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Review: Lenovo ThinkPad P50
Back in March, I took ownership of a new Lenovo ThinkPad P50 laptop to replace my venerable and beloved T61p. I've had it almost 6 months now, so it's been a good amount of time to become acquainted.
Originally purchased in 2007, my first T61p served me very well until last January (2015), when the video card failed. I looked at the current ThinkPad lineup, and after rejecting the then-current T and W series Thinkpad models due to their keyboard and trackpads, I promptly went out and bought another T61p from a seller on eBay for around $250, and transferred my SSD to it. Over the years that I owned it, the T61p proved its value, with solid construction, great ergonomics, nice, roomy 1680×1050 screen resolution, and ease of service. Originally delivered with Windows Vista, I installed to WinXP Professional, and later upgraded to Windows 7 when it became available. I replaced a keyboard, upgraded the RAM from 4GB to 8GB, and replaced the HDD once, and then upgraded to an SSD a few years ago, when they got cheap enough. The second T61p had a faster CPU (2.4 GHz Core 2 Duo) and the beefier 256 MB Quadro GPU (up from 128 MB on my first) but was otherwise the same as my original 2.0 GHz workhorse.
The extra CPU speed definitely helped me get through the last year, and other than occasionally running out of memory due to RAM-hungry browsers and running with no swap file, the T61p still feels perfectly viable today as an everyday primary workstation. I've only had a few occasions in recent months where, possibly due to Windows 7 cruft, the machine has felt slow — occasionally I'll get a svchost.exe process that uses up 100% CPU and bogs the system way down, but when that's not happening, the machine has plenty of horsepower for web browsing, software development, graphic design work, and occasional gaming.
In looking for a replacement machine, my main concerns were not performance, but ergonomics.
I wanted a screen with at least the 1680×1050 resolution that I had come to realize was essential. I like to split the screen down the middle and have two windows open side by side, and 1680-wide gives me enough pixels to do that comfortably, while 1050 of height gives me enough lines of code on the screen that I can spend more time reading or typing, and less time scrolling through my project files.
I also had grown very attached to the T61p keyboard, with its near-perfect layout, and full-size scissor-switch keys, and the touchpad with physical buttons. Later generation ThinkPad machines had done away with physical buttons, changed from scissor switch keys to chiclet keys, and worst of all made senseless and wholly unnecessary changes to the keyboard layout, which I found completely unacceptable.
Even so, after almost 8 years on the same hardware, I did want the replacement laptop to feel like a true upgrade, and to have hardware that could feasibly hold up for as many years as I'd gotten from the mighty T61p.
In late 2015, I strongly considered purchasing a W540-series ThinkPad. I held off after seeing a W540 in person, when I saw that the touchpad itself was a clickable button, and there were no separate mouse buttons. Such a trackpad would be completely useless for precision clicking, and thus would require me to plug a mouse in to do any kind of precise work, which in turn would force me to sit at tables where I could use a mouse, and limit where I could easily do useful work comfortably. This would not do.
But then Lenovo released a minor refresh, the W541S, which brought back the physical buttons, and looked like the best thing I'd seen from Lenovo in years. But this model was a bit lacking — where the full-size W540 could take 32 GB of RAM, the W541S was limited to just 16 GB — which, while adequate, didn't feel as future proof as I would have liked.
The S in W541S stands for slim, so I inquired with Lenovo customer service and was told a full-size W451 was coming soon, which would have the all-important physical touchpad buttons as well as capacity for 32 GB of RAM. I waited weeks and months, and asked again and was told that I had been misinformed, and that no such model was planned. I kept getting different stories from different reps, and got quite frustrated with not having solid, accurate information.
I briefly looked at the Dell XPS 15, which had fantastic specs — 4K IPS display, up to 32 GB of RAM, but again here I didn't care for the buttonless touchpad.
Finally, in the second half of 2015 I started hearing about the new P-series ThinkPads, and became very interested in the P70. This system is a monster: up to 64 GB of RAM, 4K IPS display, the latest Intel Core i7 CPU, trackpad with physical buttons, and what looked to be an acceptable keyboard layout, though still not the return to perfection that I'd hoped for. I wasn't crazy about lugging a 17″ laptop, but then a short time later I learned that they were also planning to offer a 15″ model, the P50. Comparing the specs between the two, it looked as though there really weren't any compromises between the two, so at that point I was sold.
I waited and waited for the P50 to be released, but it kept being delayed. Eventually, in December they became available. As my second T61p was still going strong, I elected to hold off for a bit and wait to see what the initial reviews said. Then, last week, I received email informing me that Lenovo was having one of their EPP sales, which meant steep discounts. I clicked the link and specced out my dream machine: 3.7 GHz Xeon CPU, 4K IPS screen, 4 GB video card, a jaw-dropping 64 GB of RAM, and 512 GB SSD on a PCIe-NVMe bus, and after almost $1000 in discounts, it came to around $2200, which was well under budget for what I had originally put aside for the more expensive P70.
While that sounds like a lot of money for a laptop, I considered that I'd spent around $1900 for my T61p in 2007, and after using it for almost 8 years, that amortizes away to barely anything — less than $1/day. Considering how much I use the machine (regularly 8+ hours/day), and how productive it has made me, that's an insanely good value. So when you think about it that way, it's worth spending a lot of money to get something very good, as opposed to spend less and accept compromises, or have something lower end that won't last as long whether due to durability or performance.
As purchased:
Battery 6cell 90Wh
System Unit P50 NVQ3 4G E3-1505M v5 vPro
Camera 720p HD 2D Camera Mic
AC Adapter and Power Cord 170W 2pin US
Processor Intel Xeon E3-1505M v5 MB
Color Sensor Color Sensor
Display 15.6 4K IPS Non-Touch
Fingerprint Fingerprint Reader*
*(I didn't want a fingerprint reader, but there wasn't an option to remove it.)
Graphic Card NVIDIA Quadro M2000M 4GB
Hard drive 1 512GB SSD PCIe-NVMe
HDD Config SSDx1
HDD Config 2 PCIe SSD
HDD Config 3 512GBSSD PCIe
HDD Total capacity 512GB
Keyboard Language KYB NumPad ENG
Publication Language PUB ENG
Total memory 64GB(16×4) DDR4 2133 SoDIMM (non-ECC)
Pointing device 3+3BCP FPR CS
Preload Language W10P DG W7P64-ENG
Preload OS Win10 Pro64 DG Win7 Pro64
Preload Type Standard Image
*(Windows 7 Professional x64)
Recovery Media W10P64 COUPON WW
Sub Series Variation P50 Quadro Workstation
TPM Setting Hardware dTPM Enabled
Display Panel P50 4K NT 2D MC CS WLWW
Selectable Warranty 1 Year Depot or Carry-in
WiFi wireless LAN adapters Intel 8260AC+BT 2×2 vPro
Price as purchased (incl tax and shipping): $2,271.02
I elected not to go with ECC RAM, which would have added about $450 to the cost, and the P50 doesn't have a bay for an optical drive, so no DVD option unless I want to plug in an external. I haven't burned, or even read, a DVD in years, though, so I think optical media is pretty close to obsolete.
Curiously, Lenovo do not offer a Blu-Ray drive option for their laptops that do offer an optical drive bay. The ultra-bay adapter for hot swappable hard drives is a nice option to have, but considering the P50 has an internal bay for a 2.5″ SATA device, and 2 PCIe NVMe slots, it wasn't worth it to me to go to a P70, for almost $2000 more, just to get a DVD-RW/Ultrabay (although to be fair, that $2000 would have also brought with it 8 GB video card).
Lenovo also just came out with a few more models in the P-series: the P40 Yoga, and P50S. I didn't consider either of these as I was already eager to buy the P50 that I had selected, but after looking at their specs I have no regrets about picking the P50. The Yoga offers a more flexible screen hinge that allows for using the laptop in different configurations, but with less top-end specs, and the P50S is just a slimmer P50 with slightly less capability, and so I wasn't really interested in either.
64 GB of RAM! This is 8x the RAM of my old T61p (and 16x the advertised max RAM of the T61p). Knock on wood, but I may never run out of RAM ever again with this machine. 64GB ought to be enough for anybody;-)
PCIe NVMe performance. The SSD is very, very fast. I've been using SSD for a few years now. The T61p originally came with a 7200rpm hard drive, but I upgraded to SSD after they became available at a price point I was willing to pay. I did notice some performance improvement, but the SATA3 SSD was bottlenecked by the SATA2 interface in the T61p, so I didn't get the full benefit of the upgrade. By contrast, with the ThinkPad P50, read/write speeds on the PCIe NVMe SSD are amazing. After running Windows Update for the first time on the P50 and installing almost 90 updates, after rebooting the "configuring" that Windows 7 does after upgrades are installed, which normally takes several minutes, were completed in about 20-30 seconds. Waking out of hibernation is nearly instantaneous.
4K IPS is a thing of beauty. The screen is exceptionally clean and sharp, with vibrant color even for an LCD screen. The LED backlight is very even, compared to the florescent tube backlight of older screens. IPS is definitely a much better display technology compared to TFT. I've had IPS displays on my desktop, but since I use my laptop much more, I haven't really been able to appreciate it until now.
Speakers are much improved over T61p. One of the complaints I remember from reading reviews of the T61p was that its speakers weren't very loud even at max volume. I didn't find this to be a major complaint, and most of the time audio levels were adequate, but I did frequently find it difficult to hear the audio track in multimedia being played on the machine. It just depended on how loud the source was. With the P50, the speakers are much more capable. I don't need to turn the volume level to 100% just to be able to barely hear audio anymore.
Trust. The most important con to buying Lenovo these days is trusting them not to pre-install malware and rootkits. Lenovo have been found to do this three times in the last year, which for many is unacceptable. Fortunately, I did not find anything pre-installed on my P50 that I needed to remove. It seems that Lenovo responded to being found out and did the right thing in removing the offending software. It should never have been there to begin with, but at least they had removed it from their newly shipping products by the time I ordered mine.
Superfish, the SSL-circumventing private http destroyer, was not found on my machine.
I did need to disable "Lenovo Customer Feedback Program 64" using TaskSchedulerView.
Lenovo have released BIOS updates that omit the OneKey Optimizer malware that they once preloaded on ThinkPads. I wasn't able to find information as to whether this was ever included in the BIOS for the P50 model; it's possible it never was, as this model is more recent than the date Lenovo removed it from machines that had it.
Other Software I didn't want
McAfee LiveSafe. I didn't order this, but I had a subscription to it out of the box. I haven't ever liked McAffee antivirus, since the late 1990's I've been recommending against it.
Microsoft Office. Microsoft are really hard-selling their SaaS Office 365 suite. It was something added to my build list by default, and I had to remove it. I got a reminder at check out asking me if I was sure I really didn't want it. I debated it for a few minutes, but ultimately I don't use Office very much anymore, and really prefer Google Docs for most everything, for many reasons. Still, my P50 came with something pre-installed — not sure if it's Office 365 or 2016. Either way, it's not getting used, and will be removed. I might install a viewer app so I can handle .doc files that people might send me, or I might install an old license of Office 2007 that is still perfectly fine, but I'm not sure I'll even need to do that.
