text:
\section{Introduction}
\vspace{-0mm}
Fingerprints are one of the most used biometric modalities
with a wide range of applications such as unlocking consumer smartphones or identity recognition in forensic investigations \cite{DBLP:journals/prl/JainNR16, DBLP:conf/fusion/DamerT0K18}.
The most determinant factor to achieve high recognition accuracy in fingerprint recognition systems is the fingerprint sample quality \cite{DBLP:conf/biosig/GalballyHB18}.
Therefore, many large scale biometric deployments require measuring quality scores, such as the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) \cite{UIDAI} and the European Union Visa Information System (VIS) \cite{EUVIS}.

In general, the quality of a fingerprint sample is defined as its utility for recognition \cite{DBLP:reference/bio/TabassiG15a}.
The fingerprint quality is the key property for a high recognition performance by ensuring reliable enrolment and matching.
Especially in forensic scenarios, quality assessment is of great significance since the assessment of the strength of evidence is a central activity in forensic casework \cite{DBLP:conf/btas/ZeinstraMVS18}.
However, forensic use-cases mainly have to deal with partial fingerprints and thus, the quality assessment of single minutiae are of great interest \cite{DBLP:conf/cvpr/EzeobiejesiB18, DBLP:journals/access/SankaranVS14}.

Current works on fingerprint quality assessment, such as \cite{DBLP:conf/cvpr/EzeobiejesiB18, DBLP:journals/iet-bmt/TertychnyiOA18}, focused on supervised classifiers to predict quality given the fingerprint image.
However, these approaches often neglect the quality of the extracted minutiae for the fact that current fingerprint recognition systems are mainly based on this minutiae information \cite{DBLP:journals/access/Valdes-RamirezM19}.
Previous works on the quality assessment of single minutiae are based on hand-crafted features and define the quality of a minutia through properties of the image quality \cite{DBLP:conf/cw/MakniC20, 4401958, NBIS}.
Therefore, these solutions do not consider how well the utilized minutia extractor can extract true minutiae.
Consequently, even if the image around a minutia is of high quality, the extraction of reliable minutia information might fail and thus, the quality of this minutia is wrongly estimated as high.

In this work, we propose a novel concept of measuring minutia and fingerprint quality based on minutia detection confidence (MiDeCon).
The proposed concept can be applied to an arbitrary neural network based minutia extractor and does not rely on quality labels for training.
To estimate the quality of a minutia, MiDeCon computes the extractor's confidence that the detected minutia is real.
This confidence is determined over the agreement of stochastic variants of the extraction network created by random node eliminations.
To estimate the quality of a full fingerprint, MiDeCon combines the highest minutia qualities resulting in a continuous quality value of the fingerprint.

The experiments were conducted on the four publicly available databases of the FVC 2006 \cite{FVC2006} and make utilizes the widely-used NFIQ1 \cite{NFIQ1} and NFIQ2 \cite{NFIQ2} developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) as baselines.
The results demonstrate significantly stronger fingerprint and minutia quality assessment performances of the proposed unsupervised approach in comparison to established approaches.
This holds on all investigated sensor types (electric field, optical, and thermal sensors).
MiDeCon is publicly available under the following link\footnote{\url{https://github.com/pterhoer/FingerprintImageQuality}}.
The main novelty of the proposed MiDeCon approach is that it:
\begin{itemize}
\itemsep0mm
\item \textbf{Does not require quality labels for training -}
Previous works often rely on error-prone labelling mechanisms without a clear definition of quality. Our approach avoids the use of inaccurate quality labels by using the minutia detection confidence as a quality estimate. Moreover, the training state can be completely avoided if pre-trained minutiae extraction neural network trained with dropout \cite{DBLP:journals/jmlr/SrivastavaHKSS14} is available.
\item \textbf{Considers difficulties in the minutiae extraction -}
Previous works estimates the quality of a fingerprint based on the properties of the image neglecting the minutiae extraction process. However, the extraction process might face difficulties that are not considered in the image properties and thus, produce unreliable minutia information. Our solution defines quality through the prediction confidence of the extractor and thus, considers this problem.
\item \textbf{Produces continuous quality values -}
While previous works often categorize the quality outputs in discrete categories (e.g. \{good, bad, ugly\} \cite{DBLP:conf/cvpr/EzeobiejesiB18}; \{1,2,3,4,5\} \cite{NFIQ1}), our approach produces continuous quality values that allow more fine-grained and flexible enrolment and matching processes.
\item \textbf{Includes quality assessment of single minutiae -}
Unlike previous works, our solution assesses the quality of full fingerprints as well as the quality of single minutiae. This is specifically useful in forensic scenarios where forensic examiners aim to find reliable minutiae suitable for identification.
\end{itemize}

\section{Related Works}

\subsection{Minutia Quality Assessment}

Despite that many of the best fingerprint recognition algorithms are based on minutiae information \cite{DBLP:journals/access/Valdes-RamirezM19}, only a few works proposed solutions for estimating the quality of single minutiae.
In 2005, Kim et al. \cite{DBLP:conf/avbpa/Kim05} proposed a minutia quality score by analysing the neighbouring ridge structure of the minutia in a thinned fingerprint image.
In \cite{4401958},
Uz et al. defined the quality of a minutia based on its frequency it occurs in the different impressions.
Maki et al. proposed the Minutia Confidence Index \cite{DBLP:conf/cw/MakniC20}.
This index estimates the quality of a minutia based on the location, type, and orientation of other minutiae.
NIST roll out Mindtct, a minutiae detection algorithm that additionally states the qualities of detected minutiae by combing low contrast, low flow, and high curve maps of the fingerprint.

To summarize, previous works define the quality of a minutia through the image quality around the minutia.
However, this does not consider the extraction process which might result in error-prone outputs, e.g. due to model bias.
Therefore, we propose defining the quality of a minutia as the detection confidence of the minutia extractor.

\subsection{Fingerprint Quality Assessment}

In contrast to minutia quality assessment, more research was done on the quality assessment on full fingerprints.
Traditional approaches are based on the use of local \cite{DBLP:conf/avbpa/ShenKK01, DBLP:conf/icip/TabassiW05, DBLP:conf/icb/0001LPLT11, DBLP:conf/iwcf/YoonLJ14, DBLP:conf/caip/SharmaD19} and global hand-crafted \cite{DBLP:conf/icip/LimJY02, DBLP:conf/avbpa/ChenDJ05, DBLP:conf/icb/PhromsuthirakA13, DBLP:conf/eusipco/El-AbedNCR13, DBLP:conf/ciarp/VasconcelosP18, DBLP:journals/tifs/RichterGMTH19} features, or approaches that combine both kinds of features \cite{DBLP:journals/tifs/Alonso-FernandezFOGFKB07, DBLP:conf/btas/Yoon0LJ13, DBLP:conf/btas/SankaranVS13, DBLP:journals/pami/TeixeiraL17}.
Besides the use of hand-crafted features, deep feature-learning solutions \cite{DBLP:journals/iet-bmt/TertychnyiOA18, DBLP:conf/cvpr/OlsenTMB13, DBLP:conf/cvpr/EzeobiejesiB18} were proposed recently.
These approaches aim to predict quality by supervised training of a neural network classifier.

The engagement of NIST in this aspect is also worth mentioning.
They investigated, along with their partners, 155 quality features from the literature and selected the best 14 to train classification models to estimate the quality of a fingerprint.
This resulted in of NFIQ1 and NFIQ2 \cite{DBLP:conf/biosig/BausingerT11, NBIS}.

In concept, current solutions are training supervised classifiers to estimate the quality of a fingerprint image.
Since current fingerprint recognition systems are still based on minutiae information \cite{DBLP:journals/access/Valdes-RamirezM19} we argue that the quality of a fingerprint must reflect the qualities of its extracted minutiae.
Therefore, we propose to estimate the quality of a fingerprint by combining minutia qualities  defined over the detection confidences of the minutia extractor.

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics[width=0.5\textwidth]{concept}
\caption{Conceptual idea of MiDeCon: the system's minutiae extraction network is modified to additionally provide the minutia detection reliabilities based on the agreement of stochastic network variants. We propose using the detection reliability $r^{(i)}$ of a minutia $m^{(i)}$ as its quality indicator.
To determine the quality of the whole fingerprint, the $n$ highest detection reliabilities are combined.
By integrating the minutia extractor in the quality assessment process, the proposed concept additionally takes into account difficulties that appear during extraction. \vspace{-3mm}
}
\label{fig:Concept}
\end{figure}

\vspace{-1mm}
\section{Methodology}
\label{sec:Methodology}

We define the quality of a single minutia by its detection reliability of the minutia extractor that is based on the agreement between stochastic variants of the extractor network.
Combing the detection reliabilities of the highest-quality minutiae, MiDeCon assesses the quality of a given fingerprint.
The conceptual idea of the proposed approach is shown in Figure \ref{fig:Concept}.
In the following, we provide a detailed description of how MiDeCon determines the quality of single minutiae and fingerprints given the minutiae extractor MinutiaeNet \cite{DBLP:conf/icb/Nguyen0018}.
MinutiaeNet consists of two networks, CoarseNet and FineNet.
While CoarseNet determines and extracts patches of potential minutiae in a given Fingerprint, FineNet estimates if the candidate patch consists of a minutia and extracts the minutia information from the candidate patches, such as location, orientation, and minutia type.

\vspace{-2mm}
\subsection{Assessing Minutia Quality}

Our minutia quality assessment approach is based on the output of FineNet \cite{DBLP:conf/icb/Nguyen0018} that decides if the candidate patch of the fingerprint consists of a minutia or not.
We calculate a novel minutia detection confidence based of this network and use this as the quality of the detected minutia.

