text:
require File.expand_path('../test_helper', __FILE__)

class TestController
  def params
    @params ||= {}
  end
end

module PeijiSanHelperTestHelper
  def self.included(klass)
    klass.class_eval do
      include ActionView::Helpers

      attr_reader :controller
      attr_reader :collection

      before do
        @controller = TestController.new

        @collection = stub('Artists paginated collection')
        collection.stubs(:current_page?).with(1).returns(false)
        collection.stubs(:current_page?).with(2).returns(false)
        collection.stubs(:page_count).returns(125)
      end

      def url_for(options)
        return options if options.kind_of?(String)

        options = options.with_indifferent_access

        url = "/collections"
        url += "?page=#{options[:page]}" if options[:page]
        url += "?pagina=#{options[:pagina]}" if options[:pagina]
        url += "&starts_with=#{options[:starts_with]}" if options[:starts_with]
        url += "##{options[:anchor]}" if options[:anchor]
        url
      end
    end
  end
end

describe "PeijiSan::ViewHelper::link_to_page" do
  include PeijiSanHelperTestHelper
  include PeijiSan::ViewHelper

  it "should return a link for a given page number" do
    link_to_page(2, collection).must_equal '2'
  end

  it "should return a link for a given page number with the specified page parameter" do
    link_to_page(2, collection, :page_parameter => 'pagina').must_equal '2'
  end

  it "should return a link for a given page number with the specified anchor" do
    link_to_page(2, collection, :anchor => 'dude_so_many_pages').must_equal '2'
  end

  it "should return a link for a given page number and include the original params" do
    controller.params[:starts_with] = 'h'
    link_to_page(2, collection).must_equal '2'
  end

  it "should return a link which does not include the page GET variable if it's page number 1" do
    controller.params[:page] = 34
    link_to_page(1, collection).wont_match /page=\d+/
  end

  it "should return a link with the class current if it's for the currently selected page" do
    collection.stubs(:current_page?).with(2).returns(true)
    link_to_page(2, collection).must_equal '2'
  end

  it "should return a link with the class current if it's for the currently selected page" do
    collection.stubs(:current_page?).with(2).returns(true)
    link_to_page(2, collection, :current_class => 'looking_at').must_equal '2'
  end
end

describe "PeijiSan::ViewHelper::pages_to_link_to" do
  include PeijiSanHelperTestHelper
  include PeijiSan::ViewHelper

  it "should return a list of page numbers that should be included in the pagination list" do
    collection.stubs(:current_page).returns(83)
    pages_to_link_to(collection).must_equal [1, '…', 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, '…', 125]
  end

  it "should return a list of page links with an ellips between page 1 and the next if the current page is at the end of the list" do
    collection.stubs(:current_page).returns(119)
    pages_to_link_to(collection).must_equal [1, '…', 116, 117, 118, 119, 120, 121, 122, '…', 125]

    120.upto(124) do |page|
      collection.stubs(:current_page).returns(page)
      pages_to_link_to(collection).must_equal [1, '…', 117, 118, 119, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125]
    end
  end

  it "should return a list of page links with an ellips between the last page and the previous one if the current page is at the beginning of the list" do
    1.upto(6) do |page|
      collection.stubs(:current_page).returns(page)
      pages_to_link_to(collection).must_equal [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, '…', 125]
    end

    collection.stubs(:current_page).returns(7)
    pages_to_link_to(collection).must_equal [1, '…', 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, '…', 125]
  end

  it "should not show an ellips but all pages if there are only 10 pages, this is the threshold for when an ellips starts to be necessary" do
    collection.stubs(:page_count).returns(10)
    collection.stubs(:current_page).returns(5)
    pages_to_link_to(collection).must_equal((1..10).to_a)
  end

  it "should not return more page links if there aren't that many pages" do
    1.upto(9) do |page|
      collection.stubs(:page_count).returns(page)
      collection.stubs(:current_page).returns(page)
      pages_to_link_to(collection).must_equal((1..page).to_a)
    end
  end

  it "should return a list of page numbers that should be included in the pagination list with the specified number of :max_visible" do
    collection.stubs(:current_page).returns(83)
    pages_to_link_to(collection, :max_visible => 5).must_equal [1, '…', 83, '…', 125]
    pages_to_link_to(collection, :max_visible => 15).must_equal [1, '…', 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, '…', 125]

    collection.stubs(:current_page).returns(3)
    pages_to_link_to(collection, :max_visible => 5).must_equal [1, 2, 3, '…', 125]
    pages_to_link_to(collection, :max_visible => 15).must_equal( (1..13).to_a + ['…', 125] )
  end

  it "should return a list of page numbers with the specified separator instead of the default ellips" do
    collection.stubs(:current_page).returns(83)
    pages_to_link_to(collection, :separator => '...').must_equal [1, '...', 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, '...', 125]
  end
end

module ApplicationHelperWithDefaults
  include PeijiSan::ViewHelper

  def peiji_san_options
    { :page_parameter => 'pagina', :anchor => 'dude_so_many_pages', :max_visible => 5, :separator => '...' }
  end
end

describe "ApplicationHelper, when overriding defaults" do
  include PeijiSanHelperTestHelper
  include ApplicationHelperWithDefaults

  it "should return a link for a given page number with the specified page parameter" do
    link_to_page(2, collection).must_equal '2'
  end

  it "should return a link for a given page number with the specified anchor" do
    link_to_page(2, collection).must_equal '2'
  end

  it "should return a link with the class current if it's for the currently selected page" do
    collection.stubs(:current_page?).with(2).returns(true)
    link_to_page(2, collection, :current_class => 'looking_at').must_equal '2'
  end

  it "should return a list of page numbers that should be included in the pagination list with the specified number of :max_visible" do
    collection.stubs(:current_page).returns(3)
    pages_to_link_to(collection).must_equal [1, 2, 3, '...', 125]
  end

  it "should return a list of page numbers with the specified separator instead of the default ellips" do
    collection.stubs(:current_page).returns(83)
    pages_to_link_to(collection).must_equal [1, '...', 83, '...', 125]
  end
end