Windows 10 nagware: This isn't Lenovo's fault by any means, but Microsoft is also really hard-selling Windows 10. They want the world to upgrade from Windows 7. I don't ever plan to. Microsoft's treatment of user's private data is completely disrespectful, and unacceptable. And I'm not interested in re-learning how to use and manage the new version. I haven't ever touched Win8, even. And they keep trying to push Windows Updates on Win7 users which keep trying to push an upgrade to Windows 10. At this point, the only thing that's keeping me tied to Windows is GameMaker: Studio, and if it weren't for that I'd be happily running on some Linux distro, most likely Ubuntu. I'm hoping that sometime during the lifetime of this hardware, I'll be able to make the switch and dump Microsoft for good.
4K resolution problems – TL;DR solution: 2048 x 1152
It turns out that displaying 4K resolution on a 15.4″ display results in very, very, very tiny fonts. Windows 7 does not handle this well at all. I almost returned the machine for an exchange to a 1920×1080 screen, but after playing with settings for a few days, there are a few workarounds, which I find acceptable, but none of which are perfect:
Set font dpi to 200% or better. The control panel only shows options for 100%, 125%, and 150% at first, but you can set a "custom" dpi using a link at the right. The slider control for this tops out at 200%, but you can override this by typing in the value. I found that 250-300% was about where 12pt text started to get readable to me, but it's still pretty small, and 10pt and lower is still ridiculously tiny. Unfortunately, this amount of magnification starts to break the containers that Windows puts text into, resulting in an ugly, disjointed Explorer GUI, and probably most applications as well.
Use Windows Classic theme and size the text manually. I created a custom theme for this, so you don't have to. Download Win7_4K and apply it. I basically doubled the size of all the font settings in the theme. Unfortunately, not everything in Windows uses the Theme settings, particularly older software or software developed by amateurs. But even Windows itself doesn't make all of its font sizes customizable through this interface, even in Explorer windows there will still be some fonts that are ridiculously small. What terrible design. Microsoft should be embarrassed.
Set display resolution to 2048 x 1152. OK, so native display resolution just doesn't work well in this size display, at least the way Windows renders its GUI. The only other option is to set display resolution to a lower size. Both 2048×1152 and 1920×1080 look great, and other than not having the full resolution at your disposal, there's not much of a downside.
Keyboard, mousepad
The basic keyboard layout is acceptable, although I still vastly prefer the T61p's keyboard for many reasons. Let's examine those.
The P50 uses chiclet key switches, not the scissor switches used in the T61 keyboard, but that's acceptable.
I miss the "previous page" and "next page" keys from the T61p keyboard, which weree located at the left and right of the Up Arrow key on the T61p keyboard. On the P50, these have been replaced by Page Up and Page Down, which I definitely use a lot more frequently. As well, an accidental page up/down is less disruptive than an accidental previous/next page keystroke, and so I've come to like this change. One problem that I did have with the T61p in retrospect was accidentally hitting the "previous page" key when editing text in a web form, resulting in the browser going back to the previous page, losing everything I'd typed, when I'd simply wanted to move the cursor up a line. This happened fairly frequently, and was a serious annoyance.
I do miss that Page Up and Page Down are no longer in a tight cluster with Home/End. I also find that the cursor navigation keys are a bit harder to find by touch than they were on the T61p, where there they are at corners and edges, which made finding them very easy, even in the dark. On the P50, they're to the right of the Right Ctrl key, but to the left of the 10key pad. I can find them most easily by going directly below the right Shift key.
A notable omission from the P50's keyboard is a key for the Context Menu. Normally this is thought of as the "right-click" menu, but there's a dedicated key on most keyboards for this as well, which is known as the Appskey. A workaround, to re-map the right-alt key to Appskey exists, using a free application called AutoHotKey. However, a downside of this is that Alt+PrintScreen is a very commonly used keystroke in my work, and if I re-map the right-alt key (which is right next to the print screen key on the P50) I sacrifice being able to do quick, easy print screen to copy buffer for the current window. But I also use the Appskey very frequently in my work as well. So I can instead re-map right-Ctrl to the Appskey, and do without a right-Ctrl key. None of these arrangements is truly ideal; they're all compromises. My advice is to try it and see which arrangement you prefer.
The 10-key pad on the right side shifts the main keyboard left of center of the screen, which makes it a bit less comfortable to use, and the navigational keys aren't as easy to find without taking my eyes off the screen to look for them. If I turn off numlock, though, it turns the 10-keys into Home, End, and arrow keys, which I like. I leave numlock off most of the time, unless I'm actually keying in a lot of numbers, and then I find it handy.
However, a huge negative with this keyboard is its rollover. If N-key rollover isn't possible for technical reasons, I feel that at this price point a minimum of 6KRO should be expected. I can't play games that use the keyboard for controls, because after just 2 buttons held down, a third key press is not reliably detected and reported to the OS. As a gamer and game developer, this matters, and is a huge, huge disappointment. If I gave laptop reviews a star rating, I'd penalize the P50 an entire star just for this issue. Maybe two stars. The built-in keyboard is that important to me.
The mousepad is off-center from the screen, but centered under the spacebar. It's large enough that my palms will accidentally bump it occasionally, and this can be annoying, but it's not a severe problem. I think I would like a slightly smaller mousepad, all the same.
The return of the physical buttons (three of them!) above and below the mousepad is what I like the most. It's great to have physical buttons back in this generation of Thinkpad. The lack of them was why I refused to buy a W540 last year, when I first considered replacing the T61p.
If the machine didn't have a 10key pad, and the layout was more like the T61p keyboard overall, and it had NKRO, I'd be completely in love. As it is, the keyboard is mostly decent, other than that it completely sucks for gaming.
BIOS tweaks
Looking in the UEFI BIOS, there's a couple of nice configurable settings. Foremost, Lenovo have enabled the user to decide to switch the Fn and left Ctrl key. This was a popular 3rd party hack for the T61p BIOS, but I never bothered with it because I didn't want to risk running an unofficial BIOS. Now that it's an officially supported option, I'm happy to have Ctrl in the standard location where it belongs, even if the keycaps aren't identically shaped so I can't switch them physically.
Also, there's a BIOS setting to change the top row of keys from being special functions or F-keys. By default, if you press the top row keys, they'll do things like adjust volume or dim the screen. If you're used to using the F-keys for shortcuts, Alt+F4 closes windows, and F5 is browser refresh — I use that all the time. For me, it's essential to switch this in BIOS. I could also do it by hitting Fn+Esc, which sets the Function lock on, but then the Fn lock LED is lit all the time, and I'd rather not have it lit all the time, just to save what little bit of battery drain it might use if for no other reason.
I didn't find a default Numlock state setting in the BIOS, but I'd like the numlock to be disabled, so I can use the 10-key pad for its alternative function of navigating by cursor. Keeping the 10-key pad in this mode makes the keyboard layout slightly less annoying, since Home, End, Page Up, and Page Down, and another set of Arrow keys are all available through the 10-key keys. It's just a single keystroke to toggle the numlock, but it'd be nice if it was always off after a reboot. Fortunately I don't need to deal with this much, as I don't reboot very often.
In August, I had to send my P50 back to Lenovo for warranty service, after a column of pixels got stuck on.
At 5 months, a column of pixels got stuck "on". Lenovo fixed the issue under warranty, and the machine was out of my hands for a little over 48 hours. Very impressed.
Overall the experience was great, but contacting the right folks at Lenovo and getting a clear connection was not as easy as it should have been. After a few attempts I finally got a hold of the right department, they asked me some rudimentary troubleshooting questions, and once they understood the problem I was describing, they issued me a support ticket number and explained the process for the warranty repair.
The next day, a return shipping box was at my door. I removed my SSD, not wanting to risk my data being lost or falling into the wrong hands. Lenovo considers the SSD to be a "Customer Replaceable Unit" so there was no problem for me to do this, and it did not void my warranty. With the SSD removed, I packaged the laptop up and shipped it on a Wednesday, and it was returned to me Friday morning. This made me very happy.
Considering they had told me to expect it to be gone 7 days, I was very happy with the turnaround time. I don't know what the problem was with the screen, but I suspect that it may have just been that the video cable needed to be reseated. They did not replace the screen (the tape I had put over the webcam was still there when I got it back), but the problem is gone.
Overall Recommendation
This is a very high end midsize laptop with a ton of value and great features. Performance is outstanding, and the warranty support is even better. It's pricey compared to lower end machines, but if you need a high end laptop, this is a very good one.
If it lasts me as long as my T61p did, it will have been well worth it. My T61p lasted me an incredible 8 years, and while I don't think anyone expects that from a laptop (most are replaced in 2-4 years, typically) if I get 7 years out of the P50, that works out to less than a dollar per day. When you think about it that way, suddenly spending over $2.2k on a laptop seems very reasonable.
My only complaint with it is the keyboard. The keyboard is very good compared to most current laptops, but unfortunately it has terrible key rollover characteristics that make it a dud as a gaming machine. The keyboard layout may not be everything I wanted, but considering what we saw Lenovo putting on ThinkPads between the T6x generation and now, it's nearly a return to their old form, and close enough to what I wanted that I can live with it, although I absolutely want Lenovo to deliver an NKRO keyboard with their next hardware revision.
Some users might feel that the lack of an optical drive/ultrabay is a disadvantage, and to them I would point them toward the ThinkPad P70.
The Dell XPS 13 and XPS 15 are also worth looking at in this performance class. But I think the P50 likely edges them out in most respects, but especially on the mousepad and keyboard. If you would prefer to avoid Lenovo for now due to the trust issues mentioned above, or other reasons, they might be more for you.
I haven't tried out Linux on this machine yet, so I have no remarks as to it's compatibility and stability with a Linux distro running on it.
Product Review: Anker 7500mah extended battery for Samsung Galaxy S5
I recently upgraded my phone to a Samsung Galaxy S5, after several years running on a Galaxy SII. While the SII was the best phone I'd had up until that point, there were a number of problems that I had with it, which got especially aggravating toward the end of my time with it. The biggest being ongoing support of the firmware, continually degrading performance over time, necessitating periodic factory resets, and battery life.