More formally, given a fingerprint capture $f$ and a neural network minutiae extractor \textit{ME}, such as FineNet \cite{DBLP:conf/icb/Nguyen0018}, we propose to use the detection reliability $r^{(i)}$ of the i$^{th}$ minutia as its quality indicator $q^{(i)}$.
The detection reliability follows the idea of  Terh\"{o}rst et al. \cite{DBLP:conf/btas/TerhorstHKZDKK19} by using stochastic forward passes in a dropout-reduced neural network minutiae extractor \textit{ME} trained with dropout \cite{DBLP:journals/jmlr/SrivastavaHKSS14}.
Instead of propagating the input patch one time through the network \textit{ME}, the input image is propagated $m=100$ times through different variations of the network approximating a Gaussian process \cite{DBLP:conf/icml/GalG16}.
The network variants of \textit{ME} are created by randomly eliminating nodes using similar dropout patterns as during the model's training.
For each of the $m$ stochastic forward passes through such a model variant, a stochastic softmax prediction $x_j$ is given describing the probability that the given patch contains a minutia assuming a Boltzmann distribution.
This results in a set of stochastic prediction $x^{(i)}=\{x^{(i)}_j\}_{j=1,\dots,m}$ that is used to estimate the detection reliability of a given minutia $m^{(i)}$.
The detection reliability
\begin{align*}
rel(x^{(i)}) =   \underbrace{\mathbb{E}\left(x^{(i)}\right) }_{\text{MOC}} +  \underbrace{\mathbb{E}\left( \left( x^{(i)} - \mathbb{E}\left( x^{(i)} \right) \right)^2 \right)}_{\text{MOD}}, \label{eq:MinuQuality}
\end{align*}
for a minutia $m^{(i)}$ consists of two parts, the measure of centrality (MOC) and the measure of dispersion (MOD).
The MOC computes the mean of the stochastic outputs aiming at utilizing the probability interpretation of softmax assuming a Boltzmann distribution.
The MOD quantifies the agreement of the different network variants by calculating the mean pairwise absolute distance of all scores in $x^{(i)}$.
A higher agreement and a higher probability indicate a higher detection reliability and vice versa.
MOC and MOD are equally weighted since both measures result in values of similar magnitudes.
We propose using the minutia detection confidence $r^{(i)} = rel(x^{(i)})$ of the minutia $m^{(i)}$ as its quality indicator $q^{(i)}$.

The advantage of using the minutia detection confidence as the quality measure of a single minutia is that, unlike previous works, it takes into account the minutia extraction process, rather than solely depend on the properties of the image patch around the detection.
Neglecting this process can result in over-estimations of the quality when the extractor is not able to reliably detect a minutia of a high-quality image or in under-estimations of the quality in case that the extractor is still able to capture reliable minutia information from a lower-quality image.
Our proposed solution defines the quality of a single minutia through the prediction confidence of the extractor and thus, considers this issue.

\subsection{Assessing Fingerprint Quality}

Given a fingerprint $f$ with extracted minutiae information $\{m^{(i)}\}$ and its corresponding detection reliabilities $r^{(i)}$, we assume that the quality of a fingerprint is based on the highest detection reliabilities of its minutiae.
Therefore, we define the quality $Q(f)$ of a fingerprint $f$ as
\begin{align}
Q(f) = \mathbb{E}\left( \left\lbrace \bar{r}^{(l)}(f): l \in \mathbb{N}_+ \, \wedge \, l < n  \right\rbrace  \right),
\end{align}
where $\mathbb{E}$ is mean operator over the first $n$ entries of the sorted list $\bar{r}(f)$.
More precisely, $\bar{r}(f)$ is the sorted list of the minutiae reliabilities $\{r^{(i)}\}$ of fingerprint $f$ such that $\forall \quad l \in [1, \dots N-1]: r^{(l)} \geq r^{(l+1)}$ is satisfied.
Consequently, we define the quality $Q$ of a fingerprint capture $f$ as the mean of its $n$ highest minutia (detection) reliabilities.
We choose $n=20$ since this reflects the average number of minutiae in a partial fingerprint and allows the proposed methodology to be used in forensic scenarios \cite{DBLP:conf/accv/TerhorstD0K18}.
However, this number can be arbitrarily adapted to the target application.

The advantage of this quality assessment approach is its direct use of the minutia qualities defined over their detection reliabilities.
Most of the current fingerprint recognition systems are based on minutiae information  \cite{DBLP:journals/access/Valdes-RamirezM19} and thus, measuring the quality of the direct input of these systems is more likely to succeed in estimating suitable quality values than approaches that only rely on properties of the image quality.

\section{Experimental Setup}

\vspace{-1mm}
\subsection{Databases and Model Training}
Th experiments are done on the publicly available benchmarks of the FVC 2006 \cite{FVC2006}.
This allows us to evaluate quality assessment over multiple sensor types.
FVC2006 consists of 7200 fingerprint captures from 600 different fingers over four databases (DB).
The images were collected by four different organizations in two different countries.
Each database was captured with a different sensor type: DB1 (electric field sensor, 250 dpi), DB2 (optical sensor, 596 dpi), DB3 (thermal sweeping sensor, 500 dpi), and DB4 (synthetic, 500 dpi).
DB4 consists of synthetic data that was generated with SFinFe \cite{DBLP:reference/bio/Cappelli15a}.
Each database consists of subject-disjoint test and training sets, resulting in 6720 fingerprint images for testing and 480 for training.

For the experiments, we apply MiDeCon on the FineNet network\footnote{\textit{https://github.com/luannd/MinutiaeNet}} \cite{DBLP:conf/icb/Nguyen0018}.
This network was originally not trained with dropout.
Therefore, we retrained the last fully connected layer with dropout on the training set following the training procedure described in \cite{DBLP:conf/icb/Nguyen0018}.
Since only one layer was trained, we adapted the initial learning rate to $lr=10^{-4}$.

\vspace{-1mm}
\subsection{Evaluation Metrics}
\label{sec:EvaluationMetrics}
To evaluate the fingerprint quality assessment performance, we follow the methodology by Grother et al. \cite{DBLP:journals/pami/GrotherT07} using error versus reject curves.
These curves show a verification error-rate over the fraction of unconsidered fingerprint images.
Based on the predicted quality values, these unconsidered images are those with the lowest predicted quality and the error rate is calculated on the remaining images.
Error versus reject curves indicates good quality estimation when the verification error decreases consistently for higher ratios of unconsidered images \cite{DBLP:conf/cvpr/TerhorstKDKK20}.

However, for quality assessment of single minutiae this assessment approach does not fit since the number of detected minutia strongly varies between different algorithms.
Therefore, we determine the quality assessment performance of single minutiae by considering only a fixed number (20-40) of the highest quality minutiae for recognition.
Assuming a lower verification error is achieved if the considered minutiae are of higher quality, this allows us to evaluate the quality assessment performance of single minutiae.

The verification error rates within the error versus reject curves are reported in terms of false non-match rate (FNMR) at a fixed false match rate (FMR) as specified in the international standard \cite{ISO_Metrik}.

\vspace{-1mm}
\subsection{Workflow and Baselines}
Since many of the recognition systems are still based on minutiae information \cite{DBLP:journals/access/Valdes-RamirezM19}, we utilize two frequently used fingerprint recognition systems, Minutia Cylinder-Codes (MCC) from \cite{DBLP:journals/pami/CappelliFM10} and Bozorth3 \cite{NBIS} from NIST Biometric Image Software (NBIS).
The minutiae-extraction for the matcher is based on MinutiaeNet \cite{DBLP:conf/icb/Nguyen0018} and NIST's Mindtct \cite{NBIS}.
To evaluate the quality assessment performance, we compare the proposed solution against the widely-used fingerprint quality assessment solutions, NFIQ1 \cite{NFIQ1} and NFIQ2 \cite{NFIQ2} from NIST.
Both approaches have become a standard in estimating fingerprint quality \cite{DBLP:conf/icb/GalballyHFBT19}.

\vspace{-2mm}
\section{Results}

\vspace{-1mm}
\subsection{Minutia Quality Assessment}

In Table \ref{tab:MinutiaQualityFMR10-2}, the minutia quality assessment performance is compared in terms of FNMR at FMRs of $10^{-2}$ and $10^{-3}$ using only a fixed number the highest quality minutiae.
Moreover, the quality assessment approaches are compared on the four databases containing fingerprint images captured with different sensors.
Generally, considering more minutiae for the recognition process decreases the recognition error.
However, strong differences in the performance are observed for the different quality assessment methods.
Both utilized fingerprint recognition methods (Bozorth3 and MCC) focus on local minutiae neighbourhoods.
Since Mindtct assigns minutiae qualities over a quality map, neighbouring minutiae have similar quality estimates.
This property favours Mindtct when using Bozorth3 or MCC, because these focus on local neighbourhoods, and explains the weaker performance of CoarseNet.
Moreover, it shows that the natural choice of using the model's softmax output as the minutia quality does not work.

