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Home » Software » Linux distros » Inside the…UBUNTU PHONE
Inside the…UBUNTU PHONE
0 Linux distros
This entry is part 1 of 83 in the series Linux distros
The Ubuntu phone is here at last! Explore its development, its features and what it means for Canonical and the Ubuntu desktop.
ubuntu-g-theme
Almost as soon as the first version launched in 2004, Ubuntu permanently changed the Linux distribution landscape. 2004 was a time when the desktop was still important, and Ubuntu presented the Linux desktop not as alien territory, only to be ventured through with the right skills, but as a verdant pasture of adventure and
possibility. As its 2004 tagline proudly proclaimed, this was Linux for Human Beings, and it enabled millions of people to use Linux who may not otherwise have done so.
Under the aegis of its parent
company Canonical, Ubuntu is still a huge success. It's now the distribution that non-Linux users will most likely have heard about, or have even tried. It's used when migrating offices and local councils to Linux, and it's used in many servers and cloud instances. It's also the basis for many other popular distributions, including Mint, gNewSense, Google's own derivatives and the semi-official KDE, Xfce and Gnome versions. Its easy installation and no-nonsense approach to adding applications or upgrades has forced every other distribution to up their game, and it's helped make the Linux desktop a viable alternative to OS X and Windows.
But Canonical is facing something of an existential crisis. It needs to capitalise on its success and mind-share and make more of its influence. This is happening in the cloud, with Ubuntu finding favour as the first choice behind many servers, but Canonical also recognises that it needs to diversify.
Which is where the phone comes in. First touted as a cutting-edge convergence device, and the focus of a hugely ambitious crowdfunding campaign, the first incarnation of the Ubuntu Phone is here. And we've got one.
Canonical needs to capitalise on its success and mind-share and make more of its influence.
Inside Canonical
Why phones? Why now?
Canonical employs around 600 people. This makes it tiny in comparison to other phone manufacturers. Samsung alone moved 1,000 of its employees to work on Tizen, and it could do this almost overnight. Canonical doesn't have that kind of infrastructure of funding. And it's not a phone manufacturer.
But there's more to Ubuntu than a popular Linux distribution. It's also the most visible facet to a company strategy trying to generate income from open source. The distribution was famously founded by the multi-millionaire space tourist South African Mark Shuttleworth, after he pooled the initial team from mailing lists he read while free of the internet on an icebreaker. And while there is an Ubuntu Foundation to ensure the longevity of the distribution itself, the distribution is at the heart of a business he also founded, Canonical.
Like Red Hat, Ubuntu is also used widely as a server operating system, and more recently in the cloud, with a reported 64% of OpenStack deployments – and it's even popular on Microsoft's Azure cloud platform. But Canonical makes very little money from all these people spinning up instances of the word's favourite operating system. This is open source, after all, and there's nothing forcing anyone to pay for anything, even when those instances are dialling back to Ubuntu's servers for updates and upgrades.
Ubuntu is undoubtedly a huge and growing success. But it's also true that Canonical has yet to tap into the revenue potential of its own operating system, and it's struggling to make a profit. Last year's financial report on its performance 2012-2013 showed a loss of $21,343,00, despite gross profit being up from $54 million to $61 million. And this is where the requirement for a new direction steps in, and why 2015 is going to be pivotal for its future and the future, health and investment in the Ubuntu operating system.
Newbuntu
Ubuntu is used everywhere, but moneymaking potential has remained elusive. To solve that problem, Canonical needs a piece of its own turf, one that it can invest in, capitalise on and hopefully make money from. And that's exactly what It has spent the last two years creating – not as a single technology, but as a swathe of innovations plugged into the heart of its operating system, from the desktop to the cloud. It's had to sacrifice its standing within the community to do this – moving away from Gnome and Wayland, for instance. But this has been part of its strategy for staying in control. Canonical is transforming the way Ubuntu is put together and used. And the first real, physical and tangible step towards making this a reality is the launch of the Ubuntu Phone.
The Ubuntu Phone is the most exciting development to come out of Canonical for years, and its relevance for both Ubuntu and Canonical is something called convergence. Originally, convergence meant plugging in your phone and continuing to work with a keyboard and screen. It now means use the same interface on multiple devices – hence the redevelopment of Unity and the Mir display server running in the background – and that's a difficult trick to pull off. Microsoft failed spectacularly by trying to augment Windows 8 with touch-friendly characteristics, despite almost no one being interested in using a touchscreen with their Windows laptops or PCs.
Ubuntu phone hardware: Two different makes and models
CPU 4-core MT6582 1.3GHz
GPU Mali 400 500MHz
NETWORK 802.il b/g/n, GSM/HSPA
STORAGE 8GB
RESOLUTION 540×960 – 240ppi
CAMERA 8MP (rear) 5MP (front)
DIMENSIONS 137x67x9 mm
BATTERY LiPo 2150 mAh
CONNECTORS Dual micro-SIM, micro-USB, headphone jack, MicroSD (up to 32GB)
PRICE €169 (only available in Europe)
wpid-Meizu2BMX42BUbuntu2BEdition.jpg
CPU 8-core MT6595 1.7/2.2GHZ
GPU PowerVR G6200 MP4
NETWORK 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, GSM/HSPA/LTE
STORAGE 16/32/64GB
RESOLUTION 1152×1920 – 418 ppi
CAMERA 20.7 MP (front) 2MP (rear)
CONNECTORS Micro-SIM, micro-USB, headphone hack
Inside the phone
2014 – the year of Ubuntu on your phone?
Launching a mobile phone with a new operating system in 2015 is crazy. People of Earth carry over a billion Android devices alone, and Android is fundamentally an open source operating system, negating the moral imperative for creating another. Forking Android has been shown to work too, at both ends of the scale, from Amazon to Cyanogenmod. And we won't mention other open source alternatives like Jolla, Tizen or Firefox OS.
But that doesn't mean someone else shouldn't try, and there's something intrinsically brilliant about open source in that it lets projects succeed or fall judged by their own merits. For Canonical, that means a strong emphasis on open source, open platforms and fundamentally, choice.
The turning point for Canonical must surely have been the Ubuntu Edge crowdfunding campaign in 2013. It was ridiculously optimistic: Mark Shuttlworth was asking for $32 million to give Canonical the cash to build a cutting-edge smartphone running its own operating system. Of course, the campaign failed.
Both Canonical's CEO, Jane Silber, and its VP of Mobile, Cristian Parrino, gave an impassioned talk about the importance of the Ubuntu Phone at its launch in February 2014.
But it was a spectacularly winning failure: $10,267,352 was pledged from more than 22,053 contributors, making it the largest crowdfunding campaign of the time. And whether this was a publicity stunt or a genuine attempt to fund a new phone platform, there's no doubt it left Canonical with the very real desire to create a phone.
Two years later
Two years later, we find ourselves in London on a chilly morning in February. We're sitting with approximately 40 other people in a hotel in London. This is an 'Insiders Event' where the long awaited Ubuntu Phone is going to be revealed in partnership with BO, a major phone and tablet manufacturer from Spain.
Scopes are how you interact with the Ubuntu Phone. They can be installed, removed and their order shuffled around, but they're always there.
That Canonical isn't launching the phone after a campaign of tantalising leaks and a conclusive fireworks display at Mobile World Congress is a significant sign that Canonical knows it can't compete with the likes of Samsung. Its Ubuntu Phone is going to need to attract a different kind of customer. This is likely the same reason why early batches of the phone we're about to get our hands on are sold 'flash sale' style to try and generate as much interest as possible. BO has said it was handling 12,000 orders per minute during those initial flash sales, and selling out within 10 minutes, but there are no specific numbers available on the final quantities that have been sold.
Most people at this event are vocal community members, or people who have helped Ubuntu in some way. They're not always the people with the largest number of followers on Twitter, or YouTube. They're people with a genuine enthusiasm for Ubuntu and Canonical, and this sincerity is what comes through from the beginning, when the announcement finally comes.
"There are no words to describe how excited I am, and the rest of our colleagues, the engineers, our CEO, people who do the design, Mark…" says Cristian Parrino, VP of mobile at Canonical, by way of a very emotive introduction. Fie goes on to talk about not bringing another app-centric mobile phone platform to the market, about giving users a richer, less fragmented experience, "but most of all, more personal."
For us, Ubuntu's netbook remix is the starting point of what has become Ubuntu Touch and Ubuntu Phone. It was here that the first pixels of what would become Unity made an appearance – a launch bar down the left of the screen, and a frugal use of display real-estate. This was followed by a migration to full-screen applications and unified menus and finally, the idea behind scopes. The scopes idea is Canonical's great hope for the Ubuntu Phone, because it's what it hopes will differentiate its operating system from the competition, and it's what we first played with when we finally got the phone in our hands.
The phone's web browser is derived from the same rendering engine used in Google's Chrome.
Canonical hopes that scopes will differentiate their efforts from those of the competition, and perhaps, justify its commitment to both the Mir display server, already running on the Ubuntu Phone, and the Unity desktop interface. Scopes are tied closely to Unity and Canonical's convergence strategy – using the same user interface and even sessions across multiple devices, which is why Canonical has gone it alone with so many of the APIs behind the desktop.
However, the first and biggest problem with scopes isn't a technical one. It's explaining what they do and why they're potentially so powerful. This isn't so much a problem on the desktop, where we've got used to scopes as a way of switching between different kinds of search result. However, it's not always clear what advantage this offers over a sorted list of results – where images or music files appear separated from other documents that satisfy the search criteria, for example.
The answer is that the results are aggregated from various sources. For music, that might be your local music collection, an online service and perhaps a store. For news, that might be the top stories from a selection of websites. But getting this message across to users of a new smartphone is going to be a challenge.
Scopes on the Ubuntu Phone are the default view. They're what Canonical wants you to use to get the most out of your device and they're launched with the easiest screen gesture to pull off – swiping from the left edge of the display into the middle of the screen. This is initially confusing, because this same gesture also displays the launch panel, a vertical list of running and quick-launched apps that's functionally identical to the desktop edition. Continue swiping and the currently running app is slid to the side, revealing whichever scope you were running previously. The first scope is labelled 'Today', and it's the perfect example of the kind of data scopes pull into a single window.
The Today scope is Ubuntu's equivalent to Google Now, only the information it pulls together to show on a single panel is totally under the user's control, and far more comprehensive. And unlike Google Now, the developers have complete control over what information is aggregated and how, rather than relying on Google's dark magic and an open invitation to raid your web browsing history. The Today scope shows the date, the local weather and upcoming events, as well as phone-specific events such as recent calls and messages, for instance. It also pulls in data from
You cannot bring a phone to market by turning out another app-centric interface.
external services, listing Twitter trends, for example, or the latest new stories. Scopes are enabled and disabled by using stars in the top-right of each view.
Pressing the 'Configure' icon in the top-right alongside the star will enable you to choose elements you want enabled or disabled. For Today, that means a list of 15 different sources, from upcoming holidays to FitBit stats. It's this kind of aggregation that's key to how scopes work and why they could potentially be more effective than running a single app for a single task.
Just like the panel on the Ubuntu Desktop, you can pin applications and switch between those that are running on the Ubuntu Phone.
They're not that dissimilar in function to the user interface of the hugely successful Pebble Time, which has just been successfully crowdfunded. With the Pebble Time, rather than making its users launch specific apps for specific functions, it takes nuggets of information from various app and data sources and presents these on a timeline that stretches from the past and into the future – just as you might expect with a watch.
Scopes can do the same thing, only they are most useful when there's some context, such as pubs close to your location, major news stories or Wikipedia entries for sites close to where you're staying, and they're what makes the phone so interesting to use.
Some of our favourite scopes
Forget apps for now – these are what Canonical wants you to be impressed with.
If there's one example that best epitomises the idea behind scopes, it's this. Taking your location as a starting point, this scope populates itself with music, photos and restaurants that have some link to where you're currently standing. A drop-down menu also lets you choose a mood. Telling NearBy that you're thirsty will return a list of bars (a fish bar was top of our list); if you say you're stressed, you'll get the location of your local spa, some relaxing music suggestions and a list of games. It will even pull In information from other related scopes, such as local Wikipedia entries.
The Music scope lists results from several mainstream music providers, including 7digital, SoundCloud and YouTube. Many of us listen to music from more than one source, and a scope for managing your access to those sources when you just want to listen to something makes better sense than opening separate YouTube or SoundCloud apps, but the back-end is a little too limited at the moment. The other problem is that the security lockdown on the device doesn't let third-party apps play music in the background. Photo and video scopes offer similar facilities.
NearBy Articles
This is such a simple scope – it provides a single paragraph for Wikipedia entries that have a geographical location close to your current position. But it's brilliant. You often find yourself updating the scope even when you're driving through somewhere that looks interesting. If you need to know more, click on the link to open the web browser.
If you wanted to replace NearBy with this Articles scope, you can swipe up the scope configuration panel, hold down on the scope you want to move, and the management view will appear, allowing you to drag and move the position of any of the scopes.
