text:
Commencement: Where there's pomp...
Commencement: Where there's pomp and also circumstance …
May 1, 2013 | Anna Rimel
It's that time again: Commencement! All your years of hard work have finally paid off, and a diploma will soon be in hand (at least the commencement ceremony will provide you with the idea of the diploma while the real one will take a couple of months to be mailed to you). Incidentally, what do you know about the commencements of yesteryear?
The modern day commencement address and speaker were introduced to Indiana University in 1892, when student presentations had been whittled down to a few orations and poems delivered two days before the actual commencement ceremony took place.
With over 10,000 undergraduates eligible to graduate this May, the size contrast to IU's class of 1912 is rather startling:
IU graduating class of 1912.
December 1942 marked the first time a winter commencement took place, with 580 graduates.
First winter commencement, December 10, 1942.
On December 7, 1941, the United States officially entered into WWII after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. The Indiana Daily Student (IDS) of December 20, 1942 addressed the many changes that Indiana University underwent in 1941, including the inauguration of the "speed it up" program.
The IDS reported: "New military units for university students, the establishment of a training school for both men and women in the Navy and a war-adjusting curriculum within a year made life on campus quite different for the students who had entered school when America was still saying 'if,' instead of 'when we get into the war.'"
There was also a Spring commencement that year:
Spring commencement, May 10, 1942
The university stopped conducting December commencement ceremonies after December 1944. Intermittent February commencement ceremonies took place until 1954, when Indiana University went back to a single commencement ceremony at the end of the academic year.
Due to an increasing number of college students, May 1980 was the first time the university conducted two spring commencements, one in the morning, and one in the afternoon on the same day. In 1984, commencement was separated into three ceremonies, spanning two days. In 1988, the university conducted the first outdoor commencement ceremony in 17 years, allowing for a single ceremony for all graduates that year.
In 1989, a resurging interest in winter commencement led to winter graduates being given a reception in their honor.
A newspaper clipping from January 1989 reported:
"About 1400 students graduating in December 1989 might have a commencement if a university committee discovers enough interest. The University hasn't conducted winter commencements since World War II, when many soldiers couldn't attend Spring ceremonies. Currently, December graduates may attend commencement in the Spring before or after their actual graduation date."
A November 1989 clipping stated:
"December grads will have reception in their honor on December 9 in the Musical Arts Center. Kenneth Gros Louis, University vice president and Indiana University Bloomington chancellor, said about 20 percent of IU grads finish their coursework in December."
In 1994, the university replaced the December graduates' reception/luncheon with ceremonies in the graduates' individual schools. It was then noted that a mid-year commencement could be added in the future if the number of December graduates continued to increase. Finally, 1997 saw the first reinstatement of midyear graduation since 1944, and a winter commencement was held on December 22, 1997.
In 2010, for the first time, Indiana University implemented separate commencement ceremonies for undergraduates and graduate students.
A November 2009 press release stated:
"Moving to a separate ceremony for graduate students will allow more time to focus on their distinct achievements and observe the academic tradition of hooding Ph. D and doctoral candidates. Likewise, the undergraduate ceremonies … will focus exclusively on the undergraduate experience and include new emphasis on undergraduate achievement, including the addition of undergraduate voices to the official program."
You can read more about IU's commencement history, including an extensive listing of commencement speakers and speech titles (if available), since 1892 on the IU Archives website.
Logo from the 1901 commencement program.
And congratulations, grads!
And just because I have to get this in: Did you know that Teddy Roosevelt spoke at IU during spring commencement in 1918?
Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt at left, and William Lowe Bryan at podium.
Tags: commencement, Events, Just for fun
New databases for April
The Curious Story of the Electropoise


text:
Q: which is the better way of coding Might seem like a silly question. I just wanted to know which is better way of coding.
Option 1:
if(a==null) {
    a=getA();
    return a;
} else {
    return a;
}

Option 2:
if(a==null) {
    a=getA();
}
return a;

variable a is a static variable used to cache the getA() and avoid calling it multiple times.

A: There's a 3rd alternative which is even shorter - using the ternary conditional operator :
return a != null ? a : getA();

EDIT: I assumed a is a local variable, and therefore doesn't have to be assigned if it's null. If, on the other hand, it's an instance variable used as a cache (to avoid calling getA() multiple times), you need to assign the result of getA() to a, in which case I'd use your second alternative, since it's shorter, and thus clearer (you can still use the ternary conditional operator with assignment - return a != null ? a : (a = getA()); - but I find that less clear).

A: I prefer the second choice as there is only one return statement, and this can help debugging (you only need to put in one breakpoint rather than two). Also you're arguably duplicating code in the first choice.
But in this instance I'd prefer using the ternary conditional:
return a == null ? getA() : a;

A: I prefer the second option, The best practice is have only one return statement in a method. That will be the more readable code.

A: The second is more concise, and could be better because of this, but this is a subjective matter and no-one can give you a particularly objective answer. Whatever you like or fits into your teams coding standards is the answer.
As has been pointed out, there is a shorter way to do this:
return a!=null ? a : getA();

but again, it entirely depends on what you and your team prefer. Personally I prefer the second way you showed to this, as it is more readable (in my opinion).

A: I'm assuming for a second that a is a class member and that getA() is a method that creates an instance of a.
The best solution should be to push this logic in the called method.  In other words, rather than have:
void someFunction() {
    // logic
    if(a==null) {
        a=getA();
    }
    return a;
}

A getA() {
    // creation logic of instance A
    return newAInstance;
}

You should have:
void someFunction() {
    // logic

    return getA();
}

A getA() {
    if(a == null) {
        // creation logic of instance A
    }
    return a;
}

The cost of the method call is minimal and worth not having to deal with when a will be instantiated.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
You are here: Home / Holydays / Passover Album of 5766
Holydays, Judaism, Music
Passover Album of 5766
Cross-posted from Jewlicious.com
What are you going to put on the stereo to make cleaning for Passover joyous? Something with a beat to keep you moving, something to inspire you in this ancient ritual of destroying chometz, something to get you in the Seder mood. The Rabbi's pick for Passover Album of 5766 is… the re-mastered The So Called Seder: A Hip Hop Haggadah.
Hip-Hop Hagadah is a stereophonic journey, a creative and wonderful tribute to the festival of Freedom. Using an endless array of samples from older Passover recordings, original lyrics in English and Yiddish, unstoppable beats and rhythms, Hip Hop Hagaddah is an essential part of the contemporary musical celebration of being Jewish. One note of caution: parental discretion is advised on some tracks. This is not an Uncle Moishe and the Hip Hop Seder.
From the producers:
THE SO CALLED SEDER: A HIP HOP HAGGADAH, it's newly produced, recorded and mastered in NYC. Features cameos by Wu Tang Clan's Killah Priest, Matisyahu, Mr. Bungle's Trevor Dunn, Montreal's queen of country Katie Moore, David Krakauer, Susan and Elaine Hoffman Watts, and more.
Eliyahu Hanavi has not been sung with this much soul since Yossel Rosenblatt crooned in Warsaw.
I cannot claim to have done a survey of all the Passover albums out there. I browsed through some of the titles at the JCC Passover Store and was shocked by the sticker price. So I went over to iTunes and did a search for Passover and found a surprising paucity of new Passover music.
So honorable mention goes out to two albums: Reeboot Stereophonic has issued an EP titled Passover Re-mix, where Gershon Kingsley mixes it up with a Irving Fields Trio album. Debbie Friedman has another album Mayan Hagadah in Music, very much sticking to her unique sound. But nothing got my toes taping like So Called.
Come to think of it, if some companies had given us some advanced
copies, well I am sure that we could have reviewed all the albums in their entirety. And that goes for new Jewish books too. And of course, new Jewish travel destinations and cruises. I mean, I am sure that we would find the time from amongst our esteemed blogging conglomerate to test out Jewish destinations. One of our crew has already done one of these adventures and lets hope more is on the way.
And did I mentioned cookbooks? There were definitely as many new cookbooks on the shelves as there were new Hagadahs. Hagadah choice of the year? Hold your matzahs…
April 4, 2006 /0 Comments/by rabbiyonah
http://rabbiyonah.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/cropped-RabbiYonahbookCover11.jpg 0 0 rabbiyonah http://rabbiyonah.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/cropped-RabbiYonahbookCover11.jpg rabbiyonah2006-04-04 22:44:152006-04-04 22:44:15Passover Album of 5766
May the best "bentch" win How student funds promote hate and proselytism at Long Beach State

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Look up investment synonym in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
investment synonymEuroglaze trade customers are seeing returns on the company's ongoing marketing investment, with leads generated now being distributed directly to them. Torquay's Fenster Fabrications is set to feature in an upcoming episode of ITV 1's hit home improvement show Love Your Home and Garden. Martin Nettleton adds: "We invested in the campaign to target those larger installation and distribution companies increasingly dissatisfied with the big fabricators who are starting to compete with them by setting up their own networks of trade counters and distribution outlets. Managing Director Martin Nettleton says: "Last month, we saw a record number of interactions from our website as a result of our advertising and PR, with enquiries coming directly from the contact form online, via email and via calls into our customer service department.
This scottish investment trust share price page lists articles associated with the title Seo.
If an business investment relief led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.


text:
Q: SubSonic Schema Errors I am running VS2008 in .net 3.5 and trying to get SubSonic 2.2 running. My database is called Test, the table in the DB is called TestTable. It is being run on SQL Server 2005. I get the following "warnings":

Could not find schema information for the element 'SubSonicService'.
Could not find schema information for the attribute 'defaultProvider'.
Could not find schema information for the element 'providers'.
Could not find schema information for the element 'clear'.
Could not find schema information for the element 'add'.
Could not find schema information for the attribute 'name'.
Could not find schema information for the attribute 'type'.
Could not find schema information for the attribute 'connectionStringName'.
Could not find schema information for the attribute 'generatedNameSpace'.

