enough, I'm literally looking at some other dev's code right now that actually implements an eight backslash regex sequence, with just the comment "backslash". I'm still scratching my head over what they were trying to accomplish or even communicate with this. Domino (talk) 21:45, 16 August 2016 (UTC)domino
I believe the regex is a reference to xkcd 1313 (Regex Golf) 108.162.221.90 16:08, 26 August 2016 (UTC)
I had to use a backslash that escaped the screen today. I have a Discord bot written with Node.js, and my "friends" demanded I add a shruggie output [despite Discord having that already]. So, I now have a string that looks like '¯\\\\\\_(ツ)\_/¯'. -- Papayaman1000 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)
Regarding the change to the title text (with all backslashes being removed) it appears that this may not be a deliberate edit, as other comics (e.g. 1277) have also had all backslashes disappear from the title text. It appears that one of the tools Randall is using may be 'solving' accidentally escaped characters by doing a sed 's/\\//g' Sqek (talk) 13:18, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
Retrieved from "https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1638:_Backslashes&oldid=289402"
Comics from February
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CU Boulder Today
Inaugural nationalism vs. globalism debate to be hosted on campus April 2
The Steamboat Institute announced today it will host an April 2 debate at CU Boulder's Macky Auditorium on the issues of nationalism and globalism, featuring former Mexican President Vicente Fox and Brexit architect Nigel Farage.
The talk will start at 6:30 p.m. and is part of the nonprofit, nonpartisan institute's inaugural 2018 Campus Liberty Tour. Other talks are set for April 3 at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs; April 5 at the University of Maryland, College Park; and April 6 at Lafayette College in Pennsylvania. Event moderators will include Wall Street Journal editorial board member Mary Kissel, Washington Examiner columnist Tom Rogan, and CU Boulder Visiting Professor in Conservative Thought and Policy Robert Kaufman.
"The Steamboat Institute is honored to inspire the next generation of leaders with the thought-provoking commentary of Vicente Fox and Nigel Farage," said Steamboat Institute CEO and Chairman Jennifer-Schubert-Akin. "A robust—but reasoned and respectful—campus debate is one of the most effective ways to reach students with diverse ideologies and help them learn how to think, not what to think."
CU Regent Heidi Ganahl added, "The Free to Be Coalition is honored to help launch this debate series and looks forward to welcoming Nigel Farage and Vicente Fox to the University of Colorado.
Who: Open to the public
What: Nationalism vs. Globalism Debate and Discussion
When: Monday, April 2, 6:30–8:30 p.m.
Where: Macky Auditorium
"We are pleased that these transformative figures from both sides of the political aisle will come together and demonstrate by example the meaning of civil and respectful debate, and the right for all to listen and establish one's own conclusions on views, which may differ from their own," Ganahl said.
Fox, who served as Mexico's president from 2000 to 2006, said, "Perhaps at no other time in human history have so many people strived to make better lives for themselves and their families by peacefully moving to countries with more opportunity and stronger institutions and engaging in mutually beneficial trade with other cultures. I look forward to defending these strivers at The Steamboat Institute's inaugural Campus Liberty Tour."
Farage, a politician, political analyst and former leader of the United Kingdom's Independence Party, said, "Brexit and the election of Donald Trump demonstrate that people have turned against rule by elite, who have been happy to overlook the interests of ordinary citizens in favor of trade and immigration policies that benefit their pocketbooks. I am honored to speak for these forgotten men and women at The Steamboat Institute's Campus Liberty Tour."
For more information about tickets and other details, please visit The Steamboat Institute online.
The Steamboat Institute event is hosted in partnership with the CU Boulder Center for Western Civilization, Thought & Policy and the CU Free to Be Student Debate Club.
Engaging in external service activities—A panel Feb. 1
Early- and mid-career faculty: Join a panel discussion on the advantages and challenges of engaging in external service activities, such as serving as a president, editor, conference organizer, or outreach coordinator at another organization. Read more
Reducing polarization and fighting extremism in Colorado—A panel Feb. 2
Political polarization and extremism is a major challenge in today's America. Join the Benson Center for a panel of community leaders who are working to address these challenges in Colorado. Read more
Molly Bloom, author of 'Molly's Game,' to speak at CU Feb. 27
The CU Boulder alumna, bestselling author and entrepreneur best known for her memoir "Molly's Game" will speak in Macky Auditorium as part of the Leo Hill Leadership Speaker Series. Read more
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Defy Convention with the 2020 GMC Sierra 2500HD
July 9th, 2019	by	Alex Watson
Are you in the market for a new heavy-duty truck? GMC has you covered from top to bottom with the new Sierra 2500HD. At first glance, the 2020 Sierra 2500HD—which is in its first year of a new body structure—is as impressive as they come. And once you get into the details of its capabilities and features, it doesn't disappoint. In short, it's powerful yet refined—sophisticated yet practical. This article will discuss the 2020 Sierra 2500HD's remarkable towing performance, its beautiful and functional exterior and interior features, and the various trim levels and their pricing.
THE TOWING
Perhaps the most impressive aspect of the new Sierra 2500 HD is its towing capabilities. Let's dive into the details:
Trailering Capabilities
The Sierra 2500HD can tow up to 30,000 pounds, which is quite a jump from the 2019 models of 23,300 lbs. It's clear that GMC focused on attracting customers who are looking to pull a trailer. This is the first year that the automobile manufacturer has assigned the Sierra HD models its own chief engineer and development program; in times past, their development was seen simply as an extension of the Sierra 1500. Jaclyn McQuaid, the chief engineer, noted that trailering was the focal point in the Sierra HD's design process, pointing out that the 2020 models have "a beefier driveline and suspension, a stiffer frame, larger axles and propshafts, and an enhanced cooling system." In other words, it's built to be a towing juggernaut.
The Powertrain
Of course, no features will allow for impressive towing capacity like a truck's powertrain, and the Sierra HD has it going on in that department. The available 6.6-liter Duramax turbo-diesel V8 produces 445 horsepower and 910 lb-ft of torque. While these are the same numbers as previous models, this engine has been designed for higher efficiency in the 2020 Sierra 2500HD. For instance, there is a bigger radiator and fan for extra cooling capacity, as well as, enhanced air induction. One of the most impressive aspects of the powertrain is the new Allison 10-speed automatic transmission, which is being offered for the first time in this line up of HD pickups. With closer gear spacing than ever before, the engine is able to consistently run at the perfect level, no matter the towing load or terrain.
This is also the first year that GMC is offering a 6.6-liter engine that runs on gasoline in their HD trucks. The 6.6-liter gasoline direct-injected V8 engine is exclusive to GMC, and it delivers 401 hp and 464 ft-lb of torque. This is an 11% and 22% increase in hp and torque, respectively, from the 6.0-liter gasoline engine of previous models. Customers who opt for the 6.6-liter gasoline V8 will get the 6L90 six-speed automatic transmission.
Finally, the powertrain improvements for the 2020 Sierra 2500HD include bigger and stronger rear axles, which helps to provide maximum torque to the ground, as well as, better gross axle weight ratings (GAWR). The front axles are also bigger and stronger in general, and an 11.5-inch ring gear comes standard on all 2500HD models.
Transparent Trailer View
Along with more power to pull a trailer, the new Sierra HD features one of the most exciting new technologies in the industry today: transparent trailer view. GMC calls it the ProGrade Trailering System, and it essentially renders the trailer invisible behind the truck. This has obvious advantages for trailer haulers from experts to novices.
By using various combinations of 15 cameras, the trailering system is designed to simplify every aspect of trailering. Seeing through the trailer allows for easier and safer maneuvering in traffic, backing up and parking. The system even offers a close-up of the hitch, making coupling a breeze. Furthermore, the ProGrade Trailering System includes:
