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Un solid-state drive (expresie engleză cu traducerea liberă "unitate cu cipuri"; prescurtat SSD) este un dispozitiv de stocare a datelor care folosește memorii cu semiconductori, construite pe baza studiilor de fizica stării solide. SSD-urile se deosebesc de unitățile cu discuri dure clasice  care sunt dispozitive electromecanice cu discuri de stocare aflate în mișcare, prin aceea că SSD-urile folosesc numai microcipuri care rețin datele în memorii nevolatile, fără să aibă părți mobile. SSD-urile sunt mai rezistente la șocurile mecanice, având timp de acces mai scăzut dar preț pe megabyte mai mare. Pentru a fi eventual interschimbabile cu HDD-urile, ele folosesc aceleași interfețe (semnale electrice, conectoare) ca și cele ale discurilor dure, de ex. de tip SATA. Totuși, interschimbabilitatea cu unitățile HDD nu este o condiție standard de fabricație a SSD-urilor.

Dezvoltare și istorie

Primele SSD-uri folosind RAM și tehnologie similară
Originile SSD-urilor vin din 1950 folosind două tehnologii similare, memoriile magnetice și CCROS. Aceste unități de memorie auxiliare, așa cum erau numite la momentul respectiv, au apărut în timpul erei calculatoarelor cu tuburi electronice. Dar odată cu introducerea unităților de stocare cu tamburi, folosirea lor a fost oprită. Mai târziu, în timpul anilor 1970 și 1980, la primele supercomputere de la IBM, Amdahl și Cray, SSD-urile au fost implementate pe baza memoriilor cu semiconductori.

În 1978 compania Texas Memory Systems a introdus pe piață un SSD de 16 KB RAM pentru a fi folosit de către companiile de petrol pentru achiziția de date seismice. În anul următor compania StorageTek a dezvoltat prima unitate SSD modernă, supranumită "Iceberg". Calculatorul Sharp PC-5000, care a fost introdus în 1983, folosea cartușe de stocare de tip solid-state de 128 KB, care conțineau memorie de tip bubble. În 1984 compania Tall Grass avea o unitate de backup de 40 MB cu o unitate SSD de 20 MB înglobată. Unitatea de 20 MB putea fi folosită în locul unui disc dur. În septembrie 1986 compania Santa Clara Systems a introdus modelul "BatRam", sistem de stocare în masă de 4 MB, expandabil la 20 MB, folosind module de memorie de 4 MB. Pachetul includea o baterie reîncărcabilă (acumulator) pentru a conserva conținutul memoriei cipului chiar și atunci când sistemul nu era alimentat. În 1987 a intrat pe piața SSD-urilor compania EMC Corporation, cu unități pentru piața minicalculatoarelor. Cu toate astea, EMC a ieșit din afacere la scurt timp după aceea.

SSD-uri bazate pe tehnologie flash
În 1995 compania M-Systems a introdus primele SSD-uri bazate pe tehnologia flash. De atunci SSD-urile au fost folosite cu succes ca înlocuitor pentru HDD-uri de către armata americană și industria aerospațială. Aceste aplicații asigură un interval de timp foarte mare între 2 erori consecutive (o frecvență foarte scăzută a erorilor), lucru realizat de SSD-uri datorită abilității lor de a rezista la șocuri mecanice, vibrații și variații mari de temperatură.

În 1999 compania BiTMICRO a anunțat un SSD de 18 GB de 8,89 cm (3,5 țoli). La târgul de specialitate internațional CeBIT 2009 compania OCZ a prezentat un SSD de 1 TB cu o interfață PCI Express 8x. Acesta avea o viteză maximă de scriere de 654 MB/secundă și o viteză maximă de citire de 712 MB/secundă. În decembrie 2009 Micron Tehnology a anunțat primul SSD care avea o rată de transfer de 6 GB pe secundă pe interfață SATA.

Enterprise flash drive
SSD-urile de tip Enterprise flash drive (EFD) se folosesc acolo unde sunt necesare viteze de I/O (Input/Output, intrare/ieșire) foarte mari precum și o fiabilitate foarte mare. Un EFD este, de obicei, un SSD cu un set de specificații mult mai pretențioase decât SSD-urile folosite în notebook-uri. Termenul a fost folosit prima dată de compania EMC în ianuarie 2008 pentru a identifica producătorii de SSD-uri conform standardelor lor ridicate. Nu există niciun standard internațional pentru EFD-uri, de aceea mulți producători pretind că fabrică EFD-uri, chiar dacă produsele lor au caracteristici diferite.

Arhitectură și funcționare
Componenta inițială în SSD-uri a fost memoria volatilă de tip DRAM, dar din 2008 a fost înlocuită cu memorie nevolatilă de tip NAND.

Controlere
Fiecare SSD conține un controler care constă în circuite electronice de legătură între componentele NAND ale memoriei propriu-zise și calculator. Controlerul este un procesor încorporat, execută cod (program) la nivelul firmware și este una din cele mai importante componente ale unui SSD. El execută urmatoarele funcții:
 Detecția erorilor
 Detecția nivelului uzurii
 Realocarea blocurilor de memorie corupte
 Colectarea resturilor
 eventual și criptare

Performanța (viteza de funcționare) a unui SSD variază în funcție de câte chipuri sunt folosite în dispozitiv. Un singur chip NAND este relativ încet din cauza interfeței I/O asincronă pe 8/16 biți și are o latență mare la operațiile I/E de bază. Când sunt folosite mai multe chipuri NAND, latența mare dispare dacă sarcina este distribuită egal între dispozitive.

Memorie de tip flash
Majoritatea producătorilor folosesc memorie flash pentru a crea dispozitive mai compacte și mai rigide pentru consumatorii de piață. Aceste SSD-uri bazate pe memorie de tip flash nu necesită baterii (acumulatoare). Au dimensiuni standard de 1,8, 2,5 sau 3,5 țoli. Memoria nevolatilă permite SSD-urilor să păstreze datele chiar și în cazul unei pene de curent. SSD-urile bazate pe memorie flash sunt mai încete decât cele bazate pe memorie DRAM și chiar decât HDD-urile tradiționale atunci când lucrează cu fișiere de dimensiuni mari, dar nu au timpi de căutare și nici alte întârzieri precum la memoriile electromecanice.

Dispozitivele mai ieftine folosesc de obicei memorie flash de tip multi-level cell (MLC - celule pe mai multe nivele), dar aceasta este mai înceată și mai puțin fiabilă decât tipul single-level cell (SLC - celule pe un singur nivel).

Memorie de tip DRAM
SSD-urile bazate pe tehnologie DRAM sunt caracterizate de timpi de acces ultrascurți, de ordinul a 10 milisecunde. SSD-urile DRAM conțin o baterie internă sau un adaptor AC/DC care asigură reținerea datelor și atunci când curentul este întrerupt. Atunci când curentul este întrerupt, bateria internă asigură curentul necesar pentru transferul datelor din RAM în memoria de rezervă. Când curentul revine, datele sunt copiate înapoi în memoria RAM.

Aceste SSD-uri conțin aceleași module DRAM ca și cele de la PC-uri, putând fi ușor înlocuite cu module mai mari.

SSD-urile pe baza de DRAM sunt folosite de obicei la calculatoare care dispun deja de un număr maxim de module de memorie RAM.

SSD-urile care nu au memorie DRAM se numesc DRAM-less.

Cache (buffer)
SSD-urile folosesc de obicei memorie cache de tip DRAM asemenea HDD-urilor. Un director pentru plasarea blocurilor și a nivelului de uzură este păstrat în timpul funcționării în cache. De obicei în cache nu sunt păstrate și datele utilizatorului. Compania SandForce nu foloseste pentru SSD-uri memorie cache de tip DRAM. Ei ating performanțe ridicate și fără memorie cache. Din această cauză au reușit să creeze SSD-uri de dimensiuni foarte reduse.

Baterie sau SuperCap
O altă componentă foarte importantă a SSD-urilor este bateria sau condensatorul (în engleză: capacitor, de acolo și numele SuperCap) de înaltă performanță. Acestea sunt necesare pentru menținerea integrității datelor și păstrarea datelor din cache atunci când se întrerupe curentul.

Interfețe
Interfețele nu sunt componente specifice ale SSD, dar joacă un rol foarte important. Interfața este încorporată de obicei în controler. Acestea sunt asemănătoare cu cele folosite pentru HDD-uri:
 SATA
mSATA
 Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) (folosită în general pe servere)
 PCIe
 FCI (aproape în totalitate folosită pe servere)
 USB
 IDE
 SCSI
 M.2
 U.2

Forma
Forma și mărimea oricărui dispozitiv decurge din forma și mărimea componentelor sale. HDD-urile tradiționale și CD-ROM-urile sunt construite în jurul motorului și mediului de stocare rotativ. Atâta timp cât SSD-urile sunt construite din circuite integrate și interfețe conectoare, ele pot în principiu să aibă orice formă imaginabilă, deoarece forma nu este restricționată aproape deloc de componentele interne.

Formă standard de HDD
Folosirea formei externe clasice de HDD la majoritatea SSD-urilor are avantajul că SSD-ul se poate atunci cupla și poate folosi infrastructura deja existentă fără modificări.

Comparație SSD cu HDD
Comparația este greu de realizat deoarece testele de tip benchmark pentru HDD-urile tradiționale iau în considerare aspecte ca latența la rotire și timpii de căutare, în timp ce SSD-urile nu prezintă aceste probleme. În schimb SSD-urile au probleme la scriere și citire mixtă, iar performanța acestora scade în timp.

Comercializarea

Cost și capacitate
Până spre sfârșitul primului deceniu al secolului al XXI-lea, discurile SSD cu memorie flash erau prea scumpe pentru folosirea la scară largă în tehnologia mobilă . În timp ce producătorii de memorii flash treceau de la tehnologia NOR la tehnologia NAND cu un singur nivel de celule (SLC), și recentul folosind celule cu mai multe nivele (MLC) flash NAND  pentru a maximiza folosirea vopselei de siliciu și pentru a reduce costurile asociate, SSD-urile sunt acum numite mai adesea "discuri cu stare solidă". La nivelul interfeței ele funcționează la fel ca și discurile. Se aplică în tehnologia mobilă în înterprinderi și la electronicele de larg consum. Această tendință tehnologică este acompaniată de un declin anual de circa 50 % la costul materialului brut pentru flash-uri, în timp ce capacitățile continuă să se dubleze în același ritm. Ca rezultat SSD-urile bazate pe flash devin din ce în ce mai populare în piețe cum ar fi notebook-urile și mini-notebook-urile pentru înterprinderi, calculatoarele ultramobile (UMPC) și PC-urile tabletă folosite în domeniul sănătății și în sectorul electronicelor de consum.