Apple Bacon Maple Glazed Doughnuts... Enough Said!
I read about these doughnuts on a friends blog, Naptime Diaries. I have been stewing over this recipe for a couple of months until I woke up Sunday morning and decided to go for it! I have to warn you that it took me 2 hours from start to finish, but the result was well worth the wait. If I ever attempted this high calorie treat again, I would add more bacon. I know it sound crazy and way too fattening. This is definitely not a doughnut for those watching their weight. Try it out. I promise the taste of the sweet apples and the even sweeter maple glaze match perfectly with the salty bacon to create a little piece of heaven. Enjoy!


text:
Home » Online » Blogs » Paw Prints: Wri... » Ode to Machine...
Ode to Machine Architecture
Paw Prints: Writings of the maddog
Jun 02, 2013 GMT
Jon maddog Hall
I have been writing lately about the importance of learning the underlying tenants of computing if you are going to be a great programmer, and in particular some machine language and computer architecture.
It typically does not make a difference which architecture you learn, or which machine language, as long as the architecture and machine language can illustrate the basic concepts of computing to a level that is useful in future studies of operating systems design and compiler theory, helping you to under stand issues like cache management, interrupt handling and I/O.
This blog entry, however, is not going to talk about those issues. Instead it will talk about a few instances in my life where knowing assembly language helped me immensely in solving problems.
It was 1973, and I had just graduated from Drexel University and had taken a job with Aetna Life and Casualty, an insurance company in Hartford, Connecticut. Like a lot of other students, I had studied a lot of the different high-level languages of that day, such as COBOL, FORTRAN, APL, and taken some of the rudimentary "computer science" (more like "computer black magic") courses offered at that time. In addition to these courses, I had taught myself my first programming language (FORTRAN) and my second programming language (PDP-8 Assembler) by reading books and practicing, no courses or professors involved.
My first job at Aetna was in the casualty division, working on an online claim-payment system called "Safari". It was one of the first real-time transaction processing systems in the world, and I was hired to do assembly-language programming for reports. My boss, John Silliman, wanted us to write in assembly language even though the reports could have been written faster and with less mistakes in a high level language because he was grooming system programmers for other positions inside Aetna.
In those days most of the Insurance companies in Hartford, Connecticut used IBM mainframes, with MVS as an operating system, and COBOL as their main applications language. The average programmer would stay for 1.5 years with one company, then "jump ship" to another, work for them for 1.5 years, and go to a third...increasing their salary each time. On a rainy day you could see people coming into the building carrying a Traveler's umbrella, wrapped in a Nationwide blanket, and probably carrying a "piece of the rock" (Prudential) in their briefcase.
John Silliman's strategy worked, since most of the people in John's group stayed with Aetna for a much longer time than the average "applications programmer", sometimes moving from division to division as needs for systems programmers were determined.
I did not know IBM assembler when I arrived at Aetna. I had purchased a book called "Basic Assembly Language for the IBM 360 Computer" (or something like that) and had started to read it. When I arrived at Aetna, John gave me a week or two to finish learning BAL (as it was called), then he gave me my first assignment.
A program that another programmer had written was demonstrating some odd characteristics. Not only did his program run slow, but when it started to run every other program on the system ran a LOT slower, and every other program on every computer system even remotely connected with that mainframe ran slower.
The programer who had written this was a more senior person, and my immediate manager cautioned me not to let him know that a "wet-behind-the-ears college student" was looking at his program. I was not allowed to ask him any questions, or let him know I was looking at "his" program. This was the direct opposite of "ego-less programming"
As I started to look at the program, I realized it was written in five different languages. Part was FORTRAN, part was COBOL, part was APL, part was ALGOL and part was assembler language. I think part may even have been SNOBOL with some APL thrown in, but those languages were too painful to think about, so my mind has rejected that possibility over the years.
We had some fairly amazing tools even in those early years. Aetna was the largest commercial user of IBM equipment in the free word, and even in 1973 we had massive investments in both hardware and software. We had 500,000 nine-track tapes in our tape library on site, with another 100,000 tapes in a salt mine in Idaho. We automatically ordered two of everything that IBM announced, tape drive to mainframe. No salesperson had to call us......two units just showed up on our shipping docks.
One investment was in a piece of software that could profile a binary and find out where the computer was spending its time. From this piece of code I found that 99.999 percent of the time was being used by one machine language instruction....in one location in memory.
Curious as to what this instruction did, I pulled out the manual "The IBM 360 Principles of Operation" (POA) which told what every instruction in the system did, how much space it took up in memory, how long it took to execute and many other things. In fact the POA told everything about the hardware that a programmer would want to know.
I found out that the instruction was "Read The Clock". Finding it odd that such a simple instruction would have such a big impact, I continued to read, and found out that this particular "Read the Clock" instruction was also used for synchronizing multiprocessor applications, and for setting up semaphores inside of the operating system. Before the program could "read the clock", the entire system had to come to a grinding halt. All the I/O had to be effectively complete, all the other CPUs had to be halted, all the cache had to be flushed, on every system that was in any way linked to the system where the instruction was being executed. Then you could "read the clock", and continue with your program. "Read The Clock" was an "Atomic Operation", one that could not be interrupted, and therefore would return one unique value. After that caches would have to re-fill, tape drives had to start up again, and buffers fill in core (yes, core memory). You might guess this was an "expensive" instruction, and could only be executed by a program running in a privileged mode.
My friend's program was running in that privileged mode. Those were heady times.....
I found out that the programmer was "reading the clock" for every one of the hundreds of thousands of records he was reading off the magnetic input tapes (the tapes themselves were a big bottleneck, but we will get to that later).
I forget how I managed to casually engage the programmer in conversation about his program. Perhaps it was at the lunch table, with a feigned interest in his career, or his life, but eventually I found out that he was reading this clock tens of thousands of times a day just to find out the date of execution of the program...the date it was running. I casually suggested that perhaps he could move that instruction outside the tape reading loop, do it one time at the beginning of the program and store the result in a variable. "Oh yeah, that is a good idea", he said.
The next time the program ran, it was finished so fast the operators thought it had crashed without processing anything. No other programs on any of the systems showed any signs of slowing down.
I also asked this older programmer why he wrote the program in so many different languages. It turns out he was studying for his Master's Degree at night, and that month he had a course in "comparative languages", so as they studied each language over the course of 11 weeks, he used that language in that part of the report. I congratulated him for creating such a good "job security" program, because as far as I knew there were only two programmers in Aetna's staff of 400 programmers that knew all five languages, and both of them were sitting at that lunch table.
I later reported to my boss what I had found, and that programmer was not long on Aetna's payroll.
To be fair, the "knowledge" of machine/assembly language worked against this programmer. If he had coded his program in a high-level language I am fairly sure the compiler would not have chosen that instruction to find out the "date of execution". There would have been a library routine or intrinsic that would have provided the same information without having such a great impact. On the other hand, without my knowledge of machine language I probably would not have found the answer.
Another time I had a COBOL applications programmer come to me. They had looked their program over about a thousand times and could not find what was wrong. I looked at his COBOL code, and I could not see what was wrong either.
"It must be the compiler", I said. "The COMPILER," the applications programmer exclaimed, "how could that be?" I gently explained that the compiler is a program, just like his programs, written by the same type of people who go out on a given night, drink a lot of beer, and sometimes are not in the best shape the next day. Just like his programs, sometimes the compiler creates an error.