The problem is that the namespace is not being generated so I cannot get much working. The line "SubSonic.Generated.Tables" will bring up in the intellisence the name of my table, so I know that it can connect and it is obviously doing SOMETHING. But I cannot reference my tables like classes. Below I have included the section of the web.config that the "warnings" reference.
<SubSonicService defaultProvider="GeekPower">
    <providers>
      <clear/>
      <add name="GeekPower" type="SubSonic.SqlDataProvider, SubSonic" connectionStringName="GeekPower" generatedNameSpace="GeekPower" />
    </providers>
  </SubSonicService>

Any help would be appreciated. I have been searching for hours, but no fixes that I have found work.
Thanks!

A: Do you have any classes in the project that create a namespace conflict with the generating classes?  Try regenerating with a different namespace like GeekPower.Foo.

A: You may want to see:

*

*Doesn't linq to sql miss the point?
and

*How to get into subsonic?
Especially, if you are just getting started.
Good luck!

A: Have you actually generated the classes with the sonic.exe program? That will generate the .cs files that you then import into the project. To get rid of the warnings, add this to the top of your .config:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<configuration xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/.NetConfiguration/v2.0">
  <configSections>
    <section name="SubSonicService" type="SubSonic.SubSonicSection, SubSonic" requirePermission="false" />
  </configSections>
</configuration>

A: Those warnings are because the XML doesn't recognize the config like Jason was saying. You can ignore them - or you can set the configuration to .NetConfiguration/v3.5

A: Hmm.  Sorry to reopen this one guys, but I think we can nail it and it doesn't appear to have been nailed yet.
I have exactly the same issue with the warnings, and pretty much exactly the same config.
My DAL works perfectly, builds, there is nothing wrong in broad terms, but I get the warnings in every project I have ever used SubSonic for.  It's an irritation, nothing more, but an irritation I'd love to get rid of.
If I add

<configuration xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/.NetConfiguration/v2.0">

or v3.5, to the config as suggested, I just get extra messages
Message 1   Could not find schema information for the element 'http://schemas.microsoft.com/.NetConfiguration/v2.0:configuration'
or similar, so that doesn't seem to be the problem.  It's not the config file per se, only the SubSonicService section.
The original messages seem reasonable - there should be some file (XML Schema ?) which tells VS the tags which are allowed in the SubSonicService section, and would presumably give us some much needed intellisense too.
This file appears to be missing.  Is this just a case of 'can't be bothered' ? (Rob ? - no humbug by the way, we've all been there !)  If so, can anyone point me at a reasonably simple set of instructions on how to create the file and apply it, and I'll do so and share it.


We want to establish a center of excellence for knowledge transfer and further development of the models, tools, and techniques that BIN researchers have developed in collaboration with IBM and Ontario hospitals for care process management and analytics. The technology brings BI to hospitals and promises enhanced care process management including significant reduction of patients' wait time, especial in emergency departments. Interest has been expressed in such technologies from other hospitals in Canada and in the U.S.
We would like to hire a post doc who has BIN research experience to write grant proposals to fund the center, create a permanent demo showcasing our reference architecture for care process management and analytics to date, develop and deliver training on BIN models, tools and techniques.
– Establish a center of excellence to maintain the existing reference architecture that combines the latest IBM products for Business Process Management, Data Integration and Business Intelligence with the models, tools and techniques our research has developed for care process management and analytics.
– Continue to train students, researchers and healthcare professionals on such technologies.
– Continue ongoing research and expand the knowledge base of case studies and clinical trials that validate the efficacy of our research results. This includes expanding our collaboration networks to other hospitals, companies, and researchers.
The funds will contribute to the salary of one post doctorate researcher who will help in writing funding proposals and publish scientific articles, as well as development of showcase material for knowledge transfer.
We have successfully validated our research with a case study supporting Acute Coronary Syndrome clinical pathway at William Osler Hospital in Toronto in collaboration with IBM. The Ottawa hospital and Queensway Carleton hospital have expressed interest with IBM in joining us in the creation of center of excellence to continue this research past the bin project. We have also had preliminary conversations with hospitals in the United States and the rest of Canada.
Research results have been published in a number of journals, books, conferences, and workshops.
A survey of 100 clinicians and information professionals who evaluated the Osler case study showed that our proposed reference architecture will dramatically improve care process management and can be deployed within hospitals within 2 to 5 years time frame.
This research has the potential to significantly improvement operations, management and predictability of health care. In particular 1) track in real time whether service delivery is being carried out within medical guidelines limits 2) integrate location information with business process management using smart phones and tablets to pinpoint exactly where patients and clinicians are in terms of location and clinical pathway 3) deliver in real time alerts and relevant patients data to the right person at the right location at the right time.
This entry was posted in Business Intelligence, Hospital Informatics, Research and tagged Business Intelligence, Hospital Informatics, Research on July 11, 2013 by Omar Badreddin.
Patients are facing excessive wait times at hospitals, especially within Emergency Departments. Long wait times expose patients to unnecessary risks, and are very costly to hospitals. In addition, a number of governmental and medical guidelines impose limits on patient wait times. This has prompted hospitals to explore technologies that can enhance patients flow and reduce wait times.
This research aims to address patients wait time issues by deploying a Care Process Management system (CPM) that models and monitor clinical pathways as a process model. The proposed approach provides real time dashboards where hospital administrators can view current patient states and can predict when a patient wait time will exceed a specified limit. This enables the administrator to take corrective action in a timely manner to address the cause of the delay.


text:
Corps Makes Contribution to Feature Film Making
By Ronnie Schelby
District Public Affairs
The film crew set up a crane with a camera to take imagery of action taking place under a bridge along the Rio Puerco river.
Project Manager Eddie Paulsgrove talks to Assistant Location Manager Jennifer Joyce about the intended film location.
New Mexico has become a hotbed for the television and movie industry within the last few years. Although the number of shows and movies being produced here ebb and flow, there are usually many productions taking place in this beautiful and picturesque state.
The Albuquerque District often "plays a role" during the production of these projects, as representatives from production companies contact us for guidance and film permits.
Depending on the film's needs, different sections of the District can become involved, but you can bet regulatory, real estate and public affairs are in the mix. Normally, all three sections are notified when a film will take place on Corps' land or in jurisdictional areas.
Recently, the District was contacted by Rebecca Puck Stair, location manager for an upcoming feature film called "The Host," based on the book by Stephanie Meyer who is the author of the "Twilight" books. Stair wanted to make sure, while planning to shoot at a particular location with a waterway in New Mexico, that all of the Corps' rules and regulations are followed.
The query started with Francina Martinez, real estate specialist in charge of film permits, who determined the film location was not on land managed by the Corps. However, because it was taking place along the Rio Puerco River, Martinez knew regulatory needed to be involved.
Eddie Paulsgrove, project manager in the Regulatory Division, asked to meet with Jennifer Joyce, the film's assistant location manager, at the film site, to understand what was planned.
"Regulatory Division has jurisdiction over all the waters of the United States below the ordinary high water mark, per the Clean Water Act," Paulsgrove said. "This ordinary high water mark varies and must be determined on site."
According to Paulsgrove, most of the employees in regulatory are multidisciplinary, physical scientists and dabble in everything from archeology to biology. When they do a site visit, they determine whether permits are required for the proposed activity and determine current stream or wetland conditions by looking at the landscape and ecosystem. This includes soils, vegetation, habitat, channel dynamics and water flow patterns. Once site conditions are identified, regulatory works with the production staff to understand their needs.
"Regulatory determines how the project will impact a location in the micro and macro environment," Paulsgrove said. "We are here to educate and assist the members of the film crew in understanding the bigger picture."
When Joyce explained the scene involved some trucks being driven on the side of the river, Paulsgrove wanted to determine if there were any recent plantings or other bank stabilization efforts, such as wire-wrapped rip rap, where they wanted to film that could be impacted by the movie.
"The Corps wants to ensure the integrity of the channel is maintained," Paulsgrove said.
By seeing the site, Paulsgrove noted that salt cedar, or tamarisk, was everywhere. Tamarisk is a noxious, invasive species that grows profusely around water bodies. However, even though invasive, the mature, established trees have become habitat for the southwestern willow flycatcher, an endangered species in New Mexico. Therefore, he advised Joyce that they could take out the younger saplings but not disturb the mature, established trees.
Paulsgrove also explained that vehicles entering the water must be steam cleaned ahead of time, and before leaving the scene, so they won't introduce any invasive species or spread any they encounter. Paulsgrove then pointed out areas of rip rap and asked that it not be disturbed, and he asked that the dirt around the bank get raked back to the original landscape as much as possible.
"We try to leave each location better than we found it" Stair said. "We want to be able to come back and work on further projects and are interested in establishing a good relationship."
Ultimately, she said the relationship comes down to mutual respect. The film companies respect the law and reach out to various government and state agencies to not only get film permits, but to understand requirements and expectations. In return, the Corps and other agencies mutually respect the wishes of the film agency by not taking inappropriate photos, which include anything to be seen in the film (or actors) and by staying out of the crew's way.
When and Why are Film Permits Necessary?
If filming is to occur on federal, or public, land, it requires a permit. Government agencies are stewards of the public's land, and no one can have exclusive rights to the land, like is often required when filming a movie, unless they pay the government for the use. However, if the project is non-profit, it can be exempt. A small amount of film permit money taken in from profit-generating films goes to the agency, but the money mostly goes to the general fund.
The more involved the type of use, the longer it will take to get a permit. For example, if the film requires crashing a helicopter into federal land, meetings must be held to determine the environmental impacts and it takes time. Anyone interested in a film permit or with questions about filming on land managed by the Corps should call 505-342-4829.
Related Story: Abiquiu Project Staff Enjoy Movie Partly Filmed at Site
USACE