Majoritatea companiilor de calculatoare au început să ofere astfel de tehnologie. Ca exemplu, notebook-ul actual (apr. 2011) de tip Aspire 8951G al companiei Acer dispune, pe lângă un HDD de 750 GB, și de un SSD de 120 GB.

Calitate si performanță
SSD este o tehnologie cu dezvoltare rapidă. O analiză a pieții din ianuarie 2009 făcută de către compania Tom's Hardware a tras concluzia că relativ puține dintre dispozitivele testate arătau performanțe (viteze) de I/O acceptabile și că Intel (care își face propriile chipset-uri SSD) încă produce SSD-urile cu cele mai bune performanțe din acest moment; un punct de vedere împărtășit și de către Anandtech. În particular, operațiile care necesită multe scrieri mici, cum ar fi fișierele de log, sunt deosebit de afectate pe unele dispozitive SSD, provocând sistemul gazdă să "înghețe" perioade de până la o secundă.

Potrivit Anandtech, aceasta este datorită proiectării cipului controler cu un set variat de componente, si cel puțin parțial datorită faptului că majoritatea producătorilor de memorie nu proiectează microcipul și nici SSD-ul. Dintre ceilalți producători de pe piața, Memoright, Mtron, OCZ, Samsung și Soliware au fost de asemenea amintiți într-o lumină bună pentru cel puțin unele domenii ale testării.

Concluzia finală a companiei Tom's Hardware de le începutul 2009 a fost că "niciunul dintre discurile care nu este de la Intel nu este excelent. Toate au slăbiciuni semnificative: de obicei fie performanțe I/O joase, fie consum de putere inacceptabil".

Aceasta afecta doar performanța la scriere a SSD-urilor destinate consumatorilor. SSD-urile de tip "Enterprise" evită această problemă prin rezervarea unei părți din hardware și prin folosirea algoritmilor anti-uzură, care mută datele doar în perioadele când discurile sunt slab folosite.

Aplicații
Până în 2009 SSD-urile erau folosite în principal pentru aplicații critice, unde viteza sistemului de stocare trebuia să fie cât mai înaltă. De când memoria flash a devenit o componentă obișnuită a SSD-urilor, prețurile în scădere și creșterea în capacitate le-au făcut mai atractive financiar pentru multe aplicații. Organizațiile care necesită un acces rapid la date includ companiile de comerț, companiile de telecomunicații și firmele de editare și streaming video. Lista de aplicații care ar beneficia de stocare mai rapidă este vastă. Orice companie poate evalua investițiile necesare la adăugarea SDD-urilor la aplicațiile lor, pentru a prevedea dacă vor fi profitabile sau nu.

SSD-urile bazate pe flash pot fi folosite și la aparatura de rețea din hardwareul calculatoarelor de uz general. Un disc flash protejat contra scrisului și conținând sistemul de operare și aplicații software poate înlocui discurile dure și CD-urile (mai capacitive dar mai puțin fiabile). Aparaturile construite în acest mod pot furniza o alternativă ieftină la ruterele scumpe și firewall-ul hardware.

Sistemele de fișier optimizate pentru SSD

Există un număr de sisteme de fișiere care sunt optimizate pentru discurile SSD. Câteva din cele mai populare sau notabile sunt prezentate mai jos.

Microsoft Windows
Versiunile de Windows înaintea lui Windows 7 sunt optimizate pentru HDD-uri și nu pentru SSD-uri. De exemplu Windows Vista include ReadyBoost pentru a exploata caracteristicile dispozitivelor "flash" pe USB, dar pentru SSD-uri acesta doar îmbunătățește alinierea partiției (pentru a preveni operațiile citește-modifică-scrie; SSD-ul este de obicei aliniat pe sectoare de 4 KB, în timp ce sistemul de operare este bazat pe sectoare de 512 KB, nealiniate). Alinierea corespunzătoare chiar nu ajută la anduranța SSD-ului în timpul vieții discului. Câteva operații din Vista, dacă nu sunt dezactivate, pot scurta viața SSD-ului. Defragmentarea discului ar trebui dezactivată deoarece locația componentelor fișierelor pe un SSD nu are impact semnificativ asupra performanței, dar mutarea fișierelor pentru a le rearanja folosind Windows Defrag mărește numărul total de cicluri I/O pe SSD, care însă e limitat. De asemenea și Page file ar trebui dezactivat, deoarece actualizările permanente ale fișierului cauzează uzură a SSD-ului fără câștig de performanță. Opțiunea Superfetch nu schimbă efectiv performanța sistemului și cauzează un transfer adițional de informație pe sistem și SSD, deși fără uzură.

Prin contrast, Windows 7 este optimizat atât pentru SSD-uri cât și pentru HDD-uri. Sistemul de operare verifică dacă există un SDD și atunci operează diferit cu el. Dacă pe un SSD este prezent Windows 7, atunci Windows 7 dezactivează disk defragmentation, Superfetch, ReadyBoost și alte operații la pornire și aplicații de prefetching. De asemenea include suport pentru comanda TRIM care reduce colectarea și rearanjarea datelor devenite invalide de pe SSD.

ZFS
Sistemul de operare Solaris poate folosi SSD-uri pentru a oferi o creștere în performanță. Există două moduri de folosire a SSD-ului:
 pentru Intent Log (ZIL) al ZFS-ului, care este folosit de fiecare dată când apare o scriere sincronă pe disc (pentru ZIL ar trebui folosit un SSD cu latență de scriere mică)
 sau pentru L2ARC (Algoritm de înlocuire a paginilor Level 2), care este folosit pentru a stoca datele pentru citire (L2ARC este scris rar, și un SSD cu latență mică la scris nu este necesar). Când este folosit fie singur, fie în combinație, se constată de obicei creșteri mari în performanță.

Sistemele Linux
Discurile SSD sunt în întregime suportate de către sistemele de operare de tip Linux, începând cu versiunea de kernel 2.6.33 (disponibil la începutul lui 2010), care a fost prezentată drept compatibilă în întregime atât cu detecția și alinierea SSD-urilor, cât și cu comanda TRIM. Versiunile anterioare ale kernel-ului nu conțineau suport pentru SSD.

Organizațiile de standardizare
Următoarele sunt unități de standardizare și entități care creează standarde pentru discurile SSD (și alte dispozitive de stocare pentru calculatoare). Tabelul include de asemenea și organizații care promovează folosirea discurilor SSD (tabelul nu e complet).

Producători principali
 ADATA
 AMD
 Corsair
 Crucial
 Gigabyte Technology
 G.Skill
 Hitachi
 Intel
 Toshiba
 Kingston
 OCZ
 Plextor
 Pure Storage
 PNY
 Samsung
 SanDisk
 Silicon Power
 Western Digital

Vezi și
eMMC
 NVM Express
 Fizica stării solide
 Disc dur (HDD)
SSHD
Secure Digital
Universal Flash Storage

Referințe și note

Legături externe

 SSD în Wikipedia engleză
 JEDEC continuă standardizarea SSD-urilor
 Cum funcționează SSD-urile, 18 martie 2009, AnandTech.com
 Solid-state revolution: in-depth on how SSDs really work, 4 iunie 2012, Lee Hutchinson, Ars Technica
 Comparație SSD-uri cu HDD-uri
 SOLID STATE DRIVES - How It's Made YouTube video

Bibliografie
Rino Micheloni, Alessia Marelli, Kam Eshghi: Inside Solid State Drives (SSDs), Springer Science & Business Media, 2012, ISBN:9789400751453

Stocarea datelor
Medii de stocare

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


For various reasons, we are not making the app available to the general public until we ship (in about 2-3 weeks), but we are releasing (via AppStore redemption codes) to beta testers and other interested parties. Please ping us at support@xyfindit.com if you'd like to check it out.
Android app is on track for (beta) release the week of August 15. We will have a separate update toward the end of next week, but before anyone asks -- we are still committed to supporting all 4.3+ devices.
On the production side, it looks like the factory will finish a few days early, August 7th to be precise. However, we may ask for another round of production samples, mainly to check colors, so it could get delayed back to mid-August. We'll let you know.
We are getting to the final weeks before we deliver the "jewel". It's been a crazy ride; we are sleep deprived, anxious and a bit giddy with excitement. Thanks for supporting us and hanging in there with us.
Espen Sae-Tang Ottersen, Andrew Patterson, and 88 more people like this update.
Now that the app is ready what is the shipping status of those third party tags promised back in May to those who pledged $75 or higher?
Vasistha. They said above that in 2-3 weeks will be shipped.
Now both aple and android apps are ready, when can we expect delivery ?
However are you still planning to send the additional Gimbal beacon (not XY)? Because it looks I might get the XY at the same time and in this case I actually would like to cancel my order (for the Gimbal tag). Thanks for clarification.


Your privacy is important to us. Your information is only shared to service your order and will never be sold in any way –period.
Data we collect and how we use it: When ordering on our site, you may be asked to enter your name, e-mail address, mailing address or phone number. We do not give out any account information to any third parties unless it is necessary to provide you with your order. You are invited to join our opt-in seasonal email newsletter list during the check-out process or via a sign-up form, and you can un-subscribe at any time. You are also invited to create a password-secured account for your own convenience of not having to re-enter your information. Alternatively, you can always complete your check-out as a guest.
Our standard shipping and handling rates for shipment of purchases are displayed below in US dollars. We will ship your order via UPS within one 24 hour business day. For faster shipping, we're happy to give you a quote. Just call us at (707) 944-8604.
For orders shipping outside of the US, Alaska or Hawaii, requiring expedited shipping, or simply needing more personal service, you are welcome to email us, call, or leave us a voice message and we will be delighted to call you back and do our best to help create a way to meet your needs.
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We invite you to place orders directly through our website, where we are currently accepting orders shipping to US addresses. We process payments on our secured website through Master Card, Visa, Discover, JCB, Diners, or American Express credit cards and Pay Pal, and do not store any of your payment information. PayPal account holders have additional payment options. For orders shipping outside of the US, requiring expedited shipping, or simply needing more personal service, you are welcome to email us or leave us a voice message and we will be delighted to call you back.
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We know you'll love our foods, and it's important to us that you're more than pleased with your purchase, but if for any odd reason you think something isn't your cup of tea, please call us or contact us within 30 days to arrange a return, replacement or refund.


