text:
Afghan Team Is Winning Matches As Well As Hearts With Its Sheer Professionalism
Arani BasuUpdated on Sep 22, 2018, 12:27 IST
If there was one word to define the way Afghanistan have gone about their cricket over the last couple of years, it has to be spirit. Their emergence has coincided with the downward spiral of Sri Lanka, and their presence in the Super Four of the Asia Cup here is testimony to their fighting spirit.
After beating Bangladesh on Thursday night to top Group B, 16 hours ahead of their match against Pakistan, Afghanistan's star performer Rashid Khan put to rest the controversy surrounding the skewed schedule of the tournament. "We can't afford to look at the schedule. We are professional players. It didn't matter if we had to play another match in 14 hours. We can play even now." Rashid's statement was more about sending a message to the opponents. They are hungry for matches against top teams.
A cramped schedule would be last on the list of challenges faced by Afghan cricket. They have barely played any cricket in their home country. The players and officials have been living lives of cricketing nomads - from Lahore, Dubai to Greater Noida and Dehradun - in search of decent facilities to improve their game.
"We just need to improve and focus on ourselves. We just need to show what talent we have. We have improved our fitness in the last six months. And that has helped us in this tournament," Rashid said, talking about their vision.
There's more to their rise as a powerhouse in the subcontinent than just their seniors putting their heads down. The Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB) has been proactive in ensuring nothing hinders the growth of cricket. The moment the political tensions between Pakistan and Afghanistan grew, the board shifted the base of the senior team from Lahore to Dubai before building healthy relations with India.
Pakistan shaped their cricket initially and then India lent a helping hand, including hosting their first Test match in June this year.
Afghanistan's U-19 team made it to the semi-finals of the World Cup earlier this year. A process has been set in place, along with getting first-class league started. From PR companies to emphasis on catching young talent, the Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB) has been proactive in its endeavour to popularize the sport. The idea came after observing football's struggle to take off.
"We invested in the game as a project. There were posters put up to get people playing. We reached the rural areas and got deep into the country to find talent. And now cricket is the No.1 sport in Afghanistan," a proud ACB CEO Shafiq Stanikzai had told TOI when they were allotted their first Test.
ACB has done well to set up a system to compete on the world stage but they are yet to penetrate more than half of the country. Most players come from the eastern and southern part of Afghanistan. These parts of the country touch the border of Pakistan and popularizing cricket would have been relatively easier. Their brand of cricket has kept the cricketing world excited. If they do manage to consolidate, as the authorities in Kabul have planned, the established teams will have a serious competitor to deal with.


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For the last several weeks a number of Cherokee County First Responders have been working to receive certification aimed at helping them to better serve the residents of Cherokee County.
Andy Fairel, who is the Captain of Operations at Floyd Cherokee EMS told WEIS Radio News that the class finished with a total of 23 students from multiple departments throughout the county. Floyd EMS Paramedic Broderick Smith served as the lead instructor for the 45 hour classroom course.
Training included bleeding control, bandage and splinting, oxygen administration, patient assessment and other topics. On Monday night those that completed the course were presented with 'jump kits' by Floyd EMS. Those kits include basic first aid items and assessment equipment.
Fairel said that he was very impressed with the dedication and professionalism of the Firefighters and First Responders in Cherokee County and expressed what a privilege it was for Floyd to be able to play a small part in the overall big picture of public safety in the community.
These dedicated men and women gave up numerous hours of their personal time in order to continue their education and training in making sure that the citizens of Cherokee County receive critical care in those minutes prior to the arrival of Paramedics which is often times crucial.
The class was sponsored by the Cherokee County Association of Volunteer Fire Departments, Floyd EMS and the Cherokee County Emergency Management Agency.


Set in the lush Golden Vale, this attractive parkland course is particularly renowned for the quality of its greens and fairways, and its friendly atmosphere. The view from the course is magnificent with the majestic Galtee Mountains as the natural backdrop. Drainage is a natural feature, making the course playable twelve months of the year. Gently undulating land, intercepted by a river, makes Mitchelstown the ideal golf course for players seeking tranquillity and a golf challenge. Par: 67. Length: 5,643 yards.
This beautiful parkland golf course, founded in 1927, is acclaimed by many as the 'jewel in the crown of nine hole golf courses'. Adjacent to Doneraile National Park, this course is well endowed with an abundance of natural trees, making it a most picturesque golfing experience. The sixth hole is the signature hole at Doneraile, with a severe dog leg to the right bounded by the local graveyard. The tee shot is a 200 yards carry over an intimidating ravine. Par 68, and Length: 5,768 yards (5,274 metres).


text:
India vs England 2021
England vs India, 3rd Test : Hits and Misses
BrokenCricket
Modified 22 Aug 2018, 17:15 IST
Hits and Misses from the 3rd Test Match
In a do or die Test for the Indians, they were put in to bat on a pitch with a greenish tinge and overcast conditions. The Indian batsmen showed more discipline and application this time around and propelled the team to a decent score of 329. In reply, the England batsmen struggled to get going and Pandya bowled a memorable spell to restrict England to 161. With a huge amount of lead, Indians confidently attacked the English pacers in the third innings.
Led by Kohli's superb century, the Indians set England an improbable target of 521. Cook and Jennings yet again fell cheaply and England were facing a historic defeat. But Butler and Stokes showed a lot of character and patience and provided some respite to the English supporters. But once Butler fell to Bumrah, it was all about a matter of time when India went through the lower order.
However, the grit shown by Rashid and Anderson even after India opted for an extended half an hour, the duo managed to take the game on Day 5 to keep India at bay.
But it just took visitors 10 mins and 17 balls exactly to wrap up the game on Day 5 as they defeated England by 203 runs. In spite of the win, the visitors still trail in the series by 2-1 with two games to go.
Let us have a look at the few hits and misses from the match.
#1. Hit : Virat Kohli
The hundred at Edgbaston silenced many of his critics, but this performance at Nottingham will make even his biggest haters stand up and applaud. His batting in the first innings was marked by patience and composure, but his second innings century was just pure class full of glorious drives.
His on-field captaincy was spot on with some good bowling changes and aggressive field placements. He will be very happy with the way his team has performed after a hard-hitting defeat at the Lord's and would be hoping for a similar win at the Ageas Bowl.
Published 22 Aug 2018, 17:15 IST
India vs England 2021 England Cricket Team Indian Cricket Team Virat Kohli Hardik Pandya Indian Cricket Team Under Kohli

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


We really appreciate you& considering whether to be part of this important "United Front" beta program. You& will be contributing to both the foundations of your own shared life, but also helping others who will benefit from our work together as we (the Crisses) develop this important program dedicated to fostering internal community.
What is the whole sign-up process?
Please read the current page regarding this beta program for the disclaimers of the program that you must agree to to participate. You may opt out before you even begin.
Can you commit to being available for 1.5 hours a week for 4 weeks for group coaching?
Are you willing to be an active participant and ask questions (in chat or voice) during the program sessions?
Will you fill out an evaluation after the 4 weeks to let me know what worked for you?
We may ask more questions otherwise we will send you the application, which is pretty long. Questions include information on your system, goals, internal communication ability, what you choose to do with your time and money, diagnoses, etc. Your answers are confidential, and if you choose not to fill it out and not participate in the program, we understand.
Fill in the application completely (if you aren't sure of an answer, say so!), and email it back to me.
I will send you a scheduler link to select a time for an interview for the program. This is not a sample coaching session � I'll be asking for clarification on answers for the questionnaire. This will be a 30-minute voice screening session (Skype, phone, Signal, or Mumble on my server for the highest privacy).
During the interview, you'll be able to ask questions about the program and make sure it's a good fit for you, and we'll ask your preference for what time slot(s) work for you. There will be 3 different schedules available (see above).
We will send you an answer on whether we accept your application within 3 days of the interview being finished.
How do we know participants are safe? Why is it so hard to get into the group?
We'll never be 100% confident that participants are safe, that's why we're being careful about even how the sessions will be conducted (see more below). In addition, we're screening participants pretty strongly for everyone's safety and suitability for the group program environment and you'll be glad we are making sure we're comfortable before allowing people into the program. It's not easy to get in for a reason. We also want to be certain that participants are ready and suitable participants because they may take up a slot someone who is ready and would benefit greatly could have used instead. We don't want to waste anyone's time.
We are looking for a minimum of 5 committed participants per session to launch each group, so we'll be filling up our Friday session first in the hope of getting 5-10 participants in one session to launch ASAP. We are thinking to start with a 10 or 12 physical-bodied participant limit for the first session. This may change in later sessions if it's easy or difficult to manage that many in a session.
How will I stay anonymous? I'm a famous person in Internet-Land!!
You can use a pseudonym during sessions (like a username or fake system name) and participants will interact via text chat unless you are Ok with being handed the mic � so participants won't be recognized by voice. For most of the session, only Crisses will have the mic for all participants to listen to longer responses.
What is the "Important Disclaimer" that might cause us to opt out or be disqualified from the program?
VERY IMPORTANT!!! If you are very depressed, if you are actively considering or contemplating suicide, or if you or anyone in your system may harm yourself, your body, or others, then this program is not for you, and please do not continue with this application.
What else will we (our whole system) be agreeing to?
Rev. Criss Ittermann ("the Crisses") is not a qualified therapist, cannot provide trauma treatment, and cannot provide crisis intervention services. We understand this is a screening for a group coaching program for working on our internal community, current and future behavior, related beliefs, and internal relationships. Participation in the program may have unintended consequences in increasing our self-awareness and may exacerbate other symptoms, so there may be risks involved. We understand that this program is not PTSD treatment, and if we find ourselves triggered, we may need to mobilize other supports to help us handle anxiety, depression, or other PTSD symptoms. We understand that this program and materials are based on holistic practices, non-religious spiritual concepts, coaching methods, self-help materials, shamanic training, and other complementary techniques and are not a replacement for medical attention, therapy, pharmaceuticals, or other professional support or intervention.
How long will the Beta program run?
Participants are invited for a 4-session package. So participants in the October run will end in Mid-November when the 2nd group runs. And the last session will run through December.