On synthetically generated fingerprint data, the quality estimates based on the Mindtct's hand-crafted features achieve the best results.
On data captured from real sensors, our proposed method based on the detection confidence of single minutiae constantly achieves the lowest recognition errors.
This holds for all investigated sensor types, i.e. electric field, optical, and thermal sensors (DB1, DB2, DB3) and demonstrates a strong minutiae quality assessment performance of the proposed approach.

\begin{table*}[]
\renewcommand{\arraystretch}{1.1}
\setlength{\tabcolsep}{4pt}
\centering
\caption{Evaluating minutia quality assessment - only a certain number of the highest quality minutiae are used for recognition. The recognition performance is reported at two FMRs on the Bozorth3 and the MCC matcher. Each DB was captured with a different sensor. Our proposed methodology based on minutia detection confidence shows lower recognition errors than related works \cite{DBLP:conf/icb/Nguyen0018, NBIS} in all cases, except on the less-relevant synthetic data (DB4). This demonstrates the strong quality estimation performance for single minutiae of the proposed method.}
\label{tab:MinutiaQualityFMR10-2}
\begin{tabular}{llrrrrrrrrrr}
\Xhline{2\arrayrulewidth}
\multicolumn{2}{l}{FNMR@$10^{-2}$FMR} & \multicolumn{5}{c}{Bozorth3}                    & \multicolumn{5}{c}{MCC}                         \\
\cmidrule(lr){3-7} \cmidrule(lr){8-12}
                           &                       & Best 20 & Best 25 & Best 30 & Best 35 & Best 40 & Best 20 & Best 25 & Best 30 & Best 35 & Best 40 \\
                           \hline
\multirow{3}{*}{\rotatebox{90}{\makecell{DB1\\(electric)}}}       & Coarsenet             & 0.705   & 0.713   & 0.724   & 0.751   & 0.751   & 0.712   & 0.710   & 0.709   & 0.708   & 0.708   \\
                           & Mindtct               & 0.634   & 0.569   & 0.513   & 0.527   & 0.524   & 0.686   & 0.631   & 0.592   & 0.574   & 0.558   \\
                           & Ours      & \textbf{0.579}  & \textbf{0.542}   & \textbf{0.506}   & \textbf{0.487}   & \textbf{0.498}   & \textbf{0.670}   & \textbf{0.608}   & \textbf{0.580}   & \textbf{0.568}   & \textbf{0.553}   \\
                           \hline
\multirow{3}{*}{\rotatebox{90}{\makecell{DB2\\(optical)}}}        & Coarsenet             & 0.512   & 0.402   & 0.314   & 0.295   & 0.269   & 0.513   & 0.394   & 0.324   & 0.285   & 0.250   \\
                           & Mindtct               & 0.145   & 0.071   & 0.048   & 0.038   & 0.030   & 0.175   & 0.097   & 0.060   & 0.042   & 0.031   \\
                           & Ours      & \textbf{0.074}   & \textbf{0.043}   & \textbf{0.036}   & \textbf{0.029}   & \textbf{0.029}   & \textbf{0.145}   & \textbf{0.063}   & \textbf{0.041}   & \textbf{0.029}   & \textbf{0.023}   \\
                           \hline
\multirow{3}{*}{\rotatebox{90}{\makecell{DB3\\(thermal)}}}        & Coarsenet             & 0.635   & 0.607   & 0.568   & 0.553   & 0.524   & 0.656   & 0.603   & 0.578   & 0.570   & 0.563   \\
                           & Mindtct               & 0.217   & 0.157   & 0.121   & 0.107   & 0.099   & 0.234   & 0.170   & 0.133   & 0.117   & 0.110   \\
                           & Ours      & \textbf{0.136}   & \textbf{0.104}   & \textbf{0.089}   & \textbf{0.085}   & \textbf{0.085}   & \textbf{0.168}   & \textbf{0.114}   & \textbf{0.096}   & \textbf{0.085}   & \textbf{0.078}   \\
                           \hline
\multirow{3}{*}{\rotatebox{90}{\makecell{DB4\\(synthetic)}}}         & Coarsenet             & 0.873   & 0.845   & 0.839   & 0.836   & 0.840   & 0.855   & 0.821   & 0.798   & 0.796   & 0.797   \\
                           & Mindtct               & \textbf{0.568}   & \textbf{0.485}   & \textbf{0.440} & \textbf{0.394}   & \textbf{0.385}   & \textbf{0.593}   & \textbf{0.477}   & \textbf{0.395}   & \textbf{0.344}   & \textbf{0.313}   \\
                           & Ours      & 0.670   & 0.548   & 0.473   & 0.432   & 0.399   & 0.692   & 0.577   & 0.477   & 0.411   & 0.361  \vspace{1mm}\\
                           \Xhline{2\arrayrulewidth}
                           \\
\end{tabular}
\vspace{-3mm}
\begin{tabular}{llrrrrrrrrrr}
\Xhline{2\arrayrulewidth}
\multicolumn{2}{l}{FNMR@$10^{-3}$FMR} & \multicolumn{5}{c}{Bozorth3}                   & \multicolumn{5}{c}{MCC}                         \\
\cmidrule(lr){3-7} \cmidrule(lr){8-12}
                           &                       & Best 20 & Best 25 & Best 30 & Best 35 & Best 40 & Best 20 & Best 25 & Best 30 & Best 35 & Best 40 \\
                           \hline
\multirow{3}{*}{\rotatebox{90}{\makecell{DB1\\(electric)}}}        & Coarsenet             & 0.818   & 0.829   & 0.843   & 0.856   & 0.855   & 0.835   & 0.840   & 0.837   & 0.838   & 0.838   \\
                           & Mindtct               & 0.722   & 0.674   & 0.654   & 0.666   & 0.671   & 0.769   & 0.720   & 0.690   & 0.671   & 0.653   \\
                           & Ours      & \textbf{0.699}   &\textbf{0.655}   & \textbf{0.626}   & \textbf{0.631}   & \textbf{0.650}   & \textbf{0.757}   & \textbf{0.708}   & \textbf{0.677}   & \textbf{0.663}   & \textbf{0.652}   \\
                           \hline
\multirow{3}{*}{\rotatebox{90}{\makecell{DB2\\(optical)}}}       & Coarsenet             & 0.645   & 0.506   & 0.440   & 0.386   & 0.371   & 0.658   & 0.506   & 0.412   & 0.370   & 0.335   \\
                           & Mindtct               & 0.223   & 0.124   & 0.082   & 0.062   & 0.052   & \textbf{0.237}   & 0.137   & 0.085   & 0.061   & 0.047   \\
                           & Ours      & \textbf{0.148}   & \textbf{0.080}   & \textbf{0.055}   & \textbf{0.046}   & \textbf{0.044}   & 0.240   & \textbf{0.098}   & \textbf{0.057}   & \textbf{0.041}   & \textbf{0.034}   \\
                           \hline
\multirow{3}{*}{\rotatebox{90}{\makecell{DB3\\(thermal)}}}       & Coarsenet             & 0.778   & 0.754   & 0.747   & 0.743   & 0.697   & 0.776   & 0.735   & 0.722   & 0.729   & 0.721   \\
                           & Mindtct               & 0.310   & 0.230   & 0.192   & 0.163   & 0.160   & 0.310   & 0.230   & 0.176   & 0.160   & 0.150   \\
                           & Ours      & \textbf{0.207}  & \textbf{0.158}   & \textbf{0.134}   & \textbf{0.124}   & \textbf{0.125}   & \textbf{0.238}   & \textbf{0.161}   & \textbf{0.130}   & \textbf{0.119}   & \textbf{0.112}  \\
                           \hline
\multirow{3}{*}{\rotatebox{90}{\makecell{DB4\\(synthetic)}}}        & Coarsenet             & 0.942   & 0.927   & 0.914   & 0.923   & 0.916   & 0.919   & 0.892   & 0.879   & 0.883   & 0.883   \\
                           & Mindtct               & \textbf{0.694}   & \textbf{0.605}   & \textbf{0.552} & \textbf{0.539}  & \textbf{0.515}   & \textbf{0.689}   & \textbf{0.575}   & \textbf{0.492}   & \textbf{0.442}   & \textbf{0.412}   \\
                           & Ours      & 0.772   & 0.691   & 0.612   & 0.567   & 0.541   & 0.791   & 0.678   & 0.584   & 0.519   & 0.465   \vspace{1mm}\\
                           \Xhline{2\arrayrulewidth}
\end{tabular}
\end{table*}

\vspace{-1mm}
\subsection{Fingerprint Quality Assessment}

Figures \ref{fig:FingerprintQuality_Bozorth3} and \ref{fig:FingerprintQualityMCC} compare the quality assessment performance of our proposed approach with NFIQ and NFIQ2 on the Bozorth3 (Figure \ref{fig:FingerprintQuality_Bozorth3}) and MCC (Figure \ref{fig:FingerprintQualityMCC}) matchers.
The quality assessment performance is shown as error-vs-reject curves as described in Section \ref{sec:EvaluationMetrics}.
The corresponding verification error is shown in terms of FNMR at an FMR of $10^{-1}$ (a-d), $10^{-2}$ (e-h), and $10^{-3}$ (i-l).
Moreover, the effectiveness of the different quality assessment solutions is analysed on three different sensor types (electric field, optical, and thermal) and synthetic data.

In all investigated scenarios, all quality assessment solutions show a solid and (relatively) stable performance.
Our proposed method based on the combination of minutia detection confidences outperforms the NIST's NFIQ and NFIQ2 in all cases involving real fingerprints.
Just on the less-relevant synthetically generated data using the MCC matcher, NFIQ2 shows better quality estimates.
However, on data captured from real fingerprints, the proposed methodology constantly shows a significantly stronger quality assessment performance than the baselines.
Especially for electric field and optical sensors, the proposed approach outperforms the baselines by a large margin.

\begin{figure*}[h]
\captionsetup[subfloat]{farskip=5pt,captionskip=1pt}
\centering

\subfloat[DB1 (electric field sensor)\label{fig:FPQ_DB1_1_Bo}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB1_A_fmr_0_1Best20Bozorth}}
\subfloat[DB2 (optical sensor) \label{fig:FPQ_DB2_1_Bo}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB2_A_fmr_0_1Best20Bozorth}}
\subfloat[DB3 (thermal sensor) \label{fig:FPQ_DB3_1_Bo}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB3_A_fmr_0_1Best20Bozorth}}
\subfloat[DB4 (synthetic data) \label{fig:FPQ_DB4_1_Bo}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB4_A_fmr_0_1Best20Bozorth}}

\subfloat[DB1 (electric field sensor)\label{fig:FPQ_DB1_01_Bo}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB1_A_fmr_0_01Best20Bozorth}}
\subfloat[DB2 (optical sensor) \label{fig:FPQ_DB2_01_Bo}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB2_A_fmr_0_01Best20Bozorth}}
\subfloat[DB3 (thermal sensor) \label{fig:FPQ_DB3_01_Bo}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB3_A_fmr_0_01Best20Bozorth}}
\subfloat[DB4 (synthetic data) \label{fig:FPQ_DB4_01_Bo}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB4_A_fmr_0_01Best20Bozorth}}

\subfloat[DB1 (electric field sensor)\label{fig:FPQ_DB1_001_Bo}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB1_A_fmr_0_001Best20Bozorth}}
\subfloat[DB2 (optical sensor) \label{fig:FPQ_DB2_001_Bo}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB2_A_fmr_0_001Best20Bozorth}}
\subfloat[DB3 (thermal sensor) \label{fig:FPQ_DB3_001_Bo}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB3_A_fmr_0_001Best20Bozorth}}
\subfloat[DB4 (synthetic data) \label{fig:FPQ_DB4_001_Bo}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB4_A_fmr_0_001Best20Bozorth}}

