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Chapter 2: Battle of the Networks
As the price of computer processors and peripheral components dropped precipitously from the days of mainframes, it became easier for computer technology to end up in people's homes. But the crucial element of the PC's success is not that it has a cheap processor inside, but that it is generative: it is open to reprogramming and thus repurposing by anyone. Its technical architecture, whether Windows, Mac, or other, makes it easy for authors to write and owners to run new code both large and small. As prices dropped, distributed ownership of computers, rather than leasing within institutional environments, became a practical reality, removing legal and business practice barriers to generative tinkering with the machines.
If the hobbyist PC had not established the value of tinkering so that the PC could enter the mainstream in the late 1980s,1 what cheap processors would small firms and mainstream consumers be using today? One possibility is a set of information appliances. In such a world, people would use smart typewriters for word processing from companies like Brother: all-in-one units with integrated screens and printers that could be used only to produce documents. For gaming, they would use dedicated video game consoles—just as many do today. A personal checkbook might have had its own souped-up adding machine/calculator unit for balancing accounts—or it might have had no appliance at all, since the cost of deploying specialized hardware for that purpose might have exceeded consumer demand.
There is still the question of networking. People would likely still want to exchange word processing and other documents with colleagues or friends. To balance checkbooks conveniently would require communication with the bank so that the user would not have to manually enter cleared checks and their dates from a paper statement. Networking is not impossible in a world of stand-alone appliances. Brother word processor users could exchange diskettes with each other, and the bank could mail its customers cassettes, diskettes, or CD-ROMs containing data usable only with the bank's in-home appliance. Or the home appliance could try to contact the bank's computer from afar—an activity that would require the home and the bank to be networked somehow.
This configuration converges on the Hollerith model, where a central computer could be loaded with the right information automatically if it were in the custody of the bank, or if the bank had a business relationship with a third-party manager. Then the question becomes how far away the various dumb terminals could be from the central computer. The considerable expense of building networks would suggest placing the machines in clusters, letting people come to them. Electronic balancing of one's checkbook would take place at a computer installed in a bank lobby or strategically located cyber café, just as automated teller machines (ATMs) are dispersed around cities today. People could perform electronic document research over another kind of terminal found at libraries and schools. Computers, then, are only one piece of a mosaic that can be more or less generative. Another critical piece is the network, its own generativity hinging on how much it costs to use, how its costs are measured, and the circumstances under which its users can connect to one another.
Just as information processing devices can be appliance, mainframe, PC, or something in between, there are a variety of ways to design a network. The choice of configuration involves many trade-offs. This chapter explains why the Internet was not the only way to build a network—and that different network configurations lead not only to different levels of generativity, but also to different levels of regulability and control. That we use the Internet today is not solely a matter of some policy-maker's choice, although certain regulatory interventions and government funding were necessary to its success. It is due to an interplay of market forces and network externalities that are based on presumptions such as how trustworthy we can expect people to be. As those presumptions begin to change, so too will the shape of the network and the things we connect to it.
BUILDING NETWORKS ON A NETWORK
Returning to a threshold question: if we wanted to allow people to use information technology at home and to be able to network in ways beyond sending floppy diskettes through the mail, how can we connect homes to the wider world? A natural answer would be to piggyback on the telephone network, which was already set up to convey people's voices from one house to another, or between houses and institutions. Cyberlaw scholar Tim Wu and others have pointed out how difficult it was at first to put the telephone network to any new purpose, not for technical reasons, but for ones of legal control—and thus how important early regulatory decisions forcing an opening of the network were to the success of digital networking.2
In early twentieth-century America, AT&T; controlled not only the telephone network, but also the devices attached to it. People rented their phones from AT&T;, and the company prohibited them from making any modifications to the phones. To be sure, there were no AT&T; phone police to see what customers were doing, but AT&T; could and did go after the sellers of accessories like the Hush-A-Phone, which was invented in 1921 as a way to have a conversation without others nearby overhearing it.3 It was a huge plastic funnel enveloping the user's mouth on one end and strapped to the microphone of the handset on the other, muffling the conversation. Over 125,000 units were sold.
As the monopoly utility telephone provider, AT&T; faced specialized regulation from the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC). In 1955, the FCC held that AT&T; could block the sale of the funnels as "unauthorized foreign attachments," and terminate phone service to those who purchased them, but the agency's decision was reversed by an appellate court. The court drolly noted, "[AT&T; does] not challenge the subscriber's right to seek privacy. They say only that he should achieve it by cupping his hand between the transmitter and his mouth and speaking in a low voice into this makeshift muffler."4
Cupping a hand and placing a plastic funnel on the phone seemed the same to the court. It found that at least in cases that were not "publicly detrimental"—in other words, where the phone system was not itself harmed—AT&T; had to allow customers to make physical additions to their handsets, and manufacturers to produce and distribute those additions. AT&T; could have invented the Hush-A-Phone funnel itself. It did not; it took outsiders to begin changing the system, even in small ways.
Hush-A-Phone was followed by more sweeping outside innovations. During the 1940s, inventor Tom Carter sold and installed two-way radios for companies with workers out in the field. As his business caught on, he realized how much more helpful it would be to be able to hook up a base station's radio to a telephone so that faraway executives could be patched in to the front lines. He invented the Carterfone to do just that in 1959 and sold over 3,500 units. AT&T; told its customers that they were not allowed to use Carterfones, because these devices hooked up to the network itself, unlike the Hush-A-Phone, which connected only to the telephone handset. Carter petitioned against the rule and won.5 Mindful of the ideals behind the Hush-A-Phone decision, the FCC agreed that so long as the network was not harmed, AT&T; could not block new devices, even ones that directly hooked up to the phone network.
These decisions paved the way for advances invented and distributed by third parties, advances that were the exceptions to the comparative innovation desert of the telephone system. Outsiders introduced devices such as the answering machine, the fax machine, and the cordless phone that were rapidly adopted.6 The most important advance, however, was the dial-up modem, a crucial piece of hardware bridging consumer information processors and the world of computer networks, whether proprietary or the Internet.
With the advent of the modem, people could acquire plain terminals or PCs and connect them to central servers over a telephone line. Users could dial up whichever service they wanted: a call to the bank's network for banking, followed by a call to a more generic "information service" for interactive weather and news.
The development of this capability illustrates the relationships among the standard layers that can be said to exist in a network: at the bottom are the physical wires, with services above, and then applications, and finally content and social interaction. If AT&T; had prevailed in the Carterfone proceeding, it would have been able to insist that its customers use the phone network only for traditional point-to-point telephone calls. The phone network would have been repurposed for data solely at AT&T;'s discretion and pace. Because AT&T; lost, others' experiments in data transmission could move forward. The physical layer had become generative, and this generativity meant that additional types of activity in higher layers were made possible. While AT&T; continued collecting rents from the phone network's use whether for voice or modem calls, both amateurs working for fun and entrepreneurs seeking new business opportunities got into the online services business.
THE PROPRIETARY NETWORK MODEL
The first online services built on top of AT&T;'s phone network were natural extensions of the 1960s IBM-model minicomputer usage within businesses: one centrally managed machine to which employees' dumb terminals connected. Networks like CompuServe, The Source, America Online, Prodigy, GEnie, and MCI Mail gave their subscribers access to content and services deployed solely by the network providers themselves.7
In 1983, a home computer user with a telephone line and a CompuServe subscription could pursue a variety of pastimes8—reading an Associated Press news feed, chatting in typed sentences with other CompuServe subscribers through a "CB radio simulator," sending private e-mail to fellow subscribers, messaging on bulletin boards, and playing rudimentary multiplayer games.9 But if a subscriber or an outside company wanted to develop a new service that might appeal to CompuServe subscribers, it could not automatically do so. Even if it knew how to program on CompuServe's mainframes, an aspiring provider needed CompuServe's approval. CompuServe entered into development agreements with outside content providers10 like the Associated Press and, in some cases, with outside programmers,11 but between 1984 and 1994, as the service grew from one hundred thousand subscribers to almost two million, its core functionalities remained largely unchanged.12
Innovation within services like CompuServe took place at the center of the network rather than at its fringes. PCs were to be only the delivery vehicles for data sent to customers, and users were not themselves expected to program or to be able to receive services from anyone other than their central service provider. CompuServe depended on the phone network's physical layer generativity to get the last mile to a subscriber's house, but CompuServe as a service was not open to third-party tinkering.
Why would CompuServe hold to the same line that AT&T; tried to draw? After all, the economic model for almost every service was the connect charge: a per-minute fee for access rather than advertising or transactional revenue.13 With mere connect time as the goal, one might think activity-garnering user-contributed software running on the service would be welcome, just as user-contributed content in the CB simulator or on a message board produced revenue if it drew other users in. Why would the proprietary services not harness the potential generativity of their offerings by making their own servers more open to third-party coding? Some networks' mainframes permitted an area in which subscribers could write and execute their own software,14 but in each case restrictions were quickly put in place to prevent other users from running that software online. The "programming areas" became relics, and the Hollerith model prevailed.
Perhaps the companies surmised that little value could come to them from user and third-party tinkering if there were no formal relationship between those outside programmers and the information service's in-house developers. Perhaps they thought it too risky: a single mainframe or set of mainframes running a variety of applications could not risk being compromised by poorly coded or downright rogue applications.
Perhaps they simply could not grasp the potential to produce new works that could be found among an important subset of their subscribers—all were instead thought of solely as consumers. Or they may have thought that all the important applications for online consumer services had already been invented—news, weather, bulletin boards, chat, e-mail, and the rudiments of shopping.
In the early 1990s the future seemed to be converging on a handful of corporate-run networks that did not interconnect. There was competition of a sort that recalls AT&T;'s early competitors: firms with their own separate wires going to homes and businesses. Some people maintained an e-mail address on each major online service simply so that they could interact with friends and business contacts regardless of the service the others selected. Each information service put together a proprietary blend of offerings, mediated by software produced by the service. Each service had the power to decide who could subscribe, under what terms, and what content would be allowed or disallowed, either generally (should there be a forum about gay rights?) or specifically (should this particular message about gay rights be deleted?). For example, Prodigy sought a reputation as a family-friendly service and was more aggressive about deleting sensitive user-contributed content; CompuServe was more of a free-for-all.15
But none seemed prepared to budge from the business models built around their mainframes, and, as explained in detail in Chapter Four, works by scholars such as Mary Benner and Michael Tushman shed some light on why. Mature firms can acquire "stabilizing organizational routines": "internal biases for certainty and predictable results [which] favor exploitative innovation at the expense of exploratory innovation."16 And so far as the proprietary services could tell, they had only one competitor other than each other: generative PCs that used their modems to call other PCs instead of the centralized services. Exactly how proprietary networks would have evolved if left only to that competition will never be known, for CompuServe and its proprietary counterparts were soon overwhelmed by the Internet and the powerful PC browsers used to access it.17 But it is useful to recall how those PC-to-PC networks worked, and who built them.
A GRASSROOTS NETWORK OF PCs
Even before PC owners had an opportunity to connect to the Internet, they had an alternative to paying for appliancized proprietary networks. Several people wrote BBS ("bulletin board system") software that could turn any PC into its own information service.18 Lacking ready arrangements with institutional content providers like the Associated Press, computers running BBS software largely depended on their callers to provide information as well as to consume it. Vibrant message boards, some with thousands of regular participants, sprang up. But they were limited by the physical properties and business model of the phone system that carried their data. Even though the Carterfone decision permitted the use of modems to connect users' computers, a PC hosting a BBS was limited to one incoming call at a time unless its owner wanted to pay for more phone lines and some arcane multiplexing equipment.19 With many interested users having to share one incoming line to a BBS, it was the opposite of the proprietary connect time model: users were asked to spend as little time connected as possible.
PC generativity provided a way to ameliorate some of these limitations. A PC owner named Tom Jennings wrote FIDOnet in the spring of 1984.20 FIDOnet was BBS software that could be installed on many PCs. Each FIDOnet BBS could call another in the FIDO network and they would exchange their respective message stores. That way, users could post messages to a single PC's BBS and find it copied automatically, relay-style, to hundreds of other BBSs around the world, with replies slowly working their way around to all the FIDOnet BBSs. In the fall of 1984 FIDOnet claimed 160 associated PCs; by the early 1990s it boasted 32,000, and many other programmers had made contributions to improve Jennings's work.21
Of course, FIDOnet was the ultimate kludge, simultaneously a testament to the distributed ingenuity of those who tinker with generative technologies and a crude workaround that was bound to collapse under its own weight. Jennings found that his network did not scale well, especially since it was built on top of a physical network whose primary use was to allow two people, not many computers, to talk to each other. As the FIDOnet community grew bigger, it was no longer a community—at least not a set of people who each knew one another. Some new FIDOnet installations had the wrong dial-in numbers for their peers, which meant that computers were calling people instead of other computers, redialing every time a computer did not answer.
"To impress on you the seriousness of wrong numbers in the node list," Jennings wrote, "imagine you are a poor old lady, who every single night is getting phone calls EVERY TWO MINUTES AT 4:00AM, no one says anything, then hangs up. This actually happened; I would sit up and watch when there was mail that didn't go out for a week or two, and I'd pick up the phone after dialing, and was left in the embarrasing [sic ] position of having to explain bulletin boards to an extremely tired, extremely annoyed person."22
In some ways, this was the fear AT&T; had expressed to the FCC during the Carterfone controversy. When AT&T; was no longer allowed to perform quality control on the devices hooking up to the network, problems could arise and AT&T; would reasonably disclaim responsibility. Jennings and others worked to fix software problems as they arose with new releases, but as FIDOnet authors wrestled with the consequences of their catastrophic success, it was clear that the proprietary services were better suited for mainstream consumers. They were more reliable, better advertised, and easier to use. But FIDOnet demonstrates that amateur innovation—cobbling together bits and pieces from volunteers—can produce a surprisingly functional and effective result—one that has been rediscovered today in some severely bandwidth-constrained areas of the world.23
Those with Jennings's urge to code soon had an alternative outlet, one that even the proprietary networks did not foresee as a threat until far too late: the Internet, which appeared to combine the reliability of the pay networks with the ethos and flexibility of user-written FIDOnet.
ENTER THE INTERNET
Just as the general-purpose PC beat leased and appliancized counterparts that could perform only their manufacturers' applications and nothing else, the Internet first linked to and then functionally replaced a host of proprietary consumer network services.24
The Internet's founding is pegged to a message sent on October 29, 1969. It was transmitted from UCLA to Stanford by computers hooked up to prototype "Interface Message Processors" (IMPs).25 A variety of otherwise-incompatible computer systems existed at the time—just as they do now—and the IMP was conceived as a way to connect them.26 (The UCLA programmers typed "log" to begin logging in to the Stanford computer. The Stanford computer crashed after the second letter, making "Lo" the first Internet message.)
From its start, the Internet was oriented differently from the proprietary networks and their ethos of bundling and control. Its goals were in some ways more modest. The point of building the network was not to offer a particular set of information or services like news or weather to customers, for which the network was necessary but incidental. Rather, it was to connect anyone on the network to anyone else. It was up to the people connected to figure out why they wanted to be in touch in the first place; the network would simply carry data between the two points.