So we turned on the compiler flag that generated the assembly language code for the COBOL program, and sure enough, we could see the incorrect code being generated. I think the COBOL programmer drank a little more beer than normal that night, as one of his unshakable truths had just been shaken.
The final story to this blog post came from a good friend of mine who will remain nameless in case he is still alive. He was a very good assembly language programmer, and he had been asked to develop a routine that would access data in Aetna's database and allow the COBOL programmers to update it quickly. To do this he used a VERY large array with an index into it.
Where he made his mistake was specifying the index of the array as a COBOL "Picture 9" field.
In IBM COBOL an index is normally a binary number, and you would specify it and its size for storage by now many "9"s in the field definition. Unfortunately if that is where you stop, the number is stored as EBCDIC, a code that is somewhat akin to ASCII, and is used to map characters to bit strings. IBM assembler had four instructions dedicated to EBCDIC to binary conversion: EBCDIC to packed decimal, then packed decimal to binary and the reverse. Unfortunately those four instructions were some of the slowest in the entire architecture.
If my friend had defined his number as "Picture 999 COMP", the number would have been passed and stored as a binary number. But defining it as "Picture 999" it was always passed and stored as an EBCDIC number. Therefore every time it had to be used as an index it had to have two of the slowest machine instructions act on it, then it would be used, incremented, and converted back again for storage (two more of some of the slowest instructions). This happened literally TENS OF MILLIONS of times every day.
When I realized that the programmer had done, I went over to his desk and discussed it with him. He had realized his mistake, but it was too late since the API for the routine had been published, and the COBOL programmers were happily coding their subroutine calls.
In the end it was not as bad as "read the clock", but not far from it, and was definitely not really what the company wanted. My lasting memory of this person (an otherwise great programmer and great human being) was with his head between his hands looking down at his listing....
There are other examples of why it is good to learn machine/assembly language. Coding in a high-level language, then inspecting the output of the compiler for what instructions were generated will give you an idea of the efficiency of your algorithms and your coding style.
Using your knowledge of assembler and machine architecture to explain the command line options on the gcc (and other) optimizing compilers.
In the near future I will write some examples of how knowledge of machine architecture made some programs run 10,000 (or more) times faster, and cut storage considerably.
In the meantime I am sure that there will be many readers that will contribute their own stories of how machine architecture and assembly language knowledge helped them solve problems in the past in the comment section. I will probably enjoy reading them.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
-the-
A history of East-the-Water (part 4)
Building colonies
The year 1606 saw the founding of the Virginia Company to promote the production of tobacco in the colony, in 1607 Jamestown was founded, and by 1608 the colony had its first true leader and corporate evangelist, in the person of John Smith. Yet the growth of the Virginia colony hampered by a lack of manpower, so its Governor asked King James I to send over all those in prison and sentenced to die, that they might be put to work. The Privy Council, though slow to act, eventually established forced labour in the colonies as punishment for idleness or misdemeanours. Whilst not quite what had been asked for, this still established the principle of penal transportation, a system that would contribute significantly to the growth of Virginia, and in turn to the wealth of their trading partners in Bideford.
Meanwhile, further north, John Guy, a Bristol man, had tried to establish a colony in Newfoundland in 1610, his aim being to secure Cabot's claim to the territory. As a result, by 1620, West-country fishermen controlled the island's eastern coast.
The Barton changes hands
In 1633 Sir Beville Grenville expanded the Granville's holdings by acquiring the 'Barton Grange or farme of Bydeford' and its lands, from one Anthonie Hill. The Barton Grange is likely to be the property also known on maps as Grange Farm and situated in East-the-Water, near modern Barton Tors. This transaction included fishing rights on the Torridge and in the 'Bridge Poole at Bydeford,' together with provisions for the parties and their heirs to share the profits from recently discovered coal that Hill had begun to work from that land. The presence of coal on the property suggests that it included the grange lands, as later defined, and therefore comprised, an area that included much of modern East-the-Water.
With the outbreak of civil war in 1642, the royalist Granvilles found themselves at odds with the parliamentarian town's-folk of Bideford. Sir Richard Grenville (grandson of the last mentioned Sir Richard) became a prominent royalist leader and rallied the Cornish behind the crown. Meanwhile, the Bideford-based Sir Bevill Grenville led royalist forces against his former neighbours in various skirmishes. He also formulated an unsuccessful plot against them, following the failure of which he withdrew to Stowe. Understandably, for Bideford's relationship with the Granville family must have been strained.
The Parliamentarians under Sargeant-Major-General Chudleigh secured Bideford by building two forts, West-of-the-Water and East-of-the-Water (a further fort was built to protect Northam). The East-of-the-Water fort was the more significant one and was equipped with eight cannons. It served as Chudleigh's command centre and now bears his name as Chudleigh Fort.
On 2 Sep 1643, after a desperate struggle that, it was said, left the victor's swords "blunt with slaughter," Bideford and Barnstaple both surrendered to Royalist forces.
1651 saw the end of the war, but not before there had been a change in the Granville's fortunes.
On 5 Jul 1643 the war claimed the life of Sir Bevill at the Battle of Lansdown, a considerable monument marking the field near Bath where he fell. After Sir Beville's death, his Royalist mantle was seized by his son John. A transaction from 1650 suggests the Granvilles mortgaged properties, summarised as the 'Burrough Manor Barton, and demesnes of Bydeford,' to help finance the Royalist cause. Sir Richard, despite his efforts on the Royalist behalf, had fallen from favour within their ranks and ended his days in France.
In 1660, Sir John Granville played a significant role in the restoration of the Monarchy (his mother's half-sister being the mother of the prominent parliamentarian General George Monk). He then took the family's power to a second zenith under Charles II, earning the title Earl of Bath, before another fall from grace left the family embroiled in legal wrangles and debt.
Plague town
Having escaped three earlier brushes with death, Bideford merchant John Strange ( or Strang) had a reputation as a survivor. John rose to the position of town Mayor and his family later traded out of East-the-Water. When his portrait was painted in c. 1642, it portrayed all three incidents in its background. In the process it captured a 17th C. view of the Long Bridge and the town beyond, though it is far from certain which bank is shown (see Annex 2).
Large quantities of wool from Spain were imported through the port during the reign of Charles I (1625-49), but 1646 marked the start of the the largest Spanish plague of the 17th C. The bubonic plague broke out in the city of Seville, and, with quarantine non-existent or ineffective, this pestilence then spread northward, carried by coastal shipping. In the same year, bubonic plague, said to have arrived with a consignment of wool from Spain, also hit Bideford. At least 299 townsfolk died, but the town was perhaps better able to contain the outbreak than Seville, not least because of the actions of John Strange. When the elected mayor fled, John, at the cost of his own life, stayed to organise the quarantining of the town and ensure an administration for its beleaguered folk.
Eastland properties
At various times the Granvilles owned a significant portfolio of property to the east of the Torridge, not all of which is readily traced forward to the present.
It has already been noted that in 1650 they held the the manor of Bideford and the Barton. At some point they had also acquired the Grange, a property marked on early maps. In 1701 they had Joel Gascoyne draw up 'A Mapp of the Tenement of Grange upon the East land in the Mannor and Parish of Bideford,' from which its extent is clear, as is the presence of a collection of smaller buildings in the Grange Road area, but no larger dwelling.
In 1664 the Earl of Bath leased a property called Porte to Nicholas Morice for 99 years. It may be inferred from clauses in the lease that Porte had lands on which coal was mined, open land (e.g. moorland) on which to hunt game-birds with hawks, woodlands, and areas in which to fish. Researchers have noted that this fits quite well with the part of the grange lands held by the Granville's in 1701. However, to the east of these and close to the woods, streams and coal mining areas of Cleave Wood, lie Port Cottages (aka Port Farm, or Portabello on OS maps), which, according to Kelly's 1920 directory, were historically part of East-the-Water. Donn's map of 1765 marks a property in this vicinity as simply Port. From the church rates in 1672 the Grange and Porte appear to be different properties, but both substantial. Henry Berry paid six pence for Porte, only slightly less than the eight pence Samuel Johns paid for the 'Granghouse & grounds.'