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Nebraska's 2017 fourth- and eighth-graders scored higher than their peers across the country in math and reading scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP).
The NAEP math assessment measures both mathematics knowledge and students' ability to apply their knowledge in problem-solving situations. The NAEP reading assessment measures reading comprehension by asking students to read selected grade-appropriate materials and answer questions based on what they have read. More than 4,600 Nebraska students were sampled for the exams.
Nebraska's average math score is 246 for fourth-grade, seven points higher than the national average of 239, and 288 for eighth-grade, six points higher than the national average of 282.
Nebraska's average reading score is 224 for fourth-grade, three points higher than the national average 221, and 269 for eighth-grade, four points higher than the national average 265.
Only six states outscored Nebraska in fourth-grade reading and only two scored better than Nebraska in math. Similarly, in eighth-grade only seven states scored higher than Nebraska in reading and only five in math.
The average scores for Nebraska students were not significantly different in any of the four tests from 2015 (the last NAEP assessment of math and reading).
Black students in Nebraska scored 32 points below white students in fourth-grade math, 37 points lower in eighth-grade math, and 30 points lower in both fourth- and eighth-grade reading.
The gap in score averages was similar for Hispanic students with a difference of 19 points in fourth-grade math, 27 points in eighth-grade math, 20 points in fourth-grade reading and 21 points in eighth-grade reading compared to white students.
The 2017 national NAEP report card can be viewed at: https://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/.


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The Brave New World of Cannabis Tourism
Now that many states have legalized marijuana for recreational use, a small but rapidly growing industry is catering to pot-curious travelers.
Marijuana tour companies (including Emerald Farm Tours in Northern California, pictured here) are becoming some of the first to truly embrace pot tourism.
Photo by: Emerald Farm Tours
Emerald Farm Tours
By: Jason Horn
Travel's Best
Marijuana is now legal for recreational use in nine states and Washington, D.C. (and, soon, Canada), and for medical use in 22 others (along with Puerto Rico and Guam). If you include states that allow the sale of products containing marijuana-derived cannabidiol (also known as CBD, a non-psychoactive chemical found in the plant), only four places in America—Idaho, South Dakota, Nebraska and Kansas—still ban marijuana entirely.
Legal cannabis is here to stay, and a mature industry of growers, product manufacturers and retailers is starting to pull itself together, which means it's also becoming a draw for tourists to pot-friendly destinations. And while the sale and possession of marijuana remain a federal crime, innovative businesses around the country are testing the waters of catering to tourists looking to take advantage of rapidly relaxing cannabis laws.
In 2015, Oregon became the third state to legalize recreational marijuana. "It was big news, but guests were a little shy and afraid to broach the subject," says Al Munguia, general manager of the Jupiter Hotel's two locations in Portland. "As people in the hospitality industry, our job is to make the customer comfortable, so we decided, 'Let's start the conversation ourselves.'" Munguia partnered with local cannabis businesses to create the 420 Package, which includes an issue of Oregon Leaf magazine, a vape pen and a package of coupons and other goodies from nearby dispensaries.
Jupiter Hotel's popular 420 Package features items from Portland dispensaries.
Photo by: Jupiter Hotel
Jupiter Hotel
"We reached out to start this joint package—no pun intended. We wanted it to be educational. We call it Everything But the Weed," Munguia says. "I was quite surprised by the response. It became our best-selling package ever. We sell several every week. It's opened up this whole market segment for us."
One of the dispensaries the Jupiter partnered with is Serra, an elegant and high-end shop selling the kind of artisanal and hipster-friendly products Portland is known for. It partnered with local chocolatier Woodblock to create a special series of edibles that have been a best-seller. "Woodblock with their 'bean-to-bar' philosophy is very close to our 'seed-to-weed' level of control," says Karlee Eichenberger, Serra's COO. "It's a carefully controlled, meticulously created chocolate, and we contributed the same level of detail with the cannabis."
Serra paired with Portland's Woodblock Chocolate to create these best-selling edibles.
Photo by: Kenton Waltz Photography
Kenton Waltz Photography
Serra is part of Groundworks Industries, a company founded in 2015 that's positioning itself as a leader in high-end marijuana, with a cultivation division, two different dispensary brands and a full marketing, branding and legal-compliance staff planning on rapid growth. The dispensaries do a good bit of marketing to tourists: They frequently partner with hotels near their locations, bringing in concierge teams for private tours, and they also offer "travel bundles" for curious tourists, consisting of a joint, an infused beverage and an edible.
Eichenberger says that Oregon regulations changed in the last few months to prevent dispensaries from tracking where their customers come from, but that prior to that, 60 to 65 percent of customers were tourists, either from out of state or from other parts of Oregon. And in Colorado, Native Roots, a dispensary chain with 20 locations that claims to be the world's largest, says that about 36 percent of its customers come from out of state. Clearly, travelers are interested in marijuana.
Marijuana tour companies are becoming some of the first to truly embrace pot tourism, with a variety of experiences available. A Denver-based company called City Sessions offers tours targeting everybody from those interested in getting into the cannabis business themselves to beginners visiting from elsewhere, like the Mile High Sightseeing trip, which starts with a tour of a commercial grow facility and a visit to a dispensary, followed by a scenic drive through the city or up to the famed Red Rocks Amphitheater. "Cannabis really heightens the senses," says City Sessions owner and founder (her official title is "The Knower") Goldie Solodar.
City Sessions' Denver tours kick off at a commercial grow facility.
Photo by: City Sessions
City Sessions
City Sessions also offers a New to Cannabis tour with a full introduction to cannabis production and consumption (even including a glass-blowing demo), and Solodar's been astounded by the diversity of customers. "Last week, we had a group of five women between 63 and 72 years old in from Iowa," she says. "It's really hard to bucket them in terms of age or gender, whether they're new to cannabis or a connoisseur." Last year, City Sessions ran 288 tours ranging in size from a single person to groups of 50, seeing just over 1,000 customers in total.
Emerald Farm Tours is a similar business in Northern California, with a San Francisco cannabis culture and city tour as well as a soon-to-launch outdoor marijuana farm tour in Sonoma County. The first tours launched this February. Emerald Farm CEO and co-founder Victor Pinho says the experiences have been selling out consistently, and that several hundred people have now taken the tour. "We meet people on their level. If they've never experienced cannabis and they want to go on this tour, we're gonna make sure they have a healthy, positive experience all the way through," Pinho says. "A lot of these tours are really a 'bong-on-a-bus' experience. And that's not what we wanted to do. We wanted to be an asset for this industry and introducing people who don't have a lot of experience."
Groundworks Industries in Oregon really embraces that philosophy of meeting people on their level, too. Its two dispensary brands target wildly different customers. Serra's two locations are "light and bright, with a greenhouse kind of feeling. You could be walking into an art gallery or an apothecary boutique," Eichenberger says. Store staff are called "docents," trained to help guide those unfamiliar with marijuana, and the different products and cannabis strains on offer are categorized by the feeling they engender, whether you're looking for relaxation, pain relief or focused creativity.
Serra's elegant shops aim to set a new standard for cannabis culture.
The other Groundworks dispensary brand, Electric Lettuce, takes a more fun approach. With its '70s shag-carpeting-and-record-players aesthetic and lighthearted embrace of Cheech and Chong-style "stoner" stereotypes, its four Oregon locations are pitched pretty firmly at the Baby Boomer generation. "It's the kind of place you want to bring your friend or your dad, where everybody knows your name, that doesn't take itself seriously," Eichenberger explains. "Both our brands are trying to destigmatize cannabis, in a playful way with Electric Lettuce and an artful way with Serra."
Electric Lettuce's playful, '70s-inspired aesthetic is designed to destigmatize cannabis.
Photo by: Max Noecker
Max Noecker
The fledgling marijuana-tourism industry might be booming, but there are still plenty of legal hurdles to negotiate. Chief among these is that there's nowhere for pot-seeking tourists to actually use the stuff. Many of the states where marijuana is legal do not allow smoking in public places, and the vast majority of hotels and Airbnbs ban it in private, too.
"We're gonna have all these people buying weed, and they're not gonna have anywhere to consume it," says Kyle Moon, the general manager of The Summit of Worcester, Mass., the first private cannabis club in the state, which opened in January 2018. Moon's brother had been working in marijuana cultivation and visited a similar club while attending a conference in Colorado. The grungy, run-down space he found was a disappointment, and the brothers decided to look into creating something different in their hometown.
"We're licensed just like a VFW hall, an Elks Lodge, the Masons—any kind of private organization," Moon says. Customers may buy a full membership (a minimum of three months at $15 per month) or a one-day guest pass (also $15) in order to access the private space. Much like a cigar lounge, The Summit is a private space with specialized air-handling equipment (there are four of what Moon calls "industrial smoke-eaters") for members to consume their own smokables. The Summit is not allowed to sell marijuana, but it does have a license to sell pre-packaged snacks and drinks as well as tobacco products, and it has a variety of glass pipes available for purchase or rental, plus menus from neighborhood restaurants that deliver to the front door. Though it's only been open six months, the club already has more than 100 members and saw nearly 400 visitors in the last month alone. "The city says we took advantage of a loophole, but to me, 'loophole' says 'legal,'" Moon says. "It's a need, it's a want and we're gonna do it as legally as we possibly can."
The first private cannabis club in Massachusetts, The Summit already has more than 100 members.
Photo by: The Summit
Even at the Jupiter Hotel, guests who take advantage of the 420 Package aren't technically allowed to enjoy any cannabis in their rooms. "You can't consume cannabis in the hotel, and we as hoteliers don't want you smoking in the rooms," Munguia says, "but we do give you an odorless, smokeless vape pen, and what people do in the privacy of their own room is their own business. If we can't smell it or see it, we don't know it's happened."
Another issue is advertising. Ads on Google and social media outlets like Facebook are hugely important for hotels and many other tourist-focused businesses, but the companies severely restrict what cannabis businesses are allowed to do. "Coming from a background in cannabis retail, I can tell you it was really hard to market cannabis products on the internet," says Victor Pinho of Emerald Farm Tours. Because his company doesn't actually sell cannabis, he says, "Our business is all outside the purview of all these regulatory bodies in California. We don't permit smoking on the bus, but we take people to permitted consumption zones. I don't want to be the case study that tests the law. There are no rules for this. We're following the rules as we understand them: That's kind of been par for the course in the cannabis industry."
And as local brands start to succeed, they're finding their growth stifled by the federal ban. Legal-marijuana businesses can only operate in one state each, since transporting the substance across state lines is a felony. "If you make T-shirts and you have to have a separate T-shirt factory in every state you want to operate, that makes it really complex," Eichenberger says, explaining that Groundworks is focused for now only on expanding within Oregon.
For now, state and local tourism-promotion organizations have stayed mostly silent on cannabis and tourism, but there are hints of change there, too. "We have a lot of experience leveraging substances as a reason to visit the city," says Marcus Hibdon, director of communications and public relations for Travel Portland. "I think from the mayor on down, we see cannabis as an industry not unlike some of the other industries that have made Portland famous. We love our craft breweries—we promote that all the time—and we have so many craft distilleries. Alcohol is a drug as well."
That said, Travel Portland's internal policy is that it will not fund any cannabis-related activities or accompany media members to dispensaries. The organization is funded by local hotel taxes and municipalities with no federal monies, so there's no legal issue; it's just the current policy, Hibdon says. "We also have a ban on things like bringing journalists to a strip club, for example. We don't have any objections to that industry; we just feel like that's not the best use of our budget. I don't think it's out of any fear of reprisal from the federal government."
Hibdon says he's been approached by many writers with cannabis-related questions, and Travel Portland is embracing that as far as it can at the moment. "We're happy to talk about it. We have no moral objection to cannabis, we speak openly and frankly with journalists who ask about it, and we're looking forward to the partnerships that are starting to emerge," Hibdon says. "From Travel Portland's perspective, it's very likely that someday we'll be talking about recreational cannabis and strains that are only available in Portland and we'll talk about it in the same way we do our farm-to-table cuisine." There aren't yet ads urging visitors to come use marijuana in Portland, but Hibdon thinks they might not be too far off. "If you want to come to Portland to get high, we're a great place to do it, and you can do it legally," he says. "It's not the kind of thing you have to feel bad about."
At the moment, the legal-cannabis business is kind of the Wild West, with a patchwork of unclear regulations that vary from state to state, and even city to city. But a market is emerging, and big business is coming. The Canadian arm of Southern Glazer's, the largest liquor distributor in the US, recently launched a major marijuana-distribution partnership north of the border, and America's current cannabis pioneers are honestly a bit scared. "We've accomplished so much, but how do you continue to grow that," Moon worries, "before big business shows up and blows us out of the water?"
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Q: Encryption and Decryption In MVC 4 Let's say I have a form where people enter the information such as credit card number and other sensitive information in asp.net MVC 4. I have a model class that will have the entity object and view will render the appropriate textbox or editor to enter those information. Then when the person clicks the submit button, the action method will be called and the information is captured and send to the server to store. I want to encrypt the data when the data is coming from the client so that it is protected? How to do that?
I understand that if I use [RequiresHttps] attribute in the controller class it will establish the secure connection using the certificate installed in the server? Can you please explain how this works?
Also, what is the best way of sending data from client to server in a secure fashion? Is there any other simpler techniques? Can you please explain how encrypt and decrypt will solve this problem?
Thanks in advance. BTW I am newbie to this technology.
Thanks