The News scope Is another powerful example of scopes working well, giving you a lot of control over what kinds of stories (and their sources) are delivered to your device. An RSS feed is presumably the source for this data, as there's only a paragraph and a single image to accompany the stories, but it's enough to give you an overview of what's happening and how those stories are being reported by the different media outlets displayed within the page. The only serious omission is the ability to add your own sources, but there are other RSS readers for that purpose.
Many of the applications and scopes that can be downloaded from the Ubuntu Store are open source and their licence is an important part of the information you're presented with before download. Open Library is one of the many open source applications that feels like an online store but it's actually listing books that you can legally read for free. Most of these are classics, but the Open Library also lets you borrow digital books, as well as download those that are out of copyright, often as PDF, HTML and ePub.
This scope aggregates products in the same way that other scopes aggregate music or news. Default sources include eBay, Amazon and Etsy, and It could potentially be a great way of listing the same products from different sources so that you can compare prices and services. This is what it does when you use the search field. But it could be expanded to do so much more. The GPS could be used to list useful products when your phone knows you're away – such as umbrellas in London – but it could also list competing prices or products when it knows you're in a specific store or looking for a gift.
How the Ubuntu phone is innovating in user interaction.
At the top of each scope panel, there's a small breadcrumb trail of dots, which are used to represent which scope you're currently looking at. Swipe left or right across this small section, or any blank section of background, and you swipe between scopes in the same way you might swipe between virtual desktops.
One of these scopes is called 'apps', and this is where users of other phones will feel at home. This scope behaves exactly like the app launcher for Android and ¡OS, and includes access to the Ubuntu Store and some integral functions like messaging, the camera and phone. The app icons can't be manually rearranged, but they can be limited by category and pinned as a shortcut to your launch bar, just as you might on the desktop.
Left, right, up, down
One of Canonical's other innovations is the use of every screen edge to trigger a gesture. As we've seen, dragging in from the left edge will first show the launch panel before swiping away the currently running application to reveal the scopes interface. Swiping from the right edge is the equivalent of launching the task switcher. Every application you've got running is concertinaed across the screen, enabling you to select them or flick to close them.
You can always swipe from the right screen edge to quickly switch to the previous task or open the task manager.
A quick swipe is a shortcut to the previous application you were running. One feature unique to the Ubuntu Phone is that if you continue to hold one of these gestures and reverse your motion, the gesture is cancelled. For task switching, that means you can see what's running and slide back to your original app without any interruption. The same principle is used for the notifications and quick settings panel, which is pulled down from the top border.
Those dots and circles on the unlock screen are used to tell you how many things your phone has done today – such as photos, or messages.
The panel you see will depend on where your finger Is located horizontally across the top of the screen when you Initiate the drag. On the far left, you'll get the notifications list, while on the far right you'll be able to configure the date and time. Between these points, there are panels for rotation, files, location services, Bluetooth, networking, sound and battery life. But if you hold your finger down and move to the left and right, you can switch between these modes dynamically and even close the panel without performing a single function.
The final edge – sliding up from the bottom of the phone – is used to open a contextual menu. The contents of this menu change depending on what application you're running. From any scope, for example, you can use this menu to enable, disable and install other scopes, while the Call function uses the menu to list recent calls.
Get developing!
Getting developers to write new applications for a new platform is fundamental to its success. As Cristian Parrino put it when introducing the phone, how to attract developers "is the quintessential question." And considering Google has only just started to get serious with its own development environment – Android Studio 1.0 was only released in December 2014 – Canonical has already made great progress by providing a fully fledged development environment. The Ubuntu SDK is easily installed from any Ubuntu desktop and it includes the development libraries, an emulator for testing code without any hardware, and a graphical development environment. You can also perform all kinds of remote tasks on your real Ubuntu Phone, such as connecting securely via an SSH session.
The development environment for Ubuntu Touch applications is a customised version of the exceptional Of Creator.
The application at the heart of these development tools is the venerable Qt Creator, with a few modifications to act as a portal for Ubuntu Touch development. The reason for this choice is QML, the scripting framework that takes the best bits of JavaScript (ubiquity and speed) and binds them to the expansive Of user-interface library.
This should enable almost anyone to build fully functional applications without too much difficulty. Another option is to use HTML 5 to develop your applications. Many of those that are bundled with the phone, and the desktop, do exactly this, and it means you can create truly cross-platform solutions from the same codebase.
Our favourite apps for the Ubuntu Phone OS.
1 Camera We take more photos than we make phone calls with our phones, so this app is important. 2 Cut the Rope There are many games but not so many tier-1 titles. This will change as more developers get on board. 3 Dekko An ace email client built to use all of the Ubuntu Touch Ul elements. 4 Terminal This wouldn't be Linux is we couldn't access the terminal, and Canonical's own application is one of the best. 5 File manager The operating system isn't hidden from the users, but everything is strictly sandboxed. You can still modify your own files freely. 6 OSMTouch There are a few options for navigation, but this is the best way of accessing OpenStreetMap.
The future of Ubuntu – and some would say the future of computing.
Convergence is the future of I computing. So we've reshaped Ubuntu and combined the mobility of a smartphone and the power of a desktop on a single device.
These were the words chosen by Mark Shuttleworth to start the promotional video that accompanied the launch of the Ubuntu Edge crowdfunding campaign back in 2013. And despite convergence being a difficult word to market, lots of potential users got excited by the idea of connecting a keyboard and screen to their phones to work more productively, just as you would on a desktop PC or laptop. The Ubuntu Phone doesn't have these features, but convergence was still an important part of the launch presentation. But the emphasis was different. Mark, for example, mentioned convergence as the unification of x86 and ARM – the combination of laptops with mobile phones. But this isn't likely to be from the same devices, and is more likely to be a feature that enables you to continue using the same application or workspace on more than one device.
Ubuntu has been reshaped too, as Mark originally promised. Scopes are an integral part of desktop Unity, even if they're not as developed or as diverse as those that appear on the phone. And while the single-device features touted for the Ubuntu Edge aren't in Ubuntu Touch today, they may not be far away. Ubuntu Desktop Engineering Manager, Will Cooke, has prepared a demo running on both Intel and ARM tablets running Ubuntu Touch, where applications pop-out of full screen and into a windowed mode when you connect a wireless mouse, and you can run desktop applications like LibreOffice and finally connect to a real screen, just as Mark Shuttleworth said you'd be able to do. The Unity, Mir and Xmir code needed to perform these tricks isn't quite ready yet, but it looks like it's not going to be far off, which won't affect the modest BQ Ubuntu Phone, but it will open new possibilities for convergence on faster tablets and phones, as well as the Ubuntu Desktop itself.
A future full of choice
Ubuntu Phone, Ubuntu Touch and the Unity desktop are all part of Canonical's strategy to put Ubuntu into a stronger position. If this succeeds, it will mean the future of Ubuntu is assured, even if the desktop becomes less relevant through more convergence with other devices.
But most importantly, it offers choice.
As Jane Silber said when speaking at the launch of the phone, "We're not at the end of what personal computing looks like."
In many ways, we think we're still at the beginning. iPhone and Android are winning the current round, but we all know how quickly things can change, and we're happier in a future where companies like Canonical try new things, than a future where they accept the status quo and things stay the same. This is what's so good about the emergence and the final release of the Ubuntu Phone. It takes what started as an easy alternative desktop operating system and pushes it into our pockets – and that's something to get excited about.
Snappy Core and the cloud
One of the best things to come out of Ubuntu Touch is Snappy Ubuntu Core (see issue 12 for our FAQ). Snappy Core is a minimal version of Ubuntu along with a cloud-focused package manager that makes it easy for sysadmins to create new services and spin them out across lots of instances or servers. Like Docker, each application is isolated, self-contained, sandboxed and secure – a development that only came about because Canonical needed a self-contained, sandboxed and secure solution for installing applications on Ubuntu Touch.
Snappy Core and Ubuntu's success in the cloud are both positive side-effects of investing in new ideas.
According to the OpenStack Foundation global survey, Ubuntu is the most popular host and guest operating system, with more than half of all OpenStack instances running Ubuntu, an an even larger proportion for public clouds. If Snappy Ubuntu Core can help Canonical turn some of that popularity into profit, Ubuntu will be in an even stronger position, as will the many users who cut their teeth with Ubuntu as a first distribution and want to find work within the industry.
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US market's cross-roads:
The will of the Bulls was under scrutiny in the latter part of last week. The lingering question has yet to be answered: are we experiencing a recovery, or will this be a faded rally? The S&P500 couldn't manage to break the big-psychological resistance level of 2600. The bulls appeared to simply stall on Friday, with the US market according to the S&P500 closing a very narrow 0.01 per cent lower. Friday's trade amounted to the only negative session for the major-US stock index for the week. The upside-momentum is apparently waning for US equities. The VIX is lower it must be stated, so fear is diminishing in the market. But perhaps confidence is still rattled somewhat by December's market-rout.
Reporting season looming:
A decision to push the market higher or let the recent rally fade must be imminent. Short-activity, according to IG's data, is gradually building in US indices. There will be no room to hide shortly, as traders prepare for the kick-off of reporting season this week. In total, earnings growth is increasingly expected to slow by more than first-assumed. The overriding concern in markets presently is given the weaker macro-economic outlook whether the growth expectations of US corporates will diminish in-turn. The first week of the reporting season is dominated by bank earnings: fittingly enough too, given its the banks that could prove the canary in the coal mine for any fundamental problems in the market and the US economy at large.
ASX200:
Once again, the ASX will likely trade in the slip-stream of US stocks this week. SPI futures are indicating a 15-point jump at today's open, according to the last traded price on that instrument. Like US equities, the conviction of the bulls in the ASX on Friday demonstrated signs of diminishing. The 5800 level is for the ASX 200 what is 2600 is for the S&P 500: a significant psychological barrier that is coming to represent the difference between recovery and a fading rally. The technicals for ASX200 are looking softer, based on Friday's market-activity. Breadth was a tepid 37 per cent and volumes were 36.60 per cent below the 100-day average, as the index shed 0.36 per cent to close at 5774 to end the week.
Australian Retail Sales:
Sentiment towards Australian economic fundamentals were bolstered on Friday, despite the ASX's retracement. Domestic Retail Sales data surprised to the upside, printing 0.4 per cent m/m compared to the forecast 0.3 per cent. Below the surface, the numbers weren't as strong as the headlines betrayed: the driver of the solid figure was probably the transitory effects of the Black Friday and Cyber Monday promotional periods. Moreover, annualized sales growth fell to 2.8 per cent, from a previously 3-and-a-half per cent. Irrespective of those details, consumer stocks climbed on the news. However, the implied probability of a rate-cut from the RBA increased slightly to around 30 per cent – though the Australian Dollar did mask this fact, which rallied above 0.7200, in-line with the Chinese Yuan.
Brexit's meaningful vote:
As any market participant would be aware, in this market, any number of surprises can jump-out to rattle traders. Assessing the calendar and data-docket for the week ahead though, little comes close to challenging the mid-week "meaningful vote" on Brexit in UK Parliament as the most significant scheduled event. To put into the context of prevailing sentiment, aside from swings in UK and European rates and currencies, the subject of Brexit has been down the list of trader's biggest concerns. It makes sense: global growth and Fed policy has far greater economic impacts, while the US-China trade-war is the more pressing geopolitical issue. Nevertheless, Brexit and its implications are an ongoing concern, with the result of Wednesday's parliamentary vote to influence trader's outlook for the global economy in 2019.
A weaker outlook for Europe:
It's expected that UK Prime Minister Theresa May's Brexit-bill will fail to pass the House of Commons. Assuming it does, from there markets are confronted by a series of unknowns. There's been talk of Labour tabling a no-confidence motion in May and her government; or perhaps even a general election or a second referendum. The balance of risks remain irrefutably to the downside for markets out of this event. The area which ought to worry economic-boffins is, amid what looks like a protracted Brexit-campaign, is Europe's economy looks headed for a marked slowdown. Although its GDP figures surprised to the upside on Friday, boosting the Cable and UK gilts, the UK's manufacturing data revealed a considerable contraction in activity, adding to a slew of very weak manufacturing numbers across the European continent.
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Beautiful cup and saucer by Duchess with the Happy Birthday song, in excellent condition. Cup stands 2 7/8" tall with a 3 1/2" diameter, signed Duchess on the bottom. I have other cup and saucer sets offered this week and will combine shipping when possible.