In 1672 the Earl of Bath also paid Church rates on a property known as Great Putshole in Eastland and three houses in East the Water on the east side. Eastland seems to have been a general term for the region to the east of the river fringing strip, but the location of Great Putshole is still uncertain.
Buttering the American expansion
As the colonies expanded, Bideford's potteries found a ready market for their pots. In the 17th C. this pottery was produced rapidly and in large volumes, so as to keep the cost down. In particularly great demand were vessels used to ship butter, it having been salted to preserve it.
Most of the early potteries were west of the water, on the southern side of Potter's Pill, but in 1672 two of Bideford's seven master potters were based in East-the-Water. By 1681, the Bideford potteries peak year, there were 337,000 parcels of pottery shipped from the town, with perhaps another 60,000 or so used locally.
One of East-the-Water's potteries, flanked by buildings and running to the shore, stood on Barnstaple Street, near the later site of the Ship-on-Launch Inn, and was probably operated by the potter Hugh Yeo (1611-). In 1671 he employed his two sons and another hand. At a later date he was presented at quarter sessions for having 'inmates,' lodgers from outside the town who could become chargeable to the parish. These were possibly jobbing potters.
In 1672 a 1½d rate was paid on a property described as "Wilbraham's house, Courtilage and potters' kill," which lay at the opposite end of East-the-Water to Yeo's establishment. It is not clear who operated this.
Cod and 'backy
Sir John Berry's census of 1675 lists 19 Bideford boats fishing for Cod off Newfoundland. With them were 34 boats from other West Country ports, but only one from London and one from Topsham. In 1678 there were some 25 Bideford vessels, but by 1699 a change was becoming apparent, Although Bideford had a larger fleet than in earlier years and now had so much of the Newfoundland trade that only two English ports surpassed it, those ports were London and Topsham. Bideford's part in the trade was at its zenith.
The tobacco trade was also flourishing, and, at times during the 17th C, Bideford's tobacco imports were only topped by those of London. In 1676 Bideford Merchant landed 135,000 lbs (61,200 Kg) of tobacco for just three merchants, Abraham Heiman, Anthony Hopkins and John Davie. In the period 1722-31 nearly four million kilos of tobacco were landed, with a substantial part of this then being re-exported, chiefly to Amsterdam's warehouses. With all this trade came wealth and, by 1688, the tobacco merchant John Davie had acquired sufficient to build himself a mansion. This was Colonial House, in East-the-Water, parts of which may survive in the fabric of the Royal Hotel. As hogsheads (i.e. barrels) of tobacco arrived, most were stored in the warehouses known as Colonial Buildings (presumably near Colonial House, if not part of Colonial House itself). Eight empty tobacco hogsheads found a different purpose, for in 1673 Bideford began to use them for public rubbish collection, two of them being sited in 'East the bridge.'
John Davie had accompanied Grenville to Virginia and had acquired land there, upon such small beginnings he had then built. After his death, in 1710, his monument at Buckland Brewer claimed "By his example thus he benifited his fellow Bidefordians, to the extent that it almost seemed commerce of that place seemed both to have flourished and to have fallen with him." Others involved in the tobacco trade were John Buck and John Strange.
It is said that such bounty now flowed through the Taw and Torridge ports that there were rich pickings to be had by Spanish privateers, so much so that they named the offing of the estuaries "The Golden Bay." Though an account from 1900 suggests that the name was coined by Bideford privateers, because they profited by picking up as prizes the numerous pirate vessels, often from Algiers or Tunis, that swarmed in the Channel.
Early plans
In 1700 one Joel Gascoyne was busy systematically mapping all the Granville's West-country properties for the Earl of Bath (John Granville, 1628-1701). The project was eventually abandoned, but not before it produced a plan of Bideford Grange. The grange lands extended east-north-eastward from Grange Road, to about the current location of Manteo Road. At the Grange Road end are shown a series of small buildings and yards, whilst at the eastern end are arable fields and moorland.
By the late seventeenth century, the volume of trade through Bideford made an extension to the Established (Bridgeland Street) Quay desirable. Whilst a quay already existed in 1574, when the land was gifted to the Borough, further construction had taken place in 1663, by 1690 this was about to be extend southward toward the bridge and northward toward Potter's Pill. In December of 1692 the Feoffees of the Long Bridge appointed several of their number "to contract for the building of a Key for Ships to lay at the East end of the New Street". They appointed the builder Nathaniel Gascoyne to undertake the work and it is thanks to these endeavours that we have an early plan of the area downstream of the bridge. Dating from c 1717, this plan provides further evidence that much of Bideford's early maritime activity was associated with the eastern river-bank. It shows considerable detail and, with the exception of the Long Bridge, is mostly drawn to scale. To the east of the Torridge is a ribbon of at least fifty houses, lying along Torrington Street and Barnstaple Street, but the eye is immediately drawn to one that is depicted as much larger than the rest, much as a manor house might be in maps of that time. It stood in roughly the location now occupied by the Royal Hotel and is interpreted as John Davie's Colonial House. Across the road from it are a range of non-standard buildings and a waterfront area marked as "The Key." This is the only area in which such a diversity of building styles is shown and it may reflect a predominance of manufacturing or storage facilities in this area. A further two quays are marked, both ascribed to named individuals (one to Mr Strange and one to Mr Doubty). Three shipyards are shown, of which two are in East-the-Water, the largest being just north of "The Key." On the eastern shore, and immediately south of the bridge, is an ecclesiastical-looking property with an arched doorway, which is presumably the St Anne's bridge chapel.
Sudden death and the Granville lands
After the 1st Earl of Bath, succeeding generations of Granvilles seem to have had a habit of dying just as they came to the point of power and influence, for John's eldest son, and heir, Charles Granville (-1701) shot himself shortly after his father died, an incident alleged by some to have been a suicide (precipitated by the thought of inheriting the family debts). His only son William Granville (-1711) then died of smallpox, unmarried, and just after being appointed Lord Lieutenant of Cornwall. Though this was not before his cousin Bernard Grenville could write advising him against making the New Hall (i.e. New Place, Bideford) his residence. From the letter it may be inferred that William's grandfather had wanted to demolish New Place had it ever come into his possession. So, as John inherited the family's Bideford properties, and New Place had presumably now passed down to William, was it spared because it had been leased out?
With the death of William, the failure of the male line saw a portfolio of Granville owned East-the-Water properties come to the Countess Granville, Grace Carteret, a daughter of the 1st Earl of Bath.
Trade and transportation
Sailing an empty ship was unprofitable, so most merchants favoured routes that allowed both outward and return cargos. For example John Davie liked to export earthenware and import tobacco in a single round trip. Newfoundland fishermen had less room for outward commercial cargos as they needed to carry provisions and salt to tide their men over a fishing season, but Bideford earthenware still found its way to Newfoundland in substantial quantities.
The outward cargo to the plantations of Virginia and Maryland was often a human one. The legal basis for the transport of convicts had been established in 1615 and Bideford merchants were clearly making handsome profits from it, for in 1700 John Smith of Bideford had petitioned the king for £5,000 owed to him for assisting his majesty by using his vessels for transportation and engaging others to do likewise. Such convict ships could return with a cargo of tobacco and Bideford tobacco merchant John Buck, a plantation owner himself, was involved in the transport of convicts, for almost twenty years.
The 1718 Transportation Act made transportation for a set period (usually seven years, fourteen years, or life) a formal sentencing alternative, allowing far more prisoners to be transported. Crimes that once carried the death penalty could now be pardoned on condition that the convict accepted transportation. Vagrants, who were problematic because they fell outside the system of parish support, could also be transported. Two or three times a year the prisons of Britain were emptied to provide the plantations with workers. Between 1716 and 1776, at least 400 ships, operating out of London, Bristol, Liverpool, and Bideford, carried 50,000 convicts to the American colonies. These people came to be known as "His Majesty's Seven-Year Passengers."