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text:
Richland Township is a township in Ford County, Kansas, USA.  As of the 2000 census, its population was 931. This had declined to 893 at the 2020 census.

Geography
Richland Township covers an area of  and contains no incorporated settlements.

References

 USGS Geographic Names Information System (GNIS)

External links
 US-Counties.com
 City-Data.com

Townships in Ford County, Kansas
Townships in Kansas

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บริการดี เงียบสงบ รูมเซอร์วิส 24 ชม.
My only criticism is that some of the food was overly salty and I raised the issue with the hotel. Otherwise - highly recommended because of its proximity to the airport and the fact it has a choice of restaurants unlike many resorts.
The speed boat ride you may arrange through email with the hotel staff at kurumba. It was a nice short ride! 5 minutes and I was there! The island is beautiful! The homes I had stayed in were clean and spacious! Beautiful outdoor/ indoor garden setting which was so relaxing! I love the Maldives!
We stayed at Kurumba for 5 nights. Arriving after a 10hour flight, the service from the airport to check in was fantastic and smooth. So smooth, I failed to notice that we had been given the wrong type of room. We'd booked a beach front bungalow but had been given a superior room. When I realised the next day, I spoke to reception they mmediately swapped our rooms and to make up for the error, we were moved to a fantastic bungalow, beachfront, separate living room and a personal pool, an upgrade above what we originally booked, as an apology. The staff are always friendly. The food excellent, the beach beautiful (if you're not facing Male) and shallow for less confident swimmers like me. I used the fully equipped gym once and the equipment available is state of the art. The only minor con is that being 15 mins from the airport means that on one side of the island oil tankers and the city is within sight and not particularly pretty. Ask for a room facing the other direction.
I like how the customer service greeted us. Even for the smallest requests like having a birthday cake for my son, they granted it. They are also accommodating even when we already checked out, they gave you place to stay and still enjoy the comfort and amenities that are available. The room was superb and very clean and romantic! I like the view of the surroundings and the restaurants which offered a variety of food!
We stayed here for 6 nights over New Year's Eve and had a wonderful time. We stayed in a Superior Room, which was nice but for our next trip we will definitely book one of the bungalows. The beach was pristine and the water was great. Our young child loved playing on the beach and having access to a playground was a bonus. The food was amazing with a huge variety at each meal, I definitely recommend getting the all inclusive package. Every single staff member was friendly and helpful, one of the gardeners made a small bird out of leaves which our son carried around for the rest of the day. We will definitely be returning to Kurumba Maldives.
Its nice enough but its far too close to Male. There were events going on in Male and the noise was very loud. Also the cost of the 5-10 minute speedboat trip was extortionate even by Maldives standards. Its perfectly okay although the snorkelling was a disappointment, Nice staff, friendly and helpful. We love Maldives but would probably stay somewhere else next time. Don't want to put anyone off though, Kurumba is okay.
A lovely resort with so many things to do. Spa was fantastic. A perfect place to relax. The staff are really friendly and helpful in every way. The only downside - wish it was a little away from the city.
Although it's situated 12mins away from the airport (making it the closest resort), Kurumba is charming and has colourful and probably the best marine life. Don't be dishearted that one side of the island is facing Male city, the other side of Kurumba (facing away) is absolute beauty. The ineternational staffs are polite and always helpful. Our first visit won't be our last. We will be back. We miss you already Kurumba!
I had a nice short vacay at Kurumba with my family (with small children and also the elderly). Kurumba offers variety of activities, you can refer to Kurumba Journal in their website to plan your day ahead. As my mother had arthritis and can't walk for a long distance, we brought her own wheelchair to the resort, and we were glad because most of places around the resort are wheelchair-accessible...most of the staff in the resort were warm, helpful and friendly which we appreciated very much.. It is convenience to book via Agoda because they included the tax in the overall price, except for transfer fees which you hv to pay directly at the resort...you can email the resort for transfer arrangement.. I've booked 3 superior rooms with full board and requested for connecting rooms..however at the resort, we were so grateful to be upgraded to beachfront deluxe bungalows that located next to each other..yeay!. Overall, we were happy with our stay at Kurumba and hope to stay there again!
Close to airport, 15 minute boat transfer. Thr staff is extremely friendly and helpful. Everything was clean and I love the room layout. The bathroom is open and the large powerful fan in bathroom helps combat stuffiness from outside. There are two showers and his and hers sinks and a tub right in the center. The water pressure was strong and tempature easily controlled. The WiFi is strong enough to stream YouTube which is really really great. Be prepared to pay for drinks and meals. The live music was nice and relaxing.
Professional customer satisfaction by Mr. Siba. Staffs are kind and helpful. Nice view and entertainment. Gentle temperature to do outdoor activities. For those "Phobia from Lizard" please stay at home. I liked the resort so much. Again thanks Mr. Siba for everything. Cheers.
If you really want to stay away from the busy work life, this is one of the places to go!! My wife & kids enjoyed it to the full & we love the beaches & water sports within the island. Bit expensive stay & food. Luckily we had free nice & good breakfast! Good friendly staffs & nice facilities especially for kids!!
Maldives has a lot of islands and with it resorts inc Male. But each islands have unique features including that one of Kurumba's. If you prefer a long stretch of perfect powdery white sand beach, near the airport which is just 15 mins away by speedboat, luxurious accomodation, facilities and service, hospitable and friendly staff and an atmosphere of serenity plus a wide variety of restaurants then Kurumba is the place to be. They even offer free cocktail nights and have guests who have come back to this hotel several times. I will definitely come back for more. Thanks Kurumba for an excellent service.


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Our Media Quality Reports help you invest in digital with greater confidence by illustrating the state of online inventory today, for both display and video ads, across desktop and mobile. To provide this report, we analysed data from 300 billion global impressions. The latest media quality report analysed data from advertising campaigns that ran between 1st January and 30th June 2017.
In the latest report, we introduced data for Japan, Spain, Italy, Brazil, and Singapore. Adding insights into these additional markets gives a greater overall view of media quality around the world. Each market has different nuances and maturity levels that need to be taken into consideration when comparing levels of ad fraud, viewability and risk to brand safety.
For the Media Quality Report, we show the impact of fraud if there are steps being taken to detect and prevent fraud (optimised against ad fraud) and the potential impact if no action is being taken (non-optimised ad fraud). When comparing non-optimised fraud numbers, we see that the Italian market has the higher potential to be impacted by fraud, with 16.1% of impressions flagged as fraudulent. Contrastingly, Italy's nearby neighbour, Spain, was found this half year to have the lowest potential impact of ad fraud, with 3.0% fraud found for non-optimised campaigns. When looking at data from impressions where proactive steps had been taken against ad fraud, we can see that the variance is greatly reduced, from 0.1% (in Singapore) up to 0.7% (in Japan).
New browser versions, new botnets, and new criminal schemes are all reasons why we see fluctuations in fraud levels across not only markets but also across devices and buy types – programmatic versus publisher direct buys. As media buying habits change, ad fraud evolves as a threat as fraudsters adapt tactics and look to game more automated processes.
The rise in awareness around brand safety concerns and the varying risks posed to both brand image and reputation when advertising online has now brought brand safety to the top of industry discussions in 2017. Looking at brand risk globally, the impressions flagged as appearing adjacent to content that poses a risk to brand reputation, we found that Brazil had the highest level of risk of all markets analysed with 10.2% of impressions flagged. This was followed closely by the US with nearly one in ten impressions flagged as appearing with inappropriate content, at 9.4%. In comparison, the lowest level of risk was seen in Singapore with 3.4% of impressions flagged as appearing next to inappropriate content, followed closely by the UK at 3.7%. Brand safety is not a new issue; it is a recurrent topic that flares up over the years and as a result we have seen many brands adjust their brand safety strategies accordingly to ensure that the risk to their reputation is minimised when advertising online.
Viewability remains a top media quality issue as we begin to shift to an industry measured by impressions seen, rather than impressions served. Brands no longer wish to pay for advertising that doesn't have the opportunity to be viewed by consumers. Alongside this, different agency groups are now setting their own definitions of viewability, in a bid to improve viewability and engagement across their clients campaigns. All these moves are bringing us closer to trading on viewability. In the H1 2017 Media Quality Report we found that Singapore achieved highest viewability with 64% of impressions being in-view as per the MRC standard – 50% of pixels rendered on screen for at least one second. The next best viewability was seen in Germany, with 58.1% of impressions meeting the MRC threshold. The markets that still have some way to go in terms of improving viewability across the board were Italy, where 60% of impressions do not meet the MRC requirement, the UK with 52% of ads are not providing the opportunity to be viewed by consumers.
The differences in media quality vary across the globe, and the report findings highlight the importance of understanding media quality variances especially when running campaigns for global audiences. Our bi-annual Media Quality Report provides the industry with a holistic view of the media landscape. With this information, you are better equipped to navigate the digital landscape, confirm your current investments, and uncover new opportunities to activate consumers. Ultimately, every impression should have the opportunity to be effective – brand safe, fraud free and the opportunity to be seen – by understanding this first, marketers can then make informed decisions to ensure the best campaign performance and publishers can ensure the best efficiency of their inventory.
Download our Media Quality Reports here.