Even when brand new, the battery drain on the SII was a serious problem for me, and led to me feeling like I was chained to a power outlet. I'd lose 10% while disconnected from charge for 40 minutes, the length of my commute to work. And yes, I looked in to every conceivable thing you could possible think of to identify causes of drain and do something about them — nothing worked. I bought an extended 3800mah battery for it, which helped a bit, but even so at times I would see the phone draining impressively fast — 1% per minute, on many occasions.
I came to the conclusion that an ideal smartphone should be about an inch thick, and be about 90% battery by weight.
When I went shopping for a new phone, I was really unsure of whether I would want to consider one of the newer generation Samsung Galaxy phones. But ultimately, I selected the Galaxy S5. The non-removable, non-upgradeable battery on the S6 is one of the main reasons why I went with the S5 over the newer model. The other major reason was the lack of a SD card slot on the S6. While looking at extended battery options for the S5, I found that there were a few super-sized batteries offering 5500mah+ — including a 7500mah battery from Anker, and a 8500mah from ZeroLemon.
I went with the Anker for two reasons: the case looked like it would be more comfortable in my pocket, being less bulky if perhaps less armored than the ZeroLemon. And two, the battery was shaped in such a way that it would not block the external speaker, which is an issue with a number of the other extended batteries.
Thankfully, I found that the S5's battery life on the stock battery wasn't bad at all, going 10-14 hours on a charge before it got below 20%. That's almost a full day on the go. But I still wanted to see what it would be like to live completely free of battery anxiety, and this does it for me. Maybe someday they'll integrate transparent solar cells into the touch screen so that we can charge while using the phone, and at that point a smaller battery might make sense. But I think, minimum, a smartphone with today's power draw characteristics needs a good 5000mah on tap at a minimum in order to be useful.
With the 7500mah battery from Anker, I am completely satisfied. I have had days where I unplugged at 7am, and didn't charge it at all throughout the day, used the phone quite a bit, and yet still had a 65% charge by 10pm. Knowing that I don't have to worry about my battery draining, and can still use my phone, makes me feel like I really have a phone, and not an emergency device to use sparingly if at all. And not needing to stay within 6 feet of a power outlet all the time feels like complete freedom.
It makes the phone heavier and thicker, but these are not a big deal. It's well worth it to have a phone that I can use all day, and really use, without running the battery critically low in just a few hours. I feel that this should be the standard battery performance for any smartphone. It's pretty much a must-buy.
The only real downside to the battery is that the way they designed the case, it makes it basically impossible to use the fingerprint reader/heart rate monitor. If you want to use that feature on your phone, you may want to look into a different battery. Samsung makes an OEM extended battery with 3500mah capacity, which, based on the performance I saw from the stock 2800mah battery that came with my phone, is probably adequate for an estimated 16-18 hour day of moderate to heavy phone use. There are some other larger batteries between 3500 and 7500mah from various other manufacturers, but I don't know how reputable they are, and it's not uncommon for false, inflated capacity claims from the no-names, so be careful. The Anker, at least, is the real deal. Highly Recommended.
Product Review: Scirra Construct2
development, games, product reviews, programming
Construct2 is available for download at www.scirra.com.
I've known about Construct2 for a few years now, and had downloaded it quite some time ago, intending to compare it with GameMaker in order to see which I liked better. I kept getting deeper and deeper into GameMaker, though, and since I was enjoying that, I wanted to stick with one thing until I knew it very well, rather than dabble in a lot of things that I knew only passingly.
One of my Cleveland Game Developers friends, Jarryd, likes Construct2 and I've seen him give a few talks about it, and so I've had a general impression of what it's about for a while now. This weekend, I finally sat down with it and started to give it a serious look.
So far, it feels very different from what I'm used to with GameMaker: Studio and other development environments that I've used… but I think there's a lot of potential for getting stuff up and working faster than with GameMaker.
Two of Construct2's areas of strength are the built-in project templates and object behaviors. They take a lot of the tedium out of developing your own engine and having to program everything from scratch, which means you're freed up to focus in design and gameplay more. Creating a new project from a template sets up a lot of "boilerplate" that is common to every game of that type, saving you a ton of work and problem solving. And adding a behavior to an object does in one or two clicks what many programming numerous events and scripts consisting of innumerable lines of code would accomplish in a GameMaker project. And it all works and doesn't need debugging, although there'll still be a lot of customization yet to do, and that customization will require plenty of problem solving and debugging. But it still gets you into the juicier parts of game development quicker, and allows you to build on a more featureful foundation than GameMaker does.
On the other hand, what I like about GameMaker is that by leaving these low hanging fruits un-plucked, it gives a newbie programmer some relatively easy things to develop, which affords many learning opportunities. Learning how to attack a problem and break it up into simple, manageable steps that you can solve is an important skill to have in programming, and GM provides such opportunities.
The C2 documentation is very well written, and there are a ton of example projects that come with the IDE, so you can learn by playing around with a project.
It feels different from traditional programming in that there's no traditional text editor, and not much syntax to learn, for about 90% of it, from what I see so far. If *feeling* like a "real" programmer is important to you, Construct2 may not satisfy, but if you don't care about coding as much as the ability to quickly make working games, it might be just the trick. I feel like "real" programming is more like designing shapes of pieces to make a jigsaw puzzle, and then assembling the puzzle, and using Construct2 is more like taking a bunch of ready-made jigsaw puzzle pieces out of a bin and putting them together *just so* in order to make a picture that you have in your head. But I don't consider criticisms that amount to bias toward text editing and syntax as the only true programming to have much legitimacy to them. Surely, if you never understand the circuits of the machine, you'll never be able to call yourself a Real Programmer, and most modern programming languages abstract the machine entirely. So too, with programming environments that replace linguistic syntax with visual paradigms. Still, learning Construct2 may not be as good a good first step if you're interested in getting into other types of programming, the vast majority of which do involve coding in a programming language.
Discovering Construct2 through example
One of the first things I did with C2 was to play the Asteroids example project. Labeled as an "Intermediate" project, I quickly noted that while the Player wrapped around at the edges of the screen, the Bullets did not. This bothered me, so without really knowing what I was doing, I looked at the Player's behaviors, and saw how to modify the Bullets. It took almost no time at all.
But now, the bullets just traveled around the room forever, so in short order I figured out how to add a timer to them so that they would be destroyed after a short time. This took a bit longer, but in maybe 10 minutes I had it figured out. Next, I created a new Sprite (which seems semi-analogous to what GameMaker calls an Object) and added it to the game, defined some behaviors and before too long I had asteroids floating about, that destroyed the ship when they collide with it, are destroyed by bullets, and wrap around the room. I even figured out how to create two smaller asteroids when destroying the large ones.
That's when I discovered that, if you don't add an object to the Layout, even if it won't exist in the initial state of the game, the game won't run properly. I noticed a previously overlooked bullet sitting in the Layout window, outside the game view, and, thinking I'd somehow accidentally placed it there by mistake, deleted it, only to find that the game no longer worked properly. And then I got an error message about the smaller asteroids not being defined. So then I figured out that in order to have these types of objects available to the game at runtime, they needed to be placed in the Layout, but outside of the visible area, what in GameMaker would be considered "inside the Room". This confused me, because coming from GameMaker, I expected that objects placed outside of the rooms boundaries are instantiated and run in the game. But in C2, apparently they are just available to the game, to be created when called upon by the program. It's a bit strange, and I wonder how C2 handles objects that walk "offstage" or need to begin life offstage.
Construct2 is one of the cheapest options out there right now for fledgling developers. Comparing Construct2 to GameMaker, at $119 C2 is cheaper for a license than GameMaker: Studio is, if you want anything more out of GM:S than the base "Professional" package. The free edition of C2 also has fewer limitations than the free edition of GM:S. There's also a $400 "business" license, which is for professionals and businesses that have made $5000 or more from game development, but doesn't seem to give the user any additional new features. I suppose the idea there is that businesses that make that much money from game development can afford to subsidize development for the rest of the customer base.
I haven't benchmarked the two side by side, but I understand that C2 builds everything as an HTML5 app and (if you're not targeting a web browser) wraps it in a native application for whatever platform it builds to. By contrast, GM:S has the option to build native code, depending on how you build it and what platform you're targeting, so may potentially have performance advantages over Construct2. I don't want to speculate, and for now it's merely a hypothesis that I have not myself tested, but it seems plausible that GM:S would the equivalent game as well or better than C2 on most platforms.
On the other hand, C2 is probably more consistent across platform, since on every platform it is essentially running the same code, unlike GameMaker:Studio, which currently has numerous problems with supporting features and getting to work exactly the same, regardless of build target.
Final thoughts (for now…)
I still haven't gotten very deep into Construct2, and have just barely begun to grasp what it is capable of, but so far I like it quite a bit. Whether I like it as well as GameMaker: Studio, or less, or better, I can't say yet, but I like the fact that it exists,and and it provides another option for an easy to use tool for game development. I still am much more versed and comfortable with what I know in GameMaker, but I'm impressed with how quickly I was able to pick up Construct2 and do something useful with it.
Verdict: Worth checking out.
Game review: Javel-ein by Daniel Linssen
Best Of, games, product reviews
I loved Javel-ein when it was first released as a Ludum Dare 28 Jam entry. It's been expanded into a "Full Game" — I put this in quotes because, other than perhaps a lack of background music, there wasn't anything about the Jam entry that felt incomplete or less than "full" to me. TL;DR: it's a great game, it's free, and if you run Windows, you can play it.
Get Javel-ein.
You're a guy armed with a Javelin, jumping and running through a 2D platform world of caves and lava pits. There are dangerous creatures, which you'll need to kill with your Javelin. Once all the creatures are destroyed, you need to find the door to take you to the next level. The twist is that you only get one Javelin, and you have to retrieve it each time you throw it, leaving you temporarily defenseless. (more…)