The Internet thus has more in common with FIDOnet than it does with CompuServe, yet it has proven far more useful and flexible than any of the proprietary networks. Most of the Internet's architects were academics, amateurs like Tom Jennings in the sense that they undertook their work for the innate interest of it, but professionals in the sense that they could devote themselves full time to its development. They secured crucial government research funding and other support to lease some of the original raw telecommunications facilities that would form the backbone of the new network, helping to make the protocols they developed on paper testable in a real-world environment. The money supporting this was relatively meager—on the order of tens of millions of dollars from 1970 to 1990, and far less than a single popular startup raised in an initial public offering once the Internet had gone mainstream. (For example, ten-month-old, money-losing Yahoo! raised $35 million at its 1996 initial public offering.27 On the first day it started trading, the offered chunk of the company hit over $100 million in value, for a total corporate valuation of more than $1 billion.28
The Internet's design reflects the situation and outlook of the Internet's framers: they were primarily academic researchers and moonlighting corporate engineers who commanded no vast resources to implement a global network.29 The early Internet was implemented at university computer science departments, U.S. government research units,30 and select telecommunications companies with an interest in cutting-edge network research.31 These users might naturally work on advances in bandwidth management or tools for researchers to use for discussion with each other, including informal, non-work-related discussions. Unlike, say, FedEx, whose wildly successful paper transport network depended initially on the singularly focused application of venture capital to design and create an efficient physical infrastructure for delivery, those individuals thinking about the Internet in the 1960s and '70s planned a network that would cobble together existing research and government networks and then wring as much use as possible from them.32
The design of the Internet reflected not only the financial constraints of its creators, but also their motives. They had little concern for controlling the network or its users' behavior.33 The network's design was publicly available and freely shared from the earliest moments of its development. If designers disagreed over how a particular protocol should work, they would argue until one had persuaded most of the interested parties. The motto among them was, "We reject: kings, presidents, and voting. We believe in: rough consensus and running code."34 Energy spent running the network was seen as a burden rather than a boon. Keeping options open for later network use and growth was seen as sensible, and abuse of the network by those joining it without an explicit approval process was of little worry since the people using it were the very people designing it—engineers bound by their desire to see the network work.35
The Internet was so different in character and audience from the proprietary networks that few even saw them as competing with one another. However, by the early 1990s, the Internet had proven its use enough that some large firms were eager to begin using it for data transfers for their enterprise applications. It helped that the network was subsidized by the U.S. government, allowing flat-rate pricing for its users. The National Science Foundation (NSF) managed the Internet backbone and asked that it be used only for noncommercial purposes, but by 1991 was eager to see it privatized.36 Internet designers devised an entirely new protocol so that the backbone no longer needed to be centrally managed by the NSF or a single private successor, paving the way for multiple private network providers to bid to take up chunks of the old backbone, with no one vendor wholly controlling it.37
Consumer applications were originally nowhere to be found, but that changed after the Internet began accepting commercial interconnections without network research pretexts in 1991. The public at large was soon able to sign up, which opened development of Internet applications and destinations to a broad, commercially driven audience.
No major PC producer immediately moved to design Internet Protocol compatibility into its PC operating system. PCs could dial in to a single computer like that of CompuServe or AOL and communicate with it, but the ability to run Internet-aware applications on the PC itself was limited. To attach to the Internet, one would need a minicomputer or workstation of the sort typically found within university computer science departments—and usually used with direct network connections rather than modems and phone lines.
A single hobbyist took advantage of PC generativity and forged the missing technological link. Peter Tattam, an employee in the psychology department of the University of Tasmania, wrote Trumpet Winsock, a program that allowed owners of PCs running Microsoft Windows to forge a point-to-point Internet connection with the dial-up servers run by nascent Internet Service Providers (ISPs).38 With no formal marketing or packaging, Tattam distributed Winsock as shareware. He asked people to try out the program for free and to send him $25 if they kept using it beyond a certain tryout period.39
Winsock was a runaway success, and in the mid-1990s it was the primary way that Windows users could access the Internet. Even before there was wide public access to an Internet through which to distribute his software, he claimed hundreds of thousands of registrations for it,40 and many more people were no doubt using it and declining to register. Consumer accessibility to Internet-enabled applications, coupled with the development of graphic-friendly World Wide Web protocols and the PC browsers to support them—both initially noncommercial ventures—marked the beginning of the end of proprietary information services and jerry-rigged systems like FIDOnet. Consumers began to explore the Internet, and those who wanted to reach this group, such as commercial merchants and advertising-driven content providers, found it easier to set up outposts there than through the negotiated gates of the proprietary services.
Microsoft bundled the functionality of Winsock with late versions of Windows 95.41 After that, anyone buying a PC could hook up to the Internet instead of only to AOL's or CompuServe's walled gardens. Proprietary information services scrambled to reorient their business models away from corralled content and to ones of accessibility to the wider Internet.42 Network providers offering a bundle of content along with access increasingly registered their appeal simply as ISPs. They became mere on-ramps to the Internet, with their users branching out to quickly thriving Internet destinations that had no relationship to the ISP for their programs and services.43 For example, CompuServe's "Electronic Mall," an e-commerce service intended as the exclusive means by which outside vendors could sell products to CompuServe subscribers,44 disappeared under the avalanche of individual Web sites selling goods to anyone with Internet access.
The resulting Internet was a network that no one in particular owned and that anyone could join. Of course, joining required the acquiescence of at least one current Internet participant, but if one was turned away at one place, there were innumerable other points of entry, and commercial ISPs emerged to provide service at commoditized rates.45
The bundled proprietary model, designed expressly for consumer uptake, had been defeated by the Internet model, designed without consumer demands in mind. Proprietary services tried to have everything under one roof and to vet each of their offerings, just as IBM leased its general-purpose computers to its 1960s customers and wholly managed them, tailoring them to those customers' perceived needs in an ordered way. The Internet had no substantive offerings at all—but also no meaningful barriers to someone else's setting up shop online. It was a model similar to that of the PC, a platform rather than a fully finished edifice, one open to a set of offerings from anyone who wanted to code for it.
DESIGN CHOICES AND THE INTERNET ETHOS
Recall that our endpoint devices can possess varying levels of accessibility to outside coding. Where they are found along that spectrum creates certain basic trade-offs. A less generative device like an information appliance or a general-purpose computer managed by a single vendor can work more smoothly because there is only one cook over the stew, and it can be optimized to a particular perceived purpose. But it cannot be easily adapted for new uses. A more generative device like a PC makes innovation easier and produces a broader range of applications because the audience of people who can adapt it to new uses is much greater. Moreover, these devices can at first be simpler because they can be improved upon later; at the point they leave the factory they do not have to be complete. That is why the first hobbyist PCs could be so inexpensive: they had only the basics, enough so that others could write software to make them truly useful. But it is harder to maintain a consistent experience with such a device because its behavior is then shaped by multiple software authors not acting in concert. Shipping an incomplete device also requires a certain measure of trust: trust that at least some third-party software writers will write good and useful code, and trust that users of the device will be able to access and sort out the good and useful code from the bad and even potentially harmful code.
These same trade-offs existed between proprietary services and the Internet, and Internet design, like its generative PC counterpart, tilted toward the simple and basic. The Internet's framers made simplicity a core value—a risky bet with a high payoff. The bet was risky because a design whose main focus is simplicity may omit elaboration that solves certain foreseeable problems. The simple design that the Internet's framers settled upon makes sense only with a set of principles that go beyond mere engineering. These principles are not obvious ones—for example, the proprietary networks were not designed with them in mind—and their power depends on assumptions about people that, even if true, could change. The most important are what we might label the procrastination principle and the trust-your-neighbor approach.
The procrastination principle rests on the assumption that most problems confronting a network can be solved later or by others. It says that the network should not be designed to do anything that can be taken care of by its users. Its origins can be found in a 1984 paper by Internet architects David Clark, David Reed, and Jerry Saltzer. In it they coined the notion of an "end-to-end argument" to indicate that most features in a network ought to be implemented at its computer endpoints—and by those endpoints' computer programmers—rather than "in the middle," taken care of by the network itself, and designed by the network architects.46 The paper makes a pure engineering argument, explaining that any features not universally useful should not be implemented, in part because not implementing these features helpfully prevents the generic network from becoming tilted toward certain uses. Once the network was optimized for one use, they reasoned, it might not easily be put to other uses that may have different requirements.
The end-to-end argument stands for modularity in network design: it allows the network nerds, both protocol designers and ISP implementers, to do their work without giving a thought to network hardware or PC software. More generally, the procrastination principle is an invitation to others to overcome the network's shortcomings, and to continue adding to its uses.
Another fundamental assumption, reflected repeatedly in various Internet design decisions that tilted toward simplicity, is about trust. The people using this network of networks and configuring its endpoints had to be trusted to be more or less competent and pure enough at heart that they would not intentionally or negligently disrupt the network. The network's simplicity meant that many features found in other networks to keep them secure from fools and knaves would be absent. Banks would be simpler and more efficient if they did not need vaults for the cash but could instead keep it in accessible bins in plain view. Our houses would be simpler if we did not have locks on our doors, and it would be ideal to catch a flight by following an unimpeded path from the airport entrance to the gate—the way access to many trains and buses persists today.
An almost casual trust for the users of secured institutions and systems is rarely found: banks are designed with robbers in mind. Yet the assumption that network participants can be trusted, and indeed that they will be participants rather than customers, infuses the Internet's design at nearly every level. Anyone can become part of the network so long as any existing member of the network is ready to share access. And once someone is on the network, the network's design is intended to allow all data to be treated the same way: it can be sent from anyone to anyone, and it can be in support of any application developed by an outsider.
Two examples illustrate these principles and their trade-offs: the Internet's lack of structure to manage personal identity, and its inability to guarantee transmission speed between two points.
There are lots of reasons for a network to be built to identify the people using it, rather than just the machines found on it. Proprietary networks like CompuServe and AOL were built just that way. They wanted to offer different services to different people, and to charge them accordingly, so they ensured that the very first prompt a user encountered when connecting to the network was to type in a prearranged user ID and password. No ID, no network access. This had the added benefit of accountability: anyone engaging in bad behavior on the network could have access terminated by whoever managed the IDs.
The Internet, however, has no such framework; connectivity is much more readily shared. User identification is left to individual Internet users and servers to sort out if they wish to demand credentials of some kind from those with whom they communicate. For example, a particular Web site might demand that a user create an ID and password in order to gain access to its contents.
This basic design omission has led to the well-documented headaches of identifying wrongdoers online, from those who swap copyrighted content to hackers who attack the network itself.47 At best, a source of bad bits might be traced to a single Internet address. But that address might be shared by more than one person, or it might represent a mere point of access by someone at yet another address—a link in a chain of addresses that can recede into the distance. Because the user does not have to log in the way he or she would to use a proprietary service, identity is obscured. Some celebrate this feature. It can be seen as a bulwark against oppressive governments who wish to monitor their Internet-surfing populations. As many scholars have explored, whether one is for or against anonymity online, a design decision bearing on it, made first as an engineering matter, can end up with major implications for social interaction and regulation.48
Another example of the trade-offs of procrastination and trust can be found in the Internet's absence of "quality of service," a guarantee of bandwidth between one point and another. The Internet was designed as a network of networks—a bucket-brigade partnership in which network neighbors pass along each other's packets for perhaps ten, twenty, or even thirty hops between two points.49 Internet Service Providers might be able to maximize their bandwidth for one or two hops along this path, but the cobbled-together nature of a typical Internet link from a source all the way to a destination means that there is no easy way to guarantee speed the whole way through. Too many intermediaries exist in between, and their relationship may be one of a handshake rather than a contract: "you pass my packets and I'll pass yours."50 An endpoint several hops from a critical network intermediary will have no contract or arrangement at all with the original sender or the sender's ISP. The person at the endpoint must instead rely on falling dominos of trust. The Internet is thus known as a "best efforts" network, sometimes rephrased as "Send it and pray" or "Every packet an adventure."51
The Internet's protocols thus assume that all packets of data are intended to be delivered with equal urgency (or perhaps, more accurately, lack of urgency). This assumption of equality is a fiction because some packets are valuable only if they can make it to their destination in a timely way. Delay an e-mail by a minute or two and no one may be the poorer; delay a stream of music too long and there is an interruption in playback. The network could be built to prioritize a certain data stream on the basis of its sender, its recipient, or the nature of the stream's contents. Yet the Internet's framers and implementers have largely clung to simplicity, omitting an architecture that would label and then speed along "special delivery" packets despite the uses it might have and the efficiencies it could achieve. As the backbone grew, it did not seem to matter. Those with lots of content to share have found ways to stage data "near" its destination for others, and the network has proved itself remarkably effective even in areas, like video and audio transmission, in which it initially fell short.52 The future need not resemble the past, however, and a robust debate exists today about the extent to which ISPs ought to be able to prioritize certain data streams over others by favoring some destinations or particular service providers over others.53 (That debate is joined in a later chapter.)
The assumptions made by the Internet's framers and embedded in the network—that most problems could be solved later and by others, and that those others themselves would be interested in solving rather than creating problems—arose naturally within the research environment that gave birth to the Internet. For all the pettiness sometimes associated with academia, there was a collaborative spirit present in computer science research labs, in part because the project of designing and implementing a new network—connecting people—can benefit so readily from collaboration.
It is one thing for the Internet to work the way it was designed when deployed among academics whose raison d'être was to build functioning networks. But the network managed an astonishing leap as it continued to work when expanded into the general populace, one which did not share the world-view that informed the engineers' designs. Indeed, it not only continued to work, but experienced spectacular growth in the uses to which it was put. It is as if the bizarre social and economic configuration of the quasi-anarchist Burning Man festival turned out to function in the middle of a city.54 What works in a desert is harder to imagine in Manhattan: people crashing on each others' couches, routinely sharing rides and food, and loosely bartering things of value. At the turn of the twenty-first century, then, the developed world has found itself with a wildly generative information technology environment.
Today we enjoy an abundance of PCs hosting routine, if not always-on, broadband Internet connections.55 The generative PC has become intertwined with the generative Internet, and the brief era during which information appliances and appliancized networks flourished—Brother word processors and CompuServe—might appear to be an evolutionary dead end.
Those alternatives are not dead. They have been only sleeping. To see why, we now turn to the next step of the pattern that emerges at each layer of generative technologies: initial success triggers expansion, which is followed by boundary, one that grows out of the very elements that make that layer appealing. The Internet flourished by beginning in a backwater with few expectations, allowing its architecture to be simple and fluid. The PC had parallel hobbyist backwater days. Each was first adopted in an ethos of sharing and tinkering, with profit ancillary, and each was then embraced and greatly improved by commercial forces. But each is now facing problems that call for some form of intervention, a tricky situation since intervention is not easy—and, if undertaken, might ruin the very environment it is trying to save. The next chapter explains this process at the technological layer: why the status quo is drawing to a close, confronting us—policy-makers, entrepreneurs, technology providers, and, most importantly, Internet and PC users—with choices we can no longer ignore.