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package fr.brouillard.oss.jgitver.impl;

import fr.brouillard.oss.jgitver.ScenarioTest;
import fr.brouillard.oss.jgitver.Scenarios;
import fr.brouillard.oss.jgitver.Strategies;
import org.eclipse.jgit.api.MergeCommand;
import org.eclipse.jgit.lib.ObjectId;
import org.eclipse.jgit.lib.Ref;
import org.junit.jupiter.api.Test;

import java.util.Optional;

import static org.hamcrest.CoreMatchers.is;
import static org.hamcrest.CoreMatchers.notNullValue;
import static org.hamcrest.MatcherAssert.assertThat;
import static org.junit.jupiter.api.Assertions.assertEquals;
import static org.junit.jupiter.api.Assertions.assertFalse;

public class DistanceCalculatorWrappingFeatureTest extends ScenarioTest {
    public DistanceCalculatorWrappingFeatureTest() {
        super(Scenarios.Builders.s18_wrapped_feature_branches()::getScenario, calculator -> calculator.setStrategy(Strategies.MAVEN));
    }

    @Test
    public void distance_from_H_to_E2_is_3() throws Exception {
        ObjectId hCommit = scenario.getCommits().get("H");
        ObjectId eCommit = scenario.getCommits().get("E2");

        assertDistanceIs(hCommit, eCommit, 3);
    }

    @Test
    public void distance_from_H_to_E1_is_4() throws Exception {
        ObjectId hCommit = scenario.getCommits().get("H");
        ObjectId eCommit = scenario.getCommits().get("E1");

        assertDistanceIs(hCommit, eCommit, 4);
    }

    @Test
    public void distance_from_H_to_C2_is_2() throws Exception {
        ObjectId hCommit = scenario.getCommits().get("H");
        ObjectId cCommit = scenario.getCommits().get("C2");

        assertDistanceIs(hCommit, cCommit, 2);
    }

    @Test
    public void distance_from_H_to_C1_is_3() throws Exception {
        ObjectId hCommit = scenario.getCommits().get("H");
        ObjectId cCommit = scenario.getCommits().get("C1");

        assertDistanceIs(hCommit, cCommit, 3);
    }

    @Test
    public void distance_from_H_to_A_is_5() throws Exception {
        ObjectId hCommit = scenario.getCommits().get("H");
        ObjectId cCommit = scenario.getCommits().get("A");

        assertDistanceIs(hCommit, cCommit, 5);
    }

    @Test
    public void distance_from_H_to_B_is_4() throws Exception {
        ObjectId hCommit = scenario.getCommits().get("H");
        ObjectId cCommit = scenario.getCommits().get("B");

        assertDistanceIs(hCommit, cCommit, 4);
    }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