Bideford ships also provided passage for many indentured servants. Indentured servitude was a way for the poor to buy into the promise of the colonies. In return for their passage they contracted to give a set period of service once they arrived, the ship owner could then sell their service to a plantation owner. After the set term was fulfilled, then they would be free to build a new life for themselves in the colony.
For some merchants based in western ports, an outward profit was made by carrying African slaves, with a return profit from the sugar they produced. It seems that Bideford's ships eschewed this business model, the few that traded with the Caribbean appear more likely to have done so via the New England or Newfoundland route than via Africa, but that did not stop some Bideford merchants investing in the trade through Bristol.
Salt-cod that was too poor for European tastes found a ready market on the plantations, where it replaced salt-beef (shipped in from Europe) as a staple food for the workforce. This 'West Indies' grade fish must have been supplied by someone, and Bideford's salt-cod merchants may have been happy to oblige.
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Home News Tyler, Waters and Smith on Baileys Women's Prize longlist
Tyler, Waters and Smith on Baileys Women's Prize longlist
Published March 10, 2015 by Sarah Shaffi
Anne Tyler, Sarah Waters, Ali Smith, and five debut novelists including Emma Healey and Sara Taylor are on the longlist for this year's Baileys Women's...
Anne Tyler, Sarah Waters, Ali Smith, and five debut novelists including Emma Healey and Sara Taylor are on the longlist for this year's Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction.
Meanwhile chair of judges Shami Chakrabarti has told The Bookseller: "Until you can honestly see that women are getting the placing they deserve on other lists, it is not time to give up on the Women's Prize."
Independent publisher Legend Press has two books on the 20-strong list, with half the titles coming from Penguin Random House.
London-based Legend's titles are After Before by Jemma Wayne, a story of three women who reach crisis point during a British winter, and The Life of a Banana by PP Wong, about a girl born and raised in London trying to find her own identity, whose life takes a harsh turn when her mother dies.
The other debut novels on the list are Emma Healey's Elizabeth is Missing (Viking), which won the 2014 Costa First Novel Award, and is about a pensioner who is losing her memory while trying to find her missing friend; Laline Paull's The Bees (Fourth Estate), about a bee who works her way into the inner circle of the Queen Bee; and Sara Taylor's The Shore (William Heinemann), about a collection of small islands and the stories of two families there.
In contrast to the first novels, Anne Tyler is longlisted for her 20th novel A Spool of Blue Thread (Chatto & Windus), the story of three generations of the Whitshank family. Other well-established names include Pakistani/British writer Kamila Shamsie for A God in Every Stone (Bloomsbury), about an English woman and a Pathan who meet on a train in Peshawar, and whose connection is revealed 15 years later; and Sarah Waters, longlisted for The Paying Guests (Virago), set in London in 1922 and following a mother and daughter who take in a couple as lodgers.
Virago has a second book on the longlist, Rachel Seiffert's The Walk Home, about a boy who returns to Glasgow after running away from his family.
Rachel Cusk's Outline (Faber and Faber) is about a female writer who goes to Athens to teach a writing course, and who is told the life stories of the people she meets along the journey. The book is also on the shortlist for this year's Folio Prize.
Ali Smith's How to be Both (Hamish Hamilton), the tale of a renaissance artist in the 1460s and a child of a child of the 1960s, is longlisted. It has already won the Goldsmiths Prize, and Costa Novel Award, and been shortlisted for the Folio Prize and the Man Booker Prize.
Two novels envisage dystopian or post-apocalyptic futures. The Country of Ice Cream Star by British/American writer Sandra Newman (Chatto & Windus) tells the story of a 15-year-old Ice Cream Star, who sets out to find a cure for the posies, a disease which kills people once they reach 20. Emily St John Mandel's Station Eleven (Picador), is about a travelling symphony which performs concerts and Shakespeare to the communities which sprang up in North America after flu wiped out 99% of the population.
Chinese/British writer Xiaolu Guo is longlisted for I Am China (Chatto & Windus), which follows a translator as she tries to reunite a Chinese man held in a detention centre in Dover with his girlfriend in Beijing. Formerly independent publisher Quercus, now owned by Hodder & Stoughton, has Heather O'Neill's The Girl Who Was Saturday Night on the longlist, about a girl whose life is a reality television programme. Meanwhile Lissa Evans makes the list for Crooked Heart (Doubleday), the story of a young boy evacuated from London to escape the Blitz, who finds himself in danger after helping the woman he has been sent to live with start to make money.
Former Desmond Elliot Prize-winner Grace McCleen is longlisted for The Offering (Sceptre), about a woman who had a mental breakdown on her 14th birthday, and is still unable to recall the events of that night.
Patricia Ferguson is longlisted for Aren't We Sisters? (Penguin Books), about a killer in Silkhampton and three women in danger, while Samantha Harvey makes the longlist for Dear Thief (Jonathan Cape), about a woman who writes letters to an estranged friend.
The final book on the longlist is Marie Phillips' The Table of Less Valued Knights (Jonathan Cape), a comedy focusing on Sir Humphrey du Val, a knight with one leg shorter than the other, and Queen Martha of Puddock, a woman on the run from an arranged marriage.
The make-up of the longlist is 13 British authors, two Americans, two Canadians, one Pakistani/British writer, one Chinese/British, and one British/American.
Noticeable absences from the longlist include Jessie Burton's The Miniaturist (Picador), which is the bestselling paperback fiction title of 2015 so far, and Marilynne Robinson's Lila (Virago), the latest in her connected Gilead books. Robinson won the prize in 2009, when it was sponsored by Orange, for her Gilead novel Home.
Chair of judges Shami Chakrabarti told The Bookseller it was "brutal" to have to cull the submitted books down to 20, and that there were roughly 30 novels that the judges spent hours deliberating over.
She also said that while the range of books on the shortlist showed that writing by women is "vibrant", there was still a need for the prize."Until you can honestly see that women are getting the placing they deserve on other lists, it is not time to give up on the Women's Prize," she said. "Until I see something remotely like gender justice I want to see women's stories promoted. This isn't just about literature, it's about women's experience. Sometimes stories can be more powerful than journalism or politics. This isn't the time to end the particular spotlight and celebration that is the Women's Prize."
Chakrabarti added that there were "some little groups of themes" in the longlist. "[There is] a contingent of dystopia," she said. "There are the family dramas, mother/daughter relationships being explored, the experience of ageing, which you would expect with the population as it is. It was nicely varied but there were often little groups.This is a shrinking, interconnected planet and Britain is a healthy, diverse society, and that is reflected in the books we read."
The judging panel also includes Laura Bates, writer and founder of The Everyday Sexism Project; columnist and broadcaster Grace Dent; novelist, poet and winner of the inaugural Women's Prize for Fiction Helen Dunmore; and Channel 4 News' presenter Cathy Newman.
Chakrabarti said: "My judges are pretty amazing women. They come from very different experiences. We have got a good age range, we have got different walks of life and I think different reading tastes, and I think that's helped. I think we have got an atmosphere where were feel every opinion counts."
Syl Saller, chief marketing officer of Baileys' parent company Diageo, said: "The inspiring female talent on this year's longlist is exactly why Baileys, a brand that proudly celebrates women, is so honoured to be working with the prize.
"Now in our second year of partnership, we are once again thrilled by the range of excellent books that are featured on the list. This year brings even greater opportunity to share and celebrate the very best in fiction written by women to an even wider audience."
The Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction is awarded for the best-full length novel of the year written by a woman, and published for this year's award in the UK between 1st April 2014 and 31st March 2015. Any woman writing in English is eligible.
The winner of the prize, which is in the second year of its sponsorship by Baileys, will be announced at a ceremony at the Royal Festival Hall in London on 3rd June.
Last year's winner was Eimear McBride for A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing (Galley Beggar Press/Faber & Faber).
Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction
Emma Healey
Experience tells on Baileys Women's Prize shortlist
Atkinson and Yanagihara make Baileys Women's Prize longlist
Ali Smith wins Baileys Women's Prize
Atwood, McBride and Perry longlisted for Baileys Women's Prize
Mozley, Honeyman and Hermes Gowar make Women's Prize longlist