It's way past time to congratulate the baby Jesus on the anniversary of his birth. While all those annoying unending ads for the Christmas sales have blessedly come to an end, they've been replaced by all those annoying unending ads for the after-Christmas sales.
It's a calendaric conundrum. To celebrate what it is we do for a living by taking the day off.
What's the skinny on the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh for Supreme Court Justice?
You don't need 20/20 vision to see that the whole world is waiting for the Democratic Party to push back against the tyrannical tendencies of the Trump administration.
Hey everybody. You know all that anxiety that's been building up? Well, just let it go and relax now, because the Fourth of July is here. The Great American Holiday. The one with the noise and the colors and the hot. Now, it is summer. That's what the Fourth is. Not just the day we celebrate the anniversary of the birth of the best country in the history of the world but also the heart of the season of light.
The argument is the president cannot commit obstruction of justice, because as chief law enforcement officer of the United States, he is the justice department. King Donald.
Normally, focusing on a person's physical characteristics is considered out of bounds, and just not cricket, but because Donald Trump's favorite weapon is denigration, we've decided to play by his rules.
Traditionally, the present for a first anniversary is paper, but you don't need any more of that, considering the voluminous file cabinets full of documents already collected and stashed in triple-locked, humidity-controlled warehouses all over the leaky swamp that is Washington.
Easter is a most peculiar holiday, which is saying something, considering so many other religious festivities litter our calendar.
Okay, Democrats, settle down. Drop the confetti and back away from the champagne. Stop punching each other in the arm, making with the whoop-whoop noises.
It's been quite a year, the exact reverse of that whole "time flies when you're having fun" thing.
It is our fervent hope here at Durstco that all you loyal readers join us in welcoming the elixir of opportunity that is 2017 and pray that it goes down smoother than that most recently departed year whose name has been wiped from our memory banks.
Relax. Now breathe. And repeat. The nonstop madcap insanity has finally reached its red and green holiday crescendo and its all downhill from here.
It's the first week of December, and all over the nation children dance while grandparents twitch with anticipation. Which, admittedly, isn't that out of the ordinary.
And now a public service announcement for all you prodigal sons and daughters making the pilgrimage back home for the annual Turkey Day reunion. Prepare for some ultra ugliness out there, people.
Well. That happened. Donald J. Trump didn't just perplex the pundits, pollsters and his own progeny with a stunning electoral pummeling of Hillary Clinton, he pelted them with showbiz shock and awe.
If experts are correct in saying that Donald Trump needs women voters to win the presidency, the last two weeks have been the worst for any political candidate since the summer of 1984 when Michael Dukakis climbed into a tank and tried on a helmet.
Something craven infects political candidates as the days dwindle down to a precious few.