A child engaged in self-directed learning is a marvelous sight to behold. Her unrestrained curiosity leads her to discover the things that genuinely interest and matter to her. Her drives to explore, understand, play with, and master those things, and her joy when she succeeds, are palpable. Such a child is fully alive to the world and to learning. This is what education already looks like for children who have not yet reached "school age." It continues to look like this, all the way through childhood and into adulthood, for those lucky enough to retain control of their own education, in settings where they can continuously expand their learning horizons. It can look like this for ALL children.
Now imagine a center in your community where children—and adults—could come to play, explore, make new friends, and learn. It might provide computers, art supplies, books, and athletic and science equipment; there might also be a gymnasium, as well as fields and trees for outdoor play. Perhaps it would be an extension of the public library and park systems, available for everyone's use. The people using it could form mixed-age groups to pursue special interests and learn from each other. Classes might also be offered in music, art, athletics, math, business management, wood-working, or anything else people want to study or practice in a structured way. But there would be no requirements or stress-inducing comparisons among people.
Children would flock to such a center, not because someone else is compelling them to be there, but because they want to be there—it's where they can find their friends and many interesting things to do. The center might provide childcare too, in an efficient way that capitalizes on the joy and benefit that older kids get from helping to care for younger ones. In this age-mixed environment, younger children would get to continuously learn new skills and practice higher ways of thinking; older children, in turn, would gain opportunities to synthesize their knowledge and develop nurturing skills. Adults would provide guidance and facilitate learning in response to children's requests. These are the ways children are designed to learn.
Those who join and use the center would govern it through democratic means, deciding the rules of behavior and a system for enforcing them. As evidenced in existing democratic schools, bullying and other unfortunate by-products of autocratic, competitive systems would be virtually unheard of.
This is just one of many possible scenes in the educational future we envision. It would complement learning opportunities already available to children at home (through their families and the Internet) and through other community resources. Children who prefer a more consistent learning environment might instead choose to attend a democratic school. But in general, learning will be a shared community experience, so that children could learn accounting principles by spending time at a CPA firm, for example, or learn scientific principles by interacting with researchers and perhaps establishing a mentor arrangement or doing an apprenticeship at a laboratory. Learning will be personalized, mixed-age, and unbounded by time, place and method. But most importantly, it will not be something to be imposed upon children, but something that arises from children's natural drives and instincts to do what older children and adults can do, and to prepare themselves for their future.
The need for such an educational transformation is more apparent today then ever before. The world is changing rapidly, in ways that have powerful implications for education.
Any child or adult with an Internet connection has access to a world of information. (Children are amazingly adept at using this powerful tool, when they are free to do so.) So self-directed education has never been easier. But it has also never been more essential to success. Our rapidly changing economy puts a premium on self-motivation, innovation, and the ability to acquire new skills and evaluate new ideas. People develop these traits when they are empowered to seek out and think about information that is germane to their own real questions. Fortunately, this empowerment is natural to all human beings; it exists in every child. We simply have to stop quashing it.
As a society, we can provide the settings that will help these natural drives and instincts to flourish for ALL children, regardless of economic status. Some people wonder if we can afford this. Our current system of public and private schools costs us approximately $600 billion dollars a year in tax money (federal, state and local combined) and another $50 billion in tuitions (for private schools). Depending on how you do the calculations, we are spending, on average, somewhere between $10,000 and $13,000 a year for every child in kindergarten through high school.
Imagine the educational opportunities we could provide instead with those amounts (whether through public, private or both types of frameworks; how the funding is structured is an important but completely separate issue that can be debated elsewhere). Money therefore is not the problem. Self-directed education is less expensive than top-down, forced education, precisely because it is self-directed—it doesn't require copious amounts to be spent on testing, enforcement, curriculum development, and other things that don't enhance (and in fact hinder) learning.
How will we get from here to there—to become a nation where all children can learn the way they are designed to learn? We need to transform, rather than reform, the education system. The necessary transformation will most likely be led by parents, students and concerned citizens (for ideas on what actions will help, refer to the Join the Movement page). It will materialize even faster, though, if some visionary educational and political leaders step forward and break ranks with their counterparts who feel too vested in the status quo.
The transformation has already begun outside of the standard school system. With each passing year, more families are taking their children out of standard schools and turning to home-based self-directed learning, or democratic schools or resource centers. Greater awareness of educational facts and options will turn the stream into a current.