A: The first thing you need to do is install a SSL certificate from a trusted authority such as VeriSign, GeoTrust, Thawte etc... That will secure the communication between the client and the server.  You can read more about HTTPS on Wikipedia  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_Secure
This however will not give you security.  You will need to ensure from a network level that your web server is secure, this will include ensuring there is a firewall on and proper security procedures on the server itself.  As a web developer your most trusted person to go to will be your company network security admin (I think all developers should learn to do this themselves so they know what's going on).
You will still need to secure your application.  My recommendation is to NEVER store credit card numbers in your system.  You are only asking for trouble if you do so.  For example if you store them in your database, even if encrypted, and your application is vulnerable to a SQL Injection you could expose all your customers credit card numbers to an attacker.  Even if encrypted, don't assume that you are safe because there are a lot of things dealing with encryption that you have to keep in mind including but not limited to:

*

*The actual encryption is the easiest part of encryption there are a
lot of good algorithms to choose from.

*The hardest part is the key management

*There are certain weak keys for a lot of encryption algorithms

*You may not choose a key that will give you good entropy (P@$$word is easy to guess)

*How do you store your key securely?  If your application is vulnerable to a path traversal attack a hacker may be able to get it off of your server very easily

*Even if you do everything right, what happens if the network admin or another dev decides to be evil and steal your key and db? (Sorry network admins and other devs)

If you use a payment gateway like Authorize.NET, Paypal, etc... you can process the credit card without the need to store it.  As your controller receives it, you simply make a call to a service (usually just an XML call over HTTPS) and after getting a result just forget the credit card ever came to you.  You can store the transaction number they return back in case you need to void or refund the transaction later, or if you want to do an authorization hold and then a capture later.
They even provide mechanisms for storing credit cards on their end with a token, and doing automated recurring billing.  Example would be Authorize.NET's advanced integration method https://developer.authorize.net/api/aim/ http://www.authorize.net/support/AIM_guide.pdf

A: this sample of encrypt and decrypt
 public static class lockIt
    {
        public static string EncryptString(string ClearText)
        {
            byte[] clearTextBytes = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(ClearText);
            System.Security.Cryptography.SymmetricAlgorithm rijn = SymmetricAlgorithm.Create();
            MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream();

            string key1 = "aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa";
            string key2 = "aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa";

            byte[] rgbIV = Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes(key1);
            byte[] key = Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes(key2);
            CryptoStream cs = new CryptoStream(ms, rijn.CreateEncryptor(key, rgbIV), CryptoStreamMode.Write);
            cs.Write(clearTextBytes, 0, clearTextBytes.Length);
            cs.Close();
            return Convert.ToBase64String(ms.ToArray());
        }

        public static string DecryptString(string EncryptText)
        {
            byte[] encryptedTextBytes = Convert.FromBase64String(EncryptText);
            MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream();
            System.Security.Cryptography.SymmetricAlgorithm rijn = SymmetricAlgorithm.Create();

            string key1 = "aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa";
            string key2 = "aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa";

            byte[] rgbIV = Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes(key1);
            byte[] key = Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes(key2);
            CryptoStream cs = new CryptoStream(ms, rijn.CreateDecryptor(key, rgbIV), CryptoStreamMode.Write);
            cs.Write(encryptedTextBytes, 0, encryptedTextBytes.Length);
            cs.Close();
            return Encoding.UTF8.GetString(ms.ToArray());
        }

        public static string EnString(string instring)
        {
            return EncryptString(EncryptString(instring));
        }

        public static string DeString(string outstring)
        {
            return DecryptString(DecryptString(outstring));
        }

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Большая Шугорь — село в Ростовском районе Ярославской области России.

В рамках организации местного самоуправления входит в сельское поселение Ишня, в рамках административно-территориального устройства — в Шугорский сельский округ.

География
Расположено в 8 км к западу (по прямой) от центра города Ростова и в 3 км к западу от рабочего посёлка Ишня.

Население

Согласно результатам переписи 2002 года, в национальной структуре населения русские составляли 93 % от всех жителей.

Примечания

Населённые пункты Ростовского района


CEREC (Chair-side Economical Restoration of Esthetic Ceramics or Ceramic Reconstruction) is the most efficient and effective product for dental restoration currently available. This modern computer technology uses 3D photography to assist dentists in restoring a patient's teeth with ceramics. Earlier dental restoration processes required the patient to sit through multiple appointments, but with CEREC everything can get done in just one appointment.
CEREC is one of the most advanced technologies for dental restoration in existence, and the process is pretty simple. A photograph is taken of the patient's teeth and this photograph is stored as a 3D digital model. Computer software is then used to create an approximate picture of the shape the restored teeth should take, using the intact surrounding teeth as a guide. The model is refined using CAD (Computer-Assisted Design) software.
Once the model has been designed to ensure the patient's damaged teeth will be restored to their appropriate form and function, it is complete. The data is then sent to a milling machine. The restoration is molded out of a block of solid or composite ceramic, and then this mold is bonded to the patient's teeth with resin cement. CEREC also allows for more advanced repair work like ceramic crowns, veneers, inlays and onlays.
At our practice, we have a Sirona CT scanner (Galileo's) that we integrate with our CEREC technology for implant procedures. With access to both of these amazing technologies, we can ensure that the implant procedure goes as smoothly as possible and create the perfect replacement tooth.
There are several benefits to CEREC technology that prove it to be more effective than other restoration technology.
Speed | When a dentist uses plaster impressions of teeth for dental restoration, it generally takes weeks to get the restoration molds back. With CEREC technology, the restoration mold will be completed within 20 minutes of the data model being received.
Time-saving | The procedure is completed quickly in the space of one session, so the patient does not have to waste time with multiple sessions.
Accuracy | The digital mapping technology of CEREC that charts the inside of the patient's mouth completely accurately and down to the last detail ensures that there is no issue with inaccurate dental impressions that lead the patient to experience discomfort with bulky molds and unnecessary debris in their mouth.
Natural-looking | The ceramic molds are available in up to 17 shades, so the color of the mold will perfectly match the patient's teeth for a more natural look. This is a huge improvement over the unnatural looking metal and bulky porcelain restoration products.
High Quality | The CEREC process also uses high quality ceramic molds. This ceramic is very similar to tooth enamel and looks and feels natural on patient's teeth. It is also very easy to make adjustments to this mold.