The Scarborough Synergy Volleyball Club will be offering beach volleyball programming for youth starting in May 2019.
There will be a number of sessions running with a variety of age/skill levels in mind.
The season will run typically from the end of to the end of July. Athletes playing in Provincials will continue to practice.
We also hope to hold some of our own OVA style tournaments for experience and fun.


text:
Hermann Heinrich Grauert, seit 1914 Ritter von Grauert, (* 7. September 1850 in Pritzwalk; † 12. März 1924 in München) war ein deutscher Historiker.

Leben
Zunächst war Grauert nach dem Realschulbesuch in Wittstock im Manufakturwarengeschäft seines Vaters berufstätig. 1872 ging er nach Münster und legte dort 1873 die Ergänzungsprüfungen in Latein, Griechisch und Geschichte ab, so dass er eine dem Abitur gleichwertige Qualifikation hatte, um studieren zu können. Von 1873 bis 1876 studierte er an der Universität Göttingen Geschichte und promovierte dort bei Georg Waitz. Anschließend erweiterte er seine historischen und juristischen Kenntnisse an den Universitäten Berlin, München und Straßburg.

Grauert war seit seiner Studentenzeit ein begeisterter KVer, in Göttingen beim KStV Winfridia, in Berlin beim Katholischen Leseverein (jetzt KStV Askania-Burgundia) und in München bei der KStV Ottonia. Später wurde er noch bei weiteren KV-Verbindungen Ehrenphilister, so z. B. bei Alemannia und Rheno-Bavaria in München. In deren Festschrift zum 25. Gründungsjubiläum des Verbandes, ist Hermann von Grauert 1906 als Ehrenmitglied abgebildet. Zudem war er ab 1893 Ehrenmitglied der KDStV Aenania München im CV.

Ab 1877 war Grauert als Praktikant im Reichsarchiv in München tätig; er habilitierte sich 1883, nach einem Aufenthalt in Rom, an der Universität München und wurde dort 1885 ordentlicher Professor. 1915/16 war er Rektor der Universität.

1884 wurde Grauert Vorstandsmitglied und seit 1885 Redakteur des Historischen Jahrbuchs der Görres-Gesellschaft. Bis zu seinem Tode hat er bei der Görres-Gesellschaft maßgeblich mitgearbeitet.