Syndicate Wars is the third video game title in the Syndicate series created by Bullfrog Productions in 1996. Unlike the first game,Sean Cooper was not involved in development. It was released for MS-DOS and the PlayStation, with a Sega Saturn version also fully developed, but never published. It was the final game in the series.


text:
Jamal Musiala is the FC Bayern Player of the Month for November 2022
You made your choice
Fri, 16/12/22, 18:17
As FC Bayern's year of competitive matches slowly came to an end, one whirlwind of a player really turned up the heat again: In November, Jamal Musiala thrilled the fans of the German record champions once again and secured the award for FC Bayern Player of the Month one more time. The 19-year-old received almost 50 per cent of the vote (49.6%), ahead of Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting (34.9%) and Serge Gnabry (5.8%). It's already the fourth time Musialy has won the award this season - the only time he didn't get it was in October, when Choupo-Moting managed to edge the fleet-footed sensation into second place.
Youngest player to make 100 competitive appearances for Bayern
An indispensable part of the Bayern team this season: Jamal Musiala celebrates with his teammates.
The statistics once again spoke clearly in favour of the Germany international: In four competitive games last month, Musiala was directly involved in four goals (two goals, two assists). In the last match of the year at Schalke (2-0), the artistic dribbler made his 100th competitive appearance for Bayern - and that at the tender age of just 19 years and 259 days. No other player ever managed to reach this milestone in professional football at such a young age for the German record champions. And anyone who has watched the youngster play can hardly wait for match number 101 in January.
Click here for all the information on Musiala's 100th game:
Reason to celebrate at Schalke
Magic Musiala makes 100th appearance
NewsVoteFansJamal Musiala


text:
Suzy Q, Get On Up & Do It Again: We need your help!
Suzy Q
Get On Up & Do It Again
Suzy Q »
DiscoLaidbackElectro disco
Suzy Q was a Canadian studio project created by Jerry Cucuzzella. Female vocalists include Michelle Mills and Angie Vileno. The group is best known for their song "Get on Up and Do It Again" which entered two Billboard charts.
01Get On Up and Do It Again
02Get On Up & Do It Again
03Computer Music
04Get On Up
05Get On Up Do It Again
06Can't Live Without Your Love (Airwave Mix)
07Tonight
08I Can't Give You More
09Harmony - Extended Mix
10CAN'T LIVE WITHOUT YOUR LOVE
11Can't Live Without Your Love - Airwave Mix
12Hey Ya
13Harmony (Extended Version)
14Harmony
15Get On Up - Ben Liebrand Mix
16With your love
17I Can't Stop the Rain
18Give Me Your Love
19I Wanna Feel Your Touch
20Cant Live Without Your Love
by Suzy Q
We have lyrics for these tracks by Suzy Q:
Can't Live Without Your Love I can't hold my feeling Everytime I take a look at…
Can't Live Without Your Love - Airwave Mix I can't hold my feeling Everytime I take a look at…
Get On Up and Do It Again You can do it, one more time If you feel your…
Hey You Janu mera janam tu. Aur main hu teri jane ja. Aisa bolu…
Suzy Q Get On Up And Do It Again 1981
Suzy-Q - Get On Up and Do It Again
Suzy Q - Get On Up and Do It Again
Suzy-Q - Get On Up
Suzy Q - Get On Up And Do It Again (Remix)
Suzy Q. - Get On Up And Do It Again (1981)
Suzy Q - Get On Up And Do It Again (Boosted Rework Again Edit) [1981 HQ]
Suzy Q - Get On Up And Do It Again - 81.wmv
SUZY Q - Get On Up (Remix Original Full Extended) [1983 HQ]
SUZY Q - get on up and do it again (1981)
Suzy-Q - Get On Up and Do It Again (Remix)
Suzy Q - Get On Up And Do It Again (Maxi Extended Rework Doremimate Edit) [1983 HQ]
Suzy Q - Get On Up Do It Again (12" Disco-Funk 1981)
Suzy Q - Get On Up Do It Again
Suzy Q - Get On Up (Long Version)
Suzy Q - Get On Up (12" Extended Remix)
Suzy Q - Get On Up and Do It Again_Fast
Suzy Q - Get On Up and Do It Again - (Extended By Monster-Funk)
Suzy Q - Get On Up And Do It Again (Extended Rework Buzz Compass Editorial Mix) [1981 HQ]
Get On Up And Do It Again - SUZY Q '1981
SUZY Q - Get On Up And Do It Again (Extended Version) (1981)
Suzy Q(Get On Up And Do It Again) 1981
Suzy Q - Get on up do it again [1981]
Suzy Q - Get On Up And Do It Again (Extended Rework Bubbling Minds Funkyfication Mix Edit) [1983 HQ]
Rare Disco Hit - Suzy Q - Get on up ( do it again ) - YouTube.flv
Get On Up And Do It Again - Suzy Q (1981)
Suzy Q - Get On Up And Do It Again (Extended Rework Disco Llama Edit) [1983 HQ]
Suzy Q - Get On Up 1981
Suzy Q – Get On Up Do It Again 12" 1981
Suzy Q-Get On Up And Do It Again
Rare Disco Hit - Suzy Q - Get on up ( do it again )
8. SUZY Q -GET On Up & Do It-RENALDR1.wmv
Suzy Q - Get on up & do it again ''Kid Color Gets On Up Edit'' (1981)
Suzy Q - Get On Up Do It Again 12'' (1981)
SUZY Q.GET ON UP AND DO IT AGAIN
Suzy Q – Get On Up Do It Again
K109 The Studio Suzy Q- Get On Up And Do It Again


text:
Peaceful Revolution:Who Does She Think She Is? How Far We Really Are From Equal Parenting
Peaceful Revolution: Who Does She Think She Is?
Sun 29, Mar 09 | By Astri von Arbin Ahlander
"Who Does She Think She Is? takes an in-depth look at what it really means to be an artist and a mother."
How Far We Really Are From Equal Parenting?
Astri von Arbin Ahlander | The Huffington Post
We recently got our hands on a copy of the new documentary Who Does She Think She Is?, by director and producer Pamela Tanner Boll. Boll is the co-executive producer of the 2005 Academy Award winner Born Into Brothels, which tells the tale of one woman working to help children in India's "red light" district through photography. In Who Does She Think She Is? Boll again tackles a story that revolves around art, women and children, but this time it is the women who need the helping.
Who Does She Think She Is? takes an in-depth look at what it really means to be an artist and a mother. Big deal, right? Wrong. The stigma against mothers that prevails throughout the working world ("they'll take time off," "they'll always have other priorities ...") seems exceptionally strong in the art world, which is notoriously difficult to penetrate to begin with. Yet, the greatest challenge that these women face is much closer to home. It is the expectation that taking care of house and home, and the kids inhabiting that home, are primarily a woman's responsibilities.
Lisa Belkin's June 15th, 2008 article in The New York Times Magazine, entitled "When Mom and Dad Share It All," reminded us that the idea of shared parenting is a rather novel one. Women still very much shoulder the brunt of the domestic burden in American society — even when they are working as hard as their men-folk. According to Belkin, when both husband and wife have full-time paying jobs, "The wife does 28 hours of housework, the husband just 16 hours. Just shy of 2 to 1, which makes no sense at all." Once childcare is brought into the picture, the ratio becomes close to 5 to 1.
No doubt about it: American society continues to view women as the "natural" caretakers. In the case of the female artists featured in Who Does She Think She Is?, the struggle to maintain a creative career while living up to the demands of being the family's primary caretaker is often agonizingly difficult. For instance, one of the women, performance artist Angela Williams, begins the film in a happy marriage and ends it as a divorcée. Her husband simply couldn't handle her growing desire to devote time and energy on her budding career.
With its title and its female focus, Who Does She Think She Is? risks scaring off a great deal of viewers, simply because a lot of people have an instant negative reaction to anything smelling ever so faintly of "feminism." Even we began the film with a skeptical air. As we watched, however, we became increasingly engaged. In an interview with The Lattice Group, Boll said, "I don't think I would have been as persistent, as caring, as careful with each of my subjects, getting them to open up, if I had not had the experience of being a very present and very listening mother." The nurturing touch defines the film. And thanks to it, Boll is able to capture the deepest, and most conflicted, desires of several women.
Who Does She Think She Is? underlines how far we really are from "equal parenting" of the kind described by Belkin. Personally, I read Belkin's article with interest, but also with worry and...amusement. According to Belkin, the idea of "equal parenting" is so foreign to most people that there are coaches you can hire to show you how to do it — detailed descriptions of excel spreadsheets dividing daily labor included. It all seems rather absurd. Then again, a spreadsheet or two might not be a bad idea for the over-worked mothers in Boll's film.
The interviews with Generation Yers that The Lattice Group has been doing over the past year give me hope that our generation, who will become parents in the next decade, might do things differently. As a young medical student we interviewed recently said, "Sure, the mom carries the thing for nine months, but as soon as it comes out the dad has just as much responsibility." Perhaps, for Gen Y parents, the caretaker-expectation will finally be de-mystified and duties — and joys — divided fairly. As one of the "equal parenting" fathers in The Times Magazine article comments in regards to his and his wife's seemingly exceptional choice to split caregiving straight down the middle, "'Why isn't this just called parenting?'" Good Question.
But, if things don't actually change by the time we start procreating, perhaps the question Gen Y mothers should be asking is, "Who does he think he is?"
A Peaceful Revolution is a blog about innovative ideas to strengthen America's families through public policies, business practices, and cultural change. Done in collaboration with MomsRising.org, read a new post here each week.
Astri von Arbin Ahlander is an author and the co-founder of thedaysofyore.com.
This article was originally published on The Huffington Post:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/astri-von-arbin-ahlander/peaceful-revolutioniwho-d_b_170363.html