"I was most surprised by how many people are inconsiderate or rude to the staff or other members. It especially surprised me how entitled some people feel, and how they say very rude things to lifeguards when their kids are right next to them. Even kids are rude sometimes, but how can you blame them when they learn from their parents that that is the way to talk to lifeguards?
Members will often question a rule, and they honestly believe that they have thought of something that nobody else ever has, that this particular rule is completely unnecessary, and I just need an explanation about why their particular kid should be able to use water wings. Sometimes the excuse is as silly as "she just loves Frozen so much, and she came to the pool so excited to wear her Anna and Elsa water wings, I just don't have the heart to take them away from her. Look at her!" What do they expect me to say to that? "Oh, yes, of course, I did not realize that she was such an avid Frozen fan! In that case, enjoy the water wings!" Sometimes, parents are a bigger problem than their kids are."


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On Thursday, October 6, 2016, Bishop Joseph N. Perry of the Archdiocese of Chicago offered a simple blessing to learners and tutors at Aquinas Literacy Center (ALC) in honor of its 20th anniversary.
ALC was founded in 1996 by the Adrian Dominican Sisters in response to the need for immigrants on Chicago's southwest side to learn English. ALC continues to offer free, individualized tutoring in the English language to adult immigrants.
Executive Director Alison Altmeyer welcomed everyone who attended and gave a brief history of the organization. Volunteer tutor and Adrian Dominican Sister, Pat McKee, OP, also read a biblical passage as part of the blessing.
From Bishop Perry's blessing, learners were encouraged to "enjoy their learning and take delight in new discoveries." Learners were also advised to persevere in their study of the English language. Tutors were asked to "share their knowledge with gentle patience" and to engage the "eager minds" of their students.
After the blessing, there was a reception with learners, tutors, friends of the Center, members of the Board of Directors, and staff.


Golegã, Portugal: "Capital of the Horse" - as signs at the city limits to the city will attest, and home of this year's Campeonato Nacional de Resistencia Equestre - the CEI3* 160 km Portuguese National Endurance Championships.
If you are a fan of the Lusitano horse, (and even if you are not), you will want to come here in November. Every year since the 18th century, the "Feira de San Martinho" - dedicated to the Bishop of Tours (later St Martin) - has been held in honor of the horse - www.horsefairlusitano.org). It is still one of the most important horse fairs in Portugal, and features the Lusitano breed in equestrian games and competitions. A million visitors are expected this year.
The Lusitano is the result of selection over some five thousand years, according to Manuel Viega, one of the early 20th century breeders. It was primarily used in battle; today it is competitive in a wide range of sports, and is the primary horse breed used in bullfighting. For those of you squeamish about bullfights, in Portugal, the bull is not killed. Several hundred years ago, Queen Marie of Portugal forbade killing of the bull; that tradition still continues today.
In the center of Golegã is a town square surrounding an open sand arena where most of the horse sports take place during the fair. This also serves as the setting for other horse events... such as this weekend's 2008 Portuguese Endurance Championships.
To Alpiarça: I arrived in Lisbon on Thursday, rented a car at the airport, and headed to Alpiarça, 1 1/4 hours from Lisbon, and 20 minutes from Golegã. When Steph and I came to Portugal for the European Championships last year, we got so lost at times, that this time I brought a stack of Google maps with me (maybe one reason my suitcase is so heavy), and I had an easy and lucky time making it where I was going. Easy because it was almost straightforward, and lucky because at times the highways seem to mysteriously change numbers, or the signs guiding you to another road just lose interest in continuing to direct you - they just disappear. The signs on the last bit of my route to Alpiarça lost interest in directing me there, but I happened to be stumbling along the correct path, and without any trauma, arrived at my destination, a little village in the Portuguese countryside.
In the evening I met Vasco, (who'd be crewing for Antonio), Antonio (who'd be riding his stallion Saturday), Luis, and Manuel, their groom ("we are training him"). Luis took us to a favorite restaurant of his for dinner; I stuffed myself with a huge plate of beef, plus salad and potatoes. They don't seem to believe in small servings here in the southwestern part of Europe, and I don't seem to be able to not stuff myself. I discovered another dessert to (almost) rival the delectable Creme de Catalon - some caramel dish that put me over the top. Most of the evening talk was, of course, what it most often is with the endurance people I meet: horses. Vasco and I found out that my Thoroughbred ex-racehorse Stormy, and his Anglo-Arab are distant cousins via the Northern Dancer line! Vasco talked enthusiastically about endurance and horses, and even Antonio noticed: "He's always talking horses. You see his eyes light up when he talks about them!" which was exactly what I noticed. Antonio jumped up to get the dinner bill - "the jockey is paying for dinner!" It was a very enjoyable evening with new friends from Portugal.
Tomorrow we are off to Golegã to settle in Antonio's stallion and vet in for Saturday's ride.