In Deutschland und Europa war er als Wissenschaftler hoch angesehen. Grauert war Geheimer Hofrat und wurde 1914 durch König Ludwig III. mit dem Ritterkreuz des Verdienstordens der Bayerischen Krone beliehen. Damit verbunden war die Erhebung in den persönlichen Adelsstand und er durfte sich nach der Eintragung in die Adelsmatrikel Ritter von Grauert nennen. In München-Harlaching wurde 1959 die "Grauertstraße" nach ihm benannt.

Ab 1899 war Grauert ordentliches Mitglied der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, ab 1901 zudem ordentliches Mitglied der Historischen Kommission bei der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.

Grabstätte

Die Grabstätte von Hermann Grauert befindet sich auf dem Alten Südlichen Friedhof in München (Gräberfeld 42 – Reihe 12 – Platz 6) .

Veröffentlichungen (Auswahl)
 Dante in Deutschland. In: Historisch-politische Blätter für das katholische Deutschland. Band 120, 1897, S. 802 f.
 Die Kaisergräber im Dom zu Speyer. München 1901.
 Meister Johann von Toledo. In: Sitzungsberichten der philosophisch-philologischen und der historischen Classe der kgl. bayerischen Akademie des Wissenschaften. Heft 2, 1901, S. 111–325.
 Dante und Houston Stewart Chamberlain. Herder, Freiburg im Breisgau 1904.
 Görres in Straßburg. Bachem, Köln 1910.
 Magister Heinrich, der Poet in Würzburg und die römische Kurie (= Abhandlungen der Königlich Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Philosophisch-philologische und historische Klasse. Bd. 27). München 1912.
 Zur Geschichte des Weltfriedens, des Völkerrechts und der Idee einer Liga der Nationen. Herder, München 1920.

Literatur
 Max Jansen (Hrsg.): Festgabe zum 7. September 1910, gewidmet von seinen Schülern. Hermann Grauert zur Vollendung des 60. Lebensjahres. Herder, Freiburg im Breisgau 1910.
 Winfried Becker: Hermann von Grauert (1850–1924). In: Jürgen Aretz, Rudolf Morsey, Anton Rauscher (Hrsg.): Zeitgeschichte in Lebensbildern. Aus dem deutschen Katholizismus des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts, Band 12. Aschendorff Verlag, Münster 2007, S. 10–21.

 Heinrich Günter: Hermann v. Grauert. In: Historisches Jahrbuch 44 (1924), S. 169–196.
 Siegfried Koß. In: Siegfried Koß, Wolfgang Löhr (Hrsg.): Biographisches Lexikon des KV. 5. Teil (= Revocatio historiae. Band 6). SH-Verlag, Schernfeld 1998, ISBN 3-89498-055-9, S. 59 ff. m.w.N.
 Karl Wenck: Hermann von Grauert. † 12. Mai 1924. In: Historische Zeitschrift 131 (1925), S. 263–267.

Weblinks

 Michael Doeberl: Hermann Ritter von Grauert (Nachruf der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften) (online)
 Gemälde, Hermann von Grauert als Rektor der Universität München
 Online-Bibliographie der Rektoratsreden im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert, Historische Kommission bei der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften

 Der Nachlass befindet sich in der Bayerischen Staatsbibliothek

Einzelnachweise

Mittelalterhistoriker
Hochschullehrer (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München)
Träger des Verdienstordens der Bayerischen Krone (Ritter)
Geheimer Hofrat
Nobilitierter (Bayern)
Mitglied der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften
Person (Görres-Gesellschaft)
Korporierter im CV
Korporierter im KV
Deutscher
Geboren 1850
Gestorben 1924
Mann

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Our approach to environmental services management is patient focused and performance driven. We have grown primarily by reference, and we are proud of where this steady growth has lead us. Today, we provide best-in-class housekeeping, culinary, patient flow, linen utilization management, facilities management and clinical engineering services to a wide range of hospitals and healthcare providers.
The position provides customer services including consulting, education, support and assistance. Leads, conducts and facilitates best linen practices, process improvement, linen utilization, and cost reduction efforts using project management tools.
Tracks accurately and timely the usage of linen items in all areas of the hospital.
Analyzes linen products for possible cost-savings alternatives for lowering costs.
Recommends and implements strategic plans to reduce linen costs.
Trains, monitors, supports and assists each facility with a Linen Data Management Program.
Directs facilities' staff on par level adjustments and trains nursing staff on acceptable par level use.
Collaborates, consults, plans and educates linen users by designing and conducting Linen Education and training as needed.
Documents linen cost reductions on a monthly, quarterly and annual basis by using project management tools.
Implements a strong Reject Linen Program. Documents reject linen and works to resolve any linen quality issues identified through this program.
Monitors and works to resolve any quantity, processing or distribution issues.
Develops the reputation of being the "Expert" on linen distribution and utilization within the facilities.
Creates and chairs a Linen Committee by getting support from the Administration and Nursing staff.
Complies with and executes HHS's utilization training program.
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Proficient in Microsoft software. In particular Word, PowerPoint and Excel.
Great people skills, communications skills & great client relations and customer service skills.
Able to work a flexible schedule that may include nights, weekends and holidays.


The Department of Physics started functioning with the institute in 2007 at Panchayat Training Institute, Baburgram, Jasidih and subsequently shifted to the present campus in 2008. The department has been activity involved in teaching of BE students, research in various disciplines including theoretical non-linear optics, optical communication, WDM networking, soft condensed matter physics, materials science, high energy physics and plasma physics and various administrative responsibilities. Since the establishment, the department has established its footmark in reputed international journals like Carbon, Journal of Plasma Physics, Optik, Optics Communications etc.


text:
Home » » Jokes » » Why didn't the female frog lay eggs?
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text:
Welcome Assis. Prof. Yanhui Guo from University of Illinois at Springfield, USA to be committee member!
Assis. Prof. Yanhui Guo, Department of Computer Science, University of Illinois at Springfield, USA
Computer Vision, Machine Learning, Deep Learning, Computer-aided Detection/Diagnosis
Dr. Guo's research areas include computer vision, machine learning, deep learning, and computer-aided detection and diagnosis. He is an outstanding researcher and has a lot of accomplishments. By now, he has published 1 book, 95 journal papers, and 29 conference papers. 4 papers were listed in the ScienceDirect Top25 Hottest Articles due to their number of downloads. Dr. Guo won an award from the Caryl Towsley Moy Endowed Fund for Collaborative Research as co-principal investigator in 2016, Competitive Scholarly Research Grant in 2018, Distinguished Achievement and Honorary Membership of Neutrosophic Science International Association (NISA) in 2018, Scholarly Enhancement Award in 2018, Illinois Capital Innovation Competition Awards in 2018. Dr. Guo was invited to work as an associate editor for 5 international journals and a guest editor for 4 journals. He was also invited to be a reviewer for several top journals and conferences.


Investing in a home is a big financial decision, and along with the decision to buy is the question of how much mortgage you'll be able to afford. While your debt-to-income ratio can be helpful in determining the range for your mortgage amount, a mortgage calculator can be a beneficial tool in coming to a potential price. If you're curious about how and if this financial tool can benefit you, here are the details about using a mortgage calculator.
It's very important to ensure that you can afford your mortgage before signing on the dotted line, and a mortgage calculator can assist with this. Most calculators utilize the principal amount of the loan, the interest rate and the amortization period in order to find a monthly payment that is foreseeable for you. While a debt-to-income ratio and the advice of a mortgage professional can be helpful, a calculator can be a quick determination of the overall cost involved.
Some mortgage calculators can utilize a pretty simple formula to come up with an estimate, but some are more complex and can calculate PMI, home insurance, and even property tax to arrive at a sum. The most accurate calculators will utilize the principal, interest, taxes and home insurance in order to determine an estimate that is feasible for you. However, it's important to understand that you'll need to enter the information accurately and leave out as little as possible, as this can have a dramatic impact on the calculation's reliability.
A mortgage calculator can be beneficial in providing you with an estimate, but it should not be the be-all-end-all when it comes to making the final decision. It's important to consider your current lifestyle and your future plans to ensure that your monthly payment will remain do-able down the road. While a calculator is a good place to begin, it's worth consulting with a lender to get an idea of how much home you can afford. Since they'll be required to provide a GFE with the fees disclosed, this will be the best means of understanding the costs.
A mortgage calculator can be a good means of estimating your house-buying ability, but it's important to get the advice of a lender before making the big decision. If you're currently in the market for a new home, contact your trusted mortgage professionals for more information.


"Indraneelam Haven" is another completed luxury apartment project by Indraneelam Group, in Guruvayur. Located at South Nada Guruvayur. This complex envisages 2BHK, 1BHK and studio flats. Purchasers are proud to own an apartment in this project by best developers in Guruvayur.