Is there anything that green tea can't do? A Japanese study found that consuming five cups of green tea each day could work to prevent the development of cancer. They say the study took place over a ten year period and found that green tea was remarkably effective in cancer prevention. Needless to say, the green tea and cancer relationship is certainly not a new one, and should be known by everyone.
What was found is that five cups of green tea each day could reduce the risk of lymph cancers by up to 48%, and blood cancers by 42%. Of course this isn't the only research shedding light on the relationship between green tea and cancer.
Many cases of CLL progress slowly, and often treatment involves an early stage of "watchful waiting" before patients are given strong treatments. Researchers hope that EGCG could stabilize the disease for many patients in the early stage or improve the success rates of other therapies like chemotherapy.
Green tea is rich in antioxidants, which are known to protect the body's tissues from damage by free radicals. These antioxidants are commonly associated with the prevention of other conditions like heart disease, Alzheimer's and other degenerative diseases. What's fantastic about green tea is that it protects against a whole host of illnesses and diseases, so many people are actually helping to prevent cancer when consuming green tea to help prevent other health issues.
Five cups of green tea may seem like a lot, but those who only drank one or less per day simply didn't have the same results in this research.
How can you fit five cups in?
Consider swapping your morning coffee (or at lease one cup of it) for a cup of tea.
Have a cup of tea after each meal, taking advantage of its digestive benefits.
Steep it ahead of time and add it to smoothies and other recipes.
A cup of tea at the end of the day is a great way to unwind.
does the liquid green tea extract work as well?


text:
Q: Generate all combinations of string by space Say i have a string A B C D - i want to end up with a List<List<String>> which will contain the following combinations:
[A,B,D,C]
[A,B C D]
[A B, C D]
[A B C, D]
[A, B C, D]
etc...

found a bunch of answered questions with similar requests where people asked for all combinations based on substring of a single string but was unable to tweak it to my needs.
Ay help would be much appreciated!

A: You can try to do it by recursion.
Have 2 strings, left and right. Shift the rightmost character to the right string, repeat until there's only 1 character in left string. Everytime you do so, apply the same function to the right string.
So if you have "ABCD", that gives you:
"ABCD"
"ABC" f("D")
"AB" f("CD")
"A" f("BCD")

Fully expended you get:
f("ABCD") {
    "ABCD"
    "ABC" f("D")
        f("D") {
            "D"
        }
    "AB" f("CD")
        f("CD") {
            "CD"
            "C" f("D")
                f("D") {
                    "D"
                }
        }
    "A" f("BCD")
        f("BCD") {
            "BCD"
            "BC" f("D")
                f("D") {
                    "D"
                }
            "B" f("CD")
                f("CD") {
                    "CD"
                    "C" f("D")
                        f("D") {
                            "D"
                        }
                }
        }
}

which gives you:
[["ABCD"],
["ABC", "D"],
["AB", "CD"],
["AB", "C", "D"],
["A", "BCD"],
["A", "BC", "D"],
["A", "B", "CD"],
["A", "B", "C", "D"]]

A: Note that there are N-1 places to insert comma. So there are 2n-1 variants of placements, and we can just walk all numbers in loop using range 0..2n-1-1 and get corresponding combinations.
For example, value 5=101binary corresponds to commas at the first and the last places (according to set bits), so combination is [A, B C, D]