Difficulties with speech, language and communication can impact on so many areas of a person's life; developing and maintaining friendships, coping in unfamiliar or pressurised situations, learning, day to day routines, self-esteem etc. Speech and Language Therapy can help by working directly onn identified difficulties as well as problem solving situations and advising and educating others on how to best support that individual.
My name is Rebecca Ford and I am highly experienced Speech and Language Therapist with over 18 years experience working with children, young people and adults with speech, language and communication difficulties.
All new clients will need an assessment so I can identify their areas of need. After this, we can decide on next steps; this could be regular weekly or fortnightly therapy, monitoring and reviews (for example every 3 months) or one-off advice.
I aim to make therapy fun, functional and motivating so I can help my clients reach their communication potential.
Appointments are available at The Broad Street Practice on Friday mornings and as of 12th January I will be offering slots on alternate Saturday mornings.


The Powers not assigned to this Federal Republic of Nigeria by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are left to the States respectively, or to the people.
There shall be equal number of States in Northern and Southern Nigeria. If upon passage of this Constitution, the States in the Northern and Southern Nigeria are Unequal, the Region with less States shall automatically be entitled to create more States to equal the number of States in the Other Region and the resolution shall said to be automatically passed without the consent of the National Assembly but with the approval of two thirds of the people residing in the area affected, within or across States lines as long as all the States concerned are either in the Northern or Southern part of Nigeria; and two thirds of the State or States Legislatures affected. Additional consent of the National Assembly shall be required if the two Regions are creating additional States on equal footing.
The National Assembly shall determine the boundary of Northern and Southern Nigeria.
No new states shall be created in Northern Nigeria except another is created in the South and vice versa. The National Assembly shall vote Concurrently on the newly proposed States from the North and South.
Abuja shall not be counted as State.
Democracy as a form of government shall be guaranteed and protected by Nigeria in every State against foreign or domestic invasion and domestic violence.
The Powers of the Federal Government of Nigeria enumerated in the 1999 Constitution (For example, the Nigeria Police Force) but not delegated to it by this Constitution shall be transferred to States in a manner prescribed in a Transitional Report by the Representatives of the States. The Constitution shall be approved by two thirds of the States to become the Law of the Land with each State having a simple Yes or No votes. The Transitional Report shall be approved by two thirds of the States to become a Statute of the Federation with each State having a simple Yes or No votes.
If the people of a State voted NO for the Transitional Report then they shall immediately upon the approval of the Constitution receive all powers due to them except Mineral resources and Ports but shall within reasonable time, as prescribed in the Transition Report, receive the ownership of their Mineral resources and Ports.
States courts must honor the judicial Proceedings, public Acts and Records of every other State. The National Assembly shall make Laws about how the judicial Proceedings, public Acts and Records shall be proved and the consequence from it.
A person charged with any crime in any state shall be returned to the State where the crime was committed on the authority of the State Governor.
Any debt of the Federation or of a State entered into before the adoption of this Constitution shall continue to be valid against the Federation and State under this new Constitution.
There shall be no religious qualification to holding a public office in Nigeria.


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Ever wish you had a simple solution to your child's seating needs that you can take with you when you are "on the go"? The Soft-Touch Liner offers an affordable alternative to other seating systems. It eliminates the need to transport heavy seating systems.
The two cushions of the Soft-Touch Liner can be attached together for storage using the attachment straps. Keep it in the trunk of your car so it is there when you need it!
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The Vatican is offering indulgences, a reduction of time spent in purgatory, to those who follow Pope Francis on Twitter during World Youth Day. As foolish as this sounds to intelligent people, we must wonder when will Catholics wake up and realize their religion teaches a false and fatal gospel that leads them on the broad road to destruction? How many more blatantly false teachings must come out of the Vatican before Catholics realized they have been deceived about life's most critical issue - the salvation of their soul?
Catholics, who believe a purifying fire will purge away their sins, are deluded victims of a fatal fabrication. The diabolical invention of a place for the purification of sins called Purgatory, is not only a flagrant denial of the sufficiency of Jesus Christ, but also a blasphemous rejection of His precious blood as the only purification for sin (1 John 1:7).
Over the centuries billions of dollars have been paid to Roman Catholic priests to obtain relief from sufferings in Purgatory's fire. The Catholic clergy has taught that the period of suffering in Purgatory can be shortened by purchasing indulgences and novenas and buying Mass cards. When a Catholic dies, money is extracted from mourning loved ones to shorten the deceased's punishment in Purgatory. We have heard of Catholics who have willed their entire estates to their religion so that perpetual masses could be offered for them after they die. It is no wonder that the Catholic religion has become the richest institution in the world. The buying and selling of God's forgiveness has been a very lucrative business for the Vatican.
Read Mike's interview from the Christian News Network on the Vatican's announcement here.


text:
Q: Convert 10001101101 (binary) to base 4 I did
$$10001101101_{2} = \\ 1*2^{0}+0*2^1+1*2^2+1*2^3+0*2^4+1*2^5+1*2^6+0*2^7+0*2^8+0*2^9+1*2^{10} = \\
1*4^0+1*4^1+2*4^1+2*4^2+1*4^3+2*4^3+1*4^5 = \\
1*4^0 + 3*4^1 + 2*4^2+3*4^3+0*4^4+1*4^5 = \\
103231\_{4} $$
The answer should be 101231. What went wrong?

A: When converting from binary to base four, you can just convert the bits two-by-two (since $4$ is a power of $2$):
$$
10001101101_2=1\,00\,01\,10\,11\,01_2\\
=1\,0\,1\,2\,3\,1_4=101231_4
$$
As to where you went wrong, your $2\cdot 4^3$ shouldn't be there as you have $0\cdot 2^7$.

A: It should be $1*2^6+\color{red}0*2^7=1*4^3+\color{red}0*2*4^3=\color{red}1*4^3$, not $3*4^3$

A: You computed $0 \cdot 2^7$ as if it was $1 \cdot 2^7$ and added the term $2 \cdot 4^3$ to third line.

By the base b expansion theorem,
$(10001101101)_2$
$= (1\cdot 2^{10}) + (0\cdot  2^{9}) + (0\cdot  2^{8}) + (0\cdot  2^{7}) + (1\cdot  2^{6}) + (1\cdot  2^{5}) + (0\cdot  2^{4}) + (1\cdot  2^{3}) + (1\cdot  2^{2}) + (0\cdot 2^{1}) + (1\cdot2^{0})$
$= 1024 + 0 + 0 + 0 + 64 + 32 + 0 + 8 + 4 + 0 + 1$
$=1024 + 64 + 32 + 8 + 4 + 1$
$=4^5 + 4^3 + (2 \cdot 4^2) + (2\cdot 4^1) + 4^1 + 4^0$
$=4^5 + 4^3 + (2 \cdot 4^2) + (3\cdot 4^1) + 4^0$
$=4^5 + 0 + 4^3 + (2 \cdot 4^2) + (3\cdot 4^1) + 4^0$
$=4^5 + (0 \cdot 4^0) + 4^3 + (2 \cdot 4^2) + (3\cdot 4^1) + 4^0$
$=(1 \cdot 4^5) + (0 \cdot 4^0) + (1 \cdot 4^3) + (2 \cdot 4^2) + (3\cdot 4^1) + (1\cdot 4^0)$
$=(101231)_4$

Also, since $4$ is the $2$nd power of $2$, there is a trick you can use in which you evaluate every pair of digits, from right to left...
$10001101101$
$1.00.01.10.11.01$
$101231$
Since $(01)_2=(1)_4, (11)_2=(3)_4, (10)_2=(2)_4, (00)_2=(0)_4$

A: $$10001101101_2 = 1133$$
$4^0 = 1$
$4^1 = 4$
$4^2 = 16$
$4^3 = 64$
$4^4 = 256$
$4^5 = 1024$
$4^6 = 4096$
The largest up to 1133 is 1024. The sixth place must be a 1.
$1133 - 1024 = 109$
The largest up to 109 is 64. The fourth place must be a 1.
$109 - 64 = 45$
The largest up to 45 is 16. $45 / 16 = 2 r 13$ The second place must be a 2
The largest up to 13 is 4. $13 / 4 = 3 r 1$ The one place must be a 3
The zero place must be 1.


SAY Plastics' James Young lifts a completed air-conditioning unit cover before sending it to a router for cutting and trimming. Mastercam Router software helps machine such large parts despite machine-size limitations.
SAY Plastics' programmer Jonathan Fake and Thomas Slaybaugh, engineering manager (standing), rely on powerful geometry creation tools in Mastercam CAD/CAM software to machine at nthe angles needed to fit within the envelope of its equipment.
Established in 1986, SAY Plastics, McSherrystown, Pa., designs and manufactures thermoformed components and packaging solutions for the rail, bus, material-handling, recreation, and entertainment industries. Services include re-engineering, protective-packaging manufacturing, design, vacuum forming, pressure forming, drape forming, CNC machining, fabrication, and assembly. The company forms a range of sheet materials, including acrylic, ABS, PVC, PC, and alloys.
Once parts are formed, operators perform surface-finish and trimming operations with CNC routers, specifically five-axis and three-axis machines. All models feature 5 Å~ 10 ft work surfaces to accommodate large parts. Despite these seemingly spacious work surfaces, SAY Plastics' programmers face machine-size limitations. Mastercam CAD/CAM software (supplied by CNC Software Inc., Tolland, Conn.) helped resolve that issue and provided a host of process improvements.
"Mastercam has powerful geometry-creation tools that I can use to machine at the angles I need to fit within the envelope of our equipment," says Thomas Slaybaugh, SAY Plastics' engineering manager. Six years ago, he began using the software almost exclusively for multi-axis curve and drill operations. Surface machining soon followed, and the company has relied on the software ever since.
SAY Plastics needed a way to push the envelope—or at least expand it. Its three-axis CNC router, used mainly for machining molds and surface finishing, has height limitations. For example, if a machinist tries to cut a 108-in. part on a machine with a 120-in. "X" travel and a 20-in. spindle, cutting both ends is problematic.
The machinist must drag or push cuts on the two opposing sides. The CAM software enables him to do just that. "Mastercam allows us to slice a model that's too high into multiple layers," said Slaybaugh.
Using high-speed Dynamic Motion toolpaths, programmers can push CNC machines right up to their hardware limitations. Dynamic Motion technology uses proprietary algorithms to detect changes in the material as the tool moves through. It engages the entire flute length of cutting tools, so air cutting is minimized or eliminated, saving wear and tear on the tools and ensuring constant chip loading. The software calculates angles, feeds and speeds, while Dynamic toolpaths capitalize on the machine's full capabilities.
Another CAM software feature that SAY Plastics programmers appreciate is the Verify function. It lets programmers check for gouges, view the finished shape of parts, and see how to include fixtures in the Verify simulation screen.
Productivity increases, and problems are visible before they ever make it to the shop floor. Programmers can verify on a separate thread while continuing to program, a productivity boost for those working with time-consuming processes such as 3D and high-speed toolpaths.
Most of SAY Plastics' part designs are created with Solidworks modeling software. Designers open a file and explore features like analyzing distance and angle and position editing to resolve potential issues. One customer partnered with SAY Plastics to design and manufacture a large plastic cover to encase a toilet.
The end product was a bathroom safety feature for people with disabilities. Fitted alongside a toilet that is fixtured to a wall, the cover fills the gap between the wall and toilet, reducing the risk of a person falling off or sliding to the floor.
To machine the 4-by-3-by-3-ft parts, tooling was designed at an odd angle to prevent undercuts, which can hinder part ejection from tooling. The CAM software, specifically the translate and rotate options, allowed Slaybaugh to duplicate that angle within the software program. When the part was created, it was trimmed to a perfect part sitting on top of a perfect fixture, he said. Part testing revealed that modifications were needed, however. Using the multi-axis toolpath on a five-axis CNC router, Slaybaugh was able to modify the CAM program and direct the tool to trim deeper in some places and less deep in others. The first step in thermoforming a part is making a mold. Angles are drafted in Solidworks and, in some cases, Mastercam.
SAYtooling System is the thermoformer's tooling development program geared toward new-product development, startup projects, and low- and medium-volume programs. It is far more appealing to enter a new product program spending $5000 rather than $30,000, notes Slaybaugh. But without reliable CAM software, the thermoformer would not be able to make tools in-house.
Considering that an aluminum mold that is contracted out can be made in-house for less than half of the cost, the savings are substantial. SAY Plastics passes those savings on to customers.
High-speed former now offers enhancements in cooling, speed and controls.


text:
David Owen: How Milan Cortina 2026 stayed in the shadows to deliver Olympic glory
By David Owen at the Swiss Tech Convention Center in Lausanne
This was a bid race won in the shadows.
Whatever else Agenda 2020 and the New Norm - the Wenlock and Mandeville of Olympic cost-cutting - may have achieved they have largely taken the Olympic bidding process out of the public eye.
The two contenders - Stockholm Åre and Milan Cortina - were given few opportunities compared with prior bid races to present their proposals to the general public and their proxies the media, or even to rank-and-file International Olympic Committee (IOC) members who comprise the electorate.
One upshot of this, as I cruised the usual IOC watering-holes in Lausanne over the past 24 hours was that you could almost smell the desperation of the squadrons of bid team representatives to get their message across.
Another was that even fewer vote-holders than usual seemed prepared to run the gauntlet or poke their heads above the parapet.
Effective Olympic lobbying used to be all about subtlety, the discreet placing of the right words in the right ears.
Actually, I suspect effective lobbying still is - which is one of the reasons Milan Cortina 2026 won.
Milan Cortina 2026 were awarded the Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games because they understood better how the political game in the IOC was played - especially now there are new rules ©Getty Images
The sense I got from the Swedish bid team was that they were desperate to say/do the right thing, without always being able to grasp what "the right thing" might be, or indeed to fathom why the contest appeared to be slipping away from them.
It must have dawned on them that they were fighting an uphill battle by around the second week of May, otherwise why take on the services of JTA, the pre-eminent bid consultants so late in the day?
The punchiness of Swedish IOC member Gunilla Lindberg's closing question in Stockholm Åre's final presentation - "Is the IOC ready for the New Norm, or is it just talk?" - also struck me as the type of tactic you deploy when trying to come from behind.
Milan Cortina appeared to me to embrace the slippery, more micromanaged new realities of Olympic bidding in a more sophisticated way.
Yes, you could still scent a whiff of desperation as those lobbying on the Italian bid's behalf pursued their quarry.
But usually you could also catch sight of the commanding, business-like presence of Giovanni Malagò, President of the Italian Olympic Committee (CONI), visibly directing his troops in battle, like a tall, skinnier Wellington in a suit.
I observed Malagò a lot during these final days and, while appearances can be deceptive, he always appeared to know exactly what he was doing.
Sixty-years-old now, he had to wait a long time before securing his place in sport's most prestigious club.
But the corollary of that is that he has huge experience of this idiosyncratic and, once again, increasingly covert world.
The victory of Milan Cortina 2026 owed much to the the political skill and lobbying of its leader and CONI President Giovanni Malagò - a general totally focused on what he had to do to win the bid ©Getty Images
Over the years, he has been involved, usually as President, in a long list of organising committees for major volleyball, basketball and swimming events, but also for the 50th anniversary of the Ferrari marque.
He came well prepared for this his latest task - and from what I have seen over recent days, Milan Cortina's victory was above all his.
While the race was probably run by then, even the touches he brought to today's public proceedings were telling, never missing a chance to intervene in order to highlight a perceived strength of the Italian bid.
He may even have attracted a last-minute vote or two by having the wit to introduce Milan Cortina's final presentation team in Spanish.
Of course, there is a bigger picture, and if what I read about Italy's rising debt levels is on the money or anything like it, winning the bid may turn out to be the easy part, and we might be set for another of those seven-year Olympic roller-coaster rides.
But in the narrow context of this tepid, largely private race, the Italians plainly read the tea-leaves better.
For the Swedes, it was a case of much misapplied energy and too little too late.
David Owen Chief Columnist
Follow @dodo938
David Owen worked for 20 years for the Financial Times in the United States, Canada, France and the UK. He ended his FT career as sports editor after the 2006 World Cup and is now freelancing, including covering the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the 2010 World Cup and London 2012.
Read more of David's articles
Follow @dodo938 on Twitter


Drying hair takes tons of time. For girls who are living in a fast-phase world, we have to think of ways to adapt. Usually, girls set the alarm earlier to have time for preparation. However, for times we are running late, we don't have a choice but go out with wet hair. We know that is quite embarrassing!
Therefore, in times we have to give our hair dryers a rest, note that we have options to still look good and presentable. There are hairstyles that are perfect for wet hair, and can be done in just minutes. Now, we will never have to miss the bus!
Braid that is quick to do and makes you look instantly cute!


Ballygarrett Art Studio: Size matters!
Towards the end of August there was great excitement in the studio. A visitor to the GasLamp Gallery in Gorey had seen my work and wanted to purchase two paintings and commission four more! Fab and Wow!
On going up to talk to Chris, the framer and a real knowledgeable guy in the business of selling art, the 'potential buyer' wanted SIX of my paintings for an alcove in his house. But they had to be a particular size.
There is a curiosity I maintain about how people buy art: will it fit, will it match my colour scheme, is it an investment? do I love it?
In the studio I reviewed what lurked, framed work and unframed finished work and work that was unfinished with potential. I selected eight pieces returning to the gallery the following day, Chris and I discussed a selection of six and mounting them in the correct size for the buyer to view. A few nervous days ensued as I waited for news. Nothing is ever sold until the money is in your bank.
The work looked good, and the buyer selected six from the unframed pieces. They were the right size.
I'm glad the original two he picked were not cut down to size this would have be a disaster for one of the paintings. This all comes down to listening to what the customer wants and not being over precious about work made. That's a tightrope and artist walks if they want to sell work. For me it is important to sell.
I am delighted that a new patron now owns six pieces of my work.
That's happened before where someone buys several pieces. My painting work is colourful, energetic and has presence. It is not everyone cup of tea, patrons describe being drawn to it. So hopefully more people who like art colourful, energetic and with presence will be drawn to it and I look forward to selling more, Yay!


text:
Taliban group claims Lahore park attack
BBC Online
Mon Mar 28, 2016 10:41 AM Last update on: Mon Mar 28, 2016 10:49 AM
Security officials gather at the site of a blast outside a public park in Lahore, Pakistan, March 27, 2016. Photo: Reuters
A Taliban splinter group says it carried out a suicide attack on a park in the Pakistani city of Lahore, which killed more than 70 people, including children.
The Jamaat-ul-Ahrar group said the attack had deliberately targeted Christians celebrating Easter Day.
There were scenes of carnage as parents searched for children amid the debris.
Pakistan's president condemned the attack, and the regional government has announced three days of mourning.
At least 300 people were injured, with officials saying they expected the death toll to rise.
All major hospitals in the area were put on an emergency footing after the blast, early on Sunday evening.
SOFT TARGET
Lahore is one of Pakistan's most liberal and wealthy cities. It is the political powerbase of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, and has seen relatively few terror attacks in recent years.
A spokesman for Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, Ehsanullah Ehsan, said the group wanted to send a message to Mr Sharif that they "have entered Lahore", and threatened further attacks.
Jamaat-ul-Ahrar is a breakaway group from Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan. It has carried out several other attacks on Pakistani civilians and security forces in recent months.
Mr Sharif expressed "grief and sorrow over the sad demise of innocent lives". He has postponed a planned trip to the UK.
The explosion, believed to have been carried out by one suicide bomber, hit the main gate to the Gulshan-e-Iqbal park in the early evening, a short distance from the children's playground.
Officials said the device had been packed with ball bearings.
The popular was more crowded than usual, as Lahore's minority Christians were celebrating Easter at its funfair.
One man, who gave his name as Danish, said the park had been so full when he arrived he had not been able to enter.
"We went to a canteen to have something to eat, when there was suddenly a big blast," he told Reuters.
"Everyone went panic, running to all directions. Many of them were blocked at the gate of the park. Dead bodies can be found everywhere."
Hasan Imran, 30, a local resident, told Reuters: "When the blast occurred, the flames were so high they reached above the trees and I saw bodies flying in the air."
One man told Pakistan's Geo TV station he was heading towards a fairground ride with his wife and two children when he heard a huge bang and all four of them were thrown to the floor.
Another man, who did not give his name, told the Associated Press he had taken 20 children to hospital, saying: "I can't explain to you the tragic situation."
Police chief Haider Ashraf said the park had been a soft target for the militants, saying that while Pakistan is "in a warlike situation" there had been no specific alert issued for the park.
Shebaz Sharif, the chief minister of Punjab, later tweeted: "Words cannot describe agony we are in to see our children's blood spilled by cowards."
He said that those who target civilians "do not deserve to be called humans" and that Pakistan would "make sure that your terror infrastructure is dismantled completely".
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called the attack "appalling", saying the perpetrators should "be brought swiftly to justice".
Pakistan has suffered regular incidents of Taliban-related violence, sectarian strife and criminal gang activity.
Lahore / park / attack / Pakistan / Taliban
Dozens trapped in Lahore factory rubble
Blasphemy Case: Pak SC upholds Bibi's acquittal
Taliban suicide bomber attacks NATO convoy in Afghanistan
France extends state of emergency to cover Euros
Pakistani woman torches daughter for marrying man of choice


Curating his evening of performances, Andrew Cyrille chose to highlight the whole spectrum of his artistry, assembling a program which touches on all eras of his career, covers a wide variety of styles and showcases his versatility as an improviser, composer, and collaborator. In a nod to his Haitian ancestry, Cyrille opens the night with Haitian master musicians, guitarist Alix Pascal, and percussionist Jean Guy-Rene, along with the poet Quincy Troupe. Presenting his work as a composer, the trio of Cyrille, trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith, and guitarist Brandon Ross will perform material from Cyrille's new critically acclaimed ECM record Lebroba. Acknowledging the influence of dance on his playing, Cyrille collaborates with dancer Beatrice Capote and cellist Tomeka Reid revisiting a project first assembled at the Eric Dolphy: Freedom of Sound festival. For the evening's centerpiece performances, Cyrille will fully display the free jazz drumming style which he pioneered, welcoming artists with whom he shares deep history for several freely improvised sets in varying combinations, including master drummer Milford Graves, tenor saxophonists Kidd Jordan and Peter Brötzmann, pianist/singer Lisa Sokolov, and visual artist Stefan Roloff.
Andrew Cyrille was born in Brooklyn, New York to Haitian immigrant parents. Cyrille's Haitian background and participation in drum and bugle corps shaped his early musical development. He would soon begin playing with jazz masters like Coleman Hawkins and Mary Lou Williams, before beginning an 11 year tenure with Cecil Taylor from 1964 to 1975. Throughout his career he has committed to investigating the full timbral and melodic quality of the drums, resulting in a series of solo and collaborative percussion albums, including projects with Milford Graves, Rashied Ali, Don Moye, and Kenny Clarke. A highly sought after collaborator for his vision and creative finesse, Cyrille has also worked extensively with dancers, poets, and visual artists.
The Vision Festival is a celebration of boundless improvised art. Now in its 24th year, this festival of music, dance, poetry, and visual art is heralded as "one of New York's most essential art events" (New York Times). Legendary and emerging stars representing the free jazz, experimental, and avant-garde communities will perform 30 sets over six nights. Opening night celebrates Andrew Cyrille for his Lifetime of Achievement, featuring the drummer in performance with musical associates spanning his 50+ year career.
Founded in 1996, festival presenter Arts For Art (AFA) is a New York City-based tax exempt organization dedicated to the promotion and advancement of free jazz — an American indigenous art form in which improvisation is principle.
Underwriting support provided by the Robert D. Bielecki Foundation.
The festival is made possible in part thanks to public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature. This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the city council. This program is made possible in part thanks to the Howard Gilman Foundation and the Jacob and Ruth Epstein Foundation. This project is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts. Support through New Music USA's NYC New Music Impact Fund is made possible with funding from The Scherman Foundation's Katharine S. and Axel G. Rosin Fund.


text:
Q: Floating multiple elements in a container I got this:
Demo.
And I would like this result:

I got this far:
Demo.

A: There are 2 ways you can do this in a flexible way.  Both remove the need for floats (and clearing floats) and neither requires JavaScript to achieve.
The first is to use flexbox.  The advantage here is that if there isn't enough room for the elements to fit comfortably on one row, they'll adapt.  The down side is that IE10 is the first version of IE to support it.  As a fallback, you'll need to use display: inline-block on each of the elements with flex applied to them.
http://jsfiddle.net/n4Yzc/7/
.always-visible {
    display: flex; /* prefixed attribute: -moz-flex, -webkit-flex */
    align-items: stretch; /* prefixed property: -moz-align-items, -webkit-align-items */
    flex-flow: row wrap; /* prefixed property */
}

.toggle-me {
    background-color: green;
    flex: 1 1 5em; /* prefixed property */
}

.name-mail {
    background-color: red;
    flex: 1 1 8em; /* prefixed property */
}

.description {
    background-color: yellow;
    flex: 2 1 50%; /* prefixed property */
}

.favourite-food {
    background-color: orange;
}

The second is to use the display: table properties.  This solution is well supported (IE8+), but it ends up looking squished on narrower devices.
http://jsfiddle.net/n4Yzc/5/
.always-visible {
    display: table;
}

.toggle-me {
    background-color: green;
    display: table-cell;
}

.name-mail {
    background-color: red;
    display: table-cell;
}

.description {
    background-color: yellow;
    display: table-cell;
}

.favourite-food {
    background-color: orange;
}

A: See the fiddle for desired output: http://jsfiddle.net/n4Yzc/2/
.toggle-me {
background-color: green;
  float:left;
    height:100px;
}

.name-mail {
background-color: red;
    float:left;
    height:100px;
}

.description {
background-color: yellow;
    float:left;
    width:67%;
}

.favourite-food {
background-color: orange;
}

Updated fiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/n4Yzc/6/
Width variable width of description div on basis of toggle-me and name-mail divs.

A: adjust height of  toggle-me, name-mail and description class like the following
 .toggle-me {
    background-color: green;
    float:left;
      height:150px;
    }

    .name-mail {
    background-colo

        r: red;
        float:left;
          height:150px;
        }

        .description {
        background-color: yellow;
          height:150px;
        }

        .favourite-food {
        background-color: orange;
        }


text:
Category: One On One
The D.G. Martin Opinion Column
One On One: Trump and Buncombe
by D.G. Martin Chapel Hill, NC – Would North Carolinians ever vote to elect Donald Trump or somebody like him? We did once. When we did, we proved that North Carolinians, like voters across America, can be attracted to tough-talking…
One on One: The biggest news for me
By D.G. Martin Chapel Hill, NC – The biggest news for me this year? Not ISIS, not Obamacare, not gay marriage, and not even the earth-shaking tragedy in Charleston. This year's big news is that there are no more peaches…
One On One: Memories on the fault lines of race
By D.G. Martin Chapel Hill, NC – Two people who wanted to be something else have grabbed our attention recently: Rachel Dolezal, the former NAACP chapter president in Spokane, Wash., and Caitlyn (formerly Bruce) Jenner, the 1976 Olympic decathlon champion.…
D.G. Martin: Why we lost the wars
By D.G. Martin Chapel Hill, NC – "I am a United States Army general, and I lost the Global War on Terrorism." These are the opening lines of retired U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Daniel P. Bolger's book, "Why We Lost:…
« 1 … 8 9 10
FY 2020 Per Capital Revenue Comparison between Chatham County and other similarly sized NC counties	... See MoreSee Less
After one good season, Josh Pastner's Yellow Jackets back in 'desperate mode' - The Atlanta Journal Constitution January 18, 2022
Miami Hurricanes' bid for back-to-back wins vs. ranked teams falls short vs. Duke - Miami Herald January 18, 2022
Game Preview: Virginia Basketball at Pittsburgh - CalBearsMaven January 18, 2022
Close contests have been common in ACC men's basketball this season - starexponent.com January 18, 2022
College basketball: Notre Dame holds on for MLK day win - Fighting Irish Wire January 18, 2022
Western Michigan football coach Tim Lester receives 2-year contract extension - ESPN January 18, 2022
Meet The Freshman: Paul Barton - UNC Athletics January 18, 2022
The Jason Candle to Miami as OC rumors are heating up - State Of The U January 18, 2022


text:
Q: Ampersand not showed correctly in e-mail updates As you can clearly see from the screenshot here below, the Ampersand char "&" is not correctly escaped in e-mail digest.
The screenshot comes from the daily update I receive from the "dnd-5e" feed of RPG.stackexchange.com .

The paragraph should have been:
"(...) I have created my first D&D5e character (...)"
(Of course we have the same problem with the Non-breaking space)


+ For pricing & consultation, contact her at emilystoutdraws@gmail.com.
+ For a list of services, see below.
Photography courtesy of Andrew Stout Photography, 2016.
All Content © 2014 - 2018 Emily M. Henebrey. All Rights Reserved.


Biometrics recognition system is more reliable and popular. In this paper we describe a palmprint and handgeometry based person identification consisting of three main steps - preprocessing techniques such as morphological operations. The feature extraction techniques such as FAST feature algorithm and region properties is used to independently extract palmprint and handgeometry features. Feature matching with euclidean distance classifier. These techniques are more reliable and faster than traditional techniques used. We finally conclude that the proposed methodology has better performance .This is supported by our experiments which are able to achieve recognition rate for palmprint 100 % and for handgeometry 93.75 %.
	Slobodan Ribaric, Ivan Fratric, and Kristina K. 2007 A Biometric Verification System Based on the Fusion of Palmprint and Face Features. Department of Electrical Engineering and Computing, University of Zagreb, Croatia.
	Teddy Ko 2005 Multimodal Biometric Identification for Large User Population Using Fingerprint, Face and Iris Recognition. IEEE transaction Proceedings of the 34th Applied Imagery and Pattern Recognition Workshop.
	V C Subbarayudu, Munaga V, N K Prasad, 2008 Multimodal biometrics system. Proceeding IEEE transactions.
	Andrew Teoh, S. A. Samad and A. Hussain, 2004 Nearest Neighbourhood Classifiers in a Bimodal Biometric Verification System Fusion Decision Scheme. Journal of Research and Practice in Information Technology, 36 (1).
	Anil K. Jain, Jianjiang Feng, Karthik Nandakumar, 2010 Biometrics : Fingerpeint Matching. Published by the IEEE Computer Society 0018-9162 .
	Fan Yang, Baofeng Ma. 2007 A New Mixed-Mode Biometrics Information Fusion Based-on Fingerprint, Hand-geometry and Palm-print. IEEE transactions Fourth International Conference on Image and Graphics.
	X. Wu, K. Wang, Zhang D. 2004 HMMs based palmprint identification LNCS 3072, pp. 775-781.
	Ajay Kumar, David C. M. Wong, Helen C. Shen, Anil K. Jain. 2004 Personal verification using Palmprint and Hand Geometry Biometric. Department of Computer Science, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Hong Kong.
	Harpreet Singh, Jyoti Raj Gulsheen Kaur , Thomas Meitzler 2004 Image Fusion using Fuzzy Logic and Applications. Proceeding IEEE transactions.
	Chun Wai Lau, Bin Ma, Helen M. Meng, Y.S. Moon and Yeung Yam 2005 Fuzzy Logic Decision Fusion in a Multimodal Biometric System The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, China.
	K. Ito, T. Aoki, H. Nakajima, K. Kobayashi, T. Higuchi 2006 A palmprint recognition algorithm using phase based image matching. Proceedings of the ICIP, pp. 2669-2672.
	M. Wang, Q. Ruan. 2006 Palmprint recognition based on two dimensional methods. Proceedings of ICSP.
	Conti, G. Milici, P. Ribino, F. Sorbello and S. Vitabile 2007 Fuzzy Fusion in Multimodal Biometric Systems. university of 90127 Palermo, Italy.
	Kornelije Rabuzin, Miroslav Ba., Markus Schatten, 2008 Fuzzy Active Rules in Mutimodal Biometric Systems. Proceedings of the ITI 2008 30th Int. Conf. on Information Technology Interfaces.
	Gawande U., Sreejith R Nair, Harsha Balani, Nikhil Pawar & Manjiri Kotpalliwar 2009 High Speed Frequency Multimodal Biometric System Using Iris and fingerprint. Proceeding Springer.
	Yong Jian Chin, Thian Song Ong, Michael K.O. Goh and Bee Yan Hiew 2009 Integrating Palmprint and Fingerprint for Identity Verification. IEEE Third International Conference on Network and System Security.
	Cheng Lu, Di Liu*, Jisong Wang, Shuyan Wang 2009 Multimodal Biometrics Recognition by Dimensionality Reduction Method. Second International Symposium on Electronic Commerce and Security.
	Nicolas Tsapatsoulis and Constantinos Pattichis 2009 Palm geometry biometrics : A score-based fusion Approach. Proceedings workshop AIAI.
	Mohammad Imran , Ashok Rao , Hemantha Kumar G. 2011 A New Hybrid approach for Information Fusion in Multibiometric Systems. Proceedings IEEE transactions .
	Mohamed K. Shahin, Ahmed M. Badawi, and Mohamed E. M. Rasmy 2011 Multimodal Biometric System Based on Near-Infra-Red Dorsal Hand Geometry and Fingerprints for Single and Whole Hands. World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology 56.
	S. Palanikumar, M. Sasikumar and J. Rajesh 2011 Palmprint Enhancement Using Discrete Curvelet Transform. International Journal of Computer Science Issues, 8(4), No 2.
	Feifei CUI, Gongping Yang 2011 Level Fusion of Fingerprint and Finger Vein Recognition. Journal of Computational Information Systems, 7(16) pp. 5723-5731.
	Romaissaa Mazouni, Abdellatif Rahmoun 2011 On Comparing Verification Performances of Multimodal Biometrics Fusion Techniques. International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 – 8887), 33(7).
	Nishant Singh, Kamlesh Tiwari, Aditya Nigam and Phalguni Gupta 2012 Fusion of 4-Slap Fingerprint Images with Their Qualities for Human Recognition. IEEE transactions IEEE .
	Ashutosh Kumar, Ranjan Parekh 2012 Palmprint Recognition in Eigen-space. International Journal on Computer Science and Engineering (IJCSE) ISSN : 0975-3397, 4(1).
	P.U. Lahane, Prof. S.R. Ganorkar 2012 Efficient Iris and Fingerprint Fusion for Person identification. International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 – 8887), 50(17).
	Krishneswari, K. and S. Arumugam 2012 Multimodal Biometrics using Feature Fusion. Journal of Computer Science, 8 (3), 431-435.
	D. Y. Liliana, Eries Tri Utaminingsih 2012 The combination of palm print and hand geometry for biometrics palm recognition. International Journal of Video & Image Processing and Network Security IJVIPNS-IJENS, 12(1).
	Gawande U. , Sreejith R Nair, Harsha Balani, Nikhil Pawar & Manjiri Kotpalliwar 2012 A High Speed Frequency Multimodal Biometric System Using Iris and fingerprint. International Journal on Advanced Computer Engineering and Communication Technology (IJACECT) ISSN : 2278-5140, 1(2).
	M. P. Dale, M. A. Joshi, H. J. Galiyawala 2012 A Single Sensor Hand Geometry and Palm Texture Fusion for Person Identification. International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 – 8887), 42(7).
	Srinivasa Rao D, Seetha M, Krishna Prasad MHM Comparison Of Fuzzy And Neuro Fuzzy Image Fusion Techniques And Its Applications. International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 – 8887), 43(20).
	Mohamad Abdolahi, Majid Mohamadi, Mehdi Jafari, 2013 Multimodal Biometric system Fusion Using Fingerprint and Iris with Fuzzy Logic. International Journal of Soft Computing and Engineering (IJSCE) ISSN: 2231-2307, 2(6).
	Swapnali G. Garud, Apurva D. Dhawale, Mazhar Kazi, Y.S.Rode, S.B.Dabhade, K.V.Kale, 2014 Fingerprint and Palmprint Recognition using neighborhood operation and FAST features. International Journal of Computer Application (IJCA) ISBN: 973-93-80882-12-4, 95(12).


text:
Ali Saint Q
Please introduce yourself.
My name is Ali Saint Q. I was born in Paris. My family moved to America when I was 6.
I am a storyteller and a designer.
A storyteller?
Yes. It means to share my life experiences with people, to help them. Hopefully, my stories can save people time from certain things in this industry and in life, in general.
I feel like all my collections are based off of stories.
What's the story of Norwood?
Norwood is the name of the street I grew up on, in the city of Los Angeles. On that street, you would have to be one thing, either White or Black. You couldn't play basketball and do skateboard because people would look at you weird. I was good at basketball but I'd love to skate. I would listen to rock music and hip hop. It was very hard for me to be who I wanted to be.
I really feel like I had to get beat up by people to be who I wanted to be, and I feel like it relates to fashion. People want to be a certain way but are scared of what other people might think about them. The brand Norwood, that I founded about a year and a half ago, is about embracing who you are, being free and living without labels.
You were in Paris to show the Norwood Spring-Summer 2020 collection. How do you describe it?
This collection is called "Desierto de Sierra" and is inspired by survival and by the desert. Basically, it asks the question of how would you survive if you were stuck somewhere. The clothes have a lot of pockets and hidden pockets, allowing you to carry tools to survive.
Coming back to Paris, from LA, doing a showroom with such other big brands and people that are well-known is also a form of survival for us.
I am proud of being from Los Angeles and to represent it, as much as I represent Paris.
[Norwood]
Norwood is also very committed to mental health awareness. Do you have a personal experience of mental illness?
I personally deal with a lot of depression. I can't tell you why, not because I don't want to, but because I just don't know where it comes from. For example, if 10 good things are going perfect in my life, I will focus on the one thing that is not. I have dealt with it my whole life.
It's something that I just have and I feel like we all have it in us. A lot of us don't want to talk about it, which is fine. But I am really happy that I can bring awareness to it and maybe inspire people to deal with it, through creativity, fashion and art.
With Norwood, I felt like some things were missing until we started raising money for mental health awareness. Now, the brand has a purpose and it has started to make a difference.
Mental health is very topical at the moment, and a lot of people come out to share their experiences and struggles. How do you feel about that movement and the reactions it provokes?
It's tough. I understand that because somebody famous comes out saying "I have mental health issues," other people say "Oh I have it too!" I am not knocking them and I hope they can get help, but it wrongfully became cool.
But if somebody says, "I have this problem," who are we to say, "No you don't?" We don't know what people go through. But also, people think it's cool to have this problem. It's like saying, "Cancer is cool!" No it's not. It hurts and it's frustrating.
Prior to Norwood, you launched an accessory brand, called Caravagio. Was it your first fashion venture?
Caravagio was the first brand I have founded, but prior to that, I did the Goodyear line for adidas Originals in 2007, and won Best Show at the Magic convention in Las Vegas. From that, I felt confident enough to launch Caravagio, a sunglasses brand.
I learned a lot, about how business works, about how to deal with stores and buyers, and even about how to work with celebrities. If I hadn't gone through that, I wouldn't be here today.
Do you wish you could have gone further with it?
It had its time. Caravagio was going to end, I couldn't sell sunglasses forever. Times are changing, people wanted to dress differently. It was tough to do.
I also had a bad knee injury, so I had to stop. But in my mind, it's still Caravagio! I think about it everyday.
Norwood is also popular amongst celebrities. What's your opinion on the concepts of fame and influence, and the impact it has on fashion?
First of all, product reaches everybody, thanks to the internet. Celebrities check everything and they do have an impact. Say, somebody influential like Kanye West, J. Balvin, or even a local influencer is wearing something and tagging it everyday, people are going to wear it too. On the same end, if somebody posts something negative about a brand for whatever reason, it's going to provoke a negative reaction.
Influence is important but it's not everything. If you do have a good product, people are eventually going to know about it. It goes together.
You need influence because of today's world and social media, and a lot of buyers and stores look for that too. But you have to have good product.
Does the popularity of Norwood amongst celebs get in the way of your creative process?
It does! I would design a piece with somebody in mind, telling myself it would fit him or her, or he or she would love it. And every time I do that, It never works. Here at the showroom, there's a piece I was really confident about, and nobody even looked at it. But everybody gravitates towards a t-shirt we made last minute.
It's funny, but in design, what I think will work never works. Other things do, in a totally organic way.
Norwood is part of a wave putting the city of Los Angeles on the fashion map. How proud are you of that accomplishment, and do you feel any pressure or responsibility from it?
It's not pressure because I am from Los Angeles and I know how people are. I am proud of being from LA and to represent it, as much as I represent Paris.
Brands like Fear of God, Rhude and 424 are very big brands. Jerry [Lorenzo, founder of Fear Of God], Rhuigi [Villaseñor, founder of Rhude] and Guillermo [Andrade, founder of 424] have been doing it for a long time and we all strive to be like those guys. They do the work and are successful.
People tell us, "You are on your way to be like this brand," and one day, maybe, we will. We have to keep working. I am happy that Norwood is mentioned in the same breath as those brands, it shows that we are headed in the right direction.
Why should people care about Norwood and buy into it?
I always think about this, when I go shopping. Things are very expensive these days. You look at something and wonder why you should buy this. People are very smart, they research and know what they are buying.
The customer that buys Norwood knows what the brand is about, where it is coming from and where it is made, all in Los Angeles. These are informations the shoppers are familiar with, and if they are not, I feel like they will not even touch it.
Interview by Iggy Nko (@iggynko)
Pictures 1, 2 and 3 by Antoine Martin (@antoinemartiin)
[17 juillet 2019] Marrakshi Life Randall Bachner
[9 juillet 2019] Nous Etudions Romina Carillo
[28 juin 2019] Norwood Ali Saint Q


DAYVILLE - Clover Court, in the Dayville section of Killingly, was swarmed by State Police Wednesday as the search for a missing 13 year old intensified.
According to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children it's believed Abby got into an unknown vehicle. And the organization says police brought in search dogs, but they lost her scent on a nearby road.
Abby's parents, Robert and Nicole May, were interviewed by State Police at Troop D in Danielson for several hours Wednesday.
Troop D Major Crimes Squad, K9's and Search and Rescue teams, including the Trooper 1 helicopter were focused on the Clover Court area all afternoon, exhausting all investigative efforts to locate the teen, who was adopted by her family from Ethiopia.
"It was weird waking up going to work at 5:30 AM on Monday morning and the entire neighborhood was lit up," said Michael Wetherell, who lives next door to the May family.
From 1 PM until approximately 5:30 PM, the neighborhood was watching State Police enter and exit the May's home. And they family was not permitted to reenter their home until police were done processing it.
"It's just scary," said Deborah Harrison, a resident of Clover Court.
"Too close to home," said her husband, Eric Harrison.
This couple, who lives several houses from the Mays, also has a 13-year-old daughter.
Julia says she's sad because she has never really been able to connect with Abby May.
Abby working outside, around the house, was something many of the neighbors noticed.
One neighbor told Fox 61 that he and other neighbors have called police, expressing a concern for the well-being of Abby May, over the past couple of years. They say it seemed odd that such a young child was the one, who was always mowing the grass, doing other yard work, shoveling the driveway and washing the outside of the house.
"I just hope she's OK wherever she is and hope they can find her," Eric Harrison said.
State Police say that Major Crimes units typically don't enter a missing persons case until they've been missing for 30 days. But, because this missing person is just 13, there is an urgency.
If you have any information, please call 911 or National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) at 1-800-THE-LOST (1-800-843-5678) or Connecticut State Police at 1-800-779-4900.