Medium sized personalized address stamps simplify the mailing process. Instantly put your return address on an envelope!
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The medium personalized address stamps measure 11/16" by 2 1/8" and have up to 4 lines of information.


text:
The Ellis Insight
About Jim Ellis
2018 SERVICES OVERVIEW
Tag Archives: President Obama
Tennessee Rep. Phil Roe to Retire
By Jim Ellis
Tennessee Rep. Phil Roe (R-Johnson City/Kingsport)
Jan. 7, 2020 — The House open seat total reached 40 over the weekend as veteran Tennessee Rep. Phil Roe (R-Johnson City/Kingsport) announced that he will not seek a seventh term later this year. Rep. Roe is the former mayor of Johnson City, Tenn., and ostensibly entered federal office when he defeated first-term Congressman David Davis in the 2008 Republican primary.
Roe initially pledged to serve only five terms. He changed his mind and successfully sought re-election in 2018 saying that he had unfinished business as chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee. As we know, the Democrats would go onto win the majority that year, thus relegating Roe to the committee's ranking minority member position. Losing the chairmanship virtually eliminated the foremost reason for him remaining in Congress.
The 1st District is one of the safest Republican seats in the country. The last time a Democrat was elected to the House from easternmost Tennessee dates all the way back to 1878. The longest-serving representative from the region is former Rep. Jamie Quillen (R) who held the seat for 34 years after his original election in 1962.
The 1st District occupies the eastern tail of the Volunteer State. It contains 11 counties and part of Jefferson, a domain it shares with the 2nd District that is anchored in Knoxville. The largest 1st District population centers surround the cities of Johnson City and Kingsport. Sevier County, with a population figure of just under 90,000, is the third largest segment. It contains the cities of Sevierville and the tourist centers of Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge in the district's southern sector.
The TN-1 electorate votes heavily Republican. President Trump carried the seat 77-20 percent in 2016. Mitt Romney defeated President Obama here, 73-26 percent, and John McCain recorded a 70-29 percent victory margin in 2008. In his six victorious congressional elections, Rep. Roe averaged 77.8 percent of the vote in what were always lightly contested general election campaigns.
Posted in Election Analysis, House and tagged Georgia, House Veterans Affairs Committee, John Clark, John McCain, Mitt Romney, North Carolina, open seats, President Obama, President Trump, Rep. George Holding, Rep. Jamie Quillen, Rep. Mark Walker, Rep. Phil Roe, Rep. Rob Woodall, Rep. Will Hurd, Tennessee, Texas, Todd McKinley on January 7, 2020 by Jim Ellis.	Leave a comment
Deadlines Ahead in Ohio,
North Carolina 2020 Campaigns
Dec. 17, 2019 — Interesting decisions await as candidate filing deadlines are approaching this week in Ohio (Dec. 18) and North Carolina (Dec. 20) for their respective March 17 and March 3 primaries.
The Ohio political situation, originally thought to be relatively mundane without a Senate campaign and little competition within the congressional delegation, may be changing.
In the 1st District, veteran Rep. Steve Chabot (R-Cincinnati), who lost this district in 2008 after first going to Congress in 1995 and then re-claiming the seat in 2010, again faces what will likely be a competitive re-election battle. In 2018, Chabot defeated Hamilton County Clerk of Courts Aftab Pureval by a 51-47 percent count, despite the Democratic nominee spending over $4 million for his campaign. Expected to file for the Democrats this year are healthcare executive Kate Schroder and US Air Force Reserve officer Nikki Foster.
The new potential contest coming onto the political scene emanates from the Youngstown area as Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Warren), who was an early presidential candidate but failed to generate any major attention, appears to be attracting strong opposition for the first time since he won his original congressional election in 2002.
Now reportedly moving toward challenging Rep. Ryan are former Lt. Gov. Mary Taylor, who fared poorly in the 2018 Republican gubernatorial primary, and ex-state Rep. Christina Hagan who scored over 40 percent of the vote against freshman Rep. Anthony Gonzalez (R-Rocky River/Medina) in the last nomination campaign from the neighboring 16th District.
Though both women have the ability to attract people and resources to their political efforts, the 13th CD is reliably Democratic and Congressman Ryan would be tough to dislodge. President Trump fared better than most Republicans here in 2016, but still lost 44-51 percent. President Obama, in both 2008 and 2012, topped 62 percent and Rep. Ryan has averaged 67.8 percent of the vote over his nine-term congressional career.
Still, House members who run for president often have a difficult time in their next re-election effort, so it remains to be seen if a credible challenge against the veteran congressman could develop legs.
Posted in Election Analysis, House, Polling, Redistricting, Senate and tagged Aftab Pureval, Christina Hagan, Ellis Insight, Jim Ellis, Kate Schroder, Mary Taylor, Nikki Foster, North Carolina, Ohio, President Obama, President Trump, Redistricting, Renee Ellmers, Rep. Anthony Gonzalez, Rep. George Holding, Rep. Mark Walker, Rep. Steve Chabot, Rep. Ted Budd, Rep. Tim Ryan, Sen. Richard Burr, Sen. Thom Tillis on December 17, 2019 by Jim Ellis.	Leave a comment
Rep. Yoho to Retire; Texas Filings
Dec. 12, 2019 — Keeping his pledge to serve only four terms in the House, Florida Rep. Ted Yoho (R-Gainesville) announced in a local radio interview earlier this week that he will not seek re-election next year. Also, the 2020 Texas candidate filing deadline came on Monday, and lists of the qualifying candidates are now becoming public.
REP. YOHO, FL-3
Florida Rep. Ted Yoho (R-Gainesville)
There had been some speculation brewing as to Yoho's plans for 2020 with some suggesting he might eschew his original pledge. Making this now the 37th open House seat and second in Florida, potential candidates will have until May 1 to file for the Aug. 25 primary.
The eventual Republican nominee will clearly have the inside track to hold this seat for the GOP. Florida's 3rd District is strongly, and consistently, Republican. President Trump scored 56.2 percent of the vote in 2016. This number is almost identical to the 56.6 percent that Mitt Romney posted against President Obama in 2012, and John McCain's 54.6 percent that he garnered in the 2008 presidential election.
Rep. Yoho has averaged 61.0 percent of the vote here over four elections, but the district was significantly changed in the 2015 mid-decade court-ordered redistricting plan. In the current configuration, Yoho averaged almost exactly what the Republican presidential candidates scored: 57.2 percent in his two elections since the boundary alteration.
The 3rd District occupies five whole counties and parts of a sixth. The major population center is the city of Gainesville in Alachua County. The remaining portion of the CD is nestled squarely in the north/central section of the Florida peninsula.
Three Republicans had already announced their candidacies, but none seems particularly viable. The contender raising the most money through the Sept. 30 financial disclosure period is businesswoman Amy Pope Wells, but her receipts showed just under $40,000 raised for the campaign with a cash-on-hand figure of just under $8,500.
Posted in Election Analysis, House, Senate and tagged Amanda Edwards, Amy Pope Wells, California, Chris Bell, Chris Putnam, Cristina Tzintzun Ramirez, Ellis Insight, FL-3, Florida, Jim Ellis, John McCain, M.J. Hegar, Mitt Romney, President Obama, President Trump, Rep. Bill Flores, Rep. Kay Granger, Rep. Kenny Marchant, Rep. Mac Thornberry, Rep. Mike Conaway, Rep. Pete Olson retiring, Rep. Ted Yoho, Rep. Will Hurd, Royce West, Sen. John Cornyn, Texas on December 12, 2019 by Jim Ellis.	Leave a comment
Winning vs. Ideology
Nov. 21, 2019 — As the 10 Democratic presidential candidates again took the debate stage last night, this time from Atlanta, they all needed recognize a few things: They needed to walk a fine line. The contenders needed to carefully navigate between appealing to their party's ideological base, which is key to winning the nomination, and preparing for the general election where a more centrist approach appears to be the probable course toward achieving national victory.
The Gallup organization just completed a new national survey (Nov. 1-14; 1,015 US adults from all 50 states and the District of Columbia, 437 self-identified Democrats and Independents who lean Democratic) that compared the importance between choosing an ideologically sound nominee with one who is best equipped to win the general election irrespective of where that individual stands on the party's base issues.
Looking at the current results in the prism of Gallup asking the same questions of Republican respondents when President Obama was running for re-election in 2012, and a Democratic cell group when President George W. Bush was seeking a second term in 2004, this sample skews towards electability over ideology in the starkest proportion.
According to Gallup's questions asked of Democrats and lean Democrats whether they believed it is more important to find a candidate who can unseat President Trump or one who agrees with the individual respondent on issues, by a margin of 60-36 percent the poll showed that the favored candidate would be the one having the best chance to win the November 2020 election.
In 2012, Republican responses to this choice involving replacing President Obama, surveyed in mid-September of 2011, leaned toward a candidate who could win over the ideologically pure contender in a 53-43 percent spread. Eight years earlier, when President Bush was seeking his second term, the ratio among Democrats at the end of 2003 was 50-44 percent in favor of ideology, but six weeks later, in early February 2004, the margin switched to 55-40 percent toward finding the candidate who was best equipped to unseat Bush.
Posted in Election Analysis, National Survey, Polling, Presidential campaign and tagged Democratic presidential debate, Ellis Insight, Gallup, Jim Ellis, Joe Biden, President George W. Bush, President Obama, President Trump, Sen. Bernie Sanders, Sen. Elizabeth Warren on November 21, 2019 by Jim Ellis.	Leave a comment
A Brewing Battle Emerging in Kansas
Freshman Rep. Steve Watkins (R-Topeka)
Oct. 17, 2019 — Former legislative aide Abbie Hodgson, the only announced Democratic candidate in the KS-2 congressional race, withdrew her challenge to freshman Rep. Steve Watkins (R-Topeka) Wednesday because she claims not to possess the fundraising ability to conduct a credible campaign. At this point, there is no alternative Democrat on the horizon in the Kansas district, but that will soon likely change.
Rep. Watkins won a tight 48-47 percent general election victory over former state House Minority Leader and 2014 gubernatorial nominee Paul Davis (D) last November to succeed retiring Rep. Lynn Jenkins (R). This came after political newcomer Watkins, a West Point graduate, Army Ranger and Afghanistan veteran, won a tight seven-way Republican primary but with only 26.5 percent of the vote. Controversy arose when a major independent expenditure committee emerged, which was principally funded by the candidate's father, to back Watkins.
More potential upheaval surrounds Rep. Watkins, but it simmers below the surface. Rumors were flying around in August that the congressman would imminently resign his office because of a rumored scandal that was about to become public. Watkins took no such action, and to date nothing involving scandalous activity has come to light.
This has not stopped certain Republicans from taking action, however. In early September, reportedly at the behest of former Gov. Jeff Colyer (R) who lost his own bitter primary to then-Secretary of State Kris Kobach, state Treasurer Jake LaTurner made a surprising move. He was the first declared US Senate candidate after incumbent Pat Roberts (R) announced his retirement, but he then transferred from the statewide campaign to instead enter the primary to challenge Watkins in the Topeka-anchored congressional district.
Kansas' 2nd is a decidedly Republican seat, but not intensely so. The CD occupies 23 eastern Kansas counties and parts of two others. It runs vertically from the Nebraska border to Oklahoma and consumes the territory between the Kansas City metro area and Wichita.
Posted in Election Analysis, House and tagged Abbie Hodgson, Afghanistan veteran, Army Ranger, Gov. Jeff Colyer, Gov. Laura Kelly, Jake LaTurner, John McCain, Kansas, KS-2, Mitt Romney, Nancy Boyda, Paul Davis, President Obama, President Trump, Rep. Jim Ryun, Rep. Steve Watkins, rumored scandal, Sen. Pat Roberts, West Point graduate on October 17, 2019 by Jim Ellis.	Leave a comment
The Late Luke Letlow's Widow to Run
Comparing 2020 & 2016
Early Senate 2022 Previews:
Florida & North Carolina
2022 Senate Outlook
Definitive Georgia Data
NY-22: Up 12, Down 14, Now +27
Georgia: A Deeper Dive
Jim Ellis
Identifying and analyzing emerging trends in campaigns and elections.
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The Team is cross-functional in nature. It is generally composed of programmers, testers, user experience designers, etc.
The team is self-organizing, but is accountable to the product owner for delivering as promised.
What are the core beliefes of agile project management?
-Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continues delivery of valuable software.
-Welcome changing requirements, even late in development. Agile processes harness change for the customer's competitive advantage.
-Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of week to a couple of months, with a preference for the shorter timescale.
-Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project.
-Build projects around motivated individuals. Give them the environment and support they need, and trust them to get the job done.
-Working software is the primary measure of progress.
-Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers, and user should be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely.
-Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design enhances agility.
-Simplicity – the art of maximizing the amount of work not done – is essential.
-The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams.
-At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behavior accordingly.