Lights for the hitch area
Automatic parking brake assistance
A mobile app with a departure checklist, tire pressure monitoring, theft notifications and many other features
Hauling Capabilities
GMC also worked to improve the 2020 Sierra HD's hauling capabilities and to make loading and unloading cargo as practical as possible for customers. For one, it now leads its class in cargo- bed volume and offers 12 corner tie-downs, and you have the option of adding a 120-volt power outlet in the bed. The cargo bed railings are an inch lower than the 2019 Sierra HD models, which lends to an easier liftover.
Additionally, the truck has steps on the sides of the bed and on the corners of the rear bumper—roughly the size of a work boot—so that customers can have better access to objects inside the bed. Moreover, higher trim levels of the Sierra HD showcase the new MultiPro six-function tailgate that was introduced by GMC on the 1500 models this year; however, the version of the tailgate found on the 2500 is designed specifically for the HD models.
THE EXTERIOR
Now that you know the gist of the towing capabilities, let's take a look at the exterior characteristics:
2020 marks the beginning of a new era of body style for GMC pickups; overall, it's larger and more aggressive than ever before. The contrast between the Sierra 1500 and 2500HD is more apparent than in previous years, as the latter now stands 2 inches taller and stretches 10 inches longer than its 2019 version.
Additionally, the hood line is elevated, and the grill is an entirely different thing altogether. While GMC has received some criticism for the redesigned grill on the Sierra (as with the Chevrolet Silverado), there's no question that it makes a statement: a bold, unapologetic statement with lots of chrome and character. The grill is massive, and it's capped by a hood scoop that adds to the overall appeal of the truck. The hood scoop is also designed to assist the new cooling system that comes with the Duramax turbo-diesel engine.
Another component that adds to the Sierra HD's aggressive look is the LED lighting, which is everywhere. This includes headlights, taillights, roof marker lights and fog lights (available through upgrade). Moreover, the roof has four yellow running lights, and each wheel-well flare has an orange side marker at the top.
There are eight primary colors to choose from for the Sierra HD models:
Red Quartz Tricoat
There's more to the 2020 Sierra HD than it's attractive and functional exterior; it's also built to impress on the inside:
Roominess
Driver and passenger comfort is a big part of the Sierra HD's appeal. GMC has stepped up their game in creating more room in the cabin. In fact, the 2500 crew cab models are now top of the class for front head and legroom. Also, there are three more inches of legroom in the rear-seat than there were in previous models. If you're one of the 90% of GMC customers who choose a crew cab body style, this extra room could prove critical in your riding experience—particularly on longer trips.
The cabin in the Sierra HD models is built on the same construction as the Silverado. However, that's where the similarities end. As with many other specs, GMC puts their unique touch on their cabin features, and the new Sierra HD is no exception. For starters, the seating profile is higher than in recent years, which provides increased visibility on the road and, perhaps, a greater sense of safety. While the base model is satisfyingly upscale, the most elaborate interior comes in the Denali edition, which sports large pebbled grain leather upholstery with contrasting stitching, and no truck will have identical-looking seats. Also, the trim on the Sierra HD Denali comes in authentic open-pore wood with dark aluminum decor.
You've read about the ProGrade Trailering System, which is intelligently integrated into the Sierra 2500HD's computers. But that's not all the impressive technology the truck offers. There are 15 cameras in total, which come in handy even when you're not hauling a trailer. For instance, you can see an overview of the truck, inspect the cargo in the bed, and see along the wheels as you parallel park.
Additionally, a coinciding mobile app called MyGMC offers several functions that assist with pulling a trailer and keeping the trailer in good condition (e.g., controlling temperature, monitoring tire pressure, checking trailer lights, controlling the integrated brake system, etc.). Furthermore, you can opt for a 15-inch head-up screen that displays important functions such as an odometer, an inclinometer, trailer info, and navigation instructions, among others. And let's not forget about the optional Rear Camera Mirror and HD Surround Vision camera system.
THE TRIMS AND PRICING
The 2020 Sierra 2500HD comes in five trim levels: The base model, SLE, SLT, AT4 and Denali. Prices for these trims, along with a plethora of configurations, differ as much as $30,000.
Base Model, SLE, and SLT
The base model Sierra 2500HD starts at $37,195 MSRP, which is the least expensive option we've seen for a GMC Heavy Duty truck in years. The Sierra 2500HD comes as a regular cab/long bed model, and it is basically GMC's version of the Silverado Work Truck. The price goes up to $41,595 if you opt for a crew cab with standard bed, and you can add a long bed for $200.
The SLE is one step above, meaning it has a few niceties not included in the base model. Starting at $41,595 (regular cab/long bed), you can get a crew cab with standard bed for $45,395. Again, adding a long bed to the crew cab model is just $200. The SLT is the Sierra 2500HD's middle trim level, and it reflects both in price and features. It comes stocked with a double cab and standard bed for $52,195, and you can upgrade to a crew cab/standard bed for $53,995.
This trim is all new to the GMC lineup of trucks. The AT4 was designed with off-roaders in mind. It comes with unique exterior and interior features (e.g., exclusive paint colors, dark chrome grill and trim, jet black upholstery, etc.), as well as some practical upgrades that make it worthy of its all-terrain title. For instance, the AT4 is stocked with an off-road suspension, locking rear differential and skid plates. It also comes with an off-road mode you can select for the traction control system. Furthermore, it boasts a hill start assist and hill descent control. The AT4 comes only in the crew cab model, which starts at $59,295; it's $200 to add a long bed.
The Denali is the Sierra's luxury trim, and has been since 2001. Along with some of the interior perks mentioned previously, the Denali comes with an enlarged chrome grill and 20-inch chrome wheels, among other features. Limited to crew cab form, it starts at $65,295, with the option of adding the $200 long bed.
If you're looking for muscle and appeal in a truck, don't settle for anything less than the 2020 GMC Sierra 2500HD. It has towing and hauling capabilities to compete with any pickup in its class, and its innovative trailering technology is second to none. And let's not forget its bold, attractive and functional exterior and interior. Be sure to come out to Liberty for a test drive, and find the trim level that works best for you!
-Alex Watson
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Home » Hurst appointed president of Panera
Hurst appointed president of Panera
By Rebekah Schouten
Blaine Hurst has been named president of Panera Bread Co.
ST. LOUIS — Blaine Hurst has been named president of Panera Bread Co., effective Dec. 12. He will succeed Drew Madsen, who has resigned for personal reasons, Panera said.
Hurst joined Panera in 2010 to work on the development of Panera 2.0. In May 2013, he was named executive vice president of technology and transformation, and in October 2014 he was named chief transformation and growth officer.
Drew Madsen, who became president of Panera in May 2015, has resigned.
Before Panera, Hurst was vice chairman and president at Papa John's International, Inc., vice president of information services at Boston Chicken and president of restaurant technology solutions at eMac Digital L.L.C., an enterprise backed by McDonald's.
"Blaine has been instrumental in our multiyear efforts to transform Panera into a better competitive alternative with expanded growth opportunities," said Ron Shaich, chairman and CEO of Panera Bread. "Blaine is well known and respected within the restaurant industry and the Panera family. Both colleagues and franchisees value his innovative thinking, the strength of the teams he's built and his ability to drive transformative change."
Companies Food Service Panera Bread
Former Darden CEO to president of Panera
Quiznos president appointed CEO
Panera to create thousands of delivery jobs by end of 2017
Meeting demand for clean label poultry with phosphate alternatives