text:
The Big Read – The 1975: "I feel more like I'm in a punk band than ever before"
This weekend, THE 1975 will fulfil a lifelong ambition and headline Reading & Leeds festivals for the first time, and to mark the occasion, the musical changelings have released a searing, politically-charged punk track named 'People'. With the gears of 2020 album 'Notes On A Conditional Form' already turning, frontman MATTY HEALY tells Dan Stubbs about the band's aims to save the world, freak out the squares and tear Reading & Leeds a new one. All he needs to do in the meantime is resist the urge to perform his Dubai gig with the words 'GOD LOVES FAGS' scrawled on his chest. What could possibly go wrong?
Dan Stubbs
Don't get arrested.
Those are the last words I say to Matty Healy on August 14, 2019, the day The 1975 play their first ever show in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, a city Healy describes, on the phone to NME from the ludicrously named Armani Hotel, as "a trip, man, like being at Waterside Shopping Centre for three days. Trafford Centre vibes. I mean, incredibly beautiful people but it's like a fucking massive airport terminal. Anodyne is the word. Removed from the human experience."
Dubai isn't necessarily the kind of place you'd expect to find Matty Healy: committed hedonist and full-time stoner; wearer of an ever-changing array of threadbare vintage band T-shirts; reigning Greatest Frontman In Pop, and an outspoken champion of women, youth, the environment, minorities and the LGBTQ+ community. In Dubai, a place where women are discriminated against, adultery, premarital sex and alcohol consumption are punishable by flogging and it's illegal to be gay, he is, essentially, in the belly of the beast. Yet it's here that Healy is warming up for what's set to be one of – if not the – most important shows in The 1975's mythology: their headline set at this weekend's Reading and Leeds festivals, hallowed ground to which the band would make an annual pilgrimage as teenagers. The 1975 dream so far has been leading up to this moment – an occasion so noteworthy they've just released a brand new track, a ferocious glam-punk snarl named 'People' – which will be christened on the Reading & Leeds stages.
The big homecoming follows a run of shows on relatively new frontiers for the foursome, including Hungary, Romania and Russia – another place where anti-gay sentiment runs deep. Does Matty not have any reservations about playing places that are so opposed to his own ideologies? "No, because there are definitely people here that are victim of those oppressive ideas, and I'm not a diplomat or a politician," he says. "It's like the Palestine/Israel thing – I would go and play both places. Not because I'm taking a side but because there are young people there who are not representative of the government, and I believe that in countries that may be war-torn or separated due to political ideologies, the only thing that unifies people is culture and art. It's more my job than anybody's to go places like this, you know."
In Dubai, sadly, Healy is finding that religious ideology means some of his most ardent local fans – many of them teenage girls – won't make it to the show tonight. "I've been meeting so many kids walking around and I'm like, Are you coming to the show? And they're like, Oh, I can't, my dad would not allow me, or my religion doesn't allow it, and all that kind of thing. So that's sad because I think that art is for everybody. But I understand that I'm quite a – I don't know what I am – an outspoken… bisexual… I don't know, whatever I am. So they're probably not really into my vibe over here, the dads."
Photo Credit: Mara Palena
In fact, Healy has been made patently aware that his kind must play by the rules in Dubai. On arrival at the hotel, a note awaited him – from the authorities, via the promoter – "reminding me that, you know, having sex outside of marriage is jailable. Basically, if I try and fuck someone here in this hotel – which I wouldn't – but if I did that, I could be arrested or deported."
Did you hoover your pockets before you got there in case of drug crumbs?
"Oh, I hoovered everything. George [Daniel, drummer and Matty's 1975 co-conspirator] was like, Do you have a bag – any bag – that's never had any drugs in it? And I said, No. So he said, OK, you have to go and buy new bags and you have to hoover all your clothes, so that's what I did. I mean, I was at immigration for an hour – they went through every pocket of everything that I had."
So drugs are not worth getting arrested for. But principles? That's a different matter.
"I would go to jail for what I stand for, you know – I feel like I'm in one of the only punk bands in the world," says Matty. "I'm profoundly anti-religion and I always have been. I don't agree with a dogmatic, pious adherence to scripture, because I believe that creates more pain for more people on a global level than it does solace for people on the individual level. I think it's a selfish act. But I also understand that religion and culture are two very, very, very different things. So I understand the idea of if you say to somebody, I don't know, 'your religion is stupid', it can for some people be the equivalent of somebody saying, 'your face is ugly', because it's so deeply ingrained in who they are. I would never come over here and be disrespectful to people to make a point. But I'm never going to not stand up for women. I'm not going to not stand up for gay people. I'm not going to not stand up for minorities. So it's my job to come out here and…"
But you're going to have to really watch what you say tonight, no?
"Well, I'm not allowed to have 'GOD LOVES FAGS' written on my chest, which I probably am going to. So that will be interesting."
And risk getting arrested before your headline slot at Reading and Leeds? The big one? The one it's all been building up to?
"Yeah, that's the only thing that I'm thinking. But you know, people need to say this kind of shit, man. There's not many bands like mine that come to this part of the world. What kid in Dubai, who's coming to a 1975 show, wants me to say nothing?"
But it's not those kids you have to worry about.
"Well, that's my job."
Do you feel like John Lennon being followed by the CIA?
"[Laughs] You are NOT allowed to write that I feel like John Lennon being followed by the CIA! But I feel very, very watched. And yeah, I don't know what's gonna happen. I'm sure that it'll go fine. But if they want to arrest me for what I believe in, then all I'd be doing is doing the same thing that all of the people I've ever looked up to did, you know. Billie Holiday, all those kind of people."
Which is, what – having the courage to act on your conviction?
"Yeah, you know, I'm not gonna fucking get up at award ceremonies in the west and say all of this shit, and then go to the east and be a shrinking violet, because that's not true."
So you were posting something about wanting to get 1975 hijabs on your merch stalls. I'm guessing, from you, that's not a piss-take.
"Oh, no, listen, this was an idea that was given to me by some of my hijabi Muslim stans, my 'haram-baes' as I call them. The reason I want to get hijabs done is because I see thousands of kids at my shows in hijabs and where's the representation? If my merchandise is there to represent your love for my band, where's the Muslim representation?"
I mean, it is provocative to do it, and you're going to get stick for it.
"Yeah, but what I see at my shows every single night is kids in 1975 t-shirts and 1975 caps and in hijabs. So why don't they get to have, you know, a piece of merchandise for them? I want them to feel valued."
So you've just been to Russia for the first time, too. The tentacles of The 1975 are spreading. As you meet people in these places, are you finding that people worldwide are more alike than you thought?
"I said this a million times: every 1975 show is exactly the same. They have slightly different coloured hair over here, or they'll have a slightly different skin tone over here. But at 1975 shows I play to the same group of kids every single night. And the kids in Russia were so cool. The coolest. I mean, imagine being young and liberal and a bit like me in Russia? I can't imagine what it's like."
You mean, just not having that inherent freedom that we take for granted?
"I can go on stage and say whatever the fuck I want about anything in the UK. And you know, nothing's ever going to happen to me in the UK. In Russia – this is difficult to talk about – I'm not that worried about my physical safety because I'm over that now. I worried about it for like three years but someone kicks my head in or someone stabs me or something like that: whatever. What I was worried about was like, maybe because of [2018 track] 'Loving Someone' and all of the pro gay imagery in my in my show, I was worried about a right wing group turning up to the show afterwards. I wasn't worried about me, I was worried about the kids."
Do you have a bodyguard?
"Yeah, yeah, I had so much extra security – so much extra."
No, like personal security?
"Oh, yeah, I've got one, and I've got my shot pack, my little backpack I keep with me that has, like, well, I don't want to tell everybody what it has. But basically, I've got a pack with me that if I do get shot, we can kind of deal with it pretty quickly, until I get to the hospital – sealant, you know, like a powder kind of thing that you pour into the wound so it doesn't over-bleed. You don't have to be John Lennon [to get shot], you could be Christina Grimmie [shot by a fan in Florida in 2016], or you can be Dimebag Darrel [of Pantera and Damageplan, shot on stage in 2004]. There's mentalists out there. And my job is that I go and put myself in front of 10,000 people every single day, and when, if you add the numbers up, there's gotta be some crazy people."
You do wilfully do some quite provocative stuff. Like, for example, you went on James Corden's US Late Late Show recently and played a song that's openly critical of America. Did you think: am I gonna get away with this?
"Well, I don't know if I'll be invited back. But listen, we're at one point in history and I have, whatever it is, a power or influence or whatever, I'm not going to dampen it because [TV network] CBS are nervous or because we have a conservative government, you know? You've invited The 1975 to your show, right? You've not invited… You put a band in, I keep slagging off too many bands by accident…."
…Westlife?
"Yeah, you've not invited Westlife. If you don't know who we are, joke's on you."
A performance like that spreads around the world because it's noteworthy, so the message of that song propagates more. It aired just before the recent weekend of gun violence in the US.
"But it was recorded ages ago – it wasn't live. It just happened to be serendipitous. I think that when you're talking about American gun violence as part of your art, it's going to be relevant probably once every two or three weeks."
That's true. But you also put out a song about climate change that came out on a day when Britain was frying in 38 degrees heat. I mean, that was serendipitous as well, right?
"You can't control that!"
Think back, if you can, to July, and the peak of that insane heatwave that hit the UK. That's when The 1975 released the first taste of their new album 'Notes On A Conditional Form', a companion piece to 'A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships' that was originally intended for release this summer but is now confirmed for February 2020.
The track was the latest version of 'The 1975', the instrumental mood-piece that's opened each of the band's three albums to date. This time, it serves as an ambient accompaniment to a stirring speech by Greta Thunberg, the Swedish teenager who's waging war on climate change. "The original idea was to get Greta to do the opening track for the album," says Matty. "So when the singles have all come out, you put the album on and you're waiting for 'The 1975' to start and Greta comes in. But that would probably be in, like, January by now. And once we recorded it, we were like: this is not a statement for January, this is a statement for now. A lot of 'Notes…' has been based on now, what's happening right now, you know?"
What was the first meeting with Greta like?
"Well, it's the first time I've been truly starstruck."
What's amazing is she's just one young person, but the presence and momentum she's created is incredible.
"Yeah, because she doesn't give a fuck, she doesn't care about anything apart from what she's talking about. She wakes up and lives every day trying to save the planet. I've never met anybody like that."
So she wasn't thinking, like a lot of teenagers might, 'Ohmigod, I'm gonna be on a 1975 track!!'
"She didn't give a fuck! She was respectful. Basically, her and her dad understand that because of the world, to make a real difference to young people you need to be in pop culture. So I'm making 'Notes…', and I'm thinking about 'The 1975', the opening track, and the conversation we always have is: What's the most modern statement we can make? Where are we? Where are we as a band? What do we sound like? I looked at Jamie [Oborne, 1975 manager] and I said, Well, it's Greta isn't it."
It might be the last version of 'The 1975', if 'Notes…' closes The 1975's 'Music For Cars' era, as you've said it will.
"Yeah, it very well might be but I've got something so fun up my sleeve after 'Notes On A Conditional Form' and I don't know if it will start with 'The 1975'."
Was there any concern that people would think you were just cynically hijacking her zeitgeisty energy?
"Yeah, yes. But I'd rather not be 100 percent sorted and be accused of being a hypocrite than do fuck all. I'd much rather be called a champagne socialist than be an artist that isn't talking about the most pressing issue on the planet. Everyone's going, Well, what about your car? Well, funnily enough, I don't have any cars anymore. I've got an electric scooter and electric bike in London. And on a personal level, I am doing my thing. But also: fuck off. Like, go and fuck yourself."
I mean, it's difficult to be 100 percent bulletproof with climate change, realistically. Greta is now sailing across the Atlantic for two weeks on a yacht so she can spread the word in the States. As brilliant as that is, it would be impractical for touring…
"Yeah, and I was talking to her dad and he said, 'One of the reasons we are going on a boat is because I'm not having the right-wing conservative media of old men – who are already talking shit on a 16-year-old girl – having any ammunition when she gets there'."
She has to live by the sword?
"Yeah, exactly. And I think The 1975 getting on a commercial plane to go to a country to try and spread a positive message is not going to be the reason that the world sets on fire. What's hard with The 1975 is fetishization of woke culture – it's difficult for me to tell everybody what we've done without trying to sound like we're showing off, but we have carbon offsets, we have no plastic on tour, no plastic in the office, no plastic in any of our packaging and every guest list is paid for and [the money] goes to reforestation for charities. We are doing everything that's physically in our power to be culturally powerful in the most socially responsible way. And I'm doing it for me, and I don't have to fucking explain myself to every single person."
So there was a bit of a backlash to the Greta track. What kind of things were people saying?
"Oh, just incels with Karl Marx icon photos on Twitter calling us cunts, pretty much. There was no considered discourse that went on. It was grown men pretty much personally attacking a 16-year-old girl."
Isn't that what's especially powerful about Greta, that it's difficult to attack without looking like a total arsehole?
"Well, that's because you are if you do."
Recently, the polarisation of debate has been playing on Matty Healy's mind. He sees how the way that online discourse typically plays out – with all of the destructive power of two wrecking balls swinging at each other – is undermining the kind of message he wants to put out. When he called buffoonish UKIP toff Neil Hamilton a "cunt" on Twitter for taking a pop at Thunberg, he quickly deleted it, annoyed at himself for sinking to Hamilton's level. "It's like, if you're trying to make the world a better place through being nasty to people, it's not going to work," he says. "Debate is not about finding a middle ground any more – it's about point scoring. We – the young and the liberal – even though it's not our job and it's not our responsibility, we need to be the most patient, the most compassionate and we need to be the most understanding of the ignorance that does exist."