\caption{Fingerprint quality assessment on the Bozorth3 \cite{NBIS} matcher.
Each row represents the recognition error at a different FMR ($10^{-1}$, $10^{-2}$, and $10^{-3}$). Especially on the real-world sensor data, the proposed approach outperforms the widely-used NFIQ and NFIQ2 baselines. This holds true for all investigated sensor-types.}
\label{fig:FingerprintQuality_Bozorth3} \vspace{-3mm}
\end{figure*}

\begin{figure*}[h]
\captionsetup[subfloat]{farskip=5pt,captionskip=1pt}
\centering

\subfloat[DB1 (electric field sensor)\label{fig:FPQ_DB1_1_MCC}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB1_A_fmr_0_1Best20MCC}}
\subfloat[DB2 (optical sensor) \label{fig:FPQ_DB2_1_MCC}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB2_A_fmr_0_1Best20MCC}}
\subfloat[DB3 (thermal sensor) \label{fig:FPQ_DB3_1_MCC}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB3_A_fmr_0_1Best20MCC}}
\subfloat[DB4 (synthetic data) \label{fig:FPQ_DB4_1_MCC}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB4_A_fmr_0_1Best20MCC}}

\subfloat[DB1 (electric field sensor)\label{fig:FPQ_DB1_01_MCC}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB1_A_fmr_0_01Best20MCC}}
\subfloat[DB2 (optical sensor) \label{fig:FPQ_DB2_01_MCC}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB2_A_fmr_0_01Best20MCC}}
\subfloat[DB3 (thermal sensor) \label{fig:FPQ_DB3_01_MCC}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB3_A_fmr_0_01Best20MCC}}
\subfloat[DB4 (synthetic data) \label{fig:FPQ_DB4_01_MCC}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB4_A_fmr_0_01Best20MCC}}

\subfloat[DB1 (electric field sensor)\label{fig:FPQ_DB1_001_MCC}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB1_A_fmr_0_001Best20MCC}}
\subfloat[DB2 (optical sensor) \label{fig:FPQ_DB2_001_MCC}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB2_A_fmr_0_001Best20MCC}}
\subfloat[DB3 (thermal sensor) \label{fig:FPQ_DB3_001_MCC}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB3_A_fmr_0_001Best20MCC}}
\subfloat[DB4 (synthetic data) \label{fig:FPQ_DB4_001_MCC}]{%
       \includegraphics[width=0.20\textwidth]{ERC_DB4_A_fmr_0_001Best20MCC}}

\caption{Fingerprint quality assessment on the MCC \cite{DBLP:journals/pami/CappelliFM10} matcher.
Each row represents the recognition error at a different FMR ($10^{-1}$, $10^{-2}$, and $10^{-3}$). Especially on the real-world sensor data, the proposed approach outperforms the widely-used NFIQ and NFIQ2 baselines. This holds true for all investigated sensor-types.}
\label{fig:FingerprintQualityMCC} \vspace{-3mm}
\end{figure*}

\vspace{-1mm}
\section{Conclusion}
\vspace{-1mm}

Previous works on the quality assessment of single minutiae or full fingerprint captures are either learning models based on error-prone quality labels or make use of naive hand-crafted features.
Although many fingerprint recognition systems are still based on minutiae information, previous works on quality assessment neglected the minutia extraction process.
In this work, we proposed a novel concept of measuring the quality of fingerprints and single minutiae based on an arbitrary minutia extraction network.
The proposed method, MiDeCon, uses the minutia detection confidence of the utilized minutia extractor as the quality indicator for this minutia.
This confidence is based on the agreement of stochastic variants of the extraction network.
By combining the highest minutia qualities of a fingerprint, it successfully determines the fingerprint quality of this capture.
Experiments on the publicly available FVC 2006 databases demonstrate that the proposed approach strongly outperforms the baselines, such as Mindtct and CoarseNet for quality assessment of single minutia and NIST's widely-used fingerprint image software NFIQ1 and NFIQ2 for fingerprint quality assessment.
The strong performance of MiDeCon is especially observed when facing real-world sensor data, such as electric field, optical, and thermal sensors.
In contrast to previous works, MiDeCon jointly (a) does not rely on quality labels for training, (b) produces continuous quality values, (c) considers difficulties in the minutiae extraction process, and (d) assesses the quality of both, full fingerprints and single minutia.

\vspace{-3mm}
\paragraph{Acknowledgement}
This research work has been funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research and the Hessen State Ministry for Higher Education, Research and the Arts within their joint support of the National Research Center for Applied Cybersecurity ATHENE.

{\small
\bibliographystyle{ieee}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaArXiv


WE APOLOGIZE FOR THE INCONVENIENCE. THIS EVENT IS CANCELLED DUE TO AN EMERGENCY BY THE PRESENTER.
A'Vents by August is a planning, event styling + floral design firm that creates by infusing art and visual expressions. Participants will learn about the different elements of event planning and how it relates to their business.
There's know better way than an event to strengthen your brand, your business relationships and your reach to your ideal client. Create memorable experiences that increase and solidify your brand. Learners will cover topics of building your brand, creating your brand & showing off your brand with innovative event planning.


You are looking at a unique limited edition mask that has been carved by hand from leather. This mask draws upon the themes of May with its Emerald birthstone and celebrated flower, Lily of the Valley. Because it is so intricate, I will only be making a limited number of this particular design! Each one is signed and numbered on the back.
The green stems and leaves in this mask are metallic and shimmer in the light. I've also added accents of swarovski crystal cabochons for the right amount of sparkle in the green shadows of this mask. It's simply stunning in person! It is held to the face by organza ribbon tied behind the head.


text:
Discerning the Discernment of the Universal Apostolic Preferences (UAP)of the Society of Jesus – Vincent Perepppadan, SJ
Towards 50th Year of "Development and Evangelization": Revisiting the missiological reflection of Samuel Rayan – Xavier Tharamel, SJ
Pope Francis and Diplomatic Feat in the UAE – Pradeep Peter
Levinasian Concept of Other: Implications and Contemporary Relevance – Ivin Tomy, SJ
Religion: Peace, Fraternity, Dialogue – Midhun J Francis, SJ
Expert Voice
Theological Reflections
Inter Religious Dialogue
Fr M K George
Fr Varghese Malpan
Klaus-Martin Lein
Essays Expert Voice Jesuits
June 6, 2019 June 6, 2019 admin 0 Comment
Promulgating the Universal Apostolic Preferences (UAP), Arturo Sosa, the present Superior General of the Society of Jesus, said the following words: "For the last sixteen months the Society of Jesus has been following a process of discernment as to better meet the new needs of our mission at the present time" ("Universal Apostolic Preferences," 2019). This process had been "to guide the apostolic effort of the Society of Jesus [for] the ten coming years" ("Universal Apostolic Preferences," 2019). Following is a succinct summary of the four apostolic preferences that signal a call for transformative change in the organizational mission and priorities of the Society of Jesus as presented in the website ("Universal Apostolic Preferences," 2019).
1. Discernment and the "Spiritual Exercises." This represents the legacy and the spiritual tradition that the Jesuits preserve, as handed down by Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Society of Jesus, for discernment in life. In the present age, this Apostolic Preference seeks to help people to find God and to accompany them in discerning complex choices of life; to give the world a spiritual orientation that leads humanity to its creator, which is a deeper alternative to secularism.
2. Walking with the excluded. In a world that casts out the poor, and violates human dignity, the Jesuits profess a preferential commitment to the mission of reconciliation and justice by engaging their social centers and universities with others to address the world's economic and social problems. It is also a commitment of education for reconciliation, solidarity, and healing the world. It also includes promoting healthy and safe environment for children and young people against all abuses.
3. Caring for our common home. Recognizing how the environmental crisis impacts particularly the poor and the vulnerable, Jesuit institutions of higher education commit to engage in ecological conversion; social centers engage in studying and propagating environmental concerns; schools pass the message of caring for environment; and all other Jesuit activities in parishes and elsewhere promote the values of ecological conversion.
4. Journeying with youth. Identifying the predicament of youth in "the uncertainty of relationship in a digital era, diminishing opportunities for work, the growth of political violence, discrimination, degradation of the environment" ("Universal Apostolic Preferences," 2019), Jesuits want to open their houses of apostolic work for youth creativity, which reveals God's presence in their lives.
Concluding the promulgation of the Universal Apostolic Preferences, Arturo Sosa states: "It's time to change the course of history. We accept the invitation to be actors of this change by living out these preferences in our life and mission" ("Universal Apostolic Preferences," 2019).
Discerning the Discernment
Every organization across the world is undergoing significant changes for survival (Farazmand, 1999; Rainey, 2009). According to Rainey (2009), "[a] sprawling literature addresses organizational change and innovation, with much of it focused on how to change the organizations for better" (p. 383). Observing the compulsive antecedents that necessitate organizational changes, Farazmand (1999) adds that "[t]hese changes include structural adjustments, organizational reconfiguration, and process improvements to maximize rationality and bottom-line concepts" (p. 321). Marshall Jones (2007) argues that an organizational change in nonprofit and voluntary organizations also could represent a mission drift, even when the shift is not toward a for-profit arena.
Promulgation of the four Universal Apostolic Preferences (UAP) "the fruit of a process of discernment lasting almost two years" ("Universal Apostolic Preferences," 2019) is an organizational attempt to make the Society relevant in the contemporary history. As the introduction in the website announces, the Universal Apostolic Preferences "give a horizon, a point of reference to the whole Society of Jesus. They capture our imagination and awaken our desires. They unite us in our mission" ("Universal Apostolic Preferences," 2019). It is projected that the four areas identified by the organization are vitally important for the world today. And for the Society of Jesus, the UAP collectively is a project for next ten years to pay special attention.
In the context of applying organizational theories to situations that the organizations confront, it becomes significant to ask how the Society of Jesus discerned for two years to formulate these Preferences in a universal context of the mission. It is important to check if the process had taken into consideration the geographical and cultural diversities and needs of mission and how such differences have been accommodated in the UAP. In the theoretical framework of organizations, these two years of discernment represent a process of organizational sensemaking (Weick, Sutcliffe, & Obstfeld, 2005). Therefore, the question that seeks explanation is the extent of participation and involvement of the global stakeholders in the organizational sensemaking. In other words, a critical question surfaces is, whether the organizational sensemaking behind the formulation of the UAP has been a process of discernment of an influential coalition in the Society. From the organizational theoretical frame, another question which gathers significance is about the organizational change. By paying "special attention to them (proposed four areas of the UAP) in the next ten years" ("Universal Apostolic Preferences," 2019), what would be the extent of change that the organization achieves? Would the change represent a mere adjustment, or an isolated change, or a far-reaching change with less organizational impact, or a transformational change (Eckel, Hill, & Green, 1998) in the Society of Jesus? The website announcing the UAP further states, "[w]e invite you to learn more and take action with us!" ("Universal Apostolic Preferences," 2019). This invitation involves the perceived nature of implementing the program of the UAP. It envisages a collaborative effort, involving, along with the Jesuits, the mission partners and the beneficiaries of the services of the Society of Jesus. However, this brings forth another question in the context of organizational theories on stakeholder relationship management (Friedman & Miles, 2006). What would be the extent of the involvement of the stakeholders? Would they be mere spectators or partners in the decision-making process both in the process of formulation and implementation of the UAP?
A process of constant critical self-examination has been integral to the tradition of the Society of Jesus, an organization that has survived well over four centuries. Therefore, posing these questions is a significant attempt along the tradition of the Society.
← Towards 50th Year of "Development and Evangelization": Revisiting the missiological reflection of Samuel Rayan – Xavier Tharamel, SJ
Books Culture
A Guide to "Laudato Si"
August 2, 2016 admin 0
One of the many marvelous things about Pope Francis' encyclical on the environment, "Laudato Si', on Care for Our Common
The Name of God is Mercy – Sooraj Dominic, SJ
Our Sponsers
Copyright © 2019 thanmayaonline.com. All rights reserved.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Performance Optimization | Preparing for scale while enhancing the bottom line.
Preparing for scale while enhancing the bottom line.
Business owners and leaders turn to Ankura as trusted advisors to assist their organizations through transition. Whether they need to build or shore up the infrastructure for growth, turnaround a company in distress, improve an underperforming asset, or revitalize a lagging acquisition, we help organizations build the foundation for sustained success. Our team identifies ways to optimize existing capabilities, business processes, and technologies to support growth and scale along with streamlining costs through the entire value chain. We also evaluate and recommend different solutions and outsourcing alternatives so owners and executive leadership have options and can make informed decisions quickly.
Our experts collaborate with senior leadership to develop specific performance improvement goals and targeted operating plans aimed at maximizing EBITDA and cash flow without sacrificing long-term sustainable growth. We then create dashboards and reporting mechanisms to track progress against these goals and plans. Ankura experts continue to support client leadership as interim managers or hands-on advisors to drive these performance improvements throughout the organization.
Read more about our performance optimization services.