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
HP Executive Team All of HP US
Executive team > Carly Fiorina speeches
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HP WORLD
"HP: TECHNOLOGY FOR BUSINESS AND LIFE"
© Copyright 2002 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P
All rights reserved. Do not use without written permission from HP.
Thank you and good morning. This is the fourth time I've had the pleasure of addressing this conference in one form or another, and every year, I've told you that I feel lucky because I work for one of the greatest companies in the world. I am delighted to be here today to talk to you about the new HP, which is now more than ever one of the greatest companies in the world.
With nearly one billion customers in more than 160 countries around the world, we've spent the past year working hard to give new meaning to the term "HP World."
We now have more than 140,000 people across the globe working with you day in and day out to solve your toughest technology challenges and open new avenues to business success. From what I've seen of the HP World schedule, it looks like half of them will be speaking to you here this week.
But I wanted to come here, first and foremost, to say thank you. You know, it's a fact not lost on any one of us that the longest-running information technology conference in North America is a conference of HP customers.
In part, that's a tribute to the vision and leadership of our hosts today, and I want to thank Interex for 28 great years of partnership.
Many of you have come here this week because you want to find ways to integrate new web-based technologies and processes that you spent so much time and money putting in place in the 90s. Or, you want more help in addressing the issues of manageability and interoperability. Or, you wonder whether it's possible to get more out of your existing technology assets. Or, you wonder what it would be like if you only had to pay for the computer resources you actually use. Or, maybe you're here because you want to know how HP sees the road ahead.
I'll get to all of that in a moment. But let me say from the start that even as I introduce you to the powerful capabilities of the new HP, we know that great organizations are defined not just by their capabilities, but by their character—by the company they are, and by the company they keep.
We've spent more than six decades working hard to earn your trust, to be a good partner and a good employer, to build relationships that span across generations of technology. I want you to know that at the new HP, just like at the old HP, everything we are about and everything we do starts with customers. We know that nothing happens unless you are willing to buy something from us and unless you're willing to do it again and again. We never forget who keeps us in business.
At the new HP, our sights are set squarely on the future—our customers' future. But there is one story from our past—about Dave Packard—that informs our future here today.
At the very first job he ever worked, at General Electric, Dave was given a difficult task. He was told to get a batch of mercury-vapor tubes successfully produced. Every single previous batch had failed. To find out why, he decided to leave his office and spend all his time on the factory floor. He worked long hours, and talked to all the workers responsible for making the batch. He discovered that the written instructions from the engineers weren't sufficient to do the job right. So, he worked hand-in-hand with the people on the floor to come up with a new set of instructions—and for first time, the batch got made without a single problem.
Later, he brought a very important lesson from that experience to HP: Try harder than everybody else to solve the tough problems. Always go the extra mile.
That's the pledge I make to all of you today: All of our capabilities aside, the new HP will continue to be the company you can count on. The company that understands that relationships are as important as technology and that character matters as much as capability. The company that remains passionate about finding solutions to the unique challenges that you face. The company that goes the extra mile.
It's been said that the very nature of technology is the nature of change. Many of you have been with HP through all four waves of change that have swept the computing landscape in its short history.
From custom vertically integrated centralized computing, through departmental and work group resources, right up to the distributed networked world that is now going mobile—or, if you prefer to call it, the shift from mainframes to minis to client-server networks to the Internet—change has been the name of the game. But there has never been a time when the demands placed on information technology—and the demands placed on all of you, as IT professionals—are as great as they are today.
We live in an age when it is impossible for any business to consistently predict what's coming around the corner, short or long term. It's not enough to simply be prepared to change—companies today have to move at the speed of change. And as your business is required to adapt to change, your metrics as IT leaders change. You're no longer rewarded for stability, you're rewarded for agility. You have to shift from defense to offense. You have to be able to adapt your infrastructures more rapidly and deploy systems and applications in near real time. We'll hear HP's Ann Livermore and Peter Blackmore talk more about this later today.
It means you're no longer just defending your goal line. You're now charged with making up plays and moving the ball downfield against a shifting, blitzing, lightning-fast opponent, with two minutes to play. It means that if you're an information manager, you have to think about the creation of content on one hand and then the management, the distribution, the networking, the manipulation, the mining and, ultimately, the transformation of that content into whatever form you choose. Information technology is the ultimate team sport. The challenge is many of you are trying to win the game with a quarterback—a system that saw its best days five years ago.
The old conventional wisdom of "never touch a running system" was effective when processes remained stable over long periods of time, but in today's environment, none of you have that luxury. Problem is, many current IT infrastructures were built to be stable, not to react quickly—which is one of the reasons why a survey of key technology decision-makers in the United States found that the business environment is changing seven times as fast as the underlying IT applications.
So, your staff ends up spending 40 percent of its time simply finding stop-gap fixes to outmoded solutions that can't keep up with yesterday's demand's, let alone today's. Or worse, you may have invested millions in a new system that doesn't necessarily talk to the old system, which means that half a decade's worth of critical data is in one system and there's no easy way to transfer it to a new one.
And yet, business cycles and business budgets no longer support specialized or custom-built hardware and software to meet business computing needs. So all the while, you're being pressed to do more with less.
And the real trick of it is, we haven't even begun to see where this latest technology revolution is going to take us. Because the real transformation we see happening in technology today is that physical processes are becoming digital processes. We've gone through this phase of the Internet where we thought everything was e-business, where the ability to purchase or place orders over the Web was a big deal.
But the true inflection point of this industry is what happens when we start to digitize everything—from the Library of Congress to the great works of the Vatican to your customer brochure. That is when this industry will change forever.
Just stop and think about the changes being wrought today by digital photography, which is the embodiment of the transformation of a physical process into a digital process. What do you do when you use a traditional camera? You take a picture, something happens on film, you physically take film someplace else, they develop it through a physical, chemical process, and then you end up with prints that you physically distribute or mail. It's a fairly static process. It doesn't allow you to do very much.
But digital photography transforms that into a digital process. You create content. You network it. You manipulate it. You distribute it, you change it and you store it. And, ultimately, when you're ready, you transform it into digital content—and you haven't even stepped away from your desk or outside of the house.
That same process transformation is what is going to happen next in enterprise after enterprise after enterprise. Just think about this: Into a business environment already changing at seven times the rate of underlying IT applications, over the next three years, there will be more data created—more data that needs to be mined, analyzed, understood, stored, networked, distributed, made useful and made into information—than in the entire history of mankind.
Over and over again, many of our customers tell me they want partners who can help put these ingredients together. They want end-to-end technology solutions, not independent isolated servers or storage boxes. They want real answers, not simply the latest killer app or the newest hot box. They want fewer strategic partners who can do more for them. They want somebody they can trust.
It makes perfect sense. If you're building a house, you can go out and hire your own painter, and plumber, and electrician, and carpenter, and roofer, and stonemason—and sign separate contracts with all of them. You can hire people to lay the carpet and set the tile. You can go out and buy all the materials by yourself, and then try to put them all together. But at the end of the day, isn't it better to work with one builder that you trust, who sees the complete picture, who understands that they are not just building a wall or a roof or a driveway—they are building a house. You want them to bring with them the best partners—the best painters and electricians, the best players, the best ingredients, but you want someone who can translate your vision for what you want into reality.
To us, this is the essence of a strategic partnership, the understanding of those processes and the application of a complete set of solutions and technologies. The reality of what we are seeing in the industry today is that there are fewer and fewer players who have the capability to add that value in new ways along with the resources to continue to invent and invest in the technologies of the future.
Which brings me to our merger with Compaq. Why did we make what was at the time a very controversial announcement, that we were actually going to attempt the largest merger in the history of the IT industry? Because we saw these trends, and we saw the opportunity to combine these two companies to create one great technology company, to improve our systems delivery capability to help you do what you want to do.
And now, the industry consolidation that we talked about a year ago is happening, and will continue to happen. The fact is, every industry goes through a phase of maturation where consolidation becomes the dominant force. It's the natural evolution of industries. Now it's the IT industry's turn. We felt it was important to move early, to move decisively and give ourselves the opportunity to integrate these companies while the economy and spending on new IT projects is slow.
And frankly, we think other competitors now are beginning to react to us and starting to make their own strategic choices. Think about Sun's about-face on Linux, going so far as to offer Linux on PCs so they can offer end-to-end solutions. Or think about Dell's decision to upend its business model in search of new growth opportunities in printers, services and whitebox PCs. Suddenly, it seems like a good thing to be in imaging and printing and personal computers and enterprise systems and professional services—to be an end-to-end solutions provider. I'll simply assert that it's a hard shift to make without technology and R&D assets and a service and support army, but our competitors are beginning to make those decisions. Meanwhile IBM is returning to the completely vertically integrated strategy of the 80s. So you can't have it your way, you must have it IBM's way. We think we have an advantage over all three players. We think the market is moving to our strengths.
By merging with Compaq we significantly strengthened our portfolio, but we also created a stronger operating model—a more balanced revenue and operating profit mix. I don't need to tell you why strength and stability and real cash flow and a strong balance sheet and the ability to invest over $4 billion a year in R&D are important in times like these and important in an IT partner.
Let me tell you a little bit about who you are partnered with today. The new HP today powers more than 100 stock and commodity exchanges, including 14 of the world's largest. We support 95 percent of the world's securities transactions and handle 45 percent of the platform market running SAP and i2 applications. We do two out of every three credit card transactions worldwide and three out of every four electronic fund transfers. We handle 80 percent of all telecom billing and customer care traffic in Europe and Asia. We help control 65 percent of the world's energy infrastructure and are the leading platform for High-Performance Technical Computing. We are the leading consumer technology company in the world, the leading small and medium business technology company in the world, and one of the leading enterprise technology companies in the world.
We're also the No. 1 partner for Microsoft, Intel, PeopleSoft, BEA, Accenture, Oracle, Siebel, KPMG, CGE&Y and many others. In other words, no other company is in a better position to help you design, build, integrate, manage and evolve your business infrastructure than HP. Here's where scale actually does matter. Being the No. 1 partner to all of these guys makes us a better partner for all of you—we have the scale to offer end-to-end solutions in a more comprehensive way than we ever could before.
From the beginning, on the day we launched, we knew we needed to address the question of strategy and direction for every one of our products. Which is why, on day one, we had three-year roadmaps in place and began communicating them to you. I know product roadmaps and migration paths are an important—even emotional—subject for many of you in this audience. Let me repeat what I said last year: we have never stranded our customers on legacy technology. We have always provided a migration path to the future and to new business benefits. That has been our hallmark in the systems business, and it will continue to be our hallmark in the systems business.
Now, let me run for a minute through a few roadmaps, which you will hear in more detail in the breakout sessions over the next few days.
By merging with Compaq, we've significantly strengthened our position in the high-end fault-tolerant computing with our NonStop servers. That's important because NonStop systems are at the center of some of the most data-intensive real-time applications in the world, whether those are national security or the New York Stock Exchange.
We're also working to combine HP's market leading position in UNIX with clustering capabilities of pre-merger Compaq's coveted True 64 UNIX.
And in the world of industry standard servers, we now have the industry's leading Intel server franchise.
If we're going to provide the kind of solutions and have the kind of staying power our customers demand, we think it's important to be leaders across the server market, from the low end to the high end, because virtually all of you have both. That is the reality of your computing environment and your business needs.
And of course, prior to our merger, HP and Compaq had independently announced plans to standardize on Intel's Itanium processor family across our server platforms. In July, we announced a worldwide rollout of an extensive portfolio of Intel Itanium 2-based systems, integrated solutions and comprehensive services.
The performance and cost advantage of high-volume commodity components and emerging standards-based software have become too compelling to resist. That's one of the reasons we began working with Intel six years ago to co-develop the Itanium processor family. Now, every major hardware vendor, with the notable exception of Sun, and most of the major software players are planning significant work on this new chipset. Among other things, we believe this gives us an advantage over IBM, which has chosen to continue to invest in their own, proprietary chipset.
We also intend to differentiate by being the best platforms for the deployment of the new generation of web-based applications and services. Because you want freedom of choice, we intend to leverage both the Microsoft .NET and the J2EE web services software architectures and frameworks in the places where they make the most sense for you.
And we continue to make good on that promise this week. We've recently strengthened our relationship with BEA and J2EE. I am pleased to tell you that in response to the overwhelming customer demand for .NET solutions, Microsoft and HP announced this week that we are launching a new initiative to align and focus our enterprise technologies, sales and services to more rapidly deliver integrated, end-to-end .NET solutions to large businesses worldwide. This new initiative represents a total investment of more than $50 million from both companies, and will create one of the world's largest, most specialized forces of .NET consultants and systems architects—combined with the broadest choice of technology platforms—in the industry. All told, more than 5,000 HP sales professionals will be trained on .NET, more than 3,000 HP Services professionals will be certified on .NET, and a new group of HP .NET solution architects will be formed.
This announcement represents the first major sales and services commitment to .NET web services solutions from a leading global technology company and builds on our already-strong relationship with Microsoft in the marketplace. We believe it is going to enable us to bring you high-value solutions quickly and with minimal risk, with an unprecedented return on investment, and we want to thank Microsoft for what we hope is the first of many industry-changing announcements with HP.
In storage, we've taken pre-merger Compaq's very strong mid-range StorageWorks product line and added that to pre-merger HP's leading high-end storage array systems to create a very powerful storage offering, the industry's best storage lineup.
Both companies had invested heavily in storage management and virtualization software for distributed and centralized storage systems.
And, of course, in the area of personal systems, we've merged two product lines. In business desktops, we're leading with Compaq's Evo product line. On business notebooks, same strategy. In consumer PCs, where we have strong products on both sides, we're offering both the Compaq Presario and HP Pavilion, but with differentiated value propositions: the HP brand will differentiate with new features and capabilities, meanwhile, the Compaq brand will compete on price.
Now, I go through all that to illustrate that we have clearly improved the individual ingredients of our portfolio. With these assets we are uniquely capable of architecting enterprise infrastructure. But equally importantly, we've greatly strengthened our solutions delivery capability. By joining forces, we've doubled our service and support capacity in the area of mission-critical infrastructure design and we are the leading provider of multi-vendor support and outsourcing.
With 65,000 IT support and operations professionals working at our customers' disposal in 160 countries around the world, HP Services is now one of just a few companies that can span as deep and wide as your business does—anywhere and everywhere in the world. As the economic downturn—combined with rapid change in the market—encourages more customers to turn to outside providers to manage their infrastructure environments—to both lower cost and reduce IT complexity—we believe we are in a unique position to offer managed services that meet those needs. Why? Because we believe we have built the deepest expertise in IT infrastructure. I'll talk about this more in a moment.
So, that's how the new HP began. Today, we're a little more than four months old. Of course, we've now completed our first quarter as the new HP. I'm proud to say that so far we have hit all of our integration milestones and targets. We thought it was important, when we launched the company on May 7, that we had our account teams in place for our top customers and ready to answer your questions; that we had transition plans for every product the two pre-merger companies sold; that we had our web sites integrated; that we had our customer support people trained; that we had all of our internal e-mail and voice mail systems integrated so that our employees could communicate and collaborate with one another on day one.
All of that was accomplished on day one of the new company. And now that we're four months along, as I said, we continue to meet all of our integration milestones and attract new business. At our earnings call last month, I was proud to announce that the top 48 contracts that we landed in the first 90 days alone totaled more than $2 billion in incremental revenue. As our customer base grows, our platforms become an even bigger draw for application developers and partners.
So, where do we go from here?
After more than two decades and billions of dollars of industry investment aimed at improving speeds and feeds and performance boosts, we think it's time to direct those investments toward making systems work better together.
I'm talking about making it easier to manage all of the disparate systems and applications this industry has helped to create. I'm talking about making it easier to integrate systems and data and business processes and the new generation of web-based services that are replacing applications. I'm talking about improving the utilization of system resources by being able to manage and reallocate resources on demand. I'm talking about committing to standards-based components and architectures to give our customers more flexibility, the agility to adapt to change.
It's time to simplify. We can't expect you to invest in new technology—like mobility, web services or multimedia applications—until we make sense of what already exists.
At the new HP, we're focusing our energy on reducing the cost and complexity of infrastructure. We are going to aim our collective resources and talent at reinventing the IT value proposition for our customers. We will stake our claim on being the company that offers the best return on IT.
On the manageability front, it means we are going to be getting deeper into automated, cross-platform enterprise systems management through greater investments in HP OpenView. As you know all too well, manageability is the biggest pain point for most IT executives. If you can't manage your information assets in an integrated way, you can't make them more efficient.
Our OpenView offering is already far ahead of the market in terms of being able to manage every aspect of your operations from specific infrastructure components to entire systems to monitoring the performance of business applications and processes across UNIX, Windows, Linux, even Solaris server platforms and storage from HP, Hitachi, IBM and EDS.
As I mentioned a few minutes ago, in the area of improved resource utilization, we are going to move much more aggressively into utility computing, because we believe it is the future of this industry.
Our competitors are just beginning to talk about this new computing model, but if you look back at the record, our people have been talking about the concept of utility-based computing for more than two decades—and it shows in our initiatives to date.
Not long ago, Gartner compared HP's Utility Data Center to IBM's eLiza Initiative. Gartner found	that while eLiza was a good vision of the future, HP, and I quote, "was the first to market with a product that delivers basic data center virtualization . … Unlike IBM, HP found an established solution, improved it, bundled it with its own hardware, software and services, and delivered value very quickly."
Over the past year, outsourcing, or what we call managed services, has been one of the fastest-growing segments of HP's business. And we see even greater opportunities to serve customers through a new generation of managed services, where everything from applications to compute power to storage—every aspect of infrastructure can be provisioned and paid for on a pay-for-use basis across the Net.
It's just common sense—instead of paying full price to use half the capacity of your system—with all the headaches and challenges that go with it—why not let HP work with you to manage this technology, so it will always be up-to-date, always have the latest and greatest applications, and be provisioned into your organizations to be used only as you need it.
Now I should quickly add that we are not talking about a value proposition where you turn the keys to your kingdom over to us and we check back with you in a few years to see how the contract is going. That is the old model of outsourcing, and it can't meet your needs anymore. What we are talking about is partnering with you to understand how we can use outsourcing, specifically managed services, to help you accelerate business process transformation. It is a partnership, a true collaboration.
Just last week, we signed a $1.5 billion agreement with the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce—one of North America's leading financial institutions—to provide comprehensive IT services over the next seven years. Under the agreement, HP will manage a significant percentage of CIBC's bank infrastructure, from desktop PCs to mission-critical data centers to software from multiple vendors, including MVS and NonStop systems, UNIX, Windows NT and IBM AS/400 midrange servers. This deal is an ideal example of the kinds of things we couldn't do before that we can do now—and we believe it's a sign of things to come.
On the issue of improved flexibility and less cost, we will continue to be the industry leader in standard components like Linux at the operating system level and Itanium at the processor level.
The Linux movement in particular is based on openness, on the idea (and the evidence) that the achievement of our collective work is greater than the sum of individual efforts. That everyone benefits when everyone else advances. That you know your needs best—and you do not find a way to fit your needs into an existing system, but have the freedom to build a system to fit your needs.
The truly wonderful thing about the open-source movement is that it requires an ongoing exchange of ideas between consumers and producers. We believe it provides customers with more flexibility, which is why we believe Linux is the right choice in particular application environments—especially web and infrastructure services, as well as e-commerce application development, digital content creation and the emerging server appliances market. We will continue working to drive Linux adoption in enterprise environments with partners like SAP and Oracle and with the broadest set of Linux-based service and support offerings.
Finally, on the issue of interoperability, as just one example of our commitment, two weeks ago, we signed an agreement with Hitachi to swap APIs on big arrays and storage software.
The exchange will enable HP to manage Hitachi's high and mid-range storage arrays within the HP OpenView Storage Area Management software suite. In turn, Hitachi will be able to manage our StorageWorks offering within the Hitachi HiCommand Management software suite.
This comes on the heels of two other agreements we've signed the past few months to exchange APIs with both EMC and IBM on their high-end storage arrays and management software.
Taken as a whole, this API-swapping trifecta—as it's been called—will give us the ability to manage 90 percent of the world's storage infrastructure. It's our hope that the knowledge we gain through integrating API technologies from Hitachi and other companies into a common software management platform will be used to assist the entire industry in making the long-awaited Bluefin Common Information Model standard—hopefully by year's end. We think this is a bold step, and we hope others follow in our footsteps.
So, I've covered a lot of ground here. But taken as a whole, what I'm saying is this is no longer a world driven solely by the development of technology. This is a world increasingly driven by the effective utilization of technology. Put another way, technology is not an end in itself. Technology is a means to an end. And that end is defined by you, expressed by your objectives. HP's job is to make sure we meet your objectives, serve your needs, with our products, our people, with our partners.
In this market, you are free to shop for the solutions you want and need. We know that you are going to seek out partners, collaborators and companies that can deliver what you want, because your business depends on it. Ultimately, this means that you no longer have to find a way to fit your needs into an existing or propriety computing system.
Which means that virtually every technology company is going to be forced to rethink how and where they add value, how they differentiate themselves. At HP we knew we could either lead this trend or be swallowed by it, so we made our choice.
Today, we are in a much better position to serve you than we were a year ago at this conference. Today, we are a market leader in all the essential components of information infrastructure, servers, storage, management software, imaging and printing, personal systems and mobile devices. Make no mistake about it: We will lead.
And in doing so, our promise to our customers is that we will provide you with better flexibility, better interoperability, better reliability, better manageability, better utilization and lower cost of ownership. We will be the company that reinvents the IT value proposition—and we will go the extra mile to serve you.
That is where we find ourselves at the beginning of a new century, with a new HP. It's been written that at the beginning of another century, the 19th century, people thought nothing was possible. But at the end of a century that witnessed inventions like the locomotive, the telegraph, the steamship, and the electric light bulb—a century where man walked on the moon and set up a laboratory in space—all immense leaps, not only in commerce and transportation, but in human ingenuity—people believed that anything was possible.
That's where we are today. The strides we've made in the past decade are nothing compared to the strides we will make in the decade ahead. I have never been so confident of HP's future. Today, we really do believe that with your vision and our technology and capability, everything is possible.
Enjoy the conference everyone. Find the answers you need to all those hard questions you have. Again, thank you for your business and for your support.