It's in this spirit that The 1975 released brand new track 'People' to the world yesterday evening, with its key lyric, spat with righteous venom over: "People like people/They want alive people/The young surprise people/Stop fucking with the kids."
Matty says it's a message he first tried to express on 'Give Yourself A Try', but one which is presented in the simplest terms here: we've forgotten the fundamental fact that we humans like other humans.
"Exactly – that's what it is," he says. "We are humans, indulging in the human experience, and that is a shared thing. And we act like we're all doing something different."
And we've all become these kind of angry alpha animals going after members of the pack?
"Exactly. We want to be these outward, angry, important figures. But what we really want to do is stay at home and wank and order Deliveroo."
When I first hear the track alongside a tantalising few snippets of 'Notes On A Conditional Form' at the Dirty Hit label's London HQ in July, I can't help but break out into a broad smile. The 1975 have, for some time, pushed their audiences as far as they can with each subsequent release. This time, they've gone further than ever before and delivered a savage shot of hardcore punk. They've long taken flack for some of their more indulgent moments, whether the holiday romance power-balladry of 'I Couldn't Be More In Love', the boyband frippery of 'She's American' or the smooth jazz-sax solos of, well, loads of it. But this seems to be them saying: we could do straight-up guitar music too, but we mostly choose not to. I went to that listening session expecting a surprise – and was still surprised nonetheless. "I grew up with people like Converge and Minor Threat and Gorilla Biscuits," Matty says of the hardcore sound. "And I think that 'Notes…' is an interesting record, because it has our most aggressive moments and our most tranquil moments and they're quite harshly lined up against each other."
Back at the office, Matty said 'People' was written with the aim of playing it at Reading – something that, at a festival with such strong rock lineage, would be as heavy as anything else heard through that PA. Today, Matty reveals the origins of the song actually date back to Alabama's Hangout festival in June when, before playing the song 'Loving Someone', he spoke about the abortion ban that was passed in the deep south state. "The reason I'm so angry is I don't believe it's about the preservation of life, it's about controlling women," he told the crowd. "It's not about that — you can hide behind that as much as you want and push your Christian narrative that sex is something to be ashamed of and therefore forcing women to have birth is some kind of — I don't know — some good punishment for their moral indiscretion. You are a disgrace! You are not men of god! You are simply misogynistic wankers."
After that, says Healy, things quickly became very serious – fresh from the stage, the band were informed they should consider leaving Alabama at the earliest opportunity. Rather than recount what happened off the top of his head, Matty asks if he can read a statement, as follows: "I wrote 'People' on my tour bus in Texas on the day the abortion bill was circulating in Alabama. After playing our show there in Alabama, we were advised to leave quickly due to Alabama being an Open Carry state [ie, one where citizens may carry guns in public]. So we did, and we soon stopped in a truck stop in Texas. I bought some Cheetos that were next to a collection of knives for incels and various bumper stickers encouraging women to give oral sex to truck drivers as some kind of trade for the privilege of being in the truck and in the presence of such a great man. I was pretty pissed off. I am pretty pissed off. God bless."
He pauses.
"I'm pissed off, man," he reaffirms. "You know, I have a lot of love and I experience a lot of love from my fans, and my family and my friends. But I'm pretty fucking angry."
So you were actually told to leave the state of Alabama?
"Yeah because when I started [speaking], there's that moment where some guys started booing and throwing shapes at the front. And I, for some reason, just go, 'Boo me? Fucking shoot me, I don't give a fuck'. And I saw the security guards' faces go a little bit weird, because you remember, it's an open carry state. And there's no metal detectors there."
So people may have had firearms at the actual festival?
"Yeah, definitely. So when people started to boo me and stuff like that, and I could see a couple of rednecks get a bit pissed off, the suggestion was: don't hang around. Not necessarily that you're going to get shot. Maybe someone will come and beat the shit out of you or something like that."
But they were your people, no? They were there to see you?
"Well, I was like, Listen, I know that I'm at a music festival, so I know that you all stand for freedom of expression. I know that I'm not doing this at Trump rally. But this is going on the internet. I'm saying this because internationally we're being watched right now. I wasn't scared of getting booed by the fans. I was scared of somebody caring as much as I do and doing something about it."
"All this shit was a lot easier when I was on drugs as well, because, chemically, I didn't give a fuck," he says. "I could walk through a fucking minefield with a head full of smack. So that a bit more of a challenge now."
The message of 'People' is powerful in its simplicity; the message of delivery is interesting, because it's unreconstructed, old-school punk. Is there greater power in saying something so simplistically?
"Yeah, I think that the most powerful things in the world are music and comedy. I think comedy is, maybe, two percent more important, because that's where that's where the truth is. The reason that you laugh at something is because it's true."
Given your onstage quips and goofing around in recent live performances, you could probably have a side career as a comedian if you wanted to…
"[Laughs] Well, that's just where the truth is. Because if you make someone laugh, you make someone realise. I always make jokes about religion, because that's where the truth is. I think that we're having an epidemic in comedy as well, where people are saying there are things you're not allowed to make jokes about. Those are the things you have to make jokes about."
You retweeted Ricky Gervais is the other day. This is his big bugbear: people telling him what he can and can't talk about. And he's like, I can – I'm a comedian.
"That's the point. Like, I saw this ridiculous debate on This Morning or something where a comedian, a bad one, was on with another comedian. She was like, Listen, if you were at a conference full of Catholic priests, I wouldn't get up and make jokes about Catholic priests and children. It's like, that's exactly where you make the jokes, if they're good enough. Bad jokes, yeah, let's get rid of bad jokes. But good jokes cut through this bullshit. They're a knife through the atmosphere."
Do you think that punk music is still the ultimate delivery mechanism for saying something simple and important?
"I think it is but punk makes me excited and sad at the same time, because if you look at punk and OG hardcore, '70s to the early '90s, and all of the movements that happened, these kids believed that they were going to change the world. Not just culture, which they did completely, they thought that they were going to change the world.
As you do?
"I would like to think so. But what happened is after they did all that, Donald Trump became the president. So did punk really work?"
Dunno. What would the world be like if we hadn't had it?
"Exactly, so, it's the only device that I have. Punk music, for me, it's always had a momentum to it. It's always had a thrust and a momentum to it. And it is always, well, if you're not going to listen to the lyrics, I'm going to make sure you listen to the music. And if you're not paying attention to the music, I'm going to jump on your fucking head."
Before releasing the track, Matty had been posting to Instagram pictures of his collection of vintage T-shirts, guitars and punk ephemera. It seemed almost like he was warming the fans up for the shock of 'People'.
"You see, I don't think about these things, but you're probably right. I feel more like I'm in a punk band than I ever have done," says Matty. "I've always had amongst my peers this revered collection of vintage collectibles that were kind of punk-orientated, and it really excites me to share my passion with people. So, OK, a 15-year-old who's never heard Converge until they heard it on my Instagram the other day, yeah, when they hear 'People' for the first time, surely they're going to understand that a bit more, you know?"
Then he takes something of a conversational left-turn.
"And I think the thing I'm most excited about right now is turning into a cartoon, you know?"
In Matty-speak, this means exaggerating oneself – becoming more than reality. It explains a lot about their 2019 festival shows, in which Matty moons about the stage during 'Love Me' like the reanimated corpse of Michael Hutchence. It's everything from the giant screens, neon colours and sloganeering to the ever-changing looks: sometimes he can be found in dungarees and primary colours looking like a kids TV presenter; others, in a tux like a particularly unlikely new James Bond.
"All of my favourite bands, by the time they became what they really are, they were like cartoons," says Matty.
So, for example, Iggy Pop is a cartoon character, right?
"Iggy Pop, Marilyn Manson. The Ramones."
They say if you can draw a character unbroken with a single pencil line, then it's a good cartoon.
"Yeah, anyone iconic should be recognisable in silhouette."
So the ultimate is Mickey Mouse, Bart Simpson… but we know their personalities too. What is the cartoon character Matty Healy like? Someone who says what he wants but caveats it all? Funny when required, serious when required. How do you see that character?
"I don't really. It's just me, but I think that would probably be a fair observation, what you just said."
So it's about allowing yourself to go to those places without being worried about it. Exaggerating yourself?
"Yeah, you don't get to stand there and… Stand by your fucking art. I'm sick of artists making music that sounds great but doesn't mean anything. And I'm not saying that every song needs to be fucking 'Love It If We Made It' or political, but songs need to be about something."
The 1975's videos are instrumental in etching out that identity, and the clip for 'People' seems to ratchet things up a notch, taking the intense visuals of the live show and cramming them into a 10-foot by 10-foot cube in which the band perform. "It's just this chaotic, terrifying madness," says Matty. "I just wanted it to be representative of where we are. It's about urgency."
"A silhouette in front of chaos," says Matty, is the aesthetic he's been chasing throughout his time in The 1975. And it's an idea that germinated after seeing Nine Inch Nails play at Leeds festival in 2007.
"That is what created our live show," he says. "I saw 'The Great Destroyer' live and that was it. Nine Inch Nails changed my life lots of times, but that show especially."
Reading and – in particular, being as they are from Wilmslow in the north of England, Leeds festival – have been instrumental in shaping Matty Healy and The 1975. This weekend – tonight, in fact, Friday August 23, 2019 – a lifelong dream will come true as the band take the headline slot, debut 'People' and also – for the first time – their madly innovative, environmentally-friendly merch repurposing scheme, which allows fans to bring their own old T-shirt and have it screenprinted with 'NOACF' overlay, meaning every piece is unique.
What, exactly, does the occasion mean to him?
"I mean, you know, I never thought that the 1975 would headline Academy One in Manchester."
Er… yeah you did.
"OK, but when I was 13, if you were headlining the Academy One, you were massive to me. It's like, how do I explain Reading? I've been there 12 times camping, Leeds and Reading. I went every year from 13 until I was 20 and some since. It was just about being there and being part of the culture. I would walk around Wilmslow and I would be the only one of me. I would get to Leeds and it would be a hundred-thousand of me."
And you were thinking, where do you all live the rest of the year?
"Exactly. It's so liberating. You realise that you're part of this enormous community. One of the most looked-after places I've ever been was in a Slayer pit at Leeds. People were throwing each other around but the second that there was any real danger, everybody got involved and helped that person out, and that's about community."
Do you think people still find their community at festivals?
"I'd like to think that due to the lack of ability to charge your phone, it still happens more than you would expect."
But people know like-minded people are out there now because they see them on the internet.
"That's true. It's probably slightly less eye opening because alternative culture is just culture now. This internet culture crossover music thing has happened but I'm all for it."
Are you the type who would go with a schedule of bands you wanted to catch?
"Oh, yeah, yeah. But I'd also just be fucked."
Did you manage to avoid the traditional toilet burnings and campsite uprisings in Leeds?
"No, no, no, I was right in the middle of the riots! And I had a big moment. Like, there was that game that kind of started that year in 2004, 2005, the security they got were some brutal, Irish nationalist team there to fuck shit up. So what started happening was the festival, kids would kind of back the security into a corner, and then the security would run at them and then you'd have to run away. We were 16 so we were treating it as a game. But yeah, the thing that happened to me, which is why I've still got a huge scar on the bottom of my lip, is I was stood there and the security, dressed as Robocop, they'd made a circle around the perimeter of something, I was walking over to check it out and somebody launched a tent pole, and the tent pole hit the security guard right on his shoulder and fell down directly in front of my feet. So I looked at him and bent down to go and pick it up and give it him. And as I stood up, he punched me as hard as he could in the face and knocked me cold out. The only time I've ever been knocked out in my life, and I woke up back in my little campsite because my mate Kit was with me and he dragged me back. And yeah, I remember those years, it was getting pretty fucking gnarly, you know?"
But that didn't put you off going back?
"Oh, no, fuck that, it was amazing!"
And now they're going back to claim their crowns: Reading headliners at last. Matty Healy, preparing for his big moment, taking to the stage at the festival that – quite literally – is etched on his body for life. As a teenager, Matty enjoyed the thrill of the ruck, the sheer fun of it. Today, Matty picks fights for the things he believes in. And all he needs to do is get through this Dubai show. Easy.
Except, the next morning, I wake up to the news that Matty brought a male fan on stage in Dubai and kissed him, in direct and glorious contravention of the anti-homosexuality laws and punishable by up to 10 years in prison. In the aftermath, Healy sends some concerning tweets and his dad – the actor Tim Healy – steps in to tell the fans that he's safe and that the family are proud of him. I consider whether I was joking when I'd told him not to get arrested then realised, no, it didn't surprise me that he'd done it. It didn't surprise me that he risked the biggest moment in his band's career to date for it. And it didn't surprise me that he got out in one piece. Cartoon characters can get hit by a falling piano and pick themselves up again. And Healy is gonna be one hell of a cartoon tonight.
Photography by Mara Palena
Creative Direction and Styling by Patricia Villirillo
Hair Stylist Yusuke Morioka at Coffin Inc using Bumble and Bumble
Make up artist Marie Bruce using Kiehl's
Styling Assistants Sofia Lai, Letizia Allodi and Mana Okabe
Photography Assistants Luca Trevisani, Francesco Zinno
Hair Stylist Assistant Yuuri Kato