Venterra is a Top Performer, AGAIN!
Each Quarter Venterra participates in the Ellis Shopping Report Multifamily Benchmark and I am excited to announce that Venterra has again ranked as a Top Performer in the Platinum Category out of 33 participating companies in Quarter 1! An accomplishment only 4 others were able to reach alongside us. This is due to our constant focus on the importance of benchmark questions, the creativity behind remembering each of them and the hard work and dedication each region put towards these Benchmark results.
Congratulations to the 1st Quarter 2014 Platinum Level Achievers!


There are certain cliches that we've come to internalize as a modern society, whether or not they are actually true in all or even most cases. We just assume automatically that every used car salesperson is sneaky and deceptive, straight up lying to your face in order to close the deal. There is the archetype of the starving student, accumulating massive student debt as they eat instant noodles for lunch and binge drink on the weekends. Most of these are unfair, of course, but we've come to internalize them.
And for the most part, we've come to assume that artists are generally crazy, broke, or more likely than not, both crazy and broke. While we may romanticize the idea of the artist sacrificing for his or her craft, we also assume that most artists are practically destitute, sharing one-bedroom apartments with four other "hippies" or "hipsters." But a few break through and actually achieve impressive success within their lifetimes.
Pablo Picasso is one such individual. Even if you know almost nothing about the art world (like me), you've surely heard of his name. You know that he was (is!) incredibly famous and he was (is!) very influential in the art world. You probably know him best from his cubism period with distorted images of reality.
What you see here is an oil and collage painting called Three Musicians. This is the version that is a part of the permanent collection at New York City's Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). There is another version of this painting that looks a little different but has a similar kind of colorful concept; it is on display at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
It goes without saying that Pablo Picasso was and continues to be a very big deal. But it's not like he was an overnight success either.
I'm currently listening to the audiobook version of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson. In it, he recounts a particular story about Pablo Picasso that may or may not be one hundred percent accurate, but it still illustrates a very important point that all of us should take to heart. And yes, this comes well before the Internet became a thing, let alone Internet marketing as a viable business.
So, the tale goes a little something like this. Pablo Picasso is in his later years, having already achieved great fame and fortune from his art. He's leading a much quieter life, but his creativity continues to yearn for representation and application. And so, he finds himself in some small cafe, sipping away on a coffee or whatever, and he allows his mind to wander as he doodles on a paper napkin.
As he prepares to leave and just before he tosses his napkin into the trash, he's approached by a woman in the cafe. She expresses her great admiration for his work and asks if it's okay if she have the napkin with the doodle on it. She says she'd even be willing to pay for it.
Picasso turns to the woman and tells her that the price for the napkin doodle is $20,000. Remember that this encounter would have taken place about half a century ago. Adjusted for inflation, the asking price would be somewhere around $500,000 in today's dollars.
When we see the final work of a professional, whether that's a painting, a song, a book or anything else, we only perceive the actual final product. What we don't see are the years of blood, sweat and tears that it took to get to that point. We don't see all the failed manuscripts and drafts that no one cared to give a second look. We don't see all the learning through experience that it took to get to that point.
Know your value. And know that it takes time for you to get to the point where you can, with confidence, ask for half a million dollars for your napkin doodle. The story goes that Picasso then delicately folded up the napkin, put it in his pocket, and walked out of the cafe.