There are some inventions where BlueIron will NOT invest.
I see an obnoxious number of inventions and patents from startups. I estimate that I encounter 10-20 inventions per week lately, and many are not good candidates for us to invest. It is heartbreaking to say "no" to inventors where the invention does not seem to be 'big' enough to be a saleable, stand-alone asset.
Our investment thesis is to invest where the invention has the possibility of becoming valuable. We are not looking for a huge lottery ticket, but something that will be a solid performer. BlueIron's business model relies on the startup company being successful, because that is the only way the patent asset will have some value.
1. We invest where an invention has a solid economic advantage over other ways of solving the same problem.
For a patent to have value, it must be licensable or saleable in its own right. Many patents might not fit this category because they are for defensive use, or might be used only to protect a company's niche product.
Many times, a company's core products are useful and practical, but they might not provide a very large economic impact. For example, an invention that has a new way of packaging a device may be good to protect for that company, but a patent on that technology does not have much commercial value because there are many different ways to package the same device.
This kind of patent is useful to the company because it gives them some substance to license their packaging, but it is not very useful as a stand-alone asset because the design-around costs are minimal.
2. We invest when the invention has a long shelf life.
Many inventions/products have a short window of opportunity. The Pet Rock was a great invention, but never had any staying power.
I classify many inventions (and startup concepts) as "gimmicks", but I don't mean that in a derogatory fashion. I use the term to mean that they address aesthetic value, but not substantive impact to the business itself. Well, I must admit that it is somewhat derogatory.
3. We invest when the invention is a breakthrough in a big field.
These patents take a lot of extra work to do well. The work comes in fleshing out the entire technology. Lots of inventors come to me with a wish to have a patent in a certain area. "I want a patent that protects X", but the inventor may not fully know how to implement X. The patent application involves a lot of engineering/invention/research to explain each piece that is necessary to build the invention.
Often, the valuable invention is not the end product but the problem solved on the way to the product.
Sadly, these inventions do not come from the run-of-the-mill startup. It takes a special startup with often a unique pedigree to produce breakthrough concepts. These special startups usually come from someone with deep experience in their industry and has stumbled on a real problem that needs to be solved.
Of course, these patents are the IP unicorns. These inventions are often very, very early, and there may be several startups that attack the space before the technology comes of age. In some cases, these patents may actually expire before the market comes around and the patents would have been valuable.