This is SUCH a good quote and I can't find out who its by? Confirming once again that Anon rocks. So often I find myself at the circus. This week I went to soft play with my son. For those without children this is the equivalent of a Saturday night drunken brawl with squidgy walls, … Continue reading Don't blame a clown for acting like a clown, blame yourself for going to the circus.
Quote from the lyrics of Ariana Grande. I'm totally using this quote as an excuse to open a bottle of pink bubbles (you know for photography authenticity) I have a secret, which if you ever met me isn't the greatest secret ever. In my head I am a fairy. When I first met Mr F … Continue reading Make it pop like pink Champagne.


Put your best foot forward on the style panel by wearing these golden coloured sandals from N-Gal. The upper of these sandals are made of 73% leather 27% textile and the leather sole offer you great cushioning. Fill the space with magic as you adorn this pair with linen trousers and a cowl neck top.


text:
Romance of the Three Kingdoms XIV Gets New Trailers, Video, and Gameplay Details
Today Koei Tecmo released three videos and new information about its strategy simulation game Romance of the Three Kingdoms XIV.
The first video comes from the Japanese side of the publisher, and it's the launch trailer since the game just released in Japan.
It features the theme song and a look at the extensive cast of heroes and officers.
The second is a new trailer in English focusing on the features of the game and showing quite a bit of gameplay.
The third is a developer diary video starring producer Kazuhiro Echigoya as he talks about characters and their traits.
The accompanying press release also provides more insight on diplomacy.
"In RTK14, it's important to have a large number of forces surrounding you, and actively pursuing relations with allies and the opposition is required to succeed in battle.
'Goodwill' with another army can be improved through gifts such as gold, supplies, or specialty goods — and as goodwill increases, relations will improve with a possibility of forming an alliance. Forming an alliance prevents the player from attacking their new partners or conquering their territory, but at the same time allows them to maintain their supply lines while passing through ally territory.
As the bond between the forces deepen, players can even request their ally to attack an opponent to help improve any dire situation. If an alliance isn't working, or no longer useful, it can be annulled allowing the forces to be separated. Additionally, players can take advantage of ally units by using 'Plots'. As the game progresses, this becomes a key way to weaken an enemy force.
RTK14 offers players a total of five types of schemes: Hidden Poison, Estrange, Placation, Unattended Home and Dual Destruction – allowing different strategies to be used depending on the situation at hand. Hidden Poison lowers the development and public order of the targeted Force, and can cause bandits from foreign tribes to appear. Estrange lowers the loyalty of the target officer through bad rumors about their ruler.
Placation targets the people of free areas, or areas under the control of other forces, in order to gain control of the area core. Unattended Home incites a viceroy or governor into leaving their current Force and going it along. Finally, Dual Destruction spreads damaging rumors about one Force within the territory of another.
The success of any of these schemes can have a massive impact on the overall battle situation, though failure can cause relations with the affected force to grow considerably worse.
Increasing relations with foreign units is also important as only non-enemy units can be forced to surrender. Using the 'Foreign' function, players can request the return of captured officers as well as use the Order Surrender command. Careful planning and preparation are required to ensure that a surrender is successful."
Romance of The Three Kingdoms XIV will be released in North America and Europe on February 28, 2020 for PS4 and PC.
If you want to learn more, you can also check out the first video of the developer diary series featuring Kou Shibusawa himself, alongside more screenshots and details, another video which explains how the game lets you paint the map to visualize frontlines and supply areas intuitively, the opening cutscene, and plenty of gameplay.The post Romance of the Three Kingdoms XIV Gets New Trailers, Video, and Gameplay Details appeared first on Twinfinite.
KCNcrew Pack 01-15-20
apulSoft apShaper 1.0.2 FIXED


Millennials are one of the largest generations in history. They've grown up in a time of rapid change which has influenced their perspectives, priorities, and expectations. BrandingBusiness Founding Partner Ryan Rieches talks with Dan Negroni, Founder and CEO at Launchbox, a firm dedicated to empowering individuals and organizations with skills to create success with our next generation of leaders. The two discuss the importance of shifting mindsets, finding your purpose, and the steps to developing your personal brand.