90' + 5' Second Half ends, Girona 1, Athletic Club 2.
90' + 4' Iñaki Williams (Athletic Club) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
90' + 4' Foul by Pere Pons (Girona).
90' + 4' Foul by Kenan Kodro (Athletic Club).
90' + 4' Álex Granell (Girona) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
90' + 3' Attempt missed. Álex Granell (Girona) left footed shot from outside the box misses to the right. Assisted by Patrick Roberts.
90' + 2' Attempt missed. Ander Capa (Athletic Club) left footed shot from outside the box is close, but misses the top left corner. Assisted by Beñat Etxebarria.


text:
Grant number like: PB-274405-20
PB-274405-20
College of Southern Maryland, La Plata (La Plata, MD 20646-2867)
Maria Leighton (Project Director: May 2020 to present)
Stories of Southern Maryland
The retention of an archives assistant employed in the Southern Maryland Studies Center, who would transcribe 40 oral history interviews documenting the history and culture of southern Maryland.
The Southern Maryland Studies Center currently makes available to the public 321 oral histories with an estimated total time of 450 hours of audio recordings with a wide range of subjects including education in Southern Maryland, influenza epidemic, the great depression, various themes that give voice to minorities currently underrepresented in our repository, local industry and more. Following archival and transcription best practices, 40 oral histories will be listened to and transcribed to a word document that will then be converted to a PDF file that conforms to accessibility standards. Each record will be published in our website and made available to all.
[Grant products][Media coverage]
Cooperative Agreements and Special Projects (P&A)
Preservation and Access
6/15/2020 – 12/31/2020


> functionalities I've come to use often, after 11 years of Mandrake|iva.
> can the functionalities be restored?
> If you configure a macro, then ftp/http transport will be re-enabled.
> Note that this is "unsupported" (by Mandriva) functionality in RPM.


Earlier after the incident was reported the state health minister Sudip Roy Barman expressed concern over the incident and assured of taking necessary action against the accused persons.
The Postal ballot for the 2019 Tripura Lok Sabha election in the East Tripura Parliamentary seat, is being held at Sishu Bihar School since Friday morning.
With the conclusion of election for West Tripura Lok Sabha election in Tripura, now all eye is on the strong room where EVMs are being stored at Umakanta Academy.


The only Net Promoter® Score survey package designed specifically for HR service providers.
Whether you're a small provider of outsourced HR services interested in launching your very first client satisfaction survey, or an established firm looking to amplify the value of an existing survey practice - there's a ClearlyRated survey program designed just for you.
Never underestimate the power of preparation.
Notifying your clients about a survey ahead of time gives them the chance to prepare, and increases their likelihood of responding to the survey when they receive it.
Additionally, pre-survey communication gives you the opportunity to remind clients just how much their feedback means to your company - which could influence survey results in and of itself (87% of clients say that simply being asked for feedback improves their perception of their HR provider).
ClearlyRated recommends that you survey as many clients (and client contacts) as possible to gain an accurate idea of your firm's Net Promoter® Score and reputation. Research shows that 2 out of 3 professional service engagements involve a team of decision makers rather than a single individual - so we encourage you to send your survey to as many decision-makers and influencers as you have access to.
Please note: The price of your survey subscription is based on the number of employees at your company - never on the number of surveys you send. We do this to encourage a holistic inquiry into your clients' satisfaction.
To be eligible to compete for the Best of HR Services award, you must choose at least 3 consecutive months over the past 12 months and provide ClearlyRated with a list of one hundred percent (100%) or a minimum of 500 individual contacts who were billed for services during that timeframe. The consecutive period must fall within the trailing twelve months from the survey launch date.
When will clients receive my survey request?
Key dates for your client survey will be finalized when you register for your subscription.
ClearlyRated surveys are typically "in the field" (i.e. open for your clients to respond to) for a period of 2 weeks. During that time, you'll have a lot to keep you (and your team) productive.
Real-time 'Detractor Alerts' notify you of at-risk clients as soon as they report their dissatisfaction.
'Issue Tracking' empowers you to follow up on reported issues and track Detractor resolutions.
Employee 'Shout Outs' are triggered when Promoters recognize a specific person on your team who went above and beyond for them.
Use real-time Shout Out notifications to recognize service leaders across the firm and fuel excitement for the survey process.
Maximize the number of clients who respond to your survey to eliminate blind spots and get the most accurate assessment of satisfaction.
It can require a personal touch to communicate just how important clients' feedback is to you and your company, so plan to reach out personally while the survey is in the field.
All ClearlyRated client surveys are a standard 8-question survey measuring Net Promoter® Score and its drivers.
Clients are also asked to elaborate on the rating they give your firm, which provides additional context for service resolution and improvement, as well as testimonials from clients who grant you permission to use their feedback publicly.
If you'd like to see an example of a ClearlyRated HR services client satisfaction survey, please reach out to the ClearlyRated team.
What's a good survey response rate?
Anything above a 20% response rate is considered a strong showing by your clients (and will qualify you for the Best of HR services competition). However, professional service providers that work with ClearlyRated to administer client satisfaction surveys see, on average, a 34% response rate - which is excellent.
More questions about fielding a ClearlyRated survey?
Many HR service firms fail to realize the opportunities to go beyond measurement with NPS.
At ClearlyRated, we believe a well-designed NPS survey program should place your firm's service levels at the center of your marketing strategy - from retention and account growth to differentiation and improving your online search results.
Make survey results and key findings available to your internal team.
Communicate to your clients about what you learned and what you'll change.
Commit to, and measure progress against, key initiatives that will improve service quality across the firm.
One of the biggest mistakes HR service providers make is spending more time designing and analyzing their client survey than they do taking action on client feedback!
Your clients took time out of their days to communicate their feedback to you - time to do something with it.
The quality of service you provide is nearly 2x more important to prospects than the cost of working with you.
More than 1 in 3 buyers of outsourced HR services say that client satisfaction scores and ratings influence their decision to work with a firm.
50% of buyers say that testimonials have a positive influence on their decision to work with a provider.
Client survey responses will populate your firm's ClearlyRated listing with real-time star ratings and testimonials.
Take advantage of the time after your survey closes to update your listing and manage your page.
87% of clients say that being asked for feedback improves their perception of their HR service provider.
93% say it's important to have an open channel of communication to provide feedback to their firm.
67% say they are more likely to take the time to provide feedback through a survey than in-person.
63% say they are more candid with their feedback in an online survey.