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Learning Abroad
612 Agnes Arnold Hall
Dr. Hildegard F. Glass
Email: hfglass@central.uh.edu
Lecture: THE VIGILANTE RETURNS
Wednesday, October 9 | 5:30 PM
Workshop: Reading India Now
Wednesday, October 9 | 12:00 pm
India Studies cultivates excellence in teaching and learning through interdisciplinary cooperation. The program offerings disseminate India's heritage from ancient to modern; ranging from science to arts and humanities. Interdisciplinary offerings in the fields of anthropology, art history, religion, politics, economy, sociology, and language & literature prepare students to acquire cultural competency and other skills necessary to understand the responsibility of civil global citizenship.
In keeping with the mission of an internationally recognized, culturally diverse, urban university, the India Studies program at the University of Houston promotes knowledge and scholarship on India's societies, cultures, heritage and diaspora through the College of Liberal Arts & Social Sciences. India Studies nurtures the university's relationship with the Indian American community resources and maintains its standing as a global hub for the study of India.
UH - India Studies students participate in Dussehra & Diwali Mela 2015. Gallery
India Studies students and faculty interact with Bollywood actor Manoj Bajpayee at the Asia Society. Gallery
Music guru Prema Bhat lecture on September 16. Learn more
Getting Comfortable Overseas - Religious studies major Anneka Shannon writes about India study abroad trip
Dr. Vinay Lal - Reading Gandhi: Caveats, Foundations, Hermeneutics
India Studies Program launches faculty-led study abroad course
Historic opium trade brought to life
Author Amitav Ghosh Enlightens Houstonians through Trilogy
Penguin Press quotes Anjali Kanojia, Assistant Director on Akash Kapur's book, India Becoming
American Institute of Indian Studies – Fellowships
Grants for Short-Term, International Research Fellowships in India or Japan
The Arts and Humanities Research Council's International Placement Scheme (IPS) is an exciting scheme, offering funded, short, overseas research fellowships for Early Career Researchers and PhD students. Learn More


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Home > Wine Storage Cabinets	> Classy Storage for Classy Wines: Go EuroCave!
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An amateur footballer collapsed and died seconds after the final whistle of a match.
An "inspirational" football captain collapsed and died in front of team-mates moments after a cup match in Birmingham.
Father-of-three John Rose slumped at the side of the pitch seconds after his team, Eccleston and Hart FC, had been beaten by Sutton United FC.
Players and paramedics battled in vain to revive former MG Rover worker Mr Rose, aged 36. Yesterday, his shocked team-mates were still trying to come to terms with the death of their skipper, who they described as a popular leader and all-round sportsman. The team may now be renamed in his honour.
Club chairman Bob Windsor said: "As we were walking off the pitch he just collapsed. They got him into the ambulance and to the hospital, but by the time we got there they said there was nothing they could do. Everybody was mortified, totally shocked."
The tragedy happened on Saturday afternoon after the team's away clash with Sutton United FC in Hollyfield Road, Sutton, in the Birmingham Amateur Football Association Veterans' Cup. Eccleston and Hart FC play in Division 2 of the AFA League.
Mr Rose had a partner and three children, had just launched his own business.


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Q: Store arbitrary object in a PropertyBusinessObject This question is specific for Codename One.
Is it possible to store any arbitrary object in a PropertyBusinessObject? In the examples in the developers guide and in the Codename One blog I found only Strings, Numerics and Dates. What do I have to do to store inside a User PropertyBusinessObject a new class created by me?
For example, suppose that I need to associate a User with a Sport object (that is a POJO with several attributes) and the Sport object contains a Team object (that is another POJO).

A: Right now the builtin support is for PropertyBusinessObject to reference other PropertyBusinessObject instances so Team or Sport shouldn't be POJO's but rather PropertyBusinessObject instances.
Having said that it's still useful to be able to work with other objects. E.g. I might want to store the Location object or an Image (we do use EncodedImage in some cases). The theoretical syntax is identical:
public final Property<MyObject, ParentClass> prop = new Property<>(MyObject.class);

The problem with this is the word "store".
We need an API that will map such objects to JSON/Map/Database etc. and that API just wasn't defined yet. It should be a relatively simple interface we just didn't define it yet. There are a few RFE's in the queue for 5.0 related to properties, I'm not sure if one of them covers this.


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The Role of the Chief Engagement Officer
Despite hundreds of billions of dollars spent annually by organizations to engage employees and customers, numerous independent research studies find that neither employee nor customer engagement have improved appreciably in more than a decade. The reason? It turns out engagement is an organizational issue that involves all stakeholders and requires a systematic approach to addressing all their interests.
Bust up The Silos
Engage All Stakeholders in A Systematic Way
Chief Engagement Officer Qualifications
Featured EEA Supporter:
Ask anyone in management at large organizations about what frustrates them most, and one of the most common answers is silos—the walls that go up between different departments or divisions that lead to poor internal customer service, competition for resources, back-biting and worse. Silos not only cause frustration, they create inefficiencies that impede performance. There is now so much evidence that organizations that break down these barriers to address the interests of all stakeholders outperform their competitors that investors have taken notice: over $17 trillion in investment capital and multiple so-called ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) funds such as the JUST Capital ETF (Exchange-Traded Fund) now focus on public companies with high levels of customer, employee and community engagement and sustainable management practices.
As more CEOs get on board and lead a strategic and systematic approach to engaging all stakeholders, those at large organizations will either accept responsibility for the role of Chief Engagement Officer with the support of a single executive or will need to put someone in charge of the effort.
With so much research, empirical evidence and common sense linking enterprise-wide engagement to financial results, it's clear that every organization can benefit from aligning the interests of all stakeholders in the organization's brand, values, mission, goals and objectives.
The challenge? Most organizations silo engagement between multiple executives so that no one is truly accountable, with the CEO often mediating between competing factions for resources and priorities. The role of the CEO, with or without the support of the Chief Engagement Officer, is to oversee a strategy to ensure the organization delivers its brand promises, not only to consumers but to all sales and non-sales employees, distribution partners, vendors and communities to ensure that everyone has similar expectations and understands how they can benefit from or contribute to the organization.
The Chief Engagement Officer must have the authority to bust up the silos and eliminate the politics to keep the entire organization focused on common goals rather than infighting for resources and standing. This means that in the new world of the people-centric CEO, human resources, sales, marketing, customer service, operations and compliance—any group in which people are the primary resource or customer—will either report to the Chief Engagement Officer, or the CEO will designate that this person is the stand-in for the CEO in all Enterprise Engagement-related matters. CEOs at larger companies who decide to assume this role on their own will still need the help of a full-time senior level executive, as the scope of the job, as outlined below, is simply too much for a CEO to implement with so many other responsibilities.
Either way, the CEO must be the unwavering heart and soul of the Enterprise Engagement process, making a point to get face-to-face with all stakeholders in a way that demonstrates genuine interest and an open ear, and that actively and personally supports every key strategic and tactical element of the Enterprise Engagement plan. He or she will build into almost every day's schedule the style advocated by author Tom Peters: MBWA—manage by walking around.
When ISO (The International Organization for Standardization) determined in the last decade that it had failed to address the issue of people in its quality, safety and 58 other management standards, the Technical Committee didn't just consider employees, but rather all stakeholders. The new Annex SL requirements now embedded in 60 ISO standards specifically call for a CEO-led strategic and systematic approach to addressing the needs of all interested parties—employees, customers, distribution partners, vendors, communities, regulators…in other words, anyone who touches the organization.
The challenge is that most organizations aren't set up to look at all stakeholders holistically. Most divide the management of customers, sales and non-sales employees, vendors and communities into multiple fiefdoms, so that departmental leadership often works at cross-purposes, or worse. Great organizations break down these silos to align the interests of all stakeholders toward common goals. Research on successful organizations finds that sustainable performance comes not just from having engaged customers or dedicated employees, but from having all stakeholders engaged in a common definition of the brand and its values, mission, goals and value proposition to its various stakeholders.
The process of managing the needs of all interested parties in a large organization is a full-time job, and not one that involves the traditional definition of Human Resources Manager or what some organizations call Chief People Officer. Why? Because the job involves the management of not just employees but all stakeholders and requires as much an understanding of consumer and distribution partner expectations of the brand as it does of employees, communities, investors and even, in some cases, regulators.
At organizations small enough for CEOs to regularly engage with all employees and many customers, it's the CEO's job. In a large organization—one with perhaps over 100 employees—it's a full-time position to assist the CEO, as can be seen by these core elements of an Enterprise Engagement Operating System:
1) Establish a clear definition of the brand, mission, values, goals and the role of the CEO in promoting the effort throughout the year.
2) Create and manage an Enterprise Engagement Business Plan or Operating System to manage the organization in a strategic and systematic manner.
3) Make every attempt to ensure that the right leaders and employees are recruited and developed for the right jobs consistent with the brand, values (culture) and objectives.
4) Regularly assess, survey, or obtain feedback from all stakeholders—customers, distribution partners, employees, vendors, communities, etc.—as relevant.
5) Ensure open communication to create a community, inform and reinforce values and connections.
6) To the extent possible, design jobs that not only maximize productivity, but also quality and retention by considering the human need for empowerment, self-determination and flexibility.
7) Ensure that training in the workplace is both strategic (in that it reminds people of their role in the organization) and tactical (in that it gives them the skills to not only succeed at their jobs but also to fulfill their capabilities and aspirations).
8) Create a sense of community and dynamism by encouraging collaboration at work and support Corporate Social Responsibility efforts and diversity.
9) Establish a process of rewards and recognition that surprises, delights and emotionally moves people who demonstrate through their actions the values of the organization and what's needed to achieve goals.
10) Seriously monitor all the qualitative and quantitative data for ROI, and in large organizations mine it to discover what within your overall culture fosters sustainable dedication.
11) The CEO will be responsible for any disclosures an organization chooses to make to investors and other stakeholders.
Of any position in a major company, the CEO and/or Chief Engagement Officer will have among the most measurable in terms of performance, because the measures will include the very same metrics that many public companies eventually will be compelled to either voluntarily (or in some countries mandatorily) disclose:
• Number of full-time/salaried employees and independent contractors, compared with previous years.
• Overall payroll compared with previous years.
• Overall nonpayroll expenses (incentives, recognition, benefits, training, excluding taxes), and as a percentage of payroll.
• Employee retention (percentage retained year-to-year).
• Number of independent contractors (compared with previous years) and overall expenditures on independent contractors.
• Customer retention (percentage retained year-to-year).
• Overall expenditures in marketing and sales costs, and as a percentage of overall sales, compared with previous years.
• Number of reportable accidents/deaths compared with previous years.
• Expenditures in Corporate Social Responsibility, with comparisons.
• Number of lawsuits (by employee, customer, community), with year-over-year comparison.
• Successful implementation of the current year's overall Enterprise Engagement Operating System or plan.
Because so many executives get siloed into operations, sales, marketing, human resources and finance, one of the big challenges will be finding senior executives who have; a) the executive authority to figuratively "knock heads" in order to break down silos and build alignment; b) the listening and empowerment skills necessary to inspire engagement; and c) the broad set of skills and challenges to weave together a holistic solution. From a skills and experience standpoint, the Chief Engagement Officer should have a fundamental understanding of and experience with:
1) Brand, culture and organizational values and how to build alignment around a common value proposition for all stakeholders.
2) How recruitment and leadership development can support and align with the organizational strategy.
3) The role of assessment, surveys and feedback tools and how to make sure the right information gets to the right people and is acted upon expeditiously.
4) Every form of communication, from digital and print to face-to-face and three-dimensional, to make sure that the overall brand, values and goals are effectively conveyed to all stakeholders.
5) Learning platforms and how they need to be tied to an overall organizational development strategy that supports the brand proposition.
6) Job design strategies that seek to make people more productive, engaged and quality conscious, and which build flexibility into the workplace to promote job-sharing efficiencies.
7) Innovation and collaboration practices that sustain continuous improvement.
8) Community and diversity strategies to create a culture of inclusion and warmth.
9) How to structure rewards and recognition programs to support both extrinsic and intrinsic motivation and communicate organizational values.
10) The role of technology and how it can be used to create a community, enhance information flow and address all levers of engagement in an auditable way.
10) Measurement, analytics and prescriptive use of data.
11) Human Capital disclosure issues and formats.
If your organization seeks to improve efficiencies through an Enterprise Engagement or other Operating System, the Chief Engagement Officer might also serve as the chief implementor of that process.
Sound like a tall order? It is, which is one explanation for why such an obvious and necessary role has taken a generation to emerge.
The Enterprise Engagement Academy at EEA.tmlu.org and Enterprise Engagement: The Roadmap 5th Edition, available on Amazon.com and most online bookstores, are specifically designed to provide a more complete desk reference for CEOs or Chief Engagement Officers aspiring to apply a strategic and systematic approach to engaging all stakeholders.
The Enterprise Engagement Academy
Master the hottest new profession through online training and certification.
Go to EEA.tmlu.org to get started today
Or, contact:
Bruce Bolger, President
Enterprise Engagement Alliance at TheEEA.org
245 Saw Mill River Rd., Suite 106
Hawthorne NY 10532
Bolger@TheEEA.org
Master the Principles of Enterprise Engagement to Achieve Organizational Goals and Enhance Your Career
Profit from a new systematic approach to engagement to enhance your organization's brand equity; increase sales, productivity, quality, innovation, and safety, and reduce risks.
Achieve ISO 10018 Quality People Management Certification to demonstrate your organization's strategic commitment to people to your customers, employees, distribution partners, vendors, communities, investors, and regulators.
Live Education: The Brand Engagement Conference, June 18-20, 2019, Chicago, in conjunction with the Selling Power Sales 3.0 Conference. Learn a breakthrough, practical approach to enhance performance and stakeholder experiences at Selling Power's Sales 3.0 Conference, "Frictionless Selling," June 18-19, and "Enterprise Engagement in Action," June 20, at the Drake Hotel. Register now.
In Print: Enterprise Engagement: The Roadmap 5th Edition.
The first and most comprehensive book on Enterprise Engagement and the new ISO 9001 and ISO 10018 quality people management standards.
Online: The Enterprise Engagement Academy at EEA.tmlu.org, providing the only formal training on Enterprise Engagement and the new ISO 9001 and ISO 10018 quality people management standards. Provides preparation for professionals to support organizations seeking ISO 10018 employer or solution provider certification, as well as elective courses on Trade Show Engagement, Rewards and Recognition, Government, and other topics.
10-minute short course: click here for a 10-minute introduction to Enterprise Engagement and ISO standards on Coggno.com.
5-minute Audiopedia summary of the Enterprise Engagement field.
Services: The International Center for Enterprise Engagement at TheICEE.org, offering: ISO 10018 certification for employers, solution providers, and Enterprise Engagement technology platforms; Human Resources and Human Capital audits for organizations seeking to benchmark their practices and related Advisory services for the hospitality field.
The Engagement Agency at EngagementAgency.net, offering: complete support services for employers, solution providers, and technology firms seeking to profit from formal engagement practices for themselves or their clients, including Brand and Capability audits for solution providers to make sure their products and services are up to date.
C-Suite Advisory Service—Education of boards, investors, and C-suite executives on the economics, framework, and implementation processes of Enterprise Engagement.
Speakers Bureau—Select the right speaker on any aspect of engagement for your next event.
Mergers and Acquisitions. The Engagement Agency's Mergers and Acquisition group is aware of multiple companies seeking to purchase firms in the engagement field. Contact Michael Mazer in confidence if your company is potentially for sale at 303-320-3777.
Enterprise Engagement Benchmark Tools: The Enterprise Engagement Alliance offers three tools to help organizations profit from Engagement. Click here to access the tools.
• ROI of Engagement Calculator. Use this tool to determine the potential return-on-investment of an engagement strategy.
• EE Benchmark Indicator. Confidentially benchmark your organization's Enterprise Engagement practices against organizations and best practices.
• Compare Your Company's Level of Engagement. Quickly compare your organization's level of engagement to those of others based on the same criteria as the EEA's Engaged Company Stock Index.
• Gauge Your Personal Level of Engagement. This survey, donated by Horsepower, enables individuals to gauge their own personal levels of engagement.
For more information, contact Bruce Bolger at Bolger@TheEEA.org, 914-591-7600, ext. 230.