his subjects are bone tired.
a few of them fast asleep. They are watchful in their dreams.
They too escaped the hunter's gun and will never forget.
in suits and ties, dresses.
Mark Jackley's poems have appeared in Sugar House Review, Fifth Wednesday, Talking River, and other journals. His latest book is On the Edge of a Very Small Town. He lives in Purcellville, VA.
This entry was posted in Zingara Poetry Picks and tagged Fifth Wednesday, On the Edge of a Very Small Town by Mark Jackley, Sugar House Review, Talking River on January 30, 2019 by Lisa M. Hase-Jackson.


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Palm Beach State College cancels $2.3M in student debt
by Brett Shweky
Looking to help students impacted by COVID-19, Palm Beach State College recently erased about $2.3 million in student debt for over 3,100 students.
Palm Beach State College's financial assistance helps students settle unpaid account balances incurred during the pandemic, getting students back on track this fall to continue their education.
"This is not the same as what students may owe for loans for debt like to the government or other educational loans," said James Duffie, the public college's vice president of finance and administration.
"This is stuff they owe to the college for classes they might have had to drop after refund dates or lost financial aid due to hardships with COVID. … It's not a lot of money for individuals," he said. "With all the students, it was about $2.3 million and 3,100 students. So, it's about an average of $740 per student. Here, it's probably the value of a couple of classes."
Palm Beach State canceled the amount of debt by using a portion of its Higher Education Emergency Relief III institutional aid from the American Rescue Plan, which was signed into law in March.
The financial aid was the latest of three pools of stimulus funding the college received during the pandemic.
Opening its doors in 1933 as Florida's first public community college, Palm Beach State College has grown from three classrooms and 41 students to five campuses — Lake Worth, Boca Raton, Palm Beach Gardens, Loxahatchee Groves and Belle Glade, and 48,757 students.
Palm Beach State College offers baccalaureate degrees, professional certificates, career training and corporate and continuing education.
FPL taps Kenny G, Chaka Khan and other singers for money-savings trivia game
The 27 Best Cashmere Sweaters for Every Budget
Brett Shweky September 29, 2021


Co-ordinate a large open-plan room with a happy mixture of colours. Start with a neutral backdrop throughout and add strikes of colour over the scheme using smooth furnishings. Keep the useful kitchen a defining monochrome and then merge into cool simple grey and pastels for a seating zone (that one benefits from an abundance of natural light). Finally, bring a reclaimed dining set back alive with co-ordinating seat pads in exciting jewel shades for an uplifting eclectic end that works.
If your dining table is your kitchen your decorating options will be limited, so make your table special with fabric instead. Co-ordinate a glance across tablecloths and napkins, window blinds, aprons and even oven gloves to carefully turn the table in to the centrepiece of the room. Here the delicate autumnal colours of the towel and cushion ranges have a real decorative impact on the space as a whole.
Few of us have the blissful luxury of a separate dining room nowadays. For most of us, a table is part of your open up plan living room or is the centre of all the action in a kitchen. This means we need to be canny about where we store all the bits and bobs we need to make mealtimes possible.
Very much like stain, you can also use glaze with color to improve the decorative top features of your cabinetry. In the same way that you'd use a base layer of stain, use basics coat of coloring. However, it will soften the appearance of the color.
Kitchen areas are beautiful, most of the time. Regardless of your look, a soiled kitchen can destroy your look. While you may clean it regularly or after foods, every half a year, you should deep clean your kitchen to avoid buildup and more.


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Experimental Cinema
News and resources on experimental films
Continuous calls
Venues map
Self-published editions
Videos on the net
...a piece of news
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...an event
...a directory entry
...a venue
Cineinfinito #83&84: Dirk de Bruyn
By Marcos Ortega on Wed, 13/02/2019 - 03:24
Select ratingGive Cineinfinito #83&84: Dirk de Bruyn 1/5Give Cineinfinito #83&84: Dirk de Bruyn 2/5Give Cineinfinito #83&84: Dirk de Bruyn 3/5Give Cineinfinito #83&84: Dirk de Bruyn 4/5Give Cineinfinito #83&84: Dirk de Bruyn 5/5Cancel rating
Dirk de Bruyn has been creating film works for over 35 years; mostly in the hand-made, 'direct animation' mode. He also performs live with multiple projections of his films in a highly embodied mode of expanded cinema performance. His work is renowned for its intricate, suggestive layering of sound and image, and use of sumptuous, blooming fields of colour. He has received funding to produce a number of films, but has continued to maintain a no-budget, independent, self-funded focus for much of his work.
He was a founding member and past president of MIMA (Experimenta), been involved with Fringe Network and been a member of the Melbourne Super 8 Film Group. He has written about and curated various programs of film and video art internationally and written extensively about this area of arts practice. During the late '90s he was involved in an independent weekly screening program of film and video art at the Café Bohemio.
In the early '90s de Bruyn lived in Canada. Understanding Science, Rote Movie and Doubt were largely produced while teaching Animation at Emily Carr College of Art and Design in Vancouver.
He is currently teaching Animation and Digital Culture at Deakin University in Melbourne, Victoria. (Burwood Campus).
"My hand-drawn direct work remains my regurgitated creative life-blood, continually re-inscribed with the follies and hesitations of my everyday life. It speaks to me of things I have never said. It survives viscerally outside the outside. It impacts my body before thought floods in." –Dirk de Bruyn
Programme 1:
Running (1976), 16mm, colour, optical sound, 30 min
Feyers (1979), 16mm, colour, optical sound, 20 min
Discs (1982), 16mm, colour, optical sound, 3 min
Migraine Particles (1984), 16mm, colour, optical sound, 7 min
Light Play (1984), 16mm, colour, optical sound, music by Michael Luck, 7 min
Vision (1985), 16mm, colour, optical sound, music by Michael Luck, 4 min
Cha Hit (1988), 16mm, colour, optical sound, music by Michael Luck, 16 min
Frames (1988), 16mm, colour, optical sound, music by Michael Luck, 7 min
Knots (1990), 16mm, colour, optical sound, 8 min
Screening format: HD (copies supervised by Dirk de Bruyn)
(Special thanks to Dirk de Bruyn and Steven McIntyre)
Full programme and film notes:
Cineinfinito #83: Dirk de Bruyn (I)
Cineinfinito #84: Dirk de Bruyn (II)
Running (Dirk de Bruyn, 1976)
Feyers (Dirk de Bruyn, 1979)
Discs (Dirk de Bruyn, 1982)
Light Play (Dirk de Bruyn, 1984)

Dirk De Bruyn
Cineinfinito
Monday, March 4, 2019 - 18:00
Centro Cultural Doctor Madrazo
Calle Casimiro Sainz, s/n
Series/Festival
«I propose to extricate cinema from this circular maze by superrimposing on it a second labyrinth (containing an exit)–by positing something that has by now begun to come to concrete actuality: we might agree to call it an infinite cinema»
Hollis Frampton, Eaton, New York, June 1971
Depth of FIeld. Ar, Fogo, Terra, Água: Carte Blance to Ana Vaz
12/07/2019 (All day), 14/07/2019 (All day), 17/07/2019 (All day), 28/07/2019 (All day) (Screenings)
AXWFF: Community
17/07/2019 - 18:00 (Screenings)
deranged presents (1): Dan Barnett / Saul Levine
Cineinfinito #97: José Antonio Sistiaga
In the Inner Space
11/07/2019 (All day), 21/07/2019 (All day) (Screenings)
is an independent website dedicated to provide information and promote experimental & avant-garde film.
Feel free to collaborate sending us information about events in your area, publications, your creations, or writing on and expanding our wiki section.
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© Experimental Cinema 2019


A man left an envelope with €5000 on the front seat of an unlocked car to run an errand in Paphos, only to find it was gone on his return.
The theft occurred around 4.30 pm yesterday.
The 54-year old reported the case to the police saying that besides the cash a chequebook and invoices were also taken.
Police investigations led to the arrest of a 34 year old in connection who denies any involvement.
Police said the man is also being held in connection with another pending warrant regarding theft and damage of property in Paphos on August 9. They said that a bag had been stolen a little after midnight that day from a parked car. The bag contained a number of car keys and the key to a building. The perpetrator had gained access to the car by breaking the glass behind the driver's seat.