The group, which consists of the companies Theysohn, Technoplast, Topf and Extruder-Komponenten Salzgitter, is an �all-in-one� provider which has developed a unique series of extrusion lines, tools and pipe heads, after the latest development of the new OMNIA series and the new RK Streamliner pipe head.
The new Extruder Control System TEC 4s has an operating terminal optimised for heavy industrial conditions , which enables a comfortable control of the whole extrusion line in combination with the modern HMI-Software. The 19� touch screen guarantees easiest operation with large soft-keys and intuitive colour and graphic design.
The core of the new Theysohn Extruder Control System is a powerful, fanless and therefore maintenance-free industrial-PC. The communication between the TEC 4s and all drives, peripheral devices and the whole downstream equipment works through the most efficient bussystem - PROFIBUS. Operational reliability and short down time are achieved by simple wiring because of selected high-class components, an analysis program and remote maintenance via LAN and/or WAN.
The major advantage is that in 99% of all cases the customer himself can maintain or exchange spart part of the system. Changing the frequency converters or CF-cards is simple and does not require complicated technical know-how ; and therefore production downtime is avoided. Also, software updates can be installed simply and quickly.


"Duke University researchers revealed strong ties between appearance and success in the business world. By pairing photos of the chief executive officers of large and small companies with photos of non-executives with similar facial features, hairstyles and clothing, finance professors John Graham, Campbell Harvey and Manju Puri of Duke's Fuqua School of Business found that CEOs are more likely than non-CEOs to be rated as competent looking, but less likely to be classified as likeable. The trio found that CEOs who appear competent earn more money than less competent-looking CEOs, even though appearance is not associated with measurable differences in company profitability. "Other researchers have found links between beauty and workers' pay, and demonstrated that politicians benefit from good looks at election time," Graham said. "We wanted to see whether appearance also plays a role at the corporate executive level." "I thought the appearance thing was possible for politicians winning elections -- but for CEOs, no way," said Harvey. "We are told that CEOs are very carefully vetted by boards of directors and professional consultants - as they should be for their multi-million dollar jobs. The fact that our research shows that appearance is unquestionably significant turns my stomach."
God is in charge of time and chance and in this year may He order your steps, cause lines to fall in pleasant places for you, meaning all will go well for you (Psalm 37:23). According to Jeremiah 10:23, a man or woman cannot even order his steps to be at the right place at the right time. May God order your footsteps to be at the right place at the right time, may God display His glory in you and through you this year!
As the dew falls daily without you calling it down, may God's favor speak for you daily in Jesus mighty name!
As David was singled out for favor and brought from behind the queue to the front, may you be singled out for favor. When men are saying things are bad or going down, you will be saying 'things are going great, I am being promoted, things are getting better for me and my family, we are moving higher and higher', in Jesus name (Job 22:28).
When he went into the Tabernacle of the Covenant the next day, he found that Aaron's staff, representing the tribe of Levi, had sprouted, budded, blossomed, and produced ripe almonds! In Numbers 17:8 the rod of Aaron produced, when nothing was happening to the rods of his contestants/antagonists! You will soar this year! God will single you out for favour. What is impossible for others will be possible for you, what is difficult for others will be easy for you in Jesus name! As fruit bearing was quickened overnight for Aaron's rod, may dryness give way to fruitfulness in your life in Jesus mighty name!
In this year and beyond may God support you, favor you and glorify His name in your life! Amen! And Amen!! And Amen!!! in Jesus mighty name!
Feel free to forward this onto others. Remain blessed!


text:
[![PyPI](https://img.shields.io/pypi/v/expression-parser.svg)](https://pypi.python.org/pypi/expression-parser)
[![Build
Status](https://travis-ci.org/lhelwerd/expression-parser.svg?branch=master)](https://travis-ci.org/lhelwerd/expression-parser)
[![Coverage
Status](https://coveralls.io/repos/github/lhelwerd/expression-parser/badge.svg?branch=master)](https://coveralls.io/github/lhelwerd/expression-parser?branch=master)

This parser can calculate the results of a single simple expression,
disallowing any complicated functions or control structures, with support for
custom variable and function environment contexts.

## Features

- Support for all boolean, binary, unary, and comparative operators as in
  Python itself.
- Support for inline `if..else` expressions.
- Support for assignments and augmented assignments like `+=`, only if enabled
  explicitly.
- All other control structures and multiple expressions are disallowed.
- Isolation from execution context using a restricted scope.
- Separate scope for variables and functions to avoid abusing one or the other.
- Function calls may use specific keyword arguments.
- Errors from parsing or evaluating the expression are raised as `SyntaxError`
  with appropriate context parameters to make error display easier (works with
  default traceback output).
- A successful parse yields the result of the evaluated expression. Successful
  assignments of variables are stored in a property `modified_variables`.
  A separate property `used_variables` provides a set of variable names used in
  the evaluation of the expression excluding the assignment targets.
- Supports both Python 2.7 and 3.6 AST syntax trees.
- Python 3+ conventions are used whenever possible: Specifically, the division
  operator `/` always returns floats instead of integers, and `True`, `False`
  and `None` are reserved named constants and cannot be overridden through the
  variable scope in any version.

Not supported (often by design):

- Functions or lambdas defined within the expression.
- Control structures and other Python statements (`return`, `pass`, etc.).
- Comprehensions and generators.
- Multiple expressions or assignment targets in the same input string.
- Function calls that have variable positional or keyword (starred) arguments.
- Literals which are not integers, floats, or the named constants, nor any
  subscripting or indexing. You can still inject other types of variables using
  the context, and add specialized functions to interact with them.

## Requirements

The expression parser has been tested to work on Python 2.7 and 3.6. This
package has no other dependencies and works with only core Python modules.

## Installation

Install the latest version from PyPI using:

```
pip install expression-parser
```

## Functionality

First, import the library:

```python
import expression
```

Next, determine a variable and function scope. If you do not need any custom
variables and functions in your environment, you can skip this step. Otherwise,
create two dictionaries, each containing string identifier names as keys and
either variables or functions as values. For example, to create a scope with
a few mathematical constants and functions:

```python
import math
variables = {
    'pi': math.pi,
    'e': math.e
}
functions = {
    'log': math.log,
    'log10': math.log10,
    'exp': math.exp,
    'pow': math.pow,
    'sqrt': math.sqrt
}
```

Then create the parser, either by simply calling it with no additional
arguments, such as `parser = expression.Expression_Parser()`, or by passing the
scope along to it in dictionaries of values and functions, respectively:

```python
parser = expression.Expression_Parser(variables=variables, functions=functions,
                                      assignment=bool(assignment))
```

You can also set a new dictionary for `variables`, and enable or disable
parsing of assignments in the expression using `assignment`, after construction
via the properties of the created object.

Now you can use this parser to evaluate any valid expression:

```python
print(parser.parse('1+2'))
3
print(parser.parse('pi > 3'))
True
print(parser.parse('int(log(e))'))
1
```

## Development

- [Travis](https://travis-ci.org/lhelwerd/expression-parser) is used to run
  unit tests and report on coverage.
- [Coveralls](https://coveralls.io/github/lhelwerd/expression-parser) receives
  coverage reports and tracks them.
- You can perform local lint checks, tests and coverage during development
  using `make pylint`, `make test` and `make coverage`, respectively.
- We publish releases to [PyPI](https://pypi.python.org/pypi/expression-parser)
  using `make release` which performs lint and unit test checks.

## License

The expression parser library is licensed under the Apache 2.0 License.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
THE BUG November 14, 2019 Australia, Australian politics, Aviation, Politics, United States of America
Boeing launches safer 737
The Boeing aircraft company has unveiled the replacement for its troubled 737 MAX aircraft.
A Boeing spokesperson said the new Boeing 737 GT (main picture) designed to carry 220 passengers would go into production soon at the company's Seattle plant on the US north-west coast.
"Boeing can guarantee the 737 GT will have none of the safety issues that plagued the 737 MAX," the spokesperson said.
"Boeing is proud to say that the 737 GT is guaranteed never to fall from the sky like the 737 MAX did.
"We are also proud that the new aircraft will be the most environmentally friendly commercial plane ever produced by Boeing or indeed any other major manufacturer.
"It will have zero carbon emissions, making it climate friendly and because of its environmental credentials Boeing decided to name the new 737 model the GT, after Swedish teenage climate-change activist Greta Thunberg."
The spokesperson said Boeing believed passengers in Australia and elsewhere would accept a slight increase in travel times if it meant cleaner skies and no contribution to climate change.
"Just as examples, other 737 models now take around one hour to go from Brisbane to Sydney and four hours to get from Melbourne to Perth.
"The 737 GT will take about two days to get from Brisbane to Sydney and a week to go from Melbourne to Perth.
"But we think the travelling public's concern for both climate change and safety will make those times perfectly acceptable, even if ticket prices will have to rise in direct proportion to the longer trip times," the spokesperson said.
The Bug asked for other example travel times including Adelaide to Alice Springs and Townsville to Mount Isa, but the phone line to Seattle suddenly dropped out.
Posted in Australia, Australian politics, Aviation, Politics, United States of America and tagged #boeing, air travel, aircraft, Boeing 737, Boeing 737 MAX, Climate change, Greta Thunberg, Seattle, Travel. Bookmark the permalink.
Simple words stun brave firies
We're blessed with White-hot holy advice