Cheap flights to California: San Francisco & Los Angeles for only €452!
US Airways now offer superb prices of flights to California.
Return flights from Brussels to San Francisco are available for only €452!
You can also fly to Los Angeles for the same price.
If you live in Germany or you prefer to return to German airports you can also choose departure from Brussels and return to Munich or Frankfurt for the same price.
23 kg luggage is included and there is one stopover in Philadelphia.
Book via BudgetAir (click on Show extra search options if you want to enter return to Munich/Frankfurt).
« Cheap flights to Iceland: Reykjavik for €133!


text:
Q: What are the dynamics of an atom and photon, as the atom absorbs the photon in the quantum mechanical picture? Atoms can absorb photons, and when they do, an electron "orbiting" that atom moves up an energy level. I was wondering what the dynamics of this interaction was? Precisely how is the photon absorbed, from a wave function perspective?
My mental picture is that the wave function for the photon would have to go to zero at the end of the interaction (since it has been absorbed by the atom), and the wavefunction for the atom (lets say hydrogen for simplicity) would have to change to the wavefunction for excited hydrogen.
This is just a vague picture though, and I was wondering if anyone had done the mathematics of this interaction, and whether anyone had made a physically correct animation of it. What does the dynamics of an atom absorbing a photon look like?

A: You want the scattering experiment "γ+Hydrogen", a neutral target.
The available energy levels of hydrogen have a width, thus if one could do the experiment the way $e^+e^-$  experiments are done, the energy levels will appear as resonances to this scattering.
The problem is  the low energies , ev, needed  to scan the region ,I do not think this can be done experimentally.
Theoreticaly a Feynman diagram field theoretic method should be developed, to predict the data given the energy levels available. I found this article,  so people have been working along these lines.

A: Let's start by looking at the behavior of an atom irradiated by a resonant electromagnetic wave of constant amplitude and frequency $\omega$. For simplicity, let's use hydrogen.
Classical electric field
The electric field polarizes the atom by moving the electron along the axis of polarization. To appropriately account for the discrete energy eigenstates of the electron ($|1s\rangle$, $|2s\rangle$, $|2p\rangle$, etc.) we need to treat it quantum mechanically. So instead of a point particle we need to describe it by its wavefunction. In the ground state it occupies a $1s$ orbital.
If you, for example, excite it at the frequency resonant with the $1s \to 2p_x$ transistion, the wavefunction describing the electron is displaced by the electic field along the $x$ axis. It can then be described by a superposition of the wavefunctions associated with the $1s$ and $2p_x$ orbitals.
$$\left| \Psi(t) \right\rangle = \alpha(t) \left| 1s \right\rangle + \beta(t) e^{-i \omega t} \left| 2p_x \right\rangle$$
After some time the electron will be fully in the $\left| 2p_x \right\rangle$ state. Driving it further at the same frequency $\omega$ will not inrease its energy (as expected from a harmonic oscillator), but transition it back to the ground state. This is in line with how Einstein described stimulated emission in his famous 1917 paper Zur Quantentheorie der Strahlung, Phys. Z. 18 121-128 (1917). In §2b) he wrote:
If a Planck resonator [the atom] is in a radiation field, the energy of the resonator can be changed by the transfer of energy from the electromagnetic field to the resonator; this energy can be positive or negative depending on the phases of the resonator and of the oscillating field.
Better than any wordy description is a visualization of the wavefunctions, like this applet. I got a pretty good intuition for this process by just watching the electron undergoing many Rabi cycles.
The movement of the electron creates an electric field by itself, which interferes with the incident beam. On the transmission side this interference is destructive, so that a weak, strongly focused beam can be completely blocked.
Single photon
Since a single photon holds only a finite amount of energy you need to care about its spatial extend. Typically, single photons are created by other atoms, which in free space emit in all directions. For simplicity, let's not care about this and assume that we managed to transform its emission pattern into a Gaussian beam focused on our observed atom.
The temporal envelope of a photon created by spontaneous emission is a decaying exponential, but the excitation probability is highest, when it's a rising exponential. In fact, if the photon temporally and spatially matches a time-reversed spontaneously emitted photon it would be absorbed with a probability of $100\,\%$. In that case the photon is completely gone at the moment the absorption is finished.
$$\left| 1s \right\rangle_{\text{electron}} \left| 1 \right\rangle_{\text{photon}} \rightarrow \left| 2p_x \right\rangle_{\text{electron}} \left| 0 \right\rangle_{\text{photon}}$$
The more realistic case is that the photon does not fulfill the previous conditions and therefore is only partially absorbed, so that the final state is a superposition of the photon being absorbed and having passed the atom:
$$\alpha \, \left| 1s \right\rangle_{\text{electron}} \left| 1 \right\rangle_{\text{photon}} + \beta \, \left| 2p_x \right\rangle_{\text{electron}} \left| 0 \right\rangle_{\text{photon}}$$
One can increase the interaction efficiency $\beta$ for non-ideal photon shapes by embedding the atom in a suitable environment, for example in a cavity.
The latter superposition can be collapsed by a measurement. For example if you place a detector after the atom and you detect a photon you know that it must have passed the atom. Since atom and photon are entangled it also affects the state of the atom. It will be completely in the $| 1s \rangle$ state then. Else, if you detected no photon (and unrealistically made sure that you would inevitably detect one if it was there) the atom would end up completely in the excited state $| 2p_x \rangle$.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Follow Go North East
Opening of Beamish Museum's new bus depot to preserve transport heritage
The new Northern General Transport Bus Depot has opened its doors at Beamish, The Living Museum of the North today (Friday, 22nd November) – helping to preserve transport heritage and engineering skills, along with the century-old Northern name.
The depot and workshop, which is part of the £20million Remaking Beamish project, is home to the museum's growing fleet of buses and will allow visitors to watch engineering work on historic vehicles.
Learning activities in science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) will take place at the bus depot and apprenticeships will ensure that heritage engineering skills are passed on.
Paul Jarman, Assistant Director – Design, Transport and Industry, said: "We are thrilled to be opening the Northern General Transport Bus Depot at Beamish. With the incredible growth in visitor numbers over the past decade we have been expanding our fleet of period vehicles to meet rising demand.
"The new bus depot and associated workshop has been created to support this growth and we're now lucky to have one of the best facilities in any museum in the UK for maintaining our fleet.
"We'd like to thank our funders and supporters who are helping us preserve the region's heritage, including transport heritage, for future generations."
The depot has been supported by The National Lottery Heritage Fund, Go North East and The Reece Foundation, along with local, regional and national trusts and foundations, the Friends of Beamish and the Business Friends of Beamish.
The Northern General Transport Company's first buses began running in 1913 and the name has been preserved in the new depot. The company later became Go-Ahead Northern and then Go North East. Around 175,000 journeys are made on Go North East buses every day around the region.
Martijn Gilbert, Managing Director at Go North East, said: "We're delighted to see the opening of the Northern General Transport Bus Depot at Beamish Museum. As a long-standing partner, it's great to have been involved in this exciting project and to see everyone's hard work come to fruition.
"Having operated buses in the North East for over 100 years, starting out way back in 1913, connecting communities and being a major employer particularly in areas close to Beamish, including Chester-le-Street, Stanley and Consett, it's fitting that we're supporting the museum with their new bus depot, which also forms an important part of keeping our history alive."
The Reece Foundation aims to inspire the next generation of North East engineers and, to date, has pledged £720,000 to support the museum's STEM learning programme.
Anne Reece, Chair of The Reece Foundation, said: "The Reece Foundation is pleased to support this ambitious new addition to Beamish, which will bring engineering to life for the thousands of young people and their families who visit the attraction every year.
"The trustees hope our contribution will enable the museum to continue to expand its work preserving the region's rich industrial history while highlighting the importance of engineering in the future and the exciting careers that studying STEM can offer."
Thanks to the money raised by National Lottery players, the Remaking Beamish project has been awarded £10.9million by The National Lottery Heritage Fund.
David Renwick, Director, England, North, The National Lottery Heritage Fund, said: "It's great to see this milestone in the Remaking Beamish project take place. We're really proud that our investment will not only showcase transport heritage of the North East, but also help to inspire the next generation of engineers and scientists through the fantastic learning programme."
The Remaking Beamish project is the biggest development in the museum's history and includes a 1950s Town, with the newly-opened welfare hall, as well as plans for houses, shops, a cinema, cafe and bowling green. Aged miners' homes will provide a centre for older people, including those living with dementia. There will also be a 1950s Farm and expansion of the Georgian area, including Joe the Quilter's cottage and an inn where visitors can stay overnight.
To find out more about visiting Beamish, including opening times, see www.beamish.org.uk.
DurhamNorthumberlandTyne and Wear
HeritageNorthern General TransportDepotBeamish MuseumBus
Opening of Beamish Museum...
882 KB • 1248 x 832 px
We're part of the Go-Ahead group
Conditions of Carriage |
Customer Charter |
Registered address 3rd floor, 41-51 Grey Street, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne NE1 6EE


Meet the α6300 — the APS-C interchangeable lens compact camera that puts the power to shoot professional-looking stills and movies solidly in your hands. An enhanced buffer for continuous shooting of up to 307 shots2, in-camera 5-axis optical image stabilisation, touchscreen control, super-speed AF and High-density Tracking AF Technology extend the range of your shooting capabilities.
Wide phase-detection AF point coverage With an incredible 425 focal plane phase-detection AF points densely positioned over the entire image area, this comprehensive AF point coverage ensures that no subject escapes its attention.


President Donald Trump named a Boeing Co. executive Thursday to replace Deputy Secretary Bob Work, a holdover from the Obama administration, as the No. 2 civilian at the Pentagon after Defense Secretary Jim Mattis.
The White House, on Mattis' recommendation, announced that fixed-wing and rotorcraft specialist Patrick Shanahan, now the senior vice president for supply chain and operations at Boeing, would be nominated as the successor to Work, a retired Marine artillery colonel who has taken on some of the toughest management assignments at the Defense Department on budgets, modernization and health care.
Work, who served under former Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, agreed to stay on at Mattis' request as the new Trump administration struggled to fill political appointments requiring Senate confirmation throughout government.
Mattis put Work in charge of budget workups that will likely keep him at the Pentagon through May. The overlap for Work put three Marines for the first time in the top three positions at the department -- Mattis, Work and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Joseph Dunford, the former Marine commandant.
Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, said Mattis was grateful that Work had agreed to stay on until his successor is confirmed by the Senate.
"His steady leadership is critical during this time of transition, and Secretary Mattis continues to have full confidence in him as he carries out crucial work in managing the Department," Davis said.
At Boeing, Shanahan previously was senior vice president of airplane programs and oversaw the management for the 737, 747, 767, 777 and 787 programs, the White House said.
Before that, Shanahan was vice president and general manager of Boeing's Missile Defense Systems unit and vice president and general manager for Rotorcraft Systems in Philadelphia, where he was responsible for all U.S. Army Aviation, including the Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey tiltrotor, the CH-47 Chinook and the AH-64D Apache attack helicopter.
Shanahan's was one of six nominations -- five of them from Virginia -- to fill posts at the Pentagon sent over to the Senate, all with Mattis' recommendations, according to the Pentagon.
David Joel Trachtenberg of Virginia will was named to serve as principal deputy undersecretary of defense for policy, following the withdrawal of the nomination to that post of former Ambassador to Egypt Anne Patterson. Several Republican senators had signaled their opposition to Patterson's nomination.
Trachtenberg is the president and CEO of Shortwaver Consulting LLC, a national security consultancy, and formerly was a staffer on the House Armed Services Committee. He previously served as principal deputy assistant secretary of defense for international security policy where he was responsible for issues relating to NATO, Europe, Russia and Eurasia, technology security, counter-proliferation, missile defense, nuclear forces, and arms control, the White House said.
Kenneth P. Rapuano of Virginia was nominated to serve as assistant secretary of defense, homeland defense and global security. Rapuano has a long career in national security and homeland security affairs in the private, public and academic sectors, the White House said. He currently serves as senior vice president and director of the studies and analysis group at the ANSER Corp.
David L. Norquist of Virginia, a partner with the accounting firm of Kearney and Co., was named to serve as undersecretary of defense, comptroller. Norquist has 27 years of experience in federal financial management beginning as a federal employee in 1989 with the Department of the Army, the White House said.
Elaine McCusker of Virginia was named to serve as principal deputy undersecretary of defense, comptroller. McCusker currently is the director of resources and analysis at the headquarters of U.S Central Command at MacDill Air Force Base in Florida.
Robert Daigle of Virginia, an Army veteran, was named to as director of cost assessment and program evaluation, known as CAPE. Daigle previously served in CAPE during the Bush administration as director of program resources and information systems management division.
The flurry of nominations for the Pentagon posts came amid reports of growing friction between Mattis and the White House over the slow pace of appointments to his staff.


text:
President Akıncı met with leaders of political parties
President Mustafa Akıncı had a meeting with leaders of political parties and their representatives yesterday. During the meeting, Akıncı informed the leaders of political parties and authorities regarding the new negotiation process. After the meeting, the leaders of political parties made statements to the press.
In his statement to the press, CTP-BG leader and Prime Minister Yorgancıoğlu said that they discussed the negotiation process and Akıncı had shared with them the developments to date. Yorgancıoğlu also added that their meeting was a fruitful meeting.
In his statement to the press, DP-UG leader Serdar Denktaş said that Akıncı shared his views with them mutually about the meetings held with Turkey and Greek Cypriot leader Anastasiadis since he has been elected as a president.
UBP leader Özgürgün said they would be following the talks closely and hoped they would be finalised soon. Özgürgün also said that confidence-building measures needed to pave the way for a comprehensive settlement.
Furthermore, in his statement, TDP leader Cemal Özyiğit stated that the positive atmosphere which has started with election of Akıncı has reflected to the solution and peace process in a short time.


text:
O Weston Workers Bears Football Club é um clube semi-profissional de futebol com sede em Weston, Austrália. A equipe compete no National Premier Leagues.

História
O clube foi fundado em 1907.

Ligações externas
 Sítio oficial

Clubes de futebol da Austrália
Clubes de futebol fundados em 1907

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Angela Dendinger | The Sentinel Gary Ebert, president of the Cardington-Lincoln Alumni Association with the 2016 Hall of Fame Inductees from left: Gary Ebert, Lea Ann Maceyko, Jim Morris and Carl Pecko.
Three Cardington High School graduates were honored when they were inducted into the Alumni Association's Hall of Fame during ceremonies conducted during the annual alumni party on May 28.
Inducted by Gary Ebert, association president, were Jim Morris, Class of 1961; Carl A. Pecko, Jr., Class of 1965 and Lea Ann Maceyko, Class of 1981Morris, a veteran of the U S Army, is retired from HPM, Mount Gilead.
He was nominated for his service to the community and country, with emphasis on the American Legion where he has served in offices ranging from the local Post 97, to District and later Department Commander and later was the National Vice Commander. He was a coach of the Car-Mar American Legion baseball team and coached Baseball for Boys.
committees of his church and was a member and vice chairman of the board of Trustees of the Union College in Barbourville, KY.
Public Accountant Exam in 1989.
She joined her late father's tax firm in 1986 and has maintained that office since his death in 1996. She was the founder of Friends of Cardington, a group of business leaders who use their creative ideas and enthusiasm to plan and hold events and activities in Cardington.
These events include the Street Fair, Halloween Party and Christmas in Cardington She was able to seek donations from local businesses and community members to provide these activities at no cost to the community. She also helps fund local school trips and donates school supplies to children in need. She is also the current president of the Cardington Community Improvement Corporation, serves on the Board of Directors of the Morrow County Seniors on Center as their treasurer and chairman of the finance committee.
http://aimmedianetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/29/2016/06/web1_Hall-of-Fame-inductees-2016.jpgAngela Dendinger | The Sentinel Gary Ebert, president of the Cardington-Lincoln Alumni Association with the 2016 Hall of Fame Inductees from left: Gary Ebert, Lea Ann Maceyko, Jim Morris and Carl Pecko.


text:
News Analyst
Panic Attack: NY Mag Writer Starts Crying on MSNBC At 'Horrifying' Reality Court Could Overturn Roe
Friday night news broke that Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg had passed at 87, after battling pancreatic cancer. The death of the feminist, liberal icon shook the media to the core as many analysts appeared on cable television to fret about the status of abortion rights. New York Magazine's Rebecca Traister appeared on MSNBC's All In With Chris Hayes to have an emotional breakdown panicking about abortion rights and how the evil right wing was succeeding in gutting the left's "major legal victories."
Host Chris Hayes was more composed but just as dramatic about what this could mean for Americans and far-left causes such as Black Lives Matter. He opined:
This is a year of and an era of sort of like reckoning around race and gender particularly between #MeToo and Black Lives Matter, not coincidentally with Donald Trump as president and the defeat of the first woman nominee and like losing her at this point a day after yet another woman came forward to say the President of the United States sexually assaulted her. What does it mean to you?What does it say about where we are?
Traister lamented, "It is the world's most chilling and horrible poetry." She fretted the "American right wing" has been trying to undo the left's "great social movements and progress" for the past fifty years and they appeared to be succeeding. She ranted that abortion rights were already all but illegal:
The road to making abortion everything but technically illegal is open and we are traveling down already. So the major legal um victories of the mid-20th century- this has been the project of the Republicans! And yes, there is a horrifying poetry that this happening!
While his guest sipped what appeared to be wine, Hayes tried to calm her down by pointing out that polls reveal the majority of Americans support keeping Roe v. Wade when specifically asked so the left shouldn't be so worried this will happen. Traister agreed but started to cry as she ranted it was still something she's terrified about:
TRAISTER: So you raised a really interesting point. And that point is, this moment should not be a moment where anybody thinks it is over. That's an instinct. [starts crying] I have had within the past hour. One of the easiest things to think in this moment is well, that's it, it is done, right?
It cannot be! It is only done if everybody says well it's done, there is nothing we can do. The fight that has to happen, and It has to happen from the Democratic Party, it has to happen in the Senate, it has to happen around public opinion and it has to happen around the expression of refusal to permit the system to be corroded the way they had been, that got it to this point. Remember, if Barack Obama had been able to appoint his justice, this would not mean the thing it does now and that was a breaking of how this country works. And we have to fight harder against that...
Expect much more media panicking over abortion in the weeks to come.
There were no advertisers in this hour of MSNBC but you can follow the Conservatives Fight Back page here.
Read the relevant transcript, below:
All in With Chris Hayes
CHRIS HAYES: This is a year of and an era of sort of like reckoning around race and gender particularly between me too and black lives matter, not coincidentally with Donald Trump as president and the defeat of the first woman nominee and like losing her at this point a day after yet another woman came forward to say the President of the United States sexually assaulted her. What does it mean to you?What does it say about where we are?
REBECCA TRAISTER: It is the world's most chilling and horrible poetry. I mean this has been the project of the American right wing since uh the great social movements and political and legal shifts of the mid 20th century has been to reverse all that progress and um, you know the American right had been working on this for decades, it's not just during the Trump administration. This has been a project for decades. It is already- look You already had the voting rights act. You had labor protection gutted, you had environmental protection gutted you have even decisions like June medical services which you know some people sort of read as a benign thing. The road to making abortion everything but technically illegal is open and we are traveling down already. So the major legal um victories of the mid-20th century- this has been the project of the Republicans! And yes, there is a horrifying poetry that this happening-- I mean this is the first day of in-person voting in Virginia, right?
HAYES: Yes
TRAISTER: For the election and the day that we're voting, perhaps for a Democratic President is the day that Ruth Bader Ginsburg dies, and that will, if she's replaced, which I have every reason to believe she will be by Donald Trump and by the Republicans of the Senate, that would alter the course of the Supreme Court for generations.
I would like to think, you know, earlier in this election season when we were having fights about liberal and left wing policy reform. There were some talk about court reform and um it seems very unlikely to me that Biden administration, which is not for big crashing around structural institutions but the Senate confirmed it is not just Ginsburg's seat, confirmed lifetime appointments. Trump has appointed a record number lifetime judicial appointments! The courts are stacked right now by Donald Trump and by Republicans. I do think that one of the things we should, I mean I hope that there is a conversation about what there is that could be done about this and the possibilities of court reform as much as a long shot as they may seem!
HAYES: Here is the one thing that I think and I want to hear your response to this. The one thing that I think is important not to lose sight of, is sort of for the people that are against the side against the rollback, is that public opinion has moved in those people's favor. We have seen remarkable changes in public opinion in some of the things related to race and policing.
But essentially here, and I think It is so important for people not to be scared of their own shadow Roe V. Wade is popular, overturning Roe V. Wade is incredibly unpopular. There are a lot of subtleties when it comes to abortion polling. A huge amount comes down to how you ask the question. But when you call the question that way, when you call the question essentially on Roe -- this is it, Roe or not, you get durable majorities,
TRAISTER: 60% or 70% majorities even in some purple and red states!
HAYES: I think this is just massively important for somebody to understand as we think about it. Don't be scared of a frontal political fight on Roe V. Wade, when a country that's polarized on everything, support for Roe V. Wade routinely coming in at 65% or 70%.
TRAISTER: So you raised a really interesting point. And that point is, this moment should not be a moment where anybody thinks it is over. That's an instinct. [starts crying] I have had within the past hour. One of the easiest things to think in this moment is 'well, that's it, it is done,' right?
It cannot be! It is only done if everybody says 'Well it's done, there is nothing we can do.' The fight that has to happen, and It has to happen from the Democratic Party, it has to happen in the Senate, it has to happen around public opinion and it has to happen around the expression of refusal to permit the system to be corroded the way they had been, that got it to this point. Remember, if Barack Obama had been able to appoint his justice, this would not mean the thing it does now and that was a breaking of how this country works. And we have to fight harder against that. There has been a denialism including the Democratic Party about how hard Republicans were willing to fight to get what they wanted. Those who are horrified and chilled to their bones tonight in addition to being agonizingly sad and scared need to remember what got us to this moment was a right wing that was willing to fight as hard as hell over a period of decades, when everything was stacked against them, they fought and got here, where the death of one 87-years-old woman, is, you know has the possibility of determining 50 years ahead of us. And what those who are horrified in this moment have to be ready to do and willing to do is think about creative and energetic driven way to maintain the fight to keep this rollback from happening!
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
NB Daily
CNNer Claims Trump Pick Will Be Threat to 'Rights and Liberties'
Crushing Conservatives For Replacing Righteous Ruth
Geoffrey Dickens
MSNBC EXPLOITS 10 Year Old to Predict 'Nightmare' After Ginsburg Death
Scared Chuck Todd: Republicans on SCOTUS 'Suicide Mission'!
Kyle Drennen
MSNBC Warns Court on Being 'Out of Touch' On Abortion
CNN Frets 'Un-American' Republicans 'Speed Dating' With Supreme Court
Vile 'View' Invites Chelsea to Blame Trump for Coronavirus Deaths
CNN and MSNBC: 'Decorum' Gone as 'Gleeful' Mitch Moves to Replace RBG
Scott Whitlock