If Andy Bechtolsheim, the chief technology officer at datacenter switching upstart Arista Networks, wanted to design ASICs to try to take a bigger piece of the switch pie – or more precisely, thought that this was a good idea at all – rest assured, Arista would be spending money engineering its own chips and fighting for capacity at the four remaining foundries that have advanced processes.
But when Arista was founded back in 2008, one of its founding principles was to work on a virtualized and extensible network operating system based on Linux and let the merchant silicon providers – initially Fulcrum Microsystems (which was bought by Intel five years ago) and Broadcom, and more recently the XPliant division of Cavium (soon to be part of Marvell, we expect) – grind against each other, offering a mix of features and, as it turns out, different levels of switch programmability to suit the various needs of enterprise, hyperscale, cloud builder, and even a few HPC customers.
This is a strategy that has worked well, with Bechtolsheim – one of the co-founders of Sun Microsystems and also a co-founder of Granite Systems, a pioneer in the 1 Gb/sec Ethernet era in the mid-1990s that was sold to Cisco systems only a year after it was established, giving the dominant router supplier its entrance into the switching business it still dominates – wielding a kind of soft power, encouraging the industry to adopt the 25G Ethernet standard that the IEEE initially rejected (until Google and Microsoft leaned in) and that has transformed datacenter switching for the better (lower power and lower cost per bit) and also driving the architecture of future 400 Gb/sec Ethernet standards. Arista is also, of course, growing market share in datacenter switching and making a healthy amount of money, and the wonder is why someone has not snapped it up. The company's whopping $20.2 billion market capitalization, which is nearly an order of magnitude larger than its annual revenue run rate, is definitely an inhibitor. With $54.4 billion in the bank, Cisco could afford it, but it already has its own pair of operating systems and uses merchant silicon for some of its switches as well as homegrown chips. Cisco doesn't need Arista so much as it needs Arista to disappear.
No matter. We are just as happy to Arista to be expensive to acquire and therefore independent. Because of this, the company can do things such as embrace the "Tofino" programmable switch chips from upstart merchant silicon supplier Barefoot Networks, which the company has just done. One could say finally done, with a certain amount of exasperation, but switch buyers are very conservative and do a lot of heavy testing and therefore switch ASIC makers have to be patient as switch builders put the chips through the paces. This can take years. This conservatism means the Internet still works. And the competition between vendors means there are different network processing options to support the EOS substrate from Arista, much as there are different processor architectures for servers that support Linux and, in the past and now in the future, Windows Server.
Over the past year and a half, customers have been asking for more programmability, and the switch ASIC makers have been rolling it out. The XPliant XP80 that goes into the Arista 7160 switch was the first programmable processor that the company used. This chip enabled Arista to add a feature called AlgoMatch, which replaces very expensive TCAM memory that has been typically used in switches for access control lists. This approach is somewhere around 50 percent more power efficient and delivers twice as many rules for IPv4 networks and four times the capacity for IPv6 networks. The XP80 also allowed for network admins to dynamically adjust table sizes for important resources such as MAC address tables, host tables, routing tables, and so forth, and to add new protocols and encapsulations as they come into the market. In the past, this would have required a rev on the chip, which can take 18 months to 24 months.
The company more recently added the "Trident-3" ASICs from Broadcom. The Trident line has had an increasing level of programmability, and it has been added to Arista's 7050X line of modular switches, the very first products that the company sold a decade ago that have been updated several times with different ASICs. Hull says that the Broadcom chips have roughly the same level of programmability as the XPliant chips, although the manner in which it is implemented in a combination of microcode and firmware is different.
The Tofino chips from Barefoot take programmability up yet another notch, thanks in large part to the P4 programming language that is being championed by many, notably Google.
In this regard, the Tofino chips will give the switches that use them a wider possible range of use cases and a longer life in the field, it is reasonably to speculate. They can change their personalities many times, and find different uses in different parts of the network over time. But that is not the real benefit. Getting new functionality faster is the real goal of these programmable chips, breaking the ASIC development cycle and doing something in two months that, before programmability, would take two years.
You might be thinking that this programmability carries a high premium to end users, but it doesn't. Hull estimates that there is something on the order of a 10 percent to 20 percent premium for programmable switches, with the premium being highest on the Tofino chips. In some cases, Arista will provide pre-programmed profiles for the switches based on the Tofino chips, and charge a recurring subscription for them, and in other cases such as with the hyperscalers and financial services organizations that have sophisticated network teams and programmers, they will do it themselves and keep the intellectual property under wraps.
By the way, Hull doesn't expect that the market will suddenly and abruptly adopt the Tofino-based products, but rather a small number of large customers with intense programmability needs will buy a relatively large number of these switches; enterprises and other service providers will take more time to see the benefits and learn how to deploy them.
At the moment, Arista is offering two different 7170 series switches based on the Tofino chips.
The 7170-32C comes in a 1U chassis has a single 3.3 Tb/sec ASIC that, as the name suggests, can drive 32 ports at 100 Gb/sec speeds and then a proportionately larger numbers of ports at lower speeds. This switch has 22 MB of system buffer memory, can forward packets at 2.5 billion packets per second, has a port-to-port hop latency of 800 nanoseconds (which is not all that great for Ethernet, with some chips down in the 450 nanosecond range), and a typical power consumption of 7 watts per port.
The 7170-64C has one 6.5 Tb/sec Tofino ASIC in a 2U box, and can drive 64 ports at 100 Gb/sec; the average port burns 5 watts because its power supply and cooling is more balanced, we presume. (The spec sheets quote the full duplex bandwidth of the device, which is 12.8 Tb/sec for all packets in and all packets out, taking out overhead from peak. That does not mean it has two Tofino chips in it.) The system buffer size and port hop latency are the same, but the bandwidth of this switch is 6.5 Tb/sec and the forwarding rate is 5.08 billion packets per second.
The larger 64 port switch based on the Tofino chip is shipping now, with a cloud profile shipping and a security and telemetry profile coming in August. The smaller switch will start shipping in the third quarter. The switches have a list price of $1,200 per port in the bigger box. This is significantly higher than the $516 per port charge that the industry averaged in the first quarter, according to data from IDC. But this is not precisely an apples-to-apples comparison, one being list price and the other being an average street price across a wide range of feature sets in the chips. Our point is that you can probably get these switches for anywhere from 20 percent to 40 percent off list, in the right volumes. Like hundreds to thousands of units.