text:
Bank & Insurance
Tech Post
Wheelers
Art & Glamour
Special Supplement
Mujib Barsho Celebration
National, Front Page
World Bank prediction on GDP trashed
By Staff Correspondent
Published : 09 Jun 2021 10:01 PM | Updated : 09 Jun 2021 10:03 PM
Brushing aside the World Bank's forecast on Bangladesh's GDP growth, Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal has said that the country's GDP growth rate will be more than 6.1 percent, the highest in South Asia.
THe Finance Minister came up with the statement while briefing reporters after a meeting of the cabinet committee on public purchase on Wednesday.
On the day, the Cabinet Committee on Government Purchase (CCGP) approved 11 proposals involving Tk 2,579.30 crore.
The meeting was held virtually with the Finance Minister in the chair.
Regarding the World Bank's report that the country's GDP growth will be 5.1 percent, the finance minister said, "First we have to see whether what the World Bank says has been done so far. Even if there are some plus-minuses, we still can't find a match there. We have a projection for the fiscal year 2021-22 and we will be able to implement it. We have said that the growth rate for the current financial year is 6.1."
The way the macroeconomic trend has turned positive in May-June towards the end of the financial year, we believe we can achieve above 6.1 percent of GDP growth, he said adding "That achievement will be above all in South Asia. It's only a matter of days before you see if it's okay."
Asked whether the vaccine would be available from China in time, he said this issue was not discussed in the meeting.
I cannot comment for good reason, he said, adding, if you want to know about this, you can get information from the concerned ministry (health).
Mustafa Kamal said we rejected accepting data on the new poor that came out earlier through surveys done by private research organisations to measure the effect of Covid-induced income loss.
Over the last one year, Brac Institute for Governance and Development and Power and Participation Research Centre, Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) and South Asian Network on Economic Modeling (SANEM) found in their surveys that poverty rates rose to 35 per cent to 43 per cent as many lost income opportunities in the wake of countrywide shutdown and resultant economic slowdown.
The government agencies namely Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) did not do any survey during the pandemic and it maintains the poverty rate at 20.5 percent of population.
Replying to a question after the meeting, Kamal said, "I do not accept this data on new poor. It is important to know the source of the data list, which says the country has 2 crore or 1 crore or 10 new poor."
He said the government cannot accept any data if they are not released by institutions like Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) or Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS).
The Finance Minister further said, "Optical fiber cable connections need to be established in the hilly areas of Bandarban, Khagrachari and Rangamati. We need to increase connectivity. We have to lay the cable to do that. We have given permission to do that, they can do it. The Department of Information Communication and Technology will do the job."
However, the cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs approved a proposal on establishing a permanent network in remote areas, under the project "Broadband Connectivity of Telecommunication in Disadvantaged Areas (Connected Bangladesh)".
After the meeting, Additional Secretary of the Cabinet Division Md Shamsul Arefin said initiatives have been taken to set up optical fiber networks in a total of 59 unions in three hilly districts – Bandarban, Rangamati and Khagrachari.
Considering the security risks and environmental constraints as the hilly unions are very remote, he said, the committee approved the proposal to procure an optical fiber network under direct purchase method (DPM) through Bangladesh Army.
However, among the 11 approval purchase proposals included 6 from the Department of Road Transport and Highways, 2 from the Department of Local Government, 1 from the Department of Public Safety, 1 from the Ministry of Water Resources and 1 from the Ministry of Labor and Employment.
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I didn't sleep particularly well, of course, after my marathon the night before. I didn't have any caffeinated gels or anything. I just think I was over exerted and it seemed like my body was still burning insane amounts of calories post race. Plus I had the occasional cramp.
Granted, though, this marathon I finished a LOT better than most, and when the sun finally came up the next morning I was ready to take on Vegas.
Sunday was all about the marathon. But in short, I did put $20 into a Planet Moolah slot machine at Casino Royale and wound up getting a bit of entertainment out of it. I didn't win jack though. Normally, I don't bother going in there, but they do have a Subway Sandwich store where I bought a $9.50 veggie delite sandwich. The same one cost me $4.25 today. Sigh, and Las Vegas entities wonder why the numbers are down.
Worth the paper it was printed on.
I also put a $40 bet on the over for the Lions / Cardinals game. I figured with two raging offenses the points would go over 41.5. I couldn't have been more wrong.
Luckily that was ALL the gambling I did that day.
So down $60 for the day and about $10 for food.
On the plus side, while I was eating my food up in the room, Shari made a good $100 or so on an Aruze Ultra Stack game in the Mirage. She had had no luck the previous day but at one point, she was up over $200. She wound up eating for about $20 for the day.
I was starving when I woke up. Luckily I had some snacks in the room.
After the Vegas traffic died down we headed out to the Red Rock Casino on the west side of Summerlin. Their buffet and gambling was recommended to me by a friend of mine named Paul (also a fellow runner). You can see his blog here.
I drove clear to the west side of Summerlin via the Summerlin Expressway before heading south. After a wrong turn or two I found the casino.
I expected another Vegas style casino, but this one resembled more of an Indian variety. It was very opulent though and clean. It was also new and they had a huge slot floor. I didn't find my favorite slot machines there, but they did have some of the Aruse Multi Stack games as well as a ton of Planet Moolahs.
We signed up for their player's club card and wandered around a bit. Starving, we got into line for the buffet -- wait a minute a line? In Summerlin? On a Monday morning?
I stuffed myself silly. I hadn't had a "real" meal in a while and I was starving from my marathon the night before.
After eating we gambled a bit. I wound up making about $20 profit on a variety of machines. Nothing big, but enough to keep me entertained. Shari wasn't having any luck whatsoever.
I put $20 into an Ultra Stack machine and got very little for it. Shari wasn't having any luck. We checked out the casino (it was fairly small by most standards) and they really didn't have any of my favorite machines. I did make a very small profit on a Planet Moolah game. I then jumped on to a Mr Cashman. I was betting the minimum, about 25 cents and I was getting a lot of play for my money. Not much was coming up on the reels, but Mr Cashman was making a lot of appearances, giving me some decent money. I even won the mini jackpot for $38. After a while I found myself up about $40 from this place.
Next to the Rampart is the Suncoast Casino. It is another Boyd casino so our cards were good there. We've been to the Rampart plenty of times, but never made the 1/4 mile drive down Rampart Blvd to the Suncoast. Being that traffic was starting to get crazy we figured we'd at least check it out and possibly have dinner there.
The casino reminded me a lot of the South Pointe Casino in Henderson. The floor wasn't anything spectacular but they certainly had a TON of slot machines. When I walked in I saw a bunch of Fu Dao Le like machines but they were of the Rising Dragon variety, which I don't normally play (it seems to cater to people who want to bet the max). I had hopes I'd find at least one of the Fu Dao Le-like machines on the floor, but alas, no such luck.
However, I did spot my old friend Leonidas. He was in a bank of Incredible Technology games and I was so excited to finally get to play; I hadn't played since spring. I plunked in a $50 bill and wound up playing for about 20 minutes. I got a cheesy bonus round, and a few "big wins" of $10 or so, but soon me and my money were departed. I was about ready to kick our "friendship" to the curb.
Shari tried some new machines as well and I went to a Planet Moolah and a Mr Cashman, but I was having zero luck here. Soon my profit for the day had turned into a deficit.
It was still too early to head back and we wound up killing some time in the awesome sports book watching Monday Night Football. After about 30 minutes we got up and swiped our loyalty cards just to see what we had on them. Lo and behold I had a two-for-one buffet and a bunch of other freebies. Yeah for me.
I wasn't exactly starving, but I seemed to have a bottomless pit.
We gambled some more afterwards but my bad luck continued. It just seemed like I couldn't win anything. After about another 20 minutes and down about $80 we took off back to the Mirage. We left so late that traffic was free and clear.
We gambled a bit more at the Mirage, but to be honest, I don't remember how well I did. I think I got a very small profit on Fu Dao Le and was so excited just to make money that I called it a night on a positive note.
I actually slept like a log all night long. I was so exhausted and it felt good to sleep in somewhat late the next morning.