Fassa, A A; Urban, P; Radovanovic, D; Duvoisin, N; Gaspoz, J M; Stauffer, J C; Erne, P (2005). Trends in reperfusion therapy of ST segment elevation myocardial infarction in Switzerland: six year results from a nationwide registry. Heart, 91(7):882-888.
OBJECTIVE: To document the trends in reperfusion therapy for ST segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) in Switzerland. DESIGN: National prospective multicentre registry, AMIS Plus (acute myocardial infarction and unstable angina in Switzerland), of patients admitted with acute coronary syndromes. SETTING: 54 hospitals of varying size and capability in Switzerland. PATIENTS: 7098 of 11 845 AMIS Plus patients who presented with ST segment elevation or left bundle branch block on the ECG at admission. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: In-hospital mortality and its predictors at admission by multivariate analysis. RESULTS: The proportion of patients treated by primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) progressively increased from 1997 to 2002, while the proportion with thrombolysis or no reperfusion decreased (from 8.0% to 43.1%, from 47.2% to 25.6%, and from 44.8% to 31.4%, respectively). Overall in-hospital mortality decreased over the study period from 12.2% to 6.7% (p < 0.001). Main in-hospital mortality predictors by multivariate analysis were primary PCI (odds ratio (OR) 0.52, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.33 to 0.81), thrombolysis (OR 0.63, 95% CI 0.47 to 0.83), and Killip class III (OR 3.61, 95% CI 2.49 to 5.24) and class IV (OR 5.97, 95% CI 3.51 to 10.17) at admission. When adjusted for the year, multivariate analysis did not show PCI to be significantly superior to thrombolysis for in-hospital mortality (OR 1.2 for PCI better, 95% CI 0.8 to 1.9, p = 0.42). CONCLUSION: Primary PCI has become the preferred mode of reperfusion for STEMI since 2002 in Switzerland, whereas use of intravenous thrombolysis has decreased from 1997 to 2002. Furthermore, there was a major reduction of in-hospital mortality over the same period.


For sale is a lovely art glass silver overlay vase made by The Rockwell Silver Company of Meriden, CT. The vase is a nice cabinet size as it stands 4 1/4" tall and is 4 3/4" in diameter at its shoulder which is the widest point.
This vase has a classic raised lip with a high shoulder and tapered in shape. It is very nicely decorated with a silver overlay pattern on a frosted base glass. The detail in the overlay is outstanding. The pattern in the overlay is that of an upstate New York Adirondack scene on a lake. There are Pine trees and a shoreline along a lake with a single goose flying above. The vase has 3 vertical silver overlay panels that depict Pine Cones and Pine Needles within. The silver has further etching in it to give the piece its realism.
The vase is considered to be in excellent condition as there are no cracks, nicks, chips, or dings to any of the glass. There is minor wear to the silver. The piece is signed along the bottom edge in the silver border and it says "Sterling". The glass itself is not signed. It is to my understanding that The Rockwell Silver Company purchased glass blanks from numerous glass factories such as Fostoria, Tiffin, Pairpoint and so many others. They actually did the silver overlay and marketed the product. I believe this glass blank to have been made by Tiffin. This vase was made circa 1915-1925.


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NM AG: Excess Local Tax Revenues Improperly Spent to Support Spaceport America Operations
February 15, 2021 February 14, 2021 Doug Messier News Leave a comment
The Virgin Galactic Gateway to Space terminal hangar facility (center), Spaceport Operations Center (Left) and "Spaceway" (Runway) at Spaceport America. (Credit: Bill Gutman/Spaceport America)
Excess local tax revenues collected to support Spaceport America have been improperly spent on the facility's operational costs, the New Mexico Attorney General's Office has concluded.
Chief Counsel Matt Baca addressed the long-simmering controversy over excess gross receipts taxes (GRT) collected in Sierra and Dona Ana counties in a letter to state Economic Development Secretary Alicia Keyes, who also chairs the New Mexico Spaceport Authority (NMSA). The Las Cruces Sun-News reports:
The statutes addressing spaceport tax districts made clear, Baca wrote, that 75 percent of local GRT (currently collected by Sierra and Doña Ana counties) must be used for "the financing, planning, designing, engineering and construction of a regional spaceport," while the other 25 percent may be retained by the local government for its use.
Nowhere in statute or tax code, Baca wrote, "did the Legislature state permission to use gross receipts taxes collected by local governments for the operational costs of running the Authority itself."
Since 2009, 75 percent of the revenue was directed by the tax authority toward repaying bond debt for the construction of the spaceport and 25 percent for "local spaceport-related education."
The tax has generated an excess of several hundred thousand dollars annually that went to spaceport operations instead, to the dismay of some elected officials.
Dona Ana County officials say the state should pay for operations not covered by the spaceport's revenues. They also are seeking repayment of the improperly used tax revenues.
Residents in Dona Ana and Sierra counties approved one-half cent tax increases in 2007 and 2008, respectively. The approval was part of a $200 million state-led initiative to build the spaceport to serve as the operational base for Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic suborbital space company.
When they unveiled the plan in 2005, Branson and then-Gov. Bill Richardson promised Virgin Galactic would fly 50,000 passengers on suborbital flights from the facility within 15 years.
Thus far, Virgin Galactic has flown exactly two suborbital flight tests and no passengers. The company is still in the midst of a flight test program of its SpaceShipTwo vehicle that began in 2010. That program could be completed and commercial service commenced later this year.
Residents of the two counties have continued to pay higher taxes even though they have seen few of the economic benefits they were promised by state and Virgin Galactic officials when the project was announced 15 years ago.
Spaceport America's annual budget is $12.7 million. Revenues from Virgin Galactic and other tenants do not cover all operating expenses. To date, the gaps have been filed with excess GRT revenues and state funding.
Baca's letter also addressed the duties of NMSA's executive director. The letter said the responsibilities are limited to hiring staff, managing day to day operations, overseeing the procurement process, and reporting to the NMSA's Board of Directors. Responsibility for procurement of goods and services lies with the NMSA board.
In December, the NMSA board asked the Attorney General's Office to review the tax issue and proposed modifications to its bylaws. The board is revising the bylaws in the wake of a scandal that broke last year involving the authority's two top employees.
An outside audit released in November concluded that former Executive Director Dan Hicks had exceeded his authority on spending, travel and hiring. Hicks was fired in October after the auditing firm submitted its report to state officials. He had been put on administrative leave earlier in the year.
The report recommended that Hicks and former Chief Finance Officer Zach DeGregorio, who blew the whistle on Hicks, be investigated for possible criminal charges.
The audit concluded that DeGregorio had facilitated Hicks' misconduct. The report also alleged that he had farmed out most of his job to an outside contractor. DeGregorio left his position at the spaceport last year.
The Sun-News reported that Baca told Keyes in a follow-up letter that the Attorney General's Office had not reached any conclusions about possible criminal charges against Hicks and DeGregorio.
The audit also found that former NMSA Chairman Rick Holdridge was lax in his oversight of operations and took actions that allowed violations to continue. He was replaced as chair of the board by Keyes last year.
Alicia Keyes, Dan Hicks, Dona Ana County, Matt Baca, New Mexico Attorney General, New Mexico Spaceport Authority, Richard Branson, Rick Holdridge, Sierra County, space tourism, space tourists, Spaceport America, SpaceShipTwo, suborbital spaceflight, virgin galactic, Zach DeGregorio
NASA's TESS Discovers New Worlds in a River of Young Stars
Abundant Idiocy: Peter Diamandis, MD and Founder of COVID-19 Vaccine Company, Held Super Spreader Event


As farms become larger and agricultural production systems more efficient they become increasingly mechanised. The industry needs highly skilled graduates who understand how agricultural machines and mechanised systems operate, and how machinery should be effectively managed on farms and within contracting businesses. These courses provide students with a thorough grounding in agriculture and mechanisation.
FdSc students undertake placement in their second year. You will enjoy a year of paid employment in a business related to your career aspirations and experience. Recent placement employers have included machinery dealerships or manufacturers such as Kuhn, John Deere (both in the UK and their European HQ in Mannheim, Germany), Claas, CNH and Agco, in roles as machinery demonstrators, dealer technicians, machinery testing or sales. Several commercial scholarship opportunities, linked to placement, are available to apply for with sponsoring companies paying a significant amount towards the tuition fees of successful applicants. Agriculture students from a family farm wishing to undertake a farm placement are required to work at least 50 miles from their home farm and are not usually normally permitted to return to previous employers.
All agriculture students share a common first year, studying the same modules; this allows students to change course during the first year.
In the first part of the course the focus is on practice i.e. what goes on on-farm, and underpinning science and business principles. Areas of study include animal and crop production systems, agricultural science, an introduction to farm business management and marketing, and agricultural mechanisation. In the second part of the course you start to specialise in the area of mechanisation studying areas such as farm machinery technology, hydraulics and electrics, and mechanisation aspects of soils and farm infrastructure. The mechanisation aspects are studied alongside more general aspects of agriculture such as crop production and science, farm business management and people management. In addition, all students undertake a professional project in their final year in a subject area of interest to them.
The principles of mechanisation are developed in an applied way without the use of complex mathematics.
The skills you will develop will be useful throughout the industry, whether managing large, highly mechanised farms, running a successful contracting business or working in the agricultural machinery sector. Harper Adams graduates have a long history of successfully finding employment within all of these areas of work.