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https://apnews.com/article/business-education-kentucky-e383458cda724bf0f9ddc43c68fab82b
Beshear pushes for major investments in schools and new jobs
By BRUCE SCHREINERJanuary 14, 2022 GMT
FILE - Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear delivered the State of The Commonwealth address, on Jan. 5, 2022, at the Capitol in Frankfort, Ky. Beshear pitched sweeping budget proposals Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022, as "bold investments" to bolster the state's competitiveness, calling for more spending on economic development, social services and his plan for state-backed universal preschool. (Scott Utterback/Courier Journal via AP, File)
FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — Kentucky's Democratic governor pitched sweeping budget proposals Thursday evening as "bold investments" to bolster the state's competitiveness, calling for more spending on economic development, social services and his plan for state-backed universal preschool.
With robust state tax collections fueling massive revenue surpluses, Gov. Andy Beshear said Kentucky should seize the opportunity to add nearly $2 billion for education spending from pre-kindergarten through 12th grade, raise state workers' pay, prepare more industrial development sites to create more jobs and offer preschool for every 4-year-old.
The governor said his proposed budget balances fiscal responsibility with affordable investments that would "forever change the trajectory" of Kentucky.
"It is a values statement, a chance to seize opportunity, a chance to meet this historic moment," he said in his budget speech to lawmakers and a statewide TV audience. "A chance not just to tread water but to lead. My budget is titled 'Our Future is Now' because now is when we must make the bold investments. Now is our chance to move this state forward -- not right, not left but forward."
But the governor's ambitious proposals could clash with Republican plans to capitalize on excess revenues by revamping the state tax code. GOP lawmakers have House and Senate supermajorities and will have the final say on tax-and-spend matters.
House Republicans filed their own budget bill last week that calls for less state spending than Beshear proposed. And House Speaker David Osborne said this week that Kentucky has a "once-in-a-lifetime opportunity" to modernize its tax system though he didn't offer any details. In an appearance on Kentucky Educational Television, Osborne said the House plans to accelerate budget work to allow time to tackle the complexities of tax legislation during the 60-day session.
US regulators aiming at illegal and anticompetitive mergers
The governor said Thursday that a tax code overhaul is unnecessary and could be disruptive.
"When people throw out something like tax reform, what they always say is it's our business climate that we need to improve." Beshear told reporters ahead of his budget speech. "We just came off the best year of economic development ever in our history."
Last year, the Bluegrass State posted unprecedented highs for business investments and jobs created. Strong corporate income tax receipts in Kentucky show companies are prospering with the current tax code, Beshear said.
"Most of the time when you're winning and you're winning and you're winning, you don't change your offense," Beshear said.
Osborne on Thursday called it a clear "philosophical difference." He said the governor was committed to a "brand of tax and spend politics," while House Republicans want to update tax laws to propel more growth by letting Kentuckians "keep more of their hard-earned money."
Republican Senate President Robert Stivers also raised the prospect of tax cuts.
"With all this tax money that we're sitting here holding, why are we not thinking about giving everybody a pay raise by giving them a tax cut?" Stivers said on KET after the governor's speech.
A governor's budget speech traditionally starts budget work in a legislative session. This time, Beshear's speech came after House Republicans broke with tradition to introduce their own state budget legislation without waiting for the governor's recommendations.
Caught off guard by the maneuver, Beshear responded by rolling out his spending plan throughout the week. Osborne has said lawmakers will "fully consider" the governor's proposals.
A cornerstone of Beshear's plan is to guarantee pre-kindergarten learning for every 4-year-old in Kentucky, with the state fully funding the initiative. The cost — $172 million in each year of the next biennium — would amount to a fraction of the state's revenue surplus, he said.
Beshear's plan calls for a bigger increase than the House bill for the base per-pupil funding under SEEK, the state's main K-12 education funding formula. The governor has said his two-year budget would raise the amount to $4,300 in the first year and to $4,500 in the second year. Under the House GOP plan, the amount would go to $4,100 in the first year and $4,200 in the second. The current amount is $4,000.
To promote economic development, the governor said, his budget plan calls for using $250 million to develop a Site Identification and Development program. The goal is to enable state business recruiters to tout more "shovel ready" sites for industrial prospects. Kentucky hit the jackpot with one such mega site last year, when Ford and a partner selected tiny Glendale, Kentucky, to build twin plants to produce batteries to power electric vehicles.
Along with his spending requests, Beshear said his proposed budget would add $250 million to state budget reserves.
The governor conceded he preferred the House Republican plan on at least one issue.
Beshear said Thursday he backed the size of the House GOP's proposed pay raise for state employees. The governor said his budget plan, developed before the GOP bill, called for a 5% increase. The Republican spending plan proposes a 6% raise.


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Southeast Alberta Drug Trafficking Network Dismantled
Medicine Hat, Alberta – A three-month investigation by ALERT's Medicine Hat organized crime team has dismantled a drug trafficking network operating in southeast Alberta. Seven people were arrested, and more than $64,000 worth of drugs and cash was seized.
The investigation concluded on June 18, 2019, when ALERT investigators stopped two vehicles en route to Medicine Hat and arrested five of the seven suspects. The other two were arrested the same day as search warrants were executed at three residences in Medicine Hat, along with one in Elkwater, about 65 kilometres southeast of the city.
Over the course of the investigation, ALERT seized a total of $64,410 worth of drugs and cash, including:
372 grams of cocaine;
1,074 grams of psilocybin mushrooms;
1,563 grams of a cocaine buffing agent; and
$5,630 cash proceeds of crime.
Two shotguns and numerous rounds of ammunition were also seized, along with an assortment of knives and other weapons.
PHOTO BY ALERT
"Disrupting and dismantling organized crime groups such as this one is at the top of ALERT's list of priorities," said Staff Sgt. Cory Both, ALERT Medicine Hat. "Taking down what we believe to be a whole network is a big feather in our team's cap, but we know we have to stay focused on not letting other groups gain a foothold in our communities."
A total of 27 drug- and firearm-related charges have been laid against seven suspects:
Kurtis Siemens, 24, of Medicine Hat;
Jazden Posti, 23, of Medicine Hat;
Michael Van De Wiele, 35, of Medicine Hat;
Kevin Ehrler, 27, of Medicine Hat;
Jeremy Hearn, 33, of Edmonton;
Justin Nazarek, 25, of Edmonton; and
Zachary Kroetsch, 24, of Edmonton.
More charges may be laid in the future.
Assistance on this file was provided by Medicine Hat Police Service, ALERT's Calgary organized crime team, Calgary Police Service, and Morinville RCMP.
Members of the public who suspect drug or gang activity in their community can call local police, or contact Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS (8477). Crime Stoppers is always anonymous.
ALERT was established and is funded by the Alberta Government and is a compilation of the province's most sophisticated law enforcement resources committed to tackling serious and organized crime. Members of Calgary Police Service, Edmonton Police Service, Lethbridge Police Service, Medicine Hat Police Service, and RCMP work in ALERT.
Elk Point RCMP public complaint leads to pursuit and arrest
Whitecourt RCMP investigate suspicious occurrence after suspect allegedly grabbed 13-year-old female's arm


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The time starting from March 2023 onwards is favourable for long travels such as those to foreign countries and this period spans up to Nov 2025.
Thus you need to work hard and put in the required commensurate efforts to achieve your objectives, as without efforts there is no gain.
Libra ascendant with the ascendant lord Venus posited in the third house conjunct mars, Mercury and North Node (Rahu); South Node (Ketu) posited in the ninth house; Sun posited in the fourth house conjunct Saturn in natal chart and in the twelfth house conjunct South Node (Ketu) in the divisional chart 10 (Dashamsa); Venus major period ongoing and Jupiter sub period starts from March 2023.