My heart was frozen behind the mattress...The shrieks…the cries, the anguish, and pain was beyond conception. I gaze into the barrenness...The memories of the last night ...have been a nightmare …How happy was I dressed in my bridal wear. The giggles, the gratification in my heart: I was in the arms of my lover forever, And blessed I was …to find such a love! A journey far away from my world …didn't bother my soul. I had found my love…yes true love! Then the world started shattering when the people in my new world realized I was a not part of their clan...They called me a "non believer "….Brought up in a egalitarian planet …my conscious had no space for religion! I knew I was a human...and that's what had moved me though life and that's how I believed my life to move on!...But not they …they didn't want my essence to sustain..They didn't want my dreams to grow!
It was the night of my marriage the contentness of creating a happy cosmos was all I wanted. The bullets' sound screech through the music! I was numb...Standing before me was a fanatic now I knew the word had spread: they knew I was not their own, he dragged me to the open streets. He wanted to see my flesh bleed; my pleading cries were fell on deaf ears. He kicked me hard, and the pain was unbearable...But he went on kicking me, people around tried their best to drive them away.But the one who tried was fired and sent away. To end their fun...He fired me twice. And he left me lying in a pool of blood .I was loosing myself to lord.When a lady took me in her arms and carried me into the house …I was sinking …I knew it .But she wanted to show me the light .She stabs the knife into my chest to take out the bullets and I pass into a state of unconscious. When again I open my eyes: I see myself behind a pool of mattresses. They had come again to check on my dying body...But not finding me there had provoked their anger immensely .They had raided every house to find me…and the marks of blood on the floor had given the news that I was inside .They shot every person they saw…what was such a fanaticism? Just, to see me dying they killed people whom they called their own. The shrieks subside I know everyone has deceased.They move on to locate me again. It was hours I think when I generate the potency to stand …I knew I had lost everything when a baby's muffled cry rocks my thoughts I see a movement of life from within the dead. And I manage and take that child in my arms it seems to give me the only ray of desire…!
If this is our world of today...Then what will our tomorrow be lord?
Yup sure luv ,,,,I did miss reading your posts !