We are excited to announce that v1.1 of our mac app Convert It is now available. This version adds over 100 currencies as part of the new Premium Exchange Rates subscription package ($0.99/year). The app remains free to download and use, but this new subscription adds additional content for users who want it.
When using the Currency converter, a new shopping cart button will appear in the bottom right corner of the app.
By default, all subscriptions are set to auto-renew one day before they expire. You can manage your subscription, and turn off auto-renewing, from your iTunes account (there is a link within the app).
We feel this package offers incredible value. Each additional currency costs less than a penny per year. We chose to make this package a yearly subscription because exchange rates are constantly changing and require ongoing server resources.
For users who are not interested in subscribing, you can continue to use the app as normal. If you are looking for some additional currencies, this package is a great deal and helps support further development of Convert It!
Any questions or comments should be sent to our Contact Us page.
Stock + Updated Plus a Sneak Peak!
Copyright © 2019 Chimp Studios' Blog.


text:
Griffs Arrange Season Ticket Loans
David Czurak
GRAND RAPIDS — It certainly hasn't been the largest loan program in the area for the last five years, but it quite possibly may be the lone loan program of its type anywhere.
Five years ago, the Grand Rapids Griffins — an AHL franchise — partnered with Flagstar Bank, based in Jackson, to offer season-ticket holders a one-of-a-kind loan program that allows them to finance season tickets interest-free for 90 days.
And the program is still running.
For the Griffins, the program has a built-in advantage.
It gives the franchise a clearer idea of how many season tickets the club will sell for an upcoming year. That's because the loan application deadline arrives about three months before the puck drops on a new season.
This year that deadline was July 11, when the clock on the 90-days-same-as-cash program started ticking.
"We need to have renewals in by a certain timeframe just to know who is back for next year and who is not, so we know what seats are available to sell," said Tim Gortsema, vice president of finance and administration for the Griffins.
But Gortsema says he knows not every would-be season ticket holder can afford to plunk down enough cash on the spot to buy, say, four seats to each of the club's 40 home games.
So, the Griffins met with Flagstar in 1999 to create this unique loan opportunity for its customers.
The program lets season-ticket holders order tickets. But instead of sending a check or credit card number with their orders, they can include a short loan application.
The Griffins process the orders and Flagstar does the same with the loans. The program this year gives them until Oct. 13 to pay for their tickets, three months beyond the cash deadline.
If they pay for their tickets by the October date, the Griffins pick-up the 90-days interest charge at no cost to their season-ticket buyers.
If they don't pay the balance by then, Flagstar sends the ticket purchasers a coupon book and they begin making monthly payments for a year at an annual percentage rate of 10.99 percent.
"Assuming they're approved, they've got 90 days same as cash," said Gortsema.
The program also has a 15-day grace period with a late payment charge of $5 added on the 16th day.
The cost for Griffins season-ticket packages ranges from $386 to $1,073, based on where a seat is located. But to qualify for the loan program, a package must have a value of at least $500.
The program originated as part of a marketing effort between Flagstar and the Griffins. The bank has purchased dasher boards along the Van Andel Arena ice in the past.
"But the main issue for us is, it provides a way for us to go back to season-ticket holders and offer them an alternative when they might not have enough cash to buy the tickets in the summer," said Gortsema.
"It gives people a lot of flexibility. They don't even have to pay off their balance by the October deadline. But if they do pay it off by then, then we — we being the Griffins — pay the interest," he added.
Gortsema said he wasn't aware of another sports franchise offering a similar loan program to potential customers anywhere else in the country.
The Griffins eighth home opener is Oct. 18.
Last season, the franchise drew 288,628 customers to its 40 home games for an average of 7,215 per game, which placed the club seventh in AHL attendance.
Flagstar has five banking and loan centers located in Grand Rapids, Kentwood and Comstock Park.
Previous articleNew Zoo Worth 37M Annually
Next articleSubar Oversees Model Business
David Czurak is a former Grand Rapids Business Journal staff reporter who most recently covered city and county government, real estate, construction, architecture and design and sports business.


Twenty-six people were killed and twenty injured during the shooting at First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas. The attacker, Devin Patrick Kelley, was a former US Air Force member who was court-martialed in 2012 and sentenced to a year in military prison for assaulting his spouse and child, then released with a bad-conduct discharge in 2014.
This entry was posted on Monday, November 6th, 2017 at 4:51 pm	and is filed under Government Evil, Gun Rights, Terror. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.


text:
About The Stone of Destiny
The Metaverse Is Ready to Take the Workplace to New Dimensions
Video calls could soon become outdated, as virtual meetings evolve into digital simulations of people gathered in the same room, proponents of the new metaverse say.
As The Wall Street Journal reports, tech companies foresee scenarios in which workers in different physical locations will don virtual-reality goggles and view one another as cartoon avatars — digital substitutes for the real world. With specialized gloves, we'll be able to touch and manipulate virtual versions of goods such as machinery or fabrics, they say. After work, colleagues might socialize at virtual bowling alleys.
The metaverse is still nascent and its hardware can be expensive and clunky. But workplace experts expect that, as the technology becomes lighter, cheaper and more advanced, it will fundamentally alter the way that many people perform their jobs — while also creating new jobs, some unknown today.
"The metaverse will be evolutionary, not revolutionary," says John Egan, chief executive of Paris-based forecasting firm L'Atelier BNP Paribas.
In the metaverse, "Talent won't be acquired depending on location," says Richard Kerris, an executive at Nvidia Corp., who is co-leading a metaverse-infrastructure project called "Omniverse."
Potential downsides to the technology are plentiful. While all but eliminating human interaction, a workplace metaverse could also give organizations far more power to surveil their employees. If eye-tracking is enabled on headsets, for example, eye-rolls could be recorded and logged.
Kurt Opsahl, general counsel of privacy-watchdog group the Electronic Frontier Foundation, says that such surveillance, combined with smart-watch readings of an employee's body temperature or heart rate, could help companies infer a worker's emotional state and sideline dissenters.
Tags: A.D, Abraham, arc of the covenant, B.C, B.C. The, Belgium, Bethel, Destiny, druids, Edinburgh, Edward I, Egypt, England, Fergus, France, Gibraltar, God, iran, Ireland, Israel, Jacob, jacobs pillar, Jeremiah, Jerusalem, Joseph, Lia, lia fail, Lia Faileas, lost tribes of israel, magi, milesians, Moses, Mount Nebo, Neil, Portugal, Scota, Scotland, Spain, Stone, stone of scone, tara, Tuatha de Danaan, westminster abbey
This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 24th, 2008 at 9:01 pm and is filed under Completed, History. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Things you Cannot Buy
About Pan and Anarchy
Are we Heading at a Total Collapse of all Systems?
About Number and Magnitude


This entry was posted in Photo Challenges and tagged grocery stores, photography, vegetables. Bookmark the permalink.
That's the wonderful thing about photography. You can make something ordinary a little bit special !
Nice shot Stacy; now I know: not only locally grown and beautiful pieces of vegetables, but YELLOW; how not to photograph them, too tempting!
Since I'm not very adept in the kitchen, Elina, I figured I'd approach food from a different angle, so to speak 😉 Glad you enjoyed the photo! And, thanks, as always, for your kind comments.
You carry on taking them, Stacy, because I for one, absolutly love them.
Much moreso than the butcher counter 😉 Thanks!