text:
Q: Need to split sub-string from a string which lies between first ' and second ' - python I am having following pandas dataframe column names. I have to simplify the names. I need to split sub-string which lies between first ' and second '.Expected output given below. Need help!
  for i in range(len(df.columns)):
         print(df.columns[i])

     ('date', '')
     ('A Index', 'PX_LAST')
     ('B Index', 'PX_LAST')
     ('C Index', 'PX_LAST')

Expected output:
'date'
'A Index'
'B Index'
'C Index'

This code solved the issue:
  str(df.columns[i])[1:].split(',')[0]

Thanks for comments.

A: If str is a list, or maybe a tuple (never call a list str because str is a type in Python). You have a list of tuples.
As such,
str[1][0]

will get you the first item in the tuple.
example = (('a', 'b'), ('c'))
>>> example[0]
('a', 'b')
>>> example[0][0]
'a'

A: Well my idea is :
for i in range(5):
    x = str[i][0]
    print "'"+x+"'"

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Christmas trees 10+ feet may not go through balers for netting so be prepared to bring tarp. A pickup truck and/or trailer may be the best way to get a tall tree home.
From Dallas, Heath, Mesquite, Rockwall, Royse City, Fate, Garland, Rowlett, Irving, Richardson: East on Interstate 30 to exit 83 FM 1565. Stay on south service road, right on CR 2508. 1 mile, farm on the right.
From Greenville, Sulphur Springs, Brashire, Commerce, Cumby, Campbell: West on Interstate 30 to FM 1565 exit 83, left under overpass, left on south service road. Right on CR 2508. 1 mile, farm on the right.
From Josephine, Princeton, Lavon, Saxton, Nevada, Farmersville, McKinney: South on Highway 6, right on Texas 66, left on FM 1565. Go under the overpass, left on south service road. Right on CR 2508. 1 mile, farm on the right.


text:
<?php
namespace Neos\Flow\Tests\Unit\Log;

use Neos\Flow\Log\Backend\BackendInterface;
use Neos\Flow\Log\Logger;
use Neos\Flow\Tests\UnitTestCase;

/**
 * Testcase for the generic Logger
 */
class LoggerTest extends UnitTestCase
{
    /**
     * @test
     */
    public function logPassesItsArgumentsToTheBackendsAppendMethod()
    {
        $mockBackend = $this->getMockBuilder(BackendInterface::class)->setMethods(['open', 'append', 'close'])->getMock();
        $mockBackend->expects($this->once())->method('append')->with('theMessage', 2, ['foo'], 'Foo', 'Bar', 'Baz');

        $logger = new Logger();
        $logger->addBackend($mockBackend);
        $logger->log('theMessage', 2, ['foo'], 'Foo', 'Bar', 'Baz');
    }

    /**
     * @test
     */
    public function addBackendAllowsForAddingMultipleBackends()
    {
        $mockBackend1 = $this->getMockBuilder(BackendInterface::class)->setMethods(['open', 'append', 'close'])->getMock();
        $mockBackend1->expects($this->once())->method('append')->with('theMessage', 2, ['foo'], 'Foo', 'Bar', 'Baz');

        $mockBackend2 = $this->getMockBuilder(BackendInterface::class)->setMethods(['open', 'append', 'close'])->getMock();
        $mockBackend2->expects($this->once())->method('append')->with('theMessage', 2, ['foo'], 'Foo', 'Bar', 'Baz');

        $logger = new Logger();
        $logger->addBackend($mockBackend1);
        $logger->addBackend($mockBackend2);
        $logger->log('theMessage', 2, ['foo'], 'Foo', 'Bar', 'Baz');
    }

    /**
     * @test
     */
    public function addBackendRunsTheBackendsOpenMethod()
    {
        $mockBackend = $this->getMockBuilder(BackendInterface::class)->setMethods(['open', 'append', 'close'])->getMock();
        $mockBackend->expects($this->once())->method('open');

        $logger = new Logger();
        $logger->addBackend($mockBackend);
    }

    /**
     * @test
     */
    public function removeBackendRunsTheBackendsCloseMethodAndRemovesItFromTheLogger()
    {
        $mockBackend = $this->getMockBuilder(BackendInterface::class)->setMethods(['open', 'append', 'close'])->getMock();
        $mockBackend->expects($this->once())->method('close');
        $mockBackend->expects($this->once())->method('append');

        $logger = new Logger();
        $logger->addBackend($mockBackend);
        $logger->log('theMessage', 2, ['foo'], 'Foo', 'Bar', 'Baz');

        $logger->removeBackend($mockBackend);
        $logger->log('theMessage', 2, ['foo'], 'Foo', 'Bar', 'Baz');
    }

    /**
     * @test
     * @expectedException \Neos\Flow\Log\Exception\NoSuchBackendException
     */
    public function removeThrowsAnExceptionOnTryingToRemoveABackendNotPreviouslyAdded()
    {
        $mockBackend = $this->getMockBuilder(BackendInterface::class)->setMethods(['open', 'append', 'close'])->getMock();

        $logger = new Logger();
        $logger->removeBackend($mockBackend);
    }

    /**
     * @test
     */
    public function theShutdownMethodRunsCloseOnAllRegisteredBackends()
    {
        $mockBackend1 = $this->getMockBuilder(BackendInterface::class)->setMethods(['open', 'append', 'close'])->getMock();
        $mockBackend1->expects($this->once())->method('close');

        $mockBackend2 = $this->getMockBuilder(BackendInterface::class)->setMethods(['open', 'append', 'close'])->getMock();
        $mockBackend2->expects($this->once())->method('close');

        $logger = new Logger();
        $logger->addBackend($mockBackend1);
        $logger->addBackend($mockBackend2);
        $logger->shutdownObject();
    }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Advertise of the Butler Bureau site - 20,000 pages views per month and counting.
Hello, Mr Advertiser/website owner person - what are you waiting for?
Get your message or banner in front of 20,000 plus new and returning visitors who view multiple pages on the Bureau site every month.
Our visitors recognise the fact that we provide the goods without being affiliated to any company, our only revenue is ad generated - so get in touch.
Manages to double its vistors year on year (statistics available on request).
Have a look at this page to see some of the advertising space available on some pages of the site.
But as new pages are being constantly added to the site the opportunity to have your advertisement appear in popular pages is ongoing.
For the search phrase 'domestic staff agencies' we are also #1 in Yahoo and MSN. The results on the left are pretty much reflected across the various Search Engines.
If you are running a PPC (Pay Per Click) advertising campaign on any or all of the top 3 Search Engines ( did we mention that we are currently #1 in MSN for 'butler schools?) then maybe you should consider promoting your site on the Butler Bureau !
Contact us with your requirements/web site details and, space permitting, we'll try and help you get your message across to our visitors. We look forward to hearing from you.


text:
Q: Correct $p$ value for a t-test I have two groups and I computed the t-test (both sides, $\alpha$=0.05) on them. The result shows significance difference between the means of two groups.
Now I want to know which group has a higher mean, hence I want to repeat my t-test but this time only one side (e.g. right tail).
First of all is this way correct to find out which mean is higher? Second, do I have to use $\alpha/2$,i.e., $\alpha$=0.025 this time?

A: You have the estimates of the population means (or can just compute them from the data again if the stats software you used doesn't report them). By definition the group with the larger/higher population mean is the group with the higher mean in the test.
You shouldn't repeat the test but using a one-sided hypothesis once you know the outcome of the two-sided test. Just compute the sample means for the groups from the data and you have all you need to know with the first $t$ test.
For example (using R and some dummy data with known different means):
set.seed(1)
df <- data.frame(x = rnorm(100, mean = c(-5, 5)),
                 grp =  factor(rep(c("A", "B"), times = 50)))
t.test(x ~ grp, data = df)

In R we get:
> t.test(x ~ grp, data = df)

    Welch Two Sample t-test

data:  x by grp
t = -54.683, df = 97.885, p-value < 2.2e-16
alternative hypothesis: true difference in means is not equal to 0
95 percent confidence interval:
 -10.183345  -9.470102
sample estimates:
mean in group A mean in group B
      -4.804474        5.022249  <------ Group sample means

So we can clearly see which group has the larger mean. But if we didn't get that in the output in whatever stats software we're are using, just proceed by computing the groups means. Here I do it the slow way (better R code is available)
with(subset(df, grp == "A"), mean(x))
with(subset(df, grp == "B"), mean(x))

> with(subset(df, grp == "A"), mean(x))
[1] -4.804474
> with(subset(df, grp == "B"), mean(x))
[1] 5.022249

So even if we don't know from the test which group had the higher mean we can always find it from the sample means (estimates of the population means).

(Nicer R code might include:
> aggregate(x ~ grp, data = df, FUN = mean)
  grp         x
1   A -4.804474
2   B  5.022249

.)


text:
Meatless Farm adds a new vegan sausage in Canadian market
Food in Canada Staff
Meatless Farm has partnered with Canada's leading foodservice distributors, to bring a new meat-free product to Canada.
In addition to the existing product line of meat-free burgers, the company has introduced new plant-based breakfast sausage patties for the Canadian market. Both the burger and the breakfast sausage patty are available in a 36-pack case and will be introduced across the country through our Fresh Pro Sales broker team as foodservice distributors look to expand their product offerings.
Meatless Farm's internal team of chefs and food scientists developed recipes that provide the market with the highest quality taste and texture in plant-based meat alternatives. The new recipe – a next-generation soy-free, completely pea-based mix – more closely resembles the taste and texture of red meat, making it easier to swap meat for a plant-based alternative in the familiar dishes that Canadians love and crave. Meatless Farm's new recipe also improves product quality and ensures products are free from major allergens.
"A plant-based revolution is taking place across the globe, and Canada is no different. We've loved seeing Canadians' excitement for the taste and texture of our products since launching last year," said Darcy Peters, vice president of sales, Meatless Farm Canada. "Expanding our product line to include breakfast items was critical to meet the demand of our Canadian audience and reflects the changing eating habits resulting from the pandemic. We look forward to our upcoming discussions with foodservice partners on how they can incorporate our plant-based products in their menus."
About Meatless Farm
Meatless Farm is a plant-based protein company known for its meat-free burger patties, meatless ground and sausage products. Almost indistinguishable from meat in terms of taste and texture, Meatless Farm's products are 100 per cent plant-based, gluten-free and made using the highest-quality, non-GMO ingredients available. The company launched in the UK in 2018 and has since expanded into Europe, the US, Canada, Asia Pacific, South America and the UAE. The company was founded by Morten Toft Bech, after he and his wife discovered the difficulty of preparing quick and easy protein-filled meals for their family, who follow a predominantly plant-based diet.
The Meatless Farm Co now available in grocery stores
Market for 'Beyond Sausage' expands in Canada
Nestlé adds plant-based options to Digiorno and Stouffer's line
Additional federal support for food banks and local food organizations
Bulk buying: How one British Columbian initiative is helping protect Canada's food-sector workers against COVID-19