Mixed first quarter results have Echelon Wealth Partners analyst Russell Stanley trimming his price target on Canopy Growth Corp. (TSX:WEED).
This morning, Canopy reported its Q1, 2018 results. The company lost $4.44-million on revenue of $15.9-million, a topline that was up 127 per cent over the same period last year.
Stanley notes that Canopy's topline was a little light, but the company's EBITDA loss was a little better than he expected. As a whole, the analyst takes these results as a signal that it is going to take Canopy a little longer to get where it is going.
In a research update to clients today, Stanley maintained his "Speculative Buy" rating but lowered his one-year price target from $14.00 to $10.50, the new target implying a return of 17 per cent at the time of publication.
The analyst explained his reasoning.
Stanley thinks Canopy will post an Adjusted EBITDA loss of $9.5-million on revenue of $118.9-million in fiscal 2018. He expects those numbers will improve to EBITDA of positive $32.0-million on a topline of $278.7-million the following year.


As many of you may know, we moved house last year. We sold our town centre flat and moved out into the country into a bigger property. I think my parents were a little surprised that we bought the house we did (at the time) as we had only seen it once when we put in the offer and it was only the third house we viewed. If I was in their position, I would have been a bit surprised too.
But we saw the house and fell in love with it immediately. It's not to say we made an emotional decision. I had researched the area quite extensively beforehand and we had seen another house in the same area. I also had come armed with a list of questions that I wanted to ask the current homeowners.
The Law House, who offer their services as Chiswick Conveyancing Solicitors have put together this fantastic infographic about house dates, take a look for yourself. There's some really handy hints on here about what to do when you are 'courting a property', including suggestions like visiting the property on different times of the day and listening out for noisy neighbours.
The story of our house is quite a nice one. We saw our house online a number of weeks before we actually visited it. I had dismissed it as the rooms looks very small. It was one of my close friends (who missed her calling as an excellent estate agent) who said 'go and see it, you haven't seen many houses and you never know'. She was absolutely right. The rooms were so much bigger and lighter than the photos made out. It's a beautiful house and I'm so glad we went to see it. Here we are just over a year after we made the offer, sitting here in our beautiful light and sunny new home, happy with our decision.
Not everyone is as lucky. Apparently one in ten homeowners regret buying their house. The most common reason is rushing into the purchases. I can see how this is a problem, the housing market moves very quickly and often properties are snapped up as soon as they go on the market.
So if you are looking at moving house. Have a good long think about what it is you want and do you due diligence before, during and after your house dates. I'd love to hear your house buying stories. What made you fall in or out of love with your house? By the way if you are wondering, my parents loved our house when they came round to see it.
This is a collaborative post with The Law House. Check out #perfecthousedate on Twitter. We also recommend that you Check Quotes for Conveyancing Online when buying your house!
I know exactly what you mean Jeremy. We would have liked to be closer to a train station, but we had to compromise on something. Always the way. Hope you ave settled in okay though.