I've been sick for the past week with the Cold to End All Colds (or the flu?). By Saturday, I was getting desperate for anything to kill some time. Happily, I found a link to a personality test on E Tells Tales and spent five minutes answering seventy-two questions.
Really, though, reading the description is a little like reading my diary.
Take it and tell me what you think.
I've taken this test many times. In the past, I considered myself somewhat of a Myers-Briggs Guru of sorts. The test you linked to is one of the better free options available.
I am a INTP, the description is pretty spot on, though I am a soft I, so I don't identify with all of it. It's also one of the rarer types. Tony is an INFJ (like you) ... I guess I must like your kind!


text:
Q: Finding a metric such that $\Phi$ becomes a contraction Let
$$
f:\:[0,1]\rightarrow\mathbb{R};\\
\Phi: \mathcal{F}([0,1], \mathbb{R})
\rightarrow \mathcal{F}([0,1], \mathbb{R}),\\
f\mapsto\Phi(f):=Φf := \left(x\mapsto\left\{
\begin{array}{l@{\quad:\quad}l}
\frac{1}{2}f(3x) & 0 \le x \le \frac{1}{3} \\
\frac{1}{2}f(1) & \frac{1}{3} \le x \le \frac{2}{3} \\
\frac{1}{2}f(3(x-\frac{2}{3}))+\frac{1}{2}f(1) & \frac{2}{3} \le x \le 1
\end{array}\right.\right)
$$
Where $\mathcal{F}(A, B)$ is the set of all functions from $A$ to $B$.
Since the actual assignment is to show that $(\Phi^n(\mathrm{id}))_n$ converges uniformly to a continuous function $g$, I have to find a metric $d$ such that $Φ$ becomes a contraction, or equivalently:
$$∃k\in[0,1):\: ∀f,g\in\mathcal{F}([0,1],\mathbb{R}): d(Φf,Φg)≤k\:d(f,g)$$.
I assumed that this should be the case for the uniform norm, so i looked at $[0,1]=[0,\frac{1}{3}]\cup[\frac{1}{3},\frac{2}{3}]\cup[\frac{2}{3},1]:=A\cup B\cup C$ separately:
$$
{∥Φf-Φg∥}_A
= \sup\left\{\frac{1}{2}|f(3x)-g(3x)|,\:x\in A\right\}
= \frac{1}{2}\sup\left\{|f(y)-g(y)|,\:y\in [0,1]\right\}
= \frac{1}{2}{∥f-g∥}
$$
$$
{∥Φf-Φg∥}_B
= \sup\left\{\frac{1}{2}|f(1)-g(1)|,\:x\in B\right\}
= \frac{1}{2}{∥f-g∥_{\{1\}}}
≤ \frac{1}{2}{∥f-g∥}
$$
$$
{∥Φf-Φg∥}_C
= \sup\left\{\frac{1}{2}|f(3(x-\frac{2}{3}))-g(3(x-\frac{2}{3}))+f(1)-g(1)|,\:x\in C\right\}
= \frac{1}{2}\sup\left\{|f(y)-g(y)+f(1)-g(1)|,\:y\in [0,1]\right\}
≤ \frac{1}{2}\sup\left\{|f(y)-g(y)|+|f(1)-g(1)|,\:y\in [0,1]\right\}
= \frac{1}{2}(∥f-g∥ + ∥f-g∥_{\{1\}})
≤ {∥f-g∥}
$$
but the last part does not fit into what I'm trying to show, since $k$ is supposed to be $≤1$.
as far as I can see, there are two possibilities:

*

*The upper estimation of the limit was too big, there is a smaller one leading to a valid $k$.

*The uniform norm does not make $Φ$ a contraction, I have to find another metric.

Which one of these possibilities holds? If it is the latter, what other metric should I seek for?

A: Let $X$ be the set of $f:[0,1]\to[0,1]$ such that $f(1)=1$. Then $X$ is complete in the uniform norm, the identity function is in $X$, and it's easy to show that $\Phi$ is a strict contraction on $X$.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


There are reports that all is not well between Meena and hubby Vidyasagar. The buzz in Kollywood is that Vidyasagar is not so keen on Meena donning the greasepaint but the lady appears to be keen on continuing her career. Apparently, the tiff between the couple broke out when Meena agreed to star in a Malayalam and Kannada film.
When the actress was contacted to find out if there was any truth in this, she denied it and said they are all just baseless rumors.
Does it mean that the lady will quit acting to settle for a quite family life?


What Does The Name Ersi Mean?
What Ersis Have Visited This Page?
How difficult is it to pronounce Ersi?
Can Ersi be pronounced multiple ways?
We noticed you have a microphone. If you know how to pronounce Ersi, just click the button to record. We'll save it, review it, and post it to help others. Recordings from children under 18 are not allowed.
What does the name Ersi mean? Find out below.
Ersi Lami is an athlete for the KS Veleçiku Koplik.
Ersi Kryemadhi is an athlete for the Tirana AS.
When was the first name Ersi first recorded in the United States? The oldest recorded birth by the Social Security Administration for the name Ersi is Wednesday, November 19th, 1884.
How unique is the name Ersi? From 1880 to 2017 less than 5 people per year have been born with the first name Ersi. Hoorah! You are a unique individual.
Weird things about the name Ersi: Your name in reverse order is Isre. A random rearrangement of the letters in your name (anagram) will give Eisr. How do you pronounce that?


text:
Return of the 'Blood Moon': The Last Total Lunar Eclipse for 3 Years
By Josephine Justin - November 08, 2022
What's special about this lunar eclipse?
The last total lunar eclipse for three years will occur today, November 8, 2022, with the next occurring on March 14, 2025 — though we will continue to see partial and penumbral lunar eclipses during that time.
A lunar eclipse occurs when the Sun, Earth, and Moon align so that the Moon passes into Earth's shadow. In a total lunar eclipse, the entire Moon falls within the darkest part of Earth's shadow, called the umbra. When the Moon is within the umbra, it will turn a reddish hue. Lunar eclipses are sometimes called "Blood Moons" because of this phenomenon.
How can I observe the eclipse?
You don't need any special equipment to observe a lunar eclipse, although binoculars or a telescope will enhance the view and the red color. A dark environment away from bright lights makes for the best viewing conditions.
The eclipse will be visible across North and Central America and in Ecuador, Colombia, and western portions of Venezuela and Peru. In Puerto Rico, the Moon sets just after totality begins. The eclipse is also visible in Asia, Australia, and New Zealand. Viewers in Alaska and Hawaii will have the opportunity to see every stage of the eclipse.
(NASA, timeanddate.com)
Qatar Ready to Host 2025 ITTF World Table Tennis Championship
President of Qatar Table Tennis Association (QTTA) Khalil Al Mohannadi, who is also President of Arab and Asian federations and Deputy President of th...
Aspire Zone to Host World Beach Volleyball Champions
The curtain will come down on a brilliant first season of the Beach Pro Tour when 20 of the world's best beach volleyball teams battle to become t...
Environment Ministry calls for protection of environment; bans vehicles, trucks' entry to meadows
The Ministry of Environment and Climate Change (MoECC) has called upon all drivers of vehicles and trucks and all people visiting meadows to adhere to...
M7 Announces Series of Creative Workshops for Public
Qatar epicenter for innovation and entrepreneurship in the fields of design, fashion and technology (M7) announced on Wednesday a series of creative w...
Lionel Messi Set to Reject PSG's Contract Extension Offer: Report
Lionel Messi is set to reject PSG's contract extension offer in order to return to his boyhood club Barcelona, the Marca has reported on Tuesday...


From the given options choose the word which means the same as the keyword.
1. The fox tried desperately to free itself from the trap. Which of the following words means 'free'?
Extricate means free, untangle or liberate.
2. The students rejoiced at the last day of school. Which of the following words means rejoiced?
3. The king was honored by his subjects. Which of the following words means honored?
Exalted means honored. Exulted means rejoiced.
4. When the guest speaker failed to arrive, the chairman of the club gave an unprepared talk on environmental issues. Which of the following words means unprepared?
All of the above words mean unprepared.
5. He was not fined for speeding because his need to get to the hospital quickly was a justifiable circumstance. Which of the following words means justifiable?
Extenuating means justifiable or explanatory.
6. The witness's irrelevant remarks were struck from the record. Which of the following words means irrelevant?
7. Using postal codes quickens the delivery of mail. Which of the following words means quickens?
8. During World War II many German refugees settled in the United States. Which of the following words means refugees?
9. The older boy's admirable behaviour had a good influence on the younger. Which of the following words means admirable?
Exemplary means admirable, emulative, commendable and similar ideas.
10. The deceased was lauded by his closest friend. Which of the following words means lauded?
Eulogized means highly praised or lauded.
11. Shun fattening foods if you want to lose weight. Which of the following words can mean shun?
12. Some fields of science seem hopelessly cryptic to the layman. Which of the following words means cryptic?


Thank you for this. This brought me such peace.
Thanks Melanie. It brings me peace, too – especially when I really take the time to contemplate it. Me. You. Dirty beyond measure. Jesus saying, "I've got this." Wow.
So good! Thanks for sharing this, Crystal. This dirty, muddy beyond measure, not-yet-50 boy needed this today.
Kurt – I guess we are all part of the muddy-beyond-measure crowd. Thank goodness for cleansing grace.
beautiful. this would make a great video.


Is very crucial that you have medical cover, and among the ways is to have a hospital plan. The problem is that health strategies are getting more expensive day by day. Because it's expensive why there are so various people in the United States that are uninsured, its forecast 30 million are not insured. There are some factors that this is happening. The primary reason is the very high expenses for this kind of insurance plan. However, another factor is that more individuals are starting their service organization.
When you are your very own manager medical policy are extremely costly. Some brand-new business organizations just cannot manage the health insurance they need. Often the expenses of health insurance coverage can be as much as 00 per month; this can be excessive for many people budget.
There are some methods that you can find the right hospital plan to suit your particular circumstances. Each state is different and have different essentials and will cover different things.
You'll find numerous programs that you weren't even knowledgeable about; and will be genuinely astonished by what you find. Your family physician may be able to point you in the ideal instructions if your preliminary search does not give you the right information.
Having the best hospital plan is important not simply for now, but for in the future, so do not be scared to do the legwork now. Sometimes you can discover a health insurance representative in your local health center, and they can help find you health cover. When buying your medical policy, make sure that both you and your partner are covered, not simply your children.
Each and every hospital plan is various, so ensure you have a look at all the fine print. You don't want to get into the scenario where your strategy does not do what you expected.


text:
Krosta ist der Familienname folgender Personen:

 Friedrich Krosta (1839–1914), deutscher Philologe und Gymnasiallehrer
 Otto Krosta (1844–1925), deutscher Sanitätsoffizier

Siehe auch:
 Crosta

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Watch Dogs: Legion's accessibility options will include customisable subtitles, aiming tools, narration, and more
Upcoming open-world game Watch Dogs: Legion will contain a wide selection of accessibility options. One of the developers of the hacking game conducted a Q'n'A to discuss the features that'll be included, and the development process therein.
Speaking on the official Ubisoft blog, Mihai Alexandru Nuta, associate producer at Ubisoft Kyiv, outlined all the ways Watch Dogs threequel will be accessible to players of all abilities. All control schemes are fully customisable, as are the aim-assist and aim-magnetism tools. Puzzles can be simplified, aiming can be set to auto-lock-on, and screen shake and other motion effects can be limited. Three colour-blind presets are included, and the HUD and UI have a number of options for sizing and visiblity. Several features are included to help guide the player, and menus have a narration mode, with male and female voices.
Subtitles are customisable across size, colour, and background, and gameplay will have closed captions and audio captions. In-game tutorials, helpers, and displays can be toggled on-and-off, and accessed at all times from the pause menu. These features, and more, were developed in collaboration with disabled players, who tested the action-adventure game back in 2018. "We learned a lot from community members invited to the Accessible Design Workshop, which we hosted at Ubisoft Montreal in November 2018," Nuta explained. "They were able to play a very early build and provide their feedback on how we could improve accessibility, years before the game's release."
Watach Dogs: Legion got a new gameplay trailer, and a separate cinematic trailer by a Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse animator, last month during the Ubisoft Forward. Our Richard Scott-Jones thought highly of it in his preview.
Ubisoft has been conducting an ongoing, internal investigation due to allegations of sexual harassment and misconduct within the publisher. Corporate changes have included several executives resigning.
Watch Dogs Legion will be released on October 29.
Anthony McGlynn
Weekend news warrior and resident Irishman, Anthony is one of those naive Silent Hill fans you occasionally hear about. His byline's appeared in Variety, IGN, Ars Technica, TechRadar, Mashable, and more.
Watch Dogs Legion review
Watch Dogs Legion release date
Best sandbox games


text:
3-9 January 2014 #688
Double centennial
The ambition and greed of powerful men write the history of nations and sow suffering for peoples
JON APPEL
The new year marks two war centennials in Nepal: the 200th anniversary of the Anglo-Nepal War of 1814-16 and the start of the First World War 100 years ago in 1914. In the first, an expansionist Gorkha Empire clashed with the British East India Company and in the second, Nepalis paid a heavy price for supporting the Allied war effort in Europe.
The Sugauli Treaty of 1816 allowed Nepal to remain independent, but at the cost of losing one-third of its territory, allowing a British resident in Kathmandu, and permitting recruitment of its soldiers into the British Army. Later, Nepal's Rana rulers became Anglophiles, adopting the lifestyles of the English nobility and building lavish palaces. They sent Nepali soldiers to help the British quell the Indian Mutiny of 1857 and deployed them in the colonial campaigns to pacify pesky tribes on the Afghan frontier.
As a direct legacy of the Sugauli Treaty, more than 20,000 Nepali soldiers in the British Indian Army ended up being killed a century later in the trenches of Flanders Field in Belgium, in the quagmire at Gallipoli, and in the deserts of Mesopotamia. One in every 10 young Nepali men recruited didn't make it back home. At a time when Nepal's population was only 5.6 million, up to 200,000 young men were fighting and dying in some far-off land for a cause not their own. And since many of them were from specific ethnicities, entire communities in the remote mountains of Nepal lost their men.
Thirty years later, the world was engulfed in war again. Nearly 250,000 Nepali soldiers again went down to Calcutta to join troopships sailing off to Europe and South-east Asia. Another 30,000 Nepali soldiers in the British Army died during the Second World War in 'theatres' in Italy, North Africa, Burma, and Malaya. Many of them were sons of soldiers who had been killed in World War I. Nepal's soldiers first fought Maoist guerrillas not in their own backyard from 1996-2006, but in the jungles of British Malaya in the early 1960s. And in an example of history coming a full circle, Gurkhas have returned to Afghanistan more than a century later as a part of the British NATO forces in Helmand today.
As our special coverage of the two centennials in this issue shows, the ambition and greed of powerful men write the history of nations and sow suffering for peoples. The British East India Company didn't go to war with Nepal so much for territory, but for trade. It needed control over the trans-Himalayan passes to Tibet. And after it had hacked off the region west of the Mahakali River, the Company had access to the high passes over the Himalaya and saw no need to conquer and keep, what even then, looked like an ungovernable state.
But the terms of the treaty that preserved Nepal's nominal sovereignty, altered our nation's boundary and history and started the tradition of Gurkha recruitment that continues to this day. Incongruous as it may seem in this day and age that the citizens of one country should be laying down their lives for the sake of another, the lessons from 1814 and 1914 are as relevant today as they were then.
The first lesson is economic: small countries are mere pawns in the world of globalised trade and each country needs its own strategy to take full advantage from this lopsided relation to spur growth and create jobs. If it was tea, cotton or shahtoosh 200 years ago, the commodity today is labour. Four coffins arriving at Kathmandu airport everyday is a wartime casualty rate.
The second lesson is political: a nation is only taken seriously if it is united, if it cares how it is perceived by the outside world, if its people take pride in their shared history, if its rulers protect citizens and provide for their future.
The Pashmina War, KUNDA DIXIT
100 years of platitudes, SUNIR PANDEY
More warlike, DEEPAK ARYAL
The Gurkhas: An Interactive Timeline, AYESHA SHAKYA
50 years after the raid into Tibet, SAM COWAN
Romancing power, courting a constitution
Musical chairs for the prime ministership have obscured the whole of the constitution-writing process and the bones of contention within it
MENAKA GURUSWAMY
Elusive unity
Madhav Nepal's exit is a positive move, but grants little certainty to the political process
PRASHANT JHA
Is it ok to cheat in football?
German goalkeeper Manuel Neuer missed a rare chance to do something noble in front of millions
Freedom to market
We need to acknowledge the benefits of the market economy while ensuring it works for all


The Watergate Inn is an old Coaching Inn that has evolved considerably over the centuries. The Watergate has a large outside space to the back that goes to the River Foss and it once had extensive stabling that could cater for 50 horses. Nowadays, the stables have been converted into en-suite guest accommodation and the manure heap has been replaced with a riverside garden.
Our accomodation includes a few lovely first floor rooms to rent. Please call if you are interested in booking.
Our unique garden and outside seating area fronts the River Foss and is an oasis of calm and nature in the city centre. Fish, swans, ducks, geese and much more can be spotted whilst relaxing in this idyllic location.


recently on apartment therapy i posted about one of my favorite online stores, poppin. they have perfectly sleek and modern office supplies—-everything from paper trays to notebooks—-and i can't get enough of them! i included a couple of items on my wish list, and they've made their way on to my desk! wanna geek out with me?
so this is our multi-use desk…we have a computer desk, a jewelry desk, and this one set up in our studio. this is where we ship out all of our orders, our new studio assistant works on projects, assembly lines of packaging, posters, and cards get produced—-it does everything! now, we've got a much needed inbox where we can keep our Etsy orders straight.
it's perfect—-we have a "to make" and "to ship" box, both of which are a glossy white simple design! *swoon!* oh, and this pencil cup! perfect for our brushes and clay tools. i have a bit more organizing to do for our other items, but i was too excited about these and had to share.
billy's going to have to try hard to keep me off of this site. i may end up replacing everything in our studio with poppin wares!


The Recreate Health Team is collaboration to address increasing rates of chronic disease (obesity, heart disease, diabetes). We do this by working closely with diverse partners to increase access to outdoor bike and walking options as well as increasing access to local and fresh foods by working with local farmers, food services, and hunger organizations.
Mission: To reduce the impact of chronic disease in Wood County by creating community and systems level change by empowering everyone to make healthy choices regarding nutrition and physical activity.
Focus on: Community Food Center Project (hunger relief and local food access), farmers markets, and biking and walking infrastructure.
Here are some of the teams current projects!
A new and innovative model for non-vehicular transportation, River Riders Bike Share was re-launched in June 2018!
Creation and undertaking of the Wisconsin Rapids Downtown Farmers Market including management, FoodShare EBT implementation, and new location facilitation!
Implementation of a comprehensive bike and pedestrian plan for Wood County including municipal recreation trail wayfinding signage.
Convening of local food and hunger relief partners to explore a Community Food Center in South Wood County. A formal RFP process for a feasibility study has been completed!
Google Drive Link with Supporting Documents Coming Soon!
To join this team or learn how you can help click here to see our engagement opportunities!
Google Drive Link Coming Soon!
Tried and True Resources We Often Use!


Cloud-based outsourced storage relieves the client's burden for storage management and maintenance by providing a comparably low-cost, scalable, location-independent platform. However, the fact that clients no longer have physical possession of data indicates that they are facing a potentially formidable risk for missing or corrupted data. To avoid the security risks, audit services are critical to ensure the integrity and availability of outsourced data and to achieve digital forensics and credibility on cloud computing.
Provable data possession (PDP), which is a cryptographic technique for verifying the integrity of data without retrieving it at an untrusted server, can be used to realize audit services. In this paper, profiting from the interactive zero-knowledge proof system, we address the construction of an interactive PDP protocol to prevent the fraudulence of prover (soundness property) and the leakage of verified data (zero-knowledge property). We prove that our construction holds these properties based on the computation Diffie–Hellman assumption and the rewind able black-box knowledge extractor. We also propose an efficient mechanism with respect to probabilistic queries and periodic verification to reduce the audit costs per verification and implement abnormal detection timely. In addition, we present an efficient method for selecting an optimal parameter value to minimize computational overheads of cloud audit services. Our experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach.
2) The third party auditing process should bring in no new vulnerabilities towards user data privacy.
In this paper, we utilize the public Provable data possession (PDP), which is a cryptographic technique for verifying the integrity of data without retrieving it at an untrusted server; can be used to realize audit services. It with random mask technique to achieve a privacy-preserving public auditing system for cloud data storage security while keeping all above requirements in mind.
To support efficient Handling of multiple auditing tasks, we further explore the technique of bilinear aggregate signature to extend our main result into a multi-user setting, where TPA can perform multiple auditing tasks simultaneously. Extensive security and performance analysis shows the proposed schemes are provably secure and highly efficient. We also show how to extent our main scheme to support batch auditing for TPA upon delegations from multi-users.
of proof systems. These two properties ensure that our scheme can not only prevent the deception and forgery of cloud storage providers, but also prevent the leakage of outsourced data in the process of verification.
Who has a large amount of data to be stored in the cloud.
Who provides data storage service and has enough storage spaces and computation resources.
Who has capabilities to manage or monitor – outsourced data under the delegation of data owner.
Who have the right to access and manipulate stored data. These applications can be either inside clouds or outside clouds according to the specific requirements.
In this module the client (data owner) uses the secret key to preprocess the file, which consists of a collection of blocks, generates a set of public verification information that is stored in TPA, transmits the file and some verification tags to Cloud service provider CSP, and may delete its local copy.
At a later time, using a protocol of proof of retrievability, TPA (as an audit agent of clients) issues a challenge to audit (or check) the integrity and availability of the outsourced data in terms of the public verification information. It is necessary to give an alarm for abnormal events.
To allow TPA (or other clients with the help of TPA) to verify the correctness of cloud data on demand without retrieving a copy of whole data or introducing additional on-line burden to the cloud users.
To ensure there exists no cheating CSP that can pass the audit from TPA without indeed storing users' data intact.
To ensure that there exists no way for TPA to derive users' data from the information collected during the auditing process.
To allow TPA to perform auditing with minimum overheads in storage, communication and computation, and to support statistical audit sampling and optimized audit schedule with a long enough period of time.
Data Base : Sql Server 2005.


Summer I, 2000; MTWRF 9:45-11:30 a.m.
During the next few weeks, we'll be exploring the art, literature, and culture of early twentieth-century England through the works of The Bloomsbury Group. We will examine the relationships among the literary works of Bloomsbury authors such as Lytton Strachey, E.M. Forster, Virginia Woolf, Katherine Mansfield, and T.S. Eliot, focusing our attention on their perspectives on English society and personal experience. We will also consider their work in light of their 19th century predecessors (Matthew Arnold, Walter Pater, Oscar Wilde, G.E. Moore) and in light of the post-impressionist visual artists and art theorists of the Group (Duncan Grant, Vanessa Bell, Clive Bell, Roger Fry).
Presentation/Leading Class Discussion: Depending on the number enrolled, students will sign up individually or in pairs to present some background material for one of our class sessions OR sign up to initiate class discussion for one of our class sessions. Presentations (10 minutes in length) should provide information which can in turn encourage us to explore the connections between the secondary readings and our assigned primary reading. Questions for class discussion (3-5 in number) should highlight issues or themes or queries you think we should address in our class discussion of the reading assigned for that day. In most cases presentation/leading class discussion topics are provided below. Students should contact me in advance to confirm the focus of their presentation, and students leading class discussions should email me their questions by 9 pm the night before.
Papers and Response Papers: You will write two papers, one short (4-5 pp) and one long (8 pp); you will have a choice of two or three topics for Paper #1, and you will have a choice of text(s) for Paper #2. Both papers should follow the general rules of composition and be typed or word-processed with standard double-spacing, 1-inch margins, and either 10- or 12-point typeface. Title pages and cover sheets are unnecessary. Pages should be numbered, stapled together, and spell-checked. Papers are due by the date and time on the syllabus; late papers will be penalized one grade (i.e.: A to B) for each day late.
Technology: To offer another venue for discussion, we'll start using an electronic bulletin board; technical details will follow shortly. Each student should post at least twice a week to the bulletin board, responding to an existing thread of the conversation or initiating another; weekly postings will count for 5% of your class participation grade. I'll monitor these conversations, and may also participate, but I see the bulletin board primarily as a way for you to raise issues we haven't addressed--or addressed fully or to your satisfaction--during our regular class meetings. Though extra postings to the bulletin board will not automatically replace participation in our class discussions, regular contributions above and beyond your weekly posting can certainly improve your class participation grade.
We'll also be meeting several times in ECTR110 to use some technology there; preparation and participation for these class meetings should follow the guidelines outlined above for "Class Participation and Attendance."
No Class Meeting -- Post to the Bulletin Board your response so far to the Bloomsbury Group and read ahead.
Leading Discussion: Schlegel, Wilcox, & Bast: Who Will Inherit England?
MEET IN ECTR110: DIWE Conferences on three questions: Conferences 1, 2, and 3.
No Class -- Read ahead.
MEET IN ECTR110: DIWE Conferences on two questions: Conferences1 and 2.
MEET IN ECTR110: DIWE Conferences on two questions: Conferences 1 and 2.