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Threonine biosynthetic genes are essential in Cryptococcus neoformans.. 154:2767-2775. 2008
Essential roles of class E Vps proteins for sorting into multivesicular bodies in Schizosaccharomyces pombe.. 153:2753-2764. 2007
Involvement of the S-layer proteins Hpi and SlpA in the maintenance of cell envelope integrity in Deinococcus radiodurans R1.. 152:2779-2787. 2006
Calcineurin, Mpk1 and Hog1 MAPK pathways independently control fludioxonil antifungal sensitivity in Cryptococcus neoformans.. 152:591-604. 2006
Phylogeny of Wolbachia pipientis based on gltA, groEL and ftsZ gene sequences: clustering of arthropod and nematode symbionts in the F supergroup, and evidence for further diversity in the Wolbachia tree.. 151:4015-4022. 2005
Probing the domain structure of FtsZ by random truncation and insertion of GFP.. 151:4033-4043. 2005
Cryptococcus neoformans methionine synthase: expression analysis and requirement for virulence.. 150:3013-3023. 2004
The RAM1 gene encoding a protein-farnesyltransferase beta-subunit homologue is essential in Cryptococcus neoformans.. 150:1925-1935. 2004
Cryptococcus neoformans Ilv2p confers resistance to sulfometuron methyl and is required for survival at 37 degrees C and in vivo.. 150:1547-1558. 2004
Molecular phylogeny, biogeography and speciation of the mushroom species Pleurotus cystidiosus and allied taxa.. 150:715-726. 2004
Gene expression level influences amino acid usage, but not codon usage, in the tsetse fly endosymbiont Wigglesworthia.. 149:2585-2596. 2003
Comparative gene genealogical analyses of strains of serotype AD identify recombination in populations of serotypes A and D in the human pathogenic yeast Cryptococcus neoformans.. 149:2147-2154. 2003
Regulation of cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (COX1) expression in Cryptococcus neoformans by temperature and host environment.. 149:1041-1049. 2003
A PCR-based strategy to generate integrative targeting alleles with large regions of homology.. 148:2607-2615. 2002
Molecular and genetic analysis of the Cryptococcus neoformans MET3 gene and a met3 mutant.. 148:2617-2625. 2002
Small genome of Candidatus Blochmannia, the bacterial endosymbiont of Camponotus, implies irreversible specialization to an intracellular lifestyle.. 148:2551-2556. 2002
Antisense repression in Cryptococcus neoformans as a laboratory tool and potential antifungal strategy.. 148:213-219. 2002
Multiple origins of hybrid strains of Cryptococcus neoformans with serotype AD.. 148:203-212. 2002
Ras1 and Ras2 contribute shared and unique roles in physiology and virulence of Cryptococcus neoformans.. 148:191-201. 2002
Secretion of FK506/FK520 and rapamycin by Streptomyces inhibits the growth of competing Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Cryptococcus neoformans.. 145 ( Pt 8):1989-2000. 1999
Genetic diversity in the Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex based on variable numbers of tandem DNA repeats.. 144 ( Pt 5):1189-1196. 1998
SP75 is encoded by the DP87 gene and belongs to a family of modular Dictyostelium discoideum outer layer spore coat proteins.. 142 ( Pt 8):2227-2243. 1996


text:
The vesica piscis is a type of lens, a mathematical shape formed by the intersection of two disks with the same radius, intersecting in such a way that the center of each disk lies on the perimeter of the other. In Latin, "" literally means "bladder of a fish", reflecting the shape's resemblance to the conjoined dual air bladders (swim bladder) found in most fish. In Italian, the shape's name is  ("almond").

This figure appears in the first proposition of Euclid's Elements, where it forms the first step in constructing an equilateral triangle using a compass and straightedge. The triangle has as its vertices the two disk centers and one of the two sharp corners of the vesica piscis.

Mathematical description
Mathematically, the vesica piscis is a special case of a lens, the shape formed by the intersection of two disks.

The mathematical ratio of the height of the vesica piscis to the width across its center is the square root of 3, or 1.7320508... (since if straight lines are drawn connecting the centers of the two circles with each other and with the two points where the circles intersect, two equilateral triangles join along an edge). The ratios 265:153 = 1.7320261... and 1351:780 = 1.7320513... are two of a series of approximations to this value, each with the property that no better approximation can be obtained with smaller whole numbers.  Archimedes of Syracuse, in his Measurement of a Circle, uses these ratios as upper and lower bounds:

Area

The area of the vesica piscis is formed by two equilateral triangles and four equal circular segments. In the drawing, one triangle and one segment appear in blue.

One triangle and one segment form a sector of one sixth of the circle (60°).
The area of the sector is then: .

Since the side of the equilateral triangle has length , its area is .

The area of the segment is the difference between those two areas:

By summing the areas of two triangles and four segments, we obtain the area of the vesica piscis:

Applications

The two circles of the vesica piscis, or three circles forming in pairs three vesicae, are commonly used in Venn diagrams. Arcs of the same three circles can also be used to form the triquetra symbol, and the Reuleaux triangle.

In Christian art, some aureolas are in the shape of a vertically oriented vesica piscis, and the seals of ecclesiastical organizations can be enclosed within a vertically oriented vesica piscis (instead of the more usual circular enclosure). Also, the ichthys symbol incorporates the vesica piscis shape. Ecclesiastical heraldry of the Catholic Church appeared first in seals, nearly all vesica-shaped. The vesica piscis has been used within Freemasonry, most notably in the shapes of the collars worn by officiants of the Masonic rituals. It was also considered the proper shape for the enclosure of the seals of Masonic lodges.

The vesica piscis is also used as a proportioning system in architecture, in particular Gothic architecture. The system was illustrated in Cesare Cesariano's 1521 version of Vitruvius's , which he called "the rule of the German architects". The vesica piscis was a leitmotif of architect Carlo Scarpa and is used as a "viewing device" in Tomba Brion (Brion Cemetery) in San Vito d'Altivole, Italy.

Several other artworks or designs have also featured this shape:
The cover of the Chalice Well in Glastonbury (United Kingdom) depicts a stylized version of the vesica piscis design.
Several mathematical sculptures by Susan Latham use a three-dimensional form obtained from the planar depiction of two circles forming the vesica piscis, deformed into as a curved surface with folds along the inner arcs of the vesica and with the two outer arcs meeting in a single curve. Its shape can be analyzed using the mathematics of developable surfaces.

Symbolism
Various symbolic meanings have been associated with the vesica piscis:
When arranged so that the lens is horizontal, with its two overlaid circles placed one above the other, it symbolizes the interface between the spiritual and physical worlds, represented by the two circles. In this arrangement, it also resembles the ichthys (fish) symbol for Christ, and has also been said to be a symbol of life, of "the materialization of the spirit", of Christ's mediation between heaven and earth, and of the eucharist.
When arranged so that the lens is placed vertically, and used to depict a halo or aureola, it represents divine glory.
When arranged so that the lens is placed vertically, it has also been said to be a depiction of the vulva, and therefore symbolic of femininity and fertility.
A diagram of Euclid's use of this diagram to construct an equilateral triangle, appearing with the vertical placement of the lens in James Joyce's Finnegans Wake, has been said to be "emblematic of rational man", but overlaid onto a vaginal triangle again symbolizing femininity.

Gallery

See also
 Flower of Life, a figure based upon this principle
 Villarceau circles, a pair of congruent circles derived from a torus that, however, are not usually centered on each other's perimeter
 Lemon (geometry), a similar three-dimensional shape

References

External links

Visual motifs
Piecewise-circular curves
Iconography
Yonic symbols
Sacred geometry

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Insight Technologies' Procyon weapon light offers three output options with the flick of a thumb.
Insight Technologies has been making some incredible inroads into the market for handheld and gun-mounted lights and lasers. Its latest light, the XTI Procyon, is another high-quality addition to the line.
The Procyon is a weapon-mounted light with a rugged, lightweight housing of hard-anodized aluminum. It is meant to slide right onto any Picatinny-spec accessory rail, although a smaller latch bar comes with the unit to facilitate mounting it on guns with different rail systems.
The four-ounce light (with batteries) is waterproof to 30 feet and features a shockproof LED that puts out a blinding 125 lumens of white light. The back of the light has a pair of toggle switches for ambidextrous operation. Up is the constant on position, down is momentary, and tapping the light twice in either direction produces a disorienting strobe light.
I mounted the Procyon on a Kimber SIS I had on hand for testing. It slid right onto the rail and locked up nice and tight. Operating the light was easy, even with my small hands. I used my support-hand thumb to engage the toggle switch.
The Procyon is a rugged, well-made unit with more than enough light output to disorient or temporarily blind bad guys. If you're in the market for a weapon-mounted light, I highly recommend it.


Laurie Rowan is an award winning animator and illustrator based in the South Coast of England. Acclaim for his commercial moving image and game design work has come in the form of a Bafta win and nomination, and several awards including a Lovie.
After a decade of working within the creative industries for high profile clients and campaigns including BBC, Channel 4, MTV, Disney and Google, Laurie decided to branch out with his own brand of wobbly characters.


This chic restaurant offers an extensive à la carte menu and all-day dining in a discreetly glamorous atmosphere.
Food is comfort. They make it easy for you to enjoy a delicious meal without even leaving the hotel. Whether you are into health food, snacks, or gourmet food all the way, they've got something to tempt your palate. Stay in and use our in-room dining service, check out the onsite restaurant, or unwind with after-dinner drinks at the bar. Their DoubleTree hotel was awarded the Food and Beverage Award for Excellence 2017, Europe Middle East & Africa.
This chic restaurant offers an extensive à la carte menu and all-day dining in a discreetly glamorous atmosphere. Having spent 15 years honing his culinary talents across Europe and South Africa, executive chef Simon Kemp has made the DoubleTree by Hilton Cape Town - Upper Eastside kitchen his creative home. Experimenting with a fusion-style menu, Simon is also a master at the traditional: his handmade burgers are legendary. Should you have specific dietary requirements, please do let us know - with advance warning, Simon can ensure that there is something that meets these requirements.


This range of contemporary teak tables with an Antique wash finish, are an ideal match for some of Daro's most popular Outdoor ranges. Pictured here with the Ardèche and Clermont ranges, this range is also ideally suited for use with the ever popular Auckland collection both for lounging and dining.
Shown in Durban Canvas fabric.


As your main connection, we'll keep you plugged into some great bargains for all your aviation equipment and accessories. An auxiliary power unit is an essential piece of equipment to have on hand, and with an aircraft APU plug, you'll be back up and running. Choose from Piper style jumper cable and single pole plugs, 2-pin cable plugs and other plugs and adapters. We also have low-cost power plug adapters that you can use to start your plane with your car and regular jumper cables.
When it comes to our huge inventory of aviation equipment and accessories and knowledgeable staff, we leave our competitors way behind. We've been supporting aircraft aficionados since 2003 with our online superstore, so give us a holler if you have any questions.


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Primers for State and Local Governments
Food-borne illness is a serious public health threat in the United States. Despite having one the best food safety systems in the world, the Center for Disease Control estimates that 48 million Americans get sick every year from food-borne illness — that's one out of six Americans. In an effort to improve the safety of the nation's food supply, the historic FDA Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) was signed into law on January 4, 2011. The FSMA places a new focus on our nation's ability to prevent food-borne illness, while strengthening our ability to respond to outbreaks. The Network has developed a series of primers to help state and local governments better understand the new responsibilities, opportunities and resources required and provided by the FSMA, such as guidance documents, training, grant funding, contract opportunities, and improved situational awareness.The primers also address questions about specific FSMA regulations.
The FDA recently released revised provisions that impact FSMA Section 103 and Section 105. The corresponding primers below will be updated accordingly in the coming weeks.
Primer: FSMA Section 105 - Standards for Produce Safety
Section 105 of the Food Safety Modernization requires the FDA to create minimum science-based safety standards for produce. This primer provides an overivew of section 105 and the regulations proposed by the FDA to ensure produce safety, as well as recent revisions to the regulations.
Primer: FSMA Section 111 - Sanitary Transportation of Human and Animal Food
This section of the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) mandates that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) draft regulations regarding the sanitary transportation of food. This primer will address the impact of this section on human food.
Primer: FSMA Section 101 - Inspection of Records
Section 101 of the Food Safety Modernization Act expands the FDA's authority to access and copy records relating to potentially dangerous food items. This primer explores the FDA's record inspection authority based on the revisions implemented by the FSMA and the potential effects on public health and industry.
Primer: FSMA Section 102 - Registration of Food Facilities
Food facilities are required to register with the FDA to help the agency determine the location and sources of bioterrorism incidents or an outbreak of food-borne illness. This primer provides information on Section 102 of the Food Safety Modernization Act, which requires facilities to provide additional information when they register with the FDA.
Primer: FSMA Section 103 - Hazard Analysis and Risk-Based Preventive Controls
The Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) requires certain regulated food facilities to assume a more proactive role in preventing food-borne illness. Section 103 requires regulated facilities to conduct an extensive hazard analysis of their operations. While Section 103 applies to both human and animal food, this primer provides information on the impact of Section 103 on facilities that produce human food.


Breakfast for dinner is one of those brilliant little feats that makes my world go 'round. Who can resist a short stack of pancakes or eggs with crispy bacon at such an inappropriate hour? Not this girl. I go for fluffy omelettes loaded with veggies and golden brown home fries on the side. So throw on your pajamas and grab your favorite coffee mug, because breakfast is served.
A Quick Tip: Omelettes take very little time to cook. For that reason, it is important to have all your ingredients in place and ready. This will make your cooking process more smooth and efficient.
In a 10 inch skillet, heat the olive oil over high heat. You want the oil very hot, but not smoking. If by chance this happens, briefly turn off the heat and remove the skillet. Once the skillet cools down, return it to the stovetop. While the oil heats, crack the eggs in a bowl, add the milk, season with salt and pepper and whisk vigorously. Once the pan is ready, pour the eggs into the pan. You should hear a nice crackling sound and that's exactly what you want. Immediately cover the eggs with a lid or plate for approximately 1 minute. Remove the lid and take a quick look. You want the eggs to be slightly puffed and a little runny on top. Now it's time to flip the omelette. My dad has a technique which I have dubbed the "Lift and Flip" method. Lift the skillet with one hand and place the spatula under the eggs with the other and flip. Lower the heat to medium-high. While the other side is browning, arrange two slices of swiss cheese, the spinach, mushrooms and tomatoes on one side of the omelette. Slide your spatula underneath the omelette and fold it in half. To create a seal, press down on the omelette with the spatula. This will keep all of the veggies inside and make your omelette more compact. Remove the omelette from the heat and enjoy.


What happen to "if Bernie Sanders loses the democratic nomination I'm staying in India" maybe now go to Pakistan & help them out over there.. Maybe spread your message of peace & equal right for all... oh wait.. yours was the typical liberal response to those they disagree with, ban them from speaking.. Nothing quite like Fascism! 1st amendment only applies to liberals & dems and all others should be banned voicing their opinions in public..
Autoerotique is god. Like literal god.
Vocals are okay. Beat drop isn't very exciting. Make something catchier and with more bass!


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APY Transaction: How to view, download Atal Pension Yojana contribution statement for tax exemption
By: Sunil Dhawan |
As an APY subscriber, one may use the APY mobile application which is available for APY users free of cost to check the recent 5 contributions.
After making payments and completing the transactions, you may keep track of the APY transaction statement. After making payments and completing the transactions, you may keep track of the APY transaction statement.
Atal Pension Yojana (APY) rules allow anyone between 18 and 40 years having bank savings account to join the pension scheme. Depending on the age at the time of joining the APY scheme and the amount of pension required from age 60, the APY contribution is determined. The monthly pension from age 60 can be had for Rs 1000, Rs 2000, Rs 3000, Rs 4000 and Rs 5000, while the contributions can be made on monthly, quarterly or half-yearly basis through the auto-debit facility from the savings Bank account. After making payments and completing the transactions, you may keep track of the APY transaction statement.
On enrolling into Atal Pension Yojana, the physical transaction statement is sent once a year to the registered address i.e. the address provided by a subscriber. Annual Transaction Statement can also be had on Email.
As an APY subscriber, one may use the APY mobile application which is available for APY users free of cost to check the recent 5 contributions. One can also download the transaction statement and e-PRAN anytime without paying any charge.
To view your APY transaction statement, you need to visit the APY NSDL CRA website. You need your PRAN and savings bank account details to log in. In case, the PRAN is not readily available, you can access it using your name, account number, and date of birth.
The APY contributions qualify for tax benefit under section 80CCD (1) of the Income-tax Act, 1961.
The section 'Contribution Details' gives the details of the contributions processed in the APY subscriber's account during the period. The value and other computations in the Transaction statement depend upon the date on which the Transaction Statement is accessed in the CRA system. The balances and respective narrations reflecting in your account are based on the contribution amount and details uploaded by your APY bank branch.
The auto-debit facility was paused by the government but has resumed from July 1, 2020. There is no penal interest applicable if contribution for April 2020 to August 2020 has been uploaded by September 30, 2020. It is better to view and download the APY transaction statement to get a clear picture of the transactions made.
APY Transaction How to view download Atal Pension Yojana contribution statement for tax&nbspexemption


Pakistan has made a right and timely decision to negotiate with IMF for a bailout package. It was the need of the time as Pakistan has been facing the issue of balance of payment deficit. The main advantage of consulting IMF is that the credit rating of a country improves. The government is taking mature steps for economic revival. The IMF has also expressed flexibility in its terms and conditions for the said bailout package.


We have a 415m raised track for 2.5" 3.5" & 5" engines with steaming bays. Our ground level track consists of a 5" track of 400m & 7.25" gauge track of 1.4 miles with embankment, suspension bridge and tunnel.
Burgers and cake will be on sale, tea and coffee free.


BGC0001459, decaplanin biosynthetic gene cluster from Amycolatopsis regifaucium. Locus 1. Full MIBiG entry.
decaplanin (BGC0001459). Gene Cluster 1. Biosynthetic class = NRP. GenBank LOBU02000007, positions 259653-327583. Click on genes for more information.
1. Tan GY et al. (2007) Amycolatopsis regifaucium sp. nov., a novel actinomycete that produces kigamicins. Int J Syst Evol Microbiol 57(Pt 11):2562-7. doi: 10.1099/ijs.0.64974-0.


To generate a revolutionary movement towards Cold Brew served HOT during the winter months and promote entries to the #WarmUpToColdBrew Sweepstakes.
To introduce Java House's new Cold Brew Liquid PODS, designed to be enjoyed cold or hot, we partnered with influencers known to regularly drink cold brew coffee to help introduce the product to coffee drinkers across the nation. Content showcased influencers converting to a hot drink during the cold months and promoted the sweepstakes. Key messaging was then amplified to additional audiences through a targeted media buying strategy and secondary influencer syndication.