text:
AccountingCollege Accounting (Book Only): A Career ApproachRecord the following transactions in general journal form for Ford Education Outfitters and Romero Textbooks, Inc. a. Ford Educational Outfitters bought merchandise on account from Romero Textbooks, Inc., invoice no. 10594, $1,875.34; terms net 30 days; FOB destination. Romero Textbooks, Inc., paid $93.80 for shipping. b. Ford Education Outfitters received credit memo no. 513A from Romero Textbooks, Inc., for merchandise returned, $135.78.
Record the following transactions in general journal form for Ford Education Outfitters and Romero Textbooks, Inc. a. Ford Educational Outfitters bought merchandise on account from Romero Textbooks, Inc., invoice no. 10594, $1,875.34; terms net 30 days; FOB destination. Romero Textbooks, Inc., paid $93.80 for shipping. b. Ford Education Outfitters received credit memo no. 513A from Romero Textbooks, Inc., for merchandise returned, $135.78.
College Accounting (Book Only): A ...
Scott + 1 other
Publisher: South-Western College Pub
1 Asset, Liability, Owner's Equity, Revenue, And Expense Accounts2 T Accounts, Debits And Credits, Trial Balance, And Financial Statements3 The General Journal And The General Ledger4 Adjusting Entries And The Work Sheet5 Closing Entries And The Post-closing Trial Balance6 Bank Accounts, Cash Funds, And Internal Controls7 Employee Earnings And Deductions8 Employer Taxes, Payments, And Reports9 Sales And Purchases10 Cash Receipts And Cash Payments10A The Voucher System Of Accounting11 Work Sheet And Adjusting Entries12 Financial Statements, Closing Entries, And Reversing Entries12A The Statement Of Cash FlowsA Methods Of DepreciationB Bad DebtsC Inventory MethodsD Notes Payable And Notes ReceivableE Departmental Accounting
Chapter Questions
Problem 1QY
Problem 10QY
Problem 1DQ
Problem 10DQ
Problem 1E
Problem 10E
Problem 1PB
Problem 1A
Problem 1CP
Chapter 9, Problem 6E
Record the following transactions in general journal form for Ford Education Outfitters and Romero Textbooks, Inc.
a. Ford Educational Outfitters bought merchandise on account from Romero Textbooks, Inc., invoice no. 10594, $1,875.34; terms net 30 days; FOB destination. Romero Textbooks, Inc., paid $93.80 for shipping.
b. Ford Education Outfitters received credit memo no. 513A from Romero Textbooks, Inc., for merchandise returned, $135.78.
Ch. 9 - Which of the following is true about the Sales...Ch. 9 - What is the accounts receivable ledger? a. A...Ch. 9 - Using the information contained in the accounts...Ch. 9 - Which of the following is a written statement...Ch. 9 - What does the 2 in 2/10, n/30 mean? a. Pay in 2...Ch. 9 - Which of the following is a subsidiary ledger that...Ch. 9 - The schedule of accounts payable lists each...Ch. 9 - If the seller assumes the entire cost of...Ch. 9 - Under the perpetual inventory system, how does the...Ch. 9 - Purchases on account of merchandise for resale...
Ch. 9 - What is the difference between a wholesale...Ch. 9 - For each of the following accounts, identify...Ch. 9 - What is the purpose of each of the following? a....Ch. 9 - Why is an accounts receivable ledger or an...Ch. 9 - Why is it a good practice to post daily to the...Ch. 9 - With regard to goods sold and purchased, explain...Ch. 9 - Explain the meaning and importance of the shipping...Ch. 9 - Describe the four procedures that most companies...Ch. 9 - Describe the posting procedures to the general...Ch. 9 - Describe the procedure for posting each of the...Ch. 9 - Who issues a credit memorandum and why?Ch. 9 - What is the difference between a periodic...Ch. 9 - Record the following transactions in general...Ch. 9 - Post the following entry to the general ledger and...Ch. 9 - Record the following transactions in general...Ch. 9 - Journalize the following transactions in general...Ch. 9 - Post the following entry to the general ledger and...Ch. 9 - Record the following transactions in general...Ch. 9 - Record the following transactions for a perpetual...Ch. 9 - Toby Company had the following sales transactions...Ch. 9 - Williams Corporation had the following purchases...Ch. 9 - Kelley Company has completed the following October...Ch. 9 - Bell Florists sells flowers on a retail basis....Ch. 9 - Berrys Pet Store records purchase transactions in...Ch. 9 - Shirleys Beauty Store records sales and purchase...Ch. 9 - The following transactions relate to Hawkins,...Ch. 9 - Gomez Company sells electrical supplies on a...Ch. 9 - Patterson Appliance uses a three-column purchases...Ch. 9 - Abbott Florists sells flowers on a retail basis....Ch. 9 - Lowerys Pet Depot records purchase transactions in...Ch. 9 - Mays Beauty Store records sales and purchase...Ch. 9 - The following transactions relate to Khan, Inc., a...Ch. 9 - R. J. Hinton Company sells electrical supplies on...Ch. 9 - West Bicycle Shop uses a three-column purchases...Ch. 9 - Jax Mercantile Co. has been northern Colorados...Ch. 9 - You are the bookkeeper at a small merchandising...Ch. 9 - Following is a trial balance prepared just before...Ch. 9 - Sales and Purchases Ms. Valli of All About You Spa...
The actual cash received from cash sales was 71,315, and the amount indicated by the cash register total was 71...
Costs that cannot be affected by any future action are called a. differential costs. b. sunk costs. c. inventor...
Percent of sales method At the end of the current year, Accounts Receivable has a balance of 3,460,000, Allowan...
A net present value analysis used to evaluate a proposed equipment acquisition indicated a 7,900 net present va...
In rimes of rising prices, the inventory cost method that will yield the highest cost of goods sold is (a) LIFO...
Explain the GFS backup technique. Is it used for sequential files or direct access techniques? Explain.
Capital and revenue expenditures On February 14, Garcia Associates Co. paid 2,300 to repair the transmission on...
How is setup time related to lead time?
Accounts Payable and Cash Discounts Byrd Company had the following transactions during 2019 and 2020: On Decemb...
(Rational Self-Interest) Discuss the impact of rational self-interest on each of the following decisions: a. Wh...
Many large companies monitor Twitter and Facebook posts. They have discovered social media as a tool for averti...
Rate yourself on the following 15 behaviors and characteristics, according to the following scale. = Strongly d...
Explain how reducing a government budget deficit makes future generations better off. What fiscal policy might ...
How are inflation and unemployment related in the short run?
INTEGRATED CASE NEW WORLD CHEMICALS INC. FINANCIAL FORECASTING Sue Wilson, the new financial manager of New Wor...
Using the data in exercise 2, calculate the marginal factor cost.
Suppose that in a year an American worker can produce 100 shirts or 20 computers and a Chinese worker can produ...
Contrast how marketing plans differ at various levels in an organization.
The Bureau of Transportation Statistics Omnibus Household Survey is conducted annually and serves as an informa...
(Varieties of Oligopolies) Do the firms in an oligopoly act independently or interdependently? Explain your ans...
Compare the four forms of competition.
Assume that a manager can obtain information from the organizations data-base in three ways: by direct inquiry ...
What is a government budget deficit? How does it affect interest rates, investment, and economic growth?
RESIDUAL DIVIDEND MODEL Walsh Company is considering three independent projects, each of which requires a 4 mil...
If the business community becomes more optimistic about the profitability of capital, the _____ curve for loana...
Analyze the components of the consumer decision-making process
Entries for installment note transactions On January 1, 2016, Hebron Company issued a 175,000, five-year, 8% in...
A business had revenues of 679,000 and operating expenses of 588,000. What was the amount of (A) net loss or (B...
The beginning inventory for Funky Party Supplies and data on purchases and sales for a three-month period are s...
A random telephone survey of 1021 adults (aged 18 and older) was conducted by Opinion Research Corporation on b...
Since the Fed has begun paying interest on bank reserves at the Fed, do banks still want to avoid holding exces...
Why is the NFV of a relatively long-term project (one for which a high percentage of its cash flows occurs in t...
Suppose you are a director of an energy company that has three divisionsnatural gas, oil, and retail (gas stati...
Describe the direct method of reporting cash flows from operating activities.
Explain how electronic data interchange (EDI) is used to link two companies business processes together.
Explain the view of those economists who are skeptical of the efficient markets hypothesis.
Use the percentage method to compute the federal income taxes to withhold from the wages or salaries of each em...
Metric analysis of transactions Using transactions listed in P2-i for Stanley Insurance Inc. indicate the effec...
Post-closing trial balance An accountant prepared the following post-closing trial balance: Security Services C...
What factors are making re-shoring and nearshoring more attractive as part of an organizations worldwide sourci...
Silverado, Inc., is a closely held brokerage firm that has been very successful over the past five years, consi...
If GDP is 400 billion and the countrys population is 100 million, does it follow that each individual in the co...
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What is the deadweight loss of monopoly?
A local energy provider offers a landowner 180,000 for the exploration rights to natural gas on a certain site ...
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