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It's that simple. They randomly input cash tournaments or games that take their fancy instead of carefully choosing the games they play.
An expert will assess the games accessible carefully. They will look at if the contest is suitably soft and whether they could expect to make a decent win speed. This is a mindset that poker players aspiring to acquire should use too. That's why in this post, we are going to emphasize some practical hints you can use to playing the right games. If you use the hints in this guide, you must get a better chance at winning in the future.
Take a gander at the Average Pot Size
To generate a decent win speed, players will need to be in juicy and looser games (generally). Let us face it, there aren't vast quantities to be won in matches with superb tight and careful players in. To avoid playing in these matches, we can make the most of the cash game lobby stats that are accessible on many poker sites.
Before joining a desk, you need to have the ability to observe a few important stats, among which is the average pot size. This metric is an indication of the value of every pot normally. A low average kettle suggests there is not much betting and raising and many pots are obtained before the flop or on the flop. Conversely, a high average pot is an action sport with gamers which are frequently visiting the river and larger bets involved. These are the games which we want to be in as loose opponents at low bets equal chance to earn more cash.
Naturally, there are a number of downsides to these games; gamers are more prone to call bluffs and more prone to putting in all round bets. But the advantages of playing with looser and more stubborn opponents are certainly worth it. The number one benefit to sitting in these games is that you will get paid off from the value hands.
Perform on Softer Sites
There are countless online poker websites available to play and the amount of competition ranges broad. The major poker sites may lure new players who see a tricky ad on YouTube but they are also where many experts and semi-pros ply their trade. This is not quite as much of a problem from the micro stakes but even the low stakes games have professionals who play from exotic states where the dollar goes further.
To ensure you are playing soft competition, I suggest trialing out several smaller websites. You can begin your own poker recorder to monitor your win rate on each and determine which is the most rewarding for you.
The traffic may be smaller and also the prize-pools also but few professionals perform there. To find a softer site requires a little research but it's going to be worth it. Consider reading some poker site reviews as a starting point. Another trick is to try sports gambling websites that provide poker as an alternative. The traffic is largely composed of gamblers who are affiliated with the site via sports gambling and give poker a try. Most of these players just know the fundamentals and are easy pickings for an experienced poker player.
Take into account the Time & Day
Most players do not consider the time they're playing to be a variable. They play at a time that's suitable for them. This really isn't the right attitude to get a player wanting to optimize their chances of winning.
Playing a weekday at 11 am is very distinct from playing a Sunday afternoon. Why? Well, if you want to play games that are softer and filled with recreational players, then they will not be playing on a weekday at 11 am. The recreational player will be in the workplace, bricklaying or purchasing cars. Even the weekday games will of course involve some recreational players but the vast majority of people playing now are gamers that play poker regularly and expect to win.
The top times for enjoying are on the weekends and late night on weekdays. These are the instances that revolve around a regular working day. It isn't surprising that these are the instances that generate more traffic. There'll be additional money games available and also the tournament guaranteed prize pools will also be higher.
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Testimony by Adam Schwarz before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for inviting me to speak today at the hearing on current developments in Indonesia. I am the Edward R. Murrow Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, specializing in Sou…
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Chinese Technology Development and Acquisition Strategy and the U.S. Response
Adam Segal testifies before the House Subcommittee on Financial Services, Monetary Policy, and Trade about reforming the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) and China's tec…
Testimony by Adam Segal
The United States, China, and the Globalization of Science and Technology
As the United States manages its relationship with China on science and technology, Adam Segal argues that the United States will have to maintain its scientific strength at home, while pressuring …
Chinese Technology Policy and American Innovation
Adam Segal testifies before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission on China's technology policies and argues that while the long-term impact is uncertain, the United States must pu…
Innovation, Espionage, and Chinese Technology Policy
Adam Segal testifies before the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations about Chinese cyber espionage and China's desire to reduce its dependence on the West for advanced…
Testimony by Adam Segal Asia Program
The Civilian High-technology Economy: Where is it heading?
Statement of Adam Segal, Maurice R. Greenberg Senior Fellow in China Studies, Council on Foreign Relations before the U.S. China Economic and Security Review Commission, Chinese Military Modernizatio…
Understanding the Iran Crisis
Prepared Testimony before the House Committee on Foreign AffairsFrom the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction to terrorism, from human rights to democratization, the Islamic Republic of Iran …
Testimony by Ray Takeyh
The India Nuclear Deal: Implications for Global Climate Change (Testimony before the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources)
IntroductionThe debate over the India nuclear deal has been too one-dimensional. Nearly all commentary has focused on whether this proposal would undermine efforts to contain the proliferation of nuc…
Testimony by David G. Victor
Ira A. Lipman Chair in Emerging Technologies and National Security and Director of the Digital and Cyberspace Policy Program