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FH-1 Toolbox v1.2.18.89 codename#Enigma !
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We created the bf1942 (Pixel-Fighter ToolBox) protocoll so you easily can join EACH BF1942+Mods sever by typing bf1942://ip:gameport in cmd window or search box or simply click on a website link!
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September 30, 2015 in Pet news.
September 30, 2015 in Adopted kittens.
Penny just came tonight with her sisters, an adopter came to visit and Penny was the lucky one. She will be going to her new forever home on Tuesday.
September 27, 2015 in Adopted kittens.
September 20, 2015 in Adopted kittens.


text:
← BORGEN SIGNED TO ENTRY-LEVEL CONTRACT
SABRES, MITTELSTADT AGREE TO ENTRY-LEVEL DEAL →
Game Preview: 3/26/18 at Toronto
Posted on March 25, 2018 by Ian Ott | Leave a comment
Buffalo 1 at NY Rangers 5
Goals: Reinhart
Goalie: Lehner (8 saves/12 shots) / Ullmark (10 saves/11 shots)
PP: 1/3; PK: 1/3; Shots: Buffalo 44 – NY Rangers 23
Zach Bogosian (lower body, Jan. 11; injured reserve) – 32 games
Jake McCabe (shoulder, Feb. 8; injured reserve) – 22 games
Kyle Criscuolo (upper body, March 7) – 9 games
Jacob Josefson (lower body. March 17) – 5 games
Chad Johnson (undisclosed, March 23) – 2 games
Nathan Beaulieu (upper body, March 23) – 2 games
3/22: Assigned F Seth Griffith to Rochester (AHL)
3/25: Signed D Will Borgen to a three-year, entry level contract
Thursday, March 29: Detroit at Buffalo, 7 p.m.
Saturday, March 31: Buffalo at Nashville, 8 p.m.
Monday, April 2: Buffalo at Toronto, 7 p.m.
Wednesday, April 4: Ottawa at Buffalo, 7:30 p.m.
Friday, April 6: Buffalo at Tampa Bay, 7:30 p.m.
SABRES at MAPLE LEAFS
This is the third of four meetings between the Sabres and Maple Leafs this season.
Last meeting: Toronto defeated Buffalo 5-2 in Buffalo on March 15
Next meeting: Monday, April 2 in Toronto
The Sabres are 5-5-0 in their last 10 games vs. the Maple Leafs; 2-5-3 on the road.
This is the 209th game all-time between Buffalo and Toronto; Buffalo has a 114-68-26 series record.
The Sabres are 44-40-18 on the road against the Maple Leafs all-time.
The Sabres are 10-10-2 all-time on March 26.
March 26, 1971: Phil Goyette and Gerry Meehan score goals 18 seconds apart in the third period as the Sabres defeat the Vancouver Canucks 3-1 at the Aud.
The home team has won 25 of the last 32 games between the Sabres and the Maple Leafs. Buffalo is seeking wins in consecutive visits to Toronto for the first time since the team won eight in a row from Feb. 21, 2008 to Dec. 21, 2009.
The Sabres enter tonight's game with a 7-3-1 record in their last 11 games against Atlantic Division opponents and a 10-9-3 record against the division this season.
Since joining the Sabres, Robin Lehner has appeared in 50 games against Atlantic Division opponents, logging a .926 save percentage and a 2.46 goals-against average in those games.
Sam Reinhart has totaled 30 points (13+17) in his last 31 games.
SABRES-LEAFS
Johan Larsson has recorded nine points (4+5) in nine career games against the Maple Leafs.
Sam Reinhart has posted 10 points (3+7) in his last 10 games against Toronto, including at least a point in each of the last five (3+4).
Since the beginning of the 2011-12 season, Benoit Pouliot has totaled 17 points (6+11) in 17 games against Toronto, including four multi-point games.
Jason Pominville has faced off with the Maple Leafs 52 times as a member of the Sabres, totaling 51 points (20+31) in those matchups.
Ryan O'Reilly has five points (3+2) in his last four games against the Maple Leafs.
Chad Johnson has a 6-1-1 career record against Toronto with a .931 save percentage and a 2.11 goals-against average.
The Sabres enter tonight's game with a 7-3-1 record in their last 11 road games.
Sam Reinhart has totaled 13 points (6+7) in his last 12 road games.
Rasmus Ristolainen has recorded 13 points (4+9) in his last 16 road games.
Ryan O'Reilly has an assist in each of his last four road games.
Linus Ullmark has appeared in 10 career road games, posting a 5-2-2 record in those games with a .922 save percentage and a 2.57 goals-against average.
Chad Johnson has stopped 78 of 82 shots faced in his last three road games (.951), earning wins in all three of those contests.
DRAWING ATTENTION*
Ryan O'Reilly, who leads the NHL in faceoffs won (1,175) and faceoff percentage (60.8%) this season, is climbing the single-season record books as well. His 1,175 wins already rank as the most wins by a Sabre in a season.
O'Reilly's 1,175 faceoff wins through 74 games played already tie for seventh in NHL history and put him on pace to log the most by any NHL player in a season:
Ryan O'Reilly *pace* (BUF), 2017-18 – 1,286
Rod Brind'Amour (CAR), 2005-06 – 1,268
Adam Oates (WSH), 1999-00 – 1,235
Joe Sakic (COL), 2000-01 – 1,214
At his current pace, O'Reilly would become just the third player ever to win at least 1,000 faceoffs in a season while maintaining a faceoff percentage of at least 59 percent, joining Rod Brind'Amour (five times) and Patrice Bergeron (two times).
*The NHL began keeping faceoff stats in the 1997-98 season.
I LIKE EICH
Despite missing 15 games with a high-ankle sprain, Jack Eichel is currently on pace to top his personal bests in goals (24), assists (33) and points (57) on the strength of improved production at even strength.
Eichel's 16 multi-point games this season through 60 games played have already tied his career best set in 2016-17.
With his 17th even-strength goal in his 44th game of the season on Jan. 11 vs. Columbus, Eichel surpassed his career-best total from 2015-16 (81 games). Through 60 games, Eichel now has 19 even-strength goals.
With his 36th even-strength point in his 53rd game of the season on Feb. 7 vs. Anaheim, Eichel surpassed his career-best total from 2015-16 (81 games). Through 60 games, he now has 38 even-strength points.
Jack Eichel's Production by Season
GP G A PTS ES G ES A ES P
2015-16 81 24 32 56 16 19 35
2017-18 (Pace) 67 25 36 60 21 21 42
SETTING THEM UP AND KNOCKING THEM DOWN
Of Jack Eichel's 54 points so far this season, 24 have been goals or primary assists recorded during 5-on-5 play (excludes 6-on-5 situations).
Through 60 games played, Eichel's 24 primary points (13+11) during 5-on-5 play have already surpassed his 61-game total from last season (11+10) and tied his career-best total from his 81-game rookie season (12+12).
*All primary point stats via NaturalStatTrick.com
SABRES AMONG LEAGUE-LEADERS (Sabres' league rankings before 3/25 games)
Eichel: 3.67 S/GP (7th)
O'Reilly: 1,175 FOW (1st), 60.8% FO% (1st), 1,932 FO (1st), 4 SHP (T-5th)
Ristolainen: 26:30 TOI/GP (4th)
Hits: Ristolainen (191), Girgensons (131), Nolan (119)
Blocked Shots: Scandella (103), Ristolainen (103), McCabe (79)
Shots: Eichel (220), O'Reilly (204), Reinhart (172)
1-10: 3-5-2 (8), 26/36, 5/36, 29/35
41-50: 4-6-0 (8), 27/31, 10/33, 15/26
71-80: 1-4-0 (2), 7/19, 2/15, 6/10
OVERTIME RESULTS (5-10; 113-121 all-time)
Oct. 17 at VGK: L, 5-4 (GWG-Perron, 3:52)
Oct. 21 at BOS: W, 5-4 (GWG-O'Reilly, 2:59)
Nov. 11 at MTL: L, 2-1 (GWG-Pacioretty, 3:08)
Nov. 14 at PIT: L, 5-4 (GWG-Sheary, 0:16)
Dec. 8 at CHI: L, 3-2 (GWG-Forsling, 4:55)
Dec. 10 at STL: L, 3-2 (GWG-Tarasenko, 4:24)
Dec. 15 vs. CAR: L, 5-4 (GWG-Slavin,2:15)
Dec. 27 at NYI: L, 3-2 (GWG-Barzal, 1:08)
Dec. 29 at NJD: W, 4-3 (GWG-Ristolainen, 2:37)
Jan. 1 vs. NYR: L, 3-2 (GWG-Miller, 2:43)
Jan. 22 at CGY: W, 2-1 (GWG-Eichel, 1:30)
Feb. 6 vs. ANA: L, 4-3 (GWG-Henrique, 1:36)
Feb. 15 at OTT: L, 3-2 (GWG-Hoffman,1:13)
Feb. 22 at DET: W, 3-2 (GWG-Scandella, 4:59)
Feb. 28 at TBL: W, 2-1 (GWG-Pominville, 1:26)
Oct. 5 vs. MTL: L, 3-2 (GDG-Drouin)
March 8 at OTT: W, 4-3 (GDG-Josefson)
March 10 vs. VGK: L, 2-1 (GDG-Haula)
Jack Eichel … 3 assists … 100 career assists
Zemgus Girgensons … 2 points … 100 career points
Jason Pominville … 10 points … 700 career points
Jack Eichel … 200th NHL games … March 21 vs. ARI
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Despite using Portuguese every day, the fact is, it's just that, everyday Portuguese. There's nothing inherently special about the words I usually use since I use it with my girlfriend at home and on the street when I buy something. It's not like I discuss the essence of Taoism or theoretical physics, so that means I fall into the trap of limiting my vocabulary.
One good way to avoid this is obviously to read, and lately that's just what I've started to do again, after a long hiatus.
So, what does one do when coming across those (hopefully rare) uncommon words?
Is it better to try to get the gist of them by relying on context? Is it best to underline or highlight the words for later look-up? The seemingly best answer for me is to jot them down in a notebook, next to their respective meanings, for later perusal. Then again, how many times will you pick back up that notebook? How many times will you remember to write down new words?
A while ago I found a digital solution, one that is inevitably housed in a small device that sits most of the time in my pocket. It's a free Portuguese-English dictionary app from iThinkdiff that I use on my phone.
What makes it special (I hope, although I'm not an expert in dictionary apps and what they offer) is the Bookmark List. Find a Portuguese word in the chapter you just started? Look it up and hit the plus sign to add it to the bookmarked words list. At any moment, feel free to look over that list and recall all the new words you've come across recently. With just a click, its meaning is revealed.
Being that I used to be that person who wrote new words down in a notebook, I'd rarely if ever look at them again, so the app I found has led me to increase my vocabulary even more. One caveat, though. From 10, or so, words I've recently added to the list, not all of them were commonly known to some Brazilians I informally surveyed. When learning new words in another language, it's not always easy to know when you've reached that line between more complex common words and those words which are often too complex and therefore not known or used.
Don't worry too much, though, because this is more of an issue if you've already reached fluency. To everyone else, I hope my little discovery can give you a leg up!