How Does Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo Work? How long does it take for Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo to start killing fleas and ticks? Where can I purchase Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo?
I just applied Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo, but I'm seeing more fleas on my dog than ever! Why? Can I apply Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo to my pregnant dog? Can I get my money back if Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo does not work on my pet?
How Does Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo Work?
Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo has three active ingredients: Pyrethrum, Piperonyl Butoxide, and MGK(R) 264. This formula works to knockdown fleas and ticks fast.
I just applied Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo, but I'm seeing more fleas on my dog than ever! Why?
As the fleas die, they rise to the top of your pet's hair coat where they are more visible. Be assured, Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo is working!
How long does it take for Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo to start killing fleas and ticks?
Once these pesky parasites come in contact with Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo they will begin dying immediately.
Can I apply Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo to my pregnant dog?
Consult a veterinarian before using this product on pregnant or nursing animals.
Where can I purchase Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo?
See Where to Buy for retailers near you.
Can I get my money back if Advecta Flea and Tick Dog Shampoo does not work on my pet?
Yes, you can return the product to the retailer for a full refund.


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Stick to Fortnite on PC and consoles, this mobile dock isn't worth it
The GameSir X1 dock is an interesting idea with a lot of danger attached
By Ben Kuchera May 14, 2018, 12:30pm EDT
If you buy something from a Polygon link, Vox Media may earn a commission. See our ethics statement.
Share All sharing options for: Stick to Fortnite on PC and consoles, this mobile dock isn't worth it
The GameSir X1 Battledock sounds like a good idea — on paper. The $45 device has bubbled up as a curiosity on social media a few times now, and allows you to play mobile games like Fortnite and PUBG using a mouse and keyboard. It's kinda cheating, depending on how you look at things, but this kind of cheating in those games has become a popular way to play.
I was going to buy a GameSir and review it. Instead, this turned into a story about why I literally didn't feel safe doing so.
Setup is ridiculous
The GameSir hardware itself feels pretty solid: There's an arm to hold your phone, there's a large button you hit to connect via Bluetooth, and everything feels nice and well put together. Your mouse and keyboard connect to the USB ports on the side, and then the device connects to your phone via Bluetooth. Or at least that's the idea. It all folds down into a tiny square when you're not using it, and batteries allow you to take it on the road. It's a pretty neat little package, until you try to use it.
The dock feels like a solid hunk of metal and plastic when it's all folded up
Ben Kuchera/Polygon
The important thing to know is that the X1 Battledock is going to do things to your Android phone that Google definitely does not want it to do. It's also not a product that's plug-and-play; you have to be pretty comfortable diving into the menus of your phone. Here are the instructions to get started on an Android device:
Please go to Settings > System > About, tap "Build number" 7 times in a raw to turn "Developer options" on.
Go to Settings > System > Developer options and turn "Allow USB debug" on.
Go to Settings > Application > GameSir World and turn all permissions of GameSir World on (camera, location, phone, and storage).
Also turn "Float window permission" on (name might vary, technically it is a permission to allow the app appear on the top of the screen).
Back to the home screen, go to GameSir World APP and navigate to GameSir Spirit interface.
Tap "Connect" button on the top to automatically search and connect to the GameSir X1.
Tap "+" to add your favorite games to the list.
Tap the game icon and select "Direct Play by G-Engine."
Wait for 1 mins to initialize the game, and you are good to enter the game.
If you know anything about phones, you're probably already seeing a lot of red flags here. And the Android OS doesn't want you to install this program at all.
Otherwise, this seems like relatively normal stuff so far. Operating systems these days, like Android and even Windows 10, doesn't like you downloading and running programs they don't know about, so I was pretty comfortable installing this anyway.
And Google really needed to remind me this was a bad idea. This, or some variation of this, became my home screen for the next few days:
Uh, OK. I think I'll keep going?
Google via Polygon
So I downloaded the latest version of the program from Google Play, and that's when I learned how all this works. The dock doesn't play games downloaded from a legitimate source; you have to download special versions of each game from GameSir itself. And things look ... shady on the store.
Crazy ... Fox Adventure?
GameSir
Most of the app's instructions are written in Chinese, not English, and what English does exist about the product is often poorly translated. But it turns out the version of the app that's on the Google Play store doesn't support the X1; it's for the device's standalone controllers. I needed to download the program that's on the company's website and sideload it onto my device.
But here's the thing: The app requires you to give it permissions for just about anything. I'm not exaggerating: This is a ridiculous amount of privacy to give up to use a mouse and keyboard on an Android phone. Take a look:
Nope. Nope. Nope.
GameSir via Polygon
I emailed the company last week to ask why the app needed to have this much access to my phone, and have yet to hear back. A co-worker suggested I wipe my phone back to factory settings so I could be safer using and reviewing the hardware, but at this point, I'm not sure it's worth it. I would just stay away from the GameSir altogether — this is a ridiculous number of warnings to ignore and permissions you need to give up.
So the dream of playing PUBG with a mouse and keyboard using a portable dock is dead, at least with this product as your option. It looks tempting, but it just doesn't seem worth the loss in security.


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Whether Do As Romans Do Essay
3083 words - 13 pages
When in Rome, should we really do as Romans do? An analysis of successful cross-cultural communication and negotiation
Abstract: It is widely accepted that today's workplace is becoming huge rapidly and interconnected intensively for the reason that a number of companies are looking for foreign country markets to expand their business. In turn, understanding how to communication and negotiation effectively with another language speaking negotiator can be much more difficulty than before. Thus, cross-culture communication and negotiation are becoming more and more frequent and significant in daily international business. This paper focuses on the barriers of cross-culture ...view middle of the document...
". According to Tylor, culture can be expressed through a complicate integration of beliefs, values, norms and the behavior assumptions of a society. These are the context of culture which illustrates the elements of a culture. Besides, as found on the website of Hofstede center, Hofstede developed a five-dimension framework, which are power distance, masculinity, individualism, uncertainty avoidance and long-term orientation. These five dimensions explained culture characteristics and people with different cultural characteristics think or behave distinctly in cross-culture communication and negotiation, In Parissa Haghirian(2012) point of view, when in Rome, do as Romans do or not are both true and false at the same time. Three different reactions can be showed when expatriates encounter cross-culture challenges, that are resistance, acceptance and adaptation. So, expatriates need to consider separately in different cases. Nicole L. Gullekson(2010) examined of status and emotional display rules in intercultural work contexts in the United State. He found out that the nature of emotion display for expatriates is complex, and it is important to be aware of when "do as Romans do", and when not, which suggested that when expatriates in Rome, they needn't always do as Romans do. In this paper, the first part is the introduction and the main idea. The second part will introduce the cross-culture communication and negotiation. The third part mainly identify the barriers of the cross-culture communication and negotiation. The forth section focus on whether we should follow the proverb "When in Rome do as Romans do". The last section concludes with some suggestions that what we really should do
when communicating and negotiating with another culture.
Cross-culture communication and negotiation
According to Velo and Veronica(2011), cross-cultural communication is a process of transmitting information from sender to receiver through language, non-verbal gestures, and space relationships across different cultures. The process of the communication includes a message sender and receiver. They encode and decode the information they want to convey separately in a cultural environment and the information is sent through channels such as language and non-verbal behaviors. Cross-culture negotiation is a process of bargaining with parties aiming at reaching a win-win solution under a mixed cultural background. Though out the whole process of negotiation, the communication and styles of the negotiators are significant. Effective communication as well as the appropriate styles of the negotiators may result in successful business so that parties involved will benefit from the negotiation. Contrary, ineffective communication or unpopular styles of negotiators will result in great loss for both sides. How to make a successful cross-culture communication and negotiation? Before this, we should understand the barriers of the cross-culture communication and...
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Eduard Shevardnadze, Georgia's second president and Soviet Union's last foreign minister, who died on July 7 at the age of 86, was buried in Tbilisi after a live televised state funeral on Sunday.
Foreign dignitaries from about thirty states, Georgian leadership, government ministers and the family members attended the funeral service in the Holy Trinity Cathedral in Tbilisi, where his coffin was lying in state since Friday.
His flag-draped coffin was carried from the Cathedral by men dressed in black chokhas, who passed through soldiers, lining up the yard of the Holy Trinity Cathedral; the coffin was then driven into a motorcade to Krtsanisi residence in Tbilisi, where Shevardnadze was buried next to his late wife after a senior Orthodox cleric performed religious ritual.
Shevardnadze had lived in Krtsanisi residence since he resigned from presidency after the 2003 Rose Revolution.
"Eduard Shevardnadze was victorious even in defeat. In this sense, his resignation from presidency was the biggest victory in his life, amounting victory over history," his son Paata Shevardnadze said during the funeral service in the Holy Trinity Cathedral.
Former U.S. State Secretary James Baker and Shevardnadze's West German counterpart in the late 1980s Hans-Dietrich Genscher were among the foreign dignitaries attending the service.
"Dear friend, thank you what you have done for Europe and what you have done for our people," the former German foreign minister said.
Georgian PM Irakli Garibashvili said at the ceremony that Shevardnadze helped shape Georgia's pro-Western course and recalled 2002 NATO Prague summit when Shevardnadze, then president of Georgia, made a formal declaration for his country's intention to join the Alliance.
According to the Georgian foreign ministry, among the foreign dignitaries, who attended the ceremony, were Austrian justice minister; speakers of Azerbaijani and Armenian parliaments; Turkish security of labor and social minister; agriculture minister of Belarus.