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Q: Calculating first and second derivative of negative exponent Given $f(x) = (x+2)^{-1} $ is my logic and result correct for calculating first and second derivatives ? :
First derivative :
$$\frac{df}{dx}=-1(x+2)^{-1-1} =(-x-2)^{-2}$$
Second derivative :
$$\frac{d^2f}{dx^x}=-2(-x-2)^{-2-1} =(2x+2)^{-3}$$

A: a littler mistake we get $$f'(x)=-(x+2)^{-2}$$ and $$f''(x)=2(x+2)^{-3}$$

A: No, unfortunately you aren't right.
Remind that $\frac{d}{dx} x^n = n\cdot x^{n-1}$ and $(u(v))' = u'(v)\cdot v'$.
These rules lead us to
$$\frac{d}{dx} (x+2)^{-1} = -1\cdot (x+2)^{-2} = -\frac{1}{(x+2)^2}$$
and
$$\frac{d^2}{dx^2} (x+2)^{-1} = \frac{d}{dx} \left(-\frac{1}{(x+2)^2}\right) = -2\cdot -(x+2)^{-3} = \frac{2}{(x+2)^3}$$


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Daily: 20th December 2010
20 December, 2010 at 00:28 (GMT)
By Steven Roy
Credit: Lou
Welcome to Monday. RG went off to bed feeling ill so Lou volunteered me as a last minute substitute. I do not have an inventive daily planned like RG's recent fabulous post so you will need to settle for something a bit more basic.
On Sunday night Christine broke out the Factbyte Factbox to cover the BBC Sports Personality of the Year. The replay is available for those who missed it.
The main award was won by 15 times champion jockey AP McCoy with 15 times darts world champions Phil 'The Power' Taylor in second and heptathlete Jessica Ennis third. The European Ryder Cup Team picked up the team of the year with their captain Colin Montgomerie taking the coach of the year. Naturally the award should have gone to Tottenham Hotspur. Tom Daley who won gold medals in diving at the Commonwealth Games and World Championships won the Young Sports Personality of the Year for the third time.
The Overseas Sports Personality of the Year was awarded to Rafa Nadal although I am sure Amy will be pleased to know Roger Federer appeared to say a few words about his rival. The most popular announcement of the night for us was the Helen Rollason Award going to Sir Frank Williams. The Unsung Hero award went to Lance Haggith who coaches disabled children in a range of sports. The final award was a Lifetime Achievement Award to David Beckham. It seems a bit previous to give an award like that to someone who is only 35 years old and still playing.
The real success of the evening though came after SPOTY when for the first time ever in 8 series I managed to pick the winner of the Apprentice. It should be impossible to pick the loser out of two that often but Alan Sugar picks the wrong one every single year. No wonder he has problems with the people he hires. Still he had the advantage for once that the better candidate had the better sob story this time. For someone with a reputation for being a hard-headed businessman he is a sucker for a sob story.
In F1 news Mark Webber demonstrated his Red Bull for the King of Thailand. On track Lucas Di Grassi won the first heat of the Felipe Massa International Kart Challenge at Florianapolis. Massa himself finished second with Antonio Pizzonia in third place. Politics are never far from the surface in F1 and Ferrari is usually at the centre of them. With the current Concorde Agreement due to expire in two years time Luca deMontezemolo has fired the first shot in the negotiation process. He is backing Bernie Ecclestone heavily so either he is looking to get his team a better financial deal or he is planning on stabbing Bernie in the back. In another article Luca is complaining about the cost reduction push in F1 so we could conclude that as that was an FIA initiative he plans to back Bernie against the Federation.
Don't forget to check out the Advent calendars from Sidepodcast and from Alex.
http://sidepodcast.com/advent-calendar/2010
http://gigglesadvent.com/


Led by Rev. Candace Lawrence & organist Bill Young. Renew your commitment to Christ as you prepare for Easter.
Noon – Ecumenical Worship at Liverpool First Presbyterian Church, Tulip Street. Rev. Penny Hart from Liverpool First UMC will participate in this community-wide service.
Everyone is welcome to attend. This is organized by pastors from the Liverpool Area Clergy Group.
7 pm – Tenebrae Service featuring the Chancel Choir Cantata: "It Is Finished", accompanied by an instrumental chamber ensemble.
View Biblical-themed musical dramas produced by Sight & Sound Theatres. Bring a bag lunch and meet in the downstairs gathering area to eat before the movie begins. Showing today, April 14: Ruth.
The Outreach & Missions Committee will take a "Noisy Can Offering" on April 28 to kick off fundraising for the 2020 Red Bird Mission Trip. Half of the collection will support the Red Bird trip and the other half will support local mission activities. Please gather your change to bring on the 28th.
Rose Rheinheimer will lead participants through the ritual of the Stations of the Cross. She will lead scripture along the Via Dolorosa, the painful way of the cross. There will be opportunities to participate in readings and follow Jesus' footsteps in the 14 successive incidents during his progress from the condemnation by Pilate to his crucifixion and burial. Everyone is welcome. Call 315-457-5180 or write to lfumc@liverpoolfirstumc.org to reserve a place so enough chairs are set out.
Pick up these booklets at the Information Table in the main corridor or in the narthex at the back of the sanctuary.
Behold the Beauty of the Lord – A Good Friday Fast – Join Society of St. Andrew staff and volunteers in fasting on Good Friday. This time of prayer and fasting uses our physical hunger as a symbol of our spiritual hungers. It also serves as a reminder of our brothers and sisters who live with real, physical hunger every day.
He is Risen – Ten short reflections from the publishers of Our Daily Bread devotional guides.
A Resurrection Believer – Author Stephen Skelton compares different resurrection accounts in the Bible.
An Easter Disciple – Arthur Benton Sanford's movie, An Easter Disciple, depicts an eyewitness account of the resurrected Jesus Christ – the chronicle of Quintus the Roman Knight. Includes notes by Stephen Skelton.
The Hospitality and Caregiving committees are working together to provide spring gift baskets to our homebound and nursing home residents. Donations are needed: pens, notecards, colored pencils, notebooks and other stationery; small packs of tissues, lotions, combs, razors, toothpaste; and devotionals, activity books such as crosswords, or other small gift books. Items are needed by April 28 to be ready for delivery on May 5. Want to help deliver? See a committee member at the table in Fellowship Hall on April 21 or 28.
The Cicero United Methodist Church Caring Support Group will travel to Ohio's Amish and Swiss communities June 10 – 13. All are invited. Contact Mary Alice Scheel at 315-699-7181 for information. $595 payment due by May 5.
Franklin Graham will preach at the St. Joseph's Health Amphitheater at Lakeview on May 30 as part of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association's Decision America Northeast Tour. If you wish to join members of LFUMC to ride there on the church bus, contact the office at 315-457-5180 or lfumc@liverpoolfirstumc.org to reserve your seat. Visit DecisionNortheast.com for more about the event.
Suggested contribution, $3. For senior citizens age 60 and older (spouses & guests under age 60 welcome for suggested $6). Menu: April 15 – bacon & tomato chicken salad on croissant, strawberry feta spinach salad, diced peaches; April 22 – meatball sub, green beans, pineapple.
Details on flyers in Fellowship Hall or contact Sarah Bieling.
June 5 Lunch at the Euclid Restaurant and dessert and tour at the Schroeppel Mansion (River Edge B&B). Historians from the towns of Clay and Schroeppel will speak on the history of both areas. Cost is $25 per person.
Your own transportation is required (the church bus will transport the most needy if a request is made ahead of time). Arrive at the Euclid Restaurant, Rte 31 Clay at 11:15 am for lunch at 11:30 am. The Town of Clay historian will speak at 12:30 pm. At 1 pm the church bus will shuttle people from the Euclid to the Schroeppel Mansion (1 mile away). The Town of Schroeppel historian will speak at 3 pm. At 3:30 pm the bus will shuttle those back to their cars at the Euclid and bring the ones who rode the bus out back to church. Reservations are being accepted now. Flyers are in Fellowship Hall as well as payment envelopes. Deadline for reservations is Sunday, May 5.


text:
Internships offer a great way to teach and share information with a person ready to start their career. They provide employment training and experiential learning opportunities that often enhance a person's professional qualities and strengthen 'soft skills' such as teamwork, communication, problem-solving, and professionalism. Internships also provide job seekers with the chance to break into the workforce and gain meaningful experience to launch their careers.
In honor of National Internship Awareness Month, this Profile in Passion highlights Marywood University Marketing intern Isabella Pliska.
In a few short weeks, Marywood University's spring semester will come to a close. For Pliska, a sophomore marketing major, the semester serves as a pivotal point on the road to realizing her dream of working in social media marketing. On top of managing a full-time course load and part-time job, Pliska took part in her first internship.
For the past four months, Pliska wracked up one invaluable experience after another as a spring intern in Marywood University's Marketing Department. In addition to strategizing weekly content and campaigns, monitoring Marywood's social media channels, assisting on commercial photo shoots, and creating engaging TikTok and Instagram posts, Pliska cites one thing that rises to the top of those invaluable experiences: relationship building. The relationships she's cultivated during her internship experience, which she treasures, are truly priceless.
"Everyone in the department treated me like family,'' said Pliska. "It was a welcoming environment from day one, which made my experience that much better. I've learned so much from these people. My understanding of marketing and what I'll be doing in the field is much clearer than when I started."
Pliska's passion for social media marketing can't be questioned. However, the same could be said about her other passion—gaming. When she's not busy with school or work, Pliska can usually be found playing video games with her friends or watching live gaming streams on Twitch. In a perfect world, Pliska would like to combine her passions to become a social media manager for a company like Riot Games, a Los Angeles based video game developer, publisher, and esports tournament organizer best known for creating games such as League of Legends and Valorant.
"I've always wanted to go down the esports path," said Pliska. "My dream company to work for is Riot Games, which is the biggest esports organizer in the world. One thing that Marywood has taught me is that it's okay to dream. So, maybe one day."
Students who complete internships increase their post-graduation employment chances by 85 percent, according to a recent study by Monster.com. Completing an internship doesn't just make college grads more likely to be employed following graduation - it also increases the number of job offers they receive. Job applicants with an internship on their resume receive an impressive 16 percent more offers than candidates without them, according to a study by CompareCamp.
LEARN MORE ABOUT MARKETING AT MARYWOOD »


text:
//
//  BBANetworkingConstants.h
//  BBANetworking
//
// Created by Tomek Kuźma (mapedd@mapedd.com), Owen Worley (owen@owenworley.co.uk) & Eric Yuan (mbaeric@gmail.com) on 24/07/2014.

#ifndef BBANetworking_BBANetworkingConstants_h
#define BBANetworking_BBANetworkingConstants_h

/** Supported HTTP methods */
typedef NS_ENUM(NSUInteger, BBAHTTPMethod) {
    BBAHTTPMethodGET = 0,
    BBAHTTPMethodPOST = 1,
    BBAHTTPMethodDELETE = 2,
    BBAHTTPMethodPUT = 3,
};

/** Supported content types */
typedef NS_ENUM(NSUInteger, BBAContentType) {
    BBAContentTypeUnknown = -1,
    BBAContentTypeURLEncodedForm = 0,
    BBAContentTypeJSON = 1,
    /**
     *  Used in the key service which expects unecoded value but 'encoded' header
     */
    BBAContentTypeURLUnencodedForm = 2,
};

#endif

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub